#{Brutal flower: Lily}

[benbraeden]

tag drop ft. people.

[starkeyisthelastname]

hello lily…. i just had a thought…… about dealer!rafe and me on my birthday his girl celebrating her bday 💖💖……. i cannot stop thinking about him

hi baby! 💖 you better get ready because this man is ready to spoil you even more than already he does and take you to pound town 😜.. hope you like it sweet angel and have the best birthday!!! @oceandriveab

The morning of your birthday, you get awoken by his head between your thighs. His tongue deep in your wet hole and nose hitting your clit just right. He would look up at you just as your sleepy eyes met his, a smirk on his handsome face as he pulled back. “Happy birthday mama.” His voice raspy, watching you bite your lower lip as he then dived back down into your ocean of a pussy.

It was when you walked outside, as he was going to take you shopping that you saw your dream car wrapped perfectly in a pink bow. Rafe did most of the driving, but when he was taking care of “business”, you occasionally needed to go somewhere and what better way now with the brand new luxury vehicle that cost him a pretty penny. Not that he worried how much it cost, he paid for it in cash. (Dirty money at that. 😅). You would open the door, the passenger seat holding a giant bouquet of flowers, along with neatly wrapped boxes that read Dior, Chanel, Cartier, Louis Vuitton and stacks of cash wrapped in silky ribbon. You always wondered how much money this man really made, but never questioned it as you enjoyed the princess treatment too much.

He would then take you shopping, letting you have a pamper day before a beautiful private dinner on the waters of the Outer Banks. He needed you blissfully happy and tummy full before we gave you a brutal birthday fuck.

You may have been drunk off expensive liquor, but you felt every thick and long inch of your man’s cock as he slid it in your soaked little hole. He made sure your knees were bent back, giving you that deep shit all while talking dirty to his birthday girl.

“Shit… that’s it my pretty fuckin birthday princess. Got that pussy soaked for daddy, huh?” Rafe drawled out, tone low and cocky as he watched his massive pipe stretch your fluttering hole out.

“Daddy…” You whined, your pretty eyes rolling back as he hit your sweet spot over and over. He was already about to give you your first orgasm of the night and you knew there were many more to come. “I.. slow down..” You gasped, the feeling almost too much as you reached out how to tap his toned stomach. It wasn’t that you wanted him to stop, but you were about to explode and embarrassed how quickly it was coming on.

“Move your hand and take this fuckin big dick. You know I’m not done with you yet, we are just getting started.” Rafe said between breaths, your plea following on deaf ears as he continued the hard thrusts to your sloppy cunt. “Giving my girl the birthday dick she deserves, yeah?”

He was about to give you round after round, making your birthday end with your pussy sore and the sheets soaked. A new car in the driveway, diamonds, designer bags, fed expensive food, and getting a dick one dreamed of having.

[mercillery]

can you please write a series of headcanons for yandere Zenon falling for a nun female reader who is a friend of sister Lily and father Orsi?

btw i really love your writing 💕❤️

WARNINGS: FEMALE READER + RELIGIOUS TOPICS + NOT PROOFREAD

NOTES: IM ALIVE GUYS I SWEAR IM ALIVE. ALSO, I DID THIS ON A WHIM SO IT MIGHT NOT BE THE BEST. SORRY AND THANK YOU.

Oh, you poor, unsuspecting soul.

You're about to hop on a roller coaster so wild and unpredictable that even the most hardcore adrenaline junkies would pause and reconsider their life choices before strapping in. Seriously, who could have predicted that someone as cold and ruthless as Zenon—yes, Zenon, the guy whose hobbies probably include brooding and looking dramatically into the distance—would ever let thoughts of anything other than his missions and duties creep into his mind?

And not just anyone, mind you, but a nun? The irony is ironing. Zenon falling for someone devoted to peace and virtue? It’s like discovering the Grim Reaper secretly volunteers at a kitten shelter on weekends. But hey, life has a funny way of throwing curveballs when you least expect them, and Zenon catching feelings might just be the curveball of the century.

Zenon's interest in you doesn't start as love—oh no, that would be too simple, too human. Instead, it begins as a fixation, a curiosity he can’t quite shake. You see, he’s drawn to your purity, your unwavering faith, and that infuriating devotion to something greater than yourself. For someone like Zenon, whose life is steeped in shadows and bloodshed, these qualities are both intriguing and utterly alien. It’s like he’s found a rare, delicate flower growing in the middle of a battlefield—something that shouldn’t exist, and yet, here it is, flourishing despite the chaos.

Your kindness and warmth are stark contrasts to the cold, brutal world Zenon knows so well. To him, you're almost like a living embodiment of everything he's not—and, frankly, everything he’s never wanted to be. Zenon is perfectly content with his dark, brooding existence; thank you very much. The idea of being anything else? Laughable. But still, there’s something about your devoted nature that tugs at him in ways he doesn't fully understand.

It’s not love—at least not yet—but there’s definitely something there, something that keeps him coming back, if only to try and figure out why someone like you exists in a world like his.

Zenon doesn’t harbor any outward disgust toward religion—he’s not the type to waste energy on something as trivial as disdain. Instead, religion just makes him tilt his head slightly, those dark, intimidating eyes narrowing as if he's trying to solve a puzzle he doesn’t really care about. He’s genuinely baffled by how someone could be so dedicated, so selfless, so utterly consumed by their devotion to something intangible. How could anyone willingly bind themselves to something as abstract as faith?

If we're being completely honest here, Zenon probably finds the whole concept of religion utterly useless. In his mind, power is the only currency that matters, and in the face of overwhelming strength, everything else—including religion—seems trivial at best. He sees religion as something that would only hold a person back, a crutch that prevents them from grasping real power. After all, why rely on divine intervention when you can take matters into your own hands?

But does he care if someone else wants to cling to their faith? Not really. Zenon’s not interested in converting anyone to his worldview; he’s too focused on his own goals for that. If people want to hold themselves back with their religious beliefs, that’s their problem, not his. He just shrugs it off, filing it away as another incomprehensible quirk of humanity that he doesn’t need to understand and thinks it just holds everyone back.

But anyway—over time, this curiosity of his starts to twist and morph into something far more dangerous—an obsession. As this obsession deepens, Zenon begins to rationalize the strange feelings he's grappling with, trying to make sense of them in a way that aligns with his dark worldview. He starts to see your innocence as something fragile, something that needs to be protected—by him and only him.

Of course, Zenon’s idea of protection isn’t exactly comforting. It's dark, suffocating, and possessive. In his mind, the only way to keep you truly safe is to isolate you from the world, to lock you away where no one else can reach you or taint your purity. This twisted logic extends to everyone around you, even those closest to you, like Sister Lily and Father Orsi.

Sure, even if they’re like your family, even if you dearly love them with every fiber of your being, and even if Zenon knows all of this—he still sees them as obstacles. And let’s be real; that’s not exactly surprising. To him, they’re not threats, just hurdles he needs to clear before claiming his prize: you. I’m not saying he’d immediately jump to murder, but it’s definitely crossed his mind. Whether he goes that far depends entirely on how much resistance they put up.

Zenon isn’t one for subtlety or long-winded schemes. He’s not going to waste time orchestrating elaborate events to make it seem like Sister Lily or Father Orsi are in danger or untrustworthy—that’s just too much work for something he could easily solve by just killing them. He’s got power, and he’s more than willing to use it to carve a quicker, more direct path to you. If they become too much of a nuisance, well, let’s just say Zenon’s not above using lethal force to clear the way. Sorry, but in his mind, it’s a simple equation: they’re in his way, and he’s not one to let anything stand between him and what he wants. Of course, if by some miracle Sister Lily and Father Orsi step aside and let him through—though let’s be real, that’s about as likely as Zenon deciding to take up knitting—they might just live to see another day.

That being said, once Zenon realizes that he’s not just obsessed with you and that his feelings run far deeper than mere fixation, well, say goodbye to your freedom. Forever.

Zenon’s first move would be to isolate you completely, cutting you off from everyone and everything you’ve ever known. He wouldn’t hesitate to threaten the lives of those around you if it meant coercing you into submission. It’s just a necessary step to secure your loyalty and your obedience. He’d present himself as your only protector, the one person who can truly keep you safe in a world filled with chaos, danger, and evil—a world that’s constantly trying to kill that innocence you have. To Zenon, this isn’t just a twisted power play; it’s an act of love. He genuinely believes that by keeping you close, by holding you tight in his suffocating grip, he’s shielding you from the darkness that he knows all too well.

And yes, Zenon is the very embodiment of that darkness, the very thing he’s supposedly protecting you from, but in his mind, that’s just more reason for you to stay with him. You’re precious, sacred even, and he can’t bear the thought of losing you—especially after what happened with Allen. Oh how much you remind him of that sunshine boy, that bright light that was snuffed out too soon. He doesn’t want to experience that pain again, that devastating loss. So he convinces himself that this is the only way, that by keeping you close, he’s protecting both you and himself from a repeat of the past.

But while Zenon is dead set on “protecting” your purity as a nun, he's also not above trying to chip away at the very core of what makes you who you are. He takes a strange satisfaction in subtly undermining your faith, poking holes in the foundations of your beliefs whenever he gets the chance. He'll challenge your views on life, death, and the morality of your God, all while weaving in his own twisted philosophy, as if trying to make you see the world through his cold, unforgiving eyes.

As much as he’s intrigued by your devotion, it also kinda grates on him. How can someone be so unwavering in the face of a world as dark and merciless as this one? He might be your self-appointed protector, but there’s a part of him that wants to see you stumble—a lot, actually. Zenon’s not satisfied with just keeping you safe; he wants to break your spirit and mold you into someone who sees the world the way he does. He’s not just after your obedience—he wants your mind, your very soul, to align with his own warped perspective.

In fact, at some point, Zenon would likely want you to abandon your faith altogether. He’d see it as a weakness, something that blinds you to the harsh realities he believes in. In his mind, your faith and ideals are naïve, a set of fragile beliefs that will only lead to your destruction if left unchecked. He sees his efforts to sway you as an act of mercy, a twisted form of salvation. To him, if you could just shed those old beliefs and embrace his darker, more “realistic” worldview, you’d be stronger for it—stronger and safer, as far as he’s concerned.

So while Zenon might claim to be protecting your purity, the truth is much more sinister. He wants to strip away everything that makes you who you are, to rebuild you in his own image, and in doing so, bind you to him in a way that goes far beyond physical control. To him, that’s the ultimate act of protection: not just guarding your body, but reshaping your very soul.

Moreover, Zenon’s icy logic and emotional detachment would make it utterly futile to try and reason with him—even if you’re usually a master at persuading others. With him, all your skills in negotiation and reasoning would hit an unyielding wall. Zenon isn't the kind of man who can be swayed by emotional appeals or logical arguments. His mind is set, and once he’s decided on something, there’s no changing it. If you ever attempted to escape or reach out for help, you’d quickly learn just how unforgiving he can be. Any act of defiance would be met with swift and brutal consequences, the kind that would make you think twice about ever trying it again.

Zenon doesn’t see you as an individual with your own thoughts, feelings, and agency. To him, you’re a precious, pure possession—something to be guarded, controlled, and kept away from the world. He might speak of love, but his version of it is suffocating, possessive, and devoid of the genuine respect and care that real love requires. Instead of being cherished as a person, you’re reduced to an object of obsession, someone whose freedom and autonomy are sacrificed on the altar of his twisted affections.

In Zenon’s mind, the endgame is crystal clear. He’s convinced that by breaking your will and dismantling the person you once were, he can rebuild you into something that aligns with his dark, twisted worldview. If you were to ever fully submit to his control, he’d see it as a victory—a validation of his power and a confirmation that his way is the only way. But here’s the thing: that victory wouldn’t bring Zenon any real peace or happiness. Despite his relentless pursuit, Zenon is a man consumed by darkness, and even if he managed to break you, he’d likely find himself staring into an abyss of his own making.

The purity and innocence that first drew Zenon to you would be gone, stripped away by his relentless need to control and reshape you. In their place would be something hollow and broken—a reflection of Zenon himself. He might have you under his thumb, but the person he was so fascinated by, the light that caught his attention, would be extinguished. And what then? Zenon is too far gone to appreciate what he’s lost, but on some level, he would likely feel the emptiness of his so-called victory.

Overall, Zenon’s pursuit of you is more than just a desire to possess; it’s a reflection of his own inner turmoil. He’s a man who, in trying to hold onto something pure, only succeeds in dragging both you and himself further into the darkness. The very thing that made you special to him—your purity—becomes a casualty of his obsession. And in trying to mold you into something that mirrors his own brokenness, Zenon only deepens his descent into the void, leaving behind nothing but the remnants of what once was and what could never be again.

[verysmallcyborg]

Fornax Val'ethtue

B A S I C S

Name: Fornax Val'ethtue (or Fyrstyrn [fire star] Dotharl, when thinking of the two naming conventions)

Nicknames: They don't have much nicknames, however friends that know Fornax well enough can call them "Lily" (Delmira especially calls them that, this is because of their association with the flower), otherwise only Ryss gets to call her sea puppy or treasure

Age: 37 (by Endwalker)

Nameday: 5th Sun of the 1st Umbral Moon

Race: Sea Wolf Roegadyn + Xaela Au Ra (au roe, if you will. tehe)

Gender: Non-binary Butch (she/they)

Orientation: Lesbian

Profession: Outside of WoL responsibilities... bodyguard and marksman

P H Y S I C A L     A S P E C  T S

Hair: Black with a bunch of grey hairs. If it's short, it's spiky and either has the sides and the lower back of it shaved down, or they have their sideburns. If it's longer, then it's generally messy and uneven with a "wild" look.

Eyes: Black sclera, slit pupils, and vibrant orange. Fornax's eyes only glow because their dad taught them how to apply limbal rings when she was young, but never learned how to accurately do it (or when to stop doing it, until there was a full glow) after his death.

Skin: Dark grey, has a black gradient starting at their forearms and goes all the way to their hands. Has a fair amount of scales, though some are broken and ripped off around scars.

Tattoos/scars: Decorated in scars all over their face and body, but the most notable ones are on their face, neck, and torso. Some of her face scars are from saving a coeurl kit from hunters, and briefly got mauled by its mother when returning it (they understood the protective instinct, but OUCH). The scars across their neck and chest was an incident that put them at deaths door, and then a large scar on their side is from... WELL. Ryss. :) Don't worry about it :)

Very important: their top scars!! Those tits: chopped off. Also the end of their tail (that doesn't have the top layer of thick scales) has a bite scar from the Major-General, no one believes them when they say a tiny shark with tiny legs bit them while fishing.

Fornax has a very subtle trail of faint orange stars on their back for a tattoo!

F A M I L Y

Parents: Unnamed Roegadyn mother & Xaela father. Her mom was a traveling merchant of sorts, while her dad was part of the Dotharl clan. Unfortunately, both were murdered while Fornax was young... :')

Siblings: No siblings

Grandparents: N/A (I don't think that far with family LOL)

In-laws and Other: No idea about in-laws, but for other: their lovely spouse, Ryssrael!!! :)

Pets: Befriends every stray and animal that they cross, but specifically, they have a little black coeurl and a baby amaro that follow them around.

S K I L L S

Abilities: Very skilled with a rifle and axes of any kind (WAR/MCH combo), though they are in their best element when within melee range. Weaponizes their teeth, claws, and tail as often as they can, and wields terrifying, brutal strength that amplifies when angered or under a need to win and/or survive. Best not to piss off a butch who could pull an entire ship with just them and their partner!!

Hobbies: LOVES cooking and all kinds of hands-on crafts, but specifically knitting and crocheting.

T R A I T S

Most Positive Trait: Their unwavering determination

Most Negative Trait: Has a self-destructive habit of fleeing and attempting to isolate themselves when hurt

L I K E S

Colors: Most warm colors, baby blue, black, and purple

Smells: Burning firewood, ocean breezes on the sunrise/sunset, the stinging metallic scent of blood, flowers in a field, freshly cooked food (especially stews and bread)

Textures: The subtle raised skin of old scars, the wool off of freshly sheared karakuls, tree bark, warm hands against their scales, horns, and tail

Drinks: Apple cider, hot chocolate, fruity beverages

O T H E R    D E T A I L S

Smokes: Not really, unless offered

Drinks: Only in good company/socially

Drugs: Recreationally? Maybe, otherwise nah

Mount Issuance: Still has their red chocobo (HEH...) but he spends his days sleeping and chilling in the garden of their yard. Nowadays they use a comically tiny airship.

Been Arrested: Several times by the Maelstrom and Flames, mostly when they were a teenager & young adult because of petty thefts and getting in trouble for some of the jobs they took on to scrape by. Fornax has gotten significantly better at escaping and hiding though, which is kinda funny when you wonder, how does anyone lose a 8ft/244cm tall au roe with a big ole tail?

Tagged by @hazelkjt and @cindernet-explorer!!! thank you <3

UHHHHHH i've seen most folks i follow be tagged already, so i'm pointing at the viewer. Your Turn

[hp-hcs]

(Fine, I’ll do it my damn self: part 6 of my silly lil mlm stories <3)

love triangle — rival! ron weasley x male! reader

solving a love triangle in the only correct (and gay) way

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

“Hey, Hermione,” you said with a cheeky grin, sitting across from her.

She glanced up. “Hey, Y/N..?”

“D’you wanna go to the Yule Ball with me?”

“Oh! Uh, that’s very sweet of you to offer-”

“-but I’m sure Hermione would much rather go with someone else,” interrupted the annoyance that was Ron Fucking Weasley.

You glared at him. “But of course, going to a dance with a platonic date is rather pathetic, wouldn’t you agree, Granger?”

Ron opened his mouth to snap back, when Hermione interrupted the both of them. “Boys, boys, you’re both pretty, stop fighting. I’ve already got a date.”

You turn to look at her quizzically, saying at the same time as Ron, “Who?”

“Well, if you must know, Viktor Krum.”

~~~

The Ball crept closer, Hogwarts’ halls alive with excited whispers and laughs. It seemed like everyone had a date except for you. And Ron, you supposed.

(And Ron’s friend, Harry. Although you had sneered in passing to the ginger, “looks like he’s got eyes for your sister, Weasley,” which had almost led to a fight breaking out in the halls as he hollered for you to “shut your bloody mouth!”)

((Sure enough, within the week, Harry Potter had a date to the Yule Ball—Ginny Weasley. You took great pleasure at smiling smugly at Ron whenever you saw him.))

Hermione’s rejection hadn’t deterred either of you though. Ron seemed determined to outdo you. When you gave her a tiger lily you’d picked in Herbology, Ron sent a bouquet of flowers to her dorm. When you split a Chocolate Frog with her, Ron took her to Honeydukes. Anytime you saw each other in the halls, you glared daggers sharp enough to make the paintings rattle on the walls uncomfortably. It was all-out war.

Even the teachers seemed to notice, for better or for worse.

“I’m taking your girlfriend to Flourish & Blotts this weekend, Weasley,” you whispered casually under your breath to your elbow partner in Potions.

“I swear to Merlin, L/N, I’ll-”

“Mr. Weasley, Mr. L/N, if you’d care to pay attention rather than chatter about your meaningless weekend plans,” Professor Snape drawled, glaring his beady little eyes on you both. “Ten points from Gryffindor.”

You stifled a giggle under your breath, accidentally making eye contact with Ron, whose embarrassed expression and red-tinged ears made you just absolutely lose it. You had to clamp one hand over your mouth to prevent any laughter from escaping.

Then, much to your surprise, Ron started chuckling quietly too, cheeks still flushed from the reprimand.

“Pay attention,” he drawled under his breath in a mocking imitation of Snape. You snorted, clearing your throat to disguise the noise when the Professor in question whirled around to see who dared disrupt his class.

~~~

After class, you elbowed Ron in the hall. “Man, Snape’s such a dick, right?”

“Totally. He’s got it out for me, I swear.”

“I think he’s just got it out for Gryffindors in general. Remember when he antagonized Longbottom so bad that he was his boggart?”

“Yeah, that was brutal,” Ron shook his head, as you both walked to your next class together. “Hey, look, I just wanted to say like, sorry? I’ve been kind of an ass to you this whole year…” Ron trailed off.

“Nah, it’s fine, man. I haven’t been much better. I think we both kind of got caught up in the competition of asking her out,” you shrugged. There was no reason to clarify who her was. “Truce?”

“Yeah,” Ron smiled. “I’d like that.”

~~~

So here you were, alone at the Yule Ball, your friends having left you to dance with their dates. You leaned against the wall, watching the couples twirl around with a mild tinge of jealousy. Sipping your drink, you surveyed the crowd, appraising everyone.

When your eyes landed on Hermione, who was being lifted up and spun around by Viktor Krum, your first thought was not one of envy, but rather, she would’ve looked much better in blue. Your gaze drifted to her date, and lingered on Krum for a moment too long.

Damn, he looks good, you thought to yourself, blinking quickly at the thought. Where did that come from?

Ron sidled up to you, looking rather smug for someone wearing such an ugly outfit. “She’s having the time of her life, isn’t she?”

“Huh? Oh- yeah, yeah, I guess,” you mumbled, your gaze drifting back to Viktor.

How can someone look so hot? That ought to be illegal.

Ron’s eyes narrowed, and he followed your gaze. “Merlin, dude. Are you staring at Krum?”

“What? No! S-shut up!”

He snickered, patting your shoulder patronizingly. “S’alright, man. I’ve been watching Diggory all night myself.”

Your eyebrows raised in surprise. “You’re-”

“Yeah,” he cut you off, lips thinning a bit. “That bother you?”

“Not a hypocrite, Weasley.”

He glanced at you, clearly taken off guard. You kept his gaze for a long moment, finding the way his blush matched his hair to be rather cute.

“Care to dance then, L/N?”

“If you can keep up, Weasley.”

You two took to the dance floor, twirling around like idiots and laughing loudly. Neither of you noticed your respective friends, and the teacher chaperones, watching on in morbid fascination.

And when you kissed at the end of the song, neither of you noticed Harry scowling as he handed both Ginny and Hermione a galleon each.

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

[pjsk--shitposts]

Masterlist of every song and how long its in-game version is

The other day I was bored out of my mind and decided to further fuel my PJSK obsession by going on the wiki and copy pasting every song into a Google doc in order by their in-game length. Some are exclusive to certain servers, and some might be translated a bit wonky because I didn't know whether to use the English translation or not, but other than that everything is pretty straightforward.

The whole list is below!

1:14 Hitorinbo Envy

1:24 Jackpot Sad Girl

1:27 Heartbeat Pairing

1:31 Dim Light, Wavering 1/f Noise

1:31 Nomad

1:31 Parasol Cider

1:31 The Daughter of Evil

1:32 Ready Steady

1:32 The Servant of Evil

1:33 ODDS&ENDS

1:34 Bless Your Breath

1:34 Realize

1:34 Viva Happy

1:35 Dramaturgy

1:35 Hibana -Reloaded-

1:35 Marshall Maximizer

1:37 Booo!

1:37 Connecting the Stars

1:37 Highlight

1:37 On the Verge

1:37 Worldwide Wander

1:38「１」

1:38 BRING IT ON

1:38 Telecaster B-Boy

1:39 ARQETYPE

1:39 Beat Eater

1:39 BURIKI NO DANCE

1:39 ECHO

1:39 Glory Steady Go!

1:39 Gunjou Sanka

1:39 Hated By Life

1:39 Waltz of the Deceased

1:40 Composing the Future

1:40 Hello, World!

1:41 CRaZY

1:41 Miku Miku ni Shite Ageru♪

1:42 City

1:42 Dance Robot Dance

1:42 Darling Dance

1:42 Evil Food Eater Conchita

1:42 Hello, Worker

1:42 Judas

1:42 Kirapipi★Kirapika

1:42 Limbo

1:42 Reborn

1:42 Tale of the Deep-sea Lily

1:42 World’s End Dancehall

1:43 I nandesu

1:43 Love ka?

1:43 Metamo Re:born

1:44 Charles

1:44 Float Planner

1:44 Jishou Mushoku

1:44 The Bubble Future

1:44 We Are the Stain Busters!

1:46 Cinema

1:46 drop pop candy

1:46 Ice Drop

1:46 Matryoshka

1:46 Newly Edgy Idols

1:46 Peaky Peaky

1:46 Unsung Melodies

1:47 Becoming Potatoes

1:47 Lost One’s Weeping

1:47 Lower

1:47 ROKI

1:47 TOKIO FUNKA

1:47 Twilight Light

1:48 JUMPIN’ OVER !

1:48 Living for a Millenium

1:48 Showtime Ruler

1:48 Starry Sky Melody

1:48 We Are

1:49 Amanojaku

1:49 Becoming Empty

1:49 Dance Orchestra

1:49 Kyuukurarin

1:49 Purpose

1:49 Wah Wah World

1:50 From Tokyo

1:50 Hm? Ah, yes.

1:50 Singing of a Flower

1:50 Ura Omote Lovers

1:50 Your Adventure Log Has Vanished!

1:51 Cutlery

1:51 magic number

1:51 Otome Dissection

1:51 P.h.

1:52 As You Like It

1:52 Ego Rock

1:52 Hello Builder

1:52 Teammates

1:52 SEKAI

1:52 The WALL

1:53 Hibikase

1:53 Totemo Itai Itagaritai

1:53 You’re Not in the Epilogue

1:54 At The Mercy

1:54 Awaiting Clear Skies

1:54 Color of Drops

1:54 Filament Fever

1:54 Forward

1:54 Kanadetomosusora

1:54 Kitty

1:54 needLe

1:54 Romeo and Cinderella

1:55 A Moment in the Sun

1:55 Black ★ Rock Shooter

1:55 Bottle Cake

1:55 Do Not Go

1:55 On&On

1:55 Samsa

1:56 1000 light years

1:56 Beyond the Way

1:56 Bocca della Verità

1:56 Near

1:56 Once Upon a Dream

1:56 Positive☆Dance Time

1:56 Teo

1:57 Cendrillon 10th Anniversary

1:57 Devil’s Manner

1:57 *Hello, Planet.

1:57 I want to be your heart

1:57 Torinoko City

1:58 alive

1:58 Angel’s Clover

1:58 Bad ∞ End ∞ Night

1:58 Integral

1:59 39 Music!

1:59 Goodbye Princess

1:59 Melty Land Nightmare

1:59 Passion at 25:00

1:59 Tears of Garnet

1:59 Where shall we go?

2:00 Dokuzu

2:00 Nostalogic

2:00 The Tailor of Enbizaka

2:01 Aoku Kakero!

2:01 Awake Now

2:01 Becoming Pigs Yeah Yeah

2:01 Close to Gray

2:01 Jangsanbeom

2:01 Kimi no Yoru Wo Kure

2:01 Law-Evading Rock

2:01 Lucky☆Orb

2:01 Nijiiro Stories

2:01 (Not) a Devil

2:01 Pulse of the Meteor

2:01 Rolling Girl

2:01 The Tetrad that Illuminates the World

2:01 The World Hasn’t Even Started Yet

2:01 Today is Also Cheerful

2:02 Fixer

2:02 Flyer!

2:02 Happy Cheat Day

2:02 Heat Abnormal

2:02 HERO

2:02 I know Ai Nou

2:02 I’m a Loser!

2:02 Kosho Yashiki Satsujin Jiken

2:02 Patchwork Staccato

2:02 STAGE OF SEKAI

2:02 We’re Still Underground

2:03 Clear and Serene

2:03 CYBERPUNK DEAD BOY

2:03 Hand in Hand

2:03 Happy Halloween

2:03 Heartbeat #0822

2:03 Meltdown

2:03 More! Jump! More!

2:03 Namo Naki Kakumei

2:03 Showtime x Audience

2:03 Six Trillion Years and Overnight Story

2:03 Song of “AI”

2:03 Super Last Brutal Sister Flandre S

2:03 Tell Your World

2:04 Fragile

2:04 Love Material

2:04 Mischievous Function

2:04 Osmanthus

2:04 Senbonzakura

2:04 Time Machine

2:04 Tondemo-Wonderz

2:04 Vampire's ∞ pathoS

2:04 Voices

2:05 1, 2, FanClub

2:05 An Almost-full Moon

2:05 Cantarella

2:05 Copycat

2:05 flos

2:05 Greenlights Serenade

2:05 Heart-pounding Roller Coaster

2:05 Hide and Seek

2:05 Made to Order

2:05 Niccori^^Chousa-tai no Theme

2:05 Pair of Wintry Winds

2:05 Starry Sky Orchestra

2:05 Rain and Petra

2:05 Tricologe

2:05 Watashi wa Ame

2:05 Weigh Anchor

2:06 Electric Angel

2:06 Goodbye

2:06 Intergalactic Bound

2:06 MikuFiesta

2:06 NEO

2:06 Opera! Space Opera!

2:06 Theater

2:06 The EmpErroR

2:07 Chikyuu Saigo no Kokuhaku wo

2:07 Doctor=Funk Beat

2:07 Goodbye Sengen

2:07 Lag train

2:07 Next Nest

2:07 on the rocks

2:07 Regulus

2:07 Sou Datta!!

2:07 Tokugawa Cupnoodle Prohibition

2:08 88☆彡

2:08 Bitter Choco Decoration

2:08 Bug

2:08 Can’t Make a Song!!

2:08 Children Record

2:08 Imaginary Love Story

2:08 Judgment of Corruption

2:08 “Nh-Uh-Uh.”

2:08 Night Sky Patrol of Tomorrow

2:08 OGYARINIZER

2:08 ONESELF

2:08 Red Land Marker

2:08 Sorega Anata No Shiawase To Shitemo

2:08 Venom

2:09 Cosmospice

2:09 Flyway

2:09 Hitsuji ga Ippiki

2:09 Hug

2:09 Non-Breath Oblige

2:09 The First Melody

2:09 The Miniature Garden’s Coral

2:09 Traffic Jam

2:09 YAMINABE!!!!

2:10 Airhead

2:10 Aishite Aishite Aishite

2:10 Akotoba

2:10 If

2:10 Leia - Remind

2:10 Q

2:11 Brand New Day

2:11 It’s Just Life

2:11 Literary Nonsense

2:11 Ray

2:11 Remote Control

2:11 SHANTI

2:11 Stardust Utopia

2:12 Blessing

2:12 Butterfly on your Right Shoulder

2:12 Cute Girlfriend

2:12 Just Be Friends

2:12 Kashika

2:12 Kusare-gedou and Chocolate

2:12 Love Trial

2:12 Piano x Forte x Scandal

2:12 Play With Fire

2:12 Silver Collector

2:12 STROBE LAST

2:12 The Peachy Key

2:12 Unhappy Refrain

2:13 At God’s Mercy

2:13 Ghost City Tokyo

2:13 Heart Forecast

2:13 Happy Synthesizer

2:13 Marshmary

2:13 My Palette is Full of You

2:13 PaIII. SENSATION

2:13 Stella

2:13 Twilight Melody

2:14 Disco No.39

2:14 GimmexGimme

2:14 Milk Crown on Sonechka

2:14 Sand Planet

2:15 blender

2:15 Gift from the Princess who Brought Sleep

2:15 IDSMILE

2:15 KING

2:15 SHOW OFF

2:15 Ten Thousand Stars

2:15 Tokyo Teddy Bear

2:15 When the First Love Ends

2:16 16-year Old Heart

2:16 Alone

2:16 Aun no Beats

2:16 Blue Planet

2:16 Unknown Mother Goose

2:16 Unaware Drunkard

2:16 Usseewa

2:16 Wonder Style

2:17 ENVY BABY

2:17 Kyoufuu All Back

2:18 CIRCUS PANIC!!!

2:18 Donut Hole

2:18 FREELY TOMORROW

2:18 Hurray

2:18 Into the Night

2:18 Karakuri Pierrot

2:18 Somehow

2:18 TRASH and TRASH!

2:19 Cell Phone Love Story

2:19 DAYBREAK FRONTLINE

2:19 Eternal Aria

2:19 Inferno

2:19 Luka Luka ★ Night Fever

2:19 Meru

2:19 METEOR

2:19 MOTTO!!!

2:19 Pheles

2:19 Mr. Showtime

2:19 The Snow White Princess Is

2:19 Un-Lock

2:20 Because You’re Here

2:20 Brain Revolution Girl

2:20 Dreamin Chuchu

2:20 Getting Faster and Faster

2:20 MACHINEGUN POEM DOLL

2:20 Music Like Magic!

2:20 Spring Storm

2:20 Yobanashi Deceive

2:21 DSCF

2:21 folern

2:21 Hopes and Tears at the End Mark

2:21 Kokoro

2:21 Lonely Universe

2:21 Odo

2:21 Sick of House!

2:21 Vampire

2:22 1925

2:22 Bloom in Mud

2:22 Double Lariat

2:22 DREAM PLACE

2:22 Ghost Rule

2:22 I Can’t Win Against Dense Guys!

2:22 Junky Night Town Orchestra

2:22 Last Score

2:22 Spoiled Princess

2:23 39

2:23 Chururira Chururira Daddadda!

2:23 Jouou

2:23 Kagerou Daze

2:23 Love is War

2:23 Slow Downer

2:23 Stardust Medley

2:23 THE END OF HATSUNE MIKU

2:23 Uninterrupted Indigo

2:24 Alien Alien

2:24 Brain Fluid Explosion Girl

2:24 Help me, ERINNNNNN!!

2:24 Invisible

2:24 Irony

2:24 Phony

2:24 RAD DOGS

2:24 Snowman

2:24 YY

2:25 Attract Light

2:25 Calc.

2:25 Dawn and Fireflies

2:25 Decade

2:25 Deep-sea Girl

2:25 Fräulein=Biblioteca

2:25 Ifuudoudou

2:25 Interviewer

2:26 Childish War

2:26 Hello / How Are You

2:26 Miracle Paint

2:26 Solar System Disco

2:26 This is the Happiness and Peace of Mind Committee

2:26 yomosugara kimi omou

2:27 Afterglow

2:27 Bad Apple!!

2:27 Blue Star

2:27 Change Me

2:27 Egoist

2:28 Attakaito

2:28 Even So, it’s OK

2:28 God-ish

2:28 Imperial Girl

2:28 Melancholic

2:28 Our 16bit Wars

2:28 Rin-chan Now!

2:28 sweety glitch

2:29 Cool Me Down

2:29 JINSEI [our life]

2:29 Kimagure Mercy

2:29 ONLINE GAME ADDICTS SPRECHCHOR

2:29 Paradichlorobenzene

2:29 Summertime Record

2:29 Sweet Magic

2:29 UNDERWATER

2:30 Ah, It’s a Wonderful Cat Life!

2:30 Dear

2:30 My Love is Hellfire

2:30 Villain

2:31 Colorful Marine Snow

2:31 Good Weather

2:31 Rainy Snowdrop

2:31 Sage

2:31 Sharing the World

2:31 Tengaku

2:31 Thousand Year Solo

2:32 Akuyaku ni Kiss Scene wo

2:32 Alter Ego

2:33 FUTURE EVE

2:33 Relay Outer

2:34 ÅMARA (The Great Intelligence)

2:34 Gehenna

2:34 It was a very nice June

2:34 SEKAI-Chan and KAFU-Chan's Otsukai Gassoukyoku

2:35 All I Need are Things I Like

2:35 Dear Doppelganger 

2:35 from Y to Y

2:35 Miku

2:35 Retainer Supplanting His Lord

2:35 Setsuna Trip

2:36 Be the MUSIC!

2:36 Blue Paint

2:36 Hollow

2:36 Identity

2:36 I’m Mine

2:36 Incomplete Anthem

2:36 Lost and Found

2:37 New Human Race

2:38 Mirai

2:38 Moonlight

2:38 SnowMix♪

2:39 glow

2:39 Shoujo Rei

2:40 Don’t Fight the Music

2:40 Overcode

2:40 The Intense Voice of Hatsune Miku

2:40 What’s Up? Pop!

2:41 Syndrome

2:42 Growing Up Together

2:42 One, Two, Three

2:43 MarbleBlue.

2:44 Dance Robo

2:46 Journey

2:47 Zunda Party Night

2:49 Angel’s Wing.

2:50 World is Mine

3:01 Melt

3:02 Hatsune Creation Myth4:59 The Intense Voice of Hatsune Miku (APPEND)

[ruinofchimera]

I think it’s also clear that Snape is Voldemort’s exception when it comes to class and blood status. He has underprivileged minions like Greyback who operate on the fringes, but there aren’t exactly a whole lot of other dirt poor half bloods who’ve made it into his inner circle, and there’s a reason why Bellatrix distrusts him far more than any of the other Death Eaters who claimed they’d been under the Imperius curse, and it’s because she doesn’t consider him as one of them.

Lily, as a beautiful and charming Gryffindor who is beloved of the very well connected Slughorn and the headmaster and the wealthy pureblood James Potter, actually seems to have more room for social mobility than teenage Severus as they look towards adulthood despite him being nominally more privileged as a half blood. All dependant on patronage of course, so that’s problematic in itself, and patronage won’t save anybody from terrorists in the end. Lily to her immense credit recognises this in joining the Order when she could’ve kept her head down. But that tension isn’t nothing when it comes to unpicking their dynamic.

There’s a reason I’ve been steering clear of the whole Snape and Voldemort dynamic, despite how relevant it would be to just about every discussion I’ve had about Severus. See, if there’s anything in the series that haunts me—keeps me tossing and turning at night—it’s that twisted, enigmatic relationship between Tom and Severus. Not just what’s written plain as day in the books, mind you. I’m talking about what’s lurking beneath, the things left unsaid. Because Snape is indeed Voldemort’s exception, and not only in being let into a circle that’s usually locked tight for purebloods. No, Tom crosses lines for Severus over and over again, bending his own rules. I refuse to chalk that up to bad writing; there’s something deliberate about the way their interactions stand out. Voldemort’s treatment of Snape falls right out of step with the essence of Tom’s character. That alone not only leaves acres of space for interpretation—there’s a bloody demand for it. In any other fandom, their relationship would’ve been taken apart a hundred ways already—fanfiction, art, endless headcanons. But here, Snape’s entire existence got reduced to Lily Evans, and fans call it a day. Meanwhile, his massive, fascinating dynamic with Voldemort just sits there, untouched, quietly shaping the entire outcome of the story. As I said at the start, once I get going, there’s no reining me in. So, hands up—I’ll stop myself here. Maybe one day I’ll dive into the complexity of their relationship in a proper meta, but for now, I’ll spare you from my rambling about that deliciously controversial relationship.

Now, as for Severus and Lily, the tension between them isn’t just part of the story—it is the story. Brutal, unforgiving, and about as tragic as you can get. Their mutual raw emotional wreckage is the precise reason why it works so damn well for me. If someone (or a horde of someones) wants to water that down to the sob story of a certain ginger flower’s suffering—fine by me, really. I’ve said it all on that sensitive matter. Be that as it may.

[jerzwriter]

In the Garden

Thank you to the always lovely @aria-ashryver for this ask! Come spend the first spring day in Olympus's garden!

Book: Wake the Dead Characters: Zoe Rivera (F!MC), Troy Hassan, May Words: 1,100 Rating: General A/N: @choicesaprilchallenge24 | Vegetable Garden and @choicesholidays "Spring is a time of new beginnings, how appropriate..." (though I tweaked it just a bit!)

Spring is a time of new beginnings, so it was no surprise that on its first warm day, the residents of Olympus were eager to be outside. After a brutally cold winter, it was evident that spring fever still existed, even after a zombie apocalypse, and the colony’s leader was not immune.

Scrunching down atop a patch of soil, Zoe stopped for a moment to wipe her glistening brow with her sleeve. Sounds of laughter caught her attention, and she turned to find several children playing a game of hide and seek nearby. 

“Joey,” she yelled to the oldest, a boy of about ten. “You know it’s not safe to hide alone. It’s early spring, and the zombies will be back.”

“ I know,” Joey grinned. “That’s why we have a parameter set and a big kid watching us.”

Zoe’s brow furrowed. There were only a few “big kids” in the colony, and they were doing chores during this time of day. “Really,” she asked. “And who is this big kid?”

A raspy throat clearing could be heard from the edge of the children’s play area, and Zoe shook her head. “I should have known,” she laughed.

“What,” Troy winked. “Can you honestly say you've never described me as a big child?"

“No,” she agreed. “I haven’t. The descriptor of “big” would be too generous. Besides, aren’t you supposed to be doing chores, too?”

His face dropped, and he feigned shock. “I am! I’m supervising the children! You should really just go ahead and make me a teacher.”

“So our governing committee can lose all faith in me and revoke my leadership? I think not. Besides, aren’t you scheduled to help me with the gardening?”

“But Miss Zoe!” A little voice wailed. “We are having so much fun, and it’s the first day of spwing!”

Lily was an adorable child with a long mane of curly, black hair. Whenever they flashed Zoe that mostly toothless grin, everyone in sight knew Lily would be getting her way.

“That’s fine, Lily,” Zoe conceded. “Troy can remain the big kid that he is.” Glaring over at the “big boy," she yelled. “You owe me, Hassan! Now I have to do all the gardening myself.”

“No, you don’t,” a voice cried, and a small hand slipped inside Zoe’s. May looked up, her face beaming brighter than Zoe had seen in a long time. “I can help you. I love gardening.”

“I know you do,” Zoe smiled. “And we all know you’re better at it than I am... but don’t you want to play with the kids... and Troy?”

“Nah,” May insisted. “I love gardening even more, and besides, Troy is taking bribes to tell the person who’s “it” where the others are hiding.”

“HASSAN!” Zoe hollered, but Troy had already scooted to the other end of the yard.

“What? Sorry! Can’t hear you!” he yelled, chasing after the children.

An amused Zoe turned to a delighted May. “I’m going to have to talk to him about this later, but for now...”

“For now, we garden!”

Time seemed to pass by in a moment, and before they knew it, the late afternoon sun was beginning to set in the sky. May was engrossed in her work, and Zoe tapped her shoulder to gain her attention.

“We should start heading in. We both have to get washed up before dinner.”

“I know! And I can’t wait for dinner! Eli is making chili tonight.”

“He does make a good chili,” Zoe agreed.

“He’s the best cook! I told him we were planting zucchini, and he said his mom used to make fried zucchini flowers. He’s going to make them for us as soon as these grow.”

Zoe quietly surveyed the little plot of land, her eyes downcast. “If they grow,” she signed, surprised she had said it out loud.

“Of course they will grow!” The enthusiastic little girl replied. “Why wouldn’t they?”

“Well, gardening doesn’t always... work,” Zoe lamented as she sat on a nearby step. “Especially when I’m involved.”

May was quick at her side. “What do you mean? You’ve gardened before. Feather says you’re a natural.”

“Well, Feather is very kind. But I don’t always feel like I know what I’m doing.”

“That’s because you grew up in the Tower,” May said, patting Zoe’s back. “I bet you didn’t even have dirt there.”

“No,” Zoe laughed. “Which is surprising because there sure were a lot of dirty things."

“Yeah, but I grew up at Sunflower Creek. That’s why I know a lot about gardening, and I’ll teach you. You can teach me all the things you learned at the Tower. Then maybe one day when I grow up, I can lead Olympus, too.”

Zoe reached over and lifted the girl onto her lap, squeezing her closely in her arms. “You will be an amazing leader one day,” she smiled. “I just know it.”

“And you will plant really amazing zucchini,” May giggled.

“You know what? You’re right!” Zoe grinned. “This is why we all need each other.”

The sweet moment came to an abrupt end when fun but chaotic screams shot from behind. They turned to find Troy buried under four of the children, each pulling on a different limb. Zoe rushed over, despite her side-splitting from laughter.

“HELP!” Troy screamed.

“Troy Hassan,” she scolded. “What is going on here.”

“We found out he was taking bribes from all of us!” Joey replied. “Now he’s getting all of our pudding after dinner.”

“Troy?” Zoe questioned with a stern glare.

“I’m not really going to take their pudding,” he insisted. “I’m just providing valuable... business lessons.”

May tugged at the hem of Zoe’s shirt. “This is why we all need each other,” she smiled.

“That’s right, we do. But right now, Troy needs us to get him out from under that heap of kids!”

“Oh, that’ll be easy!” May stated.

“Yeah? Why?”

Just then, the creaking sound of the old wooden kitchen windows could be heard, and Eli's head poked out.

“Come and get it!” he yelled. “The chili is hot!”

Squeals of delight mixed with Troy's whimpering and grimaces as a stampede of children trampled over man. Zoe extended her hand with a smirk.

“Let’s get you into the lodge before these kids do you in.”

Troy stumbled along beside Zoe, attempting to catch his breath. “Since they assaulted me, can I have their pudding after all?”

“No,” Zoe reprimanded. “But how about I sneak you an extra cup from the kitchen.”

“You will?”

“Consider it payback for all the treats you used to sneak to me at the Tower.”

“Nice,” he grinned.

“Yeah. Besides, you’ll need the extra energy for tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?” he asked. “What’s tomorrow?”

Zoe removed her gardening gloves and smashed them into Troy’s chest. “You’re on gardening duty, Hassan... and tomorrow, you’re on your own.”

~~~~

Thanks again for the prompt @aria-ashryver! :)

@choicesficwriterscreations Tagging others sepeartely

[iminlovewithpercyjackson]

LYDIA COLLINS AND THE END OF THE WORLD

for the 2024 inklings challenge // a standalone story

After Lydia Collins watches a girl destroy a dark being that bleeds black and melts into nothingness when struck down, she is introduced to a world of magic and wonder and fantastical curiosity, all of the things she assumed were only present in storybooks. But the world is also full of more of the dark beings, the Impia, snarling, brutal, murderers hellbent on razing and destroying not only the magical world but the non-magical world as well. Lydia’s world. This battle has been raging for years, but Lydia’s new friend Nora thinks she has a way to stop them for good, and so, together, the girls venture out to try and end this war, to try and stop the darkness, to try and save the world.

@inklings-challenge

read on my website

Lydia flicked the main light switch and watched all of the lights in the shop dim, then shut off completely. Left standing alone in the shop, a weak light filtering through the glass door from the streetlights outside, she nodded to herself.

“Perfect,” she whispered, even that quiet sound filling the empty shop. “And now I have the entire evening to myself.”

She brushed past a large bouquet of lilies and double-checked that the sign she’d flipped earlier was, indeed, positioned to display the word “closed” on the outside of the door. Sure enough, the word “open” greeted her, and she did just that to the door before letting it swing shut again. The evening air greeted her, chilly as autumn had arrived at last, but not so cold that she was uncomfortable in her tank top. She locked the door, slipped her keys back into the pocket of her jeans, and turned to face the sidewalk.

No sooner had she done this than someone rushed by her at a breakneck pace. Lydia flattened herself against the wall of the flower shop so as to not be flattened by whoever had just run by. Or… whatever.

Breathing hard, her hand pressed to her chest, Lydia stared down the street at the figure. In the darkness of the late evening, she couldn't make out much of it, but it was tall and large, all black, and oddly fluid. It shifted as it ran down the sidewalks, shifting like a slippery shadow, though obviously human shaped.

Something about it sparked a blaze of terror in her heart. There was no reason for her to be worried; it was just some rude person in a rush who hadn't bothered to apologize for nearly running her over. But still, Lydia was terrified.

Cars drove by, completely unbothered by the girl who’d nearly been run over, and Lydia decided she was being stupid. There was nothing to be scared of.

Absolutely nothing.

Sucking in a deep breath, she willed her heart to slow and her pulse to even out. When it was sufficiently normal, Lydia brushed her dark hair back behind her ― it swung back in front, anyway, too short to be held by her shoulders ― and took a slow, cautious step away from the wall.

Pounding footsteps alerted her to the arrival of yet another runner, and she jumped back. This time, the figure who came hurtling by was obviously a girl, somewhere around her own age, with long hair and dressed in green. She raced by Lydia, only just missing running into her.

“Sorry!” she shouted over her shoulder, but she didn't stop. Something glinted in her hands, something small and shiny and sharp.

She ran away from Lydia, and Lydia watched.

No, the girl was running toward that shadowy… being.

She rounded a corner and vanished, pulling the strings of Lydia’s curiosity with her. The strings of curiosity wrapped around the blaze of terror, temporarily obscuring it, and Lydia gave into it.

Glancing at her phone, Lydia decided it was early enough yet that it was fine for her to be wandering around the city streets alone, so she followed the girl’s path down the sidewalk and rounded the corner after her.

The corner led to another street that dead-ended in a three-way intersection, and there was the shadowy being, the girl still running closer.

Red lights blinked lazily over the girl’s head as she raced down the empty street, those sharp objects still shining in her hands, throwing more red light around.

Lydia stepped closer.

The girl skidded to a stop only a few dozen feet from the shadowy being, and she jerked her arm back, then flung one object at it, then the other. As the projectiles sliced through the air, Lydia recognized them. Throwing stars embedded themselves into the being’s chest, and suddenly it dropped.

It wasn't dead, no, just changing. The human figure wobbled, then grew, the hands on the ground turning into something like wide, clawed paws, the legs shifting similarly. The torso expanded, and the neck shrank into the body, the head widening, too, and soon they were looking at some animalistic figure, something like a cross between a vicious dog and a fierce bear and something else, something much worse.

Beneath the being, a pool of liquid grew, dripping from the being’s chest.

Lydia knew it was blood, only it was much too dark to be that. Darker, inkier. Black, not red. But of course it was blood. What else could it be?

She watched the other girl slowly advance on the being. The girl was taller than Lydia, lithe and lean, with long brown hair in a half braided up, half loose down style. Her green clothes consisted of leggings, a knee-length green dress with slits leaving room for her legs to move, and brown leather boots. As the girl advanced on the being, she drew a sharp knife from a leather sheath on her thigh, and she drew another one from the sheath hanging from her belt.

Suddenly, she flung herself forward, aiming for the being, a living weapon herself, a knife thrown right at it.

The dark, snarling mass lunged for her, too, and Lydia held her breath, but she couldn't follow the fight that ensued. Claws glinted in the light from the stoplights, and the girl’s daggers flashed, too quick for Lydia to see where they struck.

Only moments later, the girl emerged. The shadowy being lay in pieces on the ground, melting right before their eyes into a black sludge that dissolved into the ground, hissing like acid as it seeped into the cracks of the pavement.

Lydia’s jaw dropped.

The girl just beamed at the disintegrating remains of the being she’d killed, and she turned around. Then she froze, her eyes flicking to Lydia’s wide ones.

The girl swore. Loudly. “You weren't supposed to see that.”

“What was that? Did you really just kill it? What was it?” Lydia blurted out, the strings of curiosity burning away, terror retaking its hold on her.

The girl marched forward, and she grabbed Lydia’s arm.

Lydia tried to pull away, but she was foiled by the girl’s strong grip. “Excuse me? Let go of me! Who are you? What was that? What’s going on?”

“My name’s Nora, and that's all you need to know for now,” the girl said sharply, then ordered, “Come on. We have to go.”

“Go? Go where? Where are you taking me?” Lydia protested as Nora dragged her along behind her, trying her best to wiggle her arm free to no avail.

“Not important. Come on.”

“I think it’s very important, actually,” Lydia argued. “You know, murderers always want to get you to a second location, and you're not supposed to let them. You can't take me somewhere to kill me. I mean, you just killed that… thing, so I think you could've just killed me there. Not that you should,” she added hastily. “Coincidentally, what was that thing?”

Nora said nothing.

So Lydia kept talking. Her parents always joked that if she ever got kidnapped, she’d just talk and talk, and she’d annoy her way out of the kidnapping. It wasn't working. They were still striding down city blocks, walking quicker and quicker, though thankfully not hitting a full-on run. Lydia didn't think she could keep up with the pace that Nora would have set, and it would give her even less of an opportunity to try and get away.

“If you're going to kill me, I think I should at least get an explanation for that thing. I thought it was a human earlier, when it almost ran me over, but it didn't really look like one later. When you killed it, I mean.”

Nora sighed loudly, clearly thoroughly annoyed, but she kept her tight grip on Lydia’s arm. “I'm not going to kill you, you idiot. And of course it looked human. They can shapeshift, and passing for human lets them worm into places where there’s lots of you humans because most of you are too self-obsessed to look twice at it. Or too stupid to see the difference.”

Lydia ignored the insults in favor of saying, “You humans? Like you're not one? Are you not human?” she gasped.

“Obviously, I'm human,” Nora groaned. “Are you always this annoying?”

“Yes,” Lydia said. “You should really just let me go so you don't have to deal with me. So are those things not human, then?”

“No, obviously. And you're not getting away, so stop trying. And shut up,” Nora added. “We’re here.”

Lydia glanced around. Then she stared back at Nora, thoroughly unimpressed.

The girls stood in front of a large warehouse, tall and wide and made of red brick with a rolling door of a silvery metal just in front of them. Broken glass littered the ground around, pieces of the windows that were missing panes, and several windows had been boarded over. All in all, Lydia decided it was a pretty typical abandoned warehouse.

“Here?” she said.

Nora sighed. Keeping her hold on Lydia’s arm, she marched toward the door. It didn't open automatically, like Lydia thought it might, and Nora made no move to open it or activate a way to open it or anything. She just kept walking toward it, faster and faster again, fast enough it would really, really hurt when they ran into it.

Lydia yanked on her arm, but Nora kept her tight grip, and Lydia stayed being dragged toward the closed doors.

Just before impact, she squeezed her eyes shut.

Then she opened them just a tiny crack and watched Nora vanish into the door before her eyes. The hand on her arm remained tight until she pulled Lydia through the door, too, and suddenly, the glow of the streetlights vanished, the warehouse vanished, and the girls were standing in front of a tall stone structure with iron gates closed behind them, and in front of them was a castle.

The castle was even more massive than Lydia had ever imagined castles would be, with the stone of the gatehouse winding around it to form tall walls that obscured any of the land around it, but the smell of salt and the fact that Lydia couldn't see a single thing around the castle except for the dark night sky let her guess they were on an island somewhere in the sea. Huge rectangular buildings, all of different heights and covered in tiny rectangular, glass-filled windows of hundreds of different colors, jutted up in front of them, with a couple of stone domes on some of the buildings. Walkways connected the buildings, arches under them rounding from one building to the next, with more arches above them to connect at the floor above, too. In the center of the castle was the very tallest building, but the dome atop this one wasn't a tan stone, like the rest of them, but stained glass like the windows. Panes of blues and greens and pinks and yellows swirled together in patterns, building from the top of the building until they met at the top of the dome. Trees sprouted all around the castle, too, adding more color to the tan stone structure. She turned around, and behind the closed gates, a path wound down occasionally switching to stairways, between smaller stone buildings until it dead-ended at a little group of docks that swayed on a calm, indigo sea.

“This,” Lydia said stupidly, “is not Pennsylvania.”

We’re not in Kansas anymore. The movie line flashed through her head.

“No, it isn't,” Nora said. The added “stupid” was implied.

“Where are we?” Lydia asked, turning in circles to take everything in. And rubbing her arm where Nora had been holding on. It didn't hurt, not really, but she wanted Nora to feel bad. It didn't seem to be working.

“Arcem Castle,” Nora replied. “In Italy.”

“Italy?!” Lydia squawked, whirling on Nora.

“Off the coast of Italy,” Nora amended. “Shielded from human eyes, of course.”

“But I'm human, and I can see it.”

“I brought you here. So you can see it.”

“And you're human, too,” Lydia persisted.

“Yeah, but I'm not a boring, ordinary human.”

“Well, what are you?”

Nora sighed. “Nothing you need to worry about. Come on.” She took hold of Lydia’s arm again and pulled her up the pathway toward the castle doors.

The doors swung open silently as they approached, and quiet hallways greeted them. Torches lined the walls, dimly illuminating the corridors, since the windows weren't letting in much light, even with the bright moon outside. The hallways weren't quite empty, but they were pretty close to it. However, the castle occupants who turned to stare at them, glancing up from papers or books, pausing in the middle of quietly chanting and making something glow in front of them, weren't all human. Some were ― she assumed ― and many of them were dressed like Nora, all in dark green, with the women wearing a dress over leggings and the men wearing tunics and trousers, all with leather boots and leather belts and leather sheaths or quivers of arrows, though some weren't armed at all. Others wore different clothing, far more medieval-looking, with richly dyed fabrics and long gowns.

But not everyone was human. There were several animals, too. Foxes stared with little beady eyes, and panthers yawned lazily from their perches in alcoves. Birds twittered, and a couple of badgers nudged each other as Nora strode by, Lydia nervously trailing behind.

“Anyone know where Alata is?” Nora called out, breaking the quiet and stillness of the hallways.

A chubby brown bear turned to fix Nora with a reproving look that she ignored.

A bird flittered over and alighted on the bear’s head. Twisting its little green head, it focused on Nora and chirped, “She’s in her office, and Miss Parva is with her.”

Nora swore.

The brown bear glared at Nora.

“How’d they find out already?” Nora muttered to herself as the girls continued down the hallways and up a winding staircase.

“Find out about what?” Lydia asked.

Nora ignored her, and Lydia sighed.

Several flights of stairs later, Nora paused outside of two wooden doors. “Don't say anything,” she told Lydia.

“Why?”

“Can you just not?”

“Probably not.”

Nora groaned, and, letting go of Lydia’s arm, she pushed open the doors.

Clearly, they were at the top of the castle because this room didn't have ordinary walls. Instead, that stained glass dome curved overhead, glowing just slightly with moonlight. The light bounced off of the white floor and multiplied, somehow, or something, because the whole dome was well-lit and as bright as daytime.

A couple of curving bookcases were set at the far side of the room, straight ahead, and to the girls’ left was a sitting area with some leather chairs and a little table. In the middle of the room and just a bit to the left was a desk. Behind that desk was a short, curvy woman with a sweet, tanned face and rosy cheeks. She was dressed in a long, sparkling pink gown, with her shiny black hair pulled up into an elegant bun on top of her head. Short, pointed ears poked out from either side of her face, and sparkling, translucent white wings sprouted from her back.

Lydia stared.

On the other side of the desk, sitting in a tall chair, was another woman. She was tiny, only about three feet tall, with warm brown skin and hair in two braids ― a green-blue color ― and long, pointed ears.

Lydia kept staring.

“Well, Miss Sullivan, aren't you going to introduce us?” the woman behind the desk ― the fairy ― asked.

Nora sighed, moving into the room, closer to the desk. Lydia followed her.

“This is…” Nora paused, glancing at Lydia, and Lydia realized she’d never told Nora her name. Well, Nora hadn't asked, either.

“I'm Lydia,” she said. “Collins,” she added, after a beat.

“Well, Miss Collins, I'm Alata,” the fairy told her. “Welcome to Arcem Castle, though it’s a shame you couldn't be here under more pleasant circumstances. This,” she said, nodding to the smaller woman, “is Parva. She was once a teacher here. She used to teach Miss Sullivan, actually, and now she is Miss Sullivan’s supervisor until she fully finishes her schooling. If that ever happens,” she added, giving Nora a look.

Lydia nodded silently. So this was a school of some sorts. Got it.

“I'm not sure how much Miss Sullivan has told you―” Lydia tried her best to focus on Alata and to not glare at Nora “―but magic is, in fact, real, and not only something in your storybooks. I am a fairy, and Parva here is a gnome.”

A gnome.

“We’re here to discuss what is going to happen with you.”

Lydia’s heart quickened.

Scary words, those.

“You are here because you saw Miss Sullivan kill one of the Impia. Contact between the magical and non-magical world is forbidden, so Parva and I must discuss what happens to Miss Sullivan and what happens to you,” Alata said placidly.

“Impia?” Lydia blurted out.

“Now, now, there will be time for questions later, perhaps,” Alata said.

“To the point, Miss Collins,” Parva said quietly, and her voice was so gentle and lilting and sweet that Lydia blinked stupidly. “Humans who come into contact with the magical world are offered a memory wipe. Most often, they accept it. People do not like change, and accepting the magical world requires a lot of change.”

“A memory wipe?” Lydia gaped at her.

“It would only erase your memories of the events since you encountered Nora, and we would fill in the gaps with something suitable,” Parva told her gently. “It is quick, painless, and of course, you would never know it happened, afterward.”

“Miss Sullivan can attest to that, can't you dear?”

Lydia glanced at Nora, who was fighting a heavy frown and losing. Catching Lydia’s eye, she muttered, “This has happened before. A time or two.”

“Well, I don't want to be memory wiped,” Lydia announced. Why on earth would she choose that? She was doing alright with all the change that this required, or whatever, and it wasn't as if she was going to be sticking around. She would be able to get used to this from afar, and if she ever spotted Nora chasing around shadowy beings ― or Impia or whatever they were called ― she’d know what was going on. And maybe say hi, if Nora didn't ignore her.

“Why wouldn't you take the memory wipe?” Nora asked, staring aghast at her. “Is that even allowed?”

“Miss Sullivan, we won't memory wipe someone who refuses it, of course,” Alata said, sitting serenely and placidly behind her desk, her hands folded in front of her, something that would have almost looked serious if she weren't wearing a sparkly pink ball gown with sparkly wings behind her.

“So if I'm not getting memory wiped,” Lydia said, “can someone explain all of―” She gestured around the room. “―this to me?”

“Sure!” Nora said blithely, with a smile so big that Lydia was more than certain it was fake, especially with how much she had been refusing to explain anything to Lydia earlier. She forced herself not to glare at Nora, but her eyes must have given something away because Nora smirked.

“Magic,” Nora said slowly, “is real.”

Lydia glared at her.

Parva fixed her with a stern look and chimed in, “What my student means to say is that the realm of magic that you might have read about in storybooks is, indeed, real, but likely the stories have some aspects wrong, of course. As you can see, gnomes and fairies are very real, and so are elves and dragons, though dragons are much smaller than the non-magical world believes and also rather rare. There are sea serpents―”

“Like the Loch Ness monster?!” Lydia blurted out.

Nora rolled her eyes surreptitiously.

“Yes,” Parva said patiently, “although they are much smaller than the world at large believes. There are talking animals ― you may have seen some of them in our castle ― and mages. Generally, when humans, such as yourself, come into contact with the magic side of the world, if they choose to meld into our world, they come to Arcem and study magic that allows them to help care for the world and its inhabitants, magic or not.”

Lydia nodded slowly. “Is that what Nora is?”

“Miss Sullivan is something else,” Alata said cryptically, and Lydia deciphered from her words that she wasn't to ask any more questions. She privately filed them away to ask Nora later.

“And that… being that Nora killed. What was that?” she asked.

“Yet another magical being, dear, and certainly nothing to worry about,” Alata told her, waving a hand.

But Nora’s expression was tight and drawn, so Lydia made a note to ask her about that later, as well. There was definitely something more here, something she was missing, something they weren't telling her.

“Do you wish to stay at Arcem and study magic to become a mage?” Alata asked.

Lydia blinked. That option hadn't even occurred to her. She could… No. It was only mildly tempting, and she quickly batted that little thread of temptation away. She was more than content in her ordinary human non-magical world, and this didn't change that. It only broadened the world. So she said, “No, thanks. It’s cool and all, but I’m good with just knowing about it. I’d actually like to go home, please.”

Nora stared at her, eyes boring into Lydia’s skull, but Lydia ignored her for now. She figured that she would have to run into Nora again at some point, and Nora wouldn't avoid her now. There was too much curiosity about each other, on both ends.

“Yes, you may return home. I assume we can expect you to keep our world a secret?” Alata asked.

Lydia nodded. Then asked, “Why?”

Parva smiled at her. “Can you imagine if the world found out about us? Magic? Humans are not inherently selfless, by any means. Access to a power like ours… It could be catastrophic in the wrong hands. And we are different, which humans do not like. The magic world was persecuted once, many, many years ago.”

“Got it. Yeah, don't worry, I'll keep my mouth shut,” Lydia promised.

“Parva and Miss Sullivan shall see you back,” Alata said, and from the tone of her voice, Lydia gathered that this little meeting was finished.

Lydia hadn't been lying about keeping her mouth shut or just wanting to go home, but she certainly wasn't finished with the magic world. She had questions, and she intended to get some answers.

She followed Nora and Parva out of the castle, keeping quiet as they conversed in hushed tones, and they walked back down to the gates. Nora waved her hand, and a couple of green symbols flashed across the gates quicker than Lydia could note them. Then they were walking into the gates again, and suddenly, Lydia was back outside the abandoned warehouse in Pennsylvania, United States of America, boring, ordinary human world. She smiled.

Reaching up to shake Lydia’s hand, Parva said, “Nora shall see you home. It was lovely to meet you, Lydia. I hope we shall meet again.”

“Yeah,” Lydia said. “Me too.”

Parva turned and strode away, vanishing around a corner, and the girls stood in the quiet stillness of the night for a long moment.

Then Nora sighed. “Well, come on, then, Collins.”

They walked in silence to Lydia’s house, only a few blocks away, and when they reached the door, Lydia hesitated, unwilling to let go of her questions.

“Go on,” Nora said. “You know you want to.”

Lydia grinned. “Come on inside.”

The girls headed into the Collins’ house ― empty at the moment, with Lydia’s parents off on a trip ― and made their way to the living room. Lydia plopped onto the couch, and Nora settled onto a chair nearby, slouching and wriggling into a comfortable position.

“So,” Lydia said, “what was that thing you killed?”

“It’s called an Impia,” Nora said. “Centuries ago, there was a mage at Arcem who learned all that magic had to offer her and decided she wasn't done. She turned to dark practices, and she learned to lengthen her lifetime. With more time, she kept learning beyond what we’re meant to learn, and she didn't use it to benefit others and to better the world, like we’re supposed to. Instead, she bent creatures to her will. They weren’t perfect, though, so more recently, she created the Impia. They’re beings of darkness and completely enslaved to her will. She’s trying to use them to kill off the other mages so that there won’t be anyone to stop her from taking control of the world. The magical world and the non-magical world.”

“Wow,” Lydia breathed.

“We call her Mali Regina,” Nora continued. “In an effort to thwart her, the Eversor were created. Parva created them, actually. Like Alata said, I’m not a mage. I'm an Eversor acolyte. I know some magic, but my job is to destroy the Impia before they destroy the world. When humans entered Arcem, they used to automatically begin learning magic to become a mage. Now they choose between becoming a mage or an acolyte.”

“So you’re like a magical warrior? And they’re more like… magic scholars and stuff?”

“Sure,” Nora said with a shrug. “They do some hands-on stuff, too, but yeah, they do a lot of learning and helping people. I’m not made for a classroom, so I picked the Eversor. When I first started my training as a child, there weren't as many Impia. They weren't as powerful, either, and they did far less damage. But now, I have to track down and destroy multiple of them every day. The other acolytes and Eversor graduates are similarly spread thin across the rest of the world.” 

She leaned closer to Lydia. “If you ask me ― and no one does ― Mali Regina is building toward something, and I think she’s close to reaching her goal, whatever it is. We don't have a lot of time left to stop her.”

“Can you? Stop her, I mean. Is this war winnable?” Lydia asked.

Nora scoffed, and she kicked at the carpet. “No, we’re not close. Alata just keeps insisting on us finishing our training and graduating, like that's really what's important here. The whole world is going to burn, but Alata won't let us do anything until I have my completion certificate. It’s stupid. And I think I even know how to defeat all of the Impia ― for good ― and take Mali Regina down at the same time, but Alata won't listen to me.”

Lydia stared at Nora, processing. “And you're just going along with that?”

“What else am I supposed to do?” Nora protested.

“The whole world is kind of at stake here!” Lydia exclaimed. “Just go behind her back. Isn't there someone who will listen and help?”

Nora blinked slowly. Then blinked again. It was several seconds before she responded. Then she jumped to her feet and exclaimed. “You're right!”

“Thank you. I try.”

“I’d never even thought of that. Maker, I'm a disgrace,” Nora muttered. Lydia refrained from commenting. “Parva would listen to me. I know she will.”

Lydia bit back another comment ― you didn't even tell her? Isn't she, like, your supervisor or something? And your friend? Instead, she said, completely deadpan, “The gnome.”

“I’ll explain it all to you tomorrow. She’s important, trust me,” Nora told her.

Lydia shrugged. “If you say so.”

“We have to go find her tomorrow,” Nora insisted.

Lydia shrugged. “I'm not working tomorrow. We can do that.”

Nora nodded.

“We can take my car, too,” Lydia told her, “and if you want, you can sleep in our guest room. I don't want to make you go all the way back to your place…”

Nora nodded slowly. “Yeah, alright, Collins. Don't be annoying.”

Lydia smiled sweetly.

The next morning, the girls piled into Lydia’s car, a rather beat-up old red thing, and Lydia followed Nora’s directions out of the city. The drive would be about an hour, Nora said, and they would have to head into the woods.

Lydia frowned at her. “You're honestly so lucky that my parents are out of town, and it’s the weekend, so I don't have classes, but I cannot be on this quest by Monday morning, so will this take long?”

“Collins?”

“Yeah?”

“Shut up,” Nora said.

Lydia pouted.

The silence in the car ― well, relative silence, as Lydia had put a playlist on quietly ― lasted less than a minute before Lydia asked, “Okay, so what’s this big idea of yours? To defeat all of the imps or whatever. With the gnome.”

“Parva.”

“Whatever.”

Nora rolled her eyes. “I read a book about mind magic, and it made me think that the Impia might be created from mind magic instead of heart or soul magic. I did some more research, and as far as we know, no one’s ever created creatures like this from mind magic. When creatures are created from heart or soul magic, they take on a will of their own. With mind magic, though, it's like a hive mind situation. The minds are all connected, and they don't have thoughts of their own. Just basic instincts that Mali Regina, like, programmed into them?”

“You know what programming is?” Lydia interrupted.

“I literally live thirty minutes from you. I own a tv.” Nora glared at Lydia.

“Continue,” Lydia said, waving her hand as she drove.

“Anyway,” Nora drawled, “the hive mind means that they’re all connected. If we can capture one, we can connect to its mind. From there, we can draw all of the Impia, across the entire world, into the one we captured. It won't be any larger or stronger, but it would be a consolidation of them all. And then we can destroy them, and we can draw Mali Regina to us because they’re connected to her mind.”

Lydia nodded slowly. “I don't really understand most of what you just said, but okay.” Nora rolled her eyes again. “And what about the gnome?”

“Parva.”

“Whatever.”

“Parva’s speciality is mind magic,” Nora explained. “I'm not super knowledgeable about magic practices in general, but I know barely anything about mind magic. Parva, though. She’s good at it, and she knows a lot, so if we’re going to be dealing with it, we need her.”

Nora directed them down another road, then said, “We’re here. Pull over right there, and we can hike down those trails there.”

Lydia parked the car, and the girls climbed out, heading down the trail that Nora directed them onto. She poked Nora’s shoulder. “How did Parva make this trip without a car?”

“She’s a gnome, Collins. Nature magic.”

“I thought she was good at mind magic?” Lydia asked.

“Nature magic is inherent to gnomes. Mind magic is different. Keep up, Collins,” Nora said, pushing through some branches to get to another trail.

“These are where girls get murdered, you know, Nora,” Lydia told her matter-of-factly. “I can see the news articles now. Two Pennsylvania girls found dead in woods. The purpose of their journey is unclear, but one girl is dressed like something out of a bad medieval show and is armed and presumed to have fought back against their attacker. No sign of a struggle from the other.”

“I'm armed, you idiot,” Nora said. “We’re going to be fine.”

Lydia shrugged. “I'm just saying!”

Nora ignored her, walking down the trail.

Eventually, the girls reached a little creek, and Nora turned around to grin at Lydia. “You’ll hate this,” she said. “Follow me.”

She walked straight into the creek, and the moment she reached the middle of the water, she dropped straight through and vanished into the water. Lydia shrieked. The water rippled where Nora had been, and then it settled, bubbling along as if it had never been disturbed in the first place.

“I hate magic,” Lydia muttered, stamping out the flicker of terror that ignited once more.

Birds chirped overhead, twittering laughs mocking her.

“Magic is so theatrical. It’s ridiculous,” she added, glaring at the birds. Then she marched into the creek, straight into the middle, and then she dropped through with a scream.

She landed on a woven grass mat, straight on her feet and perfectly dry. Blinking, Lydia glanced around. Mud brick walls surrounded them, and moss carpet covered the floors. The home seemed to be underground, and it was dimly lit by little glowing blue lanterns. Little wooden doors led off to a couple of other rooms, and more grass mats covered the floors. A few wooden chairs sat by a table with a little vase of red marigold flowers, and there Nora and Parva sat, watching her.

“Come and sit, Lydia,” Parva said. “We have much to discuss, it seems.”

So Lydia sat, and Nora filled Parva in on everything that she had already told Lydia earlier. It took her a longer time to cover everything as she told Parva, since she touched on all of the technical magical details.

“So,” Nora said once she finished. “What do you think?”

“I think you’re correct,” Parva told her quietly. “Your theory makes sense to me, and if we can draw them all together, we can take them all out at once. It is certainly worth a try.”

“Alright!” Lydia said, clapping her hands together. “Let’s go!” She paused. “We do have to go back, right?”

“Yeah,” Nora told her, and it was a mark of how pleased she was that Parva agreed with her idea that she was even smiling slightly at Lydia. “Impia are drawn to larger populations. There’s a lot where we live.”

“Come on, girls. Time to get to work.”

After leaving Parva’s, they hiked back up the trails and piled into Lydia’s car. She drove them back into the city, and following Nora’s directions again, they ended up in an abandoned dirt parking lot.

While in the car, Nora had sketched out a quick diagram, and when they all climbed out of the car, she handed it to Lydia.

“You need to draw this as big as you can on the ground. Find a stick or something, Collins,” she ordered. “That’s a summoning circle. We’ll trap the Impia in there once I find one. Parva’s going to prepare her magic. You two wait here. I'm going hunting.”

Lydia nodded.

Nora raced away, and Parva took a seat beside the car, folded her hands, and closed her eyes to prepare her magic. Whatever that meant.

Lydia searched around and found a long stick. Nora’s diagram in hand, she started sketching out the loops and whorls that made up the circle. It didn't take too long for her to finish drawing it all out, and by the time she finished, Parva had opened her eyes again and was watching the circle construction.

“Is this done right?” Lydia asked.

Parva nodded, and, satisfied, Lydia tossed the stick away and plopped down on the ground beside the gnome.

Several minutes went by, Lydia unsure of how to break the quiet. Nora hadn't returned yet.

“Has Nora always been like this?” Lydia asked finally. “This… single minded?”

“You mean irritating,” Parva replied with a knowing smile.

Lydia grinned. “Maybe just a little bit.”

“Yes,” Parva said. “She has. Believe it or not, she was worse as a child. But she grows on you, does she not?”

“Like a fungal infestation,” Lydia muttered, but she was still smiling, and she nodded in agreement. Nora was growing on her.

And just at that moment, Nora came racing into the parking lot, a shadowy being, an Impia, hot on her heels.

“Ready?!” she shouted, and Lydia and Parva called back in the affirmative.

Nora raced through the summoning circle, and the Impia followed. The moment the Impia ran into the circle, Nora just enough ahead that she had exited the circle already, Parva slammed her hand down on the ground.

Thin stone pillars shot up from the ground all along the circle. They formed a series of prison-like stone bars that trapped the Impia inside. It battered against the pillars, but despite their narrowness, they held firm, not even shaking a small bit. Lydia guessed magic.

Nora was doubled over next to Lydia, her hands on her knees and her breath coming in short pants. Slowly, it evened out, and she pulled herself back up to her full height. Drawing her daggers, she handed one to Lydia.

“Are you sure about that?”

“Just in case. You shouldn't be unarmed.”

Lydia took it reluctantly, curling her fingers around the smooth hilt.

“Ready when you are, Parva,” Nora told her.

Parva nodded. Keeping her hands on the ground, she started chanting. A foreign language rolled smoothly off her tongue as she spoke the words, loudly and clearly. Glowing green tendrils of magic wove their way around the circle, vines of magic wrapping around the pillars.

The Impia let out a screeching cry, wailing loudly. It began to lose its shape as it consolidated, and it grew larger and larger and larger.

“I thought you said it wasn't supposed to get bigger!” Lydia shouted over the noise of the being.

“It shouldn't!” Nora shouted back.

Nervously, Lydia adjusted her hold on the dagger.

Suddenly, the Impia collapsed back into the original shape, the dog-bear-something-like being, but it shrank much smaller, to nearly the size of a shoebox.

Parva stood up, taking a deep breath, and the glowing vines of magic tightened. “Are we ready for the last part?” she asked. “The next step is to summon Mali Regina.”

Nora glanced at Lydia, chewing on her lip. “Maybe we should have gotten more people here. I mean, it’s just the three of us against Mali Regina! And you haven't even ever held a weapon until five minutes ago, so you're not going to be much use!”

“Thanks,” Lydia said dryly. “It’s going to be fine, Nora. Your plan has worked just fine. We’ve got this. You, me, and the gno― Parva. You, me, and Parva.”

“Okay,” Nora said, blinking. “Okay. Yeah, you're right. We’ve got this. Okay, Parva. Do it.”

Parva nodded. She touched her hands to the ground again, and she started chanting. The vines of magic turned darker and darker and darker. They were nearly black, and then, all of a sudden, the shoebox-sized Impia started to grow, bubbling and stretching as it formed into a very definitely human figure.

It formed into someone round, not very tall or threatening, and then the blackness of the Impia melted into the person, and they were staring at Alata.

“Alata?” Nora said, staring.

“Nora, really, what am I doing here?” the fairy asked, putting her hands on her hips. “This is ridiculous.”

“You… but that was supposed to summon Mali Regina!” Nora exclaimed.

Lydia gasped.

Parva took a step back. “You're Mali Regina.”

Alata sighed, looking back and forth between them all. Then her lips twitched, and they quirked into a smirk, grinning right at Parva.

Lydia’s eyes flew wide open. Beside her, Nora’s jaw dropped, and she stiffened very noticeably.

“How could you?” Parva asked quietly.

Nora’s fingers twitched on her dagger.

Alata ― Mali Regina ― tossed her head. “Don't be silly, Parva, dear. We were never close enough for you to look at me like that.”

“We worked together for many years,” Parva replied, voice still even and quiet. “And I considered you a mentor. A friend.”

Mali Regina shrugged. “Well, that is your own fault.”

“Why did you do this, Alata?”

Mali Regina shrugged again. “You magical creatures will never understand the burden of such a short lifespan. And I, I was far cleverer than most. There was much I wished to accomplish, and I simply could not do it all in the few years allotted to me. So I gave myself more. I lengthened my lifespan ― I did what should have been recognized as an extraordinary feat of magic that changed the world and the way that mages lives, but instead, I was banished from Arcem and shunned by the rest of the magical community. 

“I could not return as myself, so I created this form to suit me better. I became Alata, and I created these wings with mind magic and melded them to my body, and then, I returned to Arcem and to the mages who had once been my peers.

“But they were all so very shortsighted. They were not worthy of the gift of magic that they had bestowed upon them. The world needs to be remade, children, and to do that, the mages of the old world must be eradicated.”

“Murdered,” Nora said blankly.

“Call it whatever you wish. But that is why I created my Impia. They obeyed my every command, my every thought. Even the slightest whim of fancy, they carried out. They served me far better than the mages ever would. But then, Parva, dear, your Eversor started to slow my plans and to destroy my beautiful creations. I suppose I ought to thank you. I learned to create them quicker, and I learned to make them stronger. I am so very close to accomplishing all of my goals, numerous as they are.”

Her round, pleasant, smiling features twisted suddenly, contorting into something horrible, and she snarled, “And now― you're getting― in― my― way!”

Mali Regina lunged forward, and Parva’s stone bars shattered into pieces as Mali Regina shoved the magical tendrils into them and forced them outward.

The circle obliterated and their protection removed, Lydia backed away hurriedly. But Mali Regina wasn't focused on her, and she wasn't looking at Nora, either. Before either girl could react, Mali Regina lunged for Parva.

Her fist closed tight around the gnome’s neck, and she squeezed with more strength than a fairy should have possessed.

Parva gasped, and Mali Regina dropped her.

Before she hit the ground, her body burst into a bright explosion of green leaves and red flowers that drifted slowly to the pavement, her physical body dead and returned to its element, returned to nature.

Lydia gasped.

But Nora screamed. She charged forward, dagger flashing in her hand.

Mali Regina tossed a sparking ball of purple magic at her, but Nora batted it away with her dagger without a second thought. Nora, stronger and more determined than Mali Regina had given her credit for, leapt at the older woman, and a whirlwind of a fight ensued.

Lydia watched, eyes wide, an inferno of terror rushing through her veins as she watched Nora fight against this old and powerful mage.

But Nora didn't give up any ground. She didn't gain any, either, but she countered every blow of Mali Regina’s, and she struck out with her dagger, Mali Regina only just catching her blade and shoving her way. They moved almost too fast for Lydia to follow, but suddenly, she spotted something. An opening.

Lydia jumped forward, and she thrust Nora’s dagger into Mali Regina’s side.

Mali Regina, the nearly immortal mage, the woman who created beings of darkness to carry out her commands and destroy the world, gasped, and she coughed out a spurt of red, coppery blood that hit the pavement and splattered beside Nora’s boots.

She coughed again. “You―” she hissed, turning on Lydia, wounded enough that Lydia knew she was dying but conscious enough to choke out some dramatic and evil last words and maybe take a now defenseless Lydia down with her.

And then Nora stepped forward and slashed her head clean off of her body.

Mali Regina’s body dropped, and the shimmery wings faded away into nothing. Her head and body both distorted, and wrinkles etched their way across her round face. The long, shiny black hair that had fallen out of its neat bun now turned brittle and white, and Mali Regina, ancient witch, looked like nothing more than another ordinary old crone.

Nora stood there silently, staring at the body, and Lydia stood beside her, equally silent for once. Then Nora turned to Lydia, her mouth twitching into a smirk, something obviously snippy on her tongue.

Her eyes caught on the pile of leaves and flowers that had once been Parva, and she collapsed.

Lydia dropped to her knees next to Nora, touching her arm gently, watching the silent anguish well up in Nora’s eyes. Then Nora crumpled, falling against Lydia, and Lydia wrapped her arms around Nora immediately, letting her cry. Nora shook, her body wracked with sobs, and she cried against Lydia’s shoulder, her own arms hanging listlessly by her sides.

The girls stayed there for a long while, Nora crying against Lydia and Lydia holding Nora and taking deep breaths to calm herself so she didn't cry.

Nora’s cries began to quiet, and she stilled. She picked her head up from Lydia’s shoulder and moved toward the leaves and flowers, sniffling quietly. Then she reached out and gently touched her hand to the pile, retrieving one little red blossom.

“Marigolds,” Lydia whispered, recognizing the flower. “It means wisdom and joy.”

Nora nodded slowly. “She liked these. I always teased her for keeping a flower that reminded her of herself.”

There was another long moment of quiet. Lydia kept her mouth shut and watched Nora gently twist the flower in her hand, touching the petals with a delicate care.

Then Nora placed it back on the ground with the rest of the flowers and the leaves, and she began to whisper a quiet prayer, barely loud enough for Lydia to hear.

“Maker, receive your warrior and bring her soul home to You as her body is returned to the ground. Grant her a rest not found in this world, and let her live with You in Your light.”

Nora got to her feet, shaky but steadying once she pulled herself up, and she took a slow breath.

Lydia scrambled up with her.

“I have to go back to Arcem,” Nora said. “They need to know what’s happened.”

Lydia gave Nora a small smile. “I don't envy you that task. This is a lot to explain.”

“You could come with me. If you wanted,” Nora said. “You could stay at Arcem, and you could study magic. Once I tell them what happened, all of the mages will know your name. They’ll want you to come learn with us. There would always be a place for you in the mage school or on the Eversor path. If that stays a thing, what with the Impia gone and everything.”

Lydia bit her lip. Slowly, so as to try and avoid hurting Nora’s feelings, she told her, “Thank you, but no thanks. This was enough adventure for me for the rest of my life, probably. I have school the day after tomorrow, anyway. I’ve done twelve years of school in this world. I’ve at least got to finish up.”

Nora pulled a face. “Human school. Ugh.”

“It’s not so bad,” Lydia protested.

Nora eyed her. “You're delusional.”

Lydia stuck her tongue out, then froze, remembering what had just happened. But Nora only smiled. “You know,” Lydia said, “if you ever need to get away from all of the magic and the crazy there, you can come over for a movie night any time.”

“Yeah?”

“Probably not anything with fantasy. It doesn't really live up to real life.”

“I might take you up on that offer, Collins.”

“Any time,” Lydia said. “I mean it.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Nora said, waving a hand. She wiped her dagger on Mali Regina’s dress and sheathed it before pulling the other dagger out of the corpse. It made a sickening sound, and Lydia grimaced. Nora just grinned at her, cleaning off that blade too before she put it away. “If you get sentimental on me, I'm not showing up.”

“I’ll just come get you. I know where you live.”

“No, you don't. I live in the city, remember?”

“Oh.”

“Did you think I lived at Arcem? Before I explicitly told you I live here?”

“Well, yeah!” Lydia frowned.

“At school?” Nora scoffed. “Maker, that sounds horrible.”

“Alright, we’re watching Harry Potter when you come over,” Lydia told her.

“If.”

“When,” Lydia stressed. She glared at Nora.

Nora shrugged. “Fine. When. Whatever.” Her eyes fell back to the leaves and flowers now blowing away in the gentle autumn breeze. She choked back another sob, dashing her hand across her face to wipe away the remnants of the tears that stained her cheeks.

She turned. “See you around, Collins.”

“Yeah, you will,” Lydia told her.

“Alright then.”

“Bye, Nora.”

“Bye, Collins,” Nora said, and she started across the parking lot, walking slowly farther and farther away until she turned the corner and vanished from sight.

Lydia watched her until she disappeared, and then, with a smile on her face, she stuck her hands in her pockets and turned toward her own home.

[katzkinder]

Taking notes about Pisces and its association with the birth of Christ and lily’s regression into a baby and St Peter’s cross and how Peter was a fisherman and patron saint of net making (rope tying) shipbuilders and fishermen and how knots are often used as symbolic imagery for marriage and—DEEP BREATH

There’s just a lot here folks there’s SO MUCH and it’s so super cool how Strike takes these symbols and kind of. Inverts them. How they use them and also their diametric opposite, because Lily is a character cloaked in contradictions.

He carries both symbols of life and death, of rebirth and permanent end.

With his Scythe he is the grim reaper, with his name he heralds the coming of spring, an image of lilies pushing through snowy mounds to greet the sun. A butterfly is a symbol of rebirth but also a guide to the underworld. His favorite colors are pink and white and yet he dresses in black. His earrings are both flower petals and bloody hearts. He’s a gentle angel repenting by caring for others and a ruthless traitor who orchestrated the deaths of at least two women.

He wants to be saved and yet he tries to make himself irredeemable in the eyes of those he loves. He is both a child an adult, the demon within in a woman where he is a man. He is vain yet self hating. He is playful but brutal.

He is the Servamp of Lust yet his Name speaks of love.

Life starts with Lust but it Ends With Love

Happy Birthday Lily

[canmom]

NieR Automata anime episode 6

Continuing commentary from [part 1], [part 2-3], and [part 4-5].

Ooof, I left myself with a big not-so-live blog backlog again. Never done that before! [shoves The Flower That Bloomed Nowhere under a blanket]

So where we left off, I'd covered the Simone episode and the Pascal episode. OK! Next up we have... the YoRHa stage play episode!

episode 6

This episode recounts the story of the YoRHa stage musical! Putting it alongside four different productions of the play, the official novelisation, the text version in the game from Anemone's point of view, and the ongoing manga YoRHa: Pearl Harbour Descent Record. You can never have too many.

In the present frame story, Lily walks with 2B (who looks almost the same as her old friend YoRHa No. 2) and tells her of the past events.

If you're not familiar with the play by the way, it's just about the sickest shit. Youtube won't embed this for some reason but here's the intro number Normandy...

Just like in the play, this episode of the anime tells the story of an experimental YoRHa unit on a mission to attack a machine lifeform server in Hawaii, and the android resistance unit they encounter, the gradual process of building trust between the two groups of androids, and their eventual brutal deaths as it turns out that the YoRHa command never actually intended for any of them to survive the mission.

The cast is broadly similar to most versions of the play, but in keeping with this version of the story, here Lily rather than Anemone is the focus and sole survivor of the Resistance unit. Not that this really makes a huge difference in practice.

Where the anime really benefits is that it can convey the setting a lot more clearly than a play or even a manga. This episode is full of lush forests, and the mountains of Hawaii loom in the background.

Given they're compressing the events of a two hour stage play into a twenty minute episode, naturally a lot needs to be cut, but they do a very solid job of making it flow through montages and character moments. And of course we get the key moments in the play still: Lily getting infected with the Logic Virus and being saved from a mercy-kill by the intervention of YoRHa No. 21. Added in this version are some embellishments; when No. 21 hacks Lily, she gets a brief glimpse of some memories:

These flash by too quickly to really see what's happening in the episode, but it appears that Lily was being sexually assaulted by another android, but Captain Rose intervened and invited her to the Resistance unit? I believe this storyline is further elaborated in the manga, but I haven't read that far.

The portrayal of the Logic Virus, and the earlier Red Eye Disease (basically the same thing), varies across the series. Often it's just mindless violence disease, but at its best, it exposes the simmering tensions and resentments in the character - something emphasised to great effect in the YoRHa Boys play. Here, Lily resents her helplessness - that she is always the one who has to be protected. We also get a new physical symbol of a relationship: the bullet which Rose fires at Lily and No. 2 deflects. The addition of water to the scene adds to the staging.

Another benefit of the anime is that it can portray the scale of the machine army in a way the play can't. The CG in this episode is not exactly great, but we do see swarms of machines crawling up towards the mountain...

Notably at this stage the Machine Lifeforms clearly haven't yet developed the Stubby models - they're this kind of insectoid orb design, similar to Ko-shi and Ro-shi in the game (as well as the individual segments of Hegel). It's a nice visual way to show how the machine lifeforms are developing.

The final battle montage is very well edited in general, hitting the key moments of the play without getting bogged down in details. Anemone is once again the one to stay behind to mercy-kill No. 21 after she gets infected (which explains why she survived). However, as a new addition in this version, Lily and Rose are told to evacuate before the final confrontation with the Red Girls, and Rose sends Lily up alone. Lily tries to kill herself, but Rose once again prevents it, and orders Lily to preserve the YoRHa squad in memory. The theme of memory being core to NieR...

At the end, we get our first brief glimpse of A2, who survived - with Lily still unaware. A closeup of her chin mole confirms her identification with No. 2.

The credits are also different this time, a gradual pan over the YoRHa squad members, fading away in turn as the familiar ED song Antimony plays. The final shot is notable...

The timid Lily of the past reaches out and clasps the hand of the Lily of the future who now leads the Resistance.

Honestly, despite the fact I've seen so many versions of this story, it's still affecting. I watched it again to write this post and got caught up watching the episode. It's full of quite wacky turns if I'm honest, like let's be real nothing YoRHa (the military organisation) does makes much tactical sense, but the core character dynamics are strong and they're well captured here so it never really matters.

The post-credits puppet skit this time focuses on Adam and Eve getting dressed up in uniforms. Eve is in gakuen and Adam is in a suit, each of which gets a pinup-style illustration to go with it (we get a full pan up from the feet)...

Eve annoys adam until he decides to just leave...

Yeah, that's it.

That's as much as I'm up to writing up now, but lots more NieR to cover until we're caught up!

Huge props to [GLORY] for the excellent fansubs.

[allaboardthevespa]

Ellie Headcanons!

I love she. I've been thinking about her a lot lately so I've decided to share some HCs. Both recent ones and ones I've been kicking around in the past.

Her full name is Elinor Madison Hayden.

She grew up on a farm, as I stated before. Her father is the farm's owner, while her mother is an animal carer. Ellie grew up among nature and animals and thus has a strong admiration for them, just like Gabby. Her family in general is utterly chaotic, but they love her and she loves them just as much.

Her mother named her for the titular character of Elinor Wonders Why - a show Ellie grew a strong love for growing up. Bluey is also a family favorite.

Her favorite food is pumpkin pie, especially when baked by her uncle.

She owns a lot of stuffed animals. Not quite as many as her girlfriend but still a respectable amount. Especially bunnies!

She's a very big pop-punk fan. Some of her favorite artists include Boys Like Girls, The Maine, Dashboard Confessional, Yellowcard and All-American Rejects. Her all-time favorite song is, as I mentioned before, "Only One" by Yellowcard. She's also someone who regularly listens to different pop-punk albums every day and thus she's had a lot of wonderful experiences hearing new songs and bands. In particular, "A Twist in My Story" by Secondhand Serenade is one album that had her in tears.

She happens to be an amazing singer, too. (wishing so bad we could have a DC musical season)

Though, she's not particularly a great dancer...she often needs Gabby to help her out lol. But with Gabby's guidance, the girlfriends have shared some amazing slow dances in nature.

Autumn and spring are her favorite seasons. Autumn for the general coziness, warm lattes, orange leaves and happy vibes. Spring because she loves when it starts to warm up again after winter, and also she loves the smell of spring flowers so much. Getting to know Gabby has her loving spring even more - seeing Gabby's energy whenever spring starts is always adorable to her!

I've already mentioned that Ellie's favorite flowers are peonies and lavender (if you count that as a flower lol) but she also loves roses, gardenias, lilies of the valley, hyacinths just like Gabby, jasmine and lilacs. ...Okay she loves most flowers lol. In general, flowers have always been something Ellie has loved. Whenever her jobs were stressing her out, Ellie finds some time to spend admiring flowers, and it calms her down. Gabby has taken notice of her girlfriend's love of flowers and thus uses floral-scented products to wash both herself and the girls' belongings, and Ellie finds it so utterly heavenly.

Ellie's interest in fashion sprouted when she caught some My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic on television as a young girl and really admired Rarity's eye for fashion. Her father also has an old friend who is in fashion school.

At school, Ellie made a couple friends, but was also picked on a lot for her looks and being too much of a "girly girl" for her fashion interest and love of flowers.

Ellie realized she was bisexual not long after joining high school, where she started crushing on two different people - a quarterback boy, and a girl on the soccer team. Her family accepted her the very nanosecond she confessed.

She ended up asking both suitors out, but neither went all that well. While the quarterback let her down gently, the soccer player rejected her pretty brutally, pushing her onto the crowd and calling her nasty names. Ellie didn't ask anyone out again for a while after that. Falling deeply for Gabby truly changed her life.

In spite of her enjoyment of fashion and beauty stuff, Ellie generally doesn't use make-up. It's not her style...and she's pretty allergic to lots of make-up products anyway.

She gives AMAZING hugs. (Might as well be canon)

Her dad has an old Gamecube which Ellie plays a ton, often with Gabby and a couple of their other friends outside DC. Her favorite game for the system is Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door. You can bet she turned into a squealing little ball of joy when the remake is announced, and now she has a Switch on pre-order!

As a kid she made friends with one of the pigs on her family farm, a girl named Amelia, and spent time every day going to see her and play with her. She loved that pig dearly. Sadly, Amelia ended up passing away not long after she returned from season 1, devastating Ellie. Luckily she did have Gabby as her shoulder to cry on in those tough times.

In general, being with Gabby has helped brighten Ellie up considerably in her daily life. Sure she's pretty cutthroat when it comes to high-stakes reality TV shows like Disventure Camp, but when she's not in a competition, she's a sweet and tender soul. Her family in general is grateful to Gabby for bringing so much happiness out of their little girl. 💖

I've probably forgotten some but whatever, these are just a few of the ones I have.

Yet again I depict Ellie as a soft cinnamon roll I need professional help

[agentmmayy]

2023 monthly music rotation

it's been a hot minute since i've made one of these, but here are all my favorite songs from each month of 2023!

january:

one i wanna be with - trella: oh bop!!!!!!!!!!! this ENTIRE SONG just makes me so happy!!!!!!! it’s so full of love!!! every lyric hits but especially i can’t help but wish we met before we did.

february:

antiques - holden laurence: god the desperation in this makes me want to claw my chest open and rip my heart out. the beat fucks in this jaunty rhythm that’s such a juxtaposition to the haunting lyrics and vocals. then the bridge?????? i promise to be strong i promise to believe in love that lingers on i’ll see you in my dreams. I’M CALLING THE POLICE. this is a tess/joel song. not only because of how apocalyptic this feels (which is a whole other discussion) but also meet me in the space between all the words unsaid when we could not speak meet me i’ll be waiting for you there. thanks for coming to my ted talk.

march:

borderline - tove lo: HOT. listen. everything tove lo writes and sings is inherently sexy i don't make the rules. this one especially wtf!!!!!!

unrequited night - lily kershaw: i- please respect my privacy at this time. this is a masterpiece. immediately a song i listened to laying in bed staring up at the ceiling. VERY tlou coded. (but then again every song i listened to in feb/march and lbr this past year was) AND THE GASP AT THE END GETS ME EVERY TIME.

april:

flowers in my hair - calista garcia: sweet, slow, and syrupy. i love this song and how it feels like a breath of fresh air. it’s achingly romantic and has got me singing along and twirling my hair and kicking my feet. though, at the same time it’s so intimate i feel like i’m intruding. 

labor - paris paloma: the intensity of it still continues to blow my mind. it’s unapologetic and awful. it’s incredible. i felt every lyric in my gut. i don’t want to over explain it since i can’t do the song justice but it’s so brutally honest in describing and dismantling traditional roles placed upon women and girls. the entirety of it is like poking at a wound that never closes, a wound that’s been gaping and bleeding for centuries and it makes me so angry. the visceral reaction i had to the lyric ‘if we had a daughter’ girl i- ouuuuugh. i got sick to my stomach. i was screaming crying throwing up etc etc. anyway this song is a masterpiece. still haven’t recovered from it. also it’s a fucking bop. 

may:

‘i’m just learning how to make peace with feeling small’ ‘but i might drive off if it gets too hard’ ‘there’s always a sunset that i wanna run into’ ‘i’m searching but i’m not lost’ and my all time favorite lyric that put me on the floor when i heard it the first time- ‘i’m a growing tree a few missing leaves i can’t shelter you don’t sit under me’ HELLO????? 

vagabond - overcoats: THIS song. this song has been the one i played the most in may because one it’s an absolute banger and second of all it read me for filth and the lyrics are so beautifully crafted and honest and pure and delivered impeccably. it’s a sweet, slow melody and coupled with the lyrics it reached into the depths of my soul and pulled out everything i can’t say and put it into this song like.

fireworks - JOSEPH: now for ANOTHER song that read me for filth. lately i’ve been feeling this exact way since all my friends and people around me have reached certain milestones in life- such as getting married, settling down, etc- that i haven’t and i’m left even more alone and bereft. but THIS SONG said that’s okay!!!!!!!! this song understood!!!!!! it said i’m not alone feeling this way!!!!

every lyric absolutely sent me through the roof but these especially:  ‘all these long songs might be no good for me’ ‘how long will i wait to be happy all my friends ask me’ ‘what if i’m wrong wrong to think there’s more to this story’ ‘an act of faith even though it hurts to shut that door am i holding out forever?’ ‘am i headstrong or foolish every night waiting for lighting to strike whole you’ve got blue skies?’ and my favorite- ‘i wish i could just flip a switch and accept your kind of muted bliss’ WHAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! once again HOW did they put it into words!!!!!! this song has such a special place in my heart. i can’t tell you how many times i’ve not only listened to it but also screamed along and cried to it 

also, JOSEPH always creates the most compelling and just fun to listen to songs and this is no exception!!!!!!!!! the harmonies are delicious and the music dropping at certain points is incredible and the beat has me dancing around the room. filed right under beach music! 

moonlight - madison rose: i wore this song into the ground!!!!! AMAZING beat and vibe. liberating rejuvenating sexy etc etc.

june:

cowboy take me away - the chicks: me personally!!!!! my favorite version of cowboy take me away. i DO wanna touch the earth and break it in my hands but i ESPECIALLY wanna look at the horizon and not see a building standing tall!!!!!!!!! every summer is cowgirl summer but this song just turned the dial to the max. never have i ever wanted a cowgirl summer more.

july:

satellites - emi larraud: this one was interesting! VERY 80s themed. it's funky. it's powerful. it's just groovy.

august:

wicked game - ursine vulpine, annica: alright i'm a sucker for these intense ballads especially when they remind me of the 100 but seriously. it's sensuous. it's an experience. the vocals are out of this world.

pretty boy - LEON: of course i had to put a LEON song on here. while this isn't my favorite of hers it was just so nice to get a new song from her again. i felt like a wilting flower getting watered. to no one's surprise it's a bop and delivers lines that absolutely wreck me such as you can't outrun getting old, that hidden place where hope lives, well that's the last it goes. ma'am!!!

september:

moonburn - dani sylvia: feeling very seen rn thank you!!!!!!!! literally spongebob leaning against rock.jpg every time i listen. it's- ough. this song has layers and i am peeling them back like an onion. when does the healing start if you leave before daylight. saying SO much in one line!!!!!!! it's the inversion of the typical light vs dark trope for me! and the chorus is immaculate.

super graphic ultra modern girl - chappell roan: chappell hit it out of the park with her first album and THIS SONG SPECIFICALLY. the absolute journey @152glasslippers and i went on listening to this... especially at 22 seconds in. WHEW. super graphic ultra modern girl IS THAT GIRL!!!!!!! SHE IS THE MOMENT!!!!!

october:

honest mistake - bears den: screaming shaking crying throwing up etc etc. bears den always writes songs that lift me by my ankles and shake me until every humiliatingly private thought comes tumbling out in the lyrics of their songs. also i love how consistent they are with the aesthetics and formality of their songs. it's very soothing while ripping me up inside.

mars - noelle: listened to this 60 times in a day. you don't understand i found this song 10/17 and spotify stopped tracking 10/31 and it was my most listened to song of the year. it's dreamy. it's sweet. the vocals are stunning and the music is fantastic.

heart to heart - now more than ever: banger. when that beat dropped i was shook!!!!!!!!!! it's a very early 2000s emo vibe but also delightfully contemporary? the vibes are there. oh and the lyrics and the way they're sung is amazingly bittersweet.

november:

swimming pool - jack kane: one of my favorites of the whole year. if spotify didn't stop tracking before november this would have been my top song. it is 100000% a slow sad groove bop. every time i listen maybe not physically but spiritually i am girl at table.jpg. formally this song is delicious and lyrically it is devastating.

december:

scorpions - distance sprinter : okay this one might be a contender for top song. impeccable. there's crack in this. the beat is OUTSTANDING. i literally can't play this in the car if i'm driving because i will start dancing. the vibes are off the charts. at no point in this song do you expect what's next. the lyrics are heartbreaking and beautiful. there's so much i can say about this song but i am gnawing on the words it's just so good.

TOP SONGS OF THE YEAR: these have 5 stars. to me. 6 stars even.

antiques - holden laurence

unrequited night - lily kershaw

vagabond - overcoats

fireworks - JOSEPH

moonburn - dani sylvia

swimming pool - jack kane

scorpions - distance sprinter

[heart-sized]

flowers for you, s. snape

★⺌◞ : severus snape x f! professor reader

cw : slight age gap, mention of possessiveness and jealousy, none else that i know of

a/n : lmao i remember writing this long assed fic last year might as well post it + au where there is no voldy & lily potter is alive

other chapters : 001

masterlist // taglist

“how do you know when you love someone, severus?”

“i think it's when you see the beauty in ordinary things when you're with them.”

you stare at the cloudy sky. surely you have seen it several times, but this time it looks beautiful. can it be. . that you're in love ... with severus?

severus snape loathes muggles. they are the constant reminder of the brutality of his father. so of course, he's not thrilled when a muggle human is appointed as the new muggle studies professor. not to mention, you're clumsy, trip over his potions very often and annoy him to no extent. and yet he finds himself offering flowers. to you.

growing up, all that you have heard is about wizardry. the only muggle in your family and apparently the inherent disappointment, you surely aren't fond of the whole aspect. but when you are appointed as the new muggle studies professor all because of your father, you find out that probably, wizards aren't that bad.

“just because i agreed to be your partner, professor snape, it does not mean that i will keep on accepting each of your nonsensical ideologies and thoughts in my class.”

y/n l/n

“there are quite a lot of things in hogwarts that i cannot stand. however the top three things that i truly cannot stand are : you, you and you, professor y/n.”

severus snape

original characters :

— you can rename them as your own choice ♡

professor kiann y/l/n (your dad ♡)

sierra y/l/n (your mum ♡)

sara y/l/n (your sis ♡)

kyrus y/l/n (your bro ♡)

ᝬ ˙.໑ ╱ © wrt-i 2023 — all rights reserved. property of sev

[tmwcs]

S E 7 E N : P R O L O G U E - P A R T T H R 3 E

Warnings: MDNI18+ Sexual assault, sexual harassment, religion, angels and demons, mentions of hell, angels are bad guys, demons are good guys, sinful pleasures, dry humping, fingering, making a deal with the devil.

Your mouth partially closed as your eyelids grew heavy.

‘No….no……no……why?.....What is this?....what?....how?’

With a tiresome look, you felt all of your strength and energy zapped out of you as you stared at the blood-stained message.

‘How did this get here? Who wrote this? How did they know I’d be here?’

You beat yourself down with so many questions mentally, yet you were beyond scared. Your body wanted to jolt out and start running yet you found yourself stagnant, still staring at the message. You wanted to cry hysterically, yet your body was frozen, your emotions were frozen, everything about you was….frozen.

Unsure of how long you stood there, you finally peered away once you realized that no one was around. No one was present. Only you. Yet this message with your name is on this wooden board, and it was fresh.

You walked, no longer found the need or desire to run. Thinking back on how Lily had conducted herself days before her execution, you now understood why she had been so hopelessly stale. You have become the same as she was.

You walked, for nearly three miles as you took notice of the wooden signs, display landmarks of the miles and paths that you took.

Coming across a trail that had an open field to the right of it, the moon directly hovering over the large widen open space as it stationed itself in the night sky, you offset your path from the trail and cut through the tree line and into the field.

If it had been daylight, it would have been pretty to see, since all the flowers and the surrounding trees provided a wide variety of structure and colors.

Taking off our low-heeled shoes, your gazed remained on the ground as you walked, in pitiful motion, across the field and into the neighboring tree line.

‘Why should I even bother going home…I should just die right now….it’s better than those things killing me brutally.’ Once you crossed the field, you submerged yourself deep into the forest as you heard the trinkle of a creek nearby. In one area, there was a spot that wasn’t dense with foliage, it was a nice area that was clear, manicured even as the fluffy moss covered the ground versus grass. It had wild floral bushes growing around, and the moonlight’s rays shined through from above. Fireflies appeared at random against the surrounding bushes and trees. It looked tranquil, peaceful…it looked like a good place for you to die.

Dropping your shoes carelessly, you calmly took in the sensation of your sore feet comforted by the thickness and softness of the moss beneath them, it was bright green and felt like velvet. Laying down on it, you unbutton the remainder of your shirt, folding it, you placed your head on it as you laid in a half circle. Your thigh high stockings torn from the run; you looked like a mess. But it didn’t matter, for now, you were relishing in the feeling of the warm air hitting our skin, as you lay tired, drifting off into sleep.

It felt like you had just barely closed your eyes and re-opened them, when the chirping of the birds woke you. It wasn’t even daylight yet, but the red hue in the dark sky indicated that it was early morning.

Propping yourself up, you remained in just your skirt and bralette as your hair drapes over your frame, the dewy air felt good.

‘Where should I go?....What do I do?....’

You felt like you wanted to cry, yet you remained as strong as you could, taking in the comfort of nature that surrounded you. However, after a moment of your thoughts reflecting back to Lily, and that horrible message that was on the map with your name on it, you felt the intense burn of moisture coating your eyes.

‘Don’t cry….dont cry…..’

As much as you tried to suppress it, it became harder for you to not sob.

‘When I die…I wont be able to enjoy moments like this…I wont be able to see such beautiful nature…I wont be able to….’

You’re not sure if you began crying out of fear or because you felt sorry for yourself…maybe both. You stood up, taking deep breaths with your hands on your waist, trying to calm yourself. But nothing worked.

Standing with your arms loosely wrapped around your bare waist, you sobbed harshly, taking advantage of being alone in the forest while it was still dark, in the early morning, and cried your heart out. Your voice was all that could be heard as it bounced off the trees, interrupted the morning song of the birds nearby, and silenced the tranquil sound of the creek.  

……………………………………………………………………

“Why are you crying?”

Your head snaps up at the deep and calm voice that startles you out of your sobbing state.

Looking over to the direction of the voice, with the look of sadness and beauty drenching your face, you watched as a young man, dressed in red and black with a mask hovering over his eyes, takes in our sight as you directly look his way. A slight gasp escapes his lips the moment you look at his face, as if he was just star struck by something that greatly pleased his view.

“…Pretty….” He calmly murmurs out.

“Who….who are you?”

He slightly tilts his head as he pauses his steps. Crossing his arms, he looked as if he was studying you, though it was hard to tell exactly as you couldn’t make out his eyes beneath the black strip of lace that laid over them.

With a slight chuckle, he gives off a dashing half smile.

“You’re a sight for sore eyes…you know that?”

You ignored his words of flattery; you were in no mood for anything. Not after the night you’ve been through, as well as the horrible fact that you were going to die…soon.

“Who are you?! What are you doing here? Leave me alone! Stop talking to me I’m not in the mood to listen to your stupid pick-up lines!” you tearfully lashed out. The moment you finished, your breathing started to escalate again, as if you were hyperventilating and the urge to sob hard was breaching you.

“just please…leave me alone….” You looked away and began to softly sob as you tilted your head, your arms remained loose around your waist as you stuck out a hip, trying to ease your stance as you felt like you were going to collapse any moment.

“Hmm…you’re even prettier when you’re mad….or crying.”

Looking back up at him with a harsh look on your face, your hair surrounding your frame, the man continued to breathe slow and deep each time you faced him.

Licking the inside of his mouth, with his arms remained tightly crossed, he pokes the inside of his cheek with his tongue and leaves his mouth open, appearing rather suggestive in his countenance towards you.

“Oh geez…when you look at me that way…you’re making it harder for me.”  He slightly smirks as he tilts his head more.

‘What’s with this guy?...why is he saying these things?

“Who…who are you?” You trembled with slight hesitation in your voice as the man was consumed by the elaborate decoration of his attire. 

“Why are you crying?….”

You shook your head, tears building back up in your eyes as you felt the burn from the coating of moisture glazing over your eyeballs. His voice was as smooth as fine liquor and burned like fire.

“G-get away from me. Please! Don’t come any closer!”

Ignoring your pleas, he continues to walk softly and steadily your way. 

“Oooh….I don’t think so. Those tears….they’re beautiful-you’re….beautiful. You’re unique. You’re fearless even when fearful, and I want to do something about it… I want to do something about….you.”

With his eyes hidden beneath the mesh of the lace mask, hiding his identity completely, you couldn’t be entirely sure but from what you could make out with his other features, he didn’t look to be anyone you recognized. 

With a bright red blazer jacket, adorned with black crystals and elaborate stitching, his satin shirt rested against his broad chest underneath it, paired with black trousers. Not only did he appeared to be well dressed, but he was lavishly adorned as if he was going to a special event. 

What is a man like him dressed like this, doing in the middle of the woods of all places? 

“Please…please st-stay away….”

You pled in a near whisper as you succumbed to a tearful fall, landing on your knees as your mind becomes tatted by the harsh reality, that in seven days from now, you were going to be brutally executed, all in front of the eyes of the world. 

Up until this point, it had always been preached that only sinners would die by the hands of the angels….but what sin? What sin have you committed? What about those children or newborns that were selected? Some of them hadn’t lived for a while day and were marked with the stained label of ‘sinner’ and were thrashed before their own parents by those terrible creatures, known as the ‘angels’.

Sure, you weren’t overtly religious. You never went to church, and you weren’t a virgin, but was that truly a sin worth you dying over? What about the rest of the world? There were so many others that came to mind, people who had done far worse than you could ever imagine, yet they were allowed to live? Longer than you? 

“Please….” You sobbed…hard. Your mouth gaped open as you dipped your head low, covering your eyes with your hand as the squeaky tone of breathless gasps utter out past your lips, all from the overwhelming sense of despair of facing death in a week’s time. 

‘I….I’m going to die…and no one cares….I didn’t do anything wrong.’

You hear his footsteps pause right before you, a long exhale released through his nostrils as he squats down, taking a knee and props himself in front of your pitiful state. His hands stroke and caresses your arms as your hair lays, draping over your back and shoulders while you cradled yourself, trying to find solace in your despair. 

“Please…won’t you tell me why you’re crying? Look at me for a second…please…. look at me…I’ve never seen eyes like yours before. They mesmerize…and right now, that’s all I want…is to be mesmerized…by you.” 

His voice was calm, smooth, and deep with a slight bit of high tune when he expressed excitement in his words. 

Raising your head up, you come face to face with the man. Still wearing the lace-wear over his eyes, but up close and out of the shadows, you could tell he was devastatingly handsome. 

“Theeere….that’s better. Hmm?” He tilts his head as a sweet and soft, yet faint, smirk forms on his lips, showing just a bit of his teeth. 

“Now tell me…what’s wrong?” Even though you couldn’t make out his eyes, it was evident that he was heavily gazing into yours. He leans in, his nose barely touching the tip of your own as he releases a single, hot, and lengthy breath against your lips. 

“I…I am to die in seven days….and I don’t know why…I….” 

His head reverts the tilt he displayed. Raising his eyebrows, he licked his lips and scoffed out another smirk, only this time, more teeth were exposed in a slight grin. The smoothness and handsomeness in that smirk was…devilish. 

Watching as you frowned your brows together, confused as to why he smirked upon hearing that you were going to die in a week, he reassures you that the matter wasn’t at all funny to him. 

By slightly squeezing your arms together, he pulls you into him. 

“Hey…heeeeeeeey…..” his tone was deep. His voice croaks at the last bit of his dragged-out tone. Whispering, he bids to you. “Come here….sit on it.”

He places a firm grasp on your hips and pulls you atop of him as he leans and lays all the way back, gently guiding your form to straddle him as he raises the hem of your skirt just a tad to expose more of your thighs. 

“Better….” He merely utters as he grins and releases a short bit dark chuckle, biting down on his bottom lip.  

With his hands gently, and softly gripping your waist, he starts to motion your movements to softly grind on him. Despite the both of you being fully clothed, your thin panties did no justice in obscuring the sensation of being dry humped. 

“W-what are you….mmmm…..uugghhhh…” you moaned out as the tightness in your core starts to pulsate. It had been so long since your last sexual encounter, yet, even though there was no penetration, the feeling of the man beneath you taking control and watching you through that lace mask as he slightly lifts, pulls, pushes, and dips your hips in diverse motions, it was weakening you in the most pleasant way possible. 

The lace eyewear remained on the whole time, hovering his identity from you. Whispering, his deep tone barely present as he tells you, “Yeah…good giiiiiiiiiiiiiiiirrrrrrllll.….just like that. Move with me.” 

For a moment, you forgot about your untimely fate that would take place in just a matter of days. Each time he slightly lifted you and admits strength in his lift while also softly bucking into your barely covered slit, it caused you to moan and whimper out. Your voice bounce off each tree as it echos throughout the forest setting.

“Now…tell me more about this whole dying nonsense. What’s with that?” He issues, as he continues the movement of his hands by waving your hips against his groin. 

You whimpered out your words as your eyes remained winced shut, your head tilted back as your hair extends its reach along his finger tips. 

“I…..got selected to die…by the angels…” 

“Oooooh….those guys…” he nonchalantly states. The second he finishes his words, he begins to pick up the pace, just slightly, causing you to start bouncing rapidly at high momentum.

Underneath you, he watches your body absorb the impact of his thrusts as he bit down his lip. Moaning out, your breath and vocal cords hitch at random each time your covered clit slightly pelts against his groined attire. 

“O-oh! Oh my…..ugh! What are you…??” Your words were stuttered out as you couldn’t manage to form completely sentences. He kept up the movement and pace, yet kept speaking as if you both were talking business.

With his hands rotating your hips and popping them, a lightning bolt of heightened tingle travels from your crotch to your stomach, and chest. You slap your hands over his, desperate to grab on to something. 

‘Who…I don’t even know this man…why is he doing this? My God what is happening to me? It just…..it feels so good…oh my God he feels so good.’ 

Making your body pop continuously, your chest grew sore from the heavy weight that formulated from this man’s discretion. You lost all structured pose as you fall forward, quickly shifting your hands next to his ears as you prop yourself from falling flat against him. Yet the position you just rendered yourself into didn’t make the situation much better as he continued to display the amount of leverage he had with your movements, not to mention, your face being this close to his. It allowed him to shift over and kiss in your ear and nuzzle against your neck. 

“So…I take it you don’t want to die?” Continuing his movements, he converses so calmly once more, meanwhile your moans and whimpers pick up pace, volume, and pitch. 

“Uuuuggghhh…..mmmm ah!…God!…what are you doing to me?” 

“Mmm…your moans are the sweetest sound I’ve ever heard.” He softly speaks against your ear, causing a sensitive tickle as he kisses it with tiny, loving pecks. 

“I’m about to give you an ultimatum…you can take it or leave it, will you hear me out?” He whispers against your ear once more, followed by a sudden lick over it, from lobe to helix, and ended with his exposed, row of teeth pressed up against it, gritting against each other as your skin barely surfaces them. 

“Y-yes….mmmm…please….please I-I can’t…”

“I know baby…oh I fucking know. You’re so perfect…. let me continue while I give it to you, yeah?” 

Picking up the pace once more, he continues the act of intense dry humping, thrusting, bucking and grinding, as he takes in the delight of hearing the increase of gasped moans that escaped your pursed, glossy, Cherry-stained lips. 

“O-oh!” Was all you could vocalize out repeatedly as your breasts continuously tapped against his chest from the heightened pulse of each buck his hips commit. 

“First off, you can call me Helel…can you say it? For me? I want to hear your voice call out my name.” 

“He-Helel!” You yelped out as your hips and clothed core succumbs to the rapid series of taps from the bulging hardness that laid under his trousers, yet it didn’t deter from the immense sturdiness as you felt every bit of his hard-on while he continues. 

“Yeah…you sound even prettier than I imagined…I want to hear it…. eternally…”

Kissing your ear once more, he shifts his face right below your chin as he takes his hand, reaches for the back of your head and pushes you towards him, committing you into a lengthy and passionate kiss.

His silver stands that were swooped to the side presses against your cheek as he practically eats the inside of your mouth. With harsh and yet, sensually pleasing motions of gaping his mouth wide, then closing them just to smack them open as he massages his tongue against yours, you moaned into his mouth and melt right on top of him. You wanted more. It felt too good…he felt too good. 

It was strange though…. the kiss was…

The moment he slipped his tongue inside your mouth and massaged the inside of your cheeks, you could have sworn you tasted something…it was sweet and juicy…you recognized it, though it took you a second to put your finger on it. It was very similar to that of a common fruit…

…………..

‘Apples?…’

P A R T F O 4 R

[journalsouppe]

I initially played ACNH for 300 hours in between release day - july of 2020, and never played the 2.0 update or the HHP dlc until recently! So I decided to make a second ACNH spread with the goals to: experience as much of the 2.0 update as possible, beat HHP, complete all the bugs and fish in the museum (I have the fossils done and I will finish art another time).

I had a ton of fun but this was the longest grind I've ever done. I still have nightmares waiting like 5 hours for that damn giraffe stag to spawn my fucking god. Super worth it though bc this was the first time catching all bugs and fish even though I've played CF and NL :}

The Lily of the Valley sticker is a freebie I got from MariKrekeler!

Writing typed below!

rating: 8.5 played: sp 2023 port: nintendo switch favorite? Y replayable? Y recommend? Y series: animal crossing

comments:

Dagnel (YT) inspired me to pick the game back up

I look so cute in my work uniform >.<

the hopeful goal is to finish bugs, fish, and flowers

forcing the villagers on vacation to work and go to school is wild T^T

I love the evolution of adding new items like partitions and nature sounds

I didn't expect to do check-ups

OMG IT'S BAMS BDAY WHEN I PLAY AGAIN AND JULIAN IS HERE (my two faves)

decorating all the buildings does get tiring

i really love the venue decor

Bam gave me the pumpkin soup recipe while wearing my fruits basket sweater T^T!!!!!!!!!!

i can only play in short bursts as it's not as fun when playing alone and it's so grindy and long

an apparel shop is a really fun idea

kk concert goes pretty hard

IT TOOK FIVE FUCKING HOURS TO CATCH THE GIRAFFE STAG T^T

i haven't played aa4 yet but klavier reminds me of Julian esp bc julian was also in a band and had a falling out with a band member (ive played aa4 since then and can confirm theyre the exact same person lmfao)

8 FUCKING HOURS FOR THE MAHI MAHI

okay the rest of the writing is my checklist of bugs and fish i needed to catch and ... yall im not typing that who cares about that anyways T_T

Summary

This was brutal. I curse the name of giraffe stags, mahi-mahis, and Dagnel. I had a lot of fun with HHP and I'm happy to be done with 3/4 of the museum, but my god at what cost? I wish my 2020 self did like a small grind to get these pier fish because why the hell did it take me 8 hours for the mahi-mahi T^T. Enough complaining, I highly enjoyed happy home paradise. I never played HHD for ACNL so this was a fun surprise and I loved the range of homes you could design. I also loved how there were overarching goals to complete: school, cafe, restaurant, hospital, clothing store, and when those were all done you were treated to a KK rave. I also enjoyed seeing my favorite villagers again and getting to play in seasons I hadn't previously played in ACNH. I have mixed feelings about Harv's island. I like that a ton of characters are brought back but I think some of them could've been integrated on the onto the main island better, like reese and cyrus having an add on to nook's shop and also give us another nook shop upgrade T^T. I miss playing with friends but it seems I might be making plans to play with Grimspark! Perhaps in the future I'll pick up this game again to finish art and flowers but that'll be in 2024 me problem. Tired of grinding T^T.