#tearing my hair out as i read about the coffin scene and how it was for nothing. at least now they are back to being the same age again.
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i TRUSTED my friend who rec’d me tgcf (the actual novel) and now idk if i should have. help maybe its just the translation. but aside from the prose there have been some scenes where i just want to jump out of my skin and find mxtx and just like. kill her
#what do you MEAN you put sex pollen in there!!!!!!!!! WHAT POSSIBLE REASON WAS THERE. WHY. WHY DID YOU DO THAT AND HAVE THE LOVE INTEREST BE#LIKE SIXTEEN. IM GOIN G TO KILL YOU.#oh my god. literally any sane fan of her work wants to kill her. i am so mad#shes good at making these like beautifully tragic vignettes to illustrate the fundamental struggles of the worlds she makes. but good god#is it worth it?????? is it?????????????????????#tearing my hair out as i read about the coffin scene and how it was for nothing. at least now they are back to being the same age again.#iykyk and u are so welcome to scream in my dms or ask box about this. i am so mad. i am so mad#tip: i am so fucking mad#AND WHY DOES SHE HAVE TO WRITE MISOGYNY INTO THIS AS WELL???????#AND TRANSMISOGYNY??????????????????#bye. bye. farewell. im going to finish this fcuking book#and then pretend the donghua is the only canon piece of material and only come back to the novel for like. fanon purposes.#FUCK.#fan#tgcf#m
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I was rereading your aftercare series and I thought about if reader and her bf had like really bad sex, maybe like in his car or something, and she doesn't even cum, and then he drops her off at home where Steve and Eddie help her get off and then take the best care of her 💙
Ok so I have a couple of requests in waiting I may use this version of them for. I think it will help focus my brain and since a lot of your requests are like this I think I can fit it into this AU and get them out faster :)
I hope you like!
Why Can't I Be in a Meg Ryan Movie? (Or Even a Good Porno)
Warnings: Actor Steve Harrington/ Rockstar & Actor Eddie Munson and Actress Fem Reader, SMUT, in the shower :), some heavy petting on set, dirty talk, reader and her boyfriend have sex and she does not have a good time (quick and brief), FLUFF, these three are filming a movie together and since they are supposed to be friends they BECAME friends behind the scenes, ANGST, reader is unhappily in a relationship, he's a dick sabotaging scenes and talking down to her, they are filming an 80s Slasher movie together so their are times those scenes are conveyed (mentions of death, blood, needing to feel safe, etc.) Those scenes are brief.
Word Count: 4897
The metalhead swings open his front door, gun drawn as you squeak and hide behind your gorgeous, captain of the football team best friend.
“Whoa! It’s us, James, it’s us.”
“Jesus, Carter. What the fuck happened?!”, the long-hair boy asks as he gestures you two inside and locks the door.
“Cindy’s fucking dead.”, the jock answered with a gruff tone as he guided you towards the sink and began washing the blood from your hands as you sobbed.
“Shit. Nina, I’m so sorry.”
“I-I-It’s ok.”
The man’s palms grip your cheeks as he wipes your tears with his thumbs.
“It’s not. We can make it through this. I know we can. We just need to figure out who this fucker is so we can kill him ourselves.”
“Agreed but we aren’t doing that tonight. James, is it alright if we stay here with you?”
“Dude, yeah, of course. Sweetheart, you can take the bed and we can—”
“No!”, you cry out. “Please…I don’t want to be alone.”
“Of course, there’s only one fucking bed.”
Everyone in the room groans as you frustratingly lay your forehead against the tattooed arm you had reached out to grab.
“Cut! Ryan, we’ve talked about this. You can’t interrupt a scene.”
“Aren’t you shooting in the studio next door?”, Steve growled in annoyance as he threw the prosthetic bat he was holding on to the counter.
“Maybe they got tired of him to.”, Eddie whispered loud enough that your boyfriend could hear.
When you received the script from your agent to be in a typical 80’s slasher, you immediately turned him down for fear of being type cast like some of the other actresses you read about who starred in the genre but when he mentioned you’d be working with not only the massive heartthrob and brilliant actor Steve Harrington but also the rockstar of one of your favorite bands Corroded Coffin, you changed your tune.
When you told your boyfriend however he was less than amused. Honestly, you thought it was more his anger that you were getting a high paying job than who you were working with. Ryan’s own career was starting to stall as the ratings for his current show were in decline. You noticed he had begun taking that out on you in subtle ways like demeaning you at a party or, like right now, sabotaging a scene.
“Fuck you, Munson. I’m a respected actor! You’ve been in what one other movie?”
“Well shit. He got me, Harrington. What the fuck would I know about being an actor? Please Ryan can you teach me how to get on your level? Teach me how to be an asshole just like you!”
“OK! Jesus.”, the director whined. “Can we reset and do this with no interruptions please?!”
Both men turn and you follow Steve to the other side of the door.
“I’m so sorry, you guys. He’s not always like this.”
“Hm. You need to be careful with that one, honey. I know he’s your boyfriend and all but I don’t want him to ruin all the hard work you’ve done here.”
“Steve, this is a slasher film about a killer who wears a suit and clown mask killing high school seniors. It’s not Citizen Kane.”, you giggle making them smile.
“Yeah but picture people dressing up like you like they do with Jamie Lee Curtis or that hot chick whose show was big when we were school. What was it, Steve?”
“I have no idea.”, he chuckles.
“With the hair and the black dress that…” Eddie mimed pushing his chest together as if he had boobs making you laugh harder.
“Elvira?”
“YEAH! Good job, princess. Thank you. Imagine people dressing like you in that sexy ass tank top and jeans that hug them hips.”
You grinned as you lightly punched his arm. Since Steve was playing your best friend, after you were cast you reached out to him and invited him to lunch hoping to get to know him better. When he told you Eddie was hisbest friend, you insisted he bring him along and over the last few months had gotten to know both men fairly well. You loved their attitudes and the way they made you laugh. You felt safe with them which in a media dominated by men you appreciated.
***
“How was your date last night?”, you ask Steve while the three of were laying in the bed on set.
You were a bit nervous because this was supposed to be your big kiss scene with him so you were trying to lighten the mood as much as possible.
“Pfft terrible. She whined the entire time about my restaurant choice and was rude to the staff.”, he sighed as Eddie giggled behind you.
“I tooooold you.”
“Yeah, yeah. Shut up, Munson.”
“See we never had that problem when we shared girls.”
“Whoa! Excuse me. You’re going to have to elaborate on that.”, you laughed with wide eyes.
“Ok, first off, it did happen a few times which is why we aren’t currently in a relationship. Secondly… Eddie and I…may have shared a partner a time or two.”
“Wow. Do you two, um,…”
“No, we don’t ‘um’ but yeah we like the way a woman unfolds when we take care of her.”, the metalhead smiles making you blush a bit. “Have you ever tried it?”
“Oh, uh, no. I’m not really…adventurous like that I guess.”
“Captain asshole doesn’t blow your mind?”
Your smile widens as you punch his chest.
“Not…no. I don’t know. Ryan tries but lately he seems so distracted.”
“Hm. That’s a shame. Beautiful girl like you should have all the attention on her.” Steve throws a soft grin your way, deepening the pink around your cheeks.
You’re suddenly very aware you are in a long heavy metal shirt with underwear and no pants while both men are in sweatpants with Steve shirtless.
“Ok, gang, get comfy. We’re going to do some lighting tests real quick to make sure we’re still good and then we’ll start rolling.”
Nodding, you three get in your places that were discussed in rehearsal. As Eddie wraps his arm around your waist and you do the same across Steve’s tummy, you feel very thankful your boyfriend wasn’t there today. After lifting his arm, you rest your head on his chest as he casually starts playing with your hair.
“I’m not fucking anything up am I?”, he asks in a deep, husky voice you weren’t prepared for.
“Oh, uh, no I think…I think you’re fine.”
“You can put your hand on my chest if you want.”
Blinking up at him, you do what he suggests and a sigh leaves his lips at the feeling.
“Ok, we are good to go. Everyone is sleeping except you Carter. Nina wakes up, you say your lines, kiss, and then you hear a noise that startles you.”
Your eyes shut as you nuzzle into him as he continues to move his fingers through your hair.
“Alright, I need quiet on set and action!”
Your head stirs at the feeling of fingers caressing you as your eyes flutter open.
“Carter?”
“Yeah, hey, I’m right here.”
“Have you gotten any sleep?”
“No but I’m ok. James is past the fuck out though.” You both laugh as you glance behind you towards the sleeping metalhead. “He rolled over a while ago and wrapped his arms around you. I guess he thinks you’re a teddy bear or something. You ARE very comfy.”, he grins as he looks down at you. “I’m a little jealous.”
“James IS very pretty.”
His smile grows as he kisses your forehead.
“Naw, honey. I mean he is very beautiful but…not as beautiful as you.”
Your eyes scan his as you both slowly tilt forward. When his lips land on yours, your body lights up as your palm lightly grips his cheek. His kisses come a bit more passionately as his own hand grips the back of your neck. As his tongue slides into your mouth, you groan as your mind is suddenly clouded with fuzzy feelings of your best friend.
Is it just you or can you feel your other friend pressing himself against you. Isn’t he asleep? Maybe I could turn and—
“CUT! Guys! Listen!”, the director yells. “I said cut like five times! Y/N, Steve, remember in rehearsal we said it was a soft, delicate kiss.”
“Sorry.”, the actor whispers before turning towards you. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s ok.” You glance towards Eddie whose eyes are squeezed shut still but he’s murmuring things to himself.
“Cold showers, cold showers, Wayne naked, fucking Jeff puking after too many booze…”
“Are you alright?”, you ask.
“Yeah, yeah. I’m, um, I’m ok. I’m sorry if you, um, we can…I’m sure the intimacy lady can put like a pillow or something…”, he suggests as his gaze shifts between his legs under the blanket. “Y/N, I don’t think you’re supposed to moan when you kiss him.”
“Huh?”
“You moaned when you were kissing me.”, Steve answered breathily as he continued staring into the void with wide eyes.
“That’s why I’m…I have a… you have really sexy moans, sweetheart.”
“And you taste really fucking good.”
Your eyes lock with Steve’s at his comment as a heavy exhale escaped your lungs.
“Alright, gang, reset!”
Laying back in your original positions, you realize Eddie’s is a bit farther from you than he was before. Biting your bottom lip, you turn your head as much as you can towards him.
“Ed, you can…you can scoot closer.”
“Y/N, I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”
“I’m not.” To emphasis your point, you push your lower half into his and a subtle groan leaves his throat. Holding your hips, he grinds against you making your eye lids droop as your rub your thighs together and lift your leg over the other man’s waist, just grazing the growing bulge in the sweats they had them in.
“Ok! We’re ready to go. Take two and we’re rolling…action!”
You ARE very comfy.”, he grins as he looks down at you. “I’m a little jealous.”
“James IS very pretty.”
His smile grows as he kisses your forehead.
“Naw, honey. I mean he is very beautiful but not as beautiful as you.”
The boy’s lips feverishly crash to yours as he twists his torso to give himself better access to your
mouth.
“Carter.”, you moan.
“Y/N.”, he answers in your ear that’s furthest from the mic.
Your eyes shoot open as you realize what’s happening and no one is in character anymore. Pushing at his chest, he sees the slight regret in your eyes as he tries to regain his composure.
“I think I heard something.”, you point absently off camera. Throwing off the blanket, he grabs his weapon before you quickly grab his arm. “Be careful…please. I-I-I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
His eyes soften as he leans in and give you a small peck on the lips.
“Don’t worry, honey. I’ll be ok. I promise.”
############
“Geez.”, Ryan laughed as you tore at his pants in the back seat of his car. “What’s got you all hot and bothered?”
“I just…missed you.”
Your boyfriend’s grin grows as he takes hold of your lower back and flips you around till he’s on top of you yanking down your pants. As he kisses your neck and rubs his cock along the cotton blocking your core, your mind begins to wonder.
Steve’s lips tasted amazing. I wonder what Eddie tastes like. Feeling them groan in my ear…fucking hell…
As Ryan’s length entered your sex, you suddenly felt underwhelmed.
They both felt so big even through their pants. I wonder what they would feel like inside of me…together…moaning like they had…
“Fuck, babe.” His body shook as he thrust his seed inside of you a bit too aggressively as you laid there unsatisfied. “God that was… did you…?”
Nodding your head, he beamed down at you as he kissed your forehead before reaching for a napkin on the floor of his car. When he handed it to you, you held it without moving as a disgusted look painted your face.
“I have to get back to work. You should go home and take a shower. You smell like sweat and that asshole rocker’s cigarettes.”
With that, he exited his vehicle and walked back inside.
Shaking your head, you ambled over to your own car and reached into your glove compartment for some of the tissues you stored there. You sat in the driver’s seat for a while staring off into space feeling slightly dirty and used.
You may have initiated the contact but lately Ryan hadn’t been satisfying you and the way he was after didn’t make you feel any better.
Abruptly, you slammed your door and started the engine, driving off into what you thought was no particular direction.
#############
“Hi, um, I’m sorry. I must be at the wrong—”
“Are you looking for Steven?”, the girl interrupted sassily. “Yeah you’re in the right place but don’t expect anything from either of these assholes.”
“Carol, why are you answering my door? I told you, please, get out.”
Steve’s eyes met yours as fear flashed through them.
“All yours, babe.”
As she stomped past you, the boy took her place in the doorway of the apartment.
“I’m sorry. I should just go.”
“No! Wait, no!”, he yelled panicked as he reached for your arm. “Please, come in. She was just…that’s the girl I had my date with who was rude, remember? She came over because…I didn’t call her? I don’t know.”, he shrugs.
Stepping into their shared space, you were surprised by how modest it was. With how much money they made together, you would have expected them in a penthouse or a mansion.
“Is the pterodactyl gone?”, Eddie asks as he exits his room pausing when he sees you. “Shit. Hey, Y/N. Are you alright? You look frazzled.”
“Why pterodactyl?”, you ask with a small smirk as you feel both their eyes intensely scanning you over.
“She, uh, came in here like a bat out of hell screeching. Raaaaaaaw!”, he mimics as he spreads his arms like wings, smiling when you laugh. “See? I’m an actor.”
“What’s going on, honey? I thought you were spending some time with Ryan.”, Steve inquires as he leans over the back of their couch.
“I was! I did… we, um, spent some time together… in his backseat…”
“And then he just sent you home?”
“Yeah, well, not right away. First he came in like 3 seconds and I learned that my boyfriend who I’ve been sleeping with for 4 months has no idea what a woman orgasming feels like because he asked me if I did and when I told him yes he got super excited. Then he proceeded to hand me a dirty napkin from his floor to clean myself with and then promptly told me I should go home and shower because I smell gross like sweat and your cigarettes Eddie.”
“Honestly, I’m surprised he even fucking noticed because I was barely even present during the whole experience because I was too busy imagining you two and what you would feel like inside me! Now I feel like a whore, used, and disgusting and I didn’t know where else to go so I just started driving and somehow ended up here and—”
Steve pulling you into his arms and pressing your face into his chest cut you off as you cried.
“Hey, Munson, is your shower actually clean?”
“I’m always on tour, Harrington, so what do you think?”
“No then?” Both boys smile when you giggle against him. “That’s ok. We can use mine. Come on, pretty girl.”
Eddie trails after you both as Steve guides you into his room and towards the bathroom. Opening the door to his standing shower, you marvel at how big it actually is.
“Wow. This is very nice.”
“Thank you.”, he smiles as he sticks his palm under the water to make sure it its warm. As the steam starts to rise, he gestures inside. “All for you, honey.”
“Just me?”, you whisper as your gaze shifts between them.
“What would make you comfortable, Y/N?”, Eddie asks as he steps closer to your side.
Swallowing nervously, you close your eyes as you lift off your shirt and toss it to the side before unbuttoning your jeans to do the same.
A tap on your shoulder causes you to open them again meeting the metalhead’s chocolate irises as he tries not to glance down your body.
“You have to say it, sweetheart. If you don’t want this or anything at all that’s absolutely fine. If you want us to even just sit out here while you’re in there or just to stand in there with you…”
“Or if you want us to do some of those things you were imagining us doing when you were with Ryan…you have to say it.”, Steve adds.
Nodding silently, you remove your bra and slide down your panties, their gazes never leaving your face.
“I want you two to shower with me and take care of me.”
Softly smiling, the remove their clothes and you provide them the same courtesy they did you, keeping your eyes forward. After guiding you in first, they follow behind and you let out a deep sigh as the water hits your hair.
“You’re so beautiful, Y/N. I know I’ve always jokingly flirted with you but I do think you are gorgeous.”, Eddie admits making you smile as you wrap your arms around his neck.
“Can I kiss you?”
As soon as you get permission your lips connect to his, reveling in the taste of cigarettes that Ryan seemed to have so much disdain for mixed with mint and a hint of alcohol. While his fingers tangled in your hair to pull you closer, Steve’s hands behind you roamed everywhere, down your arms, along your stomach, and up to your breasts.
The metalhead tenderly kissed your jawline, trailing the valley of your chest. Almost as if offering him a taste, the boy behind you cupped the bottom of you breast as Eddie wrapped his lips around the bud eliciting a soft moan from you.
“Eddie.”
“Does that feel good, honey?”, Steve murmured in your ear as you leaned your head against his shoulder.
“Yes. S-So good.”
Descending to his knees, Eddie turned you to face the other man, opening your legs a bit wider and you mewled when his long tongue flicked your entrance.
“How do you feel now, Y/N?”
“Fuck.” Your response makes Steve chuckle as he grabs your cheeks and brings your lips to his. “Can I…touch you…please…”, you ask between each kiss.
“Baby, you can touch us as much as you want as long as you’re comfortable.”
As soon as your small hand takes hold of his cock he groans as his forehead falls on yours, panting against your mouth as you stroke him.
“Shit. We’ve been thinking about you all afternoon. How you would feel and what you would sound like.”
Your head leans against his chest as Eddie’s tongue moves faster inside of you. Abruptly your knees buckle but the metalhead is faster than his friend as he catches you and leans your back against his chest. Looping his arm around your front, he thrusts his two of his fingers into your cunt while you cling to his wrist.
“That good, baby girl? Good, you deserve it. You’re not a whore, sweetheart, and you’re definitely not disgusting. Cum for me, Y/N.” Turning your head, you passionately kiss him as you come undone. “Fuck, your pussy is so tight when you cum. Are you kidding me?”
“M-More. I want more. Please.”
Steve lifts you up just enough to place your back on the tile as he climbs on top of you and you promptly circle your legs around his waist.
“This ok? The tile isn’t cold, right?” Shaking your head, you lean up to kiss him, grinding your lower half against his desperately. “Are you… on—fuck—can I cum inside you?”
“Please.”
He licks his lips at the word as his cock twitches against you. Reaching between your bodies, he grips his base and as you tilt up to look you moan at how big he seems even in his own large hand.
“Go slow at first. I’ve…I’ve never had someone as big as you two.”
“Shit, honey, you can’t say stuff like that.”, Steve breathily laughs as his head hangs, his damp hair tickling your face a bit. “Okay…okay, I can do that.”
Feeling extra warmth by your side, you turn to see Eddie laying on his side as he flashes you a soft smile. Biting his own lip, he watches as your face contorts and your back arches as the boy on top of you starts pushing into your core.
“It’s ok, princess. You’re ok.”
Steve’s head fell next to your opposite side and your pussy couldn’t help but clench at the sound of his whimpers in your ear. His hand suddenly smacks the floor beside you as his arm bent at the elbow. The action startled you but made his friend laugh.
“That hard, Harrington?” Your eyes meet his in confusion as he beamed down at you. “He’s trying to control himself from not just pounding into you. Your little pussy is driving him crazy.”
This confused you even more since every man you had been with never had the reaction Steve was having now. Even Ryan made it seem like you and your body were nothing special.
“Hey, hey come back, Y/N.”, Eddie cooed as he caressed your cheek with his finger.
That caused Steve to push up on his arms to look down at your face.
“Are you ok? I’m not h-hurting you or anything right?”
“No, you’re not. No one…no one has ever…made me feel like…BEING with me is anything special.”
They knew what you meant and it broke their hearts as the man inside you kissed your forehead before placing his head back where it had been by your ear.
“I’m sorry, baby. You deserve so much better then that. Your pussy should be worshipped. Fuck me. I swear, Y/N, I’ve never had anyone as tight as you. I could fucking live inside you. God… I knew it when you kissed me. You’re definitely fucking special.”
When he was fully sheathed inside you, your hands clung to his shoulders while he waited patiently for you to tell him he could move.
Your hips tested the waters as you rolled them upwards making you both moan as your eyes rolled back.
“P-Please, Steve.” Tilting up a bit, he placed his nose against yours as he slowly thrust into your body. “Fuck, I can feel you in my stomach.”
His mouth fell open as his pants warmed your face even more than the shower steam around you. As your nails scratched down his back, his pace quickened, hitting that spongy spot inside of you repeatedly as you whimpered at the feeling.
“Steve. Harder, baby.”
Pushing up onto his knees, the man gripped your thighs for leverage as he honored your request.
“Like that, Y/N? Is he about to make you cum?”, Eddie murmured in your ear as his palm held your face. “Cum, Y/N. Let him feel what I did. Trust us, sweetheart, we know exactly what a beautiful woman coming feels like.”
Arching your back high off the tile beneath you, your vision was blinded by white as you came.
“Jesus.”, Steve growled through gritted teeth as he chased his own release.
Your lips mingled with Eddie’s as the other man leaned forward to massage your tits in his large palms before hearing him grunt above you as pumped his spend into your cunt.
After carefully pulling out of you, both men trailed kisses to your neck, tenderly sucking and nibbling at your sweet spots as your body continued to tingle with need.
“Eddie…please…”
“You don’t have to take me tonight, princess. Tonight is about you.”
“I want you.”
“Fuck me. Say that again.”
“I want you, Eddie. I need you.”
Once Steve was out of the way, the metalhead guided you around until your back was to his chest again with you both laying on your sides. On impulse, you lifted your leg and without missing a beat, he held it in place with his palm firmly gripping your thigh.
Grinding his hips, his cock ran along your pussy lips as you moaned.
“I’ll go slow too at first, ok?”
After you nod, he releases his hold on you only long enough to maneuver his length into your heat.
“Oh my god.”, you whine as your head falls into the nook of his other arm.
“I know. I know, baby. You’re—mmm—you’re doing so well. Tight little pussy is stretching out perfectly for me. Fuck.”
“Fuck me, Eddie. I-I can take it.”
Smiling, his fingers grabbed your jaw, turning you to face him so his forehead could lean on yours.
“You can take it? Are you sure?” As if to test you, he slammed his waist hard into yours hitting your now overly sensitive and abused g-spot making you whimper against his lips.
“Yeeees, baby, just like that.”
“You want it hard like that, sweetheart? Fuck, you are so fucking beautiful like this.”
While Steve did talk a bit while he was inside you, Eddie couldn’t seem to stop, whispering praises and compliments against your skin as he thrust into you. You definitely didn’t mind, wishing you could focus on anything but the pleasure to do the same.
“Stay with me, pretty girl. I need to feel you cum again and squeeze my dick.”
“Eddie…I…feels…good…”
Grinning again, he tenderly kissed your lips.
“Are you trying t-to praise me? Aw, poor baby can’t focus on words?” When you whined and nodded, his smiled grew. “Good. It’s ok, Y/N. Just focus on my cock right now. I want you to cum for me.”
Picking up his pace, you circle your arm behind you around his neck clinging to his hair till you felt your body tremble as the coil in your stomach snapped.
“God damnit! Atta girl. Feels so fucking good.”
While your pussy quivered around him, he pumped into you till you felt him warm your insides as you milked him dry.
After pulling out, the three of you laid on the floor of the shower on your back trying to catch your breathes.
“I can’t tell if I’m steamy or sweaty.”
You smirked as they both laughed at your statement.
“Either way, you smell good. Hang on.” Closing your eyes, you listened to Steve move around before jumping when you feel a washcloth between your legs. “Sorry! Sorry. I should have warned you. I’m just cleaning you.”
“I hope its ok it’s not a dirty napkin.”, Eddie sassed making you giggle as you reach over to lightly punch his arm. “You deserve better than him, Y/N.”
“You really ARE special. I hope you know that.”, Steve added. “And not just your body.”
You don’t say anything as they turn off the water and lead you back to the bedroom to dry you.
“Do you want your clothes or I can give you one of my shirts. According to Ryan, your stuff smells like smoke so I don’t see what difference a new shirt would make.”
“Oh. Um…I can just…wear my clothes…”, you pout as you hang your head.
As your about to turn to take the garments from Eddie’s hands, the other boy grabs your wrist as he takes a seat on his bed.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“No, hey, no. Not nothing. What’s running through your mind?”
Unlike with your boyfriend, when your eyes shift between theirs you don’t see annoyance but empathy. They genuinely want to make sure you’re alright.
“Do you want me to go?”
You question surprises them as they exchange a glance.
“No. God no.”, the metalhead answers as he sits on the bed as well. “Y/N, we just don’t want you to feel uncomfortable. If you want to go you’re more than welcome but we’d rather you stay.”
“We don’t want you to feel how you felt when you came in here.”, Steve adds.
“I don’t feel like that. I wouldn’t feel like that if I left right now either.” They softly smile your way as they nod. “I don’t want to leave though. Not yet.”
“Aaaaare you hungry? We were going to order some food before Harrington’s ex-girlfriend flew in wreaking havoc.”
“Oh my god. Ok, we went on ONE date! One!”
“Can we get food from the restaurant you took her to. I really want to see if your restaurant choices do suck.”, you giggle as he rolls his eyes.
“I hate you both.”, Steve teases as he gets up and heads for the phone.
Eddie helps you into one of his shirts and his friend’s shorts he found nearby.
“Comfy? Good. See, princess, you’re adventurous.”, he winks as he grabs your palm in his before looking down at how they fit together. “Did you like it? Being with two people?”
With your free hand, you tilt his chin and kiss his lips.
“I liked being with you two.”
Steddie Asks
#steddie#eddie munson#stranger things#steve harrington#joseph quinn#fan fiction#eddie munson fluff#eddie munson smut#joe keery#steve harrington smut#steve harrington fluff#steddie x y/n#eddie fanfic#steddie ask#eddie munson angst#steddie fluff#steddie smut#steddie fanfiction#steddie fic#steve and eddie#actor!Steve harrington#rockstar!eddie munson#actress reader#request#steve x eddie#steddie x reader#steddie x you
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Red
Bucky x Reader
Word Count: 3680
Warnings: Kink and trauma. You know, in case you forgot whose blog you were on! Night terrors. Non-graphic flashbacks to violence, very graphic smut. Bucky’s head is just not a very fun place? References to brainwashing and torture. Kink discovery, including some hitting/slapping during sex and some power/control fantasies, all within the context of a very happy relationship. It goes down dark but there’s a distinctly soft aftertaste.
A/N: For @cockslut-padalecki and her Decade Under The Influence challenge. My prompt was “The Crimson” by Atreyu. Thanks for always hosting the absolute best challenges, and congrats on the milestone!
Pre-reads by @thoughtslikeaminefield @mskathywriteswords and @fangirlxwritesx67. Inspiration from that scene where Sebastian Stan gets slapped. You know the one I mean.
The companion fic to this will be coming soon! It’s significantly darker and way outside my wheelhouse, but please let me know if you want a tag.
The Soldier stalks silently down the hallway to the bedroom, scanning the shadows.
The closet.
Something itches, deep under the ice: knowledge that closets are for hiding —
— a small girl, giggling in the back corner of the closet —
— ready or not, here I come —
— but those frozen things don’t belong to the Soldier.
He opens the door and finds the woman on the floor, trying to hide in the darkness. He picks her up by the throat. Moonlight from the open window glints off her wide eyes and the Soldier’s metal hand. She fights back, clawing at his arm uselessly.
He waits for her to stop struggling. They always do.
Bucky opens his eyes and bolts upright, gritting his teeth against the sweaty, shivery wave of nausea.
It takes a moment for the numbing chill of the Soldier’s memory to fade.
He knows it’s a memory. He lost so many things in the deep emptiness of cryo-sleep, but he couldn’t bury them forever, and now they claw their way out while he dreams. The darkness gives him back his life, one nightmare at a time.
Sometimes he wakes up screaming. Sometimes he wakes up convinced that the bed under him is soaked with blood, and it takes a few awful seconds to realize that he just sweated through the sheets. Other times he’s paralyzed in the darkness, convinced he’s back in the cryo chamber, and he wants to punch and claw and fight his way out, wants to see the sun again, but he tried that one too many times — he learned his lesson about wanting things.
At least he didn’t wake her this time. She makes a breathy sound as she stirs, but she’s still sound asleep, and when he inspects his hands in the glow of her night light, there’s no trace of red.
She got the light about two months ago, when he started sleeping over. She didn’t ask him, didn’t mention it — he would’ve been embarrassed, if she asked, but it helps. She helps.
He’s goddamn crazy about her. It hasn’t been long, but he knows this is it for him.
Bucky curls up facing her. Her hair is a mess, and there’s a damp patch of drool on the pillow under her slack mouth, and she’s beautiful. It’s amazing that she trusts him enough to fall asleep next to him.
He closes his eyes. This time he doesn’t dream.
The end credits of the movie start to scroll down the screen, and she makes a grumbling noise that means she doesn’t want to get up and turn the TV off. Her little apartment is full of the rich smell of whatever she’s got in the oven, and the day has been so sweetly domestic that Bucky wonders when everything will start to twist and distort and go bloody. He must be hallucinating.
But the hallucinations always had a sort of airbrushed quality to them when they started, an inhuman perfection that felt easy, like he was floating. Right now his stomach is growling, and when she shifts, her elbow digs into his side, and she’s a heavy comforting warmth on top of him.
The hallucinations were the product of his own brain, which might be why they came back all too quickly when he started to recover his memories. Even when he couldn’t remember his sisters’ faces, he remembered the drug-fueled torture that took place behind his closed eyelids, scenes that started like fantasies and ended like nightmares.
Most memories from before the fall are weak and hazy, sepia-toned afterimages that overlay the living world like ghosts. Other things bleed through the decades, making it hard to keep track of whose memories he’s seeing. The Soldier’s memories are always sharp and cold, and they’re the hardest to shake off. Sometimes they’re triggered by the present, and it’s always a surprise; he’s stepping into a crosswalk and the past is washing over him like —
The water from the hose is freezing cold as the handler rinses off the blood —
— and he’s still staring down at the slushy puddle, but —
— the Soldier keeps his eyes down, clenching his jaw to stop his teeth from chattering, watching the red swirl over the cold cracked tile and disappear down the drain, and —
Bucky has to fight to hold on to the honking taxis and the Brooklyn stink, because the cryo chamber is quiet like a coffin in the last few seconds before he’s frozen into unconsciousness, and —
— and sometimes he feels frozen even when the dreams dissolve, even when he knows they’re only dreams.
The frigid paralysis was mental more than physical, for the Soldier, and that’s a hard thing to shake. The raw human parts of him iced over, head and heart numb while his body carried on following orders.
She sits up and stretches, making her shirt ride up, and he notices bruises on her hips, wrapping around the side.
“Did I do that?” he asks, voice thin.
She looks down like she didn’t notice. “Probably.”
He tugs the waistband of her yoga pants down a little and finds the shape of a handprint, stained purple. She twists to show him a matching set on the other side. They’re more defined on the side he was gripping with his metal hand last night. He feels cold all over.
“Sorry.”
“No biggie.”
He’s too scared to meet her eyes. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I would never hurt you.”
“What if I asked you to?” she tosses back, playful and easy.
Bucky doesn’t know how to react to that. He can’t let her see how badly he wants that, so he just freezes like a deer in headlights, forcing himself to go still, to shut down, to say nothing.
“Whoa, hey, don’t do that,” she says, and she moves into his space slowly, deliberately, giving him time to tell her to stop. He blinks at her, and she smiles, soothing.
He spent the first month of their relationship waiting for her to turn and run. It’s gotten better, but…
“Why the hell do you trust me?” he blurts out.
She frowns, and hesitates, and he wants to reach up and smooth out the little frown line that forms between her eyebrows, but he doesn’t. She curls up against him and kisses his jaw.
“Would you ever choose to hurt me?” she asks.
“No.”
“There you go.” He feels the movement when she shrugs, as if it’s that easy. “You control your choices. That’s it.”
“But I —”
“No buts,” she interrupts, and her voice is firm. “I choose to trust you and you don’t get to talk me out of it.”
Bucky lets out a huff of not-quite-laughter at that. She’s stubborn as hell when she wants to be, and he knows better than to argue.
“Okay,” he says, and wraps his arms around her, kissing the top of her head. She settles closer, her breath a warm damp tickle against the side of his neck.
His body used to be a weapon.
“You can’t blame yourself for things that are out of your control,” she mumbles, as if she heard him.
He takes a deep breath and says it again: “Okay.”
He can see her reflection in the mirror; she bites her lip, teeth white against her bright red lipstick, trying to hold back, but the whimpers are getting louder by the second as he fucks her harder. She’s bracing herself with her forearms on the sink, her entire body shaking with each sharp thrust.
“Shhhh,” Bucky says, half-laughing, but he doesn’t slow down.
He’s pretty sure this was her plan all along. They barely made it an hour into the party before she tugged him into the bathroom, and usually he would protest, but he’s been half-hard since he first saw her in that damn outfit.
She opened the door earlier looking like a pinup, complete with glossy curls and red lips and this dress: flared skirt, nipped-in waist, curves threatening to spill over the scooped-low neckline. He had just stuttered for a few seconds as a wisp of memory cast a sepia glow over her pleased smile.
He used to have a dog-eared print of one of those calendar girls, and it was tame compared to some that were carried to war, but there was something warm in her smile that made him hold onto it. He used to daydream about her waiting at home, welcoming him at the door, when everything else was heavy and grey. He used to look at her smile when he couldn’t bear to close his eyes, knowing he’d only see blood. They took it when he was captured, of course, but he used to imagine —
— this, he used to imagine this, the way the skirt is rucked up around her hips and she’s bent at the waist, the way she stretches open around the shiny-wet length of his cock.
He has a flash of certainty that this is just a fantasy, something he’s imagining desperately as he fucks his own fist and tries not to make a sound, pressing his other palm to his mouth to muffle his labored breathing. He’s picturing this so vividly that when he opens his eyes and sees the stars, framed by the caved-in ceiling of another bombed-out shell of a building, he’ll have to fight back tears of disappointment.
The sight of her face in the mirror is utterly pornographic, threatening to send him over the edge too soon, but when he looks down, he can see the way her ass bounces and jiggles as she shoves herself back to meet each thrust, and that’s goddamn obscene too. Bucky’s imagination has never been this good.
She’s so close, too close to stay silent, and just as she lets out a high-pitched, keening moan, there are footsteps right outside the door.
He reacts instinctively, before he can think better of it; he slaps his hand over her mouth, muffling the sound against his palm — the metal one, he realizes, a split-second too late.
Their eyes meet in the mirror for one wild heartbeat. Her skin looks dangerously soft under silver fingers that could so easily break the fragile jawbone they grip.
Then her eyes roll back in her head, and her orgasm blindsides both of them with its intensity. If he wasn’t silencing her, she would’ve shouted, he’s pretty sure; she spasms violently against his grip, writhing like she’s trying to shake him off, and —
— he imagines her struggling, fighting back, until he pins her against the wall and —
— it hits him like a gut-punch. He doubles over, curling himself around her as he comes with a rough shocked grunt, and the white-out lightning-bolt electroshock feel of it is so incredible he forgets, for a few seconds; he just buries his face in those curls and kisses the nape of her neck.
He straightens up and realizes her lipstick is smeared over the metal hand, deep crimson red.
“God, we’re a mess,” she laughs breathlessly. She turns to kiss him, eyes sparkling, and then they have to clean up, put themselves back together, and he brushes it off.
It was probably a memory, a ghost whose features he confused with hers in one fevered second. Unwanted memories —
— dreams — flashbacks — fantasies — hallucinations —
— invade his reality every day.
It didn’t feel like a memory, though.
She smiles, and there’s no doubt in his mind that the smile is real, so Bucky swallows his guilt and smiles back. Her hand is warm in his.
There’s a knife in his hand and blood on the floor.
It’s messy, but those were his orders. Easier to frame the mistress this way. At least the carving knife was sharp. Red drips down the blade onto the metal fingers.
He’s about to place it next to the corpse when he hears the gasp. The mistress had been asleep four minutes ago, but people are unpredictable that way.
Messy.
The Soldier pivots, finds her standing in the doorway, hand over her mouth, eyes wide. She’s paralyzed by fear, like a deer in headlights as he stalks closer. Usually they run. Sometimes they fight back. This one just stares.
“I won’t say anything,” she whispers. “I didn’t see —” He grabs her wrist, and she shrieks, trying to twist away, until he pins her against the wall and holds her in place. Tears start to roll down her cheeks. “No, please, I’ll do anything you want — just don’t kill me! You can — anything, I promise, I won’t struggle! Do you want —”
“Want” is buried deep under the ice. “Want” is for bodies that are warm and soft and human. The Soldier is a weapon.
He presses the knife into her hand and forces her fingers to close around the handle. She was supposed to be asleep.
She’ll be blamed, one way or another, but maybe it’s better this way. Cleaner.
No witnesses. It’s an order.
Bucky wakes up. He’s trembling, sitting up with his hands twisted in the sheets, but it’s not as bad as it could be. She’s sitting up next to him, one gentle hand on his chest as she watches with wide sad eyes.
“Sorry,” he chokes out. “Fuck, I hate waking you up.”
“Almost time anyway,” she says, which is when he realizes that it’s morning. Sunlight is streaming in through the sheer curtains. He settles back against the headboard, taking it in. They’re both naked, with her big downy comforter around their waists, and the residual chill of memory thaws immediately in the cozy warmth of her bed.
She leans in hesitantly and brushes her lips against his. He can read the worry plain on her face — she doesn’t know what he needs right now — but he tugs her onto his lap, tilts his head back, mouth opening easily under hers for slow lazy kisses that stretch like taffy and then turn deep and dirty. She swears like a sailor as she sinks down slowly onto his cock.
Christ, she’s gorgeous.
It must be real. He could never hallucinate something so flawed and incredible as the way she looks naked, the stretch marks under his palms, the calluses on her fingers when she cups his jaw, the way she moans when he plants his feet on the bed and fucks up into her.
She’s flushed and dewy with sweat, moaning in the sharp bitten-off way that means he found just the right angle, and her thighs are shaking hard enough that he has to grip her hips and hold her steady. He can feel her starting to get close, clenching and flooded around him, when her alarm goes off.
“Cocksucking motherfucker,” she snarls.
They both look helplessly at the phone, just out of easy reach on the nightstand. Bucky’s tempted to just ignore it, but she’s already leaning over. She twists at the waist but doesn’t stop rocking her hips down against him, squeezing in little pulses like she can’t help herself, so he settles her more firmly on his lap, holding her weight and anchoring her as she reaches for it. He works his right hand down between them, an awkward angle that’s totally worth it when he can rub her clit with the pad of his thumb and feel her spasm around his cock.
“Five more minutes,” he suggests breathlessly.
“Not gonna need that long if you keep doing that.” She trembles and almost collapses before finally grabbing the phone, and she hits the snooze button immediately.
He’s already rolling his hips, grinding in deep, and he must hit something just right at the same moment she starts to straighten up; it makes her twitch, jerking uncontrollably against him as she moves, and her elbow cracks across his jaw, snapping his head to the side hard enough to rattle his teeth.
“Shit!” she hisses, and then: “I’m so sorry, I — are you —”
But the rough throb of pain hit like a swell of heat in Bucky’s gut, making him jerk up into her and shudder with pleasure. He lets his head loll, taking a deep heaving breath and letting it out as a moan.
It’s not until he tilts his head back to look at her stunned face that he realizes what just happened. His cheeks burn but she doesn’t look disgusted; her eyes go all heavy-lidded and she bites her lip as she starts to ride him again, swiveling her hips.
He’s opening his mouth to make some excuse, to deny it, when she leans in for a bruising kiss: teeth scraping his lower lip, a whimper rough in her throat, cunt silky-hot and soaked, so good his head is spinning.
Then she asks raggedly, “Do you want me to do that again?”
Without even thinking about it, he blurts out, “Yes.”
Her palm connects with his cheek, a sharp sting that draws a guttural sound from deep in his chest. He moves on pure primal instinct, gripping her hips to slam her down on his cock.
From there it’s rough and frantic and desperate. He’s only dimly aware of the way she moans, bucking against him, the way they’re moving against each other like animals, the way she bites his lip so hard he tastes copper and then he’s gone, coming so hard his vision goes white with the first intense pulses of it. She shudders as she follows him, riding out the shocks of pleasure with her forehead pressed to his and her hands in his hair.
He shivers against her, breath hitching as reality washes in like ice water.
“I can feel you freaking out,” she mumbles. “What, they didn’t have kink in the thirties?”
It surprises Bucky enough that he lets out a huff of laughter. “No. Not exactly.”
“Why is this freaking you out?”
He stutters for a second before he manages, “What’s wrong with me?”
She sits up and looks at him intently. “Fucking nothing.”
“That should be the last thing I want,” Bucky mutters, cheeks burning.
“That’s not how it works,” she snaps. “Sex isn’t — it doesn’t always make sense. It’s messy.”
“I’ve had enough of hurting people for a fuckin’ lifetime.”
There’s something vulnerable in her sheepish half-smile. “Sometimes your body likes shit it shouldn’t. You can’t control what gets you off. Believe me, sweetheart.”
He blinks, ready to question that, and she leans in for a quick kiss. As if on cue, her alarm goes off again.
“Fuck.”
“I gotta go,” she says reluctantly. “But later — later we’re going to talk about some things. Okay?”
He doesn’t say it out loud, but he thinks it very clearly in that moment: I love you.
“Okay.”
The Soldier pins her brutally against the wall, one hand around her wrists, the other around her throat. He doesn’t squeeze, not yet, just holds her there and savors the thrill; she’s writhing and lashing out at him like a caged animal, but he’s got her and she knows it.
It’s beautiful, the way she snarls and tries to struggle.
He wants —
— so this must be a normal dream, not a memory, but —
— he wants to fuck her just like this, up against the wall, and —
— his hips jerk and his cock throbs, and —
— fuck, he wants her.
“Baby?” Her voice comes out as a sleep-slurred moan.
He tries to blink away the dream, but instead he’s rolling over and pinning her, rocking his hips down before he can stop himself. She sucks in a breath, spreading her legs to meet the next slow thrust, and she blinks dazedly up at him, mouth dropping open as they rut against each other.
“What was it?” she asks, raspy and heated.
He lets out a pained sound and drops his head, hunching to bury his face in the crook of her neck. He’s so goddamn hard, so close, all over a fucked-up dream, and —
“I was holding you — up against the wall. Your wrists.”
“Yeah?” she says, voice smoky and eager. “Remember what we talked about?”
“Traffic lights. Red if you want me to stop.”
“Do it.”
Oh.
“Are you sure?”
“Fuck yes.”
He snatches her wrists and crosses them over her head, watching the way her lashes flutter at the touch of metal, the way she bites her lip. She shifts under him, squirming until the length of him is slotted up against her slickness and her legs are up around his hips.
He slides in slow, relishing every inch, her body welcoming him with living dripping heat. She arches up, and he adjusts his grip on her wrists, squeezing slightly as he braces himself. All he wants in the entire damn universe is to drive into her, piston his hips until she’s screaming, but he starts to fuck her with steady even thrusts, holding back, trying to let go of the last lingering doubts.
“Doesn’t this scare you?” Bucky asks hoarsely. “That you’re trapped.”
She lets out a moan that sure as hell doesn’t sound like fear. This isn’t a dream any more, but it still feels surreal.
“Yellow,” she says.
“Shit. What’s wrong?” He tries to pull away, but she’s got her ankles hooked, keeping him in place with her legs. He lets go of her wrists, at least, and hauls in a deep breath, trying to make sense of that fierce expression on her face.
“Nothing. I just wanted you to see that you’re in control. You chose to stop.”
He swallows hard. “Yeah. I did.”
“Stop punishing your body for wanting this,” she says.
His breath catches, and for a moment all he can do is stare. She gives him a smile so soft it threatens to rip him open.
Then he curls his fingers around her wrists again — they’re still crossed, right where he left them. He waits for her nod.
“Green.”
Companion fic is here.
#decadeundertheinfluencechallenge#bucky barnes#bucky barnes fic#bucky x reader#MCU#bucky barnes smut#bucky barnes x reader
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DickTimWeek2021 Day 2
** Day 2: Time Loop | Jealousy | Stray AU
Welp. Time to break some hearts.
They’re laughing like assholes as they climb through Timmy’s penthouse windows.
“Did you see that thug punch himself in the face?”
“That’s the right way to get out of an ass beating by the Batman.”
Tim, still in Red Robin, doesn’t even bother, just lets his knees buckle so he can slide down to the floor and laugh until tears are rolling down the dominio still plastered on his face.
He’s riding the concussion train with
(J)
Josephine and she’s not as bad as some of them are.
Dick at least tosses the gloves and gauntlets before hauling Timmy’s bruised ass up off the floor, throwing the arm around his shoulders.
“C’mon, you butt. Really Timmy, just laying here in your suit? Alfred would be appalled.”
“S’why I don’t go to the Manor much anymore.”
“Ooh, I’m telling. You’re going to be in so much trouble,” as he gets Tim down the hallway to the bathroom.
“Y-You can’t! You’re the oldest! Dami’s supposed to be the tattle-tale!”
“Nu-uh. As the oldest, I can do whatever the hell I want.”
And does he tell on Timmy? You bet your ass he does.
It’s nice when Alfred can look at someone else in the family with extreme disappointment.
Tim comes by the Manor the day Alfred video chats him, shuffles down to the Cave behind the butler and absolutely sticks his tongue out at Dick’s smarmy grin.
**
His apartment is a literal mess and Dick can’t be bothered to do much more than flop on the overstuffed couch with a groan.
Still in his uni from the day shift, he’s too bruised and battered and tired to even think of suiting up for the night. He’s been running himself ragged for two months, the day and night shifts blending together along with the usual bullshit of daily human life, and he desperately needs a night of terrible television, junk food, and snuggles.
Like he’d been reading the room, Timmy walks out of his bathroom, towel around his shoulder and hair just this side of damp.
“Hey, you made it home in one piece.” Tim’s long fingers in his hair literally pulls a noise out of Dick he can’t ever remember making.
“Yeah, I drove down because you looked like death warmed over when we talked last weekend. Luckily for you I went grocery shopping, did a few loads of your laundry, and cleaned up a little so you don’t have to worry about housework.”
“I love you. Have I told you that recently? Like, so, so much–” is muffled by the couch cushions, but he thinks Tim can probably still make it all out.
“Mmhm, I know,” and the gentle scratching against his scalp doesn’t stop, and Dick goes a little boneless with it. “I even brought my Roku so we can binge watch terrible television while you eat something more substantial than cereal. Alfred is going to be so proud of you.”
A pat to his head and Timmy is off, slinging his towel on the rack, turning on the shower again to make sure it’s nice and hot for all those bruises and contusions.
He’s no-nonsense about picking up his previous mentor and best friend, literally stripping him down and manhandling him in the shower after a low whistle at the span of blue/black across Dick’s chest and ribs, the scrapes across his back and shoulders.
The first aid kit tackle box makes an appearance because Tim plans for literally everything ever, and Dick finds himself sitting on his sink wearily while his injuries are meticulously treated.
He knows he eats something super tasty with meat and vegetables, his belly full, before Tim pulls him down on the couch and lets Dick lay against his chest, between his legs to sleepily float while watching God-awful B-movies.
It’s the most relaxing weekend he’s had in a while.
**
Dami sneers at Tim, arms crossed over his chest, the expression on his face begging Tim to try to deny it.
The third Robin however, is looking over at Dick with horror that the big secret is finally out in the open.
“Th-that isn’t– it’s not–” Tim fumbles desperately, “he’s been my big brother forever, that’s it!”
“Tt. Grayson may be painfully oblivious, Drake, but the rest of us are detectives. Even Todd knows of your feelings and he rarely even comes to the Manor!”
Tim’s soul literally leaves his body.
Dick blinks, completely taken back, mouth open without anything coming out.
Damian raises his eyes skyward and prays for patients dealing with these two. “What I am saying,” he tries, he really is trying here, “is that you two must cease and desist this pointless–” vague hand wave– “pining for one another. It is getting to the point of absurdity. I demand you two either discuss your need for one another or take this ridiculous mooning elsewhere. The rooftops of Gotham is no place for this,” another hand wave, “utter nonsense.”
Tim’s mouth goes dry, subtly backing away to be closer to the Ducati’s waiting for tonight’s ride. He’s pretty sure he has enough energy left in his shaky knees to hop on one and be the fuck out of the Cave before his face literally bursts into flames.
But, well. Dick was Batman.
His strategic retreat is stomped into the ground by acrobatic leaps and a very well done joint lock to keep him from immediately taking off.
Dami scoffs at them on his way up the winding staircase. He stops Pennyworth on the way and turns the butler to return back into the Manor proper, citing those two needed time to figure themselves out.
**
After several weeks under deep cover, Nightwing wearily hacks into Titan’s Tower and makes his way through the maze of hallways until he hits a hidden panel.
Tim is sleeping on his desk, only one empty coffee mug at his workstation. Even dead in his boots, Nightwing can take a second just to look, just to sigh, just to enjoy how much every inch of this boy is his.
He journeys down the hall, flips the bed covers up, carries his sleeping partner in and tucks the blankets around him, a quickly there kiss to the top of messy, too-long hair. A shower in Tim’s perch literally makes everything in life a little less awful and exhausting, not enough for him to do much more than crawl in bed against Tim’s warm body and snuggle up close.
He gets breakfast in bed and blue-violet eyes looking at him with fondness rather than awe, gets coffee flavored kisses and a slow-paced back rub that continues down to his thighs and calves and feet. Later, he gets a date night in a nice restaurant and a sweet San Fran club scene for dessert. He gets to let loose and hold Tim’s body against him, to play them both until the gazes are intense and the low key UST between them makes other people on the dance floor give them space.
**
Witty banter is a primary weapon against megalomaniacal bad guys of any flavor. For some former Robins, it’s an art form.
Over the years, they’ve cultivated their dip and distraction to bounce off one another like a well-oiled vigilante machine.
It should have been a standard take-down because it’s not one of their more dangerous, deadly villains. It’s not one of the Rogue Gallery baddies. It’s not one of the mobster families, not one of the super powered groups come to call. It’s not someone with hordes of thugs and deadly science waiting to take them down.
It’s a simple B&E, just Nightwing talking it up to draw gunfire while Red Robin is creeping up from behind to get the last laugh.
It’s one of a thousand times they’ve done this.
It’s a guaranteed win.
It’s the last hour of patrol before they get to go back to Red’s penthouse and snuggle together, eat and show, probably have some fantastic sex before passing out.
The .45 shell, however, cuts through the suit, between armored plates.
Going after the running baddies is automatic, taking them down, zip ties, and viola. They’re ready for GCPD to pick-up, all kinds of gift-wrapped.
When N finally realizes Red isn’t with him, isn’t answering comms, isn’t waiting for him on the roof, he goes back inside. He hits up B for a ride in the big car in case he missed –
– anything.
The pool of blood around Red Robin is more than he can afford to lose, and Nightwing has been in the vigilante life for over twenty years, has been official with Red Robin for a little over two, has personal experience on how his Baby Bird can take a mostly-fatal beating and still keep moving. He’s seen Tim come close with the Clench, with horrifying injuries, with any of the many bad guys they fight holding him hostage.
Nightwing has seen him perform literal miracles.
And tells him so the entire time he’s got Red Robin up in his arms, carrying him through Gotham’s skyline to the waiting car, falling in with Red on his lap when the familiar hatch slides back, the tourniquet already applied before he even shot a grapple. The struggling pulse is enough of a concern to get it together.
And even if they all gather to strip off the suit, and now it’s on to get vitals back to an acceptable range. Even if the Bats cry overhead, even if the equipment is top notch in the Cave, even if Dick is still talking the whole time, and Alfred is keeping a cool head and Bruce is gripping a hand and Damian is standing at the ready to hand implements and Cass is biting her thumbnail while she hovers and Steph is moving from empty space to empty space around the gurney –
The consistent beep of the flatline cuts through it all.
**
The Titans make it for the service.
Each of them make a point to hug Dick for as long as possible, holding on tightly.
Bruce is silent and stoic, a little boy again when he has to watch someone else he loves being lowered into the cold, unforgiving ground. Another Robin taking a piece of his heart to the afterlife.
Steph is red-eyed, a ghost moving around to individual circles, listening to stories she might not have known.
Cass grips the coffin with bruised knuckles, her whole body wound tight as a string ready to snap. She doesn’t move the entire service, is already convinced leaving him to his own devices caused this whole thing. She doesn’t blame the thugs or Dick or Bruce. She blames the boy that never understood how much it all means.
Duke Thomas is back in Gotham, taking leave from the Outsiders to be here for the family that took him in after the Joker drove his parents insane. He hovers in the doorway to welcome mourners, direct them toward the book to sign-in, talks about Tim Drake with regular humans and other metas in disguise, accepts condolences with his throat tight and his eyes watery. He makes sure Dick has a bottle of water after the first hour, pats Damian’s shoulder, grips Bruce’s arm, weaves an arm around Cassandra’s back to give her a squeeze, obediently looks at the old pictures of Tim on Steph’s photo roll when she’s overcome and has to see that smile again.
In the back, Jason Todd wears dark shades and a clean black suit. Roy Harper is beside him, a hand on the broad back to keep him grounded, to keep the Pit rage at bay. If anyone knows how far Tim and Jason had come over the years, it’s the former Red Arrow. If anyone knows how much agony Jason is in at this moment, at another fallen brother, another Robin gone, if anyone had held the Red Hood while he screamed and cried and broke the utter fuck down, it’s Roy Harper.
Damian Wayne hovers right by Grayson’s side, silently supporting his first Batman, his first brother. Whenever Dick’s eyes start going hazy, glazing over, Damian gently grips a wrist to bring him back, allows fingers to lace through his own and tolerates the tight squeeze that obviously assists in grounding the oldest Robin.
(Later when the night is crowding grief-stricken Wayne Manor, Damian will be the one to open Grayson’s bedroom door, lift the covers to crawl in behind him, to wind both arms tightly. He will be the one to take the onslaught of grief, to be soaked in tears and snot, to listen to the broken, hoarse voice, to make soothing hums that ultimately mean nothing.)
Alfred Pennyworth quietly talks with the funeral director about the arrangements. Of course Master Timothy would want to be laid to rest with his parents, and the family appreciates all the support and ease of process as the deceased was an important part of the Wayne family.
When he gets a phone call, he firmly verifies the name on the tombstone is Timothy Jackson Drake-Wayne Grayson.
**
Exactly four days after the service, the Flash is staring at him helplessly, gripping Nightwing’s arm tight, “please, please, Dick, don’t do this. You can’t think this is the answer!”
He can barely hear Wally with the absolute destruction going on around them, the machine they’d inadvertently stumbled upon (which is a lie, Nightwing had been looking for it and the Flash basically caught him red handed).
“You know you aren’t going to be able to stop me.” Standing between the glowing portal and Wally, debris from overhead crashing down on them at intervals, Nightwing is at his peak stubborn, “no matter how fast you are.”
“You don’t understand what’s going to happen,” Wally yells desperately as the vacuum starts pulling at Nightwing’s other arm, pulling him into–
–the Speed Force.
“You don’t have the lightning, Dick, you won’t be able to get yourself out, and I won’t have any way of tracking you!”
The small smirk as the machine’s panel starts going haywire, lights blinking and readings off the charts, makes Wally’s heart clench hard in his chest, makes him try to dig in his heels, makes his stomach tremble.
“You have no idea how many times I’ve already done this, Wally. And I’ll do it as many times as it takes until I change everything.”
The pellet Nightwing palmed before the Flash grabbed his hand goes off the same time the machine hits the highest ratings and a low boom is followed up with an intense swirling suction, pulling the heroes closer to the portal’s surface.
The light grenade goes off without a hitch and the Flash has no choice but to let Nightwing go.
**
They’re laughing like assholes as they climb through Timmy’s penthouse windows.
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The Dorm Leaders with a S/O who Burned themselves making Microwave Food
(This is definitely not something that just happened to me like 10 minutes ago but you should definitely like and subscribe and don’t forget to hit the Bell icon Cause seriously some parts of my hand Hurt like a B...Not that I burned myself or anything)
Riddle Rosehearts
• So Your feeling a Gosh dang HUNGER
• You’re too hungry to wait For Trey to bake anything So
• So Kennel Corn it is!
• In your HUNGER daze you threw the popcorn in carelessly and forget to Press the Popcorn Button and just pressed the 4 Button instead of the 3 Button like you meant to even though 3 PROBABLY would’ve Ruined Your Popcorn anyway
• You text Riddle to see if he’d wanna Share some Popcorn He said he would bring some Tarts he had just put in the oven So you waited...Thinking about Food...not noticing the disaster you were Setting into place
• Anyway you Open the Microwave Full of Hope like a Doe being born on a beautiful spring day then as soon as the black Popcorn started shooting out of your Microwave in Ramshackle you then had the same disappointment as a spring Doe who was just forced to watch Fox and the Hound Like Holy Heck that Movie gives me the Hecko Deppreso
• One Burning Kernel Hit your Cheek Just as you Wince Riddle Comes into your Kitchen With Wide eyes
• He Drags you out Picnic Basket with Tarts in Hand and Takes you to the Nurse’s Office and Asks for...whatever Burned people Need As He Patches you up you 2 Share a ~Moment~
“Riddle Honestly it’s not THAT big of a deal” You Chuckle Anxiously “Don’t be Ridiculous Y/N!” he keeps Patching you up “It Must Seriously Hurt..” He looks a little Sad and while looking sadly into your eyes he kisses your cheek where the Burn was you wince as He Quickly Spits an Apology you Chuckle “You can Kiss it better if you want~” he Looks away bright Red as you 2 Sit in the Nurse’s Office Sharing Tarts
Leona King Scholar
• “I can’t Hecking Cook!!!” you found yourself Exclaiming in the Savannaclaw Kitchen Ruffling your hair
• You see Poor F-Ing Ruggie Needs a Break that’s not a secret to anyone (# Please Stop Hyena Abuse # Please Edit A Garfield Comic Where Leona is Garfield and Ruggie is John) so you said you’d make Leona his Lunch
• why the Heck you said you’d do this you Adorable stupid Hecking Idiot you but hey you did dumb dumb
• So here you are looking in the Freezer and BINGO Big ole Meat Chunk!
• So you being A fanfic protagonist Put a giant mystery meat chunk in the microwave pressed some Buttons and said..”Eh Good enough” Guess your sex god heart throb Boyfriend Is rubbing off on you ok I see how it is Y/N OK I SEE HOW IT IS
• Anyway besides my needless aggression with my words You started to look for some utensils you found A Bento Box and a Spoon thank goodness but you figured you might Need some mittens Lunch was soon and The meat was long done but no mittens
• You take it out..and HOLY MOTHER GOD WHY DID YOU THINK THIS WAS A GOOD IDEA YOUR PALMS MIGHT AS WELL BE ON FIRE
• Leona Nonchalantly Enters The scene cause Ruggie Told him you’d be making his Lunch and Lunch started like 15 Minutes ago
• He looks at the Scene before him and sighs and takes your hands like the sex god heartthrob he is and looks at your red palms almost Deadpanning
Your face a light red “Yeah...I know I massively Screwed up with your Lunch But I really wanted t-“ “I know And I appreciate it even though you are a massive screw up..But you keep trying I appreciate that about you” He starts to lick your Palms and your face Erupts into a Blush “What the Heck!?!” he looks up at you “It’s to cool your hands down but you ARE gonna go get me Food from the vending machine afterwards”
Azul Ashengrotto
• you slam your Hands Dramaticly on your Kitchen Table “I CANNOT ACCEPT ANYMORE FREEBIES FROM THE MONSTRO LOUNGE” You were sure Azul Would start making you pay if not Azul Jade for sure
• So time to start making Food for yourself!! You Quickly Head to a Convience store where a Certain Chaotic Neutral Eel Notices you Buying like 10 Frozen...PIECES OF FOOD
• You Dump like all off them on your Counter and Choose to make some Weird fish
• You Slap that Sorry Sucker in the Microwave and like the other Sorry Suckers in this Scenario you will Burn yourself and beautiful Bishounen Shenanigans will ensue but we’re not there yet
• You literally just bought a piece of not even normal looking fish Of course it didn’t come with a Time Recommendation So you while staring at it for like 10 minutes (Letting it thaw quite a bit but you didn’t notice) You threw it in for 7 And figured “eh 7’s a lucky number this’ll work” Didn’t you read Leona’s Scenario? What happened when THEY said Eh
• You Dumby You Dating a Merman Boughta Eat a fish Dumbo what do you have? Ears?
• Anyway Floyd and And Azul are Chatting well it’s more like Floyd is talking At Azul while he does paper work Yeah I totally Saw them Buying a bunch a Random Frozen Weird Massively Weird Right? Anyway So Apparently They Let you Mix ALL THE slushie is Flavors”
• Azul hearing this After finishing up some more Paperwork Decides to go Visit You and to his Shock he finds you Trying to hold a Basically at this point Charcoal Fish and when you drop It on your leg Leaving a SEXY weird fish shaped burn he’s Immediately on that
He puts a Hand to his Temple and sighs For a Moment before sweeping you off your feet before you could say a word..the you did say a word a few in fact “I’m Sorry Azul I know you can’t give me freebies forever but I’m a terrible cook” He Kisses your forehead and gives you a reassuring look “You’re my Beloved you can rely on me as much as you want I’ll get you some bandages when we’re back at the monstro lounge and Jade will make you something not made of Charcoal” and you bet he carried you all the way
Kalim Al Asim
• you both wanted to cook Something for Jamil...Okay this’ll go south fast.
• the road to Heck Is often Paved with Good intentions
• You Were tasked with picking out food and Kalim for Kitchen Prep
• Anyway Let’s get this poor Wreck Jamil’s gonna have to fix over with
• “I Picked out some Tofu! Smart people like tofu right?
• Kalim Tossed that And all sortsa Stuff Into the Microwave and Waved off all your concerns figuring it’ll be fine! come on Y/N you coward Your a fanfic Protag you don’t have to think Silly goose no thoughts head empty
• like 15 minutes later you 2 Hear Smoke while trying to make Pulpless Handsqueezed Orange Juice cause HECK PULP
• He Opened The Microwave and the only thing that Looked even Remotely salvageable was the tofu and because you 2 are the cutest most head empty Couple Apparently you didn’t Put a plate underneath so you braving all the danger reached into the Microwave...
“Ouch!” You teared up a little And were about to Put your finger in your mouth as you do Before Kalim put your finger in his Mouth You looked at him shell shocked after a couple seconds he started pressing light kisses on them “I’m so sorry! I should’ve thought this through more! I’ll nurse you back to health!” And For the rest of the day he essentially treated you like you were crippled he carried you he fed you everything don’t worry you slipped away for a little to clean up the mess in the kitchen before Jamil got back Kalim Babysitting is always an Experience to be Had for sure
Vil Schoenheit
• “Vil! I wanna Eat Carbs Heck you!!”
• if that’s not how Every story I do With Vil Starts I’ll be Gosh Danged
• “FINE EAT YOUR MAC AND CHEESE YOU’LL RUE THE DAY-“
• anyway after you stopped listening to him you looked him DEAD in the eyes and Shoved that frozen Mac and Cheese in the Microwave and slammed...Some Numbers In wow what a power move
• He Gasped and Power walked away
• You Laughing Manically Triumphantly
• But after awhile you felt kinda bad and decided to make some Carb free food for Vil as an Apology for Deliberatly and spitefully trying to make him Mad
• But that was the final nail in your microwaved coffin When you took out your Luckily not entirely burned Mac and Cheesies it was real hot like
• You were trying To get it to a plate Quickly And Spilled some on your Wrist Luckily Your Sexy mean Boyfriend was Here To save the day and wow he’s holding something”
“Sweet Potato?” He peeked through the Door and saw you Holding your Wrists in Pain he immediately walked in And Held them tenderly “I’m Sorry Sweet Potato things got heated I did get you a..Low Carb Meal at Olive Garden I Hope this Makes things up to you I know I can’t Control your life it’s just kinda my nature” You Smiled at him through the pain “It’s Fine Vil I got WAY too Mad I’m sorry I made you a salad” you both Enjoyed your food him feeding you yours then later he put some lotion on your Wrists
YES ITS BEST BOY-
Idia Shroud
• Omg it’s the best boy 🥺
• I mean I am not Partial to any character Do not worry I do not want to be in a Poly relationship with both Malleus and Idia
• So you wanted To Hang Out with your Boyfriend today he said sure but that he would be Busy doing raids with his Online friends you agreed and even said you’d bring snacks which you did
• Including Instant Ramen! My-I mean YOUR favorite
• you decided to show how reliable in the Kitchen you are to your boyfriend by making such a Delicacy for him while he doesn’t have the time to himself at the moment
• This is will work out Well
• You decide to do it in your kitchen and bring to him
• this will work out well
• You..ACTUALLY MAKE IT PERFECTLY
• You also Make it mostly towards his room before divine intervention Intervines and says That’s not the point of this fanfic idiot
• It probably mostly worked out for you cause you have the best taste tho so-
• Ortho Hears a Mighty Loud Catwerwhail (here’s hoping I spelled that right) and Comes to check whose outside the door
• “Big Sister/Brother?” He Quickly Runs some Water on your Shoulder and Bandages you Up And Leads you in Idia’s Room With the snacks in tow meanwhile he’s wondering if your Ok or not
“Idia Senpai!” You Sit next to him And he notices your Bandages “What Happened?” You look away a little Blushing a bit “I Spilled hot Instant Ramen on my shoulder Ortho parched me up though but! I brought the rest of the snacks though sor-“ Before you can apologize he Puts his Jacket on your shoulders “No I’m sorry for not noticing I would’ve...Tried to help” His sad expression turns into one of his Competitve smirks “I’ll Finish this Raid Boss so Quicker then you even Burned Yourself!” And He did cause he’s the best Gamer boy then you played Monoply With Him and Ortho cause he’s the best boy you have the best taste RAMEN TASTES SO GOOD-
Malleus Draconia
• My Second Love I mean nothing Let’s finish this I’ve been here since like 4 it’s 7 rn
• You invited Malleus to dinner And you wanted a Good Blanced Dinner!
• Chicken From Panda Express
• McDonald’s Chocolate Milk
• Some Patties from Burger King
• Oh Yeah Veggies!
• Wait! Everything’s Closed now!!! Y/N I KEPT TELLING YOU TO STOP BEING DUM-
• Oh you have some frozen Vegetables? Okay Touché
• You Toss them in the Microwave for 6 Minutes and get ready
• You dress as Nicely as Possible in 10 Minutes cause you plan Things Horribly apparently...not that I relete having been here for like at least 2 hours
• He’s Here~ him being Also the best boy is already setting the table with Magic cause he’s just nice like that and even Enchanted the food to be set on the table and the milk in the Glasses
• But you INSISTED to present The Vegetables
• “Child of Man I really don’t min-“ “No! I got this really!!”
• Let’s see how well that turned out for you
You got the Vegetables Outta the Microwave in such a Haste you didn’t even notice how hot it was and dumped it on the plate it wasn’t horribly burnt but was Horribly Hot Malleus was Amazed though “So Man’s Growing Vegetables in Bags now?..” he Reached to touch but you smacked his hand away so fast your hand touched the food and burned you “Ouch! I’m sorry Mal But it’s really hot” He immediately Understood and Summoned some Magical Water as he do and your burn was gone “I love you Child of man even though us Fae Can’t burn you tried to shield me anyway my sweet gentle Child of man”...Did you know that I ain’t know that?
I have a Masterlist it has all my X reader fics And my Oc Stuff I will be Adding this in like a day or 2 probably now if you’ll excuse me I never Wanna Look at another word again except also I’m literally probably gonna go read fanfic
#twisted wonderland#disney twst#twisted wonderland dorm#twst imagines#twst x reader#twst headcanons#twst dorm leaders#dorm leaders x reader#twisted wonderland x reader#twisted wonderland headcanon#twisted wonderland dorm leaders
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Into Eternity - FINAL
So, oh my gosh this is actually happening???
I have been writing this story for three years and it honestly has gotten me through so much? I love these characters and to give them an ending has brought me so many emotions. Thank you to everyone who has read and has loved these characters as much as I have.
Now buckle up, for the finale.
Pairing: Jimin X Reader
Genre: Romance, Fantasy, Royalty!AU
Words: 8,877
Warnings: Attempted Suicide (it isn't graphic, but it's there so please be aware of that), Explicit Sexual Content, Pregnancy, Pregnant Sex, Unprotected Sex (She preggie, but y'all be careful), Creampie, Dirty Talk. Birthing Scene (Not terribly graphic but just be aware), the fluff we've all been waiting forrrrr! (If I forgot anything please do let me know!)
It had been a week since the fight with Morgana and your death.
Jimin hadn’t been coping well at all.
Taehyung entered the bedroom where they had set you after the fight. Father Jin redressed you and washed your hair, but other than that you hadn’t moved or breathed. Nothing to note that you were alive. Father Jin had resigned himself to his room and hadn’t come out. Jungkook was training for hours on end and Taehyung was too busy trying to keep Jimin alive to do much else.
Hoseok had sent for more guards and they arrived soon after. Although they weren’t allowed inside the palace. No one was to come near, Jimin would have them beheaded.
Taehyung saw the same sight he’d seen for the last week. Jimin, at your bedside, waiting.
“Sire,” Taehyung announced his entrance.
“Taehyung,” Jimin answered softly.
“I brought you something to drink and a bit of porridge, will you eat it?” He asked, looking down at the small mugs in his hands.
“Yes, I’ll eat,” Jimin answered.
Turning around Taehyung sighed as he saw the dark bags under his eyes. The look of exhaustion that filled his frame was overwhelmingly sad. Taehyung knew his friend, and he was a shadow of himself. As if he were slowly dying without you with him.
But Taehyung pressed on, a smile coming across his features.
“Here you are,” Taehyung said, setting the mugs in his hands.
Jimin ate slowly, methodically. As if it was a chore to be doing so.
Taehyung wondered if he tasted it, his eyes were so devoid. It was like he was a skeleton walking around. No joints or ligaments, just bones clacking together. The way he moved was awkward and ungraceful, nothing like the Prince he knew. One thing was for certain.
He missed you.
“Jimin, do you want to take a bath?” Taehyung asked, looking at his friend’s appearance.
“No,” he said quietly.
“It’ll take a few minutes, please,” Taehyung urged.
“I’d rather not right now,” Jimin almost whispered.
“It’s okay, perhaps later,” Taehyung gave in, knowing that it wouldn’t happen later either.
“Taehyung,” Jimin’s voice was stronger this time.
“Yes, sire?”
“Do you think she’s really dead?”
“I don’t-”
“Perhaps this is what they wanted for me. To suffer without her,” he said bitterly.
“Don’t think so lowly of your ancestor, he tried to do what he could for you both,” Taehyung admonished.
“Perhaps I should die as well, join my beloved where we can be free together,” Jimin said, laying his head down on the bed, and gazing at you with misty eyes.
“Jimin!” Taehyung yelled.
Jimin flinched but didn’t move.
“I don’t think this is what Y/N would’ve wanted for you. She wouldn’t want to watch you starve yourself. She would want you to lie here and wait for something that might not happen. She’d want you to go out and live your life. To go out and be happy. Jimin, please listen to me. The way you’re treating yourself isn’t anything like what Y/N would’ve wanted for you. She loved you so much, and wanted nothing but the best for you. So for you to disrespect her wishes like this... It makes me sad, Jimin, truly it does.”
“So you do think she’s dead,” Jimin whispered.
“Jimin,” Taehyung said.
“Get out,” Jimin demanded softly.
“Jimin listen.”
“Get out Taehyung!” Jimin screamed, standing up.
Taehyung didn’t waste anymore time, slamming the door before he left.
--
It was the day of your funeral...
Jimin had fought tooth and nail to make sure he never saw this day, but here it was. It had been two weeks since your death. And Father Jin said it was time to lay you to rest. Jimin had denied it at first, but now, there was an eerie calm that settle over the palace. Jimin was silent, save for the few words he spoke to Taehyung. But other than that, no words left the man.
“We are here today to lay to rest a soul who has touched all of us in many ways,” Father Jin began.
You were laying in your coffin, beautiful as the day Jimin first saw you. The maids had braided gorgeous ribbons in your hair, and graced your face with the smallest amount of makeup, enhancing that natural beauty you had. Jimin’s eyes were filled with tears as he looked at you. His beloved bride, going so soon. And it was his fault you were dead. Because he couldn’t protect you.
“Jimin,” Taehyung whispered, nudging his friend.
“I’m fine,” he whispered back, wiping his eyes gingerly.
“Lady Y/N was a tender soul. Someone who wanted nothing but to share love and happiness wherever she went. I had the pleasure of knowing her, and I will forever miss her and her laughter. She is with God now, and I will take comfort in knowing that. May God rest her soul.”
Father Jin stepped away from the casket, Namjoon taking his place.
“Lady Y/N was fearless, and bright. Always willing to lend a hand to those in need. I failed her a guard and I will forever be unworthy. But as I continue on with life I will live for her, I will live with her in mind so that no one will ever suffer the same fate. I will protect the Royal family for the rest of my days, and will forever ask for forgiveness that I wasn’t able to protect them this time. Lady Y/N, I am so sorry. May you grace us with your love and kindness, so that we may forgive ourselves as well. You will be missed, dearly,” Namjoon said.
The rest of the proceedings went on, yet Jimin felt numb.
You lay there before him, so close yet out of reach. His soul yearned to reach out for yours, longing to touch you, to hold you. To bring you into his embrace and care for you as you did for him. When it was finally his turn to save you, he failed...
“Y/N was a beautiful person,” Taehyung began.
“She was smart, funny and a true joy to be around. I remember the first time I met her. She was outspoken, yet, in the best way. She challenged all of us to be better. To think more, to be more. She challenged me to be the best version of myself, and all I can say, is that I will continue to be the best person I can be. I will remember her fondly, and I will always be grateful for what she has done for me and my friends. May God rest her soul,” he repeated.
Yoongi spoke next, saying little but it was enough. Although Jimin still felt as though something was wrong. Something was terribly wrong.
Soon, it was Jimin’s turn to speak.
He felt awkward as he went to the front to speak. He took a deep breath in and imagined you, holding his hand. The warmth that suffused him gave him the strength to speak.
“Y/N was... everything to me. Never have I loved like I loved her. She was beautiful, caring, sweet and... maddening. She challenged everything I knew about myself. Everything I ever thought I knew, and she changed me. Y/N changed me for the better. She made me believe that I could do anything, be anything. No matter what I thought about myself, she always believed in me. More than I did. Y/N was knowledgeable. She loved to read, I promised her a library. That way she could read without me getting in her way, I had a way of interrupting her at the most important part of the book she’d tell me...” Jimin laughed, tears coming down his cheeks. “I love her so much, even now I love her so dearly and so fiercely that this all feels wrong. To be burying her feels like a foreign concept to me that I cannot accept. I-I... don’t want this to be it.”
“Y/N, I love you. Please forgive me,” Jimin said, taking out a vial.
It was poison. Jimin had planned to end his life here. Perhaps that was what had felt so wrong the whole time. The fact that he knew he’d be ending his life in front of his friends brought him no comfort. He only felt guilt, but he couldn’t bear another day without you here. It wasn’t feasible to him. It was everything he could do to stand right now.
“Jimin no!”
“I love you, Y/N,” he whispered, bringing the vial to his lips.
“I love you too,” a soft voice answered.
Before Jimin could turn around, Namjoon and Jungkook tackled him to the ground, taking the vial from his hands.
“No!” Jimin fought back, thrashing around like a child.
“Sire please!” Jungkook said, reaching for the vial.
“Jimin?”
Everyone froze.
Jimin looked up to see you, his beloved bride, sitting up in your casket.
“Y/N?” he whispered. Unable to believe his eyes.
“Jimin? What’s going on?” you asked, looking around. From your standpoint, you felt like you’d been asleep for a very long time. As if you’d be put under a sleeping spell or something along those lines. But now, you felt better than ever, as if you were refreshed for the first time in a long while.
“Y/N...” Jimin said, looking at you in disbelief.
“Jimin, what am I doing in here?” you asked, placing your hands on the side of the coffin.
“My love,” Jimin said, standing up and coming to your side. You looked up and smiled, so glad to see him.
“Hi,” you said, placing your hand on his cheeks. He’d been crying, you could tell.
“Y/N,” he whimpered, wrapping you up in his arms and cradling you to his chest.
“Jimin?” you asked, trying to push him back so you could look at him. But he held you firm.
“My darling, I thought I lost you,” he said, tears falling down his cheeks so freely.
“I don’t understand, the last time I saw you I was... How am I here?” you asked, looking around.
“It doesn’t matter, my love, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that you’re here now,” he whispered, wrapping his arms around you.
“But Jimin,” you started.
“Shhh,” he shushed, tangling his fingers in your hair. “I love you, so much,” he said, tilting your head up.
“I love you too,” you said back, but before you could say much else his lips were on yours. Jimin wasted no time, pulling you from the coffin without much difficulty. Jimin had you in his arms and like hell he was ever going to let you go again.
Slowly he pulled away and let his head rest against yours.
“Can you stand?” he asked, placing your feet on the ground.
“I think so,” you answered. Carefully, you took a step, almost falling to the ground if it wasn’t for Jimin’s strong arms keeping you up.
“Maybe not just yet darling, let me carry you,” he said, sweeping you up into his arms.
“Jimin!” you gasped, hanging onto his neck, not wanting to fall.
“I’ve got you,” he said, starting to carry you back towards the palace. The rest of the men there did nothing but watch as Jimin carried you in his arms.
“I never thought that this marriage would work out,” Taehyung said softly, looking at the disappearing silhouette of you and Jimin.
“Well, never say never I guess,” Namjoon said back, crossing his arms.
“I’m glad it worked out, Jimin deserves to be happy,” Jungkook commented.
“They both deserve it,” Father Jin said, smiling.
--
Your coronation was creeping up on you.
You and Jimin both would be crowned King and Queen of Arcane Kingdom. The people would be yours to govern and yours to care for. They were now your responsibility and duty. It weighed heavily on you, the stress of being a Royal. But you didn’t let it show, because you had been given a second chance at life another try.
No one gets that lucky.
But you did. And you weren’t going to waste it.
After everything that had happened, you were still so glad that you were with Jimin. Able to call him yours. It made your heart sing knowing he was your partner in all of this, your husband and truest love.
A knocking at the door shook you from your thoughts.
“Lady Y/N,” Father Jin said from the other side of the door.
“You can come in Father,” you said, putting your hairbrush down as you turned to face the door.
“I’m here as you requested,” he said, holding his bible and other various things you’d requested.
“Wonderful, I need your help,” you said, moving towards the bed.
Father Jin looked at you with confusion.
“It’s been two months and I haven’t bled yet. I-I was hoping you could find out if I was with child?” You said softly.
Father Jin almost fainted on the spot.
“W-With child? My dearest Y/N are you sure?” He asked coming forward.
“I’ve been having symptoms, the nausea in the morning, wanting weird foods and of course not bleeding but, I just wanted to know. I know if I have the palace physician check and I am pregnant he’ll run and tell Jimin. I want to tell him myself, it’s our possible child,” you said.
Father Jin beamed at you, quickly getting his materials ready.
“It would by my absolute honor my Lady,” he said. You smiled.
He busied himself with usual questions and looking at your stomach.
Finally Father Jin smiled brightly at you.
Biting your lip hard you heard his answer.
“My dear Lady Y/N, congratulations. You’re with child,” he said. Tears burst from you quickly, unable to handle the emotion of the whole situation.
You had been so worried that perhaps Morgana killing you would ruin your chances at having a child with Jimin. And considering you two had been having plenty of intimate moments, it was starting to become a fear.
But now...
Now you’re pregnant. With Jimin’s child.
Everything you’ve ever wanted and more.
“Father Jin,” you cried, hanging onto him so tightly. He pet your head gingerly, making sure you were alright before pulling back.
“Your timeline is correct, you are around two month pregnant,” he said, looking at your stomach with nothing but sheer adoration.
“I’ve been so worried,” you hiccuped.
“It’s alright Y/N, you are pregnant. And may the Lord bless you and your unborn child,” he said softly.
“Can you please keep this between us?” You asked.
“I won’t tell a soul,” he agreed.
“Thank you Father, truly, thank you so much.”
—
You were incredibly giddy for the rest of the week. Everyone had taken notice of your spunk and lively attitude. The stoic Yoongi even asked what had you all excited.
You just brushed it off, telling them you’d read a really good book or just ate something delicious. You wanted to tell Jimin so badly. But he was nowhere to be found no matter how hard you looked. The only time you were with him was when he crawled into bed with you early in the morning. Wrapping himself around you and keeping you close to him.
But he was always gone before you woke up.
You knew he was getting ready for the Royal coronation coming up soon, but it still made you a little sad. The distance.
However, you had planned it perfectly.
Jimin’s favorite lace night dress was wrapped around your body. A soft pink dressing gown over top. The man enjoyed unwrapping you like a present.
It was everything you could do not to just run to him in his study and proclaim your pregnancy to him then and there. But you oh so loved the look on his face when you gave him surprises.
Teasing little hints.
It was already late into the night, but you were determined to stay up and see your husband. It was moderately boring in your bedroom, alone, but it wouldn’t be lonely for long...
Just as you thought about going out on the balcony for some fresh air, you heard Jimin enter the room. You hadn’t seen him awake in a few days so you rushed over immediately to see him.
“Jimin!” You said, rushing to bring him into your arms.
Jimin smiled, looking exhausted, but happier now that he got to see you.
“Y/N, it’s late. What are you doing up?” He asked, kissing the top of your head with such tenderness it made your heart ache.
“Wanted to see you,” you mumbled, cheek pressed against his shoulder.
“Well, you’ve seen me. But I think it’s time for bed,” he said, removing his tunic and draping it along the chair of your vanity.
“Can we talk first? There is something important I have to tell you,” you said, taking his hand in yours.
“Is something wrong?” He asked, rubbing your knuckles with his thumb.
“Just sit down,” you said, moving him towards the bed. Jimin sat down heavily, looking up at you with a gentle smile.
“Alright my love, what did you want to discuss,” he said, rubbing his face.
He was utterly worn out, and you could see it on his face. But you knew what you were about to say would make it all worth it. It would be okay.
“Jimin, I want you to know something,” you swallowed hard. Trying to keep your emotions from becoming too much.
“Y/N? Are you okay?” He asked.
“Yes, I’m fine Jimin. But, I want you to know how much I love you. How much I adore waking up in the morning next to you. And how much I love being your wife,” you said, bringing your hand to his cheek softly.
“I love you too,” he said, a smile appearing on his weary features.
“Jimin, I-I...” you stammered, trying to find the words to get them out. Jimin frowned at your flustered attitude. Normally you could tell him anything, he wondered what had gotten you so worked up.
“Jimin,” you said, walking closer. His sparkling eyes looked up at you and you so hoped the babe in your stomach would inherit those beautiful eyes.
“Jimin I’m with child,” you said, bringing his hand to your stomach.
Jimin’s whole demeanor changed instantaneously.
“What?” He croaked, looking up into your eyes with so much hope.
“Father Jin confirmed it,” you said.
“Y-You’re really pregnant?” He asked, looking at your stomach with a multitude of emotions running across his face.
“Yes,” you said.
“Oh my God, Y/N,” he cried, bringing you into his arms. Big fat tears were rolling down his face, catching in your hair and dressing gown.
“It’s okay, Jimin it’s alright,” you said, holding him tightly.
“I’ve waited for so long to hear those words from you,” he whimpered.
“I was worried that... possibly I couldn’t after-you know. But, I-I know they’re healthy, I can feel it,” you said brightly.
“I know they are too, my love. You’ll care for them so well, they’re going to be so perfect. You’re perfect,” he said, bringing his lips to yours gently.
Smiling into the kiss you attempted to deepen it, longing for your husband's touch. But Jimin quickly pulled away.
“I’m so exhausted my love, would it be okay if I just held you tonight? Both of you?” He asked, looking down at your stomach with so much love it made your heart stammer.
“Of course, Jimin, that’s always okay,” you said.
You both went to bed, sharing innocent pecks and warm words of love for each other.
It was so perfect.
—
Being pregnant was rather grueling task, you’d found out.
There were the weird food cravings. The palace chefs could hardly keep up with you. Then the constant nausea that had plagued you and often made you miss out on certain meals. And the aching of your back and feet was another problem.
But the love you felt for the being inside of you right now, was more than you could’ve ever dreamed.
Although, there was another symptom of your pregnancy that had been particularly hard to handle.
You were ravenous for your husbands touch.
Except, he hadn’t really wanted to do anything like that with you for a while... the last time you two had been intimate was when you made this baby. And that was five months ago.
Now that you were coming into a different stage of your pregnancy, everything was getting harder. Clothing yourself, putting on shoes. It was all so taxing and you mainly wanted to rest.
Unless Jimin was there.
In which case you wanted him to ravish you until the morning came.
But, for some reason, he didn’t feel the same.
Of course he loved you, this wasn’t something you doubted. But he was very busy and you were already pregnant so what was the point in engaging in those kinds of activities if the end goal was achieved... right?
You knew Jimin loved you, he said it and showed it often. But you wished he would take you to bed and pleasure you. Let you have as much of his cum as you wanted. However, something was stopping him.
And you were determined to find out what.
Walking through the palace halls you found your husband admiring the gardens out in front of the castle. Jimin loved seeing the flowers blooming and flourishing with colors. Made him feel light inside.
You came up beside him and looked at the flowers with him. He smiled at you, wrapping his arm around your shoulders and bringing you close.
The two of you stood like that, in silence for a few moments before you decided to speak.
“Jimin,” you said, keeping your eyes trained outside.
“Yes my love?” He answered, looking at you with pure joy.
“You seem distant lately,” you said, wrapping your arm around his waist.
“Have I? I thought we’d been spending quite a lot of time together... although if you’re feeling neglected I can see if I have more time to spare-”
“I-uh... I’ve noticed that we haven’t been... intimate since we conceived and I was just wondering, if you simply weren’t attracted to me being like this? Or if it’s because we’re already pregnant so there’s no need to try anymore or, um, something else maybe?”
Jimin’s face looked mortified as he tried to gather his scrambled mind and unprepared thoughts.
“Y/N, love no! Of course not! I absolutely adore being intimate with you! And not attracted to you? I-I can’t hardly control myself when I’m around you. Pregnant and swollen with my child,” he said, almost growling out the last part.
“Then why Jimin? Why haven’t you been touching me? Letting me touch you! What’s going on?” You asked, wondering what was causing the distance between your husband and you.
“T-the palace physician warned me about being with you like that, I don’t want to hurt you or the baby,” he said softly.
“But it’s not dangerous-Father Jin was encouraging me to, well as much as he would encourage someone to be intimate...” you said. “He said we should be... with one another as much as we can. It’s good for us to relieve the stress and I’ll never complain about you showing your love to me and my love for you.”
“But, what if I go too hard? What if I, I don’t know, make the baby come early? Or what if-”
“Jimin, my love, these are a lot of what ifs. Not a lot of what will... Nothing will happen to me or the child. That I can promise you,” you said, holding your distended stomach with affection. “You’d never hurt us.”
The young King looked so torn. Like he truly didn’t know what to do.
“I’m just... I’m worried about you,” he said softly, resting his forehead against yours.
“I’m tough,” you said, squeezing his hand gently.
“I know, God I know how strong you are. More than fit to be the Queen of this Kingdom, my wife, my equal... But, carrying a child is no small feat,” he said, brushing your hair off your face.
“It isn’t but I’m not doing it alone,” you said, wrapping your arms around his neck. “You’ve been with me every step of the way. We had rocky beginnings, but look at where we are now. Look at how much we’ve overcome and how much we will overcome in the future. It’s incredible, Jimin. You are the ruler that destroyed the witch Morgana,” you said.
“Actually, you’re the one who dealt the killing blow on that one, I just get all the credit cause I’m the King. Unfair if you ask me,” Jimin laughed lightly.
“What I’m saying is, you’re so brave, stubborn and wickedly smart. Surely you can think of a way in which we can be intimate and it not harm me or the babe?” You said, biting your lip.
“Don’t do that, I’ve been having dreams about your sweet mouth,” he groaned.
“Mmm, have you? Perhaps I should give it to you then, hmm?” You teased.
Jimin was a rather dominant person, but you’d discovered that sometimes he likes to be pushed around in bed. Told what to do and to be praised. It wasn’t something you’d been entirely good at to start, but, with a little practice you’d gotten the hang of it.
“My love,” he croaked.
“Jimin, I know you. I know how careful and gentle you can be. I’ll tell you if anything hurts or if I’m uncomfortable. But please, please take me to bed,” you begged.
Finally, it seemed you broke through. Because soon, you were being practically dragged down the hallway. Jimin’s grip on your wrist was tight, but not enough to hurt. You smirked as he hauled you into the bedroom, shutting the door firmly behind the two of you.
“God, look at you,” he murmured, coming forward to place his hands on your swollen belly. “So beautiful, so perfect carrying my child.”
“All yours,” you agreed, humming as his lips touched your neck.
“And I’m yours,” he said softly.
“Take this off,” you pleaded, tugging at his shirt with disdain. Giving you a coy grin, he pulled the shirt off and threw it on the floor. You ran your hands over his beautiful body, teasingly pinching his nipple, causing him to flinch.
“Little sprite, I’ll teach you to tease me,” he growled. Wetness pooled between your legs. Jimin came forward, finally connecting your lips.
Kissing Jimin was something you’d never tire of. You were certain. The way his plush lips moved over yours with reckless abandon make you squirm. His mouth captured your own, pulling you into a romantic embrace as the pair of you shared your breath.
“Jimin,” you whispered as he pulled away.
“What is it my love? What do you desire?” He asked, moving his lips along your jawline.
“Whatever you’ll give me, I want it all,” you pleaded.
“My my, so greedy. What a greedy Queen I have,” he tutted. You whined at his tone, wanting nothing more for the clothes between you to be removed.
“I just want you, only you,” you pleaded.
“You have me my love, all of me,” he said, kissing you softly. You wrapped your arms around his neck, cradling his head. You felt the back of your bed against your knees, forcing you to sit down while Jimin kissed you with such ferocity it made your poor core clench tightly around nothing.
“And you have all of me in return,” you smiled. Jimin pushed you onto your back, making you stare at the ceiling. Your heart was hammering so hard in your chest, you could feel it in your throat.
“I-Is it okay if I pleasure you? With my mouth?” He asked, looking at you beneath his long lashes. You smiled and brushed his hair from his face gently, but this was not without difficulty, you swollen tummy proving to be an obstacle.
“Mmm, that does sound nice. But, you have had me wait five months for you. I’m slightly tempted to skip the foreplay and go right for the main event,” you mused, watching as Jimin’s eyes inflated slightly. You smiled at his obvious desire for you, before you sat up and undid the ties at the front of your gown. Jimin watched as your chest relaxed, breasts bigger than they were before you’d gotten pregnant.
“I-If you’re wet enough,” he said, licking his lips.
“Why don’t you check?” You said, peeling your dress from your shoulders and easing the fabric down. Jimin moved so you could wiggle out of the offending material and lay naked on the bed. He was astounded and slightly concerned that you hadn’t been wearing any undergarments underneath.
“Oh my beautiful wife, how lucky am I to have someone like you...” he trailed off, gazing at your center with wanton desire.
“I’m just as lucky, if not more so,” you smiled, tugging on his ashy locks, earning you a warning grunt in response.
“A husband who neglects his wife for months on end? Surely you jest with me,” he chuckled sadly.
“You are more than attentive. Sometimes smothering, but never neglectful. Jimin listening to the palace physician isn’t wrong. He just happens to think he knows everything while Father Jin has had actual experience with pregnancy and birth. By the way, he will be delivering our child, not that ridiculous palace physician. I’d rather not have him near me when I’m giving birth,” you huffed, pouting slightly.
“Oh? I see, who else did you want there while you deliver? I know I should’ve asked this but-”
“You, Father Jin to deliver and Jungkook as well as Taehyung. Yoongi and Namjoon, and... Hoseok,” you said pondering for a moment.
“Those are all men, Y/N,” Jimin reminded, pouting from above you.
“And? Hoseok is our Godfather for the child, I believe he should be there. Jungkook is good in a crisis and also has knowledge of pregnancy and birth from his mother. Taehyung is such a dear friend, I certainly want him there. Yoongi is always calm and collected, and Namjoon would just feel left out if I didn’t include him!”
“You missed one,” he frowned.
“Of course I want you there silly. It’s your fault I’m like this, so you’re going to be there for the whole thing, no stepping out and no leaving me, understood?” You asked, raising a brow at him. Jimin just nodded.
“It’s not just my fault you’re like this, I don’t ever recall you saying no,” he snarked.
“I’m also not saying no now, if we could get back on track?” You asked, bringing his hand to your throbbing center. Jimin seemed to get the message as he rubbed his fingers along your slit, collecting your slick between the pads of his fingers and your skin.
“My love, so ready for me,” he murmured, coming in closer to kiss your neck. You let out a sigh of pleasure, running your hands down his back, scratching along the skin gently, causing goosebumps to rise in your wake. He groaned as you gripped his ass in your palms, causing him to rut forward like a pup in heat. You smirked at his enthusiasm, squeezing once more before he whined against your skin.
“Oh!” You gasped as he entered one finger inside your tight heat. A soft groan came from his cherry red lips, causing you to clamp down on the digit inside of you. Jimin moved his finger gently, stretching your hole out carefully. Everything he did, he did with purpose. It made your heart stammer in your chest as you could feel another finger slipping in next to the first one.
“So tight,” he growled, pumping in and out of you with a delicious tempo that had your hips grinding down against his hand. “You’re soaking the bed my darling.”
“I-I can’t help it, you feel too good,” you moaned.
“Mm, you sure I can’t have a taste? Just a little bit wouldn’t hurt,” he whispered against the shell of your ear. You wanted so badly to encourage his devilish mouth, but you gripped his wrist and forced him to stop moving those dangerous fingers inside of you.
He looked worried for a moment. But you smoothed your thumb over his brow.
“I can’t wait any more, please don’t make me wait,” you whined, humping against his fingers. “Give it to me, please. Fill me up.”
Jimin’s eyes turned dark as he pulled his hand away from your center. Watching with rapt attention you saw him take his sticky digits and put them in his mouth, sucking lewdly on your arousal. Jimin made a show of it. Licking and sucking on his fingers, trying to get every last drop of your essence off of his fingers. He was also proving that he could pleasure you with his mouth if you’d only let him.
“You want my cock? Want it so bad huh? My beautiful Queen, you want it? Huh? Tell me why I should give it to you?” He said, eyes glazing over as you presented yourself on all fours for him.
“Because, I’ve been so good for you. I’m carrying your baby, so pregnant and full, but not full enough. I need more, more of your cum Jimin. Want more of it leaking from me, please, remind me how you got me pregnant. Please, won’t you give me your cock? Your cum? Please, I want it so badly,” you pleaded.
Jimin’s eyes darkened further. He knew you were good at begging, it was one of his favorite things to teach you, because you learned so quickly what he liked. And he would never be able to deny such an earnest request.
“If that’s what you want my love, then you’ll have it. Have me,” he agreed, moving off the bed to push his pants and underwear to the ground before coming back to the bed. You felt his presence behind you, smoothing over your back gently. “Is this position okay? Or do you need something different?” He asked, kissing your shoulder.
“This is okay, I’m comfortable,” you encouraged. “Now, fuck me.”
Jimin needed no further words as he sank into you slowly for the first time in months. The pair of you breathed out heavy sighs as you finally felt the fullness you’d been craving for weeks. Jimin choked on a moan when you flexed your walls around him, making him buck into you a little harsher than expected.
“Sorry! I haven’t-Since we haven’t been doing anything I haven’t even pleasured myself, I haven’t had the time, you feel so good around me, fuck,” he moaned out, gripping your hips firmly.
“It’s okay, I won’t last long. I’ve missed you so much,” you moaned, your fists tightening in the bed sheets beneath you.
“Oh shit,” he growled, bucking into you again, building a steady rhythm that had your chest jolting almost painfully. Your core was soaking, and Jimin wasn’t letting up. He was fucking into you so hard some of your arousal was falling down your thighs.
“Jimin, harder,” you pleaded, head falling into the mattress. Your husband didn’t have to be told twice as he started rutting into your wet heat with vigor.
“I’ve been thinking about this everyday since you told me you were pregnant,” he snarled, pulling all the way out just to force himself back in once more. You cried out when his fingers found your clit, causing you to grind back against him. The air rushed from his lungs as he watched you practically use him for your own pleasure.
“Everyday? Then why didn’t you do anything?” You whined, bouncing back against him harshly. Jimin swallowed hard as he tried to stave off his looming orgasm.
“Because the physician... I was worried I’d hurt you or the baby, like I said earlier. But now that I know this is safe, don’t expect to be able to walk for a while,” he warned, pulling on your sensitive nipples gingerly. You cried out into the mattress when milk started to leak down Jimin’s hand. He watched as the pearly white substance soaked the sheets beneath you like your arousal had earlier.
“Fuck! Jimin, keep going please!” You begged when he got distracted by your chest practically flooding the bed.
“Have you not been expressing the milk? Doesn’t it hurt?” He asked.
“Yes, it aches so much during the day and I’m so sensitive when I try to sleep. Sometimes I wake up and my nightdress is soaked from milk,” you whined, trying to reach for him so he would keep pounding into you.
“Mm, since I didn’t get to have a taste of your pussy... Maybe you’ll let me have something else instead,” he teased, licking the milk off of his hands and groaning when it hit his tastebuds.
“More, please more!” You begged. Jimin noticed your frantic bouncing and eased you into a spooning position. He was still throbbing inside of you, but you could feel his head come to your shoulder, placing soft kisses against it.
“Let me drink from you, it must hurt my darling. So full and heavy with milk for our child, but they can share, surely?” He teased, kissing the side of your breast while giving shallow thrusts to your womanhood.
“You can have it, whatever you want as long as you keep fucking me. Please, Jimin, I’m so close,” you whimpered. Sensing your urgency Jimin started his brutal pace back up. You cried out in bliss when his mouth met your sensitive nipple. Jimin gently suckled at your chest, causing more milk to enter his mouth.
He groaned at the flavor and gave a few sharp ruts into your clenching pussy. You were besides yourself with pleasure, almost in tears at all the stimulation.
Jimin wasn’t doing much better. Five months without even masturbating was proving to be his end far too quickly.
“Y/N, I’m going to cum. Are you close?” He asked, reaching down to push at your clit gently.
“Yes! Right there, pleasepleaseplease! Jimin,” you cried. Your walls tightened beyond belief, causing Jimin to freeze in his thrusting. He watched your face as you fell apart for him, causing him to reach his end as well. A cry of your name on his lips as ropes of hot cum painted your walls milky white. Jimin shuddered in overstimulation as you continued to clench yourself around his spent cock.
The pair of you lay there, clutching each other in the afterglow as you tried to catch your breath. Jimin decided to move first, pulling his still twitching length from your abused center. You watched as he stood on wobbly legs and came back with a towel to clean you up with. A soft smile took over your features as you spread your legs easily for him.
After he was satisfied, you opened your arms for him. Jimin moved forward without hesitation, wrapping your exhausted body with his own. He kissed the top of your head, then around your jaw and finally a firm kiss was placed on your lips.
“I love you so much my darling,” he smiled, resting his head on the pillow.
“I love you too, we both do.”
—
You’d never thought that giving birth would be a pleasant experience.
But never in your entire life did you imagine it would hurt this much.
The contractions had started early in the morning. Making you wake Jimin with a frantic push.
“My love what is it?” He asked, sitting up in the bed with a bewildered look on his face.
“Get Father Jin right now,” you demanded, leaning forward to hold your severely swollen stomach. Jimin was out of bed and quickly called the guards to get the Priest from his room as fast as possible.
They yelled back their confirmation before they hurried off. You felt the distinct cramping from your groin and moaned low in pain. Jimin came back over to you, looking at you with worry etched onto his features.
“Do you want anything? Anyone? I’ll call for whatever you need,” he said, taking your shaking hands in his.
“Good morning,” you whispered, giving him a weak smile.
“Good morning,” he smiled back, kissing your knuckles gently.
Soon you were in a different room entirely, getting settled into the blankets and all the people close to you had been summoned.
Jungkook and Taehyung had gotten there first, both excited and ready for the proceedings.
“Lady Y/N! It’s really happening? Oh my gosh! I’m so excited for you,” Jungkook said, coming over to place a gentle kiss on your hand out of respect.
“Thank you Jungkook, how is training the new recruits going?” You asked, trying to distract yourself from the pain.
“Oh that’s all boring! We don’t want to hear about that!” Taehyung said, coming next to you and also kissing your hand.
“Maybe she does my Lord,” Jungkook sneered. You knew the two of them had always had a friendly competition going on. But, right now you shushed them and told them to go sit down.
Hoseok and Namjoon were next, coming in shortly after Taehyung and Jungkook.
“My lady,” Namjoon said, taking to his knee in front of you.
“There’s no need for that right now, Namjoon. How are you? We haven’t had tea in a while, and I fear if this babe comes now we might not for a long while yet,” you teased and Namjoon just smiled as he stood up.
“We can sneak some tea in soon my Lady, leave the child with the King to see how he fares,” he smirked. Jimin was pouting. You knew it without even looking at him.
“I might have to do that,” you smiled. Hoseok came over quickly after, kissing your hand a few times before looking at you with excitement.
“Is there anything you want? Anything you need? I know you’re not supposed to eat anything right now but maybe some water?” He asked.
“It’s so sweet of you to offer, but right now I’m just tired and a little cranky,” you laughed, trying to keep yourself in good spirits.
Hoseok seemed to understand, giving your hand a soft squeeze before walking over to talk with Namjoon and Jungkook.
“Where’s Yoongi? And Father Jin?” You asked, looking around.
“We’re here!” Father Jin said, a bright smile on his face as he escorted a grumpy looking Yoongi through the doorway.
“Yeah, here,” Yoongi said, yawning and scowling at the older man.
“I’m sorry to wake you,” you whispered, reaching out for the stoic man. His resolve quickly melted as he came by and pressed a gentle kiss to the back of your hand.
“I’m sure you’d rather be sleeping now too, but I’m fine. Are you alright?” He asked, looking at you with an intensity you always forgot he possessed.
“Yes, just some contractions right now. My water hasn’t broken yet,” you said. Yoongi nodded and looked at Jimin with a soft smile.
“How are you faring, feeling okay?” He asked, looking at the father to be with kind eyes.
“Nervous, but happy,” he confirmed, taking your hand in his.
“Wonderful,” he yawned, going to sit down and hopefully doze off while you were still in the early stages.
Father Jin gathered everyone up and they all listened attentively to whatever he had to say. The day progressed and your water hadn’t broken yet, but the men all stayed, asking if there was anything you needed, holding your hand if you felt a particularly rough contraction.
But most importantly, Jimin was right by your side the whole time.
When your water did finally break, it was like hell also had broken loose.
It was later, probably afternoon when you felt it happen.
Father Jin was suddenly on his feet demanding towels and hot water for you, as well as some herbs that would help numb the pain as much as they could. Jimin looked panic stricken when you clutched onto his hand.
“It’s okay,” he said softly, brushing your hair away from your face.
“I’m scared,” you whispered, another wave of pain crashing through you without remorse.
“I’m scared too,” he confessed. “But I know you can do it. You’re already the perfect wife, now you’re going to be the perfect mother... Our child is almost here,” he said, kissing your cheek.
“Jungkook, Lord Taehyung each of you grab a leg and hold them please,” Father Jin said as he sat in front of you. Both men looked shocked at the idea, but you and Jimin both nodded, giving them permission.
Jungkook gently placed his hands on your calf and pushed your leg back holding it in position for you. Taehyung did the same, each of them keeping their eyes respectful.
“Why do we have to hold her legs?” Taehyung asked, looking at Jungkook.
“Gives her more leverage and relieves some of the pressure on her back,” Jungkook answered.
“The only problem is it can close off the birthing canal at an awkward angle, but for now this is the best position to give her a break,” Father Jin said.
When you started pushing, you felt your lower back ache with how much strain you were under. Jimin could only watch as you cried out in pain when Father Jin urged you to keep going.
Everyone in the room was tense with worry.
Your health had always been fragile, even after coming back from the dead you still fell sick easily and had trouble with your lungs. But Father Jin was focused on the baby, while Jimin was focused on you.
“I never expected it to hurt this much,” Namjoon whispered, watching on in horror as his Queen and dear friend struggled to keep conscious through the pain.
“I think I’m going to be sick,” you wailed. Hoseok was quick to grab a bucket that was formerly filled with water and held it as you threw up. Jimin smoothed his hands down your back, trying to keep himself from crying. Jungkook and Taehyung had given you a break with your legs so you could turn as you emptied your stomach.
“Y/N,” Jimin murmured, kissing your shoulder gently.
“Sit back straight, Y/N, you need to keep pushing,” Father Jin said. You were delirious with pain and exhaustion. You needed something to keep you grounded. The one thing you knew would always keep you grounded.
“My love, talk to me, just keep talking to me,” you pleaded, voice hoarse with how much you’d been crying.
“Y/N, it’s alright,” Jimin soothed, kissing your sweaty forehead with worry. “They’re almost here, we’re so close to meeting our baby. We’re so close to being a family.”
“Alright your Majesty another big push on the count of three, one... two... three!” Father Jin said, you pushed hard and felt nothing but sheer agony as the child started crowning.
“I can see the head!” Hoseok said, standing behind Father Jin, now hanging onto Yoongi tightly.
“Oh my God,” you cried, head falling back on the pillows.
“Keep pushing Y/N!” Father Jin said, preparing a cloth.
“I can’t, I really can’t, I’ll die if I keep going please,” you stammered. Taehyung and Jungkook shared an anxious look. Namjoon looked at you with fear written all over his features.
“My love, look at me,” Jimin said softly, bringing your eyes to his.
“It hurts, I can’t... Please don’t make me, ah!” You cried out as you felt another contraction.
“Y/N you need to push! Hard as you can,” Father Jin said, looking at your situation.
“Keep going Lady Y/N,” Jungkook said, looking up to your weary face. He’d seen several women give birth in his village, his mother being a midwife. But, to see someone he cared about going through this was difficult.
“You’ll be alright, you will. But if you stop pushing you’re putting you and the baby in danger,” Father Jin warned.
“How much longer?” You cried, giving another hard push.
“You’re so close,” Yoongi said, watching you with concern.
“You’re doing great!” Taehyung chirped, watching on in amazement.
He couldn’t wait to have his own family...
“The head is almost out, come on Y/N, keep going,” Father Jin said.
“Jimin,” you whimpered, clutching his hand as you gave the hardest push yet.
“I love you so much, keep going Y/N, I love you,” he whispered into your ear. You pushed again and finally, finally there was some relief.
“Oh my God!” Hoseok yelped, gripping onto Yoongi’s arm so tight he was certain that he was going to break his limb.
“You’re going to rip my arm off! Father Jin is a little busy right now!” Yoongi growled.
“Can you give me one more push? Just one more,” Jimin asked, kissing your shoulder. Looking at him with tears in your eyes you nodded, giving another strong push before soft cries filled the room.
“It’s a boy!”
“A prince!”
“Congratulations your majesties!”
You slumped back onto the bed, breathing heavily when a small bundle was placed on your chest. Looking down you saw your son, wiped off haphazardly and clutching your nightdress tightly.
“Oh Y/N,” Jimin whispered, placing a gentle kiss on your lips.
“He’s so handsome!” Hoseok cooed, looking on at you and Jimin both. Father Jin had you push a few more times to deliver the afterbirth, but nothing was as intense as giving birth to your son.
“Ji...min...” you breathed, eyes growing heavy.
“Can she rest Father?” Taehyung asked, looking at the little prince attached to his mother with tear filled eyes.
“Not yet, Y/N, stay awake,” Father Jin warned.
“Why...?” You asked, slowly taking in deep breaths.
“I need to check you and the baby over, and he needs to feed,” Father Jin said softly, cleaning you up still. Your eyes were still heavy, but you heard your baby crying softly on your chest.
Instinctively you shushed him, bringing him to your chest so he could latch on. After a little struggle, he was feeding eagerly. You brushed his hair gently, watching with sleepy eyes as he ate his fill.
Father Jin came over, congratulating you on a wonderful delivery. He did tell you everything you needed to do for the coming days, encouraging you to stay in bed and keep the baby close to form a relationship. He also told Jimin to take the baby and have time as well.
“It’s important that you two stay together for this coming week, I’ll make sure that the advisors and everyone just leaves you alone unless it is absolutely life or death,” Father Jin said, looking at your babe with a tenderness that made your heart swell.
“What’s the baby’s name? Hmm? What do we call our new prince?” Namjoon asked, raising a brow.
“Jihoon?” You asked, looking at Jimin for confirmation.
“It’s perfect,” Jimin agreed, giving you a kiss on the forehead.
“Prince Jihoon, I’ll let the advisors and everyone know,” Taehyung said, running into the hall.
“Lord Taehyung! Just hang on a second!” Namjoon yelled, chasing after the excited noble.
“We’d better go and make sure they don’t get into any trouble,” Yoongi said to Jungkook, patting his shoulder before guiding the younger male out the door.
“As much as I’d love to spend time with my Godchild, I have to make sure that my brother and friends don’t cause a scene,” Hoseok said. He came up and gave your hand a gentle kiss. “Congratulations Lady Y/N, I’m truly happy for you.”
With that he left the room, followed shortly by Father Jin.
You and Jimin were alone with your baby, the soft sound of his gurgles filling the room. Jimin looked down at you, eyes watery as he kissed your child’s head. You brushed the tears away from his face, even though exhaustion was flooding your aching body, you wanted to make sure he was okay too. He had also been through a lot today.
“I love you,” you said, watching as more tears fell from his eyes.
“I love you too, both of you... So much,” he whimpered. “That was the most beautiful and heartbreaking thing I’ve ever had to experience.”
“Heartbreaking?” You wondered out loud.
“To see you in so much pain, and there was nothing I could do about it,” he said, looking at your child, hands shaking.
“It’s alright, I’m okay now,” you said, holding his hand in your clammy one. Jimin pressed a delicate kiss to your wrist, looking up at you with so much love and adoration.
“I’m sorry you hurt so much, if I could take your pain I would,” he said, brushing your hair back.
“Doesn’t hurt anymore,” you mumbled, eyes closing slowly. “Just tired now...”
“Sleep my love, we’ll be here when you wake up.”
And they were.
And they always would be.
Forever.
#Ficswithluv#Jessika Hathaway#BTS#BTS smut#Jimin X Reader#Jimin fanfic#Jimin smut#Park Jimin smut#Park Jimin fanfiction#BTS royalty AU#BTS fantasy#Yoongi#Jin#Seokjin#Suga#V#Taehyung#Jungkook#JK#RM#Namjoon#Hoseok#Jhope#Hobi#BTS fanfiction#BTS fanfic#bts
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bingo
another fic for the chayenzo community fanfiction challenge! i asked for this prompt today and wrote it in [checks watch] two hours? i was inspired. anyway! we now have vincenzo attending his mother’s funeral and having feelings about it. oh and my prompt was “i’ll still be here when you’re ready.”
thank you to @the-chayenzo-community for organising this!
word count: 1164
read on ao3
(sorry for any errors!)
enjoy :]
-
The day rains cold and rains relentless. Service takes less time than necessary, and with Geumga Plaza at his back, Vincenzo sees his mother for the last time. Unfilial son that he is, he has no tears to shed as they lower her casket six feet under, no tears to shed as the mud is filled in and she is gone from the world.
When the priest sums up all that has to be said to honour Oh Gyeongja, mother of one, Vincenzo is only left with the strangest loneliness. Only left with more space between him and the world, between him and the world, only a stretch of quiet.
The tenants of Geumga Plaza leave, one by one, unloading their condolences. Vincenzo nods, bows, receives. And then he follows Chayoung wherever she takes him by the hand, one step behind, lifeless in his steps and his grip.
Riverside. Cold, too. But the rain has let up, and the rocks are only slightly damp.
“They buried a man alive once,” He says. “I saw Father do it. It wasn’t even a big enough coffin for him to fit.”
Chayoung tugs him by the hand to sit, to watch the waves. “What happened of him?”
Vincenzo shrugs. “Never found out. I was only fifteen.”
“Thrilling for a fifteen-year-old to see,” She comments lowly. No vigour in her words. “How are we doing?”
Vincenzo’s eyes dart to her. She’s looking right back.
“I need time.”
She nods. “I’ll still be here when you’re ready.”
Vincenzo looks at the waves.
Chayoung sighs and picks up a stick. “Do you want to make a bingo or something?”
“Bingo?”
“Orphans, lawyers, attractive, incredibly smart, like seriously, too awesome for this world…”
It draws a laugh out of him. A pathetic, dead excuse of a laugh, but a laugh nonetheless.
“I’m glad you laughed,” Chayoung says. She aimlessly throws the stick. “Took a real gamble with that one.”
“What, did you think I would throw you into the river?”
“Wouldn’t put it past you, Mr. Consigliere.”
“Cruel.”
She pets his shoulder in consolation. “If it makes you feel better, I know how to swim.”
“You’re horrible.”
Chayoung takes it, shifting closer to lean on his shoulder. “She’s proud of you, you know.”
Vincenzo looks at the sky. “She would be, wouldn’t she? To have a murderer of a son.”
Chayoung glares at him. “Don’t underestimate a parent’s love. It’s unconditional.”
Vincenzo meets her glare, huffs out a scoff. They’re close enough for his breath to reflect on her nose.
“Trust me,” Chayoung insists. “I have experience in this department.”
He blinks at her, then nods, acquiescing. “Sorry.”
“No need.”
Chayoung exhales in the silence, leans in further, wraps a tentative arm around Vincenzo. The river runs and the wind flows. There are birds singing somewhere.
“Unfilial,” Vincenzo says. “Liars. Living with the most painful thing in life.”
Chayoung moves forward, almost directly in front of him, her hand placed on his back. “What are you harping on about.”
“The bingo,” Vincenzo mutters, looking into her eyes.
She sighs, sliding out of the half-hug and setting her hands on Vincenzo’s shoulders. “I think you should shut up.”
“I don’t think I should shut up,” He replies, defensive.
“Byeonhosa-nim,” Chayoung chastises. “You won’t achieve anything by beating yourself up.”
“But —”
“But then again,” Chayoung cuts in, “I was no different. Alright. You have three minutes to curse yourself out as much as you want.”
“There is a lot I should be getting angry with you about.”
“We’re partners, byeonhosa-nim.” Chayoung says, all matter-of-fact-ly. “And we’re very much the same. Getting angry at me would be getting angry at yourself, no?”
Vincenzo’s face morphs into one of those rare expressions of extreme disgust. Chayoung knows she’s seen right through him. Before he can reply, she stands.
“I’m getting out of your sight, I’m going,” She hurries to say. “Three minutes. I’m timing you.”
Vincenzo watches her walk away from the river with a scowl.
-
Chayoung buys him coffee on the way back. Espresso, in that annoyingly tiny cup, and Vincenzo Cassano. A scene that has become as familiar as her reflection in the mirror. He sips diligently.
“Did it feel good?”
Vincenzo shakes his head with resolution.
“It doesn’t,” Chayoung sighs. “I know.”
Vincenzo downs his espresso in one go.
“Wanna go home?” Chayoung asks. At his nod, she chugs down the rest of her drink.
“Let’s go, then.”
She’s standing, picking her coat off the back of her chair, when Vincenzo speaks in the smallest voice.
“Byeonhosa-nim.”
Chayoung looks at him. He’s looking back, up at her, with the slightest of red in his eyes.
Chayoung plucks his coat off the back of his chair and drapes it over her forearm, then hauls him up by the hand.
“Let’s go,” She repeats. “Let’s take you home, you’ve had a long day.”
-
The only real challenge is parking the car, for the rain had caused a power cut, and the lights in the parking lot were all out. Vincenzo’s hands only shake slightly when he unlocks the door, and he has to lean on the wall a moment before he can regain himself to take off his shoes and discard his coat and fall back-first on the sofa.
Chayoung follows less quietly, banging pots and pans even when she does not mean to. When she has water boiling, she pads to the sofa as well.
Vincenzo stares straight up at the ceiling. His lighter is in one hand, closed and held closed, and his exhales are timed.
“You’re home,” Chayoung says. “You don’t need to hold back at home.”
Vincenzo moves his gaze to hers, blankly. He takes another measured breath.
Then, brokenly: “Will you sit with me?”
Chayoung nods in less than a heartbeat, making herself comfortable the moment Vincenzo sits up. She opens her arms, and at Vincenzo’s mouth open equally as much, she just scoffs and pulls him close.
He lets out a sound of surprise, but settles against her wordlessly.
“It’s okay to need comfort.”
Vincenzo gulps, blinks up at the ceiling. Chayoung can feel the way his throat moves from where his neck is perched on her shoulder. Slowly, he reciprocates the embrace, his arms tight across her back.
Chayoung soothes him with a hand stroking his hair.
“You do trust me, don’t you?” She questions, when the heaviness builds in her throat as well. “I trust you.”
“I trust you,” Vincenzo murmurs, breath hot against her neck.
Chayoung shifts back for a moment, puts a little distance between them without breaking the embrace. The hand she had in his hair traces its way to cup his cheek. She leans forward and kisses his forehead.
“I’ll still be here when you’re ready,” She repeats.
Vincenzo bites his lip, nodding, and blinks hard. When his tears fall, they have a sure shoulder to fall on, and when he crumbles, unquiet, he has a sure embrace to fall into.
#tvn vincenzo#vincenzo cassano#hong chayoung#chayenzo#chayenzo fic#vincenzo fic#ccfc2021#whovie writes
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This is my Deubek fic ✨ feel free to read and tell me what u think
Pairing: Deuce/Sebek
Warnings: character death, angst, f to literally every first year
In which Sebek realizes time sucks
What color were his eyes?
The sounds of leaves rustling reached Sebek's ears as the young man sat calmly in his seat, his eyes drifting over the red roses, the black thorns that had curled around the garden.
He had planted the roses himself, hoping to grow big green bushes of red roses. However, nothing in the Valley of Thorns seemed to grow so splendidly, and he could only make do with a bushful of thorns, littered with red buds.
He took a sip of his drink—coffee, extra sweet. Sebek had never liked coffee too much, but one too many cafe outings with a certain human had gotten him accustomed to the flavor, although he couldn't say he adored it.
A sigh escaped Sebek's lips and he set down his cup, his eyes drawing towards the seat across from him. Closing his eyes, he could recall a vivid scene, a garden full of red blooms, and a man sitting before him, wisps of his blue disheveled hair falling over his eyes. The man looked to be much older than him, perhaps in his late twenties or early thirties, although there was a delicate charm about him that captivated many.
This man was none other than his former classmate and current lover, Deuce Spade.
He recalled Deuce smiling as he always had—and Deuce's smile was quite pretty, or so he recalled thinking so—and laughing over a cup of coffee. Deuce always did like the drink, perhaps a little too much even.
He recalled himself hesitating, his voice uncharacteristically quiet, "Hey, Deuce. Does it...bother you?"
Deuce blinked, tilting his head as he rested his cheek against his palm, his tone gentle, "This again? You ask me that every week now, you know." He smiled, ruffling Sebek's hair, "You're fae. I'm human. Our appearances aren't something that can be helped, and I don't love you any less for it."
He pulled his hand back, laughing softly, "If anything, I should be the one asking you that. I'm growing older by the day...all my officer work has given me wrinkles you know?" He gestured jokingly to his face, "At this rate, when we go out together, I'll be asked if I was your grandpa."
"N-no!" Sebek raised his voice, "I don't...I...Deuce, you look just as good as before. You'll always look good." He furrowed his eyebrows, a prominent frown upon his lips, "Don't say that…"
"Sebek, I didn't know you were so romantic." Deuce teased, "But I'm just joking." The smile on his face faded, and he trailed his fingers along the rip of his half empty cup, his voice quieting down, "I guess I haven't been taking this as seriously as you want me to."
A sigh. "You know, one day I won't be here anymore."
Sebek began to fidget with the handle of his cup, his fingers turning white from gripping it so tightly, "...We don't have to talk about that if you don't want to."
He'd been trying to bring it up for months, yet he supposed a little part of him didn't want to accept the truth.
"No. We can talk about it now." Deuce hummed, "I don't know when's the next time I'll be able to talk to you so leisurely, so now is as good of a time as ever." Deuce did dabble in quite a dangerous profession, he never knew when was the last day he'd live, and Sebek knew that.
"One day I'll be gone, and when that time comes…I don't want you to feel burdened." Deuce continued. Before Sebek could respond, he said, "You can live for hundreds of years while I might not even live to 90. The world is full of people…Sebek, if one day I am gone, I want you to know that it's okay to love someone else. It's okay to move on."
The fae sharply inhaled, "That's what you want to tell me? I won't love anyone else. I won't, ever. You can't make me." He looked to Deuce, as if begging him to not discuss this further, "I don't want to love anyone else."
"You don't have to, but I want you to know it's okay." Deuce shook his head, "You deserve happiness. Even if it's not with me."
Sebek recalled arguing with Deuce often afterwards about the same subject, time and time again. With each visit, Deuce seemed to grow older, more worn out.
He was sipping on coffee again, his voice a little hoarse, "You should've seen Ace the other day. A headful of white hair. I told him he was gonna bald out one of these days."
A constant reminder that all of them were growing older—all except Sebek. The fae smiled, and glanced down into his cup, his drink reflecting a green haired man, no older than his early twenties. He felt a little self conscious, "I wish I could've seen it."
Deuce laughed, "I'll take a picture for you next time. You should really come to our gathering next year, Epel and Jack keep asking for you." His smile grew dimmer, and his fingers traced upon the rim of his cup again, a bad habit, "Epel...doesn't have much time left."
Sebek's blood ran cold, "So soon?"
"Hm...well." Deuce could only look down, "Not that soon."
Oh right. They were all...really old weren't they? Only to Sebek did it seem like they had only been in class together a year ago, doing stupid things, getting into trouble.
"I...didn't realize." Sebek could only mutter. "I'll come next year."
Deuce merely took Sebek's hand in his, rubbing his knuckles comfortingly.
Sebek recalled next seeing Epel through a picture frame, upon a white table as the people around him, people who looked much older than him, shedded silent tears, surrounding a coffin decorated with white roses.
He couldn't recall much of what happened next. Only that the years passed by in a blur, and that loss soon grew familiar to him. Jack...Ace...Silver...everyone around him began to leave.
Eventually, even Deuce too, left him. But even then, Sebek found he couldn't recall his last words to him, he couldn't recall their last moments together or how old Deuce was then. He couldn't remember.
On most days, it was okay. He could function well enough to work, to do his job. On other days, he would lay in bed, crying himself to sleep, although the comfort of the cushion below him just reminded him of his former sleepy companion. Malleus and Lillia had told him that it would get better, that it would get easier, but it never did, not really. At least that was what he thought at first.
But that was hundreds of years ago.
As time passed, he grew to realize that perhaps they were right. The coffee in his cup had grown cold as he spaced off. And he frowned, perhaps he should've iced it.
His gaze landed back to the seat before him, the seat that Deuce used to occupy hundreds of years ago.
His memory seemed to gradually fade as time passed, and he trailed his fingers over the rim of his cup, a bad habit that he'd developed from somewhere he couldn't recall. He could faintly remember the warmth of Deuce's laughter, and the feel of his fingers raking through Sebek's hair. He could barely remember the flush of Deuce's cheeks, and the way his hair fell over his face as he spoke, his words falling upon deaf ears now that Sebek could no longer recall his voice.
The wind picked up once more, caressing through green locks like a familiar warm hand, and Sebek hummed softly, a small smile graced upon his lips as he mused to himself, his thoughts drifting off to Deuce once more, the person he once loved, the distant memory he had surely romanticized beyond recognition.
What color were his eyes?
#i am a clown for thinking i was going to write a fluffy deubek fic#twisted wonderland#deuce spade#sebek zigvolt#deubek
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Peace Is A Journey (Chapter 20/?)
In which Callum and Ezran finally confront an awful truth.
(Chapter length: 15k. Ao3 link)
Preword: this chapter begins immediately after the end of the Callum, Ezran, and Rayla scene of chapter 19, and builds on mood and context cues from it. If you’ve not reread that scene recently I’d recommend at least scanning its tail end before reading this chapter.
Warnings: Grief, heaviness of mood and theme, general sadness.
---
‘Something’s wrong’, Ezran had said, and: ’Something’s been wrong a while’. And for all that it was true, Callum couldn’t bring himself to think about what that surely meant. He couldn’t bring himself to talk. So he didn’t. Ezran didn’t, either.
They lingered wordless for all the time that Rayla was gone. It would have been silent if not for the shriek and violence of the winds. Callum stared out into the blizzard and felt strangely dizzy as he watched the snow, tracking the twists and spirals of its motion until the brightness of its white burned behind his eyes.
It was less bright now than it had been. Evening was coming, and the sun was starting to go down. His gut twisted as he thought of that, thought of Rayla, out in the storm and the ever-encroaching cold. For once, he didn’t try to tamp down on the worry. He didn’t even try to soothe the anxiety quivering in his fingers. It was better than the alternative.
Ezran was too quiet. Not in a dragon-dazed way – not anymore. He was too alert for that, even clutching the egg to his chest. His eyes were hooded, brows drawn together into a tight furrow. He looked thoughtful, but not in any sort of happy way. His fingers were tight on the shining eggshell of the Dragon Prince, and they trembled.
Callum was aware of the tension building bit-by-bit in his brother’s frame. He knew the signs of Ezran getting worked up about something, getting upset by something. He should have asked. He should have asked, but – he couldn’t. It was like a vice clamped around his throat whenever he so much as considered it. So he sat there in ever-more painful silence, not asking, and not thinking.
He didn’t think about the flags lowered on their posts atop Verdorn, surrounded by the flickering of countless ceremonial flames. He didn’t think about what Rayla had said, before she left. He just considered the state of the fire, and tersely added a few sticks to it, and deliberately did nothing more than worry about how long she’d take to return.
He didn’t ask, and he didn’t speak, and he tried not to think. But even that wasn’t enough, in the end.
Eventually, Ezran’s head jerked up towards the storm, uncanny-bright eyes fixed unerringly in the direction of the ledge. Callum’s stomach churned, torn between relief and unease at the sign, and he stared as well. He stared for a good few minutes before Rayla appeared, a shadow darkening upon the face of the blizzard, cloak and scarves whipping behind her in formless silhouettes of grey. And then she was close enough, stepping away from the ledge, that he saw her in full: shoulders dusted with snow, face wreathed in cloth, and shivering.
He was on his feet and scrambling out of the covers in a second, heart beating shallowly in his throat. His pulse felt thin and thready as he approached her, fearful in some way he didn’t want to put thought to. Instead he rushed to her, tugging on her cloak, leading her stumbling into the conjoined lights of the fire and the egg. “You’re back,” he murmured to her, instead of thinking about what had put the tremor into his fingers, or the look of dread into her eyes. He opened his mouth to say something else, but the words wouldn’t come. It was all too senseless.
“…I’m back.” She repeated, and her voice was very quiet. She wouldn’t quite meet his eyes. Her shoulders, when he went to lift the snow-strewn cloak from them, were hunched and tense. Whatever she’d hoped to escape with her reckless trip out had evidently followed her back. Callum swallowed, and set the cloak aside by the fire, and reached out to pull the scarf down from her face, to tug the wood-harness from her shoulder, to busy himself with anything and everything he could…
Ezran hadn’t spoken. Hadn’t greeted her, or stood, or done anything but stare at her silently, hands still bracketed around a stolen Prince’s egg. That silence was a chill, like an encroaching frost at Callum’s back. The hairs at the back of his neck rose, but he ignored that too. His fingers shook as he put the new firewood aside, and the snow-sodden outer scarf, and then, then-
“Callum,” Rayla murmured to him, still quiet. It was almost chiding, in a gentle way. An admonishment. As though she knew as well as he did that he was prevaricating. As though she knew exactly what he wasn’t thinking of, and was too tired to do the same.
She looked tired. She looked defeated. Slowly, with a cold and breathless dread, Callum let his hands fall away from her scarf, hanging uselessly by his sides. He looked at her, and saw the way she looked back at him. He opened his mouth, but couldn’t say anything. Without quite meaning to, he stepped away, fingers trembling on empty air.
It was only then, in that fraught silence and space, that Ezran finally moved. He straightened – not all at once, but slowly, like it was something he had to work himself up to. When he finally looked up at her, there was something frighteningly decisive about it. Something irrevocable. Looking at him then was like watching the thud of a coffin set down upon its pyre, with nothing left but to wait for the flame. His eyes settled upon her with such a weight that she flinched as though struck.
She met Ezran’s gaze, just for a second. Then she looked away. Her eyes closed, and her hands curled into fists at her sides. When she glanced across at his brother again, there was a resignation to her expression. Dread, too, and a guilt grievous enough it made his breath freeze just to look at her. “Ez?” She voiced, finally, so quietly he almost didn’t hear it.
“Rayla.” His voice trembled around her name. Callum watched, frozen in place, as his brother stared up at her, taking in a long shaky breath as though to brace himself. Finally, unsteadily, he said “I – I’m pretty sure – I think you’ve got something you need to say. Something you’ve needed to say for – maybe a long time.” His eyes, too blue, fixed on hers. He almost seemed to be daring her to deny it. Pleading, even. “Don’t you?”
Her breath shuddered, and he was close enough to hear it. She looked stricken, and couldn’t quite seem to manage to speak. Instead, she nodded, expression tight.
A thread of panic wove its way into Callum’s heart, just enough to thaw his tongue. “I – shouldn’t you be resting?” He asked, a little desperately. It sounded like a plea, even to his own ears. “You just – you just got in from the blizzard. You should sit down, warm up-“
Her hand settled on his shoulder, and his words froze on his breath. She didn’t say anything, just looked at him, but that was enough. He went still again, and the pain in her eyes became just that little bit more terrible. “I’m sorry,” she said, lowly, face drawn like the words hurt her. “I…I kept trying, but…”
Ezran stared up at them, jaw set, skin tinted blue and pale in the dragonlight, the colour making him look starkly ill. It put an unsettling cast on his expression now, wan and full of dread. His eyes were too wide. “I’m right, aren’t I.” He said, and it wasn’t a question. Rayla watched him, painfully resigned, and Callum was still frozen. “You’ve been hiding something. Something important. I just – I keep feeling it, all the time, like you’re guilty, and it’s-“ he stopped, and swallowed, and took a fortifying breath. “You keep feeling like you’re doing something wrong. And what you were saying, earlier-“
“Ez,” Rayla started, but Ezran was talking now, his amassed tension and fear bubbling out of him, like he was afraid to stop now that he’d started. Callum’s eyes flickered unwillingly between them, heart beating sick and fearful, knowing he had to stop them somehow; but he couldn’t move, couldn’t speak, like some dark shade had stolen his voice again.
“You keep feeling guilty,” His breath hitched, half way through the words. “A-and – and I’ve been trying not to think about it, but – it’s always, always whenever – it’s about dad,” She flinched, stricken, and he gestured at her as if she’d made some very telling point- “See? It’s – whenever we talk about him, or – or you see him in Callum's book, or anything – you flinch, or you go quiet, and – and you feel so horrible and guilty and I’ve been trying not to think about it but-“
“Ez,” Callum croaked out, finally, almost desperate to – to stop him talking, to make him stop, to take that awful expression off of Rayla’s face and the shaking from his brother’s shoulders and the tight, terrible pit of certainty from his belly.
Ezran trembled, but he didn’t stop. There were tears pooling at the corners of his eyes, but he didn’t stop. Instead, he looked straight ahead at Rayla and- “I’ve been trying not to think about it,” he repeated, slower, and halting, the words thick with half-shed tears. “But it keeps – and you're not saying anything, and I know you’re hiding something from us, and earlier you said ‘my parents might be dead’, just like that, like ours are - are –“ He trembled, white-lipped. “…And while you were gone I just kept thinking, and – I. I just…" he wiped his eyes on his sleeve, and looked at her. Finally, waveringly, he asked “Rayla? What happened to your other wrist binding?”
She went still. Her eyes closed, almost in time with the harsh rasp of Callum’s breath as he inhaled, because – he remembered that she’d had two at first, of course he did, he didn’t forget details like that. But he hadn’t thought of it, not since he learned what the bindings meant, and that – that was a little too much. Too much to avoid, too much for him to push down with all the other things he’d been trying so hard to ignore, just – too much.
He found himself staring at her, heart in his throat, utterly desperate for any sign, anything, anything at all that would put this horrible thought away, anything that would mean he wouldn’t have to think about it, it wouldn’t be happening, it wouldn’t be real…
Instead, she opened her eyes, and as she looked at them, he saw that they were bright with tears. “I’m sorry.” She whispered, voice choked, and – he was shaking his head, slowly, as if it would change anything- “I’m so sorry.”
“No,” he said, unbidden, the word slipping numbly from his lips as Ezran's expression crumpled. “No, no, Rayla, you can’t – you’re not saying-"
His brother’s arms closed so tightly around the egg that his hands overlapped each other, fingers curling into his sleeves tight and shaking. “Rayla,” his voice was barely a whisper, until it wasn’t. His face contorted with despair. “Just say it. Tell me!”
Her breath shuddered out. When her mouth opened, Callum felt some abortive impulse to stop her, to halt her, but- “I’m sorry.” She said again, utterly miserable and utterly defeated. “He – King Harrow-"
“You can't, “ he repeated, numbly, and her shoulders shook.
“He’s dead.” She forced out, all at once, and then there was no taking the words back. Callum froze, motionless, as Ezran went still with him. For that first, terrible second, it was like the world had halted around them. And then-
Ezran hunched over the egg and wailed. The sound of it was terrible, thin and choked with anguish, and it spun around and around and around in Callum’s head until he was dizzy with it, until his heart was pounding and his vision swimming – he stumbled backwards, and fell, and wasn’t nearly coherent enough to be thankful he’d missed the fire. He just fell, and it was the tears stuttering loose on impact that made him realise he was crying.
“Callum-“ Rayla was saying, voice choked, but he could barely hear her, and his eyes were too full of tears to see much of anything.
He didn’t mean to do it; there suddenly wasn’t enough room in his mind for anything so coherent as intention. But he did it anyway: he pulled himself unsteadily to the side, over the cold stone, reaching out blindly until his fingers hooked in the fabric of his brother’s jacket and pulled him close. Ezran was crying, and Callum had never heard him sob like that, not once, not ever.
A second later, he processed what he’d done, and tugged all the tighter. It returned some sense to his head, if only a little, to blink until his eyes were clear enough to see, to pull his brother closer until the two of them were braced and shaking around the shape of the dragon egg between them. Its light was flickering and stuttering now in time with Ezran’s sobs, as if it was crying with him. Maybe it was, with that connection it had to him. The unborn dragon whose mother had – had ordered it, and he might be crying too.
It hit him then, really hit him, staring through wet eyelashes at the egg of the Dragon Prince. A thin, wounded sound rose and shuddered from his throat, and he hardly noticed Ezran shifting to bury his face in his chest. He was too busy lifting a hand to his face, trembling horribly, and trying to wipe away enough tears that the world might make sense again. He’s dead, Callum thought to himself, numbly. There was no chasing that thought away now. No denying it. If there’d been any hope of denying it, it had passed as soon as he remembered the binding that wasn’t there.
Remembering the binding made him remember Rayla, just enough for him to lift his head, to start noticing things outside himself and his brother and the sobs that passed between them. She’d fallen to her knees, crumpled in on herself, and she was saying something. It was hard to focus past the numb shock, but a few seconds later, he managed: she was saying “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” over and over again.
Callum wiped his eyes, but a moment later they were full of tears again. He couldn’t seem to stop it. His shoulders hitched and his breath shuddered, and there weren’t any words in the world fit to respond to that senseless apology. What was she saying sorry for? He couldn’t find any sense in it. Through the haze of his thoughts, it seemed more like noise than speech, as meaningless as the ceaseless shriek of the gale.
He stared dully at the blurry ground, feeling his shoulders hitch with his uneven breaths. Ezran curled into his side, and Callum clutched back almost reflexively, mind spinning around half-coherent thoughts. I didn’t want it to be true, he thought, a little senselessly, a little despairingly. He’d thought about the chilling skill of Moonshadow elves at Full Moon, hadn’t he? When she told him about Viatori, and how an entire team had slipped seamlessly through one of the greatest strongholds in the kingdom, he’d thought about it.
The memories just kept chasing themselves around in his head. When he’d tried to reach – reach his dad, when Viren had stolen his voice, the assassins were already there. Too powerful, too ruthless. The Crownguard were supposed to be the most elite warriors the Kingdom had to offer. The Crownguard had foiled countless assassination attempts in the past. The Crownguard were supposed to protect them.
The Crownguard’s bodies had littered the tower floor.
Even then. Even before Callum fled, they’d been strewn everywhere, crumpled and lifeless, right outside the final sanctum of King Harrow. Even without seeing the memorial flames, or the flags lowered for a kingdom’s grief…that had been enough. That had been enough, deep down, for Callum to know how that night had ended. He’d just…
He hadn’t wanted to believe it.
His fingers tightened around Ezran’s shoulder, crumpling the fabric. He could feel the wet of tears where his brother’s face was pressed into his chest, beginning to soak through all the layers of cloth. “…How did it happen?” He found himself asking, hollowly, the words not even feeling like his own. Rayla’s head lifted, though, so he supposed he must have spoken them. She was curled in on herself, miserable, looking so guilty he didn’t know how to respond to it. Emotion churned and twisted in his chest, thick and choking. “…Do you know?” He wondered, then, the taste of the words unbearably bitter. “Do you know how it happened?”
Her mouth opened and closed once, helplessly. Ezran’s head lifted just enough to regard her out of one bleary eye, watching. Listening. “…I,” she tried, and then shook her head. “I’m sorry. I don’t – I wasn’t there. I just…” She clutched around her right wrist, fingers visibly trembling. “We were just out of the city, when this…”
“It came off.” He guessed, dully, and her chin jerked down in an aborted nod. “And you knew. Right from the start, you knew.”
She looked away. “I kept trying to find a way to tell you.” Her voice was quiet. “I just…couldn’t.”
There was another twist in his gut, then. It felt almost angry. What gave her the right to be so miserable, when it wasn’t her dad? What business did she have being so guilty, when it wasn’t even her fault? The bitterness of it rose in his throat, sharp and acidic, and for a second – for a second, he wanted to be furious with her for being – for not – he wasn’t sure. But…it didn’t happen. Not really. Something burned acrid in his chest, but it wasn’t quite anger. He wasn’t sure what it was.
“…Why not?” Ezran asked, in the first words he’d spoken since – since she’d said it. There was an edge to them. Like he, maybe, had managed a little more anger than Callum had.
“I-“ She hesitated, so miserable, and shook her head again. “I don’t know.”
“You ‘don’t know.’” Ezran repeated, quiet and bitter. “It’s been over a week, Rayla. There were so many times you could have said something.“
“I know.” Her expression crumpled.
“You could have told us. You should have told us!” Ezran’s shoulders heaved with the weight of the breath that shuddered through him, close enough that Callum felt every second of it.
Again, with a choking edge of shame: “I know.”
Ezran’s breath hitched then. “He’s our dad, Rayla,” He said, and his eyes were welling up again with tears. “And he’s dead. Don’t – didn’t we deserve to know that?”
She shook as if every word were an actual physical blow, and – Callum could see, just looking at her, how much she was castigating herself. How much self-loathing she was tearing at herself with. He understood her too deeply to bear, and had to look away. He clutched tightly at his brother and said nothing. “You did,” She managed, and he could hear the sickening guilt in her voice. He shuddered. “I’m sorry. You deserved to know the truth. But…”
“But what, Rayla?” Ezran demanded, with a little more of that anger, and Callum couldn’t help but see the tears falling thickly down his face.
She didn’t try to defend herself. Just hunched in miserably, and…and that, he thought, was enough of that.
“Ez.” Callum murmured, close above his brother’s head, and felt the shudder under his hands. It hadn’t quite been a chide, just…a reminder, maybe. Of what, he wasn’t entirely sure. But it quieted him anyway, and he turned his face away from Rayla again.
“He’s dead, Callum.” Ezran mumbled brokenly, straight into the wool of Callum’s sweater. “Dad’s dead.”
It hurt to hear. It hurt so much. It probably always would. Thinking about mom had never really stopped hurting, after all. And – that was what had happened, wasn’t it? It had happened again. He’d lost another parent. He’d lost another beloved part of his increasingly broken family. Callum closed his eyes, and leaned forwards to press his face into his brother’s hair. The pain in his chest was sharp-edged and cutting, like breathing around broken glass.
He exhaled a shaky, shuddering breath there, feeling Ez tremble against him, and when he looked up again he saw that Rayla had a hand half-lifted towards them, as if she wanted to reach out, but didn’t know if she could. Part of him, very quietly, wanted to be angry with her. The rest of him recognised that there was no point, and just felt tired instead. It wasn’t her fault in any way that mattered, and she was already mad enough at herself for all three of them.
He regarded her wearily for a second, then jerked his chin in a vague sort of ‘come here’ gesture, uncertain he had the energy for anything more. She met his eyes, uncertain until he nodded at her again, and then she crept hesitantly forward. She was reaching out to Ezran’s shoulder when he lifted his head to look at her, as if he’d seen her coming even with his eyes covered.
Ezran looked at her, bleary-eyed through tears, and for a second looked wary and closed-off. Like he didn’t want her to touch him, and might push her away. But then he sighed, and shifted very slightly towards her, and she put her hand down on his shoulder.
That very instant, his expression crumpled. He sobbed, breath hitching into it alarmingly fast. Rayla flinched and seemed about to pull back when Ez turned and hooked the fingers of one hand into her sleeve, tugging at it until she stumbled closer. “Ezran-“ She tried, but he was shaking his head, tears welling so thickly in his eyes that their faint glow refracted through the water, bright and glittering and pale.
“I know,” The words tumbled from his lips, like he couldn’t help it, like he was answering some desperate plea she’d never spoken. “I know, I know why you couldn’t tell us, I – I knew even before you – I just…” He pulled at her sleeve, again, until she shifted closely enough to press a little against his side. A little against Callum’s, too. “It’s not your fault. I’m just…” He shuddered, and then turned fully away from Callum to embrace her this time. “I’m just…it really hurts.”
Her expression as she looked down at Ez had gone so open and vulnerable it hurt to look at. “Ez…” Her voice was thick, and the next time she blinked, it shook tears loose. One of them ran so closely along the outward edge of her pigment it seemed almost to frame it.
“You didn’t want to hurt us.” Ezran mumbled into her shoulder, and a strange spasm of emotion shook over her as Callum watched. Her expression wavered. “You knew it would. You knew it’d have to happen sometime. But…you just – you couldn’t.”
Her shoulders trembled. “You deserved to know.” She said, quiet, still with that edge of shame. “I should have told you.”
“You didn’t want to hurt us.” Callum repeated his brother’s words, quiet, and her head jerked up to look at him. That open, terrible vulnerability was hard to see on her. She always tried so hard to stay composed, and now… “I…understand that.”
He did understand, was the thing. He understood too well. He understood that she cared about them, and knew this would hurt them, and hadn’t been able to bear being the one to hurt them like that. Not until it had been too long, and too late, to avoid any longer. He’d been avoiding it too, after all. Of course he understood.
“I should have told you,” she said again, like she couldn’t get away from it, and he shook his head slowly.
“We already knew.” He admitted aloud, for the first time. “We just…didn’t want to face it, any more than you did.” How many times had he avoided asking? How many times had he deliberately not thought about it? How many times had Ezran deliberately not thought about it, after catching that spark of guilt through Rayla’s skin?
She closed her eyes for a moment, displacing more tears. “I’m sorry.” She said then, instead of I should have told you. “I’m so, so sorry…” Ez burrowed a little more tightly into her sweater, and said nothing.
Callum looked at her, expression so full of shame, the tear-trails on her cheeks glittering in the dragonlight, and his chest hurt somehow even more than it already did. It felt like it would choke him, it hurt so much. He leaned against her, breath trembling, and felt the silent hitch and shake of her shoulders against him. “For what?” He asked quietly, helplessly, when he could finally muster the words. “Rayla, none of this was your fault.”
“I should have told you.” She said, yet again, and when he shook his head at her, “I should have done something.”
That lifted his head further, to look at her better. To see the guilt in her eyes as she averted them from him. “Done what?” For a moment, he had no idea what she could be talking about. But then-
“I should have stopped it.” Her voice was quiet, and it trembled.
…Oh.
Callum looked away, down at the egg bracketed now between all three of them. “You tried.” He said in the end, very softly. “You tried, Rayla.”
She shook her head, violently. “I didn’t-“
“We were there. You tried.” The last word caught in his throat, and then he was crying again, the tears hot on his cheeks in the moment before the storm chilled them. “On that roof, you tried – you told him to stop, to call off the mission. We told him about Zym, but he just…” He shook his head as if in an echo of hers, more slowly. That had been ‘Runaan’, right? Someone who was basically family to her? And she’d fought him. “He didn’t listen.”
Rayla was silent, then. When he looked at her, she seemed struck, eyes wide. She was so pale as to look a little ill.
“He didn’t listen.” Callum repeated, heart hurting. “You had to fight him, Rayla, so he wouldn’t come after us. You tried. You really, really tried, and-“ She was shaking her head again, as if she wanted to interrupt him, as if she wanted to deny it, so he spoke a little louder and a little faster- “And you said! You offered, when I came back from the tower, to – go up there with me, and try again, but-“ He shook, distress making him dizzy, making his throat tighten with nausea. “I said no.”
Maybe he’d already known then that it was too late. After seeing the fallen Crownguard strewn across the stone, after seeing the assault at the tower’s innermost sanctum…maybe he’d known there was no sense in going back. No matter how much he wanted to. But most of all…
“I said no.” He repeated, quiet, and looked down at the egg. Rayla seemed shocked silent, watching him as he spoke, and Ezran had lifted his head to stare across as well. “I said – I don’t remember what I said. But Zym was what mattered the most, and I knew it, and you knew it, and-“ His voice broke. “-And I said no.”
She flinched at that, as if he’d found some way to take the pain of that knowledge and cut her with it, as if she were like Ezran, and could feel it keen as a knife through her skin. As though he’d heard the thought, his brother shifted, blinking miserably up at him. He reached out, and the fingers of one hand hooked into Callum’s sleeve.
“You were right.” He said, quiet and unhappy. Another tear slipped from the corner of his eye. “If we get Zym home, we – we could stop this, for everyone. But…”
Callum reached back, clasping his brother’s hand. “Ez…”
“I wish it hadn’t happened. I wish it – didn’t have to be like this.” His voice twisted into something thick and tearstained, and Callum had a moment to feel ever-more terrible at the sight of the misery on Ezran’s face before he turned his face back into Rayla’s sweater. She hardly seemed to know what to do about it, which would have maybe been funny under literally any other circumstance. Eventually, after some hovering, she curled one arm around his brother’s shoulders, squeezing gently. Her right hand; bereft of any and all assassins’ binds.
“Me too.” She said to him, very quietly, eyes shadowed with pain. He wondered if she was maybe thinking about her parents, too. How they might be dead after all, and in such a terrible way, with no way of her knowing for certain what had become of them. The only way to find out now would be to tear the words from Lord Viren himself, and that-
Callum’s throat tightened, and he shuddered. Discomfort and unease joined the churn of emotion in his stomach, and he felt ill.
He couldn’t help but remember some of the things that Harrow – dad – had said to him, in that last meeting. I’ve done terrible things, and I am responsible for some of those wrongs, and what’s done cannot be undone.
Dad had died full of regret, but determined to face the consequences for the choices he’d made. He’d been so convinced that his death was the only way forwards. He hadn’t even tried to leave, despite knowing full well that the assassins were coming for him. He hadn’t even tried.
Callum had tried. He’d tried to convince him. Tried to reach him, to tell him the truth about the egg so maybe that would change his mind. But it hadn’t been enough, with Viren in the way. And he’d said no when Rayla offered to go with him back into the tower. And now…Harrow was dead.
What else was it he’d said? Take care of your brother? Callum sniffed, and shuffled closer until he could hug Ezran too, squashed against Rayla’s side and the shell of the dragon egg.
“I wonder if he knew.” Ezran said, then, very quietly. The words were still muffled by fabric.
Startled out of his thoughts, Callum looked down at him. “…What?” He asked, bewildered.
“I wonder if dad knew,” Ezran clarified, head lifting a little. The rims of his eyes were ruddy from crying. “About Zym’s egg.”
‘What makes you think he doesn’t already know?’ He remembered, and felt the taste of bile rising in his throat. He shook his head, violently. “He couldn’t.” Callum denied, helplessly. He wanted to say that Harrow wouldn’t have let that happen, but – at the very least, he’d thought Viren had killed the Dragon Prince, right? And he’d let that happen. Throat tight, he went on “If he’d known, he would have – he’d have done something. He could have stopped the attack.”
Ezran didn’t say anything, just blinked at him, slow and unhappy. Eventually: “I hope you’re right.”
He wished he could just ask him, find out the truth – but that was one of the terrible things about this, wasn’t it? He couldn’t, because Harrow was dead. There’d never be any talking to him again. There’d never be any words, or answers, or anything from him again.
Callum’s breath hitched, and then – a second later, he felt a memory hit so hard it was almost like a body-blow. On reflex, he scrambled to check his belt, even knowing there was no sense in it at all, not ten days and however-many changes of clothing too late. A small, wounded noise emerged from his throat, high and upset.
They were looking at him immediately, both reflexively concerned. “Callum?” Rayla spoke, worried, and he squeezed his eyes shut, breaths coming fast with distress.
“I – I had a letter,” He managed, throat so tight he was surprised he could breathe at all. He could feel tears rising in his eyes again, hot and stinging, a pit of anguish taking root in the middle of his chest. “I had a letter, from him, he gave it to me before – the last time I saw him. I was – he said to read it, when he was-“ He stopped, and couldn’t finish, a sound like a gasp choking its way out of him. ‘You’ll know when', he remembered, and – it hurt like a hand had clasped around his heart and twisted-
Ezran’s voice was tentative. “…A letter?”
“It was important.” He recalled, heartbroken, breaths coming too-fast. “It was important, it was – it was supposed to be his last letter to me, but I – I must have dropped it, I don’t-“ He stopped, and tried to think. He’d not had it when they left the castle, or surely they’d have noticed it when they were taking stock of what they had. So, sometime before that… “I must have lost it in the castle.” He recognised, numbly. “When we were running from Claudia, or-“ His eyes flickered across at Rayla.
“Or when you were running from me.” She recognised, with a flash of regret over her face.
He buried his face in his hands, the fabric of the gloves too scratchy on his salt-scoured skin. “I can’t believe it.” He muttered brokenly. “I lost it. His last letter, and – and I lost it.”
Ezran couldn’t seem to find the words to respond to that; there was nothing from his direction but silence. Rayla, though – “I’m sorry, Callum.” She said quietly, and he felt a hand settle on his shoulder. “That’s awful.”
He lowered his hands, just enough to look at her. “I lost it.” He repeated, quieter, and…abruptly, felt so overdrawn with misery that something in him crumpled into silence. His tears stopped, as though some deep well within him had suddenly, finally run dry.
“Maybe someone picked it up.” Ezran said, then, but his voice was very distant. Callum looked at him, and found him blank-faced and numb. Hollow-eyed, like this had been the last straw for him too. One final tragedy, to make things just that little bit too terrible to bear. “Maybe one day we’ll be able to read it.” Despite the words, there was no hint of optimism or hope in his voice. It rang too hollow for that.
Callum shook his head, just a little, and didn’t speak. It was possible, he supposed, but…not terribly likely. And after everything…
He didn’t say anything, the hollowness in his chest expanding until it seemed to steal the voice from him. Ezran didn’t speak either, and didn’t move, still pressed half-into Rayla’s side. She abided by their empty silence, and sat with them, shoulder-to-shoulder, while the fire crackled and the egg’s light flickered and the storm tore around the mountainside. The quiet that held between them was heavy with a bleak, oppressive sort of lethargy.
Eventually, Ezran drew back away from Rayla, and back from Callum as well, until he was sitting up with their hands still trailing back from his shoulders. He hefted the egg fully into his lap again, fingers tightening around the bright shell. His eyelids fluttered, in that familiar way, and his expression twisted as though listening to something painful.
Callum looked at him, and managed to find the energy to speak. “…Is he alright?”
Ez exhaled quietly. “He’s upset.” He admitted. “Because we’re all upset, and I can’t…I can’t stop it from going through me to him. I’m feeling me being unhappy, and you two being unhappy, so he’s feeling it too. He’s so young. He doesn’t know what to do with it all.”
His chest hurt, thinking of Ez having to deal with the grief and turmoil of two other people on top of his own. It wasn’t fair. But he wasn’t sure there was anything to do about it.
“I don’t even know what to do now.” Ezran voiced, soft. “What are we supposed to do, Callum?”
He looked at the egg. “Well,” He started, then trailed off. He shook his head. “I…guess nothing has really changed.” His voice sounded empty even to his own ears. “We’ve got to stop the war. We’ve got to get the Dragon Prince home.” Home, to the Dragon Queen who’d ordered Harrow and Ezran be killed.
Ezran’s eyes returned to the eggshell, reflecting its searing light. “…Yeah.” He said, in the end. “I guess so.”
If he thought anything else, he didn’t say it. Just pulled the egg closer, and leaned in against Callum’s side. He looked exhausted. Drawn-out and weary, like the day and its toil and its grief had taken too heavy a toll on him. It wasn’t a surprise, really. There’d been the storm, and the sheer turmoil of the overburdened dragon egg, and then the talk about Rayla’s parents, and then this. Of course he was tired. Of course he was at the end of his rope. Callum didn’t feel much better off; he could feel the stress and exhaustion burning behind his eyes, until he felt a hair’s breadth from new tears at any given second. He thought he’d still be crying, if he wasn’t so tired.
As if to corroborate Callum’s thoughts, Ez settled in, and his eyes slipped half-closed. “I’m really tired, Callum.” He murmured, shuttered eyes as blank and distant as Callum’s own. “I just want this to stop.”
He didn’t elaborate on what exactly he meant by ‘this’, but he didn’t really need to. Callum exhaled, heavy and slow, and wound an arm around Ezran’s middle to tuck him closer in to his side. “I think we all just need a rest, now.” He said, quiet. “Maybe things will seem better later. Or…at least maybe a bit less terrible.”
Ezran blinked up at him, so slow as to seem lethargic. “Did it get better, before?” He asked, and for a moment, Callum didn’t know what he was talking about. But then- “After mom died?”
Pain stole his breath away. The next moment, he inhaled again, seeing by the minute flinch of his brother’s face that his grief had been marked. “…In a way.” He answered, in the end, and felt all-too-exhausted at the thought of doing it again. Of passing days, and weeks, and months, and enduring the ache of loss until it no longer clawed so incessantly at the insides of his chest. “It does get better. It just...it takes time.”
Ez sighed, as if he’d expected that answer. His eyes, already half-shut, closed all the way. “…I’m glad you’re here, Callum.” He said eventually, head leaning into his shoulder. After that, he didn’t say anything else. He just sat there, a silent huddled form, illuminated by the shine of the egg he still held.
Rayla’s shoulder shuddered briefly against his own. When he looked at her, she seemed to be fighting a losing battle with some nameless agitation. Her expression when she looked at Ezran was pained, and – when he looked across at her, she flinched when he met her eyes. Still guilty, maybe. She opened her mouth as if to speak, hesitated, and after another glance at Ezran shook her head and closed it. In the end she stared over into the fire, shoulders tense and hunched.
He wondered what was wrong with her. What was bothering her now. The intention rose in his chest to ask, but it couldn’t seem to make it all the way. He was abruptly too tired.
The quiet that settled among them then wasn’t a comfortable one. Callum stared into the fire and felt numb, as if the cold of the blizzard were seeping into his ribcage and clutching at his heart. He remembered being out there in the snow, until the chill stole into his limbs and made it harder and harder to move. He felt like that now, even despite the heat of the fire so close by. Like the chill was in his flesh, in his bones, and he’d never move again. If there was any mercy to that cold, it was that it numbed his thoughts too, until his mind ran slow and heavy with apathy.
After a while, though… “Is he asleep?” Rayla’s voice sounded beside him, quiet and just a little surprised. Callum lifted his head to look at her, and then at his brother, whose eyes were closed. His expression remained tight, brows drawn, but there was something about the looseness of his posture and the rhythm of his breathing that Callum recognised.
After a moment, he managed to speak. “Think so.” All things considered, if Ezran had managed to fall asleep now, it would probably be a challenge to wake him up again. Callum nudged him, just a little, and produced no wakeful response whatsoever. “…I guess he crashed.” He reflected on how tired Ez had been even before the day’s troubles got started in earnest. He’d barely slept, hadn’t he? “After everything, I’m really not surprised.”
When he looked over at her, Rayla’s eyes were on Ez, shaded with regret. “I am, a little.” She admitted, still keeping her voice low. “I couldn’t imagine sleeping after all this.”
Slowly, Callum lifted a hand and smoothed it over the back of Ezran’s neck. “He’s just a kid.” His voice came out softer than he expected. “He’s ten. He hardly slept at all last night, and then…” He shook his head, rather than attempt to sum up the day aloud. “He was bound to fall asleep like this at some point. Kids are like that, you know. They keep going and going and then, suddenly…” He nodded demonstratively at his brother.
The face Rayla made conveyed, quite expressively, ‘I’ll take your word for it’. What she actually said was “Makes sense, I suppose.” She watched Ezran’s sleeping face for a few more moments, before her eyes flicked up to his. “Think he’ll wake up if we move him?”
Callum assessed him. “Nah. He’s out.” He eyed Rayla, the barest flicker of interest pushing through the shroud of exhaustion that had settled on him. “What were you thinking?”
“Get him tucked into the covers, with the egg?” She suggested. “Make sure he’s comfy.”
He hummed, and nodded. “Yeah. Sounds good.” He had to work his way up to it. His limbs felt like they were made of lead. But, after some effort, he made himself move, shifting around to support Ezran under his arms. Rayla shuffled over to help, keeping the egg from falling out of his lap as they moved him. In the end they got him tucked into the tent-covers close to the fire with only minor shifts and murmurs on Ezran’s part, the egg’s shine half-blocked by the thick fabric.
Even in sleep, though, Ezran didn’t look relaxed. There was still that fraught tension furrowing his brow, as though heartbreak had followed him into unconsciousness. It hurt to see, but there was nothing Callum could do about it. So he lifted the covers to let Bait go in as well, and then sat back down by the campfire. It felt more like collapsing, really; his body felt so heavy.
Rayla took the opportunity to throw some branches into the fire before she followed suit, shooting him a few hesitant looks before she spoke, as if she wasn’t sure she should be saying anything. “…How’re you feeling?” She asked, looking as though she regretted the words as soon as she spoke them. Sure enough, she shook her head quickly, and muttered “Stupid question, I guess. You don’t have to answer that.”
He lifted his head to look at her, and…despite everything, for whatever reason, he appreciated that she’d asked. It settled something bereft in him; some part of him that was hurting, and lonely, and desperate for comfort. “…Well, I’ve been better.” He said, finally, voice sounding worn even to his own ears.
She glanced side-long at him, looking uncomfortable, and fed another stick into the crackling flames.
Callum watched the fire part and spit around the new fuel, his thoughts flickering in and out of sight like the embers in the ash. “I feel kind of stupid, for how long I was ignoring this.” He said, softly. “There were so many signs. I just…” He sighed, and wiped a hand over his face as if it would help anything. It didn’t, of course. He felt as unhappy and lethargic as before. “I really wish this didn’t have to be real.” He murmured it to himself more than to her, but saw her flinch anyway.
She fidgeted in place, shoulders tense, and then tenser yet when she stole a glance at him. There was an agitated jitter to her fingers when she broke a branch in half, crack, and cast both parts into the flame. He was starting to work his way up to asking her what was wrong, or what was bothering her, when- “I should go.” She muttered tersely, eyes flicking out to the ledge, and he froze.
“What?” He managed, a second later, voice croaking. His heart thudded dully in his chest, too exhausted for any true panic, but awake enough for reflexive fear to move it.
“I should just…go. Give you some space.” She was saying, not even looking at him, leaning back from the fire with the intention of movement written in her every limb, like she was about to spring up at any moment, like she was about to get up and leave. “I shouldn’t – you deserve to have some time alone, right now. And more firewood is always a good thing.”
Terror stuttered into his bloodstream, choking his heart with thorns. “Rayla-“
“I’ll just pop out for a bit. I won’t be long.” Still avoiding his eyes, she pushed herself up, rising to her feet, and…
Callum wasn’t surprised. Not really. Now that he was looking at her, he recognised the tension she was wearing; she wanted to get away. There seemed to be some reflex in her that drove her to hide away whenever she felt vulnerable, or upset, or – any number of things. It was her that wanted to get some space, and maybe she thought he wanted that too, but-
But he didn’t. He didn’t want her to go. He didn’t want her to leave him alone. He never wanted to be alone at times like this. But, sometimes, it happened anyway.
He still remembered the day he’d learnt his mom was dead. Remembered waiting for Harrow in the throne room he’d been led to, uneasy, certain that something was wrong. He remembered every word of what Harrow had told him, like it was burned into his mind by the weight of its pain. He remembered, too, how Harrow had behaved afterwards. Hesitant, and halting, like he wanted to stay but didn’t feel it was his right. He’d comforted Callum for a while, and then left. To allow him some ‘space’.
He hadn’t wanted space. He’d wanted Harrow to stay with him. But he’d not been able to find the words for it then, and so he’d been left alone.
The breath shuddered thickly in his throat, and his hand was trembling horribly when he reached out and clasped it around Rayla’s wrist. “Please,” He managed, the word half-choked with emotion. “Don’t leave.” Then, when she didn’t move: “Please”, again, more desperately.
She stared back at him, looking almost bewildered. A second later, her expression trembled, and for a second, it looked like she might cry. And then-
She sat back down.
She didn’t leave.
The relief was so powerful he could hardly breathe through it. Instead of speaking he closed his eyes, and trembled, and felt his fingers move around Rayla’s wrist as she settled beside him. He could almost feel her hesitance in how she wavered there, shoulder barely brushing his. Uncertain of her welcome, maybe, or uncertain of why he’d been so desperate for her to stay. He wasn’t sure until he opened his eyes and looked at her, and…then, seeing her expression, he thought it was probably both.
“…Thank you.” He mumbled to her, the words sounding almost embarrassingly heartfelt. Her eyes looked just a little wide, as if she was startled.
She studied him uncertainly for a few long seconds, like she had no idea why he’d be thanking her. Like she had no idea why he’d wanted her to stay. He…thought he should feel guilty, for not letting her leave and get some space to clear her own head, even if going into the storm would have been a fairly bad idea. The relief turned a little sour as he thought of that, gut twisting unpleasantly.
“…Sorry.” He offered, eventually, when she hadn’t seemed to manage to find anything to say. Anxiety prickled at the back of his neck as he remembered that – really, they hadn’t known each other that long, it was maybe a bit weird to have begged her not to leave like that, especially when she’d wanted to get away- “I just…really don’t want to be alone, right now.” He excused lamely, feeling abruptly very stupid and very tired. He let go of her wrist and wrung his fingers together, shoulders hunching just a little.
He’d looked away from her, not wanting to see her expression; so the touch at his hand surprised him. He glanced down, startled. She’d reached out, however hesitantly, to put her hand over his own. When he looked up…there wasn’t any of the closed-in tension he’d feared. Instead, she just seemed sad, and there was nothing closed about it. He looked at her and, within moments, felt the anxious twist in his gut ease. “’S alright.” She said, and he was almost too disorientated by emotion to hear her. “Don’t you worry.” Her voice quieted, then. Went gentler, and a little more solemn. “I’ll stay.”
A shudder ran over his shoulders, utterly involuntary. He couldn’t help the depth of the gratitude that shook through him at the words. She was here. She cared. She wasn’t leaving.
Tentatively, and stealing glances at her all the while, he shifted his hand to clasp the one she’d laid upon it. When she made no objection, he settled his fingers solidly between hers and nearly shook with the relief of the contact. Even with the layers of gloves in the way, the solidity of her hand in his own was unimaginably reassuring. “…Thanks.” He mumbled again, and thought he’d have been more self-conscious if he wasn’t so tired. As it was…
The exhausted, numb shroud hadn’t left him. Misery hung over the edges of everything like a stain, and everything left around the borders of the apathy ached with grief. He wasn’t sure that was going to go away any time soon. But even so – it helped, to have her here. It really, really helped.
Her ears were back a bit, as if she were abashed. He wondered, very distantly, when he’d started to understand what elf ear movements meant. Whatever she was feeling, though, the gentle caring in the way she looked at him hadn’t changed. She squeezed his fingers, even, as if to reassure him. “Least I can do.” Her voice was quiet, and maybe just a little guilty.
He didn’t think he had it in him to address that guilt right now, so he just…exhaled, very slowly, and shifted his hand more comfortably around hers. She hadn’t minded the hands, so he thought she wouldn’t mind him leaning on her either. So he did, settling a little against her side, and felt some nameless tension in the back of his head ease a little. He stared into the fire and breathed a little easier.
She didn’t make any move to shift or get up for a long time. She just sat with him. It helped.
It did help. But in the end, it helped in a way that thawed the edges off of some of the numbness, some of the shock. A few times, he found himself trembling as the grief moved through him like melt-water under a glacier. Once, his breath shuddered and his eyes welled with tears again, as if finding new reservoirs to weep from.
Rayla made concerned murmurs at him until he shook his head. “I’m okay. It’s just…” He looked down at their hands. It was her right hand he was holding; the hand that had never been bound long enough to hurt.
Her expression softened into now-familiar sorrow, and she sighed. “I’m sorry, Callum.” She said it in the tones of I’m sorry for your loss, of I’m sorry this happened, and that honest sympathy was what set him off into a true bout of crying again.
His shoulders shook, and his breath hitched, and tears did fall, but it all felt so much more subdued than before. Quiet, even. It was a resigned sort of grief, he thought. Defeated, maybe. As though he’d burned through the powerful, convulsive sobs of before and left only this behind. Whatever it was, it blurred his eyes with tears, and every time he trembled he felt Rayla close by his side.
She didn’t try to stop him, though seeing him cry plainly made her feel awful. She didn’t try to talk to him, either. Maybe she recognised that this was just…crying. Just grief, and it had to spill out somehow. After a few moments of watching him, she shuffled a little closer until she was more solidly braced against his side, and then slipped an arm around his back, pulling him into a silent embrace. He shuddered and let his face fall onto her shoulder, appreciating it more than he could say. She didn’t try to move him, even when he must have been getting her sweater damp, and just…stayed there.
After a while, he pulled back, and just leaned against her side, tiredly displacing a new tear from his eyes every minute or so when he blinked. Those tears stopped eventually, too. In their aftermath he felt even more tired and drained than before. After a long interval of silence, Rayla started glancing between him and the fire. Eventually, she asked “You alright if I go over and tend the fire a bit?”
It shook him out of his exhausted stupor, a little. He glanced at her, and their hands, and though he regretted it even as he spoke, he nodded and said “Yeah, sure.”
She squeezed his hand once more, then let it go. In a second she’d moved away and to the fireside, leaving the space beside him empty. He watched her work to settle that feeling of absence, blinking slowly as she fed twigs and bits of branch into the flames. She got up to get the pot and fill it with the snow piling thickly at the less-sheltered part of their alcove, and he watched the winds pull at her hair and scarf upon the storm’s edge. He watched as she set the pot on the fire, and waited for such a time that she might come and sit beside him again.
“Think Ez is waking up any time soon?” She asked, when the snow had gotten around to melting, and he glanced back at the tent layers. They were still glowing, cyan light filtering out around the seams, and Ezran’s face only partially-visible where he’d burrowed into the covers.
“He’ll either be sleeping another couple hours or another eight.” He answered, after a moment. “There’s not really any in-between with him, once he crashes like that.”
Rayla hummed at that, just a little rueful. “Well, suppose it means he’ll be fresh and ready for if he needs to take a watch shift tonight.”
Abruptly, Callum remembered the concept of fire-watch. Of camp-things, like food and drink and taking care of the fire that kept them alive. Of the fact that it was evening now, and…technically, it was approaching bedtime. After all this, after everything…some things were still the same.
It was a little jarring. It was a little reassuring in a way, too. The thought of routine, as new as that routine might be, was just enough comfort to be worth the effort of following it. Plus, well – some of it just plain needed doing, no matter how exhausted and threadbare and grieving he was. “Need to change your bandages.” He recognised, tiredly, and his eyes slid to her left arm. “Do your hand, too.”
She glanced back at him. “We can leave it tonight, if you’re not up for it.” She offered, quietly. “I can probably manage myself.”
Despite everything, he managed a flicker of indignation. “No need for that.” He muttered at her, annoyed at the thought of her trying to sort her bandages alone, one-handed, because she thought he might be too haggard and downtrodden to help her. “I’ll do it. Just – whenever’s good.”
The barest, faintest hint of a smile twitched at the edges of her lips. “Well. I don’t know. I’ll have to check my schedule.” She said, plainly too tired to make the words sound dry, but the sentiment was there. He sighed quietly, his lips offering the same tiny reciprocal twitch, too tired and too unhappy for humour, but appreciating the gesture nonetheless.
“Once you’re done with that water, then.” He decided, and she glanced at him for a moment before inclining her head. The water was bubbling gently by now; she took the pot from the fire with her hands comprehensively gloved, then refilled all of their jars with it. She left him with a smaller jar while she went and rummaged in the bags – after a minute or so of watching her, he realised she was fetching the scissors and bandages and disinfectant. He wanted to protest that he could get those, but…by then, there wasn’t any point. He was too tired anyway.
The water was warm, and felt good to drink. The heat of it spread through his body from the inside-out, unexpectedly lulling after the day’s trials. When he was done he set the jar aside, pulled his gloves off, shuffled over to where Rayla was waiting, and wordlessly reached to help her out of her layers.
There were quite a few. He’d lost track of how many extra layers they’d all been throwing on in the midst of the storm, and it took a while to get them off without hurting her. Drawing each sleeve over her injured arm required a delicacy and focus that he’d thought was beyond him, in this depth of exhaustion…but somehow, he managed it, and piled each article one-by-one beside the fire. She shuddered as the sweaters came off, and started hunching her shoulders when her arms were finally bared, goosebumps raising over her skin. Even directly beside the fire, it was so cold that she was shivering in earnest by the time he peeled the bandages off.
It was growing dark enough now that he mostly had to depend on the firelight to check on the savage wounds over her upper arm. If there was any mercy, it was that he was still too emotionally exhausted to feel as terrible as he usually did when he looked at them.
Silent, he pressed carefully around the edges, trying to feel at the state of the developing scabs. “Better.” He said at last, quiet, and reached for the disinfectant to wash the area. “Feels more solid now. These probably won’t open up again if you’re careful.”
“Mm.” She watched him, still shivering, as he re-bandaged her arm and then carefully pulled back her collar to check on the shoulder wound. It had never been as bad as the rest, and was doing fine. He replaced the bandage pad that they’d tied onto it, and then sighed.
“Alright, we can get your layers back on now.” He attempted a smile, tired, as she exhaled with relief.
“Oh good.” She grumbled, already snatching at the first item of clothing he’d left by the fire. “I don’t have the energy to be shivering like this. It’s too bloody cold.”
He wondered, for a brief dizzy second, how terrible the cold would be without the fire. With night nearly upon them, and their mountain almost in the middle of the storm…well, there was a reason they’d needed a fire-watch, wasn’t there? Without the fire…they’d probably be dead by now. He reflected on this almost emotionlessly, then moved to help Rayla with her clothes.
A few careful minutes later she was bundled up again, clad in so many layers that her torso seemed a solid mass of cable-knit sweater. Her neck disappeared behind the scarves, and then when her hat returned, her ears mostly vanished too.
He stopped her before she went to re-glove her hands, though, reaching out to touch gingerly at the back of her wrist. “This still needs doing.” He reminded her, exhausted enough that his voice sounded strange and flat to his ears. She glanced at him, frowning.
“…Normally I’d say to leave it, today.” She said, eventually. “But…”
“Ez and Zym loosened your binding a lot earlier.” He guessed, and she nodded. “Yeah, I think that’s…probably the most important time for it.” Briefly, exhaustedly, he closed his eyes. It was more effort to speak than it should have been. “Make sure it…recirculates right, or whatever.” He glanced at her bare hand, now almost entirely a normal colour, and blinked at it tiredly. “At least it should hurt less now.”
She flexed the fingers carefully, and then shifted a little to offer the hand to him. “Feels okay, yeah. Cold, kind of numb. Stiff, but…not really sore.” She offered quietly as his hands settled around hers. Despite everything, her hand actually felt a little warmer than his at the moment – he’d taken his gloves off to help her with her clothes and bandages, and that much time in the open air had chilled them considerably. He hesitated, then shuffled them closer to the heat of the fire.
He checked the bandage around her binding, first. The binding itself was surprisingly loose; while some magical force seemed to prevent it from being moved from its exact spot on her wrist, there was enough room in it now that he thought he could actually slip a finger under it if he tried. It wasn’t visibly squeezing at her wrist at all, and the bruise-dark hue it had left on her hand and arm was gone like it had never existed. The scabs of the sores were healing well. They were still hard and thick-feeling, but he could see the hints of new pink skin starting to grow in from their edges. “I…think you can go without bandages on here, now.” He decided, slowly, and set the bandage aside. “Just be careful not to catch the scabs on anything, I guess.”
She made a face at her wrist, like she found it offensive to look at, and – after a moment, Callum found himself staring too. His eyes fixed unerringly on the strange clasp, and then the silver of the ribbon itself, all-too-aware of what it represented. His breath stuttered for a second, and he closed his eyes, suddenly struggling to breathe around the sharp-edged pain in his chest.
He panted a few times in distress, eyes tightly closed, and didn’t quite manage to move until Rayla’s hand twitched between his own, fingers squeezing gently at his. He exhaled slowly, blinked his eyes open, then turned to wipe his face on his scarf. “Sorry.” He muttered, disoriented by grief, and couldn’t make himself meet her eyes. He was sure of the way she’d be looking at him – guilty, and pained, and sad – and didn’t know if he could handle that right now.
She seemed to hesitate. “Callum…”
“It’s fine.” He said, softly, and repositioned her hand in his, turning it palm-up for him to work. “I’ll just…get this done, and then…” He closed his eyes again, very briefly. “Then, I guess we…wait out the night. Rest, maybe. Somehow.”
It was strange; he was tired enough that the task ahead seemed more exhausting a prospect than it ever had. He wished he could leave it, and just rest. But…at the same time, he was dreading what would come once there was nothing left to do. At least now he had some distraction. Afterwards...there’d be nothing but his grief, and his thoughts, and the bleak prospect of the monumental journey ahead of them. He wasn’t looking forward to it.
“…Somehow.” She echoed lowly, like she felt the impossibility of that as much as he did. She fell quiet, watching with shuttered eyes as he finally started pressing his fingers into her palm. Together, they sat in a silence swallowed by the howl of the wind, and did not speak again.
---
Rayla sat wordless and unmoving for all the time it took Callum to massage some circulation back into her bound hand. It took longer than usual, and she could practically feel the exhaustion dragging at his every motion. She kept wanting to suggest that he stop, and let her handle it, but…somehow, she thought he wouldn’t appreciate that now. So she stayed silent, and watched him, and felt guilt drag its claws viciously through the insides of her chest.
The flesh of her hand ached a bit where he pressed at it. There was a low-level sear to it, a gentle burning soreness, like someone had planted the suggestion of acid within her blood. Compared to the pulsing agony of her upper arm, it was almost pleasant. Finally, he finished, and remanded her hand back to her, and then…shuddered, a little, as he drew his own hands back to his lap and huddled down beside the fire, staring bleakly into its flickering light. He didn’t say anything.
She watched him through the corners of her eyes, heart hurting, throat choked with shame.
Again, as earlier, she felt the urge to – get away, somehow. To go out into the storm again, and give him some room to breathe. But that wasn’t an option, not with the fatal chill of a night-time blizzard waiting for her beyond their shelter. And, besides…
Rayla glanced at him, uneasily, and completed the thought: if earlier had been any indication, he didn’t want that room to breathe. He didn’t want to be left alone. He didn’t want her to leave.
She couldn’t quite wrap her head around it. Any Moonshadow elf would have wanted the solitude. Pain was a private thing; something to be held close and hidden away. Wanting someone with you during a time this terrible…that was shockingly personal. And for all that she knew he was a human, and had different cultural attitudes surrounding this sort of thing…she couldn’t help but feel bewildered, and strangely touched, by the memory of him pleading for her to stay.
She shifted in place, uncomfortable, but held that memory in place to force herself still. He’d asked her to stay, so she would. She owed it to him. It wasn’t as if there was anywhere to go anyway. But…
She had no idea what to do.
Rayla looked at him again, huddling by the fire with his knees up to his chest, eyes downcast, face oddly blank. It hurt, to see him like this. Hurt more to remember her role in doing this to him. She gritted her teeth and closed her eyes, and suppressed the agitated reflex in her body that wanted to send her to her feet, to turn her face away, to escape this space full of guilt and shame and other people’s grief.
Silently, she reflected on that impulse, exhaling almost silently. The sound of the wind drowned it out, and she had no doubt that Callum heard nothing. She opened her eyes and stared at the fire, and acknowledged to herself what was really motivating this ongoing desire to flee: it hurt to be here. It hurt to see him hurt, and to deal with her own shame. Leaving would be easier – if not for the storm – but it would also be cowardice. She’d done enough to hurt him already. Leaving when he’d begged her to stay would be too cruel.
But she didn’t know what to do.
There’d been times in the past where Runaan or Ethari had been having a hard time with something, but they always helped each other through that in private. It had been the same with her parents, though she’d been much younger then. She’d never been the person anyone turned to for comfort before. She’d certainly never had to help anyone through something like this, and – what was she supposed to do? How could she possibly make something like this better?
He wasn’t crying now, maybe, but this almost seemed worse. He was just…silent, and small-looking, and empty-eyed. It was terrible to look at. She wanted to help, but…what could she do? Talking wouldn’t solve this. He’d lost his dad.
Rayla hesitated, gut churning, and reached for one of the jars of water to take a sip while she thought. Callum’s silent form lingered in her peripheral vision, looking painfully lonely in the firelight. She wished she could reach out to him. A second later, startled, she wondered why she thought she couldn’t.
He felt…off-limits, in a way, in the grips of grief like this. It felt private, like something she shouldn’t be seeing, shouldn’t be witness to. It seemed an imposition to so much as be here, let alone reach for him when he’d not asked.
But he had asked for her to stay, hadn’t he? He’d reached for her then. He wasn’t reaching now, but maybe that didn’t necessarily mean he didn’t want contact, or that it wouldn’t help, or…oh, stars, she didn’t know. She exhaled into the warm water of her jar, then set it down. Finally, tentative, she shuffled a short way around the fireside towards him.
Callum’s head jerked up, just a little, at the sight of her approach. It was a faltering motion, as though he were struggling against some terrible weight to so much as move. Hesitantly, she reached out for his shoulder. Slowly, but – he watched her hand with that same blank, exhausted expression, up until it actually touched him, and then something in his face seemed to crumple. He shook all-over, and made a tiny miserable noise, and reached up to clutch at her hand so tightly it almost hurt.
Carefully, she tugged on it, a wordless offer to come closer if he wanted. Expression still trembling like he was somewhere on the verge of tears, he did shuffle over, huddling into her side closely enough he inadvertently elbowed her in the bands of bruising around her waist. She suppressed a wince, shifting to accommodate him more easily, and he took the opportunity to turn his face into her shoulder. His shoulders trembled.
He didn’t make any sound, but she could hear the way his breath was stuttering. He seemed a half-step from crying; too exhausted for actual tears, but upset enough that the motions of sobbing kept moving him anyway. A little awkwardly, she patted him on the shoulder with the hand that wasn’t still gripped in his, feeling very stupid for not realising earlier that this was what she should have been doing all along.
“…Sorry.” He mumbled thickly, and she wondered what he felt he had to keep apologising for. She was the one who should be apologising, but…
“Shush.” She told him, quiet and firm despite the aching of her heart. “Nothing to be sorry for.”
He shuddered again, and huddled a little closer. Tentatively, she put her arm around his back.
Callum spent the better part of the next ten minutes like that, breath hitching unevenly and his shoulders shaking. He never got quite as far as actual crying, but seemed gripped by its surrogate motions anyway. Steadily the shudders grew slower, and weaker, as if he was losing the energy for even that. After a while, he seemed to remember himself, and lifted his head for a moment. In his eyes she saw a faint, tired inkling of self-consciousness as he glanced between her face and her shoulder. “…’S okay?” He questioned.
Slowly, she reached out and smoothed her hand down the hair at the back of his neck. “It’s fine.” She murmured, and he took her at her word. His head lowered.
He still shook against her in stops and starts. It was slow, and faltering, and almost entirely soundless. He looked so terribly exhausted then, shadows dark beneath his eyes, that she thought it was more the tiredness than anything else that finally let him stop. He gradually went still, blinking blearily at the fire, and sighed quietly. Slowly, his eyelids began to flutter closed.
Ten minutes later, Rayla was almost completely certain he’d fallen asleep on her, somehow. It had to be the exhaustion to blame. She couldn’t imagine him managing it otherwise. Heart hurting for him, she made no attempt to move or dislodge him, and sat watching the fire for a long while.
She managed to avoid waking him for the next hour or so, even when taking a drink or tossing sticks into the flames. It felt like it was maybe eight at night by the time she heard movement from the direction of Ezran in the tent-layers, and turned her head to look over her shoulder.
The covers shifted. A low, unhappy sound emanated from within, followed shortly by quiet, broken whimpering. Crying in his sleep, Rayla guessed, and felt choked again with the weight of the guilt.
And then-
Callum, who’d not shifted or woken through a half-dozen incidents of her moving about, blinked his eyes open and lifted his head from her shoulder. “Ez?” He murmured, plainly disorientated, and in his uncoordinated attempt to look around ended up smacking his face straight into the scarves piled around her neck. “Mmph,” He expressed, surprised, and then he straightened up properly and squinted at her. “Rayla?” He questioned, plainly not really awake enough to have his wits about him.
“…You kind of fell asleep on me, for a bit.” She told him, voice quiet a low, her ear twitching in the direction of Ezran and his restless sleep. “Think you only woke up because-“ She hesitated, and glanced over.
“Ezran.” Callum processed, aloud, and struggled and stumbled his way through trying to get to his feet. “Yeah, I – I always wake up if he has bad dreams, I-“ He shook his head, and cut off the words. “I need to go to him.” He said instead, and finally managed to stand up. He’d taken a few wavering steps towards the covers when Ezran surprised them both by shooting upright, breath uneven, a few stray tears bright at the corners of his wide eyes. He stared uncomprehendingly ahead, too recently awoken at first to see them, and then finally his eyes seemed to focus on the shapes by the fire.
“…Callum?” He mumbled, voice strangely shaky. “Rayla? What…” He blinked at them, and then again more slowly as Callum lowered himself down at his side. He looked between her and his brother with a look of slow, terrible understanding. His eyes shuttered, and he lifted his hands up to his face.
“You sounded like you were having a bad dream.” Callum said, tentative, shifting over until he and his brother were side-by-side, pressed close against each other. “…Are you okay?”
Ezran didn’t answer for a long moment. His shoulders hunched and then shook, and he exhaled a thick-sounding breath. “I was dreaming.” He said in the end, almost listlessly, and lowered his hands from his face. “And then…I just…remembered, in the dream, that dad was dead. And it felt like a nightmare, so – I tried to wake up, but-“ He sniffed, and wiped his face on his sleeve. His breath shuddered again, his shoulders heaved…but then, instead of crying, he took a deep breath and seemed to force himself to steadiness. Finally, quiet, he finished the sentence: “But I woke up, and…it’s still real.”
Callum inhaled, a sort of pained breathy gasp, a flinch stuttering over his face. He breathed out shakily, then reached out to his brother on what seemed like reflex, pulling him close.
Ezran didn’t protest, but he did shudder at the contact, turning his face into Callum’s chest and sighing. “This is awful.” He said, very quietly. “I…don’t know what to do. I don’t know how I’m supposed to…I don’t know. I don’t know. I just..” His eyes slipped closed, and most of his face disappeared into his brother’s sweater. His next words were muffled in the fabric. “I’m so tired.”
“…You could go back to sleep?” Callum suggested, soft and unhappy, like he knew how inadequate a comfort that was for something like this. Ezran lifted his head, just enough to look up. Rayla saw the glitter of his eyes brightly in the gloom, too bright by far for how tired they were.
“So could you.” Ez said, plainly. His voice was strangely emotionless. “Would it make anything better?”
Callum flinched again. “…It might.” He said at last, after a long silence. “Sometimes, when things are awful…if you go to sleep, it can feel a bit less terrible in the morning.” Rayla looked at him, and remembered all over again that he’d already gone through something like this before. Years ago he’d lost his mother, and somehow had to live through the pain of that to a time where it started to get better. He’d had to suffer through that, just like he had to suffer through this now.
Rayla shivered, and thought of her own parents, and wondered if she’d have to do the same. She wondered if she, like them, was an orphan of this terrible war. She wondered if she should be mourning.
Ezran glanced out at the sky, dark and snow-torn, and then at the fire. “Morning’s a long way off.” He pointed out, in that same empty voice. “And there’s the fire-watch too.”
“You don’t need to be on the first watch, though.” Callum told him, leaning forwards just enough to rest his chin into his brother’s hair. “You could sleep a good while longer.”
Rayla expected him to shake his head, or disagree, or something. Instead he just blinked, tired and empty-eyed, and said “Okay.”
There was something horribly painful about that acquiescence. Callum seemed to feel it too. He closed his eyes, and pressed a kiss into Ezran’s hair.
Ezran didn’t move or speak as he was lowered back down and tucked into the makeshift bedding. He did reach for the egg, and Bait, pulling both of them against his chest. He laid open-eyed on his side for a minute or so, blinking slowly, then finally let his eyelids shut.
It was a while before he actually fell asleep. Fifteen minutes or more. Rayla sat silent, throat tight, and tended to the fire between glances back at them. Callum stayed beside his brother the whole time, near but not touching, a quiet weary presence in the dark beyond the fire. He was shivering a little by the time he returned, having waited long enough past Ezran’s sleeping that the air had chilled him through. He huddled by the fire and stared empty-eyed at the flames.
Rayla eyed him, and couldn’t think of anything to say. She didn’t think there was anything to say. So instead, she drew on her experience from earlier, and just…shuffled over to him, pressing in until their shoulders butted together. He glanced at her, exhaling slowly, and leaned back. He didn’t speak.
Time passed like that, with little interruption or change. She murmured to him at one point to suggest he go join his brother and sleep, but he just shook his head. So they remained there in silence and watched the fire together through the opening hours of the night. She warmed water periodically and got him to drink, and presented him with pieces of meat, and after a while even went to get some more to cook. It was something to do, after all.
A few times, Callum dozed off on her shoulder again. Never for long, but when she eventually did the same it was another matter entirely. She neither stirred nor dreamed, and woke a long while later to find herself covered in her cloak and curled beside the fire, a bag propped under her head as a pillow. Her body ached terribly as she finally moved, numb with cold and heavy with the pain of her bruises. Disoriented, she pulled on her sense of the Moon to figure out how long it had been. A little more than five hours, apparently.
She sat up, the cloak falling from her shoulders, and found Callum and Ezran sat together by the fire, very close by, the layers of the tent laid over their laps like unusually stiff blankets. They glanced over at her as she blinked at them, frowning. “I…fell asleep?” She concluded, bewildered that she’d not woken. They – or at least Callum – must have laid her down close to the heat of the flames, and put the cloak over her, and fed the fire through those hours…but she’d not stirred. It was unlike her.
“A good while back, yeah.” Callum agreed, voice a low hush, like he was still trying to avoid waking her. He nodded to the now-bare part of their shelter that had previously held the tent-layers. “It’s too cold back there now, so…I thought it’d be better to just let you rest here.”
“It’s too cold anywhere except right next to the fire.” Ezran said, and she saw that the egg was in his lap. That disconcerted her, but she supposed if Callum hadn’t complained it probably wasn’t affecting him too badly. “It woke me up. It was just…too cold to sleep. And then once I was here, Zym was too awake for me to sleep through.”
“You could try again now, though.” Callum pointed out, and received a very level stare for his troubles.
“No.” He said, very simply, like it was so irrefutable a decision it didn’t need to be reinforced with further words. There was that same blank apathy from before in his eyes, but with a little more animus now. He seemed vaguely unimpressed with his brother. “But you should.” He glanced sidelong at Rayla suddenly, and addressed her, saying “He’s not going to sleep, because he doesn’t want me to be awake alone. But you’re awake now. You can tell him to rest, finally.” There was a hint of asperity there, like he’d been trying for hours to change Callum’s mind without success.
She blinked several times to clear her eyes, then pushed herself all the way up, staring across at Callum, who was sat close enough that the bag she’d been sleeping on was against his side. He stared tiredly back, looking appallingly exhausted, with a resigned sort of expression that suggested he knew exactly how this was going to go. “Go to sleep, you dummy.” She told him, exasperated. “The idea of a watch is everyone gets some sleep, you know.”
He sighed. “I’m not sorry.” He said, a little indistinct, like he was exhausted enough to slur the words a little. “Wasn’t gonna leave Ez alone like that. Wouldn’t be right.”
Privately, she agreed with him. Leaving Ez awake alone would have been terrible, so she understood perfectly. But now… “I’ll take care of him.” She promised, phrasing it a little more directly than she might have if she’d been more awake. “So you can sleep. It’s fine.”
He blinked at her, looking painfully relieved. “…Good.” He mumbled, and slid his eyes sideways to the tent-layers, and then the fire. “Should I…?”
She nudged him aside and then pulled the cloak over. Ezran helpfully shoved the tent layers towards her, so she arranged those by the fire and then prodded Callum into place. “Down,” she ordered, and looking a little bewildered, he went. Soon he was curled by the fire in the spot she’d vacated, and she put her own cloak over him. He stared up at her with bleary eyes as she nudged the bag under his head. “Comfy?”
Somehow, he managed something close to a smile, face drawn and wan with exhaustion. “Mm. Very.” He sighed, eyelids fluttering closed. Then, by all appearances, he passed out within a few seconds.
“…He was so stubborn.” Ezran said, into the quiet left by Callum’s abrupt exit from consciousness. “I kept trying to get him to sleep, but he just…wouldn’t.”
Rayla glanced his way, then picked her way over to sit herself by his side. “Apparently you’re not the only one who can be stubborn when you want to be.” She said, a little dryly. She wasn’t sure if it was appropriate to tease him now, after – after he’d learned the truth she’d been hiding, and been hit by the grief of it, but…
He eyed her a little grumpily, but didn’t seem particularly bothered. “I guess.” He looked over at his sleeping brother, and his gaze gentled into something softer. Sadder, too. “…He didn’t have to do that, though. I was fine.”
Her brow furrowed. Slowly, she shook her head. “No, Ez.” She said at last. “It was the right thing to do. You…shouldn’t be alone right now.”
Ezran looked startled at that, eyes flying quickly back to her. He didn’t seem to know what to say for a few seconds, but then…quietly, he reached out to her, waiting until she consented to take his hand. He sighed, looking at their joined hands for a moment. She wondered what he was picking up from her now. Then, finally, his eyes slid up to hers again. “…You’re gonna take care of me, huh.” He said, subdued.
For a second, she didn’t know what he meant – then she remembered what she’d just said to Callum. Her shoulders stiffened a little, uncertainty gripping at her gut. She didn’t know what he thought of her now. Didn’t know what he’d accept from her. But… “Reckon I will, yeah.” She agreed, quietly. “If that’s okay.”
He watched her, silent and almost expressionless, then exhaled minutely. He shuffled into her side and looked away. “You said you’d be my sister, before.” He said finally, and let half-lidded eyes settle on the fire. “So I guess that’s fine.”
The words hurt in a way she somehow hadn’t anticipated. It felt like a stab through her chest; she inhaled sharply around it, touched and guilty and thankful at once. If Ezran felt any echo of it, he didn’t react. He just sighed, huddling against her, and watched the flames.
Full of enough nameless emotion that she couldn’t speak around it, that it choked her, Rayla stayed silent as well. The trust felt like more than she deserved. First Callum, and now Ezran – both of them had, despite everything, reached out to her for comfort. Like they wanted her. Like they needed her, somehow. Even knowing what she’d kept from them, and the role she’d played in their pain, they trusted her like this. It was…humbling. It made her heart clench with shame.
Deliberately – because she didn’t know how much of that Ez would pick up on, and he didn’t need that right now – she turned her thoughts aside and looked out at the storm.
As if reacting to her attention, the clouds flashed in the dark. The thunder that followed was faraway, five seconds removed from the light; the rumble was quiet. Already the storm was passing by. For all its noise and vicious cold, she didn’t think it’d hold them too much longer. Sometime soon, they’d have to leave this place, and deal with whatever waited beyond the blizzard. It was a relief, in a way. This was a place of grief and pain, and she wanted to be free of it. But, at the same time…they had so far to go. The mere thought was wearying.
Rayla closed her eyes for a moment, drawing on what resolve she could muster. It would be fine. Somehow. Within a day they’d have left here…and however long the journey to come really was, they’d take it one step at a time. It wouldn’t always feel like this. It would be okay.
Clinging to that thought, she wound an arm around Ezran’s back, drawing him closer in to her side. He went gladly, turning his face into the knit of her jumper and sighing softly.
Beyond their shelter, the thunder echoed further and further away, but the wind was as harsh a shriek as it had ever been. Its howl followed their vigil through the rest of the night.
---
End chapter.
Chapter Notes: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1fjPSeB8RRkc_DOw9sxaN5xgY5LwddRV4?usp=sharing
Link to PIAJ chapter notes folder (Google Drive folder including worldbuilding, commentary, medical notes, research notes, and misc notes for all applicable chapters within this section)
This chapter's notes cover: No new worldbuilding notes this chapter. However, there are author’s notes on this chapter’s characterisation, development, and some of the work that went into it.
Timeline: https://docs.google.com/document/d/107eD8zmLAAFBWSOgsLyl8g4pAdQF4EgMh4rpN_m91U4/edit?usp=sharing Link to PIAJ Timeline Google doc ( to be updated as story progresses)
PIAJ Masterpage: https://tenspontaneite.tumblr.com/piaj Link to PIAJ Masterpage on tumblr (containing links to chapters, meta, art, Q&As, and resources) (Link may not work properly on mobile/app)
Author Notes:
Happy 2021 everyone. We’ve not had the best start to the year, but with luck it’ll be less atrocious than 2020 overall.
Long chapter break again, as you may have noticed. If you don’t check my tumblr and therefore haven’t seen my various personal updates on there – since the last update, I started playing a new instrument, broke several personal writing records, and took around a 15ish day break from writing before Christmas. I had an extremely powerful writing hyperfocus across a good portion of October and November, and churned out a Large Quantity of writing in a different rayllum fanfiction that will not be published.
Personal records broken
Most written in one day: Previously 8200 words, now 9150
Fastest 50k: Previously 11 days, now 9 days
Fastest 100k: Previously unknown*, now 23 days
Most written in one month: Previously 88k, now 120k
*The previous record for fastest 100k would have been when I first started writing this story, but I wasn’t keeping detailed records at the time so I’m not sure of the exact date I started writing. I’m relatively certain 23 days breaks it though.
This chapter was kind of a lot of emotional effort to write, not to mention representing the execution of some seriously painful story arrangement logistics, so comments are very much appreciated.
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Little Pistol - The Boy Who Blocked His Own Shot
Chapter 8
First Previous Next
Why did this happen now, so suddenly you might ask. Why not develop them further, allow more to happen and their personalities to shift further before throwing this at them? Because Villains and enemies don't wait for you to get your shit figured out before striking. So here we are instead. Gore and Death warning in effect. Happy reading!
Song title by Brand New
LP Taglist
@zalladane @moonlightstar64 @amayakans @elmokingkong @queen-in-a-flower-crown @karategirl119 @dreamykitty25 @danielslilangel @melicmusicmagic @xahriia @sassakitty @yin-390 @zotinha456 @indecisive-mess-named-me @heldtogetherbysafetypins @theatreandcomicfreak @alexandriamw @messymessyml
Permanent list
@naoryllis @throneoffirebreathingbitchqueen @my-name-is-michell @maribat-is-lifeblood @dast218 @novicevoice @shizukiryuu @princess-of-fangirls @bigpicklebananatree @pirats-pizzacanninibles @abrx2002 @breemeister @darkthunder1589 @thestressmademedoit @severelyenchantedwonderland @isabellemasen @multi-fandom-freak0221 @fantasyloversblog @bzz75 @cloudiedraws @orbitsvt @gingerdaile @sotheresthatthought @kadmeread @novaloptr @unabashedlyswimmingtimemachine @crazylittlemunchkin @18-fandoms-unite-08 @tiny-goddess-of-chaos @ladybug-182 @toodaloo-kangaroo @the-alice-of-hearts @vixen-uchiha @changelinggarden
~---~
The boy before her sat slumped against a chimney tower, black suit slashed through and red slushing out in lazy tendrils down his face and sides. Hair shone copper in matted clumps around shorn expanses of scalp where the skin had just barely managed to stitch itself back together with what had to be the last remnants of Plagg's own healing magic.
It was clear in that moment that without that burst to heal his head, Chat would've died before ever reaching her.
Forcing back gasping breaths that threatened hysterical panic, Ladybug carefully lifted her partner into her arms.
"What are- my lady, I need to tell you," his weak protest murmured into deafening silence.
"You can tell me on the way," she assured softly while carefully maneuvering across to a rooftop access door into the building below, grateful for his choice in stopping place before calling her. The building below was perfectly abandoned and close by to a hospital. But first.
Laying Chat down onto the ground, she called on her lucky charm. A sewing kit of a different variety popped into her hands amidst a first aid box. Carefully washing, stitching, and dressing the wounds Plagg couldn't help, she realized that unless Hawkmoth sprung up from nowhere, she'd been right.
"Hawkmoth… he's… he's my," he started.
"I know, Kitty."
"What?"
"I suspected Gabriel, didn't I? Told you to watch him. Knew you could pull it off, though I never thought him capable of this."
"But you… know?" Chat's whisper grovel confirmed.
"I know, Adrien. You were never a suspect. You or Nino."
"Then why..?" he cut off.
"So you wouldn't hesitate to investigate him thoroughly. You were so sure of your own innocence that proving it distracted you from holding back on your father," she readily admitted, tying off another thread and applying dressings over the last wound.
"You," his voice grew just barely, to show his anger, "You knew who I was and didn't feel the need to share?"
"I'm the guardian. And you are a temporary holder. You were never meant to even know Fu's identity. There is no world in which I can share my identity with you," her voice didn't quiver or shake. It stayed even and monotonous in its clarity, "Come on, Chat. The moment I detransform, these stitches will disappear. We need to get you to a hospital." She felt no need to mention the lack of timer on her transformation. Better he rush through his information without time to process what she said, "I'm sorry he did this to you. I never would've sent you if I thought this would happen."
"I don't," he squinted, frazzled mind trying to keep up with the conversation's turn, "We could never. Why would. Oh," he stopped again as she picked him up and made way towards the window, "I don't think he knows his damage to us isn't healed with the cure. At least, I hope he doesn't," he admitted.
"Don't worry, Kitty, I'll take care of this. I'll make sure I put an end to this," Ladybug nodded to herself before taking off across the city in gentle swings. Landing adjacent to the hospital, she asked one more favor of her partner, "Kitty, you need to detransform now. Don't worry, my magic will hold until they have you fully stable. You'll be fine."
Ladybug had never seen her partner look so absolutely scared and unsure than he did in that moment. It started to break through her shock, through her calm and stability into the roaring panic that built up inside her from the moment she saw his collapsed form. Pushing it all down, she begged for five more minutes of clarity. Just five minutes of peace until she had him taken care of. Five minutes before the storm broke over her.
"It's okay. I got you. I'm right here," she whispered to the boy cradled into her hold.
"Okay."
As soon as the green light stopped flaring, she dropped down to street level and ran into the hospital, yelling for help.
"Ladybug! What happened?" A nurse immediately helped her to get the now limp boy into a gurney, the pressure and support of the magic suit having been the only thing keeping him awake.
"His father. His father did this. I barely got him out. It wasn't an akuma attack, my magic won't work, you have to help him," she urged as the ER staff closed in on them. As they started to wheel him away, she slipped the ring off his finger in the guise of hesitating to let go of his hand. And then he was gone. Behind closed doors once more.
Moments ahead of the still room breaking into chaotic noise, she disappeared the way she came. Into the sky.
Slipping on the ring felt too easy. Plagg's quiet form looking at her and understanding strengthened her. His gentle paws holding the morsel she offered as he recharged soothed her storm. His entering the ring, solidified everything she needed to know about what was to come.
With the confirmation of his identity, it was laughably easy to take Gabriel down. So easy, it gave no relief to the sheer anger in her heart. He gave up. She barged in through the window. The blatantly butterfly shaped window. She could've torn her hair out at the cruelty of such an obnoxious display of their ignorance. She broke through and screamed at him. Fought off the cane from his hand and told him exactly who Chat Noir was and where he was now and watched the light die from the once Villain's eyes as he came to grips with what he'd done. Of how permanent the damage could be. Watched as the great Hawkmoth collapsed into Gabriel Agreste's begging form. Saw him begging for her to make the wish. Told her of his wife's still form above them. Groveled for her to help. To restore his family with the combined powers she now held. Unaware or simply uncaring for the consequences.
She asked to see Adrien's mother. Followed soundlessly as the thanking, miserable form in front of her guided them towards the glorified memorial above.
She felt nothing as she opened the clear-glassed coffin and checked for a pulse only to find none. Only a perfectly preserved body remained. No life to restore even if she wanted to. All of this. All of this pain and grief and fear. For a woman who was long gone and dead.
Closing it back shut, she ripped the cords from the base, cataclysming the entire system meant to keep the body intact as it was, tearing apart the last bit of hope from Gabriel's eyes. And with it, the broach from his throat.
Finding Natalie upstairs and carefully removing her own miraculous from her sleeping form came even easier.
A call to the police took less than two minutes.
Leaving the scene was only a swing away.
Detransforming was only a matter of words.
Collapsing into her bed to the sound of the downstairs TV bellowing the news of Gabriel Agreste's arrest and Adrien Agreste's death took both a lifetime and the split of a second.
#maribat#ml x dc#timinette#timari#Dark!Timinette#major character injury#major character death#tw: gore#tw: death
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Author: Follow up to my other short of saying bye bye to Wen Ning. You can also read both on AO3
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Song Zichen comes to Gusu 10 years after they put Wen Qionglin to rest.
Wei Ying and Lan Wangji meet him at the gates of Cloud Recesses, and Song Zichen doesn’t say anything – can’t say anything – but he holds out a spirit pouch to Wei Ying, and Wei Ying sighs softly as if he already knows what is being requested of him.
It’s a heavy burden his love has to carry, Lan Wangji realizes. It’s heavy and lonely, and Lan Wangji would give anything in the world to carry it instead.
“He’s back, huh?” Wei Ying smiles, taking the spirit pouch from Song Zichen’s undead fingers.
Song Zichen nods, and though he cannot smile, his eyes are bright. Joy seems to seep out of him.
Honestly, he looks too happy for a man who has come to ask to be killed.
Wei Ying brings the spirit pouch close to his face and presses his forehead against the rough fabric. “Welcome back, Xiao Xingchen,” he smiles faintly, “You sure made Song Zichen wait a long time.”
Lan Wangji is reminded again that his Wei Ying is kind – too kind.
Wei Ying carefully hands the spirit pouch back to Song Zichen. “It’s too late for me to go to Coffin Town today,” he says, “You can go ahead and I will meet you there, or we can travel together tomorrow.”
Song Zichen carefully tucks the spirit pouch away in the folds of his robe and bows to Wei Ying and Wangji before walking down the steps of Cloud Recesses.
“I think that’s the most excited I’ve ever seen Song Lan,” Wei Ying says, a soft smile on his face that doesn’t quite reach his eyes.
“Mn,” Lan Wangji agrees. He takes Wei Yings hand in his and they walk together into Cloud Recesses.
Ten years have passed, but Lan Wangji is still unsure how to comfort Wei Ying. Still doesn’t know the right words to say, the right things to do. The only comfort he can give is his presence – and he knows it’s not enough.
“I’m fine, Lan Zhan,” Wei Ying says, leaning his head on Lan Wangji’s shoulder. “I’m fine.”
Wei Ying is always fine, and while Lan Wangji is thankful for his lover’s strength, it’s also a reminder of Wangji’s own shortcomings.
“I know,” Lan Wangji murmurs, pressing a firm kiss onto the top of Wei Ying’s head. He wants to tell Wei Ying that it’s okay to not be fine – that he can be weak and hurt in front of Lan Wangji and Lan Wangji will still love him. But…
But if he’s honest with himself, he’s terrified of Wei Ying not being fine.
He can barely offer any sort of comfort as it is – what would he be able to do if Wei Ying actually admitted he was not okay?
It’s times like these that Lan Wangji hates himself. If only he was more like his brother. If he was more like his brother, he would know the right words. Would know the right things to do to soothe hurt. Would know how to hold a person carefully so that even when they fell apart, they could be put back together.
It’s frustrating and embarrassing that even with all this love Wangji has for Wei Ying – even though there’s nothing Lan Wangji would not, could not, do for his Wei Ying… he’s useless in the face of his soulmate’s pain.
Wei Ying is lively and bright that night as they go to bed. He laughs his way through dinner, talking animatedly at Wangji and Sizhui. He acts particularly spoiled during his bath, asking Lan Wangji to wash his hair, to run the wet cloth over his body. And even now, as he squeezes himself into Lan Wangji’s side, he seems to be in good spirits.
“You don’t have to go with me tomorrow,” Wei Ying says, rubbing a soothing hand over Lan Wangji’s chest and down his side. “It won’t take me too long.”
Lan Wangji slips his arm around Wei Ying’s waist and pulls him closer to him – so close that Wei Ying is almost on top of him. “I wish to go,” he says, his eyes closed.
Wei Ying is quiet for a couple of breaths. “Okay,” he says finally – and his Wei Ying, his poor Wei Ying, sounds relieved. As if he had actually thought that Lan Wangji would let him fulfill this horrible, horrible request alone.
It’s almost hypocritical coming from him, but he wishes Wei Ying would ask things from him outright. “There is not a thing in this world that I would not give you if you asked,” Lan Wangji wants to say. Sometimes, like now, he wants to shake Wei Ying and repeat it until Wei Ying believes him.
But Lan Wangji knows nothing if not restraint, so instead of shaking his Wei Ying, he pulls him even closer and goes to sleep.
Coffin town is still as dreary and deserted as it was 20 years ago, and Song Zichen, with his all black attire and expressionless face, does not look at all out of place.
“Don’t look so excited,” Wei Ying says as they approach Song Zichen, “Xiao Xingchen will think you’re such a loser if you look so excited. Trust me, you gotta play it cool.”
Song Zichen just bows to them as if Wei Ying hasn’t said anything at all. When he straightens, he reaches into his robes and takes out the spirit pouch and hands it to Wei Ying.
Wei Ying sighs as he takes the pouch from Song Zichen. “So cold, Song Lan,” he says, “No asking about my trip, no asking about how I’m doing – it’s straight to business with you, huh?”
Song Zichen, ever expressive, just stares back at Wei Ying.
It’s almost… remarkable to Wangji – someone who, even after 15 years as husbands, has not developed an immunity to Wei Ying’s charm – to witness someone so obviously underwhelmed by Wei Ying.
Wei Ying, ever resilient, takes Song Zichen’s unresponsiveness in stride. “Fine, fine,” he waves, “Let’s get to the killing part of the evening.”
This time, Wangji follows Wei Ying to where the grave has already been dug. Song Zichen lays himself down in the coffin. Beside his grave is a lone headstone with Xiao Xingchen’s name engraved.
It’s horrific that Wei Ying has to do this, Lan Wangji thinks faintly, a shaking ache growing in his chest. Just watching weighs heavily on his heart – how much heavier must the weight be for Wei Ying?
“Rest now, Song Lan,” Wei Ying says, smiling down at the undead cultivator, “You did well.”
Lan Wangji has to close his eyes then. Can’t bear to watch the scene in front of him. He’s horrified to remember that 10 years ago, Wei Ying sent Wen Qionglin off alone. It’s so… unbearably heavy – the weight of killing someone you care about, even if it is what they want.
The first notes of Chengqing are shaky this time. Lan Wangji puts a hand on Wei Ying’s shoulder, and listens as the notes even out. He listens quietly to that lonely, aching song that he had first heard 10 years ago, and he prays.
Well done, Song Zichen, he prays, you loved a man beyond the point of death and you can rest now.
Wangji squeezes Wei Ying’s shoulder tight to remind himself that his Wei Ying is here and real. He squeezes tight to remind himself how lucky he is.
There are silent tears streaming down Wei Ying’s face when the song is over, and Song Zichen is truly dead and still in his coffin. Wei Ying picks up the spirit pouch from the ground. “Don’t do anything stupid and self-sacrificing in your next life, Xiao Xingchen,” he says, opening the pouch carefully. “You don’t know how much trouble Song Lan went through to put you back together.”
Wangji watches the blue light leave the pouch and disappear into the sky above. Rest well, Xiao Xingchen, he prays.
Wei Ying places the empty pouch that Xiao Xingchen healed in for 10 years on Song Zichen’s chest. Wangji places the cover of the coffin over Song Zichen and places the necessary talismans on the top.
Wei Ying is quiet as they shovel dirt into the grave. Quiet and his eyes are dry. Lan Wangji wonders if he had cried as he had shoveled dirt over Wen Qionglin’s grave. At the time, he had thought it was kindness to let Wei Ying send off Wen Qionglin alone. He had thought he was giving them privacy. Now – now that he’s experienced the heaviness of sending someone off – he’s nauseated at the fact that Wei Ying had done this alone.
“I’m fine,” Wei Ying had said back then – and Lan Wangji had just… believed him.
Before they leave, Wangji engraves Song Zichen’s name on the headstone.
Song Zichen traveled for 10 years, desperately putting his love back together. Working hard so that they could rest together someday. Wangji feels so inadequate, faced with that sort of devotion.
Wei Ying is quiet as they fly back to Cloud Recesses. Gone is the bright, cheeky energy he had shown last night and earlier that day. He is quiet and he leans into Lan Wangji as they fly. Wangji wishes he knew what to say – wishes there was some book of magical words that he could learn to say to ease the heaviness he knows is in Wei Ying’s chest. But he knows no such words, so he just holds Wei Ying close.
“Thank you for coming with me, Lan Zhan,” Wei Ying says when they enter the jingshi. He’s subdued and his shoulders look as if there is some invisible weight weighing them down, and he looks so tired and alone that Lan Wangji can’t help but tug him back into his arms. “Don’t thank me,” he whispers into Wei Ying’s temple, “I’m sorry that you must bear this burden alone.”
Wei Ying huffs a small laugh and pushes himself out of Lan Wangji’s embrace. “Don’t be sorry,” he says, shrugging his robes off, “it’s what I deserve. These burdens are my punishment for creating such techniques. Poor Wen Ning and Song Lan suffered for years as mindless puppets because of my stupid ideas. Sending them off is the least I can do.”
Lan Wangji feels lost, suddenly. Lost in the sudden onslaught of Wei Ying’s pain.
“Don’t say such things,” he says softly, his heart aching fiercely in his chest. “If you received all the goodness in the world, it would still be less than what you deserve.”
Wei Ying turns to him and gives him a weak smile. “Careful, Lan Zhan,” he says, a ghost of playfulness in his voice, “if you say such sweet things so seriously, I might really believe you.”
Wangji feels it again, the desire to shake Wei Ying. Shake him and repeat those words over and over again until Wei Ying believes them… but his Wei Ying looks so fragile in the candlelight… looks so fragile and distant.
It makes his fingertips tingle anxiously.
“Bathe,” he says softly, “I will bring dinner.”
“Could I skip dinner today?” Wei Ying asks, walking behind the privacy screen, “I’m really… tired.”
Lan Wangji wants to say no, but if feels impossible to deny Wei Ying anything right now. “Okay,” he says.
He eats dinner in the hall with the other disciples, his fingers tingling anxiously the entire time. Wei Ying is already in bed when he returns. He bathes alone, quietly, and brushes his hair by himself. When he slips into bed next to Wei Ying, he’s surprised to see Wei Ying’s eyes are open.
They’re open but they do not seem to see anything. It terrifies Lan Wangji just a little bit.
Lan Wangji wants to say something – anything – but he can think of nothing to say. So he just pulls Wei Ying close, so that they are back to chest, and just breathes. He strokes down Wei Ying’s stomach in soothing strokes and just breathes. He prays for strength as he falls asleep that night. He prays to become so strong that he can protect his Wei Ying from everything and anything that threatens to hurt him. This will be the last burden he will ever let Wei Ying carry by himself.
Wei Ying does not leave the jingshi for seven days after they kill Song Zichen.
Wei Ying is listless, and barely eats, and barely speaks, and Lan Wangji thinks he might soon go out of his mind. He orders Wei Ying’s favorite hot sauce, orders the best meats from Caiyi, makes all of Wei Ying’s favorite dishes, but still, Wei Ying barely eats. Barely even meets Lan Wangji’s eyes. He does not even sleep but he lays in bed listlessly.
“I’m sorry,” Wei Ying says after seven days. “I’ll be back to normal soon. I’m just… tired. I’m sorry, Lan Zhan.”
“Shh,” Lan Wangji says, rocking Wei Ying gently in his lap. “Do not be sorry. You haven’t done anything wrong. Do not apologize.” Wei Ying does not have to be okay. He does not have to be normal. But Lan Wangji just wishes Wei Ying would not hurt so.
“Wen Ning, Song Lan, they were all on borrowed time,” Wei Ying murmurs into Lan Wangji’s chest. “They were kept alive needlessly by my techniques.” Wangji does not know where Wei Ying is going with this, but he’s glad that he’s at least speaking. “Now they’re gone. They’re dead like they were always meant to be.”
“Mn,” Lan Wangji hums.
“I’m here on borrowed time as well,” Wei Ying says, “Maybe it’s my time to go too.”
Lan Wangji wonders if Wei Ying can hear how his heart stops in his chest. He can’t respond for a few minutes, too busy trying to remember how to breathe again.
“Sorry,” Wei Ying says, mistaking Lan Wangji’s silence for… for something wrong. “I don’t mean it.” He’s lying, Wangji knows. Lying for Lan Wangji’s feelings.
Lan Wangji lifts Wei Ying higher in his arms, so that he can press his lips to Wei Ying’s forehead. “You can go if you want to,” he says softly, and he means it. If Wei Ying wants to follow Wen Qionglin and Song Zichen, he can. Lan Wangji will not stop him. “It would not be a hardship to follow you.”
Wei Ying goes still in his arms before he suddenly shoots up to sit upright in Lan Wangji’s lap. His eyes have life in them for the first time all week. “Don’t say that,” he frowns, “you’re meant to be alive.”
Lan Wangji loves Wei Ying so much. It’s a little frustrating that Wei Ying does not seem to know just exactly how much he is loved.
“I let you go once,” Lan Wangji says, remembering the terror he felt as he held Wei Ying’s bloody hand over the abyss. “And I lived in the hell of regret of 16 years because of it. If you go, I will follow. I told you 15 years ago, didn’t I? I do not plan to ever let you go again.”
Wei Ying stares at Wangji for a couple of seconds, his eyes narrowing a little bit in annoyance. Eventually, he sighs and slumps forward, his head hitting Lan Wangji’s shoulder. “You’re so annoying, Lan Zhan,” he sighs, and it’s a relief because Wangji can hear life returning to his voice. “I can’t even get mad at you because your face is so damn perfect. In the next life I hope you are born ugly.”
Lan Wangji pats Wei Ying’s back consolingly. The ache in his chest, unfurling by slow degrees. “Fall in love with me even if I am born ugly,” Lan Wangj, “for if I am reborn, it will surely be because I followed you.”
“What if I’m born ugly?” Wei Ying mumbles into Lan Wangji’s shoulder. “What if I’m born with no teeth and one eye and horrific scars on my face? With my karma, I might surely well be born that way.”
“With your karma, you will surely be reborn as beautiful as you are now,” Wangji says, “but no matter what or who you are reborn as, I will love you.”
“Hmph,” Wei Ying sighs, “When did you become such a sweet talker, huh?”
“Maybe it sounds sweet because it is honest,” Wangji says indulgently.
Wei Ying yawns into his shoulder and sinks more heavily onto Lan Wangji’s lap. “I think I will have to stay alive for at least another 100 years,” he mumbles sleepily, “I need at least that long to earn enough good karma to be allowed to love you again in the next life.”
“Mn,” Wangji says. He sits there for a while longer, patting Wei Ying on the back like a tuckered out child, until he feels Wei Ying’s breath even out. He lays them both down on the bed and he looks at Wei Ying’s sleeping face. Something about him looks lighter now, Wangji thinks. It’s probably the first time in a week that he’s really fallen asleep. Lan Wangji can feel something lighten in him as well.
“I will earn good karma as well,” he whispers, running his knuckles down Wei Ying’s cheek. “There’s nothing that can keep me from you. Not you, not the gods – nothing.”
Lan Wangji knows that someday Wei Ying will go.
Wei Ying was never destined to go naturally – for some reason Wangji is sure that no matter how strong he is, no matter how desperately he tries to protect Wei Ying, Wei Ying will go sooner than Wangji expects. But it does not matter to Lan Wangji. He is ready to leave whenever Wei Ying wants to.
Lan Wangji will be glad for another 100 years, but he knows he’s already been blessed with too much as it is. He had been stupid and slow all those years ago and he had let Wei Ying slip from his fingers – but his Wei Ying, his Wei Ying had come back to him.
“Thank you for coming back to me,” he says, his throat aching something fierce. He would have been grateful for even a minute back with Wei Ying, but Wei Ying, ever kind, has given him years. He will not complain.
For some reason he’s reminded of Song Zichen then.
Thank you for coming back.
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When You Need a Shoulder to Sleep On
Spencer Reid x Wife Reader
GIF Not Mine
Summary: When you return back to work as a profiler with the BAU after being gone for maternity leave, the job is harder than it used to be, being as you’re functioning on little to no sleep and no caffeine. Lucky for you, you have your wonderful husband, Spencer, and your family at the BAU to support you.
Word Count: 2,642
Click Here For Masterlist
It had been fourteen months since I’d had a cup of coffee. While I’d been pregnant, ironically enough I hadn’t noticed the absence of the heavenly hot beverage. But now I was returning to work and functioning on less than three hours sleep? Yeah, I was exhausted. Spencer, my wonderful, loving husband and doting father, bless his soul, had even less sleep. He tended to sleep light anyway, and since the baby had arrived he’s been a little... protective. So it was routine for us both to attend to little baby Gideon Derek together, as neither of us were able to think about sleep until we knew the baby was back down.
The difference of course was that I was functioning with no caffeinated stimulants to keep my brain working, while Spencer was on his third cup of heavenly goodness since we’d arrived at the Bureau. Which of course meant that I was barely functioning at all.
‘Denise Hernandez was found murdered in her apartment a week ago. She was discovered by her landlord three days later when he went to check on her, after another tenant had voiced their concern.’ Garcia said, the beeping of her pressing the buttons on her beepy echoing throughout the room, ‘there were no signs of sexual assault and the body was in her bed and she was tucked in underneath her own duvet.’
I blinked, trying to force some energy into my body as I flipped open the file in front of me, detailing the murder Garcia was narrating.
‘The unsub wrapped her in plastic underneath the covers to prevent her blood from sleeping through the fabric.’ I voiced aloud as I read it in the report, ‘that indicates that the way he leaves her behind is important to him.’
‘That’s true, before the covers were removed she looks asleep.’ Rossi agreed, flicking through the photographs in his own file.
‘If that’s the case it’s interesting he doesn’t chose a less gruesome method of murder. If the charade of the victim appearing asleep is so important to him, why go through the trouble of stabbing her twelve times?’ Tara added, taking a sip of her coffee after she spoke.
I tried not to stare too longingly at the mug, despite knowing that a cup would jolt the energy back into my system.
‘If she didn’t live alone I’d suggest it’s done by way of giving him more time before the murder is discovered. It would be a while before anyone realized she was asleep.’ I said, looking over to the enhanced crime scene photos on the screen. There was something bothering me about the whole picture, I just couldn’t put my finger on it.
‘But since she did live alone it’s more likely that the manner he’s displayed her, as well as the method he’s employed, are both important to him.’ Spencer said, his lips pursed in thought as his eyes quickly moved over the pages in his hand.
The amount of information his beautiful brain could take in, in such little time, still blew me away after all these years. I’d never get tired of his incredible mind, whether it be the facts he knew and eagerly shared, or the way he excitedly took in new information. He was amazing and so sexy.
‘Have there been any other victims?’ Derek asked, his eyes moving from the file in front of him to the colorfully dressed blonde.
‘Yes. Danielle Richmond was discovered in her apartment this morning. She lives alone and according to the M.E. She died yesterday, she was discovered quicker than the last victim as she had plans with a friend who called the cops when she didn’t show up or answer her phone.’ She clicked her beeper three more times, bringing up a picture of Danielle and a few pictures from the crime scene.
‘They look like they could be twins.’ I noted, both had brown eyes, olive complexions, long brown hair and a slender figure, ‘seems like he has a very specific type in terms of victimology. Either he’s working up to killing someone specific in his life that looks like these women, or someone who looks like her has died and triggered these killings.’
‘Those are both things we should keep in mind.’ Prentiss nodded, closing her file, ‘wheels up in ten.’
//
‘There’s something out of place here.’ I murmured, taking a step back with my arms crossed over my chest
‘What is it?’ Morgan asked, standing next to me and taking in the room as well.
‘I’m not sure...’ I trailed off, my gaze landing on the book next to Danielle’s bed. I walked over and picked it up, reading the title aloud, ‘A book of fairytales. That’s what’s out of place.’
I pulled out my phone and dialed JJ— her and Alvez were at the other crime scene.
‘Hey, Y/N, what’s up?’
‘At your crime scene, are their any novels by the bed?’
‘Hang on,’ she said, there was some shuffling over the receiver as I handed the book I was holding to Morgan, ‘yeah there’s a copy of fairytales. Oh my god.’
Morgan opened the book, he brows lifting in surprise before he turned it around. It was a picture of Snow White dead in her see through coffin, but the victims face had been glued over the cartoon features.
‘Can you bring your book back to the station? I think I know what he’s doing.’ I sighed, hanging up my phone and sliding it into my back pocket.
//
I smiled as I entered the station, telling Morgan that I’d meet him in the briefing room in a minute after I’d been to the bathroom. Of course he knew I was lying, but he must have sympathized with the dark circles under my eyes because he didn’t call me on it.
I discretely but firmly grasped my husband’s hand and led him down an unpopulated corridor.
‘How are you feeling, honey?’ he asked, pulling me close and rubbing my lower back as I practically melted into his chest. I loved that he didn’t have to ask why I’d commandeered him for a moment alone—I assumed he was used to my clingy behaviour and heightened emotional state when I was so exhausted.
‘I’m feeling drained, Spence.’ I sighed, nuzzling into the cotton of his cardigan and relaxing even further at the scents that emitted from the fabric—softener, his cologne and a faint trace of mint from the shower he’d taken earlier that morning.
‘If you’re too tired, there’s no shame in saying so. Emily, actually everyone, would understand if you needed a quick power nap, honey.’ He kissed my hair, his other hand resting at the bottom of my neck and rubbing the flesh there—he knew I carried a lot of tension in that particular area.
A soft groan fell from my lips as he kneaded the knots out of my flesh, my bones practically melting as he continued.
‘Hmm,’ I murmured, trying to focus, but it was hard when I felt so calm and relaxed to the point of wanting to sleep, ‘no it’s okay, I’m not that bad yet. I promise.’
It was something we’d talked about before I’d returned from maternity leave—he knew my stubbornness often led to me pushing myself too far before the baby, and now I was running on no sleep it was likely to get worse due to my heightened emotions. He proposed that we come up with a deal—if I ever felt too tired, or like I needed a few hours to recuperate then I had to tell him and not push myself too far.
This deal had been proposed after I’d been taking care of our precious baby boy for thirty-six hours straight with no sleep. I’d practically been a zombie when Spence came home from a case and when he’d offered to take the baby so I could get some much needed sleep I’d nearly bitten his head off, insisting I could do it. I’d then promptly burst into tears because I’d snapped at my husband when all he was trying to do was help, and because I was so exhausted and all the emotions chose that moment to break free.
The next day after I’d slept for twelve hours straight, he’d told me it was common for new mothers to feel like they weren’t doing enough and they often felt like they couldn’t ask for help, even from their spouses. The knowledge had soothed me, as had his assurance that I was doing a good job, and that admitting I needed some time for myself was okay. That’s when he’d made me promise to not push it too far, and it now transferred to the field now I was back at work.
‘Okay,’ he kissed my hair again and I lifted my head up, my lips pursed for a kiss. I heard him chuckle lightly before he complied, his lips soft and warm against my own. I sighed, the pleasant zing his lips always inspired shooting through me from my head all the way down to my toes.
‘I love you, Spencer Reid.’ I told him, the sparkle and adoration in his eyes made my heart expand in my chest—it’d been like that for five years now and I didn’t see it ever dissipating.
‘I love you, Y/N Reid.’ He kissed my forehead and we stayed there for a few moments longer, appreciating the quiet tranquility of the moment before we reluctantly agreed to join the team in the briefing room.
//
‘This unsub is replicating fairytales.’ I said as Morgan opened the book we’d bought back from the crime scene and slid it into the middle of the table so everyone could see.
‘Danielle was the replication of Snow White. After we discovered this, we also found an apple underneath her bed that had been bitten into. It was bagged for evidence and they’re going to try and pull the teeth imprints, but my guess is it’s going to be a match to the victim.’ I pulled out a chair, scooting close enough to Spencer so that I could smell his cologne.
‘Denise’s death is tied to Sleeping Beauty.’ Alvez slid the book he’d bought back next to the other, ‘we found a miniature spindle wheel underneath her bed next to a few drops of what we assume to be the victims blood. We’ve asked the M.E. To see if there are any wounds on Denise’s fingers that look like they could’ve been made on a spindle wheel.’
‘Well this is good, in the sense that we can predict what fairytale the unsub is going to replicate next, but it doesn’t help us with identifying the next victim.’ Tara said, looking over to the clear board at the head of the room, which showcased the crime scene and victim’s pictures.
‘There has to be something, other than appearance, that these women have in common.’ Alvez commented, twirling his pen between his fingers.
‘And you would be correct, newbie.’ I smiled at the nickname— Alvez had been on the team for almost two years now, yet Garcia still called him that, ‘both women were part of a fairytale online reading club.’
‘Are there any other women in the club who look like the first two victims?’ Prentiss asked.
‘Great minds think alike my dear Emily, pictures and addresses of the three women who share similar appearances have been sent to your tablets.’
Our iPad’s beeped before she’d even finished her sentence and we all looked at the pictures, noting their characteristics were eerily similar to Danielle and Denise.
‘We should contact the women to warn them and assign them each a protective detail.’ Spence said as I observed the pictures with my lips pursed, hoping I’d have a brain wave and be able to pinpoint a connection. The Sheriff left the room to assign that responsibility to some uniform officers.
‘We know who he’s likely going after, but we haven’t figured out why or how he’d have a connection to this—.’ I paused a thought echoing through my brain so astoundingly fast that I felt a little light headed, ‘what if the unsub is a partner to one of these girls? And he’s killing them this way because he resents his partner’s love for this and he’s mocking her?’
‘That’s a good idea— maybe one of these girls cheated on him and he’s disparaging her idea of a happy ending?’ Tara added.
‘Garcia, have any of these three women recently gotten divorced?’ Spence asked.
‘Yes, Regina Kingston, the creator of the book club filed for divorce ten days ago. It hasn’t been finalized yet, but the paperwork was finalized and submitted eight days ago.’ Garcia reeled off, her voice coated with realization.
‘That’s the stressor.’ Alvez said as we all begun to stand from around the table.
‘Garcia,’ Emily started but our I.T genius cut her off and assured us his name and home address had been sent to us already.
We all geared up, adding our bullet proof vests and making sure our guns were sufficiently loaded, should they be necessary in his capture. I bit back a yawn as we made our way to the cars—now was not the time to not be one hundred percent focused. We had an unsub to detain, and so I slapped my cheeks a few times during the drive, to make sure I was definitely awake.
//
Another yawn fell from my mouth; I’d lost count of how many times I’d done so since we’d got on the jet.
‘Woah momma, why are you still awake? I thought you would have dropped off as soon as we got on here.’ Derek commented, his signature smile on his face but the concern in his eyes was just as prominent.
‘I tried, every time I close my eyes I keep seeing flashes of the things I need to do when I get home.’ I sighed, though a small bright smile formed on my face when my husband took a seat next to me.
‘How is little Gideon Derek?’ JJ asked, taking a seat next to Morgan, ‘do you have anymore pictures?’
I grinned, my face lighting up at the mention of our little bundle of joy, ‘I have around a hundred new ones I took before we left for this case.’
I handed her my phone and she scrolled through the images, her smile growing at each new one. Morgan couldn’t help joining in after a while, unable to resist pictures of his godson. I’d caught a glimpse of his home background earlier and I was pretty sure it was the picture JJ had taken of Derek holding the baby for the first time at the hospital. He was a big softie, no matter how hard he tried to appear the opposite.
I was bought out of my thoughts by Spence’s arm wrapping around my shoulders. I cuddled up into his side, eagerly snuggling into his warmth; I took a deep breath, his familiar and comforting scent relaxing me down to my bones. The voices around me became unfocused as I fell further and further into unconsciousness, the endless list of tasks that had been plaguing me before disappearing now that I was in the arms of my husband. I registered was the low vibration of Spence’s voice as he talked to JJ and Morgan, and the feel of his lips as he kissed my hair. The last thought that filtered through my mind before I surrendered to sleep was how lucky I was to have a husband as amazing as Spencer, a son as wonderful as Gideon and a family as incredible as the people that made up the B.A.U.
A/N: This one came to me after I watched the episode where JJ returns after maternity leave and has trouble staying awake without being able to drink caffeine. I kind of like how it turned out, I hope you did too!
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Joe Keery ~Glamour Interview
MASTERLIST
Joe Keery x NeutralReader
Synopsis - You and Joe do the relationship test with Glamour
Word Count - 1.1k+
** Warnings ** none
‘’Okay. For the first part of the video, we’re going to have you each talk without the other in the room. Y/n, you’ll start first.’’ I follow the man, who introduced himself as Mark. Joe and I are doing Wired and Glamour videos today. We’ve been doing interviews all week, everyone was really excited about season two. It was amazing and fun to shoot.
‘’So, I stand here?’’ I ask. He nods, and I stand on the marker. There are about five people in the room. Two of them being camera-men, the other three producers.
‘’I just need you to tell me how you feel about Joe.’’
‘’Well, he’s my best friend. He’s extremely hardworking and makes me want to work harder, along with everyone that works with him. I’ve had many people that I don’t even know, but they have worked with Joe and they loved him. He’s amazing, and I love him so much. Is that good?’’
‘’That’s great. If you could send Joe in, that would be awesome.’’ He replies and smiles at me.
‘’Of course.’’ I open the door and see Joe on his phone.
‘’How’d it go?’’
‘’Great. They want you now.’’ He kisses my cheek and goes in. After a few minutes, the producer comes out and gets me.
‘’For your first exercise, you guys will write down compliments then read them aloud.’’ They had us a clipboard with index cards and a sharpie. I write the first things that come to my head.
Mostly what I said in the beginning of the video, and a few more things. I finish and look up to see Joe is still writing.
‘’Man, this is cheesy, but I mean it.’’ Joe says. I smile at this and continue writing.
‘’You got a lot to say about me, don’t you? Geez, now I feel bad.’’
‘’Yeah. I’m over here writing a novel.’’ He smiles.
‘’I feel like a butthead.’’ I chuckle.
‘’Butthead? I haven’t heard anyone say ‘butthead’ in years.’’ He looks up and we hand our clipboards to Mark. We both step on the marks, and they signal for Joe to go first. ‘’Y/n, I think that you are the best scene partner to have on set, and to hang out with.’’ I smile and chuckle.
‘’Aww, thank you. Joe, You have an amazing sense of humor and I never stop laughing when I’m around you. It’s awesome.’’ He puts his hand to his chest and smiles.
‘’That’s what I hope to do. I think you are, Y/n, are the wisest person I have ever met. If you wanted, you could be a world leader.’'
‘’Oh, wow. Hmm, I’ll think about it. I wrote heart of gold. Because, well, you have a heart of gold. You’re super kind. No one has ever said anything negative about you; everyone loves you. You’re a super great guy, and you’re just awesome.’’
‘’What the heck, that’s so sweet. You are a very great friend. People feel very comfortable around you and like, meeting you in one second.’’
‘’You’re, umm, super motivated and determined at work and I always see you doing such a great job. You’re always super focused, and I always aspire to be like that. Like, make sure that I work as hard as possible cause you’re such a hard worker.’’
‘’Aww.’’ He comes closer to me, and we hug. ‘’And, you’re obviously gorgeous.’’ He laughs into my hair.
‘’So are you.’’ I laugh once we pull away.
‘’What did you guys think of that exercise?’’ Mark asks us.
‘’It’s very nice.’’ Joe says.
‘’It is. I like getting compliments, I feel like everyone likes getting compliments.’’
‘'Yeah, it’s really nice. It’s also I feel like, very rarely do you stand and look someone in the eye, and give them such a -, I don’t know,’' I chuckle at his loss of words. ‘’Like, oh yeah, you did a really great job, but not meeting their eye. But, to look someone in the eye, it makes a difference.’’ I nod in agreement, and turn back to the camera.
~~~~
‘’For your next exercise, you are going to look at each other for four minutes.’’
‘’Okay. Tell us when.’’ Joe says.
‘’Go.’’ I look up and look into his eyes. We start laughing, but soon stop, wanting to do the exercise correct. ‘’I’m just going to look at one eye, cause I keep going back and forth.’’
‘’I’m looking at that one over there. How rarely, though, do you just look at somebody’s eye, like this?’’
‘’Almost never.’’
After another thirty seconds, I feel my eyes starting to water. Not because I haven’t blinked, but because I’m taking in the beauty of my boyfriend. I think of our first date, first time he said we were dating, first kiss, first scene we shot on Stranger Things, and all the time we’ve spent together. The tears fall from my eyes, and I see Joe smile.
‘’Don’t cry. If you cry, I’ll cry.’’ He says. I chuckle at him and wipe the tears away. What feels like seconds later, but if probably minutes, the producer tells us that the time is up.
‘’That was weird, but I enjoyed it.’’ I say and turn my gaze from the camera, back to Joe.
‘’It now feels weird to not look into your eyes now. Wow, that was cool.’’ He says laughing.
‘’That was strange, but yes, very cool. I feel like I never really taken the time to just say, I'm going to look at your eyes and try to feel a connection.’’
‘’I feel like when you would start laughing, I would too. Or, like when you shed some tears, I felt my eyes getting watery. It’s crazy how fast my body would react to you.’’ He wraps his arm around my shoulders, and pulls me to him.
‘’What made you cry, Y/n?’’
‘’I was just thinking of how amazing Joe is. How we met, first date, and all the other time and milestones we have reached since then.’’ I smile, and squeeze his side where my hand is.
‘’Aww, that’s sweet.’’ He kisses the top of my head.
~~~~
‘’Okay, final one. You guys are going to do trust falls on one another.’’ Mark says.
‘’Ohh, this should be fun. I want to go first.’’ I smile. I turn myself and put my hands on my chest as if I'm in a coffin. ‘’I just go straight back, yeah?’’
‘'Yes, and don’t break the hip.’’ I nod, and get ready to fall. I slowly let myself fall backwards, and he catches me easily, and pushes me back up.
‘’That was it?’’ I laugh.
‘’We’re just beginning. Just had to start somewhere and work our way up.’’ He scoots back more.
‘’Ready?’’ I ask him. He answers, and I fall back again. We go pretty far down this time, but I wasn’t worried, I knew he had me.
‘’That was pretty good. Let’s do one more.’'
‘'Okay, ready?’’ We go even farther done, and I laugh when he pushes me back up. ‘’Cool, that was so cool. My turn!’’ I say excitedly, and he laughs. He turns himself, and gets ready. He quickly throws himself back, and I panic, but he doesn’t actually fall.
‘’Send it!’’ I laugh.
‘’Send it!”
‘’Alright, ready?’’
‘’Yep, go ahead.’’ I tell him.
‘’Now?’’
‘’Yes, go. You’re fine, trust me.’’ I chuckle.
‘’Countdown.’’
‘’Okay, 3...2...1 go. Joe, go. Joe just go.’’
‘’Now?’’
‘’Yes, now. On go. 3...2...1, go.’’ He falls, hesitantly, and I catch, but have a little bit of struggle when pushing him back. I don’t let him know this though.
‘'Oh, good job, babe.’’ He scoots forward so he can fall a farther distance.
‘’Thank you. Come one, trust me. I got this. 3...2...1, go.’’ He falls again, but he is too heavy and he falls on me, making me fall underneath him. I burst out in laughter on the ground, and I see the cameraman moving so he can get a shot of us on the ground.
‘'Y/n.’’ He says my name laughing.
‘’I tried.’’ I continue laughing. ‘’Well, this can be a metaphor. When you’re down, I’m down.’’ I help him up and say, ‘’When you’re up, I’m up.’’
‘'Good way to save it, Y/n.’’ He hugs me again, and I laugh.
~~~~
‘’How do you feel?’’
‘’Umm, pretty good. This was fun, and something different to try. I mean, the last one was sort of a fail. You’re bigger than me, and taller than me. Also, stronger, but it was fun. This was an experience.’’ I finish. Joe laughs and turns around. ‘’I don’t know what else to say.’’ I chuckle, and walk off camera.
‘’You guys did amazing. I’m so glad we got the honor of having you on.’’
‘'Well, when you’re with this one, she makes it easy. Thank you for having us.’’ Joe shakes his hand, and I do so as well.
‘’Yes, thank you.’’ We both leave the room, and start to walk to another interview we’re having.
‘'Thanks for being with me.’’ He says and wraps his arms around my shoulders once again.
‘’Thank you for putting up with me.’’ He smiles and kisses my head.
#joekeery#joe keery imagine#stranger things imagine#strangerthings#fandomimagines#gatenmatarazzo#noahschnapp#milliebobbybrown#dacremontgomery#FinnWolfhard#calebmclaughlin#sadiesink#steveharrington#dustinhenderson#willbyers#eleven#billyhargrove#mikewheeler#lucassinclair#maxmayfield#st#imagines#glamour#glamour interview#trust fall#youtube#actor
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Out on Allen Street, it’s 7 in the Morning
Set in the same-ish street-siblings universe as First Contact by @cryptids-and-muses and @a-sketchy-character @streetsiblings (they’re still awesome). I present to you... Angst.
Drizzle | AO3
Chapter 2: Deluge
Felipe Garzonas falls.
Jason cannot find it in himself to care. The man was human garbage at best-
A shriek of anguish rents the air, a woman's, while the stalking man pounces on her and bays with his manic glee.
-and they were just going to let him go? No dice. Jason did not push him off the edge, but it’s still satisfying enough for him to know the man is gone now.
It is here, on this rooftop, that Jason understands that the horrors of the world can never be contained, only controlled. In what ways, he isn’t sure yet, but when he thinks of killing, all he can imagine is a figure adorned in a red helmet, ruthless and proud.
When Bruce takes Jason away from the scene, long crimson snakes flow off Garzonas’ body with the deluge, painting the face of Gotham.
Cass believes Jay when he says he didn’t kill Garzonas. He can lie like the best of them, but he can never hide anything from her. Bruce still doesn’t believe him even when she says as much.
“You’re a danger to yourself and the people around you,” Bruce is saying. Cold is the only way that Cass can describe his body.
For as long as she has been with Bruce, Cass has not thought of David. But looking at him now, a small, insidious part of the man that projects the urge to control (something she had only seen from David) starts to slip through. She is so thrown about what to think that she almost misses him firing Jay as Robin.
“No.”
“But Cass-.”
“No.”
Jason resists the urge to groan at his sister. Above them, the three names of his potential mothers are displayed clearly and brightly.
“I get why you don’t want me to. But think of what will happen if we manage to bring one! We could- we could-.”
“My brother,” Cass says, with finality. She gestures to the names (although ‘Sandra Wu-san’ in particular catches both their eyes). “Not theirs.”
Cass makes that stance she always does when she wants him to stop, her back hunched and her eyes pleading. He hates it when she does that, which is why he bites back a sigh.
“Fine. I’ll leave it alone,” Cass has been trying harder to get her smile right. Her effort shows when she gives him a mega-watt grin when he relents.
“My family, love,” She says as she hugs him before leading him away to raid the freezer for Neapolitan.
Later that night, Jason leaves his copy of Huckleberry Finn on her nightstand. He has to make sure that she doesn't think he'd left her behind when he goes. As Jason leaves the window wide open, his sole companion is the rain for the first time in years.
Gotham feels it as it happens. As the madman clubs her boy over and over with his crowbar. She feels every bruise, every bone that fractures, every act of pure, unadulterated cruelty inflicted on Jason.
Her eldest cradles the body, surrounded by a field of debris and smoke left in the wake of the monster that is the Joker. She washes the blood away with her tears.
When Cassandra wakes to see her brother’s prized possession on her nightstand, she instantly knows and never lets it go, even as the sky opens up in time with her tears.
--
As the casket lowers into the earth, she absently notes no rain, not a cloud in sight. Somehow, in the void that is the Jason-shaped hole in her heart, she realises he would have hated it.
“I think… I want to have my burial when it rains. Gives a whole ‘nother meaning to bleary doesn’t it?” Jason had confessed that once, a slight chuckle drawing from his chest. It fades as fast as it came. He looked away, then. “I don’t think I’d rest in peace without it.”
Cassandra fills the silence with the hymns of her tears – droplets staining the well-loved pages of the last piece of her brother – and hopes that it will be enough.
In her mind, her efforts are for naught when they devolve into wails as the first shovelfuls of dirt encase the ebony coffin.
--
The first thing she sees when she enters the cave is- is the atrocious thing. All the noise in the cave seems to phase out. The squeaking of the bats. The banter between Dick and Babs. The low murmurs of Bruce and Alfred in the corner. All she can focus on is the caricature of her brother in full view of everyone in the Batcave. She looks at it, and the world becomes a sea of pink and brown and white. The uniform he died in still bloody and ragged; all her thoughts a cacophony of wailing; iron on her tongue; roaring in her ears; she feels nothing in her but pain.
Jason Peter Todd
A Good Soldier
She hates it. Hates it with a passion because Jason was so much more than a soldier. He was her Jay, her brother, everything; all she has left of him is a small paperback and this disgusting mockery of his memory.
But he’s Batman, and he grabs her by the arms and pins her, even as her legs kick out viciously. She headbutts him and manages to push him off, nailing him square in the jaw with her knee as she flips back.
“Cassandra-.” Batman starts.
“Mine,” She snarls, eyes blazing and her hand pushing Bruce away from her. Even with the pads of his armour, she knows it hurts. She turns to leave.
“Not Robin. My Jay. My Brother. My Jason.”
Standing in Jason’s room, Cassandra closes the window he left open. She notices a picture frame on his nightstand. It’s of them, Huckleberry Finn spread between their legs and their foreheads pressed together.
Cass curls into a ball and clutches his treasures to her chest, sobbing because there is no rain to fill the vacuum she’s found herself in.
--
Far, far away, a man between worlds shatters the dimensions. The ripple disturbs Gotham, but she cannot deny her love of the results.
Gotham watches as her prodigal son begins his dramatic return; rising from below to walk above once again.
--
“So, is it really true that you took down Troia when you were only thirteen? All on your own?” The new Robin, Tim, is okay. Really. Cassandra just can’t look him at and see someone else in the uniform. When she doesn’t answer, the boy seems to fidget nervously. She doesn’t even know what his eyes look like.
“I–I guess, since I’m here to be Batman’s new Robin, I was hoping I could be the Robin to –.”
Cassandra doesn’t even let the boy finish before she leaves.
--
Jason wakes up drowning. It’s not water that enters his lungs, but an unnatural, sickly green liquid that vexes and rots and makes his body feel like he’s on fire. Nandra Parbat is where he is when he’s calmed down from being dipped into the Lazarus Pit, trapped in a fortress of assassins that want to mould a Bat into one of them. It’s an entirely different League.
This time, Cass is not here to keep them away.
--
When she meets Steph, Cassandra is enamoured because the girl smiles and laughs (except she still isn’t the same, no one is), almost just like Jason. But there are slight differences between the girl and her brother. Her hugs are great, but they don’t feel right. She smells like lavender instead of the rain. Despite how much the girl likes to joke with her, not one of them manages to draw out her smile.
Cassandra holds onto the girl like a lifeline anyway.
What bone she can throw, Steph has an uncanny knack of finding things that others take ages to locate, which is helpful enough for right now since Tim is still missing. It doesn’t help when Steph reads that Tim is in a warehouse with none other than The Joker.
--
He’s practising his aim when she comes in, almost plucking the gun out of his hand. Jason grips the girl’s arm and flings her over his back. Rose Wilson, a wolfish grin plastered on her face and snowy hair fanning under them, doesn’t even look fazed.
“Wow Jace, if you wanted to pin me you could have just asked,” His only friend in this place is what keeps him sane; when the Joker of his nightmares haunts the edges of his mind, she is there to let him know it isn’t real. Despite how different they are, she’s a breath of fresh air in this hellhole they’re in. He should probably tell her how he feels.
“You’re such a fucking chicken-shit,” Is what comes out of his mouth instead. Rose only smirks at him, silver mane and eyes with almost the same mischief his sister had.
“Your aim still sucks balls by the way.”
He growls, raising his arm to let his gun do the barking.
--
Ranting and raving greet her as she sneaks in through a window, a litany of nonsense and stammers echoing around the warehouse. She drops from the catwalk as silently as she can, but the madman obviously still hears her as his head bends at an impossible angle to look right at her.
“Oh. Look who showed for quality time with Uncle Jay!” She doesn’t mean to, but Cassandra flinches, and the Joker’s twisted grin shifts. Big mistake. “Oh? Did I say something wrong?”
“No,” It takes every inch of willpower in her not to rasp the words, but Joker sees through it regardless.
“What? Don’t like my name?” The Joker pouts, but it looks more like a sneer. “It’s just me yaknow? Your Uncle Jay.”
Another flinch, and the Joker steps closer, a snake in the reeds.
“Mister Jay,” He’s stalking closer now; her body won’t move. “JayJay.”
“Jaybird,”
“Jay,” She is so still as the Joker seems to tower over her, his sick grin crueller and sharper (David flashes in her mind) than any other time she has ever seen it. Poison flows from his mouth like saliva as he croons.
“That’s what you called him, isn’t it? When he was still here, your precious Robin. Not this -,” He gestures to Tim, who is wide-eyed and struggling. “-phoney replacement. Want me to-? Let me tell-.” The Joker stops, frowning at the ground before continuing, his voice aberrantly low. “When I beat him over and over with that crowbar – pink with blood and brown with dirt over the white of his skin –, do you want to know what he was saying?
“The only thing that came out of that pretty little mouth of his was how sorry he was that he was for leaving ‘Cass’ behind.” The madman leers at her. “Was that you? Cass? I gotta tell you, the whole apology shtick got really boring after a while, but…
“I’ll tell you one thing. Something you can keep between just you and your Uncle Jay,” He leans in close to her ear. “I think that our Jay is almost just like me now!”
The madman cackles, his eyes sick and twisted, and his body is nothing but mania. Something in Cassandra, strained and twisted for the past three years, finally snaps.
She strikes him, harsher than she’s struck anyone ever before. So severely, she can feel his ribcage snap. His flesh becomes mince under her fists. He stumbles and contorts as she overwhelms him with every piece of her fury. The gale-force that is Cassandra Todd blows through the Joker, who laughs and laughs and laughs.
The monster scrambles for his gun, suddenly slick and focused. Cassandra snaps off the comic ‘Pow!’ that sticks out of the muzzle when he fires it at her. She backhands his face with the full force of her knuckles, knocking him down, and all he does is chortle. The Joker’s body twists and squirms as he is pinned in place. She raises the broken end of the comic and skewers his leg into the ground.
The Joker’s mouth froths. His eyes are bloodshot as he becomes more depraved and maunders yet, he’s still fucking laughing. Laughing as his spittle flecks onto every surface around them when he thrashes. Laughing even as she clenches the sides of his head and pulls. Laughing even as they both feel his flesh strain and shear as she tries to tear it off. The part of her that has so vehemently denied killing now cries for bloodlust. For this is justice, this is vengeance, this is for her, Jay. Cassandra, with all her might, prepares to wrench off the monster’s head and-.
And Batman pushes her off him. Batman blocks her assault on his body when Cassandra rebalances herself. Batman protects the god damn fucking Joker. She roars with her rage, her grief, and doesn’t even feel the sedative that Tim plunges into her side until it’s too late.
Glaring at Bruce, at Batman, all she sees from his body is fear and concern and all the latter is directed at the death-worshipping monster he cradles in his arms. Absently, before it all goes to black, she thinks she should leave. Leave without Batgirl, without Jason, without everything she has ever cared for.
She does, and like her brother, the tears of Gotham are the only family she has left.
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#street siblings au#jason todd#cassandra cain#fanfic#fanfiction#my fic#robin#batgirl#red hood#black bat#bruce wayne#the joker#tim drake#rose wilson#angst is here#angst#fluff#but not a lot of it#im sorry#i think#this is my best#cass and jason find each other#some things change#other things don't change at all#dc comics#dc#batfamily#baby tim drake#he will see so much#character death
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“Aim for the heart, but spare the face”
The 4th and final part of my narrative of Murat’s last days.
(Part 1: Murat’s Fateful Decision) (Part 2: The Capture of Murat) (Part 3: Prelude to a Show Trial)
***
The commission chosen to enact the farcical trial of Murat convened on the 13th of October. A Sicilian named Captain Starace was to selected to serve as Murat’s advocate, and pleaded with Murat to change his mind about appearing in front of his judges to defend himself. Murat replied that the members of the court were not judges, but executioners; he ordered Starace to say nothing in his defense. Shortly after, the commission sent in a rapporteur to interrogate Murat, asking him his name, age, and homeland. Murat angrily declared: “I am Joachim, King of the Two Sicilies; get out, Monsieur!”
The trial concluded around four o’clock in the afternoon. He was unanimously found guilty, ironically on the basis of a law regarding insurrection which he had enacted himself in June of 1810. Murat received the news of his death sentence with, writes the Marquis de Sassenay, “a disdainful calm.” The sentence was to be carried out, he was told, in a quarter of an hour. He was permitted to write a final letter to his wife and children.
My dear Caroline,
My last hour has come; in a few moments I shall have ceased to exist; you will no longer have a husband, and my children will have no father. Never forget me; my life has not been tainted by any injustice. Farewell my Achille, farewell my Letitia, farewell my Lucien, farewell my Louise; show yourselves to the world worthy of me. I leave you without kingdom and without property, in the midst of my numerous enemies; be constantly united, show yourselves superior to misfortune, think of what you are and of what you have been, and God will bless you. Do not curse my memory. Know that my greatest pain, in the last moments of my life, is to die far away from my children.
Receive my paternal blessing; receive my kisses and my tears. Always have present in your memory your unfortunate father.
[Murat writes his final letter, by Jacques Onfroy de Bréville]
Into the envelope along with the letter, he placed several locks of his hair.
Completing this final task, he was met by Canon Masdea, the septuagenarian priest to whom Murat had bequeathed some money for the San Giorgio church two years prior. The priest prevailed upon Murat to sign a written declaration stating that he was dying as a Christian. He also managed to persuade Murat to make confession, standing firm on the matter when the officer on guard attempted to object due to a lack of time.
“Let us go,” Murat declared after receiving absolution, “and God’s will be done!”
At six o’clock in the evening, he was led out to the narrow courtyard of the castle. He coldly refused both the blindfold and the stool that were offered him. Scarcely ten feet separated him from the twelve-man firing squad. In his hand he held the miniature likenesses of his wife and children, which he now pressed to his chest.
“Soldiers,” he addressed the firing squad calmly, “do your duty. Aim for the heart, but spare the face.”
He gave the order to fire himself.
Details of the aftermath of the execution vary, with one account claiming three pistol shots were discharged into Murat’s head after he fell, which, if true, is excessive enough to appear as more an act of malice than a standard coup-de-grâce. There seems to be no doubt that he was killed instantly by the firing squad’s volley, fired at such a close range that his body was described as “mutilated.” His body was placed into a plain coffin and buried without ceremony in the yard of the church that had benefitted from his kindness two years earlier. Today a marker lies within the church, commemorating the spot where Murat’s remains are said to rest.
[Plaque marking Murat’s final resting place in San Giorgio church in Pizzo]
Caroline Murat had received no news of her husband’s whereabouts or well-being in months. Eight days after his execution, she wrote to Catherine, wife of her brother Jerome, that “this uncertainty is becoming unbearable.” Her older sister Elisa learned that Murat had ended up being apprehended in Calabria. Both sisters expressed the hope that he would be allowed to continue his journey from there to Trieste, but Caroline remained riddled with anxiety. “Oh, my dear Elisa,” she wrote, “loss of fortune seems nothing beside the agonies which oppress me and I would be happier completely destitute if I could thereby spare my husband and myself the cruel sufferings… until the hour when he can arrive and I can know him safe.”
The same day that Caroline wrote the letter above—November 2—news of her husband’s execution was printed in the Wiener Zeitung, the newspaper she had taken to reading daily since arriving in Trieste. Her servants endeavored to hide the paper, substituting another in its place; but she insisted on receiving it. It was yielded to her with reluctance. Catherine Davies, an Englishwoman who had served the Murats since 1804, describes the ensuing scene: “Upon reading the account of her husband’s melancholy death, she was attacked with violent fits which lasted until morning. The dear children were asleep, and knew nothing of their mother’s grief, nor of their own loss, till the following day, when seeing every one looking sad around them, Prince Lucien said to my late English companion, ‘Mimie, what is the matter, that you all wear such sorrowful faces: is papa dead?’ She replied she feared he was. At this moment, they all wept bitterly, for they were tenderly attached to their father, and he equally to them.”
While the Bourbon courts in France and Naples rejoiced at the news of Murat’s death, there were many who responded with horror, grief, and anger. General Guglielmo Pépé, who had come to love and admire Murat even in spite of his political differences with his former king, fell into this latter camp. “The tragical death of Joachim,” he writes, “plunged me into the deepest grief, which I only mastered after a long lapse of time: the whole country was horror-stricken by this sad event. Even to this day, when the inhabitants of Pizzo have occasion to travel the kingdom, they carefully conceal the place of their nativity, so great is the stigma it casts upon them.” Lord Byron, who had, years earlier, written a poem about Murat, likewise lamented the legendary cavalier’s sad fate. “Poor, dear Murat, what an end! …. His white plume used to be a rallying point in battle, like Henry IV’s. He refused a confessor and a bandage; so would neither suffer his soul or body to be bandaged.”
Napoleon, arriving on Saint Helena two days after the execution of his brother-in-law, did not receive news of it until months later. Writes Barry O’Meara, who briefly served as Napoleon’s physician on the island, “Some short time after his arrival at Longwood, I communicated to the Emperor the news of Murat’s death. He heard it with calmness, and immediately inquired if he had perished on the field of battle? At first I hesitated to tell him that his brother-in-law had been executed by military law. On his repeating the question, I informed him of the manner in which Murat had been put to death, to which he listened without any change of countenance.” This sangfroid was typical of Napoleon, who disdained outward displays of emotions (except for anger) in front of his subordinates. But his valet, Marchand, who had been with Napoleon longer and knew how to read him better, remarks in his memoirs that “This news had saddened him, and I heard him talking to Dr. O’Meara, which renewed this pain as he spoke. He said nothing of the King of Naples’ wrongs toward him, adding that to go down to Calabria with fifty men was the action of a madman, but those who had ordered his death were monsters.” General Gourgaud, in his diary, describes Napoleon, later in the evening after learning of Murat’s death, as “sad, preoccupied, plays mechanically with some coins during the reading. He suffers, we see it clearly.” Murat would remain a recurring subject of the Emperor’s conversation during his time on Saint Helena. His reflections on his brother-in-law were as conflicted as his feelings towards him had been throughout their relationship, ranging from fond reminiscences of Murat’s battlefield gallantry, to bitterness over his defection in 1814, to ridicule of his outlandish attire and poor judgment. He never ceased to regret Murat’s absence at Waterloo.
It is impossible to know for certain what Murat’s true intentions were as he began taking the road towards Monteleone prior to his arrest in Pizzo. He was indecisive by nature, but also stubborn. As appalling of a prospect as he found the idea of a life in exile in Austria, his desire to be reunited with his family was genuine; his children were never far from his mind. Yet equally abhorrent to him was the idea of living the rest of his life in a state of dishonor, having relinquished, without a fight, a throne he had never abdicated. The accounts of Galvani and Franceschetti both make it clear that his mind changed throughout the journey between Corsica and Calabria, his natural optimism and faith in himself repeatedly overriding the reality of the hopelessness of his original enterprise. Perhaps he truly had resolved to go on to Trieste by the time his party encountered Trentacapilli; if so, this only renders the outcome all the more tragic.
Some historians have theorized that his voyage to Pizzo was a deliberate act of suicide. This ignores not only his repeated insistences that he intended to join his family in Trieste, but also the resistance and attempt to avoid capture he made prior to his apprehension. If Murat was seeking death, he was not seeking it in the manner of a common criminal. He had been a soldier for his entire adult life, and would have preferred to die like one. Upon his return to Naples from his final defeat at Tolentino, where, like Ney at Waterloo, he appears to have been attempting to get himself killed, Murat dolefully remarked to Caroline that he had been unable to meet death.
“Thus,” writes his former aide-de-camp Macirone, “fortune was again adverse to courage, and the blood of a hero was permitted to be lawlessly, uselessly, and inhumanly shed, by a sovereign who had never been wronged by his victim. His death was ignominious only to his enemies. Those who had been his subjects will revere his memory. France may reproach it for the evils to which he unintentionally contributed… but when the book of truth shall be unfolded, it will appear that the errors of Murat were not errors of the heart.” It is as fitting an epitaph as that of Murat’s childhood friend Agar, the Count of Mosbourg, who devoted to him a monument listing his military exploits and achievements, closing with the declaration: “He knew how to conquer, he knew how to reign, he knew how to die.”
***
Sources:
-Atteridge, A. Hilliard. Joachim Murat: Marshal of France and King of Naples, 1911
-Bear, Joan. Caroline Murat, 1972
-Cole, Hubert. The Betrayers, 1972
-Colletta, Pietro, General. Histoire des six derniers mois de la vie de Joachim Murat, 1821
-Davies, Catherine. Eleven Years’ Residence in the Family of Murat, King of Naples, 1841
-Franceschetti, Dominique-César, General. Mémoires sur les événemens qui ont précédé la mort de Joachim Ier, Roi des Deux-Siciles, 1826
-Galvani, Mathieu. Mémoires sur les événemens qui ont précédé la mort de Joachim-Napoléon, Roi de Deux-Siciles, 1843
-Gourgaud, Gaspard, General. Sainte-Hélène - Journal Inedit de 1815 à 1818 en 2 volumes
-Macirone, Francis. Interesting Facts Relating to the Fall and Death of Joachim Murat, 1817
-Marchand, Louis-Joseph. In Napoleon's Shadow: The Memoirs of Louis-Joseph Marchand, Valet and Friend of the Emperor 1811–1821, 2018
-O’Meara, Barry Edward. Napoleon in exile, or, A voice from St. Helena, Vol 1, 1827
-Pépé, Guglielmo. Memoirs of General Pépé, Vol 2, 1846.
#the last days of Murat#Joachim Murat#Napoleon#Napoleon Bonaparte#Caroline Murat#Caroline Bonaparte#Lord Byron#history#19th century#1815#today in history
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Everything I Wanted
You have a nightmare on a press tour that reveals how you really feel. Luckily, your best friend Chris is there to help you through it.
Possible trigger warning! If thoughts of suicide upset you don’t read any further and know that someone loves you 💕
-
No, you were thinking, over and over again. No. I don’t want to jump. I don’t want to die. But your body didn’t listen. You were standing on the ledge, your body shaking like it was paper in the wind. You just wanted it all to stop. The noise. The headaches. The wondering of whether anyone loved you or you were hopelessly alone. Did anyone even care about you? Would anyone miss you? No, you thought. Your mind mistook it; your mind thought you were saying that nobody would miss you. But you were saying no, you didn’t want to jump. Your body wasn’t listening. You jumped.
You felt the immense pain of the dark, cold water as you fell in. It hit like someone was slapping you, over and over again. You were disoriented in the freezing, pitch black water and you couldn’t move. You knew how to swim and you tried to force yourself up to the surface, but you couldn’t. Your legs were anchors thrown into the ocean, too heavy to do anything except sink. Your body was screaming, or maybe you were, you couldn’t tell.
The scene changed. It changed to a view of your funeral. It was empty. There wasn’t a soul in sight; just a picture of you next to a coffin, about to go six feet under. The only people there were the ones digging your grave. Where were your parents? Your friends? The people you worked with? Not there. None of them were there. You were the only person there, and that was because it was your own funeral.
You woke up crying. You felt the tears on the hotel pillow, on your hand by your face, and they were cold. You were cold. You were freezing. You tried to catch your breath, but every time you did you just cried it back out. You sat up, trying to breathe, and you couldn’t. Your head was spinning, your body in a cold sweat, your heart beating a million miles a minute. You felt like you were dying. And you must have been so loud with your crying that it woke Chris up in the room next to you, because he was opening the door that connected your rooms to the living room and kitchen area. He’d insisted on getting a suite with you, mostly just because it was convenient, but now he was glad.
You’d met Chris four years ago when you were just starting out as an actress. You were young, much younger than him, but you’d been legal at the time still. You played his sister in one movie, and now you were playing his love interest. As awkward as those scenes were to shoot, they brought you two so much closer. He was your best friend. He was also your unrequited love, but you had accepted that it just wasn’t going to happen, so you left it alone. Right now you were incredibly grateful for the suite because he walked in and strode over to you, grabbing onto your arms that were holding your knees. You didn’t even remember getting into that position, but Chris brought you out of it. He was gorgeous in the darkness and in the light. You could see the concern in his eyes and that was what made you feel guilty.
“Hey, hey, what’s going on?” He asked. He must have thought something was genuinely wrong, because he was looking you over, turning your arm to see if you were hurt. You shook your head. “Talk to me, sweetheart.”
“Water.” It was all you could say. Your throat felt like it was closing in on you. Chris let go of you to go to your mini fridge and get a ten dollar bottle of water, coming back to you with the cap already off.
“Just drink slowly,” he instructed, handing you the bottle. His arm went behind your shoulder, rubbing your back in soothing circles. Your hands were shaky as you drank, the cold water opening your lungs back up and stinging them into cooperation. Your breathing was still erratic, but you were coming back down from the nightmare. You put the water down and turned into his body, burying yourself in him. You needed a person and he was there. And the fact that it was him, your best friend, the man you loved, made all the difference in the world.
“It’s okay,” he murmured, laying down in your bed and pulling the covers over the both of you. “It’s okay. I got you. Just breathe.” His voice was soft and comforting, his arms safe and warm, his breathing controlled like yours needed to be. He let you cry as long as you needed to, occasionally telling you to breathe, but mostly just holding you. When you were finally calmed down he pressed a gentle kiss to your forehead, relaxing his arms slightly.
“I’m sorry,” you said, wiping your tears away with the sleeve of the sweatshirt you slept in. It was then that you realized he wasn’t wearing a shirt, but you didn’t care. He rubbed your scalp ever so slowly.
“Don’t be sorry. What happened?” You blinked back tears as you started talking.
“I had a dream, or a nightmare, I guess. I kept telling myself not to but I jumped off a bridge. And then I was at my funeral and nobody else was there. Not even my family.” His hand didn’t leave your hair as you spoke, but he pulled you closer to his chest until you were warm from his body heat.
“Oh, baby,” he said softly in response. You tucked your head into his neck, trying to savor the feeling of him being there, and put your arm around his waist as his went around your back. “That’s a nightmare if I’ve ever heard of one. But that’s all it is, okay? Just a nightmare.”
“It just made me wonder,” you whispered, “if…”
“No. It’s not true, I don’t want you to think for a second that it could be true. And I don’t ever want you to even think about doing that because I need you. The world needs you. You’re so important.”
“But I don’t feel like it sometimes. It feels like everyone just hates me, or wants something from me, and just doesn’t want me.”
“I want you.” He stopped, thinking for a minute that he’d crossed a line. But then he realized that you were in his arms, trusting him with this, telling him your deepest, darkest fear. And he let himself blur the line. “I need you. I just wish I knew how to make you see that.”
“You can’t. Everything just sucks, so bad, Chris.” There was another minute of silence.
“Come with me.” You looked confused, you were confused, as Chris pulled you out of bed. He went into his room and came out a second later, wearing a sweatshirt and sweat pants and sandals, the keys to the rental SUV in hand. He’d insisted on getting a rental car in case you wanted to go somewhere, and you didn’t think it would be useful until then. You put on sandals and followed him down to the elevator, through the bright lobby that gave you a headache, and into the middle of the night. You got into the car beside him, wondering what he could be looking for on his phone, but he plugged in an address and started driving.
You looked out to see that he obviously knew where he was going, away from the city, and he started going up a hill. It was a steep hill, so steep that you wondered for a minute if you were supposed to be going up there. But you were, evidently, because Chris finally came to a stop by a guard rail on the side of the road.
“What are we doing here?” You asked him.
“Get out and find out.” He turned the car off and shut the door behind him, and you did the same. For a minute you thought he might be the crazy one here. But you followed him to the back of the SUV, where he opened the hatchback and sat down in it. You were still confused, and then he pointed out past the guard rail. It occurred to you that you were at an overlook. The entire city you were in was beneath you, lit up, and the mountains were the backdrop behind it. Even though it was dark, you knew it would look pretty during the day.
“I found this place the last time I was here,” he explained, “Things were so shitty that I was just driving around in the middle of the night.” You looked over at him, pulling yourself up into the trunk. Chris pulled you back into him right away, resting against the back seat.
“Why’d you bring me out here?”
“Look out here, and look at me, and tell me that this isn’t worth living for. Even if I’m not enough to convince you, I figured maybe this was.” You looked up at him as more tears came to his eyes. “I love you,” he said finally. “I love you and I want you and I need you. And I know that might not be enough, but…”
“I love you too,” you interrupted him. He kissed the top of your head, taking in a deep breath. The softie was tearing up too.
“I’m in this with you, babe, all the way. And I just wish you could see yourself the way I see you. And I wish you’d believe me when I say that no nightmare is going to determine how people feel about you. I promise I’m going to do everything I can to make sure you know how wanted you are.” A tear fell down his cheek. “I’m sorry I’m crying. It’s dumb.”
“No,” you replied. “I like it when you cry over me.” That made him laugh, and he wrapped his arms around you and kept you in his lap. You stayed there for another couple of hours, just talking. Then the sun started to rise and it woke the both of you up from where you’d fallen asleep, or almost asleep. You went back to the front seat and he drove back down the hill to face the world, holding your hand the entire time.
A/N: I loved writing this, I’m sorry it’s so short! I loved the element of a drive and an overlook.
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