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#we are never stepping foot in that subway
jeongharine · 3 months
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a sea of tangerines
⚝ mingyu x reader
⚝ angst, romance, established couple, smut
⚝ notes: i really can't get out of my mind that postcard so i had to use it in the story to get it out of my system. i think it has become one of my favourite written letters by an anonymous on the web.
anyways, happy early holidays to you reading. hope this period treats you well x
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christmas eve, in a metropolis somewhere in the world.
"we used to live here together. i’m walking down the streets with a bag of tangerines in this city that we liked to call home. this is the only address that i could think of. happy holidays"
x
it was a hectic busy evening of december. the subway was full and mingyu really just wanted to rest. to lay on his comfy sofa and laze for the last days before the christmas crazyness. but he was stuck in a stupid metallic transport that had the resemblance of an infinite tunnel, with what seemed like the rest of the whole city.
something poked his tired left foot. then another, and another one. tangerines. a dozens of them. a wave of tangerines coming up at his feet.
he raised his head, and that’s when he spotted a ripped shopping bag held with all its might by slender fingers.
that’s when you spotted strong hands coming at you with your tangerines, a whispered sorry coming out of your mouth.
“it’s absurd really, a sea of tangerines coming up at my feet as if i had been the seashore. i thought i had hallucinations or something,”
that made you smile. “if only the supermarket shopping bags were not so shitty and-” “it was only a bag of tangerines rolling down the subway, though.”
right. it was only that.
“where you stopping by the way? maybe you do need a hand now,”
a puzzled look on your face. but then a smile. “right, me and my unwieldy tangerines need some help,”
that made him smile, though it was only a bag of tangerines rolling down the subway.
x
you left the natural tangerines onto the kitchen counter. the market with the fresh products wasn’t that far from your apartment and you waited for the rain to stop to go and do some grocery, wetting yourself nonetheless because the rain started again on your way back. 
busy streets had stopped their chant and the citylights brightly lit around when mingyu stopped by.
“hey,” he ruffled his black hair back with a smile, stepping inside.
“you made it home early,” the heavy door creaking a little while closing it. “it was a bit hectic but yeah,”
“you did well,” you complimented. you looked at him fondly, making sure he took in the praise. it was never easy for him, and you knew it well. “join me on the sofa after you showered?” pointing at his sweaty tshirt.
mingyu hummed, pleased. “got something in mind?” you chuckled.
“actually, i just would like to spend some cozy time with my boyfriend if you mind,” you answered. mingyu couldn’t hide his disappointment, looking sullen like he’d wish for another answer. “i was kidding gyu, if you want to keep your girlfriend occupied in some other way it’s fine as well.”
it was one in the morning, the lamp dimly lit the room against the bingling lights of the street outside. mingyu shut the tv before slouching on the cushions next to you. he curled behind you, the smell of fabric softener and vanilla shampoo all around you. 
he sighed deeply, nose buried in the crook of his loved one. the suspire beard in itself all the tiredness and weariness of the long day. “how long can you stay this time?”
“about ten days more or less,” you replied. after college you made it into the marketing world, and managed to get a good position job for a firm in the city. it was a source of proudness for you, for your parents and mingyu. but everything always comes with a burden. and travelling for work wasn’t that simple anymore.
distance was never easy, constantly keeping that in mind and making time to never skip anniversaries and holidays. you settled for that, and knew it would be challenging but this would have done for now.
“tired?”
“mmh,” he mumbled, leaving a trail of kisses on your neck. “it was very busy tonight in the restaurant. lots of dishes to prepare.” he placed his hand on your belly, slowly following the rising of your breaths. he took them in. mingyu would always be ready to take everything that’s bothering you. 
there was a scratch on your watch, mingyu dropped it on the pavement last time you went away. he gently pulled you in, making you turn to face him.
his rough hand met your cheek, thumb stroking it gently to draw your mouth closer to his. his tongue eager, tiredness was not so present anymore. and so he kissed you like all the stars in the sky above would have exploded. 
“i like this couch though,” mingyu whispered, lips damp from the kiss. “what do you mean?”
“that your boyfriend has something else in mind,” mingyu answered.
“bed’s waiting then.” you intertwined your fingers with his, leaving a peck on his nose.
the city lights danced slowly outside the window, a siren breaking the silence of the night when you went to the bedroom. everyone was asleep in the nearby apartments and you moved around like new lovers, when taking the risk of getting caught. but the night was gentle to you, keeping your secrecy like an oath.
being extra cautious when you brought mingyu in, the latter trying not to knock you over the drawer of your room when stripping you. you tumbled onto the white sheets, legs forever intertwined. 
“i want to marry you.” mingyu whispered, kissing you gently on the shoulder. “i found the perfect house for us, not too far from the subway for the airport and the restaurant.” 
the bed squeaked, and you smiled. you wanted that, as badly as mingyu wanted it. but it was not in your nature to rush things. mingyu looked at you fondly, the moon was brighter and he could see your soul.
“that sounds nice gyu, maybe we can look at it with purpose in a few months.” 
“yeah? y/n, you’re not fooling with me right?”
“no, i just need a few months to adjust some things at work then we can start to really think about it,” you replied, heart beating like it never had before. “come here and kiss me,” you caressed his black locks of hair. but mingyu didn’t. 
he started to trail kisses lower down your neck, breasts, stomach and slipped your undies down kissing your pubic bone and you were not prepared for it. “gyu–”
“i missed you, let me treat you as you deserve..”
mingyu got you wrapped around his finger with his sweet mouth and hand intertwined with yours. “oh,” you sighed when he suckled a little bit harder. “i don’t think i can last.”
“should i stop then?” mingyu asked, after pulling off with a pop.
“n–no, keep going baby,” you whined. the heat of the moment and your slick making you sticky, you were desperately thrusting up your hips in his face, which wasn’t easy but you tried nonetheless. mingyu responded to you with low groans, leaving your pussy unkissed like a punishment. 
“you’re so annoying.” “stop whining like a baby,” he kissed you, galaxies exploding far away but the chanting of the subway trains covered it into the night. “you taste like tangerines,” 
“ate them before,” “you’re the sweetest.” mingyu meant it literally, but you smiled like it was said just to please you. your head tilted into the soft pillow when his lips met yours with another kiss, tongue muffling all the noises.
he grabbed your back, twisting you over with the tug of his hand down his thigh. you had your leg splayed over mingyu’s waist, heavy breaths, you studied him with a perplexed cast. “want to make love to me like this?” 
“honey, for i do really love giving you a good pound into the bed i don’t have it in me right now.” you laughed, sliding off mingyu’s underwear fast. “you still have that oil there?” 
“yep,” you emphasized on the p while mingyu reached to your bedside table. his slicked up dick teased along your pussy’s lips just to hear you sigh before he slid in. a moan buried in his sweaty neck. “f-fuck .”
mingyu growled lowly. hands on your ass so the grinding was smoother on the push down. your eyes rolling back stupidly. “feels so good baby, fuck.” 
the praise made you quiver. heavy panting, desperate breathing, slippery fair skin on tan skin, tits and pecs knocking against each other because you were that close. 
mingyu rutted up another inch, your gut twisted. “y-yeah , i like that–” mingyu gasped loudly, inhaling fast. “if you keep talking i might pound into you.”
“guess you’re not tired anymore then.” “i always work hard for you.” you did not fight him when he laid you flat on the mattress under himself. you choked on a breath when mingyu couldn’t keep it to himself from fucking you that hard, especially when you were lain pliant like this. all exposed just for him and no-one else. fuck if it will never stop to drive him stupid.
the bed creaked under mingyu’s ministrations, his hips snapped rapidly and the sheets were bunched up tight in your fists. you couldn’t say you were not into it either. 
you didn’t push away mingyu’s fingers when he placed it on your delicate nub and started to circle on it. “you have to come first,” and it was not hard for him to accomplish that, you gave it to him shortly after. burning hot along your nerves, you felt the sweet unraveling you never could control, and mingyu felt it as well when your hot spurts spilled onto his abdomen, grabbing onto his bulky arms as if they were your personal lifeline.
you breathed in satisfaction, and mingyu was desperate for his high then, pumping fast for an orgasm he waited all day for and spilling over your stomach. he pumped slowly then, tiredness hitting him. “dirty.”
he chuckled when you locked him in an embrace. “i want to marry you now, tonight even.” 
you bubbled with a laugh. “i know, but give me at least three months.”
“one month.”
“no baby, i’m serious.” he replied, impatience slowly started building its home in the back of his mind. “do you want to go out and take a stroll around the city tomorrow?”
“yes, i would love to. i worked so hard today.” “i know.”
mingyu sighed. “but i will always work harder for you.” he promised kissing your nose, christmas lights sparkling the night sky hiding his promise.
you hummed into his damp hair. you would only take one month. mingyu had worked hard enough.
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my313 · 8 days
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bewitched 𓏲 ࣪₊♡𓂃 choi yeonjun
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now playing 𝄞₊⊹ bewitched - laufey
⋆ pairing: bf!yeonjun x f!reader
⋆ genre/themes/warnings: fluff, established relationship
a/n: our resident lauver yeonjun deserves this!!! enjoy this v quick drabble :3
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bf!yeonjun would definitely get a custom vinyl record with songs that remind him of you and your relationship. he'd call it the soundtrack of your love, complete with a picture of you both on the sleeve, possibly a polaroid picture of one of your trips overseas.
he'd play it most days; when you're at work or busy and he misses you, or when he reminisces over the memories you've made together over the course of your relationship.
but he loves to play it the most when you're both home. be it the weekends, or if you're stuck at home because of the rain, or even if you just decide to stay in and build one of his many lego purchases.
yeonjun thinks he's built a new core memory with you this one time he props up the vinyl on his record player, though. the big light is almost never on in your living room, opting to have the lamp you both lugged in the subway as your main source of light; its warmth looming over your flushed faces, like a pair of rose-coloured glasses that never seem to come off when you two are together.
he extends his hand, dipping into a satirical curtsy with a silly grin on his face. "care to dance, m'lady?" yeonjun sounds like he's teasing, but you know with how his eyes glisten hopefully that he truly wants you to get on your feet and put your hand in his. you stifle a laugh, attempting to follow along with his lead, nodding. "well, of course!"
his lithe fingers find their rightful place at your waist, your hands on his shoulders as laufey's bewitched plays softly. yeonjun knows you're his; he knows you're here to stay, but in moments like this, with your faces inches away, he memorises the way your eyelashes kiss the apples of your cheeks as you laugh bashfully, navigating your feet to the melody - as if you're going to fade into the yellow hue of the room like a figment of his imagination.
"i'm gonna step on your foot, junnie." you giggle, looking down at how your steps stumble over yeonjun's relaxed rhythm. "that's okay baby, you can step on me any day." he winks, aiming to see you throw your head back with an animated laugh. he feels his chest swell when you do just that.
yeonjun could do this everyday. play the same twenty songs and never get sick of the way you squeal each time he spins you; the way you laugh when you try to spin him back, only for his forehead to smack against you, opting to crouch to fit under your outstretched arm. he pulls you in and out, crazed laughter overpowering the gentle jazz.
you get tired at one point, so by the third track, you're pressed into a hug and taking the smallest steps, swaying left and right. your face is buried in the crook of yeonjun's neck as his arms engulf you, squeezing you into him as if he wants you both to be one entity. you retract from his shoulders to have a good look at your boyfriend's handsome face, beaming when you find him already staring at you. yeonjun abruptly pecks your lips once, twice, more than four times, before he's kissing you all over your face. he ends on your forehead then looks right back at you, "do you think we'll run out of songs to dance to?" yeonjun's way of asking if you'd stay forever, you think. it makes you want to write all the love songs in the world, give him his very own vinyl.
you shake your head firmly. your hands pull away from his waist and onto either side of his face, squishing his cheeks to make lips form a pout. "we can even dance in silence if we're together, junnie."
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loveysloveclub · 2 months
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forever and always - luke hughes
in which, it is ally and luke's first and last moments together.
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tuesday, 16th of june 2023
"yes, mom. i told you i'm fine." ally grumbled into her phone as her mother gave her a new list of things to worry about. earthquakes, car insurance, expired milk.
the list continued to grow every time she called, and ally had only been living in new york for a month. "mom, i know it's a big city- yes! i have a map! it's called google maps."
if she had been paying attention to the bustling street of new york instead of her mothers concerned voice ringing in her ears, then maybe she would have saw the stranger who was also engrossed in a phone of his own coming straight for her.
but in true ally fashion (as her over bearing mother liked to call it), she hadn't realised until she was on the floor and her phone was being run over by an oncoming truck.
"no, no, no." ally mumbled to herself frantically as she jumped to her feet and ran to retrieve her phone, only for an arm to wrap around her waist and pull her back to the somewhat safety of the sidewalk.
"i'll buy you a new phone, but please, don't kill yourself because i broke it."
ally had completely forgotten about the other half of the collision that had occurred moments beforehand. looking up at the stranger who had saved her life, ally was sure she had met the love of her life.
the unknown man was exactly her type. almost as if he was crafted for her.
"it's not the phone," ally began to tell him, "it's the constant 'i told you so's' i'm about to get from my mother."
a small smile graced the face of the stranger before her as he let out a breath of a laugh.
"i'm sorry about your phone."
ally simply waved him off, "don't be, you honestly were doing me a favour. my mother was about to begin her daily lecture on how to take the subway safely. mind you, she's never stepped foot out of oklahoma."
"still, they're sort of expensive."
ally shrugged her shoulders, a devious smile tugging at her lips, "eh, at least a cute stranger offered to buy me a new one."
and with that, the girl turned on her heel and began walking down the street. "i only said that so you wouldn't dive into oncoming traffic!" the boy yelled after her, but she pretended not to hear him as she continued on her way. "do you really think i'm cute?"
this caused ally to halt in her steps as she turned to face the boy, narrowly missing the people pushing passed her as she shrugged her shoulder, "guess you're gonna have to find out."
janurary 11th, 2024
"i don't understand." ally shook her head as she looked over at her boyfriend, tears streaming down her face.
her and luke's relationship had been in a bit of a rough patch ever since around thankgiving. she had no idea what had caused it, and honestly, neither did he.
they just weren't clicking anymore. they weren't working, and this was obvious to both of them, but luke seemed to be the only one bale to admit it out loud.
hence the situation they were both currently in.
luke had offered up the idea of a break, which ally knew meant to break up. which had led to a remorseful luke and a crying ally standing in the hallway of her two bedroom apartment.
"i'm so sorry, al," luke began, his hands instinctively cupping the girls face and wiping at the tears. the tears which he caused. the tears that would keep him up at night.
ally placed her shaky hands over his, holding them there for a minute as she closed her eyes and revelled in her last moments with him.
she knew it. luke knew it. hell, even jack knew it when luke left their shared apartment earlier that evening.
opening her eyes once more, ally shook her head and pulled away from luke's touch. "i thought you- you said you loved me."
"i do, i do love you. but we both know this isn't working. and until we can figure out why, i don't think we should be together." luke rebutted, almost offended that the girl would even suggest that he wasn't head over heels.
ally sniffled, but nodded her head regardless. she knew there was no avoiding this like she had been the obvious issues in her and luke's relationship over the past couple of weeks.
so, the girl bit her tongue as she watched the boy lean down and give her one final kiss on the cheek before walking out the door.
god, she wished her mother had a lecture about this one.
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Very different church conversion was done on this 1876 church in Ulster Park, New York. 4bds, 4ba, $2M.
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As soon as you enter, you can tell that it will be different. I've never seen a church decorated in navy and black with antique farm implements.
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Stairs lead up to a blue foyer with a terrazzo floor and a fancy carved door molding.
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The foyer leads into a combination living room/kitchen. The living room has a new fireplace and it's a small cozy area.
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There's a kitchen island and the modern kitchen itself extends farther back.
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There's also a side entrance into the kitchen via a small stoop.
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From this level is are ladder/stairs made from 2 old beams. The railing is a simple rope.
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This leads up to a large open area with such dark walls that I thought they were charred, but it's just dark.
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The stone walls are the same that we saw on the exterior. There's a dining area with an elaborate chandelier.
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There is also a sitting area, a chopping block and a large round indoor firepit with an exhaust hood.
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Looking down on the area, you can see sliding doors to a deck.
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The deck is a large size and has 2 storage areas for logs that are used for the firepit.
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Back indoors, stairs go up to a lofted bedroom.
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This is the only bedroom that is open.
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Bathroom #1 is small and done in classic white subway tiles.
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The 2nd bedroom is larger and is the primary.
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This bath has stone walls and a cool slanted slate sink.
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The smallest bedroom works well as a child's room or guest space.
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The largest bath has a stone sink, modern toilet & bidet, plus a shower and a vintage claw foot tub.
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The 4th bedroom is a nice size.
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Here, they built a platform that is used as a home office, and above is a loft stacked with lots of wood for the firepit.
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There's another level that looks like a flex-space and it also has an industrial sink.
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Two steps up is another area. I really don't know what you'd do with all these various areas.
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This is the tower that is in front of the building and there's more firewood stored up here.
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Spiral stairs go up the the uppermost part of the tower.
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And, this is the view.
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There's a .50 acre of property.
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tyxoxo · 10 months
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One Night Only - VII.
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ch.6, m.list
Jeno x fem!reader series
Genre: slow burn, fuckboy!jeno, enemies to lovers/hate fucking fwb! bookstore jeno → model jeno au, 00’ dream + mark + jun (seventeen) character inserts
Words: 2.4k
Warnings: only suggestive themes in this chapter, jeno is mean, cocky, stubborn, this relationship is extremely toxic (i dont condone, this is pure fiction),
tagging: @sukistrawberry @mingiandbaconjam @baecobies @produmads @glitchfiles @devinitysann @jamy99hoe @pradajaehyun
a/n: don’t come for me! i know it’s been a minute 🫣
**edit: forgot to write that jeno changed his clothes. just imagine him in his all black fit from Milan!!:)
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Chapter 7
He had to have been the most foul person to ever step foot on this subway, thinking he could get away with trying to put his hands in between your thighs. It was painfully obvious that he was attempting to get to where you secretly needed him the most.  
“Jeno…” The way his name fell from your hushed lips made him go wild. Even if you were going to tell him to stop, it wouldn’t keep him from daydreaming about spinning you around to face the subway doors, letting everyone on the other side watch the two of you fly by as he took you against the foggy windows.
Even bonus points if he managed to rip your flimsy flannel open as he fucked you from behind, breasts pressed against the plexi glass from his relentless thrusts.
He was aware you weren’t wearing a bra underneath; practically begging to be exposed.
You whispered out his name again, not even realizing that you snapped him out of his wild daze.
“Hmm?” He hummed against your ear, causing your back to arch and ultimately intensify the way your ass fit perfectly into his groin. 
“We can’t do this here…” You fought against your desires, trying your hardest to not let your words drift off into a moan. There was no way the other subway-goers couldn’t hear you. Your tone was quiet enough to hear a pin drop but everyone was practically squished against one another, you and Jeno included. The only thing that set you apart from these strangers, was your guilt from struggling to behave.
“Why not?”
“There’s kids in here…”
He briefly turned his head from the front of the train to the very back. Due to his one-track mind, of course he didn’t notice.
“Fuck…” Disappointment was evident in his expression, forehead dropping onto your shoulder from the realization that he was cock-blocked.
You purposely dropped your eyes down at both of your shoes, knowing the civilians were probably disgusted, and would maybe even consider reporting you to the nearest authorities; this was Seoul after all. 
Regardless, Jeno kept his claim on you, making sure his hands were locked on your waist for the entire train ride. 
~
“So…what is there to know?” You asked as the two of you scoured the outdoor flea market. You didn’t know of any other way to start a conversation, but you hoped something would come out of it.
Neither of you were on the hunt for anything in particular, but the multitude of booths gave you both plenty to look at.
From antique’s, to handcrafted jewelry, to “hand-me-down’s” in a stand alone thrift section, there could be something worth buying. 
“What would you like to know?” Jeno knocked his shoulder into your own as a signal for “shoot it.” But you were certain that he had no idea how many details you wanted to discover. 
“Well, you seem pretty tame at the moment, which is why i asked.” 
He scoffed at your statement, knowing that he was so close to causing a scene on the subway. But he could care less about the old farts or the young bloods. He was never one to respect authority.
“I mean yeah, since we’re very well acquainted now.” He said his snarky comment rather loudly, to which you gave a rather loud and abrupt “shhh.”
A few shoppers turned to view your utterance, to which you quickly diverted your eyes from the sudden onslaught of attention. 
“Hmm, let me guess. You want to know why I'm being so nice right now. Or maybe you want to know when I'm gonna ditch you…”
He looked up towards the sky as he listed his malicious theories; a shit way to ponder on all of the possibilities.
You could only shake your head from your decision to initiate talk, but you couldn’t help but remain curious.
“You know you’re like a billion red flags right?” You snapped back with something only half as presumptuous; never quite on your “A” game with someone as forward as him.  
“Yeah, and what does that say about you?” He said with a smirk. It was becoming increasingly difficult to not tug on your lips with every word he spoke.
Sadly, he was right.
You were just as unstable as him, to all of a sudden be around him more often than your old self would’ve wanted to. 
“That I should be ashamed of myself…” 
Somehow that amused the both of you. And hearing him laugh for the first time, actually stirred something within you, even his eye smile making your cheeks turn scorching hot.
“But seriously though, what made you want to work at a bookstore, doesn’t seem like your kind of vibe. Having to be quiet all the time…”
“I mean, Renjun and I both wanted something lowkey and not super complicated. And could you imagine me in retail or fast food, sounds terrible right?” 
You covered your mouth as you imagined the scenario, entertained by his facial expressions and agreement with his own statement.
“I definitely couldn’t. But you should really treat Mark with more respect, he’s way too lenient with you, or any of us for that matter.”
You couldn’t help but scold Jeno, for all the times he was inconsiderate to your nothing-but-nice boss.
Jeno gave a sarcastic pout, and an aura of silence after catching sight of a ring at one of the many handcrafted jewelry booths. As he began to approach the tent, you inspected the banner attached to the front, reading “Brimstone Jewelry” with a Leviathan Cross situated on both ends. 
You followed behind him, hanging onto the back of his black jean jacket to keep up with his stride. 
As you stood side-by-side, you watched as he grabbed the grunge-inspired silver band, face showing interest in the decorative etchings. 
Eventually, who you presumed to be the owner, approached the two of you, hoping Jeno would buy it. 
“You like it?” The woman had a unique look to her. Despite being middle-aged, she seemed to be just as lively as the younger demographic: with dyed red fringed hair, spiked cuffs, and an all black sheer dress. 
Jeno could only respond with a “mhm” and a subtle nod, raising the ring to get a good view of the sticker on the inside that gave the size. 
“Do you have this in a size 9?” 
“Yes! Let me get it out of my box!” The lady bent down to grab the container that was hidden underneath the table by a white drape sheet. In it, was the ring he had asked for, along with others that were just as edgy. 
It was noticeably bigger and once Jeno placed it on his right middle finger, you felt your knees buckle.
He looked so hot, with it on. Even though his black jean jacket covered the veins on his arms, you could see them branched out on his hands, complimenting the avant-garde design of the ring.
You hadn’t even realized that your mouth was hung open as he held up his hand in the sunlight, not until the lady smiled and laughed at your expression.
Jeno was oblivious until she spoke again,
“Are you guys a couple?” 
She was daring to ask such a thing, and you tried to gulp down the lump that formed in your throat like an aftershock.
Jeno placed his hand down, giving an obvious and shameless “why would you ask such a thing” look.
“No.” 
Jeno’s curt response, without a reassuring glance, made the air around you go cold, despite the relatively warm day.
What did you expect? And why did it make your entire body slump into a low-spirited posture? 
“Didn’t mean to intrude, young man. Just thought I’d ask because I have some really nice couple rings.” The lady gave a sympathetic bow, one that was ignored by Jeno as he tossed the ring on the table and walked off without you.
You were in disbelief, not only from his brusque actions, but from the entirety of the situation. It seemed like he retreated anytime your presence was known…did you even really exist in his mind? Or only when it benefited him? 
Of course, you were probably overanalyzing. But this was the second time he withdrew after the two of you engaged in such a way. 
You mentally shook your head of your inordinate thoughts, giving a delayed bow to the lady on behalf of your anarchic partner, if that even was the appropriate title. 
“How come you didn’t buy it?” You eventually caught up, with your subconscious never failing to make you grab a hold of his arm as the two of you walked. Surprisingly, he didn’t shrug you away, and you could honestly care less if he secretly hated it. 
“I don’t know. I just didn’t want to…” 
If you ended up following through with your spur-of-the-moment plan, you could no longer say that you didn’t have feelings for Jeno. All of the denial would be nonexistent from this point onward. 
Because the moment you decided to walk back up to that same booth, you would make it your mission to have Jeno fuck you with that ring on, one way or another.
“Where are you going?” He looked back after feeling you release the back of his jacket. 
“I’ll be right back. Can you find me something to drink and some shade, like frozen lemonade or something?” 
As you attempted to keep your whereabouts unknown, you were stopped in your tracks by Jeno’s firm grip on your wrist, causing you to whirl back around to face him. His jaw was clenched, probably due to your equivocal decision to go alone suddenly, especially in such a busy crowd.
“What?” He asked with a tilt of his head.
“I’m gonna go check something out, can you find me something to drink in the meantime?” You tried your best not to involuntarily point your head in the direction of your objective, fearing it would give your plan away. 
“Tell me.” 
“I said i’ll be right back!” 
Because of the increase in your tone and the attention drawn to the two of you now, Jeno had no choice but to let go. He seemed to walk away in the opposite direction, where you had both eyed a drink stand minutes prior. You continued your journey back to the jewelry booth, hoping the lady wouldn’t tell you to go away because of Jeno’s ill-mannered attitude. 
Surprisingly, she smiled upon seeing you step up again to her booth.
“Back again huh?” 
“Yeah I couldn’t stay away.” You offered an awkward laugh to fill the once-cold space.
“Could I buy that size 9 ring we looked at earlier?” 
“Of course! But may I ask…how come he won’t?” 
She seemed to be the nosy type, but for some reason you didn’t mind, even envying her audacious personality.
“Uh-uhm. It’s a surprise for him. He never tells me or shows me what he likes so I thought why not.” 
A terrible lie, one that she might see right through.
“Well, I must say it fits him. You guys look good together. Just make sure he treats you right…been there, done that.”
She spoke low as she put the ring in its own matte-black holder, assuming Jeno was nearby to hear.  
You bowed from her conscious advice after handing the money, to which she waved goodbye as she handed you the brown paper gift bag. 
The bag was adorned with the same Leviathan Cross sticker on both sides, indirectly foiling your plans to keep it a surprise. 
As soon as you left the booth, you took out your phone to see if he texted where he could possibly be. And there on your lockscreen was a single message.
2:27pm 
[jeno]: i’m at the drink stand we saw earlier. you should see a bunch of bright yellow chairs
[you]: ok, heading over now
It was impossible to hide the rush of excitement that forged within your body. You just knew he would love it, even if he tried to outwardly display annoyance from your persistence. 
You held the bag close to your body as you made your way to the stand, almost stumbling past a few people in the process.
There, in the distance, you saw him. And despite the toxicity, he took your breath away at every glance: the way he sat in the chair with the typical male leg cross—ankle up and resting on the opposite knee while scrolling through his phone made you grip the bag even tighter.
He had successfully fulfilled your request, with two large cups of what appeared to be frozen lemonade placed on the outdoor green mesh table.
It wasn’t until you got in arms-length distance that he looked up from his phone, eyes following the brown paper bag as you placed it on top of the table.
And once he looked from there and to your smug grin, he instantly knew. 
“What the fuck?” He leaned forward, switching to a normal sitting position simultaneously. 
His profanity garnered a mother with her two young children to cover their ears as she stood nearby ordering at the stand, but neither you nor Jeno cared about her own censoring. You began sipping the slushied drink through the straw as you shifted in the bright yellow chair, watching with a smile as he inspected the familiar sticker on the bag.
“Try it on again.” 
You spoke in between sips, not surprised to see him obeying your command within a second of your sentence.
After a hefty amount of rustling through the bag, he pulled out the matte-holder, and with it came the satisfaction of a lifetime.
As soon as he slipped it on his right middle finger, your mouth hovered over the straw, just like when you first saw him with it. 
He looked down at his hand with intrigue, and soon fixation as you scooted your chair over to him.
He sat frozen in his seat as you leaned over, chilled lips hitting his ear in two breaths,
“Now fuck me with it on…”  Where did all of your daringness come from? Not even you could answer that, but based on the rush of how he gathered all of your belongings and your wrist, he was determined to find out...
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normal-internet-user · 11 months
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TRUTHS AND LIES: 2
♤~~◇~~♤~~◇~~♤
Pt: 1 Pt: 3
Summary: You meet your father after a lifetime of not knowing him.
Warnings: Angst but with comfort this time,
Requested: N/A
Female Reader
....................................
You followd Leonardo nervously.
You knew his brother would not take kindly to him bringing you into their home. That wasn't why you were nervous though, you could understand their reservations about you, you were their enemy less than an hour ago.
No you were nervous to meet your father. How will he react to seeing you? Anger? Dissappointment? Sadness? Happiness?
It was so unpredictable you couldn't help your rising anxieties.
Leonardo led you up the old subway station steps, and you felt your shoulders tense as his brothers looked up at the two of you.
Silence filled the Lair, and you didn't dare break eye contact with Raphael.
"Guys, I this might seem bad-"
"What is she doing here!?" Raphael shouted, storming up to Leonardo and in turn, you, "Great idea, Leo, bring Shredder's daughter to the Lair. Now she knows exactly where we are!"
"Raph, calm down, she needs to see Sensei. She said she believes that he's her real dad."
Raphael's angry gaze flickered between you and Leonardo, but before he could argue further, Splinter stepped into the room.
"What is going on here?" He asked in his authorative tone. His eyes caught your own, and he dropped his jade staff.
"Tomoe?" His hands were raised, as though he wanted to do nothing more than hold you.
You looked down at your feet, the realization that you still wore your Foot Clan symbol filling you with shame, "Hello, Father."
The name was foreign to you, you only knew the name you were given by Shredder.
Tomoe. It meant blessing.
That thought only furthered your shame and guilt. Tears pricked at your eyes as your gaze never left your feet.
Your eyes widened in surprise as Splinter engulfed you in a hug, you held your hands up nervously, before returning the hug.
"I'm so sorry." You sobbed, hugging Splinter, your father, tighter.
"I'm so sorry." you repeated breathlessly, "I- I didn't know, I thought- He said-" You could even finish your sentences. You needed him to hear you, to hear that you were sorry. You were so so sorry.
"Hush hōseki. It's alright, I am not angry with you, I never could be. Shhhhh, it is alright." Splinter pulled away from you, wiping away your tears, "Follow me, my dear, there is much for us to discuss."
You nodded, following Splinter into the dojo. The second the doors closed behind the two of you, you could hear Raphael blow up at Leonardo.
You winced, "I didn't mean to cause an argument, I-"
Splinter held up a hand, silencing you, "Hōseki, they must sort out their issues alone. Raphael has his reservations when it comes to trusting people, he will come around."
"How could he though?" You stated, "I've done- horrible things. I-I was never strong enough to stand up to the Shredder, I just did what he said, I-" you took a deep breath, looking down at your hands, "I hurt people."
Splinter sighed, "You are not your past my dear. I have made mistakes myself. Those mistakes cost me my family. They cost me you. They cost me your mother and your sister. Those mistakes won't leave you, they stay for a long time, but so long as you learn from them and better yourself, those mistakes only aided in making you who you are."
Splinter rested a gentle hand on your shoulder, smiling softly at you, "Come my daughter, sit with me. Let us talk."
You followed Splinter, taking a seat under the impossibly large tree. You were still tense, but you had definitly calmed down quite abit. You felt more comfortable in your father's presence, like it was natural.
He gave off that fatherly energy of comfort, something you had never felt from Shredder. Shredder was, cold, and distant. But Splinter seemed as though he wanted nothing more than to learn who you were, who his daughter had grown to be.
"You look just like your mother."
You looked up to catch Splinter gaze, a soft smile played on his lips, "Really?"
He nodded, "Aside from the eyes, yes. You have my eyes." he moved a hand to brush aside a strand of your hair blocking your face, tucking the strand behind your ear.
"Dad, I-"
"My dear if you say you are sorry again, I will make you sit through a lecture from Michelangelo about self forgivness."
You chuckled, "It can't be that bad, right?"
"Well maybe not, if he didn't randomly add 'dude' to every sentence."
That caused you to fully laugh, something you hadn't done in years. Sure, Karai managed to get the occasional snort or giggle out of you, but again you were the silent one. Laughter included.
But as time passed, and you stayed with your new family, you felt that silence dissapaiting. You were more comfortable in your own body, you no longer had to fear punishment for speaking your mind.
Of course, you were still quiet. That's just who you were. You just spoke more often, but still in that soft and gentle tone.
The turtles, you new kyoudai, they all came around on their own. Leonardo was obviously the first, he broight you here because he trusted you afterall.
Michelangelo was the second.
It only took afew days and some time with him to welcome you, and now it seemed he wanted nothing more than to spend time with you.
Donatello was third. You spent quite abit of time in his lab with him, it was the place most foreign to you, so you wanted to familiarize yourself with it.
You mostly sat aside and asked questions, though you knew when he needed silence. He came around rather quickly as well.
Fourth and finally was Raphael.
He seemed hell bent on hating you, no matter how you tried to show him you meant no harm.
Eventually, Splinter decided enough was enough, and sent the two of you on a solo patrol, leaving you with a very upset Raphael.
He blew up at you, saying that he didn't know how his brothers trusted you so easily. You sighed, and moved to sit at the edge of the roof.
You explained the way you felt after Leonardo told you that Splinter was your dad, the betrayal you felt. You had been lied to your whole life, the people you had been told were enemies were actually family.
You knew what it felt like to be betrayed, it hurt. It hurt that someone you trusted with your whole being would toss you away or lie to you so easily.
You told him as much.
"I get where you're coming from, Raphael. I understand that you don't trust me. I'm not exactly a saint among men. I've done- horrible things, all because I was to afraid to stand up to orders." You said, not breaking your gaze from the New York skyline.
"I hurt people, innocent people, all so Shredder could grow his empire. Now, I get that you don't trust me, but it doesn't matter either way, because wether you trust me or not, I'm gping to help you destroy the Shredder, and the empire I helped build."
You turned to look at him, your normally soft eyes burning with a fire you had never known before, "I swear on my life I will."
And that was four.
....................................
Alright so Tomoe is the name you were given at birth, it means blessing. It was changed just like Karai's.
But it doesn't really matter, cuz Splinter is really the only one who calls you Tomoe.
Tramslations:
Kyoudai: Little brothers
Hōseki: Gem
As usual, let me know if they're incorrect!
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call-me-doll-face · 11 months
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YEARNING
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Warnings: all of them. Smut, angst, unedited. I worked this on a whim so I'm sorry if there are mistakes!
To say today had been busy would be a massive understatement. Almost to the point that it's laughable.
The little subway i worked at, while normally not a hard job, had been dreadful. I'd had to stay an hour past closing just to catch up and get everything done.
By the time I reach the door to my little apartment, my feet are dragging. Stepping in I mindlessly throw my keys onto the accent table right inside the door; watching as they almost knock over the pile of neatly stacked mail.
Next I move into my tiny kitchen, grabbing my favorite glass and filling it with water, gulping it down in two very unlady like chugs.
Looking around I wonder where my little feline friend is before shrugging it off, knowing she'll come find me when she's ready to.
Moving to go around the island I have a one track mind.
Bed,bed,bed.
So focused on finally getting some rest after pulling a double I don't notice the eyes watching me. Don't notice the figure moving from out of the shadows in the corner of the room. Until it's too late.
Before i can even realize what's going on a strong hand is gripping the nape of my neck in a tight grip, bending me over the island and pinning me to the countertop.
"Oh, what the fuck!" I cry out, more frustrated and angry than scared. All I wanted was to fucking sleep.
"What was your first mistake?" The deep sultry voice asks mischievously. My heart skips a beat at the sound of it. of who it belongs to.
"B-Bucky?" I sputter out in shock, trying to wiggle free so i can turn to see his face, to know he's really here and i'm not going crazy.
He just tsks at me, clicking his tongue as he runs a big palm slowly up my outer thigh then up to the curve of my ass. "I said-" I gasp as he slowly runs his tongue up my neck before closing his teeth over my ear in a gentle nip. "what. was your first. mistake?" That hand squeezes my ass. A warning.
"Jesus, buck! I'm too tired to play these games! let go of me!" A loud smack sound in the room as his palm lands harshly on my ass, right cheek stinging from the strike.
"I won't ask again doll. Do you think hydra would be so patient? hmm?" His voice deepens, words rolling smoothly off that wicked tongue. Despite the warning my body shivers with pleasure, remembering just how capable that tongue could be....
When I don't answer another smack lands on the opposite cheek, this time with enough force to jolt me forward. "Fuck! Wait,wait wait, I don't-" grunting in disapproval I feel his hand lifting again and cry out desperately. "Th-the table in the entry!"
Giving me a pleased hum he gently lowers his hand back down and caresses the skin there, moving up to give my hip a gentle squeeze.
"What about it, pretty girl?" He asks, pressing a soft open mouthed kiss to the back of my neck.
Within seconds he has me whimpering or him, wanting to please him. I should be angry. Should be screaming and yelling at him for the way he just left me. Middle of the night with no explanation, leaving me to wake up alone and to not hear from him for months. Then to have the audacity to waltz (or break) back in and ask ME what my mistake was. The balls. But fuck me if I don't have the strength to hold out on him.
"It was organized. I never organize, Never have time." My stomach flutters at his sound of approval. Kicking my legs apart with his foot he doesn't hesitate to wedge his big thigh there when they spread, pulling another whimper from me.
"What else doll?" Doll.... he used to call me that all the time... when we first met id thought it was only because he was being a gentleman, but after a while id picked up on the fact that i was the only one he'd used the term with.
"The water cup. It was in the cupboard. Usually I leave it on the corner of the sink for when i get home."
"mmm, Good girl." Bucky basically purrs, thumbs hooking into the waistband of my leggings, pulling them and my panties over my ass and down my legs all at once.
Becoming self conscious i try to wiggle free once again, try to stand up straight but buck is quick to pin me down again. With a hand flat against my lower back, he slide down to kneel behind me and my cheeks burn red with embarrassment as he eyes me hungrily. My thighs clench on their own accord and he's quick to slide his hands down and spread me open, breathing deeply.
"Such a pretty pussy. Smell so good doll, God I missed you. So fuckin perfect." The words are a rumble and my breath catches when i feel the heat of them against my sensitive skin.
"Buck..." I don't know why his name leaves my mouth; Don't know why it sounds like a plead, but he takes it willingly.
A sharp cry leaves my lips as the flat of his tongue licks a wet strip up my center, all the way to my leaking hold. He doesn't hesitate to devour me; tongue spearing into me as his fingers clench my ass, using his hold on them to pull me back on to his face.
It's not long before he has me coming apart at the seams, rocking back onto him as i grip onto the countertop. He eats and drinks from me like a man starved and I'm his last meal, slurping and groaning obscenely.
"Fuuuuuck, fuck,fuck,fuck!" I cry out desperately as the coil in my belly tightens into an almost overwhelming point. He groans against he happily, sending vibrations straight to my core.
I cry out in frustration when he pulls away from me completely, only to flip me onto my back. My eyes widen at the shock of finally being able to see his face after so long.
His beautiful hair that had touched the tops of his shoulders had been cut short, looking just long enough to run my fingers through and grip. Those beautiful blue eyes, my favorite blue yes in the whole world, had grown colder; harder. There were more lines on his face, looking like he'd aged years...
But under all that is still my Bucky. Still the most beautiful man I'd ever seen. A man that I would willingly give my life for, almost HAD given my life for.
The man was staring at me like he was the devil himself, smiling with a look of pure sin on his face. And if he was the devil, well I'm going to be damned.
"You want these?" the question is teasing, playfulness behind those big blues as he runs cold metal fingers featherlight down my stomach. I nod eagerly, lifting my hips in expectation causing him to chuckle. "so, so desperate."
Too impatient to tease any more he pushes two fingers into my wet heat, instantly curling them to reach that one spot that only he could reach. A cry leaves my lips and throwing my head back I reach under my shirt to push my bra up.
"That's it doll. Play with those fucking perfect tits. Gonna make you cum on my tongue, then I'm going to fuck that pretty pussy." God, the mouth on that man. Who would have thought that the stoic, moody James Buchanan Barnes would have such a dirty side. Not that I"m complaining.
His fingers and words very quickly work me back up to my peak again and his free hand grabs onto my hip to steady me, ground me.
Reaching down I grab onto his wrist; nothing but the sound of my cries, the obscene sounds of my wetness, and his praises filling the room.
"Come. Come now." He commands right before lowering and swirling that deadly tongue in tight circles around my clit. That does it for me, sends me over the edge and falling.
Blue eyes eaten up by black watch me as My back arches, toes curl, and a scream leaves my lips. My vision goes white and my body clenches as the best orgasmn ive ever had tilts my world on its axis. Metal fingers keep hitting that spot, keep working me through it until I finally come back down, body relaxing and tired.
When my eyes open and meet his, I'm surprised to see tears gathered on his lash line, just barely keeping from falling. The sight takes my breath away... so pretty...
"Buck?..." I whisper, gut swirling with uncertainty.
Did i do something wrong?
"Need you." Before the words are even all the way out we are reaching for each other, hands ripping off the others clothes as fast as possible.
Within seconds we are both bare, his cock standing hard and flushes red in desperation. Gripping it tightly, he strokes his a few times before notching it at my opening and thrusting in to the hilt.
We both cry out at the feeling of finally being connected again. Tears prick my own eyes at the stretch that always came with being with bucky, No amount of preparation had ever been enough to ease the burn from his sheer size.
My hands grip onto his shoulders as his arms wrap around me, pulling me up and flush against him so that my ass is just barley resting on the edge. Leaning his forehead against mine and letting out a shaky breath he finally opens his eyes to look at me; silently asking permission to move.
Leaning forward i finally press my lips to his, whining into his mouth as i roll against him, marvelling at the delicious slide of him against my walls.
His tongue parts my lips and slides against mine effortlessly as he starts to move, pulling out to slowly push back in, each time going deeper and deeper.
I dont know when it turned in to this, but its overwhelming, my heart feeling like its swelling with emotion and about to shatter at the same time. We Cling to each other as his thrusts pick up speed, breathes mingling.
"Buck..." His name is a broken sigh and I watch as that plump bottom lip quivers.
"I fucked up. I fucked up doll and im so god damn sorry. So sorry..." The tears finally fall, sliding down his cheeks in steady streams. burying his face in my neck he grips me tighter, leaning me back slightly. The new angle has him hitting something devastating and my own tears fall but for a completely different reason.
"I love you. Love you so much Doll. You're my best girl. Never leaving again. Fucking stupid. Gonna stay, be with you forever." He's babbling now, hands sliding and gripping anything he can reach. mouth moving down to capture my nipple; Nipping and sucking and rolling it between his teeth. Once again im becoming quickly overwhelmed by him and the affect he has on me, my mind swirling with all the words he'd said, is saying. Because it doesn't seem he can stop.
"Gonna have a family with you. Fill you with my babies, have little ones that look like us. You want that pretty girl? want me to make you a mama? hmmm? you'd do so good baby.Doing so good taking me like this." My breath is knocked out of me with his next thrust and he doesn't even give me a chance to recover.
Gripping my ass he lifts me off the counter causing my legs to wrap around him even tighter. He's holding me up, supporting all my weight as he bounces me up and down on him viciously. I can tell he's becoming desperate, his jaw coming unhinged as he watches his cock disappear into me; Groans loudly when he sees the glistening wetness coating him.
Watching how dismantled he looks is what sends me over the edge for the second time that night. I'm screaming, blubbering like a baby, begging and pleading for him to give it all to me, everything he promised, I want it all.
With a loud growl he gives it to me, smashing his lips to mine in a violent kiss, teeth clacking together as his rhythm falters. "Of fuck. Of fuuuuck." He moans out, hips jerking up into mine, cock twitching as he shoots rope after rope of hot cum into me, coating my walls with his seed. I whimper as my walls clench, milking him dry of everything he has.
When we both finally come down he's quick to carry me into my room. Once there, bucky does what bucky does best. He takes care of me.
Later that night as we are lying in bed, curled up together under my thousands of fuzzy blankets, I finally ask what had been on my mind since I realized it was him.
"What made you come back?"
"I missed my best girl, had to see her again." My heart swells even more at his words, if that's even possible. "Hello, Alpine."
Meow.
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outoutdamnspark · 1 year
Text
Human
Inspired by the Robo!Submas x Reader au by @nc-eikin​ - because this bitch (affectionate) has a death grip on my soul. I’m such a robophiliac, you have no idea.
(Was listening to Matsudappoiyo’s cover of Talk of the Past while writing.)
*cracks knuckles*
AIGHT. Robo-romance, here we go!
(Cw: Panic attacks and mentions of dissociation, brief themes of ableism(???) Tenderness, non-sexual body [hand] worship, pining. Robots in love. Shifting narration focus. Reader is called “lady” but is left genderless. Submas x Reader.)
soa have mercy this got so out of hand. no pun intended.
===
The entire day has been awful from the start.
You’ve suffered through bad days before - many times - but no matter how many, you’ll never quite get used to the extra long shift, or the endless slew of technical issues that all seem to spontaneously appear back to back to back, or the people being rude as hell when you're just trying to send in a report or a request for replacement parts. (And you’ll never, never, get used to how, on top of all of that, the miserable weather, dreary, wet, and cold, is causing your phantom limbs to ache.)
You’re exhausted by the time your shift is at its blessed end, fed up, in pain, and nearly ready to break down in frustrated tears as you quicken your pace towards what you desperately hope is safety in the ‘Employees Only’ corridors.
But it is not to be.
You'd always been so careful of your gloves, making sure they were as well-maintained as the delicate mechanisms your grandfather taught you to build and repair. Any loose thread, any thinning seam, and you were quick to repair or replace the fabric barrier between your prosthetic limbs and the judgemental world around you, and this meticulousness had served you well for oh so long.
But even the most vigilant of individuals can fall victim to blind chance, and blind chance is exactly what puts the snagging ends of a frayed wire in just the right place inside your pocket. It catches on the side of your glove as you pause in your walking to reach in and search for your employee pass. The tiny copper fingers seize your glove, hold it, tear it, find a weak spot in the seam and break it open. You pull your hand back out of your pocket to the soundtrack of shredding fabric.
It’s bad; the way the thread had pulled had ripped the seam in both directions, leaving the entire side of your glove split apart and the metal of your prosthetic beneath it to shine in the overhead lighting of the subway platform. You grimace. Not wanting to endanger the remaining material any further, you peel it off.
You hope no one notices.
(You hope in vain.)
“Wow, cool!!”
A small child - maybe seven or eight years old - dashes in front of you with sparkling, excited eyes trained directly on your exposed metal arm, blocking your path to the employee door just as you start to try and move.
“I didn’t know they had a lady robot here, too!”
A lance of ice and clawing shame plunges itself between your ribs and straight into your lungs, knocking the breath from your lips. Suddenly you’re shaking, too aware of how loudly the exuberant child is being, of how crowded the platform actually is.
Heart rattling, you say nothing to the child as you attempt to step around him, to cross the last few yards to the employee door and the eyeless hallway beyond. Unperturbed, the child simply moves along with you, keeping pace, darting erratically from your side to practically under your feet and then back - and all the while his incessant questioning gets louder and louder, like he thinks you can’t hear him.
“Hey! Hey lady! You’re a robot, too, right? What kind are you? How come you don’t have fake skin like the other robots? Are you broken? Can I see your hand?” He nearly trips you when he gasps and stops close enough to your foot that he’s practically standing on your shoe. “Can I have cool robot parts, too?!”
You don’t mean to almost knock him down, you really don’t.
You don’t mean to slap his grasping fingers away as he reaches for your metal limbs, nor do you mean to bolt like a wild animal towards the employee door, abrupt enough to earn you the child’s (loud, loud, so loud!) cry of surprise and his nearby mother’s angry reprimand.
They couldn’t understand. No one ever has.
Because while it may have seemed like an innocent enough encounter on the surface, just like always, you can feel the eyes of everyone within earshot turning towards you, burning along your skin. Just like before. Just like always.
(You're so, so tired of being stared at, of being bombarded with questions, of being the focus of pity and fear and morbid curiosity.)
Without slowing down, you smack the pad beside the door with your ID, barely waiting for the latch to click and the light to flash green before yanking the door open with more force than flesh-and-blood limbs would ever have allowed.
You nearly sprint down the corridor, taking the turns through sheer muscle memory as your vision blackens at the edges, until a familiar (safe-safe-safe!) door comes into view just up ahead.
It’s empty when you enter, but that’s okay. You don’t think you want your friends to see you like this - you don’t want to tell them why.
You reach the far corner of the little room the Station Masters call their own and brace yourself against the wall. Shaking, you slide to the floor and try to get your breathing under control.
-
They’re ashamed that it takes them almost an hour to find you.
There hadn’t been cause for concern at first - they’d simply realized you’d never clocked out, which meant there might still be a chance to see you again before you left for the day. It had been a happy thought, one that had them eagerly sneaking away to go and look for you.
But you were nowhere to be found.
They’d checked everywhere they knew you’d had work to do that day, thinking that maybe a task had run longer than expected. Then, they’d checked the live camera feed to see if they could spot you that way. Still nothing. Thinking perhaps you’d simply forgotten to clock out and had already left for the evening - which would have been horribly unlike you - they’d resigned themselves to waiting until the morning to be graced with your presence.
And then they’d gone back to their storage room.
There, in the corner, tucked away where the camera’s eye didn’t quite reach, was you.
The Station Masters hover nearby, processors overloading with concern as they watch you, unresponsive, sitting hunched against the wall and staring at nothing with the remains of tear tracks still drying on your cheeks. Your gloves are clenched so tightly between your fists that the fabric looks on the verge of tearing as you hold it, twisted taught between your metal fingers. Dissociation, their automatic index tells them; trace indicators of sweat and adrenaline, their cursory scans conclude.
A quick bluetooth conversation is had between them, and they determine that no, they've never seen you like this before, this isn't normal.
They approach. You don't react.
(The twins wonder if this is what it feels like to wish they could cry.)
‘Should we contact medical assistance?’
‘I... don’t know.’
They look to one another, silently hoping their brother will have the answers they do not.
(Now that they know where you’ve gone, they search back through the security logs and follow your path in reverse, tailing you backwards until they see...
Oh.)
“Oh.”
-
You’re peripherally aware of the twins as they step in perfect unison to flank you, slowly kneeling at your sides until they no longer tower over your crumpled form. You want to move, want to respond when they call your name, let them know you can almost hear them - but your body refuses to cooperate.
Instead, you stare at the empty space between the far wall and the floor and try to collect enough pieces of yourself to find your way back towards their light.
“Darling?” one of them calls - it doesn’t matter which.
“Can you hear us?”
Barely, but yes. You can make out their words as though from some far-away shore, muffled and weak. It’s a comfort, regardless.
(You trust them, you think. More than you ever have another human being.)
Through foggy ears, you listen to them speak. They murmur, coax, gently plead, come back now, please, you're scaring us, are you alright? They tell you they saw what happened, how they’re sorry they weren’t there - but that’s silly, you want to tell them. It wasn’t their fault; there was nothing they could have done to circumvent what always, always happens.
(It doesn’t stop a tiny piece of your heart from wishing they had been there beside you, with kind words and protective stances.
Maybe then they wouldn’t have to see you as you are right now.)
There is movement.
Gently, so gently, the brothers lean into you. You can feel them pressing their arms against your own, the contact oddly warm from their internal functions. Your skin prickles at the touch - but pleasantly so, instead of the crawling bad that physical contact usually brings.
With deliberate, worshipful slowness, they each take one of your mechanical hands in their own, weaving their fingers together with yours, loosening your grip on your gloves until they can be safely pried from your grasp. One of them, maybe 3MM-ET, carefully lifts your hand and brings it to his lips, resting it there reverently. The other, probably 1NG0, lifts your other hand and gingerly uncurls your fingers so he can press your palm against his cheek.
Neither one of them speaks for a time. 3MM-ET brushes his lips over your prosthetic fingers repeatedly, ghosts of kisses he isn't wholly brave enough to properly give; 1NG0 closes his eyes and holds your hand to his face with both of his. He nuzzles into your touch, lips gliding across the heel of your palm but never pressing down.
"Beautiful," one of them whispers.
"Verrry beautiful," the other agrees.
You don’t know how long you all stay like that, with your heart gradually thawing with each and every word that spills from the speakers hidden in their throats. Their warmth and the weight of them grounds you, little by little pulling you back towards that distant shore. Your lungs work without you to fill with fresh air, replacing the stagnation that’s settled deep inside while you’d been lost to the void inside your own head.
The twins continue to murmur praises, reassurance, fondness, steadily growing into whispers of devotion in between the spaces of their spoken words. They adore you, they say, you're wonderful, so human and so alive and so very, verrry lovely; you don’t realize at first that they're talking about you.
It’s like a riptide when you do.
You gasp as you slam back into your body from that foggy mire inside your mind, the burn of a sharp inhale rivaling the way it feels like something’s finally been released inside your ribs. Freed, lanced like an ill-healed wound.
Out pours the blood and pain of years of bottled emotions, of facial expressions you trained yourself not to make, of the shards of at least one barrier you’ve held tall and strong for an age. And with it all there comes the pent-up toxins of the day, spilling out over your eyelashes in a new wave of tears, tracing down the paths left behind from before. It hurts. You’re glad it does.
You don't just sit there silently as you blink the saltwater from your eyes this time; instead, they pour like a swelling river over its banks, and you lean forward with the weight of them. A low, pitiful sound pools inside your mouth and slips past your teeth before you can stop it - a quiet, keening whine that breaks and stutters into a single sob.
Then another.
And then a third.
Your shoulders jerk as you start to drop, but before your body can fold itself in half, there are arms around you, gentle and firm, holding you steady.
Your hands are relinquished and the arms cross one another over your chest like a brace, their own hands coming to rest on your shoulders opposite where they each kneel. A second pair of arms wraps around your back just above your waist. The duo hold you upright, keep you from falling, pull you close in perfect equidistance between them; one rests his cheek on the crown of your bowed head, the other rests his chin in the dip of your shoulder.
You shake as you cry, letting out the long stretch of the day, your hitching breath the only sound you make through clenched teeth, and through it all they hold you. Even as five minutes turn to thirty and the tears finally ebb, and you can feel yourself slot back into place within reality, the arms encircling you stay, the murmurs continue, their presence remains.
They ask you if you're alright.
You simply nod your head.
With a glance at one another that holds another private conversation, you’re sure, the androids slowly shift, slowly stand. Their arms do not move, and you find yourself pulled along with them as they lift you from your spot on the floor and guide you to a battered old loveseat along the wall - something your grandfather must have brought in years and years ago.
In perfect unison they sit, bringing you to rest between them so close that their sides, their thighs, their shoulder all press against your own once more with comforting pressure.
"I should...go. Let you recharge," you say at last. You make no move to get up.
3MM-ET hums, thoughtful. He lets his arm slide from where it crosses your chest like a seatbelt and gingerly takes your hand. Warm, gloved fingers slip in alongside yours, soft leather against sleek and shining chrome, and 3MM-ET runs the sides of his fingers back and forth between your own like gently rolling waves. With each pass he gives a light squeeze so that you can feel the hidden ball joints of his knuckles. He delicately pinches your ring finger next, your middle, your index, twisting them ever-so-slightly as if examining them from different angles. Despite the strength you know his artificial body contains, his touch is never anything but kind.
(From anyone else, you might find it uncomfortable, invasive. But not from him. Not from them.)
"...You are gorgeous, you know?" he says in his usual soft monotone. His quietude belays the strange, awed tint to his words, the softening of his synthetic smile in a way you've never seen before.
From your other side, you can see 1NG0 slowly nodding from the corner of your eye. Like his brother, he, too, finally shifts his hand from your opposite shoulder and brings it down to cover your free one. He curls his fingers around the metal plates that make up your knuckles, cradling them like something invaluable. The pad of his thumb brushes over the hinge of your own, back and forth, back and forth.
"Gorgeous," he says in agreement, uncharacteristically quiet. "And perfect."
You scoff, wet and choked. "I'm not--"
But 1NG0 raises faintly glowing optics to meet your gaze and your protest dies behind your tongue at the sight of something raw behind his eyes.
"You are human," 3MM-ET says beside you. "Something we will never be."
You turn away from 1NG0 then, and twist your neck to look at his brother with furrowed brows. But 3MM-ET’s smile is achingly fond and he shakes his head before you can speak. "It is the truth," he states simply. "We are not human." He shrugs - and it's such a distinctly human gesture, one that you know can be programmed or learned through behavioral study, but usually never properly applied in subtle ways. Here, it is subtle, and for a moment you forget which of you three is made of wires and which is made of flesh.
But 3MM-ET isn’t done. He turns your hand over in his grasp and runs his thumb down the inorganic lines of your palm. His gaze lowers to watch it, as though he’s unable to meet your eyes. “...But you treat us as though we are.”
1NG0 shifts, leans forward to study you in profile. “We are flawed in mechanical ways,” he says, voice still soft and tender and warm. “You are flawed in human ways. We can be programmed to emulate human flaws, but it’s nothing more than an illusion, a lie of perfection. Or of imperfection. Whatever the one writing our code wants us to be.”
The arms still curled around your waist squeeze you in gentle, almost nervous tandem as both the androids hug you close.
3MM-ET’s thumb changes direction on your palm, circling counter clockwise. “We are aware of this.” His fingers tighten almost imperceptibly, but it’s still enough for the sensors in your metal hand to detect. “Of our artificiality. Sometimes we forget, but not for very long.”
Your mouth twitches at his admission, not a frown but almost; he just shakes his head.
“You do not get it; you make us feel human. You. With you it is not forgetting, it is like we always were.”
On your other side, 1NG0 hums. “You have never indicated that you see us as things; you do not treat us as lesser in any way, when by nature of our inhumanity someone else might. Where another might see our personalities as faults, and our faults as something to be rectified, you treat them as though they are normal.”
3MM-ET nods. “As though we are human.”
1NG0 nods as well. His hand on yours twists, aligning his palm with the back of your hand. He threads his fingers together with yours. “Your humanity is what makes you perfect,” he explains. “You simply exist as you are, flaws and all.”
The arms encircling you slowly slide from your waist, gloved hands brushing along your back and sides until they fall away. 1NG0 brings a hand up to trace the back of a knuckle just under your eyes; when he pulls back again, there is a single droplet of moisture left on his glove.
(You didn’t know you still had tears left to shed.)
3MM-ET’s hand alights on your shoulder. He trials his fingertips reverently downward, tracing the seam where your skin meets metal - and even further down. He stops at your elbow, gently cupping it, and lifts your arm until it straightens out. The thumb that once drew patterns across your palm now carefully uncurls your fingers, and he adjusts his hold until your forearm rests across his own. Slowly, like he’s terrified you’ll pull away, 3MM-ET lowers his head and lifts your arm higher to meet in the middle.
Soft and whisper-light, he touches silicone lips to the ball joint of your wrist.
Your breath catches in your throat; this is all too much. You don’t know what to do with this tenderness, this gentleness, when all you’ve known for years is how to build your walls higher and higher to avoid the leering gaze of others. You cannot fathom, no matter your grandfather’s skill at breathing artificial life into cold copper and warm circuits, how these two (objectively inhuman) beings can show more humanity than members of your own kind.
And how they, technically perfect in their artificiality, can consider you the perfect one - because of and not in spite of, your failings.
Your mechanical fingers curl, unconsciously trying to capture 3MM-ET’s hand once more.
The brush of leather against your face pulls your attention back to 1NG0, back to a luminous silver gaze that meets your own and somehow softens as if you’d hung the moon and stars. He rolls his hand so that his palm cradles your cheek, and with his other he tugs at your fingers until he’s pressed your hand to where his core sits beneath his chest plate, holding it there like he’ll die if he lets go.
There is no need for him to breathe, no real heart that needs to beat, but you can feel the impersonations of them under your hand; the rise and fall of his chest in simulation of breathing, the faint thrum of the pump that forces hydrolic fluid through his internal structure. Even with your prosthetic, you can feel him.
“These are not flaws,” 1NG0 whispers, stroking your mechanical hand with his thumb. “They are simply a part of you.”
You feel the tickle of 3MM-ET’s lips against your wrist as he picks up where his brother leaves off, unwilling to remove his almost-kiss from your arm even as he speaks. “Therefore,” he murmurs, “these are perfect, too.”
You’d thought yourself dam-less, the cracks in your walls now laid bare as the banked-up river of emotions runs dry inside your soul. But as you look from one conductor to the other - one with his lips held to your wrist and his twin with your hand clutched to his core - you feel the tide come in anew.
1NG0 swipes at the trickle of tears gliding freely from your eyes, though his gentle touch does nothing to stem their flow. You shake your head to dislodge his hand.
Before either of them can react, you’re pulling back, tugging your appendages from their respective holds and reaching blindly out to grasp at their shoulders. You manage to find one of them through your blurry vision, 3MM-ET, and yank him to you. He lets you bury your face in the crook of his neck and rests his cheek against your temple.
Your free hand fumbles to find 1NG0 on your other side, but now that he can guess what you want, he puts himself in your path; you fist your fingers into his coat and pull him close until he’s pressed against your side with his forehead alighting just below your ear at the hing of your jaw. He ghosts his lips against the skin of your jawline and wraps both of his arms securely around your waist.
3MM-ET’s arms follow suit, coming to rest above his brother’s, as one of your own slips around his side to cling desperately at the back of his coat. You wriggle your other arm until it’s actually under the one 1NG0 has around your front and reach up to dig your fingers into his sleeve, hanging on like you’re afraid you’ll be washed away without him there to ground you.
The last dregs of overwhelming emotion wring from your exhausted heart as you allow yourself to be held and to hold in return - for once finding a hand extended in the dark behind your walls. You make no noise as you cry this time; there is only the sound of your breathing and the whispered words of two voices in your ear, telling you how glad they are to know you.
You’ve never felt more human.
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nikarie5 · 5 months
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First Frost
Rating: General Audience, no ship unless squinting General description: Leo finds out what happens when a sidewalk frosts over. Cast: Leo Knut, Finn O'Hara, Remus Lupin Thanks to @noots-fic-fests for organising, and @lumosinlove for such lovely characters to play with. ---
“Awww, yikes!”
Leo goes down, grabbing onto the railing as his gangly legs flail out from under him. He starts pulling himself back up, his legs dancing on the slippery pavement as he tries to find traction. Failing, he gives up and scoots on his butt to sit against the railing’s post. Finn collapses with laughter in the doorway.
“Is this why you wanted to get up early and go for a walk before practice, Knut?”, Finn asks as he regains his breath.
“It looks so pretty out, like everything has been etched over by tiny lutins. I forgot elves are also known for being dangerous, luring unsuspecting travelers to their doom,” Leo drawls, looking out over the frosted over shrubbery that lined the path sloping down to the sidewalk and road. “I had read about this, but never seen it before. Our sidewalks are different kinds of booby traps down in Nola.”
“This is your first ever frost? That does explain how a professional hockey player can’t manage to walk on a tiny dusting of ice,” Finn teases as he helps Leo lever himself up off the ground and shuffle back to safe ground. “Grip with your toes, grip with your toes.” Finn twirls the car keys around one finger. “Tell ya what. I’ll drive us to practice and park in the outdoor lot instead of the spot in the garage, and you can practice on a flat surface.” He throws his arm around Leo’s waist and starts steering him towards the stairwell. “You’ll get plenty of opportunities to see frost up close and personal this winter here in Gryffindor, I promise.”
Leo leans in to the support Finn is giving him, hoping Finn can’t feel his heartbeat speeding up at the casual contact initiated by his shorter teammate. He blows lightly on his palms, happy he had had the forethought to put on his light knit gloves before venturing out onto the treacherous pavement. The last thing he needed was scraped up hands, he’s still getting used to his new Lions blocker and glove.
In the car, Leo presses his forehead to the window, watching the frosted landscape pass by, marvelling as they pass through the park across from the arena.
Finn pulls into an empty space in the near-deserted parking lot, about halfway between the subway station exit and the arena’s entry. Hopping out of the car, he yells out to the lone walker leaving the subway, “Loops! Come watch a baby deer learn to walk!” He dashes around the hood to open Leo’s door before he can do it himself.
Remus comes striding over, and offers Leo a hand to get out of the car. “Oh right, I guess you aren’t used to walking on frost yet. It’s a vital skill up here, especially if you aren’t planning on getting your own car.”
Leo leans lightly on Remus, gripping his forearm tightly as Leo’s feet threaten to betray him on the slippery concrete. “Thanks Loops. I haven’t got the trick of it yet.”
Finn butts in, “I told him the trick is to grip with your toes.” Loops joins in, chanting with Finn, “Grip with your toes, grips with your toes!”  The two look at each other, give a high five, “Ya man!”.
“I am so lost right now”, comments Leo, still struggling to find his footing while Remus shakes with laughter next to him.
“Kiss my lucky egg?” Finn asks.
“Some people say you know you can’t believe”, Remus starts off, with Finn joining in for “Hey Jamaica, we got a bobsled team.”
Leo looks at them both, completely bewildered. “I am definitely missing the reference. Seriously, how do I do this?”
“Aw, sorry Knut. Here, for now, practice sliding your feet along as though you are skating, just with smaller strides.” Finn steps out in front, demonstrating, then Remus slowly slides one foot forward and waits for Leo to copy him.
“You got this Knut, you are a professional hockey player, you can skate. It’s just like skating,” Remus adds, guiding Leo into another step forward.
The three make their way slowly to the rink’s entrance, Leo chanting the whole time under his breath, “I’m a hockey player, I can do this. I’m a hockey player, I can do this.”
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bbugyu · 2 years
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no one could be prouder or more pleased to be by your side.
classic | epilogue
2.9k | joshua x afab enby!reader, fluff, humor, swearing, eating, josh is the literal sweetest human alive
this is a quick one! i've actually had this written for about a year LMAO but i never posted for some reason 🤕 anyhow, i threw together a title card and cleaned it up a bit to post as a thank you for 1500 followers! i seriously can't believe so many of you find me worthy of a follow, and i genuinely appreciate it so much. thank you! thank you thank you thank you!!!!!! also yes i pulled the name from THE 00s romcom of all time starring ryan reynolds and sandra bullock and YES i used a joshua picture from canada because that movie is set in alaska (it's as close as i could get without using the gum wall pics ok)
*
sometimes, days were just bad. there was no real cause, and nothing to be done about it, but sometimes small things piled up in ways that you couldn't stop thinking about. you stubbed your toe on the dresser first thing in the morning after not sleeping particularly well or long. your subway car was more crowded than you liked, and when you stopped at a cafe to get a coffee a block away from the studio, you realized you had forgotten the memory card for your camera and had to resort to filming on your phone instead. you only worked at maji studio once a week these days, and you were always excited to spend some time with yunhyeong, but he hadn't been able to make it in because his sister and her wife dropped in for a surprise visit, so you didn't even get to see him. it was slightly too hot for spring and you could feel it under your arms. the pollen count was too high and you could feel it in your nose. your shoes were too new to be fully broken in and you could feel it in your achilles.
all this, and one of your best friends had just gotten engaged.
it went without question that you were extremely happy for the couple, and absurdly excited to celebrate with them, but krys had asked her half-brother to be her "maid" of honor (leaving you relieved, karol indignant, and sending joshua into a manic and panicked research spree), and asked you to make the cake. she had shown you pictures of things she liked, you knew her color scheme, and you had spent the last four years getting to know her tastes, so all in all, she was going to be the easiest client you had ever worked with. however - and you would never let her know in fear that she would retract the responsibility - the added baking you had to do for the cake tasting appointment you scheduled with her put just enough on your plate to have a looming stress over your entire week. 
a recipe for disaster, as it were. and when you dropped your lunch leftovers on the sidewalk outside the loft, the pad see ew and swimming rama that you had ordered in an attempt to brighten your mood splattering over the concrete like a crime scene, you just let out a groan in frustration and planted your palms over your face.
"well, diaz-" you slid your hands down to view the source of the familiar voice, joshua walking up to you from where you saw his car parked down the street and studying the food, hands on his hips to imitate the tv detective from one of your favorite sitcoms. "looks like we got a homicide on our hands."
"fuck today," you whined, your foot stomping against the concrete in that cutesy way you only did around him, and he caught the glimmer of tears in your eyes, immediately dropping the joke.
"aw, baby," he cooed, stepping over the food and gathering you in his arms. "don't cry over spilled thai."
you choked out a laugh as you settled into the hug, sniffling and willing the tears back into your ducts. "i'm not crying."
"you okay?" joshua asked, hand rubbing up and down your back, effectively wiping away your stress with his touch. "do you wanna talk about it?"
you buried your face in his neck, fully succumbing to the embrace despite the fact that you were standing outside, and you had a pretty strict aversion to indulging in intimacy in public places. it felt too nice to let go, joshua's warmth and comfort a welcomed juxtaposition to your awful mood. you sighed. "wouldn't even know where to start."
he breathed out a laugh, squeezing you. "long day?"
"really long."
he pulled away slightly to waggle his eyebrows at you, and you laughed, swatting at his chest. he nodded at the door of your apartment building. "you go wash up. i'll deal with the crime scene."
you pouted at him. "are you sure?"
"of course," he said, letting you start towards the door despite holding onto his arms. "best boyfriend ever. don't you forget it."
you tried to hide a smile. "only because seokmin's a fiancé now."
he pointed at the door. "shut up and get inside before i change my mind."
you giggled at him, making him break and smile at you, but you took the instructions nonetheless, after planting a kiss on his cheek.
the shower felt like therapy, scalding water stripping your skin of grime and your brain of pressure. you took a little longer than normal, water dripping down your face from where it was spraying against the back of your head and neck, letting the incessant noise of it make your mind go blank. after your moment of meditation, you shut off the water and went to find something comfy to wear, but joshua intercepted you at the bathroom door.
"hey," he said, a gentle smile on his lips. "do you wanna go get something good for dinner?"
you blinked at him, towel wrapped around you. "like what?"
"well, i was thinking," he started, letting you step past him into the bedroom to begin digging through the closet. "you were telling me about that high end beef place in gangnam the other day-"
"woo tender?" you asked, eyes big. "isn't that a little fancy for a wednesday?"
he pointed at you. "i knew you'd say that. but i looked into it, and turns out they give free dessert if you get engaged during dinner."
you stared at him for a second, thinking about how you had told him in the past that if he even tried to ask you to marry him before year five you would break up with him, and the further caveat that if he tried to propose in public you would say no on principle. "joshua."
"not for real," he said, making a face like you were insane for even thinking he would suggest it. "i just thought you might like today more if we could put on the 'can't wait for marriage' act to get free food."
you pushed our lips to one side of your face, fiddling with your towel and giving him one of those looks that he could never look away from. "that actually sounds really fun."
he made a fist in victory, backing towards the door. "pick out something nice to wear, i'll match you. i have to make sure they have a table real fast. you don't happen to have a ring, do you?"
you looked over to the dresser, where a tray of jewelry sat. "yours wouldn't fit any of my fingers, huh?"
"well, it's only the one finger that matters," joshua pointed out, eyebrows raised, and you giggled at him. "it's fine, we can find a shitty one on the way."
that made you laugh out loud. "so romantic," you said, shoulder popping up to your chin sassily.
"only the best for you," he winked, finger gun being the last thing you saw as he left.
the statement was repeated later, joshua's tone facetious and teasing as he shoved coins into a gacha machine in your local mall, the pair of you being massively overdressed to be betting on which squishy gudetama your spare change was going to gift you. you wanted the rolled omelet - of course, who wouldn't? - but that was exactly why joshua was positive you would never get it. you had already placed the almost convincing ring that had popped out of the previous machine on your finger, it's greatest giveaway being the plastic seam you could feel between your knuckles, but glittered vaguely in the light in a way that you were sure emulated a real stone. if you kept moving, no one would be able to notice that the silver had no depth to it.
joshua sucked his lips between his teeth, exerting much more effort on the reusable capsule than one would think it needed. he huffed when it popped open, displaying the contents as you both peeked in.
"oh my god!" you giggled, immediately picking the little rolled omelet out of the capsule and tearing open the plastic packaging. "gudetamagoyaki!"
joshua stared at you. "that's insane. i've watched seokmin pull eight of the steamed egg squishes out of this exact machine."
you thought for a second. "well, yeah. we're each others' good luck charm."
he laughed, an endeared light in his eyes as he watched you gesture between the two of you. he put the capsule in the provided bin on top of the machines and fell into step beside you as you left the gacha arcade. "please elaborate."
"your promotion," you said immediately, hooking your arm under his as he took the inanimate animated egg from you to squish between his fingers. "you got the editor position because you came back for a proper kiss."
he turned his head to you, and there was a laugh just threatening to burst from his lips at the sight of your proud face. "right, nothing to do with my years of dedicated work, aggressive networking, and sheer ambition. not like i went to college for this exact reason or whatever."
"exactly," you agreed, as if he had just stated that the sky was blue, displaying your ringed finger in front of you as you exited the mall and headed towards the car. "and you were my first viral video."
joshua's head cocked as he stared at your hand. "now that's true."
you looked over to him. "so was the other one."
he smiled at you. "right."
you looked back at the ring. "this is so goofy."
he laughed as you pulled it off your finger, putting it in his outstretched palm as he led you across the parking lot. "it only has to be convincing for half an hour."
you chewed your cheek, spotting joshua's car right where the two of you had left it. "and i have to say yes to get the dessert?"
joshua rolled his eyes dramatically. "alright, you can walk home."
"i'm kidding!" you laughed, tugging on his arm, and he let a sly smile sneak through his annoyed facade, hand fishing in the pocket of his pants to unlock the car. "i won't be able to say no when you ask me for real, so i might not get the chance again."
a smirk stretched across his face as he pulled open the passenger door. "you act like we won't absolutely pull this scam again."
you laughed, telling him he was so right, and rewarding his chivalry with a quick kiss on his upturned lips before dropping into the car.
joshua's hand always found you. it wasn't even a conscious action for him anymore, you were pretty sure - a habit at this point, a natural proclivity to brushing his fingers over the small of your back to prompt you to distractedly step up in line at a café, or rubbing his thumbs into your shoulders when he checked on you while you edited on the weekends. today, his hand slid over your thigh as soon as he had navigated back to a main road, a sign that he had settled into the drive. he peeked over at you when you put your palm over his hand, squeezing at his fingers, and he squeezed your thigh back when you gave him a tiny smile.
"feel any better?" he asked, checking his side mirror quickly as he merged.
you let out a breath. "a lot better. thank you for this."
"i'm being selfish," he said quickly, making you sputter out a laugh that got him to join you. "have you seen their sweets platter? i need to eat those donuts." 
and while the dessert was the purpose of visiting gangnam on this particular wednesday, everything else about the meal was just as beautiful and delicious as you hoped it would be. you felt ridiculous, absolutely, spending way too much money for a gourmet meal on a random week night just for the idea of a free dessert, but perhaps that inside joke was part of what made the evening so fun. being able to make quick eye contact that only had meaning between the two of you, stifling a giggle that made him smile and clear his throat. the plates you had been sharing were almost empty, signifying a nearing end to your stay in gangnam and the question you had been waiting for all night.
"here," joshua said, pushing the entree plate towards you lightly. "the steak was good, you eat the last of it."
you pouted at him. "are you sure? you can have it."
he shook his head at you. "saving space," he said, hand on his stomach and giving you a subtle wink. you giggled and picked up your fork to make the last perfect bite. he watched you stab the last bit of greens and meat, scooping up as much of the sauce as you could before depositing the whole affair in your mouth, and he grinned when you made a noise of enjoyment. "it looks tastier when you eat, anyways."
"this is why i like eating with you," you said after you swallowed, fully savoring the rich sauce and tender meat. "usually i'm the one making other people take the last bite."
he gave you a look - the look, you realized, the one he gave you when he was about to say something brain meltingly cheesy that would always make you giggle and hit him playfully. your name dripped with honey, a sweet song from his lips, and despite knowing exactly what was coming, having already rehearsed your parts of the act in your head before getting seated, you couldn't help but feel slightly caught off guard, heart racing when his hand reached for you across the table and when his eyes met yours. "can you promise to share meals with me for the rest of our lives?"
you blinked helplessly at him, his smile widening at how shell shocked you looked. he slid off his chair, hand still holding yours as he gently got down on one knee beside your table. "joshua, what are you-"
"darling," he interrupted, eyebrows raised playfully at you, one hand reaching back to fish the trinket out of his sports coat's pocket. "i'll always let you have the last bite, so," he paused a second, looking up at you, and you could have sworn there was something genuine behind the almost awe struck chuckle that fell from his curved lips. "do me the honor of staying by my side."
your breath caught, and if you didn't feel the eyes of neighboring tables on you, you probably would have smacked the shit out of him for flustering you like that in public. but you fancied yourself an actor, so instead, you pushed your palm to your face as you conjured tears to your waterline. you even let yourself get caught up in the magic of the moment as he pulled the ring forward, the dim lighting of the restaurant making it even more believable than you had expected, your eyes flashing between it and joshua. you started to nod, small at first, then firmer when you finally laughed out a yes.
people were clapping, you were pretty sure, when joshua scraped the plastic ring onto your finger, grinning wide as you both stood, his arms naturally running up your body and catching you in the kind of hug that could make your knees go weak. and even though you had an innate distaste for the relationship checkpoints society projected on romance, and even though joshua had agreed instantly that he didn't think you were the kind of couple that needed a ring and a piece of paper to prove that they love each other, and even though this was all just a scam to get free dessert, you still broke your rule about public affection. your fingers combed through the hair on the back of his head, and you pulled away from the hug just enough to kiss him.
joshua seemed shocked for just a second by your vigor, and if he commented on it later you would absolutely tell him it was just for the performance, but he sunk into your lips, his hand running over your waist. 
he hummed when you pulled away. "that steak sauce was really good."
"gross, joshua," you laughed, gently pushing him back to his seat with a cheesy grin on his face.
it took less than three minutes for the prophesied dessert platter to arrive, complete with chocolate writing that congratulated you on your (fake) engagement and an assurance that it was on the house from the waitress - though joshua was more interested in the donuts than the sentiment. he immediately swiped the pastry through the chocolate ganache script for the flavor benefit, and for just a moment, a sweet thought floated through your head as his entire face dropped in shock before he solemnly told you they were absolutely insane. you giggled before selecting one yourself, swiping it similarly through the ganache, and though you would never say it out loud, there was no one on the planet you would rather devote the rest of your sweet thoughts to.
even if the engagement was a scam.
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swtki · 2 years
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Too Nice To Talk To - P.P
Masterlist
Pairing: TASM! Peter Parker x Fem! Reader
Summary: Peter loves her, the only problem is that she’d be in so much danger if he dare spoke to her
Warnings: Swearing, if you choose to listen to the song they do say the R slur in it. (it was the 80s), very dramatic Peter, mostly fluff, reader doesn’t know Peter is Spiderman
A/N: I love this song SO much
Too Nice To Talk To - Wha’ppen? - The English Beat
Its too late now, its twenty past two. I spent the night just watching you.
Making sure you were safe, that there wasn’t a single threat around.
I watched you every night, no matter where you were. You could be walking home with some girlfriends, and I was lurking in the shadows, making sure nobody followed you all. Or you could be home, dancing in her kitchen as you reheated last nights Indian food, butter chicken. The place downstairs from your apartment had the best butter chicken in Queens.
Now I think quite a lot as I stare at my shoes, About all these things that I put myself through.
Why do I watch you so intensely if I know I could never make you mine? I don’t know, Y/N. Theres something alluring about you. But ultimately, I know, you’re too nice to talk to.
I could never forgive myself if I hurt this ray of sunshine. Just by introducing myself as anything other than your friendly neighborhood spider-man could cause my enemy to pounce on you. To get to me.
One time, I did think about introducing myself as Peter Parker. We were in the subway, you were standing a foot away from me, and I glance but you just stare me through.
But eventually, I got my chance to talk to you. Unfortunately, it was because you were almost getting mugged. Of course, I stepped in right as the gun was pulled out. I knocked him out, webbing him to the wall. You looked at me, shocked. unsure of what to say. Finally, you spoke.
“Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it! What else is the friendly neighborhood Spider-man for?”
You smile and start walking away. I should have said something, I should have made my move.
So, I went back to watching you. Until I couldn’t. I tapped on your window one night, your fourth story apartment window. You look confused and then shocked when you saw my big white eyes staring back at you. You opened your window.
“Hey spider- man, can I help you?“ You were unsure how to feel about me.
“Patrol is a bit boring tonight, came to see if I could offer a pretty lady like yourself any flowers.” I pulled the bouquet from behind my back.
Your eyes widened and you froze. “How did you- why did you- what?” but nevertheless you grasped them in your hands and you welcomed me into your apartment.
“Sorry it’s not the cleanest.” You said, kicking a pile of clothes under the bed. I’d plopped down onto the plush floor and looked around.
“This is a very nice room.” You rolled your eyes and we walked out into the main kitchen and living area.
“So,” You pull a vase out of the cabinet, it’s purple, your roommates favourite color it would seem. “Do you make pit stops to give all the women in queens a bouquet of flowers, or am I special?” My face burned under my mask, you were looking at me, talking to me.
“Just you. There’s something about you, Y/N.”
Your eyebrows raised, and for a minute I thought I’d offended you. Felt such a fool I felt you knew, But you might tell me to go away.
“Do you, um, do you want something to drink?” You turned to the fridge and opened it. “I have beer, hard cider, Dr. Pepper, sprite?”
I laughed, “tap water, if you have it of course” You laughed back.
“Of course.” 
I wanted to throw myself at you, to kiss you right then and there.
This evening hasn't gone like I planned, Should I take the situation in hand?
Unfortunately, I chose the other end of the bad choice spectrum.
You handed the glass to me, to which I drank in one swift move.
“How did you know my-“ You started,
“Well, I should be going, thanks for the water!” I ran Out the window you might say I'm out of of my mind.
But you're too nice to talk to.
Too nice.
REBLOG IF YOU LIKE! REBLOGS ARE MORE HELPFUL THAN LIKES !!!
Taglist:
@mssbridgerton
@Katiekatbooks
@augustvandyne
@babyhoneymp4
@raajali3
@dreamy-clousds
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afreakingdork · 5 months
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Miss dork.
- when I first started messaging you I was always scared that I’d read into things too much and it’d be embarrassing if I was wrong-
Now I know you like “share with the class” and you set me straight if I’m wrong so-
Omg. Prodigal don flipping coin again. Strikes again! Also, Don breaking down? I was MOVED I know I predicted he’d vaporize Leo into itty bitty turtle pieces but I hope you know I’m never disappointed I just like guessing- but back on track Don breaking down- rabbit brain raccoon brain - his little check over of reader? I was calm and oh so in control until he started Checking Reader’s Feet and aaaaaaaaaa all I could think about is how a form of interrogation torture is to strike the bottom of someone’s foot (listen Bones the tv show was surprisingly educational) and I had an out loud scream over the thought of Donnie checking Reader for TORTURE- and then I had to pretend I hit MY foot on the coffee table to avoid explaining what I was wailing over-
Oh and almost forgot Leo going “they’ve got bruised knees” like. Hello. I don’t know where Don’s mind went but I know where mine did and it was a fucking nose dive if there was a moment for Leo to get vaporized it would be. Right. Then. (I told you I wouldn’t survive) Like Eugh boi to coin his phrase whole foot in mouth and chewing 😂
I did have a question because I know you visualize where everyone is in a scene-
Where was Raph in relation to Donnie during the trade off scene? Above him, behind? Was Donnie aware he was there?
And oh I love Splinter/Donnie interaction because it’s like a tennis ball court because it really highlights that reader only has bits and pieces to go off of and everyone’s reactions to each other is so interesting! I loved the diner scene!
🦝,
Yes! Yes!!! No fear!!! I'm not scary!!! (This last one isn't to you, but in general! I don't mean to be scary! I've been told the way i speak can be curt, but I really don't mean it like that. I just try to make things concise and clear) I love hearing others thoughts!!!
Saying 'share with the class' is such a great way to put it 😂
HOLY MOLY
I cannot believe we both learned that from Bones!!! You freaking nailed it, 100%!!! Truly an amazing catch, I hadn't even added that to my behind the scenes! Also,
✨Phalanges✨
YUUUUPPPPPP, the bruised knees was absolutely a double entendre. Don went there FOR SURE and that's why reader stepped in like they said they would to Raph! Leo couldn't help but still provoke Donnie in spite of himself. He can't help but be a little bit of a shithead 😂
Oh good question and another of those I had worked out, but no necessity to write. So as you now from the last chapter, 39, Raph asks “Which entrance?” after he finds that Mikey didn't come back with Leo. Leo then says “Grand.” Leo clipped. “Stand by at Black Cat and I’ll signal if it goes south.” Since we know the turts are occupying the subway, those are code names for stations. Grand is the only obvious one as Grand Central Station, a good hub for a fly guy to get a vantage point of the city. Black Cat isn't a for real reference, but instead to a comic shop so I picture this as the station the turts would go up to get their comics (I feel like Leo still reads).
tldr; the other turts were waiting at other subway stations~
Yay!! I'm so glad you liked it! I'm really enjoying playing with perception through unreliable narrator reader. Slowly, but surely they are learning more and more. I wanted it to really feel like you were in a relationship with someone. Peeling back those layers and getting closer 💞
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timelord-emmet · 9 months
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Chapter 8
Proceed with Caution :
After spending a few weeks in Celibi’s forest to adapt and learn of his new abilities , Emmet is practically vibrating in unused energy and frustration to move on and proceed to his destination which is to go back to Sinnoh and use his powers to grow a stupid berry for the stingy Lake Guardians for the stupid Trial he has to complete .
Emmet huffs at the small condensed version of information of thoughts in his mind his foot tapping impatiently , suppose he is to be blamed for this , he abandoned his usual Safety Checks to become a Timetraveller which would be the next big step to find his brother and Agent Looker’s worry is getting reeeeeallly annoying and forcing him re-check himself ,listen to Celibi and put back aaaaalll his safety checks for he can not leave till he is absolutely sure all Safety measures are accounted for etc etc.
Cel-Bi!Bi!-
The Subway Boss looks up at the mythical time travelling pokémon his head tilted as he listens to them address him , he can sorta understand what they mean now that all the power has settle in his body, not as clear as Sprits voice as she uses telepathy to talk to him but enough to get the gist of Celebi’s cries.
“I am Emmet , you say i can leave now?”
bi Bi!- the pokémon nods
He grins “ Brillant! Thank you for your accommodations and kindness in teaching me what you know! Sprit! Mr.Looker ! we are moving to our next destination!!!”
he starts marching out of Celibi’s territory following the barely made trail and avoiding any flowers the Mythical likes to avoid stepping on them and inviting their wraith , he hears the fairy pokémon and Sprit hovering over to him and Lookers footsteps hurrying to catch up as he sputters.
Mr.Emmet! are you sure your re-
The conductor cuts him off “ I am Emmet and i am Fine! Thank you for your concern!”
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Looker frowns “ Emmet sir i can understand your hurrying but i don’t think a week is enough time for you to fully adapt to such powers!”
The Subway boss hums smile twitching as he keeps walking .
“Maybe not ,but we will never know! unless we continue forward , we can not stay stuck on one track forever and i refuse to dawdle any longer ! “
Looker sighs as he follows catching up to his pace and looking the other over , he is still concerned at the many wrong or worst possibilities that could happen , there will be questions when Emmet reamerges in civilisations, his clothes have strange markings that be difficult to explain not to mention the fact if these side effects that Celibi warned happen in public.
Continue to worry Mr.Looker and you stress yourself into a early grave !” Emmet speaks up making the Agent sigh
“I can say the same to you ,how are you so sure you can achieve such a goal? How can you be so sure these consequences your willing to take won’t affect others around you? Keep you from your brother where ever he is more and more ?” he questions making Emmet pause and blinking a few times , the conductor slowly turns to him.
“............Nothing will keep me from my brother.....i will not stop and i will make sure all passengers are safe along the way !”
he turns away and continues marching his voice was low as he spoke monotone but picks up to normal again
“After all! the safety of my passengers always come first! Check Safety ! Everybody smile ! ALLLLL ABOARD!”
The two mythical quickly speed up as Emmet does and Looker pauses standing still as he watches them get farther away , he shakes his head muttering low.
“Safety of your passengers ? What about your own safety ? Do you care for yourself aswell as others?”
Agent Looker quickly catches up with the other three a frown on his face -Just what have i REALLY gotten myself into?-
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capandcarter1918 · 1 year
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Okay I wasn’t tagged but I wanted to do it and the OP said it was an open tag! So here we are!
8 Show Tag
Rules - List 8 Shows that are important to understanding you or will help your followers get to know you!
I am going to go a step further and explain each choice! :D
1. LOST - First, this is the first TV show where not only the song choices but the actual score affected me to my core. There is nothing more ominous than the title sound and more stressful/grating than MG’s use of the horns. Not to mention the emotionality behind some of the songs (Lock’D Out Again, Moving On, etc) that make me want to cry. Also the depth of character, starting off shallow and then each episode digging deeper, making you love the ones you hated and hate the ones you first liked. Masterful work. The mystery even when it got insane. I don’t know. I still loved all of it. Even and especially the last episode.
2. Ted Lasso - The most recent addition to my favorites but man it has come crashing through. I cannot explain the depth of my love for this show, it’s characters, the writing, the heart? All of it. We’re Richmond Till We Die.
3. Smallville - My first foray into the superhero genre. Superman was my first superhero love and without Smallville I never would have become the Cap fan that I am. The freak of the week premise, the heart in the Kent family, the way Lex Luthor was grown as a character and the actor who KILLED it as Lionel Luthor. Love all of that. The dated but nostalgic soundtracks, the way I never got tired of watching Clark Kent on screen. Like I never needed Superman. CK was that to me. (I ignore all Chloe related stuff ugh that breaks my heart) And we don’t talk about the last episode. Many episodes were terrible/cheesy/awful. I know that, but I still love it all.
4. Friends - Of course this is on here. How could it not be? This is “The One That Taught Me Humor” hahaha Loved this show, it’s silliness and it’s heart. Sure it has ploting problems and sometimes I wanted to shake the characters but hey. That’s every show.
5. Chuck - My sweet sweet boy. With, of course, it’s cheesy episodes and missteps and insane subway advertising deal, it lost it’s footing a few times. But I still Loved the heart and soul of this show. Chuck Bartowski. Zachary Levi could act the hell out of that character and I loved it. The music was great as well and I loved the supporting cast!
6. Avatar: The Last Airbender - I mean, is there a more masterful animated series? To this level? Perhaps, but I haven’t seen it. This show was flabbergasting to me. I watched it even later in life than it premiered and I loved it. Specifically Zuko’s Story arc. That boy…. Man he could lift Thor’s hammer to me by the end. That scene by the fire where he says he has everything so why is he still angry??? UGH I feel so many feelings seeing him fight that internal struggle. And the score in that show was also masterful!
7. Sherlock - Barring some strange choices, I LOVED this adaption. BC and MF do an amazing job at building that strange friendship and making us care for them. I loved the first two seasons especially and of course Moriarty is a masterfully fun villain.
8. Community/Parks and Rec - I put these as a tie as they fall along the same lines of humor, heart, and ridiculousness. I love both of these shows. As much as the Office has funny parts and I do love me some Jim and Pam… I don’t know, I’d take Ben and Leslie any day. I don’t enjoy the overt cringe and crass in the Office. P&R is more my style. And Community really has some of the most ridiculously fun and insane premises to pull off, and they reoccur too (pillow fort, Halloween, christmas, bottle episodes, the beetle juice trick) Not to mention the Russo’s are involved and they really cut their teeth on that show! Plus the quirky and fun music in community is a win.
Honorable Mentions:
Timeless - Who doesn’t love a good time travel show? And Honestly Garcia Flynn??? Best part of that show. I loved the costumes and history and characters. I loved the way they got a movie to wrap it up and I wish we’d gotten more!
Downton Abbey - especially the first 3 seasons. The costumes, era, and character growth was such fun to watch!
Daredevil - The gritty and down to earth take on this hero was so fun and brutal. I loved it. Foggy Nelson has my heart and I love the Punisher ins S2. CC as MM is just masterful and I CANNOT WAIT for his own show.
MCU Shows - WV, TF&TWS, Loki, Moonknight, Agent Carter, AoS (haven’t finished this one) are all incredibly enjoyable to watch. Some of the finales don’t strike the chord I wish they did, but overall I love watching them! The mystery of WandaVision is something unparalleled. I haven’t gotten up early to watch a show ever and for that one I did. Bucky’s growth? Sam taking the mantle? ❤️ Also the Moonknight score? The Loki Score??? *faints*
This Is Us- I haven’t watched the finale season… I can’t bring myself too. But the way they weaved this story and made me cry almost every damn time? It’s rude.
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tmnt-obsessed-ace · 1 year
Text
When The World Crumbles: Chapter 11, Calm Before The Storm
'I'm coming home!' Mikey sent the text message, stuffing his phone back into the pocket of his warm thick hoodie. Several bags of groceries were hanging from his arms as he walked, several more being pulled behind in a cart Donnie had made.
The cart had a custom made forcefield around it so the contents inside would not get damaged. Not even by bullets, as the softshell had bragged.
Which was a relief since Mikey had bought a lot of stuff and having to repurchase everything would be insane.
The orange clad turtle whistled a bit through his gap tooth, glancing up at the gray skies overhead. Dark rain clouds crept ever closer, promising heavy rains to drench the city.
Oh well, Mikey was almost home with plenty of groceries.
After all, they had four more mouths to feed.
It had been several hours since their four older counterparts woke up from their nearly five day snooze. And with their ferocious appetites more food was necessary.
"Nine days…" Mikey whispered under his breath, his stomach clenching. Nine whole days without food. Granted that probably counted their week long nap of four and a half days.
So that meant they probably went without food for nearly five days before they got to this dimension.
That was still horrifying. To go so long without eating anything, and then having to fight in that condition.
Barely any sleep, no food in your belly, covered in dirt and injuries. It was truly a miracle that the four older turtles managed to even put up so much of a fight.
Mikey never felt so guilty before in his life.
He helped beat them into unconsciousness when they were already on the end of the line. How horrible do you have to be to attack someone who's starving and exhausted?
"They didn't seem too mad about it though…" The youngest turtle said out loud as he entered the sewers, walking down the familiar path to their new home in the subway.
Of course maybe they didn't seem 'too mad' because they were thinking about the invasion.
The thought made Mikey stop in his tracks, his stomach tightening even more.
How could he forget? The reason their counterparts ended up here was because they were trying to stop an entire alien invasion of their own dimension! There wouldn't be any room for anger at him and his brothers if they were thinking about their own home.
"The invasion has probably started by now. Millions of people are probably being mutated as we speak." Michelangelo's words replayed in the box turtle's mind.
The older turtles definitely have bigger things to worry about than Mikey's contribution in their beat down. With a small gulp he continued home, wanting to return to his kitchen and get to work on dinner.
He was gonna make something so good!
"I'm back and I got groceries!" Mikey called out, gaining April's attention.
"Need some help with all that?" Mikey nodded, his arms were getting tired. April grabbed the bags from his arms and carried them to the kitchen, with the turtle pulling the cart.
"Yeesh Mikey, how much did you buy?" April asked, struggling to lift the heavy plastic bags.
"A lot! We have guests and I want to be sure we'll have enough food." He tried to open the door to the kitchen, it wouldn't budge.
He tried again, maybe the door was stuck. Donnie could oil the hinges later.
Again the door wouldn't open.
"It won't open?" Mikey kept trying, why won't the stupid thing open!
"Lemme try," April set the bags down and tried to jimmy open the door. Like her little brother she had no success. Eventually she took a step back before slamming her foot into the door with as much force as he could muster.
The metal door loudly creaked, the hinges refusing to break. A scowl formed on April's face as she kicked the door again and again.
"I don't think it's gonna break, April." Mikey deadpanned as his older sister stood panting in front of the metal door. Damn you Donnie and reinforcing all the hinges!
"Maybe Leo can portal us in." April said between pants. Just as the words left her mouth, the now heavily dented door creaked open.
"Did you need something?" Donatello asked as he poked his head out from the door.
Mikey raised a brow, April put a hand on her hip.
"Uh yeah we got groceries to put away." The older turtle suddenly looked guilty. The door was opened all the way, with Donatello grabbing as many bags as he could carry into the kitchen.
"Ok why did you lock yourself in the kitchen?" April asked as she and Mikey brought the rest of the bags inside. Apparently Donatello wasn't alone. Leonardo sat at the table, surrounded by balls of crumpled up paper. A small stack of blank sheets was sitting nearby.
"Well I'm currently working on repairing my laptop since it's kinda…busted."
The purple clad turtle gestured to his laptop, or what remained of it anyways. The screen was in pieces and the keyboard had been snapped. Not to mention all the frayed wires and shattered circuit boards.
Both April and Mikey cringed at the sight.
"How did that happen?" Mikey asked as he started putting the groceries away.
"I'm assuming that most of the damage occurred from our battle against you guys at the playground. It was in my backpack after all and I did land on it quite a few times."
"Sorry about that…" Donatello just waved a hand.
"Nothing to worry about, truth be told I wasn't expecting it to stay in one piece anyways. Plus my laptop has been damaged far worse before." A loud groan cut off the genius, making all eyes turn towards Leonardo. He crumpled up the paper he'd been previously writing on, smacking his head onto the table with a dull thud.
"And I'm also here to make sure he doesn't give himself an aneurysm." Leonardo shot his younger brother a glare, mumbling a small 'shut up' into the kitchen table.
"What's he doing exactly?" April interjected, the frustration was near tangible. April only knew that feeling when writing essays for school.
"Planning. Well he's trying to anyways." A paper ball was thrown at Donatello, who deflected it so it bounced off of Mikey's head.
"Hey! Not cool, I'm putting the eggs away!" Mikey squeaked from the fridge. April snickered.
"Sorry little Mikey." Donatello playfully snickered, getting a small pout in response.
"I thought we would start planning tomorrow?" Mikey asked, confusion clear in his voice.
"Yeah, try telling Leo that. He's beyond stubborn. I fear I might have to tie him to the bed to get him to sleep." The purple clad turtle wasn't even trying to hide the playful smirk. The little shove he gave the blue clad turtle only solidified it.
"I can hear you, you know." Donatello held a finger to his brother's lips.
"No more talking, you've strained your voice enough for today."
The only response was an eye roll.
Mikey and April shared a glance, both amused and a little bit concerned.
"So where's tiny and other me?" Mikey asked, both older turtles snickering.
"Do not let Raph hear you call him that." Leonardo warned, despite the warning glare Donatello shot him.
"Leon challenged Mikey to some video games in the little arcade area, winner will play against Raph." Donatello added, the hard look never leaving his face.
The last of the groceries were put away, time to start prepping dinner.
"Well I'm gonna go join them, later!" April left the kitchen, with the box turtle waving goodbye.
Once she was gone, Leonardo went back to scribbling away on a new sheet of paper, with Donatello came over to the smaller turtle.
"You got any medicinal tea for him?" The older turtle whispered, though he had to lean forward a bit given the height difference between the two. "It'll help soothe his throat."
"Maybe, I dunno. But if you tell me the ingredients I might be able to brew it up quickly." Donatello smiled a bit, another groan and crumpled up wad of paper caught their attention.
"Yeah that sounds like a good idea."
"Dude you are so bad at this game!" Leo taunted, kicking Michelangelo with his leg. The orange clad turtle grit his teeth, having resorted to an old classic video game strategy.
Mash all the buttons till something gives.
"Nothing can be the power of button mashing!" Michelangelo yelled, rolling over on the bean bag.
"Says the guy who's losing!" Leo fired right back. They were playing an old fighting game, with Michelangelo losing badly. They were in the final round, winner takes all. However Michelangelo had less than half his health bar left.
Next to Michelangelo, Raphael was draped across another beanbag, watching the fight with half interest.
He would be playing against whoever won this match.
Naturally he was hoping it would be Michelangelo, always root for your brother over a stranger.
However, judging by the fact that one of his younger brother's hands was wrapped in a tight cast and he was losing horrendously, it was more likely he would play against Leo.
That actually made Raphael a tad bit nervous. Not because he was scared of losing to a fourteen year old, hell no.
It was because he had previously threatened to kill this specific fourteen year old.
That thought made him sick to his stomach.
Fourteen.
The kid was only fourteen.
He knew the kid was young but fourteen!
They hadn't even been allowed to go topside at fourteen!
And yet Raphael threatened to run his sai through the kid's skull.
His mind wandered back several hours earlier, when Michelangelo was getting his wounds cleaned and rebandaged while Donatello took his turn in the shower.
That left Leonardo and Raphael alone together in one of the old subway cars they had claimed as their temporary bedroom.
"I don't understand something." Leonardo had written in a notebook while his throat recovered.
"What's that fearless?" The red clad turtle replied, absentmindedly fidgeting with the piles of blankets.
"Why did our counterparts attack you guys? They don't seem entirely malicious."
Raphael's face had fallen, shame washing over him.
"That…that was my fault." Leonardo raised a brow but let his younger brother continue. After a minute he spoke again. "I attacked Leon and earned little Donnie's wrath."
The marker squeaked a bit as it was scribbled over the pages of the notebook.
"You attacked him? How exactly?"
"It wasn't that bad, really! I just tackled him…and threatened him. God I'm such an idiot!" Raphael buried his face into his hands.
"Why did you do that Raph?" Despite not speaking, Raphael could tell that his brother was a bit ticked off, given how rigid he went.
"I wasn't thinking ok! It had been a god awful night of nearly fucking dying multiple times! First to the Kraang and then to a Freddy Fazbear knock off that apparently is immune to fire for some reason, don't ask!" Leonardo held up his hands, sitting down next to the red clad turtle.
"And then this little twerp came along and said that he knew where Mikey was! He didn't even tell me or Donnie until after I threatened him! Not to mention that earlier he said that they lost Mikey and that he had a broken arm! A broken arm!"
Raphael groaned again, trying to ease his racing heart. The more he thought about that night the angrier he got.
A warm hand on his shoulder made the short turtle look up, dark blue eyes meeting with his own bright green ones.
Leonardo's gaze had softened as he traced circular patterns into Raphael's shell. It was soothing, grounding.
After a few minutes of staying like that, Raphael continued yet again.
"This kid said that they would go get Mikey once the animatronic from hell finally died, but he said it so casually! Like he was gonna get a pizza instead of saving Mikey's life. Do you know how we found him?"
The leader in blue shook his head.
"Dangling from a beam at least fifteen maybe twenty feet off the ground. Hanging by the backpack with no grappling hook and a glider that wouldn't open! If we hadn't gotten there in time…he could've…" His eyes screwed shut, he didn't even want to finish that thought.
The nudging of the notebook got Raphael's attention.
"Did our counterparts know that?"
Raphael shook his head.
"Maybe…I honestly don't know. I just…snapped and the next thing I knew Leon was on the ground and threats were spilling out of my mouth." He leaned his head into Leonardo's uninjured shoulder. "God damn it, why am I like this?"
The blue clad turtle turned over to a blank page and began to write, leaving Raphael to stew in his own shame for a bit.
Eventually Leonardo finished writing and capped the marker. He laid the notebook in Raphael's lap and pulled him close.
With slightly nervous eyes he looked down at the page.
"While I don't condone you threatening our counterparts in the slightest, I can at least understand why that happened. It's been a nightmare of a week where nothing went right for us even once. The portal wasn't where it was supposed to be so he had to ditch the Shellraiser, we got chased out of nearly every single Kraang hideout, the invasion getting closer and closer and we got sent here with no food or medical supplies!.Then all of us getting attacked by the strange nightmares of this dumb dimension it only added to the growing pressure. Truthfully if I had been in your position and I was getting vague unhelpful answers about where my missing brother was, I probably would've reacted the same."
"I still feel bad for the kid, he didn't mean to make the volcano go boom. He just said the wrong thing at the worst possible time." Leonardo nodded.
"You didn't ruin anything Raph, just got off on the wrong start. I'm sure once you apologize it'll be water under the bridge." The blue clad turtle whispered, earning a small shove.
"Don't make your voice worse, Fearless. And yeah I know, I'll apologize to the punk later." Leonardo squeezed his brother a little tighter. After a few moments he spoke, voice just above a whisper.
"You better, or I'll make you go on a ride with Turtflytle." Raphael's eyes went wide.
"Don't you fucking dare that is one of the most annoying things on the god damn planet."
Leonardo chuckled as Donatello came back, still slightly dripping from the shower.
"Alright Raphie, you're up." Raphael nodded, leaving the two cool color brothers behind so he could shower.
Michelangelo smacked into the red clad turtle's shoulder as he squirmed around on the beanbag, knocking Raphael back onto reality, somehow managing to turn the fight around in his favor.
"What the fuck dude!" Leo whined, losing his cockiness.
"Button mashing is unbeatable!"
"We'll see about that!"
"What's the matter Leon? Mikey too good for you?" Raphael shouted, playfully shoving his now upside down brother in the side.
"Hell no I got this!" The slider replied, eyes still fixed on the screen.
Michelangelo growled, kicking his legs as he spammed every single button on the controller.
Leo suppressed a yawn, rubbing his eyes as he continued to play.
"What's the matter, didn't get your morning nap in?" The orange clad turtle mocked as the game became neck and neck, both players down to the same amount of health.
"Shut the fuck up!"
"Hey guys!" Leo looked up as April walked in, smiling brightly. "Mind if I join the next game?"
"Sure thing Apes! Just gotta beat Michelan-" Raphael swatted the controller from Leo's hands, smirking at the scream that came from his mouth.
"Get em Mikey! Wipe the floor with him!" Raphael cheered as Michelangelo quickly knocked off more and more hit points while Leo scrambled to pick up his controller.
"No! No! No! Noooo!" Leo whined as the last of his player's health bar was knocked away in a knockout. Michelangelo cheered, jumping on the beanbag.
"You just got played, son! Michelangelo for the win! Go ninja! Go ninja! Go!" Raphael and April laughed while the slider's eye twitched.
"You knocked the controller out of my hands!" Raphael smirked at the accusatory finger being pointed at him.
"Did I? I mean I didn't see that happen! Did you Mikey?" Michelangelo wore a devilish smirk.
"Nope! I saw absolutely nothing! I was too focused on being the best at video games!" The two exchanged a high three, watching with growing amusement as Leo's eye twitched yet again.
"April you saw that! Didn't you?"
Raphael shot April a look, a silent plea to play along.
She pushed up her glasses.
"Nope!" She said, popping the p. "All I saw was you lose." Leo's jaw dropped.
"Betrayed by my own sister! You corrupted her! How dare you!" Michelangelo only laughed harder, poking the younger turtle over and over in the cheeks.
"Alright Mikey, enough games! Let's do this!." Raphael taunted, cracking his knuckles. His brother returned the playful glare as April plopped down beside them.
"I play whoever wins!" She said with excitement. Leo grumbled but sat next to April, ready to be a little shit again.
"You got it sister!" The game was reset, a controller put in Raphael's hands.
"Be careful Mikester, he plays dirty! Destroy him!" Leo said with a clap of his hands.
"Oh I will!"
"Bring it on!"
The second game began.
"Crap…" Leonardo mumbled, wiping sweat off his forehead. "Out of paper."
All the paper from his stack had been turned into crumpled balls, all the attempts at plans scrawled on them and deemed not good enough.
"Time to take a break until tomorrow." Donatello stated, leaving no room for argument. The blue clad turtle begrudgingly nodded, tomorrow once he had a clearer head he would come up with a somewhat decent plan.
"Let's go see what the others are doing." He scribbled onto the notebook after a sharp glare from his younger brother made him keep his mouth shut.
He grabbed one of the empty grocery bags and slid all the crumpled paper inside, even picking up all the ones that fell on the floor.
The bag tied and thrown near the recycling bin at the far wall. "We're gonna see what Raph and our Mikey are up to." Mikey nodded but gave no vocal response while he cooked. He was in the zone.
As Leonardo stood up, his right knee painfully twanged, threatening to buckle under his weight. He grit his teeth, hands planted firmly onto the table to keep his balance.
However his little stumble hadn't gone unnoticed by Donatello while he stuffed the remains of his laptop back into his bag.
Leonardo shook his head, gesturing at Mikey. Not in front of him.
Donatello nodded, not saying a word as he helped his older brother stand. He leaned against him as they left the kitchen together.
Once the door had closed behind them, a quiet whisper broke the silence.
"Are you ok?"
"I'm fine, stupid leg just threw me off balance." Leonardo sat down on a nearby beanbag, carefully undoing the knee pad and brace.
Donatello sat down beside him, carefully examining the offending joint.
"On a scale of one to ten-"
"Six." Leonardo said automatically. It was just a six. With his high pain tolerance that was annoying but tolerable.
"You strained it a lot these past few weeks." Was his brother's reply as he carefully turned the leg. The pain went up a tiny bit but nothing Leonardo couldn't handle.
"It's gonna rain soon."
"Ah that's it." Pressure changes made the joint ache more than usual. "You should use your cane for a while." Leonardo sighed and shook his head.
"Can't do that, I left it in the Shellraiser." Donatello shot him a sympathetic look. They could only take the gear they already had on, forced to leave everything else behind in the Shellraiser. Which was no doubt in Kraang custody by now. He had actually seen it, sitting next to his seat, surrounded by Kraang Droids.
"Well I'll just make you another one." The blue clad turtle sat up.
"Dee you don't have to-"
"It will only take twenty minutes Leo."
"But what about your laptop?" Surely a broken laptop took priority! Right?
"Like I said, twenty minutes."
"Is everything alright?" Another voice chimed in. It was Raph. Concern was written all over his face. Leonardo shifted a bit so that his right leg was out of view.
"Yeah everything's good, hey where's younger Donnie's lab? I need to grab a few things." Donatello said coolly, despite shrinking away a bit from the much larger turtle. Just like he and Michelangelo had been doing since they woke up.
It was clear that the snapper had noticed. Leonardo could see the tiniest flash of hurt in the large turtle's eyes.
"Oh yeah, the lab is that way! Just look for the neon purple door, you can't miss it!"
The purple clad turtle locked eyes with his brother, a silent conversation being had.
"Will you be ok here for a few minutes?"
"Yeah I'll be fine, don't worry."
Donatello nodded, leaving towards his counterpart's lab. However not before shooting the eldest brother one last look. A silent threat.
'Don't get up or else.' Truth be told, as much as Leonardo wanted to protest that he was both the oldest and the leader so he didn't need to be babied, the threat kept him glued to the beanbag he claimed. The 'or else' could mean anything! Donatello was nothing if not creative.
So the blue clad turtle stayed put.
An awkward silence began to form.
"So…" Raph started, sitting on the floor next to beanbag. Leonardo grimaced, why couldn't they have gone back to their subway car room? Because the living room was closer?
"Are you sure everything is all good?" The older turtle nodded, taking out the marker and notebook once again, if only so Donatello won't chew his head off.
"Everything is fine." He wrote, even underlining the word fine for emphasis. Another dull ache shuddered down his leg, making him wince. It probably started raining.
Raph didn't look convinced in the slightest. Leonardo turned away, waiting for his brother to get back.
Once again the two fell into awkward silence.
A high pitched shriek echoed from the arcade area, followed by loud cheering.
"LET'S GO! MICHELANGELO IS UNSTOPPABLE!" Said brother shouted with triumph.
"God damn it! MIKEY!" Raphael hollered, prompting the orange clad turtle to run out of the arcade. Michelangelo's laughter and Raphael's shouts echoed throughout the lair.
Eventually the orange clad turtle raced into the living room, eyes landing on Leonardo. With a burst of speed he slammed into the older turtle, quickly trying to scramble behind him.
All the air was knocked out of Leonardo's lungs as he tried to bat his brother off. It was too late, the menace had slipped behind him, wrapping his arms and legs around his body. His injured ribs throbbed from the sudden motions, with the younger turtle mumbling apologies all the way.
Raphael stumbled into the living room, his twisted ankle throwing him off balance.
"Are you fucking kidding me?" The red clad turtle angrily hissed while Michelangelo played cute.
"Woah what's wrong little buddy?" Raph interjected, trying to deescalate the situation. All three older turtles let out a similar squeak, Raphael's eyes narrowing.
He decided to ignore his much bigger counterpart entirely.
"You're seriously hiding behind Leo!" Michelangelo had the audacity to look offended.
"No of course not! What? Am I not allowed to spend time with my favorite brother!" He nuzzled Leonardo's cheek for emphasis. The leader sighed, writing in the notebook.
"What did he do?"
"He LICKED me! He fucking LICKED me!" Raphael shouted, his younger brother laughing behind Leonardo.
"What's the matter shorty? Can't take what you dish out?" Leo called out as he and April came into the living room.
"No one asked for your opinion!" Raphael fired back.
"Come on now there's no need to fight!" Raph said, once again trying to play mediator.
"Whatcha gonna do Raphie? Leo's got two broken ribs remember you have to play nice!" Michelangelo taunted, acting like he didn't aggravate the wounds himself.
Raphael growled, crossing his arms.
Leonardo held up the notebook, a single sentence written on the page.
"Lick him back." The two eldest brothers shared a smirk, with Michelangelo suddenly realizing that his shield turned against him.
As the short turtle approached, Michelangelo piped up.
"Can I at least get a five second headstart?" He held up his broken arm, showing off the cast.
Raphael rolled his eyes, a playful glint shining in those bright green depths. One that had been missing for the past two months.
"Since I'm such a nice guy, sure! ONE!" With that Michelangelo squirmed out from behind Leonardo, taking off.
"TWO!" Leo pulled out his phone camera.
"THREE!" April gave Leonardo a concerned glance, he only smiled at her. It was just roughhousing, they both knew not to go too far.
"FOUR!" Raph looked worried, Leonardo put a hand on his arm.
"FIVE!" At the final number Raphael broke off into a sprint, chasing after Michelangelo. Well, as much as he could with a twisted ankle.
The two turtle's yelling could be heard throughout the lair, making Leonardo smile fondly as he relaxed into the beanbag.
"Should we stop them?" Raph asked, the blue clad turtle simply waved a hand before writing in the notebook.
"They know what boundaries not to cross, nothing to worry about."
"Right…while they're doing that wanna play against me Leo?" April asked, holding a controller in one hand. Leonardo nodded, putting the knee brace and knee pad back on. He stumbled a bit to get up, Raph holding him steady.
"You sure you're ok?" The snapper asked as a loud crash sounded from the direction of Donnie's lab.
"WATCH IT SHELL FOR BRAINS!" Donatello barked, Michelangelo's laughter filling the air.
Leonardo smiled brightly, this was exactly like how it was back home.
Or at least how it was supposed to be.
Ever since…that day, the lair had gone quiet. Donatello spent days upon days holed up in his lab, Raphael hardly ever left his room anymore and Michelangelo practically lived in the kitchen. And then there Leonardo, hiding away in the dojo.
They barely spoke to each other for weeks. Hell about two weeks ago was the first time they all ate together as a family since that day. And when the shock finally began to fade away so the broken pieces could be mended, the Kraang decided to invade.
Now they are stuck here. Is that really such a bad thing though? Listening to his younger brothers squabble like they used to, it was familiar. It was normal.
First actual shred of normalcy in nearly two months.
And Leonardo couldn't help the big dumb grin that spread across his face, the corners of his mouth starting to hurt from how hard he was smiling.
"Uh, Earth to Leonardo?" April said, snapping her fingers in front of his face. Leonardo shook himself from his thoughts. "You zoned out on me!"
"Sorry April, ready to lose?" She smirked and the two headed to the arcade, with Leonardo holding onto her shoulder to steady himself. Either she didn't notice or she didn't mind.
The grin never left his face.
Little did the four older turtles know that this tiny shred of normalcy was about to be shattered like glass against the rocks.
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The train had long since stopped within Gear Station, and the rain had subsided. Kappa, still asleep, dozed noisily on the train seats, oblivious to her surroundings. She felt peaceful. The sound of the train and the rain luring her to sleep off the anxieties of the day.
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Until a foot was shoved into her face, of course.
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[Marigold]
“Come on! Get up already! We are the last ones still on the train and the staff is getting pissy. Get your ass in gear and stop drooling on the seats!”
Marigold stomped rudely on Kappa’s face, mussing up her beard.
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[Kappa]
“Yeah, I get it... I’m awake...”
Dragging herself from the seats Kappa flopped lazily down the steps and off of the train, still dazed. Marigold hurriedly followed after her, embarassed to be seen with the snoring Samurott.
“Where are Nema and Morelet..?” Kappa asked as she realized they were alone.
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[Marigold]
“They were the first ones off the train, unlike us. Morelet wanted to show Nema someplace called the Musical Theatre.”
Ah, that place. Kappa recalled vague memories of preforming there as per Valkea’s wish. Her trainer thought she looked cute in a top hat.
“Anyway, I’ve never been here before so do me a favor, and don’t get me lost.”
Kappa grunted in reply and led Marigold off of the platform and into the station. Gear Station was as busy as ever. That is to say, too many Pokemon, not enough trains. They were still figuring out the ins and outs of the subway after the humans abandoned it, why couldn’t Pokemon put it to good use, after all?
Kappa just hoped that the Super Multi Train wasn’t suddenly out of order. Again.
Kappa ushered Marigold over to the exit of Gear Station.
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Marigold gawked at the lovely golden city. The large bodies of water that surrounded the city were crystal clear and free of pollution. The many buildings boasting exciting opportunities for dining, shopping, and entertainment.
The sun hung low in the sky. Kappa led Marigold to the nearby park, for a rest.
[The group has arrived in Nimbasa City.]
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