not to me, not if it's you

Old Works (AO3) // New Works (AO3)

Beyond: Two Souls

Criminal Minds

Critical Role (C2, EXU, Cinderbrush one-shot)

These Are The Places We’re Lucky Just To Be Between (Orym of the Air Ashari, EXU)

orym’s friends are teasing him for not asking you out. little mister takes things into his own hands and, when orym doesn’t act, so does dorian.

Just Being Here Now Is Enough For Me (Fearne Calloway, EXU)

somehow, you and fearne are sharing a room at the tavern you’re staying at. the night is cold, and you can’t sleep. turns out, neither can she.

I Though That I Heard You Laughing, I Thought That I Heard You Sing (Fearne Calloway/Orym of the Air Ashari, EXU)

orym has a lot on his mind. well, he has fearne on his mind. to him, though, she’s a lot in the best way.

You Know You Got To Go Through Hell Before You Get To Heaven (Mollymauk, C2)

you’ve always known there’s a soulmate on the other end of your injuries. when you’re working the victory pit during the harvest close festival, though, it’s the furthest thing from your mind. ironically, it’s the closest mollymauk has ever been to you.

Gentle Kindness (Beauregard, C2)

beau deserves kindness, and you intend to give it to her.

Mutual Kindness (Caduceus, C2)

beau says some shitty things to caduceus, and he comes to you. no matter what he thinks, you love him and you make sure he knows that he’s not broken.

Small Kindness (Caleb, C2)

caleb is not so sure that he deserves the kindness you’ve done for him. you’re sure that he deserves so much more, and you plan to show him in small increments so that you don’t scare him away. the shopping trip is only the beginning.

Accepting Kindness (Fjord, C2)

fjord takes care of the mighty nein. you take care of fjord.

Sneaking Kindness (Jester, C2)

you are in love with jester. jester is not in love with you. fjord keeps your secret.

Loud Kindness (Mollymauk, C2)

a tavern owner gets mouthy. you get mad. molly finds out you love him.

Hidden Kindness (Nott, C2)

nott is not very kind to herself. you love her, but you know that she has someone that she sends package after package to. you won’t get in the way of that but you will be kind to her in a way that she understands.

Unapologetic Kindness (Yasha, C2)

you never want to say anything to yasha that would warrant an apology. this causes some tension in your relationship with her.

Detroit: Become Human

Dragon Age

And I Don’t Know (Where To Begin) (Cullen Rutherford)

(he never kisses her left hand, always her right, because she once told him that she’s nothing more than the anchor on her hand and the history of the fight with the archdemon so many years earlier.)

I'll Sober Up (And Come Down In Time) (Anders)

"alright," anders says. there's noise like he's adjusting the way he's standing, or maybe pushing himself up to sit on perrin's desk, and then a few heartbeats of silence. "would it make you feel better if i told you that i want you to hurt me?"

Hannibal

Law & Order: SVU

Bigger Fish To Fry (Elliot Stabler)

you get called in on date night. munch gets an i-told-you-so moment.

Give Me A Boost Over Heaven’s Gate (Elliot Stabler)

your schedule is almost exactly the opposite of elliot’s. that doesn’t mean that the two of you don’t make it work.

Could Have Been Me (Elliot Stabler)

sometimes relationships aren’t made to last. sometimes years later, it still hurts. sometimes closure comes where you least expect it.

Marvel

Tell Me Which One Is Worse, Living Or Dying First (Bucky Barnes)

you are in love with bucky barnes. for a long time, the both of you were joined at the hip but then your team stops being paired with his on missions. he stops inviting you over for movie nights. when it finally looks like things are looking up, you hear bucky talking with steve and… it’s not good.

As I’m Sinking, I Relive The Story (Steve Rogers)

steve is acting weird. avoiding you, being snippy and mean, leaving the room when you enter. all you want is your boyfriend back, but all he wants is to pretend you don’t exist. when he’s almost hurt on a mission, you do what you’re made to do.

I Grew Up In Shoes They Told Me I Could Fill (Bucky Barnes) & part two

you were built in the image of the winter soldier and with that comes blood on your hands. you do your best to find any sort of repentance in your new life with the avengers - your new life living with, and being in love with, bucky barnes. when your past comes back to haunt your present… well, you’re not sure you’ll get a future.

Where Would We Be Without All The Distance? (Steve Rogers) ⛥fic aes

you are used to people hating what you can do. sometimes even you hate what you can do - and how isolated it makes you. steve rogers is one of the people that you expected to understand the weight that you carry on your shoulders, but he doesn’t. not until he has to see it firsthand.

Maximum Ride

OHSHC

Stardew Valley

The Arcana

The Last of Us (1 & 2)

Twilight

Umbrella Academy

Until Dawn

“Sure,” Perrin says sarcastically to the hound, “I’ll get the door.” He’s just on the right side of drunk - the room isn’t spinning, nor is his stomach, but that’s not going to be the truth for long. The door is just a temporary distraction from the shit-show that his life has been since the Blight forced his family from their home. It doesn’t matter that Amell House is the family seat he rightfully owns, it’s not home. So he stumbles to the door, footsteps echoing in his silent and empty front room, and tries to right his finery before he opens the door.

Knight-Captain Cullen Rutherford is standing on the other side and for a brief moment Perrin is disappointed. He thought it would have been… Well, the news had to have spread through Hightown to Darktown, and he thought… Actually, Perrin isn’t too sure he wants to see any of his normal companions at the door, especially not any of his mage companions. Regardless, the Knight-Captain isn’t wearing his usual armor and has a bottle of brandy in one hand, looking contrite (for something that he did not do, Perrin notices), and then shrugs. “I heard the news. Figured that you would empty out the wine cellar before you’d be caught in the Hanged Man tonight.”

Perrin doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t really have to. He just looks down on the Knight-Captain and then runs a hand down his face. “Thanks, Cullen,” He eventually says, instead of all the things he wants to say, “But I’m not very good company right now.” And he punctuates the silent and I don’t want anyone to accompany me with a wry smile.

Cullen stutters - because that’s what Cullen does when he’s nervous and Perrin makes him nervous. Everyone knows that his father was an apostate and that his parents sired two mighty warriors who fought at Ostagar and one apostate mage that, until three or so years prior, roamed Kirkwall freely because of the threat that Perrin is. He’s six and a half feet tall and as broad as a barn, which had come in handy doing small labor jobs and mercenary work in Lothering. Saved his life, and Carver’s, at Ostagar. “No, yes,” Cullen says, “I - I understand. I only meant to, well, I only meant to drop this off and leave.” He passes the brandy over and it’s a good brand. He’s almost surprised, but then in a second he takes in Cullen’s appearance: thinner than the week prior (but that might just be that he’s without armor), deep bags underneath his tired eyes, and a light haze over his eyes. Perrin is smart enough to know when a man’s lyrium dose has been upped, again, and knows that Knight-Commander Meredith also pairs that with a pay increase to keep the Templars from straying too far from her orders.

He takes the brandy from Cullen, but it feels wrong. Everything feels wrong, really, so that isn’t a surprise. “Thanks, Cullen,” Perrin finally says, trying for a smile. “You’re right, this might be better than wasting all the fancy wine that’s been aging for years. And I won’t be caught at the Hanged Man. Surely you’d see me on the stocks in the morning if I went.” He laughs to tell Cullen that it’s a joke and Cullen chuckles too, rubbing the back of his neck. There are a few moments of awkward silence, with Cullen shuffling and unable to be still and Perrin standing at his door like a statue.

Once upon a time, he’d thought about pursuing Cullen. The man is handsome, wise beyond his years, and honorable. Perrin hadn’t pursued him because of those last two facts - he couldn’t stand the thought of sullying someone like Cullen Rutherford. Still, they’ve formed a strong friendship just by being two Ferelden men in another country, chased from their homes because of the Blight.

“Well, I should be returning to my chambers,” Cullen nods decisively. He shakes Perrin’s hand and smiles when Perrin claps him on the back.

“Don’t let Meredith take too much from you,” Perrin warns just before Cullen leaves, “She’ll steal your life with that leash if you’re not careful.” He doesn’t stay at the door to see Cullen’s face, instead pressing the heavy wood closed and setting the brandy on one of his console tables as he passes. He’s very careful to act normally as he passes the hearth where a fire had been minutes before and doesn’t look for where Lothering is as he climbs the stairs to his room. The windows leading to his room have all had their curtains drawn and now his bedroom door is slightly open.

Perrin slips an ornate dagger out of a sheath that’s strapped to his thigh. He’s never unarmed, and neither are the other highborns or those who ascended to Hightown. Most Kirkwallers take a note from the Orlesian playbook and never leave themselves truly vulnerable. It’s more for status and image than anything practical, but Perrin isn’t like most people who live in Hightown. He’s more equipped to exist in Darktown, where brawn and brains get you further than money. That’s why when the person hiding behind his bedroom door lunges for him, it’s only a few seconds before he’s wrestled them against the wall, dagger tip pressed dangerously between their ribs, not breaking fabric or skin.

Yet.

Perrin’s chest is bellowing, his teeth bared like a rabid animal’s. He’s almost growling, looking for a fight just to get some of the errant emotions swirling in his chest. It almost doesn’t register that he’s pinning Anders - nearly half a foot shorter than him and much thinner, too - to the wall. The mage doesn’t even flinch but yields to Perrin’s tight hold and the press of the larger man’s body. He smiles softly and says, “Sorry, love, I just wanted to surprise you.” Perrin jerks away, dropping the knife and separating himself.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be here,” He finally says, bristling when he turns his back on Anders. It’s not Anders that he has a problem with right now, but magic in general. The wound in his chest, however metaphorical, is still raw and aching. He can taste the magic in the air between them, just like he’d been able to hear the humming of lyrium when Cullen was at his door. Perrin chalks it up to being mage-blooded, especially with how powerful of a mage his father was. Still, the air ripples as Anders walks closer, and Perrin bodily flinches away.

“You shouldn’t be alone,” Anders says, still, knowing that maybe touching Perrin isn’t the best idea right now.

“I shouldn’t be near mages right now,” Perrin bites, striding to his desk if only to put some distance between the cloying taste of magic against his soft palate. He would say more but he risks ruining the burgeoning relationship that they have. He’s already going to have to apologize to Merrill for how he’d turned on her when she’d tried to offer him comfort.

Is it worth it now? Is your precious blood magic worth it? This is what you are. This is who you are. You’re just like him.

It’s unfair, but Merrill knows and has known how Perrin feels about blood magic. He doesn’t mind magic, or mages in general, but blood magic is an entirely different animal. He can’t stand the way it tastes in the air, or how it’s never enough. When he sees the scars on Merrill’s palms or arms, he flinches visibly. After the first time, before the Deep Roads, he’d cried to Bethany and begged her to promise him that she’d never turn to blood magic. She’d sworn on Carver’s grave that she’d never resort to that.

Anders doesn’t say anything because he knows that Perrin is right, but the mage has also never been good at following orders or listening to reason. He’d escaped Kinlock Hold time and time again because of that. He’d been so desperate to get to Kirkwall to find Karl, and instead found Perrin. The hand on his lower back almost physically hurts just as much as the loss of his mother. “I won’t use magic,” Anders says, voice low as he moves around to be in front of Perrin, “I won’t do anything you don’t want.”

And suddenly, Perrin is blindingly angry. Just like the day prior, when he’d lit his mother’s pyre, he can feel the anger burning past white-hot into something more dangerous. His lips curl in a snarl and he shoves Anders back, the blond man catching himself on the ornate desk. He looks shocked, Perrin thinks, and I like it. “And what about what I do want?” He presses close to Anders, jerking him lightly by the front of his robes, “What will you do, then, Anders?” He snarls his lover’s name to make it hurt, but there’s no reaction besides a small smile. Perrin shakes him again just to do something.

“Anything you do want,” Anders supplies, “I trust that if I use the watch-word you’ll stop.” Perrin pushes away, turning his back again, and moves to stand in front of the fireplace.

“And you think that will fix me?” He scoffs, “You think that if I fuck you that I won’t be like this anymore?”

“No,” Anders says without moving from the desk, “I think if you fuck me the way you want to - the way you’re afraid to - that it will give you something to take your frustration out on.” His voice is soft, like Perrin will break with any more force behind the words.

Perrin’s not sure he wouldn’t break, honestly. The anger inside of him darkens and turns into something else - lust that swirls like smoke in his ribcage and leaves him grinding his teeth. “No,” He finally says, “You may trust me, but I shouldn’t be doing anything like that right now.”

“Alright,” Anders says. There’s noise like he’s adjusting the way he’s standing, or maybe pushing himself up to sit on Perrin’s desk, and then a few heartbeats of silence. “Would it make you feel better if I told you that I want you to hurt me?”

Perrin turns around, slowly. His heart is thundering and the fire in his veins is starting to feel good instead of world-ending. His lover is sitting on his desk, all sharp angles and loose hair. It hands around his face and shoulders like a perverted halo as he smiles at Perrin, leaning back on his hands like an invitation. “Why would you want to be hurt?” Perrin asks, unable to help the way his voice drops or his trousers tighten. Anders has always been so good at reading him - he’d be afraid the man was reading his mind if he didn’t know any better. “Who wants that?”

“I do,” Anders answers, instead of rising to the obvious bait, “And I think you want to hurt me.” He adjusts again and begins to peel himself out of the linen shirt he’d worn to Perrin’s home. He doesn’t pressure Perrin to answer or to do anything, simply slowly strips down as he sits on the other’s desk. Perrin stands back to the fire watching as each inch of skin is revealed: scars, freckles, tan lines. He can practically taste his lover’s skin underneath his tongue, feel the resistance of it underneath his teeth.

He’s always hungered for dark things. Not in the way of forcing his partner to do things that they don’t want, but forcing them to do the things they do want. Perrin wants his partner to push back, to be a brat, to force him to use his strength on them. He wants to mark them as his, fuck them so thoroughly that anyone with half a brain will be able to see them and know that they belong to Perrin Hawke.

He wants to own them: body, mind, soul - if only for the hours that they’re in his bed. But how can he say that? How can he tell Anders these things when he’d spent every year of his life past twelve years old subjugated, owned, trapped? How can Perrin admit that he wants to fuck him until he’s crying, until he can’t speak, until he only begs?

And yet: here is Anders completely naked on his desk, cock hard, asking Perrin to do those things to him. To hurt him.

Perrin licks his teeth and drops one hand to his own cock, holding pressure there so that he can try and think. He screws his eyes shut and ignores the part of him that wants to do nothing but take and destroy and struggles to find the part of him that had stepped up and taken on the role of man of the house when his father died. “I shouldn’t.”

“Says who?” Anders snaps, “The Chantry? Fuck the Chantry. I want you to hurt me, Perrin, I want to ache.” He groans and Perrin’s eyes fly open to find him stroking his cock, sat there on Perrin’s desk like he owns it. “I want to feel you burn,” He gasps, pressing on his frenulum and then stroking again, and shudders, “I want be a mess, to be so fucked-out I can’t think about anything. I want you to use me.”

Perrin can feel himself just standing about, mouth open and hand pressed flat on his cock. He knows he should do something - say no, say yes, leap across the room and take Anders every way that he knows how to and some that he doesn’t yet know how to. Instead, he just shudders, squeezing his groin, and groans. “You don’t know what you’re asking for.”

“We already have-” Anders takes a second to writhe, circling his thumb and pointer-finger around the base of his dick to squeeze, “-We already have a watch-word. We’re already two men. How much worse can we get?” He grins, hand not otherwise occupied flexing on his thigh before pressing flat against his abdomen. Perrin watches it move up, up, up until Anders is pinching his nipple so hard it looks painful.

“I won’t be nice,” Perrin finally says, nearly choking on his lust. Anders grins, knowing he’s made his case as he watches Perrin frantically remove his shirt and shoes. He divests himself of his trousers as he crosses the room and doesn’t even go for his dick, despite the fire-warmed air making it twitch. He stops himself just short of Anders, chest heaving and feeling like he’s lost his mind, “I won’t ask for what I want,” He explains, voice rough as he tries to reel himself in. It makes Anders shiver, “I won’t stop if you say no, I won’t stop if you beg, I won’t stop if you fight. I will only stop if you say the watch-word.”

“Yes,” Anders moans, abandoning his futile attempt to not tug himself off before Perrin got his hands on him, “All of that.”

“I will be mean,” Perrin grits his teeth, watching the mesmerizing way Anders’ hand moves on his cock, the way that the head of his dick begins to redden and his thighs begin to shake. “I will do what I want when I want it. I don’t care if you don’t come or if you come too much.” His lover just nods, mouth falling open as he huffs out breaths of pleasure. Perrin watches for a few moments more before he can’t take it anymore. That dark, smoke-like lust in his chest overtakes him and he gives in to it. Anders doesn’t flinch when Perrin lunges at him, only shouts another yes! as he’s manhandled.

Perrin grabs him by the shoulders and twists, tossing Anders off of the desk. He doesn’t care if Anders lands on his feet or arse, just that Perrin towers over him when he’s not sitting on the desk. He grabs Anders by the hair and forces him toward the fire - not a mindless monster by any standards, but he holds the hair in a tight fist. Enough to hurt, but not to harm. When they get close enough and Anders realizes that Perrin isn’t going to stop before his face hits the brick, he catches himself on his hands. It brings a predatory grin to Perrin’s face, who leans in close to his ear. “Good boy,” He growls, “You learn quick.”

“I-I,” Anders manages, gasping when Perrin kicks his feet apart. Perrin mocks his stuttering gasp and grips Anders’s hip. He can’t resist the siren call of the broad expanse of naked skin holding the man by the head and hip affords him, so he leans down and sinks teeth in, drawing a howl from the trapped man. “Yes!”

Perrin jerks him back by the hair and then spins him around. Anders has tears in his eyes and a flush running from the bridge of his nose to the hardness of his cock. He grips at Perrin’s arm to hold himself up and look pathetic. It makes Perrin moan. “Look at you,” He rumbles, leaning down to press their noses together, “Look at how much I’ve already ruined you. I’ve barely touched you.”

“Please,” Anders gasps, trying to lean up to kiss Perrin. He can’t move past the hand holding him still. “Please!”

“Kneel.” Perrin says instead, dropping Anders’ hair and taking a step back. Anders barely catches himself, legs wobbly, and Perrin grins something sharp and feral again. He reaches down to stroke himself slowly, feeling pent up. Anders just stares and watches as Perrin preens and allows it for a moment. And then he snaps his fingers, “I said kneel.” He snarls, baring his teeth as anger chases lust through his veins. It feels good, feels better when Anders tilts his chin up and sneers.

“Make me.” His eyes flash for just a moment and Perrin isn’t sure who’s talking: Anders, Justice, or the fucked-up amalgam of them both that he’s taken to calling Vengeance. He cocks his head, waiting for the light to die down, and then Anders speaks again. “I said: make me.” It’s only then, in that moment where Perrin is sure it’s his lover speaking and not the spirit inside of his lover, that he moves.

“Incorrigible bastard,” Perrin gripes, manhandling Anders back several steps only to throw him off balance. He sweeps a leg behind the other man’s and presses against the back of his knees, all the while pressing down on his shoulders. Anders falls to his knees with a shout and a loud impact, but Perrin doesn’t stop moving. He can’t think past the throbbing of his cock, the memory of muscle and skin beneath his teeth. The sight of Anders on his knees, bite mark bruising on his shoulder, and an agog look on his face nearly makes Perrin spill right then. Instead, he almost gently rubs his thumb over Anders’ bottom lip before his face twists in a grin. Perrin shifts his hand so that his first two fingers are lying where his thumb just was and then he presses.

Perrin laughs almost antagonistically when Anders gags against fingers that are so much longer than his own, tears welling in his amber eyes almost immediately. He doesn’t pull away, or vomit, but closes his lips around Perrin’s fingers and sucks.

It becomes clear to both of them very quickly what move Perrin will make next. He almost doesn’t know he’s moving until his fingers are free from Anders’ mouth and his spit-soaked hand is in the mage’s hair again. “Open your fucking mouth,” He snaps, almost too impatient to do any of the things he wants to do. “I’m going to come down your throat, and you’re going to thank me, and then I’m going to fuck you until you beg me to stop.”

The only thing Anders says, just before his mouth is full of cock, is: “Please, yes, please!”

He’s not a monster, so the first push of Perrin’s dick is slow and steady. He holds Anders by the hair, the other hand steadying his length as he gasps - gasps and watches. It’s almost like a miracle the way that Anders looks on his knees, the way that he squirms and his eyes roll back in his head like he’s feeling the white-hot knife of pleasure that curls around Perrin’s spine. The first few push-pulls are just like that: slow, elaborate, all-consuming. “Maker guide me,” He groans, trying not to fist too hard in the mage’s hair and failing, “Andraste’s Sword of Mercy strike me.”

Perrin loses himself after that. Both hands grip the sides of his lover’s head as he moves faster and harder; he hisses when Anders grips at his thighs, nails leaving crescent marks and red lines. The pleasure burns, chasing away all of the dark thoughts and bad feelings, if only temporarily. He’s gasping for air, unable to decide if he wants to tip his head back and keep his eyes closed as he chases his end or watch as Anders chokes on his cock.

Anders groans, and gags, but doesn’t complain. He doesn’t pull away or pinch Perrin’s thigh - their watch-word for when they have their mouths full. Instead, when Perrin goes back to watching with his mouth open, chin against his chest and ragged groans filling the room, Anders relaxes his throat even more. He catches Perrin’s eyes and - oh, the bastard - he hums.

“Mine,” It slips out unbidden, chased by the roiling pleasure and power that he feels with Anders on his knees, “You’re mine, I don’t care who’s in your head,” He bares his teeth when, for just a moment, Anders holds himself all of the way down, gagging on Perrin’s cock. “Fuck, yes, just like that baby.” Perrin jerks Anders back by the hair, ignoring the way that the mage groans when his mouth loses contact. He holds, for just a moment, and then brings one hand up like he’s going to strike Anders.

“Say the word now,” Perrin warns, “If you don’t want me to slap you.”

“Maker,” Anders gasps, voice ragged through his gasping. He’s still gripping Perrin’s thighs, his own splayed wide as he thrusts at nothing but searches for everything, “Yes, I want it. Hit me, Perrin, please.”

He rears back even more and slaps Anders. The crack of his hand is almost deafening and he sees, for a brief moment, Justice flash to the surface. Anders either wrestles him down or he realizes what’s happening when he sees Perrin standing above him completely naked. Anders gasps when he comes back to himself and his body shudders. Instead of putting his cock back into his lover’s mouth, Perrin takes himself in hand. “No,” Anders whines, “I want - please, I want to swallow you.”

Perrin’s teeth flash in the light when he forces Anders to swallow him down again, focusing less on hurting like Anders had wanted and more on coming like he needs to. It doesn't take long with his cock in the tight, wet, heat of the other man's mouth. Typically Anders has control, chooses the pace, brings Perrin to peak in the way the he wants. Tonight he just lets Perrin chase that high, choking on the dick in his throat.

Only a few moments after the slap - that has left the man's face reddening - Perrin’s hips begin to stutter. He knows he's saying filthy things (I own you, I want you to taste me for weeks, I want to live inside of your body) but he doesn't care. He only cares about the fire in his veins, the way his body is tensing, the right feeling deep in his stomach. He only cares that Anders isn't even reaching for his ass, or his sac, or any of the places that he usually grabs and kneads to help Perrin along. The most Anders can do is keep his grip where it's at and take it.

It's that thought that finally makes Perrin come. Anders is taking it, every dark part of his desires, because he wants to. Perrin isn't forcing him, isn't making him, isn't hurting him in a way that he doesn't like. Anders is willingly taking the rough edges of Perrin, the way that the larger man can use his strength and size to be indomitable - in the bedroom or otherwise. The heat races through his body and he feels himself still with Anders’ nose pressed against him, groaning and writhing as he comes. He feels like he's been struck in the gut, knees weak when he pulls away but then Anders is swallowing - swallowing and smiling up at Perrin like he's gotten exactly what he wanted in the first place. He leans forward and bites Perrin in the thigh, hissing when he gets tugged back by his hair.

She remembers being a child in Honnleath, before the blight and before Ves and before shedding the heavy Sulzbacher name for the equally heavy Cousland name. She remembers being friends with Rosalie first, one year her senior, and then Branson next. Branson was a few years younger than Amalia, but she got along with him fine. Mia came next and then, finally, Cullen Rutherford.

She remembers that he was three years older than her and golden. Golden hair, skin touched by the long hours with his father and farm hands in the fields, and fundamentally benevolent. She first saw him through a curtain of her then-black hair after Branson had tripped her as she trotted alongside Rosalie, smiling down at her. She was only six at the time, to Cullen’s nine, but she knew. She knew that he’d go on to do great things, knew that he’d escape Honnleath like she wished that she could, that he would find a great love like in the stories her mother used to tell.

The world seems so simple when you’re less than a decade old.

Now, though, nothing has really changed. Amalia is still friends with Rosalie and Branson, though only by the letters she sends and receives from the South Reach. Cullen is still all of those things he was as a child, except now he’s been tested by the Maker in tragedy, war, and now one of the Magisters who first entered the Golden City. Selfishly, she’s glad that it’s Cullen. She’s almost thankful to the Maker and Andraste for all of the shit they’ve mucked Cullen through - and the shit that they’ve mucked her through - because it brings the two of them to now, this exact moment in time.

The truth of what nearly happened at Fort Drakon ten years ago had come out at the war table, but Cullen hadn’t looked at her any differently. They’d had the night together at the Winter Palace, after Amalia’s disastrous decision to dule that Duchess in front of the entire court, and Cullen remained stalwartly at her side. And then, when she’d gone up to his office to try and escape her meddling family he’d asked her to go back with him.

To Ferelden. To the Redcliffe arling.

To Honnleath.

She had been hesitant. Matthias surely wasn’t still there, but Amalia also didn’t want to risk seeing her father again, no matter the circumstances. She also didn’t want to see where so many of her happiest childhood memories took place - always at the Rutherford farm or sitting underneath the shade that Shale provided and never inside of her home - after the blight and after ten years of abandonment. But Cullen smiled so sweetly at her, took her right hand and pressed a kiss to her scarred knuckles, and said please.

(He never kisses her left hand, always her right, because she once told him that she’s nothing more than the Anchor on her hand and the history of the fight with the archdemon so many years earlier.)

Cullen had taken her to the lake, had given her his coin, and then taken her back to Honnleath where the bulk of the force they’d traveled with had finished the job they set out to do. Amalia doesn’t mind that they’ve gone through the small home, and dungeon beneath it, that had been her childhood abode. Doesn’t mind that they’ve taken her grandfather’s writings and research and loaded them in heavy boxes on the back of the bronto-drawn carts. She’s not a mage, just mage-blooded enough to pull off rituals as seen by the time she spent with Morrigan’s grimoire and the survival of her Grey Warden siblings. Amalia, at heart, is a warrior. If her grandfather’s works will help the Inquisition mages, then they shall be taken back to Skyhold.

It helps that Wilhelm Sulzbacher was a bastard of a man to everyone in his life, including his elven wife and golem. Amalia has nothing left for him, or her father, Matthias. It helps that he was also a bastard of a man to his elven wife, and elfblooded daughter. It’s almost cathartic to see the Inquisition soldiers - Amalia’s soldiers - carting everything up out of the dank basement she was so terrified of.

Cullen had let her watch for a few moments, standing in the spot that Shale used to stand in, before he took her back to the Rutherford house. It had been cleaned, probably at his request, and then…

Well, and then Cullen made good on his promise.

When she’d been nervous at the Winter Palace, he hadn’t pushed her into sex. They’d shared pleasure, yes, but not sex. Amalia hadn’t wanted their first time to be because of a duel and she agreed with Cullen’s sentiment: neither wanted their first time laying together to be in Orlais. They’re Ferelden at heart, and no amount of satin bedding or hearty foods could convince them otherwise. He’d promised her as he brought her off on his fingers that she’d know nothing but pleasure from him. He’d take her back across the border into Ferelden, he’d find a place comfortable for both of them, and if she wished it they would lay together.

Of course, being in the throes of an orgasm made Amalia agree to anything he was saying. Cullen Rutherford is a strategist at heart and a man of his word. As soon as the missive had crossed his desk about needing Wilhelm’s research, he knew that it was of the upmost importance that Wilhelm’s granddaughter, Amalia, be there when it was retrieved.

The fact that he had his childhood bedroom prepared, cleaned, and fitted with more expensive sheets before their arrival is none of anyone’s concern.

Except Amalia’s, but she’s not very concerned about that. She’s more focused on the way his skin feels against hers, hot and slick, and the way that pleasure still lays heavy in her limbs. Cullen has her pulled as closely as possible to him, legs tangled, as his hands roam up and down her bare back. He has been right when he’d told her that she needn’t worry with him. When Cullen had tried to press into her body for the first time and Amalia had flinched - barely noticeable but she knows that he notices everything about her - they’d prepared more.

(Prepared, of course, meaning that he’d put his mouth on her again until she peaked once more.)

There was never a moment in which Amalia Cousland felt like Cullen Rutherford was just fucking her to own her or taking what he wanted without considering what she wanted. His body over hers, so broad and muscular and golden, hadn’t felt like those moments before Alistair had kicked the door to the machine room down. Cullen’s hands handn’t felt like brands upon her skin - well, they had, but the good kind of brands. The kind of brands Amalia can see herself becoming addicted to. The way Cullen held her as he pressed into her hadn’t made her panic with claustrophobia or cry out in terror.

Amalia isn’t even sure she can call what they did fucking. That seems too… Primal of a word for what they shared. Love-making, maybe. It had felt like love, and she knows that she loves Cullen but can he love her? If he doesn’t, could he? Her past weighs heavy on her shoulders, and she can’t even escape it. Everyone knows the story of the girl who took the final strike on the archdemon at Denerim, of the Grey Warden who refused to let her die, of the Ashes that brought the girl back to life. The scar on the left side of her jaw, from just below her mouth to underneath her ear, is proof that she did die at the hands of the archdemon, that when Ves used the Ashes of Andraste leftover from healing the Arl of Redcliffe that they not only brought Amalia back to life but darned her face back together and left a mottled line of proof.

And now she’s the Inquisitor. The Herald of Andraste. She half believes it herself, because why else would the Ashes have worked? Why else would the Joining not have taken?

Why else would Ves and Alistair, both set on keeping her away from the Conclave and the fact that their Calling was shouting at them to be there, sent her with Bethany and Carver to see if they could find the other Wardens?

Why else would she have been the only survivor? Another moment of death and loss, and Amalia is still standing.

Before she knows it, she’s crying. She doesn’t want to worry Cullen, he already carries so much on his shoulders, but she can’t stop. Before long the heady, heavenly feeling of being in his arms, of knowing him and his body, twists and sours into panic and sorrow.

“Amalia?” Cullen asks, pulling only slightly away from her. Just enough to see her face, really, and she wonders what she looks like. Hair and eyes leeched of color because of her brush with death, scarred face, Anchor… She can’t possibly be the woman he thought he’d be in bed with. The woman that he thought he’d end up betrothed to. “Amalia, darling, what’s wrong?” His voice shakes and he cups her face with one hand, tilting her head up until she’s looking at him.

And, well, she can’t let him think he’s done something wrong.

“I am,” She finally warbles, shaking her head as best she can when she’s laying on her side tangled up in him, “I’m wrong. I should have died in Denerim, and I should have died during the Joining, and I should have died at the Conclave. How can you stand to look at me, Cullen?” Her voice breaks as she begins to cry in earnest, tears blurring his face as he looks at her.

“Oh, darling,” He whispers, bringing her close enough that his lips can press against her forehead, and then her nose, and finally on the jagged scar that reminds her of what she was willing to give up to protect Ves and Alistair. “I don’t care what should have happened,” Cullen finally says, pressing himself as close as possible, “I only care what has happened. Everything leading up to this moment, with you in my arms, is all that matters.”

“But we’ll never be free of it,” Amalia allows herself to sink into him, to press her nose against the side of his neck and drown in oakflower, eldermoss, and the faint scent of leather. “We’ll never be free from people knowing who I am, what I’ve done. I don’t care if it’s all good, if they think that I’m the Herald of Andraste. I just want a normal life. I want you to have a normal life, and I can’t give you that.”

Cullen shifts and for a brief second, Amalia is afraid that she’s chased him away. He only sets her down on the mattress and disentangles himself so that he can prop himself up over top of her. His hand cups her neck, large enough that his thumb can press and lightly rub back and forth over her scar. He smiles down at her, his own scar pulling slightly as he does so.

“You needn’t worry about me,” Cullen kisses her briefly, “Especially not about whether or not I want normal. I don’t care about normal, Amalia. Maker’s breath, the only thing I care about having is you. That’s all that matters to me.” She hiccups, tears still trailing over the sides of her face as she looks up at Cullen, and tries to believe him.

“But would you be happy with me?” Amalia asks, voice pitifully quiet. “If we were to stay together past the Inquisition, I mean.”

“If?” He asks instead of answering, “If? Amalia, I am in love with you. I would lay down my life for you. I don’t know what will happen past the Inquisition, I don’t know what will happen in ten years or twenty, but I know that I want you by my side.” He looks so serious, golden, that Amalia’s breath is taken away. “I want to be by your side.” He says, softer than he spoke before.

“You love me?” She asks, reaching for his face, “You love me?”

Cullen smiles crookedly, and it’s like the sun. It almost fully chases away the storm clouds that had settled in her chest. They’ll never truly be gone, not with what she’s seen and what she’s been through, but in Cullen’s arms and his bed, they don’t seem so scary. They don’t seem so all-consuming like they had been only moments before.

“Of course I love you,” Cullen says, “I can’t imagine a world in which I don’t love you.”

Just which incorporeal thread are you going to tug on to fight him? Instinct says fire because Steve doesn’t have a long-range attack, not really. The fire will keep him at bay and do damage, which will win you the fight. But fire is angry and hard to control, which doesn’t match Steve’s new fighting style at all. Every movement he makes, every point-turn to try and get you on the ground or off balance, is a brilliant strategy that you know he’s coming up with on the fly. The serum did a lot for Steve physically, but you heard the rumors from the Handlers. He’s always been whip-smart, a little irrational and irresponsible, and a hell of a good strategist. Those things knockout using air and water, too. Air is too unpredictable, even when you’re the one in charge. Water is too much give and take for the way that he’s moving.

Steve fights like he’s a brick wall with legs. He uses his shield to try and batter you to the side and uses his legs and feet like they’re steel rods connected to his torso to anchor him low to the ground to keep him agile. It makes you grit your teeth because earth is stubborn. It’s hard to move unless you’re grounded and with Steve’s speed, it’s hard to keep more than one foot on the ground at a time. He knows he’s pushing your buttons, too, because the whole time he’s on the offense and you’re dodging backward and sideways out of his way he’s fucking grinning.

Typically that would set you off, but it’s easy to remember what this is for, especially now that you’re in the swing of things. They want to see what you can do so they can see how useful you are to them. They want to measure your power, yes, but also your control. Earth is all about control, and so is Captain Steve Rogers. (At least, what you know of him from the Before and what little you’ve gleaned of him in the After.)

When you take a turn for the offense it takes Steve by surprise. Instead of dodging away from his fist you take it on the chin and let it knock you back. He pauses just for a moment but that’s all you need - letting the momentum spin you and working with the topsy-turvy way that the hit makes your head spin, you come from back with a heel to his chin. Behind you, where the others are observing, you hear someone groan. Steve’s eyes go foggy just for a second because you’d put your back into the kick and it gives you just enough time to take measured steps backward out of his melee range.

A deep breath while he recovers, grounding your bare feet into the bare dirt you’re standing on. You extend yourself into the earth and tug the strings up through the soles of your feet like a ball-jointed doll. You are thrumming with the heartbeat of the world underneath you by the time Steve finally raises his head less than half a second later. His eyes widen as he watches your eyes flicker, a deep forest green taking over the entirety of your sclera for a fraction of a second before your eyes are back to normal. “Yeah, good job,” He praises.

Because you’re jacked into the ground beneath you and everything on or in it, you know what Steve’s going to do just after he does. He rears back and slings the shield at you like a frisbee but you’re ready. Sure, it’s an adamantium shield but adamantium is still metal. It’s still mined from the earth and perfected from its raw form. It’s still a string you can tug on, a limb you have that nobody else does.

He gapes when you catch the shield in your hand and bend it like a paper plate, tossing it to the side. You’re tired of playing games, tired of being a prisoner, just plain tired. It had been a realization when you’d let yourself go completely into the earth: the others were watching you fight Steve which means each fight after this one is going to get harder and harder. Not just because you’ll be tired, but because they’ll have seen your fighting style. There’s no doubt that Bucky, Natasha, and Tony are impeccable fighters. Steve, as a Captain, wouldn’t let them fight you if they weren’t skilled. So, logically, the faster you get each fight over with the less they know and the more stamina you save for the next fight.

The shield clangs against a rock and your crack your neck, still standing vaguely relaxed except for your grounded stance. Steve’s muscles coiling echoes through your mind through the soles of your feet but you’re done fighting him. It was fun dodging and ducking around Captain America, but now you just want to get this over with and get back to your cell so that you can continue to pay the penance of your failure. Before Steve can take a step you’re sliding your dominant foot forward, feeling the heartbeat and flow beneath it, and pulling your hands up like you’re a puppeteer.

The ground in front of him rumbles for a split second, not long enough for him to do anything, and then Steve is encased in a cave of rock four feet thick. There are shouts behind you but then everyone hears his fists strike his cage one, two, three times and they calm down. You’re not a monster, not in the way that they think you are. You’d left him room enough to crouch and, apparently, throw a few punches. Your blood is still thrumming five minutes later when Tony finally calls the match, Steve unable to figure out how to get out of the rock cage.

He’s flushed, chest heaving when he’s revealed with just the wave of one of your hands, the earth shifting back to where it rests naturally. “My shield!”

“Oh,” You start, already forgotten that you’d bent it out of place. Bucky’s holding it, mouth slightly agape as he turns it over in his hands, “I can fix it.”

“How can you fix that?” Sam has joined Bucky in gaping at the ruined shield. “It’s a piece of history, y’know.” You know he’s trying to joke with you and break the tension, but you won’t be relaxed until you figure out who you’re fighting next and how.

“I’m a piece of history,” You mumble, taking the shield from Bucky as Steve joins the three of you. Maybe it was a little mean to bend it in half like that, but he threw it at your face. You frown as you work the shield open, ratcheting your arms and focusing on the bonds of the metal. Everything has a natural state and you’re just able to bend those states to your will - basic physics says that everything wants to go back to that natural state though, so once you’re done the shield is as good as new.

“Oh, geez,” Steve breathes as you hand it back to him, “It doesn’t even look like you bent it.”

“See?” You glance at Sam and shrug, “Everything’s jake. Wouldn’t have done it if I didn’t think that I couldn’t fix it.”

“You could have killed him,” Natasha finally parts from where she, Wanda, Bruce, and Tony had been discussing something in a tight group, “But you didn’t.”

“Why would I kill him?” You frown, crossing your arms over your chest, “You’ve brought me out here to run tests. I’m goin’ to do the tests the same way that I would if I was with the Handlers.” An eerie silence falls around your group, Steve and Bucky sharing an unreadable look with Natasha and Sam. “You’ve already given me a much better chance of winnin’, too, because you’re letting me outside.”

“Letting you?” Bucky repeats, eyebrows pulled tight over his eyes. He looks confused, which is confusing to you. “What d’you mean?” You frown and look away from the heavy glances they’re sending your way.

“Well, I can’t exactly walk out here by myself.”

“You can,” Sam is the first to speak, “You literally can.”

“Wait,” Steve shifts his weight and puts a hand up, his voice drawing your attention up, “Do you think you can’t go anywhere without one of us?” Over his shoulder, the slow-dawning horror begins creeping up Bucky’s face.

“That’s exactly what you think. Y-You’re allowed to leave your room without one’a us. You’re not trapped here.” He wraps his right hand around Steve’s wrist, drawing the blond’s attention, “Did we not make that clear? This whole time-” He chokes on his words and you look to Sam and Natasha for some sort of explanation. Natasha’s face is soft with compassion - or pity, maybe. They look about the same to you.

“You have pretty much free reign of the compound,” She shakes her head and then pushes some of her fiery hair out of her face, “Your room isn’t a cell.” A visceral uncomfortable feeling rises in your stomach and chest. They’re catching you off guard and it’s… It’s awful. This was easy when Bucky brought you out here - it was familiar. But now they’re trying to tell you that you’re not in a cell? That you’re not just another lab rat? You take a deep breath and swallow hard.

“It is,” You shake your head, frowning, “It’s a very nice cell, though. I - you don’t - there’s no need to pretend here,” You take your time to look at the people around you. They all look horrified, but in different ways. “I know what I am and I know what you guys are. I’m in your custody and you’re my Handlers. I give you information and you give me good food and good exercise, and Bruce gets to study me. I get it, you don’t have to pretend this is anything but that.” You shrug. “It’s better here than it was Underground.” The silence is unsettling. You can hear the soft conversation from the other group of people outside and then the thrumming life of birds and insects in the grass and trees. You’re uncomfortable under their gazes, especially the look Bucky and Steve give you. They’re like mirrors of each other: clenched jaws, low eyebrows, bobbing throats. They’re upset about something - maybe it’s because you’d finally said it out loud. Everybody knows that you’re technically their prisoner, but maybe it’s saying it out loud that has upset them. Your hands begin to shake when you think about the fact that you might’ve upset them, especially with how brightly they’d been looking at you while you fixed Steve’s shield.

Like a Godsend, Bruce calls your name and gives you an excuse to push past the super-soldiers to join his group instead. He looks up brightly from the rectangle in his hand that’s called a tablet and is just like a laptop except small with no keys to type with. He’s using a pen on the screen but you don’t see an inkwell. “What a brilliant fight,” He gushes, looking up at you for just a fraction of a second over his glasses. Bruce is almost always frazzled like this when you’ve done something that he thinks is particularly spectacular. “I want you to spar with Natasha next. Does that sound good?”

“Of course,” You nod, crossing your arms over your chest. How could you say no?

“I hope Bucky explained this to you, but we prefer it if you try to limit your abilities to one element per combatant.” He mumbles something under his breath that you don’t understand, but that’s pretty common, and then snaps the case on his tablet closed. Bruce gives you a bright grin and you smile weakly back. “And you can tap out at any time if you want. I know you have a high endurance but I imagine this is taxing, regardless.”

“Being outside helps,” You shift, “It makes me stronger to have… Connections. To everything.” It’s hard to tell Bruce that because it’s also telling him that if you lose control or they want to hurt you that they can just cut off access to one of the elements. But it’s also easy because Bruce is incredibly fascinated with everything about you. He’s nice, and it’s nice to have a scientist that doesn’t poke you with a cattle prod if you have an attitude or collapse exhausted. (He also doesn’t work you to exhaustion and gives you breaks. It’s nice.)

“Of course,” Bruce nods like he’s known that, and maybe he has. His mind works incredibly fast for someone who’s not enhanced. In fact, Bruce might be the smartest person that you know.

Tony is also very smart from what you’ve seen. Everyone on the team is wildly intelligent but all in different ways. There’s no doubt that they’re going to adapt after every match and make it harder for you to win. Still, you’re confident in your ability to come out of this set of tests not only impressing the Avengers, but winning each match. Bruce observes you for a second, muttering under his breath, and then takes a step around you. “Nat! We’ll have you go next, okay?” She looks unimpressed from her spot in the huddle but nods in affirmation.

“We’ll see how you fare against me,” She moves toward you as Bruce moves away. You take measured steps backward to put more space between Natasha and the others so that you don’t hurt them once you gauge what to use against her. She matches your steps forward in a casual gait, mimicking how you’d stayed light on your feet against Steve. You don’t have the upper hand in this fight, though, because you have no idea how Natasha fights. She’s not wearing any visible weaponry but you can sense the knives she has hidden on her person. Will she throw them? Will she try to get into melee with you?

You switch gears when Natasha lunges at you, unsheathing a knife from a holster under her arm. Instead of falling back or dodging to the sides, you meet her halfway and follow the arc of her slash just a few seconds faster than she moves. While she stumbles forward, taken off guard by your bold move you fall forward into a roll behind her and pop to your feet in a defensive position. You both fight like that for a few minutes and finally, it clicks in your head: she’s a dancer. Steve is a brick wall of force and Natasha is a dancer. The wind shifts cold and then warm around you as you pull on the air, rebuffing her next attack with a gust that knocks her off balance and her feet until she’s skidding in the dirt.

“Dirty, dirty tricks, darling,” She says from a crouch but she’s grinning. It’s all teeth, feral and hungry for more combat. You bare your teeth at her in the same way, snarling low in your throat. “You’re fun when you give up the ghost and play.” She leaps, then, and you rock up onto your toes. It’s easier to get the air around you to behave when you’re mobile, stepping lightly, dancing around Natasha as she tries to swipe at you. Natasha is a bullet, all red hair and teeth, but she’s still graceful. She barely touches the ground as you two spin around each other. It just takes one moment of lost focus for her to land a strike on you.

The pain is hot against your side as she slashes upward in an arc over your ribs. It bursts behind your eyes in a flash of scorching blood and torn fabric. Natasha hesitates, clearly not expecting to land such a devastating hit and you use that to your advantage. The pain is a lot, yes, but you barely flinch. Compared to the others that the Handlers would make you fight, this is nothing.

The pain is nothing.

Natasha grunts when you spin again, bringing the current of the air with your open palms. It slams against her with gale force that’s strong enough to lift her off of her feet and slam her back-first into the ground, the knife falling from her limp grasp. You back off, listening to her gasp for breath and make sure you hadn’t accidentally broken a rib into her lungs. Also, you wait for the cattle prod, the cuffs, the pain to come because you messed up. It wasn’t supposed to be that strong, wasn’t supposed to do that damage, wasn’t supposed to fling her ten feet into the air and then flatten her on the ground.

You tense your body, close your eyes, and you wait. It seems to take years for the footsteps to cross over to you, but you wait. You can pick out who’s walking by the sound, now, after so much time listening at your door for who’s coming to pick you up. Sam, Tony, and Bruce pass you in favor of helping Natasha up - or asking her questions, in Bruce’s case. Steve and Bucky stop behind you, perhaps watching the way your elbows press into your sides as you make shaking fists or the way that your shoulders slowly rise to meet your earlobes. Maybe they’re not looking at any of that, maybe they’re looking at the fractalling burn patterns on the ground beneath you as you fight for control over your fear, or the ice that’s starting to curl up over your biceps and encase your skin in swirling, intricate patterns. When one of them finally lays his hand on your shoulder you flinch so sharply that the ice breaks and falls to the ground, fire burning out as you retreat back into your head.

“I’m sorry,” You hear yourself saying, “I didn’t mean to hurt her.”

“You didn’t hurt her,” Steve’s hand stays on your shoulder as he walks around to be in your line of sight, “See? Nat’s fine.” She is, getting up and grinning and everything, but it’s so hard to process that. Even the sunlight of the day outside is starting to look like an industrial ceiling with dank, broken pipes that leak when the snow melts too much or when the Handlers on the surface use too much water too quickly. Even Steve’s voice, sturdy and calm with an unshaken power, doesn’t sound much like him. You can hear a Handler, feel their warm breath over your face as they leer closer and closer with their teeth bared and a sick smile and heavy hands that touch much too much and -

“Hey!” Bucky knocks Steve’s hand off of your shoulder and drops his vibranium hand on the opposite shoulder. It rattles you physically and mentally, drawing your wandering and slow-moving eyes to his. “Listen to me,” Steve is there, over Bucky’s shoulder, “You are outside with us. Nobody here is mad at you, nobody here is going to punish you. This is what we wanted you to do. Do you understand?” His voice is strong, cutting through the mildew smell that had begun to choke you, pulling the threads of your mind back to the protective shell of you versus You. But Bucky doesn’t seem to want to let that happen.

“I… I understand.” You finally reply, trying a small smile as you look between Steve and Bucky. “I think I understand.”

The news jumps on the mysterious painting almost as soon as it’s noticed. It’s off in an alleyway not frequented often, but frequented enough. First, it starts as a picture on Instagram. Found some rad graffiti. Wonder what it means. Then it’s a local picture spot for a week or two.

Finally, the owner of the bistro notices and calls his boss. He’s not stupid, not by a long shot, and he knows what Serdste means. He’s heard the stories passed down from his family members - men who’ve been in the business of blood money for far longer than he has. He’s a generation or two removed from Russian as his first language, but he still speaks it enough at the old folk's home to know what’s coming next.

His boss must call their contact in the NYPD because the next day he’s sitting on his couch listening to his old lady chatter on the phone and watching the footage from the helicopter he heard earlier that day.

The footage is hard to make out unless you know what you’re looking for. It appears to be innocuous graffiti - a bit large and sort of an eyesore - and it’s just a heart on fire. Anatomically correct, a little off-putting to think about, but a concept that he knows the local youths will, and have been, going crazy for. It was the writing that had made him pick up the phone the first time he'd seen it. In haphazard scrawl across the main expanse of the heart is angry, dripping, black ink.

Сердце

Живет на

И снова поднимется.

Or:

Serdtse

Zhivet na

I snova podnimetsya.

Or:

The Heart

Lives on

And will rise again.

You take a break after your fight with Natasha. She comes over after Bucky has you do some breathing exercises with Steve at your side and claps you on the back. “That was a good hit. Very strong. I haven’t had someone down me that quickly since I was a teenager.” Her words hold some weight that you’re not sure you understand in the way that others understand but still, you know. She had asked you about the Red Room - it must be something like the Underground. You wonder how many people she’s had to kill and how many of their names she remembers.

You remember them all.

You’re getting worked up about everything again when Bruce comes over to lay his hand gently on your bicep. “Maybe we should continue another day. I shouldn’t have suggested so many tests in one day like this.”

“I’m sorry,” You reflexively reply, “I know I can do more tests. We don’t have to wait.”

“We’re not mad at you,” Natasha points out, “We’re worried about you.”

You blink and then look back at Steve and Bucky - the people that, despite how they treated you when they first found out who you are, you trust the most. Bucky smiles weakly at you - which he’s been doing since you calmed down during the breathing exercises - but Steve nods. “It’s true. None of us knew how you felt about your room.”

Cell, you want to say. It’s fine, you want to say.

But you don’t.

He reaches out for your elbow and you try to swallow down your gasp, but he and Bucky at the very minimum hear you. "Why don't we have a movie night tonight?"

"A movie night?"

"We'll pick out a movie and make snacks. You can wear comfy clothes and we'll show you a movie that you've never seen before." Steve shrugs, "Buck and I spent a long time catching up and we're still not there. We've all missed a lot of media."

"I think we should start with the Wizard Of Oz," Bucky cuts in before you can respond, "And then Star Wars." He grins and then knocks his knuckles gently against Steve's elbow, "Those blew my mind.”

"That's surprising," Steve says, “Because you and I have been livin’ sci-fi for the past seventy years.”

“I wouldn’t say living it,” Tony drawls before you can ask what sci-fi is, “Considering how much you spent on ice and how much he spent as the Fist.” The casual, blase way that Tony mentions The Fist of Hydra raises your hackles. Your jaw clicks shut audibly and a sour feeling rises in your stomach. It’s nothing but a sickly sweet reminder of what you’d done - rather, what you’d failed to do. The one good thing you’d tried to do and you couldn’t even do that right.

It’s why you’re not mad about the cell, or the training, or the tests. If that’s what you have to do to be useful, to be helpful, to be good… Then you’ll do it. You’ll take your punishment with a neutral face because, fuck, if you’d just made it out of that ice field with the files then maybe none of this would have happened. Maybe you would have died and not come back to live a bastardized, second life among the ones you’ve failed the most.

By the time the blood is done rushing through your ears and you’ve calmed down a little, you realize that Wanda is watching you closely. Everyone else is heading back toward the doors but she’s there, standing next to Steve, and watching you. She hadn’t approached you or talked to you much since you had your… Lapse of judgment about Helen Cho. It didn’t make you mad - sadder than anything else - and you understood how hesitant she might be. It’s hard to have your thoughts and memories; you can’t begin to imagine what it would be like to be assaulted with them with little to no warning. There’s no malice in her eyes now, though, and not even a little bit of pity.

“My brother is coming back tonight,” She says abruptly, cutting Steve off. The three of you are the only ones left outside, and Steve had been explaining something that was going in one ear and out the other. “I think you two would get along.” Steve glances between the two of you like he’d just realized that Wanda hasn’t left yet, like she was invisible. Maybe she’d been wanting to fly under his radar, just able to watch you. “Would you like to meet him?”

You blink slowly and glance at Steve as if you’re asking permission. He holds up his hands and smiles a little bit, “I’m not your keeper, you can make your own decisions.”

“Pietro is nice,” Wanda nods, fidgeting with her fingers, “And you remind me of him sometimes. I think it would be a good friendship to have, especially after finding out what exactly you think of your situation.”

“I, personally, think Pietro would be the best kind of bad influence,” Steve’s smile is blinding as he nudges Wanda with his elbow, but there’s also something hiding behind it that you don’t understand. “Maybe he’ll get you out of your room more often.”

“Does Bucky like him?” You ask before you can stop yourself, “I don’t want to make… Anyone mad.” Wanda cocks her head, dark hair falling over her shoulders. She tsks once and then, when she speaks, her accent is thicker than it was before.

“Lyuba mayn, Bucky is going to be grumpy no matter who you’re spending time with. If he had his way he would keep you to himself - and Steve.” She giggles and cuts a sideways glance at Steve’s quickly reddening face. “Still, he will be tired after his mission, but he eats dinner with me in our room after. It’s easier to keep our kitchen kosher instead of trying to have our own utensils in the team’s kitchen. Would you like to join us for dinner?" She reaches for your hand but hesitates - you can practically see your memories flashing in her eyes. "Pietro and I will join the others for the movie, of course."

"I don't know Wan… I think we could all use some rest after that." Steve worries his lip between his teeth, glancing between you and the brunette still reaching out for you.

"What's more restful than breaking bread with friends?" She slaps her hand on her thigh and turns to Steve with fiery eyes. "Besides, the two of you aren't the only ones who can understand the trauma there." They hold eye contact in a way that makes your hackles rise because they're clearly communicating in a way that teammates do and it's obviously about you. You grind your teeth, fists flexing at your sides. Wanda smirks and breaks eye contact with Steve in favor of taking a step toward you. "What do you say?"

"Does he know what I've done?"

Finally, the pity rolls over Wanda's expression and you can see Steve tense up, jaw hard as he glances away. "Of course he does, lyuba mayn. He's the one that told me to invite you to dinner so that he could meet you. We are not so innocent either." You let her take your hand, focusing your eyes on the glint of silver resting against her sternum to ground yourself.

"I… Will go, if it's allowed." Your skin burns where Wanda is touching you, but the fire travels down your spine under Steve's gaze. He's inspecting you - that's the only word for the way he's looking at you. Does he not trust you? Should you decline, eat dinner with the team so you can scurry back to your cell after? You look back towards Wanda, "Or, maybe, I could just…"

"Ignore Steve," She throws a smug look over her shoulder at him and you watch a blush rise over his skin from underneath his suit. "He and Bucky just want to be your friend so badly because they feel like they will be the best at it."

You blink dumbly at her for only a second. Your friend? That hadn't even crossed your mind. Steve huffs out a sign, hands low on his hips as he cranes his neck away from the two of you. "Wanda…"

"We do have the most in common," You frown, "The three of us are all enhanced, we've all had scuffs with Hydra, and we've all fought in a war nobody else fought in." Wanda grins slyly when you shrug.

"All of the more reason for us to steal you away and become your friends as well."

You shower before heading to Wanda and Pietro's apartment and choose the biggest sweater you currently own. It doubles as something to keep you warm as your body tries to recoup from the afternoon and also as a form of protection. The fabric draping over your shoulders and torso hides the bulk of your body and the sleeves are so large you can hold a ball of fabric in your fists with some still left over. It's nice to dig your fingernails into when you get overwhelmed or nervous - plus its fire-resistant and water-wicking. Natasha had explained both of them to you and you'd asked for most of your wardrobe to be made in those fabrics.

You're chewing gently on the cuff when Wanda comes to your room to get you, still smiling and bouncing slightly on her feet. "He's home!" She reaches out and tugs on one of your sleeves, "Pietro is very excited to meet you."

"I'm excited to meet him," You say because that's what people say, "Where has he been?"

"Undercover," She tugs on your sleeve once but then leaves you to walk next to her, "He prefers to stay out of the media, despite how he acts around here. People know my face and most of the other’s faces… But Piet has done very well in keeping a low profile, as they say." There’s more of a bounce in her step as she takes you to where she lives with her twin brother. After you parted ways before your shower, Steve mentioned that Pietro is a ‘good kid’ but also that he’s quick to act and a little short of thought. It makes you nervous, but weirdly enough the good kind of nervous. Everyone else is so… Soft around you and, for someone who spent a lot of time in militant training or around military folk… Soft feels an awful lot like you’re not only delicate, but pathetic too. You don’t blame them because in some regards you are delicate, fragile, and other synonyms for broken. But in some regards, you’ll never be able to put yourself back together stronger if you’re never allowed to break.

Wanda turns to smile at you just before she lets you into her apartment. “Don’t be nervous, really, he’ll love you.”

“If you say so, Wanda.” You shrug, crossing your arms over your chest. Squeezing the cuffs of your sweater helps ground you and prevents your nails from biting deep into the meat of your palms. Just before she fully pushes the door open, Wanda tracks something just above your head.

“You don’t have to meet him, y’know. We’ll be just fine doing introductions at the next dinner.” When you shake your head she telegraphs her movements until she’s flapping her hands around your shoulders. “Could have fooled me that you’re ready to meet him. There’s smoke coming from your collar.” The heat had been building around your ribs and stomach, but you’d brushed it off as hesitancy or maybe even fear. When she points out the smoke you realize that you’re actually feeling a fire fueled by that fear curling around your midsection protectively. In a blink you extinguish it, thankful that Natasha had sprung for the fire-resistant clothing. Wanda turns away from you and flounces into the apartment as you pinch the fabric of your sweater between your fingers and fan it out, hoping to get rid of the smoke altogether. It clings to you like the campfires you used to make when you were sent out of the Underground. By the time you follow Wanda in and close the door behind you, she’s already in the kitchen chattering with someone in another language.

It’s something with Slavic roots but it sounds like plenty of Germanic borrowed words. You can’t even begin to grasp what country it’s from, let alone decipher what they’re saying. Wanda gestures to you just as you come around the corner, saying something with your name mixed in the middle of it. For being twins, Pietro and Wanda only look vaguely related. They both have high cheekbones set on their round faces, both have sharp brown eyes. Pietro’s dyed his hair blond instead of Wanda’s dark brown hair, but it’s clearly grown out an inch or two to be shaggy around his ears. He looks relaxed, but you can see that underneath that facade he’s tense in his casual, lounging clothes. Pietro steps forward and extends a hand to you, speaking in a thick accent. “It is nice to meet you finally. I can finally put a face to the lyuba mayn my sister tells me about.” His hand is strong, agitated or maybe threatened by your presence in his sister’s life. If you were him, though, you’d be agitated by your presence too.

“I can’t say I’ve heard a lot about you,” He drops your hand and steps back to the counter, resting his hips against it and crossing his arms. Wanda sits on the counter grinning happily and swinging her feet. “But that’s understandable when you’ve been on a mission.”

“Ah,” Pietro nods and relaxes a fraction, “Yes. After my sister and I were… Acquired by and invited to join the Avengers, I’ve been doing work in Sokovia to quell the unrest there.” He sighs before gesturing to the stove to his right. “I’ve made kreplach for dinner if you’re joining us. They’re almost done cooking, I just have to make sure that they don’t stick.”

You blink, following his hand to the stove where there’s a pot of water boiling softly. “You’ve been doing work in… Sokovia?”

Wanda’s eyes widen and she laughs, light and carefree. “Oh, yes. Sokovia is a relatively small and new country. Perhaps past your time above ground.”

“You’ve never heard of Sokovia?” Pietro seems overly confused as he turns to prod at the food in the water with a wooden spoon, “Strange. We have been in the news a lot for the past ten to fifteen years. The team heads there a lot now because there is a lot of Burning Staff activity. I’m sure you’ll see it soon.”

“But not any of the good parts,” Wanda complains, seemingly falling into the role of sister faster than you thought, “Only the shitty parts with shitty people.” You can sense Pietro rolling his eyes. “Did you not read the file I sent you?” Your hackles raise at the thought that your file is being sent around, but you understand why it is. You wonder how much information is inside of it and how much they left out.

Pietro scoffs and turns off the stove. “No, I did not read the file. If malen’kaya lapa wants me to know, I will be told.” You know those words and shuffle. The Maximoff twins are very liberal with their nicknames - first Wanda labels you my love before she uses your name and now her brother is calling you little paw. “It’s basic respect, Walentya.”

Before you can stop yourself, you take a step forward to watch Pietro scoop the kreplach equally into three bowls. “Walentya?” You ask, finally smelling the broth as he pours it over the pasta, “What does that mean?”

Pietro only glances at Wanda over his shoulder and she sighs. “Walentya is my name. I chose Wanda when I came to America.” You’d heard of people doing that - mostly the refugees during the war so that they would be safe in America more than if they kept their birth names. Wanda doing that is a little confusing because you assumed that she’s safe here, with her friends, more than anywhere else.

“Oh. So you chose Pietro when she chose Wanda?”

He laughs, bright and happy, the final dregs of tension wisping away from his shoulders. Pietro digs around in a cutlery drawer at the same time he pulls three glasses down from a cupboard. “No, no. I would rather sit on a tack than call myself something like Peter.” He turns back around to hand you an empty glass, his nose wrinkled. “I tried to convince Walentya not to change her name, but she's not one to… How is it said?" He looks to his sister, rubbing his chin with squinting eyes as he searches for the translation. "Ah, she is not one to be led by the nose."

“I feel… More comfortable with an Americanized name. Pietro has always been better at fitting in,” Wanda cuts in to explain, “He is louder and more boisterous.”

“You seem to fit in just fine,” You frown as you accept the large bowl of kreplach, the serving bowl warm against your frigid palms. It’s just enough to remind you that you can’t lose control, not here, even though you’re so nervous. “The team likes you.”

“The team likes you too,” She volleys back, swinging her dark hair over her shoulder to move from the kitchen and into the dining room, “But you’re unfortunately convinced that your room is a cell and that we’re your Handlers.” Pietro’s steps, to his credit, only stutter a little bit. He sits across from you while Wanda takes the head of the table and doesn’t do a very good job of keeping his surprise off of his face. His eyebrows have crept up to hide underneath the shaggy bangs that hover just above his eyes. You pointedly ignore the way that the Maximoff twins are looking at you in favor of eating your kreplach. “See, Pietro, you two are alike!”

“You think that anyone who comes to this place the way that we did is like me,” He grumbles around a mouthful of food, “Besides, malen’kaya lapa is a tad too shy to be anything like me.” You chew slowly as Pietro’s eyes darken, twitching between your slouched form and Wanda’s blase, casual eating. His face darkens to what seems like an unnatural degree for a man you’ve only just met. “How did you come here, malen’kiy dukh? I would like to know.”

Little Ghost. That’s more fitting for you than Little Paw. He watches you as he eats - he must be enhanced like Wanda because he’s eating the same amount of kreplach that you and his sister are without blinking. You take a long sip of water to put off answering but there’s only so much that you can do to procrastinate. “I… Was found.” You finally decide to start at the beginning of your new life, not your old one. “I was found in the ice where Captain Rogers was found because I froze myself there, trying to escape from the Underground and my Handlers with the Program that they executed on me. I was trying to save Sergeant Barnes from going through the same thing.”

“I am sorry,” Pietro says quietly, “You did not make it?”

Setting your fork down you shake your head. Your stomach is rolling now, lights flashing at the corners of your eyes in warning because your heart is racing too. It feels like the room is spinning around you. “I am here now because I am very powerful,” It feels like a sin to admit it, “And I know a lot about the Underground - things the Avengers need to know.” You swallow thickly and try to smile, but it’s weak at best. “Now I’m stuck here in this time that is very confusing with the weight of everything I’ve done on my back.” Wanda, surprising you, reaches out and touches your forearm with lithe fingers to comfort you without overwhelming you. Pietro sighs and nods but then he sets his fork down and leans back, seeming to chew on his words before he speaks.

“I understand,” His voice is lower and accent thicker than before, “More than you know. Steve and Bucky maybe more than I,” He gestures lackadaisical;y with his hands and then shrugs, “But it is not a race, yes? Before we were here and the people you see sitting in front of you, Walentya and I were in Sokovia and desperate. Our parents were killed in a bombing.”

You frown, crossing your arms and digging your thumbs into the seams of your cuffs to ground yourself. It takes everything in you not to lose control but it’s becoming harder and harder not to burst into flames or start a cyclone like the one in the interrogation room. “I’m sorry.” Wanda smiles but doesn’t say anything more.

“We have done our healing,” He nods, “It still hurts, but it will always hurt. The bombing was carried out by the United States. For three days we looked at a dud shell in our apartment with Tony Stark’s name on it.” Your breath catches in your throat. You’d known, of course, of the things that Tony’s father had been involved in. For Christ’s sake - Howard had bought you from the Handlers just to shove you face-first into a war that you hadn’t even known about. Then, when your usefulness was up, he gave you back. But Tony? The worst you’d seen from him is the vitriolic hate that he has for you.

The hate you see every single time that you catch your reflection in the mirror. “Why are you here?” You finally ask, throat raw and quiet, “If Tony Stark killed your parents?”

“Tony did not do it,” Wanda finally cuts in, shaking her head, “Not in the way that you are thinking. Tony used to make weapons and sell them to the military. They were used in the bombing of Sokovia meant to destabilize our government in order for the CIA to input a newer, more American-friendly leader.”

“We took that,” Pietro picks the story up and carries it like he’s reading Wanda’s mind, “And we internalized it.” He touches his fingertips to his sternum, finally looking away from you. “We were some of the faces of the biggest riots in the country. It was not until later that we learned they were Hydra driven. Speak about being lead by the nose, huh?” He chuckles wryly. You haven’t been told a lot about Hydra, but they sound just like the Handlers. Bucky mostly shies away from conversations about Hydra, either changing the subject or leaving the room altogether. “We did a lot of things for our country. Things I do not regret.”

“And neither do I.”

Pietro continues after a deep sigh. “We were used as tools for years. A man approached us, wanted us to help usurp the soldiers in our country from the US. It was an occupation - my feelings on that have not changed. We went with them; I was ready to die for Sokovia and I convinced Walentya to come with me, to lay down her life.” His voice gets tight, but Pietro pushes on. It’s like he’s confessing his sins more than telling a story. You feel like you’re looking in a mirror, at a person broken down to their raw components of every single thing that they regret doing and every single thing they’d do all over again, consequences be damned. “We were taken and changed. The Avengers call it enhanced, but I have only changed for good a little bit. Now I am fighting on a side I know is at least genuine. Being in America is… Hard. The US does a lot of things I do not agree with. But I do more good here than in my home country, which is still rife with crumbling infrastructure and corrupt politics.”

The silence hangs heavy over the three of you. “Have you… Ever killed someone?” The twins laugh, looking at each other like neither of them expected you to actually ask. But you need to know. There are a lot of similarities between Pietro, Wanda, and you. You need to know that, maybe, when they wash their hands or take a shower sometimes they see the slick blood on their palms and finger pads. Sometimes they can’t wash it off because it’s not really there, but it is - just soaked into the skin so deep it won’t come out.

“Of course, we have,” Wanda says softly, “For Sokovia, for Hydra, and now for the Avengers.”

“It is never easy,” Pietro says, eyes softening. He goes from looking troubled to looking at you exactly like Wanda looks at you. “Taking a life. I regret every single one. But sometimes there are not choices. Between my sister’s life and the life of a stranger… Well, there’s no competition.”

“And I will always choose Pietro. Over everyone, even my friends here.” Wanda pats your arm, “We try to lower the casualties of missions as much as possible, with tranquilizer bullets instead of lethal rounds, but you must know that in war death is inevitable, no?”

“Of course I know,” You reply without thinking, “Fighting in wars is what I was made for - living like this is still foreign to me.” The twins sigh at the same time, Pietro picking up his fork again.

“Eat your kreplach, malen’kiy dukh. We will become friends before we share any more secrets, yes?”

You’re washing your hands just before bed when it happens again. You stifle your scream and stumble backward into the wall, clutching your hands at your sides as you watch the spout drip thick, viscous blood. It’s not real. It’s not real! It can’t be real. Blood doesn’t come from plumbing, water does. It can’t be blood. You clench your eyes shut, trying to breathe over the jackrabbiting of your heart in your chest and the burning in your lungs and throat. It’s not blood, it’s not blood.

You nearly jump out of your skin when someone knocks on your door this late at night in the middle of your panic. Instead the water - water! Not blood! - coming from the spout evaporates as the temperature spikes around you and the shower door rattles angrily with a strong gust of wind. Breathing heavily, you answer your door on shaky knees. It’s Steve, face grim with his phone in his hand.

“We need you in the debrief room. There’s been… Activity relating to you lately. We don’t know what it means and we can’t find it in your notes.”

the fragments that stick with you

the ones you really feel

those parts aren't real