#( i'm sorry i do so many of these they're just so fun ;;; )

[fandoms--fluff]

Hello gorgeous I love your work and I want to ask you is you cold do one more of Hayley Marshal and Mikaelson little sister were Hayley take on a walk in the stroller yn and Baby Hope but some people trait to attract them but yn kill them

Puddles

Flufftober, October 4th

Baby Mikaelson heretic sister reader x Hayley Marshall (& Hope Mikaelson)

Warnings: mentions of death?

A/n: Thank you, Love. I hope you like it!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Make sure you stay close, okay, Sweetie?" Hayley zips up your yellow jacket. "One han' on s'roller" You nod your head, looking up at the brunette hybrid.

"Yes, exactly. Good job." Hayley places a kiss on your forehead and double checks that Hope is all strapped in. Once she's certain the one year old is all secure, she goes back to the handle bars and starts walking.

You have one hand grasped onto one of the side bars of the stroller as you walk.

Hayley takes you guys down one of the paths in the local park. You jump in all the puddles you walk by, giggling as your yellow rain boots gets water splashed everywhere. But you make sure not to get any puddle water on Hayley or Hope.

The hybrid watches with a smile as you have fun. She knew you were getting restless from being kept in the abattoir for so long. So she planned this small outing for the three of you without any of the family drama for the afternoon. Nothing to worry about. And you finally get to let out some of your energy.

She wasn't sure how much more of your jumping on furniture and running around the place Elijah and Klaus could take before they snapped.

Her head snapped up from where she was looking down at a snoozing Hope. She feels someone trailing you guys. "Can you come here, Hun?" Hayley asks as if nothings wrong.

"Okay" You jump over to her and she places you on the stroller step under the stroller. "You want a snack?" She asks. "Mhm" You nod up at her, not noticing anything off.

Hayley grabs one of the baggies of goldfish out of the diaper bag and hands it to you. "Fanks" You say and open the baggie. "Your welcome" Hayley smiles as she starts to increase her walking pace.

She tries to make her way back to the abattoir to get one of your brothers or Marcel. She needs to keep you and Hope safe.

Before she knows it, you guys are surrounded by eight vampires.

You look up from your goldfish crackers when you realize you're no longer moving.

"Don't move, Hun. Please" Hayley pleads to you. You worriedly nod in compliance. Your nerves start to flare up with nervousness. You're scared. You don't know what's happening and you can tell Hayley is nervous as well.

You look back to Hope to make sure she was okay and when it's clear she's still asleep, you turn back over to face Hayley. Except she wasn't there. You turned to the side where she's fighting against two of the vampires.

One second she was taking them over before she got pinned down by a third one. And then you saw one of them advncing on Hopey. That, you couldn't let happen.

You jump up from the stroller and yell, "STOP!" A big wave of energy emits through the air and as soon as it crosses to the eight vampires, they drop dead to the ground. Veins are rising up their bodies, declaring they're dead.

Hayley Vamps up from the ground and over to you and Hope, who has been sleeping through everything. "Oh my god, are you okay, Sweetie?" She lifts you into her arms. She pulls you tight into a hug and you nuzzle your head into her chest, nodding.

"Scary" You mumble into her jacket. "Yeah, it was. I'm sorry Y/n/n." She pulled away from you a small bit and looks into your widened doe eyes. "Did you mean to do that?" She asks, referring to the many dead vampires.

"Mmm, no' exa'ly. Just happen" You shrug. "Has to keep Hopey safe" You tell her and turn to the sleeping Hope.

"Yes, and I'm grateful for that, but you have to remember not to put yourself in dangerous situations like that in the future, alright? You have to promise me" She runs her hand through your hair.

"I p'omise" You lay your head back onto her chest.

Hayley carries you with one arm while pushing the stroller with her other hand. She takes you guys back to the abattoir the quickest way possible.

"I think that was enough excitements for today" Hayley sighs as she lays Hope in her crib. You kick off your yellow boots and matching yellow rain jacket before climbing up on the chair next to the crib.

"Sleepy Hope. Nigh' nigh'" You wave to the one year old. "Yeah, good night, Hope" Hayley nods with a smile before picking you up from the chair.

"Let's go bake some cookies, huh?" She asks you after closing Hope's nursery door. "Yeah!" You exclaim, the days events behind you guys.

[sleepyseals]

[Image Description: A digital painting of a Lego Bionicle Rahkshi facing left and stooped over as if tracking its prey along the ground. The background is black with a bright green vertical shape to contrast the character in front. The Rahkshi is holding its spear in its right limb, propping its body up with it as it holds its face close to the ground. It is rendered as a black metallic material with red eyes. Its hunched shape and angular spines stand out harshly against the green background. End Image Description.]

I got a rahkshi recently and wanted to draw it so here's this - kind of an experiment with studying a real life object and how to pose it into a interesting composition and then replicating the lighting I got tired of rendering this partway through however :P

[necrotic-nephilim]

i recently remembered DickTim Week 2024 is happening very soon and i looked at the prompts again to see if i could get anything out for it and. the Hades & Persephone AU prompt for day 1 has got me really thinking so here's a vague concept i plan to write.

i've been pretty burnt out on modern Hades & Persephone retellings because of how they always seem to fall into the same generic "innocent wide-eyed girl runs from her evil mean mother into the arms of a dark mysterious man because actually she went willingly and chose to marry him" which has gotten repetitive for my tastes. (for clarity i don't care if this retelling is your cup of tea personally, so long as you're not actively trying to rewrite the original myth and claim untrue things about it, if this is your favorite flavor i sincerely hope you enjoy the buffet i just have little interest in it since it feels overdone for me and exhausted of it's supposed commentary atp)

but? but. biblically accurate Hades & Persephone AU has me all kinds of interested. because wait listen so hear me out right. Hades!Dick and Persephone!Tim, obviously. i feel it'd be more loosely inspired by with themes and imagery (though playing with death and nature powers could be interesting, i haven't decided) rather than explicitly making them gods and all. but. something dark and fucked up where Dick and Bruce are especially estranged. maybe to do with Jason's return, maybe to do with them just clashing and having their usual explosive arguments. and Bruce knows the peace needs to be kept, if he and Dick are at odds then everyone starts to pick sides and things just fracture so he needs a peace offering.

and the peace offering is Tim.

Bruce (the stand-in for Zeus) offers up Tim. agrees to have Tim move to Bludhaven and be Dick's... whatever Dick wants him to be. knowing that with the implication comes the likelihood of Dick grooming Tim. and Tim has no real say and is hesitant to put up a real fight. he doesn't want this, he knows what this is going to imply Dick will do to him, but he also knows if he says no things have the possibility to just... fall apart. so he's the unwilling bride, dragged off to the metaphorical underworld (Bludhaven) with Dick, away from his family, his friends, the life he built.

and on the flip side, i think weirdly enough, your best pick for the Demeter stand-in is *Jason*. just, hear me out on that. not necessarily on the side of it being motherly, but on Jason being just estranged enough from the Batfamily to be the one willing to call it out for being bad and wrong and raising bloody hell to get Tim back. maybe it's because Jason wants Tim for himself, maybe it's truly out of a concern for Tim to have autonomy, i'm toying with the idea of it primarily being Tim's POV and him genuinely not knowing which of these is true. (and the truth possibly ends up being a complicated middle ground) and because i like Helena, i think you can use her as the Hekate stand in, the one who strikes a tentative alliance with Jason and tries to go find Tim and bring him back. Tim stuck with Dick, getting groomed and hyperaware of it, possibly even getting fucked the whole time as well, knowing he can't go back without causing massive issues for Dick and Bruce because well, Bruce did promise him to Dick. so he has to adjust his whole life, try to figure out being a vigilante in this new city with Dick breathing down his neck the whole time.

and then much like the ending of the myth, a sort of compromise is struck that's a shaky deal for everyone involved. Tim is put on an essential timeshare, going back and forth between Gotham, where he has friends and family and a support system, then getting dragged right back to Bludhaven with Dick in this brutal cycle that he slowly gets used to and stockholm'd into even liking it. Dick isn't so bad, once he gets used to the quirks of their unbalanced 'relationship'. the sex is even something he can adjust to as well. not quite a happy ending but one that sits in this realistic grey area that becomes Tim's life.

i will write this, eventually, but i don't know if i'll get to it before DickTim Week ends so by posting the idea i'm essentially putting it out into the world so the peer pressure holds me accountable. i just. really like the potential of making Hades/Persephone AUs as fucked up as they can be simply by adhering to the source material and making it a raw story of being stolen away and forced to like this new home you didn't ask for.

also a less fleshed-out aspect of this idea i have ties into Persephone becoming the Queen of the Underworld when she's taken and how the transition from Kore to Persephone could be reflected in Tim. how he makes the best of the worst situation and becomes something far more dangerous and dark when he's in Bludhaven, possibly takes on a new vigilante name/identity and leans into the worst quirks of his personality he tries to tamper because there's no point in not going full tilt Obsessively Weird if he has no choice anyway and it being one small way he takes back his autonomy, and that inevitably making Dick *more* into him, because he gets to see Tim finally just. let loose.

[cosmic-ships]

Hey if you gloat about "stealing" f/o's from a person who doesn't like to share, I'm gonna need you to grow up and respect people's boundaries and also get the fuck away from me.

[that-was-anticlimactic]

i think it's about time that we acknowledge that, no, that character would Not change their name in a groupchat! especially not to that. and, no, that character would not change everyone else's names! especially not to that.

[sskk-manifesto]

Finally got around to watching ep 11 (´；ω；｀)

[ru5t]

@lcfthaunted //> requested.

  He's left their guest no further than just inside the door: the office directly off of the entryway at the front of the building. Di hovers near the office door, the image of her standing guard puts a strange chill in his stomach. It lingers as he puts himself to his task, going through whatever's left in the catchall - they'll need to go trading again, soon. That task sorts itself into the ever-growing list of things he has to do in the next week while his searching goes on autopilot and Jack wonders if this woman from the center of the city sees an ally or a threat in the young ex-drac standing at attention in the mouth of the warehouse. Honestly, he's not sure what he sees, there. Only that he knows the office is the best place for her for now. Too much that is precious resides in the units to play loose with strangers, and too many of his crew are too nosy for their own good to let them go stampeding in to peer and poke and probably insult. ... He allows himself a deep sigh, a soft curse aimed at the empty air over his head, then he gathers what he came for and returns to the entry. Jack dismisses Di with a casual nod over his shoulder, get outta here, and she scowls at him, but sets off for the garden anyway. She'll be back.

  He gives a light knock before pushing through the office door, announcing himself.

  The office was a nightmare when they first began settling into the haven, full of dust and who knew what else. Since then, they'd pulled up the carpet entirely, and someone -best guess said Dawn and Lith, though jack didn't know for sure- had painted a mural in its place. Bright orange and purple wildflowers in a sea of scrub grass, like what bloomed in the ridges to the north. The shelves had been pushed into a neat configuration, some covering the widows like blinds to cut the heat, and that old couch Weasel had rolled up with weeks ago finally had a place that wasn't the middle of the entryway. Even the old business counter was painted, and a few battery operated lights sat waiting there for nightfall like end table lamps. The result was a strange, colorful thing, but nice as far as ruins this far out into the desert went.

  Jack lays the bundle of clothes he'd gone digging for on the old counter. It's mostly out layers, any jackets he could find, and shirts that could go overtop of something thin and almost sheer that is decidedly not designed for the desert-- though a few genuine articles are in the mix as well. Anything he thought might fit, though he expects she's not likely to go trading anything out. Not right away. Thus, the jackets. It's always easier to borrow a jacket than lose whatever you've got, at first.

  “You'll burn if you don't cover,” he advises, and that's all he says of the state of her. But he keeps looking. Brow lightly furrowed, something reluctant stuck in the back of his teeth. He crosses his arms and leans against the counter. “I can't get you back through the wall.” Blunt, in terms of opening, but it's important there are no illusions. He can't, and his sister doesn't deal in smuggling people, and he won't suggest she start (or even bring her smuggling up at all. Not until she gets back and decides on that for herself - if this was still the situation when she did get back.) So as far as he's concerned, it's impossible. “You can stay here,” a nod at the couch, “or if you'd rather take your chances, I'm riding back to three tomorrow. There are neutral settlements, there, and maybe someone who can do what I can't. But I expect y- .. the crew from the market will be watching for that. Watching for you. I'd give it time.”

[anonyanonymouse]

🙈

[sparky-is-spiders]

Hi! I’m here suffering from lack of good Archivist!Sasha content as well 😭 On that note, do you have any fic on that topic you would recommend? Or just good Sasha fics in general, (or Jonsasha, if that’s your cup of tea)? Thank you in advance 😊

Tragically, I think there is a general dearth of good Archivist!Sasha content (and just about none of it Jonsasha content, as far as I can tell (and not only is Jonsasha my cup of tea, but the ONLY thing standing between it and the #1 OTP spot (currently occupied by JE) is the fact that the Jonsasha that I desperately crave exists in my brain and nowhere else)). Admittedly, I haven't looked very far into her tag yet (I should rectify that at some point tbh) but I've dug around the Jonsasha tag when I first got into it, and I know at least one fic where Sasha drifts towards Beholding through an interest in office gossip.

In terms of Jonsasha Ao3 has:

This very good Sasha lives fic where Jon shows up to Georgie's with an unconscious Sasha and everyone involved is very confused.

These two fics are cute also. The former is by @/suttttton and is them getting together, the latter is established Jonsasha from @/dickwheelie.

Eyevatar Sasha might actually be thinner on the ground (outside of fix-its where she solves everything and her canon reckless curiosity is completely ignored). Ao3 has:

This fic, which is Jongerry with outsider PoV Sasha. Just barely has the implication that she might be shifting towards the Eye (via prying into the lives of her coworkers) but gets a mention through sheer force of Excellent Sasha Characterization. I read this and I feel like I'm reading a fic from a Sasha Understander.

There's also this fic, which looks very promising but which I haven't actually gotten the chance to read yet, so I can't speak to its quality.

Unfortunately I've only gotten into Sasha fairly recently (especially as compared to Jon, who my brain latched onto in a deathgrip from the start), so I haven't gone through her tag yet. A scroll through the Archivist!Sasha or Beholding Avatar!Sasha tags pulls up a lot of fix-it and J//mart, which isn't really what I'm looking for from the concept. I'm sure there's more out there, and if/when I find them I'll come back to this ask probably, but I lucked into Reverse Nighthawks (I was on a Jongerry kick).

But god every day I wish that I could write romance and/or longfic, because about a year ago I read a Jonmichael fic that, when discussing alternate universes (where Jon ended the world) it's revealed that he once did an apocalypse out of love for his Archivist, Sasha James. And it was one (1) single line, but it struck me so hard because god. A perfect concept I think. The potential dynamics of Archivist!Sasha/Assistant!Jon are enthralling to me. Jon destroying the world (or helping her destroy the world? Cute date night I think: bringing about armageddon with your eldritch monster partner) for Sasha... anyway mostly I mentioned that one because My God if I have to live with that tantalizing AU rotating in the background of my mind 24/7 so do the rest of you.

[bakingmoomins]

building scientists without any ethical thought, no moral compass and zero political conscience is a huge failure on 'higher' education

[tweetsongs]

Transmigrating into the Reborn Male Lead’s Ex-Boyfriend Chapter 155 (End)

prev chapters

last chapter! i hope this helped someone out there get closure for this book. it's a silly little thing, but i'm glad i got to know how these two turned out.

-

In the end, the doctor’s assessments were around an hour slower than the system’s. But their assessments held a similar pessimism regarding the viability of Xiao Yuanmu’s treatment when they spoke to Song Xuanhe.

As the head of the clinic, Xiao Yuanmu wasn’t wasn’t allowed to hear his own prognosis. It didn’t actually matter, as even without hearing it, he knew very well what the state of his body was.

He swept his eyes past the downcast expressions on his doctors’ faces, eyes only wavering when they fell on Song Xuanhe. He waved a hand to have the doctors leave the room, and broke the heavy air that had surrounded them when he had told Song Xuanhe to return to his world.

He said: “I want to go back to China.”

Song Xuanhe’s focus had always been on Xiao Yuanmu. When he spoke, he thought about it and then said: “Okay.”

He knew Xiao Yuanmu, knew that he wasn’t the kind of person who sat around waiting for death. Whatever this person did, he was the kind of person to do it without flaw. From the time that he went back to China for his assessment, to bringing everyone he trusted to his side without stirring up suspicions, to even now, he kept the fact of his condition so tightly wrapped that it was impossible to leak.

If Xiao Yuanmu was giving up on treatment, it could only be said that he knew the limits of his own body. The treatments available with modern medicine couldn’t give him a cure, at most, it could only bring him some relief, nothing more.

Even that relief was barely possible now.

Song Xuanhe felt like his heart was being crushed, heavy and painful. It was hard to even breathe, but he was somehow able to keep his cool. 

Maybe it was because Xiao Yuanmu was the protagonist of this world, or because the system was so advanced in technology. But even now, with overwhelming worry surrounding him, he still didn’t feel scared.

More than that, he even felt some strange sort of confidence. He thought that Xiao Yuanmu would definitely not die.

If the system knew what his thoughts were, it might mock him for his superstitious ideas. But right now the system was busy searching for the reason that Xiao Yuanmu was breaking down, it had no time to look through Song Xuanhe’s thoughts.

Seeing how quickly Song Xuanhe agreed, Xiao Yuanmu looked slightly surprised. He thought that Song Xuanhe would try to stop him.

“Once you’ve rested properly, we’ll leave,” Song Xuanhe said.

“I’ve already gotten Yang Jie to book us a flight, I can rest on the flight.” Xiao Yuanmu said.

Until the flight, the two had a tacit understanding not to bring up whether or not Song Xuanhe would return to his original world after three days.

The flight would take around eleven hours. The moment they boarded the flight, Song Xuanhe pulled Xiao Yuanmu into the bedroom. The two of them laid side by side in a cot, listening to the sound of the plane taking off, neither speaking a word.

Time passed like this, seconds into minutes. Xiao Yuanmu finally couldn’t resist the exhaustion in his body and closed his eyes.

Hearing the soft breathing by his side, Song Xuanhe slowly moved his hand, gently taking Xiao Yuanmu’s cool hand into his.

In his memories, Xiao Yuanmu’s hand and his icy personality were always different, his hand was always warm and dry. Now, though, his hand carried a faint chill, and was slightly damp. It made Song Xuanhe’s heart clench.

He couldn’t resist asking the system: [Have you found a way to treat Xiao Yuanmu yet?]

The system took a moment to reply: [No, his organ failure isn’t normal. It’s not because of any disease, and it’s impossible to find the source of the failure. Also, I can’t figure it out- Xiao Yuanmu is the protagonist of this world, his body shouldn’t be failing like this. If I had to guess, I would wonder if this is perhaps the result of some previous plotline.]

Song Xuanhe’s brows furrowed. [Xiao Baicong’s kidnapping?]

[Yes,] the system replied. [This world was made from an author’s time online, and revolves around the plot and circumstances they created. Because the author never finished the book, the plot that the world is controlled by can only go up to that point. If there aren’t any mishaps, the plot of the book should only finish after two years. Xiao Yuanmu should still be the protagonist in that time, so nothing should be able to happen to his body in the meantime.]

[But the plot of the book has ended now,] Song Xuanhe’s expression suddenly changed as he continued to speak to the system. [Xiao Yuanmu is no longer the protagonist of this world.]

[...Yes.]

Seeing Song Xuanhe’s face, the system didn’t continue, letting him have some time to digest this.

It didn’t take him long to speak again: [If Xiao Yuanmu isn’t the protagonist of this world, what will happen to him?]

The system said: [You already know.]

Song Xuanhe did already know, but he couldn’t help but act like a spoilt young master again, hoping that the system would give him an answer that still carried some hope.

[Will he really die?] Song Xuanhe found it difficult to speak.

The system fell silent, then avoided his question: [You still have sixty-nine hours to think about it. You said before that you had a reason you had to go back. Since it’s a necessary reason, I hope that you think about it properly.]

[Is that your answer for me, then?]

The system didn’t answer, and Song Xuanhe fell silent as well.

In this silence, he felt in the bottom of his heart a drop of despair begin to spread.

Before this, he had always thought that Xiao Yuanmu’s protagonist halo would help protect him. No matter how difficult the situation was, he never thought that it would turn that severe, since the world would always force things back on track. This time, since the world’s protagonist had an issue, the world would of course step in to save him.

But the system told him that Xiao Yuanmu was not the protagonist of this world anymore.

Now he was just like any other of the infinite beings on this planet, the world no longer cares whether he lives or dies. The world will treat him like any other being, allowing him to pass through the cycle youth, old age, illness, and death without care as if he were a being no more remarkable than dust, no more individual than an ant.

[Xiao Yuanmu is awake.]

The system’s voice pulled Song Xuanhe out of his own mind. His eyelashes shook for a moment as he pulled out his cell phone. The plane had entered the Chinese border, and the time zone had switched to this timezone as well. It was 10:50PM, and after half an hour they would be landing.

Song Xuanhe’s eyes were on his phone, his mind unable to untangle the mess of thoughts within. He hadn’t decided what to do yet.

Xiao Yuanmu grabbed the back of his neck and pulled him downwards, his lips turning upwards to fill them. He easily opened Song Xuanhe’s jaw, pressing into his mouth to make his claim. He alternated between passion and sweetness, leaving no corner of his mouth unexplored.

“Good morning.” Xiao Yuanmu let go of him, the corner of his lip turning upwards, a soft smile on his face.

Song Xuanhe looked at him dazedly, expression open as if everything were normal. After a pause, he replied: “It’s not morning right now, but. Good morning.”

He bit at Xiao Yuanmu’s lips again before speaking: “We’ll be landing soon. Put on your seatbelt.”

Xiao Yuanmu thought about how meticulous Song Xuanhe was about checking their seatbelts every time they drove and laughed a little, fastening his own seatbelt.

The plane landed steadily. Because it was already late, they didn’t contact anyone else, and directly went back to their previous residence.

Even though nobody had lived there in some time, there were still people who came over every few days to clean and lock up. When they returned, all they needed to do was change the sheets and they could go to sleep.

It was Song Xuanhe’s first time changing a duvet, and he stared at the zipper of the duvet cover for a long time before finally carefully replacing it, focusing with single-minded intent on the task.

Xiao Yuanmu watched him from the door, lips curling unconsciously into a smile.

“Let me.”

Xiao Yuanmu walked up to Song Xuanhe’s side and took the duvet from his hand. While tidying out the duvet that was being messily stuffed into the cover, he also taught Song Xuanhe: “You have to air out the duvet first, and then make sure that the four corners-”

Song Xuanhe listened to him intently, seeing how Xiao Yuanmu managed to neatly make the duvet in under half a minute.

Comparing the two of them felt embarrassing.

“This was my first try, wait ‘till I’ve practiced a bit more.” He said stubbornly. “Then we can have a duvet-stuffing contest, and whoever loses will have to listen to whatever the winner says.”

Xiao Yuanmu laughed and asked: “How much time do you need to practice before this contest?”

“At least three to five years, otherwise it’s unfair...” After he spoke, Song Xuanhe fell silent. Xiao Yuanmu’s smile dimmed a bit.

Looking at Xiao Yuanmu’s darkening eyes, he said: “Xiao Yuanmu, you will definitely be okay. Believe in me.”

Xiao Yuanmu lifted his eyes to meet his, curling his shaking hand into a fist. He made a soft sound of agreement.

“Well, now that the sheets are done being changed, we can go to bed,” Song Xuanhe said. “Or are you not tired anymore after sleeping for too long on our flight?”

“Let’s go to sleep,” Xiao Yuanmu changed into his pajamas and said. “I want to watch you sleep.”

Song Xuanhe suddenly walked forwards until he hit Xiao Yuanmu, beginning to peel open his pajamas. “Since you’re not tired, why don’t we do something else instead?”

-

For the next two days, Xiao Yuanmu and Song Xuanhe had congee together and went to visit the orphanage, went to visit the Song household to visit Li Nianan, visited Song Xuanlin, called up Xiao Shenglin and the others for a gathering, took the orphanage children to the playground together...

Time passed quickly, until it was down to the final three hours before Song Xuanhe had to make his decision about whether or not to return to his world. Up until then, the system still hadn’t given him any information on how to treat Xiao Yuanmu.

Xiao Yuanmu had long since given up, but Song Xuanhe refused to.

Until the system said to him: [I know why Xiao Yuanmu’s body is breaking down.]

[Xiao Yuanmu’s physical breakdown is not because of something happening to his body, it’s an issue with his soul...] the system said. [He said before that he had already been reborn twice. Maybe it’s this that wore down his soul, making it begin to break down. As his soul breaks down, so will his body. There’s virtually no way of stopping it.]

Song Xuanhe lifted his head to look outside at the night sky, bright with stars. With no change in expression, he asked: [You said ‘virtually’. That means that there’s still hope, right?]

 [Yes, the soul-replenishment elixir,] the system said. [From the System Miracle Store. If you choose to stay here, you can get it in exchange.]

Song Xuanhe’s eyes lit up, and he began to speak when the system cut him off. [However, the things from the System Miracle Store only work for you.]

[What do you mean?]

[The soul-replenishment elixir can only be given to you.]

Song Xuanhe’s eyes dimmed a little. The hope that he had been using all his might to hold onto these past few days began to break down, and he felt frustration and exhaustion well up in his heart. [Then what use is it?]

[You’re the system, it’s your store, isn’t there a way to bring the elixir out?] Song Xuanhe asked. [I still have two opportunities to ask for help, and a rebirth pass. If I give them all to you, can you give the soul-replenishment elixir to Xiao Yuanmu?]

[I can’t...] the system said. [I exist in your mind, I can only make exchanges with you. Those are the rules.]

Song Xuanhe fell silent for a few seconds, then his eyes lit up again. [You said before that you’ve crossed hosts before, right? That means you can enter someone else’s body. You can enter Xiao Yuanmu’s body and give him the elixir, right?]

[In theory, that’s right.] the system said. [But I can only enter someone’s body when I have a mission order. That would be against system regulations. Also, while I’m still bound to you, I can’t leave your body for someone else.]

[But after you and I unbind...]

After beginning to speak, Song Xuanhe stopped himself. The system had told him before what the consequences of breaking system regulations were. All beings had a fear of being annihilated. Just because it was a system, it wasn’t as if he could tell it to sacrifice itself to save Xiao Yuanmu.

[I saw a life conversion device in the System Miracle Store, what is that?]

The system didn’t want to answer, but felt compelled to. [It allows one person to extract their life force and give it to another person. But there are serious side effects. The person extracting their life force will feel extreme pain from the exchange process’ effects on their soul, and afterwards their body will also be much weaker.]

[If I gave my life force to Xiao Yuanmu, will he be able to live?]

The system was silent for a long moment. [Yes.]

[I will exchange for the life conversion device.] A smile floated onto Song Xuanhe’s face, and he said confidently: [Once my time in this world is over, let me exchange for it.]

The system didn’t answer, but Song Xuanhe took his silence as a tacit agreement.

He turned his smiling face to look at Xiao Yuanhe. When he saw the other’s sleeping face, his smile dimmed for a moment. He reached out and cupped his forehead gently, smile growing deeper.

He knew that there would be a way to save Xiao Yuanmu.

Xiao Yuanmu’s sleep was very light. When Song Xuanhe’s hand touched him, he woke up. 

He was lying on Song Xuanhe’s leg, and his eyes met a smiling expression that seemed to suddenly be relieved of a heavy burden. An idea began to rise from the bottom of his heart against better reason, though he found it hard to believe.

“You’re awake?” Song Xuanhe quickly noticed Xiao Yuanmu waking up. He lowered his head and said: “Do you want to sleep a little more?”

“It’s fine,” Xiao Yuanmu sat up, looking at his watch. “I’ll sleep after you leave.”

Song Xuanhe raised an eyebrow. “Then I’m afraid you’ll be waiting a long time before you sleep again.”

Xiao Yuanmu’s face was calm as he spoke: “You promised me before that you’d return to your own world.”

Song Xuanhe blinked, lips tugging upwards. “But that was on the premise that there was no saving you.”

Xiao Yuanmu paused, unable to hide the astonishment on his face. Looking at Song Xuanhe, he couldn’t bring himself to ask the question.

“You can be saved,” Song Xuanhe had never seen such clear astonishment on Xiao Yuanmu’s face before, and he couldn’t help laughing out loud at the sight. He reached a hand out to his shoulder, pulling him in by the back of his neck into an embrace as he said: “I told you there was a way to save you, so I will save you.”

“How?” Xiao Yuanmu lowered his hand, pushed down his astonishment until his face was calm again.

“My system found a way,” Song Xuanhe said. “If I stay in this world, I can make a trade for an item in the system store. Before, I couldn’t see what was in the store, but this morning I saw something-”

Song Xuanhe tried to dramatize the climax of his story, but Xiao Yuanmu’s face wasn’t impressed at all, only grew colder.

“The soul-replenishment elixir,” Song Xuanhe said, clicking his tongue. “Your organ failure was because of damage to your soul, and the damage to your soul was because of your rebirths. That’s why the doctors in this world weren’t able to cure it. But with the soul-replenishment elixir, we can fix the damage that your rebirths did to your soul.”

Xiao Yuanmu’s pupils shook. He was usually quick to react, but this time he couldn’t get his mind around what was being said. Song Xuanhe’s words were simple and easy to understand, but he found it difficult to believe him. He had already convinced himself so thoroughly of his inevitable future, and yet that inevitability was being shattered so easily.

“What’s the price you need to pay?”

Song Xuanhe pursed his lips, seeing the way that Xiao Yuanmu tensed nervously on top of him, and couldn’t help but let out a giggle. He said: “Before, I haggled three opportunities to ask for help out of the system, but I only used one. The soul-replenishment elixir is in exchange for me not returning to my world, and the other two opportunities for help. If we don’t count me not returning to my world, it barely costs anything.”

Song Xuanhe had always been good at scamming people. Xiao Yuanmu knew this, but he still was never able to find his true intentions from his eyes. It was the same this time, he couldn’t tell if Song Xuanhe was lying or not.

He wanted to believe it was true, he wanted so badly to selfishly be with Song Xuanhe for more days, more weeks. Even a few more hours would be enough.

But if it wasn’t true, then the consequences would be that Song Xuanhe would be trapped forever in a world that he had said he didn’t feel like he belonged in.

He couldn’t do that to him.

“You don’t believe me?” Song Xuanhe’s brows knitted together.

Xiao Yuanmu’s lips shook, then he said: “I’m just scared.”

“I’m afraid of you loving me more,” he pulled him into an embrace. “Afraid that you’ll be alone afterwards.”

Song Xuanhe’s eyes looked blank for a moment, then turned red. His throat moved, then he pushed Xiao Yuanmu away to say: “It’s going to be time soon. You’ll be able to know soon. We don’t just have these few moments. We still have days, months, years.”

“Z48,” Song Xuanhe laughed, and then spoke: “I have to thank you for taking care of me for all this time. I haven’t said it before, but I’m glad I met you. I’m also glad that you took me to this world. Even though we’ll be saying goodbye now, I’ll definitely remember you. Let’s do this.”

Xiao Yuanmu’s body was one long line of tension, staring at Song Xuanhe. It didn’t seem like anything was happening to Song Xuanhe, but he could feel his weak body beginning to feel a little stronger, his shaking limbs becoming steady again, his fuzzy mind clearing slightly, the pain in his body beginning to lift...

Not three minutes later, he could feel that his body was healthy again. And Song Xuanhe was still beside him.

He couldn’t believe it, it was actually true.

He grabbed Song Xuanhe’s hand, his clear voice becoming hoarse as an uncharacteristic quiver entered his voice: “You’re still here.”

Song Xuanhe’s eyes turned up. “Of course I’m still here.”

As he spoke, his face stilled as he felt something move in his mind, he immediately recognized that it was something moving out of his consciousness at last. He quickly said in his mind: [Thank you, Z48.]

[No thanks necessary,] the system’s voice had a smile in it. Its presence being removed from his mind felt weaker. [Goodbye.]

Song Xuanhe paused, said: [Don’t you need to extract my life force?]

He hadn’t felt any sort of pain up until now, and couldn’t feel his body becoming weaker. Actually, apart from the feeling of the system leaving his mind, he couldn’t feel much of anything at all.

[It’s already been extracted,] Maybe it was because of the extraction process, but the system’s voice became weaker and weaker. [I haven’t said it yet, but meeting you was the happiest thing to happen to me. My greatest wish is for you to be happy. In the future, you have to be happy, and brave...]

The system didn’t finish its words before dissipating. Song Xuanhe blinked and lifted his gaze to the stars outside. A gap he had always felt in his heart was gently being filled.

“I love you.”

Xiao Yuanmu pulled him closer, covering his lips. His eyes were full of love, and a happiness that he would never get sick of.

Song Xuanhe pulled himself back, heart full of relief and joy. He tilted Xiao Yuanmu’s jaw up, bringing himself into the moment. “I love you too.”

In the sky, a softly shining star lit up for a moment, then gently became lost in a sea of constellations.

[automatonknight]

i <3 2fort forever yay ^__^

[cherubchoirs]

I am utterly in love with how you draw v1. The personality you gave it is such a Thing, and i cannot explain it in words, but it really shines with the way you pose and color, and its fantastic

V1 simultaneously looks like it has a very gory imagery in its mind and no thoughts at all at any given point. Its a dinosaur to me. A very bloodthirsty rooster that's armed with several guns. Mental illness personified

Love it

ouuuughhh thank you!! i have. such a specific idea of how fucked up v1 is in my head so i’m glad to hear it’s translating exactly like i imagine in my pieces. its movements are very bird/velociraptor-like, leaned forward and flicking its head around quickly to fully observe its environment (until it locks onto a target and the gyro stabilizes its eye). it’s curious and likes to explore, but only because it wants to find as much blood as possible or fuck with things as enrichment. internally, it’s a major mess - its software stopped getting updates when v2 was prototyped and it’s only gone massively downhill from there because it has no way of patching itself. i’m not sure how advanced the ai is meant to be in supreme machines, but v1 does seem to have thoughts and a personality (it made hank AND kept that joke going later, plus...while i know its a feature in every fps ever, i still like the idea of v1 specifically choosing to color its weapons), so i think of it as intelligent. it’s just also completely unhinged because of how buggy its code is, and its thoughts basically have three major flavors: Violence, fucking around (to find out), and static. it’s hard for me to fully describe its personality because it really is A Creature but it’s also smart and self-aware, it’s a blood-fueled war machine but it’s got mental illnesses we can’t even fathom. so it’s gotten a more complex personality than it was ever intended to have, but it’s only served it to become even more of a menace (i can’t...stop thinking of the style meter as something v1 thought up to have more “fun” and “play” with while getting blood). it walks all wrong (it’s supposed to stand like a human, it hardly ever does at this point), it’s constantly flicking a coin (that particular loop of code is very broken), and it’s thinking far outside its parameters. it’s really just the most fucked up little guy imaginable tearing through hell with its skill and sheer unpredictability (how can the enemies know what it’s gonna do if IT doesn’t knows what it’s gonna do???? it’s never gonna be stopped at this rate!!!)

[tarakau]

.

[that-was-anticlimactic]

just got in an argument with my mom and sister because they said that comedians making offensive jokes are funny because “they’re not talking about a specific person, you just don’t have to take it personally” like HELLO??? i used an example with ts since, you know, i have ts and they were like “i’d laugh at a ts joke because they’d be joking about the stereotype” like yOU DO SEE HOW THAT’S EXACTLY THE ISSUE, RIGHT??? and i said that there’s a difference between Me making ts jokes and someone who Doesn’t have ts making ts jokes because 1. mine are actually funny aND TRUE 2. coping 3. I’M NOT MOCKING TS like God

comedians aren’t funny and if you need to insult other people to Be funny then you were never funny to begin with UGH