#“Will ship pieces crash into my buildings?”

[pushing500]

The daily life of Irwin and Connie Dermokaites. They're very sweet. I feel like Connie might be more affectionate since she converted to the Path of Animism, but that could just be me reading into it too much.

Head Researcher Brennan can't stop researching even when she's off the clock. I want to know what Impid horns are made of, too, Brennan.

We had a very exciting event today: a Space Battle! There were chunks of spaceship and steel slag falling down for the better half of a day. Not too much fire, which was good. The worst fire was down in the bottom-left corner of the map, where we never go anyway.

There were a few escape pods, too, with very interesting people inside. We did our best to rescue as many as we could- The Path of Animism believes in charity, after all.

Oh, hey, this person looks fun. I hear people called Gracie are the coolest ever! :3

Here are all the survivors we rescued! We only just had enough hospital beds for everyone. They're a fun bunch. I wonder if any of them will stick around when they've recovered? I hope so. That would be fun.

I love the nicknames "Hot Minute" and "Grump". Rimworld nicknames can be so intriguing sometimes. I mean, I can imagine why someone would be nicknamed "Grump", but how do you end up being named "Hot Minute"??

Oh, and of course, Gracie is a name I'm particularly attached to for no reason involving any personal biases.

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[tropes-and-tales]

The Enemy of My Enemy

(The Predator/Yautja x F!Reader)

CW:  Violence; smut (monsterf*cking; fingering; PiV, unprotected). 18+ only.

Word Count: 9889

AN:  This was originally requested by an anonymous person!

The distress call is what bring Mah’tu to Earth:  a Yautja ship infested with a single xenomorph that escapes its cell to wreak havoc before the ship crashes onto the planet of the oomans.  Mah’tu, in a nearby star system, is the closest to handle it.

Thank the gods he has the foresight to call for aid.  A single xenomorph on a planet full of soft, weak creatures…it turns into an infestation almost immediately.  Mah’tu is grateful the Yautja ship at least crashed in a small ooman settlement

Still, the small settlement is overrun quickly.  Mah’tu finds himself outnumbered, outgunned, overpowered.  He sees some oomans as he fights:  they scurry around, they try to run.  Few manage to escape before they are slaughtered.  He pays them no mind.  They are a weak species and only worthy prey because of their inventiveness, but these oomans are panicky and stupid with fear, and easy prey for the serpents.

He finds himself cornered in a large building.  He hears the faint crackle in his comms of other Yautja as they approach Earth, but he himself is lost:  he’s trapped with two of the xenomorphs, and he dispatches one easily, but the second stabs him with its barbed tail, sprays acid blood, and Mah’tu falls. 

The Yautja are strong, durable.  They heal quickly, and neither of these injuries would be fatal, but he feels his vision edging in black, and he knows once he’s unconscious, the serpent will kill him.

Mah’tu is a noble warrior.  He was Blooded young.  His bloodline is ancient, and he’s sired many Yautja that will live on beyond him, so he does not mourn his own lost life as he slips out of consciousness.  At least he won’t feel the blow, though there’s little honor in that sentiment.

It surprises him, then, when he doesn’t die.  When he instead wakes up, comes to, and finds a ooman—small, trembling—crouched beside him.

No, not beside him.  Not exactly.  The ooman is crouched between Mah’tu and the second xenomorph.  It lies dead and twitching as it oozes its acidic blood from where the ooman has impaled it with a metal pole through its long skull.

The ooman is a female of the species, even smaller than the males, and Mah’tu sits up with a grumble and takes in the measure of his savior.  A small thing, filthy.  Stinking of fear and sweat and the rich metallic tang of ooman blood and the acrid, biting odor of serpent blood.  Trembling as she turns and stares at him, her too-wide ooman eyes studying him warily.

How did something so small and cringing manage to kill a serpent, and with a piece of scrap metal, no less?  Mah’tu had seen better trained, better armored Yautja fall to serpents, and yet…

He knows what it means to kill one of the kiande amedha.  The Yautja revere them as the ultimate prey, and to kill one is a feat to be celebrated. 

He does it with little thought:  the ceremony is ingrained in him, as it is ingrained in all of his kind.  To kill a kiande amedha means the ooman is Blooded by Yautja culture, so Mah’tu reaches down and drags a claw through the pooling acid blood of the serpent.  Then he reaches out to the ooman, who flinches away from him, makes a whimper of fear.  But he reaches out his other hand to grasp the filthy face.  He holds her still and traces a small mark onto her forehead that makes her cry out at the sting of the blood as it scars her. 

He marks the ooman—you—as Blooded.  In Yautja culture, it means you are an adult, capable of Hunting alone.  But more than that, it marks you as a full member of the clan, and given the strange circumstances of this moment—Earth, a xenomorph infestation—he marks you as his clan.

When the crackle comes through his comms that his fellow Yautja have arrived, that the military oomans of this sector have loosed a missile of some sort to level this infestation, Mah’tu again acts with little thought.  This is ingrained in him too:  marked as his clan now, he grabs your wrist, tugs you to the roof of the building, and narrowly escapes with you before your settlement is leveled by your government.

He realizes what he’s done once the ship is safely away from your star system.  He’s marked you as Blooded, as his clan, which means you’re his responsibility now.

-----

A famous ooman once wrote that the course of true love never did run smooth.  Mah’tu, without the benefit of any sort of literature course in his Yautja education, never heard the quote, but it doesn’t make it untrue.

Who would have thought the cringing little ooman would be so relentlessly furious at him, once the fact of her situation became clear to her?

Reason must flee your little skull.  There is nowhere for you to go unless out of the airlock into the void of space, yet you fight him.

Or you try to.

The first night you attack him, Mah’tu is taken unawares.  Why would he ever think you’d try?  He’s sitting in the pilot’s seat of his ship when the sensitive appendages on his head alert him to someone behind him, but not quickly enough:  there’s a dull bloom of pain in his shoulder, and it comes accompanied by you yelling some ooman word he does not understand.

He turns in his seat and appraises you.  He takes in the fury on your face, as it cedes to confusion, then dejection.

From the meat of his shoulder, a small shank of metal is half-buried.  He pulls it out, the pain minuscule, the cut already mending.  He examines the weapon, a pathetic thing that you’ve found and tried to shape into something that could kill him.

It makes him chuckle, which sounds like a trilling to you.  Then he stands, takes your arm in his paw, and drags you back to the storage area he cleaned out to house you. 

“Stay,” he orders you, and he locks you in anyway.  He cannot know how you bristle to be ordered about as you would order a dog.

The second time you attack him?  You’ve loosened the bolts on a seat in the cockpit.  You must have been at it for hours at a time, working your feet against the fastenings while you slouched beside him and stuck the fleshy part of your mouth out in a pout.  Mah’tu bends in his seat to recalibrate a certain piece of equipment, and a moment later, the loosened chair smashes against his skull.

The chair breaks into several pieces.  His skull doesn’t break at all.

“God fucking dammit,” you breathe out as he straightens out, stands to his full height. 

He locks you in again, and as he drags you to your quarters, you try to punch him.  Your little fists aim for his face, his eyes, his throat, and they glance off of him with no effect.  You land a punch to his mouth and it cuts your hand.  Mah’tu smells the metallic tang of your blood as he tosses you into your cell.

He thinks on it a beat later, then tosses in a med-spray so you can heal your fragile ooman skin.

-----

From there, you change your tactics.  You abuse him verbally.  You narrow your eyes into slits and call him all sorts of names:  monster, alien, crab-faced motherfucker.  Slimy fucked-up lizard.

When he’s alone in his quarters, he must look up some of the words you use.  A crab, for example, is a harmless water creature on earth that oomans eat.  Mah’tu cocks his head, considers it.  Have oomans ever eaten a yautja before?  The records are silent on the matter. 

The verbal abuse is much like your physical abuse.  It glances off of him.  His kind have little capacity for metaphor, for simile or abstract thinking, so when you call him a “motherfucker” it does not bother him because you are wrong—he has never mated with his dam.  A silly thought.

-----

Your fury never seems to lessen, but it does cool into something more refined and less ruled by passion.  You finally seem to grasp that he means you no harm and that attacking him could leave you stranded in a star system your kind has never even heard of before.

You don’t try to attack him anymore, and your verbal assaults have lessened as well.  You still twist your too-soft mouth around into a look that means displeasure, and Mah’tu senses that you are assessing the situation.  Waiting for an opportunity to escape him.

So be it.  You may be a Blooded member of his clan now (a fact he must remind himself, as your behavior often puts him in mind of a youngling, rash and stupid), but he is your elder both in age and tradition.  He has followed all the protocols:  he’s alerted the head of his clan, who required several confirmations that yes, you were a ooman and yes, you had killed a kiande amedha.  He registers your DNA in the clan’s codex.  Lists both your ooman name and the Yautja one he chooses for you (his name means “Swift Judgment,” but yours translates roughly as “Vexing Thorn”). 

And though you are Blooded, as your elder, he takes up your training.  Against his judgment (swift or otherwise), it is protocol, so he trains you.

Wisely, he starts by teaching you defensive moves.  Why put a blade or worse, a plasmacaster, in your twitchy little paws?

If he hadn’t seen the evidence of your killing the kiande amedha, Mah’tu would doubt it now.  Even accounting for the general weakness of oomans, their lack of speed or agility or flexibility, you are terrible.  Your reflexes…do you even have reflexes? 

Mah’tu shows you how he’ll attack you, he shows you how to counter, he comes at you at quarter-speed, and still you fail.  You take his punches, his slaps, the sweeps of his leg, and you always end up on the mat in the training room of his ship.

As your elder, he tries to give you helpful advice.

“You are very slow,” he tells you.  “Move faster.”

His advice is not well received.  “Fuck you,” you spit from your place on the floor, wheezing as you try to catch your breath.

Mah’tu shakes his head.  “No, you must train more.  How will you ever join the Hunt?”

“I’m not a hunter, asshole!”

“You are Blooded.”

“I’m a goddamned dispatcher at a heating and cooling company!”

He considers this—he did not know that the oomans could control the weather or environment in this way.  He will add it to the codex so that other Yautjas may investigate it.  But it likely will not help you on the Hunt.

He holds his hand out to you, and you glare at him for a long moment before you take it and allow him to haul you back onto your feet.

“Again,” he says.  “I will attack you from the front, and you must feint and then counter by striking me low on my arm.”  He pauses and adds, “I will go as slowly as I can.”

You make a growling noise in the back of your throat.  “Fuck. You,” you grit out, but you change your stance as he shows you.

A second later, you’re on your back again, but at least you land a blow before Mah’tu puts you on the floor.  Your weak little fist glances off his arm, but he is feeling generous and counts it as a win for you.

-----

At his next Hunt, Mah’tu judges that you are not prepared, so he leaves you behind at base camp.  He’s not concerned that you’ll try to escape:  if you run off, he’ll easily track you.  If you try to steal the ship, you won’t get far, as you don’t know how to fly it.

“Stay here,” he orders anyway, and you do that thing with your too-close eyes where they move in their sockets.  He believes it may mean you are displeased, but most of your expressions seem to mean that.

“Aye, aye, captain.”

He shakes his head, touches his hand to his chest.  “No, I am Mah’tu.  Not cap-tan.”

You do the thing with your eyes again.  “It’s an expression.  Sarcasm, in this case.”

He tilts his head, and you clarify, “a kind of joke.”

Ah.  He nods, then turns back to his weapons.  He inspects them one last time, then holsters them on his body.  The different blades, the net-gun, the darts and spear.

“I will return victorious.  You will stay here, little sain’ja.”

You scowl at the nickname but say nothing, and Mah’tu doesn’t tell you that it means “warrior.”  It is a jest because you are no warrior.  A kind of joke, as you’d say.

-----

It is a successful Hunt.  It brings him much honor and new trophies. 

You are unimpressed, but when he strings up his kills and begins to clean the skulls, you make an injured noise and dart to the edge of camp to retch.  The retching goes on and on, so much so that Mah’tu pauses in his efforts to check on you.

“You are ill?” he asks.  “You have eaten something poisonous, perhaps?”

“No, you fucking psycho!”  You stand up, swipe the back of your hand along your mouth.  “You killed those creatures just for their skulls?”

“Oomans kill for trophies as well,” he points out reasonably.

“Yeah, but we also eat the meat.  Venison, turkey, whatever.  Some humans, you know, use all of the animal.  The skin and horns and stuff.”

Ah, a misunderstanding.  It’s bound to happen.  Mah’tu puts his hand on your shoulder and lowers his head to show he is sorry for not explaining better.

“Do not worry,” he tells you.  “We will eat these creatures’ flesh as well.”

You blink at him, and then you turn away quickly to retch again.  Perhaps there was a misunderstanding, but perhaps you are ill as well. 

“I will get you a med-kit,” he tells you.  “It will cure your illness quickly.”

“Dude, really?”  You heave again, but your stomach seems to be empty of any contents.  “Honestly, fuck you.”

-----

Living with you is never easy, but it does reach moments of ease, especially when considering how you tried to kill him at first.

He trains you, or tries to.  You do get stronger, leaner.  You lose some of the ooman softness you had, and through your spat-out cursing, Mah’tu learns small details of your life on earth.  How, for example, your role as weather-shaman was a passive one that entailed a lot of sitting and little movement.  You apparently were a leader of sorts, ordering other weather-shamans on where to go to bring heat or coolness to other oomans. 

There is a limit to your abilities as a fighter, though, and you reach them quickly under his tutelage.  You can block many of his attacks, and you can land a blow occasionally, but in twenty sparring sessions, you are lucky to draw his blood once. 

He finds that the sparring helps to spend your general fury at him, and the time afterwards—your muscles trembling, your body fatigued and bruised—is almost pleasant.  Mah’tu has always been interested in the ooman civilizations, and when he asks his questions, you usually answer them honestly.

“Who were your sire and dam?” he asks.

“My mom and dad?”

“Yes.”

“Then say ‘mom’ and ‘dad,’ you weirdo.”

This is how Mah’tu learns that word choice is important to oomans, that your species uses words to differentiate things that are essentially the same thing.

“I never knew my dad.  He took off before I was born.  My mom was an alcoholic.  She died when I was twenty.”

“You did not know which clan sired you?”

You narrow your eyes at him.  “Fuck you.  I knew my dad’s name, but that was it.”

“Did you share your si…dad and mom with others?”

That, for some reason, makes your mouth turn up at the corners, your lips curved upwards.  “We call those siblings.  Brothers and sisters.  And no, I was an only child.”

“Ah.”  Mah’tu nods knowingly.  “Your dad was not worthy to sire many oomans.”

And that, for some reason, makes you laugh.  It doesn’t sound like a Yautja’s laughter, but it isn’t unpleasant, Mah’tu finds.

“Mom would have liked that.  Not worthy.  Well, the bastard never paid a cent of child support anyway.”

-----

The two of you continue like this:  misunderstanding each other, clarifying what confuses the other, navigating your two separate species and cultures.

It’s not easy, but it grows easier with each passing moment.  He no longer has to lock you in your room each night, as you no longer try to escape.  He no longer fears your fury (not that he feared it much anyway), so he doesn’t keep such a close eye on you.

He deems you worthy of a blade.  He knows you’ll likely never be trained to a level of plasmacaster, but a small blade, designed and weighted for your size and strength seems appropriate for the rare Blooded ooman.

He spends long hours in his workshop crafting it for you.  His sire was a renowned weapons master, and he passed his skills onto all of his offspring.  Mah’tu forges the metal, hones the edge to such a sharpness that it could split one of the hairs on your head.  He carves the handle to fit your hand perfectly, and finally, he tools a fine sheath out of leather, because he worries that you’ll cut yourself sooner than you’ll cut an enemy.

On the leather sheath, he picks out the symbols for your Yautja name.  His Vexing Thorn.

-----

Mah’tu learns much from you, and he adds all of it to the great shared codex of information so that other Yautja may know and learn.

Your mention of child support, for example.  It is a thing that a sire must use to support his offspring—money, which is the paper goods that represents wealth.  He questions you heavily on this point; Yautja honor is derived from the Hunt, but ooman honor seems to come from which of your species can acquire the most of those paper goods.  It determines who may live in a fine home and who may starve, and when he explains it back to you—to make sure he understands it correctly—you stare at him, then nod.

“I mean, basically.”  But then you try to explain a thing called a stock exchange, and a thing called capitalism, but when he presses certain points, you get confused too.

“I dunno, dude.”  You throw your hands up, a gesture of helplessness.  “I never went to college, and if I had, I wouldn’t have majored in economics.”

-----

Early on, he calibrates to the ebb and flow of your body, and the questions he asks you in regards to your biology is what makes you the most anxious.  Through his bio-mask, he can see how the heat courses to your face.  He can hear your heartbeat increase in cadence, but he cannot understand why you respond in such a way.  A body is a body.  It’s systems and rhythms are what they are.

“You are injured,” he tells you, early.  He’s still locking you in at night, and you’re still scowling at him and calling him, among other things, a fucking lizard asshole. 

“’m not,” you reply.

He breathes the air of the cockpit.  “I smell blood.”

The heat floods your face; it shows white-hot in his mask.  “Shut up.”

“If you are injured—”

“I said I’m not.”

“If you are bleeding, I can get a med-kit—”

“Fuck, dude!  I’m on my period, okay?”

Mah’tu tilts his head and thinks back to the rudimentary studies he’d read about oomans.  “Ah, you are menstru—”

You cut him off with another scowl, but your eyes fix on the stars in front of you outside of the cockpit.  “And by the way, having one’s period in deep space is not as fun as it sounds.  I bet Princess Leia never had to worry about it.”

He does not understand your ire.  “Is this Princess Leia a famed statesman on your planet?” he asks, kindly as he can, but you cut him an icy glare and launch yourself out of your chair and out of the cockpit.

You manage to toss a strained “fuck you” over your shoulder before you leave, as you often do.

-----

So Mah’tu comes to understand the seasons of your body.  He also comes to understand how your feel about those seasons.  He does not mention when you are on your period, though he can tell.  He is sure to give you more privacy, and that helps ease the strain between the two of you.

But with other things, your face does not get inflamed.  When your head aches, or when you twist a joint in sparring, you are free with discussing these things with him.  When you feel hunger or thirst, when you require a blade to trim away the excess hair that grows from your head.  When you feel tired.  You share these things with him.

The only other thing  you don’t share is when you are in heat.  Mah’tu can tell that too, can scent you when your heat is upon you.  It runs in the same rhythm as your period does, the two part of the same cycle that seems to come every thirty or day earth days.

It happens so often, he thinks.  Yauja females only have a handful of heats in their entire long lives, yet you could spawn eleven or twelve oomans in one earth year.  His mind is baffled by the math of it until he checks the codex and learns that no, oomans do not spawn that much.  Despite their numerous heats, they only produce roughly the same number of pups as a Yautja female would. 

Mah’tu sighs and leans back in his seat once he reads that.  He has so much to learn.

The next section in that part of the codex details observed ooman mating rituals, and below that, known instances of Yautja and ooman mated pairs. 

It is the latter that makes Mah’tu lean forward, then glance over his shoulder, then lean forward more:  a furtive move that would put one in mind of a teenaged human boy looking at pornography for the first time, though of course Mah’tu would not know that.

*****

Sometimes you wonder if you were in an accident that has left you in a deep coma somewhere.  How else can you explain the hell that broke loose that night, your small town overrun by monsters?

And how else can you explain the monster who…what?  Kidnapped you?  Saved you?  Because he stole you away from home, but you also saw that mushroom cloud from the porthole in his ship.  Did earth even still exist?  If you could escape, where would you go?

It’s easier to imagine this all as a fever dream.  A coma.  Some consequence of a broken brain throwing out insane story lines around monsters and aliens and space travel to worlds you couldn’t even fathom.

But then reality comes rushing back at you, usually in the form of the giant beast named Mah’tu, swiping at you or tripping you or hitting you with the dull blades of his goddamned fucking spaceship dojo.

Then you realize, arm or leg throbbing, bruise forming on your stomach, eye swelling shut or lip split:  this is no coma.  It’s real life.

-----

He doesn’t kill you.  You learn, over time, it’s because you killed one of those disgusting black things with the giant head full of teeth.  He had traced its blood onto your head, and you finger the scar sometimes when you struggle to sleep at night.

“You are Blooded,” he explains, like you know what the fuck that means.  “You are a member of my clan now.”

Great.  Wonderful.  You finally had a found family of giant lizard aliens.

You try to explain it to him.  Killing that thing was dumb luck.  It was some animal instinct, flailing as it cornered you.  Your hand had found the piece of metal, and the monster came at you, and you had swung in a move of self-preservation. 

“Dumb luck,” you tell him.

But his beady little eyes shine at you, and he lays a heavy paw on your shoulder.  “A warrior’s instinct,” he corrects you.

You snort.  You, a fucking warrior.  You barely passed gym class in high school, cringing during dodgeball, puking during the timed mile run. 

“A mistake,” you counter.

He shakes his head.  “Fate.”

-----

It’s not terrible.  You’re no warrior, but your childhood with an unsteady mother left you with the ability to adapt pretty easily.

He trains you, or tries.  He goes hunting for his psycho room of trophy skulls, but he doesn’t force you to eat the raw, dripping meat he harvests.  He takes the time to feed you a fruit-type stew, great chunks of roasted vegetables, some kind of flatbread.  You recognize the hypocrisy of it—you loved a good burger on earth—but now you’re a vegetarian by default.

He gives you your own space, a narrow storage closet that he cleans out and makes a little nest of furs.  When you hurt too much or get sick, he administers some sort of alien medicine that heals you and gives you a boost of energy, like you imagine old-style Coca-Cola used to do when they made it with a little cocaine.

So you endure, and sometimes—you’ll never admit it to him, the goddamned asshole who stole you away from home—sometimes, you actually enjoy this new life.  When the stress of work and debts and making rent each month and trying to save up for a new car fall away, when you are whittled down to a more essential sort of life, you find that your anxious mind calms. 

You find that you sleep pretty well in that nest of soft furs, all things considered.

-----

The training, though.

The goddamned training.

He is unfailingly patient, at least.  He never once gets frustrated when you fail to move the right way.  In the rare off-chance you land a blow on him, his happiness is outsized, like a parent crowing when their toddler takes their first steps.

It should be humiliating, but sometimes his praise makes you smile in spite of yourself.  You know he’s humoring you, but still.  You’ll take your wins where you can get them.

The problem with your handful of training successes, though, is that he thinks you ready for more.  He introduces weapons with dull blades.  Today, you’re training with some fucking spear thing, and he raps you over and over with his own.  A stinging blow across your knuckles.  A stab to your belly that lands like a punch.  Finally, a curt jab to your ankle that strikes you right on your ankle bone, and you hit the ground with a shriek at the pain that crackles like lightning from your foot.

“Asshole!” you wheeze.  You pull yourself into a fetal position on your side, and you pull your injured foot up towards you.  You flex your foot.  It doesn’t seem broken, but you know it will bruise.  And you know he’ll make you swallow a vial of whatever healing shit he has, and the bruise will heal within the day, and tomorrow you’ll be back here, tears leaking out of your eyes as you stare up at him.

“You were supposed to move to the left.”  He tilts his head, studies you.  “You stepped into my blow instead.”

“Fuck you!”  You spit it out with all the venom you can muster.  Sparring is as much choreography as it is strength and speed, and guess what?  You’ve never danced in your life, aside from some drunken flailing at bars and wedding receptions when you were younger.

At your words, though, he tilts his head the other way, and his bright yellow eyes bore into you.

“Not now,” he replies.  “Perhaps when you are in heat next.”

That immediately takes your mind from the throbbing in your ankle.  You gape at him, and he stares down at you wordlessly.  Did you misunderstand him?  It seems a miracle he can speak at all, and English at that, but he is very literal. 

“What?” you finally manage to choke out.

“If we are to mate, we should wait until you are in heat again.”  He says it so matter-of-factly, and you can feel the blood flooding your face and neck.

“I don’t—”

“It will be upon you in four or five earth days.”

You uncurl yourself and sit up.  “How the fuck do you know that?”

“I can smell you.”

You curl your nose in disgust.  “Oh, gross.  You can smell me?  You sound like a fucking serial killer.  Hannibal Lecter in space.”  You struggle to your feet, and when he reaches out his hand to help, you bat it away.

He tilts his head again, but now there is a question in his eyes.  “Is this a misunderstanding, little sain’ja?  You have said numerous times you would like to mate with me.”

“The fuck I have!”

“Is that not what it means, when you say ‘fuck you’?  The codex indicates that ‘fuck’ means ‘to mate.’”

You gape at him again.  Then you close your eyes, pinch the bridge of your nose.  You take a deep breath.  He’s not wrong.  You’ve said ‘fuck you’ a thousand times to him.  Goddamnit.

You keep your eyes squeezed shut, and you manage to say as politely as you can, “yes, it’s a misunderstanding.”

You hear the huff he breathes out, the low growl, and then he replies, “another instance of ooman words meaning different things, then.”

“Yeah, update the codex, dude.”

“I will.”  A beat, and then he adds, “this Hannibal Lecter.  Is he a great warrior in your species?”

-----

The problem is, once he says it, you can’t get it out of your head.

Why do you seem more open to it as time passes?  You read once that Stockholm Syndrome wasn’t real, but perhaps it is and you have some version of it.  Or maybe you’re just lonely, and had been lonely before you got kidnapped by him, or saved by him, depending on the lens you took on the matter.

It’s true that you had been in a dry spell on earth.  You lived in a small town with few prospects.  Everyone your age was already paired up, many married with kids.  You and your ex had broken up a year before the alien invasion, and you’d had no dates in the interim, no offers, no tempting moments with another person.

And anyway, your ex hadn’t been that great.  It had been a relationship of convenience until you had gotten wise to the fact that life with him was not convenient at all.  The sex was mediocre at best, he was always borrowing money from you, and never rinsed his toothpaste down the drain when he brushed his teeth.

He never got you anything as a gift either.  Mah’tu, in comparison, crafted a custom knife for you…which isn’t exactly a necklace from Tiffany’s, but there is no other knife like yours in the known universe, either.

He’s also considerate to your temperament, your likes and dislikes.  He makes sure you have food you’ll eat.  He does his skull-cleaning grossness out of sight now.  More than once, he’s taken a detour to a planet just to show it to you, just to watch you stand on alien soil and gape like an idiot at flora and fauna that no other human has ever seen.

The craziest thought you’ve ever thought:  maybe this fucking alien is the closest thing to a healthy relationship I’ve ever had in my life.

“You’ve lost it,” you whisper in the darkness of your quarters one night.  “You’ve lost your goddamned mind.”

Because you lie there for a long moment, thinking about it, and you find that you don’t need to be in heat (the word alone makes you groan in disgust) to feel the sharp knife of desire lance through your belly at the thought of him.

-----

One night, around the fire of a planet where he’s hunting, you ask him.

“Why did you save me?”  You watch him as he looks up from polishing his knife.  He seems to consider his answer.

“Because you are Blooded, in my clan.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t have to do that.”

He shakes his head, the dread-like things on his head moving as he does.  ���It is required.  You killed a kiande amedha.”

“I’ve told you, that was an accident.  Dumb luck.”

“Many Yautja die in the attempt to kill one.”

“But I’m no warrior.  I could never kill another.”

He makes a low trill, which seems to be his version of a chuckle.  “No.  But you only need kill one to be Blooded.”

You look down at your hands.  They are calloused now from all the training, the nails trimmed short.  “So it’s just that, then?  Just dumb luck that got me here?”

“Not only that, little sain’ja.  You could have killed me but did not.”

“So you owe me?”

“No.  There is no debt.”  He pauses.  “Why do you question me?”

You lift your hands in a helpless gesture.  “I dunno.”

“The codex says that oomans often question their fate.”

“Yeah, I guess so,” you snort.  “I just was curious.  I thought maybe it was that thing, you know.  The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

“You think I brought you here because we mutually aided each other against the serpents?”

You nod.  “Sure.”

Mah’tu shakes his head again, and he chuckles in his way.  “No, little sain’ja.  I brought you here because you are Blooded in my clan.  I’ve kept you with me because I enjoy your presence.”

It’s not Shakespeare, you suppose, but it’s a sweet sentiment, in his own sort of way.

*****

There is a series of Hunts, and Mah’tu fails in one, succeeds in the others.  His trophy room has much more Honor added to it, though you remain unimpressed by his prowess.

“Gross,” you say when you peek in at it.

He points to the long skull of the kiande amedha, the one he killed to become Blooded.  “Had we more time, I would have beheaded yours so you could keep your trophy.”

You make a face and lift a hand to touch the scar on your forehead.  “I think I have plenty to remember it, but thanks.  If I ever end up back home, I’ll need to look up a plastic surgeon to handle this.”

It takes some explaining what you mean, but when Mah’tu grasps your meaning, he is outraged.  You think the mark makes you unworthy.  Ugly, you say.

“It marks you as worthy.  A special ooman,” he spits out.  “The others of your kind would be fools to not see you as such.”

Normally, you’d do that thing with your eyes, but instead you study him.  Stare at him, steady and unblinking.  Finally you say, “you may be the only creature who sees me that way.”

He huffs.  “Then I am the only creature with eyes to see and a brain to think.”

-----

He is not sure what changes with you.  Perhaps you only needed time to adapt to life with him.  Oomans, he knows, are highly adaptable.

You have stopped the verbal abuse entirely.  You make an earnest attempt when training, and by applying yourself, you earn the right to learn the net-gun.  You earn your own bio-mask, and Mah’tu labors over it for several star cycles.  You have such a tiny skull, and your eyes are so far apart.  It must be custom made.

You join him on a Hunt.  It is just a small one, a training to whet a new spear he has made.  The prey is hardly worthy, but Mah’tu uses the opportunity to teach you how to stalk, how to move silently, how to be still and watch.  You are much better at that than you are at fighting, and though you kill nothing on your first Hunt, you earn Honor for yourself by successfully stalking a herd of very jittery prey.  They never once suspect you, and Mah’tu trills in pride when he sees you get close enough to reach out and touch one.

That night around the fire, he gives you much praise.  You like that, he finds—you duck your head as if ashamed, but it is to hide your smile.  Which means you are pleased. 

“Had you been a moment quicker, you could have killed one,” he tells you.  “Though it would be a small skull.  Our younglings often kill them to learn their blades.”

You laugh.  “Oh, fuck you.  Our younglings.  Yeah, yeah, I get it.  This weak-ass human is less skilled than a Yautja infant.”

That phrase again.  He knows what it means now, though he was greatly disappointed that it wasn’t what he thought.  Still, he bristles; he sits up straighter and looks at you when you say it, and when you realize what you’ve done, you give him a sheepish look.

“Be at ease,” he says.  “I know what you mean.”

Incredibly, you lower your head, and he sees no smile there.  You kick your foot in the dirt, scuffing it, and you mumble, “maybe I meant it the other way.”

“Which way?”

You groan, and you place your hands over your face.  He isn’t wearing his bio-mask, but he can guess that your face is inflamed. 

“Don’t make me say it.”  The words are muffled, and your voice is tight.

“Say what?”

“Ugh, the gross way you phrase everything.  You know what I mean.”

“I do not, little sain’ja.”  Though he does—it is a lie to say he does not understand.  As you’d say, it’s a kind of joke.  Pretending one thing when another is true.  A ooman sort of jest.

“You know what I mean.  Fuck’s sake, I mean mating.”  You whisper the last word, make it small in your mouth, but he hears it anyway.

He wonders what changed in this respect too, but he can consider it later.  “We should wait until your next heat is on you.”

That makes you squawk, a sound of outrage.  “Absolutely not!  I’d never survive it if I got pregnant!”

He chuckles at your horror.  “There would be no risk.  There are no Yautja-ooman hybrids.  It is an impossible thing.”

You sag in relief.  “Then why wait?”

“We cannot if you are not in heat,” he points out.

Now it is your turn to laugh at him, and then Mah’tu has another clarification to add to the codex:  oomans can mate nearly any time, any place, so long as the mood is upon them.

As it turns out, the mood is upon you now, and Mah’tu is grateful that his face does not show his emotions as blatantly as yours does—otherwise, you may see how he is flustered, then aroused in equal measure.

*****

He would take you outside, you think, but you douse the fire and lead him back into the ship.  For one, you don’t want this to be out in the open, where any creature could witness. 

For another, you want to be as close as possible to his array of med-kits and healing sprays.  God knows how this is going to work.  He’s bigger than you in every way possible.  It may not work at all.

He seems confused, but he lets you lead him.  You, for once, hold your hand out to him.  He makes a low trill, and takes it, and he follows you into the ship.  You start to lead him into your quarters by habit, but he stops, tugs you towards his.

“More space,” he says.

In his quarters, he only stands and watches you.  Waits for you to make a move.  Which is novel, for you:  you’re used to letting your partner lead, though your partner up until now has exclusively been a disappointing and generally clueless human male.

“Um.”  You kick off your boots.  You fiddle with the hem of your shirt, then take a breath and pull it off, as quick as you can.  “How do you usually?”

That curious head tilt of his.  “Usually what?”

You swear to god that he’s toying with you.  His stupid face gives nothing away, but he’s not usually so dense.

“How do your kind mate?”  You undo the snap on your pants, the zipper, and you push them over your hips.  You kick them off, peel out of your socks, and stand in front of him in your underwear.

They mate like they do everything else:  with ceremony, rules, customs, elaborate steps that either mean honor or dishonor.  They mate due to some confusing clan alliance, and the mating is always towards breeding the next generation of Yautja.  They don’t generally mate for pleasure, though of course it is pleasurable to mate, he explains.

“But you are not beholden to those customs,” he adds.  “As you cannot add glory to our clan by breeding with me.”

“Noted.”

“Even if we could have offspring, they would be very weak.”

“I said I got it, thanks.”

While he gives his explanation, he strips too.  He lays aside his greaves, his gauntlets, his weird footwear.  The data pad he wears on his wrist.  The fine netting of his invisibility tech.  The thick belt that holds more weaponry than Batman’s setup.  He leaves his loincloth-thing on, though, and stands to look at you.

He makes no move.  You give him a long moment to lead, but when he only stands and watches you, you decide to lead.

You bridge the few steps between you, and this close—sans most of your clothing and most of his—the size difference has never been more stark.  Hell, the difference in your damned species has never been more stark.  He’s objectively ugly, you suppose.  You must be just as ugly to him, but you wonder if he finds you as fascinating as you find him?

He's a greyish green at first glance, but you’ve noticed that his coloring depends on the light.  Sometimes he looks more like a gem, glimmering a darker green like an emerald.  Now, in the lower light of his berth, he shimmers almost iridescent. 

You’ve touched him plenty in the training sessions, so you know that your first impression (cool and slimy) is incorrect.  His skin is dry, warm to the touch.  You reach out a tentative hand and lay it on one of his massive pectoral muscles, and when you do, he lays his own hand over yours.  Engulfing it.

“How do your kind mate?” he asks, and honestly?  He kinda nails the bedroom voice because he lowers his register and growls it, and the sound makes the ache between your legs grow stronger.

Who knew he had it in him?

You think on how to answer him, but he adds, “show me, little sain’ja.”

*****

It takes much of his strength to not overpower you.  He can smell your arousal, sharper even than when you’re in your heat.  He can hear your heartbeat growing faster, can hear your breathing getting a harsh edge to it.  Mostly, though, it’s just his instinct to want to fight you, to submit you to him.  To treat you like a Yautja female, really.

But you’re not Yautja.  The sight of you in your thin underthings is proof of that.  Your fragile skin has no variations aside from a few scars.  Your fleshy mouth, your too-wide eyes, the strange lifeless hair that sprouts from your head…he should find you repellent, but when you touch him, he leans into the sensation of your hand on his chest.

He orders you to lead.  He does not want to hurt you, so he puts the moment in your hands.

You pause, considering your moves.  Thoughtful of what to do in order to make this work.  You nod then, and remove the remainder of your clothing, and Mah’tu takes in what has been hidden from him:  your breasts, despite having no younglings to nourish.  The curls that cover your sex.  You gesture to him, and he removes his loincloth, and your already-wide eyes go wider to the point where he fears they may fall out of your skull.

“Fuck,” you breathe out.

He nods.  “Yes.”

You laugh at him, and it’s the merry version, not the frustrated kind.  “We have to go slowly.”

“Yes.”

“I mean it.  You have to….”  You pause, and he hears the way you swallow as you study him.  “You’ll basically have to not move until I, uh, get used to it.  Once we…start.”

Another nod.  “Yes.  I understand.”

"But you can, uh, touch me. If you want. Before we start."

He lies down on his furs when you tell him to, and you approach him carefully.  You cast a wary eye on him as you kneel beside him, then shuffle closer.  He takes a hand and chances to touch one of your curves, the one from the dip in your waist to the swell of your hip, and you like that.  He can smell the way your arousal blooms, so he continues touching you.  Slowly.  Carefully.  He leads you to lie down beside him, and he touches all the parts of you he never has touched in your training sessions.

Each place is a revelation.

Your breasts are soft, malleable, yet they are tipped with firm nipples.  He molds his hands around the shape of them, which makes you moan, but when he skates a blunt nail carefully over each nipple, one and then the other, you part your lips and swear at him.

“Fuck’s sake,” you say, and your voice is tight, like you’re pained.

“Did I hurt you?”

“No.  God, no.”  Another hard swallow.  “That’s…that’s good.  You can do that again.”

So he does.

Oomans, he finds, perhaps like their pleasure with a little pain, or even just the threat of it.  He is gentle with you, careful of his strength and his claws, but your arousal grows sharp when he draws a nail over your tender skin or when he wraps one hand around your neck to hold you still from your wriggling.

His exploration leads him lower, to the source of your arousal.  He slides a gentle finger between your legs, feels how hot you are, how wet you are, how the slick seeps out of you in anticipation for the joining with him.

All the same…

“Your sex is very small,” he mutters.  He drags the pad of one finger through your folds and finds your entrance.  He tests it, pushes it into you, and it goes fine with how wet you are, but a lone finger is nothing compared to his cock.  Still, when he breeches your entrance with his digit, he hears the breathy way you whisper his name.  Better, he feels how your sex twitches against him.  Like it seeks to draw him in deeper.

So he adds a second finger, which makes you curse, but it is much the same.  The same twitching from the smooth muscles of your sex.  A fresh pulse of wetness coats his fingers, and he pushes them in, draws them out, mimics mating in this way.  Spreads his fingers inside you, to stretch you in preparation.

“God,” you whisper.  “Please, don’t stop.  Keep…keep doing that, okay?”

He nods.  He’s an eager pupil, and you can teach him this.  A moment later he feels it:  your tiny hand, fumbling for his cock.  Circling your slender fingers around his girth.  You have little strength but it’s enough to give him pleasure, and he wonders how much is due to your grip and how much is due to the fact that it’s you, his Vexing Thorn, gripping him there.

“This gives you pleasure?” he asks.

“Yes.”  You hiss it, draw the word out.  With your other hand, you reach down yourself and show him another part of you, a firm little bud also slick with your arousal, just above your entrance.  “If you, you know, touch that carefully.  Rub it?  Carefully.  It will be…ah, fuck, yes.  Like that.  Just like that.”

As he works his hand, he feels you relaxing.  Loosening.  You are still very small, but it seems more likely that you can take him now, so he keeps going, and you writhe against him, stroke him as you whine out all sorts of words he’ll have to study later. 

You reach some point where you deem yourself ready, and you push his hand away.  You take your own hand from him, and he grumbles in disappointment, but then you are on him, on top of him, pushing him back, and he lets you.

“Are you okay with this?” you ask.  You straddle him, and he feels the hot slick of you pressed against the length of him.  “I mean, I don’t know the politics of this.  Is this even consensual?”

“Explain your question more.”

You sigh, but you also slide against him, your lower body moving back and forth in small motions as your hands brace on his stomach.  He feels how you’re coating him in your arousal, and the mechanics of it make sense.  If your sex is slick and his is as well, it will make the mating easier—

“I mean, we never reviewed consensual sex with other species in high school sex ed.”

“I do not understand.”  He grips the fat of your ass, you’re so soft there, and he urges your movements.  There is pleasure even in this, and he feels himself growing harder underneath you.

“Am I…fuck, I don’t know how to say it without just saying it.  Is this what you want?  Am I coercing you for sex?”

He chuckles under you, trills deep and long.  “Little sain’ja, how could you coerce me?  You are so weak.”

You pout, the fleshy lower lip of yours stuck out and wet.  “Asshole.”

“I could throw you off me in an instant.  I could be on top of you before you could even blink.”

That makes a fresh beat of arousal pulse out of you, coating him more.  He notes it.  Perhaps you would find pleasure underneath him, just as he is enjoying being underneath you.

“Okay, yeah.  Good.  So we’re good, then.”

“This is what I want,” he clarifies to your question.  “You can feel how I strain to seat myself in you.”

“Well, then.”  You gaze at him a beat longer, but you shift, reach your hand down.  You grasp him at the root of his cock, and you lift yourself up enough to slot the flared head of him against your entrance.

“I mean it.  Please don’t move at all until I tell you.  This is…”  You trail off, and your pink tongue darts out to lick your lips.  “This is a lot.”

He nods.  “I will not move until you order me to.”

At that, you begin to lower yourself onto him.

It goes so slow.  It must, despite your arousal.  You are so small, and he is large, but your anatomy is such that it can take far more than he thought.  But it must go slow, so your sex can adapt to him.  Wonderful, adaptable oomans:  your sex twitches and grabs at his cock as you work yourself onto him, but he enters you bit by bit, and you breathe deep and mumble curses, but you also groan at what you’re feeling, and it sounds like a pleasurable noise to him.

But you take him to the root, in time.  In time, you sit flush on him, no space between where he ends and you begin, and Mah’tu has never felt a mating like this in his long life.

“Fuck, I can feel you in my throat,” you whine, and you wriggle at where you sit on him.  It sends him a fraction deeper, and he can feel the end of his cock nestled against some inner part of you, though he assumes it is your womb and not your throat.  But he also assumes it is one of those things where you say a word and it means something else, but he doesn’t ask for clarification because he needs all of his strength to lie still and wait for your command to move.

It doesn’t come just yet.  You sit on him, the back of your thighs flush with his hips.  You don’t move much; you move and resettle, you wince and then move, and your tense face cedes to one of panting pleasure.  Little by little, you start to move:  lifting yourself off of him a fraction, lower yourself back down.  Your arousal keeps it as easy as it can be, and in moving, he feels your sex relax more, molding itself to the shape of him.

“Is this okay for you?” you whisper, and he nods his head.  He keeps his grip on your ass but only as a place to touch you, not to harry you along.  How can he describe what he’s feeling?  He has no tricky words like you do, and he fears his blunt speech may anger you.

If he could say what he’s feeling, it would simply be this:  that you’re his mate, and now that he’s felt this once, you’ll be his mate for life.  He would not give you to another, nor allow another to touch you, and if you wanted to return to earth, he’d go with you and find a way to live amongst the other weak, tricky oomans.

Eventually, you begin to move in earnest.  Riding him in a steady rhythm:  raising off of him until only the broad crown of his cock is nestled in you, then sinking back onto him.  Over and over, in this way, your constant phrase of ‘fuck you’ is realized, and Mah’tu growls at this new way of mating.

“You can…you can move,” you finally tell him.  “But slowly, slow….ah, fuck!”

You don’t finish the thought because he moves.  Not as you expected, probably, but Mah’tu is a quick study.  He shifts one hand from where it kneads at the softness of your ass, and he draws the pad of his finger at where the small nub peeks out at the apex of your sex.  He rubs it carefully, mindful of his claw, and it makes your hips jerk against him.

“Yes, don’t stop.  Jesus, you’re….keep doing that.  Just that.”  The pace you’re riding him picks up in speed, and it makes your breasts bounce, drawing his gaze for a moment before it snaps back to where he disappears into the confines of your body.

“I’m close,” you tell him a moment later.

“Close to me?” he guesses.

You laugh, breathless.  “Close to coming.”

“Coming where?”

Another laugh, and your rhythm falters for a moment.  You reach out and steady your hand on his chest, and your face is perfectly relaxed, radiant in happiness, and Mah’tu thinks that even if you are ugly with your ooman features, he finds you beautiful.  Perfect.

“Close to…my pleasure,” you clarify, and you resume the quick pace of fucking him, riding him, drawing him into your body.

“Ah.”  He strokes the hot, swollen bud above where he slides into you, and he considers himself.  His own pleasure has been close for a while now, his seed close to bursting.  “I am close too, then, little sain’ja.”

“You can….come….with me.”  You’re panting now, pushing out your words in time to each time you reseat yourself.  A sheen of sweat glistens along your skin, making you look almost part Yautja in the low light.  “If you…want.  Want to…feel you.”

He nods.  “I will do as you ask.”

Another breathless laugh, but then you say no more, and he can only observe your body for any clues.  Ooman pleasure is blatant, he finds, because your sex gets wetter, and then you moan loudly.  Then your entire body seizes in a way, trembles and shakes above him, but your sex tightens against him like a fist, and it’s easy for his pleasure to break as well.  He feels it in a way he never has before, like a great wave carrying him towards you, and he spills inside you with a roar that must shake the walls of his ship.

-----

With Yautja mating, once it is complete, the two part.  If they meet again, it is only incidental, a consequence of sharing younglings.

So it is strange, how you nestle against him after you both reach your pleasure.  He remains nestled inside you, a snug fit that keeps his seed confined in your body—but you lean your upper body down onto him, nuzzle your face against his broad chest, and just lie there.

It is very strange.  But it is not unpleasant.  A beat after you settle, he places a hand on your back to hold you firmer against him.  Your skin is warm and soft under his palm, and he strokes you softly.

“I did not hurt you?” he asks after a long while of lying like this. 

“Only in the best way.”  Your mouth is near his skin, and he can feel your warm breath against him.

“Explain your meaning.”

“I’ll definitely be aching in the morning.”  You pause, seem to think on it.  “But it’s a good ache.  Like…the ache of training really hard.”

Mah’tu chuckles, and he drags the blunt tips of his claws along the skin of your back, which makes you squirm against him.  The motion makes his cock, only half-hard now, twitch back to life.

“You are much better at mating than training,” he tells you.

“Asshole.”  You turn your head against him, and he feels the blunt edge of your teeth.  You are biting him, but there is no pain.  The sensation—your wet mouth on him—makes his cock twitch harder, make the blood pool there to make him grow harder.

You can feel it.  You breathe against the wet spot you’ve put on his chest, but then he feels you move—a deliberate rocking, very carefully. 

He has many questions he’d like to ask you—other ways your kind mate, for example—but he saves them for later because the mood is upon you again, just as the mood is upon him.  And anyway, in the course of your second mating, some of his questions are answered by showing, and Mah’tu is an eager pupil.

[hannibals-favourite-meal]

Hello. (Bingo) Can you write Dark Clark Kent and plus size female kryptoian reader ?

.⋆｡The Last of His Kind｡⋆.

Dark!Clark Kent x plus size reader

Clark is no stranger to loneliness, but a mysterious ship in the middle of the desert could be just the answer he’s been searching for

Warnings: kryptonian!reader, DARK FIC but more soft than my usual stuff, naive reader, kidnapping?, possessive!clark, no use of Y/N, future isolation and controlling behaviour WC: 1k

6k Follower Celebration Bingo

Library- @hannibals-favourite-meal-library

Clark had always been alone in the universe, an unfortunate consequence of his own people’s arrogance and willing ignorance of the happenings of the world around them. He didn’t mind so much as he had never experienced anything different but after Zod and the briefest of hints that he wasn’t the last, Clark felt a deep stirring in his chest.

He often caught himself staring off into the void between stars, wondering if there were others out there. But his duty was to Earth, he couldn’t just leave because of some slim hope that other Kryptonians lived on a far away planet. And even if there were, they could be like Zod- power hungry and cruel. 

But on a cool day in late October, Clark got his chance to find out.

The office was almost empty, everyone having gone home early to beat the autumn storm that was predicted for later that evening, leaving Clark virtually alone in his block of cubicles. His article was almost done but he found himself picking it apart over and over again, like something deep in the recesses of his mind was telling him to delay returning home for as long as he could. Then, he heard it.

A heavy thud of something crashing into the earth, it had to be bigger than a meteor but far smaller than an airplane or weather balloon. Clark’s head tilted as he focused all of his senses to somewhere in the Sahara. The groan and pop of heated metal slowly cooling, the hiss of air escaping a pressurised chamber. He could smell gunpowder and dust that clung to the shell of whatever it was. But he could also hear the steady beat of something within the metal.

With a cautionary glance around the office, which was now absent of anyone save for him, Clark stood. He was careful enough to shut down his computer and gather his things but as soon as his bag was zipped and he was safely in the stairwell, he darted down the stairs, just barely keeping himself restrained enough not to go too fast and give himself away.

He could hear the beating slowly getting faster. He ran out of the building as the hissing ceased and the familiar turning of gears started, just like it had in the ship he discovered in the arctic. Clark stumbled over his work shoes, the buttons of his shirt practically flying off in his struggle to get out of them. If this was another Zod, he wouldn’t have much time to react before they started acclimating to Earth’s healthy sun. 

His glasses were barely off his nose when he finally heard it, a soft groan- delicate, gentle (as much as a groan could be) and Clark’s heart skipped a beat. She let out another soft sound and Clark finally took off. 

This could be it, the answer he needed so badly. Perhaps it was an elder who could really teach him about his home world, a child who had been lost just like him. But some deep part of his soul, a piece he had locked away a long time ago, wondered if it was someone his age, someone who would be his equal, his partner.

The sands of the Sahara quickly revealed a huge slash through the dunes, darkened by the heat of the ship’s dramatic entry. The ship itself was halfway buried in the sand, its black hull a stark contrast against the bright sand. Clark landed in front of its rounded end. 

Steam curled around the dark metal but he barely had time to appraise the vessel before a mechanical clanging began and the sand around its side started to shift. Clark darted forwards as a panel lifted and the earth around it immediately began to spill inside. He grabbed at the open frame and tugged the ship free just as its occupant became visible.

She was beautiful.

Large curves highlighted by tight spandex-like material, the exact same as his suit. The symbol spread over her generous chest consisted of two overlapping circles, one that he didn’t recognise even after his father’s lessons. Clark felt like he couldn’t even breathe as he looked down at her body, everything about her was captivating, hypnotising, everything he had ever wanted. Her hair was pulled back and away from her face, allowing him to observe every blemish and mark of her skin in extraordinary detail. She was a goddess in its truest sense, an ethereal being in mortal form.

And when she finally opened her eyes, he was met with the most brilliant shade of e/c he had ever seen. Panic briefly flashed across her face before she saw his own house symbol and immediately relaxed, her expression more calm than he thought it should be in this situation.

“I’m Kal-El.” Her eyes sparkled in the strong rays of the sun as a small smile crept onto her face.

“Kal.” She repeated his name back to him in a voice far more pleasant than he had ever heard before. Her lips parted again but suddenly her body rocked forwards, as painful coughs rattled through her lungs. Clark swept her into his arms without thinking and pressed her to his chest. She limply clutched at his back as she continued to cough.

He flinched with each of her laboured inhales, his own chest burning with a rage he couldn’t explain. But what he did know was that no one else could know of her. Only god knew what would happen if any government found out about another Kryptonian, especially a female one. Lois and his mother would try to corrupt her mind, encouraging her to leave him.

He wouldn’t let that happen. He would never let himself be alone again.

He could protect her, mould her. She would be safe. No one would know of her existence, not until she knew who exactly she belonged to, the only person that she would ever be able to trust.

Clark smirked as he cupped her head gently, his thumb tracing the apple of her perfect cheek. Oh yes, she was absolutely perfect.

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𝔇𝔬 𝔜𝔬𝔲 ℌ𝔢𝔞𝔯 𝔦𝔱𝔰 𝔖𝔢𝔭𝔲𝔩𝔠𝔥𝔯𝔞𝔩 𝔗𝔬𝔫𝔢?

siren furina au

warnings: none really (maybe some mild gore? but thats it)

word count: 3.8k

a/n: this is part of @edgeray 's halloween event. i hope everyone enjoys! (also please dont let this flop, i know im not a Tumblr Writer but still)

The waves crashed against the hull of the Alcor, a sea of obsidian in the dark night. Nothing could be seen except the massive ship cutting through the waves. Beidou stood at the helm, navigating through the choppy waters and narrowly dodging jagged rocks that threatened to sink the ship and its crew and drag them to the bottom of the sea. You stood at the starboard side of the ship, tightly gripping at the railing as a few other pirates tried to calm you down. Your face was somehow both pale with fear and green with nausea as your eyes surveyed the water’s surface, looking for any sign of the missing woman that Fontaine turned itself upside down to look for.

Furina had gone missing months ago without any trace. All of a sudden, nobody saw her out and about in the streets of Fontaine. Nobody had seen her ordering a slice of her favorite cake at the Hotel Debord, nobody had seen her at the Opera Epiclese watching the newest drama, and nobody had seen her taking a stroll with her theatre troupe while discussing plans for their newest show.

All the fingers pointed to the Fatui Harbinger Arlecchino. The second word got out about Furina’s disappearance, Monsieur Neuvillette had ordered that the Harbinger be captured and put on trial. The air in the courtroom was stifling. Nearly the entire city crowded into the courtroom to witness the trial, with some people sitting in the middle of the floor and some people even hanging off of the pillars lining the walls to get a better view.

“Where were you on the Night of Miss Furina’s disappearance?” Neuvillette questioned, his voice booming throughout the opera house.

The Harbinger kept a level head, clearly recounting the days leading up to Furina’s disappearance. Most of it was her day-to-day business dealings and duties as a father to many children, but one piece of evidence caught the Iudex’s attention:

“I was right here in this building. My children, Lyney and Lynette, had a rather important magic show. Freminet even joined as a prop holder. A past associate of one of their childhood idols was in town, and they wanted to put on their best performance, so naturally, as their father, I chose to support their endeavour.”

“And how long did you remain at the Epiclese for?”

“Until my children’s performance was through. Afterwards, we stopped by the Cafe Lucine and picked up a few sweets to bring back to the House of the Hearth.”

Neuvillette hit his cane against the ground like a gavel. “May the witness please come to the stand?”

A man of about 40 years stepped up to the witness seat opposite to Arlecchino with a rather accusatory look on his face.

“Your Honor, I saw this Harbinger wait around until the night’s performances were over, hours past what she states, and on my way out, I saw her walk backstage after most of the performers and actors had either left or gone out into the main seating area. I’ve prepared evidence for my case. If you look at the pictures I’ve taken,” he paused, allowing an officer to hand Neuvillette an envelope filled with about ten different pictures, “you will see signs of a struggle, or a confrontation. Observe the scratch marks on the chair that perfectly match this Harbinger’s wretched talons. Look at the broken glass across the floor, undoubtedly used to knock Lady Furina unconscious. There were remains of a liquid on the floor, and after testing, it was determined that it was Sinthe.” He paused to let a shocked gasp emanate from the audience before continuing. “Therefore, I conclude that The Knave snuck backstage and attempted to drug Lady Furina with a bottle of Sinthe. Lady Furina, of course, put up a valiant effort, and The Knave resorted to crude acts of violence, shattering the bottle over her head and rendering her unconscious. From there, she took Furina’s body and disappeared back to her Fatui Headquarters. We know from several sources that the House of the Hearth has had long business dealings with child experimenters and murderers. I fear deeply for what has befallen our beloved actress, Your Honor, and I want nothing more than to bring her back safely, out of the clutches of this wretch.”

One sailor, the taller one out of the two, spoke up first. “We- we were sailing down to Bayda Harbor down in Sumeru to trade spices and sugar, and,” he stopped to catch his breath, his hands on his knees, “we were about halfway there when suddenly, these clouds covered all the stars and the moon, and this fog came over the water, about as thick as a stew. We had to light all of the lanterns on our ship, and we still couldn’t see anything. Then, a couple of our men – there were seven of us to begin with – started complaining of this high-pitched ringing sort of noise. A couple of them started leaning over the edge of the boat as we kept making our way to the harbor, but more slowly this time, on account of the fog. As we got closer, we heard a woman’s voice in the distance. It was- it was piercing, and-” The man’s eyes went wide and he stumbled backwards. Neuvillette jumped up to get him a chair and a glass of water while the other sailor continued the story.

From that point, time became a blur. Arlecchino was sent to the Fortress of Meropide for two months while the overworld scrambled to find any leads. A few frantic sailors came back one night clamoring about the voice of a siren that bore a striking resemblance to Furina, falling on top of each other on their way to Neuvillette’s office to recount their tale.

“So, we heard this voice singing this tune. Alphonse here started shouting at everyone to put wax in their ears. He dragged me below the deck to get sponges, wax, anything to block the sound out of our ears, but it was too late once we got back up. Nobody was at the helm. Our captain jumped into the water. We saw two other men jump into the water despite our attempts to drag them back. The last thing we saw was this…I don’t know how to describe her…phantom looking creature, I suppose, jump up the side of the ship. She had these claws and fangs, the whole deal. She latched onto our last man and ripped his arm off, then dragged his body underwater. The only thing I could hear was his screams, and archons, it was awful. Our ship hit some rocks and started sinking right as the lights of Bayda Harbor came into view. The vessel was ruined, and Alphonse and I had to cling to the rock in hopes that whatever creature attacked us wouldn’t come kill us. I feel like I nearly died out there, shivering in the cold. Thankfully someone heard us shouting and came to rescue us on a raft.”

Neuvillette narrowed his eyes as he listened to the tale. “Could you further describe the creature that attacked you? I believe this may be a lead to our missing person case.”

“I don’t think it was Lady Furina, Monsieur, but I’ll try my best,” Alphonse said, taking a deep breath, “Long white hair, a gaunt face, bony hands…I didn’t get a good look at her eyes, but I think they were either blue or white. Just a very skinny thing. I didn’t see her lower half because she was just hanging off the side of the boat, but from what I could see, her frame was pretty small.”

“I think we have a lead.”

The Iudex then scrambled to find somebody, anybody to sail out into the sea that separated Fontaine and Sumeru to find this murderous creature that had a slight chance of being Lady Furina. Every sailor that he asked nearly immediately shut down any offer of Mora, even when offered billions, enough to support their families down to the seventh generation. By some stroke of luck, Captain Beidou of Liyue was on a voyage that crossed paths with Fontaine. When the Alcor sailed into Lumidouce Harbor, Beidou was bombarded by several officers of the Court of Fontaine, all begging her to bring the mystery to a close.

“Captain Beidou! Thank the archons you’re here!”

“Beidou! Captain! We have a commission for you!”

“We’ll compensate you accordingly! Billions of Mora!”

“Please, Captain! We’ve nobody else on the case!”

The four officers nearly tripped over their own feet the moment Beidou stepped foot onto land for the first time in days. She stumbled back slightly before squaring her shoulders and steadying herself.

“Woah, woah, calm down everyone. I know I’m popular, but you’re gonna have to slow down so I can listen to all of what you have to say,” the captain said as her crew exited the ship, not so nonchalantly listening in to the conversation happening at the docks.

“Captain,” a man with auburn hair and a mustache said, stepping forward, “we’ve had a strange case around Fontaine lately, pertaining to the seas. You see, our former archon, Lady Furina, went missing two months ago. We’ve exhausted all of our leads on land since then, even locked up one of those Fatui Harbingers on account of the evidence stacked against her. A few weeks ago, Monsieur Neuvillette received news of a group of sailors getting dragged to the bottom of the sea by a monster, leaving only two survivors. Based on the survivors’ description, it seems like this ‘monster’ was actually Furina herself. We don’t know what the truth is at this point, but we’ve been trying to get somebody to sail into those waters, hunt down that monster, and bring her back alive to figure out what really happened. We’ll offer you five billion Mora for her capture. Nobody has accepted any other offer, and frankly, we’re running out of options at this point. What do you say?”

Beidou’s working eye widened as she processed all of the information. “Well, I’ve dealt with a god of the sea before, so I think I’ll be fine. I’ll drop the voyage I’m on right now and pass it onto one of my Fontaine contacts. I’m sure it’ll go smoothly. I’ll do it."

That’s when you, a member of Beidou’s crew, caught wind of everything. She trusted you the most to escape from this voyage unscathed, so you were going to keep watch on the deck for Lady Furina while Beidou stayed up at the helm.

The officers heaved a sigh of relief, profusely thanking the pirate before sending her to Neuvillette’s office for more information.

The night you disembarked on your voyage, the officers dragged Arlecchino up from the Fortress of Meropide and let Beidou lock her up in the brig below deck in hopes that the Harbinger would be of some use regarding information related to the disappearance of Lady Furina. Unfortunately for everyone, the Harbinger did nothing except scratch sigils into the wood planks of the ship and say she didn’t know anything.

“I honestly do not know why they’ve kept me locked up for so long after I’ve gone through several rounds of interrogation and told them everything I know,” the Harbinger said whenever you passed by the cell she was held in.

“Well, all I know is that you’re rather close with Furina, and you may be of some use to our case, so that’s why you’re here.”

“Close with her, absolutely,” Arlecchino muttered in a snide tone, “Useful to your case, absolutely not. The only thing I can think of is to lure her in with a slice of that limited 16 slices a day cake. She goes wild for that.” The Harbinger sighed and went back to scratching her mysterious sigils into the wood.

You shrugged and went up above deck, greeted by the stars and moonlight guiding the Alcor through the surprisingly calm waters.

“For everything those sailors said, it’s pretty calm right now,” you said to Beidou.

“I think it’s more like the calm before the storm, sweetheart. Look up there.” You followed where she was pointing, up towards the horizon, where the starlight suddenly died out, not due to the presence of any clouds. There was simply a solid line where the stars went black, and the moonlight did not reflect off of the water underneath that portion of the sky. You couldn’t tell if it was the gust of chilly wind or the eeriness of the dark sky that sent a shiver through your body and made you want to turn the ship around and never come back. But of course, you knew better as a sailor, as a pirate, and you bit your tongue. “I know. It makes me uneasy too,” Beidou said, as if reading your mind.

The Alcor kept cutting through the water effortlessly. The sound of the waves began to dull, becoming a mere echo, similarly to how the world begins to grow dark when one is about to pass out. You kept turning back to look at the stark contrast between the horizon ahead of and behind you, and the sickening feeling that grew inside you each time you looked at the cold void ahead of you.

“I’m getting a bad feeling about this,” Beidou muttered under her breath. As if on cue, one of the lanterns on the edge of the ship went out with a whisper of the wind. Several men on the deck scrambled to relight it, shouting and falling over each other. One man stood with his hands around the lantern, as if trying to shield it from the wind, and others did the same for the other sources of light around the ship. Beidou cursed under her breath, tightening her grip around the wheel and rolling her shoulders back.

“No,” Beidou answered after a moment, “I think we’re getting closer to finding our lady. Go get that Harbinger from below the deck. See if you can get anything out of her.”

“Should we turn back now?” you asked, growing more sick and more faint with each passing second.

You nodded, eager to get away from the eerie atmosphere for even a moment. You took your time descending the stairs to the lower levels of the ship, where Arlecchino was being held. She languidly looked up at you, her red eyes flickering in the low lighting of the ship.

“The captain wants you above deck now,” you said, taking out the key to unlock the cell door, as well as the rather comically large chains that bound her wrists.

“Thank the archons,” Arlecchino hummed, rubbing her wrists, “The air was getting rather stuffy down here.” You led her up the stairs and out onto the deck, and saw her eyes widen at the blank night sky. “Wow,” she drawled, “Oh, you’re all fucked.”

A crew member walked up to the Harbinger, about a head taller than her. ���Give us information on where Lady Furina is.”

“You know, after all this trouble, you’d think that if I knew anything about our Lady’s whereabouts, I’d tell you, right?” she scoffed, “There’s really no need to keep accusing me of such things.”

“Tell us where she is!”

“For the love of Celestia, I don’t know,” Arlecchino sneered, “And if you keep insisting that I do, maybe I’ll just damn you all to a fate far worse than that of the sailors a few weeks ago.” Her eyes flickered like embers at the end of the sentence, causing the man to back away and slink back over to his previous spot near the ship’s lamps.

Little by little, the waves grew larger, rocking the ship back and forth like a ragdoll. Beidou’s expression darkened in determination, squinting to just barely see the jagged rocks jutting up above the waves, eager to pierce the hull of the ship and bring it down to the Primordial Sea.

Despite the efforts of the crew, a lantern went out with another near-silent whisper of the wind. Then another. Then another, until all of the lanterns were out, leaving nothing but the smell of smoke on the deck. There was a faint sound of the crew scrambling to relight them once again before the sharp cry of a woman, then the nauseating sound of flesh tearing and bones snapping, before the lanterns suddenly relit themselves.

You stumbled back in horror to see nothing but the woman’s head lying on the deck, frozen in an expression of sheer terror. A pool of blood surrounded it, the dark liquid trailing over the side of the deck and into the black water below. You felt a faint tapping on the starboard side of the ship when you leaned over it, trying to see anything in the water that could’ve killed that woman so quickly, but you saw nothing.

“Oh no,” Arlecchino murmured. You looked at her with a raised eyebrow, and she grinned. “Be quiet. Listen.” You did, straining your ears to hear a high pitched note ringing out over the ocean, belonging to a soprano voice, one that was rather unmistakable amongst the people of Fontaine.

“Oh god,” you muttered.

In the faint lantern light, you saw one of the crew members begin to walk towards the edge of the ship. There was a glazed look in his eyes and a robotic nature to his movements, even as two men attempted to hold him back by the arms with all the strength they could muster. He broke free of their hold, stumbling over the side of the ship and crashing into the water below. One of the men tripped after him, accidentally going down right along with him. The second they both hit the water, the soprano voice grew louder, singing a song that sent chills through your body, as if each note pierced your soul to let your deepest fears seep in.

“I’m not staying here for this,” Arlecchino said as soon as the voice grew louder, “I’m locking myself in the brig this time.” With that, the Harbinger disappeared below the decks once again, chaining herself up and locking the door to the brig all over again.

“Everyone, find something to put in your ears! Block out the sound of that voice!” Beidou shouted, quickly turning around and searching the crate behind her for a container of wax. She put two pieces in her ears and urged for everyone to do the same.

The lanterns went out again. The same sounds of chaos ensued, but this time with more grotesque sounds of flesh rending and the pained screams of several men and women.

The lanterns relit themselves again. People scrambled over to the crates scattered across the deck, fighting each other over who could put the wax in their ears to block out the siren’s call first. All the while, the voice got louder, and her song more enticing, as if the temptress was watching the chaos unfold on the deck.

A few times, you felt something brush against your ankle, wet, slimy, grotesque, like a piece of seaweed winding around your leg when you go swimming in the ocean. But this was different. It was almost sentient. Each time you felt it, your eyes shot down to the planks below your feet, but you saw nothing, only the seemingly eternal flickering of the lamps disorienting you even more as you stumbled along the deck, heart beating angrily in your chest, threatening to jump out of your throat along with the bile that so badly wanted to come up. The sweet song of the siren veered you off course, made you dizzy with some strange, intoxicating desire.

The scene around you became a blur of panic, blood, and shouts of fear and anguish. You’re sure that somebody’s blood had been spattered across your shirt as they were dismembered and dragged to the eternally dark depths of the sea, but you couldn’t be fully aware of it. A sickening dizziness overtook you all of a sudden, and everything became suddenly unbearably overstimulating. The siren’s song pierced your ears as if it were trying to wedge its way through your skull and shatter the bone, a deep ache settling in between your ears as you almost drunkenly slumped over the hull. You could see your heartbeat at the edges of your vision, bright and blurry, as you looked out to the sea and its few waves illuminated by the faint flickering lights on the ship.

An abrupt movement caught your eye, shifting your gaze to a nearby rock up ahead. Through your blurred vision you could see a pale outline on rock’s otherwise black surface. The ship got closer, and the siren’s song grew louder. A sinking feeling settled in the pit of your stomach as the white figure grew clearer and clearer, but still, you tried to deny what you were seeing, chalking it up to insanity and delusions, but your eyes were not deceiving you.

On the rock sat a creature with a human head and torso, with pale blue hair and eyes of two different tones. Her skin was covered in an array of blood, seaweed, and cuts. Whether most of the blood belonged to herself or to others was a mystery, though. Her hands were long and sinewy, with claws replacing where a human’s nails would be. Blood covered her limbs up to her elbows. Her lower half was not human, though; rather, it was akin to the tail of a mermaid, dark blue in color, and glittering in the faint light.

“Furina.”

Your eyes met hers, and it felt as though a predator had just set a target upon you. Furina bared her teeth in one of the most disturbing smiles you had ever seen and pushed herself off the rock and into the choppy waves below.

You began to lose all hearing except for Furina’s song, the sounds of the crew around you fading to barely a muffled whisper. You thought that you felt them try to jostle you out of your stupor, but you weren’t sure.

You felt a sharp pain and pressure behind your shoulder blades as something dragged you over the edge of the ship. The cold ocean water enveloped you, and you opened your eyes, hardly able to see anything except the faint outline of Furina’s face right in front of you. Her serpentine pupils widened in a sick glee as she traced your jaw with a pointed claw and leaned in to press her lips against yours. As she pulled away, you saw a faint flicker of light in her two-toned eyes before the cold, dark waters overtook your senses, and your consciousness faded from your body. The siren had gotten the only thing that she desired at last.

The lanterns flickered out again.

[jamsunstone]

How Outer Wilds handles horror

Part 1: Dark Bramble

**MAJOR OUTER WILDS SPOILERS BELOW. MAINLY FOCUSED ON DARK BRAMBLE, BUT ALSO SPOILS PARTS OF THE ENDGAME**

Dark Bramble is about being scared.

It's a planet that looks like Pluto swallowed an angry seed. Getting close to it pulls you in harder than even Giant's Deep. And something about the fog in the center is just eerie. And once you're in there? You can't see shit. You're flying blind, crashing into branches, finding exits only to become lost in an entirely new way, you fly towards a light and remember just too late about the anglerfish skeleton you saw in the observatory. You can learn it's secrets and find the optimal paths through, but it never gets less scary.

Horror games rely on novelty. If you've seen something 100 times, the scare factor wears off, so horror games can't overplay their hand. Dark Bramble is one of many points of interest in the solar system of Outer Wilds, and has less important pieces of knowledge by quantity when compared to the other big planets. Unless you're constantly flying into anglerfish mouths, you're not gonna visit Dark Bramble as much as the other planets. That's how it maintains it's novelty.

But hey, maybe you're not me and you got over Dark Bramble after a couple visits. That's fine! Outer Wilds is partially a game about conquering fear of the unknown through knowledge anyway. So you go through your final loop, and pick up the warp core, and that familiar music kicks in and… oh. You're no longer protected. And you've gotta get this thing to the vessel… in Dark Bramble. And it's behind the anglerfish nest. Oh. The trick of Dark Bramble is revealed. You think you've overcome it, and then it swallows you up and this time, you've got no time loop to save you. One shot. And that journey is terrifying. But you have to make it. You can't put this thing back in the box. So you drift through a lightless void, filled with giant fish that are floating like they're dead and breathing down your neck. You can't control your ship, or the sound of your engines will wake them up. You can't go faster, despite the supernova time limit.

So you drift.

That's the genius of Dark Bramble. The way my heart dropped when I realised where the warp core had to go. The way I couldn't breath as I drifted through a field of fish. The satisfaction and triumph when I reached the vessel, slotted in the core, and realised I would never have to see those evil fish again (haha shut up). In that moment I became the Nomai, chasing a mysterious signal despite not knowing where it would lead them. I became the Hearthians, building spaceships out of wood and scavenged materials and rocketing into space. I became Riebeck, who did it while scared.

Dark Bramble is about being scared, but pushing through anyway.

[thealienfantasy]

Alien Fantasy-File 8: The giant that gives us water.

(It's been a minute since i've uploaded. I've been focused on my new job and i've also been suffering a bit from writers block. I can't say it's been fixed. But hey, i got something out. hope ya'll enjoy it.) the Chlorovian Research team wandered about in their makeshift settlement. This research squad, literally the size of ants, crash-landed in this weird place full of giant plants about a month ago. And using whatever they could salvage, they were able to create a small camping site that served as their home until they could repair the ship and return home.

Commander Zeno gazed up at the towering plants surrounding them. his leaf-like appendages rustled as they gathered around a particularly interesting specimen - a small tree that stood out from all the massive ones in the area. This one was roughly the size of the trees back on their home planet. if not slightly larger.

"Fascinating...." Dr. Phyla said. Her iridescent wings fluttered with excitement as she pointed towards the tree.  "Look at this specimen! It's so much smaller than the others. Do you think it will grow to match their size eventually?"

The group turned their attention from the small one to the big trees. These were so big. Almost bigger than the biggest mountain on their home world. and there were several of these. She suspected they were behind the mass amount of oxygen on this planet. 

As they continued admiring the gigantic trees, Scout Pol slid up to the group, munching on a small piece of the red fruit he just gathered.

"You know, I wouldn't mind staying here. Have you seen the size of the fruit? It's incredible! Way bigger than anything we have on Chlorovia!" He said, taking another munch. "The other day, I saw a green sphere hanging from one of the plants down there. It was easily twice the size of my house! And the flowers! Some of them are big enough to house our entire colony!" He said with excitement. 

"It's not just the plants." Phyla said. "Have you noticed the creatures that fly around? They're massive compared to us, with wings that create gusts of wind as they pass by. And don't get me started on those eight-legged monstrosities that build sticky traps between the plants!"

A collective shudder passed through the group at the mention of the multi-legged monster. They're the reason why they were now one squad member short.

As they chatted, Commander Zeno's attention was drawn to the enormous structure looming over their base. His gaze fixed on the transparent section. It was definitely a window. Much larger than the ones on his home planet. but a window nonetheless. 

"I wonder what lies beyond that clear barrier.." Zeno mused aloud.

"Well, We've sent rovers to investigate, but they never last long inside." The engineer said. They had gleaned precious little information from their ill-fated expeditions into the structure.

"From what we've gathered," She added. "giants inhabit that building. Beings of unimaginable size and power."

As if summoned by the mere mention, a massive shadow suddenly loomed behind the window. 

"They're back! Everyone, back to the main plant! Now!" Zeno commanded. The entire squad scrambled towards their crash site, seeking shelter among the leaves.  They watched  as one of the giants emerged from the structure and began approaching the plants. This particular giant was taller than the others they had caught a glimpse off, with hair on the lower half of its face. In its massive appendage, it wielded a strange device that seemed to dispense water.

The squad huddled together, some cowering in fear while others watched anticipation as the giant moved from plant to plant, dousing each with a torrent of water.

As the behemoth approached their plant, the aliens held their breath. Some ducked under leaves, while others pressed themselves flat against stems and branches as the giant loomed over them. Suddenly, water cascaded down upon them, flooding their makeshift home. The squad clung desperately to whatever they could grab, fighting against the raging current that threatened to sweep them away. Just as quickly as it had started, the rain ceased. The giant moved on, leaving the drenched aliens in its wake.

"Is everyone alright?" Commander Zeno called out, doing a quick headcount of his team. A bunch of affirmatives rang out, followed by a series of relieved sighs. Then, unexpectedly, a moan of delight pierced the air.

"Oh, by the great deity of chlorophyll!" exclaimed one of the scouts, his body practically glowing.  "That was... incredible!"

"Speak for yourself." grumbled one of the members, shaking his antennae. "I nearly got washed away... again! We really need to find a way to secure our equipment against these floods."

Commander Zeno watched thoughtfully as the giant continued its watering ritual with the other plants. Questions swirled in his mind: Did this enormous being know of their presence? Was this act of watering an attempt at communication? A gesture of kindness? Or simply the incomprehensible behavior of a creature beyond their understanding?

As the squad regrouped and began the process of salvaging their waterlogged equipment, while soaking in the giant droplets left behind by the titan, Zeno couldn't help but wonder...What would it be like to establish contact with these giants. 

Maybe they could come to an agreement. Maybe they could get along? Maybe the giant would give them a whole ocean?

"Oh, for the love of {{Redacted}}! One of our rovers got destroyed again!" 

...Of course, it was just as likely that they would dispose of them the same way they've been disposing of the rovers.

..Maybe it was for the best to remain confined to these plants for now.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

Donnie stepped back from the last plant, a satisfied smile spreading across his face as he set down the watering can. He wiped a bead of sweat from his brow, taking a moment to admire his handiwork.

The garden was his pride and joy, and it always filled him with delight to see it it flourish. It was an activity that always seemed to calm him down.

His eyes lingered on the bonsai tree, a recent addition to his collection. It had been a surprising challenge to keep it healthy, but the results were worth the effort.  Though come to think off it, he recalls hearing of his kids go on about how they saw something glowing near the bonsai every night. Maybe it was just fireflies. who knows?

 "DAD?! WHERE IS THE FLY SWATTER!?" A young voice shouted from the house.

[starwrighter]

I am not a baby!!! (Yes you are)

(Ao3) (Masterpost) (Previous) (Next)

(Chapter 15 lets goooooooo!!)

Sneaking past the serpent was a piece of cake! Even with all those eyes, Dami’s still blind as a bat. He didn’t mean to toot his own horn, but he’s gotta say he’s the sneakiest swimmer on this planet! Not even squidding, he thought it would take longer, now, he’d have time to krill after finding this signal.

…He needed to step up his pun game.

This was an ocean planet for ancient's sake! There were so many opportunities, and he needed to take all of them. If Alterra came to rescue them, Danny needed to be surfing up wordplay until ears started bleeding! Do some real punitive damage. 

Sneaking out the kelp forests, Danny stuck close to the surface, praying any other leviathan wouldn’t think to look up. As the distance to the signal ticked lower and lower, Danny's hopes sank like an anchor. 

Sat on a rocky ledge, was Life Pod 17, blood red grass surrounding it. The hull had been torn into leaving a gaping hole where the right wall used to be. Sand lined the bottom of the pod, the only remaining light from an abandoned PDA.

“Ozzy’s log. It’s the day of the crash. I don’t know what the heck is happening. I’m scared and I’m not going outside. There are shadows in the water under the hatch but I can’t tell if they’re rocks, or aliens, and there’s weird looking caves nearby.” Ozzy sounded terrified, Danny didn’t blame him.

“The Aurora was carrying everything needed to build the phasegate: mobile vehicle bays, bioreactors, propulsion cannons… It had a cinema. There-there was a zero-G gym. My cafe. I don’t understand how we’re here now. I don’t know what no one’s coming for me,” It started mournful, longing even, before sinking into despair and disbelief.

Danny could guess what happened after this log was recorded, and it wasn’t pretty. Eaten by whatever was lurking underneath the pod, a brutal way to go if you asked him. Once again, a body had been scavenged until nothing was left but a couple specks of blood on the PDA screen. Only this time, he had a name to write down in his own log. Just a first name, but it’d be enough to tie a name to a face when rescue arrived. 

A chunk of a sea moth almost completely buried in the sand was strewn a few feet from the pod. Shards of glass stuck out of the seabed, Danny salvaging what he could, doing his best not to cut himself. Whatever snake thing killed Ozzy already had a taste for human blood, and Danny didn’t want to risk giving it a taste of halfa blood. 

The cave system’s entrance is visible from where he was. Danny could only guess that’s where the sea snakes came from. There wasn’t any sign of them now. Maybe Ozzy just got unlucky? The crash was loud, If he was a snake-like thing, he would’ve left home to see what the hell happened too. He wouldn’t have eaten anybody, but still, he would’ve wanted to know what the hell was going on.

A dim glow of pinkish purple was seen as he creeped closer to the caves. 

“The conditions in this cave support a microcosm of unique, possibly predatory lifeforms.” That didn’t sound good for him.

“Detecting an artificial structure somewhere in the region,” That, however, sounded very good.

What’s down there? Was it just part of the Aurora? A smaller chunk of ship sinking into a cave without blocking off the entrance was unlikely but plausible. The PDA didn’t usually alert him when wrecks were nearby, what’s so different about this one? 

Whatever’s down there could help him. If it was the same as all the other wrecks, his PDA wouldn’t have notified him. The problem was, he didn’t know how deep these caves were. Was it even possible for him to reach whatever was down there? 

Surfacing for air just above the cave entrance, Danny gripped the handles of his seaglide. Sucking in a sharp breath, He dove, delving down into the bioluminescent caves. Gigantic plants like crossbreeds between mushrooms and jellyfish were everywhere throughout the caves. A hole in the middle of each where gigantic, fanged snakes shot out of snapping their teeth in an attempt to catch prey. Outcrops of shale were strewn out throughout the cave, but Danny couldn’t tear his eyes away from the bright light shining just a few feet away. 

A floodlight…

On top of a rusted foundation was a floodlight, its brightness wavering, ready to give out after years of wear and tear. Crates were scattered throughout the area, his hair standing on its ends as he searched every side of the crate in front of him. Alterra’s logo was nowhere to be seen. Not even the smallest scrawl of product placement for the gigantic corporation. Instead, only the rust over scrawl of a label he could barely make out.

Torgal corp…

A name vaguely familiar to him. The disappearance of the CEO and his son had been all over the news for a long time. Danny had just turned three when the news of their mysterious disappearance broke out, but with his interest in space exploration, they were the first things you’d learn about. Hundreds of news articles and conspiracy theories on what happened to them flooded the internet from the moment it happened and continued to pop up every now and again to this very day.

A lone PDA lay glowing atop a supply crate, its blue light more entrancing than anything in his life would ever be. Danny pursed his lips, oxygen meter ticking down with his indecisiveness. Hesitantly, he snatches the tablet, a loud, blaring noise emitting from his own…

A signal had downloaded itself to his PDA 

{Purposed Desagi habitat (250m)}

What the hell!? Nothing about this solar system had ever popped up when he researched the Desagi! There was no reason anything related to Torgal Corp should be on this planet! Yet here it was, an environmental log made by Paul Torgal and a signal to their possible shelter.

Was this a Bermuda Triangle kind of situation? He didn’t like the idea of the Desagi crashing for the same reasons as they did. It painted an ugly picture in terms of rescue. Something fishy was going on, and Danny was going to find out what.

“Thirty seconds,” The robotic voice like a curse as he booked it out of the caves. Water seemed unending as his vision began to blur, his chest painfully tight as he desperately swam towards the surface.

Breaking the surface just as his view began to go dark, he gasped, taking in the longest gasp of air he’d ever taken. His mind was swirling an unending whirlpool of dread and confusion. 

Now, he had more to do than he’d ever before. No schoolwork would ever be as stressful as the responsibilities he’s got now. He had to attempt to stop a quantum detonation, find out what happened to both their ship and the Desagi, find any survivors of both ships, get off this planet, and reunite with family.

If all this landed on his shoulders and his shoulders alone they’d all be screwed.

Loud screeching calls echoed throughout the grassy plateaus, breaking him out of his downward spiral. The eerie noise sent shivers down his spine, it was a panicked sound, desperate. He could almost feel the emotion from here as cries grew louder, roars replying to said cries.

A cloud of sand uplifted into the sea, and a faint noise of thrashing and the wheeze of a pissed-off crashfish reached his ears. Danny couldn’t help but creep closer, hoping he could sneak back into his base before whatever was causing this ruckus tried to kill him.

Like he expected, Dami was making the loud roaring noises. What he didn’t expect was another gigantic leviathan to be seemingly screaming at him?

Were they going to fight? Should he start placing bets?

His base was dangerously close to where the new Leviathan was thrashing around like an electric eel on LSD. Its scales were like armor plating, teal gray with fins like javelins. It had a set of electric blue eyes on the front of its face. Like Dami, he had hands, four fingers with toxic blue on the pads of each finger. His claws were curved, more useful for grasping things and climbing than they were for fighting. 

An aura of electricity surrounded the leviathan, a peeper floating belly up upon making contact with it.

Yeah, Danny didn’t feel like getting electrocuted anytime soon. He couldn’t bite or attack the guy without getting into shock range. 

Maybe he could convince Dami to chase this guy off?

@ashoutinthedarkness @avelnfear @meira-3919 @thought-u-said-dragon-queen @hugsandchaos @blep-23 @zeldomnyo @bytheoldwillowtree @justwannabecat @shepherdsheart @starlightcat04 @stargazing-bookwyrm @pupstim @dragongoblet @noxcheshire

[atinylittlepain]

Oh Baby - A Carmy Berzatto Story

dad!carmen berzatto x f!reader

carmy masterlist

a small family, a new family, trying to figure this thing out.

warnings | 18+ angst surrounding being new parents, work stress, but enough fluff to make up for it, i promise

a/n | this sweet little piece comes from a lovely request sent to me over DM, thank you so much for sending this my way, i hope i've done it justice. Also have to thank the cousins @tieronecrush and @northernbluess for reading this bad boy and letting me scream about the bear, love ya both

........................

He’s running late. It started with a question from Sydney about one of the new menu items, and then it was Sugar needing to show him a quote for some inspection they still need to get done. And then there was something with one of the new chefs, though he can’t really remember what it was right now as his brain fries with how late he is. 

He told her he’d be home by midnight at the latest, finish dinner service and get his ass home immediately. He had even made a joke about getting home just in time to give their girl her seemingly routine middle of the night bottle. But it’s now two in the morning and he’s only just getting on the L to get back to their apartment. 

It’s not like he has a hard time with the late nights. In fact, he always thrived on this chaotic rhythm. But he knows it’s not doing her or their girl any good. Getting home and crashing in bed, useless until ten in the morning, no help with breakfast or getting their girl dressed and ready for the day, shuffling into the living room to find her already working at her desk, her foot keeping a steady rock to the bassinet right next to it. A few days ago, the fleeting thought that she looked like a single mother, and then an immediate clench and clash of pain sliding through his chest. It’s the same feeling he has right now on the train, building and beating until he has to put his palm right over the hurt, like he might be able to press it out with the heel of his hand. 

He could slow down, everyone at the restaurant has offered that up to him. Shorter shifts, only there when he’s really needed, whole days off. So he doesn’t know why he can’t just accept that, why he’s still holding onto the restaurant with white knuckles. And right now, he’s too tired to give it much thought beyond how badly he wants things to be different. No more disappointed sighs, no more ships in the night, no more making promises only to break them. 

He’s only a little surprised when he walks into their apartment that the light in the kitchen is on, her light murmurings filtering through, enough to make that hurt even worse. He finds them standing in front of the microwave, waiting for a bottle to be warmed up, and for a moment, what a sight it is. She’s wearing an old The Beef t-shirt, legs bare and set in a slow shuffle side-to-side, her cheek pressed over the top of their girl’s head where she’s held in her arms, eyes dropped shut. A small smile that slides away when her eyes crack open to see him standing in the doorway. 

“You’re home.” It’s barely rasped on a whisper, a small frown pulling down each word. He considers for a moment that he’d really like for the ground to swallow him up right about now. 

“I’m sorry, baby, I–” His words crack when their girl starts to fuss, small coos and whimpers, tiny fists balled and pressing against her mom’s chest to arch her back away from her hold. And there it is, that sigh, that small collapse of her shoulders as she gets the bottle out of the microwave, no longer looking at him, brushing right past him to go sit down in the living room. He follows on her heels with all the timidity of a scolded dog. 

“I can do it, if you wanna go lay back down. It’s– I’d like–” 

“I can do it, Carmen.” Still not looking at him, her eyes focused on their girl, finger skating down the rounding of her cheek as she latches onto the bottle. He knows it’s one of the ways she tries to even the score with him, a petty thing to not let him partake in or watch this small wonder. When she was first born, and she was still breast-feeding, and he was still on a Sugar-mandated paternity leave, he’d hover endlessly. Just over her shoulder, watching the way their girl's hand splayed over her sternum like a perfect flower as she latched on, whispering in awe at her contented sighs and eager gulps. Always dropping a kiss to her temple, small words of love and gratitude, her chin tilting up, basking in them, warmth in the way she would look up at him. 

But now, now she’s looking at him with all of the kindness of a prison inmate, eyes blank and jaw set as she cups the back of their girl’s head, smoothing out the mass of curls already growing, just like his. For a moment, only fleeting, anger starts to rise like bile up the back of his throat. Anger that he’s here now, wanting so badly to be here now, and she’s the one boxing him out. But that anger is gone in a blink because he can see the way her eyes are starting to swim, red-rimmed and heavy down her cheeks. And he can see the way her lip is starting to tremble too, even as she coos and hums to their girl when she starts to fuss with the bottle. He can’t be angry when she’s hurting like that, when he’s the one who has made her hurt like that. 

He kneels down in front of where she’s sitting on the couch, a small relief that she doesn't flinch away when his palms come to rest on her knees. He can tell that she’s trying not to break, little sniffs to hold back the flood as their girl continues to suckle. 

“I don’t want it to be like this.” 

“Neither do I, Carm.” Said on a sigh, like, sure, nice words, not expecting anything to come of them though. 

“Tell me what I can do to make this different.” 

“I’m dumbfounded by the fact that you’re asking me to tell you what to do. Do you really not know?” Quick and clipped, still whispered so that it doesn’t disturb their girl as she finishes her bottle. He opens and closes his mouth a few times, trying to arrange the right words to respond.

“You’re right.” The best that he can come up with at two in the morning, though at least it’s the truth. She just sighs though, shaking his hands off her knees so that she can stand up. And this hurts too, how easily she can do this by herself, or at least how easy she makes it look, transferring their girl to one arm as she pads back into the kitchen. A little more space between them as he follows behind her, watching how she holds the bottle against her hip to get the top screwed off, rocking and shushing their girl all the while as she soaps up the bottle. 

“Baby, let me do that. I can, here, just let me–”

“Goddamnit, Carm.” Still whispered, but still sharp, enough for their girl to let out a whine at her sudden exclamation, though she’s quick to soothe and calm against her shoulder. 

“Do you want to know why I don’t let you help? It’s because I’m trying to get used to doing this on my own.” 

“What?” It feels like the floor has dropped out from under him, a skittering, sickening feeling running up and down his spine. He wants more than anything to reach for her, for both of them, to thumb away the tears that are starting to fall even as she tries to steel her jaw. All he can do to ball his hands into fists over and over.

“You’re not here, Carmen. And when you are, it’s like– it’s like I’m living with a stranger. You told me before we had her that you would be here, that things at the restaurant were going to change. And I’m getting tired of waiting for that to happen.” 

“What are you saying right now?” She scrunches her eyes shut for a moment, pure frustration, and complete exhaustion, all the while still rocking their girl. 

“I’m saying that if this is how it’s going to be, I don’t know if I can keep doing this with you. My sister–”

“No.”

“Carm–”

“No. That isn’t– that’s not– you can’t just take her from me like that. We– we said we would do this together.”

“We already aren’t doing this together, Carm. And I’m just– I’m tired.” There isn’t any more to say, not now. She doesn’t look at him again, brushing past him through the doorway of the kitchen to get to the nursery down the hall. He doesn’t try to follow, numbly shuffling back to the couch, a full body slump, tilting his head back and pinching the bridge of his nose when the tears start to prickle. He listens to all the small sounds, stealing snippets of her humming, the quiet padding of her bare feet into their bedroom, the rustling of sheets. And then perfect silence, except for the broken exhales he keeps trying to stifle. 

…

Sleep happens, somehow. Curled onto his side on the couch, but not for long, the watery blue glint of dawn slanting in through the blinds when he’s woken up to the sound of their girl’s quiet babblings. The nursery is closer to the living room, so he’s almost certain she hasn’t been woken up by the sound yet. But he also knows that those soft coos will soon turn into full-blown wails, so he gets up, biting back a groan as his spine shifts and crackles upright before stumbling into the nursery.

Everyone seems to call their girl something different. She calls her bean, or sometimes pearl, any iteration of small, precious things, usually with a my in front of the word. Richie calls her cub, or cubby, a fitting choice given her father’s nickname. Sugar calls her curl because of that head of hair she’s already grown into. Sydney calls her miso baby, though it all comes out as one word like misobaby, on account of the cravings for broth and noodles her mother incurred while she was pregnant with her, something that Sydney was always happy to accommodate whenever she stopped by the restaurant. Carmy’s is less creative, he thinks, the first word he remembers coming to mind when he first held her in his arms, somewhere between wonder and utterly sweet devastation at the sight. 

“Hey, little, what’s going on in here?” It always shocks him, how light his whole world is when he picks her up in his arms, and how easily her cheek settles against his chest, his palm smoothing the small shake of her cries between the fragile wings of her shoulder blades. He remembers being terrified the first time he held her, that he’d somehow manage to ruin this most perfect thing. Laying in her hospital bed, watching, she reassured him that he wouldn’t, that he couldn’t, that perfect came from him just as much as it came from her. 

“It’s breakfast time, isn’t it? We’re gonna let your mom sleep in, okay? I’ve got it.” He drops his lips to the crown of her head, taking a long breath in as he shuffles out to the kitchen. And he does have it under control, after all, he knows how to follow a recipe. 

He keeps her close in one arm, only fumbling a little with the one-handed bottle into the microwave production, but he manages. And then onto the couch and honestly, he thinks it’s a little holy, it certainly feels that way. Watching her eyes slip shut in contentment as she drinks from the bottle, her tiny gasp and sigh when she’s all done. How could anything ever be as good as this? He doesn’t think it’s possible.

“Think we oughta make breakfast for your mom, huh? You wanna help?” She gurgles over his shoulder as he finishes burping her. He’ll take that as a yes. He maneuvers her high chair into the doorway of the kitchen with about as much grace as his one-handed abilities will allow him, trying hard to stay silent, peering down the hall to make sure she hasn’t woken up yet. Coast clear, he settles their girl into the high chair and gets to work. 

There’s a slightly old half of a loaf of brioche on the counter, something he brought home a few days ago, one of Marcus’ new projects. Eggs and milk in the fridge, so his plan is already forming. 

“You know, when I first met your mom– you’re a little too young for the details, but– the morning after, I made her french toast. I think it got me a second date.” He whisks up the eggs and milk quick, a pinch of cinnamon like he knows how she likes it. 

“I think for a while she was just coming back for the french toast. But I didn’t care, I was just happy that she kept coming back.” Butter melting deep and golden in the pan, and then the silent sizzle and snap of the battered slices of bread frying up perfect. He glances over to their girl in between checking on the bread in the pan.

“You weren’t done, were you, little? I’m sorry, I got you.” A little spit-up down the front of her onesie. He stretches between the stove and her high chair to dab it up with a clean dish towel, not even trying to resist the want to press a kiss to her forehead, earning him an exasperated gurgle from her.

“Already too cool for me, huh?” She smiles, showing off the two new teeth that have only started to come in. He doesn’t think he’s ready for any more teeth to start coming in yet.

He’s just plating up the first few slices when his ears prick to the sound of stirring, what sounds like a stretch groaning in her chest from down the hall. Bare feet padding, stopping at the nursery, he’s sure, and then coming closer, his heart starting to kick up in anticipation. 

“Good morning, my bean.” He can hear the kiss she drops to their girl’s cheek, and he chances a glance over to see her bending over the back of the high chair to nuzzle her face into their girl’s, contented giggles bubbling up in her small chest at her mother’s ministrations. His heart stutters stop for a moment before the gears start to turn again in a much better rhythm. But too long of a glance because–

“Oh shit.” The smell of singe, one of the slices burnt up and unsalvageable. He’s quick to scrape it out of the pan. Still plenty to make this right, okay, not perfect though. He was going for perfect.

“What’s all this?” She’s being quiet, not looking at him as she gathers their girl out of the high chair and into her arms, a small sway side to side. 

“I, um, breakfast– you hungry?” 

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“I wanted to. Go sit, I’ll get it.” 

“Did she–”

“Yeah, I fed her.” She’s finally looking at him, bewilderment rounding and widening her eyes, though she quietly nods and shuffles through the kitchen. A soft graze past him and toward the small dining table they have set up in front of the windows, now letting in the first honeyed light of the morning. 

Two slices, steam still rising and melting down a sliver of butter. Syrup on the side because she doesn’t like it to get soggy. And a plate for himself too because he knows she’ll tell him to eat, even as mad at him as she is now. 

She keeps their girl in her lap, her arm curled around the soft round of her belly to hold her upright, and he can’t help but smile, sitting down across from them. A small sigh with her first bite and it feels like the greatest relief, something slackening beneath his ribs. 

“I didn’t play fair last night. I’m sorry, Carm.” Always beating him to the punch, he hates that she’s apologizing.

“No, you were right. I’m the one who’s sorry. I’m gonna make some changes, okay?” She sighs, her lashes dropped to the tops of her cheeks, not buying it. And he doesn’t blame her, he’s talked about changes in the past. Though the changes have yet to happen. 

“Baby, I’m serious. I’m gonna talk to Sugar today and get this figured out. Not gonna keep messing this up.” 

“You aren’t messing up, Carmen. I know how important that restaurant is to you. And maybe it’s selfish, but I just want you here more, with us. You’re missing so much, and I don’t want that for you.” Their girl chooses that moment to start to squirm in her hold, pressing the dough of her palms into the edge of the table to stand up in her mother’s lap, turning around and wrapping her small arms around her mother’s neck, making a smile get big and bright on her face as she smacks a string of kisses on her cheek, a quiet thank you, my bean. Missing things like this, he thinks. His heart aches with it. 

“Nothing is more important than this. I think when she came– I was just like– holy shit, you know?” Her smile tempers, settling on him as she continues to accommodate the squirms and shuffling of their girl in her lap. 

“Yeah, I’m familiar with that feeling.” 

“This isn’t an excuse, I know it isn’t. But, I don’t know, I think I believed that if I could just work harder, make sure the restaurant was good and money was coming in that– that it’d somehow make me feel less terrified.”

“Terrified?” 

“Of getting this all wrong. I just– Jesus Christ, I want everything for her.” There’s more he’d like to say, but he cuts himself off with a resigned laugh, holding his head in his hand as he watches their girl twist around in her mother’s arms again, looking at him now like somehow she knows he’s talking about her. And then a small hand reaching out across the table. Small hand reaching for him.

She gets up with a sigh, rounding the edge of the table, an easy pass-off, their girl’s hands grasping at his t-shirt, the same one he came home in last night. He holds her close, taking another deep inhale of the crown of her head before looking up at her mom. Her mom, his woman, his partner, who carefully runs her fingers back through his mussed hair, nails scratching lightly at his scalp. 

“There are so many people also working to make sure that restaurant is good, Carm, and it is. But I– we need you here, we just do.” Her palm slips down along his cheek, and he turns his head to press a kiss to the center of it. A much smaller hand tugs at his curls to get his attention, making him laugh as he drops a kiss to their girl’s temple. 

“You’re right. This is where I need to be. I don’t want you having to do this on your own anymore.” He gets up with a sigh, hiking their girl onto his hip, reaching out for her with his other arm, his fingers curling behind the nape of her neck, a small coaxing that she allows, pressing her forehead against his.

“We’re gonna do this together, alright? I’m here, and I’m gonna figure out how to keep being here.” An answer in the way her nose brushes along the side of his, an okay. And the realization that he can’t remember the last time they were this close is enough to bridge what space is left between them, more of a sigh than a kiss, but he’ll take it. Quick to be interrupted by quiet fussing and a small fist pressing against his cheek, both of them pulling away with a laugh to look at their seemingly perturbed girl. 

“I think we’ve made a small monster.” She says it absolutely dripping in affection, her hand coming to brush their girl’s sleep-tufted hair back from her face. 

“Maybe, yeah. She’s still fucking perfect though.” He snakes his arm around her waist, pulling her close so their girl is half-sandwiched between them, eyes wide as she babbles up at them both.

“We have to stop saying fuck around her, Carm. It’s gonna end up being her first word.” 

“She’ll fit right in at the restaurant that way.” 

A small family, a new family, figuring it out in their sun-soaked kitchen. Tired eyes and bare feet and quiet laughs. And there’s going to be more messing up, he already knows that. Both him and her. Passing sorry back and forth, willing and receiving. But this is enough to make it right, to keep going. This can be perfect. 

[atiny-for-life]

Ateez's Full Storyline Explained - Part 19

Masterlist

미친 폼 (Crazy Form) (Z-World)

Before we begin, I'd like to say that I'm writing under the assumption that Ateez are taking a backseat this comeback while the Black Pirates are leading the fight in the streets. This is based on the group's comments prior to the album's release, as well as last album's diary entries which left Ateez in a precarious situation that doesn't align with the happenings in this MV.

We open at night time on a shot of the Black Pirates (in marching-band-esque outfits reminiscent of Wonderland) and their fellow Revolutionists crouching in line in front of a structure which looks like two roofs lined up side by side where the dip between the two cradles the city skyline illuminated by a crescent moon (reminder that the nature of the Cromer‘s powers are affected by the moon cycles).

Keep in mind that Crescent Part 2 can be found on this album while the first part can be found on TREASURE EP.3 : One To All which includes 'Illusion' and 'Wave' - two songs heavily leaning into the concept of dreams and traveling into them by utilizing the Cromer‘s powers. This also aligns with the Alice in Wonderland themed promotions.

Regarding the latter: throughout the MV, you will see colors blur and get splotchy every now and again, indicating this is likely to be a dream transmitted to the citizens to fire them up for the upcoming main event of the revolution. This would also further support my assumption that we only get to see the Black Pirates here as they're the ones visiting others' dreams, not Ateez who seem to be unable to control this power fully and usually just end up in a shared dream among themselves.

Back to the MV: the captain begins to strut down the center aisle between the crouched rows like the runway model he is as he's instructing them to 'Get up'.

Once he's reached the front, everyone breaks formation and jumps right into the performance. The lyrics here already inform us of their intent - follow along, join us, put yourself first and stick it to the authorities.

Side-note: it was bugging me that I couldn't figure out what 9024 could mean so I dug a little and found an explanation by Reddit user " rowtyde37" who explains: "It's actually 90-2-4. So, it is the drums but they are telling you out the gate it's 90 beats per min, 2 quarter (4) notes (beats) each bar. Just a heads up on the drums coming to invade your space."

We cut to Yunho in comfy clothes and a headband back in the bunker who's sitting at a large table covered in blueprints as he activates a palm-sized Iron Man arc reactor looking thing that turns out to be a hologram projector.

Blue tinted holograms of the pirate ship's main mast, buildings, and pieces of teach are floating around him as he flips through them.

Throughout this scene, we regularly cut to Yunho dancing with four fellow revolutionists in a round underground space lined with doors (because he's the main dancer and he deserves this).

We cut to Mingi in a fully black getup with hat inside what looks to be a surveillance room situated in one of the rooftop-like buildings we saw at the start of the video.

His performance there is interspliced with clips of him outside in a suit as he's getting into a car and speeding through the city full of neon signs.

This maniac races into a black alley where he crashes his car straight through the wall of a small unassuming building which turns out to be a casino.

His idgaf attitude takes him straight to the bar where he pours himself a cocktail glass of milk which the bartender doesn't seem to mind.

Once his glass has been emptied, he opens the small metal suitcase near his elbow which contains another of the hologram projectors. I've rewatched the scene frame-by-frame and it seems the case was already there when he arrived so I'll assume the bartender is providing it to aid in the revolution.

This belief is reinforced when we get a shot of Mingi's empty glass filled with a stack of olives impaled by a black cocktail flag sporting the red encircled A representing both Ateez and Anarchy throughout this era.

Moving on to Wooyoung who's joining Yunho in the bunker, though in his own corner where he's surrounded by pieces of tech and holograms. He's wearing an oversized plaid shirt, glasses so large they're reminiscent of safety goggles, and black and silver gloves.

And honestly, I don't know how tech-savvy this little gremlin actually is since he's currently hammering a long-ass nail into the metal hull of some piece of equipment prior to chucking said hammer across the room with what seems to be a pout.

Said hammer shoots by behind Yunho, who's sitting several feet away, before it slams into something off screen and sets off a shower of sparks.

Yunho gapes at him for a sec before he throws up his arms ("The fuck, man?"), to which Wooyoung looks unfazed and points at him ("You asked me to toss it over, why're you mad?") followed by a half eyeroll and look away ("You're overreacting.").

Just then, a warning pops up on Yunho's holo-screen which causes Wooyoung to jog over as well.

We cut to a poker table where a game is in full swing and one of the player's is Jongho dressed up in a simple black suit. We're inside the casino Mingi literally drove into earlier.

The other two players seems to be some high-ranking officials in the military or police force, at least that's what I generally assume every time I see older men in uniform in anything. (In the Making Film, they simply call them "high officials from the Z-World")

Jongho proceeds to hold up the ace of Anarchy which causes one of the uniformed men to pull a gun on him under the table - an action both Jongho and Mingi are clearly aware of since Mingi steps up beside Jongho right away.

Without missing a beat, Jongho snatches up the gun hidden in the waistband of Mingi's pants and points it straight at his opponents. He doesn't hesitate to pull the trigger.

Cut to Seonghwa set up right outside the heavily fenced off 'Area 08'. He's performing on a makeshift stage right by the gate, surrounded by warning signs telling people to stay away. The building behind the fence is covered in banners sporting the Black Pirates' Z-logo we've last scene in 'Bouncy'.

His audience is made up of fellow revolutionists donning all black robes while he himself is dressed in a flowy white shirt, silver jewelry and a black corset with matching pants. It's clear who's not afraid to be recognized by anyone who could be spying.

The next scene reveals that San and Yeosang are also joining him for this performance, though the scene is interspliced with fleeting clips of all of a larger number of Black Pirates performing together in a back alley lined with shuttered store fronts and neon signs.

It seems to be San, Yeosang, Hongjoong, Wooyoung and Seonghwa who we'll see again a coupla scenes later in the same room Yunho danced in earlier.

Cut to Yeosang and Hongjoong in yet another alley during daylight hours. They brought spraypaints and a skateboard.

It's quickly made evident why they chose to go out during the day for once - they plan to appear on the news.

As Hongjoong reaches the line "Crazy boys are getting crazier", the video takes on a familiar news channel framing. The classic globe logo in the bottom left corner runs through several random letter combinations (the channel has no clear name) until it transforms into the two words "Breaking News".

A recorded feed from the casino's surveillance camera pops up in the top left corner - the scene with Jongho and Mingi played out just last night.

Simultaneously, the news ticker at the bottom of the screen informs us that "The Black Pirates break into the Lounge".

Shout out to Hongjoong's black fingernail. (Join the Polished Man Campaign here)

After all the ruckus Hongjoong has already caused, he somehow manages to twirl in a circle as he shoots bullets from his finger gun into the air.

The power of his imagination is truly something to behold. However, it's far more likely that this is just another indicator that we're not in a regular world but rather a dream transmitted to the locals to fire them up for the upcoming revolution.

Either way, Hongjoong's goofy bout of wackiness alerts the authorities who begin to chase him down the alley which only seems to get him more motivated to dive deeper into a pool of mischief.

He hops onto a car surrounded by armed cops and begins to wiggle his hips to provoke them further. What a legend.

Cut to him spray painting a white line across a wall covered in their own revolution flyers before passing Yeosang who ends up with a white streak straight across his black jacket.

He throws up his hands as he looks after his captain ("Why would you-?")

While once again fleeing from the authorities, Hongjoong nearly collides with a black car which sped up to him. The scene transforms into a comic book panel (this is not the real world).

He rolls across the hood and lands on the other side, only to lean over the hood with a smirk. Another comic panel forms.

Cut to a maniacally laughing Seonghwa getting dragged along by his own audience.

This is closely followed by San showing us his signature peace/middle finger - the return of these gloves is unexpected but welcome, especially in such a idgaf, I'll do what I want MV.

Between group performance clips, we return to Wooyoung in the bunker where he's looking at a hologram of their pirate ship which we'll see again shortly. It has been missed.

We also get to see Yeosang spraypaint "Be Free" onto a shutter door (which joins a marker written 'We Know', referencing the first track on the album).

A scene later, we see the full picture - three shutters, all covered in their signature Z and those two red words: Be Free. The message that connects all versions of Ateez across the multitude of realities.

We return to Jongho in the casino who just fired off three rounds in quick succession while Mingi stands by to watch their maknae go rogue. He must be proud.

One of the bullets swishes past a sprinkler, setting it off, while another pieces the wall and destroys the TV in the neighboring room just as an Android Guardian was seen on screen. It's very symbolic.

Our Haribo walks off with a satisfied lil smirk as the sprinklers gently drizzle him.

Between further performance clips, we return to Hongjoong who's being pushed onto the hood of a car by the cops who'd been hounding him.

He manages to free an arm and affixes a gadget that looks like another holo-projector onto the side of the vehicle which proceeds to eject a beam of light.

The activation signals Wooyoung in the bunker who looks up through a hologram circle. A pulse of light washes across the entire city, dousing it in darkness as a familiar pirate ship appears in the sky like a literal glowing ghost ship; it’s the hologram Wooyoung and Yunho had been working on this entire time.

The moon now appears full as the Black Pirates laugh and celebrate, smirking up to the sky, performing across locations, drinking in the casino/bar which leads me to reasonably believe they really did complete the mission between the two moon cycles but the way they went about it was different from the wackiness that took place in the dream world.

We end with them back at the double-roof structure before the screen cuts to black.

We've done it! Freedom has been achieved in Z-World! This may be the last time we ever see the Black Pirates since Ateez say their goodbyes and return back to the A-World in the Golden Hour: Part 1 - Diary Entries

However, the music video has not ended yet: a beat later, a shattered glowing Cromer appears on screen.

From it rises a bluebird, the one we've last seen in Halazia. It's holding a red pulsating object in its beak as it rises up to the night sky where a red full moon has risen.

The next few videos will be about Halazia World's Ateez - see you there!

[may--hawk]

Writer's Interview Meme

I was tagged by @possibility-left - thanks! This was a blast to noodle over.

How many works do you have on ao3?

34 works if you don't count each chapter of the mixtape series as its own oneshot - which I do. If you count it that way, it's 75 works.

What’s your total word count?

353,780.

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1. some of these days, AKA the South Downs one.

2. always crashing (in the same car), AKA the time loop one.

3. fall at the foot of thee, which was a huge surprise to me! Yet another "they're not talking" fic. (Mind the rating).

4. this must be the place, which was my first experiment in writing a multi-chapter plotty fic. AKA the Orpheus one.

5. you are wild (i'm in your possession) AKA my first "they're not talking" fic. (Another mind the rating).

Do you respond to comments? Why/why not?

Yes! I am overjoyed when people take the time to comment. Each and every comment I've received is wildly precious to me. Responding to comments has led to a few fantastic friendships. <3

What's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending?

always crashing (in the same car), AKA the time loop one. Or, in the mixtape series, love song from a dog.

What's the fic you've written with the happiest ending?

some of these days, AKA the South Downs one. Or, in the mixtape series, here comes the knight (AKA the Lady Aziraphale one.)

Do you write crossovers?

I wrote my first crossover recently - a Good Omens/Jeeves and Wooster crossover, featuring Jeeves as an honest-to-goodness demon. All Hail Jeeves. Probably the one and only crossover I will write, but it begged to be written.

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

I have not. Maybe way back in the day, but if so, it's blocked out of my memory by now.

Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I do, but tend to keep it pretty tame (in my opinion) as far as these things go. It's more about the opportunity for *pining*, y'know?

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

I have not; although I have had someone kind enough to ask, I'm tentative on the real-world applications.

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

I have not!

What's your all-time favourite ship?

I've shipped Aziraphale/Crowley for nearly two decades. It's got to go to them. (I cannot adequately explain how wild it is to me that they are canon in the TV show!)

What's a WIP that you want to finish but don't think you ever will?

@possibility-left I definitely want to read your WIP if you ever finish it! No pressure!

For my own WIP I will likely never finish, I've got a through-the-ages fic with Aziraphale and Crowley, working title the first love of the world. The reason I think I'll never finish it is that I keep robbing from it to write one-shots. I think it may end up dissected and spread across a hundred different possibilities.

What are your writing strengths?

I think I can pull a reader into a scene in all its details. (I hope). I enjoy world-building a broader history outside the immediate scope of the story, namely through footnotes and backstories (which I usually get inspired by to write other stories).

What are your writing weaknesses?

Ha. Emotionally satisfying happy endings in longer pieces. A complete and utter inability to use the right "awhile" (thanks @benjamental for your eternal corrections.)

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

All English for me so far*- if it were relevant for the characters and story I would do it as necessary.

*This being said, I've got two Greek words in an upcoming fic that I put in Greek, because it was relevant to the character and what I was trying to convey.

What was the first fandom you wrote for?

Stargate Atlantis, Sheppard/McKay. But that was in another country, and besides, that livejournal* is dead.

*WOW I went digging for that old livejournal and, although it is deleted, found caches of me apparently writing in a ton of fandoms I'd completely forgotten I'd written for. That was a trip.

What's a fandom/ship you haven't written for yet but want to?

Discworld, VetVimes. I've got half a rough draft started but haven't worked up my nerve yet. STP's voice is such a tough one to nail and I want to make sure I get those two right before I start.

What's your favourite fic you've written?

@possibility-left Your Michael fic sounds awesome and has been added to my TBR list immediately.

For my own fav fic, I love all my children equally.*

*earlier that day: I don't care for Gob.

Short answer? Usually whatever story I'm currently working on, unless it's giving me a hard time, in which case, it rapidly becomes my least favorite story ever.

Long answer? always crashing (in the same car). I'd been writing straightforward fiction for so long that I relished the opportunity to write something a little weird. In the mixtape series, where some of my favorite stuff is, expresso love or real real gone. In other stuff, Doves' Eyes, which is a collection of A&C pining through the ages organized around Aziraphale's eyes, or and into strange vagaries fall, which is a pre-Fall Beelzebub fic where Beelzebub and Crowley are besties up in the Heavenly Engineering & Development Department. I know, I know, I'm sorry I love all my children equally.

Tagging!! Please feel free to take this if you see it - this was an unexpectedly huge amount of fun. My tags are @chlorine-and-daisies, @hopelesslysleepy, @lvndrlondonfog, and @adverbian.

[coelpts-artchives]

otherside

Okay, so. Remember that Doctor project from last Art Fight? This piece takes up a similar sort of space in my heart for Art Fight 2024. Details and gushing under the cut.

Earlier this year, my housemate Khalimar and I played on a private Minecraft server to test out a particular modpack idea of his. He's been kicking around this thought for a long while: it's a pack where you build your base and then it moves with you. He's always envisioned it as building a ship to sail on, but in order to test the idea he set up a Create pack with Interactive so we could build up a train and add to it while it was in motion.

Y'all. It was a fucking monumental experience. I have a lot to say about the Nameless Train to Nowhere and not a lot of space to put it, but understand that this was probably one of my absolute favorite Minecraft experiences in years, bar none. Whenever we were done exploring an area, we just…kept riding west, racing the sun into the distance, digging tunnels and finding new structures.

One of my stand-out favorite moments was while we were riding through a shrubland, icey lake on one side and low-lying grasses and trees on the other, and we popped Otherside into the jukebox. It just felt…right. He was driving the train, I was standing on the edge railings looking out for fun structures and mobs, and I saw a perfect image in my mind of the exact scene as if it was animated.

So…that's exactly what I made. I didn't crunch it this time, no fucking way. I worked on it little by little throughout the month, learning to paint to make the backgrounds and designing the train in a more stylistic, less blocky manner. I took a lot of screenshots on the server- every environment drawn is one we traveled through that I wanted to immortalize. I even learned how to use DaVinci Resolve so Krita didn't crash nearly as often as it did during my previous animation! It only crunched twice!

I wanted to show all of the love I felt for this pack in an animation. It's full of in-jokes and references (the blueprint is unnamed because we forgot to name the train before engaging it, the armors The Emissary and Aero wear are our actual endgame fits, train car 4 looks like it's been stung by a bee because we accidentally made it too small and we had to expand it, and there's Moofy in train car 2 with the other livestock, and that's just a few examples) because after only two months this became one of my favorite modpacks of all time. How could I not?

I still ended up cramming the day before because circumstances lead to me being unable to do art until the last few days, but I still finished the piece with hours to spare instead of minutes. And honestly? This is one of my favorite pieces yet.

You can also check out this animation on Youtube!

I was on Team Stardust for Art Fight 2024! I hope you all had a good time this year!

[amethystfairy1]

Through the Sky-Blue Cracks

Scar had thought that twenty years in the superhero profession would’ve taught him a thing or two. He’d settled into this role, an architecture professor moonlighting as the arrow-slinging superhero Hot Guy, protecting the over-city, both from haywire criminals, and from the monsters emerging from the rifts torn through bedrock by the under-city folk, who lived in the massive caverns beneath their feet. For all the things he didn’t understand about the world and the people below bedrock, for all the conflict he felt with his own past concerning the council and biotech institute, he’d chosen a long time ago to stay the course, no matter how torn up he was over it.

That all comes crashing down with the appearance of a winged vigilante from the under-city, who picks up the nickname of Cute Guy from the local press. To Scar, it feels like worlds colliding, but for others who’ve chosen to hide their sharp edges to live their lives beneath the open sky, it’s been this way all along. And maybe it’s asking a lot, acceptance of these links, so old, that’ve been concealed for the sake of an entire society. But Scar’s a superhero, so that’s kind of in his job description.

***

My current WIP AU! With over 200k and growing over on A03, I’ve been writing it in a piece-by-piece format, keeping it aligned by chronological order as I go! So you can read it all in order, following your preferred characters or ships through the timeline, or just bounce around! All the pieces are written as mostly stand-alone, which has been lots of fun, as I’ve been able to continue expanding it and creating storylines for all the ships and characters. I wanted to start posting here little snippets and thoughts as well as open up asks to anyone who wants to talk to me about the AU! I love getting the chance to spitball and world build, and A03 comments aren’t always that great for that, so here we are instead!

[lunar-writes-things]

Song of the Sea

Pairing: Goodtimeswithscar x reader, Grian x Reader, Grian x Goodtimeswithscar

Summary: In which a kidnapping resulted in a relationship crashing in like a wave

Genre: Romance

Extra notes: FLUFF WITH AN EXTRA TRIPLE FLUFF ON THE SIDE

Content warnings (If any): None, just babies being sweeties. 

WC: 3k 

Future monarch of the Oceri, the grand kingdom that is in charge of most of the ocean. 

It was an intimidating title for a humble mer-person such as yourself. Yet Your husband, Crown Prince Scar of Oceri, made it seem like the easiest thing in the world. It wasn't but as you began to learn from the current queen, you began to become accustomed to the way of the kingdom. 

However, when you had a break, you and your husband love to head to the surface of the ocean to relax. With you, a Guard was usually brought for safety reason but the Guard was a good friend of yours.

"Cub!" You pleaded "Please?" 

"I'm sorry Y/n," He said softly "But I'm obligated to keep you down here. There's a pirate ship overhead and I've received information that they may be hunting for mer-people. If I see you two leaving I'm going to lose my job." 

"I'm sure a little bit of sun won't hurt. We'll stay under the water but we just want some sun." Scar spoke up, swimming up from behind "and its only if you see us leave."

"Plus you'll be able to watch over us once we beat you there," You said "Like always."

"If I see even a glimmer of your tails, I'm dragging you two back." Cub sighed and slumped forward while placing a hand over his eyes "You have a minute." 

You and Scar giggled and swam up to just below the surface as you as fast as possibly could, holding hands the entire way. The rays of the sun warmed your skin and you sighed as you began to float in the rays of the sun in the calming presence of the sea. Scar came up from under you and held you tight, humming a random tune and pressing kisses into your cheek. 

Despite all this love you two had for each other, it always felt like their was a missing piece. Like there should be someone else. However, You just brushed it off for always being in public and being mentally drained so you relaxed into your lovers arms and sighed happily. 

That's when cub came up urgently 

"Prince Scar, Y/n," Cub quickly swam up "I do suggest coming down quite a bit. The ship is really close now and I dont wanna risk anything." 

"I think I have to agree on that," You muttered and look at the shadow that was coming closer and closer by the second 

The men nodded and began to swim down, You took one last look at the warm upper water before turning to swim down to catch up with your husband and his best friend. As you almost reached Scar a thick net dropped in front of you and caught you and some other surface fish and it tugged you up 

"Y/N!" Scar cried and swam up to grab you but missed your hand by an inch as you were pulled out of the waters and into the boat where the air burned your lungs as you cursed to Poseidon for getting you into this mess. 

While you could turn into a human more suited for the air, that would leave you completely indecent and you had more sense of reason than your husband but it may- 

your thought process stopped when you were unceremoniously dumped on the ship deck and gasps caught your attention 

"We- WE CAUGHT ONE!" The crew cheered 

"Now put a gag on it before it starts singing!" One crew member said "And put it in water! We don't need it drying out!" 

The leader exclaimed and there was a flurry of movement that made you dizzy but soon you were gagged and were dumped in a way too small tank filled with sea water. 

"Hello Little siren," A man walked up to the tank "Welcome to the Architechs. A pirate ship that builds and designs better than the kingdom." 

You didn't answer. Something about him seemed... familiar. No matter what there was something else tugging at you about him. He was... pretty. 

Yep 

thats it 

The captain of the ship was undeniably gorgeous. Nearly on par to your husband. 

but there was something more than the simple physical attraction, you just had no idea what it was

"I'm the Captain of this here ship, My name is Grian. This here is my first mate, Mumbo and our Quartermater Iskall." The man, Grian introduced 

Why did everything about him seem so familiar?

However, Down in the sea with Cub and Scar... 

"I'm going to get them!" Scar said and swam up to the surface and grabbed onto the ship that was starting to speed up “Make sure My father knows we’re safe! I'll deal with the humans! After all, they can't be all be that bad.” 

Unfortunately, Scar was unaware they could be that bad. 

For now, he began climbing up the ship and once his tail was fully out of water, he made sure to switch into the human form only royal family members had. 

He climbed up the ship and eventually made it over and onto the lower deck where no one was. He looked around, gaining his surrounding when he saw his partner tied and gagged in a small tank full of water. 

However as he got closer he noticed the crew of the ship and that you were staring at someone with eyes that held curiosity, wonder and... something else

but when Scar took one step closer, he understood. 

His attention was immediately drawn off you and to the man in front of you. A dirty blond with black eyes as dark as obsidian and most likely, the captain of the ship. Something about him made Scar want to grab him and You and drag you back down to  the bottom of the ocean. A need to protect, to love, to claim. 

Soon he caught your eyes. Scar saw you light up at the sight of him and you called to him in your native tounge. 

'Scar!' You chirped 'Isn't he pretty!' 

Scar nodded with a smile. Even after being kidnapped you were focused on something else.

Unfortunately, your call to him revealed his location and he had to move from out of the shadows. 

 When Scar did, most of the pirates covered their eyes at his indecency and Grian screeched something akin to 'put your clothes on!" while throwing his cape to the merman. 

Grian had recognized this idiot of a man. 

This was the crown prince of Oceri, Prince Scar. 

But why was-

Grian felt his eyes widen and he turned to see the 'siren' his men had captured pressed up against the glass tryng to be as close to prince scar as possible.

but if Grian recognized scar them...

"Greeting to His highness, the crown Prince of the Sahara Kingdom. It is a pleasure to see you again Prince Grian." Scar said and Gave Grian a deep bow 

Hearing the old title made Grian cringe but he held his face neutral as his crew gaped in shock. Then they began to shout and thats when Grian had enough. 

"GET BACK TO WORK! Mumbo! Iskall! Bring our prisoner and the crown prince inside my office! And will someone please stop the ship!” Grian shouted and quickly turned to head back inside his office 

Soon the four were in his office and the prisioner was wrapped in a red blanket and on two legs. 

that means... 

"You're Prince Scar's partner," Grian groaned and ran a hand down his face 

"I am indeed," You say and give the prince in front of you a sweeping bow "I hold no ill will against you for this." 

"I thank you for that," Grian said and slumped into the seat behind his desk, with Mumbo standing behind him on his right and Iskall on his left "But I cannot let you leave knowing that the crown prince of Sahara has run away to lead a gang of pirates. So, what will you like?" 

You looked to your husband and he gave you a subtle nod. 

"That is actually something me and my husband would like to talk about." You said "You see, Mer-people have this weird thing about knowing who is fated to us when first meeting. Think of it as a soulmate bond."

"And what does this have to do with me?" Grian asked while Mumbo and Iskall gave an exasperated look behind him 

"Well, When I boarded the ship there was a tug. At first it was a simple attraction to your looks but then my husband boarded... That simple attraction became ten times stronger and that is when I realized We... are bonded. And I suspect that this was the work of my husband and his tiny child brain."

"Admittedly, Yes," Scar gave a grin and a nervous chuckle "See when we had first met as children Grian, I had imprinted on you accidentally. Then I met Y/n, I imprinted on them accidentally as well. I had no idea I would marry them and I had totally forgot about imprinting on you until just a few minutes ago." 

"So?" Grian asked and raised an eyebrow "Its not like I will marry you two right away." 

"oh goodness no!" You spoke up "Thats not what means. See because he had imprinted on both of us, My attraction to you int as strong but it is definitely still there. What we would like to do, if okay with you, is possibly... ah- how do humans say it... enter the talking stage and possibly date? Truthfully, if you are uncomfortable then we can drop this and we leave with no troubles."

Grian seemed to mull over it and as he did small mutters escaped his lips "They would hush up... connect the kingdoms even further..." 

He then looked to Iskall and Mumbo who both shrugged before  looking back to the group. 

"No conditions?" Grian asked 

"Two," Scar spoke up "One, No more Hunting for merpeople or sirens and Two, We would like if you stayed in a nearby fishing town. My partner and I can't go far from the kingdom or it will cause a panic." 

"We could use a break," Mumbo spoke up softly "We've been at sea for years now without really ever stopping." 

"But we-" Grian started 

"I agree with Mumbo here," Iskall said ad watched as Grian slumped back in his seat "We could all use a break at sea. I havent felt real concrete for three years." 

"Fine," Grian waved them off and Iskall and Mumbo both silently cheered behind Grian "You may court me and we will see how this ends. Where is this fishing town?" 

You and Scar grinned widely and grabbed each others hands with joy

The next year and a half had your heart felt full. 

The missing piece now found. 

Grian was hesitant at first with the entire arrangement, That was understandable. You and Scar danced around him for months until he was comfortable enough to initiate hand holding and kisses. Grian fit perfectly between you and Scar, a perfect match for Scar's chaotic energy and your calm demeanor. 

Now you were watching Scar and Grian bicker of what to make for movie night date Scar and you had planned on a hidden end of the each near the fishing town, sat on the shore letting the water splash at your legs as you smiled at your boys stupidity.  

"We should make a filling meal!" Scar said 

"Or we can get a bunch of snacks and fill up on those?" Grian asked a sly smile on his face 

oh no-

That's when Grian pulled out his signature pout. Scar could never resist the look and neither could you. He must have learned that as a princeling.

With a defeated groan, Scar trudged over to the blanket and dropped down and rested his head on your lap. 

"That's what you get for trying to fight with our pretty bird." You snicker and jolt when Scar lightly swats at your leg in mock anger 

"Oh shush," Scar said but you felt his grin spread across your leg but his voice lowered as he started again "Are we-?" 

"Yes, I would like to," You whispered back and leaned down to press kisses onto his scalp "But if he doesn't want to then I'm willing to wait. Anything for the two of you." 

"What doing?" Grian asked as he sat down with the snack in his hands and spreading them amongst the three of you. There were normal human snacks but also the of the mer people snacks that you had introduced to him a while ago

"Talking," You answer quickly

You were slightly flustered that he caught you two talking about your plans, the entire reason for this date. 

After a little over a year, Grian had warmed up to the two of you exponentially. You had learned that within the first few months of courting Grian had fallen for the two of you, especially as he had gotten to know you and scar. 

Truthfully? You definitely felt the same if not more. 

 So last month, you had bought a ring and showed it to scar. 

You could never describe the way he lit up when he saw it. He told you he had the same idea and was going to talk about it with you that night when Grian was fast asleep. 

So You planned this.

and this was going very according to plan. 

"About?" Grian asked and sat down between you two, nuzzling into your side with closed eyes and a sweet smile that took your breath away 

You looked to your husband who gave you a singular nod and a thousand uninvited butterflies filled your stomach. Why were you so nervous now? Was it the idea of him rejecting the two of you? 

Despite your frantic thoughts you blurted out "You." 

That made Grian pay attention. His eyes snapped open and widened as his mouth gaped before he jolted upright and asked "Did I do something wrong?" 

His voice was soft and there was a thickness to it that indicted tears from the man. 

"Huh? Oh! Nononono!" You waved your hands frantically as your eyes widened in panic "Of course not our songbird!"

Grian let out a sigh of relief and slumped back into you, Meanwhile behind him, Scar moved to one knee and opened the small box with a pearl ring you had gotten from the town Jeweler 

"Sorry to scare you Songbird," Scar rumbled "But we have a very important question to ask." 

This piqued Grian's interest and he turned around before a sharp gasp came from him 

"We don't wanna scar you off," You started softly and moved up behind him, gently turning his hed so he can catch a glimpse of you from the corner of his eye "and Whatever you say, we will respect your opinion. No matter what we will love and-" 

"Y/n, Yes, I understand," Grian cut you off and then you noticed his eyes, filled with tears and adoration "Please ask the question?" 

"Grian H. Dreamslayer, Will you marry us?" You and Scar asked at the same only to be dragged to tackle Scar

"Yes!" He grinned and pressed small kisses to your and Scar's face "I was gonna ask next week but I'm kind of glad you two beat me to it. I didn't want to feel like I'm rushing you two." 

"Oh," You coo and caress his face "Songbird, We're practically soulmates. You could never rush us." 

You pressed a sweet kiss to your fiances lips before turning to kiss your husband who kissed you back. 

"Now, why don't we enjoy this movie and celebrate more at our home," Scar whispered and pressed a Kiss to Grian's lips 

"Yeah," Grian said and curled up between the two of you with a content smile

That night held many kisses, snuggles and some light showing off on Grian's part but it made you happy. 

So very happy. 

[hopemariposa]

How “The Last Crash of the Sunchaser” Parallels the Story of Della’s Crash

this is my second dissertation.

I would like a PHD in Ducktales lore now.

first up we need to set up the players in this game (rather, who the characters “equivalent”/role in either end of the story are)

Donald=Beakley, sometimes all three of the triplets.

Scrooge. Scrooge is himself in both parallels.

Della=Dewey.

so the story of Della’s crash goes as follows:

Scrooge, as a present, decides to go ahead and build an experimental rocket ship for the mother-to-be-Della

he does this behind Donald’s, the voice of reason, back

Della takes the ship early and crashes herself on the moon, which effectively makes her seem dead.

while the story in “The Last Crash of the Sunchaser” goes like this:

Scrooge repeatedly ignores all reason and puts the kids in more and more danger

this defies Beakley’s heavy suggestion for more safety precautions

Dewey almost gets himself killed because he fervently goes after the last piece of the puzzle, and because Scrooge was not more careful on their flight

do u see what I mean now? the two different stories very much mirror each other

Scrooge is still going against what should be his better judgement. He builds a rocket; he crashes the Sunchaser.

and ultimately, this mistake and trauma in his past leads his family leaving him again, like Donald left

in this way, the rest of his family is parallel with Donald’s reaction to loosing Della:

Donald blames Scrooge for loosing his sister. the boys blame Scrooge for loosing their mom.

the generational cycle repeats itself

[physalian]

IngramSpark: Good or Nah?

I decided to work with them last minute to set my book up for success, and, in case they screwed me over, I could hate them in a properly informed manner.

So!

IngramSpark (IGS) vs. Amazon (KDP) so far: A detailed comparison.

Spoiler Alert: FUCK INGRAMSPARK

Alrighty these are two proof copies (author copies) of the exact same book made with the exact same PDFs. IGS is on the left in all pics.

Stuff to note:

The IGS copy is slightly greener, the purple is less vibrant. KDP made the exact colors I painted this with in photoshop.

The KDP book is slightly thicker and while the spine print is slightly off center, the front cover is perfectly centered. Compare both of the lower moons on the right side and it's very obvious that IGS cut theirs incorrectly. It's cut incorrectly because their paper is thinner, thus needing a slightly narrower print PDF (which isn't something they would tell you).

KDP is slightly thicker because they used thicker paper. Theirs is less polished creme, you can feel more of a grain of the pages, but because they're thicker, they're less transparent. I can read straight through to not only the back of the title page, but straight onto the next piece of paper for the IGS copy, and theirs cost more to print.

KDP shipped in lighter packaging, which meant my copy got a little banged up as opposed to the cardboard coffin the IGS book was in. Pick your poison.

KDP

PROS

A breeze to work with in most areas. I did not need to use customer service, so I can’t comment on that, but I’ve heard it’s superior to IGS in every way. They do have a community chat that I have used when confused (more below) and pages upon pages of how-to resources.

Simple user interface, very easy to click through all the set-up menus and not once did it freeze or crash on me (more below).

Did not use their formatter or cover generator, I used Adobe and did my own so I can’t comment on their quality.

Their “print previewer” was fantastic. I could click through the whole book and they explained very thoroughly where some issues were and what I should look out for and they let me use my own files without issue instead of having to build them in the platform.

Their royalty rate is the best you can get in this industry, because they’re not selling to anyone but themselves so there’s no middle man taking a cut of the profit.

Print quality of the book itself is fantastic. Only thing I miss is the ability to emboss, but no print-on-demand company does that as far as I’m aware. The colors were an exact match to my design in Adobe, I have no complaints.

Instant reports and near-live report refreshes for ebooks. Print copies don’t register on reports until the book ships, but Amazon prints and ships within ~2 days.

Because it’s Amazon, even though proof copies aren’t applicable with Prime, my copy still got here in 5 days including print time. My print copy totaled the print cost plus $3 in standard shipping that I could have rushed.

It did get a little banged up on the bottom but I think that was during shipping not at the printing press.

If you’re really strapped for cash, they do offer free ISBNs *but these are KDP only ISBNs, you don’t own them, and they are non transferable between vendors and POD companies. Bite the bullet and just save up for your own ISBNs and buy them in bulk if you can and you plan on publishing at least 2 books in your lifetime (like a paperback and hardcover of the same book, even).

After I submitted my ebook for preorder, I kept finding little details to fix and lines I wasn’t happy with that got nixed at the 11th hour. Updating this was seamless and free and the updated versions were processed within 6 hours or so. Amazon did not lock in the files to the date the preorders were set like IngramSpark would have.

CONS

They still don’t have paperback preorder, but they do have a feature where you can submit for a future release, which is just giving your files over to go live on a set date. Thing is: When you get to the end of the setup, there’s a button that says something like “submit for publication” which does not actually mean “move your publication date to right now” like I thought. So I missed my paperback date by 2 days.

Their proof copy has that annoying grey “Not for Resale” stripe across the cover so it looks wonky in marketing images.

They have a “cover art size calculator” feature, which did not line up with the actual file size I needed come submission time, off by a few millimeters. Which meant resizing in Photoshop and it was incredibly annoying and tedious.

Upon finally hitting the “publish” button Amazon flagged my book and told me to fix the highlighted errors. Well there were no highlighted errors, and said error(s) could be anywhere across four pages of details. I had to consult the community notes to figure out what they were talking about (it was an ISBN issue) which was quite annoying.

IGS

PROS

Well-known as the best print-on-demand (POD) company with the widest reach, including Amazon, for expanded distribution. (NOT IN MY EXPERIENCE)

Also well-known as the highest quality self-publish paperback, that still doesn’t do embossing. (NOT IN MY EXPERIENCE)

They do paperback preorders (which I did not participate in).

Integrates flawlessly with libraries and retailers that Amazon won’t do (which is about its only claim to superiority). My book was searchable on Barnes & Noble within 48 hours.

IGS, like KDP, has free ISBNs (US only), with the exact same non-transferable issue. However, because they integrate across all sellers, Amazon included, if you only intend to work with them, you’ve reached every market anyway.

CONS

Their royalty rate sucks ass. I had to price my book $1 higher through IGS because I was literally at a deficit with all the printing costs and vendor discounts (so if you want my book for slightly cheaper, buy it through Amazon). Through IGS, I think I’m making about $1 in royalties, when all is said and done. And I’ve heard, shockingly, that that’s pretty good.

I didn’t try to use their customer service because I know it’s notoriously terrible. But it would have been helpful when their website crashed.

Their website crashed on me three times when trying to upload my files. Before it crashed, their “submit files” button simply did not work, so I had to go the roundabout way through their formatter and cover wizard (which I didn’t like) which then told me my 300DPI cover art was too small. The exact same file I submitted and had in my hands at perfect resolution to Amazon. It took almost 2 hours of running around in circles on their site to essentially start from scratch to get this up and running—and I did all of this with polished files from the get go because I knew revisions would be tedious. Can’t imagine the hassle if you aren’t ready to go immediately (this is why I didn't do a preorder with them).

I have heard that if you make changes to your files, they don’t go into effect until the next month, meaning if you have typos, and anyone buys your book before the next calendar month despite you fixing them in the system, that person is still buying the old version. I have also heard that generating reports is not seamless. After 60 days, revisions also cost you $25 a pop (KDP is free).

If you submit pre-made PDFs for your manuscript and cover (as in, you don’t format or generate them within their system) they do not have an instant previewer. Mine took 48 hours to deliver a link, when that shit should be automated and instantaneous and should allow me to use my own files.

IGS does not have Amazon’s monopoly on shipping, so to get my book here at all quickly, it cost me almost $20, rush fees applied for only 1 day faster than Amazon did. “Quickly,” being I ordered the proof on the 24th, and it won’t get here until the 28th. Meaning, that if you’re not paying rush fees, you’d have to wait longer.

They can be quite confusing with revisions during the preorder process. Per their website, they can begin printing your book “generally” 30 days before go-live. Which means someone who preordered your book on the 3rd gets the version of the book that was available on the 3rd, even if you update it on the 5th, because they print those immediately, even if the book’s official release date of the 30th hasn’t passed. You’d pretty much have to be completely done with revisions before setting up for preorder with them to be absolutely sure, which means wasted time. I don’t know why they don’t just queue up the books to be printed on a hard deadline a few days before release.

So. While I hate that Amazon has a monopoly, about the only thing IGS has going for it is their expanded distribution when everything about their business, from their platform to their user experience to the actual quality of books is at best dead even with KDP, but in my experience with my best foot forward, IGS annoyingly inferior.

I don’t think they’ll remain the “best POD company” for very much longer. I did not do hardcover for ENNS as of this post so I can’t comment on either service’s print quality, only what I’ve seen in other reviews. Some people like the jacket-less print-on-the-cardboard look (Amazon), some people (me) like the jacket, if only so I can use it as a bookmark.

*I wrote the above paragraphs before getting my proof copy from IGS and fucking hell they're not even competent at printing

It is also a massive waste of paper and shipping resources to have to print multiple versions of proof copies fixing errors outside of my control. My proof copy from KDP is perfect. IGS? Nope! But they wouldn't let me properly preview it so I had no idea this would happen.

Even as a consumer who might hate the idea of giving Amazon more money, there’s an argument to consider: I totally understand the desire to keep brick and mortar stores afloat and I don’t want Amazon’s monopoly on the market to grow even larger. However, Amazon makes sure that you’re making more than pocket change on your book, unless you jack up the prices for readers on the back end so the whole thing costs more all the way down the pipeline. I refused to do this.

That deficit that forced me to price ENNS even $1 higher than Amazon really bothers me with IngramSpark. That deficit exists because of a higher print cost and a 55% discount given to vendors so they can still make their cut of profit from stocking your book. IngramSpark had me sit through a whole video saying “if you don’t do this no one will stock your book” while saying you could go as low as 54% but that might scare off vendors.

In essence, at this time, KDP makes sure that you, the creator, make money. IGS makes sure that they and the businesses selling your book for you make money. I didn’t do any of this for profit, but it does hurt seeing all your hard work, possibly years of effort, have a royalty of $0.87.

So, yeah, is IngramSpark worth it?

I don’t yet know what their reach will amount to. It’s a dream of mine to see my book on a bookstore shelf, but signing up with IGS does not guarantee you sales, it just guarantees you the best chance possible at reaching potential buyers. But at the moment, all it looks like to me is fees, a bad UI, cheap printing, arrogance from perceived superiority in the market, and a business built boldly in favor of its own profits.

Amazon’s a shady-ass corporation, but I’m going to have to say they’re the better bet. At the very least, for your first book when you don’t have an audience and if making a profit is important to you.

—

I did not try to use any other POD like Draft 2 Digital or Barnes & Noble Press, as I already have KDP and IGS is the best platform to integrate with KDP.

See here for the cost breakdown of my debut novel from draft to publication.

[aanoia]

Reunions and Goodbyes

Peter Quill x reader

Summary; after your best friend disappeared you made a name for yourself with the help of the Avengers, what happens when you accidently find said best friend again? But in space?

Words; abt 1,300

Warnings; death 😋, not proofread

I kinda hate this but kinda love it but kinda want to burn it at the stake. Yk?

Btw yalls can manipulate metal, like magneto, but cooler

Requests are open! Requests are welcome and encouraged! (Pls I'm desperate) Fandom list is my pinned post! (REQUEST SOMETHING, ANYTHING, LEAVE ME A CUTE NOTE, PLEASE IM SO BORED WITH LIFE RN🙏🙏)

“We might uh, um turn! Turn! Turn!” Peter P. said as the ship ran into a demolished building, causing the whole thing to shake.

“Oh Lord.” I mumbled under my breath forcing a piece of metal to lower itself in front of me and steadying myself. Peter P. grunted as we crashed onto the ground, Stephen doing his best to steady us.

The ship came to a stop and I took a breath of relief, letting go of the metal as Peter P. hung upside down on his web.

“Let me just say, if aliens wind up implanting eggs in my chest or something and I eat one of you, I’m sorry.”

I shook my head with a laugh.

“I do not want another single pop culture reference out of you for the rest of the trip, you understand?”

“Uh, he’s just trying to tell us someone is coming.” I warned and Peter P. nodded.

“Thank you, Y/n.” He thanked me as a little metal ball rolled in between us. In just a moment it exploded, sending us backwards. I grunted as I hit the ground and looked up to see two red eyes coming in from the fog, followed by silhouettes of other people.

A big one yelled and threw knives at Stephen, who blocked them with his shield, making the man scream in anger before getting tackled by Cape. The one with red eyes began shooting while flying up in the air, Tony following after him, his mask now on. Tony shot a blast at the guy who dodged it but ran into a piece of metal I placed next to him.

“Ah!” I heard Peter P. screech and I looked to him to see an alien girl leaning over him, her tendrils glowing. “Woah woah woah, please don’t put your eggs in me!” He shot her with webs causing her to yelp in surprise before the red eyed guy kicked Peter down.

Tony took Capes spot above the man as the guy with red eyes held onto Peter P. from behind, a gun pointed to his head. I held my hands up, hood covering my eyes as metal flew around me, aiming at both the red eyed and the big guy.

“Everybody stay where you are, chill the f out!” He brought his hand up and his mask retracted. I shivered as a sudden wave of familiarity filled my body. Do I know this guy? “I’m gonna ask you this one time, where is Gamora?”

“Yeah, I’ll do you one better!” Tony said as his mask also retracted. “Who’s Gamora?”

“I’ll do you one better, why is Gamora?” The big one said from beneath Tony. I looked at Stephen who looked just as confused as me.

“Tell me where the girl is or I swear to you I’m gonna french fry this little freak.”

“Woah, watch your tone there, man.” I told him, waving the metal in the air. His eyes flashed with something unrecognizable, but I ignored it.

“Let’s do it. Shoot my guy and I’ll blast him! Let’s go!” Tony threatened.

“Do it Quill! I can take it!” The big man said and my stance faltered. Quill?

“No! He can’t take it!” An alien looking girl I didn’t even realize was there yelled.

“She’s right. You can’t.” Stephen said calmly.

“Oh, yeah? You don’t wanna tell me where she is? That’s fine! I’ll kill all four of you and I’ll beat it out of Thanos myself!” He pushed the gun harder against Peter P.’s head. “Starting with you.

“Wait what?” Stephen asked. “All right, let me ask you this one time. What master do you serve?”

I snorted, “What is he supposed to say, Jesus?” I said as red eyes guy said the same thing, just with “I” instead of "he.” He looked at me with wide eyes.

“Woah, weird.” Peter P. mumbled.

“Wait, you’re from Earth?” Tony asked.

“Not from Earth, I’m from Missouri.”

“Hey, that’s where Y/n’s from.” Peter said quietly, but apparently only I heard him as everyone continued talking. 

“Yeah, that’s on Earth, dipshit. What are you hassling us for?”

“Wait, so you’re not with Thanos?” Peter asked shakily.

Red eyed guy looked at Peter P. incredulously, “With Thanos? No, I’m here to kill Thanos. He took our gir- wait, who are you?” 

Peter’s mask retracted. “We’re the Avengers, man.” 

“You’re the ones Thor told us about!” The alien girl said and the red eyes guy looked at me in thought.

“You know Thor?” Tony asked.

“Yeah, tall guy, not that good looking.” Red eyes guy said, not breaking his gaze. “Needed saving.”

“Where is he now?” Stephen asked.

My metal dropped to the floor with a loud bang, making everyone jump.

“Y/n?” Peter P. asked and I lowered my hood, looking straight at red eyes guy with teary eyes.

I walked closer to him, my heart thumping heavily.

“What is it? Y/n?” Tony asked.

“Peter?” I whispered to red eyes guy who stared intently at me.

His eyes widened, “Y/n?” He whispered back.

“They know each other?” Peter P. asked Tony and Stephen who shrugged, just as lost as him.

I laughed in relief and tackled him in a hug, squeezing tightly as a few stray tears left my eyes. It had been years since I had last seen him. We were eight. He disappeared right after his mother died and I never fully recovered. It had been a while, and we were only eight and it was so dumb, but I loved him so much.

“I can’t believe you’re alive.” I said to him quietly, finally letting go to look at him. “What happened to you?”

“I was literally abducted by aliens.” he said and I laughed.

“What’s going on?” Tony asked.

“I know this guy. He’s a good guy.” I told him, not providing an explanation on purpose.

Tony nodded, knowing it was pointless to pry. I would tell him when I was ready.

“Okay, have your little reunion thing, I’m gonna make a plan.” He said and walked off with Stephen. 

“So you’re telling me that after you left you literally joined a superhero team with Captain freaking America?”

I laughed, “You work with a tree! And a racoon!”

“Speaking of, I hope you and Rocket get to meet. I feel like he’d like you.”

“I hope I can meet all of your new friends.”

Peter Q. grabbed my hand, “I’ve really missed you, Y/n. You’re the reason I almost came back to Earth so many times.”

“I’ve missed you too, Peter.” I said and he leaned in slowly. My eyes flickered down to his lips as fast footsteps came towards us.

“Y/n! Help! He’s gonna kill me!” Peter P. said, out of breath as the big guy, who I now know is Drax, ran behind him. I laughed loudly before looking back at Peter Q.

“Sorry, sister from another mister duty calls, Peter Q. Gotta go save my brother.” I said and stood up, quickly pressing a kiss to Peter Q’s cheek before running after Peter P. and Drax.

Bonus

“Peter! No!” I yelled with teary eyes as Peter Q. began turning to dust. I ran up to him, placing my hand on his slowly disintegrating cheek. “No, I just got you back!” I cried.

“I love you, Y/n/n.” he whispered before disintegrating. I cried harder at the use of the nickname he gave to me when we were si

I heard the other Peter cry and desperately beg for help, I turned around quickly, running over to the other Peter who was laying down while holding tightly onto Tony.

“No, not you too.” I said, holding tightly onto his hand.

“I don’t wanna go, I don’t wanna go.” He said over and over and I shushed him through my own tears, gently pushing his hair from his face.

“Shh, it’s gonna be okay, Peter. You’re gonna be okay, alright?” I said and softly hummed him his favorite song. The notes turned into sobs as he disappeared, not paying attention as yet another person I loved disappeared, leaving only Tony, Nebula, and I. All alone.