Do you guys like Wicked? Who am I kidding, this is Tumblr.
My newest novel WESTERN COMPANY is now released, and will be available to read chapter-by-chapter on my Patreon! The Prologue, and Chapter 1, are now available and completely free, so if you'd like to check it out please do!
Of course, feel free to get a taste from this summary first...
WESTERN COMPANY...
A modern OZ reimagining...
A small-town girl with nowhere to go becomes embroiled in a magical world she never knew existed, right beneath the wheat fields of her backwater home.
Guided by some familiar faces, she discovers a power she never knew she had.
But even magic itself, isn't safe from corruption...
~ WRITING COMMISSIONS ~ ~ PATREON ~ ~ KO-FI ~ ~ NOVELS ~
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Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. I do not own anything except my own writing. All properties belong to their respective creators.
Content Warning: YANDERE doin' yandere stuff, imprisonment
The damp chill of the Boiling Rock’s lower levels felt like a mockery of the Fire Nation's scorching reputation.
Down here, in the shadows beneath the volcanic rim, your nose burned with the scent of sulfur and salt. You sat in the corner of your cell, the cold iron of your shackles biting into your wrists, listening to the rhythmic hiss of steam pipes. It was all you had to keep you company. All you’d had for a while.
Until you heard footsteps. Footsteps a shade different from the usual guard. They weren't the heavy, clanking boots of a prison warden. Somehow just from the sound, you could tell they had more authority…
The heavy metal door groaned on its hinges. Standing in the amber glow of the hallway lanterns was Prince Zuko.
He looked different than he did on the battlefield. The sharp lines of his red-and-gold armor had been switched for a more casual crimson cloth fit. His golden eyes, usually burning with a desperate, frantic need for honor, were now unnervingly calm.
Fixed. Entirely on you.
"Azula wants you dead," he said, his voice a low, gravelly rasp, husky in a way you couldn’t deny had an appeal. "She spent the morning describing the different ways she could make you scream before the end. She thinks you’re a loose end. A distraction."
He stepped into the cell, the heat radiating from his body instantly cutting through the subterranean chill. You scrambled back until your spine hit the jagged rock wall. Handsome as he may have been, nothing about this man was trustworthy.
"And what do you think?" you managed to whisper, your throat raw from days of silence. Any time you’d tried to speak to yourself for comfort, had earned you a sharp warning from your captors.
Zuko knelt, his shadow stretching long and distorted across the floor. He reached out, his hand hovering just inches from your face. You flinched and cowered, but he didn't pull back. Instead, he gently tucked a matted lock of hair behind your ear.
Even just in a chaste touch like that, you could feel the heat. After so long alone, it took a little fight in you not to lean into it…
"Well, I think she’s right about one thing," he murmured, his gaze dropping to your lips before locking back onto your eyes. "You are a distraction. I haven't been able to focus on the Avatar, the war, or my father since we took you at the Earth Kingdom border. Every time I close my eyes, I see you looking at me the way you did then. All…defiant."
He leaned closer, his warmth becoming stifling.
"I told her I would handle it. And right now, she’s waiting for the smoke to rise from this cell block."
Zuko’s hand moved from your hair to your throat suddenly, and while he didn’t squeeze, he clasped it just tightly enough to serve as a reminder of how easily he could crush the life out of you. Or, burn it out.
Whimpering, you reached up with your bound hands, the shackles clanking as your feeble grip wrapped around his strong wrist. If there were ever a time to appeal for mercy, it was now.
Tilting his head, he couldn’t hide a smirk. Cute.With his other hand, he ignited a small, concentrated flame, pulled forth from one of the torches outside. The heat of the fire danced between his fingers, illuminating the wine-colored scar that marred the left side of his face.
"You have two paths tonight," he stated, the flickering firelight making his expression look like a mask of tragedy and obsession. "The first is the one my sister demands. I leave this room, I turn up the heat, and I let the fire do its work. You’ll be nothing but ash by dawn, and I’m sure that’ll make Azula pretty happy.”
The flame grew larger, the roar of the heat beginning to singe the air between you. The very tips of your hair strands fizzled away where they were closest to it. Your eyes scrunched, as the heat hovering near your cheek began to sting your nerves.
"Or," he whispered, his thumb tracing your jawline with a possessive slow motion. "You realize that you belong to the crown. To me. You come with me now, and I will strike your name from every record. You’ll live in the shadows of my private chambers. And I’ll protect you. From everyone, but especially her.”
Trust, he would need to. Zuko knew his sister well. She never let things go.
“But, it’s only on one condition. You’ll never leave my side. You will be mine in every way a person can belong to another. How does that sound?"
The way he said it, it was almost poetic, almost twistedly romantic. Looking at his face though, you could see a dangerous, almost boyish glee. Sadistic desire.
Most of all, you felt confused. Lost. Why you? What was it that he saw in you that made him want you so? Why weren’t you as worthless to him as you were to Azula?
With time, you were sure you’d come to know the reason. Frankly, you weren’t sure if that was reassurance, or something you dreaded…
He extinguished the flame, plunging the cell back into a dim, suffocating orange glow. He leaned in until his forehead rested against yours, his breath hot against your skin. Intimate in a way you weren’t prepared for, enough to make you flush from something other than the temperature.
When all you could see were those increasingly crazed eyes, when the only life you had left to you now was as a prisoner, and perhaps soon, a dead one, some part of you…some part of you began to feel like maybe it wouldn’t be so bad?
Either way, you had to make your decision, and fast.
His command was simple.
“Choose.”
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LITTLE BIRD | YANDERE!ARMIN x READER | ATTACK ON TITAN
~ WRITING COMMISSIONS ~ ~ PATREON ~ ~ KO-FI ~ ~ NOVELS ~
Join my Patreon to get early access to my works up to 2+ MONTHS in advance, exclusive stories and free commissions! Read my new Wizard of Oz-inspired novel, WESTERN COMPANY, for FREE!
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. I do not own anything except my own writing. All properties belong to their respective creators.
Content Warning: YANDERE doin' yandere stuff
A/N: uploading some of ye old DA stuff. was always really fond of this one 🤍
Chirp chirp.
“Aww. It's so cute.”
“You're okay to fly now, right?”
Armin was a very kind person. Not that you wouldn't have tried to help an injured bird yourself, you just wouldn't have even known where to start, and you might have only made it worse. Yet Armin knew exactly what to do. All his time spent reading those books had paid off in boatloads.
Now here you were. This once damaged little creature you had discovered by the stables one day was ready to fly freely again, and hopefully return to whatever family it had out there. Its wing was looking a lot better, and sure enough, it hopped around eagerly in his palms, ready to jet off.
“On you go then.”
The bird fluttered away just like that, flying up high into the blue, far above even the wall itself.
You smiled, before looking over at the hopeful blonde standing beside you. The light breeze ruffled his golden locks, his blue eyes sparkling.
It brought him so much joy, and in turn it did the same for you.
So that evening you walked back to the dorms quite happily, feeling the warmth of the sun as it spread its last few amber rays over the city before calling it a day, and revelling in the rare peace you had. Sure, you still had your training, but you didn't shy away from that. It was the duty you took on after all. A duty that would ensure you could keep having days like this...
“Shall we get something to eat before going to sleep? I think Sasha has some extra jerky that she stashed-”
You looked over at Armin with surprise when he suggested that. “Well! It's not like you to be so mischievous.”
“Hehe, ahh...” he sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck and looked at you with a blush. “We did a good deed today, so I feel like it's alright.”
Hell, you could run with that logic.
The two of you went to Sasha's room and Armin cautiously knocked, hoping she hadn't already scoffed it all. If she hadn't then it would be nice to spend the night eating it with you for company too. Yet when Sasha let you in with a smirk and a mouth already full of jerky strips, he spotted someone else in the room.
Someone he didn't really want to see right now. Not when you were around.
Eren. By all means, the two of them were best friends, and had been for years now. However...Eren was a little bit of a problem.
For you see, Eren had confidence. All the confidence that Armin didn't have. Eren was a lot smoother when it came to talking with, well, anyone. And while you seemed to like Armin well enough, he worried that you saw more appeal in his dark haired friend.
Dare he say it...preferred him?
Armin tried to take his mind off it. He tried to take his mind off it by eating that jerky with you. He tried to take his mind off it by chatting happily with you. He tried to take his mind off it by training to protect you.
But his mind was stuck to it like a moth in glue.
Jealousy.
Why couldn't he have been blessed with that confidence?
...He tried to take his mind off it by thinking only about him being with you.
…He tried to take his mind off it by forcing lucid dreams about you.
...He tried to take his mind off it by...building this for you.
A beautiful thing. That was what he called it.
Smooth iron bars he'd picked up from the scrap shed and worked on welding together. A base laden with the softest cloths and comfiest pillows he could find. A fine curtain draped around it like décor in the cities of Wall Sina.
It wasn't a cage. It was a home.
…
How fitting.
The dream you had that night was of the bird you had saved. You imagined you were up there flying with it freely. High above the world, looking down on the sprawling green lands and dense emerald forests, the sandy paths cut across the plateaus, your home within the supposedly safe stone confines of those walls.
It all looked so small from up here, like you could fit your entire life in a matchbox. All your problems seemed so petty then.
How nice it felt. To be truly free...
“Mmnn...”
A soft moan left you, [E/C] eyes fluttering open and settling upon a crimson color, a curtain around you. Frowning slightly, you sat up in the red glow and tried to ascertain where you were. Light was coming in from somewhere at least, illuminating this little cylinder.
It really was little. Maybe only a foot or two of extra space besides yourself in each direction, a circle of iron around you. You were sitting up on bundled cloth and various pillows, but it was still easy to tell you were located on a hard floor.
But...where the hell were you?
“...H...hello?” you questioned uneasily, and reached out to find a gap in the curtain, hand going between the suspicious bars that were arrange all around you. Pushing the fabric aside, you braced yourself for what you'd see.
A blue eye stared back.
“AH!” Crying out with shock, you recoiled and slammed against the other side of the cage, practically hyperventilating. Armin quickly pulled back from the bars too, gasping a little.
“Oh! I'm sorry, I-I didn't mean to scare you like that!”
...What? What the hell is going on here!?
“Armin, what is happening, what is this!?” you looked around yourself in utter disbelief. Your fingertips frantically felt up every polished confine you could see, it was easy to tell that this cage had been constructed with love.
A debauched, twisted sort of love.
“...I...I know it's a lot. A lot for you to take in right now, I'm sorry-” Armin stood up just so he could pull back the curtain fully and you could better see the room you were in. There was a simple white-sheeted bed pushed against the back wall, and a crudely made night-stand with an empty glass on it. The room was coated in a fine layer of dust which Armin kicked into motion when he walked around, dust motes drifting in what sunbeams made it through the partially opened window.
It was an old place. Like the attic of an abandoned home.
“...I uh...I made a lot of sacrifices for you...[Y/N]...” Armin spoke almost absently as he bundled up the curtain around his arms, having removed it completely from atop the cage so that you wouldn't have an obstructed view. It was only the morning after all, you ought to experience the rest of the day like he did, as close as possible anyway. That was only fair.
“-I was never really cut out for all that Titan business anyway. I'm glad I took you with me too, since, no offense, I don't think you are either.”
You might have taken offense to that indeed, if not for the far more insulting situation you were currently surrounded by.
“But I suppose without those field based training missions I wouldn't have spotted this place out here. Do you remember that spot we went to just to the East a little, still within the walls?” Armin reminisced. “We came out here to practice horse riding over long distances. Anyway, I don't think anyone else did, but I spotted this cute little abandoned place while we were here and I knew it would be perfect...”
The curtain in his hands was suddenly gripped, his nails digging in. It felt delightfully like clawing at the scalp of a certain someone...
“I'd just hoped I could take you here under different circumstances. But...” he sighed defeatedly. “...I really had no other option. There was no way you were going to end up marrying me with the way things were going with him.”
While Armin walked over to lay the curtain atop the dull bed, you looked ahead vacantly, baffled.
“...Him?” was as much as you could manage, and Armin didn't so much as glance around as he answered curtly:
“Eren.”
...That was what this was all about!?
Armin kidnapped you...because you had a crush on Eren...
...This was really happening right now.
Suddenly, your sweaty hands clamped up onto the bars and gripped them tightly. The cage had a door but of course it was locked tight. Every ounce of strength you had was focussed on the sole goal of bending them apart somehow, because you couldn't see any other way out.
“Fuck! Come on!!”
Armin glanced over his shoulder and sighed when he saw what you were doing, shaking his head like he was watching a dumb toddler. “Come on [Y/N], I made that cage out of iron. It's not something you can just break with your hands.”
Ignoring him, you tried harder, and you ended up shaking them, rattling the whole cage with your desperate and frantic motions. All you cared about in that moment was getting out.
How could Armin have done this!? Not only did it seem so odd for someone like him to have done such a thing, but since when was blacksmithing his forte!? Armin was a wildlife expert and ocean enthusiast, how could he even have the time to learn how to do this?
Well as much as it seemed to be well constructed, this cage was indeed flawed. One hard tug and you felt something shift. Looking down, you noticed that one pole hadn't been welded down properly to the base, and only a thin piece of metal was keeping it attached. If you could successfully remove that, you'd be able to squeeze out of here!
“Good thing you're a heavy sleeper [Y/N]. Don't worry, I'm not saying you were heavy or anything...”
Armin still seemed to be busy tidying up the bed, not worrying about it, just chatting with you casually.
“No...you're perfect. Head to toe.”
You took your chance while you had it. Leaning back and gathering your remaining effort, your leg shot out like instinct and kicked hard against the cage. The pole scraped and bounced out of spot, still hanging from the top but letting you move it aside so you could then scramble out.
He heard you then of course. If not the impact of your boot, then the sound of you scrambling towards the door like a dog pulling against his leash. Armin closed his eyes and took a deep breath. This wasn't an option he had even wanted to consider, but in the end you'd really left him with no choice...
Foolish [Y/N].
You didn't account for there being a solid wooden bat under that bed he was fixing, so when Armin swung and slammed it against your ankle you buckled more with shock than the searing pain and numbness. Dropping like a rock, your jaw was agape, eyes wide. The room melted around you as you sank through the earth.
Only one sound echoed in your head.
A crack.
…
“Aww...you're so cute.”
Armin dabbed some tears away from your cheeks. The fact that there was a gap in the cage to go along with the locked door he'd already crafted didn't matter. It wasn't like you could go anywhere now.
“Can't move, right?” those deceptively innocent azure eyes flickered up to you and he smiled a little when you nodded weakly. Your face was red with tears after only just coming to a little while ago, but surely you had been happy to wake up and see how prepared he'd been. You were all bandaged up, and he'd even gone to the trouble of picking some natural herbs to ease the pain.
“That's just great then.” he purred, resting on his haunches outside the opening you'd made. He had since pulled the pole off, and he picked it up, tapping it against his palm a few times before giggling. “Hehe~ you should be glad I didn't use this on you instead. Your leg might've come clean off!”
He was laughing at you. Telling a joke at your own expense. Yet he expected you to love him back?
You just stared at him in hollow silence, and his wide smile gradually faded back to a jaded smirk as he set the pole down beside him again.
“I know you're angry right now, but it's okay. I forgive you for that.” his boyish face turned dreamy, “I do love you after all. In time you'll love me too...”
Armin reached up to gently grasp one of the bars, looking through at you with wide and serious eyes,
“...You'll forget all about Eren as well.”
You just kept staring.
“Won't you?” he started crawling in through the gap, never ripping his own unblinking gaze away from you either. You only looked back into it without relenting.
“Won't you?”
When you still refused to answer, Armin lost his temper. His left hand slammed down on your broken right leg, gripping it like he might one of his 3DMG blades during a tense battle.
“AAHHHG--!!” you screamed, trailing off into a guttural choke of pain. Armin's hold loosened but your limb was left throbbing, the sheer agony never subsiding. It likely wouldn't for another few hours at least.
Closing the remaining gap between you both, Armin tilted up your now sobbing and cringing face with two fingers, studying you for a moment before leaning in and tenderly kissing your cheek. No need to rush things after all. When he pulled back you were managing to look at him through a squint, but there was no tense fury in your eyes anymore.
Just fear, and sorrow. Begging in silence.
Armin couldn't give that to you though. What you wanted the most...it was an unfortunate impossibility. Kind of like an animal too badly maimed to truly function again. Your love for Eren was an abhorrence, it went against everything natural here.
So of course he had to destroy it.
“Shh...it's okay, don't cry...”
Leaning in again, the boy chastely kissed your other cheek this time, gracing his lips with tears in the process. You could hear his tongue licking them away as he leaned in close to your ear, resting his mouth against it and speaking in such a gentle tone that you might have fallen for his act all over again.
“You'll learn, little bird...”
He whispered.
“You'll learn.”
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FRAGMENT | KADAJ x READER | FFVII: ADVENT CHILDREN
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The rain in Edge never seemed to wash anything away. It only slickened the gray streets, and made all the shadows that much deeper.
Lately, there had been a lot of those shadows…
You pulled your hood lower, stepping over a puddle glowing with the oily sheen of spilled mako, wanting nothing more than to get back to your apartment and shut out the miserable world. These days it was becoming harder and harder to hold onto hope.
But there was something that made you freeze, as you passed by one of the many, winding alleyways. A pained groan, true pain.
Normally, you’d keep walking. In a city still recovering from Meteor and plagued by Geostigma, minding your own business was a survival trait. Especially when you were on your own like this.
Yet, driven by a reckless spike of curiosity, you stepped into the narrow alley.
Leaning heavily against the damp brick wall was a young man. He wore a stark black leather coat, his silver hair plastered to his forehead by the rain.
His frame shook violently, one leather-gloved hand clutching his chest as a harsh cough tore through him. That was alarming enough, considering the rampant sickness that had spread here before.
But it was his eyes that stopped your breath. Even in the dim light, they glowed with an eerie, luminous green. They seemed almost cat-like by design, he had a face like no other you had seen before.
And…it was a face you realized you recognized. From all the rumors you’d heard.
He was one of the Remnants. The dangerous, silver-haired trio that had been sighted terrorizing the outskirts of the city. This was Kadaj, you were fairly sure.
Before you could retreat, his head snapped up. Those glowing eyes locked onto yours, wide with a volatile mix of malice, but at the same time they looked strangely vulnerable. The last expression you would have expected from such a known menace.
"What are you looking at?" his voice hissed, sharp as a razor, though it cracked slightly at the end. He reached for the hilt of the double-bladed sword at his hip, but the movement exhausted what little strength he had left.
His knees buckled, and he slid down the brick wall, a snarl twisting his pale face as he hated himself for his own weakness. There was nothing he despised more.
You should have run. This man was a known danger, but still…he didn’t seem that way in this moment.
Instead, you took a step forward, your hands raised in a peaceful gesture. To a fault, you were someone who struggled not to intervene when you saw someone suffering right in front of you. That was why you tried to keep your head down most of the time so you wouldn’t see it at all.
It rarely led to anything good.
"Are…are you okay? You look like you’re hurt…”
"I don't need pity," Kadaj spat, his breath coming in ragged gasps. He leaned his head back against the brick, staring up at the dark sky as the rain washed over him. Rather than trying to hurt you, he instead attempted to ignore you.
Softly, he began to murmur under his breath.
"Mother...why haven't you called for me yet? Am I not good enough?"
The raw despair in that slight voice struck a chord in you. He wasn't just a threat; he was a terrified child trapped in a lethal body, desperately searching for a mother who would never truly love him back.
And he had become so weak, he wasn’t even able to hide it.
"Hey," you said softly, kneeling in the wet dirt a safe distance away from him. "The rain isn't helping. If you stay out here, you're just going to get worse."
Kadaj let out a mocking, breathless laugh, his eyes slitting as he looked at you. "And what do you care? You should be running to your savior. Go find Cloud Strife. Tell him I'm here. Tell him to come get it over with."
"I'm not looking for Cloud," you replied quietly, holding his intense, glowing gaze. "I'm looking at you. And right now, you look like you need a place to dry off."
Your kind of kindness was something he was unprepared for.
Kadaj looked at you fully. Stared at you, searching your face for deceit, mockery, or fear. Finding none of them (well, perhaps a little nervousness), his sharp features contorted with confusion.
He wasn't used to kindness. He was used to being a weapon, a brother, a leader—but never someone worth looking after. Least of all by a stranger, by a human.
Slowly, testing his limits, Kadaj pushed himself up from the ground. He swayed on his feet, his hand dropping away from his sword. While he didn’t say yes, he still made no move to hurt you.
"If you're lying to me," Kadaj whispered, leaning in close enough that you could see the faint luminescence of his mako-infused skin, "I'll make sure you regret it. You keep that in mind"You swallowed tightly, but didn't flinch. Somehow you had the feeling that was all talk.
"Fair enough. Follow me."
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PROSECUTOR | YANDERE!MILES EDGEWORTH x READER | ACE ATTORNEY
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Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. I do not own anything except my own writing. All properties belong to their respective creators.
Content Warning: YANDERE doin' yandere stuff
A/N: i do not object to this man doing whatever the hell he wants with me
The courtroom was a battlefield of words and evidence, and you had somehow ended up right in the middle of it.
As a junior analyst for the prosecutor's office, your days were filled with sifting through documents, verifying alibis, and occasionally testifying on minor details. But today felt different. The case was high-profile—a murder tied to corporate espionage—and Miles Edgeworth, the legendary demon prosecutor, was leading the charge.
You'd seen him in action before, his sharp suits and sharper gaze commanding the room like a conductor wielding a baton. There was something magnetic about him, the way his cravat fluttered slightly with each precise gesture, his voice cutting through the chaos with unyielding authority.
But you'd never spoken to him directly. Until now.
“Miss [Y/N],” Edgeworth's voice echoed through the chamber as he turned to you on the stand. His steel-gray eyes locked onto yours, piercing and unblinking. “Your analysis of the financial records is pivotal. Walk us through the discrepancies again.”
Your heart raced, not just from the pressure of the testimony, but from the intensity of his stare. You explained the forged transactions, the hidden accounts, your voice steady despite the knot in your stomach.
He nodded once, a faint approval in his expression that made your cheeks warm. The defense attorney tried to trip you up, but Edgeworth dismantled their objections with ruthless efficiency.
By the end of the day, the verdict was a conviction, and as the gavel fell, you caught him watching you again—from across the room, his lips pressed into a thin line.
…
That should have been the end of it. A win for the office, a notch in your resume. But the next morning, as you arrived at work, there was a package on your desk. No sender's name, just a neatly wrapped box containing a first-edition law textbook you'd mentioned in passing during your testimony.
Your brows furrowed in confusion. Who could have known? You shrugged it off as a colleague's gift and dove into your next assignment.
Weeks passed, and the coincidences began to pile up. A late-night coffee run after crunching numbers? There was Edgeworth in the lobby, 'coincidentally' grabbing his own. He nodded politely, but his eyes lingered a fraction too long.
A threatening note slipped under your apartment door, anonymous and vague? The police dismissed it as a prank, but Edgeworth appeared at your office the next day, insisting on reviewing your security.
“It's my duty to ensure the integrity of my team's safety,” he said, his tone clipped, but there was an undercurrent of something fiercer, more personal.
You started to notice the patterns. Your schedule seemed to align with his more often than chance allowed. Files you needed appeared on your desk before you requested them, always with his meticulous annotations.
And then there was the way he spoke to you now—direct, almost possessive.
“You've been working too hard,” he'd say during breaks, his gloved hand brushing yours as he handed over a report. The touch was brief, electric, sending a shiver down your spine.
You told yourself it was admiration, professional respect. But deep down, a thrill stirred, mingled with unease.
…
One rainy evening, after a particularly grueling day, you decided to walk home instead of taking the subway. The streets of Tokyo were slick with water, neon lights reflecting in puddles like shattered glass.
Your mind wandered to Edgeworth—his unwavering focus, the rare glimpses of vulnerability when he thought no one was watching. You'd caught him staring at you during meetings, his expression softening just enough to hint at the man beneath the prosecutor.
A shadow detached from the alley ahead, and your steps faltered. Two men, rough-looking, blocked your path.
“Hey, miss, you look like you could use some company,” one leered, his breath reeking of cheap sake. Panic surged as the other grabbed your arm, yanking you toward the darkness.
“Let go!” you shouted, struggling, but their grip tightened. Rain poured harder, muffling your cries. Then, a voice sliced through the storm like a prosecutor's objection.
“Release her. Now.”
Edgeworth emerged from the downpour, his coat billowing like a cape, umbrella discarded at his feet. His face was a mask of controlled fury, eyes narrowed to slits. The men laughed at first, but something in his stance—the coiled readiness, the aura of unyielding authority—made them hesitate.
“Walk away,” he commanded, stepping closer.
One man shoved you toward his partner and lunged at Edgeworth, but the prosecutor sidestepped with grace, delivering a sharp strike to the assailant's knee. The man crumpled with a yelp. The second hesitated, then bolted, his accomplice scrambling after him into the night.
You stood there, drenched and trembling, as Edgeworth turned to you. Without a word, he shrugged off his coat and draped it over your shoulders, the fabric warm from his body heat.
“Are you hurt?” His voice was low, urgent, his hand hovering near your cheek as if afraid to touch.
“I-I'm fine,” you stammered, but your knees buckled. He caught you effortlessly, pulling you against his chest. The scent of his cologne—crisp, like polished wood and faint spice—enveloped you, steadying your racing heart.
“This cannot happen again,” he murmured, his breath warm against your hair. “I won't allow it.”
There was a possessiveness in his tone that sent a confusing mix of fear and warmth through you. He hailed a cab, bundling you inside, and gave the driver your address without asking.
The ride was silent, save for the patter of rain on the roof. Edgeworth sat rigidly beside you, his gaze fixed on the window, but you felt his awareness like a tangible force. When the cab stopped, he paid and escorted you to your door, scanning the hallway with predatory vigilance.
“Thank you,” you whispered, fumbling with your keys. “How did you...?”
He met your eyes, his expression unreadable.
“I was following you. For your protection.”
The admission hung between you, heavy and undeniable. Before you could process it, he stepped closer, his fingers tilting your chin up gently.
“You have no idea the dangers out there. Or how much I…”
He trailed off, his thumb brushing your lower lip, a spark igniting in the air.
Your breath hitched. This was Edgeworth—stoic, impeccable Miles Edgeworth—looking at you like you were the only truth in a world of lies.
“Miles,” you breathed, the name slipping out unbidden.
His eyes darkened, and he leaned in, capturing your lips in a kiss that was both tender and fierce. It was a claim, soft yet insistent, his mouth moving against yours with a hunger he'd kept leashed for too long.
Your hands fisted in his shirt, pulling him closer, the world narrowing to the heat of his body, the subtle press of his frame against yours. It ended too soon, leaving you both breathless, foreheads touching.
“I cannot lose you,” he said softly, his voice raw. “Not to this city, not to anyone. You're mine to protect.”
The words should have alarmed you, but in that moment, wrapped in his coat and his gaze, they felt like a promise. You nodded, dazed, and he pressed another kiss to your forehead before stepping back.
“I'll see you tomorrow. And every day after.”
As he walked away into the rain, you touched your lips, heart pounding. He had ensnared you with all the skill you’d expect, and strangely, you weren't sure you wanted to escape.
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A/N: is it bad if i say i was only into the show when he was a part of it... 👀
The Camaro's engine growls softly as Billy pulls up to the curb outside your dorm, the headlights cutting through the misty haze of the college parking lot like twin beams in the fog.
It's late—past midnight—and the campus has emptied out, leaving only a few stragglers chatting on the steps, and the occasional rustle of leaves in the autumn wind.
You slide into the passenger seat, the door thudding shut. The interior smells familiar: leather worn from years of use, a faint trace of his cologne, sharp and musky, and the lingering smoke from the cigarette he probably crushed out before arriving.
That’s his way. He does what he wants. Whether his father hates it or not, and all the better if he does.
Billy doesn't look at you right away; his hands rest easy on the wheel, fingers drumming a lazy rhythm as he waits for you to buckle in.
"Rough night?" he asks, voice casual, almost lazy, as he eases the car away from the dorms and onto the main road leading out of town. His profile is sharp in the glow of the streetlights, blond curls catching the orange hue, but there's a tightness in his shoulders that you can't quite place.
He's dressed in his usual—faded denim jacket over a black tee, sleeves pushed up to reveal the corded muscles of his forearms—but tonight, he seems weirdly tense, more tense than usual. Like a coiled spring disguising itself as a slouch.
You settle back, the seat conforming to your body, and let out a sigh. Small talk it is, much as you hate it.
"Yeah, exams are kicking my ass. Spent the whole evening cramming with some people from class."
The words tumble out easily; this has always been your buffer with Billy, a way to navigate the edges of his intensity without diving straight in. Just…discussing the mundane. It’s harmless, right?
The radio crackles to life as he fiddles with the dial, settling on a low station playing some classic rock—Springsteen, the guitar riff weaving through the air like a threadbare comfort.
He nods, eyes on the road as the campus fades in the rearview. "College life's treating you good, then? All those late nights, parties..."
There's a lilt to his tone, teasing but not pressing, and he shoots you a quick glance, the corner of his mouth quirking up in that half-smile that could charm or cut, depending on the day.
The highway stretches out ahead, sodium lamps casting rhythmic shadows over the dashboard, and for a few miles, it feels almost normal. Billy's Camaro eats up the pavement smoothly, the tires gliding smooth against the asphalt, and you let the conversation drift. Talking about your professors, the cafeteria food that's somehow gotten worse, a funny story about a group project gone wrong…
"Sounds like you've got a full plate," he says after you finish laughing about the mishap, his voice warm but with an undercurrent you can't ignore, like the way the engine's rumble vibrates.
He reaches over briefly to adjust the heat, his arm brushing yours in the process. Accidental, or so it seems…and the contact lingers in your mind, a spark of warmth in the cooling night air. Circumstance may have brought the two of you together somewhat unwillingly, but there’s no denying that you’ve always felt attracted to him.
The miles tick by, the town lights dimming as you head toward home, but then something shifts. The exit for the usual route—the one that loops through the suburbs and drops you at your apartment—approaches, and Billy doesn't signal.
Instead, he keeps straight, veering onto a less-traveled artery that snakes away from the familiar path.
You sit up straighter, glancing at the signs whipping by. This road leads out toward the old quarry, empty and forgotten at this hour, lined with dense woods that swallow the moonlight.
"Billy? This isn't the way home," you say, keeping your tone light but laced with confusion, your fingers twisting in your lap.
His hands stay steady on the wheel, but you notice the way his jaw ticks, a muscle jumping under the skin, even if he doesn’t look your way. The radio dips lower, the song fading into a murmur as the road narrows, pavement giving way to patches of gravel that rattle under the chassis.
"Needed a change of scenery," he replies finally, voice even, but there's a deliberateness to it now, like he's choosing each word with care.
"Too many lights back there. Thought we'd take the long way. Clear your head after that study session." His eyes flick to you then, blue and piercing under the dim interior light, holding yours for a beat too long before returning to the windshield.
There’s something about this you really don’t like.
The detour settles over you like a weight, the trees closing in on either side, their branches forming a tunnel that blocks out the stars. The Camaro's headlights probe the darkness ahead, illuminating fleeting glimpses of deer eyes reflecting back or the glint of a discarded beer can on the shoulder.
You shift in your seat, the leather sticking slightly to your jeans, and try to shake off the unease prickling at your neck. "Okay, but...why now? It's late. I just want to get home. Don’t you?"
Billy lets out a soft exhale, almost a chuckle, but it doesn't reach his eyes. He slows the car around a bend, the engine's hum the only sound breaking the silence for a moment.
Then, as if the words have been simmering just beneath the surface, he speaks again.
"That study group...it include that guy Steve? The one with the perfect hair? Steve Harrington, right?"
The question lands casual at first, tossed out like an afterthought, but there's a probe in it—a hook disguised as idle curiosity. His fingers flex on the wheel, the veins standing out against his skin, and the air in the confined space of the car feels suffocating all of a sudden, clammy, and not just because of impending rain.
You hesitate, watching the dark road unspool before you, the white lines blurring into a hypnotic streak. Steve's face flashes in your mind. Easy smiles during lectures, shared notes in the library…a charmer for sure, but you push it down, not wanting to feed whatever this is.
"Yeah, he was there. But it was just group work, Billy. Nothing big."
He hums again, the sound low in his throat, and the car straightens out onto a straighter stretch, the speed picking up just enough to press you back into the seat.
"Just group work," he echoes, tasting the words, his tone still light but with edges sharpening. "He always that helpful? Lingering after, making sure you're 'taken care of'?"
The jealousy creeps in now, not a flood but a slow seep, coloring his voice with a roughness that wasn't there during the small talk. His gaze darts to you again, assessing, the dashboard lights casting shadows that hollow his cheeks, making him look both familiar and dangerously unfamiliar.
You turn toward the window, the glass cool against your temple as you try to create some emotional distance, to diffuse the building tension with nonchalance.
"Come on, it's not like that. Steve's just...around. Drop it, okay? Let's just get home."
The response is swift, visceral. Billy's right hand snaps across the console in a blur, fingers closing around your wrist with a grip that's ironclad and anchors you instantly in his orbit.
“Billy!?”
He tugs you closer across the bench seat, the motion abrupt and commanding. Your body angles toward him involuntarily, the seatbelt straining, and the world outside the windshield tilts for a split second before he rights the wheel with his left hand.
His hold is firm and increasingly painful, thumb settling over your pulse point and pressing just enough to feel the frantic thrum beneath your skin. An intimate reminder of his control in this claustrophobic cocoon of metal and night.
"Drop it?"
He repeats, his voice dropping to a murmur that's controlled, threaded with that dangerous calm that sends a shiver racing down your spine.
The thumb strokes once, tenderly tracing the vein in a way that's almost soothing despite how he’s hurting you, holding you fast as the car barrels onward. Fear coils low in your belly, twisting with a tension that's sharp and unwelcome, a heat that blooms despite the dread, making your breath come shallow and uneven.
He doesn't release you, doesn't soften the grip as the road curves gently, the headlights sweeping over a faded billboard long abandoned to the weeds. His eyes stay mostly forward, but they flick to your joined hands, then to your face, intense and unblinking.
"I'm looking out for you, that's all. Always have. Steve...he's a problem waiting to happen. Thinks he can slide in, play the hero, but what does he really know about you? The real you—the parts that keep you up at night?"
His words build slowly, each one measured, but the restrained temper simmers beneath. You want to snap at him, remind him that he doesn’t know the ‘real you’ either.
You tug experimentally at your wrist, but his hold tightens fractionally, thumb pressing deeper, as if to say not yet.
The questions pivot, turning inward, invasive. "Tell me—does he get it? The way things are for you? Or is it all just easy talk, surface-level bullshit? You trust him with your secrets? With what makes you feel safe?"
"Billy, let go," you murmur, voice strained, but he shakes his head once, sharp, eyes locking onto yours for a longer moment this time.
"No," he says simply, the word final, laced with that possessive edge that brooks no argument. "Not until you say it. Who do you feel safe with? Me...or him? Be honest, baby…”
His hand loosens from the wheel a touch. Panic begins to swell, as you feel the ribboning road beneath start to slip away at an angle under the wheels.
“I know when you're lying–"
The words cut off mid-sentence as the Camaro drifts, tires skimming the gravel shoulder with a gritty whine that slices through the charged silence. His prized vehicle lists to the right, the world outside tilting in a nauseating sway: the dark treeline rushing closer, branches clawing at the periphery of your vision like skeletal fingers.
Your heart slams against your ribs, a wild drumbeat drowning out the engine's roar, and you yank harder at his hold on your wrist, the pressure of his thumb now a vise that anchors you even as everything else spins toward chaos.
“Billy please–!!”
The headlights sweep wildly across the underbrush, illuminating twisted roots and the glint of wet leaves, the road's edge crumbling away into a shallow ditch that looms like an open maw. Gravel sprays up in a staccato patter against the undercarriage, the steering wheel vibrating under Billy's lax grip as the car fishtails, rear end sliding out in an arc.
Your free hand shoots out instinctively, slamming against the dashboard for purchase, nails digging into the cracked vinyl as a scream builds in your throat, raw and desperate. The air whips through the cracked window, carrying the sharp tang of earth and impending disaster, and in that split second, the claustrophobic intimacy shatters into pure, visceral terror.
“BILLY! Stop—pull over, you're gonna—”
Your voice cracks, high and frantic, the words tumbling out in a rush as the front tire catches the lip of the shoulder, jolting the frame with a bone-rattling thud.
The Camaro teeters, suspension groaning, and you can feel the momentum pulling you both toward the drop-off, the darkness swallowing the beams of light.
Panic surges hot and blinding, flooding your veins with adrenaline that makes your captured wrist throb under his fingers. As you shut your eyes tight, Steve's face flickers in your mind, irrelevant now, a distant spark against the immediate threat of twisted metal and shattered glass.
You don't care about group studies or easy smiles; survival overrides everything, and the words spill from you in a breathless plea, laced with the fear that's twisting your gut into knots.
“Okay, okay! I won't— I swear, Billy, I'll never hang around Steve again! Never talk to him, nothing! Just you, only you—please, God, get us back on the road!”
Your voice breaks on the last word, tears pricking at the corners of your eyes from the sheer force of the terror, body rigid against the seat as the car hangs on the precipice, engine revving uselessly against the angle.
Billy's gaze sharpens, drinking in your capitulation like it's the sweetest surrender, a flicker of satisfaction cutting through the intensity.
His thumb presses once more against your pulse, feeling the erratic hammer of it, before he lets go and both hands snap back onto the wheel with a decisive twist. Tires screech as he corrects the drift, muscles in his arm bunching under the denim sleeve, hauling the Camaro back onto solid asphalt with a jolt that snaps your head forward against the seatbelt.
The car straightens, engine settling into its familiar growl as the road reclaims its steady path, the ditch receding into the shadows behind you. He exhales slowly, the tension bleeding from his shoulders like air from a punctured tire, his jaw unclenching as the half-smile returns, softer this time, edged with triumph.
The radio, forgotten in the chaos, crackles back to life with a tinny guitar solo, filling the cabin with a mundane normalcy that clashes against the pounding of your heart.
“Good girl,” he murmurs, voice low and approving, the words wrapping around you like smoke—possessive, soothing in their finality. He steers the car with one hand now, the other trailing lightly up your arm in a gesture that's almost tender, thumb brushing the inside of your elbow before withdrawing to rest on his thigh.
The road ahead smooths out, the detour forgotten as he loops back toward the familiar highway, town lights twinkling on the horizon like a promise of safety. “See? Wasn't so hard. Knew you’d see it my way.”
You slump back into the seat, breaths coming in shaky pulls, the adrenaline crash leaving you hollowed out and trembling.
Billy glances at you sidelong, eyes softer in the dashboard glow, and cranks the heat up a notch, the vents sighing warm air over your chilled skin. The miles unwind in relative quiet, small talk absent as the Camaro swallows the rest of the distance, pulling into your apartment complex in no time.
He kills the engine, the sudden silence amplifying the faint tremor in your hands. Billy turns to you fully then, reaching across to unbuckle your seatbelt with efficient fingers, his touch lingering at your shoulder.
“Get some rest,” he says, voice rough but steady, the storm in his eyes banked for now. “We’re good. Yeah?”
Still shaking, fit to cry, all you can do is give him the answer he wants.
“Y…yeah.”
“And? What do you say?”
You can barely ‘say’ anything. You feel sick.
But you do. Because it’s what he wants.
“…Thank you for the ride…”
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A/N: didn't trust this man from the start tbh
The announcement came on a dull Wednesday morning, right after midterms.
Your homeroom teacher tapped a stack of papers against the desk, calling for quiet — though it wasn’t necessary. Everyone had that post-exam foggy dread.
“Shujin is participating in the Tokyo Youth Ethics Initiative this winter,” she said, sounding rehearsed and strained, probably hungover. “As high-achieving students, some of you will be paired with external representatives. Consider it…an academic exchange.”
There was a murmur, but you kept your head down, doodling in the margin of your workbook.
You didn’t care, really. Until she said his name.
“And…Akechi Goro will be partnering with—”
Your attention snapped up.
Please no. Please…
She read aloud:
“…[Y/N].”
A small collective gasp broke out. A few envious groans. Someone whispered, “Lucky…”, which was particularly hilarious. What exactly was ‘lucky’ about that??
You blinked, processing. And in that blink, the classroom door slid open.
“Apologies for my late arrival,” he said, bowing slightly. “There was a scheduling conflict with my agency.”
Everyone straightened. Some girls tried to fix their hair in their phone screens. It was clear how many folks he had smitten.
He scanned the room politely and pleasantly, until his gaze reached yours. And there it held.
Longer than polite.
Longer than pleasant.
But he smiled charmingly, disarmingly. Something about the smile made your stomach twist.
…
You and Akechi were given a shared binder and a thick packet of instructions.
Topic: “The Role of Ethics in Civic Responsibility.”
You could practically feel his boredom radiating off him. To be fair, it wasn’t all that riveting for you either. Even if it had been, though, how were you supposed to focus when he was the one you’d been glued to?
“Quite the surprise,” he said lightly, when class wrapped up and it was just you two packing to go. “I never thought Shujin would pair us.”
All you gave him was a tight-lipped, curt little nod. There was no strong attempt on your end to hide your disdain.
“They must think highly of you,” he continued. “Or perhaps they enjoy watching capable people suffer together.”
“That’s…encouraging,” you finally said, and dryly too.
He laughed softly. It was startlingly gentle, and real. Not nearly the arrogant sort of chuckle you’d expect from his sort.
“Shall we begin tomorrow?” he asked. “Kichijoji’s library seems quiet enough. I’ll rearrange my schedule.”
“You don’t need to do that. I can work around—”
“I insist.”
His tone was syrup-sweet, but his auburn eyes said: It’s not a request.
“I want to give this partnership the attention it deserves…”
The way he said “attention” felt loaded.
The way he looked at you felt even more so.
…
Kichijoji’s library smelled like old paper and pine cleaner, and it was nice and quiet at this time of day. Akechi arrived exactly on time to meet you, not a minute early nor late.
He removed his gloves before sitting, placing them perfectly aligned on the table. Then he opened your shared binder and scanned your notes like he was searching for flaws. You watched him leaf through it, expecting at any moment that he’d start getting critical.
But instead, he paused.
“Your handwriting is…”
He tapped the margin.
“Unpredictable.”
“Unpredictable?” you echoed.
“Yes.”
His gaze flicked to you.
“Half the strokes are hesitated. Half aren’t. You switch between two writing styles depending on the content. People don’t usually do that.”
He said it like he was revealing your blood type. You squinted at him though, scrunching your brow, finding it nonsensical. Pretentious.
“I didn’t know you analyzed handwriting.”
“I analyze everything,” he said simply.
So it seemed…
As the hours ticked by, you began to notice he had the most irritating habit of watching you while you worked. Not discreetly, either. He observed you like he was constructing a psychological profile.
Every time you wrote a sentence, his eyes tracked the movement.
Every time you phrased an argument, he paused to absorb your logic.
Every time you shifted in your seat, he adjusted too. Mirroring without conscious thought.
At one point, when you challenged his assumption about moral absolutism, he went utterly still, looking shellshocked enough you’d have thought you’d just revealed the meaning of the universe.
“I’ve never heard someone disagree with me quite like that,” he said softly. “That’s never happened before. It’s…refreshing.”
He meant: You’re the first person who ever surprised me.
And he didn’t know what to do with that.
…
Over the next week, Goro became…
Different.
Not outwardly — everyone else saw the same polite, charming, well-spoken boy who could talk circles around a politician.
But with you? It was like he had begun to slip, just a little.
He started showing up five minutes early to every meeting. Then it became ten, and fifteen, and so on, and so on. You’d always find him waiting for you, hands clasped and patient. A twinkle in his eye you hadn’t noticed before.
When you mentioned you liked a certain café near Inokashira Park, he “coincidentally” suggested working there the next day. He would correct your grammar, but then apologize immediately after. This was a guy you would never expect to apologize for anything.
But he seemed pleased — genuinely — when you snapped back at him. The questions that prodded you and poked at you and got a rise out of you, you were never shy about showing it. Yet he strangely seemed to like that fire in you.
He asked questions no normal partner would ask:
“Why do you hesitate before stating your opinion?”
“Do you always rub your thumb against your palm when you’re thinking?”
“You avoid topics about fairness. Why?”
“Who taught you to write in such careful margins?”
“Why do you leave things unsaid?”
Individually, each question was nothing. You could even call any one of them stupid. Who cared? Big deal?
But together? It felt like he was peeling you open like a case file. All these minute, specific little details, the nuances of you. Akechi seemed to want to know it all.
…
It finally happened when you were in Leblanc.
A study session turned into an argument about one of your project’s examples. It was nothing serious, just a tiff about approach. But Akechi froze when you retaliated this time, not smirking the way he usually would when he was so clearly amused by you.
Then he said, very quietly:
“Why does it bother me when you disagree?”
You stared at him. He stared back, expression too raw for the mask he usually wore. Speechless, you wondered why he was asking you? How the hell were you supposed to know what was going on in his head?
“This is absurd,” he murmured, almost to himself. “You’re just a classmate. A partner. This shouldn’t matter.”
His fingers tightened around his pen until his knuckles whitened.
“But it does,” he said, meeting your eyes.
“You matter. And I don’t know why.”
The café buzzed softly with background noise. You felt the world shrink to his confession.
“Goro…”
You said his name carefully.
“...I don’t know what’s been going on with you lately, but it’s weird, ok?”
His breath caught, but you carried on, leaning across your side of the cafe table and looking into his eyes quite seriously.
“You’re right that it shouldn’t matter. We barely know each other, we aren’t friends. So…I don’t understand where this is all coming from—”
“No,” he said, almost desperately soft. “Don’t say it like that.”
He placed a hand on your notebook. Not touching you, but close enough that you shied back a little bit.
“I don’t want this to be complicated,” he whispered. “But you’re unpredictable. You’re intelligent in ways I can’t categorize. You challenge me. You see things I don’t.”
His eyes darkened.
“And that terrifies me.”
He paused, and wrapped his hands deliberately around the coffee cup in front of him.
“But it also…anchors me.”
For a moment, he almost looked boyish. Innocent in a way that didn’t suit the haughty attitude he usually had.
A shaky laugh followed.
“You’re becoming the control variable in an otherwise chaotic equation,” he said. “Something stable enough to measure myself against.”
Then, softer.
“No one has ever done that for me.”
You weren’t sure whether he was confessing affection or dependency. Maybe both.
But one thing was unmistakable:
Goro Akechi — brilliant, volatile, elegant liar — had begun to orbit you.
And he had no intention of stopping.
…
A week later, your teacher announced that your project draft was the strongest in the cohort.
The class murmured when the results were announced. You couldn’t help but shoot Akechi a small, rare smile, you were actually proud about this. But he didn’t smile back.
His gaze was fixed—not on you—but on a student across the room who had whispered:
“Figures. Akechi carried them.”
A flicker of something murderous crossed his expression.
No one else saw it.
But you did.
And Goro saw you seeing it.
When he approached you after class, he was perfectly, stiffly smiling. Without hesitation, he addressed the elephant, or rather, the classmate in the room.
“Don’t listen to them,” he said quietly. “They’re wrong.”
“I didn’t care what they thought,” you said. “Did you?”
His breath shook.
“I care when someone diminishes you.”
You froze, and squinted at him a bit. Had he forgotten the many times he had done that himself in the past?
He continued,
“And I won’t let anyone take credit for what you’ve achieved. Not my reputation. Not theirs. Not the world’s perception of us.”
Us.
The word lingered like smoke from a gun, and your mind flashed back to the way he had blurted out “you matter” back at the cafe. These pieces that had been perfectly lined up, you couldn’t ignore them anymore like the obvious wasn’t obvious.
Akechi took just a step closer in his polished school shoes.
“I won’t lose ground to anyone,” he murmured. “Not academically. Not emotionally. And certainly not when it comes to you.”
You hesitated, glancing up at him through your lashes.
“You keep talking that way…why don’t you just come out and say it?”
But he stepped back with a soft smile, almost bashful.
“I’ll see you tomorrow. Don’t be late.”
As he left, you stood bewildered, alone in the corridor.
Strange as it was, you were beginning to see it clearly. The truth of the matter.
The teacher had stuck you together against your will.
But Akechi wanted this partnership to last.
Forever.
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The endless reflection of the mirror room didn’t just multiply Jiji’s face; it multiplied the claustrophobia. It multiplied the dread.
It multiplied every awful feeling that surrounded you and consumed you in that place.
In every direction, thousands of versions of him held thousands of versions of you, creating a seamless, terrifying horizon of your own hopeless captivity.
As the days—or what felt like days—bled together, that initial desperate panic you’d felt began to numb until you felt like a ghost in your own body.
And as you grew quieter, Jiji’s delusion didn’t stabilize; it mutated. The bright, lopsided grin of the boy you used to know was entirely gone, replaced by a restless, hyper-vigilant intensity.
He was unraveling in the very paradise he had constructed for you. He treated you like glass, but glass he was entirely willing to shatter if it meant you wouldn’t slip through his fingers.
That was perhaps the most terrifying part of all of this. That, even if he claimed to love you, he would so easily, quite happily, hurt you, if it meant he could get what he wanted.
He would spend hours braiding your hair, his hands trembling slightly, whispering apologies for how rough he had been when he pinned you against the station wall.
"I didn't mean to squeeze your wrists so hard," he would murmur, pressing his lips to the faint, fading bruises. "You just...you make me crazy when you run, [Y/N]. You know I only did it to keep you safe. If you just stop trying to leave, I’ll never have to hold you like that again. Promise."
But the moment you pulled away, even a fraction, the tenderness evaporated. If you stared at a mirror for too long, trying to find a flaw in the glass, he would suddenly grab your face, forcing your gaze back to him.
"What are you looking for?" his voice would drop, losing all its warmth, his pupils dilating into sharp, dark points. "An exit? There isn't one. I told you. Are you looking for him? Is that it? You think he’s going to break through the glass like some kind of hero?"
Jiji would shake you, just enough to make your teeth click, his breath coming in ragged gasps. "He doesn't care about you. He’s out there with Momo. They forgot about you the second the doors closed. I’m the only one who stayed. I'm the only one who loves you!"
Then, seeing the terror in your eyes, he would break down, burying his face in your lap, weeping violently and begging you not to hate him. Again and again, over and over.
It was an exhausting, inescapable cycle. He was losing his grip on reality, and he was dragging you down with him.
…
To understand how someone like Jiji could become this kind of terrifying creature, it was necessary to look back in time…
Jiji had loved you since the beginning. It wasn't the loud, theatrical affection he threw around to mask his insecurities; it was a heavy, consuming thing.
For months, he had played the role of the loud, goofy childhood friend, the reliable comic relief, because he thought it was the only way to keep you close. He forced himself to be loud so you wouldn't hear how fast his heart beat when you leaned against him.
And then, Okarun happened.
In reality, your bond with Okarun was built on shared trauma, survival, and a deep, platonic camaraderie. It was hard to find fellow humans who understood you so well, but Okarun was that rare kind of person.
You looked to him because he understood the supernatural madness tearing your lives apart. You didn't love him romantically. It was a different kind of affection.
But to Jiji’s fragile, deeply insecure ego, every look, every whispered plan, and every brush of your shoulders with Okarun was a trial by fire.
Jiji’s mind, poisoned by jealousy, began to distort every memory. Nothing was sacred.
When you laughed at Okarun’s awkward stuttering, Jiji didn’t see friend-to-friend reassurance. He saw a secret language he was locked out of. Something he wasn’t allowed to be a part of.
Every time Okarun stepped up to fight an alien or a spirit, Jiji felt a visceral, sickening wave of inadequacy. Why is it always him? Why does she look at him like he’s the savior?
The day Jiji truly lost it was a week before you got trapped. You had been hurt in a skirmish, a minor scrape on your cheek. Okarun had handed you a tissue, looking worried. You had smiled up at him—a tired, grateful smile.
Jiji, watching from the doorway, felt something physically snap in his brain.
She never looks at me like that. I crack jokes, I act an idiot to make her happy, and she looks right through me. But he does the bare minimum, and she looks at him like he’s her entire world.
From that moment on, Jiji’s internal monologue was a relentless, frantic, paranoid loop.
Every time he saw you and Okarun in the same room, his blood boiled. He would feel a physical phantom itch under his skin, a desperate urge to physically wedge himself between you two, to scream at Okarun to get away from what belonged to him.
He started staying up at night, staring at the ceiling, convincing himself that Okarun was actively trying to steal you away, that everyone was laughing at "good old, harmless Jiji" behind his back.
When the ghost station trapped you both, Jiji didn't see a curse. He saw a miracle. He saw a clean slate where Okarun didn't exist.
…
Back in the mirror room, Jiji was currently resting his head on your chest, listening to your erratic heartbeat. His eyes were wide open, staring at one of the infinite reflections of you both.
"You know," he whispered, his voice dangerously serene, "I used to hate myself. I used to hate that I wasn't enough for you. But this place...it showed me the truth. You just needed to be isolated from the noise. Out there, everyone was poisoning your mind, making you think you needed him."
His hands roamed over you like he was staking claim, sliding a little under your clothes as they ventured over your body. He had never gone so far as to take all of you, but the worst part about being touched like this was knowing that he could.
In here, in this cage, Jiji could do anything he desired.
He sat up suddenly, his fingers gripping your jaw with that terrifying strength, forcing you to look at the mirror.
"Look at us, [Y/N]. Just look. There's no Okarun here. No Momo. No ghosts. Just me. Forever."
You looked into the mirror like he wanted, but with no joy, no love. Just eyes hollow and brimming with tears.
In the reflection, Jiji leaned in, kissing your cheek with a soft, reverent sigh, completely blind to your despair. Or perhaps he could see it clearly, but nevertheless chose to ignore it, accept it.
He was entirely, beautifully, and irreversibly insane—and in his mind, you were finally exactly where you belonged.
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Content Warning: YANDERE doin' yandere stuff
A/N: a yandere in harry potter glasses is always a win tbh
Lumiose at night glittered like a circuit board.
Prism Tower throwing light across the boulevards, taxi horns echoing between the cafés and boutiques. It was beautiful from the street.
It was suffocating from the inside of Corbeau’s letter.
A crisp black envelope, delivered by a grim-faced Syndicate grunt. No return address, just a stylized rust-colored logo and a single line written in a precise, almost calligraphic hand:
“Come. Your presence is required.”
— C.
There was no threat written, but the threat radiated from the paper like static.
You shouldn’t have gone. You knew you shouldn’t have.
But ignoring a Syndicate summons in Lumiose? People whispered about what happened when you did, and some risks, frankly, weren’t worth taking.
So you went.
…
The Rust Syndicate building didn’t look like a criminal hideout.
It looked like a luxury bank: sweeping glass doors, marble floors, minimalist lighting. Everything so sterile and polished.
You expected a receptionist. A grunt. Someone to size you up, but there was nobody when you entered. A little awkwardly, you made a beeline for the elevator, figuring it was alright.
As soon as the doors slid smoothly open, there he was.
Corbeau.
Small but sharp. Pale as a ghost beneath the neon lights of the display panel. The poison-drip tails of his jacket swayed slightly as he turned his head, violet eyes narrowing with polite annoyance.
“You kept me waiting,” he said softly, as if he couldn’t decide whether the idea amused or insulted him.
His Scolipede curled against the back wall, huge body coiled like a trap sprung halfway. Its mandibles clicked once, and caused you to flinch.
You swallowed in an effort to stay composed. “The letter didn’t have a time.”
“Everything has a time,” Corbeau murmured, adjusting his glasses with two fingers. “Did it not sound like a request to see you immediately?”
Apologetically, you dipped your head. Maybe he was right, maybe it did…
As the doors closed, you felt cramped. His presence didn’t take up physical space; it took up psychological space, thought-space, breath-space.
You had the sudden feeling you’d just been sealed into a vault.
…
After an uncomfortably silent ride, the elevator chimed and opened into a dim concrete hallway that didn’t match the expensive lobby at all. It was far more industrial and cold, greyish, and you could hear machinery humming behind the walls.
Corbeau stepped out first, hands clasped behind his back, posture perfect. Scolipede scraped out behind him, the sound of its armored legs skittering across the floor echoing in the tight space.
Corbeau didn’t look at you as he spoke.
“You handled my prior tasks efficiently,” he said. “Your work in the old apartment complex, the sewer system, the Connoisseur situation.”
He paused, lip curling a touch.
“You understand how to follow instructions.”
You frowned.
“Those weren’t instructions. Those were jobs to clear someone else’s debt.”
“Semantics,” he said lightly. “You performed well. Accept the praise.”
He led you through a hallway of locked doors. You noticed each one had heavy steel bars. Reinforced hinges. Security panels. It did not feel like a typical office environment.
“What’s behind—?”
“Nothing you need concern yourself with yet,” he cut in, voice clipped. “Classified.”
You didn’t like the ‘yet’.
Not at all.
…
His office opened at the end of the hall, revealing a room with massive windows overlooking nighttime Lumiose. The city lights refracted through the glass, shimmering like gems, but Corbeau’s presence sucked all warmth out of the view.
He moved with elegant efficiency: pulling out a chair for you, brushing invisible dust from the edge of his desk, adjusting the angle of his chair by a fraction of a degree before sitting.
“Do you know why you are here?” Corbeau asked, lacing his fingers. His nails were so clean they almost gleamed.
“To threaten me?” you said before you could stop yourself.
His lips twitched. “If I intended to threaten you, you would not feel safe enough to speak.”
A pause.
“Or to breathe. Or do anything, really.”
Scolipede slid into the room with a low hiss. Corbeau placed one hand on its neck plates, lightly stroking. You realized — with a jolt — that the Pokémon relaxed under his touch like a loyal dog.
“Then why am I here?” you pressed.
He leaned forward.
“You took initiative,” he said softly. “You performed tasks meant for Syndicate members. You handled volatile spaces with caution but without fear. That interests me.”
Your throat tightened.
“And interests incur interest,” he added.
“What kind of interest?” you asked.
He smiled. Thin. Precise. Concerning.
“Proximity.”
Without breaking eye contact, Corbeau opened the top drawer of his desk. Then he slid a folder across the surface toward you.
Your name was written on the tab. All you could do was just stare at it for a long, worried moment.
“You keep files on people?” you whispered.
“I keep files on potential threats. And potential assets.”
He steepled his fingers.
“You are…unusually difficult to categorize.”
You didn’t open it.
You didn’t want to know what he’d observed.
But he told you anyway.
“You battle with hesitation,” he murmured. “But not out of fear. Out of empathy, no?”
He tilted his head, glasses glinting, momentarily obscuring his gaze.
“Your Pokémon trust you. A rare trait. Potentially exploitable by enemies.”
“That’s not a bad thing.”
“It is if others notice.”
His voice dropped.
“And others have noticed. I felt I should inform you of that.”
Your pulse quickened. “Who?”
He leaned back, crossing one leg over the other in a way that seemed relaxed but wasn’t.
“People who want your potential,” he said. “People who want to manipulate it. People who want to destroy it.”
Corbeau’s eyes lowered, drifting over your posture, your bag, the scuff on your shoe from earlier.
Every detail. Every little inch of you.
“I won’t allow it.”
At that moment, it seemed like a good time to leave. But like it read your mind, Scolipede immediately shifted to block the door. A massive wall of poison and chitin you couldn’t hope to penetrate no matter how you tried.
“Don’t,” Corbeau spoke simply. Curtly.
And you didn’t.
He rose from his chair and paced towards you, around you, observing you…
“When something interests me,” he said in a low voice, “I protect it. How one should.”
You tried to form a response. Your mouth was dry.
Eventually it became a struggle even just to look at him, and your eyes dove for the floor, head tilting completely downward. But his delicate, gloved fingers, dipped beneath your jaw and lifted it again.
He had no right to touch you so softly.
“You have no allies in this city,” Corbeau murmured. “No roots. No safety net. Nice as you are.”
Quickly, you jerked away from him. How could he speak like that? Like he knew you so well, inside out? Well, he didn’t.
“…Corbeau, I’m not joining the Syndicate. If that’s what you’re trying to do, then I’ll just tell you now that I refuse.”
“That is your decision,” he said calmly.
“So let me leave.”
The smile he gave you was patient enough to get right under your skin, you hated it.
“...You’re not going to?”
“You misunderstand,” he said. “You may walk anywhere you like.”
His lips fully curved into the smirk he’d been holding back. With such sharp features as his, it only looked all the more sinister.
“So long as it is within my sight.”
Immediately, your heart plummeted.
“You can’t—”
“I can,” he said simply. “And I will.”
His voice went soft, velvet-dark, as he began walking the room again, framed against the glittering windows, the world beyond that now seemed unreachable.
“You have already proven your loyalty once. You will not disappear into the back alleys of Lumiose like so many foolish, lonely souls.”
His eyes sharpened when he stopped, and looked right at you again.
“I will not lose something I have invested in.”
With a shudder, you practically collapsed into the chair at his desk. You wished you would have had the bravery to refuse, but all you could do was sit there, weakly.
“I don’t belong to you,” you whispered.
His expression did not change, but there was a cold fierceness behind those lenses of his, a predatory look in the amber.
“No,” Corbeau agreed simply, and walked back over to you, until he loomed over you, taller and more imposing than he had ever looked before.
“Not yet.”
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Content Warning: NONE. this one is just wholesome/angsty
A/N: wickedposting in the year of our lord 2026???
Fleeing to the forest. It was all you could think to do…
Ash clung to the undersides of the leaves overhead, making everything look bruised and dimmer than usual. This was what Oz had become. Awash of the color and life it once had, and you knew who to blame.
Creatures that once chirped and chattered fell silent as you passed. Even the wind seemed cautious, moving through the branches with long, mournful sighs.
Tragic as it was, at least you were alone…
Since you’d helped Elphaba expose the Wizard—truly expose him, not merely embarrass him—the world had shifted against you. Emerald City guards hunted you. Citizens fearfully whispered your name like it was a curse, as if saying it aloud might summon you. The Wizard’s remaining loyalists wanted blood. Some wanted yours.
And Fiyero…
You didn’t know what he wanted anymore.
He had vanished after Shiz, returned a different man in service of the Army of Oz, heroic, hardened, carrying a weight behind his eyes that didn’t belong to privileged princes. He had chosen sides long before you did, but neither of your choices aligned. Not entirely.
You could feel him approaching long before you heard him. By the time his voice broke through the trees behind you, soft and trembling, you already knew it was him.
“Stop running,” Fiyero said. Not an order, so much as a plea.
You froze, and almost ran faster. Yet slowly, painfully, you turned.
He stood between the blackened trees, half-shadowed, half-lit by the fractured moonlight spilling through the canopy. His uniform was dusty from travel. His tawny hair was disheveled in a way that didn’t suit a prince of any kingdom, but suited him, strangely. His breath rose in shallow clouds from how fast he had pursued you.
But his gaze held the same softness it once had when you were both younger, when the world was easier, and he’d grin lazily across the Shiz courtyard just to make you roll your eyes. Except now there was something else too.
Fear.
He lowered the crossbow in his hands the moment you faced him fully.
“Y/N…” He said your name like it cracked something inside him. “Thank Oz. I thought—” His throat closed. “I thought I’d find something else.”
He approached slowly, each step cautious, as though afraid one wrong movement would send you running again. As if you were a frightened deer, who could be sent scurrying at the sound of a branch snap.
You swallowed hard. “Why are you here, Fiyero?”
His laugh was small and painful.
“Why am I—? You tell me. You vanish with a fugitive witch, help overthrow the Wizard, then disappear into the woods like some tragic folk tale. Of course I came.”
“You weren’t supposed to.” Your voice wavered, fragile as ash.
“No,” he whispered. “But I did, didn’t I?”
There it was. That old warmth beneath the worry. The memory of falling for him without meaning to.
He stopped a few steps away.
“Y/N…” His jaw tightened. “You helped Elphaba imprison the Wizard. You stood with her. Against Oz. Against the Council. Against—”
“Against corruption,” you corrected. “Against evil. As you should be, as everyone should be.”
Fiyero’s mouth pressed into a thin, miserable line. “I know. I know. But that doesn’t change what they want to do to you now. The danger you’ve put yourself in.”
You looked away, unable to meet the sorrow in his face. “Is that why you’ve brought a weapon with you?”
He exhaled softly, shaking his head. “I brought it for everyone else. Not you.” His fingers fluttered at his side, restless with unspoken things. “I can’t hurt you. You know that.”
You didn’t answer. His voice broke first.
“Do you remember Shiz?” he asked. “Before all this? Before the politics, before the fights, before the world demanded we grow up overnight?”
You nodded. A small, aching movement.
He smiled faintly. “I remember you studying by the library windows. I pretended not to stare. Everyone else noticed before I did.”
“Fiyero—”
“No. Let me say this.” He stepped closer, desperation shimmering beneath his calm facade. “I should have told you then. Before everything changed. Before I—” He swallowed hard. “Before I chose her. Before you chose this.”
His hand lifted, trembling, and for a moment it hovered between you, as though caught between reaching and retreating.
Finally, he touched your arm, in a soft and revering way. Your breath caught, and you wanted to flinch back, yet you stayed put. It shocked you, and yet as soon as you felt it again, you realized just how much you had been yearning for it.
“I’m supposed to bring you in,” he whispered. “They want a traitor for the crowd to fear. They want a public example. They want someone to blame for the chaos.” His fingers drifted to your wrist. “And the Council doesn’t care how you’re treated once you’re in their chains.”
He grimaced.
“No doubt they think that by capturing you, it will be enough to lure Elphaba as well.”
His grip tightened.
“I can’t let them have you,” he spoke, quiet and fierce. “Even if it means betraying Oz.”
Your chest ached at the confession.
“Fiyero…what are you saying?”
“I’m saying…run.” His voice trembled on the edge of breaking. “Run before they find you. Before I have no choice. Before they see my hesitation and replace me with someone less…” He inhaled shakily. “Less attached.”
“Attached?”
The word escaped you before you could soften it.
He looked stricken.
“You know,” he whispered. “You always knew.”
Leaves rustled around your ankles. A single moonbeam cut through the trees, illuminating his face, the thin sheen of sweat on his brow, the softness in his eyes that he could only show when you were alone together like this.
You stepped closer still, so your chests nearly brushed.
“Will I ever see you again?”
His breath hitched.
“I shouldn’t promise that.”
“But do you want to?”
Your voice was barely a whisper.
He closed the final distance gently, his forehead gently brushing against yours.
“I never stopped wanting to,” he murmured. “Not even once.”
The world held still.
His lips brushed your cheek. But it was no mere kiss. It was a farewell.
“Go,” he breathed into your skin. “Before I make the wrong choice.”
“But this is the wrong choice,” you whispered.
His eyes shone with something tender and tragic.
“For Oz, maybe.”
He cupped your cheek at last, warm thumb brushing just under your eye.
“But not for me.”
He didn’t follow when he let you go. He only watched.
Watched you turn. Watched you walk into the dark. Watched the distance grow like a wound.
You didn’t know then if it were the last time you’d see each other. If the next time you did, you’d be true enemies.
But you knew this:
He had chosen you.
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Content Warning: YANDERE doin' yandere stuff
A/N: TUMBLR YOU GOTTA FIX YOUR GIF GAME. it's just stan twitter up in here.
anyway this myth was so out of pocket i'm never gonna move past it.
At first, the distortions came in small, almost ignorable ways.
Lights flickered when you passed underneath them, but only when your thoughts drifted into a strange kind of longing you couldn’t name. Glass surfaces trembled subtly, as though reflecting a draft that wasn’t there.
Your reflection paused a heartbeat too long before moving with you. When you gazed at yourself, the person staring back was watching you in a way that wasn’t familiar anymore.
You kept assuming, telling yourself at least, that it was a trick of the eye, the mind, the light. Strange things…but surely explainable…
At night, the air in your room grew heavy, rich with the strange sensation of being observed by someone who stood just beyond the veil of the world, as though the universe had become too thin to keep him out.
Each morning you woke exhausted, half-convinced you had been wandering through a different life while you slept.
Then came the dreams…
…
You stood in what seemed to be the ruins of a celestial temple, its pillars fractured and dissolving into gold dust. Stars crumbled silently in the distance, falling like dying embers across the horizon.
At the center of this cosmic emptiness stood a tall figure robed in light and shadow, a man whose very presence seemed built from divinity. Long hair the hue of deepest night, rich, shimmering golds and creams cloaking his sculpted body. An aura that drew you in step by step…
You did not know him, yet your soul recoiled every time you woke, as though being torn from him was a fresh wound. He seemed so fantastical though, you only assumed he was indeed that, a fantasy. Something your mind had conjured up in your loneliness.
That explanation lasted until the night you woke with a start, yanked free from sleep, and saw him standing at the foot of your bed.
The moonlight that streamed through your window refracted into soft spirals, and the shadows around him darkened into a regal aura. He looked like a fallen star given human shape, you could see now the gold threaded through that ebony hair and eyes that held the exhaustion of a man who had lived too many lifetimes without rest.
He regarded you silently, and albeit not menacingly, with something far more difficult to withstand: recognition.
You pushed yourself upright, heart pounding. Understandably, a strange (if beautiful) man suddenly standing in your room, was cause for alarm. Whether he had come from a dream or not.
“Who are you?”
For a long moment he simply contemplated you. When he finally spoke, his voice carried a weight that had you sinking into your bedsheets.
“You survived,” he said, and it didn't seem he was speaking to you so much as he was speaking to your soul. “Against every law that governs existence, you survived.”
You felt your breath shorten. “What does that mean? How do you know me?”
A faint, sorrowful smile touched his lips. It was the kind of expression one only wears when looking at something beloved and long lost. He took a slow step toward you, approaching cautiously, giving you time to recoil if you wished. You didn’t move. You couldn’t move.
Nor did you particularly wish to.
“I know you,” he spoke, “because once, beyond the boundaries of this world, you were a goddess. My counterpart. The creator to my destruction. The one whose heartbeat I held in my hands.”
Your throat tightened. His words sounded like madness, yet some part of you, one you had attempted to ignore for months, leaned toward them, drawn to a truth your mind had forgotten but your spirit had not.
He continued, and his gaze never wavered once.
“When you died, I walked the forbidden path. I shattered the laws I was born to uphold. I tore out my own heart and placed it upon the divine scale, trading it for the Creatio Core—the one force capable of calling your soul back from extinction.”
His expression darkened with memory.
“It was not meant to be wielded. Not by mortal hands, nor gods. But I used it anyway.”
It came to you all at once. The feeling of panic, confusion. And grief. Inexplicable, heart-wrenching grief.
“And what happened to your world?” you whispered, eyes beginning to glisten.
The man lowered his eyes, as though bearing the weight of a sin he could never atone for. There seemed to be so much he couldn't aptly put into words.
“It collapsed. Everything that once existed crumbled into a void of my own making. My body, that realm, every life within it. All of it dissolved under the strain of rewriting destiny. Only one thing remained intact: the heartbeat I restored.”
You pressed your hand to your chest. Your pulse pounded, strong and terrified.
“My heartbeat,” you said quietly.
His gaze lifted again, and the intensity within it nearly stole your breath. “Yes. Yours.”
For a moment, you were silent, as you took in those words of his.
“If reviving me destroyed everything,” you eventually managed, “then why appear again? Why risk breaking another world just by coming here?”
A bittersweet expression crossed his face. “Because when your soul returned, the universe shifted. I felt it. Like a pulse through eternity. I tried to remain distant. Tried to let you live whatever life fate granted you this time.”
His fingers curled slightly at his side, betraying a tremor of emotion.
“But you spoke my name in your sleep before you ever saw me. You called for me. After that…I could no longer stay away.”
You shook your head. “I didn’t— I don’t even know your name.”
“You knew it once,” he said softly, “and the memory still lingers in the deepest parts of you. That is enough.”
To that, you weren’t sure what to say. He wouldn’t even speak his name?
“If my presence risks everything,” you whispered, “then let me go. Let me die again. Let me stop whatever damage this is causing.”
In an instant he was standing beside the bed, his hand wrapping around your wrist, unyielding.
“No,” he said resolutely. “Do not speak of your death as though it is acceptable. I have endured that agony once, and once was enough to break a god.”
The stranger leaned closer, his breath brushing your cheek, his eyes fierce with a love that felt dangerously close to ruin. “If this world must fall to ash for you to live, then let it burn.”
“That’s selfish,” you whispered.
His thumb traced your pulse slowly…
“I am aware,” he murmured. “Love is selfish. Desire is selfish. And I learned long ago that I cannot bear existence without you in it.”
A shiver ran through you. His devotion was overwhelming—terrifying even—but there was a tenderness in it so profound it was impossible to look away.
“I don’t remember you,” you said softly.
“You will,” he replied. “Memories are not lost; they are merely sleeping. I will not force them awake, not yet. But when they return, you will understand why I defied everything for you.”
“And until then?” you asked, sounding more hopeful than you even intended to.
His fingertips brushed your cheek, feather-light.
“Until then,” he said, “I remain near. Watching the balance of this world. Guarding you from the consequences of your own existence.”
He leaned in, pressing his forehead gently against yours. The gesture was intimate, aching, and unbearably familiar.
“And praying,” he added in a whisper, “that fate does not demand another sacrifice.”
For the first time since his arrival, his voice cracked.
“I cannot lose you again.”
The room fell under a sudden, deeper darkness, a pitch you couldn’t see through. His touch vanished from your skin, and as you reached out, you clutched only at air.
Somewhere deep within your chest, a memory stirred.
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Content Warning: YANDERE doin' yandere stuff
A/N: if rider didn't exist he's the hottest
To summon a Servant…was no easy task.
Your workshop was small, your circuits weak, and your magical training inconsistent at best. The others in the War had tutors, bloodlines, legacies. You had instinct, a handful of borrowed texts, and the half-desperate hope that if you could call a heroic spirit forth, maybe the Grail would grant what you needed.
It was all a bit…messy.
So when the air inside the summoning circle shuddered, you thought it was a misfire. A backlash seconds away, a prana surge preparing to rip your consciousness apart.
Then, a red flare ignited the room.
A figure stepped out of the distortion, tall and sharply defined, scarlet cloaked and well built. Silver hair gleamed under the lantern light, tan skin deeply hued. His eyes, when they lifted toward you, were sharp as smoldering coals.
You swallowed hard, stepping back a pace.
“Archer…?”
He didn’t answer at first.
He just stared at you.
You had expected judgment, arrogance, annoyance — the usual reactions when a powerful Servant was bound to a lackluster mage. What you saw instead was something infinitely stranger.
Recognition.
He breathed your name, softly and brokenly like a little prayer. And you froze.
“How do you know that? I didn’t— I didn’t introduce myself.”
Something fractured behind his eyes. A muscle in his jaw tightened, and for a moment he looked young — painfully young — in a way that didn't match the stoic warrior standing before you.
“…We have met,” Archer said at last, voice quiet. “But not in a way you remember.”
A ripple ran through you. “What does that mean?”
He didn’t answer. Instead, he straightened, composure sliding back into place like a mask.
“You summoned a Heroic Spirit,” he murmured, expression unreadable. “I am bound to your will for the duration of the Grail War. That is enough for now.”
It was an evasion. A gentle one, granted, and so you didn’t push. But no doubt, it bugged you. Heavily.
You simply accepted him, grateful to have a Servant at all, unaware of the truth: that the ritual had not pulled from the Throne of Heroes, but from the instant, in another world, where a dying man had whispered your name before closing his eyes for the last time.
…
The first days passed…
Archer insisted on taking the night watch. You thought it was habit, perhaps what you could call a soldier’s discipline. But you noticed how he moved. Never more than a few paces from where you slept, never letting his guard down, not even for a single second. Never permitting an enemy within even the suggestion of striking range.
He fought with elegance, with precision. You were not a celebrated mage, but enemies died far too quickly if they came for you.
At first you mistook it for duty.
Until one night after a skirmish, when an assassin’s dagger grazed your side. The wound was shallow, a cut no deeper than a knife slipped while cooking. But blood streaked your shirt, and Archer saw it before you could cover it.
He was at your side in a heartbeat, grip firm around your arm, eyes darkened to a frightening intensity.
“Who did this?” he asked.
“It’s nothing,” you whispered, embarrassed.
He tightened his grip until you winced.
“Who.”
You had never heard him speak that way. Never seen such a furious look on his face, and at the time, it was the first moment when you could have ever said he frightened you.
When you didn’t answer quickly enough, Archer turned away, stalking across the ruined alleyway with a frightening calm. When he reached the dying servant who’d delivered the strike, his voice held none of that calm.
No time was wasted in the kill.
No theatrics. No hesitation.
The whisper of steel, a choked gasp and gurgle of blood, then nothing.
When he returned to you, expression carefully schooled, his hands trembled faintly as he tended the shallow wound.
“Archer,” you murmured, touched by his intensity, “I told you—”
He didn’t meet your eyes.
“It’s not the injury that matters.”
“What is it, then?”
He paused, and when he finally looked at you, his expression was raw in a way you didn’t understand yet.
“It’s losing you.”
Your breath stilled as he said so, and you watched his fist clench around the bloody cloth.
“I’ve…lost you before.”
The confession hung between you. You wanted to ask. To understand. But something in his posture warned that speaking more would break him in ways you weren’t ready to see.
So you let the silence stand.
…
Little by little, the signs grew.
He never let you walk behind him. Always beside him, always within arm’s reach. Whenever threats did come, his response was one of escalating brutality, worse and worse each time.
One evening, as you shared a rare moment of quiet in the workshop, you caught him watching you, in a manner that wasn’t quite lustful, but nevertheless, set you on edge.
“Archer,” you whispered, raising your hand. “What is it?”
His gaze dropped fully to you, and he slowly approached.
“You don’t understand,” he spoke softly. “This war…these timelines…you are the only constant.”
Your heart pounded. “I’m just a mage. I’m not—”
“You’re the reason I lived long enough to become this,” he interrupted quietly. “The reason I swore myself to ideals that tore me apart. The reason I died. The reason I still fight. The reason I can’t—”
Archer’s voice cracked then, and he turned away, unable to continue.
Clarity began to come, and it made your heart ache with realization of the truth.
He didn’t love you because you summoned him. That wasn’t the reason for his attachment. He loved you because he had loved you before, in so many worlds, so many times, that even remembering just one of them brought him great pain…
…
Everything unraveled the night you nearly died. It was bound to happen.
A new Master ambushed you on the outskirts of the residential district, their Berserker rampaging across the street. The battle was chaotic, flames rising through fractured pavement, the clash of steel and curses ringing through the air.
You moved to dodge a strike and stumbled — a shard of metal cutting your thigh, sending you crashing to the ground. To say you were unprepared for combat was an understatement, you never were. It would be fair for anyone to question why you had even gotten involved in this war in the first place.
Berserker’s blade descended toward you, but at the last gasp—
—Archer intercepted it with a scream of steel on steel, sparks flying as twin swords crossed immediately above your body.
After his arrival, the fight was over in moments, so fast you barely saw the shapes move, only the smear of red that sprayed the wall when Archer’s blade cleaved through Berserker’s core. The enemy Master fled, only to collapse seconds later with a broken arrow through their back.
Archer stood over them, breathing hard, his eyes wild and manic. He seemed so badly, to want to do more.
“Archer!”
Your cry for him stopped whatever revenge he had in mind. Turning to you, he approached and dropped to his knees, hands shaking as they cupped your face.
“You’re hurt,” he murmured, voice raw. “Gods—your blood—”
“It’s nothing,” you whispered, in shock.
But he pulled you into his arms, pressing your head against his chest. You felt the tremor in his body, realizing he must have truly feared you’d die.
“...This can’t go on…”
He spoke lowly, then stood suddenly, lifting you with him as though you weighed nothing. When you tried to struggle, he held you tighter like a drowning man with driftwood.
“Wh-what do you mean? Archer hold on, where are you taking me–”
“Somewhere safe,” he spoke as he started walking. “Somewhere no one else can reach you. Somewhere away from this War…”
The expression on his face told you how serious he was. Panic surged, because what that seemed to imply, frightened you more than any Berserker on your heels.
“Archer, Archer wait, you don’t need to!”
But he pressed his forehead to yours, pausing his steps only so he could hold you closer.
“Forgive me,” he whispered. “Or don’t. But I cannot watch you die again.”
When he carried you through the night, the bounded field he cast sealed behind him like a door slamming shut on the world.
And for the first time, you understood:
He had not merely been summoned. He had been dredged forth from a time where you had already been lost, into a world where you breathed again.
And Archer — your Archer — would burn this timeline to ash before letting fate take you back.
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Content Warning: YANDERE
A/N: look i don't usually go for a beard on a man but HIM?? sign me up.
Progress Day felt like a promise.
The banners shimmered, hexcrystals hummed with celebratory light, and Piltover’s upper streets glimmered as if scrubbed clean for the occasion. The air smelled of sugar pastries and engine smoke.
You and your partner walked hand in hand through the crowd, weaving between vendors, laughing at a mechanical toy that sprang to life and promptly collapsed again. Everything felt so easy, and so warm, and so safe.
Jayce Talis’s voice rose from the grand stage across the plaza—earnest, confident, hopeful as he introduced the future of Piltover. People clapped. Children perched on their parents’ shoulders. It was the kind of moment you wished could stretch on forever.
You leaned your head against your partner’s shoulder. “It’s beautiful,” you murmured.
They squeezed your hand. “It’ll get even better. You’ll see.”
But the strange thing was the way the speaker system crackled. Just once. Then again. No one else seemed to notice. The banners fluttered though the air around you was still. Your partner frowned and glanced upward—and that was the moment it happened.
A streak of bright, unnatural light filled your vision, and it seemed for a moment as if you were staring straight into the sun.
And then came the explosion.
The world ruptured in a single burst of heat and incandescent shrapnel. A shockwave slammed into you, ripping your hand from your partner’s. You hit the ground hard, stone scraping your palms, ribs cracking against the pavement.
Your ears rang. Smoke swallowed everything. You coughed, dizzy, pushing yourself upright, trying to make sense of the chaos. People were screaming. Fire licked through the wreckage like hungry fingers. The grand stage had collapsed into a sparking ruin.
Your first thought was your partner. Making sure they were okay.
You staggered toward where they had been thrown, lungs burning with acrid smoke. The plaza was carnage—metal twisted into grotesque shapes, broken machinery still sputtering steam, bodies scattered like discarded dolls. You tripped over rubble, crawling, shoving aside pieces of shattered stone until—
You saw them.
Pinned beneath the collapsed archway.
Dust-coated.
Bleeding.
Alive.
“Hey—hey, stay with me,” you gasped, dropping to your knees beside them. Their leg was crushed under a slab of stone, blood pooling slowly. Their breath came in tight, pained whimpers.
“You’re okay. You’re okay. I’m going to get you out.”
You braced your hands against the rubble, pushing with every ounce of strength you had. Nothing moved. You pushed again, harder, screaming in frustration, tears blurring your vision. The stone didn’t budge.
Your partner’s hand trembled as it reached for your face. “Don’t—” they choked. “Don’t…stay here. Go. Please.”
“Absolutely not.” Your voice cracked. “I’m not leaving you.”
The smoke thickened. Fire crept closer, flickering in the reflection of their widening eyes. You tried again, nails splitting, shoulder screaming. The rubble didn’t even shift, it began to seem hopeless—
And then a voice cut through the roar.
“[Y/N]!”
A shadow emerged from the wall of smoke—Jayce, battered and bloodied, his coat torn, his hair dusted with ash. His chest heaved as he sprinted toward you, eyes locked on your figure as though you were the only point of light in the devastation.
He dropped to his knees beside you, hands gripping your shoulders, frantic relief spilling across his face.
“You’re alive,” he breathed. “Thank the gods—you’re alive.”
You gestured wildly at your partner. “Jayce, help me, please. We need to lift it.”
He looked from you to the rubble and his face changed. Not with disgust. Not with apathy.
With horror.
He shoved his hands beneath the stone anyway, teeth gritted, muscles straining. He pushed until his arms shook violently, until veins bulged beneath his skin, until his breath came in guttural, pained gasps. The rubble trembled—just a fraction—but didn’t lift.
He collapsed forward slightly, clutching his wrist where something had torn. For a moment, Jayce just stared at your partner, chest rising and falling rapidly, expression collapsing into grief.
Then he looked at the fire creeping closer.
Then at you.
His voice dropped to a devastated whisper. “There’s…there’s no time. [Y/N] there’s no time.”
“Jayce,” you snapped, panic rising like bile. “Help me again. We can do it together. Please—please!”
He shook his head, face crumpling. “If you stay here any longer, you’ll die. The whole structure is coming down.”
“I am NOT leaving them!”
Your partner squeezed your hand, forcing a thin, broken smile. “It’s…okay.”
“No!” Your voice broke into a sob. “Don’t you dare say that—don’t you—”
The ground rumbled ominously beneath you. Jayce reached for you, but you slapped his hands away.
“Don’t touch me! Help me save them!”
Jayce’s voice shook. “I can’t lose you too.”
A crack split through the remaining structure above you. Pebbles rained down. Flames licked the archway’s edge.
“Jayce,” you whispered, pleading, desperate. “Please.”
But something inside him snapped. Suddenly he grabbed your upper arms and pulled you back. At first you fought wildly, shoving at him, kicking, clawing. He held you tighter, breath ragged with panic.
“Jayce—stop—Jayce STOP—LET ME GO—”
“I’m sorry,” he choked. “I’m so, so sorry.”
Your partner reached toward you, fingers trembling, trying to hold your hand one last time. You reached desperately, fingertips brushing, but…
…Jayce pulled you away.
And you were forced to watch the flames swallow them while Jayce held you pinned against his chest, his arms iron-strong around you, his face pressed into your shoulder as if he could hide from the sound of your screaming.
When the archway collapsed completely, when the fire roared high enough to consume everything, Jayce tightened his grip until you could hardly breathe.
“I saved you,” he whispered, voice shaking with grief and delirious relief. “I saved you. I couldn’t— I couldn’t lose you too.”
You sobbed against him, fists pounding his chest until your strength failed. Jayce didn’t flinch of course. He simply held you like you were the last living piece of his world.
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Content Warning: YANDERE doin' yandere stuff
A/N: new Danganronpa game when?
You never thought much of your talent.
It wasn’t flashy or dramatic like the Ultimate Gymnast or prestigious like the Ultimate Princess. No one applauded when your title was announced during introductions. Most people didn’t even understand what your talent meant—they only nodded politely, confused and unimpressed.
At a certain point, you had resolved to be quite…ordinary. Hell, maybe it was a blessing in disguise. Life sure would be easier.
Or so you thought…until Nagito Komaeda entered the picture.
The one person who made a point, an effort, to compliment you. To tell you what you thought you’d never hear from a soul.
“I’m honored,” his sincerity was strange. “Truly honored…to have someone like you among us.”
At the time though, the praise felt harmless.
Only later did you realize that was the beginning of the end.
…
Nagito always seemed to be around when danger approached.
A falling light fixture during breakfast missed you by inches, and you were saved only by him pulling your chair aside in time. He assured you it was “mere luck”, yet he’d been right there at the snap of a finger.
Later, when Teruteru took offense to your rejection of his creepy advances, it was Nagito who stepped in and diffused the situation calmly. Yet he had a look in his eye that seemed like he wanted to do a whole lot more than just tell him off.
But nothing alarmed you quite as much as the first murder.
A body was found.
A trial was held.
Suspicion rippled across the courtroom, voices rising in fear and self-preservation. Fingers pointed everywhere—toward you, even, at one desperate moment.
But Nagito had reassured you before even coming in here:
“Don’t worry. Hope doesn’t die today.”
And then he had turned his attention to the court.
One by one, he dismantled every argument against you. Facts he shouldn’t have known. Motives he shouldn’t have guessed. He drew threads no one else had seen and forced the true killer into a corner until they broke. In a bizarre twist, it was Teruteru.
It was only after the execution—after the screens dimmed and the room fell eerily silent—that you realized what he had done.
He had known.
He had known from the start.
Afterwards, he approached you in the hallway, his eyes bright with exhausted exhilaration.
“I’m so glad,” he said. “So relieved you survived. It would have been a tragedy for Hope if someone as important as you died so early.”
You stepped away from him though, warily.
“Nagito…why do you keep saying things like that?”
He blinked in genuine confusion.
“Because they’re true? You might not see it yet—you’re humble, which is another reason your presence shines so brightly—but your talent is essential, [Y/N]. The others don’t understand it, but that’s fine. I can protect you long enough for them to see.”
“Nagito, I don’t want anyone protecting me.” You told him bluntly.
“Oh.” His smile just softened almost sympathetically. “It’s not a matter of what you want. It’s a matter of what Hope requires.”
There was no arrogance in his tone, but given what he’d just said, you would have expected it.
“Nagito, what are you planning?”
“Nothing sinister,” he promised, hands raised in a gesture of harmlessness. “I only want to guide the game toward its most hopeful conclusion.”
Those misty eyes were so matter-of-fact. Yet he spoke the words of a zealot.
“Hope needs you alive.”
…
With time, the manipulation became impossible to ignore.
Someone set a trap meant to kill you. Someone else tried to frame you again.
Yet always, it was Nagito who made sure you were spared. Eventually, it got to the point where the others had begun to notice.
When Chiaki confronted him, accusing him of rigging the game, Nagito laughed. He didn’t stop even long after you had both walked away from his accuser.
“Rigging it? How so? By protecting the innocent? Stopping a murder? Defending the only person here I’m certain would never commit one?”
He had looked so smug when he spoke.
“Oh no. I’m only helping fate along.” Nagito’s eyes shone with reverence when they looked your way. “That’s all.”
Your heart sank, and you began to slow to a stop in the dorm corridor.
“Nagito—”
“Hope is light born from overwhelming despair. And what could be more despairing than watching someone as incredible as you be targeted by worthless and selfish motives?” His smile widened, trembling with intensity. “Hope must be protected. Even if it means twisting fate to ensure the right person survives.”
Startled, you took a step back. Quickly, he turned, and walked towards you, stretching out his hands.
“Please don’t misunderstand, [Y/N],” he said softly. “I don’t believe I deserve you. I don’t believe I deserve to even speak to you, honestly. But that’s why this is so perfect. I’m a stepping stone. A vessel. My role is to be your shield, your scapegoat, your sacrifice—whatever Hope requires.”
He took your hand then, so gently you almost didn’t feel it. Any attempt to turn away from him was met with a tug.
“You don’t need to trust me,” he whispered. “You only need to live.”
His thumb brushed your knuckles, reverent and shaking.
“I’ll take care of the rest.”
…
More began to die.
Not by Nagito’s direct hand. But through a chain of events so improbable that Nagito’s idea of “luck” was the only explanation.
And it had reached the point where you simply could not accept it any longer. As greatly as he may have frightened you, how could you ignore it? It seemed he may only listen, if it were you doing the talking.
So, you took it up with him in his dorm.
“You’re not doing this for Hope,” you snapped. “You’re doing this because of me.”
“…Is there a difference?”
His answer was immediate, and he turned to face you on a swivel chair, arms casually locked behind his head.
“I’m nobody,” he murmured. “A worthless, talentless speck of junk. But if my existence can shield you—if I can twist luck, fate, and despair itself until the world realizes your value—then maybe my life won’t be meaningless after all.”
Those stormy eyes became a little darker, as his eyelids hooded wistfully.
“It will have served a purpose.”
Before you could respond, he shot up so suddenly the chair knocked off the side of the desk.
“Please,” he whispered, voice cracking, “don’t throw away the gift your talent brings. Don’t die. Don’t let despair claim you. Let me be the one to fall in your place.”
You stared at him, trembling.
“...Is that how you want things to end? Is that what this has all been…leading up to?”
He looked at you like a parched man would an oasis of clear blue water.
“Hope shines brightest through sacrifice,” Nagito said softly.
“And I would gladly sacrifice everything…if it means your light survives.”
His hands took yours then, fingers interlinking, and squeezing. You felt his forehead press against your own, and gazed worriedly into those foggy eyes. They were so clouded with this strange lust he had…they didn’t even seem to see you at all.
“That’s what it is, [Y/N]...”
Nagito breathed it like a whisper.
“Hope.”
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Content Warning: YANDERE
A/N: 2D, 3D, this man can get it in every dimension
The last sound you remembered before everything went black was the ocean.
It had thrashed violently against the hull of the enemy ship—the one that tore you from the Straw Hats—while your captors argued over how much bounty your life would fetch. You remembered the smell of cheap rum and metal, the press of ropes biting into your skin, and the frantic thought that if Zoro realized you’d been taken, he would come for you.
And then a quieter, more frightening realization:
If he came, he wouldn’t stop.
You drifted in and out of consciousness after that, only catching glimpses of chaos. Shouting, heavy footsteps, something wet splattering the floor, the slow crack of wood splintering under tremendous force.
At first it seemed like a dream when the hatchway swung open and moonlight cut across the room, illuminating a silhouette framed by smoke and destruction. Sapped in red, the overwhelming, metallic scent of death choking your nose.
It was only when he spoke your name that you realized this was real.
Zoro carried you out of that bloodied hold as if you weighed no more than a piece of driftwood. He said nothing as he stepped over the bodies of the men who had dragged you away. His silence was more unnerving than rage would have been.
But you knew he had raged. You could see it, evidently.
He didn’t call out for Luffy, or Sanji, or anyone at all. He must have come here alone.
You tried to ask where he was taking you, but your throat only cracked with the attempt. Still, he glanced down at you, with a dark expression.
“Save your strength,” he murmured. “We’re leaving.”
He found a small emergency vessel with a single oar and a torn sail and placed you inside it. The night wind was cold, but he pulled off his coat and draped it around your shoulders without breaking eye contact, as if afraid you would vanish if he looked away for even a heartbeat.
The sea turned quieter as he rowed. Moonlight brushed the water in pale ribbons that shimmered each time the oar cut through. You drifted in and out of sleep again, lulled by the rhythm of Zoro’s movements, his muscles rippling as he worked to get you as far away from that hellish place as possible.
The second time you woke, he was carrying you in his arms again, stepping onto the coarse sand of a small island you didn’t recognize. Its shoreline curved steeply into thick, wild greenery, illuminated by the first light of dawn. Mist curled low to the ground, softening the world into a watercolor haze.
Only then did he speak again.
“This place isn’t on any map,” he said quietly, almost to himself. “No one will find us here.”
Us.
The word struck like a pebble dropped into deep water, sending ripples through your exhausted brain. As you came to fully, you parted your lips to question him, but he tightened his hold just slightly, guiding you toward a narrow path swallowed by foliage.
The island was eerily quiet. Leaves rustled only when Zoro brushed past them, his swords clinking dully against his hip. Eventually, the path widened into a clearing where an old cabin stood—weather-worn but still standing, its wooden beams bleached by sun and salt.
Zoro pushed the door open with his foot.
Inside, the cabin was simple: a single bed, a table whose legs were uneven, a small window letting in angled morning light. Dust motes drifted lazily, disturbed only when he set you down on the mattress.
Your voice was hoarse as you finally managed a question.
“Zoro…why aren’t we heading back to the Sunny?”
His broad shoulders stiffened, as he froze on the spot.
“...I can’t take you back yet,” he answered, each word chosen carefully. “You’re injured. You’re shaken. And the others…they can’t keep you safe the way I can.”
He sat at the edge of the bed, his weight digging deep into the mattress. His shirt had been changed from the blood-soaked one earlier, but you couldn’t tear the image from your mind.
“You don’t know what I found on that ship,” he said, voice lowering. “What they planned to do to you. They were willing to hurt you to get to us. To get to me.”
Your breath stalled.
“They had no idea what kind of wrath they invited,” he continued. “But I don’t want to fight the whole damn world just to keep you alive.”
He finally turned and touched you suddenly, knuckles brushing your cheekbone first, then the soft underside of your jaw, tracing the dried tear track as though memorizing its shape. You quivered slightly, bewildered by the action. To say he wasn’t usually like this…was quite the understatement.
“You scared me,” he whispered. Zoro rarely admitted fear. The confession cut deeper than any blade.
It frightened you, too, as his strong hand drifted further down, fingertips sliding the length of your throat. Under that touch, you swallowed thickly, nervously. Surely he knew how this made you feel, but still, he carried on:
“I thought I’d lost you. And if I had…”
He swallowed, eyes darkening.
“I wouldn’t have stopped until everything that took you from me burned.”
Your heart throbbed in your chest, heavy with a feeling you didn’t want to name.
“Zoro…take me home. Please. I can’t stay here. The others must be worried, they at least deserve to know I’m alright, don’t they?”
The hand on your cheek went still. He’d frozen again.
“I’m not taking you anywhere,” he spoke carefully. “Not until I know you’re safe. Fully safe. And that means away from enemies, away from danger…” He hesitated, dark gaze locking on yours. “Away from anyone who could hurt you. Even unintentionally.”
He wasn’t talking about strangers anymore. You began to realize it. He meant the crew too…
Your breath shook with a sharp inhale, as the truth dawned.
“You kidnapped me.”
Zoro exhaled slowly, eyes half-lidded as if the word didn’t wound but annoyed him.
“I rescued you,” he corrected. “Remember? And now I’m keeping you alive. If that feels like kidnapping, then so be it.”
You pushed yourself upright despite the ache in your limbs.
“You don’t get to decide that!”
His jaw tensed.
“Someone has to.”
There was a silence then that stretched, grander than the ocean between you and the Sunny.
Eventually he rose to his feet, fingers brushing dry blood on his sleeve. He looked at it, then at you, eyes softening in a way that made your stomach do loops.
“I’ll get water,” he murmured. “And food. You need rest.”
Standing, he reached the door before pausing and looking back. The early sunlight caught his face, highlighting the slight tremor of emotion behind his expression. Desperate and devoted.
“Don’t try to run,” he said quietly. “Not because I’d be angry.”
Zoro gazed right into your eyes, sharply and seriously. There was an almost…mania there. You could see it as he spoke:
“...Because I can’t lose you again. And I won’t. I refuse.”
The door clicked shut. The lock slid home. He sealed your cage, and you were helpless to stop it.
Truly, then, it dawned on you. This grim reality.
You were alone on an island no one could find.
With a swordsman who would cross oceans full of corpses to reach you.
And there was no telling whether that devotion would save you—
—or destroy you both.
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