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vanderilnde · 2 days

Text

bury me beneath the basswood tree

pairing: ghost/soap/reader [12k]

rating: 18+ only. minors don’t interact.

tags: non-con sex, kidnapping, stockholm syndrome, size kink, forced fellatio, forced cunnilingus, impact play, brief watersports, double penetration in two holes, forced breeding, implied hybrid/shifter au

Needing time away from her humdrum life at home, she ventures into the woodland for respite. Little does she know, straying into that cabin in the woods will be the worst—or best—decision she’ll ever make. Depending on who you ask.

all my thanks to @/ohbo-ohno! thank you for being the best beta reader and sitting through my abhorrent typos <3

AO3 MIRROR

The mountain’s breadth of trees and foliage are written with prose.

It’s repetitive. Mind-numbing. She’s already passed this necrosed tree stump five times before. On the sixth circle, she treks through the undergrowth like it’s curdled milk, the tiny scythes of branches whispering against her arms and slicing her open the same way thumbs tear into oranges.

Dehydration crystallises like sediment in her mouth. It makes her bones heavy, bending against her flesh as if they’re groceries about to tear through a plastic bag. The balls of her feet are calcified, her thighs chafed. They rub against her threadbare jeans the same way a match reacts with red phosphorus to produce a flame. It burns, and so do her muscles. They feel moth-eaten and spent. Hung out to dry.

The stench of damp soil and sugar maple impairs her like an opiate. The peal of idle birdsongs grate against her ears. She’s sick of it—she’s been here for three days—and already, she’s sick of it.

She tries her phone again. It’s unresponsive, no signal. She unfurls her map but it’s mottled with rainwater and mud. Her lungs feel dry, pruney, as the dew drops slipping off fern plants seem to replicate the tears thawing in her eyes.

Evening mist hangs over the ground, and the sky turns red-bottomed as it progresses into nightfall. It’s as if the mountain is sentient. Nocturnal. Stirring from a torpor once the sun sets and awakening all that lives within it.

A sob wracks her ribs. It has the same effect of a bullet, ricocheting. She keeps moving even though she doesn’t know where she’s going. She believes that should she continue walking, nothing will be able to catch her. Not the spindly tree branches that take the shape of arms or serpentine shrubbery. She won’t give the mountain any time to fossilise her, if only she keeps moving.

Her movements are clumsy though. Her eyesight is hindered by panicked tears, turning everything shapeless and blurry. She keeps tripping and skinning her knees like the hide of a pomegranate, her flesh peeling back to show the red pulp of her innards.

It was a rashly undertaken lapse of judgement that brought her here. To a conscious mountain that lives and breathes and feels her fear. It was her heart, empty, carved out and replaced by brutal loneliness. Her friends back home are heedless and her parents are never satisfied with what she does. She figured that if none of them would listen, the woodlands would.

And listen, they did.

When she cries out, the wind howls. When she changes her direction, pivoting on her heel, the soil rumbles. She sees things—a shadow spotting her vision, not composed of matter—peeking from behind a tree trunk before quickly slipping away. She witlessly calls out, asking if anyone’s there, and is met with the forest's silent presentiment. She feels the stark pressure of piercing eyes sprawling down her dewy neck, sweeping over her body.

The longer she spends lost, the more she sinks into Appalachia.

It pulls her down like molasses. Like she’s an innocent fly trapped in glue. Soon, she knows there’s no hope. She knows her scent is written into the bark of trees—supple, sugary. A treat for whichever predator finds her first.

A brown bear, swinging its claws at her until her entrails are threadbare and striated. A snake, injecting venom in her blood. A bobcat if she’s lucky. It would be a quick death—sinking its loose jowls into either side of her neck until it snaps and she goes slack.

She’s apt to let go. She’s keen to yield to the alluring call of the woodland to let go, to fall to the forest floor and sit there until she rots. Until the roots worm into her breathing wounds and branches start growing out of her mouth. The urge to stop moving and become one with the mountain is suddenly cogent, leaves no margin of doubt. It comes with the promise of eternal respite and divine mercy. She’s about to find a cliff to jump off of, but before she can, something catches her attention.

A plume of smoke curling in the air.

Whorls of slate-grey soot thinning and disappearing into the sky. She looks for the source and follows it blindly, shouldering past pine needles and hawthorn and all but sobbing as a cabin comes into view. It’s made of wood and the tufts of wildflower that sprout from its thin fissures. It looks neglected and eaten by the elements. Its vaulted roof is stained by the off-white assault of bird droppings, discoloured by acid rain. Some of the windows look covered with dewy newspaper, but still, she knows it can’t be vacant. The smoke undulating from the chimney tells her that.

She staggers onto the porch. Her fist rasps against the door, clippings of wood burying itself into her skinned knuckles as she wildly knocks. Silence. Not even the leaves flutter against each other. Fleetingly, a stint of panic seizes her. What if nobody’s home? But she’s twisting the knob and pushing herself inside anyway, dropping her bag to the floor with a thump, stepping inside.

The cabin makes for a liminal space, smelling of sawdust and pine. There’s a layer of dust on every surface, making the air thick. All the furniture is carved from wood and a couple taxidermied deers are mantled above the stone fireplace, looking more like warnings than decoration. The pelt of a black bear is unfurled across the floor, and a few trinkets are strewn around—a bookshelf of spine-cracked novels, dead plants hanging from the ceiling beams. A mountain of used cigarettes, but strangely, no ashtray.

There’s everything but picture frames. Nothing she can use to humanise the cabin nor the people supposedly living in it.

She guides herself to the kitchen by feeling the walls. There’s a piped stove in the corner and cast iron tools hanging above the counter. Her stomach bubbles, and immediately, she starts scouring for food.

There’s three barrels by the door, and upon popping them open, the stench of brine sprays her in the face. It’s fish with a crust of salt, preserved. In the other barrel is meat buried in shelled corn, and fermented poultry in the last barrel.

It’s all raw and bloody. She steps back, gagging, turning her attention to the shelves that line the faraway wall. Jars of pickled cucumber and carrots. Garlic braids hanging from the edge. Rusty milk churns nestled in the corner.

There’s a galvanised tub full of ice on the floor. She digs through it and almost moans at the jars of jam. She untwists one, sticks her fingers in it, and wipes it clean with her tongue and teeth. It’s tart and tangy but it’s food, sticking to the walls of her stomach, satiating her. And once she starts she can’t stop. She goes back to the wall and finds a stained jar, fishing out a handful of fermented cabbage, stuffing it in her mouth, her face tightly puckering at the sharp sourness.

The juice of the food goes spilling past her lips, sluicing down her chest. It sticks to the chasm between her tits and mixes with sweat, making her shirt cling to her skin, revealing the barest outline of her nipples. She’s so engrossed in keeling over the counter and stuffing her face that she doesn’t even notice the pointed shift in atmosphere. The deer outside stopping their rutting, the trill of birds ceasing. The leaves stilling, as if holding their breaths to hide. Thick, silvery clouds nestling together and eclipsing the sun, casting a thin overcast over the woodland, darkening the already-dim surroundings.

She’s too preoccupied to recognise the tell-tale croak of the door swinging open. It’s tinny, but bullied by the sound of her smacking on marinated cabbage. She doesn’t notice the dull, throbbing footfalls. Pays no heed to the stench of blood invading her senses because she believes it’s coming from her dry, leathery lips that split open as she widens her mouth to fit the cabbage inside.

It’s only when the room darkens, a box-shaped shadow sweeping over her vision, does her blood run cold. She freezes with a handful of vegetable raised halfway to her lips, the brine rolling off a cabbage leaf like it’s an awning, dropping to the floor—drip, drip, drip—the rapid succession of shedding liquid hitting the floor sounds similar to the beating of her heart against her fickle, feeble ribs.

The saline spray in her mouth gets soaked up by her tongue, making it puffy, too big for her mouth. She turns around clemently—treating the shadow like a wild animal—no sudden movements. She goes rigid.

It can’t be human.

It’s huge. Bigger than anything she’s ever seen before. Sweeping shoulders, broad thighs. Its neck is bent uncannily because it’s too big to fit in the doorway. Its chest rises heavily like a bull.

She tries to find a face, and when she does, the blood is drained from her.

It just makes her feel… uncomfortable. Its face is the poor imitation of a human, as if someone tried drawing one from memory but scarcely failed. Failed to capture the humanity, the animation, leaving it looking like a half-convincing resemblance. Its tapetum lucidum glows yellow, burning in the thin mist of moonlight that penetrates the newspaper sticking to the windows.

It stares blankly at her. The hair on her arms stick up, a bead of sweat slices down her neck.

“I’m sorry…”

The creature raises an arm and pulls on a hanging bead-chain, tugging on the light, which is simply a naked bulb in the middle of the kitchen. The kindle is weak but does more than the delicate moonlight. Just barely illuminates its face. His face.

She tries not to let her fear show. Tries not to preen under his depthless eyes, the mean twine of his lips. His hair that seems to have been shaved too closely to his scalp, if the nicks and small cuts on the shells of his ears are anything to go by.

He grumbles an idle prusten. He rolls his elbows back—his shoulder blades unfurling like folded wings—and twists his thick neck.

“What’re you doin’ in my home?”

“I’m so sorry,” she repeats, her words stifled around a wad of cabbage. “I– I’ve been lost for three days. I came up for a hike but lost my way and I saw your cabin and I’m sorry, but I’m just so hungry and–”

A deep, guttural voice peals from the living room.

“Simon!” It says. “Where should I chuck the deer? It’s too big for the livin’ room.”

The aforementioned Simon, she presumes, doesn’t answer the unobserved voice. He keeps his eyes on her, face twisted into a puckered, mean mug.

A string of footsteps precede the face that appears behind Simon’s shoulder. A rounder, ruddier face. A salt-and-pepper stubble and eyes so blue they glow like bioluminescence.

Johnny acts surprised as if Simon hadn’t smelled her from miles away. Her honeyed scent roiling off of her, curling into the air and thinning between the trees. Her sweat pooling in the gusset of her panties, raw and pungent.

He’s purposely coy. It’s written into the furrow of his brows and the caper of his cupid lips but the girl is too disoriented to catch on. She looks at him and beseeches, but almost faints at the deer hanging limply over his shoulder. He holds it like it weighs nothing—a sack of sprouting potatoes.

He coos. “Who’s this?”

“Lost bird,” Simon grunts. “Found her diggin’ through our food.”

“Oh, poor lassie,” Johnny hums. More so to Simon than the girl, which makes her squirm. “She didnae mean any harm, Simon. She’s just hungry… tha’ right, lass? Are ye hurt?”

She stutters out a nod, gesturing to how her jeans cling to her knees, sun-bleached and darkened with blood. She rolls her shirt over her ribcage, showing them her wounded torso. How her skin sticks to her bones.

Johnny bristles.

“The lass needs a place to stay, Simon,” he whispers. “And she’s hurt. Bleeding.”

They talk of her as if she’s advertised merchandise in a magazine catalogue. She squirms.

Simon turns to look at her. The depression in her cheeks due to her hunger and the split skin of her mouth. The pert curve of her breasts. The desperate look in her eyes.

He grumbles, looks over his shoulder at Johnny. “I’ll start the fire. You take the deer out back and drain it ‘fore it hardens.”

“Aye,” Johnny says. He thumps away in clunky boots and a thin t-shirt and jeans. The deer sways with his gait and disappears behind the screen door when he steps outside.

She redirects her attention to Simon, who’s already looking at her. More specifically, at her pulsing neck. His jowls are slightly unfastened, his pupils blown out and eclipsing his irises.

Presentiment settles in her stomach. She blanches.

Suddenly, Simon is grunting and gripping her arm, heedless towards her whimper of fear and fleeting stint of resistance. His nails are sharp, digging sickle-shaped impressions into her arm. He drags her down the hallway and into another room—a bathroom—and tugs the flickering light on. It lacks sheen, barely illuminates the room from its moss-covered nooks to the tiled floor caked with crusted dirt.

(The lightbulb is so dull. It doesn’t reach the farthest corner of the bathroom where the radiator is placed. The radiator bathed in black, hidden beneath the lip of shadows, so she isn’t able to see the forgotten handcuff hanging limply from one of the pipes.)

Simon works his heavy body around the bathroom. He leans over the clawfoot tub—which he dwarfs—and twists open the spigot, watching as brown-coloured water slowly ripens into something clear, gushing out of the faucet. He stuffs a plastic plug into the rust-ringed drain.

He straightens back into his full height. All-encompassing, panoramic. Simon is so impossibly large that it’s a wonder he has so much muscle packed under his skin. Rustic, hard thighs. A shirt that bends against his arms, about to snap.

“Take a bath,” he commands. “Get y’rself cleaned up.”

Simon shoulders past her and ducks to exit the bathroom. There’s no door separating it from the rest of the house, but a multitude of beads hanging above the threshold to imitate one. She keeps her eyes trailed on it while she strips—peeling off her jeans, pulling her shirt over her head. Rolling down her panties and consciously hiding them beneath her other clothes.

She clutches the lip of the bathtub for leverage and dips her toes into the water. Immediately, she melts. The hot water swallows her foot and travels like a spool of thread to the rest of her, weaving itself into her wounds, licking her open like the first thaw of spring.

She submerges herself fully, bringing her knees to her chest. Her neck hoists backward and into the water, soaking all the grit and dirt knotted into her hair. It’s like plying through syrup as she lifts an arm, retrieving a homespun bar of soap, clutching it to test her grip. There’s coily hair knotted into it and sticking to the dried bubbles. She brings it up to her nose, sniffing. Hesitates before rubbing it into her skin and around her throbbing wounds.

The water idly sloshes as she cleans herself. It’s a hollow sound, amplified by the echoey room. She trails her hand below her waist, slipping her sudsy fingers between her lips and stroking, rubbing herself clean.

Beneath the tinny sounds of water surrounding her like a petticoat, something else peals out. Something like a whine. Her fingers cramp above her warm cunt and she goes taut. She turns her head to the threshold of the bathroom and nearly screams but her throat puckers before she can, blocking it, her mouth hanging open in a soundless screech instead.

It’s Johnny. He stands in the middle of the hallway, peering into the bathroom and staring at her, half-obscured by the bead curtains. He looks like a sit-and-wait predator like this—silent and unassuming, if not for his blindingly-white smile shining through the curtain like strobes of sunlight breaking past trees. He steps inside now that he’s been spotted, and that causes ice to lick her organs—she sinks her breasts below the water’s surface, squeezing her thighs together. She bristles as Johnny strides impossibly close, the lip of the tub cutting into his thighs.

He stinks of sweat and iron and wood. His t-shirt clings to his skin, darkened with deer blood, outlining the barest hint of his bulky chest.

He grins. “Brought ye some clean clothes.”

“Oh. I… thank you,” she mumbles. “You can leave it on the toilet if you don’t mind?”

Johnny sets it down. A folded flannel and a pair of sweatpants. He idles a little longer, still smiling, before leaving the bathroom. She counts the minutes in her head and tries to find the right time to leave the tub, outstretching her hand for the towel once it comes to her. But the towel is just scarcely out of reach. The terrycloth grazes her fingertips, teasing her. It’s like it was methodically placed there. Bait at the end of a fish hook to ply her out of the water and stick her ass in the air, reaching over to grip the cloth and tug it over her breasts, stepping out of the tub.

Her eyes stay locked on the crude door while she changes. She buttons the flannel up to her neck and takes heed of the pointed absence of any undergarments, slipping her legs into the gauzy sweatpants, tying them at her waist.

Johnny bursts in as if on cue. He’s still slick with blood, his mohawk odd-angled, spun-thread and matted to his head with sweat. His cheeks bulge around another grin.

“Too big for ye, is it?” He pants. “Might as well take it off. Might trip and hurt yerself again. Wouldn’t want that happenin’, right honey?”

Johnny shortens the space between them in one stride. His fingers, thick and jaded, are already fumbling around the knot she tied, pulling it out of its bow and letting the sweatpants fall, pooling into a crimp around her ankles.

The flannel is big enough to reach her thighs. Still, she clenches her fingers around the hem and tugs it lower, preening under Johnny’s smouldering gaze. It’s almost paradoxical how it works—his eyes are icy blue, yet they have the same effect as basaltic molten. Burning hot. He’s fixated on her skinned knees, gnawing on his bottom lip.

“Simon’s got the fire goin’,” he says. “Let’s go get yer wounds cleaned too, aye?”

Johnny’s walking out before she can blink. She follows after him, flustered, stumbling into the living room lit by a dulcet fire. Simon’s kneeled beside it, sticking his hand in to adjust a lopsided stock of wood, unaffected by the flames that eat away his arm hair. Johnny takes the girl by the scruff of her neck, guiding her to a hand-crafted chair placed conscientiously in front of the fireplace. He presses on her—the sensitive divot between her shoulder and her neck—and pushes her into the seat, unzipping a first-aid kit.

Johnny takes her feet and pulls them into his lap. The angle makes her flannel hitch up, exposing her bare cunt to the hot embers of the fireplace, and the equally hot embers of Simon’s prying eyes. She squeaks and covers herself, averting her gaze as Simon’s stare darkens into the colour of midnight splash hanging over the sky.

“You’ll feel a wee sting,” Johnny warns. He rips the corner off a rag and drenches it in vodka, poising it over her flayed knees. “Should probably give my hand a squeeze or somethin’, ye ken? To lessen the burn, o’ course.”

She hesitates but slips her hand around Johnny’s all-encompassing one, her fingers barely meeting whilst wrapped around his palm. She winces when the ethanol meets her wound, shooting through her veins, and tries recoiling into herself.

But the amplitude of her pain swells, and her muscles girdle.

It’s Simon’s massive hand splitting itself across her thigh that keeps her pinned to the chair. His fingers bite rivets into her skin, the pinch overriding the sting of her tissue soaking up the alcohol.

“Stay still when he tells you to,” he grumbles. “Otherwise it’ll hurt.”

She wriggles uncomfortably. Tries not to flinch when the rag meets her knees again and burns her wound. Simon’s hand doesn’t leave her thigh until he’s throwing another block of wood into the fireplace.

Johnny hums. “So, what’re you doin’ up here? Religious retreat? Mental health?”

She smacks her lips, unsure if she should answer that. She chances a glance towards Simon and bristles because for some reason, she just knows that if she lies, somehow, he’d tell.

“Um. Just stepping away from home, I suppose,” she mumbles. “Friends. Family.”

“Oh. They dinnae care about you?”

She flinches. Not because of the vodka against her skin, but Johnny’s implications.

“No,” she says. Her words are so fickle, so distorted by misery that not even she believes it. “They do care about me. I just needed space.”

He nods. Slowly, his eyebrows press together. “I don’t remember much of my family. It’s a wee bit odd. Can’t say if they liked me or not…”

Simon squeezes the back of his neck. “Enough of tha’. Pay attention.”

Johnny makes a sound like he’s humiliated. It’s only when he unrolls a spool of gauze, wrapping it around her kneecaps, is he afforded mercy when Simon changes the topic.

“Where’s the bird gonna sleep?”

“We’ve still got a cot in the root cellar, aye?” Johnny replies. “For hurricanes and tha’. Figured she wouldn’t mind it there. Wouldn’t ye, lass?”

Clemently, she shakes her head.

Simon grunts. He stands up, towering over them both. “The deer’s there, Johnny. What kind of hosts would tha’ make us? Puttin’ her up with a corpse?”

Johnny blushes as if he’s been scolded. His bottom lip curls out, petulant, a waspish colour flooding his cheeks.

“Aye…” he grumbles. “Tha’s right. The livin’ room, then?”

The girl is sitting, her head oscillating between the two men like a pendulum as they talk.

“No,” Simon says. “We’ll move the cot to our room.”

Johnny nods. He scratches his stubble, pretending to think. “It’s important we keep an eye on her wounds, too.”

“Exactly,” Simon says, petting Johnny’s head. “Smart boy.”

He clicks his tongue and Johnny shoots up, scurrying out of the living room to retrieve the aforementioned cot. Muffled sounds peal out from the root cellar below them. Johnny comes stumbling back up in mere minutes with a rickety cot fitted under his armpit and disappears into a dark room.

“Best get to sleep before it’s too late,” Simon splays his hand over the small of her back. “Y’must be tired.”

She submits to Simon’s touch, letting him guide her through the cabin and into the darkest room lit only by a lone oil lamp.

Johnny is finishing up the cot when Simon releases her. He drapes a cable-knit blanket over the surface, fluffing up a pillow. She doesn’t point out how close it is to their bed, the lip of her cot almost touching their rickety mattress.

“Fair warnin’ lass,” Johnny begins, peeling off his shirt, kittening into bed. “Simon snores quite a bit. Dinnae be feart to smack his gob if he gets too loud, aye?”

She stiffly nods. She climbs into the cot and bunches the blanket around her, making a conscious effort to hide her bare legs. Simon crawls between them, the mattress sinking with his weight, and throws their whisper-thin blanket over his legs.

Darkness penetrates the room when he blows the lamp out. The only smoulder is the silvery glow of moonlight invading the curtains and the reflective light in Simon’s eyes.

He sits up impossibly straight, staring at her like a cryptid caught on a trail cam. It causes discomfort to congeal under her flesh, but slowly, the longer she looks, a bristle of sleepiness lays hold of her. She closes her eyes and falls into limbo. Her breaths thinning into a short, even pattern.

———

She’s between the threshold of awake and sleep when she hears it.

She can’t tell if it’s a dream or the amplified sounds of Appalachia. She feels as if she’s underwater or stuck in syrup, able to hear the rushing brook of her blood against her ears but unable to distinguish the sounds around her.

There’s a grunt. And a moan. The wail of the bed next to her snapping then creasing. Heavy breathing. Sprinting hearts.

Her head is so muddled she can’t register anything. Her mind tells her that the violent slapping of skin against skin is the crack of thunder. That the strangled whimpers are the call of a cottontail.

“Right there, Johnny?” A voice asks. “Takin’ my big cock so fuckin’ well. Greedy lil’ bitch, you are.”

A long, drawn-out whine chases after it. A choked-out scream as if something hurts, succeeded by a wet squelch.

“Look at ‘er,” that voice jeers. “Think she’d take it? Better than you? Think she’d bleed all over it like– fuck… how I smelt it on her?”

The other voice—broken in, wispy—chokes on a response. It sounds a little stifled, as if speaking through something shoved in its mouth.

“No… nae better than me,” it mumbles. “Nae better than me…”

It’s like she’s drowning in purgatory. She can’t move, can’t speak. She’s caught in a phantasmagorical limbo between reality and fantasy. She can feel the serpentine hands of something with no material existence wrap around her and stain her slick with sweat, sweeping over the space between her legs, licking a wetness up her pussy.

A dewy sound peals out. It’s a predator loosening its jowls, stringy and frothy, flaying its lips to bare its teeth. A rumbling roar rips out of its throat, animalistic. She can hear the popping of teeth sinking into flesh. The dull sound of skin breaking.

“Ah!” A squeal. “Simon, tha’– it hurts.”

She feels a vortex in her belly, an ache in her clit.

It’s like she resurfaces the water. All at once, she hears clearly. It’s a lone word whispered in a guttural cadence so close that she swears it’s mumbled against the hot hull of her ear.

“Good.”

———

She wakes the next morning with her tongue sticking to the roof of her mouth and a damp heat between her legs.

Sunlight filters through the gauzy curtains, hitting the bed next to her. The bed is starkly empty she notes, as she crawls out of her cot and pops the stiff muscles in her back, stretching.

She pokes her head out of the bedroom and tiptoes around the cabin as if avoiding a barrage of landmines. There’s a downward force in her bladder that tells her she’s been in torpor for the better half of the morning, and a heavy crust in her eyes that shifts when she blinks. She finds her way to the bathroom and shucks the flannel over her hips, lowering herself on the toilet seat, emptying herself.

It’s the only stint of respite. The closest thing she can get to calm since losing her way in the mountain three days ago. She relishes in the idle birdsongs outside and the sound of overnight frost melting into the dew that slips off tree leaves, pitter-pattering to the ground. Listens to the stream of her pee peter out, and the ruffle of folding fabric as she tosses the flannel back over her thighs. She listens to the–

“How’d ye sleep, pretty girl?”

She flinches at the gruff voice. It’s written with sleep, barely lucid under a Scottish lilt. Her hands freeze under the running water of the tap as she watches Johnny waltz inside the bathroom, shucking his pants to his thighs and pulling out his cock, pissing in the toilet.

She’s stiff. Fixed to the cold clay tiles of the floor, unable to be bent. She tries not to let her eyes wander, tries to block out the chubby mass of muscle swinging between his legs.

“Oh…” her words are stifled by shock. “F-fine. I slept fine. Thank you again for opening your house to me.” She thinks back to last night—the whimpering, the croaking—and rashly decides to tack on, “But I did hear some weird noises. I could have been dreaming though.”

Johnny chuckles. “...Aye, it’s almost matin’ season ‘round these parts. I think you’ll be hearin’ more of that. It’s best to ignore it.”

Her body girdles when he sways his cock, shaking away the liquid on the tip. He stuffs himself back into his pants and pulls the flush, grinning.

“Bet you’re still hungry. Simon’s wrappin’ up breakfast. Let’s go.”

He pats her bum and makes her squeak. He grips the hem of her flannel and reels it around his knuckles like a leash, tugging her into the dining area—which is more of a nook nestled into the living room—and pulls out a seat.

“Hope ye fancy porridge,” Johnny chuckles. He splits his palm across the top of her head, pushing her into the chair.

She huffs and hoists her neck up, grimacing at the acrid scent of animal hide burning against the base of a cast iron pan. It takes a conscious effort to not crinkle her nose in disgust.

Simon ducks as he emerges from the kitchen threshold. He wields two bowls of food. One for her and the other for Johnny. She takes heed of how—despite his stature—Simon doesn’t have anything to eat.

However it’s a cursory thought, because she’s quickly pulling her lips into a weak smile and examining the bowl in front of her. Food is a generous word, since it looks more like coagulated milk than porridge and smells sour. Simon places a chipped plate of bacon alongside it. It’s curled because it’s overcooked, crusted with charcoal.

She swallows as Simon takes a seat next to her. Johnny, on the other side of her.

“Looks delicious,” she hums. She turns to Simon, “Are you… not eating?”

He picks an off-white tendon from his canine tooth, flicking it away.

He answers in a rigid tenor. “Don’t hurt your head over me. You eat your food.”

She marginally shrinks into herself, embarrassment licking up her spine. She feels like a chided puppy, but perhaps that’s the sentiment.

When she opens her lips and raises the spoon to her mouth, her flannel curls like a wisp of hair off her shoulder, baring her bruised albeit supple skin. She hastily pulls the sleeve back up.

She speaks around the stale porridge and her rising apprehension. “Uh, do you have my clothes from yesterday?” She asks, squirming as her sweat glues the back of her thighs to the chair, sticky. “It’s just, uh, they fit me better.”

“Oh,” Johnny blinks, “o’ course.”

She watches him stand up and slip through the backdoor. He walks towards a clothesline hitched between two trees and retrieves her clothes, returning with them tucked under his arm.

“Here ye go sweetheart,” he grins, setting them on her lap. Petting her head.

She slowly peels through her clothes. Her fingertips drag against her threadbare jeans, her overripe shirt, but never touch the sweat-imbued gauze of something more… intimate. Her maw tenses around the hot porridge.

“Where are my… um…” she lowers her voice even though it’s redundant—Johnny is leaned in close, practically huffing against her ear, sniffing her neck. “... Undergarments?”

Johnny tilts his head, puckering his lips in confusion. He’s written with the innocence of a puppy—whether it’s real or fabricated, she can’t tell. The words have begun bleeding together, blotchy and unintelligible.

“Panties, ye mean?” He laughs. “Ye never had any of those.”

She swallows thickly.

“No, I… I did. I wouldn’t go hiking without–”

“Ye must be goin’ crazy, lass,” Johnny says. “This was all you gave me. Nae panties.”

He stares at her with large, intercosmic, unassuming eyes. His gaze flickers towards Simon. It’s so fleeting that she almost misses it. The sweep of his blue irises widening, eclipsed by his pupils. She tenses. Omniscience hits her like a brick.

Her tongue goes heavy in her mouth, melting her words. The porridge turns frothy in her gut, nausea sticking to her organs and presentiment curdling in the air. She tightens her throat around a gag.

“... When can you drive me into town?”

Johnny reaches over and grips her thigh. He digs divots into her flesh like a fish hook caught in a flayed gill.

“You’re welcome to stay as long as ye want, pretty. There’s nae rush.”

She feels bile crawl up her throat.

“Oh, well, I just don’t want to overstay my welc–”

“He’s excited to play host,” Simon growls. His words are marked by firm determination, leaving no room for objection. He leans over the table, his wifebeater clinging to his muscle, his wiry chest hair pressing against the soft cotton. “We rarely get visitors ‘round here and he’ll be upset if you leave. Y’wanna make him upset?”

Finally, warnings blare like strobe lights in her mind. She fidgets in her seat, sweating, shooting a cursory glance to the backdoor. Calculating her chances of survival should she break through the mesh and make a run for it.

“O-of course not. Not after everything you’ve done for me,” she stutters, feeling a bead of sweat travel down her neck. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for asking.”

Simon settles back in his seat. Johnny, too, frowning around his porridge.

“Good,” Simon grunts meanly. “Now shut your gob an’ eat.”

She clemently chews away at her breakfast, preening under their smouldering gazes. Throughout her polishing off her bowl, she’s reminded Simon doesn’t have one. It’s unseemly for a man so sturdy to not be eating, but as Simon’s lips peel back, sated while he watches her take her final bite, she spots a spray of red liquid washing the spire of his fang tooth, glistening in the sunlight.

“How’d you like tha’, pretty?” Johnny asks. He collapses whatever thoughts—whatever inklings—begin to seize her about Simon as he smiles and their bowls, disappearing into the kitchen.

Right away, Simon is hooking his foot behind a leg of her chair, using it to pull her closer.

He’s centimetres away from her face when he says, “How ‘bout you start pullin’ your weight?”

Her eyes flicker up to see Simon hovering over her. He’s dewy with sweat, big and burly and drifting above her like the closet-dwelling monster from everyone’s childhood.

“You’ve caused enough trouble in my home,” he continues. “Ate a lot of our produce. It’s time you make up for tha’.”

She resists the urge to snarl. She doesn’t even want to be here yet Simon is insisting she fill her role—whatever that role may be.

But as she hoists her neck up at him, she gets skittish and looks away, her tongue knotting. She knows it isn’t smart to upset Simon again. He’s a beefy man with sharp canines and vertical pupils, with more hair sprouting from his forearms than what’s considered normal. A man who expels deep tonal flutters instead of regular breaths. Who—despite his size—can’t ever be heard approaching.

So she smiles instead, asking, “What is it you need help with?”

“Floors need scrubbin’.”

He shoves a rag in her hand and holds out a bucket of sudsy water she hadn’t noticed before.

“Kitchen, livin’ room… just get to work.”

The water sloshes over the lip of the bucket when he sets it down. Simon stands to his full height and stalks out of the room, leaving her alone with her multitude of thoughts.

Slowly, she stands up. She hauls the water bucket to the middle of the living room and is starkly reminded of her strength—or lack thereof. Simon had picked the bucket up so naturally, but with the weak tendons lacing her arms, she struggles. It doesn’t help that her vision is still spotty.

She lowers to her knees, wincing at the chord of pain beneath her bandages. She awkwardly drenches the rag in the water and wrings it dry, poising herself above the floor, working the rag into the floorboards.

She tenses when Johnny walks back in. He’s behind her. Unlike with Simon, she can feel him creeping up. She can feel his eyes on the lips of her pussy where her flannel hitches up while she’s bent over, scrubbing the floors.

Her cheeks burn. She blindly reaches behind her to tug the hem down, covering her warm cunt.

Johnny chuckles. “This is wha’ Simon has you doin’ out here?”

She looks over her shoulder, her skin prickling when she sees an axe in his hand.

“We’re goin’ to the yard to chop some wood,” he says, “but I see you’re already busy bein’ our bonnie housewife.”

She stutters. That operative word, housewife, burns a hole in the snail-shaped cochlea of her ear. “No, Simon j-just asked me to. He asked me to.”

“I know, sweetie,” Johnny replies. He squats next to her and rubs her back in slow circles, trying to hike up her flannel again. “Simon’s just takin’ the piss. He��s a meanie like tha’.”

She tries shouldering him away but Johnny only holds her tighter. Simon reappears in the doorway, watching with his arms crossed.

Johnny clears his throat. “Thought we’d spend time in the yard today. Doesn’t tha’ sound sweet?”

She looks at Simon who’s already looking at her through hooded, brutish eyes. She realizes that her autonomy is divested—that she has no choice but to follow what they say because something is very, very wrong here.

Perhaps this is what the mountain had warned her of. In all of its howling and breathing, the branches gripping her and the delirium written into her psyche, maybe, it was all a warning.

She hangs her head. “Mhm… sounds great.”

She has no time to process what’s happening before he’s folding his hand into the cavity of her armpit and dragging her up and out of the door, into the backyard.

It’s more of a cleared grove than a yard. Dead tree stumps litter the small expanse, grass the colour of ripe lemons because it’s been seared down. There’s a block of wood sitting on a stump, split down the middle. Sun-bleached clothes hanging over the clothesline.

“Y’can watch here,” Johnny says, gesturing to one of the tree stumps. “We’ve got to chop wood for dinner tonight.”

He pulls her down on the makeshift seat, finally letting her go. And just as Johnny pivots, slamming the spire of the axe into the block of wood, she sees him scrunch his nose as he sniffs his hand, drinking in the sweat from her armpit. It goes up his nose and through his nasal cavity, making him quiver as if her sweat is an opiate. Disgust slams into her, sinking in her stomach and settling there like sediment. She doesn’t even notice Simon walking out of the cabin and reaching for the axe, raising it over his head, until the resounding sound of wood snapping peals out, and she’s jumping in her skin.

“No need to be feart,” Johnny laughs. “Just his usual routine.”

She watches Simon work. He looks like a beast on its hind legs like this—impossibly large and splayed out with his arms over his head, growling whenever he brings the axe down on the tree stump, splitting it in two. Sweat burns through his wifebeater and turns the fabric translucent, revealing the barest outline of his chest. His chest hairs are matted with sweat, his sinews straining with each chop of wood. His face is curled meanly into itself, his trimmed hair nicked in different places from at-home shaving and washed with sweat.

Every time he brings the axe down on the wood, expelling a guttural groan, something stirs in her. He does it with such force, such strength, it makes her wary. He fractures the wood along the grain without so much of a blink, without any stifling in his muscle.

All those horror films she watches alone—when her friends say they’re too busy to join, when they lead her on after planning a get-together that doesn’t come to fruition—finally catch up to her, sowing the thought in her head that if she stays, she’ll become the tree stump. Impotent beneath Simon’s hacking and eclipsed by his behemoth-like body.

Her missing panties. Johnny’s sticky hands. Simon’s less-than-human behaviour. It all slams into her like whiplash.

Her fear rears its head as a rashly undertaken announcement tumbling out of her mouth.

“I have to pee.”

She ignores the way Johnny perks up, as if that activated something in his brain. His ocular vein goes large, rapt, his pupils blowing out as he looks at her and then her navel where her bladder sits, suddenly grinning.

“I can come with–”

“I’ll go in the woods,” she says. “Behind a bush or something, okay?”

Simon grunts. It’s a deep prusten sound as he splits another block of wood. Johnny pouts but lets her go, watching with those imploring eyes as she disappears behind some foliage.

It’s now or never, she decides.

She makes sure she’s concealed by the flowering of a tree before speeding up her walk. She moves like an unoiled machine, rusty, as her walk ripens into a run.

She doesn’t know where she’s running. She doesn’t know how far the nearest town is or how to find the trail she lost herself on, but she knows she needs to get far away from here.

The woodland is labyrinthine. Everything looks the same. She hopes she isn’t sprinting deeper into the heart of Appalachia and straight into her new grave, but still, she doesn’t stop running. Not until her lungs wilt into themselves and turn pruney, not until her heartbeat plateaus.

It’s as if she’s working against a rip current. She feels as if a part of herself is already woven into the woodland soil, feels herself written into the rotting, wet trees. It’s like she’s treading water instead of sprinting. And it’s like a supernova has erupted in her ankle as it gets caught under a root, sending her face first into the dirt.

She reorients as quickly as she can. She raises to her feet but winces at the flaring nerves in her foot, and looks around for a stick she can use as a crutch.

But something else catches her attention.

A dog-eared paper taped to a Basswood tree. It’s been eaten by the elements, mottled, barely hanging on. She steps closer and reads the blocky letters across the front, her blood running cold in her engorged vessels.

MISSING PERSON

Fleetingly, hope seizes her, but she soon remembers nobody back home is heedful enough to report her missing, let alone realize she’s missing in the first place. Additionally, the year suggests that the flyer is three years old. Her eyes slink down, trailing over what’s still intact.

LAST SEEN: CLIFF TRAIL

$3,000 REWARD FOR INFORMATION

Foreboding clings to her flesh. She quivers, her knees weakening.

FIRST NAME: J-

The tail-end of it is smeared, the ink bleeding and thinning into the paper. It’s unintelligible, so she trails her gaze lower, heeding the victim’s last name instead.

MACTAVISH.

“Sweetie!” Peals out from behind her before she can read any more. “What’re you doin’ all the way here? Had me and Simon thinkin’ ye ran away or something. Hah.”

Johnny hurries close and swallows her flinch with a tight hug. He frowns at the flyer.

“Why’re you readin’ this silly stuff?” He asks. He tears it off the tree and crumples it up, tossing it away. “That shite gives y’nightmares.”

“Johnny, I–”

“You went pee?” Johnny asks. Nearly makes her screech when he dips his hand low and cups her cunt, feeling around for any dregs of liquid. He buries his fingers unnecessarily deep between her puffy lips, blindly massaging.

“No…” he clicks his tongue. “No. You didn’t. Did ye lie to us? It dinnae matter, sweetie. Here. Do it here, pretty. I’ll wait.”

She musters whatever pluck she has left to shake her head.

However her spine is fickle. All it takes is Johnny glowering, his eyes darkening, his pout upending and curling into something meaner, to force her back into submission.

“Simon’s already angry ye pulled this stunt, sweetie,” he says. “I’m helpin’ you out.”

A tear escapes her. It rolls down her gaunt cheek like the dew that dribbles down trees. She’s quickly crying, expelling howls that burn her energy. She trembles as she squats to the forest floor and pushes pee out of her. She sniffles as she stands back up and lets the liquid sluice down her thighs.

“Good girl,” Johnny hums. “You’re so much sweeter when ye listen, ye ken?”

She sobs into her palms, her ribs so brittle they rattle together. Johnny coos vacantly at her, rubbing her all over the same way one rubs stone fruit to test their ripeness, and croons at her swelling ankle.

“See what happens when you’re naughty?” He asks, picking her up, carrying her close to his chest. “Let’s get you home, honey. These woods are no place for a bird like you.”

She hates how she curls into him. It’s her repressed underbelly fighting its way to the surface because the accumulation of neglectful family and friends has soured her, carving a chasm in her heart that forces her body to respond to Johnny’s affections. He’s a warm body for her, a pair of listening ears. It’s scraps, but it’s more than she’s ever gotten.

They make it back to the cabin in what feels like minutes. Simon’s waiting next to the door with his arms tightly crossed, his face meanly pinched. He growls like a provoked animal. He hovers like an executioner. He’s the living antonym of light at the end of the tunnel, huffing like a bull as Johnny carries her inside.

“How about you rest?” Johnny asks. He sets her down on her cot and pulls the blanket to her quivering chin, tucking her in. “Want some tea? What kind do you fancy?”

She purses her lips, trembling. Johnny sentimentally hums as if he’s sorry. As if he isn’t a part of her plight. Her piercing fear and deep-seated fatigue.

“Garden mint…” he says to himself. “I’ll be right back, bonnie.”

He disappears and returns a few minutes later with a cup dwarfed in his hand. Steam curls over the rim, thinning into the barren bedroom. He tilts it into her mouth, nursing her.

With every sip she feels herself slip more and more back into the familiar territory of limbo. Her eyelids become heavy, her cognizance slackening.

She peels her tongue off her gums to muster a whisper. It’s so weak. Barely audible.

“I wanna go… home…”

Johnny croons. He cups her cheek. “Honey, those people dinnae care about you. Not how me and Simon do. This can be your home.”

He raises the cup to her mouth again, stifling any protests on her tongue.

She hiccups around the drink, her eyes warm and wet.

That’s how she falls asleep.

With hypnotic tea invading her bloodstream, turning her eyelids heavy. Turning her helpless.

———

She wakes with a start.

It’s a crack of thunder that had stirred her, she realizes, instead of the enigmatic sounds of bed springs snapping.

The bedroom is dark and bathed in midnight light. She can barely see anything, save for the barest outline of Johnny in the bed next to her. When lightning strikes, illuminating the sky with a blinding impact crack, she’s able to see the swell of his body beneath his sheets and the shadow of his spun-thread hair. His chest rising and falling steadily.

She’s caked with sweat. Her perspiration soaks her flannel and makes it cling to her flesh, which is flared up as if she rolled in a pile of poison ivy. Her mind is so cluttered she almost folds over as she stands up, testing the grip of her toes on the wooden floor, testing her ability to balance herself.

She’s in limbo. A border space between heaven and hell, awaiting her execution. That’s how it feels as she tiptoes her way out of the room, reaching for an oil lamp, holding it out in front of her.

It’s almost worse like this. A weak flame that barely illuminates her peripheral. She fears that should she turn too fast, an aberration will materialize from the margins of her view and tear her to ribbons.

At this point, she supposes that’s a kinder fate.

She slips into a pair of large boots because she can’t find her hiking shoes anywhere. She opens the door and pokes her head out, immediately met with the spray of rainwater on her face, the wind running through her ropes of neglected hair.

Sheets of heavy rain fall from the awning, creating another divide that keeps her trapped inside the cabin. She steps onto the porch, listening for any incongruous noises. Even if there were any, they would be bullied under the assault of rainfall. She can’t hear her own thoughts like this, can’t formulate a plan to get away from here once and for all.

So of course she doesn’t hear the floorboards settle behind her. Of course, she doesn’t hear the heavy drumming of feet closing in on her.

She doesn’t heed the body behind her until Johnny is sniffing up her neck and snuffing out the oil lamp, laying hold of her in a grudging grip.

“You just dinnae listen, do you?”

He takes her by the scruff of her neck and pulls her back into the cabin, knocking the lamp out of her grip. It falls to the floor and flares into a crash, louder than the rain. Almost louder than her sprinting heart and the blood rushing to her ears.

She wrestles against his grip. “Fuck you both—you sick fucks!”

She almost vomits when her insults make Johnny moan, his cock fattening against her back in a crude Pavlovian response. Each time she struggles against him, his grip tightens. It reminds her of the mountain itself. The more she tries escaping its soporific arms, the deeper it drags her down. It’s fruitless for her to fight it—the whistle of the branches, the tight sinews of Johnny’s grip.

He swings his arm around her neck, pinning her against his chest in a headlock. Her lungs stutter and her eyes turn dewy, her deep-seated fear ripening into paralyzing terror.

A web of lightning shatters the sky, and she almost dies right there.

It’s Simon but worse. A mutation gone wrong. A changeling, perhaps. He’s squeezed inside the threshold, breathing wildly. His wifebeater is torn in different places across his body, split around tufts of fur. Fur that is matted with thick ichor, wiry and sprouting from the spot behind his ears.

Another flash of lightning ignites the cabin, revealing the shaggy coat of hair on his chest. The sheet of fat over his stomach that flutters when he puffs, growling under his breath. He clenches his jaw because he can’t clench his hands, because his thick fingers have turned into claws, sharp spires covered in gore.

Simon snarls. Blood and spit drip from his bloodied teeth as if he’s a rabid animal with a limp maw. He rolls his shoulders and cracks the cartilage in his neck, the sound pealing out so loudly, it’s more like the popping of bubble wrap in rapid succession.

She can barely see him through her tear-filled eyes. It’s the epilogue to her life as he strides in close, biting his talons into her hips and drawing out blood. A snarl of satisfaction escapes him when he smells it—her blood, sweet, albeit stale due to her dehydration.

“Anyone ever told you you’re an ungrateful mutt?” He growls. “I give you food to eat an’ clothes on your back but here you are, tryin’ to sod off.”

Her cheeks dimple when he grabs her jaw. She opens her mouth to protest, but her grievances get smothered beneath Simon’s claws. He stuffs his fingers down her mouth, stunting her complaints. She gags and coughs around the taste of metal and mire crusted under his claws, bile shooting up her throat.

“Dogs don’t talk,” he tuts.

He hoists his arm back and she puckers, preparing for an attack. However, instead of her cheek, Simon’s hand slices against her shirt. He tears her flannel into ribbons, making the fabric slide off her like water from a milk bath.

She stands naked, her skin pocked with fear. She shivers despite being pressed between Simon’s furry chest and Johnny’s warm arms.

“‘Bout time someone taught you some manners,” Simon mumbles. “I was in the middle of my dinner you know? Fuckin’ rude to interrupt.”

She blanches when she sees a limp coyote behind him, splayed out on the porch. She recognizes it as the orpiment-coloured fur to the hair flossed between Simon’s teeth.

She screams as he wrestles her from Johnny’s grip, pulling her towards the bedroom. Simon throws her onto the stiff mattress, her spine shuddering from the impact. She tries covering herself, tries wrapping her arms around her body, but Simon is having none of that.

He pounces, taking her hips and pinning them to the bed. He hovers over her, rainwater dripping from his broken nose, impossibly large as he makes up her whole world. Simon swallows her entire view, leaving her with no chances of escape.

Her gaze flutters down to the chub outlined by his sweatpants and decides she’s left with no chances of survival, either.

She flails her legs as Simon slithers low, flattening his nose against her cunt. She lets out a protracted cry as he hitches his lungs and inhales, breathing in the musk of her bare cunt. The sweat stuck between her fuzzy hair, the sticky arousal that spreads as he forces her legs open.

Simon hisses. It rides the ruck of his throat, expelled from his nose. It’s not in any capacity a human sound. It seems more like a bear flaring its nostrils, poised for attack.

Johnny notices the confusion between her eyebrows because he’s leaning in and murmuring against the shell of her ear, licking it.

“Remember wha’ I said about matin’ season, kitty?”

Johnny leans away, leaving it at that. Equivocal and cryptic and calcified into the furrows of her brain. She isn’t allowed to wade in her confusion though because Simon’s tongue is lolling out, sweeping a fat stripe over her pussy.

It’s like the first thaw of spring. Simon licks her open, spreads her out on his tongue. She can’t help the immediate warmth that courses through her, swathing her in silk.

She cries out. Her back bends off the mattress when Simon pulls her lips into his mouth to suck.

She looks to Johnny for help. She twists herself and tries reaching out, tries crawling off the mattress, but Simon is gripping her ankle and popping the gauze of her bandage with his claws, pulling her back down, wrapping his lips around her engorged clit.

Johnny’s face doesn’t show contrition, but is pinched in jealousy. He watches with a fat mass growing in his sweatpants.

She splits her hand over Simon’s shaved head, using the cauliflowered shell of his ear to try pulling him off of her. That only makes him growl, the vibrations quavering up her spine, his claws digging into her flesh.

She folds her arms over her face, sobbing. Simon’s tongue is wet and hot against her pussy, lapping between her soft folds, slurping her juices. She flushes at how wet she is. At how pleasure leaks through the cracks in her resolve and spreads all over her, reducing her to a panting mess.

Simon releases her clit with a pop. He raises to his knees, towering over her, and now she’s unsure if his glistening chin is because of the rainwater outside or her arousal.

“Hold her down, Johnny.”

Her heart drums against her chest. Johnny crawls onto the bed and kneels behind her head. He pins her wrists down with his kneecaps, keeping her from squirming.

“Will ye let me put my cock in ‘er mouth?” Johnny asks. “Simon, will you–”

“Shut it,” Simon snaps. He shoves down his sweatpants, his cock springing out. All of her nerves bristle like rope, her heart sputtering to a stop.

Simon’s cock is fat and heavy. It droops between his thighs, drooling with precum. It’s stiff but hangs because he’s so large, the engorged tip angling downward, his balls plump, ruddy.

He chokes his hand around it, tugging it. Her throat closes in on itself but her legs instinctively peel apart. Her puffy lips spread open and she flushes at the sticky sound, hoisting her neck back to look at Johnny.

He has his cock out too, pumping it. He grins when they lock eyes and smacks his dick against her cheek. Johnny presses his cockhead into the corner of her mouth, using it to tilt her lips into a repugnant curl. It’s reminiscent of a smile, but it isn’t one.

She wails.

They both make up her beginning and end. They trap her between themselves, leaving her with no escape. Simon at her feet, Johnny at her head. Each of the men are more intimidating than the other, both inspiring fear in her feeble heart. Both inspiring unwanted arousal between her legs.

Simon slaps his flaring tip against her clit. She mewls and hates herself for bucking her hips into him. She’s dew-skinned as Simon pushes her knees to her ears, thumbing her clit.

He deeply inhales.

His chest expands, tugging at the steel-wool hair felted against his big chest. He quivers as he expels his breath, his mating call, and finally feeds her his cock, pushing past her first ring of muscle.

Her body tries curling in on itself like a Venus flytrap, but Johnny is quicker. He bites his fingers into her wrists and pins her to the mattress, keeping her still while Simon stuffs himself deeper. Johnny kisses her tears away while he does it. It’s oxymoronic and it’s betrayal—a Judas kiss—while he wraps his lips around sweet encouragement against her cheeks.

“Got so much fight in ye, sweetie,” he whispers. “Just stop strugglin’ and it’ll feel good.”

Simon leans over her, his cock slipping deeper into her warm cunt. The blood and saliva from his maw drips onto her chest, the blood is so fresh there’s still steam, hitting her like scythes.

Johnny’s getting restless. He watches raptly as Simon starts slamming his hips into her. Johnny ruts against the chafe of her brittle hair and hopes it will give him satisfaction by proxy, but it does little to offset the ache in his balls. His lip warbles.

“Simon, please,” a voice crack, “can I put my cock in ‘er mouth?”

“Fine,” Simon growls. His hips are piston-paced against the girl’s skin, unrelenting and uncaring to how her nails scratch striated lines down his chest in her struggle. “Just stop interruptin’ us.”

Her jaw cramps when Johnny cups her chin. He puppets it open and forces his fingers down. They’re caked with dirt as he swirls them over her tongue, coaxing up the warm spit from the furrow of her throat to be used as a natural lube.

The only mercy she gets is the stint of time between Johnny pulling his fingers out and gripping his dick, laying it on her tongue. He forces her lips apart with the tip of his cock, smearing himself all over her.

“So pretty like this sweetheart,” he hums. “Simon smelt it on ye. Hundreds of klicks away. How sweet y’are.”

She doesn’t have the energy to decipher that. Most of it is being wrung on trying to fight the two men off, but it’s fruitless. Johnny is already slipping into her mouth, and her cunt is already stretched around Simon’s plump cock.

Johnny starts pumping in and out, his cock embroidering a burn in the hinges of her jaw.

She lies there limply, but as Johnny’s wiry hair meets her nose, she realizes there’s one thing she can do. In her thrashing, she undertakes the lapse of judgement to clamp her teeth together, sinking them into Johnny.

He yells and pulls himself out. Johnny wraps a hand around himself, squeezing, placating the sting. A warm wash of tears twine his eyelashes together, long and babydoll-like. He looks to Simon, preening, imploring.

“She bit me.”

Simon slows his hips, only scarcely so. Only enough for her to fill her lungs halfway before he’s dragging himself out agonizingly slow, burying himself back inside.

His eyes, hungry, flutter down to her. His lips wind back, revealing his sharp fangs. He snickers.

“Now you’ve pissed him off, hm? Dumb girl. This is why puppies need owners.”

He pinches her clit, softly tweaking it between the pads of his fingers. He looks at Johnny and condescendingly smirks.

“C’mere, boy. If she won’t suck you off, why not take a go at her other hole?”

She tenses. Fear washes over her like a rip current, all the way down to her ass that squeezes in protest. Her heart feels too big for her chest suddenly. She can’t even see Johnny’s blinding grin through her cloudy eyes as brine tracks down her cheeks, mixing with her sweat.

She whimpers. “No–“

A palm whistles through the air, exploding into a crack of thunder as it breaks against the skin of her cheek.

She lapses into silence. Little hiccups escape her while she peers up at Simon, sniffling.

“Yes,” he says.

He grips her by her hips and flips her over. This way, Simon’s on his back and she’s on top of him, his cock digging deeper. The position is etched with a degree of intimacy that causes heat to pool in her belly—she can feel his hot breath fanning over her face, she can see his feline-like eyes better.

She almost jumps out of her skin when Johnny presses his fingers into her ass, trying to break her in. He thumbs at the puckered muscle, chuckling when it tries squirming away from him.

“Cute little thing,” he says. “She ever been fucked?”

The way she sobs when Johnny forces his forefinger inside gives him his answer. He almost comes right there. At the sound of her slick lubing her up, at the sound of her being torn open like a stone fruit and her pitiful cries for mercy.

“Stop…”

“Stop?” Johnny repeats, “Sweetie, if I stop it’ll hurt when I fuck you. Ye need prep, silly.”

That only wracks her ribs harder. The patrionizing lilt in his voice, the way he pats her bum like she’s nothing but a dumb puppy. Johnny sinks another finger in, knuckle-deep, and curls himself into the walls of her ass, massaging it.

Simon starts thrusting again. He takes one of her tits in his mouth and tongues at her nipple, snapping his hips into her. It only adds more pressure to her other hole, the one being fingered open by Johnny.

“Y’think she’s ready, sweetie?” Johnny asks. He slaps his cock against her hole, teasing her. “I think she’s fuckin’ hungry. Look at ‘er winkin’ back at me.”

Johnny collects the saliva moulded into his gums and sputters out a wad of spit, wetting her tight asshole. He presses his cockhead against her opening, pushing himself inside.

She buckles, doubling over. Her cheek falls on Simon’s chest, chafing against his coarse hair. She’s never felt so full. Folded between the men and being fed two big cocks, left with no space to breathe. She isn’t given respite. No mercy. No time for her to stretch around their cocks.

Johnny splits his hand across the divot where her spine begins and shoves her into Simon. Her jaw hangs loose, her lips parted dumbly, her drool trickling onto Simon’s chest. She’s limp. Letting them have her way with her. Letting them brand her with their fingers digging sickle-shaped scratches into her skin. Letting them break her open with each of their jackhammering thrusts, letting their pants of encouragement and degradation swirl around her like whistles from the woodland, causing goosebumps to arise and her head to pound.

“Do ye feel it, Simon?” Johnny pants. “Is it comin’ on?”

His words sprawl by like a lazy river in her mind. Desultory, like lukewarm water. They don’t click into the empty chasm of her cognizance until something else happens. Something inhuman. Something that has her choking on the raw bile that scratches her throat and the spit coaxed into the rivets of her tongue by Johnny’s assaulting fingers.

Simon’s ramming gets shaved into stunted thrusts. It isn’t due to a loss of energy, but is due to something else keeping him from slipping out. A balloon pushing against the walls of her pussy, swelling inside her. It isn’t fat but is chubby enough for her to feel it, flutter around it.

The knot snarled into Simon’s cock plugs her up. She can’t pull herself off him because it’s puffed up past her cunt, keeping her stuck on top of him. It doesn’t help that Johnny keeps slamming his hips into her, riling the thin skin that separates her cunt from her ass, bending it to the shape of Simon’s cock.

Johnny gasps. “I’m close– shite, I’m close.”

She doesn’t want to admit it, but she is too. She feels her nerves begin to fray at their edges, her stomach wearing thin. Johnny slips his hand low and blindly sweeps at her clit, nibbling on the husk of her ear.

He only gets three more pumps in until he’s emptying his balls in her ass. He grabs her hair when he comes, puppetting her head back so her mouth falls open and he can spit inside. His thrusts are slow and deep and peter into something calm, his cock softening inside her. Johnny grins.

“Say thank you, kitty.”

It crosses her tongue as an unintelligible mumble. She can’t speak properly with Simon’s cock still in her.

Johnny chuckles at that. He wraps his arms around her and pinches her nipples. Twisting them, pulling them.

Simon’s so big beneath her, lounging like a bear. He fucks into her, his thrusts curtailing into sloppy snaps of his hips.

“He’s close, bonnie,” Johnny says. “Kiss ‘im when he comes. It’s what he likes.”

Finally, Simon’s knot unravels, his thick ropes of come sticking to her walls. He makes sure that the warm come dressing her is so deep, it’ll have no choice but to take.

Her body betrays her when it crests and crashes into her orgasm. She’s flashbanged with blinding light, gushing out an off-white liquid that coats Simon’s thighs. It seizes her so deeply it hurts, the panoramic pleasure. An orgasm that makes her brain melt, makes her feel otherworldly.

Belatedly, she remembers Johnny’s order. She leans down to kiss Simon, her lips leathery against his. She only wants a modest peck—something to sate Johnny—but she can’t pull away because her bottom lip is caught between Simon’s teeth, pinched, and being sapped of its blood.

He laps it up before letting her go.

He slips his softening cock out but keeps his come inside her with two fingers, his claws having retracted.

He huffs like a bull. He presses his heavy paw into her abused cunt, palming it. He reeks with a carnal musk, the aftertaste of his rut heavy in the air.

Suddenly, it all makes sense to her.

Simon is the crux of all cautionary tales. The mountains aren’t sworn off because of rabid raccoons or feral fishers but because of something eldritch, whose reputation and folklore precedes any proof of its existence. Whatever Simon is, it can’t be put into words or into anything material, so he’s condensed into the urban legends that have haunted the woods for centuries. The stories that keep hikers off needle-covered paths and unmarked trees and make them carry crucifixes in lieu of bear spray.

She doesn’t even realize she’s softly sobbing. It feels like that’s all she does these days.

Johnny hugs her as if he hadn’t taken a part of her dignity.

He kisses her, kittening into her so that Simon is able to wrap his arms around them both, hugging them.

The calm that lolls after the storm only bruises her further. They act so normal after they’ve stripped her of everything. Johnny massaging her thighs, Simon igniting a cigarette between his lips.

“Will you ever let me go?” She mumbles against Simon’s chest.

He exhales the smoke. “Go where, love? You came into my house, remember?”

Johnny won’t stop kissing her. He’s a pest that’s attached itself to her dewy flesh, trying to lick her clean. Simon curls his fingers in her and makes sure that’s where his come stays.

Simon takes another drag of his cigarette. “Not like anyone back home would miss you, anyhow.”

———

She watches with a smile on her face as Johnny roasts the flank of a moose on a homemade grill and as Simon chops some more firewood.

She lounges in a chair, swathed in her caribou-hide coat. Winter is at its height, laying a skin of pillowy snow across the mountain.

The cubs wriggle in her lap, pawing at the loose tendrils of her hair and trying to pinch her nose.

“Lookin’ so pretty today, mama,” Johnny hums. She giggles when he kisses her, scratching at the cubs’ bellies.

“Ain’t she bonnie?” Johnny turns around and prompts Simon, “Our wee looker.”

Simon pauses his wood chopping and nods. He grips the hem of his lumberman’s jacket and raises it to his forehead to wipe his sweat away, revealing his chest and his hair that disappears into the waistband of his jeans. The cubs yip when he resumes his chopping, splitting a tree stump in two.

She grins.

She loves her family. Her providers and the offspring of their seed. She loves the cubs’ fine hair rubbing against her cheek when they jump on the bed to wake them up in the mornings, their blunt fangs biting her when they’re hungry, and the tiny chines on their back where their sharp spine will eventually grow in, just like Simon’s.

Briefly, she tries to remember her other family. The one that came before this one. But all that encompasses her mind is a supermassive black hole in place of memories. For some reason she can’t delineate them. The face of her father is blurry and the features of her mother fit together like a crudely sewn patchwork quilt.

She doesn’t remember much of her family. It’s kind of weird. She can’t remember if they liked her or not.

But she knows that doesn’t matter. Not when she has doting men around her and their litter hanging off her hips, another one currently swelling under her belly.

She pays no heed to the missing person posters taped to the fringes of the mountain that look eerily similar to her. Not to the K-9’s that try tracking scents but fail because she’s written with Simon and Johnny’s musk. She ignores the odd helicopter passing through each month, scarcely flying past their ramshackle cabin.

None of it matters because she knows she’s where she needs to be.

#simon riley x reader #ghost x reader #cod x reader #johnny mactavish x reader #soap/reader #soap mactavish x reader #soapghost x reader #ghost/reader #simon ghost riley #simon riley #cod mw2 #simon ghost x reader #soap x reader #ghoap x reader #writing

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fear-is-truth · 12 hours

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𝜗ϱ ┆ HOW THEY CUDDLE .ᐟ

── THE EVANs ‧ h e a d c a n o n s ೃ࿐

ft. tate ‧ kai ‧ kyle ‧ kit ‧ jimmy ‧ james ‧ austin ‧ peter ‧ warren ‧ colin

⟣ TAGS ‧ SFW | gn! reader | fluff. not proofread

• a/n: this is very poorly written and i apologise. made this more “aesthetic” to make up for the horrid quality xx

ೃ࿐

⟢ 𝐓𝐀𝐓𝐄 𝐋𝐀𝐍𝐆𝐃𝐎𝐍.

when you settle into bed, Tate curls up, inviting you to spoon him from behind. it’s become your special routine – his back pressed flush against your chest, your arm wrapped around him protectively. sometimes he opens up about his problems, mostly with his mother. more than often, he cries. you’ve come to understand that one of the reasons Tate prefers being the little spoon is that you can’t see the tears running down his face. but it’s okay. you listen quietly while gently running your fingers through his hair or tracing patterns on his skin. after that, silence follows, the only sound being the rhythm of you breathing and the occasional sniffle of shuddering sigh.

one of your favourite moments is when Tate reaches out and takes your hand, intertwining your fingers and holding it in front of his chest. another intimate gesture he often does is pressing his thumb on your wrist pulse points, feeling your heartbeat beneath his touch. it soothes him; grounds him to reality and reassures him that you’re alive; here.

⟢ pre cult .ᐟ 𝐊𝐀𝐈 𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐎𝐍.

the sound of glass shattering, punctuated by muffled sobs. more yelling. your heart sinks; you’ve always hated these moments, despised the helpless feeling as you listen to the argument upstairs escalate. Kai doesn’t say a word; he’s already gotten used to the never-ending cycle of discord. instead, he moves closer on the basement couch, resting his head in your lap. you respond instinctively, hand moving to rub gentle circles on his shoulder, offering what little comfort you can.

⟢ cult leader .ᐟ 𝐊𝐀𝐈 𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐎𝐍.

cuddling isn’t really his thing. no, scratch that, general displays of affection isn’t his thing. for Kai, it’s about dominance and control. you can still find scraps of intimacy in the small moments – sitting on his lap during cult meetings, or perched on his thigh while he works on his laptop, his attention divided between the screen and the warmth of your body pressed against him.

however, in the privacy of your shared bedroom, the softer, less-of-an-asshole side of Kai emerges. when you lie there together in bed, he likes to spoon you from behind, his body molding to yours, and you can feel the warmth of his breath tickling the nape of your neck as he presses his chest against your back, your heartbeats in sync. his touch is gentle but possessive, fingers tracing patterns on your skin as if trying to memorise every curve and muscle of your body. and when Kai whispers in your ear, his voice is low and fervent as he tells you about the new world he plans to build for you. in those moments, the mask slips away, revealing the boy beneath all the bravado, craving for your validation and affection.

⟢ pre death .ᐟ 𝐊𝐘𝐋𝐄 𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐍𝐂𝐄𝐑.

cuddling with Kyle is a daily routine, whether it's lounging on the couch watching movies, studying together in the library, or simply enjoying each other’s company in bed after a long day of classes, it feels like the most natural thing in the world, which, you suppose, is true. his arms wrap around you so effortlessly, pulling you close with a smile and a pair of dimples that lights up the room before leaning down to capture your lips with his.

friday nights and weekends often mean parties and social gatherings with Kyle’s fraternity brothers, but even then, the both of you always sneak away to a quiet corner where you can cuddle… cuddles that often segue into hot make-out sessions.

⟢ post death .ᐟ 𝐊𝐘𝐋𝐄 𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐍𝐂𝐄𝐑.

despite his freakish strength, Kyle is always gentle to you, as if he’s handling fragile porcelain. there’s a protectiveness in the way he holds you, like he’s shielding you from danger. his large hands cupping your face, chocolate brown eyes searching into yours with an intensity that never fails to make your heart swell with love. seeing the smile tugging at your lips, he smiles too before leaning in to kiss the tip of your nose.

⟢ 𝐊𝐈𝐓 𝐖𝐀𝐋𝐊𝐄𝐑.

your cuddle sessions with Kit are nothing short of intimate and romantic. every night he comes home from work, you run towards him like something out of a chick flick romance, (minus the dramatic slow motion). he’ll catch you in his arms, his laughter mingling with yours as he twirls you around the room until you’re practically begging him to stop. with a grin, he pins you down on the couch, arms caging you while his body pressed against yours. then he peppers your face with soft kisses – the tip of your nose, your forehead, your cheeks – each one leaving you breathless and desperate for more. gradually, his lips trail down to your neck, lingering on your collarbone. he raises his head slightly to meet your gaze. the silent inquiry hangs between you in the air, intermingled with the warmth of your shared breath. you nod in response, the familiar pulsing between your legs becoming impossible to ignore. without further ado, he leans down to capture your lips once again, hands slipping under your shirt. your husband is anything but a cruel lover.

⟢ 𝐉𝐈𝐌𝐌𝐘 𝐃𝐀𝐑𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐆.

you rest your head on his chest, finding comfort in the steady rhythm of his heartbeat beneath your ear. despite the limited bed space of your caravan, you manage to find a comfortable position with on leg thrown over his, fitting together like two puzzle pieces. Jimmy likes to have an arm curled around your waist, his hand finding its way under your shirt, tracing idle patterns on your skin. he especially loves the way you hum softly into his chest in approval when he scratches your back. sometimes, you crawl onto his chest and play with the strands of brown curls that fall onto his forehead. he grumbles something about you messing up his hair, but there’s always the affection in his tone that lets you know he doesn’t hate it as he pretends he does.

⟢ 𝐉𝐀𝐌𝐄𝐒 𝐏𝐀𝐓𝐑𝐈𝐂𝐊 𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐂𝐇.

every morning, you lay tangled together on your king-sized bed, nestled under the luxurious silk sheets. James has his back propped up against the many pillows as you lean into him, your head finding a comfortable resting place on his shoulder. his touch is painstakingly gentle as he strokes your hand, cold fingers tracing delicate patterns on your skin. despite the chill in his touch, there’s warmth in his eyes as he gazes at you, something that is reserved only for you. those dark eyes, which are usually filled with murderous intent, soften with tenderness he brings your hand to his lips and presses a gentle kiss to your knuckles.

but it's not just his touch that sets your heart ablaze; it’s his morning voice— that brahms accent that never fails to send butterflies fluttering in your stomach. especially when he calls you his “little dove” or “dearest” in that velvety drawl, it makes your toes curl and your cheeks flush with warmth.

⟢ 𝐀𝐔𝐒𝐓𝐈𝐍 𝐒𝐎𝐌𝐌𝐄𝐑𝐒.

more often than not, when Austin takes the “black pill,” he becomes consumed by his writing, barely stopping for days on end. you’ve learned not to disturb him during these intense bouts of creativity, knowing that he’s in his element and needs space to work.

but when he finally emerges from his writing frenzy and calls you over, you try to contain your excitement, not wanting to seem too eager. as you approach Austin, he’s lounging on his favourite leather couch, a small pout on his lips as he stretches out his arms towards you, making grabby motions. “i need my snuggle fix, pronto!” there’s a playful lilt in his voice when he said that, his dark eyes glittering with childish amusement. joining him on the couch and crawling atop him, you feel his arms wrap around you, pulling you close in an embrace. he presses a kiss to your temple, lips warm against your skin, before sighing softly. “missed you,”

⟢ 𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐑𝐄𝐍 𝐋𝐈𝐏𝐊𝐀.

it usually starts with Warren lying in bed, lighting up a joint. smoke begins to swirl toward the ceiling as he takes a leisurely puff, his eyes glazed over and unfocused. you enter the room quietly, dressed in nothing but your panties and an oversized flannel shirt that you stole from him the previous night. as you crawl onto bed, he turns his head and smiles, a lazy grin spreading across his face. with an outstretched arm, not holding the cigarette, he welcomes you, inviting you to snuggle next to him.

you settle into the curve of his side, finding a comfortable spot and wrapping your arms around his midsection. in turn, Warren drapes an arm lazily around your waist, your legs entwining in a haphazard yet intimate way. lazy cuddling at its finest. also he’s gonna get handsy and you’ll end up having lazy sex ;)

⟢ 𝐏𝐄𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐌𝐀𝐗𝐈𝐌𝐎𝐅𝐅.

Peter tries to stay still when the two off you cuddle together, he really does. but soon enough, he’s wriggling around. he’ll try to find your tickle spot or pretend to have you in a headlock, and the both of you ending up in a tangle of limbs. you two will look at each other for a beat before bursting out in laughter.

sometimes, when he’s feeling particularly cuddly (correction: more cuddly than usual), Peter will whisk you away to the nearest couch or bed for a spontaneous cuddle session. and while part of you wants to scold him, you can never bring yourself to be truly mad at that goofy smile, not for long, anyway.

⟢ 𝐂𝐎𝐋𝐈𝐍 𝐙𝐀𝐁𝐄𝐋.

in the early stages of your relationship, Colin had been a nervous wreck when it comes to initiating acts of physical affection. but as time went by, he becomes more comfortable expressing himself. now, he’s the one who surprises you by wrapping his arms securely around your waist from behind, pulling you close and burying his face into your neck.

you can feel his warm breath against your skin, mingling with the scent of fresh-ground coffee and cologne that smells of pine — a wonderful combination that is so uniquely Colin. you can feel the soft brush of his lips against your skin as he gently pushes your hair aside to press a tender kiss to the nape of your neck, before he peppers your shoulders with a series of sweet kisses that alights every nerve in your body. the sensation is far more effective in banishing your sleepiness than the coffee he’s made for you, but you keep that little secret to yourself.

thanks for reading! reblogs, comments, likes, requests are deeply adored xx

TAGLIST— @acidbrainstorm @evanpetersmybf @alittlesil @kaiandersonsdevotedwife @ellaaaaa44 @newwavesylviaplath @warrenlipkaswife @slvt4jamesmarch @kaismanwich @maddaline @evpeters87 @lacucarachapisser @howtobesasha @lissasharp @feefymo @mariposa-nova @nickrhodeslittledarling @bluerthanvelvet444 @r8ttenapples @nahoyasboyfriend @kai-slut @lak3cityqui3tpills @coentinim @doll3tt33 @taintandviolent @violet1737 @sukirosiac @slutforgarlogan @90sbr1descake @am3ricanh0rrorwh0re @k31sley @violet-harmon2011 @luuuuucyscorner @starry-eyed-wild-child @viscerati @colinzabelswife @cultw3b @babydollxxblood

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zepskies · 11 hours

Text

Wake Me Up - Part 3

Pairing: Soldier Boy/Ben x F. Reader

Summary: A few weeks after you and Ben celebrate your first Christmas together, Ben is returning from another mission with the Supe Affairs team. When he discovers that you’ve been taken, he’ll do whatever it takes to find you. And then, to help you heal.

AN: Get ready for some angsty, but fun attempts at memory jogging. 😅

Song Inspo: “I Can Read Your Mind” by the Doobie Brothers.

Word Count: 4.3K

Tags/Warnings: 18+ only for some...mature talk lol. Angst and hurt/comfort, fluff, PTSD, protective Ben, tinge of spice~

💚 Wake Me Up Masterlist || Break Me Down Masterlist

Part 3: “When You Hold Me”

Those first few days were the hardest ones.

Marie ran out of paid time off, which meant she had to go back to work. That left you alone with Ben during the day.

He was standing in the middle of the kitchen, arms crossed, and glaring at you after you’d just pushed away the bowl of bland instant oatmeal he’d “made” for you.

“We’re not gonna have this discussion again. You need to fucking eat,” he said. “I could feed you, though I promise you’re not gonna like it.”

His surly, frowning face was annoying you. His deep voice was annoying you. His tall, ridiculous wall-of-man body in your line of vision was annoying you, clothed in the rumpled shirt and sweatpants he’d slept in.

Everything about him annoyed you right now.

But that could also have something to do with the pounding ache in the back of your skull, radiating forward and between your eyes.

“Bro, I’m on like, three kinds of medication,” you replied in weary irritation. “With what appetite do you expect me to eat?”

Bro? His eyebrow twitched. He saw the pain and tiredness written across your face though, and the way you were sitting hunched at the breakfast bar, arms crossed on the counter. He softened a little.

“Look, I get it,” he started to say.

“No, you don’t,” you snapped. Your eyes closed as the pain sharpened. You lifted your hands to either side of your temples. “You don’t know what this feels like.”

You huffed and dropped your hands flat on the counter in frustration. Your eyes opened, and you looked down at the various healing scars littering your arms. You knew there were a few more across your neck and chest, and even your thighs. No matter how you stood, sat, or laid, it was painful to move your body. Even your face still hurt, with the fracture and bruises.

“You’re not the one who looks like Edward Scissorhands had a party,” you said, gesturing at yourself as you glared up at Ben. Emotion began to rise in your throat. “Or for a reference you’ll actually understand, how about this: I’m the Bride of goddamn Frankenstein. A fucking patchwork quilt.”

Ben hardened again, even with the deep pit forming in his stomach.

“That’s enough—”

“And despite what little you, or my mom, Grace, Annie, or even the doctors have told me, I can’t even remember who did this to me or what the hell happened,” you said. Hot tears welled up in your eyes. You wiped at them furiously and turned your face away.

“So no, the indestructible supe doesn’t understand. You literally can’t!” You pushed away from the counter and did your best not to lose your balance when a wave of vertigo hit you.

Ben started toward you, but you held up a hand against him.

“Just leave me the hell alone,” you muttered.

It wasn’t the first time you’d ever said that to him, but somehow, this one cut into him worse than the last.

Over the next several weeks, you did begin to heal from your injuries. Your doctor even noted that you were healing better than she expected. Bruises faded, wounds slowly became scars, some of their stitches removed, and with the right topical medication, a couple of them began to disappear.

The memories remained—at least for Ben. Finding you in that dark, disgusting place, breaking your chains, seeing how thoroughly that piece of shit had worked you over…

It still made him angry at times. He’d broken a couple of mugs, and one near-empty beer bottle. (You’d only caught him once, though he’d given you some bullshit excuse as to why.)

Your memory, on the other hand, still didn’t return.

And you weren’t an easy patient. That episode in the kitchen wasn’t the first, nor was it the last. Often the pain made you crabby and irritable, whenever your medication wore off. The head injury was also causing vast mood swings that Ben could barely keep up with.

It was all he could do to stop himself from snapping back at you at times (and sometimes he failed). He wasn’t exactly Mr. Rogers.

Marie was the only buffer. At least, when she was home. On more than one occasion, she’d had to try and diffuse the tension.

She was working during the day though, which of course, left you with Ben.

You were prone to headaches and dizziness, so he was careful with you, more than he’d ever been. You were starting to notice how he sometimes had to correct himself before he touched you, or forced himself to be deliberately slow when he helped you.

Your mom had also been doting on you, laying out your clothes, brushing your hair, trying her best to cook for the three of you in the evening. Apparently, she’d been taking lessons, though she still couldn’t cook for shit. Ben often suggested takeout, since he was also no “Betty fucking Crocker,” in his own words.

Still, it was a foreign feeling to be taken care of. It often left you unbalanced, even after your vertigo settled, or your headaches eased.

You considered it while you and Ben were channel surfing together from opposite ends of the couch in the living room. Your mom had just given you a blanket to cover your shoulders, before she went off to water your potted plants on the balcony for you. It was a Saturday, so she had the day off work.

You watched her go with a measure of disbelief.

“Look at Mother Theresa go,” you remarked. “You’d think they replaced my mom with one of the Stepford Wives.”

Ben snorted, because he actually knew the movie you were talking about. You’d forced him to watch it with you a few months ago, mostly to tease him.

“She’s never babied me this much in my life,” you said. “Not even when I was still old enough to be babied.”

Instead of commiserating with you, Ben just sighed, shaking his head a little. He glanced away from the History Channel on the screen to shoot you a glance.

“Maybe you should cut your mom some fucking slack,” he said. “She’s doing a hell of a lot for you. Even more than I am.”

You raised a brow at him. While you had a feeling that wasn’t so easy for him to admit, something about his words annoyed you.

“You clearly don’t know her like I do,” you said.

Your childhood had been no picnic. While you didn’t necessarily blame your mom (anymore) for staying with your father when you were a kid, you had never truly been a child. Your self-imposed job had been to protect your sister’s childhood, and sometimes, your mother too.

Ben gave you a more direct look.

“I know plenty,” he said.

And in his eyes, you saw that he did know something. Perhaps too much. You gathered the throw blanket closer around your body and sank further into your side of the couch.

The last thing you wanted to talk about was your messed up childhood, let alone your father. You couldn’t even remember his death, though Marie told you that you had been there. And so had Ben.

You snuck a look at him while his attention had returned to the TV. He’d settled on Ice Road Truckers. You weren’t impressed.

“Ugh. Can we watch something else?” you asked. “Something funny maybe, like How I Met Your Mother?”

Ben shot you a look. “Sounds like a chick show.”

“Not true! It has universal appeal,” you argued. Slowly you raised yourself from your corner of the couch, grimacing just a bit as it disturbed the delicate equilibrium of your still-fractured skull. It was healing, but that, of course, would take the most time. Your headaches would turn into migraines if you weren’t careful.

Ben knew that full well as he watched you move towards him across the couch. He couldn’t help but reach out a hand to steady you by your arm. You gifted him with a smile and grabbed onto him.

“Please?” you implored.

Ben tried to remain unaffected, but that smile of yours was endearing. Plus, it wasn’t often that you willingly reached out to him, touched him.

“I’ll do you one better,” he said, turning off the TV with the remote. You gave him a curious look. He turned to you with a smile.

“Let’s go for a ride.”

Of course this man would have a Benz, you thought. The car was black and sleek with beige interior, and it was both comfortable and decked out with all the modern bells and whistles.

You wondered if he knew what half of these buttons did as you gazed across the dashboard, but the path of your eyes continued until you settled on the man himself. Ben was casually dressed in a burgundy sweater and dark brown slacks, a silver Rolex on his wrist. He had one hand casually on the wheel and the other resting in his lap.

Part of you itched to take his hand, but you decided against it. You could admit, if only to yourself, that you were warming up to him.

Maybe you even liked him.

You knew you didn’t always make it easy, but he had been as patient and gentle as he could be with you, for a man who clearly wasn’t used to being either for anyone.

Despite his gruff exterior, however, you knew he had to care about you to put up with all this. It made you more willing to trust him…and even more curious about him.

“What’s my favorite color?” you asked.

Ben gave you a furrowed look. “What?”

You crossed your arms over your blouse.

“We’ve supposedly been together for a year,” you reasoned. “You should know what my favorite color is.”

He shook his head in disbelief.

“Come on,” you nudged his arm, trying to get him to smile. You succeeded, just a little.

“I don’t know…blue,” he guessed. Your mouth fell open in shock.

“How do you not know my favorite color’s red?” you said. “That’s the most basic thing ever.”

“What are you, five years old? Who fucking cares?” he said, rolling his eyes.

“I do!” you said. “Well, fine, Mr. Grump. When’s my birthday?”

With another shake of his head, he did correctly answer that question, at least.

“What’s my favorite food?” you asked.

“What’s with the goddamn quiz?” he retorted.

“I’m seeing how well you actually know me,” you countered. “Come on. Impress me.”

Ben slowed to a stop at a busy intersection. He’d been trying to jog your memory by passing certain landmarks he thought you might recognize, like the grocery store you two always shopped at, or the park where you liked to go for walks. So far, you seemed disinterested in the sights and more interested in grilling him.

Despite his longsuffering sigh, he had to wrack his brain in order to come up with something for you.

“The Beatles are your favorite band. Specifically the Abbey Road album,” he said.

That didn’t exactly answer your earlier question, but…he wasn’t wrong.

“Okay, you get a point there,” you said.

“And you fucking love Christmas,” he said, somehow with both annoyance and fondness. “Tacky as hell, with the…the ribbons, and the red flowers, and the jingle balls, and whatever the fuck else you can get your hands on. You love that shit. Because when you were a kid, that was the only time of the year your family got any peace.”

You were smiling at his description, but you sobered when he got to that last bit. Ben met your gaze.

“I know that you’ve had three boyfriends before me,” he said. Then, a smirk grew across his face. “But I’m the only one who’s made you come. Every time. Like a goddamn faucet.”

You gaped as your face grew red with a hot blush. “Excuse me—”

“You claim to like getting taken from behind the best. And you do. You’re all too happy to get bent in half for me. Hair pulling, ass-slapping, the whole sticky nine yards,” he continued, with an even fonder gleam of memory in his eyes. His hands caressed the leather wheel of his car, long fingers flexing.

“But you actually like it better when you can see my face, watch me work. I don’t blame you,” he added, smiling. “I mean, if there was an Oscar for laying it the fuck down, I would’ve taken that shit year after year. Would’ve beat out Bert Reynolds by a fucking landslide.”

You thought you were about to combust, whether from indignation, or straight up embarrassment, you didn’t know. (And you were going to ignore the little tremble of heat between your legs.)

But just as you were about to blow your top, figuratively speaking, Ben’s expression became more serious when his gaze returned to you.

“I know that you’ve had to take care of yourself. And that you’ve been alone all your life,” he said. Then a slight pause, before his attention went back to the road. “That’s something you and I have in common.”

The light turned green. Your anger and embarrassment settled, somewhat, into contemplation. You didn’t know what to make of this man.

He was infuriating, with all kinds of audacity. He was crass, and at times, he grated on your very last nerve.

But somehow, he knew you. He seemed to know the parts of you that you didn’t even want to know.

Sensing your angry gaze on the side of his face, he turned to you with a devil-may-care grin.

“You hungry?” he asked.

“Ben, I’m not dressed for this,” you said, leaning in close to whisper to him.

He’d taken you to a nice steakhouse for dinner, on the even more affluent side of town. You still couldn’t believe you’d moved out of New York City to Scarsdale, of all places.

Ben wrapped an arm around your waist and guided you closer, enough for you to feel his body heat.

“You’re just right,” he looked down on you with a teasing wink. It made you blush, despite yourself, with a small smile.

You went with him to a secluded booth in the back, by his request with the hostess. They seemed to know him, so maybe he was a regular. Or more likely, both of you were regulars. This place was only vaguely familiar, but when you saw the menu, you knew you were going to get the salmon.

Ben snorted when you said so.

“Yeah, that’s what you always get,” he said.

He smiled though—at the fact that this little outing was helping you make progress after all.

He didn’t need the menu either. He always ordered the dry-aged porterhouse steak. You couldn’t drink on the medication you were on, but he ordered a glass of bourbon for himself.

When the meal eventually came out, you glanced at his enormous plate with wide eyes. That had to be the biggest damn steak you’d ever seen, along with a huge loaded baked potato and a side of broccoli. You doubted the greens would do all that much for him, nutrition-wise.

“Whoa. Did they cut up a stegosaurus back there?” you quipped.

Ben chuckled. He’d actually missed your sense of humor, no matter how dumb it was sometimes. He unwrapped the steak knife they gave him from his napkin and started to carve a big piece.

You raised your brows, but shifted your attention to your fish and mashed potatoes. It was delicious. Like melt-in-your-mouth good, and you weren’t sure fish was supposed to be “melty.” No wonder you two liked coming here.

But then, your thoughts were entirely derailed.

Hearing the sound of his knife hitting the plate, carving into the meat—it struck a discordant note in your mind. You looked over, and the sharp, silvery gleam of it caused a vision to flash across your eyes…

Of a blade sliding against your skin, over and over. Along with questions. The same questions being asked of you, over and over.

You can’t. You can’t. You can’t.

“Tell me!” a man demanded. “Give me something.”

He grabbed your face, squeezed your neck until you choked on blood and spit.

“Hey!” a more familiar voice cut through it all. “Come on, sweetheart. Answer me.”

You blinked and caught yourself mid-gasp, staring into the deep green of Ben’s eyes.

Your head was resting on his shoulder, his hand pressed to the side of your cheek, which stung slightly, as if he’d had to try and wake you. His arm was wrapped around your waist in the booth.

He was gentle in sliding your hair away from your face, but his own was hard and almost angry, as his brows were knitted together. His gaze then traveled across the room, and you realized that there were other people in the restaurant now watching you and Ben. Even the servers stopped what they were doing at the sound of his shout.

He gave them all a pointed glare.

“What? Nothing to fucking see here,” he snapped. Most of them were wise enough to turn away, back to their meals and conversation. Ben focused on you as you caught your breath. You were finally able to support yourself, though you stayed leaning on his shoulder. He wasn’t about to let you go either, until he got some answers.

“What the hell happened?” he asked. You frowned at his gruff tone, until you met his eyes. Somehow, you could see that there was worry there.

You glanced down, and you closed your eyes when you saw it. You pressed your face into his arm to steady yourself.

“The uh…the knife,” you whispered. “It made me see something…remember something.”

“What did you remember?” he asked quickly. You sucked in a shuddering breath, squeezing your eyes shut tighter.

“Nothing good,” you whispered.

You felt him pause. You heard the shuffle of silverware, a thump on the table. Then his hand came up and cupped your cheek.

“It’s okay. I put it away,” he said.

Tears burned behind your eyelids, and you buried your face harder against his chest. At this point, it wasn’t just about seeing the knife. It was knowing that whatever had happened to you, it had truly been hell. Unlike anything you’d ever been through before.

“You want to go home?” came Ben’s voice, deep and steady in your ear.

You sniffed and nodded, as your tears seeped into the fabric of his sweater. He rubbed your back, holding you more securely.

“Okay,” he said. “Let’s go.”

Unfortunately, the episode at the restaurant led you to a migraine. Ben carried you to the master bedroom and laid you down, helped you undress down to your underwear, and gave you a shirt you liked to sleep in. He turned all the lights off and made sure the curtains were closed tight.

Marie brought you your pain medication with a glass of water. Ben hoped there was enough in your stomach that the pills wouldn’t make you nauseous as well, like they occasionally did.

After you took the meds, you curled up on the bed and closed your eyes tightly, trying not to whimper like a child. You’d dealt with pain before; that was nothing new. But this was getting ridiculous.

Ben gave Marie a certain look. “I’ve got it from here.”

She gazed at you with sympathetic tears in her eyes, but she nodded and touched his arm.

“If you need anything, just call for me,” she whispered.

Ben nodded, but he closed the door behind her and began by taking off his watch, then his shoes, pants, and sweater. He changed into a pair of sweatpants and a loose shirt.

You were too busy hugging your pillow and pressing your face into it. You didn’t realize he was still with you until the bed dipped behind you.

Ben turned you around and gathered you into his arms. You inhaled sharply, but then you clung to him. His chest and middle were warm, a bit unnaturally so.

“You’re hot,” you muttered, splaying a hand against his chest. “Like a radiator.”

Ben quirked a smile. “Yeah, you tend to complain about that.”

You shook your head and pressed yourself closer to him. “Not today.”

He wiped the tears from your cheek and laid a kiss on your forehead. He held you that way for a while, just silence and the sound of your breathing covering the room. Eventually, the pain medication began to kick in, helping to ease your pounding skull.

You pulled back enough to see Ben’s face. He was still awake, but he opened his eyes and met yours in the dim light. You reached up and touched his bearded cheek, hesitantly.

“Why can’t I remember?” you asked, in a broken voice.

Ben’s brows furrowed. He curled his hand around yours and let out a breath.

“I don’t know,” he said, but all he wanted was for this to be over.

“I could take this from you,” he said. “What’s the big fucking deal about a blood transfusion?”

Your fingers stilled against his cheek. Your tearful eyes averted from his, but you weren’t as opposed to the idea as you were before.

“The last time, it healed me?” you asked.

“Within the hour,” he said. His hand tightened a fraction on yours. “It’ll be like it never happened. And your memories could even come back.”

You sighed, briefly closing your eyes. Your hand fell from his cheek, but you nodded.

“Okay. I’ll think about it,” you said.

Ben’s frown remained, but at least it was a step in the right direction. He took your chin and slowly tilted your face up to his. You stared up at him with shining eyes. He didn’t like the pain he still saw there, but he did like the way you glanced down at his lips.

He took a chance, and he leaned down to meet you with a kiss. What first was a gentle touch, soon became heady as your hand slid up his arm and into his hair. He brought you flush against him and deepened the kiss, when his tongue swept past your lips and brushed against yours. You welcomed him in with a surprised moan.

He hadn’t tasted you in so damn long, it was like indulging a craving he’d been denying himself. It was even harder to slow down and ease away from your lips.

You rested your forehead against his chest afterward.

“Wow,” you breathed. “Okay.”

Ben chuckled. But unlike the movies, a kiss didn’t break the spell. You were his, but not completely.

He wanted nothing more than to show you how much you could be…but your body was still weak. He would have to continue protecting you, even from himself.

“I want to stay here tonight,” he said.

Despite his earlier thoughts, he didn’t think he could take one more night of not being with you in this bed. He could control himself. He just wanted to make sure you were all right, and safe with him.

It took you a moment to decide, but you nodded.

“You can stay,” you agreed, with a more teasing smile. “I don’t think your old man back can handle the couch anymore.”

He snorted in amusement. There was some more of your sense of humor peeking through.

Meanwhile, you still weren’t totally convinced that him sleeping in the bed with you was a good idea. A good part of you craved his nearness, and how he made you feel safe…but you also weren’t sure if you were ready to continue being so vulnerable with him.

Just when you were about to put some distance here between you and tell him to stay on his side, Ben rolled you back around so that your back was pressed to his chest. He slid a warm, strong arm around your waist. His lips pressed to your bare shoulder. The sleep shirt you wore (one of his old shirts) had ridden down your arm.

“Just relax,” he said. “I’ve got you.”

And you actually believed it.

You felt comfortable and secure in his embrace. Soon enough, you relaxed into him.

Sleep wasn’t easy, but you got there in time. It even lasted for a while.

Just not long enough.

In your dreams, there were flashes of things that didn’t make sense. They were jumbled together like white noise on a TV, occasionally screeching with color, and mostly red with blood.

You woke up shaking and sweating.

Ben was a light sleeper at best. He was startled awake in confusion, disturbed by how you had been tossing and turning and making sounds of distress. He turned toward you and moved his arm to make room for you, but he decided he would let you come to him this time.

You didn’t disappoint him. You reached for him and buried your face in the crook of his neck for a while, trying to ground yourself in him. He held you and rubbed your back until you calmed down.

When you pulled away slightly, and spoke his name in the dark, Ben looked into your eyes. For a moment, he could’ve sworn you were there. The real you.

“Thanks for staying with me,” you whispered.

Ben was disappointed. This wasn’t you remembering. But at least, this was you being you, thanking a man like him.

He just nodded and guided you back into his arms. You let him hold you for the rest of the night.

AN: So close, but yet so far. 🥲

But just wait for the last part...

Next Time:

You brushed your fingers over that picture in wonder. You didn’t remember that day, even though you were sure you must have been there…

It was so odd to see so much of your life in pictures, yet it was all still so fuzzy, or entirely blank in your mind.

You paused, blushing once again when you saw the picture of you getting out of the shower with the towel barely wrapped around your body. Why the hell would this be in a photo album?

You quickly moved on. Though you stopped next at a picture of you and Ben in what looked like a dark nightclub. The way he was holding you, looking at you like he was ready to devour you, and the way you were looking up at him, with a smile that said he’d better damn well try…

It made a sharp pain lance behind your eyes.

Ko-Fi Me ☕

Break Me Down Masterlist

Soldier Boy Masterlist

Main Masterlist

BMD/Series Tag List (Part 1):

@deans-spinster-witch @this-is-me19 @waynes-multiverse @samanddeaninatrenchcoat @spalady26

@spnwoman @syrma-sensei @wirdbeimaufhebengebunden @muhahaha303 @123passwort

@mrsjenniferwinchester @lyarr24 @xoxovienna @lollag0w0 @globetrotter28

@nancymcl @ashbatz @secretdreamlandmentality @kristophalis @wonderland2022

@emily-winchester @shelh93 @sl33pylilbunny @spoonmynoodle @chernayawidow

@buckybarnes-1917 @asgardprincess97 @sometimes-i-sing @itsyellow @theonlymaninthesky

@kimberleymjw @is-this-a-febreze-commercial @iamsapphine @sanscas @se-fucking-hun

@lassie-bird @jessjad @yepimthatperson @fromcaintodean @stoneyggirl2

@spnfamily-j2 @im-a-slut-for-fluff @lacilou @venicesem @mimaria420

@tearsfortheyouth @agalliasi @chriszgirl92 @kazsrm67 @deansbbyx

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runnning-outof-time · 2 days

Text

A Special Woman | Tommy Shelby x Reader (featuring a very special guest)

Request: no - written for @look-at-the-soul ‘s The Grandma Series

Pairing: Tommy Shelby x Reader & a very special guest

Summary: (Y/N)’s big day is made extra special by one of the most important people in her life.

Warnings: none

A/N: ok so there’s a lot of dancing happening here…I didn’t quite mean for it to be such a focal point, but I guess that’s what happens when you write fragments at a time. I hope it’s not overkill for y’all! I also wrote this envisioning it being set in modern times, but it could definitely be read in the PB period as well. Enjoy! :)

A/N 2: I’m sorry it took me sooo long to write this, Mar but I knew that I wanted to participate in this lovely celebration of yours. I hope you like it!!

I’D LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK! — YOUR COMMENTS & REBLOGS HELP ME WRITE!

Comment/Message me if you’d like to be tagged!

“Darling you look wonderful,” the older woman said to her granddaughter. It was probably the fourth time she’d assured her of it. “Stop fussing with your dress,” she then swatted the younger woman’s hands down.

“But what if it’s…”

“But nothing,” (Y/N) was brushed off yet again, “you’re dress is perfect. You’re perfect,” the older woman said as she moved to stand behind her. “Let me fix the back now.”

(Y/N) conceded, allowing her grandmother to work on getting the back of her dress tightened. She stood still as the buttons and ties were done up, her smile widening with each second that passed. This was really happening…soon enough she’d be married.

Her eyebrows furrowed together at the feeling of something cool being draped around her neck. She looked down and noticed that a small, light blue locket was now resting against her chest. Tears welled up in her eyes immediately as she realized exactly which locket this was.

This locket had been in her family since the day that her grandfather draped it around her grandmother’s neck. Inside of it was still a picture of the couple in their younger days. The love that was present between them in that photo still remained all of these years later. (Y/N) hoped that she’d have a love like that with the man she would soon vow to spend the rest of her life with.

“Gram…” she trailed off, getting choked up as she turned to look at the older woman.

“It’ll be your something blue,” her grandmother smiled back at her, “you wear it beautifully.”

“Thank you for allowing me to wear it,” (Y/N) said, wrapping her arms around the other woman then. “You know it’s always been one of my favorite pieces of yours,” she added once they pulled away from each other.

“Maybe I’ll get you one of your own then,” the older woman thought aloud, “you can add a photo of you and Thomas into it.”

The saying of her fiancé’s name was enough to set off butterflies in the bride-to-be’s stomach. She couldn’t help the little giddy dance she did before her grandmother took hold of her arms and squeezed them gently.

“Everything is ready for you now, (Y/N),” the event coordinator announced as she entered the dressing room.

(Y/N) acknowledged the statement before she turned back to her grandmother. The older woman instantly noticed the fact that nerves were seeping into her granddaughter’s features. She wouldn’t let them take over. “Let’s get you married,” she announced, sqeezing the younger woman’s arms once more before she led her out of the dressing room.

(Y/N) met with her mother and father in the lobby, accepting both of their arms so that they could help walk her down the aisle. She sent one last beaming smile to her grandmother, who waved at her before she entered the main area of the chapel to take her seat.

Tommy and (Y/N) found themselves on the dance floor directly after the wedding party introductions were made. They both knew that they’d share their first dance as a way to kick the reception off into full swing. A little bit of a calm before the storm, (Y/N) was calling it.

She enjoyed being held close by her husband. Even though all of their guests’ eyes were on them, she truly felt like she and Tommy were the only two people in the room.

“I’m happy all of that’s over,” Tommy mumbled into her ear, his cheek pressed against hers as they slowly swayed.

(Y/N) just had to pull her face away to see him clearly, her eyes slightly widened. “Are you saying you didn’t enjoy our wedding ceremony, Thomas Shelby?” she asked, feigning shock.

Tommy’s lips tugged up into a smirk upon seeing her expression. “Oh I enjoyed it, love,” he assured her, tilting his head to the side and grimacing slightly before he finished his statement, “the attention of our families, not so much.”

A breath of a laugh left (Y/N)’s lips as she ran her hand down the lapel of his suit jacket. “For a man who thrives off of power and attention I must say that I’m quite surprised to hear that.”

“I would’ve been happy with it being just you and I, eloping and then telling our families after the fact.”

“I don’t think our families would have appreciated that,” she commented with a smile.

“Even better,” he grinned, leaning in and pressing his lips to hers.

“Cake time!” (Y/N)’s mother exclaimed, prompting everyone to turn their attention to the newlyweds where they stood by their wedding cake. It was quite simple, a three-tiered cake that had silver and gold accents throughout its floral decorations.

Tommy and (Y/N) took hold of the cutting knife and together cut a piece of the cake from its bottom tier. Tommy held the plate between the two of them after making sure that (Y/N) had a fork.

“Clean or messy?” he asked, his words quiet enough so that only (Y/N) heard them.

“Clean…” she trailed off, raising her eyebrows and sending him a look that he immediately took as something along the lines of ‘messy later’.

“Cheeky,” he commented, winking at her before they both got a forkful of the cake.

“Whenever you’re ready!” her mom called, making the two remember that their party guests were still crowded around them. If there was one thing that (Y/N) and Tommy had down, it was that they were able to make each other feel as though they were the only people in the room.

The room broke out in applause as they cleanly placed the forkful of cake into each others mouth, and (Y/N) was easily able to distinguish Arthur’s wolf whistle amongst the cheers when Tommy leaned in and kissed her.

It was a bit later in the evening when (Y/N) saw that her grandmother was finally free. She’d been playing the role of social butterfly all night, meshing with Tommy’s family naturally. This may be the only time she was alone, so (Y/N) wasn’t going to wait a moment longer. “I’m going to go have a dance with gram, if that’s alright,” she told Tommy, making to leave the small group conversation they’d been pulled into.

“Go ‘head,” Tommy answered, sending her off with a soft smile.

“Shall we dance?” (Y/N) asked her grandmother as she approached her from the side.

“Oh!” the older woman exclaimed, surprised by the sudden voice. Her surprised expression quickly fizzled into a smile when she noticed who was beside her. “Of course, darling,” she hastily agreed, allowing her granddaughter to take her of her hand and lead her onto the dance floor.

“I see that you’re getting along with Tommy’s family fine,” (Y/N) made conversation as they swayed to the soft song.

“Swimmingly,” her grandmother smiled, glancing off to find Tommy, who was now talking with one of his brothers. “He’s good for you, (Y/N),” she added, looking back to her granddaughter.

“He is,” the younger woman agreed, smiling as she also snuck a glance over where her husband was. Her smile widened as she looked at her grandmother once more. “Thank you for all that you’ve done to help me today, gram,” she said.

“I want only the best for my granddaughter,” the older woman responded, her smile matching (Y/N)’s.

The sound of a throat being cleared made them both look to the side. Tommy was standing there, wearing a smile that made butterflies erupt in (Y/N)’s stomach. “May I steal her for a dance?” he asked, not addressing either of the ladies in particular.

“Of course,” (Y/N)’s grandmother immediately answered, stepping to the side so that he be able to take his bride’s hand.

“No, you,” he clarified, holding his hand out to the older woman.

“Really?” surprise was evident in her voice, “what a gentleman he is,” she then said to her granddaughter.

Tommy winked at his bride before he led her grandmother out onto the dance floor.

(Y/N) had to take a moment as she watched them begin to dance slowly. She quickly realized how grateful she was for those two people swaying out on the floor. She was grateful for Tommy; a man who she could love deeply and be loved deeply by. Those outside of their circle may not think that Tommy Shelby was capable of a love like that, but that was the Tommy Shelby that (Y/N) has the pleasure of knowing.

She was also grateful for her grandmother; a woman who was truly the cornerstone of her family. A woman who taught (Y/N) how to be the woman she is take. Her grandmother was truly special, and (Y/N) knew that without her, she wouldn’t know where she’d be.

MASTERLIST

Postnote: it ended rather abruptly there…I didn’t mean for that, but I’ve been hanging onto it for a looong time and wanted it to finally be out in the world. It’s also only loosely edited because…well I wanted to just get it posted already.

Tagged: @mystcldydrms @the-anxious-youth @cloudofdisney @look-at-the-soul @elenavampire21

@mrsalwayswrite @julkaamazing @evita-shelby @notyour-valentine @theshelbyslimited

@peakyswritings @just-a-blackhole @watercolorskyy @strayrockette @peakyduchesss

@alexxavicry @captivatedbycillianmurphy @yummycastiel @dark-academia-slut @tommystargirl

@emotionalcadaver @stevie75 @lyarr24 @signorellisantichrist @zablife

@anotherblinder @cillmequick @dandelionprints @letal-y-poetica @garrison-girl-08

@insanitybyanothername @depxiety @justrainandcoffee @dragons-are-my-favorite @forgottenpeakywriter

@cljordan-imperium @brummiereader @red-riding-wood @everythingelseisextra @little-diable

@thomashelbyswife @shaddixlife @ryecosse @padfootdaredmetoo

127 notes · View notes

leclercsluvs · 8 hours

Text

CL16/DR3 | Already Over | smau

part 7

an: i'm not really sure how long this is going to be, but i am pretty sure it's not going to be too many more parts. pairing: charles leclerc x fem!reader, daniel ricciardo x fem!reader

charles_leclerc

liked by carlossainz55, landonorris and 5.619.174 others charles_leclerc been working on some new stuff. written for a specific person. love you.

carlossainz55 you're doing everything you can huh?

charles_leclerc i've got to show i'm the one for her landonorris that's the reason you sent her flowers without letting her know? danielricciardo the flowers were from you? maxverstappen1 ooo charles needs to watch out next race

scfty/n i'm scared this isn't good.

norrislcve oh lord i fear for the next race.

luvsricciardo okay but imagine seeing daniel absolutely fight the shit car he has just so he can threaten charles?? it's gonna be exciiiiting norrislcve and if he takes them both out of the race?? luvsricciardo good for him tbh. charles lowkey deserves it norrislcve you don't even know the full story??? you have a few paparazzi photos and an album FROM ONE SIDE and you decide charles deserves to be taken out of a race? if they can't separate their private life and the race it self, they should NOT be racing.

f1updates

liked by sharllve, lecsluv and 1.279 others f1updates we have been sent these photos that is supposedly yourusername back in ferrari merch. is this a hint towards anything? tagged: yourusername

scfty/n those first two photos are literally old, and the last photo isn't even her?? she posted those two photos on her instagram after one of the first races she attended with charles.

leclrcs i literally saw here there tho, and she was wearing jeans like that scfty/n and that's supposed to prove what? that she reuses jeans? and there's literally two types of jeans here, a pair of black and a pair of light blue 🤨

wrldofleclerc i saw her there, but she was wearing a mclaren jacket (probably to support her bf??)

yourusername

liked by charles_leclerc, danielricciardo and 4.719.720 others yourusername well it seems some people were concerned with what i was wearing at the race this weekend. ferrari? nah. mclaren? yes. (he caught me trying to be sneaky while taking a photo) tagged: danielricciardo

danielricciardo to be honest you don't have to be sneaky. you can take photos of me anyday. i know i look good

yourusername you're right. i can take photos of you anytime. because i'm your girlfriend. i dont need permission 🥰 landonorris if he ever says you can't take photos of him, you're free to start taking photos of me 🙃 yourusername might take advantage of that offer. thank you danielricciardo don't steal my girlfriend 😠

y/nsvsp looks better than the red tbh

leclercsbae how dare you? y/nsvsp just speaking the truth 🤷 wrldofy/n can we agree she looks amazing in everything tho?

lecswrld good for you tbh. tell them

yourusername

liked by charles_leclerc, danielricciardo and 2.823.973 others yourusername all talked out, don't worry no one's being pushed off the track this weekend. right? am i going back to red? never. i found my color 🧡 tagged: charles_leclerc, danielricciardo

danielricciardo speak for yourself, i'm pushing people off the track i need to get back on that podium

charles_leclerc not the best way to do it mate landonorris you're letting me stay right? your favorite teammate? danielricciardo let's see yourusername don't threaten lando. he's too precious.

lecswrld he already looks so much happier!

rics.aep omggg they're friiiiends

luvsnorris are they getting back together?

leclercsaep i doubt it. with the rumors of him having cheated and her being in a happy relationship, there's probably a slim chance y/n and charles will get together

charles_leclerc

liked by yourusername, pierregasly and 1.718.032 others charles_leclerc was forced to tasted this green thing. never doing that again. absolutely horrifying. tagged: yourusername, maxverstappen1

maxverstappen1 and you loved it

yourusername you charles you loved it >:( charles_leclerc i absolutely did not. i hated it. horrible. worst time of my life. maxverstappen1 worse than qualifying in baku 2019? charles_leclerc blocked.

pierregasly thank you for these photos. they're amazing.

yourusername i have some of max too. wanna see them? charles_leclerc YOU DIDN'T POST THOSE? yourusername no, not yet. do you see them on my profile? maxverstappen1 if you post those, i will make sure both daniel AND charles will end up in the wall on sunday. charles_leclerc you wouldn't danielricciardo i am shook.

comicallec everyone say a thanks to y/n for taking these photos

landonorris thank you y/n 🙏

danielricciardo

liked by yourusername, mclaren and 2.492.129 others danielricciardo back on that top step baby! knew it was possible 💪 tagged: mclaren

landonorris excuse me did you forget that i was there with you???

danielricciardo my dear friend, you are in the second photo. landonorris was expecting more aknowledgement ngl yourusername don't worry i took lots of photos where it's visible landonorris at least someone cares about my feelings

mclaren so proud of our drivers for the 1-2 this weekend! 💪

yourusername

liked by landonorris, danielricciardo and 3.111.304 others yourusername since my boyfriend couldn't care less about including lando, heres a few photos from the weekend that includes lando (i'm aware most of you follow me for my singing and not these randon guys that likes driving fast cars, but i'm just very proud 🥹 i'm leaving for tour in a couple of days and then you'll get all sorts of content) tagged: danielricciardo, landonorris, mclaren

landonorris THANK YOU

danielricciardo you're acting like i didn't include you AT ALL 🥲 landonorris because you barely did maxverstappen1 yeah mate you could have put in some more effort yourusername yeah daniel you could have included at least one more with him. danielricciardo wow i see how it is

ncrrisfav YESSSS gimme gimme gimme

landonorris

liked by yourusername, danielricciardo and 1.908.166 others landonorris daniel hurt my feelings so he's not being included >:( thank you yourusername for the second photo! amazing weekend. would not recommend drinking champagne from daniel's shoe tho tagged: danielricciardo, mclaren

yourusername yeah honestly drinking from daniel's shoe, disgusting.

danielricciardo and i thought you loved me landonorris your feet sweat tastes disgusting. never doing that again danielricciardo can i bribe you?? landonorris depends how much you're willing to pay yourusername disgusting.

norris.vfx god the content we're getting right now is AMAZING

clarkeybog ikr?? loving it!

okayyy i'm not entirely sure how many more parts are left. i'm not making more than ten parts in total and i might make a time jump longer than the ones i've sort of implied. i'm not sure tho. BUT it's now weekend and that means 1. my parents are away (wooo) and 2. i can write whenever i want. so i'm expecting my brain to produce some ideas throughout the day. hopefully i'll get this finished soon, because i have so many other plans that i can't carry out as long as this is in the back of my mind (my brain does not have space for too many ideas at once) but as i said, i know how it's going to end so i just need to figure out a way to get there.

#charles leclerc x reader #f1smau #f1 x female reader #f1 x reader #f1 x y/n #f1 x you #formula 1 #formula 1 smau #formula 1 x y/n #formula 1 x you #formula one x you #daniel ricciardo x y/n #daniel ricciardo x you #daniel ricciardo x reader #daniel ricciardo #charles leclerc

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writingforstraykids · 3 days

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okay SO this may be a weird question but i've gotta start somewhere 😭

i kept seeing your name being tagged everywhere but i hadn't scrolled across any of your works (sad ik). but literally i just kept seeing your username so i was like "okay i have to find out who this person is omg" and BABY WHY DO YOU HAVE SO MUCH CONTENT OMG 😭😭 i love it but it's also like wow... i strive to be this sm??? but also it's like where do i even start here? 🥲

this is my long winded way of asking: do you have any favorites you've written or recommendations of what fics to start on for all the newbies to your blog? with my stuff, ik i have certain ones i'm most proud of/pleased with, so if any come to mind for you, pls pls let me know! ❤️

Not a weird question at all, I've gotten worse😂

Oh, hahaha, well, thank you for checking out my blog after tumblr seems to have thrown me right into your face😂 uhh, honestly, because I'm insane. I love procrastinating uni assignments, clearing my head with writing instead. I usually work on fics for at least an hour of the day (my sleep schedule is fucked), and I work on like five things at the same time at least to avoid getting stuck anywhere...I also had a schedule of posting 4 times a week which I had to stop, not it's like 2 to 3 times a week😂

There's two ways to tackle this😂:

1. Okay soo most of my fics are Minchan or include either Chan, Minho or Felix. So if your bias is one of them, go wild😂 I only recently started writing more for the others as well. I'd recommend you start out easy with the masterlists for Seungmin, Changbin, Jisung, Jeongin and Hyunjin; there's one soft thoughts fic for each. Then probably Felix, his is still short. Check out Minho's and Chan's individual masterlist then if you want stuff with a reader. Me and my friend @zehina also started posting weekly rambles that are just soft thoughts on all the members.

If you're into pairings among the members, go check out the member x member (mostly smut, one Jilix/2min fluff thing) and the Minchanlix one. For Minchanlix, you'll find something with the reader as well; the Chanlix master list is mostly with a reader. If your favorite pairing is Minchan (with or without the reader)…almost half of my fics are on that Minchan master list.

2. Some fics/series I really love currently (15.05.24) are:

Always back to you (single!dad!Minho x male!Reader) - ongoing series

All the times you fell in love with Minho (x femReader)

All the times you fell in love with Chan (x femReader)

It's always been you (Chan x male!Reader)

Finding home in your heart (dilf!Lix x femReader) - ongoing mini series

You don't need me (Minchanlix x femReader)

You're so cute (soft!dom!Chan x first time sub!Changbin)

Second chance (Minchan x femReader)

Only the best for you (Minchan -> will become a poly!skz series)

More than friends (Minchan x femReader) - series

I owe you a kiss (Minchan x femReader) - ongoing series

Addicted to you (Minchan) - the first thing I wrote for skz; there's bonus content planned - series

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do-not-fearr · 2 days

Text

Grabbing the Bull by the Horns - Asterius x Reader - Part 1

So my hiatus was already technically over, but my writing was taking forever lol. Anyways here's a new story, and there's not even smut in it (yet!). Friend keeps making fun of my beefy (geddit) intros before the actual smut, but I can't help it. This was the worst offender though, so I decided to cut this one into two parts with part 2 having the smut. Written while traveling so I hope there aren't too many mistakes!

Pairing: Minotaur x f!Reader

Wordcount: 4833 words

Tags: blood, mentions of death (minor), no smut

Summary: After a series of unfortunate events you find yourself in a labyrinth, trying to find you way out. The minotaur helps you find your way.

Crying in a tangled mess of red thread, that's how he found you at the end of the labyrinth. But really, there was no other way he could've found you, for the labyrinth did not have an end. With walls that changed and paths that were ever winding, you were doomed from the moment you were put inside, and his heart squeezed in his chest. This labyrinth was used as punishment for heavy crimes committed by the supernatural, and he wondered why you were here. The crimson red thread you had used to find your way around was now tangled around you. It was a nice visual touch on soft, exposed skin, your hands raw and bloody from unwinding the coarse wool that had finally run out, and he felt the need to get closer. Jeans ripped at the knees showing chafed skin underneath, face dirtied with tears and dried blood. You looked like a frightened animal in need of comfort.

He, however, refrained. He was a monster, created to punish those thrown in the labyrinth. He was afraid he could not be gentle or soft, blood already pounding in his ears from the bloodlust that crawled just beneath his skin. A scream from elsewhere had his ears perk up - he'd get the others first, he told himself. Maybe the labyrinth would end you before he had to. He ignored the silent hope inside him that you would survive.

How did any of this come to be? You were just an average person. Well, an average hungry person. You had spend all day on a new hobby that had completely taken over your mind lately; knitting - and it was well into the late evening when you realized you hadn't had dinner yet. A groan escaped you when you realized you didn't have any food to cook, and you had to go outside to the store despite how comfortable you were at the moment.

"Why am I like this?" you muttered to yourself as you put on your coat, grabbing a bag and you wallet just before stepping out. It was dark out, just after sunset, and despite the fact that it wasn't quite that late yet there were no people around. An almost eerie silence hung in the air as you quickly made your way to the supermarket. Something felt wrong, but you couldn't put your finger on it. There were goosebumps on your arms, but relief in your sigh as your eyes found the well lit windows of the supermarket. You couldn't see anyone inside, but the familiar sight had you release some tension none the less. The door already opened, warm air greeting you as your feet brought you closer to the threshold where outside met inside.

Just before you could enter however, you were grabbed from behind, and all the tension inside you returned full force as an embarrassing screech escaped you. Struggling against this unseen assailant you used your full body weight to pull yourself forward, into the safety of the supermarket, as someone yelled something in your ear you couldn't quite decipher. The voice registered as female as you fell back, and you realized they were begging you to wait.

The struggle left you as you slowly turned back to her, seeing a frightened looking woman about your age, hunched over and holding her arms around her body protectively.

"I'm sorry for grabbing you," she spoke quickly with hushed tone, as if she was afraid someone was going to overhear you. "I was just so scared. There is no one out here, only us, and I thought that if you were to cross the threshold into the supermarket I'd be completely alone out here."

What a strange thing to say. "Why don't you come with me inside then? You startled me to death... I could've hurt you, or myself." There was something off about her, but you weren't sure what exactly it was that made alarm bells go off in your brain. One thing that dawned on you was that it wasn't just your own feeling that the outside world was eerily empty and quiet. What was going on?

"I've... I've done something bad," the woman said, something dark coming over her expression for just a second before the air of wild fear replaced it again. Her flailing arms motioned to something around in an uncoordinated manner, but you weren't sure what she was referring to. "I think this is for me."

...yeah. She had lost the plot. You were going to go inside the supermarket and ask for help, because you both probably needed it at this point. "Okay..." was your answer as you shuffled backwards towards the safety of the store. "I'm just gonna... find someone, okay?"

She lunged forward again, and you stumbled, falling to the ground with her on top of you. Your knees burned, and a sound of pain escaped you as you were once again stopped from entering. So close to the door it opened again, the sounds of conversation and the beeping of the scanners meeting your ears. It was as if no one noticed what was going on in front of them though, as the woman struggled to pull you back.

"Help!" you gasped while she held you down with surprising strength. It almost felt like your voice stopped at the door, and even when you made eye contact with someone they looked right through you. "Let me go!"

"I can't-" she growled, "If I do I'll be- I think I might-"

Might what? You had no idea what was going on, and it seemed she, unhinged as she was, at least had an inkling. Your eyes widened when someone finally walked your way from inside, hoping to finally get some help, only for them to disappear right in the middle of the doorway. It was like there was some sort of barrier between you and the other people; only you and this crazy woman inside of this empty, backroom-esque outdoors.

"What did you do? What is going on?" you fought as hard as you could, grabbing your bag to have something to hit her with, a ball of red yarn rolling out almost comically as the bag made contact softly and without any impact. A curse left you at this, and fear renewed inside of you when her hands found their way around your throat, choking you with desperation.

"I don't deserve this," she grated out, "It was their own fault..." Your hands scratched at hers, blood welling up surprisingly quickly beneath your nails, but she did not let go. Her eyes bulged as the blood dripped down your arms in thin streams, watching as it dirtied your clothes. Her demeanour grew more feverish as she wailed out: "I will not be captured. I'll let them take you instead!"

Drool hung from your lips as you felt your eyesight blur, but the moment you thought it was the end she let go, jumping from you towards the safety of the supermarket. You saw her enter almost too easily, and she looked back one more time, towards you, where her dark eyes now looked straight through you.

She was safe, but were you? With tears in your eyes you got up quickly, body aching as you moved. Grabbing the stupid ball of red yarn as you angrily put it in you bag, hurrying to follow the woman inside. Rushing to get out of this uncanny empty world, but before you could take one step on unsteady feet the ground below you opened up and swallowed you whole.

Your hearing came back before the rest of your senses as you jolted up from a scream somewhere too close for comfort. It was darker than before when you came to- eyes slowly adjusting to realize you were staring at a blank wall. Behind you was another wall, but to both your sides was a dark, seemingly never ending corridor. Growing darker the further it seemed to stretch. You jolted to your feet when another scream came from your right, much closer than the first, or at least that's what you thought with you being unconscious before and all.

Quickly you made your way down the dark corridor, the only thing lighting your path the moon coming from above. For a moment you thought about climbing the walls to get a better look at where you were, but when you ran your hand over painfully smooth stone you dropped that idea. The walls were high, and had nothing you could grip onto. There was no way you were going to be able to climb them without help, so you just needed to move forward and hope to find an exit out of this nightmare soon.

The road split in two, and you groaned. Left of you another long, dark hall stretched out, to your right you could see another split in the distance. Looking up there was nothing but dark skies, filled with stars you couldn't name in your growing panic. There was nothing to tell you where to go, no place you could remember for later, and you realized your breathing had picked up significantly, deafening you to the world around.

Where were you going to go? Well, both sides seemed equally uninviting, and you really didn't want to pick one at random... Until heavy, dragging footsteps from behind made you choose the right quickly. Drawing a cross on the dirt with your feet as you went so you would recognize this spot later. No use in thinking too hard when you were being followed by someone. Chances of them helping you out in this crazy labyrinth were practically non-existent, and if they were here to harm you as your gut feeling was screaming at you it was best to just run. Deciding to just choose right every time since you would... probably... reach an exit if you just kept your right hand on one wall even when the clouds obscured the moon stealing your vision was your plan of action. The sounds behind you had ceased, but instead the longer you were walking around the more other sounds you could make out. A slight mumbling suddenly filled your ears as you turned a corner, and you strained your ears to make out what was being said- unable to find the source of the voices until you put your ear against one of the walls.

It seemed that two people on the other side were having a hushed conversation that slowly rose in volume before turning into straight up screaming. You stepped away from the wall as you realized what you were hearing sounded much like a lovers spat, the two people on the other side blaming the other for being here and being lost. Thoughts about finding them somehow died before you could think about it properly as strange snarling sounds suddenly overtook the sounds of them yelling, and their yelling turned into frightened screaming. Ripping and splattering sounds quickly followed as the screaming turned into gurgles, and all blood withdrew from your face at your realization that something had brutally murdered them. It sounded snarling and monstrous, and you were frozen on the spot, not knowing whether moving ahead or moving back was going to bring you closer towards it. There was only a wall between you now, and you were unsure how thick the wall was, and if the murderer could tell you were on the other side. A small whimper escaped you before you could swallow the sound, and your limbs started shaking from the strain of standing so still, hunched over. Shit, had it heard you? Holding your breath you listened for any indication, blood running cold when you heard a strange sniffing sound. Could it... could it possibly smell you from the other side? Tears gathered in your eyes but you kept still, listening for any signs of the creature coming your way, but a loud scream coming from further back startled you so much you jumped. Thankfully no further sound escaped you as you heard a strange war cry from the other side. You decided this was the moment to run. Bolting away further down your path, opposite to the sound of the scream - possibly from another unlucky victim coming upon what you could only imagine was a gruesome murder scene and some sort of animal.

You rounded the corner and stopped when you found another split in the road, only this time you could vaguely make out a hastily scribbled cross in the dirt on the split to the left.

He smelled blood. He smelled blood everywhere, and it was driving him crazy. As a being created to punish, both his bloodlust and his sense of justice were elevated beyond that of a human. And all the ones he came across he would punish - as they deserved. A rallying cry escaped him as strong human legs carried him forward, further into the labyrinth. He'd find all that were lost in here, sooner or later. The labyrinth may let the ones inside escape, eventually, he would not.

Your mind was running in circles and so were you it seemed. But not only had you been here before, the cross was on the wrong side. Had you turned back somewhere? Was someone playing a trick on you by writing the cross on the other side? Or had someone else had the same idea as you? There was no use in thinking about it calmly, that stop had come and passed. Thinking about things calmly was no longer in the stars for you, and when you suddenly thought about the red yarn in your backpack it almost felt like your brain shouldn't have been clear enough for such a realization. You feared there was nothing you could tie it to, but you suddenly found a hook attached to the wall you hadn't noticed before. It was pretty close to the floor, so there was nothing you could do with it other than tie your little yarn to it, and start walking once again. Now you couldn't be confused with other people's marks, and if you'd take a turn to see your red thread you'd know to take another route. Slowly you started walking again, taking the right once again, glaring daggers at the cross as you went.

You passed piles of something, and you were about to investigate when you noticed the dark pools muddying the sand beneath it. The blood on the walls was the next thing you saw and you backed away. Someone, something had been slaughtered here, pieces of it scattered on the floor and you shuddered, moving on quickly, your eyes trained on the road ahead.

It was going well enough, until at the next corner your thread went taut. There had been significant slack before, and it was too sudden to just be because you hadn't unrolled your yarn enough, it was almost like someone was pulling it and you stopped in your tracks. A small curse escaped you when the rope went slack again. One thing that you left yourself vulnerable to with your idea was that someone could follow you inside this maze perfectly, so you picked up your pace. There were sounds from all around you that scared the shit out of you, but you had to keep going; you had to find the exit. You went by another corner and your eyes caught sight of a red thread, tangled and messy but undeniably yours. You were about to turn the other way when you noticed something strange. Instead of coming from a hallway the yarn seemed to come straight from the corner of where 2 walls met, and you stepped forward to look at it a little closer, confused. You pulled at it a little and though at first you thought it was stuck there when you tried a little harder you could actually pull the yarn out further. Frayed from the friction of the stone it was trapped between it snapped as something terrible dawned on you.

The yarn continued behind this wall, so you had come through this wall. There had been a clear path before, and now there was not. Panicked you looked at the ground, finally seeing how the earth seemed to have been moved and displaced by what you could only assume to be the large, moving walls. Cursing yourself for not not noticing this earlier you realised it wouldn't have mattered. Knowing this could only bring you hopelessness, and you were almost glad you hadn't known this from the start; all your hope suddenly dashed as you felt a dark pit of despair almost swallow you up. But you couldn't stop now.

Wrought with desperation, you moved on, unable to blink back tears as you knew walls shifted and moved behind you, leaving an ever changing maze around that you're sure has no end. Until you just can't anymore. Exhausted, desperate, crying, tangled in your own useless yarn, you collapsed against one of the walls.

And that's when you saw him for the first time. There's fear, raw, painful fear that numbed and rooted you to the spot, as you locked eyes with black pools that stared back unblinkingly. You recognised the creature that's standing still at the end of a hallway as a minotaur. Not that you'd ever seen one in real life of course, but you've read myths about a maze and a minotaur. It's almost funny how you seemed to be inside of one of those stories yourself, and you felt a hysterical cackle bubbling up that you only barely held down, too scared to make a peep.

"You don't belong here," it said, voice deep and rumbling and not entirely human. "There must've been a mistake." he voiced exactly what you had been thinking all this time and this time you couldn't stop the dry chuckle that left you.

"Can you take me out of here then?" the creature flinched, and you almost felt something like unease coming from him, legs ready to bolt. You were sure there was no way he could be afraid of you though.

She was still there. He had seen her, left for other business and come back, and she was still where she had been before; unmoving. She had given up. A part of him wanted to laugh at her weakness, rile her up so she'd run from him with renewed desperation, but another part was concerned for her, telling him that she didn't belong here. After all, she was just a simple human, and simple humans didn't get judged in the maze.

"How did you get here?" he said after a long silence. "You should be able to return from the way you came." The look you gave him would have been comical if the situation wasn't so grave.

"You mean inside of the maze? just... retrace my steps until I'm back to where I was? Or do you mean how I got to the maze in the first place? I don't know how to get back either way."

He nodded, crossing strong arms in front of a muscular chest, and you shivered. Now that you got a good look at him you noticed he was covered in blood. Old blood flaking off, new blood splattered across a broad chest. And ever since you'd locked eyes with the creature you had tried not to look at its head, fresh fear coursing through you with each accidental peak. There was a monster right in front of you; the thing that had ripped the others apart, the reason for the screams you'd heard. However you felt no immediate threat from the creature, not with the way he was pondering your answer, arms crossed and tapping a bloodied finger on an even bloodier arm. Head tilted half to the sky as he murmured to himself, the occasional flick of his furry ears and the tapping the only movement coming from him. Oh and the tail that lazily swished behind him, comically cleaning a spot on the wall behind him with its movement.

Well, there you were. He should kill you now, everyone else was already dead or taken by someone else. You were the only one left, and if he didn't do it now someone else would take his prey from him. The fact that you hadn't run into any traps yet surprised him, and he was almost angry that he had to be the one to do this. He looked you over again, but found that he couldn't do it. Something in him stopped him from seeing you as prey, no matter how desperate and frail and somehow cute you were at this moment. What was he to do?

You were unsure why, but you were somehow calmed by his presence. Slowly you gained the mental energy to untangle yourself from your own yarn, the red digging into your skin, tangles evidence of your earlier breakdown.

"Will you help me get out?" you meekly asked, as you put the newly wound ball of yarn on the ground next to you, one thread of it reaching towards where the Minotaur was standing; the way you came from. The ball was small, unless you were going to reach the end soon there was no way the yarn would last all the way, but you couldn't part with it just yet. As you stood up you reached for it, holding it tightly in sore hands as if it was your lifeline. The minotaur seized you up it seemed, not replying yet. You shivered, fatigue in your expression, and he made a strange sound in the back of his throat, uncrossing his arms and snorting.

"Well, you wouldn't be able to get out by yourself, would you?"

It was true, obviously. It wasn't for lack of trying, but could you trust him? Probably not, but did you have a choice?

"Please?"

Well, how could he possibly say no to that. "Fine." it was less a word than it was a grunt, but when he walked up to you and grabbed your arm you felt both relief and panic flood you all the same. He was rough, pulling you along as he looked around like a wild animal, grunting and snorting, his ears flicking this way and that as his tail hit your legs once in a while while you stumbled behind him.

Your panic and his wild state made you uncomfortable, and you weren't sure if you wanted to fill the silence with your ramblings, but when he asked something along the lines of "How did you even get caught up in this?" the words spilled from your mouth like water. You told him about the strange streets of your hometown, you told him about the lady that had grabbed you and prevented you from going to the store, how something seemed off about her, but you couldn't quite place it, and that after she had ran off you had lost consciousness. He nodded his large bull head, a movement much larger than if a human would do the same, and the movement caused a small smile to form on your face. You had never seen a creature quite like him, and as he dragged you along seemingly already traveled hallways you had time to look your saviour over properly.

The first obvious thing was his head; a black horned bull head with wild, flaming eyes, a snarling mouth and somehow adorable furry ears that flicked nervously. From his neck down he was a well build man with bronze skin, countless scars and a tail that trailed behind him, hitting you against your legs once in a while. The only thing he wore was a loincloth and you had to tear your eyes away from him as you focused on the road ahead, trying not to think about the fact that you definitely liked what you saw. You wondered how far you'd have to go to get out, and if you were even able to get out, your thoughts interrupted by a cuss and walls moving in front of you so abruptly that both you and the minotaur struggled to stop in time. He managed, but you bumped straight into him, the fleshy sound of your bodies colliding echoing off the walls. You apologised profusely, but he shushed you suddenly with a hand over your mouth, pulling you back in a dark corner you hadn't realised was there at first.

You looked back inquisitively over his large hand still covering your lower face and met his wild eyes once more. He puffed out some air and looked away, motioning to something up ahead in one of the paths that had opened up just now. Two identical men came walking down the path, but there was something strange about them that made you shiver and want to look away. He loosened his grip and you quickly turned around into his chest, unable to bear looking at the two that appeared, and hoping they'd leave quickly. When their voices came closer he pushed you back into the dark corner, stepping in front of you and bristling loudly.

"What are you doing here?" he roared, and you made yourself smaller behind him, "This is my area."

One of them spoke, a sound that made you flinch, despite the fact that it was a very normal human voice, unlike the one from the minotaur.

"No it's not." it said, "you went outside of your territory, Aster."

The other continued, but their voices were so similar it could've been the same guy. "There's talk about a human still being free somewhere around here, and we'd like to find it ourselves."

"Humans are a rarity around here. We wonder how they taste."

Aster, as you assumed his name was, bristled once again. "She's my prey!" he said while stomping the ground, making sand fly up. It was quite like an actual bull ready to charge and you heard some shuffling from the two men, their terrible voices getting further away as they decided not to fight Aster on this just yet. His wording hadn't filled you with much confidence though, and you wondered if your feeling of safety behind the broad back of this beast was justified.

"Finders keepers," one said.

"Eat it, or keep it as a pet, I wonder which one is more appealing..." the other added, before their voices faded to nothing and it was quiet again, safe for the sound of your panicked heartbeat in your chest.

"Will you kill me?" you asked him after a little bit, dodging his hand as he reached out to grab your arm again and he huffed.

"I should," he said, "That's my job."

Your legs trembled as you put your feet a little further apart, toes digging into the soil as you were ready to bolt, but he grabbed you before you could, fingers once again digging into your skin. He was rough, but at your flinch his fingers loosened a bit. Not enough so that you could run, but enough that it didn't actually hurt you.

"I won't though. You don't belong here, and I will make sure you get out safe. There's no sport in hunting the weak and innocent." The last part was added under his breath but you could just make it out, once again taking note of the blood that still covered him. Well, you had little choice but to trust him at this point, following him once again as he started walking. You didn't run into anyone else before you got to a large opening, greenery growing against the walls from the abundance of nature outside of it.

Your heart made a little jump in your chest when you realised you'd reached the exit of the labyrinth, and you squeezed Aster's hand.

"It's the exit!" you whispered to him, and he nodded his large head.

"Yes," he replied bluntly, letting go of your hand. "Just crossing the threshold should be enough to send you back to your world. Now go."

You skipped forward, stopping to look back at Aster one last time, thanking him for helping you awkwardly and waving, wondering if you should give him a hug or something and deciding that was probably a bit too much. You were turning around when from the corner of your eyes you saw quick movement.

It was one of the guys you'd seen before, and he was now standing between you and the exit. When you looked back at Aster for help you saw the other one stand between you and Aster, both laughing widely and showing pure black inside. You had finally found the exit, but now there was another obstacle between you and freedom. Were you ever going to get out of here?

@stygianoir

#Terato #monster x reader #x reader #x y/n #minotaur #mythical creatures #my work

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