#—IT IS *SUCH* A WEIRD FEELING HAVING THE MAN WHO... TECHNICALLY CREATED YOU LOOK INTO YOUR HOSTS EYES‚

[lie-lacdreams]

Tender (Curly x Reader)

here's a little oneshot that takes place in Thermodynamics & Turmoil but can be read separately. Sorry if the writing is a little weird - I wrote this at 3 am. I'll create a masterlist soon to clarify timelines as I write more of these.

This goes out to anyone who feels like there’s never an end in sight. I’m right there with you. Things will get better and all your hard work will pay off.

Engineer! Reader x Curly Word Count ~ 1.1k

Dread is an all-consuming feeling – she would know. Disaster always felt imminent, and if she didn’t burn the midnight oil, skip another meal to conserve a precious thirty minutes of time to scan through pages and pages of steam tables, her failure to figure out her responsibilities would fall on her crewmates. 

It was times like these where the cortisol would flood her system, leaving her in a permanent state of anxiety, numbing her to any other emotion. 

(Y/N) had her limits. She was human, after all. Pushed beyond her capacity a long time ago, she had no choice but to continue – she wouldn’t dare think about what would happen if she didn’t succeed. 

She was currently in the lounge, the familiar spread of her texts and loose papers over the table. Hungry and tired, she promised herself a snack after she had a breakthrough, but things weren’t looking promising. Just this morning (or was it technically yesterday morning now?), she sat where she was now, having spent the entire night with books open as the lounge screen grew brighter and brighter. At some point, Swansea made his way in to get some coffee and raised an eyebrow at her, wishing her a good morning. It embarrassed her to no end to be caught, and she tried to lie and claim that she just woke up early to get a head start on work. Scrambling to collect her things, she made her way somewhere else so she wouldn’t get caught by anyone else. 

(Y/N) knew at this point, Curly was very likely worried about her, but she knew that he would know better than to interrupt her when she needed to concentrate the hardest. While she wanted nothing more than to crawl into his arms and sleep, she knew her work was far from over. 

At this desperate hour at night, the bar for comfort was a low one. Taking a moment to strain her eyes towards the night time display, she thought it was the most beautiful thing she had seen all day. Looking back at the compressibility chart in front of her, waves of lines seemed to melt and swirl together into insignificance. She needed to sleep, but with so much at stake, she knew she couldn’t. Every hour down to the last minute counted now as the ship’s steam tunnels were a ticking bomb unless she could figure out how to decrease the pressure building up. 

Blame it on the heat exchangers that corporate failed to add safeguards to. Or the worn and weathered valves they refused to replace on the insulators. If only the ship were running the way it was supposed to, (Y/N) wouldn’t have to jump through hoops and reinvent the wheel. But alas, she was here now, fighting a valiant battle to keep her eyes open and her brain wired. 

The door opened, and (Y/N)’s eyes darted over to the noise and stuck to the man who entered through it. She typically never saw him out of uniform and in such casual clothes (she assumed what he was wearing now to be his pajamas). A simple white t-shirt spread over his chest and shoulders while he wore a simple pair of sweatpants. His wavy hair, usually parted and somewhat styled, was unruly and disheveled, likely from sleep. The tired expression on his face was unwavering, a deep seated frown and furrowed brows were not budging. 

“Hun, what are you still doing up?” He sounded disappointed, and she slouched further in her chair, ashamed. 

“Duty calls. I’m working on a tight deadline, Captain. The ideal gas law waits for no one, no matter how tired they may be.” She let out a loud sigh as he pressed the pads of his fingers into her shoulders in an attempt to sooth all the knots that accumulated in her muscles. 

“It’s frustrating knowing that I can’t do much to help you. I wish there was something I could do to make it better.” He sat beside her now, gently holding her face in his hands as he caressed the dark circles under her eyes with his thumbs. He brought her head closer to his lips to kiss her face. Her heart leapt, wanting nothing more than to crawl into his arms and feel the weight of his hold. 

Suppressing a whine, she put a hand over his. “You just being here now makes things better already.” 

Curly’s eyes brightened for a second before he stood up, tugging her hand to get up with him. “Come on, I have an idea.” He helped gather all of her supplies as they moved to the couch where he dragged the coffee table closer, moving board and card games to  place her things down. Sitting down in front of the table, he patted the spot between his legs, inviting her to sit with him. With a small chuckle, she sat, continuing with her work once more as he pressed a kiss on her neck and rubbed her shoulders. For an hour they sat in silence as (Y/N) worked diligently, the feeling of being under his hands grounding her to a greater degree than she was before. 

Finally, she put her pen down, leaning her back into Curly’s chest as he wrapped both of his arms around her. “All done?” He asked, hopeful.

“I think I’m in a good place to stop until tomorrow morning. At least this way I can get a couple of hours of sleep in. Swansea will need to help me with tightening and loosening the valves for what I need next, anyway.” There was a rush of giddiness that flooded her as she turned around and kissed him. They both leaned back more into the couch as he wrapped his arms around her and returned the kiss. Their movements were slow and lazy, likely a direct result of the fatigue they felt, but the grasp Curly had on her was warm and firm – secure and safe. 

“Thank you for staying with me. You made that more bearable than it typically is.” She looked down at him, now laying on his chest. He brought her to rest against him, one of his hands still rubbing her back. 

“I got you, hun.” he said simply. They laid in the silence of the early hours of the morning, savouring the warmth they shared a few minutes longer before (Y/N) reluctantly got up, Curly following suit. But even as they moved towards the door to head to their beds, his touch was ever present on her waist, and at her door he gave her one last kiss goodnight before heading to his own room. 

Working for Pony Express was harsh and unforgiving for her; she was never disclosed the amount of responsibility she would have to shoulder when she first joined, but now, lying in bed, exhausted and starving beyond belief, she couldn’t bring herself to feel regret and disdain. The job was hard, but at least she was here with him, and he treated her so tenderly.

[maleyanderecafe]

I Can Die for You (Manga)

Created by: Saori

Genre: Shoujo/Comedy

This is another one that I typesetted and is actually @meo-eirui's baby (as in she translated it). This one is just starting out, but is relatively light. It's in the same ballpark as Kurosaki-san no Ichizuna Ai ga Tomaranai in that it is a relationship with a teacher and a student (so an adult and a minor), though again, I think it does it tastefully enough that it's not too weird(well, mostly), at least in the context of the story. This is a pairing of a light yandere and a jirai kei type of character, though it is mostly pretty light hearted as of now. Currently there is two chapters out, though we will be updating weekly until the story is finished. . If you like our stuff, please donate to us on Ko-fi for more yandere stuff.

The story starts out with Nemu waiting on Christmas Eve for her boyfriend to come and visit her. While waiting she spots another man waiting for his love to come as well. However, as hour pass by, she and this other guy wait in the cold until finally their lovers come to visit. However, we find out that for both of them, they were essentially broken up with and didn't want to see them again, thus ditching them entirely. Nemu then invites this other guy to come and eat with him, feeling that she has a sort of comradery with him given they both waited in the snow for about ten hours. Nemu and Rindou then both complain about how they were too much for the other person with Nemu being a Jirai Kei (a landmine girl) and Rindou being yandere light. They both have similar ideas in terms of what they want in a relationship (like having only their love as their only contact, having a gps tracker on their phone and having the lovers prioritize only their lover), and Nemu feels really touched that she's found a kindred soul in this way. After spending too much time eating, the two aren't able to exchange contacts because their phones are dead, though Nemu hopes to see him in the future. A couple of months later, Nemu ends up dating another guy to stop the loneliness, though it's clear that she's still thinking about Rindou. This leads to the breakup of her current boyfriend, though lo and behold, her new teacher is Rindou which she cheers about immediately. Of course, Rindou doesn't respond, which leads her confused and she goes to look for him after. She finds out that indeed, this is the Rindou that she met on Christmas, and even asks him out, though Rindou refuses because he can't date someone who switches up with other guys so easily. The chapter ends with Nemu declaring she won't give up.

In the second chapter, Nemu continues the attack on trying to ask Rindou out, though she keeps on failing regardless and ends up being kicked out of class for interrupting too much. This leads to her writing a bunch of letters and whatnot declaring her love for Rindou. During this time, one of her ex's, Keito, comes to ask to be together again as the two only split up because of his parents. Despite this, Nemu continues to refuse him, both finding him annoying and finding that this will interfere with Rindou's perception of Nemu. Eventually Keito pulls up the attention that dating Rindou would cause him to go to jail given that she's a minor and he's an adult, causing Nemu to start to worry and be less aggressive in trying to pursue Rindou. Eventually, this excessive worry causes Nemu to cause an accident during Chemistry class where Rindou brings her to the nurse to take care of her. Nemu confesses that she stopped trying to be so aggressive once she found out that she could cause Rindou to get fired, though Rindou simply laughs at this stating that he wouldn't even care if he got fired if he was a teacher or even arrested, though once again, the chapter ends with Rindou rejecting her advances because she has ten exs.

This one is kind of strange because technically Rindou isn't really a yandere for Nemu, or at least doesn't have interest in having a relationship with her not because of the age difference (which well, manga logic) but rather because of her tendency to jump from guy to guy. We do see him show tendencies for his ex though, given that, like Nemu, he waited in the snow for three hours, was about to propose to her after only three months of dating and would have likely killed (or otherwise hurt himself) if not for Nemu's interference. Generally yanderes don't really jump from person to person, they tend to have one person who they are ride or die for, but this isn't really the case. Currently we don't have all the chapters translated (because I can't read Japanese) but we can assume that as the story goes on he does become more like how he was with his old partner to match with Nemu, given that it's going in the direction of the two being endgame. I think that they match pretty well and I'm a sucker for couples like menhara x yandere or in this case jirai kei x yandere since they often are able to match each other's energy. Meru is really spreading the word here with this kind of thing lol. It will be interesting to see how this series goes since it does have such a unique coupling.

Nemu is go getter from the beginning and I can always appreciate a proactive MC. It is kind of refreshing seeing a lead that is going after the yandere rather than the other way around, since usually the yanderes are the ones who pursue their love interest. I don't really know too much about Jirai Kei other than the general outfits that they wear, but at least from what I can tell they do tend to be very explosive in their emotions while still having a specific type of fashion that they have as well. I'm not really sure if Jirai Keis are types that tend to be more assertive in what they want, but in any case it is fun seeing Nemu's personality and seeing how much she loves the yandere side to Rindou. It does make me wonder if there's maybe too many series we do where there's a happy ending with the yandere and their lover but, that's an issue for another time.

The next chapter seems to be more about Keito and his relationship with Nemu, which I'm sure will somehow give me second male lead syndrome, but I guess we'll see how that goes. In any case, if you are interested in this series, please feel free to check it out. We'll be trying to post on Fridays on Mangadex, so keep an eye out.

[suzukiblu]

WIP guessing game: "Robin"

Superboy has existed for about six months at best (five months, two weeks, and six days, but who's creepily spying on their fellow heroes and vigilantes? not Tim, for sure) and was created in a lab full of extremely niche genetic experiments whose creators very rarely bothered making look human, which is probably why he has some weird ideas about certain social norms.

Tim assumes that's why the guy just decided to drop a very annoyed Catwoman on him out of nowhere, anyway.

"The fuck?" he says, though through his vocoder it comes out more like the incoherent screeching of the damned. That being, well, the whole purpose of the vocoder and all. Superboy grins down at him from the nighttime sky all bright and sunny and weirdly adorable, for being a lab-grown weapon and a guy who is technically capable of disassembling Tim down to his individual atoms with, like, a touch and about two seconds' worth of thought.

Not that Tim has been creepily spying on anyone or said anyone's Cadmus files, again.

Also Superboy might not even know he can do that yet, so it's really not a smart thing to mention right now.

"Hey, man!" Superboy greets cheerfully. "She was breaking into that big museum a couple blocks over, figured you'd care about that. As opposed to, like, breaking into some rich asshole with insurance's penthouse. Figured you would not have cared about that."

"The museum also has insurance, for the record," Selina informs him sourly as she makes an art of getting off her unceremoniously roof-dumped ass while looking like being on this roof was her idea to begin with. Because, like: Selina. "And has not properly sourced the artifacts in their new Bast exhibit."

I know, that's why I was on my way to the museum to keep an eye out for you, is what Tim does not say, since Robin is supposed to be a splintered aspect of a mysterious all-knowing city spirit given human form and not just, like, a really dedicated teenager surviving on semi-legal energy drinks and conspiracy-board detective work and the occasional occult ritual to summon the Batman.

What he does do is jerkily cock his head and say, "Preyyyyy?", and let his vocoder horribly mangle the word into a sound usually best described as "unholy avian screeching". Superboy beams, which is not a normal reaction to hearing Robin's voice. Selina just rolls her eyes, but Selina of course knows about the whole "really dedicated teenager surviving on semi-legal energy drinks and conspiracy-board detective work and the occasional occult ritual to summon the Batman" thing.

Like she's never summoned the Batman for anything, geez. Or "Bruce", as an eight year-old Dick Grayson had once upon a time decided to randomly dub him. Tim still can't call the eternal and unsleeping eldritch protector of their city that without feeling like he's going to spontaneously combust, but it is in fact a thing that the Batman will answer to.

Might as well call Pennyworth "Alfie", though.

Jason was even worse at names than Dick, Tim is pretty sure.

"Yeah!" Superboy says, sounding still more cheerful and floating down the rest of the way to the roof to land lightly in front of Tim. Selina eyes him in a way that would end very badly for anyone who was not functionally invulnerable. "I mean, she seems cool and all but I dunno, figured the Bat wasn't big on Cats in his territory. And also the criming. Definitely also the criming."

"How . . . find Robin?" Tim asks. Superboy doesn't have enhanced senses, as far as he knows, so . . .

"Oh, I've been stalking you," Superboy explains. Tim blinks behind his unblinking mask and feels several ways about that statement. "That's what you Bats all do when you're interested in somebody, right? So I figured you'd like it if I did it back."

. . . Tim feels several ways about that statement.

[chronicallyonline101]

hi its me, i LOOVEEE the way you've characterised everyone in DK and it makes me wonder how many HCs you have for them all????? because theyre so unique down to the littlest of details, like Formaggio liking Smashmouth and Ghiaccio preffering Warhammer over DnD! i want to hear ur headcannons. share them with the class

hello again !!!! i will share !

I've got... a LOT. so i'll put them under cut!

La Squadra Headcanons!

Risotto HCs:

Started the hitman team at age 21 in 1994.

- Lived with his Aunt and Uncle growing up because his Catholic parents thought he was a 'bad omen'.

- Started a band with his cousin when they were around ten or eleven, stopped playing instruments after his cousin died.

- Was technically 'kidnapped' by Passione after killing the man who hit his cousin, emotionally manipulated under the guise that the organisation had 'saved' him from being sent to prison. This is one of the reasons he turned traitor.

- Likes writing poetry and short stories; particularly graphic, gory horror stories. When he was younger, he had wanted to be an author. Nowwadays he can't really see a future for himself.

- Keeps one of those diaries where when you input the code a song plays and it opens.

The song he chose is Enter Sandman, by Metallica. It's his favourite because it reminds him of himself, but if anyone asks him his favourite song he'll say something obscure like Creeping Death because he doesn't want to be seen as some basic poser.

- Forced Prosciutto to listen to The Grateful Dead.

- He's normally quite cordial with his workspace; the Hideout and his office are clean and proper, but his bedroom is extremely messy. It's his own space, so he lets it get tatty because he doesn't want to associate it with the stress of work.

- Has a really bad posture because he always has to hunch over to do paperwork.

- He's always quiet, not because he's mysterious and cool but because he was very isolated as a teenager and has ZERO social skills - he's always scared he'll mess up and say something weird, so he's very reserved.

In turn, he's created a sort of 'Boogeyman of Passione' name for himself. He's learnt to embrace his timid nature.

- The bells on his coxcomb are a test of stealth for himself. When you put a bell on a cat, it learns to hunt without ringing it; he's done the same.

On the contrary, though, it's not uncommon to hear jangling inside the hideout as he goes about his business because he doesn't feel the need to conceal himself within the presence of his teammates.

- Had anaemia growing up, was shot with the arrow and obtained Metallica; it cured his anaemia, but then he developed haemochromatosis - which is a result of too much iron building up in the blood over a prolonged period of time.

Since Metallica is his stand, his case of haemochromatosis isn't too severe and the symptoms aren't bad. It doesn't affect his work too much, but he can often become very fatigued and experiences a lot of joint pain.

- He is an artifical stand user (hit by the arrow.)

Prosciutto HCs:

Joined the hitman team at age 19 in 1994.

- Pesci and Prosciutto are half-brothers; they share the same mother but have different fathers. Pesci looks more like their mum while Prosciutto looks more like his father - this caused a rift in their family because Pesci ended up being the favourite child.

- Was raised Catholic; claims to be atheist, but in truth upholds agnostic ideologies that he will sometimes accidentally project onto his teammates.

- Doesn't like smoking, but it's a habit he's gotten stuck into. He doesn't know how to quit.

- Joined La Squadra two years before Pesci, during this time Pesci thought he had died.

- Often uses their late mother as a way of manipulating Pesci: e.g. "What would she think of you behaving like this?" , "She'd be disappointed in you."

He doesn't realise how bad this behaviour is, he thinks he is doing the right thing in trying to mentor Pesci.

- Unlike Risotto, Prosciutto didn't know what he wanted to be while growing up. He was very focused on his classes in school, often earning lots of rewards and prizes but he only did it to try and earn his mothers affections. He never actually liked school.

That being said, his intellect is natural. He has always been very smart without trying.

- He has a gap in his front teeth and he HATES it because everyone tells him it looks cute and he doesn't want to look cute he wants to look scary and cool.

- Doesn't understand why Pesci is so morally upstanding. Why is it so hard for him to kill? Look, Prosciutto just killed twenty people! In one go!

Because of the Grateful Dead, it is very easy for Prosciutto to kill and not face the moral consequences of his actions. His kills are indirect and 'merciful', as he puts it - whereas Pesci has to get physical. He needs to come into direct contact to kill, so he has to deal with the moral turmoil that comes with murder.

- I also like to think he's got really prominent eyebags and forehead wrinkles because of how often he is subjected to the effects of his own stand.

Like, he seems to be able to control how his own body ages and shifts between old and young whenever a situation negates it, nd I don't think it's very good for his skin to be doing that all the time.

Maybe he has an extensive moisturising routine to combat the effects of his stand?

- Cleans messes on instinct; even if it isn't his own, he cleans up after everyone. He knows this is bad because it just gives everyone else a reason to be slobby, but he can't help it - nobody else ever cleans to the degree he likes anyways, so he might as well do it.

- He is an artifical stand user (hit by the arrow.)

Formaggio HCs:

Joined the hitman team at age 23 in 1995.

- Gwess and Formaggio are also half-siblings! Different mothers, and about twenty-years difference between the two of them so Formaggio probably didn't know she existed until a LOT later in life.

ALSO. when i first watched Stone Ocean i kept mishearing Gwess' name as Gwyn, so I headcanon her to be Welsh, which means by default I also headcanon Formaggio to be Welsh !!! But that's a HC i tend to leave out of my fics cuz it's really outlandish.

- If he'd lived until 2012, I like to think he would have tried to break Gwess out of prison. Probably would have failed.

- Got his cat as a gift from his mother when he was a teenager, it's the only thing he has left from his mother and so he tries his hardest to take care of her - even if he is struggling to take care of himself.

Despite this, he still shoves his cat into bottles and jars and things. It's a really cool party trick! Everyone always thinks he's so cool, like some kind of magician!

- Unlike Risotto and Prosciutto, who were both raised Catholic, Formaggio's parents were both atheist. His mother attended Church, but it was mostly an excuse to get away from his father and he never bothered to go with her.

- Has joint pain and muscle soreness from how often he has to shrink himself and then re-grow himself.

- Like's to collect mini-things; like those little baking kits. He thinks they are so cute!

- He is a natural redhead, like in the manga, but dyes his hair grey, like in the anime, so that he doesn't get bullied.

- He is a natural stand user (born with ability.)

Pesci HCs:

Joined the hitman team at age 19 in 1996.

- Pesci would rather be doing ANYTHING else. He never wanted to be a hitman. He doesn't like killing - not because he's all soft and sensitive like people make him out to be, but because he has morals and??? killing people? is wrong?

So why is he a hitman?

Well, I think Pesci has had the WORST life humanely possible. At twelve, his dad died in a boating accident. At sixteen, his brother 'went missing', presumed dead. At seventeen, his mother died. He was so lonely, and isolated, that when he realised his brother was in fact alive, he was willing to do anything to try and give himself purpose.

- Despite joining the team years beforehand, Pesci only had his first kill in 2001. This was because Prosciutto still coddles him as his little brother and he can get away with doing less on hits.

It's kind of manipulative - like, weaponizing faux incompetence, but he doesn't care.

- He wanted to be a fisherman when he grew up, like his father had been; he rarely has time to go fishing since joining the hitman team.

- If he could leave the team, he probably would.

- That being said, I think if he had lived past the events of VA he would have had the potential to become one of the most powerful hitmen on the team - and that is why Prosciutto never gave up on him, despite his supposed 'cowardice'

- His hair matts really easy so he tries to keep it short; he'll spend hours before bed trying to brush knots out of it.

- He is a night-owl, and likes staying up until quite late into the night listening to music or doing some of his other hobbies, like painting or drawing - he is extremely creative!

But because of this, when he does go to sleep, he often ends up sleeping until the late hours of the day. He is always criticised for this by Prosciutto.

- He is an artifical stand user (hit with arrow.)

Melone HCs:

Joined the hitman team at age 18 in 1994.

- Pookie... where do I even start.......

- I think he has mild heterochromia; one of his eyes is a blue-ish green and the other is blue. He used to be bullied for it, which is why he covers it.

Since joining the hitman team and meeting Risotto - who, yk, has funky eyes - he has learnt to like his eyes a bit more.

- Melone wanted to be a doctor or a scientist when he grew up. He loves biology and chemistry, particularly in regards to the creation of human life: reflected in his stand, Babyface.

I like to think that he had toyed with 'creating life' even before he got his stand; as a teenager he would do old fashioned experiments with homunuculuses and other alchemy.

- Since Junior is not connected to his body, he often does not get injured during missions. He is the least muscular and most lithe out of everyone on the Hitman team, however, maintains a semi-athletic built as he maintains a very firm exercise routine - being a Hitman takes a lot of muscle, so he can't get away with not exercising in the same way his teamates do, even if he experiences less threat than them.

- He also has a lot less scars than the rest of them for this very reason.

- His teammates are hot-headed, quick-thinkers; he is not. He is slow, cold and calculated. Since he is almost never in the heat of a battle, he is allowed to sit back and think. He has the time to calculate his next move.

This is his downfall, however; when Giorno's snake finds him in the trainstation he isn't given a chance to think through his next decision. The attack is quick and painful. ☹️.

- Unlike the rest of the team, he didn't know his parents that well. They sold him to Passione when he was very young, so any memory he does have of them has been soured.

- They were likely atheists, though.

- He can be quite manipulative at times, and he knows exactly what he's doing. In fact, he has a chart on Babyface which shows him the traits and weak-points of all his teammates; he knows near everything about them, and can poke and prod in a way that gets him exactly what he wants.

- His outfit squeaks whenever he walks. He's really bad at stealth missions.

- He also has REALLY bad posture (which I think is semi-canon tbh cuz, during that one scene where they are searching Donatella's house he walks into the room and HE LOOKS LIKE A SHRIMP.)

- I also have a transfem hc for Melone, but the last time I shared that with someone they started tweaking and told me it was weird so I mostly keep that to myself now  😭

- If he had lived, I think he would have had a MySpace and Tumblr, I think he'd of liked how you can customise your own blog and how it's your own little space to yap about whatever!

- Has a HORRIBLE sleep schedule. Not because he has insomnia or anything, but just because he always gets distracted on his laptop right before bed and ends up staying up until 4-5am.

Like Pesci, he is more of a night-owl anyways. The two often end up bumping into each other in the middle of the night.

- He is an artifical stand user (hit by arrow.)

Ghiaccio HCs:

Joined the hitman team at age 20 in 1994.

- His brash personality is a result of his bad upbringing. His parents were very abusive, and so he is used to having to bite back at those around him; he is constantly in 'defence mode' and snaps at the people around him often unintentionally.

He feels bad about it, but doesn't know how to stop. It's especially hard to recover from this habit when his teammates are always plucking at his nerves.

- With that in mind; his parents are rich.

Like, how else could he have that convertible??? La Squadra was getting paid PENNIES and then he rolls up to HQ in his shiny new eighty-one-million lira (i did the math for this) car????

- His parents seemed to think buying him nice stuff would win his affections. He got the car for his 18th birthday, and still uses it despite having since cut off his parents.

- He went to a private school growing up and is objectively the most educated on the entire team.

- Because of the way he was raised, he detests authorative figures. He didn't like Risotto when he first joined the team, but has since learnt to respect his stoic leader.

- Reads play-scripts for fun. (im projecting)

- REALLY likes tabletop RPGS, but would rather die than tell ANYONE about his little hobby.

He finds it to be a good distraction, especially after getting mad and blowing up at someone; painting the figures, or reading the rules, or playing the game can be a good way for him to focus on something else and relax.

His favourite is Warhammer, though. He doesn't like D&D, he thinks its for mainstream wannabe nerds. Not him. He's cool. (he's not.)

- He pretends to hate Fallout, but secretly loves it. I've talked abt it on my blog before, but I think when the first game came out in 1997 he was SO mad that RPG games were getting popular - Formaggio got into it and he felt like his interests were getting invaded, so he refused to play the game for like a year until the second Fallout came out in 1998, and he realised it was actually a really good game.

He is probably rolling around in his grave watching how Bethesda is slowly destroying the franchise.

- His family was Catholic, but he is an atheist.

- If he had lived, I like to think he would have DEFINITELY had a Reddit and 4Chan acct, but he wouldn't use it often because it would piss him off how stupid everyone is on there.

- He desperately needs a hug but doesn't know it and refuses to ask anyone for it. He is SO touch starved.

- Unlike Melone, he has a really good sleep schedule but suffers with insomnia. He takes melatonin gummies to go to sleep.

- He has a very good schedule in general; he exercises regularly, eats healthily, showers every day - with special shampoo to retain his curls, and likes to go for at least half an hour walks outside. A routine keeps him stable, he would fall into bad habits if he didn't have complete dictation over his own life.

- Because of this, he can grow extremely irritated when there are disruptions to his routine. Which happens often, since being a Hitman can be quite unpredictable.

- His stand is natural (born with ability.)

Illuso HCs:

Joined the hitman team at age 19 in 1995.

- Knows everything about everyone and WILL use it as blackmail.

- He is EXTREMELY nosy and will stick himself into EVERYONES business. Nobody is safe.

- Can be quite rude at times, but he never actually means it. It's just his way of showing affection. He has quite a sarcastic sense of humour that other people on the team *COUGH* GHIACCO *COUGH* don't get.

- Had to become very independent from a young age. He didn't have a father, only his mother which meant that when she developed a deadly sickness in his teens he was forced to support for the family by himself.

- BUT because of the fact that he was raised by his mother, he respects women! Yay! It's why he's into more 'feminine' stuff, he's never really seen an issue with being girly, and sometimes the others bully him for it but he doesn't care.

- He was probably raised Catholic, but doesn't really care for religion.

- He is a sleepwalker AND a sleep-stand-user (a term I made up), and will routinely freak everyone out by showing up in their mirrors in the middle of the night.

- He is so self-centred, yet blindingly insecure, that he thinks anyone who so-as-much spares him a glance is interested in him. With that in mind, he is oblivious to people who actually show interest in him.

- Illuso didn't know what he wanted to be when he grew up. He was forced into a role of authority so quickly, that he was never actually given a chance to think for himself.

- If he did get given a chance to pick his own career, he would likely stay on the Hitman team. He doesn't have the school-grades to get any job that is actually worthwhile, and he doesn't see a reason to leave his team.

- Refuses to let any of his teammates use two-in-one shampoo. If he sees it, he's throwing it. He once caught Formaggio using three-in-one and almost had a heart attack.

- Like Melone, if he had lived he probably would have owned a MySpace account.

- He is a natural stand user (born with stand)

Sorbet & Gelato HCs:

Joined the hitman team at ages 21 in 1995.

- I don't have a lot for these two, BUT, i could never forget them.

- I like to think they met in secondary-school, (high-school, for the Americans) but they didn't get together for a WHILE.

- This is because they were in totally different social circles. Gelato was quite popular and chatty, he knew a lot of people and was invited to parties like every weekend - yk, classic airheaded blond - whereas Sorbet was a social outcast and didn't have a lot of friends.

- But they are both extremely virile and violent.

- I think Gelato used to get a kick out of hurting other things. It started with animals, but eventually turned to that of people - he likes having control over things, knowing he is more powerful than those around him. He was a rampant bully, and took to hurting those he saw as 'less-than' him.

- Sorbet on the other hand, while he didn't actively go around hurting people for control, was into very grotesque things. He liked those weird, sexual slasher films of the 80's and took extreme interest in blood and gore and the likes.

- BECAUSE OF THIS, when they did eventually find each other, they clicked immediately! I'm not gonna share how I HC them having met, because it's spoilers for DK  🤭 but it's dramatic, it's bloody, and it's romantic!

- A lot of people interpret them both as being money hungry, but I don't think that's the case! In the series, when asked where they are, Ghiaccio suggests they might be "Playing hooky" (i hate that phrase sm), BUT THEN Risotto says "Gelato, maybe, but Sorbet always comes for his cut of the pay."

- Which makes me believe that out of the two of them, Sorbet is the greedy one. I think that Gelato doesn't care about money, and if he had been in charge the two wouldn't have tried to go against the Boss - but he loves Sorbet, and he wanted him to be happy. So when the discussion was first brought up, he had his reservations but trusted that they could pull this off.

THATS ALL. its all i can think of rn... i probably have more somewhere but ong I can't remember :(

[filmbyjy]

MINESTREAM

SYPNOSIS > Wanting to start a new stream series with his best friends, Jay had a bright idea of playing some simple Minecraft with them. Everything was normal, until he realises there is another person in the call with them. He quickly learns that it was ni-ki’s older sister, (name). Watch how streaming a simple game of Minecraft can dig up some interesting feelings between the main leads.

EIGHT – asscrack

MASTERLIST | PREVIOUS | NEXT

a/n: the inspiration behind jake’s little world naming…that was the first word that popped into my head. don’t ask why. I’d like to know too.

finally after so long with multiple technical issues on jay’s end, the minecraft series could officially start. he could hear jake and ni-ki just chatting about the free online soccer game they found on steam. his eyes gazed the mute button right beside your username. the other boys had turned on their cameras in discord while you and angel(Yvette) didn’t.

he hasn’t once heard your voice. well, he could barely hear your voice since he shut ni-ki’s stream off earlier due to the boys attempting to catch something. he only heard your giggle once and that was it. nonetheless, in that short moment he thought you sounded adorable. his heart drumming in his chest, wondering how your voice would sound like.

he shook his head and clicked on the stream button. as per usual, he puts on a waiting screen to tell the viewers that ‘hey, we’re going to play soon. please wait.’

he unmutes in the discord, “hey, everything has been set up. I just wanna ask what should the server name be?”

“asscrack.” jake suggests as he looks up from his computer and directly into the camera.

“what?” heeseung speaks up as he was caught off guard by the weird name.

“I don’t know, don’t ask me. I’m shit at giving names to things.” jake shrugs. the other boys deadpanned at him.

“let’s name it…sunoo and the boys.” sunoo suggests.

“as if. just put the default ‘My World’ that’s the easiest. not a single hassle to the world.” jungwon adds.

“Alphas.” sunghoon voices out.

“uhh, have you forgotten there are two girls here?” ni-ki says.

“well, who cares about that. Women can be dominant too.” sunghoon shrugs.

jay sighs, “I’m just going to call it MineStream.”

“lame ass name.” jake says. jay turns on his camera on discord and zooms in the camera to his face. he gave jake a death stare and so jake awkwardly laughs it off.

“okay, you scare me. I’m sorry.” jake pouts.

as for you, the moment jay opened his facecam. your eyes widened, a tiny gasp left your throat. since no one could see/hear your reaction due to you being muted and your camera was turned off, you were basically in shock. that man is most beautiful man you’ve ever seen.

the way his eyebrow raises as the rectangle glasses suited his face. he was just in a simple black shirt and his jet black hair was parted prettily. good lord. you were going to play with him? you were going to play with all these pretty boys?? oh lord.

“okay, the world is loading so wanna do the intro when we all load into the world?” jay asks.

“yeah, we should. we have new guests here and we have to introduce the fans too!” sunghoon says.

“alright, I’ve already loaded in. I sent the world invite into the discord. by the way, there are mods that I added to make the game more interesting.” jay says.

“the only interesting thing we should try to do is do hardcore mode or like a ‘if one person dies, everyone dies’ kinda thing.” sunoo suggests.

“we could do that for another time.”

you had clicked on the link and waited to load into the world. since ni-ki helped to create your account, you could easily go in and of course he was your first friend in the game. you had finally clicked turned on the camera in discord and so everyone could see you. you weren’t exactly streaming but you were recording for a video since ni-ki suggested that putting up videos onto YouTube also generates money. once everything was settled, jungwon claps his hand and starts off with the intro.

“hello everyone, today we are-” ni-ki’s character punches jungwon’s as he was talking. “ni-ki!”

“whoops misclick.” ni-ki says. jungwon rolls his eyes.

“today we are playing minecraft! woo!!”

“the premise of how this started. jay hyung wanted to do a series together that was nostalgic and so we decided to go with minecraft because who doesn’t love minecraft!” sunoo says.

“besides our normal friend group, we have two other people on here! let’s welcome angel and (name)!”

“hello hello.” angel says. her little vtuber character moves and tracks her movement.

“woah, cool character, angel. it’s really pretty.” sunoo says.

“oh, thank you.” angel smiles. everyone’s attention was now on you.

“oh umm, hi. I’m (name). I’m ni-ki’s older sister.” you waved towards the camera. everyone was mesmerised (excluding heeseung and ni-ki), you were beautiful.

“good god.” jake says.

“you have a very sexy voice. would love to hear that all night-” sunghoon gets cut off.

“sunghoon hyung, i will find a way to ban you from this server.” ni-ki warns him.

you giggled and jay’s heart melts. god, he’s a simp but he can’t show that…his facecam was turned on. jay turns to read a couple of his comments. most of them were simping for you. kinda made him jealous, not going to lie. plus, it didn’t help that jay had this overlay thing where whoever talked, it would display the person’s facecam (if turned on) from discord to his livestream.

— “she’s so pretty.”

— “wow, she’s so…no wonder she’s ni-ki’s older sister. the family genes are so strong.”

“let’s just start playing. gather resources everyone.” jay says.

and so everyone does. each of them collected wood, from the trees. you sat there looking clueless and so jay comes up to you in game.

“something wrong?” he asks.

“oh, sorry. this is my first time playing minecraft so I have zero clue how to do things.”

“want me to guide you?”

“sure.”

jay happily guides you on how to play the game, from punching wood to making crafting benches and finally making tools. jay turns to read the comments for a bit,

— “woah, what is this visual couple going on?”

— “yoooo, they would look cute together! like wow.”

jay was satisfied by the comments. he can’t help but look at your facecam, your concentrated face as you mined for stone and attempted to make stone weapons.

“hyung!” jungwon whacks jay’s character. it causes him to turn around.

“did you have to hit me.” jay deadpans.

“whoops, anyways. ni-ki and sunoo found a cave. I don’t remember minecraft caves being fucking huge.”

“there was a huge update I believe 1-2 years ago so yes, huge cave.”

“they also found a mob spawner with saddles in the chest and jake hyung stole them to try and get horses.”

jay sighs, “can’t say I’m not surprised.”

“are you and (name) noona flirting?” jungwon suddenly asks. it causes you and jay and to look at each other in game before turning to jungwon.

“no? he’s just teaching me how to play minecraft.”

“yeah, she doesn’t know much about the game so what better way then to teach her?”

“don’t believe it one bit. next thing you know, we will have a couple in a minecraft server who share a house together, sleep together and have cats and dogs together.”

— “oooo, jungwon is onto something.”

“the comments are agreeing with me.” jungwon smirks.

“shut the fuck up, my friend.” jay shoos jungwon away. the younger boy runs off to find sunghoon, who wants currently getting chased by a creeper.

jay sticks by you throughout the whole thing, he gives you tips and even hands you some stuff.

“we are making a community.” heeseung says.

“and why?”

“because with 9 people on this server, all the resources are going to be sucked up. also I am not sharing a house with any of you. especially, (name). she’ll make the house with pink wood.”

“there’s pink wood?” you say.

“there is, you just need to find a cherry blossom biome.” jay explains.

“why are you helping her?” heeseung asks.

“because she doesn’t know how to play and I’m just being a gentleman since you guys aren’t helping her, clearly.”

jake bursts out laughing, “I’m sorry but this is the first time I see you being so gentlemanly to a woman.”

“do you want me to set myself into creative so I can blow up your shit dirt house.” jay threatens.

“go ahead, I feel like renovating it anyways. just let me move my stuff first-”

sunoo quietly hands jay some tnt and a flint and steel. before jake could even grabbing his things from the chest. jay covers his base with the tnt and ignites it. it hisses.

“(name), I suggest you run if you don’t wanna blow up.” jay warns.

“oh.” you quickly dashed out of the way and the explosion was massive. it causes sunghoon to yell.

“I had a pet dog in there…” jake says.

“too bad, mess with me again and I’ll burn your next house.” jay says.

jake definitely learnt his lesson of not teasing jay during this session.

-

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[haartemis]

Sweet Tooth | Rodrygo Goes

pairing: rodrygo goes x fem!reader

word count: 3.1k

A/N: based on this request. so sorry for the delay anon, had some writer's block. i hope you like it <3. let me know what y'all think!!

summary: a text to the wrong number sparks conversation with the mysterious 'baker boy', die hard rodrygo goes fan and fellow dessert enthusiast. as the friendship progresses, an undeniable connections grows between the two of you and you start to wonder about his real identity.

you: hey! those chocolate things you mentioned are called brigadeiros, right? wanna make sure I’ve got the right dessert lol 😅

You attach a link to the recipe you’d found online before shooting a quick text to sofia, your co-worker. earlier that day she’d mentioned trying these little fudgy chocolate truffles when she visited brazil. as someone with the biggest sweet tooth known to man, you’d immediately wanted to try them yourself. so after work, you headed straight to the store, picking up cans of condensed milk,cocoa powder, and sprinkles. now, standing in your kitchen, you’re ready to see if they live up to the hype. but then, a tiny worry popped up in your head: were they brigadeiros, or was it another brazilian dessert she mentioned? To be sure, you decided to double check with sofia.

 you get a response a few minutes later. 

+34 680 123 456: that recipe’s kinda bad. I should know, I’m brazilian. 

you blink. sofia was definitely not brazilian. glancing back at the number, you feel a jolt of realization.

“shit,” you mutter under your breath. you’d sent the message to a complete stranger.

you debate texting back an apology, but before you do, a new message comes through. it’s a detailed recipe. along with the steps, the person’s included specific tips, like their favorite brand of cocoa powder to use and a suggestion to roll the brigadeiros in coconut flakes for an extra touch.

you smile at one of the little notes:

+34 680 123 456: stir until your arm hurts. trust me, it’s worth it :)

you’re touched by this stranger’s kindness. shooting them a quick thank you text, you roll up your sleeves and get to work, following the recipe to a T. An hour or so goes by and you gaze down at the tray of gooey, fudgy treats you've created. when you take a bite out of one them, you close your eyes and actually moan. 

you carefully arrange the brigadeiros on a plate, trying to the best of your ability to make them look as aesthetic as possible before snapping a picture and sending it to the stranger.

you: omg thank you again for the recipe! they turned out to be so good 😍

+34 680 123 456: no problem :) they look really good!

+34 680 123 456: let me know if you have any other queries regarding dessert recipes i'm kind of an expert 😉

you: did i accidentally text a professional baker 👀

+34 680 123 456: haha no. far from it. it's just a hobby. my actual job keeps me busy so baking is a nice distraction

you: i get you, there's nothing like melting chocolate to remind you there's life outside spreadsheets and emails

+34 680 123 456: my job's a bit more physical but yeah, baking is like instant therapy.

you don't respond after that, because what else is there to say to someone who is technically a stranger? letting the conversation go on as long as it did was kind of weird and maybe a little risky, but you're grateful for the recipe, so you don't run to block the number.

instead, you lock your phone and munch on another brigadeiro.

a couple of days later, you're curled up in bed, watching your favorite romcom. when it gets to a scene where the main character indulges in a delicious looking chocolate souffle, you get an idea. bolting out of bed, you head to the kitchen, pulling your cupboards open to check if you have the ingredients needed. you've arranged all of it on your kitchen counter when another thought hits you and you impulsively grab your phone:

you: any tips for making chocolate souffle?

when a few minutes go by and you don't get a reply, you start feeling a twinge of regret. why did you think it was alright to text a stranger at 11 at night? you face palm, cringing at your own actions.

but then, your phone buzzes.

+34 680 123 456: chocolate souffle huh? that's ambitious

you: i'm up for the challenge 😌

a few minutes later, you receive a detailed recipe along with tidbits of helpful tips. it's a couple paragraphs long, and yet again you're hit with gratitude for this stranger's kindness.

you: thank you!!

+34 680 123 456: no worries , fair warning though it might take some patience

you: uh oh. now you have to promise to stay on standby in case of a souffle emergency lol

+34 680 123 456: i'll be here 😊

you can't help but smile down at your phone, feeling an unexpected warmth inside you.

you follow the recipe, and although it isn't as picture perfect as you'd liked it look, it does come out tasting amazing.

you: another success!

+34 680 123 456: no picture this time?

you: it doesn't look that good i have to admit..

+34 680 123 456: i still wanna see! come on, just one pic

you sigh, looking over at your deflated dessert. after a moment's hesitation, you quickly snap a picture and send it over.

+34 680 123 456: hey it's not that bad

+34 680 123 456: also you're really pretty, by the way :)

confused, you zoom in on the picture you'd sent and realize with a jolt that your reflection on the oven's glass is visible. it's not exactly your best angle, but your heart still flutters.

+34 680 123 456: sorry was that weird?

you: maybe a little, but i don't mind.

+34 680 123 456: promise i'm not some old creep. just a regular 23 year old guy who appreciates souffles (and accidental selfies apparently)

you feel a wave of relief at the knowledge he's age appropriate. but now you're curious, so you go and save his number, then open whatsapp.

you do a double take. his profile picture is a photo of rodrygo goes, real madrid's #11, beaming as he holds last season's champions league trophy.

you cringe a little. there’s nothing more off-putting than football fanboys who plaster their favorite players everywhere. you were hoping to get a glimpse of his face, but oh well.

you send him another text, this time on whatsapp:

you: can i get a pic of you? it's only fair

baker boy: you're looking at it

you: no i mean a real picture of you. that's just some footballer

baker boy: hey, that's a future ballon d'or winner, not just 'some footballer' 😌

you roll your eyes, fighting off the ick you're getting from the fanboy vibes.

you: right... but if i wanted a picture of rodrygo, i'd just google him

he doesn't argue with that, and a few moments later you get a picture. your breath catches at the sight of a lifted shirt and a toned, muscled brown torso decorated by a striking tattoo of an eagle. you swallow hard.

you: ok definitely not what i expected 😳

baker boy: you asked, i obliged

you: is there a story behind that eagle?

baker boy: yeah. but if i tell you, you'll have to tell me something about yourself in return

you: fair enough

and just like that, a steady stream of messages start to be exchanged between you two, and the most unlikely friendship of your life begins. what started as baking tips suddenly turns to late night conversations about everything from your favorite movies to bucket list activities. you don't pry much, but he gives you just enough information for you to piece together that he's well travelled, an avid surfer, a huge fan of football, and extremely well off. you start wondering about his job— you think that maybe he's in finance or tech, but that doesn't line up with what he said about having physically demanding work. nonetheless, you find that you enjoy his conversation very, very much. each text feel like peeling back another layer of someone so funny, thoughtful and kind. and more often than not, you find yourself grinning at your phone like an idiot.

one afternoon, you're hanging out at a friend's place, a real madrid match on. just as you look up, rodrygo scores an amazing goal. you immediately go and text him: omg your fav player just scored!!

he doesn't respond for about 3 hours. usually, when he's off work, he's quick to reply, so the delay stings a little.

in the evening, your phone buzzes.

baker boy: did you like it?

baker boy: sorry for the late response, i was at the stadium

you: yeah. it was cool

you: you watched the game at the stadium?

baker boy: you could say that

something tugs at you, a question beginning to form in the back of your mind. but before it can take root, you push it aside.

another week goes by, and you find yourself with a friend seated in the stands of the santiago bernabeu, soaking up the electric energy of the match. it pulls you in completely, the roar of the crowd, the sea of white jerseys. you try and keep track of the ball, but your eyes keep drifting back to one player in particular: rodrygo goes, with his quick darts and beautiful footwork. you get it now, why baker boy is obsessed with him. there's an elegance to the man, something about his game that draws you in completely.

as the final whistle blows and madrid claims victory, you anxiously glance down at your phone to check for any new messages. you'd texted baker boy a picture of the view from your seat, hoping that maybe he'd be here as well. but alas, no response throughout the game.

the players have all retreated into the tunnel and you and your friend are about to start leaving when your phone buzzes.

baker boy: you're here?

you: yup!

a pause, and then:

baker boy: which section?

you quickly type it to him, a nervous feeling growing in your stomach.

baker boy: stay where you are

you gulp. a million anxious questions flood your mind. what if he’s been lying this whole time? what if he’s actually a 50-year-old creep? who even thought it was a good idea to start a friendship over text? what if he’s exactly who he says he is, but there’s no spark in real life?

no, this was a bad idea. a really, really bad idea. panic rising, you grab your friend by the sleeve and practically drag her to the exit. you don't let out the breath you were holding until you're in her car zooming away, watching the stadium fade in the rearview mirror. a part of you feels guilty, but another part, the part that's responsible for self preservation feels that it's the right decision.

baker boy: i can't find you. where are you?

baker boy: did you leave?

baker boy: hello??

you don't respond to any of the messages.

"remember the girl i introduced to you last week?" sofia asks brightly, leaning over the divider between your desks.

"huh?" you pull your tired eyes away from your computer screen to look at your cubicle neighbor.

"thaynara! i brought her to happy hour on thursday?" she tries to jog your memory.

ah,yes. thaynara was a pretty, bubbly brazilian that you'd gotten along with. you'd even swapped numbers.

you nod. and sofia continues, "her cousin is having a small get together tonight at his house. she said you should come."

"sure" you mutter. " why not?"

it's been a week since you last spoke to baker boy, the day you bolted from the stadium to avoid meeting him. since then, his messages have sat unanswered, and each time you open the chat, a wave of guilt washes over you. you tell yourself it's the right call, that forming and keeping a friendship with a complete stranger over text is at best idiotic, and at worst, dangerous. no matter how much it felt like he was a normal, genuine guy who occasionally made your heart flutter, it just wasn't worth it.

sofia's invitation seems like a nice distraction though, so after work, you quickly head over to your place for an outfit change before grabbing a ride from sofia to head to thaynara's cousin's place.

as you enter the gated community and pull into a long, tree lined driveway, you can't help but ask the question at the tip of your tongue: "thaynara's rich?" you blurt.

"her cousin's rich" sofia corrects with a small smile.

"right.." you mutter, admiring the beautiful villa in front of you. "what does she do?"

"it's a he" sofia softly chuckles as she parks the car. "and you'll see"

you shoot her a quizzical look, but before you can ask any more questions, she's already out the car and leading the way. you quickly follow.

you catch up just as she rings the bell, and a moment later thaynara opens the door. she greets you both enthusiastically, pulling you inside the house.

soon the three of you are sitting in the spacious living room, chatting with the rest of the guests. you quickly pick up on the effortless closeness between all of them and you're not shocked when you find out they're all childhood friends who grew up in the outskirts of sao paulo.

“where’s—“ sofia begins to ask, glancing around curiously.

“he’s upstairs taking a nap” thaynara says. “I swear he’s like a koala bear, every day after training he has to go sleep”

you smile to yourself, thinking about baker boy and his insistence that daily naps were a non-negotiable part of his day.

“don’t listen to her” you hear a deep, groggy voice interject.

you look up, and your eyes immediately widen. at the top of the stairs stands rodrygo goes, clad in sweatpants and a cozy looking hoodie. his eyes are slightly bloodshot, a tell tale sign he's just woken up. he walks down the stairs delicately, body obviously worn out.

"sorry guys" he grimaces as he limps over. "tough training today"

he sinks onto the couch next to thaynara with a sigh. he still hasn't noticed you.

"rodry" she nudges him. " this is sofia's friend, y/n. i told you she was coming"

his eyes snap up. now he sees you.

he pauses for a moment too long, eyes fixed on you. he visibly stiffens, and you see a hint of something on his face, maybe shock. was he...blushing?

you're about to open your mouth to ease the awkwardness when he finally responds quietly: " it's nice to meet you, y/n. i'm rodrygo."

you offer a polite smile, but inside you're trying to decipher his reaction. "nice to meet you,too"

the evening goes on. there's more chatter and laughter, and you're swallowed in conversation with the friendly brazilians. the tv hums in the background, drawing a couple people in with a basketball game. meanwhile, another group has started a game of monopoly. you enjoy the casual atmosphere, swept up in stories and jokes in portuguese and english.

except there's rodrygo. he doesn't make any effort to start a conversation with you after your initial greeting. he stays across the room, laughing and mingling with everyone but you. you would think he absolutely hates your guts, except you catch him glancing at you from the corder of your eye once or twice. you tell yourself not to dwell on it too much, but there's something about him. something that makes you feel like there's tension simmering beneath the surface.

you’re pouring a drink in the kitchen when you sense someone behind you. you turn, and there he is, leaning casually against the doorway, his eyes finally meeting yours.

“hey,” he says softly, a hesitant smile playing on his lips. “you enjoying yourself?”

“yeah” you reply, trying to match his casual tone. “it’s been nice. everyone’s been really welcoming.”

he nods, looking down as if gathering his thoughts. “i didn’t expect you here tonight,” he admits, meeting your gaze again. there’s something vulnerable in his eyes.

your face falls. "oh, i'm sorry. i didn't - thaynara said you were fine with having me over. i- "

his eyes widen in return, and he raises his hands in defense. "no, no, no. that's not what i meant. i-" he searches for something in your face, then seemingly gives up. "never mind"

you stare at the floor. you feel so embarrassed. you shouldn't have come at all.

"um" he swallows. "gabriel asked me to grab him a glass of water"

you don't know why he feels the need to explain his presence in his own kitchen but you nod. you watch as he reaches the highest cupboard. as he does, the bottom his hoodie lifts just a bit, revealing a sliver of tanned, toned stomach. and there, unmistakable, is the eagle tattoo. your breath catches, eyes widening.

it's him.

realization hits you like a speeding freight train. you feel your cheeks heat up, and you slap your hands over your face, peeking through your fingers to look at rodrygo's now smirking face.

"i feel like an idiot" you murmur, before bursting in to laughter. "you're.. you're baker boy"

"took you long enough" rodrygo chuckles along with you.

his fingers are warm against yours as he gently pulls your hands away from your face. his touch lasts longer than necessary, but when he lets go, you find he's looking at you with an amused yet nervous look.

"i thought i'd never get to talk to you again" he says, voice low.

you stare at the ground guiltily. "i'm sorry. i just- i thought it was getting weird, being that devoted to a friendship with a stranger"

he nods. "no, i get it. thank god you somehow made it to my house, huh?"

"yeah." you say quietly. "thank god"

a beat of silence ensues.

"so, uh, how about we take things offline" he fiddles with the bottom of his sleeve nervously. you find extremely it cute. " there's this brazilian restaurant. they have a new dessert on their menu i want to try. do you want to go?"

a warm smile spreads across your face as you nod, unable to hide the excitement bubbling up inside. “i’d like that,” you say softly.

his eyes light up, and his nervous fidgeting gives way to a confident grin. “great. I’ll send you the details then”

you head back together and continue to mingle with friends. he steals glances at you, and you flush each time. now, there's a spark between you two. something familiar, yet new. you can't help but feel like this is a fresh start. the beginning of something great.

[the-universal-sun]

Do you have any little Fiddleford hcs?

I haven’t really thought about before, but you’ve inspired me. Thank you! Please let me know if this is what you were thinking of!

I don’t really think he’d start regressing until after the memory gun is created and Ford goes through the portal. His mind is in shambles, he’s stressed, anxious, and neurotic all the time basically. He’s probably homeless/living in the dump at this point, too. So all that combined leads his mind retreating to a safer age, a younger age. It’s the one good thing besides the Society that he has.

Now, let’s imagine he goes to the Mystery Shack to confront Ford after a memory is triggered and he finds Stan instead, after Stan explains his connection to Ford, Fidds tells Stan that he used to be Ford’s research partner but left for reasons he couldn’t and didn’t want to remember. Stan, feeling sorry for the squirrelly little man, offers to drive him home, but when they reach the dump he’s been staying at, he offers Fidds to stay back at the shack. He doesn’t do it out of kindness, though a part of him is sympathetic given he was homeless for a decade up until a year ago, but because he thinks he can convince Fidds to help him with the portal. Stan’s a conman, so it doesn’t take him too long to get Fidds to agree to stay, just for the winter at least.

I would imagine that they don’t spend time together until Stan convinces Fidds to help with the portal, which took weeks to do. And he’s still not happy about and refuses to go down to the basement. He’ll do the equations and teach Stan the engineering bits, but that’s all he does, and he’s only doing that much because Ford still is his friend.

Onto the actual headcanons:

- Stan doesn’t really notice anything too out of the ordinary at first, Fiddleford is already an odd, fluttering, and anxious mess with a fractured mind, so seeing him act less like an almost 30 year old and more like a 7 year old isn’t out of the question, who knows the effects of the memory gun?

- It only clicks for Stan after living with and observing Fidds for a couple of months. Stan is actually not surprised or weirded out. He’s lived on the streets for 10 years, he’s seen his fair share of different behaviors, and this is one he actually sort of knows about. One of the prisons he was in made him go to weekly group therapy and this was brought up more than a few times.

- For all the fronts that Stan puts up, he’s a deeply caring and emotional man when it comes to his loved ones, and Fiddleford wiggled his way into his heart quite easily, so he’s going to look after the little guy. That being said, he won’t make it obvious that he knows and cares (he’s being so obvious it’s painful). He speaks softly to Fidds when he notices him feeling smaller, offers kid friendly food and shows, and doesn’t let him work on the portal’s math. And sometimes rocks him to sleep. He’s not obvious at all.

- Fidds is a smart man, he knows what’s going on, he knows that Stan knows what’s going on. But he doesn’t mind so much, having Stan there just helps his anxiety and quiets his mind. Plus, he hasn’t been called “Little Fella/Guy” since he was actually 7 years old, and it feels nice to be taken care of instead. He took care of his 5 younger siblings, his cousins, Ford, his own family, technically he takes care of the town with the Society of the Blind Eye, so this is a nice change

- He does have the energy and eccentricity of Old Man McGucket when regressed. He’s just a boy from the south who loves to run in the dirt and hock loogies sometimes. Stan encourages it, encourages Fidds being loud and playful and full of energy, something he never got to be. It was beaten out of him, but damn if he ain’t gonna make sure that his boy can experience childish joy

- You know how sometimes kids from the south have the strongest and cutest country accent? That’s how Fidds sounds when regressed and Stan cannot get enough of it. He usually hates the accent, but coming from his Little Man? It’s the best sound he’s ever heard, and if he hears anyone making fun of it, he’s punching their lights out

-Fidds is an engineer at heart, always has been, so Stan swipes him some wooden stacking blocks, some child’s robotics sets, and some advanced looking Rubix cubes. Of course when Fidds is feeling overwhelmed and super anxious, not wanting to think for a little bit, Stan acquired some kid friendly books from the library, some crayons and marker, and regular old printer paper

- About every picture Fidds ends up drawing gets put on the refrigerator by Stan. He’s so happy and he loves them

- I headcanon that Stan shows love through home made gifts and quality time, like with Dipper and Mabel’s fishing hats and the time he spent with them, so he makes gifts for Fidds. He’ll draw with him and give him the drawing to keep afterwards (they’re all in Fidds’ little treasure/memory chest), he’ll spend time learning and making food he grew up eating, home made biscuits and gravy, buttermilk pie are the first he learned and are what Fidds wants to eat the most. He hand sews stuffed toys for him, Fidds’ favorite is a dog that was made with different cloth patches, he carries the affectionately named Copper with him everywhere

- Fidds loves being with Stan, his Bubba, he loves the care he can see and feel with each action. His soft touches when Fidds gets into a fit, his soft voice, he never yells and somewhere in the back of his mind, he knows why, but his head is too fuzzy to think on it. Fidds was always the one in charge, the big brother, so it’s nice having his Bubba take care of him. He gets fed, he stays warm, and on the days when Fidds feels awful in his mind, he gets wrapped up in a blanket burrito and just held and carried everywhere, all day. He loves Stan

- When Fidds gets scratches and scrapes from playing outside, Stan kisses his boo boos for healing and puts a colorful bandage over it. And then kisses them again for good luck

- His juice has to be watered down or he’s bouncing off the walls and talking a mile a minute, which is cute and all, but not when it’s been nonstop running for 4 hours

- He once had an accident after a nightmare during his nap. He just sat there sobbing until Stan came, he was so scared that Stan would be disgusted and would yell at him. But when Stan found him, all he did was whisper a soft “Little Man”, pick him up, and bring him to the bathroom to give him a warm bath, wrap him up in a burrito with a clean blanket and Copper, and rock him back to sleep.

- Stan loves taking care of Fidds, he likes being needed sure, but he truly does care for Fiddleford, whether he’s the genius engineer helping his get his brother back, or his Little Guy, who loves to draw horses and pigs and can solve a Rubix cube in 15 minutes. And Fiddleford loves Stanley, his best friend who’s helping him stop with the memory gun use and eagerly listens to his engineering lessons, and his Bubba who draws with him and kisses his boo boos when he falls down

- In conclusion, Fiddleford H. McGucket is just a little guy

[mindscapers]

HI, IT'S ME, BILL CIPHER. YEAH, I GOT TO SHAKE HANDS WITH THE MAN WHO'S EFFECTIVELY GOD TO ME. YEAH, I'M BEING TOTALLY NORMAL ABOUT IT. DON'T LOOK AT THE TAGS.

HELLO MUTUALS I'M BACK FROM PORTLAND OREGON AND I GOT TO MEET

ALEX

HIRSCH

[velvetvexations]

Since we're talking about forcefem, here're most of the forcefem-related asks I've had in my inbox, some of which are a few days old on account of technically going in the vexatious tag if not exactly kink asks. I wanted to answer one from today on it's own which I'll get to later but I wanted to get to the older ones and also get to a few of the others from today while I was at it.

i just saw a post where a trans guy was showing some messages where someone was (unconsensually) basically roleplaying forcefemming him. despite him telling them that he did not want that and that it was very much transphobic, and he atill got a message boiling down to "you're not a man, silly, you're a girl :D" and. to be honest. this was the thing that stopped the brainworms of "what if the whole concept of transandrophobia is actually transmisogynistic and i am entirely wrong" bc at least some of these people will just say the most bog standard transphobic shit to trans guys and not register it as transphobia. so why the fuck would they be right about anything transmascs experience also on that note thank you for being so outspoken in favour of transmascs getting to discuss their oppression. it's really helpful to see trans women stand with us here, especially when it comes to aforementioned brainworms

congratulations to that transphobe for creating a new transandrobro

the 'forcemasc isnt revolutionary' shit is the most annoying iteration of stupid tumblr discourse. like im going through the tag trying to read some horny shit and oh look. theres someone being stupid and hypocritical. in my horny tag.

people are getting tribalist about kinks and it's depressing

Every time people are saying that trans men & mascs cannot possibly fathom being objectified & fetishized, I think on all of the posts I’ve seen that did that exact same thing. And yeah, some of it might have been kink, so no hate no judgement I dabble in that tag too, but I’ve also seen “get in the dress” type posts that seem to be genuinely calling for trans men to be more feminine, untagged & in the wild, enough where I’m like — am I just imagining this? Like am I crazy? Am I missing something, or was that extremely detailed post about why I MUST stay feminine — or become more — for someone else’s benefit being 100% serious? And, again — if it’s kink, all the power to them, I love that for them, I even occasionally love that for me. But I have encountered enough people who were dead serious that I sometimes want no one but trusted friends & advisors to ever witness me again. And then I look at statistics & feel genuinely ill. And yeah, I’m gnc — and there’s the rub, because while I feel genuine joy being fem as well as masc, I want it to be a Choice, not something forced upon me.

people need to be fucking normal

Yh like ik a lot of shitposts don't have any tags but people have. Really gotta tag forcefem. I've blocked a large amount of people making these jokes + filtered their names n I still see it

I'm sorry, anon. <3

Fuck thank you so much for talking so openly about forcemasc. I’m so dumb I thought there wasn’t a name for that kink that I’ve been into for years, albeit my version is way more weirder. It would be like a… forcemascfem??? Like first it’s forcemasc and then it turns into forcefem and then right back to forcemasc…. And then back to- Idk my gender is weird and my kinky fantasy for that is weird

Cross as many boundries as you want, that sounds rad. Forcefem has a lot of infrastructure to jump off of.

“I’m doing a kink in a non kink way so it’s not kink blog!” Sorry this pisses me off It’s still a kink. Like. If someone made an I-suggest-BDSM blog and tried to claim it wasn’t a kink blog I’m sure more people would see how silly this is but because it’s the transfem approved virtuous forcefem they just let it slide??? Like. You are engaging in a kink and thats fine. You can say there won’t be anything explicitly sexual! But it will still be a kink blog because it’s a blog about a kink! A kink blog if you will! It doesn’t matter if you’re not getting off to it, it’s still a kink! That you are participating in! On your blog about that kink!

It SHOULD piss you off! It's extremely fucking scummy!

what the hell? for like one solid minute(longer than that but i like saying it this way) all the forcefem on my dash was tagged and i could blissfully not have to see it every other post and then just today i had to unfollow a buncha people for an assload of untagged forcefem :/ like im transmasc i think its understandable that i do not wish to see that anyway hope your day is goin well miss velvet

yeah it's praxis to not tag kink anymore

trfs are perfectly aware what the "force" bit means when forcemasc comes up in conversation

strange how that works

[utilitycaster]

Can you share your name examples? Please!

under a cut in case people feel like guessing or something

putting syllables together and they sound nice: literally almost any fantasy book that doesn't use modern names but like, off the top of my head: Essun from The Broken Earth Trilogy. Sabriel and Lirael from The Old Kingdom Trilogy. Shallan from the Stormlight Archives. The vast majority of women's names in ASOIAF that aren't too close to irl names. No shortage of names in Wheel of Time.

putting syllables together and they sound like arthuriana: Egwene (Wheel of Time) is the big one for me.

Slightly altered irl name: Bunch of names in ASOIAF notably Eddard and Alicent. Really common in actual play (Revvetha is sort of a joke but sort of not; Belizabeth).

Extremely apt character descriptor you know who you are: Kaladin of the Stormlight Archives. As a paladin stan I must stan and the character genuinely is great but like. c'mon man.

Mashup of irl names: Brennan Lee Mulligan does this EXTREMELY often most notably with Raphaniel.

Something meaningful in an irl language: SILAHA is a great example. Idk Dune probably did this.

Something meaningful in an elaborate self-created conlang: welcome to Lord of the Rings, an opportunity for Tolkien to take his conlangs for a test drive.

Something meaningful in a foreign language siri set alarm etc: self-explanatory. look to your left look to your right if no one at the D&D table used an Elvish Translator then it's bc they used the fantasy name generator for a different fantasy race.

IRL names not in common usage: I suppose it's not exclusively but The Locked Tomb does have Palamedes and this is also a Classic D&D Naming Strat.

This is Linda and she fights dragons: Robert Baratheon, whatever the fuck is going on in Dune, when D&D characters are named things like Kristen or Beauregard or Imogen or Ashton. Also obviously true in almost any Earth-set fantasy; I have a taste for like, regency/Napoleonic Wars-set fantasy novels and so people are just named things like Thomas and Catherine and they are worried about Their Place In Society but also they are wizards.

Series of complex and mysterious titles: The Man with the Thistledown Hair from Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell (speaking of normal-ass names in fantasy); The Emissary; The Man in Black. Often some kind of eldritch/otherworldly being but like, you could just decide that's your name in a D&D game. no one is stopping you.

Rigid Naming Conventions: offhand my problematic fave The Belgariad has some weird naming conventions (dryads all have names starting with X or, when softened into Tolnedran, Ce' as a prefix; acolytes of Aldur all have Bel- or Pol- prefixes to their names based on gender but the names themselves vary); the weird palindrome names in Stormlight Archives; The Vorkosigan Saga is sci fi and set in a future of our universe so many names are existing ones but the naming convention is often passing down the two grandfather's first names to the eldest son and other such things.

Pun or meme: again, D&D classic; Percival Friedrickstein Von Musel Klossowski De Rolo III, every Crown of Candy PC.

Fantasy name generator already covered. who knows how many people are using it. who knows what data set it uses.

Acronym: I believe this is what Tav is in BG3; This is also I believe where Thedas comes from.

Literally just a noun: Fjord, Keg; The Belgariad has characters who technically are going by codenames bc they are from The Spy Country but practically speaking I cannot actually recall what Silk's actual name is off the top of my head and I've read those books like 5 times and he's a major character. Shadowheart is i guess two nouns but it's the same principle.

[sergeant-angels-trashcan]

I'm literally about to sleep but Kate and the 141 being a sense8 cluster is this anything

THE WAY MY EYES WIDENED HOLY SHIT

(Gonna ignore age differences. Maybe they all technically died and "breathed their first breath together" upon resuscitation I love shit like that anyway)

They would be in a cluster for the LONGEST time and not realize it. The guys would BE in the task force together and NOT REALIZE IT. But also. I love the angst. And I kinda want Kate to visit with Simon as he's buried alive. Because how fucking horrifying????? And his fear/panic is so great that it yanks her consciousness to him. Maybe this is before they are born as a cluster? But the trauma is so great that Simon's brain is reaching and reaching and reaching for the connections that should be there!!! And Kate is the closest geographically.

nooo no this is really interesting. i think the trauma could trigger the birth of the cluster, OR, Kate and Simon are kind of like...preemies? They can sort of sense each other but their sensate biology isn't fully developed so it's a very incomplete form of visiting/sharing (it would be interesting if trauma is why their cluster is all different ages? like they were all supposed to be in DIFFERENT clusters. Simon and Kate would have had the same cluster "parent" and the rest of the 141 would have been in separate clusters but trauma+proximity made those connections form with each other? Near death experiences? I'm thinking about when Gaz falls out of the helicopter. The sensate part of his brain is like FUCK I NEED CONNECTION and Simon's sensate brain is all untethered and goes oh HELL yes, FINALLY, cluster here we come! (sensate scientists are fucking feral over this cluster and the IMPLICATIONS )

BUT ANYWAY

simon is just like "sometimes I hallucinate a woman, it's a trauma response"

Gaz: huh weird me too sometimes. First I was freaked out, you know? But then I got used to her

Soap, joking: she's not American, is she?

Gaz, Ghost, and Price turn as one to look at him.

Price: what

So THEN they all think they are having a shared hallucination. Is that something that can be spread? Ghost seems like patient zero but he never said anything about her til now???

Naturally Kate chooses this moment to bebop in. "So I'm a shared hallucination? I don't feel like a hallucination." "How would you know?" Soap points out. "You've got me there. Counterpoint: Why would you create a hallucination that is American?" The four men lean back. Which. Well. "I mean, me hallucinating four hot British guys? Believable. Four hot British guys hallucinating me? Not so much." "You think I'm hot?" Soap says. They ignore him. "You're saying we are the hallucinations," Ghost says flatly. "Or, get this," she says. "None of us are hallucinations." Gaz makes a disbelieving hum. "Okay fine. Easy test." She sticks out her hand, palm up, wiggling her fingers. "Someone give me a phone." After some hesitation, Price pulls his out and slaps it into her hand-her oddly solid hand. She taps the screen for a few seconds before handing it back. "Okay, call me." "What?" "I put my number in. Call me," she repeats then disappears. "Cap, "Gaz says when he finds his voice. "Did that hallucination just put a number in your phone?" "Oh, thank Christ," Soap interjects. "I'm not the only one who saw her." Price looks down at the phone in his hand before answering Gaz. "Appears so." "You gonna do it?" Soap bounces of the sofa. "'Spose it could be a detonator. You call it, something explodes." (Kate, appearing on the sofa next to Soap: oh, PLOT TWIST! I didn't do that, though. Don't know how to. Do you know how to do that? Soap: yes!!! Kate: omg can you teach me? Soap: YES :DDDD loml i will teach you how to make SO many things explode) Ghost kicks him. Gaz tugs the device out of Price's hand. "Video call," he says decisively. Price hits call. It rings. It rings It-- A man's face fills the screen. He's familiar. He is not, however, hallucination woman. "Clinty-boo, can you tell me what you see on my phone?" "What?" "Just tell me what you see.' "Three very confused dudes and someone in a mask, who could be confused and a dude, I just can't tell for sure." "Cool, thanks!" The familiar voice chirps before a familiar face fills the screen. "See?" she says, proud. "None of us are hallucinations. Yay!"

Ok for some reason I see Kate in Egypt doing something slightly sketchy to get info on Rama tut with Marc Spector and Layla El Faouly and she is like "can you see those creepy British guys?" (They cannot) Kate says something about how they are glaring at her and saying they're a 4 hour flight from her, she better not be doing anything illegal, yada yada, they keep following her around or vice versa??? And Marc, apropos of nothing, says, "Yeah, they're your cluster."

"Of what???"

"Fellow sensates. You're sensates."

WhAT

(idk i just liked the idea of Marc being like oh yeah nbd. and kate is like no no i think it's a VERY bd. also Marc knows Ghost.)

when kate visits them she koalas on to one of them. they're so used to it that when they meet in person Soap just carries her around because she's not supposed to walk!!!!

when they visit her Gaz is the one constantly touching her, always has an arm around her. always shows up when she starts to get irritated at her PI work

Her sleep schedule is super fucked because Ghost (NEVER asks her to) sleeps better if she is visiting him. since she has a more flexible schedule (aka is not in the military) she'll stay up late and take naps at random times during the day so Ghost can get some sleepy snuggles companionship to help him drift off

price will visit when she's strategizing to offer helpful advice. gives her scalp massages when the young avengers are on her last damn nerve.

ok i've been sitting on this for a while so i'm gonna stop here!! i love this idea

[c0nnn1e]

tractor au we really goin at it now huh

They’re waiting for their dinner to get delivered when Ren realizes just how gorgeous Martyn is. They’re not doing anything really special, just too out of it to cook so Chinese takeout it is.

Originally, Ren had been saying lines for some movie his manager helped score him a role in. Some highlights from a scene between the main character and Ren, who's playing the love interest.

He says some stuff, it's cliche and sappy, and Martyn throws in small remarks here and there.

They have a system. Ren doesn't actually remember how it started, it kinda just happened one afternoon of sitting around and doing nothing, Ren looked at Martyn and just, stars, Martyn in the orangey lighting of Ren’s kitchen in his jeans and a dark green sweater, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, using his hands to tap absently tap at the counter. Ren had never been more gone for anyone.

That afternoon, they ended up on the couch, Martyn's hands in Ren's long hair and Ren's hands on Martyn's shoulder and neck, practicing a kissing scene Ren had.

And since they'd first begun doing that, Ren had started repeating his favorite lines for Martyn whether they included a kiss or not, it was something fun for both of them. Martyn made witty jokes and improved lines (Sometimes going against the plot of the movie to create some mess of a roleplay in some raspy over-exaggerated accent)

Tonight,  Martyn taps absently on the counter as Ren just plucks strings, it’s a very jumpy beat, but Ren makes due.

RD#1 

“Okay, uh–you ready dude?” Ren smiled, shifting his guitar on his lap as he sat on the marble island counter, watching Martyn as he moved around the kitchen. 

Martyn hummed, giving him a thumbs up.

Ren pressed the record button, this was technically a first draft, right? A demo?

The lyrics start as hums, nothing more than white noise in Ren’s ears as he thinks about if they’re good enough to be said out loud, he almost doesn't want to speak the words he's thinking up.

And when he sings the first word, the first verse, he wants nothing more than to just shrivel up and die. Nothing's more embarrassing to him.

Dream of my hands in your golden hair, “When I wake up, will you still be there?”

It's the first thing that he sings, he's honestly just spitballing here.

As Ren sings, he kinda has a problem closing his eyes and swaying, rocking back and forth in slow movements as he plucks and strums his guitar strings. But this time? He is still as a rock, wide-eyed, and looking at Martyn (who's still cooking, which requires his back to be turned, and Ren guesses that's a bit more comfortable than having Martyn stare at him as Ren sings the song he literally wrote about the blonde)

Because this song is not Ren the actor. It's Ren, just a regular guy. Just Ren, the guy who just so happens to be in love with his best friend, the guy who knows how Martyn takes his coffee, Martyn’s favorite weird food combinations, how he spends his Sunday afternoons, the guy who is hopelessly in love with his personal assistant.

They aren't exactly dating. They're well aware of their mutual feelings for each other, yet have no label on what they are. They're just them. And that's enough for Ren, and if it's not enough for Martyn they can put a label on it. But, they're in no rush.

Ren put everything into this song. Everything he loves about the man in front of him. He hums through the chorus, something, something, loving how Marytns jacket smelt that one night they were out late and Ren didn't have a coat so Martyn gave Ren his green jacket, something about how Ren stayed in bed an extra hour the next day just to not have to take the same jacket off when je got dressed, something about how Ren is actually drowning when he looks into Martyn's blue eyes and it's so much that he doesn't want to save himself anymore (he can deal with drowning if it's Martyn).

“I'd love to show that love's worth running to.” He finishes the song with the chorus, then an instrumental that fades out.

Martyn looks over his shoulder with a cheeky grin, “It sounds great! I like it!”

“I hope so. I don't think people would be happy to know I'm in love with someone who works for me, so…”

“What's the worst they can do?”

“I think getting canceled would be real scary, like it's my whole career on the line!” 

But, really, does any of it matter when Martyn snakes his hand into Ren's hand and entwines their fingers? Does any of it matter when Martyn uses his other hand to take the guitar from Ren and lean it against the counter next to them? Does anything need to worry Ren when Martyn pulls him down and kisses his cheek?

He's smiling like an idiot but decides that, no: his worries are kinda stupid, and a couple of angry fans aren't going to kill him.

[tyrantisterror]

While we’re on the subject of Dungeons & monsters, what are your top ten favorite D&D monsters & why?

I'm going to limit this to monsters that are either original creations of D&D or so divorced from their mythological roots that they might as well be original creations, or else this would just be me listing dragons. This is also in no particular order.

I'm gonna start with the Otyugh, because I think it's a result of D&D creating a very interesting ecosystem to justify its mechanics. You have all these artificial dungeons filled with different man-eating monsters, right? Well, what about the waste products they create? Carrion, yes, but also, you know... poop.

Well, you get Otyughs, a species that, depending on the setting, was either artificially engineered to take care of the waste products of a dungeon, or naturally evolved to clear out the waste of enormous megafauna predators like dragons. Is it mostly just an excuse to introduce yet another weird monster with a unique attack mechanic (say hello to sepsis and other infections, players)? Yeah, but it's a good excuse, it gets the imagination flowing.

I've actually played a lot more Pathfinder than D&D proper, and Pathfinder went out of its way to give Otyughs love by exploring all the aspects of their ecology that were only lightly outlined or implied in D&D, including the fact that they're technically intelligent enough to be capable of speech and reason - and thus, not necessarily a monster you have to deal with using violence alone. It really endeared me to them, to the point where Otyugh characters became something of a trademark of mine when running Pathfinder/D&D campaigns - and to the point where I ended up making up an expy of them for my own fantasy setting.

Bulettes are one of the coolest looking D&D monsters for my money, especially given that their modern designs take two inspiration from two very different animals - sharks and tortoises - and manage to combine them so beautifully to create something at once very cool and yet perfectly plausible as a "real" creature.

I love Rust Monsters for the same reason I love Otyughs - it's a monster that was made to showcase a game mechanic (namely, destroying players' weapons and armor, making sure they know how valuable those things are) and ends up creating a weird but plausible and interesting aspect of the ecology and world-building as a result. Also like Otyughs, they're very cute in a groady monster way.

Not every monster needs to have a big mind-blowing concept for me to be happy, though. Sometimes a creepy guy with a squid for a head who eats brains is enough. Mind Flayers are iconic and often imitated despite/because of being such a simple and easy to grasp concept.

Speaking of iconic monsters, Beholders feel like such an obvious cool concept that is shocking to me that they're more or less an original D&D creation - and it kind of sucks that they are, because a giant monster head with one main eye and several smaller eyes on stalks feels like it should be as ubiquitous in fiction as dragons and unicorns, and yet it can't be without paying Wizards of the Coast a shit-ton of royalties.

I will say that the lore D&D gave Beholders is pretty good, though - namely that each Beholder thinks it is the apex of their kind, and hates all other beholders for their perceived imperfections. Because beauty is in the eye of the beholder, you see. It's great, no notes, but beholders should belong to the people, not copyright holders.

I'm pretty sure Mimics originate from D&D, though I guess they just couldn't keep the idea of "a treasure chest that fucking eats you" from the people, since they appear in a lot of non-licensed stuff. As they should - man-eating treasure chests are another monster concept that should belong to the people.

I was talking about Froghemoths the other day on here but I want to reiterate that I love them despite/because of the fact that there really is no greater concept at play here than "what if there was a big fucking frog freak," and not once in the long history of this game has anyone decided there needed to be more at play than that. A big fucking frog freak is enough for all of us.

I just think this one looks neat.

D&D kobolds are in the category of "so far removed from its mythic roots that it's basically a new monster," and in that case the new monster is "scrabbly little dragon people with extreme anxiety," and I love that. Kobolds are my favorite humanoid species in D&D, and I'm glad 5th edition finally gave them a stat block that's actually playable, as opposed to previous edition's attempts, which made the prospect of being a kobold character the equivalent of having a public humiliation kink.

Finally, and also in the category of "technically named after a mythic monster it no longer resembles in almost any way," we have the Tarrasque, which went from a turtle/lion hybrid dragon in myth to a nigh-indestructible monster that's explicitly compared to natural disasters for its immense size, vast destructive power, and near inability to be harmed thanks to its armored hide and insane healing abilities. Or, in short, D&D lawyer friendly equivalent of Godzilla. How can I not love D&D Godzilla?

[puckingeccedentesiast]

This is Embarrassing.

Word count: 1.3k

Description Jamie and Trevor help Trevor's daughter with her period.

Hornet POV: 

Thunk. “MY KNEE!” My dad cried after running into the living room coffee table while playing Just Dance. 

“HA HA! That's what you get for being a tryhard Z!” His best friend and Teammate Jamie Drysdale teased.

“Well at least I’m not stuck on one star!” My dad, Trevor Zegras fired back, continuing to dance, albeit awkwardly with his now sore knee.

“Why do I feel like the most mature person in a room of adults?” I questioned brushing my knotted brunette hair out of my eyes in a short lived attempt to see the television screen so I could continue beating my Dad and my technically not Uncle, Uncle, Jamie. 

“Oh, OH, GET THE GOLD MOVE TO FINISH! LET’S GO BABY!” Dad cried while standing in the questionable ending position, his overgrown hair falling over his eyes. As the screen faded black then white to show the ending scores I moved to sit down and gritted my teeth as my lower abdomen cramped suddenly, moving to grab my water and take a seat next to an exhausted and couch-hogging Jamie I leant back and started sipping on my glass while pushing his feet away from me. He fell to the floor dramatically with a THUD, followed by an exaggerated groan. Jamie Drysdale the Professional Athlete my ass. This man can’t handle two rounds of Just Dance, how's he supposed to have the endurance to play hockey? I inwardly laughed at that thought.

“I’m going to get some more water, I’ll be back in a second.” Dad announced trudging off to the kitchen.

“Ok!” Jamie and I shouted back in unison,

I settled back into the couch and cringed when I felt a warm and damp sensation in my pants. I gasped and shot up, almost knocking a kneeling Jamie over as I rushed to the bathroom in my room.

“Sorry Jamie!” I rushed out shutting my room door.

“All good Kiddo!” He shouted back, still dazed from the dancing and falling on the floor. I rushed over to my wardrobe and grabbed a new set of underwear and a pair of black sweatpants so that way, if I had another leak it wouldn’t be super obvious. Groaning as I doubled over my dresser, I waited for a moment for the pain to subside before speed-walking into my bathroom, the cold marble tiles harsh against my feet as I recklessly put my clothes down on the stone countertop knocking over some items and even knocking my toothbrush off of the bench. I hissed, doubling over again this time leaning on the countertop, I yanked my top vanity draw open, eyes widening at the fact that the clear acrylic container that normally was full with everything I needed in this situation was empty. “Crap.” I mumbled under my breath, I completely forgot that I needed to get more pads and tampons as I ran out the last time I had my period. I needed to create a temporary solution so I changed into the new clothes and made a makeshift pad out of toilet paper while I figured out how to ask dad to go and buy me some. This is going to be embarrassing. 

Trevor’s POV: 

Wandering into the kitchen I walked over to the glasses cabinet and pulled down one of the basic IKEA glass cups with my right hand and opened the fridge door with my left pressing the glass to the dispenser button for the chilled water. Once the glass was nearly full I pulled it away and lifted it to my mouth and took a sip, “WHO WON!” I shouted back into the living room as I made my way down the hallway.

“WHO DO YOU THINK!” Jamie yelled back. I walked around the corner and saw my daughter’s silly-looking icon with her nickname Hornet written on the screen under the gold first-place badge, mine followed and as expected Jamie’s weird punk-rocker dude was last. I sighed out a laugh, 

“She’s too good, dude!” 

“I know it’s crazy.” he murmured looking up at me from his position leaning against the couch.

“What are you doing on the floor anyway?” I asked, the couch would be much more comfortable.

“Hornet pushed me off,” he replied. “Then, when I tried to get back up she rushed off to her room and knocked me in the process.” 

“Right then,” I extended my hand to help pull him back up, which he accepted gratefully and did just that, almost making me spill my glass of water over both of us. Once he was up I moved over to the hanging chair that Hornet insisted we get because it would be fun, I do have to admit though, the gentle swinging can be quite soothing. Jamie flopped down onto the couch and moved his hand around looking for something.

“What are you looking for?” I inquired.

“The TV remote, so I can turn this wretched game off.” he grumbled, continuing to move his hand aimlessly looking for the remote. “Z,” 

“Mm?” I hummed, turning my head.

“Is your knee bleeding?” he asked, lifting his hand, fingertips covered in a deep red substance. Glancing quickly down to my knee that was spotless, I looked back up with wide eyes.

“Where did that come from?” I shot up from my seat, sending the hanging chair swinging into the wall as I rushed over to the couch taking in the bloody stain on the gray material. “You're not bleeding are you?” I questioned as he got up and started down the hallway to the kitchen, I walked in after him to see him scrubbing his hand with soap.

“No, I’m not and have no reason to, that’s why I asked about your knee.” he explained.

“Oh.” I replied as I shuffled over to the linen closet across the hall to grab some bleach and cleaning rags from the shelves.

“Oh indeed.” Jamie replied from his spot in the living room, where he was using paper towels to wipe the excess blood off of the chair. Once he moved out of the way I knelt down and screwed open the bleach container lid, putting it on the floor next to me and pouring some of the bleach into the cleaning rag and using it to scrub the red-ish brown stain from the soft material. Putting my weight down through my arm I used the added leverage to scrub harder causing the majority of the stain to begin to lift, using some left over paper towel to wipe off the excess. I folded over the cleaning rag and poured more bleach into the soft fabric and turned back to continue scrubbing the stain.

“You're really putting your back into that aren’t you?” Jamie remarked, observing from the hanging chair on the other side of the room.

“It’s tough to get out!” I exclaimed, whipping my head around to look at him while still aggressively scrubbing at the material. “It’s almost out now though-”

“What’s almost out?” Hornet asked, awkwardly standing in the doorway.

“The mysterious blood stain that was on the couch.” I responded, “there, that is as good as we are going to get I reckon.” I threw the rag onto the couch and stood up, dusting off my knees. Reaching back down to grab the rag and bleach bottle, shuffling out from between the coffee table and couch to return the bleach bottle to its spot on the linen closet shelf and making my way into the kitchen to rinse the cleaning rag clean of the bloodied bleach.

“Hey dad?” Hornet asked, timidly for her normal self.

“Yeah,” I turned off the faucet and turned to hang the damp rag over the oven door handle, turning back around drying my hands on my shorts noticing the visible wince on her face as she moved to sit down on one of the barstools, “what’s up?”

“I-uh this is really embarrassing, but uhm y’know the blood you just cleaned off the couch.” she looked away embarrassed. “That’s uh my blood, because my period started early and I had a leak.. And I kind of don’t have any pads or tampons left. So, I was wondering if you could maybe go get me some… please.” 

“That solves the blood mystery then, doesn’t it?” Jamie conceded as he walked into the kitchen. Hornet's face was filled with pure mortification as she looked down at her hands that were clasped together. Jamie eased himself into the seat next to her and grabbed one of her hands from its bundle to hold it in both of his to assist in calming her down. 

“Nothing to be embarrassed about Hornet, it’s natural. Are you sure you have nothing left?” Jamie asked, stroking his thumb tentatively up and down her hand. 

“No, I was meant to get more the last time we went to the shops but I forgot.” Hornet responded quietly.

“That’s all good kid.” I responded in the same tone of voice “What do you need me to go get you?”

“I’ll write it down, just wait here.” She mumbled sliding off her chair and disappearing down the hallway. 

“It’s weird to see her so quiet.” Jamie admitted “I mean, considering half of her came from you.” 

“You say that like all I do is talk.” I replied, turning to face him.

“I mean, you are the enemy of silence.” He replied in an amused tone. 

“Wipe that smirk off your face.” I snapped back, walking around the other side of the island counter, pulling out a chair and sitting down as Hornet walked back into the room with a list written on a green post-it note.

“Here you are, that’s everything and the brands are important.” She emphasized pointing to the brand names in brackets.

“Okay, alright” I mumbled reading over the list. “I can do that.” I stood up and walked to the shoe rack pulling off slides and chucking them on the ground so I could slip my feet into them. Grabbing my keys off the wooden hook next to the door, I opened the door “I’ll be back as soon as possible.” Two voices responded in tandem with ‘Ok!’ I shut the door and walked down the short driveway to my car, unlocking it, swinging open the door and hopping in. The engine roared to life, I shifted the gear stick to reverse and pulled out of the driveway, changing the gear back to drive and speeding down the road. 

Hornet POV:

I walked down the hallway and into the living room, around the front of the couch and tried to sit down but a hand stopped me.

“Just wait a sec Hornet, let me get a towel just in case whatever you’ve done in the meantime falters.” Jamie requested, as he looked at me for confirmation, which I gave in a nod, and he rushed down the hall, heavy footsteps followed by the squeak of hinges as a cupboard door was thrown open and the squeak and slam of the door being forcefully shut. “Here we go, Hornet.” He stated, leaning over the back of the couch laying the towel over the soft gray material for me to sit on. Jamie walked around the couch to the large rattan basket that was against the wall in the little alcove next to the hanging chair and opened the basket to pull out the ashen gray weighted blanket. Walking back over and draping half of it over my knees for me to adjust how I want, he sat down next to me and pulled the other half up and over his knees and lap. “Want to watch a movie?” he asked, holding the TV remote and pointing it at the screen.

“Could we watch Shadow and Bone?” I requested. 

“Sure!” He smiled, opening Netflix and going into my account clicking on the show. “I like this show. It’s very thought out, like the story line.” 

“Eh, I prefer the Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom Duology.” I return, Bringing my knees to my chest. “Y’know, Ben Barnes kind of looks like Tyler Seguin.” Jamie laughed at this, wrapping his arm around my shoulder and pulling the blanket up a bit higher on me so I could cuddle up to his side, and get as comfortable as possible in my current condition. 

“Do you need anything, or are you good for now?” He inquired, turning to look down at my head which was poking out of the blanket enough to see the show.

“No, I’m ok. I should be fine till dad gets back.” I mumbled in response.

“Alright.” he whispered back in the same tone, gently running his hand up and down my arm in a soothing motion.

Trevor’s POV:

Tick, Tick, Tick. I looked at the little green indicator around on my dashboard as I waited for a break in the traffic so I could turn into the parking lot. After the red car. Driving up the first lane I couldn’t find any parks so I turned left down another lane, three minutes of diving around the parking lot and one stolen park later I found a park under a tree. Grabbing my phone, wallet and the green post-it note I opened the door, minding the car next to me shut it again, locked it and ran towards the glass sliding doors. Grabbing a basket from the stack and looking at the list before deciding to take a quick detour heading to the confectionery isle I grabbed a packet of strawberry creams, snakes alive, melody pops, two Cadbury marvelous creations and two caramilk marvelous creations bars, as well as packet of milky bar kids. Each landing in the basket with a plastic THACK. Scanning the aisle for anything else Hornet might want, maybe something minty I thought,

“A-ha.” I whispered to myself reaching to grab a darrell lea mint-choc bar. Walking down the aisle I turn left looking at the signs hanging from the roof for the toiletries, wandering past a few aisles quickly scanning the signs sparing fast glances to make sure I wasn’t going to run into anyone. About five aisles down the overhead sign had toiletries in bold white on the black background. 

“That’s the one.” I smiled to myself, walking down the aisle at a fast pace, stopping at the feminine products and pulling out the list. Looking between the list and the shelves I determined what I needed and grabbed double what she wanted just to make sure Hornet had what she needed for the foreseeable future. Grabbing the last packet off the bottom shelf, I stood up and placed it in the basket with the other items and briskly walking to the self checkout lane, grabbing a paper bag as I walked past the shelf. Scanning all the items, I pulled out my wallet and from the pocket my card and held it up to the eftpos machine to pay. Seeing the green tick I slid my card back into my wallet and my wallet back into my pocket, grabbing the paper bag filled with items in my left hand and pulling my phone out of my back pocket with my right I sent Jamie a message as I walked to the car.

‘Got the goods + extras. On my way home now.’

Jamie POV:

PING, glancing over my shoulder at my phone on my right side which was haphazardly thrown onto the couch next to me when we sat down I noticed Trevor’s icon. Picking up the phone and swiping up to get to the home screen I clicked the green messages icon on my taskbar then Trevor’s icon, skimming over the message and then looking at Hornets small figure curled into my side I whispered,

“Your Dad’s on his way home.” She looked up at me, stretching out slightly, visibly wincing when she wiggled the wrong way.

“OK.” she mumbled, getting comfortable again. 

“Do you need me to get you anything?” I queried the small ball of girl who looked like she was actively trying to crawl out of her skin. 

“Could you get me a heat pack, please.” she mumbled.

“Ok.” I said, trying to  get up, “Y’know you’re going to have to let go of me?” Reluctantly unclasping her hands from my side and dragging them timidly back to her small, curled form, silently allowing me to make my way down the hallway into the kitchen to retrieve the wisteria coloured heat pack from the top cupboard and place it into the microwave, setting the timer for two minutes. My attention was drawn from the spinning glass plate to the front window when I heard a car’s engine pull into the driveway and the porch light turned on. 

“Hornet! Your dad’s home!” I called the living room.

“Tell him he’s not allowed back if he doesn’t have chocolate!” she called back irritably. I locked eyes with my teammate who was standing in the hallway with two shopping bags in his left hand and a pair of shoes in the other.

“Good thing I thought ahead then! I yelled out, placing his shoes on the rack and walking toward the living room with the bags. I heard some distant mumbling and then the shuffle of feet down the hallway along with a door opening and closing.

BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. Turning around to the microwave and pressing the button to unlatch the door I grabbed the purple heat pack out, throwing it up in the air a couple of times because it was too hot to hold in my palm. Walking back down the hallway and meeting Hornet at the entrance of the living room I handed over the heat pack and she moved to sit down in between the corner of the L corner of the couch and her dad who handed her a packet of strawberry creams. Walking around the couch and settling myself a respectful distance from Z getting comfortable, I looked at the two Zegras’s and asked. “All good?” 

“Yeah, Thank you.” Hornet responded with a weak smile.

“Anytime kiddo.” Trevor responded. “Now, what are you watching?”

[lovecatsys]

Hope's relationship with gender is soooo complicated.

On the surface I imagine people would get the impression that she's a very masculine character, wearing mostly masculine clothes and her personality being Like That. And I guess she technically is? But you have to think about like how she was raised by Cable and has VERY few women in her life. She had a mother when she was like 3-4ish? and she dressed more feminine then, but after that she just had Cable and his weird sci-fi suits.

There's this one scene in Second Coming where she and Cable go to a convenience store and she sees a kids set of barrettes and a comb or something and gets distracted staring at it, Cable gets mad at her but then secretly buys it for her and gives it to her later, in which she's excited, but after trying the barrettes on she tells him that these are for babies. I think she would have some insecurity when coming to the present about not being a "real girl," but I'm also not exactly sure how much of it is just wanting to fit in, versus actually wanting to be feminine and be like that. Because in the years after she never really changes her personality or her clothing style, she continues to wear those suits and be like her Dad, be obsessed with guns and make jokes about piss.

Cable is her role model, she looks up to him for everything, so it makes sense she would model herself after him, or that she would just naturally be like him as she has been since she was a kid.

Another interesting thing I think is how this affects her relationships with people of different genders. She connects really well with adult men like Shaw and Exodus, gets along with them easily, but she has mostly toxic relationships with other women and girls. She's mean to Emma, she and Laurie have issues, she's manipulative and controlling to Idie. I like to think she and Jean would NOT get along at all. I think she has trouble connecting with women because as I said before, she doesn't really have any women in her life. I think she really just doesn't know how to appropriately interact with them, and if she has insecurities over being a "real girl" as it's shown, she probably projects these insecurities onto her relationships with other girls.

All of this being said I feel like it wouldn't be entirely off to say that she could be a closeted trans man. But I do like these gender dynamics of her being a girl but mostly behaving like a man and not really knowing how to Be A Girl, which of course is all a social construct anyways, but it creates a complex within her that affects her relationships with other people. I'd love to see a relationship (whether platonic or romantic) develop between her and Laura, or Noriko, or another girl from her generation who has similar issues but enough differences to create an interesting dynamic between them that helps develop Hope in a way where she can explore her gender issues more. Or having her develop a complicated familial relationship with Jean or Maddie or Rachel. It could all be so fun.

[formulatrash]

What do you think about team accounts using ship names? Williams has started posting about Loscar a lot but do you think they know what it means?

I have a bunch of thoughts about this but to start off with: yes, I am absolutely sure they know what it means.

the Williams social admins will have seen thousands of Loscar edits on TikTok. they will have read lots of comments and replies about Loscar on their other social platforms. beyond their official, professional commitments to monitoring the Williams stuff they're also F1 fans and they may well be on here or even AO3. you would be surprised how direct the pipeline from WattPad to PR is.

(a fair number of people who started off writing fic on livejournal are also quite high up in engineering these days and other technical roles obviously, just using WattPad to PR as an example there; basically, some people in F1 absolutely know about this sort of thing)

it's pretty innocent for social media admins to play on trends, especially if they know they get more interaction if they post Loscar than if they just post Logan. at the end of the day, it's a metric-based job and their task is to make numbers go up, not wonder if this might feel weird to some of us on tumblr. when I ran the F1 account I never would've used the word Maxiel but did definitely speed right on over to post anything that I thought might get picked up that way. was this kinda dirty cheating? yes but I had engagement targets to hit and the niche knowledge to know this was one way to do it.

(also technically my most unhinged work was creating this gif in staggering high definition for 2019. anyway!)

I do think there's two ways it's quite problematic for teams to lean into shipping, though. the first is that shipping is fictional and they're team accounts that are, well, real. the little guys that they have a sandbox to play with (coming up with sponsor content ideas and convincing the drivers to do them) are different from the dolls people make kiss on AO3.

the other is that it's queerbaiting, innit. we know how poor LGBTQ+ representation is in racing in general and how homophobic a lot of fans are - look at the abuse directed at Matt Bishop. or me, I guess but people (entirely reasonably, he's an absolutely brilliant man) like Matt more. anyway, the point is motorsport does not like LGBTQ+ people and therefore, probably shouldn't be allowed to use the idea of fictional versions of us for marketing.