#// and it also slaps her too since she taught her / that is her own personal shikomi / maiko

[usagimen]

wouldn't it be neat if another one of sayuri's artisan skills is singing? though, she's so shy about it rarely does one even hear her hum. her voice leaning on a huskier && more melancholic note, only after her ascension during the culling game can one hear a soft hymn radiating from her - perhaps, a swan song for the past variation of who she was before the fires swallowed that version up.

[forevermore05]

1. I can't speak for other cultures that were represented in this show (I'm so sorry if your representation was ruined too), but since I'm a South Asian and specifically an Indian and Hindu. I think I have some credibility. Ok, so this may depend on the interpretations of Hinduism that you've grown up with if you're a Hindu reading this. Well, growing up, I was always taught that Chakras were so important. I learned that the GODS could not accomplish something unless they access all their Chakras (again, this is the interpretation I grew up with it might not be the same for you). So the fact that watching Aang just be able to live life without accessing all of his charkas properly was a big slap to the face. Let me just say this right now. If you were representing a culture, especially the culture that you base the entire show on you either do it correctly or you don't do it at all. Don't make it half-baked because that's just disrespecting the people who follow that religion. And you're emphasizing how insignificant their religious values are (mind you Hinduism is one of the oldest religions in the world). What little representation we had was also ruined.

2. I also want to talk about another point since I'm here. I think I've made it very clear that I'm a woman of color. Even though me and Katara Are not the same ethnicity. She was my representation through skin color. And it's so interesting. How even though I knew that she was not my ethnicity, I still grasped onto her as a representation. Now this is not a PSA for studios to say "Hey, let's have a person that is brown, and everyone will be okay with it because they will have a person of the same skin to relate to." No this is me criticizing the lack of diversity in the show. The fact that you can base an entire show on a culture but not be able to handle a main character from that culture. And also I think the reason why I like Zuko and Katara ( I've made this point before) But the amount of respect that they have. As a woman of color, I have not exactly received respect from other men whether that be because of my gender or my skin color. So seeing a woman of color be respected regardless it's just so refreshing to me.

3. Also I want people to be mindful that a lot of people who ship this ship. Are women of color and/or part of the LGBTQIA2S+ community. However, I'm going to talk specifically about women of color since I'm straight. A lot of us have come from countries that have been colonized and still face the repercussions of colonization to this day, so what I'm trying to say is. When woc ship this duo they know what they're doing and they're not doing anything wrong. It's disrespectful to insult them for being racist and misogynistic when in reality a lot of these women face misogyny and racism in their own lives. They understand why they ship this ship. They understand it very well because they able to see and understand what is truly going on.

4. If you have a problem with this post and want to potentially hunt me down. I'm only saying this because I've seen other women of color be harassed for liking Zutara. I need you to remember that I'm a teenager. I'm a kid. I don't think you want to beef with a kid. And no, it does not matter that I'm 18. You shouldn't be harassing anyone over a ship. In fact, accusing shippers of being racist but then being racist to that poc/woc shipper is insane. It kind of shows that those people are not on a moral high horse.

5. I'm a kid......don't even think about it.

[minhosimthings]

For Love to Exist: A Hyunjin Fic

Synopsis: In which Aphrodite makes a plan for two loveless souls.

Pairing: Hwang Hyunjin × Fem!reader, includes rest of Skz (side characters)

Word count: don't know but it's really long

Warnings: Fluff, angst, slow burn, mentions of self harm, and mental abuse, reader is an orphan, mentions of food and drink. She/her pronouns used, reader has scars on her skin

A/N: this is sort of a self indulgent fic for me and it is dedicated to all the people in my life who have made me feel like I am worthy of love again. This is based off of my own experiences due to my abusive past and how I let those go with the help of the people I've met here in university. I based Y/N off of myself (I hope you don't mind) because I feel like Hyunjin would be the type of person to love s person, regardless of their past, and ignorant of their future (and also I'm too delulu for Hyun rn). I dedicate this fic to all the people around the world, who feel that they do not deserve a red heart, and an I love you everyday. I dedicate this fic to the little girl inside of me, who still thinks that she is unworthy of love.

For love to exist, souls should exist too. For love to breathe, souls should take a deep breath too. For love to live, souls should learn how to live too. But for you, souls simply did not exist. They were just imaginary things made up by boring adults to tell children why they married their partners, to mask whatever what going on in reality. Why would anyone believe in souls and hearts and bonds and all that bullshit? Kids, of course, believed it.

You, on the other hand, were taught by cold eyes, ever since forever. Cold eyes had taught you that warm ones always lied and that love was just a fairytale made up to increase the population of earth. Cold eyes told you that June wasn't about pretty flowers and sundresses. They taught you it was about the burning sun and the heatwaves. Cold eyes taught you that flowers were nothing more than biological creations of two genetically unique organisms. Cold eyes taught you that the world was just the Earth, just a globe and that the universe didn't care for a tiny speck like you.

Work, Eat, and sleep. Those were the only things you did with passion. Those were the only things in your life that you noticed and yearned for. It was painful to watch your coworkers at the company, who were below you, enjoy life so much. As chief editor, you had less work than they did, yet they saw life as a chance. They saw life as a chance to enjoy the fruits of the universe, while you still saw life as a scarred being. Funny, how you thought that everyone else was mad to have love in their lives, yet there you were with scars on your chest, both physical and mental, going unnoticed by the minute.

Until Hyunjin came into your life.

Hwang Hyunjin. Step son of your goddamned boss. You were told that he would be working alongside you as both an assistant editor and as a new cartoonist, replacing Mr Park, who had resigned five days ago. You groaned at the idea of having someone follow you all day, asking you if you needed anything. You were better off without an assistant or a cartoonist. But your magazine wasn't the leading magazine in South Korea for no reason. The illustrations provided alongside the thigh slapping articles always provided the greatest entertainment to the millions of readers. Mr Park was an old man, who was always quiet and mostly kept to his drawings, exactly your preference. Someone who doesn't annoy you or ask about your love life because apparently, at 23, a woman has nothing better to do. But a man, your age, who you've heard used to be a singer in a band, yeah that wasn't going to work with you.

Your boss had introduced you guys on his first day. He was.... surprisingly handsome. His eyes were like a kitten's, small and glittery, as if Andromeda had poured all her stars into them. His nose and jawline were so sharp, in total contrast to his gaze, soft and pinkish. You wondered why all those thoughts were coming into your head. Never before had they had even touched your mind, when you saw other men and women around you, no matter how pretty they were.

He worked in silence. Complete silence. He wouldn't even move his chair or anything. The desk on which he worked was so pristine and organized, very much like yours, exactly like yours. But there was an aura with which he worked on piece of paper with a black ink pot that you could only dream of having. It was like the sky favoured him, sunlight illuminating all of his features, including some tiny moles on his face. You couldn't help but admire his serious face, headphones in, with an ink stained brush moving swiftly across paper, tracing the tiny dots and lines of whatever he was making. You had first approached the company as a cartoonist yourself, having the skills because of an art minor. But soon the director saw you better as a journalist and slowly but surely you moved your way up the ladder to become chief editor. And when you saw other people doing something you used to love doing, you wondered if you hadn't accepted the job as an editor, would your life have been so mundane? So brown and still?

"Um Miss Y/N?" A voice broke you out of your stupor, starting you and getting your mind away from the articles on your computer screen. Hyunjin was standing next to you, holding pieces of paper in one hand and his brush in the other. He had a dab of ink sprawled across his nose. Cute, you thought.

"I, uh, finished the illustration for the first article you sent. Are they ok?" He gave you five pieces of paper, all with funny intonations on them, a cookie wearing hat, and an iguana wearing a DJ's glasses. It was cute, really cute you thought, as you gave them back to him, nodding in approval and shooting him a small smile. "You have ink on your nose, did you know that?" You pointed out to him, handing him a tissue from your tissue box, which he took and immediately disappeared behind his computer, wiping his nose aggressively. Cute, so cute.

You usually left work at eight thirty, not too late and not too early that you'd miss your tea. But something made you want to stay back today. Someone, specifically. Hyunjin told you that he usually went home by ten, since he didn't do much during the night. You refrained from telling him when you went, lest he question why you stayed back today.

"Miss Y/N I'll be heading out now. Good night." He held up his olive green bag and waved goodbye to you. Something inside of you wanted to say 'Wanna go together?' but you had always ignored that something so you instead waved back to him and started picking up your things.

That day, the old grandmother at the ramen shop you always went to said something was different about you and told you to smile more. You didn't know whether or not that was a complement but you took it willingly along with spicy ramen with beef.

"Miss Y/N I-" "Hyunjin stop call me Miss. Im your age. Just call me Y/N, alright?" You finally got that sentence out of your mouth after keeping it in for an entire week. An entire week Hyunjin addressed you with honorifics and today you wanted to tell him that just your name was enough. Just your name coming out of his mouth like a sweet melody was alright. "Oh well ok Y/N." He said with some difficulty, feeling awkward not using the proper words. "I wanted to say that lunch break began over two hours ago and you still haven't got up from your seat, so I uh bought you something. I asked your co workers what you usually eat so um yeah." He did what? You looked down at his extended hand, holding a box of your usual Ramyeon and an americano. You silently took the food from his hands, shooting him a quick 'thank you'. He deserved more than that, but at that moment, all your shocked brain could do was that.

Someone cared for you. Someone noticed that you weren't eating. Someone noticed how you stayed on this cold October day. And that was sort of sweet? Someone did that for you and for once it seemed he did not want anything in return. That couldn't be true, you thought as you silently ate your Ramyeon, all the while shooting tiny glances at Hyunjin, who was once again immersed in his drawings. Seeing him so deeply imbued in an art, which provided him a job, was so endearing to look at. He was doing something he enjoyed, while earning money for it. Isn't that what everyone in the world would love?

"Um Hyunjin? Hyunjin." You snapped your fingers in front of Hyunjin, who had his headphones on, with that brush back in his hand. He looked so cute, being broken out of his hypnotised state. His eyes blinked at you for a few seconds, before he took the headphones off and greeted you. "What is it Mi- I mean Y/N?" God he was so handsome. He was in a loose baby blue sweater and white pants today. He looked so dainty and fragile as if you touch him and he'll break. "I uh wanted to thank you again for the food today. Um. Any way I can thank you for it? Maybe buy you a coffee?" You could feel your cheeks getting redder by the moment. Even if he couldn't see the blush, you could definetly feel them. If your guardian angels were watching you right now, they'd be saying 'Y/N get your ass up and stop blushing so much.'. "Oh. Um uh" Hyunjin stuttered for a bit before checking his watch. Nine thirty am. There was still half an hour left to go home, meaning you both had enough time to grab a coffee and perhaps a bagel or something tasty.

"Oh course Y/N. But please do not pay for my food. You need not repay me for lunch." Your pleas for that sentence went unheard, as Hyunjin kept saying that he didn't want anyone to pay for him, reasoning that lunch was a basic human need and he was just helping his co worker out. Something about the way he defended himself and explained things was so adorable. It was like a ferret explaining why it's fur is white and why it's ears are so round.

"This is surprisingly good." You commented, as Hyunjin and you sat by the little round table in the coffee shop, drinking Americans and eating Macarons. Hyunjin raised an eyebrow at you, watching as you are your pistachio Macaron. "You never had a Macaron before in your life?" You shook your head at his question, trying to swallow your bite of the Macaron quickly, so as to answer his question. "No actually." You managed to cough out after what seemed like five hours of you chewing the sweet dessert. "I don't have a preference for sweet things. I used to but I grew out of it." Hyunjin looked up at you, from staring at his shoes. "You used to? Well I always used to believe that a sweet tooth could never grow out of their preferences. Turns out I was wrong then." The corners of your mouth twitched as your heart itched not to say 'why are you so perfect?' to the man sitting in front of you. "So what musicians do you listen to?" It was now your turn to look up at him with wide eyes. It was funny how both of you were eating food together like two normal human beings, yet neither of you dared to look at each other, or maintain direct eye contact for more than a fraction of a second. "Pardon?" You asked him, eyebrow raised and foot tapping on the floor. He stumbled back a bit and said, in a apologetic tone, "Oh I didn't mean to impose. Im sorry. I just thought, you know we see each other every single day, and I have never gotten to know what my coworker likes a dislikes so um.. I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable." Seeing him apologize like that was like seeing a puppy apologize to a black cat. You probably looked scary right now, with your expression and your rigid figure, so it made sense for Hyunjin to react like that.

"Oh it's alright Hyunjin." You said, shooting him the tiniest smile ever. "People don't really ask me questions about myself that often so I was kind of taken aback." Hyunjin just nodded and hummed in response to your bland statement.

That night, when you went home, you thought to yourself, about how much you missed human interaction. Most often disassociation and loneliness were your favourite drugs, but Hyunjin asking you a simple question about your favourite singer, made those drugs seem pleasure less. Your therapist would have probably looked you up and down and immediately told you that you were in love, being the hopeless romantic he was. People were scared to approach you. You, with your head held high in the air, your gait threatening that of Hera's, and your expression, cool and wicked. But Hyunjin just casually asked you what musicians you listen to, as if he had known you for years and he was meeting up with you again, at a school reunion. It was shocking to you, how he could just say that, without stuttering. Yes he did stutter later on, but it was so adorable the way he apologized to you, hands nervously palming at his fingers and nose silently twitching. Maybe friends weren't so bad after all, you thought, as the stars looked at you in pity, talking amongst themselves, about where had God gone wrong with you.

A sticky note? Your boss never left sticky boss for you. Usually his assistant to deliver you messages. So who wrote this mysterious pink sticky note, stuck to your computer with a smiley and something written on it? You had arrived at work after Hyunjin today, who, once again was is a hypnotic state, lightly bobbing his head to whatever was playing inside of those blue headphones. You slightly suspected that the note was probably his, as you sat down on your chair, hanging your bag in the usual place beside your table. You pulled off the note from the computer and examined it closely. There was something written on it with a glittery purple pen.

I scared you yesterday with my question. So I'm going to ask you through a note. What musicians do you listen to? (PS you can answer through a sticky note too)

You noticed Hyunjin kept giving you small glances from time to time, only taking his eyes away from his art for a fraction of a second. Cute, you thought, really cute. This was by far the cutest thing he had done. You silently took up a glittery blue pen from your drawer and wrote some sentences on a different sticky note, knowing when you were going to stick it.

"Hyunjin could you do me a favour?" You tapped on his desk to alert him. He looked up at you once again, with those same doe eyes. You noticed the ink once again splattered on his nose. "Yeah?" "Could you take this up to Mr Kim once and ask him if this is how he wanted the article to be edited?" You handed him a blue file to take it upto your boss, which is silently took and went up to the boss's office, giving you enough time to stick the note onto his computer. You made a last minute addition to the note, before rushing off to the canteen, lest Hyunjin catches you in your mischievous act. Even though it was just sticking a note to your co worker's computer this felt like the most amazing thing you had ever done in your life, the most daring.

Where had you gone? Hyunjin had come back to his desk after handing off the file to the boss, who said he'd give it back tomorrow, only to find you nowhere to be found. He swore that he had saw you here just a second ago. Where had you gone now? Shrugging his shoulders and telling himself that you had probably taken a bathroom break, he sat back down on his desk, ready to complete the illustrations for the day, that you had given him yesterday, when he noticed something stuck to his computer. A green sticky note. Could it be? Did you respond to his very creepy, weirdo nerd way of asking you a question in order to get to know you better?

When Hyunjin sat down on his chair, and slowly pulled the sticky note out, he sweated that his heart had skipped a hundred beats (or 143 beats hehe). Your loopy handwriting was scrambled on it with sparkly blue ink.

This is very middle school of us to be passing notes in work but I like listening to Lana del Rey, Florence and The Machines, a bit of k-pop and lot of classical music. Now you answer my question along with your own question. What is your favourite ice cream flavour? (PS you have ink on your nose)

Hyunjin's soul was doing backflips in his stomach. Having an obsession for love, he wondered whether this was how Cupid felt like when he shot his first arrow. You listened to the same artist he did. He absent-mindedly wondered about what question to ask you next when you came out from the canteen, carrying lunch for the both of you. "Oh hey Hyunjin." You said in what you hoped wasn't an over active tone. "I uh got you lunch to pay back for when you got me lunch and um here you go." You awkwardly handed him the cup of spicy tteokbokki along with some other dishes and an Americano. As if returning the awkwardness, he mumbled a sheepish 'thank you', grabbed the food and hid behind his desk. Somewhere in the clouds Aphrodite was sighing, not knowing what to do with you two.

After a few hours, when you had gotten up to go the boss's office, Hyunjin saw his golden chance and took it. He scribbled his question onto a pink sticky note and quickly stuck it to your desk, frantically sitting back on his chair and pretending to be focusing on his cartoon which had long been completed.

Happiness. Happiness was all you and Hyunjin felt that night, when both of you parted ways. It was that happiness which a fourteen year old gets when their crush pays attention to them. It was mischievous happiness, as both you went home and pondered about questions and answers. Middle school romance was something neither of you had, with him not finding the correct person, who would love him for who he is, and you just not wanting love anymore. Aphrodite would be probably be smiling right now, twirling her roses and she makes the next part of her plan.

"Hyunjin! Over here!" It was raining very heavily today and you had chosen this very day to not take your car. Apparently Hyunjin had done the same thing, as both of you saw other close to the cafe a distance from your work. He didn't have an umbrella and you had spotted him running over in the direction of your work, blue hoodie gripped tightly over his head. "Did the universe have to choose the day I didn't get my car to rain?" He shouted at you as you both were shielded by your umbrella. "I was thinking the same thing!" You shouted back at him. "Let's get inside the cafe!"

The cafe thankfully wasn't crowded at all, and as you took off your coat and shoes to dry, you appreciated the heat coming from inside the cafe. It was on the more traditional side, with a wooden interior and sepia toned plants hidden in mud pots.

"Oh great." Hyunjin sighed. He was holding his phone is his hands, having taken off his hoodie and his shoes before you did and setting his bag down at a table for two. "Boss just texted. Work's cancelled for three days straight." "So we went through all that rain for nothing?" You deflated on the comfy chair, opposite Hyunjin, who was revealed to be wearing a dark blue shirt underneath his baby blue hoodie. "Well damn it. What do we do now? I didn't bring my car and neither did you. Do we have to wait out the storm here?" You asked him, wiping your face with a handkerchief. "Well we can." Hyunjin responded. "I think the owner will probably let us." You raised a brow at him at that statement while he just stared into space, as if expecting an alien to show up any moment. "How do you know the own-" "HWANG HYUNJIN YOU FINALLY DRAG YOUR ASS HERE TO SEE ME."

A very loud voice rang through the cafe, accompanied by a much quieter 'Hyunjin's here?'. Hyunjin groaned and buried his face in his hands, as a handsome man with olive skin, brown hair, and the prettiest nose ever, came striding up to your table, wearing the uniform of the cafe. He promptly pulled up a chair and collapsed onto it, next to Hyunjin, all the while playfully glaring at him. "Hey Minho hyung." Hyunjin mumbled, not looking directly at whoever this Minho was. The other man clicked his tongue out of disapproval and said, "Say that louder would ya? And why have you not been coming to visit me and emotional dump on me for like two weeks? Oh and who's this lovely young lady?" He looked into your eyes at that last bit, startling you a bit, at how round and black his eyes were, like tiny little boba balls. "I'm Y/N." You extended a hand forward. "L/N Y/N" Minho took your hand and shook it with a firm grip, before getting up and slightly bowing to you. "Well Miss Y/N, may I get you anything? Perhaps something which is not an Americano, which is what this monster" he motioned to Hyunjin "drinks?" You gave him a calculator look before saying, "Oh. Um I would like an americano actually and probably one for Hyunjin too please." Minho looked ever so slightly taken aback by your words. "As you wish!" He declared before giving Hyunjin and a smirk and leaving.

"So who was that?" You asked Hyunjin, whose ears were burning red. With a sigh, he put his elbows on the table, burrying his head in them.

"That was Lee Minho. A college mate of mine, who opened a cafe with a friend of his, soon after graduation, because apparently he didn't want to get into a boring job." He chuckled slightly at that. "He's a mentor to me. He's like I think two years older than me and he treats me like a damn baby. But it's fine cause I'm the one who helped him cheat on his exams so I get free shit here."

"Americano for two?" Oh hey Hyunjin!" A freckled boy had come up to your table, americano filled cups in his hand. His skin was porcelain, like glass, dotted with star like freckles, with blonde hair framing his beautiful face. "Hey Lix." Hyunjin patted the boy's back, as he set the coffee down on the table. "How's your mum now? Is the treatment working?" A smile never seemed to leave this boy's face, as he sat down in the chair which Minho had pulled up earlier. "She's good now. Much better! I've been sending her some brownies every now and then but she's still disappointed because apparently her son won't get a girlfriend." He slightly pouted as Hyunjin chuckled lightly. "Oh who's this? Wait are you-" the boy looked at you with excited eyes, before gasping and turning his head to Hyunjin. "Is this the Y/N you told me about?" He excitedly extended a hand towards you, which you took, experience pleasure at his soft grip and hands, which was in stark contrast to Minho's handshake. "I'm Felix! Lee Felix. Nice to meet you! Y/N right?" The amount of happiness radiating from this boy was so much that you thought he was probably the reincarnation of Helios himself. "Nice to meet you too Felix. I'd introduce myself, but judging from your excitement I believe Hyunjin's already told you about me." You gave him a smile, which he returned. "Yah Felix!" Minho's voice came from across the wooden walls. Felix groaned and got up from his chair saying goodbye to both of you and rushing off to Minho.

"They're really nice." You told Hyunjin, sipping on your americano. It was nice and weird to have people like you for who you are. It was kind of alien to you, to meet two people who knew about you. It was even more alien of Hyunjin to tell people about you. What could people tell about you? What fragments of your being attracted Hyunjin that he told his friends about your existence?

"Y/N are you ok?" Hyunjin's voice broke your mind from staring at the rain pouring outside. The storm had calmed down now and it was just lightly drizzling, drops staining the window, racing against each other. "Oh yes I'm good. Sorry."

"So you wanna talk about the notes or should we keep it a middle school secret?" Hyunjin's question rang across your brain, and as you sipped on your americano, you couldn't help but notice how innocent that question was. It was just a question. It wasn't an interrogative question, which you'd be punished for if you didn't answer. You fingers unconsciously went up to your wrists when you thought about that question. "What do you suggest? I'm alright with answering the question in person, instead of exchanging notes." You responded, keeping your tone casual, so as to not reveal the fast pace of your heart beat.

Hyunjin smiled at you and sipped on his americano again. "My favourite ice cream flavour is pistachio. And I also like listening to Lana del Rey and classical music. My turn now." He leaned forward slightly. "A song which you could listen to, for all eternity?" Musical questions were what you enjoyed the most, having being in love with music ever since your ears picked up the tune of twinkle twinkle little star. Hyunjin's question seemed hard, since your favourite song changed every few seconds and you couldn't just choose one melody to pleasure your ears for all of eternity. "Hmm" you responded after a while. "Probably Love by Lana Del Rey." "Why so?" Hyunjin asked.

"Because along with having an amazing tune and the greatest vocals ever," you started your lecture "It's also such a deep song. The way she is symbolising young love is so beautiful, from the way she alters her voice at certain lines to the lyrics themselves. I especially fell in love with the chorus because it signifies such a beautiful matter of being so much in love that even the tiniest actions can seem like elephantine gestures. Even that lyric 'The world is yours and you can't refuse it' it's so pretty. It's symbolising that feeling of ruling the world when you fall in love. Or atleast I think it does. I've never fell in love so."

You fell quiet after your rambling, hoping that it didn't freak him out how much you knew about one particular song, which you definetly did not write an entire essay about. L/n Y/n you've done it again. You've scared a person off because of your rambling about your hyperfixation because you have nothing else to love. Great job, you thought.

But as you looked over at Hyunjin's face, it was happy? His eyes were wide and his lips were slightly parted as if thinking what to say, his americano straw remained in his mouth, but he wasn't sipping on it. He was in total awe, something you couldn't see.

"That- that was amazing." He said after a pregnant silence. "I never thought about songs that way honestly. But I think from now on I'll start thinking of it like that." God his smile was so handsome. The way the corners of his mouth stretched and the way his lips always slightly parted, it was all so pretty. And since when have you became so observant? To notice a man's manner of smiling?

Aphrodite smiled again in the clouds, calling for her chariot, to take a ride across the sky, making up the next step of her masterplan.

It was still pitter-pattering outside the window as both of you finished your drinks. You declined Minho's offer to eat, since you had already ate a lot for breakfast and you weren't feeling hungry. You tasted a bit of Felix's brownies, for which you complemented the freckled boy so mich to point where his glass skin turned into stained red glass.

"God the rain is stopping, how the hell are we going to get home?" Hyunjin sighed, as he meant back in his chair. You both had put your shoes, hoodie and coat back on and were staring out the window. You had an idea in your mind. A peculiar idea. An idea unlike you. An idea made by your heart controlled mind. You know how they say that we should never let our heart control our brain? Well sometimes, just sometimes, in the tiniest moments, we could let it control our being just a little bit.

"Doyouwanttocomeovertomyhouseitsreallycloseby" "I beg your pardon?" Oh great you spoke the easiest sentence in the fastest way you could possibly imagine. You should probably get the Nobel Prize for the most awkward person ever. Taking a deep breath, you made eye contact with Hyunjin (perhaps for the first time) and said, "Would you like to come over to my house? It's close by and I can drop you off at your house if I get my car." Hyunjin looked slightly taken aback by your suggestion, and as he pondered over it with a series of 'ohs' and 'ums', you mentally scolded yourself. How could you never say the right thing ever? How did you manage to say the wrong thing every single time? How did you manage to scare off every person every single time? Were you really not capable of love? Was your mother really right?

"If I don't impose Y/N, I would like to come over to your house. I should actually probably get going home too, so I accept your offer, only if it doesn't bother you." Your heart lifted from where it was earlier. Listening to the words coming out of Hyunjin's mouth in the soft tone, was something so comforting to you. It was like the smell of old books, like the way flowers moved in the wind, like the way wine swirled in a wine glass and like the way melodies danced to the beat of a song.

"This is your house?" You and Hyunjin had walked all the way to your house, shielded by his umbrella. It was safe to say that your house was a very luxurious one, in the more expensive side, courtesy to your high profile job. It was a two bedroom house, with the most beautiful terrace and balcony anyone had ever seen, which gave a view of the Seoul skyline. "It's beautiful." Hyunjin breathed out. "Come inside." You said, taking off your shoes at the entrance and unlocking the wooden door. "Want some food?" Hyunjin shook his head as both of you entered your house, his mouth dropping on seeing the interior. You had a conversation pit inside your house, much like one of those 80's sitcoms, and it was the most queer thing in your house. It was purple and magenta, with white finishings and a pretty carpet, sitting below a glass table. "It seems the interior is much prettier than the exterior." Hyunjin said, as you both entered the pit, sitting down. You sheepishly smiled and mumbled a thank you, before getting up to get him some water, even though you both had downed a big cup of americano.

"Your books are really interesting." You had started showing Hyunjin around your house, and when you reached the library portion, he wouldn't move from there. Granted, you did have a pretty library, decorated with fake moss and hanging vines, which made it look like a shelf growing out of the forest. "What is so interesting about them?" You asked him as he stroked the book covers with his fingers, to which he smiled and pointed to the last two books. "Their arrangment is fascinating first of all. I mean The Animal Farm and Pride and Prejudice are sitting together, as if going for a tea party. Did you arrange them yourself?" You only nodded to his question, too scared to answer. "The second interesting thing about this bookshelf is that all the books are so dual to each other. You have Harry Potter-" he pointed to the topmost shelf, "then you have 1984-" his fingers went to a handsome leather book, "and then finally you have a pop up children'd book." He laughed pointing to the bottom most shelf, where a glittery pink book lie. You blushed, as you saw that book. It was the book, which your best friend at the orphanage had given to you, before she was taken away. You cherished it a lot, it being the only form of love you had ever recieved in your life. "Woah you have Taylor Caldwell too!" Hyunjin said, excitedly, his fingers bouncing on the shelf closest to him, where a series of faded books lie. "Do you want them perhaps?" You asked him, to which he gave you a sad smile. "I've always loved her since the age of eleven but I could never buy any of her books, courtesy to my mum thinking they're too 'westernised'." "You can take some if you want. I hardly ever read these ones." You pulled out some of the books and put them in his hands. He looked surprised and his eyes widened at you. After much trial and error, which included him refusing to take the books, and you threatening to leave him out in the rain if he didn't take them, he finally stuffed then into his bag, thanking you over and over again.

The car ride to his home was fun, to say the least. Hyunjin narrated some funny stories with Minho and Felix, and a few of his other friends. You were shocked to find out that he used to be in a band, where he played the drums. "You must play them for me one day." You said, as you pulled up to a light. "as payback for the books." Hyunjin gave you that sweet smile again, causing your brain to malfunction.

"Thank you for the ride home Y/N. And for the books." Hyunjin said as you both pulled up to his house. "Say I have a question." He said, before unbuckling his seatbelt (drive safely kids). "Would you ever be interested in spending your lunch break with me everyday? Cause I really like talking to you and I don't have many friends at work. Only if you want to though!" God he was so adorable with those round eyes and those cute cheeks. Was he actually so cute or was your hopeless brain just making it up?

Aphrodite sighed again as she watched you silently from the bushes, happy that you were going on the right path, but worried about the trajectory of your mind.

Spending time with Hyunjin were the best moments of your life. It was surprisingly fun to spend a part of your day everyday with Hyunjin. It was just lunch and americanos, fresh from Minho's cafe, since it was the only one you liked now. You warmed up to him more than you had wanted to, and for the first time, your brain didn't mind being ruled by your heart. Hyunjin had introduced you to some of his closest friend, who came to visit him at work, making sure he didn't overwork himself. And he had interesting friends. Apart from Minho and Felix, there was a producer group called 3Racha who wrote songs for a company called JYP. It was composed of the three most kindest people you had ever met. Jisung, Changbin and Chan treated you like their own sister, often picking up an Americano for you whenever they got one for Hyunjin. You met Hyunjin's youngest friends Seungmin and Jeongin at Minho's cafe, when Jeongin bumped into your shoulder, dropping his books and apologizing to you frantically. Both of them were University students, one having a pottery studio and the other studying computer science. They were mischievous little things, but you loved them too, with you sharing Seungmin's love for pottery and Jeongin's hatred for sugary foods. It was so fun, having friends, even if they weren't your friends from the beginning. This was the first time you had experienced happiness ever since you were eight.

The words on your books weren't skimmed over by your eyes anymore. Instead they were carefully taken in, word by word, appreciating how every letter formed the beautiful sentence. Now, winter wasn't about surviving anymore. Instead it was about being warm and cosy, all wrapped up in a big blanket, hugging a plushie and drinking hot chocolate as pretty winter flakes poured outside the window. Now you digged out the sundresses you haven't worn in so long, and you would wear them to work every now and then, catching the eyes of every person you passed (because you are the most beautiful person on earth LOVE YOURSELF I LOVE YOU). You never noticed it, but now, Hyunjin looked at you differently. He wasn't a very defensive person, choosing to end arguments quickly, but whenever his eyes set upon your figure dancing in a yellow sundress, embroidered with flowers, he swore that he would burn done the entire world for you. Both of you regularly met up at each other's house, having k drama nights, where you would do nothing but cry over the slow burn, and try out a new snack from the local convenience store every time. Sometimes Hyunjin would play the drums for you, taking your excited requests of the 70's and 80's rock songs. It was all so perfect, having Hyunjin in your life and every time you saw him moving his own across a piece of paper, whipping up a cartoon for you as a gift, your heart smiled, urging you to let it take over for just a little longer.

But Aphrodite had something else in plan.

Sometimes the Gods plan sinister things for humans. Sometimes they say 'lets whip up conflict'. And most often it's not between one human and another. Most often it's between a human and her own mind. You had gotten a call on a nice Thursday morning, when you were about to set out for work, clad in a white dress, which reached your knees. A call from your adoptive parents. Unbeknownst to the entire world, behind your pretty face, you hid a grief filled secret behind those glassy eyes. Your childhood wasn't all sunshines and rainbows. You had grown up in an orphanage basically your entire life, and at the tender age of eleven, you had gotten adopted by a rich couple. Good right? Nope it was the polar opposite. Turns out they had adopted you for their own benefit, to gain support from the media to continue their company or some bullshit like that. It had haunted you all your life, how they would never speak a word to you, never a word of affection. It was just words of 'who would ever love you?' and 'you aren't capable of love'. When you had gotten accepted in college, with a full ride scholarship, they had help a party, not for you, but to brag that their daughter, whom they did not even love, had gotten into a college all by herself. They had turned their devil tails into angel wings and it angered you, but you stayed silent. Why should you fight battles with other people when you could fight a battle with your own mind? You had cut off all communications with them however as soon as you left for college. Now it was just you and the world. Getting a job was the hardest thing and you still remember all those days that you survived on water and biscuits, like Marie Curie, when she used to research on radioactivity. You had learnt that your 'parents's' buisness had gone bankrupt, soon after you had gotten a job, but they still hadn't ever contacted you until this Thursday. It was Seungmin's birthday today and you had gotten him a puppy keychain, one that he had been wanting for a long time, which he had told you about in secret. You had purchased it the day before and wrapped it up in a cute box, writing some notes on the top. It was supposed to be the most perfect day. Happiness and melted ice cream that was what this day was supposed to be.

"Hello?" You had picked up your mother's call and your world came crashing down immediately. "Hey there Y/N. We need some money right now and we know you work for Mr Kim. Send us some money please." Not even a hello. The woman who had given you food and shelter didn't even say a hello. The woman who you owed nothing to didn't even say hello.

Hyunjin wondered where you were that day. You wouldn't ever miss a day of work and plus you were excited for Seungmin's birthday. You were going to go for a birthday party which was to be held at Chan's house. Hyunjin had told you that most of the boys would be bringing their girlfriends so you could meet them. You wouldn't never have missed this, especially not when your eyes lit up, when he had told you that Seungmin would be singing for you guys and Minho would be bringing his famous meat. So why? Why was your chair lying all alone and your americano untouched? He had asked Mr Kim whether you had called him today, to which he got disappointment when Mr Kim said no. Your boss didn't really care whether or not you took breaks, since you mostly finished your work in advance, in order to save time. That day Hyunjin told the guys, that he wouldn't be coming to the party, much to their disappointment. But they understood when he said that he was worried for you. He basically talked about you 24/7 and the boys still didn't understand how their most romantic friend ever ended up not knowing what love was.

Hyunjin had an extra key to your house, which you had given him after two months of knowing him, trusting him enough to keep an emergency contact. Hyunjin kept fiddling with it on the cab ride to your place, massaging his nerves to calm himself down. As he reached your house, the atmosphere around him changed. It became gloomy, even when the Sun attacked him with his rays. The sunflowers in your garden all seemed to bow their heads to him, as if to apologise.

"Y/N?" Hyunjin stepped inside your house, calling your name. "Y/N where are you?" He shouted a little louder this time. If you weren't in the living room, you'd be up in your bedroom or the library. Hyunjin slowly climbed up the stairs to the second floor, taking in the eerie silence of the house. It was such a loud silence. He could hear something in the distance but he didn't know what it was. Was it a cat? He heard a wailing noise that sounded something like a wolf crying.

The door to your bedroom was open. Hyunjin stepped inside, careful not to make a sound. He knew how creepy this was, to enter a person's house like this, but he didn't have a choice. "Y/N?" He called out, noticing the light in your bathroom switched on. "Y/N!" You were sitting on the floor, with a knife next to you. Your hair was in tangles and your body swayed back and forth, As you kept mumbling something to yourself. Your upper arm was slightly bleeding and your breathing was heavy. You had been lying there for the entire morning. You were still in your dress,which was now stained with blood from your arm. Your face was tear stained and your eyes were glassy. "Y/n. Hey look at me. Look at me. I'm here." You looked up to see Hyunjin's worried face, eyebrows furrowed and lips parted again. "Hyunjin?" You breathed out in a weak voice, which made Hyunjin's heart drop to his knees. "Yes it's me. Hey breathe. Please breathe for me." He coached you through breathing in and out, which calmed you down a bit, but you were still shivering and your skin was ice cold and white. You looked like a ghost. A ghost with sunken eyes and shocked expression stuck on its face.

Hyunjin carefully lifted you up and carried you to your bed, careful not to disturb your injury, which he immediately knew how it happened, from the knife lying beside you. He got some cloth and medicine for you from the first aid kit you hid under your bed, something you had told him a long time ago. You watched him with wide eyes as he carefully dressed your wound and got some water for you, forcing you to drink it.

"What happened? And it's ok if you don't wanna tell me." He sat beside you as you leant back against the bed frame. You tried not to catch his eye because you knew if you looked into those galaxies inside his eyes, you would start weeping. "Nothing happened Hyunjin." You mumbled, to which he scoffed silently, getting his hand up to your forehead to check your temperature. It was normal, thankfully you didn't have a fever. "Y/n" he faced you and out his hand on yours. "You know you can tell me right? I'm here for you and I'm worried. Please tell me what happened." It all happened so quickly. You looked into his eyes, taking in the stars inside of them, and you couldn't hold it back anymore as you burst out crying. Hyunjin was quick to hug you, holding your head gently as you buried yourself deeper in his chest, staining his grey shirt. His heart was breaking into a milion pieces, seeing his universe crying out her planets from her eyes. He shushed you from time to time, to make sure you don't become weak from crying.

"Y/N hey hey." He held you head in his hands, cupping your cheeks. "What's wrong? Just one word. Tell me one word. I beg you." You sniffled slightly and looked up at him, stopping you're tears slowly. You felt guilty, for him coming to you. Why should he? He's a human like you and he has responsibilities too and he should tend to them, not you. "Hyunjin, you should go. Y-you have S-Seungmin's party to attend. I'll be fine." Hyunjin knew how much you rejected being taken care of. Care was was word which simply never existed in your dictionary, courtesy to your past.

"Y/N-" "No Hyunjin!" You lashed out at him, tears brewing again in your eyes. Hyunjin now understood why the sunflowers outside had bowed to him, and why the aura was grey today. You had bottled up your feelings again, and one single word from a person of your past, was enough to break you. "I don't want help I don't need it! Just leave me alone! I don't want to be around you!" You panted a bit after shouting all that, your chest feeling heavy, not from the weight of your exhaustion, but from the weight of the entire world around you "Get out. Now."

The next few days, you came back to work, you avoided Hyunjin. You couldn't bear to look at his face, knowing that the stars in your eyes will collapse again if you do. You both worked in complete silence, with Hyunjin silently putting the completed illustrations in your desk, whenever you left to go to the bathroom. You now left at 9 am, instead of your usual 10 am along with Hyunjin. Your americanos seemed even more bitter now that you had no one to share your memories with. Every song in the world sounded like the same mundane melody now, chords repeating over and over again.

But Aphrodite always have something in plan, for souls like yours and Hyunjin's.

Hyunjin had been comforted by his friends for a week now. Every week, he would turn up at either Felix or Chan's house and cry to them. It broke their hearts to see their dearest friend weep and sob over you. You, on the other hand, would sometimes turn up to Minho, drinking his americano and venting your feelings, while he silently grilled his meat and put it on your plate. What you didn't know was that Hyunjin would be hiding silently behind the counter, listening to the notes of your voice talk about him. So one fine Saturday morning, he decided to do something. Something that would finally satisfy Aphrodite, and make her drop her roses down to earth to celebrate.

"Y/N." He called your name as you focused on your most recent article. "Y/N." He said again, when you didn't respond. "Y/N for Pete's sake, talk to me!" He basically shouted at you. You were staying back late tonight, courtesy to the hundreds of things you had to edit, due to your numerous amount of holidays. "Not now Hyunjin. I have to edit this." You spoke sternly, abandoning the fun filled voice you usually used when you were with him.

Hyunjin frowned at you, this time an actual frown, not like the playful ones he did when you would steal his meat from his plate. He was angry. He was angry at the world and at your mind for not treating you well. He was angry at your past, for making you believe that you were unworthy of love. He was furious and he would take it out right now, when no one except for you two were in the office building.

"Y/N listen to me!" He shouted, making you startled. You had gotten up from your seat and now you were cowering against a wall. You had never seen Hyunjin like this before, eyes narrowed and lips closed, burning anger seeping through them.

"Y/N you are quite possibly the most amazing person I have ever had the pleasure to meet in my stupid life. The way you walk the way you talk, everything about you is so amazing! It's so magnificent to me, how everyday you would explain the meaning behind a song, with your eyes all widened and your mouth moving fast! And it hurts me. It hurts me so much to see you like this, thinking that you are unworthy of love." His words were hitting you like bowling balls. "When you told me about your past, you know what I felt? I felt anger. True anger for the first time in my life. For the first time in my life, I wanted to burn down this entire world for a person. I was also so relieved that you trusted me enough to tell me about something like this. You really think I can't see the scars on your wrist through your foundation?" The scars on your wrist. How did he know about that? "Hyunjin-" you breathed out, crystals forming in your eyes again. "Y/N it breaks me. It breaks me so much to have a person like you in my life and not love them. I love you more than you can imagine. So why won't you accept it?"

"Because I can't!" The words spilled from your mouth like water spilling from a waterfall. "I can't Hyunjin! I don't know what love feels like! I never did! An-and when you came into my life and introduce me to all these amazing people, I felt so happy! For the first time in this dumb thing I call my life I felt happy. And I hated it! I hated the way Felix's eyes would light up every time he saw me. I hated the way Chan would always check up on me, making sure I don't overwork myself. I hated the way Minho would treat me like his own family, making sure I got the biggest portions of meat." Everything that you had kept hidden in that crack of your soul came running out. "I hated the way Jeongin looks up to me, telling me he admires the way I work! And you know what I hate the most out of all? I hate you! I hate the way you care so much for me and my stupid brain can't see it! The way you draw little cartoons on my americanos, the way you talk to me as if you were talking to a gentle lamb! I hate it Hyunjin! I hate myself for not seeing how much you love me! And I hate that I can't return the favour!"

Your knees gave way and you collapsed on the floor, sobbing your eyes out. Hyunjin was quick to kneel down next to you, hands searching for yours. Both of you looked into each other's eyes, seeing your entire universe's inside of them. You need love. You needed love to exist. And Hyunjin was there just to do that.

He leaned closer to you, eyes not leaving yours. He knew he had to do it now. Now or never right? Hyunjin, cupped your cheek with his left hand, right one still squeezing yours, and kissed you. He kissed you as if you were the most beautiful thing in the world. He kissed you as if you were the reincarnation of his last lover. He kissed you as if he had been wanting to kiss you for the last fifteen years. He kissed you, and you kissed him back. Your lips moved in sync with his, not moving away, hands wrapped safely around each other, both of you shielded from whatever the world was planning next. Time moved slowly again, as if the spinners of time had abandoned their looms to come watch you two.

And somewhere in the clouds, Aphrodite smiled, knowing that her mission was complete, and that two loveless souls had finally reunited, mending each other's cracks, slowly but surely.

Epilouge

"Hyunjin! We're going to be late! Hurry your ass!" You called out to your boyfriend of five years, as you waited by the door, bag clutched in hand, and white sundress flowing softly. The ash coloured cat you had both adopted, rubbed against your legs, purring and licking herself. Hyunjin had organised a 'special' date today, taking you to one of your most favourite places, a meadow by the beach, where you used to spend your days. It was already late in tbe evening, when Hyunjin finally came down from the steps of your house, still fixing his hair. "Alright Miss Universe, stop fixing your hair and come on!" You said, causing him to giggle, as both of you got in the car and drove off towards the sunset.

"God I love this place so much." You stretched your arms as you watched the dying sun, collapse into the ocean. "More than me?" Hyunjin pouted, as you slapped his chest playfully. "Oh god are those Minho's Macarons? These things are drugs to me." Both of you took a Macaron each, and raised them in the air, as if to make a toast. "Well, to our five year anniversary." Hyunjin toasted while you said 'hear hear!'.

"Y/N, I have a gift for you." You both had eaten all your food and we're slightly leaning against a tree, wrapped in each other's warmth. "What is it Hyun?" Hyunjin pulled out a paper from his pocket. A link sticky note. With Purple glitter pen scribbled on it.

Marry me Y/N?

"I thought I should do it in the way we first talked to each other. You know to make it more roma-" Hyunjin didn't get to complete his sentence, as you threw yourself around him, kissing him on his lips, as if you didn't kiss him every single day.

And Aphrodite couldn't stop giggling and smiling, knowing that now, love existed. And you? Oh you loved the existence of love.

[melanieph321]

Dominik Szoboszlai x Black Reader - First Sight Part 4/8

The Ex

This story is about the night reader met her boyfriend Dominik and the series of crazy events that led up to the beginning of their love story.

Enjoy!

"Say something, please?"

You were still locked in the bathroom, faces inches apart, with Dominik pressing your back against the wall."

"Dominik?"

He didn't say anything for a few moments, just stared at you in stunned silence. You felt a lump form in your throat, waiting for his reaction. You once dread having to explain your sexuality to people, but your parents taught you at an early age about the importance of being open and honest about what you feel and for who, and since you liked Dominik, alot, he desrved to know.

"So erm...." He cleared his throat, making an effort to speak up. However the words that came out of his mouth made you want to slap him. "So you're one of them, huh?"

"A lesbian?" You frowned.

"Yeah?"

You sighed, "Yes. I guess I am, one of them. "

"Right."

"Actually I'm bi."

"Of course you are." He chuckled, scratching the back of his head. "Look, Y/N, maybe it was just me, but I really thought that you and I...you know, had something?"

"I thought so too." You mumbled, your eyes darting at the floor. But I've never..."

"Been with a man before?"

You nodded.

"....yeah I got that part." Dominik stopped pressing you against the wall, the moment between you having passed. He still lingered in the bathroom, but the newfound distance between you might as well be kilometers apart.

"Does this mean that you're still a virgin?"

It was another dumb question for him to ask, but you were just glad that he choose to be informed rather than letting his own prejudice make up his mind for him.

"Technically, maybe? However the things I've done with women....I think it would be very misleading to classify me as a virgin."

"Oh."

Dominik's cheeks grew red.

"Yeah." You smiled.

The two of you eventually left the bathroom, returning to a party you were no longer in the mood to join, that is, until you felt a tap on your shoulder.

"Cassie?"

"I knew I recognized that sexy ass walk of yours."

You were stunned and a little bit embarrassed. Cassie was your latest hook up, latest meaning you were on and off during your freshman year at university. At some point the two of you even lived together. However you decided to break things off with her due to your dropping grades, eventually moving in with Tara who was also studying to become a nurse. You and Cassie however, never failed to keep in touch, she was simply the coolest person that you knew, with her many piercings and unapologetic 'can do' attitude. Not to mention her banging body.

"Aren't you going to introduce me to your friend?" She said, peering over your shoulder towards Dominik.

"Oh, yes. Um...Cassie this is Dominik, Dominik this is Cassie my...."

"Booty call" She grinned and stretched out a hand for Dominik to shake. He did so reluctantly. "She hates it when I tell people that."

You really did, especially after seeing the crumbling expression on Dominik's face.

"Where have you been Chiquita? I've been begging you to go out with me forever, but you're always so busy studying. I guess only a special person can drag you along to a party like this?"

Heat rose to your face. Dominik looked uncomfortable too, especially since the two of you almost had sex in the bathroom minutes ago.

"We're actually out for a beer run." You explained.

"Really? Who's dorm are you getting wasted in and why was I not invited?"

"Um, it's actually Tara's friend..."

"Tara?" Cassie smiled, a mocking smile. "Let me guess, her 'friend' is a guy? Asian perhaps?"

"Jupp." You chuckled. Cassie had gotten to known Tara well through you, however the two had a slight beef after Cassie called Tara out for having a fetish for Asien men. Tara obviously denied this, either way, their relationship was strained.

"Anyway, if you guys are sticking around for a bit, how about some shots?"

"Actually we we're...."

"Szobo!"

Like a psychic, Dominik's friend appeared with a tray of shots. "Take two." He encouraged.

"I'm good Ibou, thanks man."

"Come on Szobo, I thought you came to party, no?"

Dominik looked to you, his expression hard to read. Perhaps he wanted to leave, just like you?

"I'm down for a shot." Cassie grabbed two glasses from the tray, handing one over to you before you could protest. And just like that the night became a blur again.

Dominik withdrew to the living room, talking vividly with his friend as they sat on the couch. Or it was more Dominik's friend who did the talking, since Dominik's eyes were set on the coffe table before him, occasionally lifting his gaze to look at you from across the room. You stood with Cassie, catching up on what's been going on in your lives, however it was hard to be interested in anything she said when your heart was beating so profoundly for somone else.

"Dominik?"

"Yes?"

You approched him. It was well passed midnight, and it was safe to say that your beer run had not been a success. However, "....I don't want this night between us to end."

"Me neither." He admitted.

You smiled. "Cassie doesn't live far from here, please come with us."

Dominik looked to Cassie who was still enjoying herself on the dance floor, vibing to the music.

"She's really not that bad, I swear."

He looked to you, eyebrows furrowed. "I never said she was?"

"No, but I see the way you look at her, as if...."

"As if she's gotten to know you better than I have? It's called jealousy Y/N, look it up."

"W...what?"

He was grinning, but you were unsure weather he was serious or not.

"Y...You're jealous, of Cassie?"

He shrugged his shoulders. "Apparently she can offer you more than I can do."

"Which is?"

"Well for starters, I bet she gives better head than me, since two women can't...."

"You're such a dickhead." You sighed. Dominik laughed as you hit him in the arm. "A real fucking dickhead."

"Bet you love it though."

"Trust me, I don't."

That was a lie, your heart was beating faster than normal, and the spark that you thought had faded when you told Dominik about your sexuality, returned.

"Are you guys ready to go?" Cassie asked, finally done for the night.

You looked to Dominik and he nodded. As you said goodbye to his friend, leaving his house, Dominik draped an arm over shoulder, pulling you close to whisper in your ear. "Just know that I'm willing to step up my game for you."

"What game?" You chuckled, his words tickling your ear.

The question answered itself as Dominik look at you, tounge swiping slowly across his bottom lip, indicating that tonight would be one you'd have a hard time forgetting.

[izzyspussy]

[MENTION OF SUICIDAL IDEATION, GRAPHIC VIOLENCE]

i also think it could be fun and funky fresh if ian was gone a little longer and mickey eventually couldn't fucking take it anymore and came out at the alibi on his own and like. okay he's fighting back against terry like on the fucking principle of the thing, and a little bit because he really does want to get at least a few good fucking hits in - god he's so fucking angry and he's so fucking angry about being so fucking angry and - but on the other hand. he's by himself, he's like a third of terry's size and only half as vicious, and most importantly he lowkey kind of wants to die at this point anyway.

so. mickey comes out half because he just fucking can't stay in anymore and half for fucking spite - the latter being the main reason he does it publicly. this way terry can't keep it quiet that he's got a queer son. cause you know, unfortunately for terry, a dead fag is still a fag. so fucking there.

terry charges him of course just like in canon, and like in canon (iirc) mickey gets in the first hit. maybe even the first couple. but it's not seconds before terry has mickey down and spitting blood onto the floor. and once mickey's down... well he doesn't stop fighting entirely. he doesn't give up and he doesn't fucking tap out, and he won't let anyone else claim they taught him that, that's all him, it's his fucking nature. but he maybe starts phoning it in a little bit.

and it's. i mean it's brutal. the bar is quiet, because no matter how accustomed to this sort of violence you (think you) are there will always be at least a moment of frozen horror, and it's only worse when there's such a clear imbalance, when you know the guy on the ground is just a kid, when you know the guy kicking him is his dad. so everyone can hear the dull, concussive whap of the back of terry's hand across mickey's face, can almost feel the way it snaps mickey's head to the side so hard he stumbles with the momentum. et cetera.

and it's... it's lip who breaks the dam. he's pissed about it, he doesn't want to be doing this, mickey is the last fucking person he wants to stick his fucking neck out for, but ian fucking loves him. loves him loves him, the real fucking deal, and that makes mickey a piece of him whether anybody fucking likes it or not. and lip will always stick his neck out for ian.

so he curses mickey's name black and blue, and he bitches about how he can't believe he's doing this, and he threatens that he'll never forgive either of them, and he grabs a chair and he swings it right into terry's face.

mickey looks up at him from the floor, bloodied mouth hanging open. bro is flabbergasted dot jpg.

"i draw the line at giving you a hand up," lip says, and that kicks the whole fucking bar into gear.

mandy jumps onto terry's back, screaming like a fucking banshee and wrapping her skinny arms around his neck as tight as she fucking can, probably bites him too by the way he yells. terry's few buddies/sycophants/goons leap up to take his side, only to realize they are wildly outnumbered when the milkovich brothers and uncles take mickey and mandy's. kev calls the police, even though it makes him throw up in his mouth a little. some unaligned bar patrons flee, and most of the upstairs girls do too. some patrons start fighting each other, since there's a fight and all. some settle in for the show, and some just plain don't fucking care.

and mickey gets himself up off the ground, insert non-diagetic punk remix of i'm still standing by elton john here, and wipes his mouth with his hand. he surges forward to twist terry's arm behind his back when he rips mandy off his back, before he can throw her to the ground. she slaps their father in the face with her fingers curled, leaving four bleeding scratches across his cheek. mickey hears lip cuss again, impressed, before the back of terry's head breaks his nose.

and even as blood splurts down his face mickey wonders, dazed and almost giddy with the possibility, if lip backing him up means ian still cares about him. at least a little.

[ninjagirlstar5]

Ok we know primal's opinion in Green becoming cronically online but what IS her opinion in BLUE being a nether wart addict and an alchemist

I've actually talked about this before with my buddy on Discord, so I'll just elaborate on some of those, Primal's opinion on alchemy, Blue's role in the group, and some of the headcanons I have for her values.

While Blue is more of a pacifist and only fights when he has to, he's still the medic of the group through his alchemy. Medicine was something he was far more interested in than fighting, unlike his twin, Green, and Primal respected both of their wishes when they were little. She taught him how to heal cuts and bruises, what plants and herbs work best for certain types of injuries, and how to make medicine. I headcanon that Primal believes that being strong is important, especially in her way of life, but so is being smart, and she values a person's role and function to a group rather than whoever is the "strongest" as an individual. While Blue doesn't like fighting (unless he had to), he could still be helpful by providing help through his growing knowledge in medicine and healing their family, having the role of a doctor. Primal saw his little spark of interest and tried to nurture that as he grew up until Blue and Green went missing. So she sees the value of Blue's healing potions from his alchemy.

That being said, it would also depend on how Primal would see buffs and debuffs when it comes to Minecraft's alchemy and potion system. So I decided to form my thoughts out on this by comparing Blue's alchemy to The Box scene in AVA S3 since both have similar uses, just with different methods (Blue's potions offer buffs for allies and debuffs for enemies, which can be carried around, while The Box can be used to enhance victim's abilities while downgrading and taking away Chosen's powers amongst other things in an enclosed area). My friend and I talked about how the Mercs may feel about The Box scene from what we could tell from their body language on Discord, and I personally headcanon that Primal wouldn't really be in favor for it. She considers victim using The Box to boost her abilities and take away Chosen's powers to be cheap as she's all about the hunt and reaping the rewards after a long and hard fought battle. However, it doesn't mean she looks down on trickster tactics either since she knows that just strength alone won't allow you to catch your prey, you need to be smart about it as well. If creating traps and doing "dirty" tricks is more efficient in capturing, stopping, or even killing your prey, then by all means go for it. She'd do it herself in a heartbeat, too. It's why she wasn't against using the glitch bullets from the hoverbikes or the taser guns that the rest of the Mercs used even though she never used one herself. Primal understood that Chosen would be near impossible to capture without them due to his powers and it's her job to take him in, as that's what RocketCorp (a.k.a. victim) ordered her to do. So she'll do what's necessary for the job, for the group, but prefers her own weapons if she feels like she could accomplish a task without RocketCorp's tech. And initially, she chose to remain silent about her displeasure on victim's use of The Box since she can tell that Chosen is a fighter despite all of his running and avoiding direct fights with the Mercs, and would decimate anyone that would get close without the proper restrictions. victim couldn't get her answers without them and she can't exactly judge her for that. Even when she finds it unpleasant to watch victim purposely and slowly strip Chosen's of his abilities and even used them against him multiple times with Agent's help in a situation where he had no way of escaping in the first place (probably), she accepted that it was necessary.

And then victim takes out the memory device and slaps it onto Chosen's face, and Primal's feelings go from "this is disturbing but necessary, so I'll just take the time to sharpen my weapon in case anything goes wrong" to "oh you just wanted to do this, not because you needed to do this." Because the minute that device is used, Primal would see how unnecessary it was for victim to torture Chosen in that way since she could've just debuff their powers, tie them down to the chair, and then slap the device on almost no problem to find the information she seeks. Chosen was already captured prey. victim probably didn't need to go as far as she did, not with the memory device she has on hand. So Primal would find it distasteful after all of that. Not to mention how it would most likely backfire on them later since beating someone down doesn't necessarily mean they would just give in. If anything, it may do the opposite and give Chosen the incentive to fight back even harder the next time they get a chance. "If you beat a dog into a corner, don't expect it won't bite back" kinda thing.

Unlike her feelings towards The Box, though, I think she'd be far more accepting of Blue as an alchemist due to it's usefulness as a role. As mentioned earlier, she'd respect Blue as the medic of the group since that in itself is an important role to take. A group can't function well if none of them know how to heal themselves up properly and can end up succumbing to simpler injuries and sickness as a result. So Blue's role as the medic would allow his friends to recover and keep doing what they need (or want) to do. As for the other alchemy potions, while she'd probably find it cheap, she can't deny that these offer their own benefits when it comes to a fight or hunting down prey even. Hell, if the kids end up in a situation in over their heads and have to fight for their lives, Blue can easily sway the battle into their favor with his buffs and debuffs and Primal isn't going to scoff at something that can protect her children's lives and boost their chances of survival. So she'd ultimately respect Blue as the medic, and would file his "ability to think outside of the box with his potions" under trickster tactics that she accepts as a suitable form of fighting.

As for Blue's netherwart addiction, Primal...probably doesn't understand their need for it. Mostly because netherwarts don't offer any benefits, not even to appease hunger, and they would need to brew it into their potions in order to create the base of buffs and stuff, not, like, eat them. And when Blue tells her about the events of AVM S3 and how their addiction was used against them TWICE to lure them into a false sense of security and essentially get them out of the way, Primal would probably start intervening at that point since it becomes obvious it's a weakness that has been exploited more than once. But she's probably not very successful at first since she wouldn't have the knowledge on how to deal with addictions and tries to get him to stop altogether before learning that being forceful about it isn't going to help Blue and would need a softer, understanding approach to the whole ordeal and the underlying reason why they're addicted to netherwarts beyond just "they think it tastes good." (It probably doesn't help that Green and the rest of the CG kinda just...accepted that Blue is addicted to the stuff and end up enabling them by just doing nothing about it. Hell, they cheered when Fake Blue proclaims that they found their netherwarts when they first "reunite" back when the Witch was introduced. I know it's just a running gag in the show itself and is part of Blue's character, but it's a little...concerning...that his friends (and his twin brother, in my headcanons) aren't trying to help them get off of this stuff.)

Primal is trying her best to help Blue through his addiction, but she also...just doesn't know how. So she'd probably have to ask someone else for help, like Hazard or even Ballista.

[antianakin]

@theneutralmime

I imagine you could PROBABLY interpret it either way since, like you mention, they're not SUPER explicit about what the Jedi do or do not know about Anakin's past aside from Obi-Wan telling Ahsoka about it in TCW.

But I think it seems unrealistic to assume the Jedi DON'T know about Anakin's past. There's a lot of Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan's report to the Council we don't get to see and ten years of Anakin's apprenticeship that never gets explored. I find it pretty unlikely that Obi-Wan would know (either because Qui-Gon explained it at some point during TPM we don't get to see or because Anakin explains it post-TPM) and not pass that information along to at least the Council.

I think whether the Jedi treat everyone the same or make exceptions for special circumstances would likely vary based on the situation. For example, Anakin is clearly expected to follow the same rules and guidelines as any Jedi, he has to follow the Code, and he has clearly been taught the no attachments/possession rule. BUT, we do also see the Council be RELATIVELY lenient towards him when he pushes back against them during TCW in particular. He doesn't tend to get much more than a verbal slap on the wrist for things like making the entire Council wait for HOURS as he plays house with Padme instead of reporting to them when they call. Mace and Yoda both advise Obi-Wan to be more lenient towards him in AOTC, to let him make his own mistakes and learn from them. Yoda tells him in season 6 that it is his spontaneity that makes him different from other Jedi and that this is a strength, not a weakness. In that same arc, Yoda has a vision of sorts where he literally has to "save Anakin from falling." So I think you could argue that the Jedi ARE aware that Anakin's upbringing makes him different and that they DO make allowances for it where possible, but that they also expect him to follow the same general guidelines and rules as any other Jedi.

You could make the argument that this is how they handle everyone, we see them be fairly lenient towards Ahsoka, as well, right up until she gets accused of a serious crime and they can't just handle the issue internally. The Jedi ALWAYS make allowances for people, they ALWAYS make allowances for differences between their members that require different kinds of support rather than strict punishment and enforcement of uniformity. So you could say the Jedi DO treat him like everyone else because they treat EVERYONE individually since you never really know what specific kind of support each person is going to need, it's not necessarily always going to be the same and it's not going to be the same all the time even for the same person either. The Jedi adjust for EVERYONE and so while they might have to make slightly more or slightly different adjustments for Anakin than they've made for other initiates/padawans before him, they wouldn't be unused to the concept of making adjustments IN GENERAL. Ahsoka herself was raised by a loving family until she was brought to the Jedi and raised pretty normally among the Jedi, but we see them make adjustments for her, too. She's allowed to become a padawan earlier than usual due to her being advanced for her age. So this is just... what the Jedi DO.

[lumisails]

I need to give my two cents about the whole Max' matter. I have been trying to find a coherent way to share my thoughts for days and I think I've got it.

I'd also like to point out a few scenes which are very relevant to both Max' background and the fact she understands how this world works and what the show is trying to show us by telling this story.

This is gonna be a long post with quotes and I'm sorry if I'm not as eloquent as some of the brilliant minds in this fandom but here we go.

First of all, obviously, the scene in 3x03 where she tells her story to Anne. She talks about watching from outside. And yes, it is a very sad story and also a story which was unfortunately, the story of many slave children back then. But I think it's important to point out something here. To quote: "When I was very small, I would sneak out of the slave quarters at night to the main house. I would stand outside the window to the parlor. I would stand amongst the heat and the bugs and the filth on my toes to see inside."

Ever since she was a child, Max has been observing. We know the rest of this speech and how she points out that her sister had safety, warmth, a home and how it tells us what Max' ultimate goal is - peace, ambitions aside. But I think it's also important to note that it tells us she has always been an observer and that is one of the things that makes her one of the best players in the game. Does the show try to frame her as "good" or "bad" because of that? No. As it doesn't with any other character. It doesn't try to tell us a tragic backstory just to we empathize with her. She has a tragic backstory because she was a slave child. The difference between her and Madi is that she has been observing how society works from a young age and has always been trying to find a way to fit herself in it, while Madi has been taught to reject it from a young age. But their origin is the same.

But of course, the show is written to make us see the ugly side of the empire. How it takes and oppresses, so it's much easier for empathize with Madi than Max, but had Madi been raised the same way that Max has instead of living isolated, would she still carry the same idealism? Or would she be more like Max? Had Max been raised isolated from the world with only people like her, would she still want to insert herself in that society? Or would she be a part of the cause?

Madi and Max tell the same story from two completely different sides and points of view but when you put this show under black and white lenses, good and evil and whatnot, it's much easier to see Max as a bad person and Madi as good.

But they are both people.

Anyway. Carrying on, we have Max' conversation with Jack in 4x06. We have been watching her be a player this whole time and we know how smart she is. But this is the moment she says it clearly.

"You cannot fight civilization from the outside in."

This is the moment the show also slaps all of us as an audience on the face. You cannot, indeed. Flint's cause is a lost one. We all know that as an audience, there's no way not to know that when we're talking about a semi-historical show, which is supposed to be a prequel to Treasure Island. Had the British Empire fallen in Treasure Island? No.

So, when Max says that, she is simply stating the truth. Not being a villain who's going against Flint's cause. Not being a selfish person who only cares about her own survival, but simply stating facts. And Jack recognizes that. He does so so much that even if he is absolutely mad at Max in this moment, he stops fighting her, calms himself down and does what she says. Despite what that could do with his relationship and alliance to Flint too, because he knows she is right.

And that is also a result of all of her observing! The thing she has been doing ever since she was a kid. Max calculates everything. But that comes from a need of protection too. She was vulnerable once! Look at where that took her. She didn't have a whole society of people like her isolated in an island to protect her. She has fended for herself for God knows how long, and she has observed. Learned ways that even a woman like her could survive in this society. It's not because Max knows how to navigate in it that it means it will never be good to her. It hasn't been good to her at all. She had to keep slicing parts of herself to survive. What we get is an illusion that she has not been affected by this as much as the other characters, but she has. It's in every nuance of Jessica's brilliant acting.

And finally, we have Idelle's speech in 4x08.

"Cause despite the world reminding her every day of her life that she's undeserving of being given anything by it, that she was unworthy of what little she'd managed to take from it… despite all of that, she never believed a word of it. That woman has been fighting the whole goddamn world since the day she was born."

Again, the show reminds us of where she comes from. And Max may not be a historical character but she is in a way still. (tw for SA) Many slave owners took their slaves and had children with them. And what became of these children? They were also bought and sold, like many others. As Max herself points out that it happened to her.

Max was not a real person, but she's realistic enough. And like any other realistic character in this show, she is filled with flaws and good qualities, but at the end of the day, her flaws and actions were shaped by how the world has treated her since the day she was born. It's how Black Sails frames everyone's stories. This is why we get so many episodes showing Flint's. This is a story about stories and above all, we cannot ignore that it's also trying to tell us how each of these characters backgrounds' shape them. And we cannot forget this is also a story about stories of people that could have existed. Whether Max' triumph in the end is a good or a bad one, it's up to every watcher to decide. But we cannot deny that it is an important story to be told for what she represents.

Just as important as Madi's.

[moltengoldveins]

alright. It’s self-inset week on this illustrious hellsite, and I’m unlearning shame, so here’s a self-insert for the pseudo-MCYT universe I have meticulously constructed in my brain that had only a passing resemblance to the actual canon:

Her Deal is that she’s an Enderian who, for various reasons, got picked up by Emduo during a midlife crisis arc after the end of the (general) events of SMP earth. She was caught in the rain, pretty badly burned, and had no local support system. Their intentions at first were to find her a place to stay while traveling, since mortals have a rough time around gods for long periods of time. However, (because I tend not to give my self inserts a lot of powers, but when I do, they’re powers I think I'd actually have) they find that, while she isn’t the most physically gifted, she has an unparalleled ability to just…. Mentally Handle Bullcrap Beyond Mortal Ken. She isn’t the kind of person to be phased by either a walrus Or a fairy at her doorstep, that kind of thing. They have few rough patches with her being too stubborn to get along well with Techno but it evens out eventually, and she’s good with Brian (the crow) so they kinda just… let her stick around as they travel.

She’s a hardcore, so her aging quits after a few years of ‘just traveling, trying to find you a home, we swear.’ She ends up a Blood God adherent later on, (I have Headcanons about the blood god that are too complicated to explain here, the gist of it is that most gods have ‘chats’ in one way or another but the BG is basically the only one to have a Chat that just Sucks That Much for their adherents. Mari’s chat is pretty dang small, and they are restrained to her pov. Techno’s the only BG adherent with an omniscient chat.) and over time, their relationship goes from ‘kinda uncles’ to ‘those are my weird parents, thanks.’ Sometimes a family can be two demigods, the Lady of death, and a funky little teleporter with severe sensory impairment. (Sucky vision, hypersensitive hearing)

She’s absent from the events of the DSMP for any number of reasons, (depends on my mood tbh. She’s fun in the DSMP, but she’s also nearly as fun when slapped randomly in another media property entirely and attempting desperately to get home, I’m a sucker for dimension hopping AUs) but pops back in at least once, enough to meet Tommy and be aware of Wilbur’s loss. Her dynamic with Will was rough, and her dynamic with Tommy distant, but she saw the potential in the bedrock bros dynamic, even when said bros are on the outs.

Post-DSMP (good ending, the people we love live and are friends) she spends the vast majority of her time doing physical labor around the family house, learning how to build with Phil, and helping Beeduo with Michael. She’s nowhere near Emduo in combat skill, but she was taught by them for a long time, which means she’s still good enough to draw even with Tommy, ten months into his training regularly with Techno. She still can’t manage to beat Tubbo in a fair fight, no teleportation. (he’s small and jacked and fast ok, she’s no good at countering that)

honestly I just like the idea that Emduo at some point in their however many hundreds of years picked up a slightly-too-neurospicy-for-their-own-good-child and couldn’t find a way to get rid of them fast enough to keep from getting attached, and I personally enjoy having enough platonic relationships with the characters I care about in that fandom to excuse any random plot point I feel like writing about XD it’s a convenient overlap that has created a pretty fun character :)

[poisonouspastels]

Anon forgot time exists. I would really love to hear more about Groda's transition from antagonist to basically house cat! Her character really fascinates me and I love a good redemption arc.

Hey no worries at all!! I've actually been talking to Atlas a lot abt Groda lately (he's #1 Groda fan I'm pretty sure) so I can actually copy/paste some of the stuff I've talked abt previously! And to anyone who needs to do some additional catch up reading, I talk about a lot of her past history here, and a bit about more recent (but also still past) events here. But!!! Talking about her (rather long) transitional period specifically, that pretty much started the moment that she got (unwillingly) taken home by the main 4 players after her defeat. Given she held Rana hostage for a few days, among other things, fair's fair. The main focus point though was after everyone getting back to somewhat decent health, Herobrine using his magic was able to find a way to block Groda from using it on her own, hence creating a longer term solution than just having her tied up forever effectively. Groda, without her magic, is a goddamn sitting duck. No Wardens, no turning people to stone, no way to fight back other than a half-hearted slap fight at best. Unfortunately her loss of the ability to use magic ALSO means almost no one could understand her anymore. Previously, thanks to her magic, the Galactic language was basically auto-translated to the players as Commonspeak (her lips actually wouldn't fully sync up with words she spoke, something that was noted by Rana during her time stuck with her in the caves), but now she'd only be reduced to Galactic at its purest form. Fortunately due to Herobrine's self-taught learning of the language (albeit a VERY butchered version of it being self taught), he at least was able to still understand her and communicate in some regard. Or perhaps you could consider that unfortunate for him, given the only weapons Groda had left to use was her words, and he had to be the brunt of actually understanding that and teaching her Commonspeak. On the contrary, soon after this revelation Rana would try and learn Galactic to try and make Groda more comfortable with the current circumstance and maybe feel more motivated to put in the effort. She's not very good at it, but it's the thought that counts! Groda did pick up rather quickly on Commonspeak though, since it and Galactic aren't too far apart in translation. Once she picked up enough on the language to be able to communicate basics (and maybe curse words she would pick up on from Alex), she would soon be getting her hands dirty for once in her life and actually doing field work with Rana, not only to carry her own weight in chores but also to get her more in touch with the new world and being an actual PERSON after her long lived royal life. With time, learning more of Commonspeak and taking in the world around her with the people who were willing to even TRY and help her change for the better, she started to realize more and more how badly her actions managed to inadvertently fuck everything up. How much the world had changed because of what she unleashed, and the weight of her actions fully dawning on her. Which I give this important note of Groda's characterization to:

She gets better slowly with time of course, its all just taken day by day and she learns more and more to do things for herself and to help those around her. I think one of my favorite turning points for her though is when Rana and Herobrine bring home a Sniffer egg they found in some old wreckage at sea. (Sniffers being a species in this instance that went extinct because of the Wither being unleashed by her) Groda is dumbfounded to see the thing even intact at ALL, and hesitant to hope that it may still harbor life at all, but she does take it upon herself to care for it until it does indeed eventually hatch! She names him Bear :)

Thank @beegswaz for the art of them together im obsessed with it Another important arc for her character, arguably the most important one is when she's spotted by the Wither Cult and is eventually pursued directly by White Eyes upon her finding out that Groda is still alive. Upon the (deadly) confrontation between White Eyes and the main 4 + Groda, she shows her truest colors:

After the dust settles, White Eyes is brought home much like the same way Groda once was (albeit unconscious this time around) and a way to free her of the Wither's influence will eventually be found. And though the mere sight of Groda brings her to a rage even now (very understandable), Groda takes some solace in the fact that she for once can think with 100% unbiased confidence that she did the right thing.

[pandora-morningstar]

Moriarty the Patriot: Enola Holmes general headcannons

((this is my version of Enola and what I think she's like in Moriarty the Patriot))

1) She's they youngest at eighteen years old. Not long after she was born her father died and when she was around six years old her mother disappeared, leaving her in the care of her brothers. Sherlock practically raised her since Mycroft was always busy.

2) She dresses similar to Violet Evergarden, it's easier for her to move around and run. No complicated puffy skirts for her just a simple petticoat and stockings under her dress, but whe she has to attend a fancy party she will dress more appropriate, she also dresses in her brother's old clothes. She wears her hair in a braid that's tied in a bun.

3) Enola loves dogs, when she was a six year old child she had a long haired Dachshund called Otto, Sherlock give her the dog to help cheer her up after her mother's disappearance. She had Otto for a long time and now has a short haired Dachshund called König, which is German for king, she got the idea from a German guest at the hotel she was living in.

4) She's smart and sassy, her and Sherlock often have battles of witts to see who can piss Mycroft off the fastest. She uses her intelligence to help solve cases and her sass either gets her out of trouble or in more trouble depending on who she's facing. It's usually up to her brothers or Louis to save her.

5) Speaking of her brothers, Enola is closer to Sherlock since he raised her and allowed her to become her own person. She still has that familial love for Mycroft but she can't forgive him for trying to send her to a all girls finishing school just because he couldn't handle her since she was Sherlock's double. When she started living with Sherlock, the first meeting with Mycroft was awkward and involved him shouting about her being a stain on the family name and how their father would be rolling in his grave. He finally shut up when Enola slapped him across the face, she clapped back at him by saying that he was the worse brother in the world and he should be ashamed that he skipped out on his duty as the eldest to care for her and Sherlock. Now the wedge between the eldest and youngest is bigger, Sherlock takes Enola's side everything.

6) She has met the Moriarty brothers before, she met Albert when she had to give Mycroft some documents. She greeted Albert with grace before dumping the folder in Mycroft's desk with saying anything to him and left, when asked about it Mycroft just replied that she's moody. She met William and Louis on the train with Sherlock and Watson. She found William very interesting but she didn't have time to analyze him because she had to distract Louis form stabbing her brother.

7) Her and Louis have a true rivels to possible lovers relationship, always saving eachothers butts form danger. They bond over the fact that their the youngest and most stable siblings in their families. They often have afternoon tea at the Moriarty estate and gossip about their brothers, they also enjoy walks in Hyde park, playing chess and Enola even asked Louis to pretend to be her sweetheart so Mycroft wouldn't get the idea to marry her to someone, he agreed and they both enjoy the chaos it causes. Unknowingly to them Jack and Bonde have already planned their wedding.

(8 Speaking of Jack, he likes Enola she's a funny girl and enjoys watching her interact with Louis, he taught her how to use a knife. Enola likes him too and sees him as a father figure, she was grateful to him for teaching her how to use a knife like he does. He also like König.

[byersfanclub]

You can just tell that milkvinis really don't pay attention to this show because as of today, one of their most used arguments as for why Mike is in love with her and the right person for her is because in season 3 he was in the right while controlling her on how much she was using her powers instead of letting her choose herself, and according to milkvinis, since no one listened to Mike, El overused her powers and that's why she lost them. But in season 4 it was established several times that Vecna made the Mind Flayer bite her leg and suck her powers (that's how he became stronger and was able to start opening gates the following year). Literally the whole point of the "Mike not letting El use her powers by herself" plot was to show the lack of trust and healthy dynamics in that relationship. It's even worse when they go even further and accuse Max of manipulating El (when she just taught her to make her own choices, stand up for herself and make the choice to dump a boy if he's not treating her like she deserves). It really bugs me that they want to misinterprete a feminist arc on the main female character and accuse her friend (first and needed positive female influence on her life) of being toxic and manipulative, just for the sake of defending a sinking ship.

That's why we shouldn't take them seriously anymore, even if they come to the tag to cross tag and spit their dead ass takes

I think pretty much all of their reasonings are bad, including this one, but also just... so many other things that make el and mike a bad couple when they'd be better off as friends. I've never really taken them seriously in the first place, they're hopeful over a dying relationship where both individuals have constantly felt cheated and lied to, where neither can feel confident and secure, both continuously put on a front to seem cool to one another when they both know they're "freaks" and it'd have been different if this got resolved in s3 altogether and not slapped them back "together" at the last 5 minutes of the season and actually just showed us that mike and el can work and they are good for each other, but they didn't do that and went into season 4 showing us that they still lie to each other and make one another feel bad about who they really are and that they have to hide their true selves. milkvan will never be able to overcome this if they stay together or else it would have been resolved by now instead of dragging out this toxic, shit on and off relationship throughout 4 seasons while showing us how good mike and will are together and how confident and loved they make one another feel and the tension and jealously when it comes to girls between them. tbh, el never actually stood a chance with mike, she just got caught in the crossfire that is comphet and internalized homophobia within mike (as someone who is a gay mike truther, it's my belief he never actually liked el romantically, ever) and before anyone comes after me, I love el, but this is specifically targeted at other characters because stranger things isn't JUST about el, it's an ensemble cast for a reason and she doesn't have to be the center of everything all the time. she's used for story arcs for both hopper and max as well, I don't see how it's out of the realm of possibility she's used for mike and will and their relationship as well. THIS GOT WAY TOO LONG! anyways, yes, I overall agree to this.

[mobolanz]

For the ship ask game: 9, 5 and 15!

Heyyy thank you!:D here for another Reinelyn round babes 🍎🛡️💞💞💖✨

Who curses, and who reprimands the other for it?

Now ofc we're talking about Mr. first memorable line is shove a blade up their asses and this young lady radiating sweetness literal personafication of politeness

But consider :D

The blank eyes, paling to almost blue skin and dropped jaw on Reiner's face once hearing a very vulgar word slip from her mouth in a snap are as if she just revealed to be a participant in a Satanist cult. 😆(Bonus if it's not actively reprimanding but deep incoherent screeching that just makes her furrow her brows looking up as if to ask if something's wrong)

How did they know they were right for each other

Turns out I already did this game once and answered this so I'll quote the original and add up a bit more

Mannnnn so like, for Reiner it’s almost a love at first (n)sight. Not to spoil my fic’s chapter 1 concluding line I’m such a genius that’s so poetic noooo I’m getting cocky but in a brainstorming I had with muvva she thought about it and I think this could summarize it as “something something playing into the notion of him leaving Paradis behind and becoming Reiner Braun™ again and shedding his cadet persona and running into this New Person making him Feel Things ohhhhhhh”. Initially I figure he’d deny it in his mind over and over and try appearing standoffish tho but ah well, :“)

Granted, same thing can be said for Evy in the exact same situation to a certain extent, but a realization comes later than expected with her cautious and withdrawn outlook on things , but she finds herself drawn to him just as much. I’m thinking that having them introduced to each other while he’s in a vulnerable low and weak spot inherently enhances her value of his display of resilience and strength despite being so worn put. To quote her thoughts ”suppose my judgement is biased and close minded, but it’s admirably more human than most I know of…“

Who has a hobby only the other knows about?

Okay this was an interesting one!:D

Evelyn has more than one especially in the artistic department since there was such vast to it during her enrolling at private lessons since childhood (art, needlework, instruments and even singing etc. - especially when it intrigues her curiosity on knowledge) . And Reiner the first if not only person that comes to mind finding out about it and not making it feel like a waste of time she should be doing much more with since it's not gonna contribute to anyone around.

Because Evy IS doing so much already just as that - and beautifully too. Honestly like insert anything out of what I mentioned, she's looking at it and from behind he makes a comment"I shouldn't be surprised but... wow where did you learn that??" (But it IS a surprise to reiny that she didn't notice his coming tho) . In a way it's also nice to him to discover that since it shows she can has more in her life to turn to than the pressure constantly placed on her, and can do something for herself without feeling it's out of owing it to someone.(since at this stage she CAN still develop her skill except this time because she wants to, and it's a lot more appealing once it's actually about her growing comfortable with it, because it's her. There's more hope for her than she thinks and she unknowingly let there be 🤧. )

( Especially also since initially at home too Evy wasn't taught any of those to really polish and invest in what she's personally intrigued by of them because she was interested; But more about for the sake of appearing like some perfect daughter™ who excells in many and slap another sticker reason on "here's why she would make a good troph- I mean wife and heir." After being enstraged it was all pretty much thrown to the dumpster as soon as she was taken in by the two officers. They bombarded her with their own demands on work as the condition for her to stay at their home so she had to ditch it for a while and . Honestly I could even imagine them making mockery out of it, if not outright ripping something she made in two.) It's a pleasant surprise she retains the skill even if she thinks it's probably rusty by now though)

But also imagine imagineeeee if Reiner ends up as her muse owo 🤧✨

Questions for self ship/OC x canon couples

[zoyalannister]

hi

so

this is going to be long

I have seen those type of posts , the /most/ problematic aspect of those blogs is that they actually find they weren't /anti/ or /problematic/ takes in the first place -> they find normal Gabriel would be not only a neglectful father but also partner in other senses aswell

that an author decides to destroy her own character to let other characters "shine" in a new novel, doesn't erase this said character characteristics stablished in previous novels. Cecily would never tolerate being with someone that not only mistreats her but also neglects the family they make

Cecily does most of the work -> this is not only sexist but also saying her job is to be a child raiser, in the infernal devices Cecily made clear she wanted to fight, she explicitely said she wanted to be more than a wife (/or even a mother/)

I have seen many posts praising Gideon (who /canonically/ is always working ) or Will (who /canonically/ treats his children like they were his bestfriends and who overlooked many things a parent should /never/ overlook), ironically the one left out and pointed as neglectful is Gabriel who /canonically/ is seen accepting his children and hugging them everytime he saw them in canon.

Many pieces by fans also describe Gabriel not wanting kids or having breakdowns when he is told Cecily is pregnant -> how can you keep being with a person who makes an scene when you tell him you are expecting? -> how can you have 2 more kids with that person?

Taking canon back into account, Gabriel comes from a family where the concept of "family" is very important. Benedict taught them to be loyal and protect the family -> family before law. Also Benedict would have probably expected both Gideon and Gabriel to maintain the family's name, by having children. Then Gabriel since a child would have known at some point he would have kids -> and he surely knew how they were made.

If he ever had doubts there were things he could have done -> not marrying until he was sure, tell his partner about this thoughts, take contraception, etc.

thanks for reading all

Hi!

Let me say firstly that I agree with literally everything you said, but my elaboration will be quite long too.

I was shocked in the first place by how these people normalize Gabriel being neglectful to both Cecily and the kids. They don’t call this problematic, for them it's just a Tuesday.

I was baffled by this sexist and borderline abusive vision of Gabriel, and even more by the vision of Cecily totally accepting this passively, which is a very misognistic take beside making Cecily super OOC.

If Gabriel should ever go crazy and become a sexist asshole, Cecily would, as we say in my country, slap him twice per time until she reaches an odd number.

The implications that Cecily’s only work is raising kids is CC's fault because she ruined her character, but the fandom that says that she’s basically alone in this is an expression of all their misoginy. Gabriel would never let Cecily alone to raise his kids while he goes to the pub.

Yes, they adore either canonically absent fathers like Gideon or the worst father of TLH, Will. I don’t like Will, and TLH only confirmed what I was thinking about him: he likes being a friend for his kids, not actually parent them. If he was a good father as his stans claim him to be, half of the plot of TLH wouldn’t exist because he would have realized immediately that James and Lucie were having issues.

But he's the fandom favourite, so a man-child who at 40+ years old is as immature as he was at 17 is a better father of Gabriel who actually cares about his kids in canon.

And don't get me started with the fanfics where Gabriel is upset because Cecily is pregnant, or she’s too scared of telling him she’s expecting.

This is a typical vision of Gabrily written by Wessa stans, but that’s another rant that I will do another time.

Some people try to justify this with the fact that Gabriel was raised by Benedict, but as you said Gabriel is very loyal to family and in my opinion, after finding out the truth about his father, he would do everything in his power to be the opposite as Benedict and be sure that Cecily and the kids know that he loves them dearly.

[tarnishedxknight]

Mantis… was not sarcasm’s best friend. Not because it made her defensive, but because she often didn’t get it. She was someone who always said what she meant, so she forgot others didn’t always do the same, because others didn’t always think people were deserving of candid words. Even though Rocket, Nebula and Quill used sarcasm often, a part of Mantis always forgot that sometimes people didn’t say what they really meant. She knew people lied, but sarcasm was… almost a lie, but not quite, and it escaped her. So when Noah said he was overjoyed Basch was helping her, her bright smile simply widened.

When Noah said that what was written on the paper did not concern her, Mantis just shrugged. “You are right,” she replied innocently. Despite her powers letting her know everything and more about others, Mantis didn’t think she was entitled to people’s private affairs. She was a rather private being herself, so it was easy for her to respect people wanting to keep their secrets. It did not mean she had a problem sharing her feelings, her past or her thoughts if she believed she was helping someone feel less lonely by doing so; she simply didn’t think she was interesting enough to share things about herself, having been taught so by her own father’s treatment of her.

But then Noah seemed to change his mind rather quickly, and slapped the file down onto a table. Mantis was curious, but she did not look at the paper. He didn’t want her to know, and she understood that. When he started explaining what was written on the paper and what it meant, Mantis was just confused. He clearly felt he was being defamed by the medical staff of Terra, although Mantis did not understand why they would do that to him. People didn’t feel defensive unless they had a reason, so she was sympathetic. However, her antennae twitched at the mention of Noah wanting his brother dead. Those… were definitely the words of someone who had not been raised among the bones of their siblings. If he knew, really knew, what he was wishing for, he would not wish for it.

She frowned slightly as he asked if she had come to mock him. “No? No. Why would I do that? That would be so mean of me.” Her fingers reached for the paper, but stopped halfway and she retreated her hand back to herself. Noah clearly needed to vent, and Mantis always did her best to listen because she knew what it felt like to not be listened to. The Guardians did listen to her. Basch had done so, too. And she was grateful. But that didn’t change the way she was raised, and Mantis was okay with that. Why complain about not being listened to when she could actively listen to others? Why complain about not being understood when she could try to understand others?

“I think I would feel really bad too if I had people come and tell me everything that is wrong with me. But I would ask myself whether they mean well or not. If they are simply trying to hurt me, I would not care. If they are trying to help me, then I would do my best to listen to what they have to say. But that is just me. Each person reacts differently to things.” As she spoke, Mantis noticed Noah was about to cry, so she looked away to not pressure him. Mantis gravitated to a bouquet of flowers decorating a nearby shelf, letting out an excited squeal, before she took one of the flowers, bringing it to her nose and inhaling deeply.

(Okay, so she’s not defensive. I think what happens is that since she’s so accepting, she already accepted Pietro as part of the team, so his words mean a lot to her. If she considers you a friend, family, or team, your words will matter to her. If you’re not, then she will very rarely take it personally.)

__________

{ Ah, gotcha. That makes sense. Pietro, in addition to not realizing how Mantis would take what he said to her, also didn’t realize that she had already accepted him as part of the team. He still sees himself as an outsider, or at the very best, like he’s on probation and can get kicked out at any time. Well good to know that maybe she won’t take anything Noah says personal, heh. }

Why on earth was she smiling so? Was she touched in the head? No, she must be a simpleton... Yet, she didn’t sound like a simpleton, even if she oddly behaved like one. Just a foreigner, then. Alien. Perhaps in her culture it is customary to respond to bitter sarcasm with oblivious happiness, he thought with dark frustration.

He was surprised how easily she gave up about knowing what he was holding in his hands. It was rather bewildering, in fact, and not at all what he was used to. Noah was far more used to other, the Judge Magisters of his time, in particular the very nosy and interjecting Ghis, wanting to butt themselves into his affairs left and right. Whether to simply rile him up or for actual intelligence gathering, they did so without shame and often relentlessly, until he was forced to physically leave or more assertively explain to them why they were going to immediately cease in their inquiries, and the consequences if they did not. But this woman... just... agreed. Agreed that it was none of her business. Well? Then? Noah had no idea how to respond to that.

Strangely enough, it was this honest admission that now had him more willing to share with her. If someone wanted to know something about him and damn near stopped at nothing to obtain that information, Noah guarded it like the world would end if it escaped his protective care. But if someone was more casual about it, if they didn’t seem as vulture-like with regard to obtaining it, then he was far more likely to acquiesce. Wasn’t that how Drace had coaxed him into sharing so many things in the past?

Oh, she was definitely a strange one. Her reaction to his defensive accusation that she might have shown up there with the sole purpose of mocking him was so childlike and transparent that it was almost laughable. Was she really just that honest and genuine, or was she playing a game with him? He was not used to honest souls. They... they scared him a little. No, they made him scared for them, because honest souls didn’t survive long in this cruel world. But of course he wasn’t going to admit any of that. “So? Would it bother you to be mean? You would be within a rare minority of folks if it would,” he said with his own bout of honesty.

He saw her reach for the file and hesitate, so he picked it up from the table and held it out to her. No words, just the gesture of here, take it, despite his earlier defensiveness with regard to her prying in the first place. As he listened to her words of whether or not the staff meant well, Noah felt his eyes well up. Watching in silence as this strange woman gave her attention with unusual enthusiasm to a nearby bouquet of flowers, he found it easier to think with her attention off of him. Did the staff mean well? He was more inclined to assume they were simply doing their jobs, in which case he didn’t matter to them at all. They were earning wages and praise from their superiors, nothing more.

But beyond all of that, he didn’t care, because, “Whether or not they mean well has no bearing upon my life whatsoever. It is my right... to fight as I wish, when I wish, where I wish. I held a sword in my hand as soon as I could lift it. Not even one decade old and I was learning to be a soldier. They have no right to deny me what I have worked hard all my life to maintain. I am a Judge Magister. Few in this world have ever held such a rank. I would never have achieved it, nor held it for nearly half my life, if I were as fragile of mind and body as their assessment of me portrays.”

As he spoke, emotional venom dripping from his words. He was not only insulted and angered, he was hurt. His evaluation had taken a chunk clean out of his pride which, until now, had been bolstered by the knowledge that he had built himself into something through blood, sweat, and trauma. Despite all, he had endured. Now... he was being told that he would not. That he ought not. “They have no right,” he repeated, for his wounded heart couldn’t help him to form any further words to describe his pain.

But then, even in the midst of such anger and resentment, Noah asked her something, for he could not help but wonder... “Have you some sort of special attachment to flowers? They seem to make you happy...”

[devilisln-moved]

A Study in Violence (a short little thing to shake off some dust. I feel like my writing has been very mid lately and guess I just wanted to stretch my fingers a little, and I always feel like I need to practice my ability to write action)

Matt did not understand why violence was so impressive to some people. If he could imagine that the person behind him was admiring his technique, perhaps he would understand a little. He wasn’t fighting a horde of enemies, seeming to predict their moves as he dodged, weaved, kicked, punched, and grappled with them. Nor was he caught in a graceful free fall only to catch himself in the end, swinging through the night between buildings. There was nothing pretty about this fight, not really very noble either.

The years that he thought that what they did was noble had long since passed. It simply was the best that they could do given their powers, abilities, training, constitution, etc.

He’d found them near the tail end of his near-nightly patrol of his corner of Manhattan. Though it wasn’t always so cleanly delineated, they all had their own little sections of the city that they protected. Sometimes there was a spoken agreement, oftentimes there wasn’t. Usually it just fell down to personal affinity. Where were you born? Where have you done the most living? Where did you call home? In any case, they had been three blocks from his apartment, a young woman’s muffled screams as she was accosted. The man’s words were soft. They should have been for only her ear: “Shut up, shut up! I don’t wanna hurt you, ya noisy bitch! I just want yer bag. Let go and then I’ll be out of your hair!”

Matt had hesitated for a moment, wondering if the woman would let go of her purse. Not that she should, but it would make it hell of a lot easier if he just had to chase him down and not have to worry about her getting hurt in the scuffle. The girl had guts, though, he'd give her that much. Instead of giving up her property, she’d hurt him instead. He’d only been able to imagine from the sounds of gnashing teeth and stomping of feet. Unfortunately it hadn’t done much good for her and instead of giving her a chance to get away, it had earned her a hard, open handed slap.

The man’s howl of ‘ow! That fucking hurt, bitch’, followed quickly by the meaty sound of flesh hitting flesh had easily covered up Matt’s landing at the mouth of the alleyway and rush forward to separate the two.

Matt was dimly surprised that she hadn’t taken off when he’d thrown her attacker into the opposite wall. He’d thought that she was in shock until he realized that she was excited. Not sexually, thank god, that was always awkward. No, it just seemed like she was enjoying the experience of being an onlooker in the kind of scene you had to pay the cost of a movie ticket to see. Every jab, every feint that left the man wide open, every time his fist landed with a resounding body blow, her heart skipped a beat, her breathing came faster, and occasionally she murmured incoherent approval. 

In movies, a fight lasted entirely too long, especially between two amatuers. You could learn to throw a punch but that didn’t do shit for your endurance. Training taught someone not only how but also the endurance to last in a fight. When Matt had only begun, the would-be thief was woozy, leaning heavily against the building behind him as his knees buckled. 

“That was sick,” she breathed from somewhere behind him. Matt was vaguely surprised to hear a foreign accent. One of those indecipherable European ones that he could never pin down. Norwegian? Swedish? Swiss? French? For all he knew she wasn’t European at all. Accents could be such nebulous things.

Matt grimaced before turning to face to her. Ignoring her vastly misplaced praise, he spoke softly. “Where were you going?”

“Huh?” She seemed taken aback by his question. “Oh, I was on my way back to a hotel.” Her sigh sounded a little embarrassed. “I’ve been using this alley as a shortcut for the past few days…I guess I never considered it might be more dangerous at night….”

Matt hummed, not quite unsympathetic. This should be a world where a person could walk wherever they wanted without fear of being attacked. Maybe where she came from was safer. Some idyllic small town where the cops weren’t corrupt and the streets weren’t awash with crime.

“Go catch a taxi,” Matt told her. “It’s not a good habit to wander far from well lit, busier streets at night.”

“No shit. Thanks, by the way. What are you gonna do with him?”

Matt canted his head and listened. The man’s daze had slid him into unconsciousness. Strange, he didn’t think he’d beaten him that badly. “Don’t worry about it.”

After she left, Matt considered his options. Was he really worth dragging to the nearest police station? True, the encounter had gotten violent, and the man had fought him back, but he didn’t exactly have the vibe of a career criminal. In fact he’d be willing to bet high that this was his first attempt. Sometimes justice wasn’t jail time; sometimes it was a lesson well learned. Being beat up by Daredevil in your first foray into a life of crime seemed like something you wouldn’t soon forget.

Instead he went to go find the girl to make sure she hadn’t gotten herself into more trouble. He found her waiting just as he’d strongly suggested: Trying to catch a cab or maybe she’d called one of those ride sharing services. He rather hoped it was the former. Matt was all too aware that the drivers for those companies weren’t exactly strictly vetted. Either way, he waited for her to be picked up and hoped, with some faint twinge of guilt, that he would be done for the night once she was whisked away to safety.