I Have Been Vacinated About 30-45 Times In My Life. Do You Know How Much I Paid For It? Not A Dime.

In the club freakin it Wilson style

me!; peter parker.

track sixteen of LOVER

pairing: tom holland!peter parker x gn!reader

synopsis: the world is black and white until you meet your soulmate

word count: 2.4k

From what you’ve heard, New York City isn’t that different in colour than it is in black and white. When you’re deep in the city and the skyscrapers are towering over you, the seas of blacks, whites, and greys that you can see doesn’t really affect anything. You’ve met people in the past that lived by the sea or in the country when the lack of colour is more prominent, but you consider yourself lucky that in a city it’s not that big of a deal. Sure it would be nice to be able to see the colour of your mother’s favourite flowers or appreciate the blue of a summer sky when there’s not a cloud to be seen, but it’s not necessarily impractical for you to not be able to see colours.

That doesn’t mean that a part of you doesn’t ache when yet another one of your friends sends an excited message to your group chat that she’s met her soulmate. You smile at the message and send the appropriate messages of congratulations but it’s a wistful smile more than anything, and it fizzles out the good morning you’d been having. The number in your group that haven’t met your soulmate yet is dwindling, and sometimes it’s hard to feel like you’re not being left behind. You know that you’ll meet your soulmate when the universe decides it’s time but you’re starting to feel the edges of frustration growing in your subconscious. You went through both middle and high school without meeting your soulmate, and now you’re in your second year of college, it’s starting to feel like the universe is just toying with you.

You finish the remains of your lukewarm coffee before saving the assignment you’d forgotten you were working on and shut your laptop down. The warm atmosphere of the coffee shop you’d been residing in seems to have dulled slightly at the news, and you’re more in the mood now to go and throw a mini pity party for yourself than worry about your communications assignment. You’re quick to gather all your belongings and load them into your backpack, swinging it over your shoulder as you make your way to the exit. You throw a quick smile at the baristas as you walk through the door onto the crowded street outside. It's almost spring and the warmth in the air seems to have brought everyone outside as you try to make your way through the crowd to the nearest subway station to get home.

It's the sound of a scream that makes everyone stop around you. Attacks in New York are sadly all too common so people quickly start to move on, hoping to avoid whatever maniac in a suit is causing chaos today. You manage half the walk home before the sound of something crashing into a building just down the street really sends people into a panic. You find yourself struggling to move forward as people become more erratic at getting away before they get hurt, and it feels like for every step forward you manage, people shoving past you pushes you five steps back. It finally seems to clear in front of you and it doesn’t occur to you to worry why that is, just that you should try and keep moving and get away from whatever is going on around you. It’s only when you hear a woman scream that you turn just in time to see a huge block of cement flying through the air and heading in your direction.

In what you're going to later categorise as a very uncharacteristic moment, you find yourself freezing in place at the danger in front of you. It's only a blur of grey and an arm wrapping around your waist that jolts you from your mind as you're pulled into the air and away from the slab of concrete that definitely would've killed you if it had been given the chance to make contact with your body. It takes your brain a good few seconds to process what's happening to you as you feel solid ground back underneath your feet and the arm is removed from your side. You’re vaguely aware of someone speaking to you but your brain isn’t quite caught up and it’s all you can do to not collapse as your legs start to shake as what just happens begins to settle in your mind. The words being spoken to you start to become clearer as the fog slowly lifts from your brain.

“Hey miss, are you okay? Can you hear me?” You finally feel like you’re able to open your eyes without throwing up and it’s all you can do to let out a groan of discomfort. When you finally look up to see the person who pulled you from certain doom, your first thought is that you didn’t think you’d ever get this close to the masked vigilante that’s been swinging around New York for the last few years. That thought is immediately shut down though, when colours start to bloom into your vision, starting with the deep red of his mask and bleeding out into everything else in your vision. He seems equally startled by the revelation, stumbling back from you slightly as if he’d been burned. “Oh my god.”

“You can say that again.” The two of you continue staring at each other, or at least you’re staring at him. The mask makes it difficult to tell if he’s staring at you but you have a feeling that he is. You can also tell that he’s panicking slightly about the situation that’s just unfolded in front of you both.

“You just almost died!” He takes one of your hands from your side and it’s only then that you notice how much you’re shaking. You can’t tell if it’s from finally meeting your soulmate or if it’s from the near death experience and you decide to chalk it up to both. “What’s your name?” The voice is softer now, quieter now he seems to have reassured himself that you’re physically okay.

“(Y/N). I’m assuming I can’t ask you yours?” Spiderman shakes his head slightly, and the shifting of the vibrant red hurts your eyes slightly as you still find yourself adjusting to being able to see colours.

“I have to go and stop Scorpion, but I promise I’ll find you. Is there anywhere I can meet you when this is over?”

“I’m meant to have a class later. I study journalism and communications at NYU.” Your soulmate lets out a noise of consideration at your words.

“What class do you have later?”

“Journalism 301.” He seems to contemplate something for a moment before speaking again.”

“I have that class too. I’ll meet you on the benches outside the building.” You step back at his words, and when you speak confusion is heavy in your tone.

“You’re a student?”

“If these guys with masks keep attacking during my classes I might struggle to graduate but for now my GPA is holding enough for me to stay a student, yeah. I have to go before I lose Scorpion but meet me after class later?”

“Will I know who you are?”

“I’m not sure. I guess we’ll find out later huh?” He gives your hand a gentle squeeze before letting go and turning around, jumping up and sending a web towards a building to pull himself into the sky. Some passers-by run over to you as he swings away, checking that you’re physically unharmed, and then you’re being walked to the nearest subway station by a friendly older woman who wouldn’t hear of you making the five minute walk by yourself. She only leaves your side as you step onto your train, thanking her for what must be the tenth time in five minutes.

The journey back to your dorm is silent, and you’re relieved that your roommate isn’t there so you can take some time to process what’s happened. It’s nice to see your dorm as most other people see it, a multitude of colours all over the walls and the pictures of you and your friends in colour. You cringe slightly at some of the pictures from a few years ago, back when none of you could see colour and you’d all refused to let your parents tell you what colours you were wearing. You make a mental note to call your mom and berate her for letting you walk around in an outfit with such clashing colours before falling back onto your bed.

When you make it to your journalism class, you can barely focus. You take a seat at the back of the class, and you barely make any notes, too busy watching every guy in the class to see if any of them look over to you more than just for fleeing glances. When your professor announces that the class is over, you’re slow to pack up your things and you’re one of the last to walk out. When you walk out of the building, there’s only one person sitting on the benches, and he’s not facing you but you know who it is. The familiar mop of curly hair gives away your soulmate’s identity and you freeze in place. Peter Parker is Spiderman? You walk towards him, only slowing when he turns to face you.

“Hey (Y/N). I’m-“

“Peter Parker.” You see a flash of surprise on his face when you say his name before him.

“You know who I am?”

“You’re like the smartest guy in our class Peter, everyone knows who you are.” The small flush of pink on his cheeks as you compliment him is sweet, even if you were being sincere.

“I figured we could talk? About everything that happened today?” You give him a slow nod, watching as he jumps to his feet, pulling his backpack in front of him and opening it. He’s quick to pull out a small bouquet of flowers, a mix of yellow and pink flowers, and hold them out towards you. “I didn’t know what kind of flowers you liked so the florist suggested these.” His nervousness is endearing and you can’t not smile at the gesture.

“They’re lovely, thank you Peter.”

"I guess we have a lot to talk about huh? Do you, uh, wanna grab a coffee? My treat?"

"Coffee sounds great. I'll buy though, I owe you for saving my life after all." It surprises you that the walk to the coffee shop is filled with conversation, like you’ve known Peter for years. It’s almost uncanny the way you seem to finish each other's sentences and are on a similar wavelength. It’s even stranger that you realise that you’ve shared a number of classes in the past few years, and how the two of you have never run into each other before feels like a mean twist of fate, to have him so close and yet so far away.

The two of you spend six hours sitting in the coffee shop talking about anything and everything. The time passes without either of you properly realising and it’s with an almost embarrassing lack of awareness that one of the baristas has to ask you to leave because they’ve reached closing time and you’re both still there. You spend the walk back to campus laughing about it, poking fun at each other for it. It’s even stranger when you work out that your dorm buildings are practically next to each other. You both decide to head up to his dorm since Peter doesn’t have a roommate so you can talk about everything that can’t be discussed in a public setting, or at least somewhere with prying ears. You’re vaguely glad you’re not going back to your dorm, you’d left it in something of a state before leaving this morning and hadn’t felt mentally up to tidying after almost dying and meeting your soulmate in the same event.

Peter’s dorm is small but cosy, decorated with pictures of him with his friends and an older woman whom you’re assuming is a relative. You can’t help but smile at how happy he looks, and a part of you is so excited to meet all these people that he holds most dear to him. You try not to make it too obvious how you’re trying to absorb everything about Peter but when you look at him and see the fond smile on his face you know you’ve been caught. He invites you to sit on his bed whilst he pulls the chair out from under his desk and turns it so he can face you. It’s the first time you’ve had a moment of pure silence between you since you met after class and it seems like neither of you are sure who should go first. You decide it should be you to speak first.

“So, are we going to speak about this afternoon?”

“Yeah, I guess we should. Are you sure you’re okay?” You break the eye contact you were holding, eyes shifting down to the floor as you think about how today could have ended. You could’ve died today. You’re lucky that Peter had been there to save you, the whole thing still doesn’t feel real.

“I think so? I mean I don’t think it’s hit me yet? Not properly anyway.” Peter nods at your admission, a look of understanding on his face.

“That’s understandable.”

“Thank you for saving me. I completely froze when I saw that concrete coming at me and I just…I dunno, thank you.” You’ve noticed that Peter gets bashful whenever you compliment him and you make a mental note to keep doing so, he’s clearly not used to receiving praise for what he does, probably because of his need to stay anonymous.

“I was just doing my job.” His humility is clearly a knee-jerk reaction to any and all attempts to credit him for just how much he’s doing to keep the people of this city alive and safe, and you make it a personal mission to spend every day of the rest of your lives together making sure he knows he’s amazing.

“Your job is incredible. To do all of that on your own whilst being a full time student? I don’t know how you do it.” You gesture for him to join you on his bed and, when he does, you take one of his hands into your own. He seems to melt into your touch and it’s in that moment you know that this is exactly where you’re meant to be and exactly who you’re meant to be with.

Already seeing people on tiktok saying “I still hate trump but he ate with this one” like … babes … you just got propagandized … that’s literally exactly what he created this situation in the hopes you would say …

PSA: bot comments are taking over ao3

The above examples have been provided with the authors' permission to demonstrate what these look like.

Basic rundown:

They are all 3 sentences long

Perfect grammar, capitalization, and punctuation

Like absolutely flawless English teacher-style writing with only a single exclamation mark, ever

No mentions whatsoever of character names, settings, situations, or anything that could be tied to the story

The usernames may be identical to people who exist on ao3, but the name is not clickable, and no profile is associated with it EXCEPT when you directly search for that name. What this means: the comments come from an unregistered (not logged in) reader, bots scrape the site for real usernames, attach that to the comment, and post

Please spread the word about this so authors can filter comments and report them accordingly

There has been some speculation about why this is happening at all, and the best guess is that this is a feature that AI-training story-scraping tools are implementing to try and make their browsing traffic look legitimate

Y/N: Okay, truth or dare?

Sherlock, shrugs: Truth.

Y/N: How many hours have you slept this week?

Sherlock:

Y/N:

Sherlock: ...Dare.

Y/N: Go to bed.

Sherlock: I don’t like this game!

ding!

. . . kozume kenma. affection, oh affection.

truth be told, kenma loved soaking up your affection for him.

he acts as though he wasn’t that excited, reasoning that he was busy with a game he’s playing, but the unmistaken eagerness in his body language says otherwise. all of a sudden he rested his head on your desk, drowning out the sounds around him. sleep threatened to lure him into its enticing embrace, and he shifts slightly.

because you were brushing his hair gently, so careful to untagle the small knots on the ends of his hair, humming a soft tune.

kenma swore he felt like he was in heaven.

“so pretty,” he hears you coo. “you’re like a cat, ken. how cute.”

there’s really not much of a fight in him to tell you off. he just lets you do whatever it is you want with him—massage his scalp, braid his hair, delicately comb his hair—and he could care less because the words died down on his throat once he felt your touch.

“brush my hair again, please,” he murmurs, slightly raising his head, eyes blurry of sleep that almost got to him when you had suddenly stopped.

“ok, ok. lay back down.”

kenma hums, pleased. he lets you have all of your attention on him, occasionally answering the puzzled questions of your classmates if he were okay. you merely mouthed, “he’s a bit sleepy,” which they shrugged and didn’t mind that much. after all, it was almost a normal thing to see students fall asleep during their free periods.

when kenma did wake up, he felt like he had the greatest nap of his life.

he fell asleep rather quickly, too, which surprised him.

“what time is it?”

“almost three,” you answer.

“oh,” he blinks, feeling the little braid you did on his hair. kenma nodded.

he kept the braid until after volleyball practice ended.

“since when did you learn how to braid?” tetsurou asks with a teasing smile.

“none of your business,” kenma replied, rolling his eyes. “pack your bag quicker before i leave you.”

“so mean! i was just wondering.”

he thinks he’ll ask you to brush and braid his hair more often from now on.

noomon © 2023. do not copy, modify, or translate my work.

The Midnight Subway

Pairing: Five Hargreeves x GN!Reader

Deranged Five my beloved ❤️ They massacred your character

(this is not canon compliant in the slightest; prepare for gross misinterpretation of Five's new powers)

Summary: You are the only passenger on the timeline subway. You've met many iterations of the same traveler, but he never comes back. Until he does, and he finally asks the right questions. He claims to know how to stop the apocalypse, and all he needs is your help, but is he worth leaving behind all you know?

Word count: 3.6k

(AN: Confession: I never watched season 4 because I saw what a trainwreck it turned out to be, so this is very VERY loosely based in canon. Also the relationship between Five and Lila doesn’t exist because Genuinely What The Fuck. Basically I saw the vague concept of a time subway and ran with it.)

He’s covered in blood again.

He is more often than not.

In the middle of wiping arterial spray off his face with a handkerchief, he notices you, and surprise and suspicion flit over his face. Not a version of him that’s met you before, then. You’ve met him… eleven times now? All different versions from different timelines. All tired. All old beyond their years.

They get off at the same stop every time and never get back on.

This one’s wearing his school uniform. You’ve never seen him dressed like that before. His hair is long like the rest of them, though, strands hanging over his narrowed eyes.

“Who the hell are you?”

You blink. He’s not usually so aggressive. “I’m just a passenger.”

“How did you get here?”

You shrug. “Stepped off the station platform, I think.” It was a long time ago, except it wasn’t. You’ve been riding this subway for a very long time, except you haven’t. Your mind is filled with a hundred thousand identical minutes of staring out the window at the blurred lights, but you look exactly the same as you did when you boarded. “Hey, what year is it for you?” Sometimes he says something truly outrageous.

He ignores your question in favor of trying to pull open the subway doors, but they don’t budge. He curls his hands into fists. Blue light crackles around them and he pushes, but nothing happens.

You clear your throat. “Unfortunately, that won’t work. You’ll just have to wait until we get to your stop.”

“What do you mean, my stop?”

“I don’t know. I think you just have to feel it.”

“Well, aren’t you cryptic.” He rolls his shoulders and angles his chin, a tell you’ve noticed he does just before attacking. Sure enough, out comes the gun from his pocket. He angles it square at your forehead and snaps, “Explain. Now.”

“I can’t.” You raise your chin, daring him to shoot. You’re not sure if people can die on the subway. You’re not sure if you can die. You’re not sure that you don’t want to. “Obviously I’ve never felt it.” You gesture pointedly at your seat. “I’ve been here a long time.”

“How long?”

“Time doesn’t really exist here.”

For a moment it’s obvious that he’s internally debating whether or not to shoot you. “Fuck.” He shoves the gun back into his pocket. “When’s the next stop, then? I need to get off, I need to save my family. There’s an apocalypse—”

“I know,” you say gently. He’s always worried about one apocalypse or the other, always running from a million different ways to end the world. “You might as well sit. There’s no way to stop the train. It’ll stop when it’s meant to.”

“No. No, I don’t have time for this.” He shakes his head. “I’m finding a way out. You can rot here for all I care.”

“I won’t,” you say serenely. Until the timelines implode, you’ll continue to ride the subway. And once they do, you probably still will. It exists outside of the continuum. All that will change, you think, is that there will be no more stops. It’ll just be one long subway ride for eternity. If not, then at least you’ll go out painlessly.

He sighs and looks around for anyone to commiserate, but there’s only you. Without so much as a goodbye, he’s stalking away in that little ramble that reminds you sometimes of an adolescent bear: a dangerous beast that thinks it’s as large as it will be, not as it is now.

He slams the door to the next compartment. You sigh and scratch the cheap paint on the pole to your right. Sometimes he stays longer, sits down in a seat across from you and asks questions meant to seem casual, but you always know they're an interrogation.

You'll see another him soon enough. There's no indication of time on the subway—if it was real, it would be in an underground tunnel, and the only light comes from the flickering fluorescents above and the occasional tunnel light through the window. Days don't pass with the indication of a sun and moon. You're not sure if you've ever even slept. So you're not sure how long it will be before another shows up. Once two showed up at the same time and tried to kill each other. At least the survivor was nice enough to drag the body away before he got off.

Some time later you feel the subway shudder. You tilt forward slightly as it starts to slow down and eventually stop. Both sides of the doors open to a nondescript subway station, and the train repeats its usual monotone monologue. Time for him to get off, then. Maybe there's a difference in the destinations depending on which side you choose, but probably not. You're pretty sure the subway knows what its riders need.

An hour, a day, or a year passes, and the door to the next compartment opens. He steps through again. This one is wearing the same schoolboy uniform, and he doesn't look surprised to see you.

In fact, he's strangely intent.

"There's no one else on this train," he says, and you realize this is the same boy you just saw.

He came back.

He's never come back before.

Something stirs inside of you, something you haven't felt in a long time. It's still trapped beneath the blanket of dull apathy you've nurtured for so long, but its shape starts to rise in your throat.

"So why are you here? How are you here? Who even are you?" He stands in front of you close enough that you can see blood on the side of his neck that he didn't wipe off.

"I told you before. I got on. Why didn't you get off at your stop?" He's never stayed on the train longer than he has to. He's never stayed.

"This isn't a subway you can just 'get on.'" He uses finger quotes. "Do you work for the Temps Commission?"

"No," you say slowly. "I don't know what that is."

Abruptly he sits down across from you, loosens his tie, and asks, "What day were you born?"

"What a strange question. I don't know."

"You don't know an awful lot."

"I was born sometime in the fall of 1989," you say. "Sometime in September, I think, or maybe early October. That's what they estimated at the orphanage, anyway."

He sits back and runs a hand through his long hair. "You don't know."

"What do I not know."

"Who you are." He looks at you curiously. "That's why you keep ignoring the question."

You snort. It's not even very funny, but you haven't had anything to find amusing ever since you stepped on the platform. What a relief to learn that you can still laugh. Of all the things the universe stole from you, laughter isn't one of them. "Of course I know who I am. I'm one of you."

"What?"

"Or I was supposed to be." He still looks confused, so you elaborate, "One of the umbrellas."

"How do you know about that?"

"I didn't grow up on the train. I got on when I was nineteen. I saw your team all over the news growing up." A familiar hurt pangs in your stomach. "Why was I the only one your father didn't adopt?"

He lets out a long breath, then says, "Jesus." He stands up, then sits back down. “Well, if it makes you feel better, you weren’t the only one. Reginald only needed seven. He made forty-three.”

“Oh.” You slouch a little in your seat. It’s comforting to know that your exclusion wasn’t personal. You and thirty-five other kids hadn’t been found. Had their parents kept them? They probably had families. And even though the Umbrella Academy’s families hadn’t kept them, at least they had each other.

It’s comfortable to sink back into self-pity.

“So what can you do? Do you have a name, at least?”

“Of course I have a name,” you say, and tell him what it is. “Funny you ask me that when you’re the one that doesn’t. Is this where you went when you died?”

“No.” A shadow crosses over his face. “I went somewhere much worse.”

“Sorry,” you say after a pause. It seems like the appropriate response. You haven’t had a real conversation in a while. Or maybe you had the last one yesterday, just before stepping onto the subway.

“So what can you do?”

“Change time.”

“Excuse me?”

“How do you think I made it here?”

Technically, time broke when you and Five were born, bunching into little pockets like the one you made your home. When he jumped through time, though, he started the branching of realities.

The only real difference between you two is that you can manipulate time, and he can get in and out of it. That's not to say that he doesn't have its own influence over it, though.

"I made this little pocket of time into a circle, and around and around we go.” You spin your finger in the air. “But it’s because of you that it looks like a train. Five, who do you think broke the timeline in the first place?”

He stares at you, speechless.

“I didn’t mean to,” you say defensively. “And you didn’t know what you were doing.”

“That’s—just so—how does that make any sense? People are still dying! My family will die!” Instead of the gun, this time he pulls out a switchblade and flips it open. The tip glints under the fluorescents.

This has never happened before. The Fives never come back. They’ve never asked the right questions. After all, you’re not hiding anything.

“You can’t kill me,” you say wearily.

“I can try,” he growls, and lunges.

Here, you exist constantly. It's a circle and it's one stationary point. The track is an ouroboros, and the train isn't even moving. Five lunges and he doesn’t, and your throat splits and it doesn’t, and blood spills all down your front and it doesn't. You choke as it rushes out, and—

There is no blood. No cut. Five is back in his chair holding the switchblade, and you’re still in yours.

“You can’t surprise me,” you say apologetically. “I’ve seen everything. Before you even try to kill me I’m stopping you.”

“I’ll figure out a way,” he growls.

The subway grinds to a halt. You look around, surprised, when the brakes squeal. That’s never happened before. The announcement over the speakers is so gravelly you can barely understand a word.

The doors open. Five looks between you and the exit several times, then makes his decision.

“I’ll be back,” he promises. Threatening, like that’s supposed to scare you. You’d be glad for the company, you think. You’ve been sitting in silence for so long.

He steps off the train and the doors whoosh closed.

The ride starts again, and you fall back into the comfortable lull of the engine’s rumbling.

Some time later, the subway stops again. Its words are still garbled through the speakers. Technically, no time exists here, but you're pretty sure these intervals are out of the ordinary. Are they affecting the subway?

It starts back up again, and the connecting compartment's door opens. In walks a new Five. He's wearing the same schoolboy uniform as the last—you think. Instead of a spray of blood on his face and collar, though, he's completely soaked in it, like he drained a hundred bodies and bathed in their entrails. His hair is soaked flat against his head, and his teeth are red when he bares them.

"I'm back," he growls.

It's the same Five.

He came back again. No one's ever come back for you even once, let alone twice.

"What did you do?" Your stomach twists. You're not squeamish, but this is... a lot.

"I went to a diner," he huffs and sprawls in the chair across from you. The gaudy faux-velvet seat drinks the blood up greedily. "Met a lot of alternate versions of me."

"Did you kill them all?" you ask, horrified. Some of them had been polite. Gentle, even, beneath their hard exteriors.

"They had given up," he snarls. "They wanted me to give up on saving my family. I haven't spent decades of my life fighting for them to do that." A manic light shines in his eyes. "One of them made brisket."

Your lips twitch. "You're not a fan of brisket?"

"I like brisket fine," he says, giving you an annoyed side eye. "What I didn't like was their attitude."

"So you killed them all."

"Yes."

Well, at least he remains secure in his decisions.

“So I broke the timelines?”

“We both did.”

“So we’re the only ones with a chance of mending them.”

“I don’t think that’s possible.”

“Why not?” he challenges. “You said you made a pocket of time—this pocket of time—a circle. Why can’t you fix it?”

“Because our birth was what broke it in the first place,” you say sharply. “I don’t want to die.”

“You’re so selfish you wouldn’t sacrifice yourself for the world?”

“The world’s never done anything for me,” you say. Cruel foster home after foster home, orphanage between them, minimum wage paychecks kept in a box beneath your bed because you couldn’t open a bank account without guardian permission as a minor, and an abrupt stint at being homeless the moment you aged out of the system. You couldn’t afford housing even on the highest-paying job that would hire you. You couldn’t afford a college degree to get a better job. No, the world never did a thing for you. That’s why you left in the first place. “It’s not my responsibility to save it. Besides, you’d have to die, too. Are you willing to make that sacrifice?”

“For my family, in a heartbeat,” he says immediately. “I’ve killed plenty of people to save them. What’s another two more?”

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” you sigh. “For as long as we exist here, the timelines stop branching.”

“What?”

“I already did the world a favor by leaving, but you kept breaking it by jumping through time.”

“If you won’t come willingly, I’ll force you.”

“You could certainly try.”

“I’m leaving.” He stands abruptly.

You sigh as he does, accompanied by the train's distorted, "Arriving now—doors clear at—see you—"

What a miracle that he visited you thrice. The company should tide you over for a long while yet.

You sit for a while, just looking at the blood stain he left on the chair across from you. Eventually it starts to stink, or maybe that’s just in your head. Either way, looking at it makes your stomach turn.

Ever since you got on the train and sat down, you’ve never switched seats. It’s almost a surprise that you can stand up. You clutch the pole close to you for balance when the floor vibrates underneath your feet just slightly with the force of the train’s engine.

You head across the compartment and sit in a seat facing away from the bloodstain, but the back of your neck prickles. It’s in the shape of Five’s body, and you can’t stop picturing it coming together as a facsimile of a person, a terrible lumbering blood-shadow creeping up on you.

You jump to your feet and whirl around, but it’s just a bloodstain.

You can’t stay here, but you don’t know what the next compartment looks like.

Will it be exactly the same? Will it be completely different?

It's the same, and for some reason you can't bring your feet to stop moving. You pass through that car, then the next. They're all the same, except none have the bloodstain that Five left on his seat. Would it still be there if you were to return? Can you even go back?

You can't stop opening the doors, but the train never slows. You want to get off. You want to explore more of this inbetween space.

You want to find the Five that came back for you.

You give up after a hundred compartments and stand in the middle of one, clutching the nearest pole for dear life, barely swaying with the train's gentle movement. The train was always an escape for you, but now it seems more like a trap. One that you sprung on yourself without knowing how to get out.

Do you even want to get out?

The air shifts, and you turn just in time to see the bag close over your head.

Five drags you away from the pole and slams you into a seat. Something poking out of it digs into your back. You can only see the faint light filtering through the bag, and that makes you hyperfocused on Five's hands on your shoulders.

"I figured it out," he snarls, the sound so close he must not be more than an inch from your face. "You and everyone else that gave up were wrong. There's a way to save the world and save my family, so you're going to get off this train now, or you get off the train in thirty minutes after I cut off each of your fingers and feed them to you and you beg me to stop you."

You suck in a breath. It's one of his more graphic threats for sure. Oddly enough, you can't see how this will play out. The bag over your head means you can't see where the blows will come from.

For the first time in a long time, you're scared.

Your mouth opens without knowing what to say. You're saved by a screech of static. The train announces, "Congratulations! All passengers—to a book club—third compartment in any direction—Ben will see you there."

The pressure of Five's hands disappears from your shoulders, and you hear hurried footsteps. He never tied the bag, so you rip it off in time to see him pass through the door to the next compartment.

Your pulse bounds in your throat. That announcement was new, and makes the train sound much more sentient than any train ought to. You're supposed to be the one in charge of this pocket dimension, but what if you're not? What if someone else has been calling the shots this whole time?

You chase after Five. At least with him, you know what he wants. You know how to appease him. He doesn't go out of his way to hurt people, at least, though he doesn't seem to think of himself as anything more than a killer.

You only catch a glimpse of his heel in the next compartment. You start to run. What if the doors lead you to separate cars, and you never see him again? The only person that ever came back for you, and he did it four times.

You're still running when you make it to the third compartment, and you run straight into Five's back. He doesn't even seem to notice it, apart from stumbling a bit. He's too busy staring openmouthed at the man sitting down. His hair is a little bit longer than it was when you saw him last.

The stranger has dark hair and glasses, and there's a book forgotten on his lap. He looks just as surprised to see Five as Five is to see him.

Five chokes out, "Ben?"

Oh. Ben Hargreeves. Number six of the Umbrella Academy. The Horror. He always seemed so gentle when you saw him on TV, at least when he wasn't covered in blood.

"Five." Ben puts the book to the side and stands. Five is already striding towards him, and they collide into a tight hug.

Seconds later, Five pulls away and demands, "What are you doing here?"

"I don't know." Ben shrugs. "I woke up on this subway a couple days ago with this book."

A muscle twitches in Five's jaw. "And instead of trying to find a way out, you started to read it?"

Ben says, "It seemed like the right thing to do." His eyes slide past his brother and land on you. "Who's this?"

You introduce yourself and Ben's eyes widen. "That's you?"

"What do you mean?"

"It's hard to explain. It's just... you exist in this subway." The way he says exist sounds like he means something bigger. Deeper. He just doesn't know the right words for it, because there might not be any. "I was waiting for you to find me."

"Why?"

"It felt right."

What on earth does that mean? If it felt right for him to wait for you, why didn't it feel right for you to seek him out? Why did it take you decades or minutes to chase after Five and bump into Ben? None of it makes sense.

Five grabs Ben's sleeve. "Hold on to me." He looks at you and says firmly, "You have to let go."

"Let go of what?"

"You know what. The reason you got on the train in the first place. Y/N, you have to let go."

Your lips tremble. "I don't want to."

"I know. But you have to." Five's hand takes yours. He squeezes it comfortingly. "I need you for this. Won't you come with me?"

You take a deep breath.

And you let go.

Five x Reader Taglist

@statsvitenskap @dare-the-punisher @thespian-anon @ask-veronica-sawyer-heathers @fivegallaghers @ggclarissa @akiyamakuro @featuringcone9 @badluckqueen @littleamoux

My requests are open! As always, let me know if there's anything you particularly want to read!

Can i request a fic were Wilson is a morning person but since reader came into his life he has been staying in bed longer or/and taking more time to have breakfast 😉

A/N: I’m so sick and tired of Tumblr making my photos so shitty 😭😭 anyways thx for the request hope this is good! Sorry if it’s short

Fluff Oneshot

⚕️Mornings with you

James Wilson x Gn!Reader

James has always been a morning person. He got dressed, ate a quick breakfast, brushed his teeth, blow-dried his hair, and then went off to work. You are not. But ever since you came into his life, he’s stayed in bed waiting for your eyes to flutter open so he can wake you up with kisses. It’s made you question your faith to the term ‘night owl’. He’s made sure you get up early enough to eat breakfast and get to work on time. To say he spoiled you was an understatement; he worshipped you. If he got up early enough, he loved to make you your favorite breakfast so he could surprise you with it in bed. He loved seeing the tired smile on your face when you woke up. Today was no different.

🔆

The sweet smell of pancakes and fresh fruit fills your lungs as you wake up. A small yawn escapes your mouth as you turn over, arms falling across your boyfriends chest. A sweet kiss is pressed to your temple in turn.

“Good morning my love.”

You groan, face buried in his chest, in response but make sure to kiss him back.

“I made us breakfast.”

“It smells good.” You mumble in a half-awake haze. James’s hands find themselves in your hair as he twirls on your beautiful locks. Despite how much you want to stay in bed with him all day, you realize you should probably get going. It was nice living with James; previously you had to set 15 dozen alarm clocks to make sure you get to the hospital on time, but now you had a live in one, one that awoke you with kisses and delicious gourmet food. You could get used to it.

One final groan pushes through your lips as you make your way off of him to go eat breakfast, your end target motivating you along with your boyfriend, who stood up with you and hugged you from behind as you walked through the house. Breakfasts for James usually meant scarfing down really whatever he could find before finishing his morning routine and leaving; but when you came into his life, his home, he wanted to give you everything you’ve ever wanted. He made sure that you weren’t stuck with shitty food or nothing at all. When you came to live with him, breakfasts now meant him waking up early to make you only the best and eating with you as you cuddled up together and watched a bit of TV, listened to music, or just talked.

You walk into the living room and take a seat on the comfy couches, one of the many things you loved about his house. You grabbed a plate and plopped down, James following, and took a bite as you leaned into him.

“Holy shit— this is so good?!” You exclaimed. Sure, you were used to the food he made being good, but today it felt like it was made with extra love. He blushed a pink hue and you find it adorable that you can make him flustered with just a small compliment.

“Only the best for you.” He hums as he smiles, taking a bite himself as you continue.

“You know, I think I’m starting to like mornings,”

“Oh yea? Why’s that?”

“because I get to spend them with the best boyfriend in the world, who makes me the best pancakes ever.”

“You promised you wouldn’t forget me” + ambrose please?

+ “I wished every day to hold you once more”

I haven’t written Ambrose yet so I hope this is somewhat good!!

Ambrose’s house arrest was a touchy subject. He had his family, of course. He could act like that was enough, but he craved more. He would feign indifference.

He often remembers his life outside of the Spellman household, the people he met, the lovers he had. He remembers, but wishes he could forget. There is nothing worse than those memories. The memories taunt him in his dreams. Y/N haunts him in those dreams. 

The bed was suffocating as he attempted to unwrap his body from the sheets. The dreams, again. The same face he’s seen every night for 75 years in this house. He rubs at his eyes, trying to get rid of the thought, but he can’t drop it. Y/N. They had lost contact after everything that happened with the Vatican. He’s tried to find traces, but to no avail. You did not want to be found. The feeling of betrayal was the only thing he had left from you.

“How long has it been, Ambrose? 70 years?” A voice from across the room made him scramble in his bed.

“Who’s there?” He was never one to be scared, but the voice was hauntingly familiar. It was just there, in his dreams. Was he still dreaming?

The room is dark, he’s unable to see a thing. “You promised you wouldn’t forget me.” The voice teased, bouncing of the walls from every side. It itched at him as he stood up from the bed, hating the way the voice taunted him. This was all too familiar. He fumbles around the room for his light, flicking it on.

Ambrose meets the same face he’s seen every night for 75 years and he’s positive he’s dreaming. Except, the hair is different, the eyes aren’t as bright, but that’s the same seductive smile from years ago. Not a single word seems to be able to escape his mouth, even though there’s a million of them swarming his thoughts. “Y/N.” Is all he can say, eyes wide. “You’re not real.”

“Why would you say that?” You questioned, reaching a hand out to touch his cheek. He responds instantly, leaning into your touch. It feels like you never left. “It’s me, Ambrose.” You reassure him.

He searches for something that would tell him otherwise, but he finds nothing. It has to be you. “I wished every day to hold you once more.” He confesses, eyes pleading with your own. He’s never felt so vulnerable, yet so complete at the same time. “Why did you leave?” He finally questions, but doesn’t pull away, too scared you’ll disappear.

You open your mouth to answer, but Sabrina bursts into his room. She looks frightened, but stops in her tracks when she sees the scene in front of her. She steps forward tentatively, reaching a hand out to Ambrose. “Ambrose…” She trails off, eyes apologetic as she touches his arm. “There’s a sleep demon in the house, this…” She glances at your figure. “This isn’t real.”

Ambrose turns to meet your eyes again, wondering if what his cousin is saying is true, but you’re gone. He can still feel your hand on his cheek. He was simply reliving all the other dreams he’s had for the past 75 years. The real torture is waking up, the real torture was him believing you’d ever come back.

“You have to wake up, Ambrose.”

Gally: Valentine’s day is just a consumerist holiday that holds no real value other than drive people insane buying heart shaped chocolates for their significant others and pos- y/n: I wrote you a poem. Gally, already crying:You did?