#<- that's the tag for the previous post and I am now declaring it the au name

[oddcryptidwrites]

Welcome Back to the Collection of the Odd Cryptid's Writings

Hi! I'm Athens/Andy (they/them). I am a somewhat old yet somewhat new face on writeblr. I'm currently a second year student at a university in the deep south, studying history and anthropology in order to become a museum curator. Most of my free time is spent writing, which is the driving force behind this blog. Writing has become the love of my life over the past ten years.

AthensWrites has had two prior iterations. All I posted here in the previous iteration was privated, including Not Your Typical Fairytale. Don't fear, NYTF will make a glorious return ;)

With all that said, welcome back to the odd writings of Athens, and I hope you enjoy your stay. Below the cut, I've detailed some of my current projects, which range from Sci-Fi (my favorite) to thrillers to fantasy to realistic fiction. I've highlighted key content warnings and tags for each, just to keep you aware. If you'd like to hop on a tag list for any of these stories, please let me know! Some of them I post more frequently than others. I am also very tag list and tag game friendly so PLEASE tag me in stuff. If you need other people to tag in a writeblr tag game, look no further than this post!

The collection is constantly updating and evolving, so stay tuned!

Not Your Typical Fairytale (#nytf)

Although originally planned as a standalone novel, NYTF has now expanded into three separate books: Knight of Dawn, Queen of Noon, and King of Dusk. There's an additional collection of short stories/untold stories planned as well, tentatively titled Pawn of Midnight.

Content warning: gore, death, violence, graphic scientific experimentation, derealization, paranoia, drug use and abuse, alcohol use, child abuse (physical, verbal), relationship abuse (verbal, manipulation), sex (consensual) Related tags: nytf, Piers Hall, Grady Yensey, Rene Dubois, ATLZoS

Knight of Dawn

Piers Hall is the newly crowned monarch of the post-apocalyptic State of Georgia, after their mother, Queen Adele, was declared unfit to rule. Despite meaning well, they find themself unprepared for the role, especially as political rivals, like North Carolina’s President René Dubois and Councilmember Shanna Miles, close in on their tail, seemingly threatening to topple their rule. When various palace staff start to show where their real loyalties, it seems like Grady Yensey, Commander of the Royal Guard and their closest friend, is the only one they can trust. Piers and Grady must scramble to uncover the truth behind Queen Adele’s questionable associates, Piers’ missing past, and President Dubois’ shady activities

International Alliance of Superhumans (#iash)

Superhumans have existed as long as we have, normal people who suddenly develop seemingly magical powers overnight. That’s why the International Alliance of Superhumans was founded in 1945, to help control these superhumans to better humanity. Now, the Alliance's ideals and control is falling apart, as the Underground and the Union threaten its weakening rule over the superhuman community. Fireball is the golden hero of the Alliance , the face of the organization, the beloved apprentice of the Chief Administrator after the death of the one and only GoldenSon. He’s brave, courageous, kind, and always up to take a photo with the kiddos, accompanied by his partner, NightSong. He’s taken down villains from Quantum Rift (the killer of GoldenSon) to Árbol Terror, and now has his eyes set on taking down Hueso Blanco and Morpheus Nox before they can tear a hole in reality. Brigid Roberts is the face behind the mask of Fireball. They’re the only child of the now-deceased Nikki Roberts and find have found themself seeking revenge for Nikki’s death…while also trying to manage this superhero business and their senior year of high school. It doesn’t help that the administration of Wesmoreland keeps threatening to expel them for their aggressive behavior. Hueso Blanco is the epitome of an ex-Alliance villain, a well beloved hero fallen from grace, after Árbol Terror and Quantum Rift convinced him to join the Underground. Now with both of his former allies dead, he leads the Underground, and with the help of Morpheus Nox (an up and coming villain with a terrifying similarity to Quantum Rift) he plans to tear a hole in our reality, ripping out world apart. Martin Garcia-Flores is the sole caretaker of his younger brother, Elias, and would do anything to protect him. After the Alliance's violent threats, he left, in order to protect what was left. He lost friends and family and his love to the Alliance's corrupted side, and now works tirelessly to bring it to his knees…while also trying to work three separate jobs to keep himself and Elias afloat. When fate brings Brigid and Martin face to face, maskless and vulnerable, the two come to understand they may not be as different as they’d both previously thought. Content Warning: violence, gore, death, family abuse (physical, verbal), alcohol (use) Related Tags: IASH, superhumans, Brigid Roberts, Martin GF, Hueso Blanco, Fireball

Space Clue/The Murder of Fredrik Lexand (#tmfl)

In 2183, humans abandoned earth as her ecosystems collapsed and became uninhabitable. Now, the remnants of humanity live in the Lexand Starfleet, a group of 16 name-brand ships, sailing towards deep space. In control of it all is Fredrik Lexand, the 17th great grandson of the original founder of Lexand StarFleet. From his living pod at the head of StarSeeker Alpha, he controls everything and anything that happens to humanity, from their food to their spouses to where the remnants of humanity will travel to. The weight of the world on one man’s shoulders (who are we kidding, of course he has lackeys who do all the menial work), worshipped as a god. Until the morning he is found brutally dismembered, mangled parts of his body strewn all over his office. Humanity freezes, watching intently, as the Lexand Pod is locked down by Detective Scoud Tambry, swearing to uncover the killer, and avenge the Corporate god-king. Content Warning: Violence, gore Related Tags: tmfl, space clue, Triple A Siblings, Scoud Tambry

Something Queer is Afoot (#SQIA)

Something Queer is Afoot is a massive collection of stories, all centering around queer life and romance. The Queer Crew is the group which most of them are centered around. This collection is MASSIVE and has about 10 different novella-length stories within. The content warnings listed below covers ALL of SQIA. Content Warnings: su*cide, death, homophobia, transphobia, abuse (physical, verbal, and sexual), drug use and abuse, religious trauma, sex (consensual and noncon/r*pe) Related Tags: SQIA, tqc, nlth, frf, sunandgun, boc

Still to be added: All of SQIA's individual projects, Cryto Conspiracy, The Great Fantasy American Road Trip, World of Ateine, Neon Squad

MORE TO BE ADDED SOON, SO STAY TUNED!

Athens' Current Objectives....

Blog Tag Directory:

#athenswrites: Personal writing

#athens answers: ask games

#other writeblrs: exactly what it sounds like, other writers I've reblogged

#writers I love: reblogs of close friends or writing that just hits me different

#rblg: general reblog tag

I'm pretty good at tagging extensively, so if you need to find something or are looking for a specific wip in my blog, there's a high probability I've tagged it like crazy

[murdereraisuha]

Classpecting TWST: Heartslabyul

After basically an eternity, I have finally gotten back into the mood for TWST character analysis and classpect. Therefore, I am briefly emerging from my swamp to slap this on the internet before retreating back to my hermit hut.

For everyone who wasn’t here years ago for my previous classpect posts, please check the classpect tag on my blog for more info on what the hell this is. Spoilers for chapter 1, chapter 5, and some personal stories. No knowledge of Homestuck required to read. This post will be using quotes from Kanade Musing’s translation of the original Japanese version of the game.

[Image description: A banner containing a picture of Riddle, the symbol for the rage aspect, and the words “Riddle Rosehearts: Maid of Rage”]

Right off the bat, I can’t think of any 2 aspects that could fit Riddle better than rage or doom, which both have to do with limits/rules. Rage focuses on stubbornness and “no,” while doom focuses on systems and caution. To me, the distinction between the two seems to be like personal vs universal. Anyway, Riddle’s strict self-discipline and adherence to the rules obviously relates to one of those aspects.

How exactly does the concept of limits/rules factor into his personal growth? The conflict in chapter 1 revolves around Riddle going ridiculously far with enforcing the rules in his dorm. From Trey and the post-overblot flashback, we learn that Riddle’s behavior stems from his mother being extremely controlling and teaching her son to value the rules & success over his desires & happiness. At the end of the chapter, Riddle apologizes to the dorm and becomes more lenient with enforcing the rules. 

Ah yes, the good old days of less than 30 episodes a chapter. This is a refreshingly straightforward story compared to basically everyone else, which means that I’ve already narrowed it down to 2 classpects: maid of rage or maid of doom.

Maids, the active creation class, make their aspect, as shown by Riddle enforcing the rules amongst his dorm. In terms of their personal journey, a maid is first controlled by and reliant on their aspect. Their moment of development comes when they rebel against their aspect and finally claim it for themself. For Riddle, he is first controlled by the rules, like when he has to throw away the tart Ace made when he actually wanted to eat it. However, in the end, he rebels against his mother’s teachings and starts thinking about how he can work towards his own goals rather than blindly upholding the rules.

The question now is whether Riddle’s aspect is rage or doom. After some thought, I believe that rage suits him better. First of all, rage deals with negative emotions like hate and fear. Those emotions characterize the interactions we see between Riddle and his mother, from her vehemently declaring that sweets are poison, to her outrage at Riddle hanging out with Trey and Chenya. You can also see it in Riddle in his destructive anger and his despair at not having friends.

Secondly, rage deals with refusal and denial. It is the opposite of hope, the aspect of belief. Prior to and during his overblot, Riddle stubbornly denies that he is wrong. Just look at these lines from episodes 1-23 and 1-24:

Riddle: Are you saying that I’m wrong, too? Even after I did my best to protect all those strict rules?! Even after I’ve endured so, so, so many things! I won’t… I will never… I will never believe it!!!!!

Riddle: HAHAHAHAHAHA!! I do not need anyone who defies me in my world. I am my world’s absolute ruler. My world itself submits to me! I will not tolerate any answer aside from, “Yes, Lord Riddle.”!! It’s off with the heads of everyone who defies me! AHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

Riddle: I’m the only one who’s always right!! If not, then all that I’ve worked for was…!!

Doom, which deals with caution, death, and acceptance, does not seem nearly as relevant to Riddle’s personality and struggles as rage is. Therefore, Riddle is most likely a maid of rage.

[Image description: A banner containing a picture of Trey, the symbol for the mind aspect, and the words “Trey Clover: Heir of Mind”]

I’m gonna start out with some pieces of dialogue from episode 1-17

Cater: Are you really okay with this…?

Trey: ……….. There’s nothing I can really do…

and episode 1-19

Trey:  … I understand why you’d think of him as a tyrant, and I understand that the way he does things is a little wrong, too. But, I… I still can’t find it in myself to go against him at all.

Ace:  ………. Now that I know more, I understand completely now. The reason why Prefect Riddle is like that… It’s all your fault…

Ace:  If you think that the Prefect’s making the same mistakes as his parents, then tell him directly. Fix your mistakes. What’s gonna happen to him if you just feel sorry and spoil him? So you’re just gonna watch everyone hate him and alienate him from a distance?

I feel like these lines encapsulate Trey’s problem in this chapter. He knows why Riddle acts the way he does and he knows that what Riddle is doing is wrong, but Trey hasn’t done anything to fix it. Therefore, in terms of Trey’s classpect, I currently believe that the class that fits him best is seer.

Seers, the passive knowledge class, invite understanding of their aspect and through their aspect. For Trey, in chapter 1 he provides the 1st years with knowledge on apologizing to Riddle and Riddle’s upbringing. Also, a seer’s main problem is their struggle to understand and use the information that they have. In Trey’s case, he doesn’t know how to handle the situation with Riddle, so he ends up just giving advice to the rule breakers instead of actually confronting Riddle. 

Now, we need to do some more investigation to figure out what aspect he is.

Trey has a obsession with dental care because his parents, who work as bakers, did not want all the sugary treats he grew up with to negatively impact his health.

Trey has many younger siblings and he often treats his dormmates like younger siblings too.

Despite how Trey’s brotherly behavior suggests a romantic and selfless outlook on things, he can actually adopt a rather practical and self-serving attitude as shown in his lab coat and dorm outfit personal stories.

Also in his dorm outfit personal story, Trey lets the other students try and utterly fail at making cakes to teach them how difficult baking really is instead of just telling them that their cake requests are unreasonable.

Trey is perceptive and was able to figure out that Cater dislikes sweets by observing him.

Trey’s unique magic, “Doodle Suit,” overwrites qualities (ex. taste, unique magic, color) of things or people with something else.

Going back to Trey being a seer, what exactly does he know and invite understanding of? Trey holds knowledge about Riddle, baking, dental care, Cater’s dislikes, and dealing with siblings. How the hell do all these things relate to each other?

Actually, hold on. Is he a seer? Cause I’m realizing now that he could also be a sylph, the passive creation class. Sylphs are typically known for getting involved in others’ business and fixing what they think needs to be fixed. For Trey, he offers advice to the 1st years, he tries to calm Riddle when he’s angry, he makes sure Unbirthday Party preparations stay on track, and he tries to enforce good brushing habits in the rest of his dorm. Giving up on fixing the Riddle situation might just be him failing as a sylph.

I’m kind of stuck there now, let’s consider aspect for a bit. Though his unique magic does relate to space, I don’t think his aspect is space, time, light, or void. Whatever his class is, it seems to mostly relate to concepts like harmony and healthiness. Therefore, the 2 main aspects I’m considering are heart and life,

Life would relate to his nurturing nature, his concern for dental health, and his relationship with food/baked goods. Heart would relate to his management of others’ emotions, his unique magic which basically alters the identity of something, and his turmoil with the Riddle situation relating to their relationship with each other. Now that I’ve listed these out, I’m gonna say that his aspect fits closer with heart due to that relating better to important things as well as the pun there with Riddle’s name being Rosehearts.

However, it is also important to consider the opposite aspect of mind. The thing is, about half of this post was written more than 2 years ago. Back then, I ended up putting Trey as seer of heart. However, looking back, I really don’t feel like that fits with my current understanding of his character. So, I am going to argue against my past self’s reasoning now.

Trey’s relationship with Riddle is indeed a big part of his character, and the events of the main story did induce some character development in Trey. However, Trey is his own person who is not defined by Riddle and who has his own problems and areas for personal improvement outside of Riddle.

What his own problems are can be seen in his personal stories and his appearances in event stories. A recurring theme with Trey is how he stubbornly denies that he is anything more than average. In his gym uniform story, he deliberately tries to get average grades in flying class, then proceeds to pull off maneuvers in an emergency that has Vargas praising him. In the port fest event, he makes an excellent chowder for the class’s booth, and then brushes off the others’ praise for it. In the 2nd Vargas Camp event, he comes up with a successful strategy for defeating the monster (Vargas) and then, again, brushes off the others’ praise for it.

So many of his efforts go towards blending in and hiding his true capabilities. Going back to chapter 1 of the main story, his main problem is that he hides what he is truly thinking about Riddle. Together with stuff from the bullet points up there like his “practical and self serving attitude”, I don’t think this behavior is something to do with what his class is like my past self did, but I think this is a symptom of his aspect being mind.

Now, after looking at the possible classes to pair with that, I believe that Trey’s classpect is heir of mind. Heir, the passive manipulation class, really seems to fit Trey. Trey seems to naturally default to putting up a mask, since he is often misinterpreted by other characters to be more caring about others than he actually is. He has a goal of not standing out and getting into trouble, and he does stuff like aim for average grades and shy away from going against Riddle as an extension of this goal. These two things seem to be examples of him being embroiled in or manipulated by “mind”, as an heir of it. 

Then, as shown in his Starsending Robes personal story where he convinces Riddle to get the dorm a food processor that it doesn’t really need or his ceremony robes story where he successfully stalls Riddle while Cater fixes the roses at the dorm, he is great at getting what he wants through manipulation, but it is not very focused/deliberate like active manipulation would be. He did not make a premeditated plan to talk Riddle into getting a food processor for the dorm, but he happened to stumble on Cater and other students struggling in the kitchen and took the opportunity to bring up a food processor in conversation. In fact, Cater and the other students join in the conversation to back Trey’s sales pitch up without even knowing Trey’s true thoughts on the matter, which seems like a obvious example of inviting manipulation of mind. Therefore, I’m pretty sure that Trey is a heir of mind.

[Image description: A banner containing a picture of Cater, the symbol for the heart aspect, and the words “Cater Diamond: Bard of Heart”]

First, here’s a link to my Cater analysis, which contains my evidence and reasoning for my interpretation of Cater. You only need to read it if you’re curious about how I came up with this summary of him:

Cater’s puts up a constant happy façade to hide his inner sadness. He blends in with the crowd by following the latest trends and acting like a peppy cheerleader towards others. Because of family issues and constantly having to move, he has built up a strong resistance towards trusting others or forming close bonds with others.

Based on his deception, his blending in, and his unique magic “Split Card” which basically allows him to fragment himself, Cater’s aspect is most likely mind or heart. Mind deals with apathy, conformity, and masks, while heart deals with emotion, showing off, and identity.

For classes, I’m going to eliminate page, sylph, and the theft classes cause those don’t seem relevant. I don’t think he really rebels against anything so witch is also out, and the way his personality was shaped by nurture instead of nature doesn’t make heir seem likely either. Finally, though he puts up a mask, it’s more of a way to avoid attachment than hide insecurities so he’s probably not a knight. The remaining options are mage, seer, prince, bard, and maid.

Pairing those up with aspects (and also throwing out seer in the process) leaves us with mage of mind, prince of heart, bard of heart, and maid of mind.

I think the best way to decide between these 4 classpects is to focus on what Cater’s biggest problems are and how he as a person would change when those are resolved. 

First, I feel like one of his biggest problems is how he pushes others away. He hides the depressed mandrakes he made in his lab coat personal story, and it is Trey who has to deduce that Cater doesn’t like sweet food rather than Cater telling him that. Second, the other big problem he has is how he not only refuses to acknowledge his problems to others, but also to himself. Even when he is completely alone, like at the end of his ceremony robes story, he still insists on maintaining his happy, life of the party persona.

The natural resolution to these problems would for him to be more truthful with others and to himself, revealing his “heart” and reducing his reliance on his masks, his “mind”. The resolution to his personal journey is really not a change in his relationship to “mind” but a distancing from “mind” and towards “heart”.

Therefore, I think that his true aspect is heart, and his specific classpect is bard of heart. I feel like the way that he lies to himself about his feelings and his overall laid-back nature aligns more with the passive destruction that a bard brings about than the active, focused destruction of a prince. With no other options remaining, I’m locking in my final answer for Cater as bard of heart.

[Image description: A banner containing a picture of Deuce, the symbol for the hope aspect, and the words “Deuce Spade: Heir of Hope”]

Deuce is a very earnest and “act first, think later” kind of guy. Though he is hard working, his enthusiasm and naivety can lead to him go about things in not very thought out ways, which makes me think of him as having an opposite attitude to the lazy but calculating Leona.

An issue he is very conscious of is how he is quick to anger and get into fights, which is what led to him being a delinquent in the past. Now in high school, he is trying his best to change his ways and be an honors student out of a desire to help instead of hurt his mother.

He is pretty hard on himself about this, but in chapter 5, Rook and Kalim help him see that his approach to things isn’t necessarily bad, leading to him accepting himself and developing his unique magic during the overblot fight.

Overall, his personal journey and character development seem to really revolve around the concept of going with your instinct versus strategizing. However, it doesn’t seem to be in the heart/mind way which is focused on rationality and expressing or hiding one’s true self. Instead, Deuce’s behavior comes more from an drive to get things done and push forward towards his goals regardless of what stands in his way and what others may consider unrealistic odds. His unique magic, “Bet the Limit”, is all about taking a bad situation where facing down someone who is stronger than him and is winning and flipping it on it’s head by retaliating with an even stronger version of the magic they’ve used against him.

Therefore, I believe he is strongly involved with the hope and rage aspects, with the hope aspect being the most likely of the two, so I am going to proceed with the hope aspect for now

So, for classes, the main thing we have to consider is how Deuce interacts with Hope. His personal journey is basically first he rejects hope because it caused him anguish because of his mother, then he realizes how he can use hope in a good way and accepts it. However, I do not think his relationship with hope was really destructive. Unlike someone like Cater who buries his “heart” as far down as he can, Deuce still does things based on hope. He acts according to his ideals and instincts, he’s just ashamed of it afterwards. Therefore, I don’t think Deuce is a prince or bard.

Therefore, I think one good possibility is heir. Like an heir would, Deuce naturally connects with core parts of the hope aspect such as trust and “doing” rather than “stopping”. His unique magic is based so much on his intuition that after he uses it he isn’t even sure how to do it again, which seems quite heir-like. Connecting his class to his personal journey, his challenge was to redefine his relationship with hope into a more healthy one instead of letting it pull him down bad roads like his delinquency, which kind of seems to fit with heir based on what tiny bits of memory I still have left of John Egbert’s character development in Homestuck.

I’m not 100% sure about that though, so another possibility is seer. As the passive knowledge class, the challenge of the seer is to reach a better understanding of what their aspect is and figure out what the right path to follow. This looks somewhat similar to Deuce’s case, but after some thought I don’t think seer fits. After figuring out the course of action to take, a seer tells others about it instead of taking action themselves, and Deuce is the only one here doing stuff with his hope. I don’t think Deuce is a seer or even a mage, because understanding/comprehension doesn’t seem to be a major thing with him.

 Deuce could be a page. However, the problem is that he didn’t try to be better at hope or anything like that, he avoided hope. His behavior just doesn’t mesh with a page’s. Deuce could also be a rogue. He does struggle with owning his spontaneity/hope, but he never does any giving of it to others. Finally, going over the rage aspect and possible class pairs with that, nothing seems to really match up given how hope-based Deuce’s final character development and unique magic is.

So, in the end, the best fit I can think of for Deuce is heir of hope.

[Image description: A banner containing a picture of Ace, the symbol for the breath aspect, and the words “Ace Trappola: Sylph of Breath”]

In contrast to Deuce’s honesty, sense of duty, and occasional naivety, Ace is shrewd, independent, and has a talent for deception.

Ace often looks for the most efficient, corner cutting way to do things, such as in the 2nd part of his dorm uniform personal story where he decides to focus his rose painting efforts on the ones that are most in view.

One of his hobbies is doing magic/card tricks.

Though Ace puts himself first a lot, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t care about others at all. 

Ace is not afraid to call people out if he thinks they’re being unfair or doing something harmful, such as in the dialogue I quoted in Trey’s section in this post.

Though Ace insists they he just hangs out with Deuce, Grim, and the player character out of pity, he shows a lot of care for them, such as in chapter 4 when he makes the long trip back to NRC because of the distress call the player sends when they’re held captive in Scarabia. Ace’s Halloween costume personal story is specifically about Lilia and Malleus commenting on how much Ace cares about his friends, complete with flashback scenes of stuff like Ace giving up his omelette at lunch to stop Deuce and Grim fighting over Deuce’s omelette.

Another cute example of how Ace acts aloof is in his dorm uniform story, when the hedgehogs go missing. At first Ace just tries to find the hedgehogs quick so Riddle won’t punish him for forgetting to lock the cages. However, once he actually starts to worry about if he can get the hedgehogs back, his mind automatically goes to how distressed Riddle was about the hedgehogs. He starts begging the hedgehogs to come back with him because Riddle will be really worried otherwise, even though Ace had previously made fun of another student for talking to the hedgehogs since they can’t understand human language.

According to the wiki.gg Twisted Wonderland wiki, throughout the main story, Ace apparently shows a talent for wind magic.

Given these facts, the first thing I want to consider for him is the breath aspect. Though his occasional contrarian attitude could look like witch-like behavior, given other parts of his character, I feel like it is more a manifestation of his aspect rather than his class. He insults people and expresses unpopular opinions as an assertion of his freedom and lack of attachment to others. Therefore, compared to other aspects, breath (and its opposite, blood) seems like the most relevant one here.

Now, to figure out what his relationship to breath might be. I’m just gonna copy paste this dialogue down here too cause I think it’s a good example of how Ace operates.

Trey: … I understand why you’d think of him as a tyrant, and I understand that the way he does things is a little wrong, too. But, I… I still can’t find it in myself to go against him at all.

Ace: ………. Now that I know more, I understand completely now. The reason why Prefect Riddle is like that… It’s all your fault…

Ace: If you think that the Prefect’s making the same mistakes as his parents, then tell him directly. Fix your mistakes. What’s gonna happen to him if you just feel sorry and spoil him? So you’re just gonna watch everyone hate him and alienate him from a distance?

After hearing about Trey and Riddle’s situation, Ace is able to quickly figure out what the essence of the problem with Trey and Riddle’s relationship may be, figure out what should be done to solve the problem, and succinctly communicate that to Trey. This ability immediately makes me think of the knowledge classes (mage & seer) or sylph.

What’s also interesting about this is the exact advice Ace is giving. Looking at this while thinking of the breath and blood aspects, what Ace is saying can be interpreted as him telling Trey that he is too restricted by his feelings for Riddle, (aka blood) to tell Riddle what he needs to know, so Trey needs to make the hard decision to step back (aka move towards breath) and confront Riddle.

Based on this, I think that Ace’s tendency to call people out for stuff is a result of him being a sylph. As the passive creation class, sylphs are known for meddling in other people’s matters and “healing” any lack of their aspect. For example, this advice that Ace gives Trey can be seen as an example of Ace “healing breath” by trying to introduce more objectivity to Trey and Riddle’s relationship, which in this context means more breath.

His feigned apathy towards his friends and the feelings of others ties into how a sylph can have a very fixed interpretation of their aspect, which can lead to problems when others challenge that interpretation. Ace seems to view attachments to others in general as something negative. Not just concrete relationships like friendships and romance, but also simple empathy and care, like that which the random student in Ace’s dorm uniform personal story shows to the hedgehogs when he babytalks to them. In the story, Ace pointedly notes that the hedgehogs can’t understand them, discouraging the guy from talking to the hedgehogs. This is an example of Ace going too far as a sylph and micromanaging breath here to an unnecessary extent. Therefore, Ace’s challenge is to learn when to limit his pursuit of freedom and recognize that some personal connections are alright to have.

The idea of Ace being a sylph of breath really felt right to me, so there is a decent probability that something else that I didn’t notice fits him better, but I’m gonna go with the ~vibes~ and settle on sylph of breath. 

It was close, but basketball club didn’t end up as blood club. It’s just blood-and-breath club now I guess. Freshman breath player gets bullied by a pair of sophomore blood players. Hah. 

Anyway, bye.

[andydrysdalerogers]

Cross-Checked ~ Chapter 21

Andy Barber x OFC Leighton "Leia" Andrews

Summary:

Andy Barber is having the best year of his life. His game is on point. It’s gets to play with his best friend and his fiancé just... dumped him?!. 

Reeling from a sudden change in status, Andy decides it’s time to just focus on hockey. Until his best friend's sister comes out with news that rock the entire organizations world., 

Andy has always carried a torch for the untouchable Leighton but in her hour of need, is now the time to shoot and score or risk getting cross - checked again? 

Warnings: Cheating (but not by the MCs); slow burn; friends to lovers eventually; SMUT!; pregnancy; jealousy; handsome goalies, evil exes...

A/N: The tag list is open! Also, so sorry to be behind on this one. Life got in the way for awhile but I'm back!

I do NOT give permission for my work to be translated or reposted on here or any other site, even if you give me credit. DO NOT REPOST MY FICS. Reblogs, comments, likes, and feedback ALWAYS appreciated

Dividers by @firefly-graphics

Banners by me!

Previous: Chapter 20~ When Two Become Three

Series Masterlist // Main Masterlist

Chapter 21 – It's the Playoffs, Baby 

Leia 

The last six weeks have been the most wonderful dream. My little Avery came home the same day I was released from the hospital after a week-long stay. She’s perfect in every way. Andy refuses to put her down unless she’s hungry. He’s besotted with his little girl, and it just makes my chest hurt from the adorableness. It was rough the first couple of weeks with the surgery, but Andy found a night nanny to help. He also hired a housekeeper for us, Mrs. Langfield. She is a godsend. She is so helpful with the house and caring for me when Andy head-to-head back to work.  

But here we are, six weeks later, and we are attending our first home game together. Management got us our own box with the. WAGs. I am a WAG now, which is wild.  

Andy and I get to the arena early, him proudly carrying the car seat in. My social media team are on it with the arrivals, and I step out of the picture because I know that the fans will go nuts for this daddy/daughter moment. But my top assistant, Alicia, spots me.  “Leia, we have to get a picture of the happy family.”  She pulls me and we pose. I’m leaning into Andy before he pulls Avery out of the car seat so he’s holding her.  

“That’s great!” Alicia declares.  “These will be up soon, but I’ll send you the good ones,” she tells me, and I flush.  

We head to the private elevator and Andy looks down at me. “Sweetheart, why are you so red?” 

“Nothing,” I looked down at the bags. I could feel the hot tears welling behind my eyes and I was trying desperately to stop them.  

While Avery has been magical and beautiful and wonderful, I did not feel the same way about myself. I was dull, fat and blah. I didn’t feel like myself anymore. I felt like all people saw now was Avery. I was nothing.  I didn’t want the photos of me to go up because next to my gorgeous boyfriend and my beautiful daughter, I was the fat lump of a woman. I tried to make an effort and done my hair and makeup, but I still felt like a fraud.  

I know that this is just post pardum feelings. I know I should talk to someone but all I want is to be home with my baby girl. I hear a throat clear, and I look up at Andy. “Baby, what’s wrong?”  I move to say nothing, but he cuts me off.  “My queen, you are sad. I can see it. Talk to me.”  

I can feel one tear fall down my cheek. “I don’t want them to post my picture,” I whisper.  

“Why?”  

“I feel gross and ugly, and I don’t want my picture there. I don’t need the whole word to know how much of a mess I am and that you have an ugly girlfriend and...” 

“Whoa, baby, stop right there.” Andy pulled us to the side, away from the crowd. “Sweetheart, you are beautiful, strong and amazing.  You cooked our little princess and protected her for nine months.  Look at her.”  I look down to the car seat where she sleeps. “You did that. You made that. That makes you a superhero Leia. That makes you, my queen. I worship at your feet because you gave me the greatest gift I could ever ask for.”  

“But, I don’t do anything.” I start to cry. “The night nurse takes care of her when I sleep, and Mrs. Langfield takes care of her and the house. I’m useless, Andy. Just a milk machine.” I hiccup. “All anyone sees is Avery and her cow.” 

He pulls me in and holds me tight. “Oh baby, why didn’t you say anything earlier?” 

“I don’t know. You’ve been so sweet to make sure I’m being taken care of I didn’t want you to think I am ungrateful. Because I’m so grateful Andy.” I sob harder into his chest as he cradles my head.  

“Sweetheart, you have to talk to me, okay? I don’t know what help you really need if you don’t tell me.” He kisses my forehead and lets me cry for a few moments before he tilts my head back. “How about this?  We will let the night nurse go in a couple of more weeks.  But she starts to get you up to feed instead of pumping. Then when you feel more comfortable, we’ll let her go.” 

I sniffle. “That sounds good.”  

“Ok.  As for Mrs. Langfield, I’m sure we can talk to her and tell her what you need, and she’ll be able to help. I don’t want to make life harder right now we the team almost in the playoffs.”  

“You think she’ll be ok with it?” 

“I’m sure she is willing to do anything for Avery.” He gave me his dazzling smile. “I promise we’ll figure this out, ok?” 

“Ok. I love you, Andy.” 

He leaned down and kissed me softly. “I love you, my queen. Let’s get my girls settled.” He took my hand and walked me to the box. We were immediate greeted by the WAGs that are already there and they started to coo over Avery.  

Avery, my perfect princess, decides this is the time to open her eyes and show off beautiful blue green eyes.  “Oh my,” Katerina Marchand coos. “She’s gorgeous Leia.” She looks at me and her smiles falls.  “Have you been crying Leia?” 

“Oh,” I wave her off, “I’m fine.”  

“Leia, honey,” Moa sat next to me and took my hands. “You just had a baby seven weeks ago. And it wasn’t an easy birth. Its ok to not be ok.” 

I felt my lower lip wobble. “I’m just not feeling myself. I don’t know how Andy hasn’t run away because I’m so fat and ugly.”  

“Sweetie, that is absolutely not true,” Rebecca took my hands. “When we saw the post of you and Andy with the baby, David and I were commenting on how beautiful you look. It doesn’t even look like you’ve had a baby seven weeks ago.”  

I felt a big fat tear leak from my eye (stupid hormones). “Really?” 

“Yeah, really, I wish I looked half as good as you when I had our baby,” Rebecca said.  “It’s ok to feel uncomfortable and undesirable but that’s just the flood of hormones talking.  David has told me that Andy can’t stop showing off pictures of the baby and you. How sweet and peaceful his girls are. It's so sweet.”  

“Brad was telling me the same thing,” Katerina said. “You grew a human; you can be a little off for a while.” 

These ladies have embraced me as one of their own and I am forever grateful for it. I hadn’t had many girlfriends, just Stella and eventually, Miranda. But these women are ready to take me in and show me the ropes. “Thank you, ladies. Really, it means a lot.”  

“What does Andy say about all of this?” Moa asked.  

“He was upset I hadn’t said anything.  We’re going to make some changes that make sense and hopefully it will help.” I swallowed.  “He’s been so good to me, to us.” 

Moa smiled. “I knew that man was made to be a father.”  

A week later, life turned upside down.  We had talked to Mrs. Langfield, and she was more than happy to show me the ropes to being a mom. “I raised four of my own. It isn’t easy but it is the most rewarding thing you will ever do.” she patted my hand, and we went to work.  I thought that would end the drama, but it didn’t.  

Stella ended up on my doorstep while the guys were still in New York after clinching a playoff berth and she was a mess. “Stel?” 

“I need to hide out here for a while, please,” she said as fat tears rolled down her cheeks.  

“Of course, sweetie,” as I pulled her in. “What’s going on?” 

“Have you seen the headlines about the Bruins?” 

“Uh, no.” I picked up my phone. While I was still on maternity leave, I was trying to keep up with all the posts and letting my team know of any discrepancies. I scrolled and I saw the article about Jeremy going back to his partying ways.  “What the... I don’t understand.  I thought he was cleaning up his act and doing a damn good job at it.”  

“Yeah, he was.” She sniffed and wiped her nose.  “Because we had been taking care of each other.”  She looked at her lap and I froze.  

“You and Jeremy. You were, what?” 

“We were in a ‘friends with benefits’ situation.” She looked at me with sorrow. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you but he was there when I broke up with Kevin and then it was supposed to be one night. But we didn’t stop, and it was great. I thought we were getting serious but then this and...” she breaks down and sobs and I wrap my arms around her.  

“It's going to be ok, Stel. You can stay here as long as you like.  I’m sure there is a perfectly good explanation and when you are ready, we’ll get the truth.”  

I feel for my friend. It's obvious that she’s in love with him. I’m not sure how I missed it but now she needed me to take care of her.  

Jeremy was benched soon after, not sure why. I would have to wait for Andy to get home.  

Andy 

What a shit show. 

Jeremy getting sent home is the last things I was expecting after his shutout performance. But I guess management didn’t like the photos and I couldn’t speak to the GM right away.  I finally caught up with him and explained that Jeremy had turned down the girl and I walked with him to his hotel room.  That Jeremy admitted to having a girlfriend whom he loved very much.  Once that got cleared up, they allowed him to rejoin the team once we got home.  

It was the day before the first playoff game and we would be on the road to Toronto. I was packing my bag when I hear, “Andy!”  

Fuck, Leia sounds panicked. I race down the stairs. “Leia, baby, what’s wrong?”  

She’s clutching our daughter like her life depended on it. “My mother messaged me, and I panicked. I’m sorry, I just... why is she doing this?” 

“Let me see the message.” I pick up the phone to read. 

Monica: I heard that you had the baby. I would like to meet with you and my granddaughter alone. We need to discuss yours and your daughter’s future.  

What the fuck. I look at my girl and she is afraid. “What is she trying to do?” 

“I don’t know but you know as soon as she realizes that you and Luke are gone, she’ll try to ambush me.”  

I didn't even think about that. Fuck, I can’t leave her here alone. But an idea forms, and I whipped out my phone. I send a message to the GM and he replies automatically. “Ok, sweetheart, why don’t you and Avery join us on the road?” 

“What?” 

“I just messaged the GM about having you on the trip. I told him it was a safety thing but since you are still the social media director, you still have the option to travel with us.”  

“But won’t I have to work? Who will watch Avery?” 

“My queen, I can guarantee she will have about 20 babysitters when she’s not with us.  Plus, Stella is going as well, so she can hold the baby if you need take some pictures and stuff. What do you say? Come be my lucky charm?” 

Babies, as it turns out, need a lot of stuff.  But it didn’t bother me in the slightest because it just meant that my girls were with me on the road.  Three suitcases later, I carried my baby girl onto the plane.  

“Holy shit! Princess Avery is in the house!” Jeremy yelled as he went to reach for her. He took the carrier off me and took her to his seat with Linus.  

“I guess Sway is taking the first shift,” I said to Leia who smiled. I pulled her to my row so she could sit with me and Luke. I get her settled and then go over to check on the baby with our goalies.  Linus already has her out of the carrier and in his arms, telling her something in Swedish. Jeremy just plays with her toes as he watched. “You guys good with her?” 

“Go away, Barber,” Linus says. “My niece and I are discussing all the things we will be doing when she visits me in Sweden.”  

Jeremy grins. “And I am making sure all of these toes are perfect. Shoo.” I chuckled.   

“Hey, I want to hold my niece as well,” David says.  

“Uh, she’s my niece too,” Brad says with a dramatic pout. The arguing gets loud, and Avery takes objection to it by letting out a loud wail.  I swoop in to take her into my arms. ��

“Avery, my princess, what’s wrong? Did your uncles get too loud? You didn’t like big loud men scaring you?” I cooed at her. Her eyes open slightly. “There’s my girl.” She gives me a sleepy smile. I walk back to our seats to the protest of my teammates. “When you guys get a schedule down, then you can have her.  Until then, she’s with daddy.”  

“Yes, Captain,” I hear them all grumble. I smile as I sit with my girl. Leia leans on my shoulder to stare at my girl. She’s been getting better with the post-partum. She still has moments where she curls up and cries. We talked about maybe seeing someone to help her. I tell her every day that there is no shame, no shame whatsoever if she needs help. Mrs. Langfield has been a godsend.  She has been there for Leia when I have been on the road. Once she understood what was happening, she immediately knew what to do when I was so utterly lost.  

The flight was smooth sailing. Avery was a gem and we arrived in Toronto without an issue. Avery’s passport is so adorable and gets so many reactions as we go through customs.  We pile onto the bus and head to the hotel. I get my girls into their room (stupid travel rule: can’t sleep away from the team) and make sure they have everything they need. “I have a team meeting and then a walk through.  I’ll be a couple of hours, but Linus and Jeremy will be here since their schedule is different.  But if you need me, call me.” I kiss the top of Avery’s head before I softly kiss Leia.  “I love you.”  

“I love you. We’ll be okay, won’t we baby girl?” Leia talks to Avery as she sleeps.  “Shoo, I promise, I’m ok.”  

She’s got this, my brave warrior queen.  

Leia 

Avery and I walk down the team floor in search of a couple of goalies.  I find them going over tape in a conference room at the end of their hall. “Hey guys!” 

“Hey Leia,” Jeremy says, glancing at me before doing a double take when he sees Avery. “It’s the princess! He moves to take her from me and starts to walk around telling her secrets I can’t hear.  

“How are you, Leia?” Linus asks. Linus is a father twice over, so I know he knows about the post-partum. Moa, his wife, has been a godsend with the advice. 

“I’m getting better.  Being on the road is a good distraction.” I smile. “I actually need your guys' help.”  

“What's up?” Jeremy asks. I explain what I want to do, and the guys look at me funny. “Don’t you want a girlfriend for this?” 

“She has stuff to do while she’s here.” I don’t say her name because I know that she and Jeremy are still not speaking. When I thought about it, they make sense.  He is perfect for her and vice versa. The pictures looked bad but when Andy explained what had happened, I tried to talk to Stella, but she was not having it.  

“I’ll grab one of their sticks,” Linus offered. He went out to the equipment storage room, leaving me with Jeremy.  

Its awkward for a moment, until I hear, “is she ok?” I look up at him and my heart breaks for him. I’ve never seen the look in his eyes before. When he was angry, sure. Happy, all the time. But what he has is heart break because I can see that he is in love with my best friend.  

“She’s putting on a strong front, but I know she is heartbroken too. I’m trying to talk to her because Andy told me what happened, but she’s been hurt like this before. She’s protecting herself.”  

“From me? I told the guys I am in love that night. It's been her for a while. I was planning on telling her.” His posture is turn down in defeat.   

“Oh, Jer, I’m sorry.” I sit next to him and put my head on his shoulder.  

“I’m going to get her back Leia.  I have to. She’s my everything.”  

We hear the door opening and Jeremy wipes at his eyes. Linus comes in with two sticks and a couple of rolls of tape. He sees Jeremy’s eyes and frowns. “Everything ok?” 

“Yes Linus. Just reminiscing about the birth.” I look down at the stroller with Avery asleep. “Never got to properly thank Jer for holding my hand. I’m still sorry about your hand.”  

“Swear it’s the reason I got the shutout in New York,” he says with a wink. “So, do you have the paint?” 

Andy 

We’re headed out to warm up for game one when Alicia stops me and Luke.  “Guys, we need you to take some photos with some specialty sticks.” She guides us to the ice before handing us the sticks. We both pose before I look at the stick. And I choke up. “Alicia?” 

“Leia wanted to make them for you.” She smiled as she continues to snap pictures.  

On the tape of the blades are tiny hand and footprints in pink with the words “good luck daddy love Avery” painted on them. I see Luke wiping his eyes as he stares at his, the words “kick butt Uncle Luke” written on his. I look up and I see Leia with Avery in her carrier standing behind the bench. I get as close as I can. “You did this?” 

“I had some help but yeah. We’re so proud of you Andy.” She looks down at Avery, who has on the tiniest ear defenders on, in pink, of course. “I love you. Go kick some Toronto ass.” She presses her hand to the glass, and I reach up with mine.  

“I love you my queen and my princess.”  

I don’t play with that stick, but I leave it in the tunnel for luck.  And luck did it bring. We won that game and the next one to take the series back home. I’ve decided to keep that stick in my locker and take it with me for every game this playoff season.  

After we land, I tuck my girls into the car. Avery had a rough night, so Leia and I are dog tired. I had stayed on the phone with Leia while she worked to sooth Avery. She finally conked out around three A.M., and we had a flight at eight. Nobody was a happy camper but luckily, Avery stayed asleep in Luke’s arms, giving me and Leia some much needed rest.  

We have a light practice this afternoon and I keep thinking of things we need to get now that we are home. Maybe I can take Leia to bed. We’ve only started to fool around now that she has the all clear from her doctor. The thought of having her body under me starts to make me hard and I almost miss seeing a black Mercedes parked in front of the house and my defenses goes up. All thoughts of a sexy nap with my girl fly out the window. I pull the car all the way in the garage and close the door.  “Leia, stay inside with Avery.”  

“Andy? What’s the matter?”  

“I don’t know baby, but just stay inside. Don't open the door unless you see on the camera that I am alone.”  I move to go out the side door, lock it and pull it close. I move to the front of house and the car doors open.   

Fuck my life.  

NEXT

Taglist:

@patzammit @texmexdarling @slutforchrisjamalevans @firephotogrl74 @tinkerbelle67 @before-we-get-started @bunnyforhim @alexakeyloveloki @sunnyhummingbee @whiskeytangofoxtrot555 @peaceinourtime82 @saucy-sassy-sparkly @kmc1989 @kandis-mom @lokislady82

[sunwarmed-ash]

Roy/Jamie fic idea: just Roy being secretly obsessed with Jamie’s nipples ever since he flashed them at Roy at the gala in S1. One day in S3 or beyond, Jamie’s being a little shit and Roy finally snaps, taking Jamie to bed and declaring that he’s gonna undo Jamie just by doing all manner of things to those nipples. Jamie couldn’t be happier.

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSSS!!!!! i love all the royjamie prompts I got, so I combined all three into one response!

Prompts:

Coach kink-Jamie calls Roy coach at practice to rial him up, a sequel to 4 AM

Jamie gets his nipples pierced. Roy goes insane

Nipple obsession/nipple worship

Hope you enjoy it!! I certainly had fun writing it!!

Insatiable Tartt

Ships: Roy x Jamie Fandom: Ted Lasso Rating: Explicit Tags: Nipple piercing, nipple worship, public sex kinda, bottom Jamie, Roy/Jamie's ever developing relationship, The Infamous Boot Room, hand jobs, fic under the cut and on ao3, Jamie has a praise kink, and a coach kink, PWP

‘Coach this,’ ‘Coach that,’ ‘Yes Coach,’ ‘please coach’

Coach. Coach. Coach.

In the almost 20 years Roy has been in sports he has never given the word a sexy, second thought. But then Jamie fucking Tartt, his previous business and romantic archrival-turned friends-with-benefits had to go and sob the damn title while he was posted up on Roy’s cock. Begged him, his coach, to make him cum, again and again. And now, after one night together, it’s had an almost instant, pavlovian response with his dick. 

Goddamn you Jamie Fucking Tartt.

-A month later-

They've only hooked up two other times since the first time. The next time was in Amsterdam, after the little shit spent the entire evening teaching him how to ride a bike to honor his grandads memory and then took him to see a windmill because Roy had never seen one before, and then  to add cherries to an already perfect night, Jamie leaned over and kissed him, taking his breath away with a simple press of lips that he hasn't felt since Keeley. 

Jamie didn't kiss him for long, he actually misinterpreted Roy’s freezing as denial and started to retreat almost instantly. Roy was quick to remedy that. His hand was catching the back of Jamie’s head and pulling his lips right back down against Roy’s own, where they belonged. 

Jamie and he then hauled ass back to the hostel the team was staying at and Roy fucked Jamie into the mattress. At least until Roy’s knee started acting up. But then Jamie took over, riding Roy hard into the bed for another good half hour.  

-

The third time was after Roy’s ‘misguided though comical’ attempt at ‘teammate awareness’ with the whole dick tying thing. It wasn't all bad. Jamie had admitted that it actually turned him on. After he blamed Roy for the new pain kink he developed around his dick because of it. 

That night, Roy had spent an hour tying Jamie up with the remaining red rope, binding his legs and arms away from his front so Roy had unlimited access to his body. He even tied up his cock, like a nice little present for Roy to admire and praise. Before slapping it hard with his hand while Jamie sobbed and pled for more. 

“Like that, do you slut?”

“Yes Coach…” Jamie pants without a fuss. 

-

After that last time, Roy thought he had finally gotten a one-up on the man. But evidently, he had underestimated the little shit, again. Because when Roy walked into the locker room after practice and the team was getting changed, his eyes caught a shining glint off something and someone he did not expect. 

And he wasn't the only one who noticed. 

“Oi boyo, when’d you get those?” Colin asked Jamie, referring to the matching piercing bars through the man’s nipples that were currently making Roy’s mouth fucking water. 

Jamie smirked and tossed his shirt over his shoulder instead of putting it on, letting Colin get a nice long look. 

“Long time ago mate,” Jamie shrugged. “16? 17 maybe?” Roy hates that that fact means he could have had those bars in his mouth already but Jamie specially chose not to disclose having them until today. 

“Only wear em when I’m tryin’ get lucky, ya know.” 

Roy looks at Jamie just in time to realize he was pointing that intention directly at him and his burning arousal and fear of public displays of affections has him shouting a familiar threat in the full locker room. 

“TARTT, BOOT ROOM! NOW!”

-

“I didn’t even do nothing wrong this time!” Jamie whines the second the boot room door closes and Roy’s mouth is on his to silence the bitchy noise. 

“Take off your shirt,” He says when he breaks apart and Jamie smiles, all the way up to his ears.

“Oh, oh, yeah, okay,” and then his shirt’s off and Roy’s hands replace it, running over every inch of skin he can reach before settling on what he really wanted to see. The silver and blue barbells through each of Jamie’s dusky brown nipples. 

“It's a good thing these aren't new,” Roy says, and before Jamie can ask why, Roy’s mouth is latching over one, biting into the pec hard before soothing the bite with a suck and several pointed licks around Jamie’s nipple. 

Jamie’s painful shout morphed into a pleased whine with the attention to the piercing with his tongue and Roy was happy this was making Jamie as crazy as its making Roy. He's admittadbily been obsessed with Jamie’s nipples since that little tart decided he was too good for a shirt at the charity auction. 

“Roy, please,” Jamie whines, breaking Roy out of his thoughts and back to the current moment. 

“No,” Roy growls against Jamie’s skin, and it makes Jamie’s cock twitch against their bodies. “Address me right if you want something,” 

“Coach,” Jamie whimpers, quickly entering the matter phase of melted goo in Roy’s specially crafted hands.

“There's a good boy,” Roy praises, and Jamie melts even farther with a pitiful whine. “Shouldn’t surprise me you have these pierced. Actually a little cross you didn't tell me sooner.”

Jamie’s eyes open and bore into Roy’s. There’s too much there to attempt to process it all.  

“Wanted to surprise you.”

“Suprise me? Why?”

Jamie flushed pink, now avoiding his eyes. 

“Don't know... Thought maybe you'd like them. Do you?”

Roy raised his eyebrow before grabbing Jamie's hand and holding it against his own cock. 

“Does this answer your question?”

Jamie hums and his eyes flutter and he nods. 

“Fuck me?”

Roy shakes his head. 

“Can’t here Sweetheart, as much as I want to. But I can keep this up, probably make you come apart without even touching your cock. Would you like that?”

Jamie’s whines don’t contain actual words. He just nods and reaches out for Roy, pulling him close so Roy can bite and lick across his chest any way he wants to.  

Roy does. He loves the way the metal feels against his tongue, how much it makes Jamie gasp and squirm when he just barely scrapes his teeth across the hardened flesh. Loves how loud he cries when Roy bites him so hard it’ll leave marks tomorrow. 

Jamie’s cries get pitchier when he sucks around Jamie’s nipple, licking the piercing balls on either side with his tongue, Jamie's hips thrust forward, bumping against Roy’s thigh and pulling another moan from the younger player's lips. 

“Coach, please,” Jamie begs and Roy moves up from the hickied and bruised chest to Jamie’s lips, biting roughly into his lower lip. 

Jamie whines and Roy chuckles, soothing his cries with another deep kiss.

“What do you want Jamie?”

“Make me cum, please, I’m close.”

“That all?”

“No,” Jamie huffed. 

Roy’s playful tug on Jamie’s piercing with his teeth had the younger man humping against Roy’s thigh now. 

“What else then?”

“Want you to fuck me, at home. You can tie me up again if you want.”

“You really liked that huh?”

“Your fault, you put the image in me head.”

“Something tells me you have the capacity to think devious thoughts up all on your own,” Roy laughed before slipping his hand down the front of Jamie’s track pants and gripping his hard cock tight. 

Jamie’s retort died on his tongue and his hand shot out for Roy, pulling his head forward and mouth back onto his chest. 

“Fuck, touch me, please,” Jamie pants and Roy goes to work. Jamie wasn’t kidding, he was getting close. Most of Roy’s hand was now slick with Jamie’s precum. 

The younger seemed to really like when he bit hickies into his chest Roy continued his pointed assault, squeezing the head of Jamie’s cock the next time his pumping hand reached it. 

“Fuck-” Jamie cries and it’s all over. His thighs tremble below Roy’s hand as his orgasm pulses through him. Roy’s hand gets slicker but he doesn't stop pumping. Not until Jamie’s pretty bite swollen lips beg him to. 

Roy pulls his hand out of Jamie’s pants and uses his clean hand to pull the man forward, kissing him back down after an intense, public, orgasm. 

Jamie hums under the kiss, slumping onto Roy’s chest and giving him all of Jamie’s body weight to support while he came back down to Earth. 

“Are you still hard?” Jamie asks after a couple of minutes, and Roy chuckles at the ridiculous question. 

“Course I am.”

“Still wanna tie me up? We can go, like right now. If you wanna.”

Roy chuckled before kissing Jamie again. 

“Insatiable tart.”

[lumenflowered]

Hello. My name is Maria. She/her. I am a Faller from a place called Yharnam through means unknown, the Chosen champion of Ho-oh through means theoretically known, and the current Champion of the Indigo League through means I know very well, as I did defeat Lance to win that title.

Though I still am thoroughly uncertain as to what quirk of fate resulted in my arrival here, the Johto region has become my home, and I will defend it. Team Rocket is now a memory, as is its leader. They will not be missed.

Here is my Trainer Card, for those curious—I have found that I look rather dashing in it.

My team is as follows; if you would like to know more about any of them than I have provided here, you need only but ask:

Rakuyo (Meganium, X) Hunter (Furret, F) Molotov (Arcanine, M) Adeline (Gengar, F) Evelyn (Kingdra, F) Eileen (Honchkrow, F)

My Gengar, Ade, is considerably more technologically literate than I and frequently borrows my device to editorialize upon my posts, record what I am doing, or make posts of her own. When she does, she favors the color purple.

Silver is, technically, still the rival to me that she has declared herself to be. She now has her own blog at @cosmic-crobat. In previous posts upon my blog, she has utilized the color blue.

Occasionally, the god that deemed me worthy of saving Johto chooses to speak here as well. When Ho-oh does so, they do so with bold orange text, and they use that name interchangeably with another they have chosen: Solaire.

The first person to show me kindness in this world was an eleven-year-old boy named Ethan. He introduced me to the second—his mother, a woman named Reina, who I hold in the highest esteem and bear much affection for. I have lent her my device before, and her favorite color is pink.

(Ethan, in his single brief appearance here, used the color yellow. Unfortunately, Rotomblr seems to have removed that color from my post editor and I lack the technological knowledge to restore it, so should he return I will ask what he would prefer instead.)

Some time ago, there was an incident where my Pokégear was stolen and found its way into the hands of a mysterious woman known only as Dee, who distinguished her own posts with green text. I spent the following weeks attempting to solve the mystery of who she might be, only to discover that she was in fact the living Doll modeled after me.

I... do not know how she is in the same world as me. Nor do I know who her friend with the bold red text is for certain, though I have reason to suspect that they are from Yharnam as well.

Now that Team Rocket can be referred to in the past tense, I suppose I do now have the time to devote to the mystery of Dee, or I will soon. A part of me wants nothing to do with her. But she bears no responsibility for the circumstances of her creation, and perhaps she knows the answers to some of the questions I still have. Perhaps she knows something that I do not.

(OOC info under cut!)

Man these intro posts just keep getting longer and longer. Maria has a Lot To Say now that she's less depressed it seems, which is probably objectively a good thing but still. Anyway, hi, it's still me, @ofstormsandfire, with the pokeblog I've been devoting the majority of my time on Tumblr to for the past few months. I have no regrets this has been very fun and is helping with my Bloodborne withdrawal.

Anyway. Hi. I like Bloodborne, I really like Lady Maria of the Astral Clocktower, and I got the idea back in November that I could make her a Faller. That, honestly, there isn't much I can do to her that wouldn't be an improvement over the Ocean Horrors. So this blog resulted!

With that said, Bloodborne is ostensibly a horror game and while Maria is currently in the world of Pokémon, that does not change the fact that she has been through The Horrors and is likely to reference them. Canon-typical themes for that may be present, I'll do my best to tag for anything that isn't average pokeblogging fare, if you'd like me to tag for anything specific feel free to just ask!

Here's some navigational tags for y'all (and I finally figured out how to make them chronological between the last intro post I made and this one, woo!)

#firebird arc: I combined the Radio Tower takeover and the Ho-oh subplot, made the Kimono Girls a lot more relevant, and ramped up the stakes slightly. Ho-oh is a firebird and I think there's a type of rocket called the firebird. I like puns. Sue me.

#from the ashes arc: Giovanni became an actual threat, there got to be an entire Rocket base in Tohjo Falls, and Silver got traumatized more. Mind the tags and also the warning OOC post at the beginning.

#kanto rocket arc: There wasn't much to do in Kanto so I had Rocket start causing problems on purpose. Silver transed her gender and Giovanni... seemed to no longer be a problem at the end of it.

#downpour arc: This hasn't started yet, and won't for a little while, but I've got one post in the tag already establishing it and letting people know what's up OOC ahead of time. I'll probably need to write another new intro post by the time this arc actually begins but it's nice to have my bases covered anyway.

#milf time and sonboy hours, #milf time: The first tag was specifically posts from Ethan and Reina, but Tumblr stole my yellow and Ethan didn't care about Rotomblr so we're not likely to see more of him actually posting. Maybe on Silver's account who knows.

#passing stranger: Posts from or relating to Dee, which y'all now know both ic and ooc is the Plain Doll. Though most of the posts in this tag are from her 24-hour takeover back in February, there will be more, she's coming back more permanently soon and I'm excited.

#rainbow wings: Posts from (or sometimes relating to) Ho-oh. They don't post that often but they're a giant rainbow bird they can do what they want. What they want, when they happen to be online, is generally for injustice to Not Happen. Good luck buddy.

#what's with this sassy lost child?: Posts from Silver, before she got her own blog at @cosmic-crobat. These days she mostly uses her own blog. I might reuse blue for another character later, or I might just keep using blue for her, we'll see what happens.

#ask game: Reblogs of ask games and responses to said ask games. This one isn't chronological.

#hints to the future: Specifically, responses to that one ask game with the gear emojis that lets you hint at future events. I am always accepting asks for this one no matter how long it's been since I last reblogged that ask game. I like hinting toward what's to come and I like writing prose.

#glimpses of the past: That one ask game with the hourglasses that lets you see into the muse's past. Again, always open because I love writing prose and I can write out prose for things that have already happened this way.

#pelipper mail: It's open, it keeps happening, it keeps causing problems. Note that while I do not have magic anons on, if you're sufficiently creative with Pelipper Mail and it isn't too story-breaking you can probably get a similar effect to a magic anon that way.

#the vampire allegations: Silly tag for posts involving the recurring jokes about Maria being a vampire. It keeps happening, due to her entire aesthetic and also me deciding she can be allergic to garlic for coincidental and completely mundane reasons.

[ultramagicalternate]

ULTRAMagic Chaos Chapter 4

Previous | First | Next

Master Post

Wynstan noticed the other arbiters were giving him displeased looks. “What? I didn’t actually blow anything up this time…”

Osbeorn pointed at the desk he had been using. “Really now?”

“Reactions. Nothing but reactions.”

“Isn’t an explosion a type of reaction though?” Razor pointed out.

This warranted a mild glare from Wynstan. He then approached Razor with an inquisitive look. “And who might you be?”

Tusk cleared his throat. “Well that’s Magnus’ son, Razor.”

It then occurred to the messy arbiter who was standing next to him. “Tusk! Good to see you again!”

“You too, Wynstan,” he replied as they shook hands and high-fived.

“Sorry to give you the chilly reception, friend,” Wynstan apologized as he vigorously shook Razor’s hand.

Ealdhelm stepped over to the main podium. “Once Ultimatum arrives with Adelheid and Ulrich, we can really get down to business…” He was interrupted by a bird made of magic, dropping a note before him. “Oh? Let’s see what we have here…”

“10 coins says it’s one of the champions” Wynstan muttered to Tusk.

“Probably.”

Ealdhelm groaned. “General Raisa appears to be bothering the three.”

“Called it,” Wynstan announced.

“I’ll go help them,” Tusk declared.

“Are you sure about that?” Ealdhelm questioned. “Raisa is quite the handful.”

Before Tusk could speak, Mayhem stepped forward. “Then follow me! Dragutin will get us there in no time.”

“Very well,” Ealdhelm confirmed. “Don’t hesitate to call on us if things get out of hand.”

The two made their way to the courtyard, with Razor tagging along. He was nervous, but also wanted to get in on the action. Standing in the hallway leading outside was a humanoid goat in royal blue clothes. His fur was dark purple, his ears and horns were upright, and he held a dark staff with a red stone hovering at the top of it.

“Hey, Tusk. Long time no see.”

“Randalph!” Tusk replied as they gave each other a best friend’s hug.

“So where are you guys heading off to?”

“The Droom Outskirts” Mayhem answered. “Apparently Raisa is bothering Ultimatum.”

“Oh jeez. Mind if I tag along?” Randalph asked.

Tusk continued to lead the group outside. “Of course. That would improve our chances greatly. Oh, Randalph, this is Razor Scully, Magnus’ son.”

The two shook hands. “Nice to meet you, Razor. I’m Randalph Theoprastus Scarfe. Tusk and I used to be alchemy students and explorers.”

“Yeah, dad and Chief Sigmund have mentioned you before.”

Randalph then looked at the stone arm. “Tusk, what in the blue blazes happened to your arm?”

“The Lich of Old, Randalph. I am never doing that again.”

Dragutin was sitting in the center of the courtyard and readied his wings as the group approached. “I trust that Ealdhelm got the note I saw, Mayhem?”

“Absolutely” he said as he climbed up onto the jabberwock’s back. “To the Droom Outskirts. Also this is Tusk and Razor, two of the people who were watching us at the arena.”

“A pleasure to meet you two” Dragutin greeted as Tusk got up on his back. “Hopefully your trip to the city went without problems?”

Tusk nodded. “Thankfully, given all the chaos around here at the moment.”

Razor could see that Dragutin did not have enough space on his back, so he began to turn into a wolf. He was stopped by Randalph. “What’s the matter?” he asked.

Randalph pointed to a great bird flying towards them. “There will be no need for running. Here comes Otho…” An eagle as large as Dragutin landed in front of them, with Randalph giving the bird a pet along its head. “Let’s roll, Otho!”

Razor was helped up, but was startled when the bird made a light screech. “What kind of Eagle is this?”

“A void eagle. They are truly amazing birds to behold and tame.”

“Follow me lead, Otho” Dragutin instructed as he began to take off.

Meanwhile, Ultimatum was not having a good time. Adelheid and Ulrich were not in any danger, but it was ideal that Raisa did not follow them back to Droomopolis. Ultimatum insisted on handling this, despite Ulrich’s offer to help. Raisa was sixth dimensional and the angel was seventh dimensional. What should have been an easy fight was turning into a real hassle for him, however. Raisa was a lot more persistent than he had initially expected.

Raisa was an unbelievable opponent. Originally a mad scientist’s experiment, she had been appropriated and enhanced by Delphine. The champion had long, large arms lined with spikes and giant, clawed hands. Her skin was like a weird, sludge-like material, and her head looked like it had merged with a bodysuit meant to keep her contained. This was made clear by the fact that her head was sleek and shiny like rubber. She also had a face that had two, glowing eyes and a mouth full of shark-like teeth. Aside from that strangeness, she also had the body of a typical fit female. Normally Ultimatum would have dispatched her with ease, but the magic she had access to made winning easier said than done.

“Stand still, you slippery miscreant!” Ultimatum ordered as he fired arrows from a bow of shining light.

Raisa was teleporting around, laughing as she did. “Too slow! Close, but no cigar!”

Adelheid straightened out her rather fancy coat. “Come now, Ultimatum. Let’s finish this and be on our way.”

“Yes, Discordant Blood…”

“If you can’t deal with this little wench, what good are you to the ULTRAMagic Guild?”

“Hey, easy, Adelheid,” Ulrich cut in. “He’s doing his best…”

“His best is prolonging this journey, Discordant Gravity. Why were you so insistent on walking when we could have easily teleported to Droomopolis?”

Ulrich shook his head. “Because you don’t get out of your cathedral enough and need the fresh air.” She groaned because she knew Ulrich was right.

Raisa launched a punch at Ultimatum, who blocked it with a shield of light. “Cool! You should join Delphine and teach me that!”

Ultimatum chuckled. “Raincheck, but I’m free on the seventh at seven.”

“So it’s a date then!?” Raisa cackled. “Just don’t bring Adelheid. She’s stinky!”

Adelheid gave Raisa the most violent look imaginable as blood poured from under her coat, forming blades from her arms. “THAT’S IT, CURSE DELPHINE AND HER SMUG FACE! I’M THROTTLING THIS BRAT!”

As Ulrich went to stop Adelheid and calm her down, Dragutin and Otho touched down. Tusk and the others charged in, with the former leading the attack. He had covered his fist in a giant, stone gauntlet of which he used to punch Raisa, sending her flying into an abandoned building. The gauntlet crumbled, but Tusk did not expect it to last. Raisa took a second to get up from the rubble and was laughing as she did.

“That was awesome! Show me how to…” Raisa immediately realized the odds were not in her favor as the entire group approached her. “That’s all, folks!” she said in a comedic tone before running away as fast as she could.

“Good riddance” Adelheid growled as she dispelled her blood.

Ulrich dusted off his office shirt and pants. “It just occurred to me that Raisa doesn’t fully grasp the fact that she’s sixth dimensional now.”

Ultimatum breathed a sigh of relief. “Tusk, good to see you again.”

“I trust you’re not going to bounce on us again, Ultimatum?”

“No, not this time,” he replied with a laugh. “Thanks for the assist, that was incredibly annoying. Situations like that make me question my journey to The Final Azoth sometimes.”

“Hey, Ultimatum!” Razor held out his hand.

“Razor, good to see you again! Is that ULTRAMagic I sense?”

He nodded with enthusiasm. “Yes indeed. I’m going to join the guild when we’re done.”

Ultimatum gave a calm, triumphant laugh. “We’ll be happy to have you, Razor.”

Adelheid cleared her throat, getting everyone’s attention. “As fun as this reunion is, gentlemen, we ought to be moving on before the sun sets.”

Ulrich exhaled. “Don’t mind Adelheid, guys. She’s just cranky over having to go outside for once.” The others laughed while she gave him an annoyed look. “Nice to meet you, Tusk and Razor,” Ulrich said as he shook their hands. Despite being a Discordant God, he was dressed rather casually and looked like he worked in an office. He also had a very friendly demeanor.

Taking a moment to admire the surreal beauty of the setting sun, Ultimatum began walking towards Droomopolis. “Alright, let’s get moving. Lord only knows what else we’ll have to deal with out here.”

As the group walked, Mayhem went ahead with Dragutin and Otho to tell the arbiters the good news. The rest of the journey went without any interruptions. Razor was concerned about Raisa returning, but Ulrich assured him that was unlikely. Delphine treasured Raisa and would not send her into a situation she could not handle.

Adelheid had been studying Tusk and Razor as they walked. “Tusk, was it? While I appreciate your assistance, are you sure you’re up to the challenge? You got in a lucky shot, but I question whether or not you’re up to par for this conflict.”

Tusk looked bewildered. “That’s a lot of words to ask if I’m ready for this…”

“I can personally assure that Tusk’s a capable mage and alchemist, Discordant Blood,” Randalph vouched.

“Indeed” she replied in a skeptical tone.

“I think you’ll do fine, Tusk,” Ulrich said as he scratched his stubble.

Randalph tapped Tusk’s arm. “You really need to visit Limbo sometime. Grendel has really missed you.”

“Yeah, I probably should. How’s he doing?”

“Great. He’s really perfecting his shapeshifting. In fact, he should be in Droompolis at the moment.”

Razor looked confused. “A shapeshifter?”

“Yes,” Randalph answered. “My homeland moves across Limbo and we picked him up one day when I was but a mere kid becoming a buckling. Grendel is a colony lifeform that my family adopted.”

“Oh, wow. That’s cool.”

Tusk nodded. “Yeah. I think you’ll like him, Razor. Randalph, you also need to swing by the forest when you get the chance. The scrolls and tomes I brought back from the Dark Grand Desert are unbelievable.”

“You don’t say,” Randalph replied. “Given the waves your battle sent through the realms, I’d be surprised if they weren’t. Did you happen to find any unique alchemical formulas?”

“Tons…” Tusk picked up a rock and transmuted it into a metallic, purple sphere that appeared to function as a compass. “And this is just the tip of the iceberg.”

“Just be careful, you two,” Ultimatum cautioned. “The Great Unspeaker has a great deal of forbidden knowledge in his archives.”

Ulrich laughed. “Don’t let Kleitos hear that. He’ll be all over that place like a moth to a flame.”

“Don’t worry, guys,” Tusk said in a reassuring, yet slightly dismissive tone. “Fun is the name of the game for me and Randalph, like that one time we used a grand scroll formula to make an ice cream castle!”

Randalph cleared his throat. “That was his idea. I advised against it.”

Tusk smiled. “True, but we still had fun, didn’t we?”

His friend shook his head and chuckled. “Yeah, not going to lie.”

“See, there you go,” Ulrich stated. “Those who are humble and passionate have nothing to fear from knowledge.”

Adelheid giggled. Tusk was starting to grow on her. “I’ll give you that, Tusk; You’ve certainly got spirit.”

Now it was Razor’s turn to chuckle. “You should have seen him a couple of months ago.” He then stood still, as if mimicking a tree. The others laughed.

The spark in the group’s souls was becoming more apparent to Adelheid. “Normally I wouldn’t say this so casually, but you certainly seem to have a lot more potential than the rabble that offers their services on the regular…” As she said that, what remained of the Vestergaard knights were in full retreat towards Droomoplis. “See what I mean?”

Ultimatum took a second to process that only three of the seven knights were there. “Dear God! I guess those who boast the loudest have the most to hide…”

Razor looked concerned. “Should we help them?”

Ulrich placed his hand on his shoulder. “Leave them be. This is a lesson they need to learn on their own. It won’t do them any good for us to interfere.”

Tusk nodded. “If we help them now, they’ll potentially think they can rely on us for everything. I’m all for helping people out, but Sir Gebhard sounds like he has some maturing to do.”

Razor nodded in acceptance. “Oh, I see.” He could sense that Tusk was still offended by being called a ‘sapling.’

Next: Chapter 5

ULTRAMagic Alternate © 2022 William Ford II (ChaoticTempleKnight)

[inevitably-johnlocked]

Five Fics Friday: June 2/23

Happy Pride month everyone! Why not celebrate with fics about our favourite husbands?????? Enjoy!

SIGNAL BOOSTING

Deduce Your Own Adventure by Jimlockian (E, 35,380 w., 99 Ch. || Choose Your Own Adventure-Style || Alternate Canon, Humour, Canon Divergence, Assorted Tags) – A Sherlockian, old fashioned, Choose Your Own Adventure book!! At the end of each scene (chapter) you are presented with choices which can lead to any number of options – three different cases, a chase, four romantic pairings (navigational Johnlock & Sheriarty/Jimlock smuts!), three main characters to kill, kidnappings of different characters, rewritten RBF, endings that are odd, happy, angst-filled, humorous, fluffy, smutty - all from choices made by you! Will you take the case of a body turning up where it oughtn't be, or a stolen artifact from a museum, or perhaps theft after a lover's quarrel? Will you find Johnlock, Sheriarty/Jimlock, Johniarty or minor Johnbastian? Is Sherlock witty or romantic? Does John's nobility last? Is Jim patient or naughty? Will you make it to the chase scene, or to RBF? Fluff or smut? Your choice will decide! Choices: 2-3 varying solutions for each case, many pairing themed storylines/endings; 5+ Johnlock & Jimlock, 3 Johniarty (NEW: smut, fluff endings), 2 Johnbastian, 1 Morlock... +25 endings!

RECENT MFLs

Sexual Frustration by SailorChibi (E, 2,181 w., 1 Ch. || Semi-Public Sex, Possessive Sherlock, Porn with Feels, Neglected John) – "You," Sherlock said very quietly, "have a 15 minute head start to get home, strip, and get in my bed. If I catch you before you make it back to the flat, I will fuck you where I find you regardless of who is watching." His hand tightened, fingers threatening bruises. "Either way, I am going to fuck you so hard you won't be able to walk for three days."

Wish I Was In Heaven Sitting Down by standbygo (M, 3,282 w., 1 Ch. || Post S4, Five and On, Food, Missing Scene, Three Garridebs Moment /John Whump, Cuddling/Snuggling, Hurt/Comfort, Love Declarations, Parenthood, Friends to Lovers, First Kiss) – Five times when Sherlock and John ate together, and one time they didn't. A history of the boys, in food.

A Tale of Two Soldiers by batslikepastel (T, 14,136 w., 5 Ch. || S4 Fix It, Jealous Sherlock, Misunderstandings, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Christmas, Friends to Lovers, Mutual Pining, Developing Relationship, Cuddling / Snuggling, First Kiss, Stress Baking, Domestic Fluff) – It's Christmas, and Sherlock and John are finally flatmates again after the tumultuous events of the previous year. But a sudden revelation about John's sexuality and James Sholto's unexpected presence throw a wrench into Sherlock's plans, and his jealousy threatens to overwhelm him even as John remains blithely oblivious. Their relationship has reached a turning point, and the ball is in John's court now.

The Case of The Boy & The Soldier by WhatLocked (T, 36,263 w., 18 Ch. || Alternate First Meeting AU || Sherlock POV, Sneaky Mycroft, Parentlock, Developing Relationship, Case Fic, Lists, Original Child Character, Parent John, Light Mystrade, Kidnapping) – When one William Watson wanders into the life of one Sherlock Holmes, claiming that his daddy has been taken by bad men, Sherlock finds himself caught up in a rather intriguing case of not only locating the boys father but also in discovering a side of himself that he never knew existed. Part 1 of The William Watson Case Files

[paintedbutton]

Find The Vibe Tag Game

Post a snippet that matches the previous vibe

@koala2all tagged me in this snippet and since there's plenty of both fancy parties and annyoing nobles in Worthy of a King, I thought of a younger Aneiric and Bran escaping a particular one in this backstory bit:

Aneiric could never quite tell whether Bran liked or hated feast nights. It was the height of summer, the air warm and heady even inside the castle walls. Flowers had been strewn everywhere. Aneiric had enjoyed it, for a lot of the night, but even he was tiring at this point. That, and he’d almost entirely forgotten what exactly they were celebrating. An engagement? Hopefully not his own, or this would have a dreadfully embarrassing aftermath. He turned towards Bran, who had been a silent presence at his shoulder for most of the night. The captain looked at him, head cocked in askance, eyebrows raised. He’d slicked his hair back, something that didn’t suit him at all. Aneiric wanted to run his hands through it, mess it up, but he knew better than to follow those urges.

“I want to go,” he said instead. He thought Bran smiled before he turned and led the way out of the room.

*

He wasn’t sure why they ended up in the throne room. Moonlight was refracting through the stained glass windows, the only light in the room at all. It was quiet, peaceful. Aneiric planted himself on the throne and looked up.

“This feels wrong,” he declared to the room at large.

Bran chuckled in response. “It does fit your mother better.”

Aneiric agreed, but he still took the opportunity to pout. “Traitor.”

Bran walked until he stood in front of the throne. When Aneiric looked up at him, he couldn’t quite stop himself from swallowing. The shadows did a lot of things to Bran he’d rather not examine with the man right there, standing so close to him.

“Let your mother rule, my prince. It’ll fit you eventually.”

“What? The throne?” Bran nodded. “What if I don’t want it?”

Bran cocked his head. Aneiric couldn’t quite see the expression on his face, it was too dark for that, but he knew him well enough that he could guess at it. “You will be king eventually.”

“I am hoping for a change of mind when I’m old.” He said it with a levity the topic didn’t make him feel. Mostly, he didn’t think about it at all. When he did, all it did was make him sick. Even the thought of the responsibility was crushing.

Bran seemed to sense some of those thoughts. “Old?” he asked lightly, “Like me?”

Aneiric chuckled, leaning back. “You’re not old,” he said.

“You certainly used to think so.” Used to, yes. When he was but a child. Before the crush that ended in a kiss he’d rather forget had ever happened and blood staining Bran’s shoulder.

He stood abruptly. Bran moved back to allow him the space with practiced grace. “Don’t hold that against me.” He knew the smile on his face carried in his voice. “Some would say you’re a man in your prime.”

“Some?”

He was treading dangerous ground. He didn’t know why Bran was treading it with him. “Don’t pretend you don’t see the looks. You could dance with one or two of them, at least.”

In the darkness, Bran’s shadow shifted. It wasn’t exactly defensive, but it certainly was more held-back than it had been a moment before. “I’m on duty. And no.”

“Oh come on, you can dance.”

“I can’t.”

The thought was irresistible. Aneiric stepped forward before he could stop himself. “You’ve definitely been taught,” he declared. He was close enough now to feel the air of Bran’s discomfort.

“I have,” he answered, haltingly, “I wasn’t good at it.”

“It’s only footwork. Here, give me your hand.”

“Aneiric.” His name suddenly sounded dangerous. Aneiric wasn’t certain what he was doing. He’d been so good ever since the incident. He’d sworn to himself he would never push Bran away again, and here he was, doing … Well, he didn’t know what.

“Please?” It was too late. He couldn’t quite keep the wheedle out of his voice. Bran sighed, and a moment later a gloved hand was laid into his.

Aneiric led them through a simple few steps. Say what he wanted, Bran knew how to follow. “It is easier with music. But.” He pulled Bran closer before pushing him in the opposite direction. When he proved graceful enough, Aneiric quickened his own steps. By the end of it, Bran was stumbling and Aneiric couldn’t stop the laughter bubbling from his lips. He stopped abruptly, bringing Bran to a graceless halt before him.

“Oh, you are bad,” he said between hiccupping laughs.

“I did tell you.” He didn’t sound sour at the laughter. In fact, he almost sounded distant.

Aneiric calmed himself enough to look up. They’d stopped close to the window, moonlight casting coloured shadow across Bran’s face. He’d never seen the expression that was on it before – wide-eyed and almost devastated. He couldn’t begin to guess at its meaning.

“Are you alright?” he asked tentatively, when Bran didn’t say anymore. Bran blinked and his expression changed, smoothing out into something that was supposed to be calm. It wasn’t. His eyes still looked terrified.

“Fine. Are we done making fun of me?”

“I’d never make fun of you. But yes. Think it’s safe to go back to my chambers without being dragged back out into the hall?”

Bran thought for a moment. “I’d say so.”

“You won’t let them take me?” It was supposed to be a jest, something silly to lighten the mood that had suddenly turned so heavy.

Bran, however, had nothing but conviction in him. “I won’t. My prince.”

Aneiric shivered.

Gently tagging @anyablackwood, @charlesjosephwrites and whoever else wants to do this - I am curious what vibe you all got from this :)

[olet-lucernam]

A Hollow Promise [21] chapter v, part ii

main tags : loki x original character, post-avengers 2012, canon divergence - post-thor: the dark world, canon-typical violence, mentions of torture

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summary: In the aftermath of the Battle of New York, the Avengers need a few days to build a transport device for the Tesseract. With the Helicarrier damaged and surveillance offline, SHIELD sends an asset to guard Loki in the interim: a young woman who sees the truth in all things, and cannot lie.

Even long presumed dead, her memories lost to her, Loki would know her anywhere.

And this changes things.

Some things last beyond infinity. And the universe is in love with chaos.

(Loki was never looking for redemption. It came as an unexpected side-effect.)

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chapter summary : despite his chains, loki begins gathering his pieces on the board. astrid works on escaping her own confines, and mitigating the damage of disasters to come.

recommended listening : do it all the time, i don't know how but they found me

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[PREVIOUS] | [MASTERLIST] | [NEXT]

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Odin’s declaration that he would never see Frigga again lasted approximately four days.

Hands clasped at the small of his back, Loki watched, unmoving, as a troop of guards carried a suite of furniture into his new corner cell, his mother overseeing them with a regal self-assurance.

“An illusion?” He guessed incisively.

Frigga- or, rather, a figure of gathered, refracted light sculpted in her image- glanced in his direction.

Although dressed for the eyes of the court this time, in an elegantly draping gown of burnished bronze satin, she had eschewed any plate or jewellery, as though to complement the soft moss fabrics and supple leathers that had replaced Loki’s armour; they were lounging clothes, more or less, of equal quality to that which he had worn while still regarded as one of Asgard’s princes, but insufficient to hold against gunfire or turn away anything but the bluntest of knives.

“Your father is rarely overly specific in his wording,” Frigga said, cool and deceptively mild as sea air, carrying an edge of salt and a whisper of raw power beneath the placid tranquillity, “somewhat to his detriment.”

“Not merely his,” Loki replied acidly, watching from the corner of his eye as a guard set a low armchair down a short distance from where he stood. Waiting until the guard moved away again, Loki approached the chair, and skimmed his fingertips along the carved arm.

The suite was crafted from ebony, wrought gold detailing and dark emerald upholstery, with a slender serpentine design to its supporting structure, like willow branches. It wasn’t dissimilar from the pieces that furnished his quarters currently, and was clearly selected to reflect his tastes.

Idly, Loki half-wished that Frigga had chosen a rosewood set instead.

Only now, when he started looking, did he realise how much he had hidden away and protected, long before he fell into the hands of the Black Order.

“Gilding my cage, Mother?”

“I am ensuring that my son is as comfortable as possible,” Frigga answered evenly, “under the circumstances.”

“While Odin turns a blind eye,” Loki inferred.

Although Frigga had long since earned the esteem of the people, building and whittling out her sphere of influence, transmuting herself from a foreign war-bride into a beloved queen, the fact remained that her power and authority was ultimately derived from Odin. The Allfather’s respect and affection for her, and her dutiful fulfilment of her role, made him inclined to overlook her defiance upon occasion, and let her have her way in some small matter that meant little enough to him.

Such as Loki, evidently.

“He loves you still, Loki,” Frigga said softly, shaped more as a reminder than a reassurance.

Loki lifted his gaze to her, calmly, beneath the mask of a diplomat.

“Oh, I see now,” he breathed, quiet as a keen blade, “how you managed to lie to me all those years.”

Her only reaction was a slight crease in her brow.

“You were gone for two years. Might I ask,” she said carefully, “if you have been well, at least?”

Loki turned away sedately, observing two of the guards sliding a chaise into place near one of the walls, its cushioned base laden with pillows and throw blankets, seams glinting with golden thread.

“Why are you truly here?” He asked darkly, his voice ground out like charcoal. “To soothe your guilty conscience?”

“Loki-”

“Did you know?”

Loki felt her gathering her patience. “Be specific, my son. About what?” She asked composedly.

He spun to face her.

“Thor’s coronation date.”

Frigga did not quite flinch.

Grief mingled with a pained comprehension formed in the piercing blue of her eyes, pulling tension into her brow and mouth, like the frame of a drawn bow.

Anger roared afresh into him, at the confirmation that she had known- even as he acknowledged that there was little that she could have done to prevent it, and as he felt himself forgave her the barest inch, because at least she had cared enough to remember.

“Is that why?” Frigga asked coaxingly, taking a tentative step towards him, as though reaching for him to soothe an injury.

It hurt, how much he wanted to lean into it.

Loki could admit that he resented Frigga the least. But that did not mean he could trust her.

“Be specific, Mother,” he replied with a wintry smile. “After all. There should be no secrets in a family, should there?”

Frigga returned to his cell often.

Frequently, she would come bearing gifts. Books were the norm; she bought duplicates of works that she knew he had in his own collection, new volumes that she had come across and decided he might enjoy, volumes stacking up like a pallet of bricks against the wall. On other occasions, it was some trinket or curio, akin to the souvenirs he used to bring her from his many adventures with Thor, or a dish that she had requested the kitchens prepare for him, couriered in the hands of one of her ladies and transferred into his cell by one of the guards. Whatever the most recent peace offering, Frigga would linger and talk with him as long as her duties and Loki’s mood would permit, undeterred by his relentless baiting and evasions, contorting their conversations until it reflexed upon itself and knotted them into a stalemate.

His mother didn’t falter even once.

Loki had been counting on it.

Frigga had resilience, and thousands of years of patience formed by adversity. But Loki had recently rediscovered the value of restraint.

He allowed the days to spill into weeks, holding in place, until he could almost feel the ache of it like overwound clockwork.

-

An opportunity eventually presented itself, some month or two later.

That day, Frigga arrived at his cell with a tea service, faintly fragrant steam coiling from the tall spout, and a small wooden cask.

Leaving the tea to steep, and at the hopeful tilt of his mother’s head, Loki unlatched and pried open the lid of the cask.

It was filled with countless tiny, dried blossoms, their vibrant rich violet dulled by dehydration, petals curling up and crispening into a dark mauve- íviðia blossoms, also known as witch-flowers, imported from Vanaheim.

“I thought you might like some,” Frigga said, her tone light and unabashedly unsubtle.

Loki supressed a smile, almost wanting to concede the victory to her.

Over the centuries, Loki had collected thousands of memories of the flowers- of his mother dropping them into cups of freshly boiled water, watching them rehydrate and unfurl, producing a migraine-relieving tea as Loki complained his way through the snag in a spell he was constructing- or bottling them up with sprigs of kæsia-gras and citrus slices to infuse into a Vanir infusion that cleared and focused the mind.

“These are the first shipment of the season,” his mother added.

“That time of year already,” Loki noted without thinking.

“Indeed. Winter shall soon be upon us,” Frigga continued, following the thread that had netted her a milder response. “The final harvests are underway, as are arrangements for the winter feasts. We’ve been preparing the gardens before the first snowfall.”

Loki exhaled, a memory ghosting behind his eyes, like a scene from another life.

Glasislund was unparalleled at Yuletide.

The Glass Grove was at the heart of the palace grounds, cultivated like a colossal terrarium within wards that maintained a specified climate in each quarter- save for the very centre, which was attuned the current season on Asgard, and where the ancient tree that lent its name to the gardens was rooted. The feast and night-market that followed the Wild Hunt was held under its boughs; Glasir’s trunk was broader than a respectable townhouse in Gladsheim, crowned with a glorious metallic foliage of gold-copper that spread like the eaves of a great marquee, sheltering the festivities from snowfall and starlight. The flames of the torches burned from dusk until first light, reflected in the leaves like beaten mirrors, the air thick with the scent of woodsmoke and roasted game and toasted honey cakes.

Loki pulled himself away from a phantom echo of laughter- the warm, steady weight of Thor’s hand on his shoulder, the pliant curve of Astrid’s body against his side, shouts of revelry from close by and a heady lightness filling his head with the currents of music and mead- and back into a cold douse of fact and calculation.

Maintenance of the grounds were under the queen’s purview, but there were a few in particular that Frigga had chosen to oversee personally, or had delegated to one of her ladies in waiting- a high honour. Glasislund was amongst them, containing some of the rarest, most unique, and spectacular flora in the Nine Realms, both native and imported.

Including-

Gazing into the box of dehydrated flowers, Loki half-listened as Frigga told him which gardens had come into crop, and which produce had been harvested, proposing a few dishes that she could commission from the kitchens for him.

“Are the cordolium roses in bloom?”

Frigga paused.

“Cordolium roses?”

“The hjartablom.”

After a strained moment, Loki glanced up at his mother. She was staring at him with a carefully blank brightness, like diffused light on waves, unmoving.

He consciously strangled his voice, compressing it into something that was desperately trying not to sound tremulous.

Its source was no longer a wound, but its memory, and its scarring- but he hoped that Frigga could not quite decipher the difference.

The best lie was a well-employed truth, after all.

“Are they in bloom?”

-

The next time that Frigga visited the dungeons, it was with a vase of freshly cut blossoms.

Compelled into existence, a cultivar forged by horticultural crossbreeding and magical-forced splicing, they resembled some of its distantly related namesakes- strong, thorned stems, with a flower formed of numerous tightly furled petals, exuding a cloud of fragrance into the sterile air. Each bloom seemed to have been carved from pearl, a delicately clement shade of cream, lipped with a sun-hot incandescence that blurred its silken contours out of vision. Every individual petal was etched with a tessellation of hairline-fine golden fractures, resembling intricately tatted lacework, thickening towards the base of the bud until it became almost wholly metallic.

Loki crooked a finger underneath one delicately curling petal.

The light seared brighter, sparkling over with a violent crackle of refracting colour- a jewel-dust shimmer of rose and lemon, lazuline and ruby.

He had named them in Latin first, and the ancient Aesir tongue second, but the latter had become the one by which they were commonly known, in reference to their most unique attribute.

“Is their scent still the same for you?”

Standing on the other side of the end table, Frigga summoned a bittersweet smile.

“Yes.”

Loki hummed quietly, in the back of his throat.

The appearance of the cordolium rose was said to reflect the identity of the one who had raised them to its first flowering. Meanwhile, the scent of the blossoms, and flavour of the rosehips, reflected the heart of the observer.

In short: they smelled, and tasted, of whatever a person loved most.

“And you?” Frigga asked quietly.

Her demeanour suggested that she already knew the answer.

Loki swallowed.

Closing his eyes, he breathed in.

“Morning air. Hot metal. Vanilla.”

He didn’t mention the spritz of citrus and clean warmth of sandalwood, or the river rocks and savoury tang of salt- or the old books, toasted honey cakes, and ozone.

Mercifully, the oak and pelt was fainter than it had ever been before.

Frigga’s smile was wistful, glazed with history.

“Of course,” she murmured.

-

It took five weeks, to see dividends.

Frigga sent fresh cordolium roses every three days, despite the longevity of the cut flowers. The vases steadily accumulated across every available surface of his cell until it began to resemble a glass house, the brunt of the bare white walls softened by their spatters of gold and shadow and emerald.

When the first hips came into fruit, Frigga sent a package of them to his cell, shredded together with the dried petals into an herbal tea that was coveted across the realms. With a flask of water, the tea service that she had gifted him, and a simple spell to set it boiling, Loki could set a pot of it steeping whenever he pleased.

The dregs of one such pot was cooling on the side table, when the Tesseract tapped at him.

It had begun alerting him whenever someone approached the dungeons, like a proximity enchantment, showing him a glimpse of the mouth of the stairs’ descent so that he was never caught unawares. Usually, if not his mother’s illusions or one of her attendants, or an altered changing of the guard, it was simply another batch of raiders being escorted in, corralled by Thor and shipped to Asgard for indefinite internment.

Watching each procession with amusement, the cells within his view becoming increasingly saturated, Loki wondered if the palace administration had considered that the gaols were, in fact, finite- or that these new inmates were simply symptomatic indicators of deeper faults.

Unlikely.

Still, besides a few nettle-mouthed remarks to his mother, Loki could have no objections. The destruction had to be curbed before it could spiral too far, and the marauders were an invaluable resource; each of them carried hundreds of fragments of information from far-flung worlds and the inner complex of Yggdrasil, from the recent tectonic shifts plaguing Ria to the burgeoning political schism destabilising Hala. The wealth of information that Loki had collected from them, simply by feigning disinterest and waiting, could rival that of the dockside bars of Knowhere.

This time, however, the visitor was not amongst those who frequently traversed the cells.

Loki drained his cup, cracked the spine of the closest book, and waited.

Even on the flagged stone, her approach was barely audible. Her stealth had improved significantly in the years since they had known each other, if only because Loki had needled her over it enough for her to retrain herself out of sheer spite.

The corner of his mouth twitched.

Turning the corner, she came to an unceremonious halt, framed by one of the windows of his cell.

The forcefield stood as a silent sentry between them, beads of light sliding along each line in its looped trellis array, like electrified wires. At a glance into the vivarium tank of his cell, Loki projected the image of a prince at leisure, surrounded by offerings of flowers and whiling away the hours reading- a veneer that had prompted a slow incline of disinterest from the other inmates.

She would not be fooled.

Loki didn’t lift his attention from the page he was skimming, but neither did he keep her waiting.

“It has been a while, Brunnhilde.”

The flavours of the cordolium tea swirled on his palate- ice wine, sharp raspberry, caramelised sweetness, snowmelt, citric acid, the first time he had tasted chocolate- and lingered on his tongue, infusing the greeting.

Finishing the paragraph, Loki glanced up at her.

While the Einherjar were recognisable across the stars, attired in gold- plate and mail, heavy sweeping saffron cloaks, helms with flat antlers that curved from the brows like a halo- the Valkyrie were fewer, seldom deployed, and distinctive in sharp white. Their armour was ivory plate, limned with platinum like the midday sun behind clouds, with a mid-length cloak of deep blue satin, the exact colour of the skies at nautical dusk; even while overseeing funerary rites, they wore draped white silks and linens, embellished with silver applique to turn the translucent fabrics opaquer.

A Valkyrie in white would have drawn attention anywhere, but particularly within the dungeons, cutting through the dark. Instead, she had worn the chromatic reverse, matte and unembellished, closer to that of a mercenary- a sleeveless tunic hemmed with an asymmetric neckline, as though constructed from offcuts of high-quality black leather, with hard-wearing trousers and soft-soled boots, doused under a mantle of muted storm-blue wool. Her cloak was secured at one shoulder with a penannular brooch, cast from gold- or, rather, a metal that closely resembled gold, but was richer and deeper, marbled with ripples like pattern welded steel.

Loki recognised it easily.

He met her eyes. Brunnhilde stared directly back at him, boldly casual.

She had scraped her hair back from her face into a taut, efficient Valkyrine braid down the centre of her scalp, complexion pale beneath its cool fawn tones. Not for the first time, Loki mused that she resembled a blade- tarnished, yet whetted to the finest, cleanest edge, with a curt strength that few saw beyond and into a core that was restless, and disillusioned.

“My greetings to the prince.”

Her tone was faintly derisive, and easily misread.

“My greetings to she of the honoured Valkyrie,” Loki replied, inclining his head, and gently closed his book. “I hope you have been well, Brunn.”

The corner of Brunnhilde’s mouth clenched into a shrug.

“Well, I would return the sentiment, but,” she eyed him for a moment with a slight smirk, but her gaze flicked aside to catch upon the flowers filling his cell- and her mask slipped for a haunted moment, before she hitched it back up, “I have functioning ears. And eyes.”

“You certainly have me at a disadvantage,” he admitted mildly. “So, then. What of you?” Loki dropped his tone low and intimate, rising from the daybed and setting the book aside with an unhurried, fluid grace. “Accompanying my noble brother in cleaning up the realms?”

Brunnhilde’s expression flickered.

“No.” She answered bluntly. “I wouldn’t want to interfere with their fun.”

“Not even for the honour of fighting beside Lady Sif?”

Her lip curled unsubtly.

Loki grinned, not quite laughing.

“It really is good to see you, Brunn.”

The sentiment was utterly sincere, but Loki didn’t know if it would matter to her.

She considered him with a flit of her eyes.

“Wish I could say the same.” Brunnhilde answered blankly.

Loki tilted his head at her, consideringly.

“Why are you here, Brunnhilde?”

She lifted her chin.

“You know why.”

“Do I?”

“I heard they were hacking away at the Birdcage,” she said brusquely, “and I wanted to know why.”

“Oh,” Loki said casually, glancing towards the nearest bouquet of cordolium roses, “is that where they cut them from?”

It was absurd to feign ignorance. There were only three places where they grew on palace grounds, and therefore only three places from which Frigga could have procured the blooms at high volume, without incurring unnecessary cost and attention. Aside from Loki’s quarters, and an abandoned attic room high in the palace eaves, there was only one other place.

Located in Glasislund, in a section locked into a glaze of hard frost and thawing spring, the Birdcage was constructed from two dozen trellised cordolium rose plants, bedded in a broad circle at the base of a large stone platform. The thick stems had been contrived and trained to twist and curve and interlock into living benches and pillars, arches and rafters, forming an elaborate pavilion that resembled a great wrought-filigree aviary, festooned with flowers and foliage.

Those roses were the only ones, of the three locations, that had not been raised by Loki- and therefore the only ones that bloomed with ivory, gold-engraved blossoms.

Given that his mother was likely employing witchcraft to accelerate regrowth, no one would notice the flowers being gathered.

Not unless they were specifically paying attention.

“You’re not smart enough to be playing dumb, Prince Loki. Why.” Brunnhilde reiterated sharply.

With a blink, Loki glanced down at the seam of the forcefield between them.

“If I offered you the truth, would you believe me? And if not-” He lifted his eyes to hers with a look of gentle, mock-askance. “Why did you even bother coming here to ask?”

For a long moment, she said nothing.

The iron-hardness of her stare subsided, infinitesimally, revealing a glimpse of grudging, uncertain hope.

Loki exhaled a laugh.

“Well. It doesn’t really matter,” he admitted, more relieved than he would care to acknowledge, “I was going to tell you either way.”

With a swift, subtle flick-sweep of two fingers, he sent a spell rippling through the cell, washing across the walls and into every corner.

The moment that it was set, his eyes snapped back onto Brunnhilde, culling the pretence of a pretence between them.

“I’ve cast a veil against Heimdall’s gaze,” Loki told her, hushed and urgent, starkly aware of the inmates in the other cells, scanning those within view to ensure that the past few minutes had sufficiently lost their interest, “but my magic has been contained to this cell. He cannot see me, but he can see you. For your own sake, be very careful of how you react.”

Brunnhilde lifted her chin, challengingly.

Loki didn’t allow himself to hesitate.

“Astrid is alive.”

It spoke volumes of her discipline- and a centuries-strong guard of apathy- that she barely reacted.

Still, Loki could saw the spark of rage and pain rip through her like a barbed arrow, hands twitching reflexively into loose fists.

“I wouldn’t lie about this, Brunnhilde,” he hissed in a harsh whisper, before she could make the accusation. “Not to you.”

Brunnhilde visibly swallowed.

It was a line that he would not cross, and they both knew it. It had been the origin of the trust between them, evolving into a comfortably acerbic closeness over time.

I hate it, Brunnhilde had confessed to him once, halfway into the strongest bottle of liquor that Loki could lift from Odin’s cellars, the words crystallising on the frigid midnight air, the secrets, the lies, the whole golden sham.

She had slouched against Loki’s arm with a sigh, one knee propped up and a forearm draped across it, handing him the bottle. He accepted it from her, the thick glass touch-warmed, winter-chilled brennevín sloshing against its sides.

Thank you, Loki murmured, as he bought the bottle to his lips.

Brunnhilde had shuffled her head against his shoulder to squint up at him.

For what? Letting you have some of the liquor you stole? I know, Lokes, I’m so generous.

Loki swallowed the swig, letting it burn against his sternum and swirl into his skull, unbalancing him.

For hating it, he had answered with a slight gasp against the spiced alcohol, shifting and turning into her, letting her rest a little more of her weight against him. I can’t let myself hate it, because if I do- a part of me thinks that I’ll burn it all down. Or that I should be burning it down. That anything less wouldn’t be enough.

Brunnhilde had given a terse, thoughtful noise, before nipping the bottle out of his grip.

Then thanks, she said shortly, taking a long draught that almost stole her breath, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, for not letting yourself hate it. Otherwise I wouldn’t have much of a reason not to hand you the flint. Or strike one myself.

Brunnhilde spoke through a closed throat, screened under the unimpressed arch of her eyebrows.

“You’re saying that’s your reason?” She said, with the most nonchalant air that she could muster.

“Yes. Now, we don’t have much time, since I’m fairly certain you’re not here officially. Make a choice, Brunnhilde. You can walk away, with plausible deniability intact,” Loki continued coolly, “and without acrimony. Or- I can tell you everything, and we can do a controlled burn.”

Brunnhilde’s eyes flared beneath their jaded sheen, zeal warring with cynicism.

“Alright. This should be good,” she said blithely. “Go on, then, Your Highness. I’m listening.”

-

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[crystowl]

please tell us about your skrelv headcanons? i for one would love to hear more about the baby boy

ok. so like I said on my previous post, a lot of my thoughts on Skrelv came stuff I saw here, but those snowballed a bit as my partner and I ping-ponged ideas back and forth (unfortunately he's not on tumblr, but sometimes I inflict what I see upon him). of course, an amount came from actual lore (I have to admit, I am not a lore expert when it comes to Magic. I only got into the game last year, around the time New Capenna released. I try to at least understand what is going on in current sets but man oh man is there a lot of reading for me to catch up on). so take what little we know of Skrelv- he was declared worthless and was going to be recycled for parts, but instead bit the ever-loving shit out of anyone who tried- and then take that a little bit further. and it's occurring to me now that I've gone back to find the posts that inspired me- at least the ones I remember the most distinctly- that those were your posts! like minimalist Skrelv. 'This machine bites fascists'- hell yeah he does. so what naturally followed from that was deciding that Skrelv is a communist. hence, comrade Skrelv. The other one that really stuck out was about Phyrexian gender. to be honest I don't remember what came first- deciding that Skrelv would definitely be a trans ally because that seems fitting for one who is fighting against a fascist regime that seeks to destroy all individualism, or seeing that post- but those tags definitely got the wheels turning. 'Elesh Norn decides your gender and there's nothing you can do about it.' well...for Skrelv, the very act of living is an act of defiance. he was created for a purpose that he no longer fulfills, and is seen by his creators as worthless for that, but despite everything he continues to live and has created something of his own. sounds pretty queer to me! I like the idea that at the same time he is defying the role Norn assigned to him, he is defying the gender she assigned to him. in so many bites he is saying, 'no, that is not who I am.' so yeah, why not, he's trans now. further thoughts: Skrelv is alive and well after the events of March of the Machine because I couldn't bear it if he died. he and his hive have seized the means of production and implemented a communist form of goverment on New Phyrexia. they have established a peace treaty with the myrs and everyone is much happier now. peace and love on planet earth New Phyrexia

[embracesufferdestroy]

Journal

Irt the tags on my previous post: I have always struggled with reality/memory issues, of course. A lot of the time, especially when I was younger, like maybe 11 or so, I had this very strong feeling that I was lying about or exaggerating the things that were happening to me. I wasn't sure how to convey my feelings to my parents, so I basically just said something to the effect of "I'm a liar. I think I'm lying to you." And man, they held onto that for years. Any time I had a concern they would just tell me I was lying because I "admitted" to it.

Years later I was in a psych ward at 15. I had a complete nervous breakdown. I couldn't handle the stress of my own traumas, school, or what was going on in my head. When I was in there they threw the DSM-5 at me, diagnosed me with everything from bipolar to depression with psychotic tendencies to anxiety/general nervousness. They had me on 3, 4, 5, I can't even remember how many medications. It completely screwed with me, and I'm convinced that all that medicine permanently fucked up my brain chemistry in some way.

I don't remember much of my time there, but I did learn in my 20s that particular ward was shut down due to malpractice, which didn't surprise me. They were overloaded with patients, all the children were mistreated. They were over sedating 5 and 6 year olds. The youngest boy there was 3. They would keep the patients, children, away from their parents by moving them throughout different facilities without their knowledge. The final thing that got them investigated and shut down, I don't even really feel comfortable saying. I just feel really bad for the poor girl, and I think about her so very often. The nurses were straight bullies and my therapist, she did not like me. Whenever I couldn't speak, which I'm now assuming Alice was fronting back then (makes sense - that place was awful, triggering, and stressful) she would get mad at me and say I was being uncooperative & that if I couldn't share my traumas I didn't deserve to be there. If my stories or memories or feelings ever changed, she would call me a liar and accuse me of making things up again.

All that is to say at 15, I was called a liar again & a therapist reinforced this with my parents, which made me feel utterly helpless. I was somehow a liar, yet I was forced to be on several medications and had a litany of possible diagnoses. I felt like I went more nuts in there than when I went in. Afterward my parents made a point to make me feel guilty about ever needing to be there in the first place. Despite knowing everything I went through as a child, they didn't think I needed therapy at all and that I was making all my symptoms up. They completely took me off of everything cold turkey when I was 17, claimed I didn't need it. That sent me on a downward spiral that took a while to recover from. My parents took a lot of missteps when it came to dealing with my issues, and while I don't hate them for it now, I have never forgiven them.

I hated my parents a lot during this time in my life, I felt that they didn't care about me, and sometimes I still think they don't care. I have a better relationship with them now, and I am pretty close with my dad. I just don't think they understood me or knew what to do with me. It was much easier to declare I was some kind of attention hungry hypochondriac than to come face to face with the fact that I was screwed up, and that they screwed up by putting me in that ward in the first place

I also feel the need to clarify that my bio parents are divorced. My mom, the one I was raised with up until I was about 11, was the one that caused all my trauma. I haven't spoken to her in years. My parents, on the other hand, are my dad and stepmom. They are better people, and not malignantly abusive, but due to a lot of circumstances they were just kinda neglectful. The only reason I went into therapy in the first place is because I had a panic attack so bad in the gym I actually passed out & ended up at the hospital. I hate hospitals.

[tovaicas]

Saint, they/them, adult. I interact from @vounoura; I can be found at Rouvastre Leuvechier @ Brynhildr / Crystal.

GIF-only archive is @mjahlar.

DRG main, though I compulsively level jobs and play them at varying levels of skill.

Saint plays FFXIV and saint.txt are my general tags. Not spoiler-free - I tend to spoiler tag very generally. DT spoilers are tagged.

I block anything that looks like a bot on sight.

Basic DNI criteria apply. Please note that I am an adult, and I would prefer to interact with other adults.

Current MSQ progress: @ patch 6.4

Sparknotes WoL lore under the cut (HW/SHB spoilers):

Rouvastre de Leuvechier (aka Joranir Tovaica through ARR -> patch 3.2) is my Coerthan-born DRG WoL; they’re agender/genderfluid, use any pronouns, and have two in-game models I switch between periodically. Before the Calamity, he was a minor noble and Durendaire House Knight from a vassal house in the Coerthas Western Highlands, and fled to Ishgard proper with her family during the disaster. Due to what happened during the crisis, the family's abandonment of the area was extremely controversial.

Right at the start of 2.0, their family was falsely accused of heresy for in-universe unknown reasons (the situation is extremely murky); Rouvastre smuggled themselves out of Ishgard and was declared a fugitive, while the rest of the family was tried at Witchdrop. Hiding their identity through all of ARR and most of Heavensward, as of Nidhogg’s death he was placed on trial and later acquitted of all heresy charges.

She later befriended an ex-Horde wyvern named Drahm Kohr, who now powers their DRG abilities as dragon and rider. As of the end of EW, Drahm Kohr has metamorphosed into an elder wyvern. Rouvastre does not have the auto-translate function of the Echo.

He suffered severe burns while fighting Nidhogg, especially to the inner thighs and hands, and post-ShB also retains a line of pale scaling / changes to the eyes from the Lightwarden incident - all of which she’s extremely self-conscious about. As of EW they’re a wolstinien wolship, with previous wolchefant/wolsayle in HW.

Rouvastre is largely my vehicle to explore/write Ishgard lore, and given the nature of Ishgardian society (esp. mid-War Ishgardian society), reader discretion is advised.

[mimelord1]

Amazon October Prime Day 2022: Automatic Cordless Wine Opener With 25900 5-Star Reviews Is on Sale

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[fuckingfinwions]

[Cleaning up some stuff that I posted on Discord a while back. In the timeline where Fingon outright buys Maedhros from Morgoth.]

Fingon presents this to his family as having rescued Maedhros, who is in a delicate emotional/physical state and doesn't want a lot of visitors.

Fingolfin's Noldor and the Feanorian Noldor don’t have much diplomatic contact, so no one's in a hurry to send him to his brothers, or even tell them he’s back. The Feanorians are, after all, those bastards who stranded us on the ice, and then abandoned their own brother for dead. No one is going to advocate on their behalf.

Maedhros is of the opinion that being Fingon’s property is the best treatment he's had in years, he doesn't want to be given away to someone else. He’ll do whatever it takes to stay with Fingon, including following the scripts that Fingon gives him. So Maedhros is able to come across as slightly unwell but mostly capable of making his own decisions to Nolofinwe or anyone else who checks on him - at least, assuming Fingon has advance notice, and the conversations only last ten minutes or so. But Maedhros is obviously recovering from both physical and mental trauma, so Fingon usually can give excuses about Maedhros’s “poor health” to explain why the conversation can’t happen now or has to be cut short.

But usually isn’t always. And Nolo is going to be paying close attention to the potential competitor for the throne who is also his son’s boyfriend. It’s not any single thing Maedhros says, but eventually Nolo realizes the situation - Maedhros believes he’s still a slave, and Fingon is encouraging him to think so.

Nolo calls Fingon into a meeting, to decide what to do about Maedhros. Nolo refuses Fingon’s idea of letting things go on as they have. They haven’t announced Maedhros’s rescue, but people are going to figure it out pretty soon (especially if Fingon hand-feeds fruit to Maedhros in the garden while Maedhros kneels at his feet again).

But they also can’t let anyone find out now, as Maedhros is completely unfit for company. He can keep quiet about everything that’s happened since he was captured if ordered to, but telling him “you can mention everything but the sex” doesn’t work because nudity isn’t sex really, or being tied to the bed with his his clothes on! If asked to act like all the sex he had since Fingon rescued him was consensual, Maedhros would be very confused. He is obedient, and even eager a lot of the time - Fingon makes it so much nicer than anyone else, and sometimes even focuses on Maedhros’s pleasure!

Diplomatic relations between the Nolfinwean Noldor and the Feanorian Noldor are strained, but they’re not at open war. Keeping their brother captive where they can’t speak to him might spark one. Actually letting them talk to Maedhros as he is definitely will.

So the options are a) keep Maedhros locked away forever where no one he knew can find him or b) gaslight Maedhros until he believes Fingon treated him appropriately.

Regardless of the final decision, Fingon punishes Maedhros for “letting” Nolo find out. Fingon justifies it to himself a little that it was one of the few rules he gave Maedhros, and Maedhros won’t listen to him again if Fingon doesn’t follow through on his threats.

But really, Fingon is worried and angry and Maedhros is a convenient outlet. Fingon doesn’t want Maedhros to be taken away from him. And I think there’s a few hours between when Nolo tells Fingon “this is unacceptable long term” and when Fingon and Nolo figure out a plan.

“You let my father find out what I do to you, Maedhros, even though I told you not to, and now he’s upset. Bad boys get punished, so strip and face the wall.”

Maedhros does so. This is the first time he’s seen Fingon really angry with him, and he’s terrified. And the king disapproving of Fingon’s treatment - what does that mean? Is Fingon being too gentle? Maedhros will put up with much worse if it lets him stay with a Master who gives such clear orders. Or is Fingon too possessive, and the king has heard from his captains that they’re not being rewarded for victories? Maedhros hopes that if that’s the case, he can still spend most night with his Master, rather than congratulating strangers, but of course if Fingon orders him to the middle of the barracks he’ll go. He’s not as practiced at pleasing more than one person at once, but Fingon bought him rather than one of the camp whores and Maedhros is very glad of that.

Maedhros doesn’t ask any of these questions though. His master will tell him what he needs to know when he needs to know it. If Maedhros is going to be sent back to Angband, there’s no reason for anyone to tell him before they reach the gates. He takes off his tunic (he was wearing nothing else), and stands against the wall.

Maedhros has no idea what Fingon will do to him. Acid is the hardest to stand during, but he will try all the same. Or maybe the whole standing and facing the corner is the punishment; Fingon does have some odd ideas at times.

Th first strike is unexpected - Maedhros hadn’t even heard Fingon get an implement. Over the next ten Maedhros realizes why. He’s being hit with a riding crop, likely the same one that Fingon fucked hm with the handle of a few nights ago.

Crops don’t tend to break bones or injure internal organs no matter how they’re used. And even if his skin splits, it’s unlikely to scar. Maybe his Master still intends to keep him, even tough he disobeyed. Maedhros resolves to do his best to stand up to this punishment. He moans or even whimpers in pain but he doesn’t scream, because his Master had said before not to yell, and Maedhros is already in enough trouble for breaking one rule.

Maedhros does eventually run out of stamina; especially as he’s been treated so gently and not building muscle. He stumbles, and catches himself on the wall. He flinches back when he realizes, and tries to straighten his legs before he can be accused of cheating and letting the wall hold him up.

Fingon notices though, and, since he is such a kind master and does not wish to destroy Maedhros, stops.

“Turn around.”

Fingon pushes Maedhros flat on his back on a desk to fuck him. Maedhros bites his tongue until it bleeds trying to keep quiet. Fingon thinks that’s hot, and leaves bite marks on Maedhros’s shoulders and neck while fucking him, breaking the skin several times. (There’s no prep, but it’s not like Fingon leaves Maedhros alone for long enough for him to ever tighten up completely. Fingon’s cock fits without tearing Maedhros’s hole, and that’s the important thing.)

Once Fingon comes he keeps Maehdros’s injured back against the hard wood of the desk and covers the rest of him body in bites, pecs and nipples and ears until he looks like he was attacked by an animal.

Fingon pauses a moment to get a gag, and Maedhros sucks on the dildo compliantly. Then he continues, trailing bites ever lower.

Fingon is a little gentler on Mae’s cock and balls, and doesn’t break the skin at all. With the gag, Maedhros is able to keep from screaming as he grips the side of the table. He knows better than to reach his hands forward where they might block Fingon’s access.

By the time Fingon is done with Maedhros’s cock, Fingon is turned on again. That was the point after all, to have one last time of getting his mouth on his lover and watching Maedhros writhe in pain for him.

Fingon demands Maedhros ride him, and spending an hour on his back means Maedhros’s legs have regained some of their strength.

When Fingon’s done, he orders Maedhros to put in a plug and get dressed. Then Fingon ties him to a chair and leaves.

__

a) is straight forward enough. Maedhros will stay in Fingon’s room rather than going out to the gardens sometimes. The servants will know Fingon has a lover, but not who, or how Fingon got them. Maedhros is well trained enough that they don’t even have to bolt the door so he doesn’t run away; if his Master tells him to stay, he will.

Still, Maedhros might get bored if left alone and peer out the window, or sing a song to entertain himself, or do something else that reveals his identity. So when Fingon is going to be out of the room for long periods of time Maedhros will be drugged. He doesn’t have to be unconscious if Fingon would prefer not to have to wake him up, but something to make his thoughts fuzzy and his limbs heavy and his body slow.

Fingon doesn’t bother trying to hide the drug from Maedhros. A strong routine and clear rules have worked so far, and Maedhros thanks Fingon very nicely every time Fingon keeps a promise even if it’s just that Maedhros will be allowed breakfast. “I’m going to give you this drug most mornings. It will make you less energetic, so that you don’t get into trouble looking for ways to burn off the energy. Let me know if it’s painful, though it shouldn’t be.”

Maedhros makes sure to drink every drop of the drug. His old masters would punish him for spilling and wasting something they wanted him to drink. And it sounds like a very gentle drug, and just another example of how Fingon is the most wonderful master ever. Fingon gave Maedhros an order that isn’t even very difficult, but he still wants Maedhros to succeed, and is making it easier for Maedhros to do so. In Angband, Maedhros had been ordered before to stay in one place and then given a drug that made it feel like thousands of ants were crawling across him and he wanted to claw off his skin. A balrog once fed him something that made him nearly pass out and then ordered Maedhros to ride its cock for an hour.

Fingon wants Maedhros to stay in the room and is giving him a drug that makes moving harder; this isn’t an order Maedhros is even tempted to disobey. And the drug making it harder to think doesn’t matter either, as the only thing Maedhros needs to think about is Fingon, and Fingon will order him if Maedhros forgets what he was doing.

Fingon skips doses whenever he has a full day free. Maedhros thoughtlessly compliant is pleasant enough, but sometimes Fingon wants Maedhros’s full mind and creativity devoted to Fingon’s pleasure.

--

b) is a bit more complicated. Basically, it relies on lying to Maedhros about everything that’s happened since Fingon bought him. Once Maedhros "has a firm grasp on reality" and "stops getting caught in delusions", Nolo can let Maedhros contact the rest of the Noldor again, without any fear of diplomatic problems. They expect a recovered Maedhros to help keep things secret because he won’t want to admit he's so used to being only thought of as good for sex that he apparently hallucinated sexual slavery to the only people who’ve actually been kind to him.

In terms of actions steps, this plan starts with drugging Maedhros as well - but only long enough to take out the plug and move him to a guest room. When he comes to, he’s lying on his belly in an unfamiliar place while a healer bandages his back. Maedhros is terrified, because if he’s not in Fingon’s room does that mean Fingon got bored of him after all, and he’s being given away or being sent back?

“Good morning there. Are you feeling better now? Do you remember why you hurt yourself?”

Maedhros thinks for a long moment, but has no idea what’s going on. And Fingon told him that refusing to talk to anyone but Fingon would also get Maedhros taken away, when Maedhros had suggested it as a way to not reveal Fingon’s secrets. But lots of people are confused when they first wake up, so Maedhros can just refuse to answer questions.

"I'm not even sure how I hurt myself, much less why.”

“Your back is a complete mess, and your front isn’t much better. You apparently didn’t even wait for a knife, most of these wounds are so ragged and small I don’t know what made them.”

Oh, the healer doesn’t know that Fingon punished Maedhros for disobeying. Maybe he should correct that, so they don’t make him hurt less than his master wanted him too? No, if Maedhros is here its because Fingon wanted him healed, or else Fingon is no longer his master and Maedhros is being given to someone who wants him healed. He shouldn’t try to change what’s being done to him.

“That you for bandaging me.” He doesn’t know what response is appropriate, but he thanks the servant who brings his lunches and dinners on a tray and that’s never been wrong yet.

“I’d say any time, but I hope not to need to again!”

Maedhros can’t control whether he’s injured to the point of needing healing again, and the healer obviously knows that.

“How long will the bandages stay on?” He’s much less pretty with bandages on. He can’t be used as roughly if burns from too much cold or heat aren’t immediately visible, and they cover up his lovely smooth skin. It’s worse than robes, which keep him warm and comfortable when not being used but can be removed whenever his master comes back. How can Fingon enjoy Maedhros’s body if half of it is covered up? It’s very unfair to  Fingon that he can’t mark Maedhros, and that Maedhros’s inability to touch his own cock is due to anything besides his Master’s orders.

“At least a week. It would be a terrible idea to take them off now, and you shouldn’t be in such a hurry about it.”

Maedhros nods, suitably chastised. The healer didn’t say exactly what happens if he takes the bandages off, but he knows not to press further once he hears a threat. Sauron liked to immobilize Maedhros while he healed, but some of the others would rely on orders, and break his arms if he tried to get in the way. The months afterwards of being unable to use his arms were exhausting, and he knew it had been cut short by Sauron using his power to get Maedhros fixed enough to ruin again.

“Do you know where Fingon is?”

“I think he’s in the solarium, but I’m not sure. I can send one of the pages to get him once I’m done bandaging you.”

“No!” Maedhros can’t demand that his master come to him, that’s not how anything works. Fingon will visit Maedhros if he wants to and not if he doesn’t, and Maedhros’s desire to see him doesn’t enter into it all. But now the healer is looking at him, and Maedhros realizes he must have said something odd. Sticking to questions might work better. “I was just wondering what he said was going to happen to me?”

“Why would he decide what’s going to happen to you? You’re not under arrest, and even if you were, King Fingolfin conduct the trial, not the prince.”

Maedhros panics. Did Fingon give him to someone else? Did Fingon throw him away entirely? No, if Maedhros was being thrown away there would be no reason to fix the wounds. Unless they haven’t decided yet, and want to keep their options open? Maedhros has interacted with healers in Angband, when he got too injured to be good at sex, but always being fixed up for someone. If his Master isn't deciding what to fix and what to let leave an interesting scar, than who is?

“Who makes decisions about my medical care?”

“I’m the chief healer, and I’ll be taking care of you personally since you’ve been through so much. But if there’s anything I do that you don’t like, you can always refuse treatment. I didn’t ask before because you were asleep, but most of the remaining welts would heal on their own eventually.”

Maybe Fingon hasn't given him to a new master? Maybe Fingon is doing some sort of test, where Maedhros has to figure out how to recover fast enough before Fingon replaces him? It seems crueler than Fingon has been so far, but Maedhros did mess up by trying to make decisions about what to say to Fingolfin. If he lacks a skill, threats and torture are the fastest way to teach him; he learned to deepthroat with the back of his skull against a stone wall.

“I want to be healed, the faster the better.” And once he’s fixed, his Master will take him back, and everything will make sense again.

Fingon stops by a few hours later. The healer leaves them alone for a private conversation only after Fingon says it’s okay. (They have to be sure that Maedhros, who was just delusional and self harming, won't attack Fingon!)

Maedhros asks Fingon which of the injuries Fingon gave him should stay. Maedhros thinks the scrapes on his cock and balls, though less severe than the ones on the rest of his body, will heal worst because it’s such a sensitive area. And Fingon likes playing with those, so that’s where Maedhros told the healer to give the most attention. But Maedhros of course will change that if Fingon says so, and it’s not like Maedhros really needs full sensation on any body part. He can still be fucked and suck cock quite well, if Fingon wants to test it?

Fingon acts like Maedhros is saying complete nonsense and talks as if Maedhros has been occasionally hallucinating . Of course he would never make sexual demands from Maedhros! That's an evil thing that Morgoth does, and only very disturbed people would even think of it!

Maedhros thinks that Fingon is acting for some reason and apologizes for being too stupid to follow along. He asks Fingon what Maedhros should do, what role he should play

"I can act the loyal servant, or the devoted pet, or even the stubborn guard if you want. I promise, whatever you want to do to me, no one will be able to tell."

Fingon acts horrified! He "discovers that Maedhros has been hallucinating more than we thought"! Fingon had thought Maedhros had been initiating (extremely vanilla) sex out of love, so he didn’t push back even though he was worried Maedhros might be traumatized.

But obviously Fingon is going to stop fucking Maedhros now, since Fingon realizes Maedhros meant it as payment and no longer loves him.

Maedhros is terrified and confused. He might as well stay with the healers, since no one has told him to go anywhere else? Eventually Fingon will explain enough of what’s going on for Maedhros to ollow along. Or else Fingon will just punish Maedhros whenever Maedhros fails, and Maedhros will learn the rules that way. He would prefer the first, but obviously his opinions have no effect on what Fingon does. 

After few days, Maedhros is used to the routine in the healer’s wing. He’s not comfortable, but he can mostly predict what’s about to happen to him even when he doesn’t understand why. His bandages are changed before lunch, and he’s in bed the rest of the time to not put too much pressure on anywhere. The healer will ask gentle questions about why he cut himself that Maedhros won’t answer in the late afternoon, and then it’s time for dinner. Fingolfin stops in briefly in the evening to reprimand Maedhros for upsetting Fingon. The injuries aren’t healing fast, but then Maedhros has no idea what elven bodies actually heal like when you don’t have poisons weakening them or dark power fueling them. He takes each day as it comes, and tries to understand.

The nest morning, Maedhros eats his breakfast as normal. But things seem odd after that. The air is hard to breathe. He opens a window and sees Sauron’s smiling face behind it. He turns back to his bed and the blankets feel like sand, rough but somehow sliding through his fingers so he can’t grasp them. The walls are changing from reassuring brick to dripping stalactites. The door opens, and Maedhros sees his father come in holding a sword. Feanor says that Maedhros is ruined, and will not be brought back to Angband or Tirion. Instead he’ll be bound and thrown to the bottom of the sea, where no one will have to look at him again. Maedhros argues that he’s trying so hard to be good, and when he next looks up he’s in Araman, staring at the frozen wasteland.

(There was a hallucinogen in his breakfast, not that Maedhros ever learns that. What better way to convince someone not to trust their memory?)

The healers manage to restrain Maedhros eventually, but not before he’s pulled most of the bandages off. They tie him to the bed, and post a guard on the door.

After a few times, Maedhros learns to ask the healers what’s happened to him, since he obviously can’t tell what’s real. They don’t always know the details, but Fingon is sweet and patient and loving and endlessly willing to sit by Maedhros’s bedside and help him reconstruct his memory. Fingon always looks hurt when Maedhros asks if he really was constantly locked naked in Fingon’s room, if it’s true that Fingon cut off his brands personally with no anesthetic. (Maedhros had wanted that be true, that Fingon had repaired him so personally.) But Fingon always answers, and in time Maedhros puts together the basic of what happened to him.

(The hallucinations get worse whenever Maedhros fixates on a horrible thing Fingon did to him. It makes sense he supposes, that trying to make his grasp of the past fit such obviously impossible ideas weakens his grasp on the present as well. Fingon for his part listens carefully every afternoon and evening, and decides whether Maedhros will be drugged the next day or not.)

Maedhros led Fingon into bloodshed at Alqualonde and then abandoned him. Maedhros was captive in Angband for decades, while his brothers did nothing. Fingon got him out, and has stayed at his side ever since, building Maedhros back into the prince and warrior he was before.

Maedhros writes a letter to his brothers saying he’s alive. He’ll visit if they wish, but he wants to stay with the one who’s showed him true loyalty.

[ynscrazylife]

Loki request (spoilers)

Reader is a variant who got captured by the tva, they're sent to trial and Loki saves them from getting killed bc he still owed them a favour. Morbius gets confused bc those two dangerous variants know each other, turns out they were best friends in their original time line. Now Morbius has to babysit two sarcastic assholes. Double trouble ensures.

Double Trouble | l.l fluff fic

Summary: The request. 

Authors Note: I fully acknowledge and support Loki being genderfluid. In this fic, I will be using he/him pronouns for Loki since those were the pronouns they’ve used for Loki in the show so far, indicating that at the time this fic is set, Loki’s genderfluid identity is of a man. Should those pronouns/identity change, so will the pronouns for my fics. I do not intend to be harmful in any way so if this is harmful to the genderfluid community, PLEASE let me know!

Request to be on a Taglist (or multiple) here! (Taglists are at the end of the fic)

MCU Masterlist #1 | MCU Masterlist #2 | Main Masterlist

PSA: Do NOT copy, steal, translate, plagiarize, republish, etc any of my works on Tumblr or any other platform. Also, do NOT claim any of my works as your own. All of these works are either requests I’ve gotten that people have wanted me to write or original ideas I’ve had for works. If you happen to take inspiration from anything I’ve written and want to write something inspired by that, please a) ask me first and b) IF I say yes, credit me as inspo in your post by tagging me and link whatever work of mine that inspired you. Thanks.

header c @dearcardan on twitter

Yeah, Loki was definitely not taking any of this seriously. At this point, he theorized that the Avengers were laughing their asses off on this elaborate prank they were playing on him, and he decided to just wait it out. It had to stop at some point, right? There was no way that this “TVA” bullshit was actually, in any way, real.

At least . . . He believed that until he saw a familiar face.

Mobius had just saved him from being reset to the original timeline and they were walking out of the courtroom just as the doors opened and two TVA agents were walking another “criminal” in. Loki still wasn't buying this elaborate scheme so he didn’t really pay this new person much attention, until he heard the judge speak. 

“Miss Y/N Y/L/N - am I correct?” 

Loki froze, eyes traveling to the “criminal” passing him. He first thought that Thor had set this part of the prank up, but he knew his brother didn’t really understand how mischief really worked. Plus, Loki could tell Y/N wasn’t an illusion. 

. . . So that meant she was actually here. 

“Hey, wait, can I see this trial?” Loki whispered to Mobius, who glanced back at the judge and raised his eyebrows skeptically at the brunette deity. Loki added, “I just want to see a little more of how this place works, okay?” 

Mobius was sure Loki was onto something and after a couple moments of thought, he agreed. At least this would give him a chance to get to know this troublemaker better, and they both shuffled into seats. 

“You are correct, madame,” Y/N answered mockingly, a big grin on her face as she walked up to the podium. She then looked around in an exaggerated manner. “Well, do I get a lawyer or what?” 

Loki smirked and the judge scoffed. “How do you plead?” The judge asked, dismissing her questions. 

“What ‘crimes’ have I supposedly committed?” 

“You have been accused of creating an alternate timeline that does not fit into the main continuum. You snuck into Odin’s vault using your Asgardian abilities  and when you used the fake Infinity Gauntlet and, in your attempt to enchant the Gauntlet to work like the actual one, you accidentally travelled forward in time and created a new timeline,” the judge summarized. 

Loki smiled, amused and proud. He only wondered what led her to this. 

“In my defense, I heard that my friend was in trouble and wanted to help out,” Y/N said with a shrug. 

“Well, the enchantments were not supposed fully work. They were meant to just backfire on you and knock you unconscious, where you’d be imprisoned in the dungeon. But then you tried to use another powerful object in Odin’s vault which created a Nexus event, messed with your enchantment on the fake Power and Time stone, and here you are,” the judge explained.

“If I wasn’t meant to do this - why didn’t these ‘Time Keepers’ control my actions and make me do something else?” Y/N asked, changing the subject.

“I am not going to entertain you any further. In your previous statement, quote: ‘In my defense, I heard that my friend was in trouble and wanted to help out’ You have admitted your guilt and will now be reset,” the judge declared sternly.

Immediately, two TVA agents grabbed Y/N harshly and began to drag her away from the podium. Loki, who at this point had connected the dots that he was the friend she had been trying to help, knew he owed her one. He couldn’t just let her be reset and then be imprisoned. So, thinking rather quickly, he leapt up from his seat and shouted, “No!”

All heads turned to him. Y/N’s eyes went wide, not having spotted him, and Mobius was beginning to regret his decision. Loki turned to Mobius. “You need me to help you with this ‘sacred timeline’ stuff. I’ll only do it if Y/N stays,” he said, panting.

Mobius caught an angry look from the judge but his gaze settled on Y/N. After a couple moments, he sighed and relented. “Fine.”

Y/N and Loki cheered and she broke out of the agents’ grips, running to Loki who picked her up and hugged her. “That’s my girl,” Loki said, proud of her for her prank.

Mobius internally groaned. This was going to be a long day.

———————————

“So how do you know each other?” Mobius asked as he walked in-between the Asgardians, leading them to his office.

“Y/N’s been my best friend, partner in time, ever since I was little,” Loki said, grinning.

“Got it,” Mobius said, frowning. He could only imagine the mischief they had conjured.

———————————

After reviewing both of their files, Mobius had to step out for a second, leaving Loki and Y/N alone. “Let’s try to break out,” was the first thing to leave Loki’s lips.

Y/N rolled her eyes. “And suppose we do, how the hell are you gonna get the Tesseract back? Plus, I won’t wanna be imprisoned on Asgard,” she reasoned, quickly shutting the idea down.

Loki huffed. He was bored. He wanted to do something.

And he had something to do when Y/N stood up and started walking around. With a smirk, he grabbed the remote controlling Y/N’s collar and clicked it, immediately sending her back to her seat.

She turned and glared at him, and he just smirked, innocently shrugging. “I wanna have fun,” he said.

Y/N rolled her eyes and cautiously stood up again. When nothing happened, she walked around a bit more, and Loki let her . . . Until he got bored again. With another click, she reappeared on the other side of the room, in mid-walk.

Before she could protest, Loki did it again. And again. And again. He finally stopped when she got out the words, “CUT IT OUT!” and laughed to himself.

“You asshole,” Y/N grunted, beginning to walk towards him, but skidded back when Loki clicked the button just one more time.

“Oops. My finger slipped,” Loki smirked.

Y/N glared, but being reset made her lose her footing, and she tumbled to the floor, causing her best friend to cackle. Annoyed, she ran at him and managed to push him off his chair, tackling him to the floor. They rolled around, neither one gaining the upper hand for too long, until Mobius re-entered, saw the chaos, pulled Loki to his feet, and grabbed the remote, resetting Y/N so she was back in her chair.

“Hey!” Loki exclaimed, pushing Mobius off him. “No one controls my best friend!”

Y/N couldn’t tell if he was being serious or not, but smiled nonetheless. Mobius glared and grabbed Loki’s remote, resetting him so he was back in his chair. He then turned to them both.

“I’m beginning to agree with my colleagues that this-” he gestured to Loki and Y/N, “-was a bad idea.”

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[sapiowoman28]

I can, I can't: Part 2 of 3

Pairing: Jaemin x female reader

Genre: smut, fluff, friends to lovers au

Warning: smut, flirting, spanking, male dom, female bratty sub

Tags: @nctlover94 @m1ss-foodi3 @heyyyun

The days that followed were hard. It was as if something had taken over Y/N, and she was perpetually horny, not from anything but from her thoughts of Jaemin doing things to her. Lucas was happy to help, but after 3 days of meeting, he was puzzled.

"You're never like this. What happened?" he asked, as they were soaking in the bathtub post sex.

Y/N wasn't sure if she should tell him. It wouldn't be nice.

"I don't know..." she lied. "I wish it'd stop. I need to focus on my assignments."

"About that, I can't meet you any more this week. I have 3 due next week and i haven't started on aything." Lucas looked regretful.

"It's ok, Lucas, we both need to finish our assignments"

She decided she'd focus on her assignments instead, and work on them in the library - where the wifi was pretty good - instead of home so she wouldn't have to face Jaemin. Not until she was sure about what she wanted to do.

So day by day, she left the house early and returned late. The boys texted her as usual, and she replied. But with Jaemin, she was reticent. Instead of her usual teasing, she provided one or two word replies. She was afraid she'd attempt to flirt with him and things would go overboard.

The good part was she made pretty good progress on her assigments. They were her best yet this year, and she was pleased. She was working through the conclusion to one of her papers when she was interrupted.

"Hey!"

She froze, looking up. Jaemin, sitting down on the seat opposite hers.

"Hey Jae." she smiled. "Lost?"

"I study, ok? he threw his hands up. Then proceeded to unzip his laptop bag.

"What are you doing here?" she watched him suspiciously. Neither Jaemin nor Jeno were library people.

"I've an assignment to complete. And I haven't seen you for days. I just wanted to know you were ok. You haven't been very normal."

"Speak for yourself. Any updates on your turbulent sex life?" she grinned, inwardly proud at how she deflected his question.

"I got my ID back. Told him i could report him for assault AND retaining my ID. You should have seen his face." he said proudly.

"Told you you'd be fine standing up to him. He had no right to hit you," she giggled.

"Thanks." he said, reaching across the table to rub her arm affectionately. She flinched. She wished her friends weren't so touchy with one another sometimes.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"I'm not in a mood to be touched." she said awkwardly. "I'm going through a phase."

"Ok. I won't touch you then" he shrugged and started getting to work on his assignment.

Y/N looked at him. He was beautiful, she thought. The lashes. The way he concentrated. Or when he frowned to himself. No wonder he was known as the handsome one.

it was hard to focus with Jaemin sitting opposite her. Her previous momentum was lost. She wished he hadn't come. But she told herself she wasn't going to let her assignment be affected. So she struggled through the conclusion and soon managed to complete her assignment.

"If you give me 15 minutes, we can go for lunch after that." he said, not looking up. She agreed, looking at the surrounding tables. She saw Renjun a few tables away with a girl. Their eyes met. He waved. She raised her eyebrows and he faked an annoyed look before turning back his attention on the girl.

"Someone's getting lucky soon." Y/N commented.

"Who?" Jaemin asked still focussed on his laptop.

"Renjun."

"Oh. It's not going to work. She has a boyfriend."

"They can still fuck."

"Are you aerious?" Jaemin looked up half amused.

"She's not married." she shrugged. "You need to loosen up."

"You have no morals." he declared.

"I'm proud of that." she winked. "Seriously, you need to try living life on the edge a little."

"Getting caught in bed and getting beaten up not wild enough for you?"

"Well, it depends. Were you handcuffed?"

Jaemin gasped. "Censor yourself, Y/N!"

"Or was she? What position were you guys caught in?" she knew she had crossed a line but somehow couldn't stop herself.

"Y/N!"

"Yes, Mr Na?"

Jaemin brought his face close to hers.

"I said stop it." he said, voice low and gravelly. Y/N felt herself pool.

"What if i don't?" she challenged him, looking him straight in the eye.

"I suggest you don't challenge me." he said through gritted teeth.

"I'll think about it." She said. folding her ams in front of her, eyes twinkling.

"Yo! What's Jaemin doing here?" Haechan asked as he plonked down on the chair next to hers.

Jaemin leaned back and relaxed, breaking into a smile.

"Y/N thinks I'm lost."

"You ARE lost." Y/N laughed, looking at Jaemin who was still keeping his composure. "Someone needs to guide you back onto the right path."

"I don't know. Being guided isn't my kind of thing. I prefer to be the one guiding."

"Now I'm lost!" Haechan whined. "What's happening?"

Y/N sighed.

"Let's go for lunch." she said.

Things got worse from there. Jaemin began avoiding her, staying cooped up in his room as much as he could, spending time either doing his assignments or gaming. Y/N was upset, though she wasn't sure if she was upset with herself or with him.

All she knew was things were awkward now. She tried texting him but he either didn't reply or replied with one word answers. She had to do something. There wasn't much opportunity though, since there never seemed a time where they were both home alone. And the last thing she wanted was for the rest of the guys to get involved.

Then one night two weeks later, all the boys decided to head out to the clubs to party to celebrate the submission of all their assignments. Y/N gave it a pass. She wasn't one for clubs - the loud music and the lights and the smells always gave her a headache. She had previously tried of course, but it mostly turned out unpleasant for her - the same throbbing headache that progressively got worse over the course of the night and made her feel sick.

So the guys headed out and she decided to soak in the bathtub in the bigger bathroom. She dropped her favourite vanilla scented bath bomb into the warm water, and got it after removing her clothes and giving the water a few swishes. This was the life, she thought. Who wanted to be stuck in some club against sweaty bodies and wake up with a hangover the next day?

After her bath, she took time to put on a mask and applied lotion to her body. She was glad all her assignments had been submitted, and this was a good time to pamper herself after all the hard work.

When she was done, she put on an oversized t-shirt that came down to her mid thigh and wore her favourite red cotton underwear. Feeling upbeat, she headed to the kitchen to make some pasta. It was just 9pm when the front door opened. She looked up from the ham she was slicing.

Jaemin. She forgot he had not gone with them. In fact, he had been out most of the day, probably at the cafe he worked at on some weekends.

"Need dinner?" she asked, somewhat unsure if he would respond. "I'm making some pasta."

"Dinner would be good," he nodded with a slight smile. "I can open a bottle of wine after i have my shower." He knew he just had to stop behaving like a dick now.

She grinned. "Yes please!"

He went and took a quick shower before coming back, smelling fresh.

"The bathroom smells nice." he said, sniffing. "Actually you smell nice too."

"Jaemin! At least say the food I'm making smells nice!" Y/N poked his arm. He embraced her from the back.

"I missed you." he said.

She felt his chest against her back.

"Missed you too. Why were you avoiding me?" she asked.

"Why were YOU avoiding me?" he asked her back.

Neither of them said anything.

She took the pan off the stove and divided the pasta into two bowls. Jaemin opened the wine and they both sat at the dining table for dinner. The air was tense as they ate silently.

"Jae," she said, not being able to take the silence any longer. "I know i shouldn't have ignored you. But I've been struggling."

He put his fork down. He tried to grab her hand but she pulled it away nervously.

"I'm listening, Y/N," he said gently.

"I can't stop thinking of yo...."

But she couldn't finish, as he grabbed her face and brought it closer to his. She felt her heart beat faster as he looked her in the eye.

"Why are you doing this?" he asked, looking at her in the eye, his face tensed up, his voice low and trembling. "Do you know what you're doing to me?"

"I know I'm probably not your type...." she began but he cut her off.

"Don't speak for me, Y/N. Everything about you drives me nuts! Your laughter, the way you tease me. Everything! You're such a bad girl, Y/N!"

"I've never said I was good. I don't have morals, remember?" she grinned. "Maybe you'd have to teach me how to behave, Mr Na."

He felt his cock twitch. He grabbed her by the arm.

"What are you doing?" she asked, struggling as he stood up, taking her with him. Roughly, he pushed her against the kitchen cabinet.

"Bend over!" he demanded, grip getting tighter. She had no choice but to comply, yelping as she felt his hand land hard on her butt.

"Ouch! What the hell, Jaemin?"

"You deserve to be spanked for taunting me in the library." he said through gritted teeth, landing another smack. She gasped.

"That hurts!"

"Good! Maybe next time you wouldn't think of being such a tease." he said, giving her yet another smack. "3! We're going to 10!"

"!0?!" she tried to wriggle out of his grip. It was no use.

"4!" he said, landing yet another slap. She bit her lip. It was hurting more and more as the number of spanks progressed. But she didn't dislike it.

"5!" she felt her eyes watering. This was getting too painful.

"6!"

"Jae, please, it hurts!"

"Say one more word and I'll make it 20!" he warned.

She gave up, whimpering as he gave her another 4 blows, tears rolling down her face. Finally he let her go. She turned around and shoved him.

"Do that one more time and watch what i'll do!" she warned. He grabbed her by the back of her neck, forcing her to look closely at him again.

"You need to get one thing right," he hissed, as he wiped her tears away with his fingers. "I'm the one in charge here."

"Oh yeah?" she challenged him. "We'll see about that."

"Listen, you're not in a position to argue with me. Do you want me to fuck you or not?" he asked. "Yes or no?"

Silence. She glared at him.

"Answer me." he said, glaring back.

"Fine." she said. "We'll play by your rules."

He let go, suddenly going back to his usual self. "The food's getting cold. Let's eat."

"No, Jae...." she pleaded. "Fuck me, now, please!"

"I'm not fucking you tonight, Y/N."

"Nobody's home now!"

"I'll decide and let you know when I'm ready," he said firmly.

She reaiised that she had to be fair and wait for him to be ready. She sighed.

"Fine." she said.

If only he knew how wet she was, from the spanking he gave her, she thought to herself.