everything mine | desktop only: everything mine but chronological
stories
snippets
everything Gaz
everything Soap
everything Ghost
everything Price
everything multi-141 and poly 141
everything Alejandro
everything KorTac
everything Hesh and Keegan
tag games/ask games
---series masterlists---
soulmate Soap
gym partner Gaz
post-apocalypse au
shark mermen 141 AU
---other series---
pick up lines
at Gaz: looking good.
at Soap: do you have a mirror in your pants? because i can see myself in them.
at Soap: what’s the difference between an enzyme and a hormone? you can’t hear an enzyme.
at Soap: do you like magic? because I’ve got a rabbit and a wand we can use.
^ follow-up: i think you broke me. / would you rather i broke your bed instead?
at Gaz: call me bunny, cause i wanna bounce on your lap
^ follow-up in the car
messy sexual tension Gaz
01: Gaz making things sexual on purpose
02: Gaz being jealous
03: Gaz getting your lewd selfie
04: …
soft dom gaz (wholesome route)
01: falling into bed with soft dom Gaz
02: waking up next to soft dom Gaz
soft dom gaz (toxic route)
01: flirting with Gaz on the job
02: spreading rumors about dating Gaz
03: spreading rumors about dating Gaz, part 2
snippet: you like it when Gaz bullies you
snippet: Gaz isn’t gonna fix you <3
snippet: Gaz “savior complex” Garrick
TF-141 and free use medic reader
free use + rough sex + group sex
Soap is pissed
Ghost and Gaz protective over you
Ghost teaching Soap how to take care of their toy
with Alejandro
first time meeting Ghost
Ghost + coworkers with benefits, part 1
Ghost + coworkers with benefits, part 2
dark courtly love au
01. a courtly love au, but unhinged
02. Ghost is a weapon
witch!reader and familiars!141 au
snippet: witch of the wilds reader
shapeshifter familiars 141 tormenting witch reader, part 1
part 2
part 3
part 4
part 5 + epilogue
---misc by character---
Soap
“And why would a medic need a call sign?”
Soap is a munch, but it’s not for your benefit
meeting best friend Soap at the airport (hurt/comfort)
Soap indulging himself on you
Gaz
Gaz plays tank; you play healer
snippet: Gaz bites you bites you bites you bites y
Price
smutty collab: Price impolitely asking for your attention
Nikto
Nikto and honeypot reader (a la red sparrow)
Hesh
offering to help Hesh out with his virginity
Keegan
snippet: let me divorce you
snippet: ex-husband keegan
Captain MacTavish
treating you like an unruly kitten
^ soft counterpart: when you keep fighting him anyway
multi
snippet: thinkin about a reader who is a people-pleaser in bed (with TF141)
inspired wholly by this hard of hearing!simon by @ynstark — i’ve been plagued by the thought ever since
cw: suggestive
he hears the kettle just fine when it whistles, and he hears the front door when it slams with the wind. what he doesn’t hear, almost ever, is you.
“john,” you call.
you get nothing in return. he’s got his feet up on the coffee table, his reading glasses sliding down the bridge of his nose, some dense paperback open in his hands.
“john,” you try again, huffing.
still nothing. the corner of the room he’s not facing may as well be another county.
you cross to the sofa and stop right in front of him until the shape of you finally registers and he looks up over the rim of his glasses, eyebrows lifting like you’ve appeared out of nowhere.
“what?”
“i called for you twice.”
“did you?” he asks, lips pursing slightly.
you’ve been dealing with this for a long while. over dinner, leaning across the table, repeating yourself, watching him nod at the wrong moments and answer questions you never asked. in the kitchen, talking to his back, getting nothing in return. in bed, breathing his name against his neck, not getting the same response from him you would’ve got a few years ago.
decades of gunfire and breaching charges and the thumping punch of helo rotors, year over year. by the time anyone thought to check, preserving it was out of the question because the damage was already there. the audiologist had been matter-of-fact about it. showed him the chart, the slope of it dropping off. he nodded along like it was someone else’s ear.
the hearing aids have been sitting in the dish by the bathroom sink for weeks, untouched. they’re good ones too. tiny things. they sit down in the canal, you’d have to be nose-to-nose with him to spot the little nub of them, and even then you’d have to know to look. nothing hooks over the ear or catches in the light.
he just wont wear them.
“i’m not seventy,” he’d said the once you really pushed it. “m’not puttin’ in hearing aids.”
“you’re wearing them, john. you already had them fitted.”
“i don’t need them,” he’d protested. “not day to day.”
which is how you ended up here, two weeks later, watching the back of his head while he reads and ignores the sound of you existing.
so you change tactics.
you don’t say his name again. you take the book out of his hands gently, dog-ear his page with your thumb, set it on the table next to his feet. and before he can do more than open his mouth you climb into his lap, knees bracketing his thighs, settling yourself down onto him.
his hands land on your hips instinctually, his whole expression changing. the annoyance smooths out and something warm comes up slowly in its place, you can read his thoughts as clearly as if he’d said it out loud — ‘well, this is alright’.
“well, hello,” he says low, hands sliding up your sides.
he thinks he’s won something. he’s already tilting his chin up for you, lips looking for yours.
you reach into the pocket of your cardigan and pull them out, cupped in your palm where he can see, and his face drops.
“oh, you’re joking,” his shoulders sink with disappointment.
“hold still,” you grumble, leaning forward.
“i was comfortable,” he complains.
“john.” you get the first one in before he can turn his head, fingers careful at his ear, and he huffs through his nose like a dog that’s been told no. “other side.”
“this is entrapment.”
“mm-hm.” you fit the second one in, tucking his hair back where it’s gone astray. you sit back against him to look with your hands resting on his chest. “there,” you grin, satisfied.
“i was reading.”
“and you weren’t hearing a single word i said all night.”
“i can hear!”
“so you’re choosing to ignore me then?”
“i wasn’t— i just—,”
“you answered ‘fine’ when i asked if you wanted chicken or fish for dinner.”
his jaw works. he doesn’t have anything to say to that. “they itch,” he tries instead, pressing a finger against the front of his ear, rubbing the cartilage there.
“they don’t itch. you’re being dramatic.” you shift your weight, just slightly, settling in more solidly against him, and watch his breath catch. “tell me they itch now.”
he’s still scowling, but his hands have tightened on your hips. “i don’t see what hearing’s got to do with this…” he looks down at where you’re pressed to him.
you roll your hips down against him, folding forward, letting your mouth go to the side of his face, right up close to his ear, and you breathe out — soft, the smallest sound, half a moan and half a laugh because you can’t help yourself.
you feel him go still beneath you.
you do it again. rocking down against the shape of him through his trousers and let the noise come up out of you naturally, quiet and close and meant only for him, the kind of sound you make without thinking when his hands are on you. his fingers flex and splay and grip harder, his head turns toward you like it’s being pulled.
“there you are,” you murmur.
“…christ.”
“you hear that?”
he doesn’t answer. his eyes have gone heavy lidded and his hand’s come up into your hair and he’s turned fully into you now, chasing it, the small wet sounds of your breath against his ear, the catch in your throat when you press down and he pushes up to meet you.
these little intimate things he stopped hearing a long time ago and never noticed he’d lost because of how gradual it happened. this way you sound when you want him, the quiet things. the things you only ever say just for him, the things you’ve been saying into the dark for a year now with no return.
“say my name,” you breathe.
“…what?”
“in bed. i always say your name and you never—,” you rock against him and his breath stutters, “you never answer anymore.”
his hand comes up to the side of your face. he pulls back just far enough to look at you, and there’s something that’s gone serious under the want, something that’s caught up with what you’re telling him.
“m’so sorry, love,” he nudges his nose under your jaw, kissing the soft of your neck. “say it now. again,” he says, rough. “go on.” he’s gone hard under you, rolling his hips up, hands keeping your hips down. the seam of his zipper pushing through the thin cotton of your joggers
“john,” you breathe.
he hears you and you watch him — watch his eyes close for a second like it’s gone straight through him.
“yeah,” he says, his thumb moving slow against your cheek. “heard that.” then your name unfurls from his tongue and you kiss him before he can pretend he wasn’t affected, and his arms come all the way around you, and he doesn’t say a single word about the hearing aids again.
john wears them after that without making a fuss over it. just puts them in every morning before you’re up. you never mention that you notice. don’t wanna spook him.
affirmations for writers: i know how to write. i have seen sentences before, and i know how to make one. i can identify up to several words and their meanings. i am not afraid of semicolons.
look i think a lot of booktok smut is silly and there's stuff to criticize for sure but oh my god i am so tired of reviewers who are Shocked and Traumatized by the fact that a smut book involves a kink they don't have or lines that sound weird. yeah its fucking porn. omgggg this erotic book for adult women features breeding kink? the love interest gets called daddy? should we get you a fainting couch? should we call the pope
"why did this smut book even have to involve incest/sexual assault/abuse it could've been so nice otherwise!!" "why can't dark romance just be about princesses in love with their guards :(" because that's not. the fucking. genre. why engage with dark erotica if you clearly have no respect for it as a literary genre with it's own standards for quality
why did oedipus even have to kill his dad and fuck his mom! it could've been a sweet story about an orphan finding his parents if that sick freak sophocles hadn't ruined it. why can't tragedy just be about slightly sad people solving all their problems with the power of love :(((
It's not about the sexual assault/abuse/incest or whatever there is that is the problem, but the romanticizing of it, even more so if it's between the two main characters. If the main character is fucking raped and it's romanticized, it has nothing to do with romance. No, not even "dark" romance. Y'all need to get a grip (and probably therapy) if you think getting sexually assaulted and then getting together is a good read. lmao
You're right, this is the problem. Irresponsible use of “romanticizing” and “glorifying” and the like to describe stories that deviate from your Hayes Code ass expectations.
If someone wrote a manifesto about how sexual assault is Good Actually and sold it to teenage girls, yeah, I'd think they were doing something wrong. But if a grown woman writes erotica about sexual assault because she likes exploring dark themes, and then sells it as explicitly labeled dark erotica for adult readers that involves themes of sexual assault, that is not “glorifying” SA.
Yes, in a dark romance story, dark elements are romanticized. And in a dark erotica story, dark elements are eroticized. It's the core element of the genres: exploring certain themes through the lens of love and desire. Two very powerful emotional & physical experience which makes them very fertile ground for compelling storytelling.
There's this thing in communication studies called the magic bullet theory. It's the idea that the media we consume will immediately make us desire certain things or think certain thoughts, with no ability from the audience to do anything about this. It was popular in the 1930s/40s. It's thesis is that the audience is not active in the media they consume, but instead are passive and will believe whatever message is presented to them, willingly or not.
This is a overgeneralized and outdated model of mass media. We know that this is not how audiences work; we do engage critically with the messages we consume, or at least we all can when we are taught to cultivate critical thinking skills. Herta Herzog developed uses & gratification theory by interviewing housewife fans of soap operas, and found that they were an active audience who sought out the media they engaged with to meet specific needs, much like fans of erotica.
There's a lot of possible motivations to write dark erotica. Maybe the author thinks it's a good way to make money. Maybe they are interested in exploring fucked up situations and their effects on people. Maybe to explore their own trauma and anxieties. Maybe they just think it's hot.
What I am certain is not a motivation, however, is Secretly Convincing The Youth Of America That Underage Incest Is A Good and Noble Pursuit. Which is why these books are not advertised by the authors as such. They are advertised as dark erotica written for the entertainment of adults. Who the author assumes has the critical thinking skills to decide whether they want to engage in the story, and to understand why the story is being told. And if a teenager did happen to read a dark erotica book (because teenagers have interests and kinks, too), they are also not mindless robots who believe anything you tell them. I have faith that a properly educated teenage girl is capable of recognizing that she finds something hot in fiction but would be bad in real life.
It's an act of moral laziness to place all the blame on the existence of these stories. It's certainly easier to ban certain stories on the premise that they are immoral, because they are objects. It's much more challenging to say that human beings have a moral responsibility to engage critically with art and with each other. But that's what we have to do.
Sometimes bad things happen in a fictional book and no one will turn to the camera and explain that these events are very very bad and you shouldn't do them in real life. This is because the book is not an instruction manual and you are not a robot who needs your moral programming delivered via fiction.
Summary: Recovering from the aftermath of a joint operation gone wrong, and the betrayal and subsequent death of your Soulmate, you’re living a quiet life as a civilian nurse. Until, one night, you receive a phone call from someone you were sure was long gone.
Content Warning: Military inaccuracies, kidnapping, language, canon typical violence, noncon if you squint, but that's just by nature of the given tropes. Look Graves is a manipulative asshole, we all know this, and love him for it.
Author's Note: This was heavily inspired by @all-purpose-dish-soap’s soulmate Soap fic and sixteen-year-old me's obsession with these two specific tropes.
CW: Military inaccuracies, kidnapping, language, canon typical violence.
Author's Note: This was heavily inspired by @all-purpose-dish-soap's soulmate Soap fic and sixteen-year-old me’s obsession with these two specific tropes.
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masterlist
Chapter 1
The air inside the C17 had been freezing, so you were relieved when the warm Las Almas air poured in as the large ramp lowered. It wasn't a thick, humid summer heat, but it was a sunbaked warmth that felt good on your skin.
You wore a pair of cargo pants and combat boots, a plain olive green t-shirt paired with a tactical vest.
“Let’s go,” Soap said, flashing you a quick grin before making his way towards the back of the plane.
You looked at Ghost who nodded once. Ready?
This was your third time in the last two years that you’d been loaned out from the CIA to Task Force 141. As a signal intelligence specialist, your specialties had included hacking WiFi networks, utilizing satellites and cell towers to track targets, and acquiring data from encrypted spaces.
You liked the 141. They were easy going to work with, but reliable when shit hit the fan. You didn’t usually see much of the action (as you spend most of your time in transport vehicles with your laptop and radios) but they made you feel safe and part of the team.
“Let’s do it,” you said to Simon with a small shrug of your shoulders, the usual pre-op nerves had you flexing your hands open and closed a few times.
Your boots echoed as you followed the two men down the ramp. The tarmac was buzzing with activity: orders shouted in Spanish, soldiers and air crew moving quickly and efficiently. It smelled like jet fuel, but strangely enough, you liked it.
Directly in front of you was a man, older than you, but with his dark hair slicked back and a short, well groomed beard, he was noticeably attractive. It was too bad, you thought, that you were in a work setting and had to keep things professional.
“Alejandro,” Soap called to him.
“Sergeant MacTavish,” he replied, reaching out for a handshake.
“Call me Soap,” Johnny told him.
Alejandro's eyes skated to you, and you stepped forward offering your hand.
“Resident Geek Squad,” you told him as an introduction, although you weren’t sure anyone present would understand the joke. You told him your name and explained that you were SIGINT.
Whether he understood the joke or not, he smiled at you before he looked at Simon.
“Lieutenant. Laswell says they call you Ghost?”
Johnny put his hand up, cutting in with a sly smirk. “Actually, I think he prefers to be called—”
“That’ll do,” Ghost interrupted with a growl.
Soap snapped his mouth shut, his hand still hanging in mid-air. You stood next to him, stifling your urge to laugh.
Alejandro glanced between the three of you, mild amusement etched onto his handsome features.
“Welcome to the City of Souls,” he said, jerking his head and leading the way to a group of SUVs waiting nearby.
“I’ve never been to Mexico,” Soap commented.
Alejandro shook his head.
“This isn’t Mexico,” he replied. “This is Las Almas.”
“Shephard’s contractors are inbound to reinforce,” Ghost told him. “They’re bringing hardware. They’ll need room.”
You frowned, glancing up at Simon. This was the first you’d heard about a PMC joining you. Then again, you’d missed the briefing, having been a last second addition to the op.
“My base is your base,” Alejandro told him. “We’ll drop off your Geek Squad and make sure she’s got the space she needs.” He threw you a sideways glance with an amused twinkle in his eye.
You chuckled softly as you climbed into the back of the SUV, squeezing into the middle seat between Soap and Ghost.
Now you sat inside the spacious office that Alejandro had offered you. The wall in front of you was taken up mostly by a large window which provided a view of the spacious hangar, where you knew Shadow Company would be arriving with their air support.
You’d heard of them before. Shadow Company had a reputation that preceded them. It was the kind of outfit that got called in when things were messy, when governments wanted their hands clean but still needed a job done. Put plainly, they were fixers, efficient and ruthless. Men and women who lived outside the restrictions that bound conventional soldiers or government organizations.
You weren’t always a fan of working with PMCs. It wasn’t uncommon for these contractors to have an attitude. To think they were better because they didn’t have to operate under the same ROEs as the rest of you did.
But you knew not everyone was cut from the same cloth and you didn’t have a habit of judging people before you’d had the chance to work with them.
On the desk in front of you, your gear lay neatly organized. You adjusted your headset, running comms checks with Soap and Ghost while aligning your maps and data feeds. You pressed the talk button on the small microphone clipped to the table.
“Ghost, comms check. How copy?”
“Loud ‘nd clear, Sparrow,” came Simon’s reply. “How ‘bout me?”
“Crystal clear, Lt,” you answered.
You leaned back in your chair. Adrenaline was humming in your veins, and you began to bounce your knee. Subconsciously, you reached up to the back of your neck, fingertips brushing over the familiar lettering etched there.
Your Soulmate Mark.
You’d had the name printed on you for as long as you could remember. Most people’s showed up at around ages six to eight, the tattoo like lettering appearing faded and light at first, and then darkening quickly over the course of a few years.
You couldn’t remember a time when you didn’t have your Mark, but you do recall your mother’s excitement when it first appeared.
Your parents weren’t Soulmates, but that wasn’t uncommon. Many people went their entire lives without finding their fated match.
But that didn’t mean they didn’t fall in love and get married.
You’d heard stories of people being married for decades only to meet their Soulmate and leave their spouse for them.
To you it sounded messy and complicated.
Still, you’d spent much of your adolescence trying to imagine your other half.
Phillip Graves.
Was he tall or short? Was he kind? Was he smart? Loyal?
You’d heard about the intensity of the Soul Bond many times.
Allegedly, when you met your Soulmate, it was like your brain chemistry altered. You experienced a strong emotional connection that even allowed you to feel some of each other’s emotions through some unseen tether.
But you were certain that was all an exaggeration used to sell contemporary romance novels.
By your mid-twenties, reality had set in. Your parents hadn’t found their Soulmates, and they’d been perfectly happy. That was likely the path ahead for you too, and you’d made peace with it. You weren’t going to sit idle waiting for fate to hand you the perfect partner. You had a career you enjoyed and a life to live.
But sometimes, late at night, the curiosity snuck back in. His name would slip reflexively from your lips in quiet moments when your own fingers were coaxing you toward release. You’d even let it escape once during a drunken hookup, moaning a name that didn’t belong to the man inside you. The memory still made your cheeks burn with embarrassment.
You leaned forward in your chair forcing yourself to return to the present. You hated this part of the job... the waiting. Sitting behind a desk while your team pushed into danger, knowing you couldn’t step into the fight alongside them. But your role was different. Intel was an effective tool and providing them with the most accurate data possible could mean the difference between life and death.
“Troops in contact,” Ghost’s voice clipped through the radio, the sharp snap of gunfire echoing behind it. “We’re taking effective fire.”
You stood abruptly, leaning over the desk. A frustrated breath hissed through your teeth, and you drummed restless fingers against the metal surface, eyes flicking toward the hangar’s open doors.
Movement caught your attention. One of Los Vaqueros was sprinting across the tarmac, urgently. Then you heard it: a deep, rolling thunder that grew louder by the second, vibrating through the floor beneath your boots.
The low rumble swelled until it shook the air around you, the sound rolling across the tarmac like a storm front. Squinting into the distance, you caught sight of the C-130 cresting down onto the strip, its massive frame descending with an almost predatory grace.
You bolted from the office, sprinted through the hangar and across the tarmac to meet the man you’d seen running by.
“Shadow Company?” You shouted, as you caught up to him, jerking your chin toward the looming Hercules as it barreled closer, engines snarling. “We have troops in contact. They need backup,” you told him quickly, urgency sharpening your words.
He nodded once, before looking past you at the incoming aircraft.
“Is that them?” you asked again, the urgency of the situation making propelling you forward.
Without waiting for his reply, you reached across to the radio clipped at his vest and pulled it off of him. You brought it to your mouth and keyed the mic. “Shadow Company, this is Sparrow. How copy?”
The man fumbled with his headset, pulling it off and passing it over to you.
You nodded to him as you slipped it on and caught, a smooth southern drawl saying, "—is Shadow One. Read you loud ’n clear, Sparrow. Send traffic.”
Your pulse jumped. “Shadow One, we’ve got troops in contact at a safe house approximately ten klicks north of our position. They’re taking heavy fire.”
“Copy that,” the man replied without hesitation. “Consider it handled. Shadow One, out.”
The transmission cut, leaving only the fading hiss of static on an empty line. You lowered the receiver slowly, watching as the massive aircraft immediately began ascending once more.
You shaded your eyes with your hand, watching the plane pick up speed. The engines roared like thunder, rattling through your chest, and you tilted your head back to watch it go by, spinning on your heels as it passed overhead.
The sound was deafening, a shrieking scream that tore through the sky, followed by the violent whoosh of displaced air that whipped at your clothes and tugged at your hair.
Then it was gone, racing north, banking toward the fight where Ghost, Soap, and Alejandro were holding out. Your pulse hammered in your chest, and you watched the plane disappear into the distance, caught somewhere between awe and relief.
Backup was on the way.
By the time the sun slipped under the horizon, the quiet base was alive again. The Hercules rumbled back onto the strip, its bulk slowing as it taxied in, the roar of the engines dulling as they began winding down. One by one, Shadow Company operators spilled out of the back ramp, helmets tucked under arms, gear slung across their backs, voices carrying a note of satisfaction that told you everything you needed to know about how the mission had gone.
You lingered near the edge of the hangar, watching them as they unloaded, chatting and slapping shoulders, moving with the swagger of men who’d done their job and done it well.
That’s when you spotted someone breaking from the group. He was tall and built thick through the chest and shoulders, his black Shadow Company fatigues stretched comfortably across his frame. His eyes were smudged with eye-black that streaked messily down his cheeks, giving him a look that reminded you a little bit of a football player. Dreadlocks brushed his shoulders and his face was framed nicely by a dark beard.
He came straight toward you, boots thudding heavily on the tarmac.
“You Sparrow?” His voice, deep and rough, carried easily in the large space.
“That’s me,” you confirmed, straightening as he closed the distance.
He thrust out a hand, wearing fingerless black gloves. His grip was firm when you accepted it.
“Oz Ryan,” he introduced smoothly. “Appreciate the call. You got us there just in time.”
Relief surged through you, tension bleeding out of your shoulders at the confirmation. “Happy to help,” you said. “Where are they now?”
You glanced past him toward the C-130, half-expecting to see Soap or Ghost.
Oz followed your look, then gave a short nod over his shoulder. “Somewhere quiet, talkin’ to our guest.”
You exhaled, finally letting go of the breath you hadn’t realized you’d been holding. Hassan Zyani had been captured. That single fact unraveled some of the weight sitting on your chest.
Maybe, just maybe, this meant things were drawing to a close and you’d be on a flight home before the week was out.
“So, are you Shadow One?” you asked him.
Oz gave a quick shake of his head, dreadlocks brushing his shoulders. “That’d be Commander Graves,” he said.
Your heart skipped a beat. Graves.
You immediately thought of the Mark on the back of your neck, and forced yourself to keep steady, even as your pulse thudded in your ears. There had to be plenty of people named Graves in the world. Statistically speaking, it didn’t necessarily mean anything. Sure, you’d never met one before, but that didn’t automatically make the Shadow Company Commander your Soulmate.
“Commander Graves,” you repeated the name just to taste it on your tongue.
Oz nodded, oblivious to the turmoil brewing behind your expression. “Yeah, that’d be the big boss. He should be back soon enough—”
“Uh oh,” a new voice drawled smoothly, cutting above the chatter of the hangar. “My ears are burnin’.”
The voice was rich with confidence, carrying the easy authority of someone used to commanding a room. Both you and Oz turned toward the sound.
He was striding toward you across the room, every inch of him radiating capability. Mid-thirties, maybe, with sandy blonde hair that caught the last glint of evening light, trimmed close on the sides but a little longer on top. A thick stubble shadowed his jaw, lending him a rough and rugged look.
And then his eyes, a deep dark blue, met yours.
The world shifted. The voices of the men unloading the C-130 dulled into a strange, muffled sound, as though you’d been plunged underwater. A tightness pulled at your chest, not painful but insistent, as if some invisible thread had looped around your spine and was gently tugging you forward. Your pulse hammered franticly, a little voice in the back of your head whispered the thought that you were almost too afraid to acknowledge: this is him.
But Graves only kept walking, flashing you a polite smile, perfectly at ease. No flicker of recognition, no falter in his stride.
Your heart sank as you watched him approach.
Was he not feeling any of this? Was it just you?
“Sorry?” you blurted, realizing belatedly that he’d spoken.
He chuckled, the sound low and warm, and repeated himself with that same easy charm. “I said, you must be Sparrow.”
He held his hand out for you to shake.
You hesitated only a heartbeat before slipping your palm against his. And instead of introducing yourself as Sparrow, like you always did, you took a chance.
And introduced yourself by your real name.
You watched him carefully as you told him your birth name, but nothing came. His expression didn’t change one bit. Not even a twitch.
He just gave your hand a firm, professional shake.
And yet, when his skin pressed to yours, a sharp spark jumped, a jolt that shot up your arm like static electricity. You blinked hard, breath catching, your gaze darting to his face.
He remained perfectly at ease. Unbothered, with that easy smile. Calm and confident, like it hadn’t happened at all.
You forced yourself to let go, pulse racing as though you’d imagined the entire thing. Hell, maybe you had.
“So,” you managed, doing your best to control the waver in your voice, “where are Soap and Ghost?”
Graves pulled his hand back, casually grasping the neck of his Kevlar vest.
“They should be around here somewhere.” His expression tightened as he added, “Had to cut Hassan loose.”
You barely registered the words, your thoughts still tangled in that odd spark, in the way the world had gone muffled when his eyes first found yours. “Oh. Oh. Why’s that?” you muttered absently.
“Bloody politics, tha’s why,” Soap’s voice growled before Graves could answer, his heavy Scottish accent rolling across the space as he strode up with Ghost looming close behind him.
Soap’s scowl lingered on his features, and Ghost shifted forward, just as someone turned on the interior lights of the hangar.
A loud clapping sound reverberated in the space as each large fluorescent light blinked to life.
CLUNK. CLUNK. CLUNK. CLUNK. CLUNK.
The eyeholes of Simon’s skull mask were shadowed under the bright light, leaving them appearing as gaping black voids.
Without a word, he reached into a pouch on his vest, then tossed something your way with an underhanded flick.
“Got somethin’ for you to play with,” he said.
You caught it clean against your chest, fingers curling around the small object. You looked down at the little cheap cellphone in your hand and your brows shot up.
“Wait. You cloned his phone?” you asked, unable to keep the excitement from your tone.
Ghost’s silence was answer enough, and Soap smirked faintly, clearly proud of the stunt.
A grin tugged at your lips despite the storm still stirring inside you. “I’ll get to work,” you chirped.
You turned slightly, catching Oz Ryan still standing nearby. “Good to meet you, Oz,” you offered, genuinely meaning it.
“Likewise,” he said with a nod, stepping back to rejoin the rest of his squad.
Then, before retreating, you turned your eyes to the commander again. Forcing your shoulders square, you tried to bury the heat rising in your chest as you dipped your chin slightly in acknowledgment. “Commander.”
His eyes caught yours again, and for the briefest second, you swore you saw something shift there. Not recognition exactly, but a subtle tension in the lines around his irises, like a ripple across still water. It was so quick you might have imagined it, before he slid back into effortless composure. He flashed you a polite smile as if nothing had passed between you.
And maybe nothing had.
You blinked, heart hammering racketing your ribs, then slipped away before anyone else could notice. Back into the office, back to your desk, clutching the cloned phone tightly in your hand.
You needed to focus, to bury yourself in work, to ignore the static still tingling faintly up your arm from where his hand had clasped yours.
You shut the door behind you, set the cloned phone on the desk, and exhaled sharply through your nose. Focus.
Sliding into the chair, you pulled the portable hardline case from your rucksack and flipped it open, revealing the slim diagnostic laptop, connection cables, and a portable encryption-cracker. You connected the cloned phone with a USB-C tether, trying not to let your gaze drift to the large window where Graves and his man were was still chatting with his man Soap and Ghost. There was a familiar vibration buzzing against your fingers as the device came to life.
The laptop immediately ran its handshake protocols, fingerprinting the operating system and displaying a string of identifiers across the screen: IMEI, carrier frequency, OS build. You put on your headset mic out of habit and then your fingers flew across the keyboard, initiating a packet capture and beginning a brute-force bypass of the encryption. The algorithms spooled up, running through combinations at blistering speed.
Normally, this part of the job consumed all of you: the rhythm of keystrokes, the satisfaction of watching firewalls peel back one layer at a time. But as the evening crept into night, your concentration kept slipping. Every pause between lines of code was invaded by the image of midnight blue eyes pinning you in place.
Graves.
Your thoughts curled back to the name on the back of your neck. It really was improbable. The world was big. Enormous, actually. Graves couldn’t be that uncommon of a last name.
You didn’t even know his first name. And he hadn’t even flinched when you gave him your full name. Maybe the sparks, the tugging sensation in your spine… Maybe, it was all in your head.
Your mind replayed the jolt of static at his handshake, the way the world seemed to dim when your eyes first locked. Too visceral, too specific to brush off as imagination.
The screen beeped softly, drawing your attention back. One of the encryption layers had crumbled, lines of text flooding open. You adjusted your focus, parsing the fragments of contacts, geolocation data, and stored SMS logs beginning to populate your screen.
And still, the thought circled.
What if he is my Soulmate?
Another possibility struck harder: What if he is, and he doesn’t care?
Your stomach tightened. You’d never heard of someone outright rejecting their Soul Bond. People dreamed of it, yearned for it. But that didn’t mean it had never happened before.
You rubbed at the back of your neck unconsciously, fingertips brushing over the dark letters etched there like they might offer some clarity.
Like they might chase away the disappointment of one undeniable truth: Across the hangar, Commander Graves had looked at you like you were just another face in the room.
Another hour slipped by almost without notice as the screen’s glow pulled you deeper into the maze of data. The cloned phone had been a goldmine of fragmented intel.
With persistence, you pieced together a breadcrumb trail: Hassan’s communications pinging off a cell tower along the coast of Spain.
You scrolled through timestamps and connection logs. Cross-referencing geodata to paint a clearer picture, narrowing the pings to a stretch of industrial coastline. More digging, cross-matching contact IDs with known cartel numbers, revealed a common location.
A hatchery.
It looked innocuous on satellite feed, but the traffic in and out told another story. Long-haul trucks, unmarked vans, and vessels docking nearby at irregular hours. The cartel was possibly using it as a smuggling front.
You chewed on your lip, anticipation making you anxious. Could the missiles be there? It wasn’t proof, and you’d have to run it through your HUMINT pipeline, but it was the strongest lead you’d had yet.
You were so focused on the work in front of you that you didn’t hear the footsteps as they grew louder. A sharp rap landed against the door. The sound startled you, jerking you upright in your chair, just as the door swung open.
Commander Graves leaned casually against the frame, head tilted slightly to one side. That easy confidence clung to him like a second skin.
“S’it alright if I intrude?” His southern drawl smoothed over the words, polite but self-assured, like he already knew the answer.
Your chest tightened in that same, maddening way, a thread tugging taut behind your ribs. You forced it down, burying the feeling as you shifted in your seat.
“Uh, yeah,” you said, voice steadier than you felt.
Graves walked toward you with unhurried confidence, each step measured, steady. His eyes flicked to the screen, then back to you.
“Mind if I take a look?”
“Go ahead,” you replied, already beginning to stand, preparing to vacate the chair so he could take your place.
But he didn’t sit.
Instead, he leaned down, bracing one hand flat against the desk, the other on the back of your chair, as he hovered over your shoulder.
You dropped back down into the seat, the warmth of his presence filling the space around you. His shadow stretched across the desk in front of you as his eyes scanned the data.
A low whistle escaped him. “Impressive,” he uttered, voice heavy and close, reverberating directly into your ear.
The sound alone sent a current pounding through you. Something stirred to life beneath your skin, humming in your veins like electricity running hot through a wire. Your heart skipped a beat, every breath felt shallow, and that strange tugging sensation, the one you’d tried to ignore, tightened again, pulling you toward him even though you sat perfectly still.
“So, Sparrow, huh?” he said referring to your callsign. “I’m betting there’s a story behind that one.”
“Uh-huh,” you answered, your voice thinner than you’d intended. You turned your head slightly, forcing yourself to meet his gaze even as he still crowded your space.
One corner of his mouth tugged upward, though his eyes were sharp, watchful. “Hmm.”
He shifted his attention to your equipment, surveying the setup with what you suspected was feigned interest, a leader’s trick to put people at ease while he studied them.
“And a pretty young thing like you workin’ for the CIA?” His words landed smooth, almost casual, but beneath them ran an unmistakable thread of tension. “M’betting there’s a story there, too.”
That same something pulsed again inside you, insistent, as if it wanted to escape your chest cavity
“Yep,” you said, still not expanding any further.
He watches you for another moment, before his gaze flickered out to the window, showcasing the empty hangar.
“Do they know?” He asked, turning his gaze back to yours.
You blinked slowly. “Know what?” you were almost whispering.
The corner of his mouth lifted into the faintest smirk, and then he raised a brow at you knowingly.
“Do they know?” he repeated, slower this time, leaning closer as his hands settled on the arms of your chair, caging you in.
Your lungs felt like they’d stopped working completely and you weren’t sure if you were still breathing. Your palms dampened against the edge of the chair.
This time you whispered so softly you almost doubted he’d hear. “No.”
“Good,” he muttered, then his mouth was on yours.
The kiss was dizzying.
Your head buzzed as the Soul Bond roared to life, surging through your veins like fire. Sparks tingled along your lips, down your throat, into your chest until you swore your whole body was buzzing. Your breath hitched against his, your lips parting without thought, and for a second all you could taste was him. All you could feel was heat, want, and something sharp and electric that made your toes curl inside your boots.
You grabbed his shirt collar instinctively, fingers curling into the fabric. You vaguely noticed he’d shed his vest at some point.
He angled deeper, pressing you further into the chair until you had no choice but to clutch him even tighter.
When you finally tore away just enough to breathe, your lips were swollen and your pulse was hammering.
“Good?” you breathed, brows furrowing as you searched his face, dazed but still looking for clarification.
Graves looked down at you with eyes that you swore would burn right through you. His smirk lingered, dangerous and hungry. “Ain’t nobody’s business but ours,” he rumbled, his voice rough and thick. “Want you to myself for a minute. Anything wrong with that?”
You shook your head, unable to form words. He lifted one hand, sliding it up your arm and over your shoulder until his palm rested at the back of your neck. His thumb brushed over the raised Mark there, and his smirk deepened like he’d just confirmed something he already knew.
You bit your already tender lip, nerves twisting with need. You had to know for sure. Looking up at him, you forced out the name, soft and almost embarrassed to be asking. “Phillip?”
For a fraction of a second, his expression flickered with something akin to smug satisfaction, maybe even relief.
“The one and only,” he confirmed, and before you could draw another shaky breath, his lips were on yours again, harder this time, sealing the truth between you.
A sudden clanging rang out across the hangar, metal striking metal, sharp and hollow. Both of you broke apart instantly, lips still tingling, your breathy pants loud in the charged silence.
Your eyes darted to the window. A shadowy figure was moving between crates at the far end of the hangar. Someone doing some late night work.
Heat flooded your cheeks. You turned back, wide-eyed, only to find Phillip already watching you. He had a crooked grin.!-A chuckle rumbled in his chest, low and knowing.
“Follow me,” he drawled. “I’ve got a space.”
Straightening to his full height, he extended his hand down toward you.
You didn’t hesitate to slip your hand into his. The spark came instantly, fizzing up your arm like live wire, no less powerful than the first time. His fingers curled around yours with easy confidence, and the simple touch made your head spin.
The rest of the evening was spent in his makeshift quarters, blurring into something wild and intense as you got to know each another.
Not with words.
But with the glide of calloused hands over skin, exploring one another like you had all the time in the world. The press of his mouth, slow and sensual, then desperate and hungry. It was laughter, shared in ragged breaths between kisses, and the breathy, soft moans he easily coaxed from you. You learned each other beyond cautious introductions, with tongue and touch, the Bond humming louder and louder until it felt like every cell in your body was alive.
You memorized the line of muscle under his shirt, the way his stubble scraped lightly against your skin when he kissed the corner of your mouth, and down your stomach. You felt the weight of him braced above you, the press of his hand against the small of your back as though he couldn’t stand to let go.
And for the first time in your life, the gnawing ache of incompleteness that had lived quietly in your chest for years… went silent.
Now, warm water cascaded down your shoulders, rinsing suds into rivulets that swirled at your feet. You scrubbed sand and soap from your hair, humming softly to yourself, unable to stop smiling. Your body still buzzed with the aftershocks of everything you’d just shared. You felt overwhelmingly, almost deliriously happy, like you’d stumbled into a dream that you never had to wake up from.
Arms slid around your waist from behind, pulling you back into solid warmth. You startled faintly before relaxing against him, your grin breaking wider. Phillip’s mouth brushed against your damp shoulder, leaving heat in its wake, then grazed up to the back of your neck. His lips lingered at the Mark on your skin, sending a shiver straight down your spine.
“So,” he murmured, his voice vibrating against your skin, “I gotta know. How old are you, darlin’?”
You turned slightly, cheeks heating despite yourself. “Mm… twenty-nine,” you told him. “As of last month.”
He barked out a laugh, deep and unrestrained, the sound bouncing off the shower tile.
“You’re a kid,” he teased, amusement thick in his voice.
You gasped dramatically, twisting to face him fully, water dripping between you both. “Well, at least I’m not an old man.”
“Oof.” He winced exaggeratedly. “That hurts. Real bad.” His blue eyes twinkled as he leaned closer, voice dropping. “I’m thirty-seven. Not exactly geriatric.”
You snorted, rolling your eyes, but the smile betrayed you, curling up despite your best effort to look unimpressed.
“I wasn’t sure it was you,” you confessed, quietly.
His gaze was magnetic as he looked down at you. He slid his hands down your sides and onto your waist, squeezing once. “I knew the moment I laid eyes on you.”
There, under the spray of the shower, with his hands firm on your hips and his warm laughter still echoing in your ears, you couldn’t quite believe it. You’d found him. You’d found your Soulmate.
Author’s Note: I promise this is going to be a good, angsty slow-burn, just bear with me. We’re laying the groundwork here, friends.
edit as you write. use adverbs. use said. outline. or don’t. plot it. pants it. make a mary sue. who cares! just write whatever makes you happy. that’s all this is about. be happy in what you make.
asking for praise for a thing you made feels so humiliating like oooh look at me I’m a little animal and I did a trick and made a thing can I have pets and treats about it. and then somebody tells you it’s good and you understand why golden retrievers are the way they are
Yes we love mer!141 and researcher!reader but what abt the reverse???
Youre a mer that got permanently injured by a boat, so you get taken into a mer sanctuary. The staff there are...surprisingly nice compared to the horror stories your podmates told you.
Soap and gaz are more than happy to splash in the shallow zone while they feed you. Theyre trying to socialize you better to having others around, hoping to introduce you to the other mer. Unfortunately for them you still seem pretty nervous when the other mers chirp or bellow in other tanks, clinging to gaz or kyle instinctively. Strong arms keeping them in a hold, they have to gently remind you they dont have gills, less you drown them.
Ghost and price are great too. Doctors who help ease your pain. Ghost is much more indulgent with you, offering pats and treats for good behavior. Price is less so, but he does give good tummy rubs if you are exceptionally well behaved for check-ups. Hes the more experienced doctor, you think, judging by how he is always watching ghost and offering small corrections.
Sometimes, all four of them come to see you! It makes you happy to see your pod all together, offering gifts of small food or shiny things you find. They've all accepted their pod gifts, now you just need them to accept their mate gifts!
You try and get their attention, but they dont fully pay attention. Soap pats your head where it rests against his thigh, but you catch snippets of conversation. "Confused....mates....poor socialization...."
Its hard to follow when they used big words or talk fast, so you just nuzzle against soap and let their voices drape over you. Its odd theyre so worried with the spring approaching. But hey, they are your pod after all, no need to worry when they're here!
Weapons. Trained, tested, forged in steel and fire. Failure is an inevitability that ends in death. Pain should not be felt--it should be recognized, familiar, and inconsequential
Martyrs. In the form of servants and princes, of leaders and underdogs. If blood is necessary, the martyr will lift their hands and offer it all
Shields. Like tempering a sword, but only to bear and not to lash out. Wounds are medals--not symbols of pride, but symbols of worth. A pretty shield is useless; scars mean a job well done
Experiments. Raised on the cold comfort of a lab table. Restraints are only necessary when they're not in their right mind. Is it honorable, to be twisted beyond recognition? Or is it just a necessary evil?
Monsters. Cruelty, caution, and regarding one as a creature beyond reasonable thought is tempering in its own right. But if you keep a leash at the right length, perhaps the massecre won't reach you. One can hope.
Idols. Pretty face, pretty name, pretty hands around their shoulders and throat. There to seduce, manipulate, force any feeling to come to the surface and twist it to their favor. Any genuinity stays locked behind the guilded cage that surrounds their pretty little heart
Trophies. Status and wealth and the traditions that keep someone at their heels, on their knees, to display and serve and decorate one's ballroom.
Sacrifices. Drenched in honorable clothes, prepared and adored and cleansed. The gift of hope at the cost of one's life. Is it taken with no fight? How can you escape the ropes you were born in?
Your time spent enjoying the creative process is infinitely more valuable that any final project you create. So stop putting yourself down for never finishing or posting those WIPs because every moment you spent creating something you loved is a moment not wasted. Your progress and talent is measured by your passion not your number of posts.
