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[fivewholeminutes]

HEY LOOK I BLINKED AND IT'S ANOTHER WEEKEND ALREADY time is an illusion which hates me

Y'all i love u not ignoring u, just having a busy weekend, but i am kissing on the mouth everyone who sent me an ask lately 🥺

[shreddedparchment]

A Wife for Thor Pt.22

Obstacle

04/08/2021

Pairing: King!Thor x Reader          Word Count: 5,413

Warnings: angst, jealousy, marital problems, pregnancy, allusions to cheating (no actual infidelity), fluff, smug Loki

A/N: It took me SO long to get this chapter down. I wrote literally like a few sentence a day for a bit and then finally got some good chunks out. This has been a tough week but this chapter makes it all worth it! I hope y’all think so too. A lot of good stuff happens in this chapter, as in stuff that I really like. If you happen to reblog, thanks so much for helping me spread my work!

Please DO NOT repost my stories on any other sites or blogs.

REBLOGS are always welcome!

The shuffle around the palace as Loki escorts you through the front gate is overwhelming.

It’s safe to say that judging by your reception when you’d shown up in Heimdall’s tower located on the far side of the city, the Asgardians are happy to see you.

Armod is also happy to see you and you rush to get into your car before you can get swarmed by eager Asgardians.

Loki joins you in the back seat and lets Armod gush over his happiness at seeing you back home and healthy. And pregnant! More than anything, the people are happy to see the swell of your belly.

Many of the women are crying as you step out of the car at the palace gate, the men cheering enthusiastically.

Some of the children have found flower petals to throw into the air and it rains white, pink, and yellow blossoms.

It's the small waving hand of a little girl with ebony floor length braids that tugs too hard on your heartstrings and you give in to your impulse.

“Armod, stop the car, I’d like to greet the people,” you ask, swayed further by the eager faces of the young girl's siblings who flank her..

As much as being Queen had come unexpectedly and as much work as it's been, loving the Asgardians has never been a challenge and you've missed your people.

Their kindness has always been the best part of your day.

Armod gives Loki a quick look but stops the car just as the palace gates are opening.

He pulls over to the side, putting it in park before hurrying out to open the door for you.

“Are you sure?” Loki checks, reaching over to place his hand over yours on the seat.

“Of course. I owe them this. I’ve been gone for so long.”

“If you’d rather go in, we can find an excuse.”

“Loki,” you laugh once. “Is something wrong? Is there a reason I shouldn’t get out of the car?”

“Not at all,” he assures you. “I just don’t want you to force yourself. I know this pregnancy hasn’t exactly been easy on you.”

“I’m okay. And I’m sure they wanna see the proof that they have an heir coming. Really, Loki, I don't mind.”

Loki sighs, but gets out quickly to move around and take Armod’s place and offer you his arm.

Taking it, you pull yourself out, and after a long moment to steady yourself on your feet, you turn to face your people.

A large number of Valkyries suddenly pour from the open palace gateway and you wait as they line themselves in front of the gathering crowd. A simple border of control to keep you safe.

The people don’t seem threatened by the guard either and they continue to cheer until you raise your hand and call them to silence.

It only takes a few seconds for the noise to die, leaving only the ambient sounds of the city, wind, and the shuffling feet as more Asgardians and visiting humans gather.

“Hello,” you begin, voice a little shaky from nerves. “I’m...I-I’d like to start by first apologizing for disappearing. And then for being gone so long.”

The people watch and listen attentively, hanging on your every word. As your hands drop down to your belly to stroke it anxiously out of habit, their eyes are drawn to it and they seem to rattle with excitement again.

Looking down at your tummy, you contemplate the little one inside and the kicks he gave you earlier in the day.

He's really in there.

“It’s been a long journey to do what’s been expected of me. Difficult, actually. Giving you and Thor what we’ve all been hoping for is a privilege though. It's important that you all know that.

"However, I'm not as strong as all of you. I'm not as resilient. As soon as I knew that I was expecting the future prince or princess of New Asgard, I knew that I had to take precautions. I had to stop thinking like your Queen and just for a while, think like a mom. I told Thor that I wanted to take some time away from my duties as Queen if only to make sure that my pregnancy would take. In order to ensure the health of this baby.

“Im so very sorry if I caused any of you any worry or pain by disappearing. That was never my intention and it makes me...I can only say that I'm sorry. I hope that you all can understand why I left. The The thing is I’m happy to say that my efforts weren't wasted, clearly."

There's a rumble of gentle laughter that flows through the crowd and breaks the slightly somber mood your speech is causing. You give them a smile and they smile back.

"And while that does make me very happy, it has not been easy to carry this baby. I have been sick and weak but after some rest I'm now feeling stronger than ever. With the constant and careful care provided by Doctors Wilson and Alric, I’m finally able to resume my duties as Queen with the knowledge that this baby is strong and healthy and my body can take the strain of bringing him-or her into this world.

“I’m so happy to be back among my people, my home. You all are my family and it fills me with such joy to know that I have made you all proud.”

The people cheer, more and more gathering along the street so that it’s now clogged and impassable. Others have taken to peeking out of windows from the surrounding buildings or finding balconies and roofs to stand on to get a better look at you.

Their excitement changes to trepidation at the look on your face as you realize that now is the perfect time to address what happened yesterday.

They’re so attuned to your mood that they quiet down again and wait nervously for you to speak.

"On a more serious note, I know that many of you must have been shocked by the lies spewed onto the pages of the Watch. And I'd like to be as clear as I possibly can about my absence from the palace.

"I only left because of the concern I had for our future prince or princess. There was absolutely no other reason for my absence in our great city. While it is true that something did happen between Thor, Jane, and myself--well, I will only say that now I know that His Majesty the King of Asgard is wholly devoted to me and our family, just as he has been from the moment he accepted me as his wife.

"Not that I ever doubted it," you lie. No one needs to know how bad things are and it is true that now you know Thor is devoted to you.

So, it's not completely a lie.

"As a people," you continue. "We'll need to be vigilant about the people we choose to trust to come into our homes. We will be more cautious now, and as a woman…"

You swallow hard, thinking about the words itching on the tip of your tongue to tumble forward and make your heart clear. Maybe it's not right to say it? Maybe it isn't the queenly thing to do?

You don't care.

"As a wife and a soon-to-be mother, I will say that Doctor Jane Foster is not welcome in my home. She has proven to be unworthy of the trust we placed in her and while her expertise is an invaluable commodity that I am sad to lose, I would rather have the second best than risk the stability of my family."

To your surprise, there are a flutter of approving nods and smiles, wives and husband's looking scandalized by the confirmation that something went down but clearly it was Thor that had Jane kicked out. A few cheers come but they quiet down quickly.

"My love for His Majesty is unwavering. As is his for me. No marriage can be without it's struggles but Thor and I are as united as we have ever been. Both in love, devotion, to each other and you, our people. Together we will strive to protect this kingdom to the best of our abilities and with this child, I hope we can begin to lay down proper roots for us so that everyone on Earth will know that New Asgard is here to stay."

The crowd cheers. It's deafening and your hands are trembling so terribly even clenched into fists they shake.

"LONG LIVE THE QUEEN!" someone shouts and the others fall into the chant as it's picked up by what sounds like everyone in the crowd.

A cool hand presses against the center of your back and you lean towards him as he whispers in your ear.

"That was beautifully done, Y/N," Loki admires. "Now come along. You need your rest."

You cradle your bump and the crowd cheers louder as you wave while Loki leads you back into the car.

As it pulls away from the curb, the Valkyrie turn to follow behind you. Faces full of stern pride. Their gleaming armor shining bright in the late afternoon sun.

The large wooden and steel reinforced gates of the palace close with a thundering clatter and you lean back, heart suddenly clenching painfully. Your stomach turns and you feel like you might throw up.

You shut your eyes and open the window allowing the cooling air to help drive your nausea away.

"Y/N? You alright?" Loki checks, putting his hand on your arm.

"I'm fine," you assure him, unwilling to open your eyes.

"Are you sure? Only, you're looking a little green."

That doesn't actually happen does it? Do people look green when they're gonna throw up?

You assume he's exaggerating, but as the last bit of the swirl in your belly passes, you look at him with fearful eyes.

"I'm nervous," you admit.

"To see Thor?"

"Mm," you nod.

"He's missed you. He will probably try and hug you. Might even kiss you."

"I don't know if I can handle that, Loki."

"You'll have to. The guards around the palace are sworn to secrecy about anything that happens in here, but with the amount of information that magazine was able to get we're pretty sure there's a mole amongst our number."

You look away from him, frowning because the last thing you want is to hug and kiss Thor.

Well, that is, you really want to do those things. Which is why you shouldn't. Not until you can be around him with some kind of rational thought and control over your feelings.

You need to get a grip and come to terms with the reality of your situation before you can let yourself love hum.

You have to protect yourself.

It turns out that you have nothing to worry about.

Estrid who had come before you with your things is there to greet you. A few others of the palace staff come to see you and you're welcome back with fondness.

Because you know you have to play the part, you look for him.

"His Majesty had a sudden summons from the Lady Sif and the Warriors Three, my Queen. He apologizes for missing your arrival but he's had the small dining room filled with all of your favorites.

"When you are finished with dinner, he has asked that you wait for him in his study."

Estrid's tone tells you she's wary for you. She wants to make sure you're okay.

The disappointment you feel gives you away not only to yourself, but everyone there to see your face fall as you caress your belly.

"A blessing in disguise?" Loki suggests in your ear for just you, but the smile on his lips says he knows better.

"He'll be back before it gets too late, Your Majesty," Estrid assures you, trying to soothe your sadness. "He promised. There’s nothing more he wants than to see you."

"I know," you smile at her, then the others before you head for the dining room, your stomach grumbling in anticipation of the foods you know are waiting.

~~~~~~~~~~

Waiting is torture. You keep trying to read your book but your attention is pulled back to the door of Thor’s study every few seconds.

You groan, dropping the book onto the desk before throwing your head back with scrunched up eyes.

How is it possible to be desperate to see someone while also dreading it?

It feels like you'll die if you don't lay eyes on Thor but also like it'll tear you to shreds if you do. There's no winning here.

You gasp as the door opens and get to your feet in the same breath.

Thor's body is rising and falling heavily with his own labored breathing. He'd been running.

To get to you? No. You can't be swayed.

"I'm here."

His declaration is soft but heavy with meaning. More than just him announcing his arrival.

"Oh, aren't you a vision," he gushes.

"Hi," you whisper, only because you can't catch your breath.

He's wearing jeans, a plain black t-shirt stretched across his bulging chest. He's even more massive than you remember. Three months away has deprived you so fully that suddenly being in his presence leaves you hungry for him.

You want him so much.

"I've missed you, desperately," he confesses. "May I greet you properly?"

You frown, so undecided.

"Or not," Thor relents. "Forgive me, I just got caught up in the moment."

Why is this so hard?

You want to feel him.

"You can greet our baby properly," you give in.

A big part of you needs to feel him and this is the only way you can give in and feel like you're still doing your best to hold strong in your resolve to get some distance.

Thor’s eye lights up and quickly finds the swell of your tummy with recognition.

"Really?"

"I will never keep you from our baby, Thor. Even if I'm not ready for things to go back to normal between us just yet."

Thor takes a half step towards you and watches you carefully for any indication that you're not comfortable with his proximity.

You sigh, head tilted to the left slightly before you hold out your hand to him, beckoning him closer.

In three long strides Thor takes your hand and stops when he's only a foot away.

"Here," you gasp.

Your heart is in overdrive. Thor’s touch is doing things to your body. There's an initial rush of butterflies in your stomach and quickly you pull Thor’s hands to the spots where your baby is kicking in response.

Thor’s body freezes. He goes rigid. He even stops breathing.

For a moment you begin to worry that maybe you've broken him, until he suddenly drops to his knees.

He swallows hard, eyes pooling as he stares at the swell of your stomach as the baby continues to kick.

“They’re really in there,” he’s so choked up about it that his voice cracks around the words.

As he speaks, the baby kicks more.

Thor laughs but then leans in to kiss your stomach over the fabric of your dress.

“We really made her,” Thor gushes.

“Her?”

He looks up at you, confused for a second before he smiles wide, “Or him. It doesn’t matter. What matters is our baby is coming.”

Your heart swells, and you’re so happy that you could float away like a hot air balloon with the warmth flooding your limbs.

This is the moment you’d dreamt of. This is the moment that had been stolen from you by Jane and her lies. This is the moment that you and Thor had both been yearning for.

He’s so caught up in it, floating through the glow of this perfect moment that he presses his lips to your tummy again two more times before he’s rising, his hand hooked behind your neck as he meets your lips as he gets to his feet.

You’re so unprepared for it, so utterly lost in this sweet exchange between him and your baby that your lips pucker on their own.

He opens his eye and yours, already open, stare into his. He looks slightly shocked to find himself kissing you but he doesn’t stop.

Instead, his expression shifts into a pained look of desire. He pulls back, his hand dropping to grip your bicep.

“I would say that I’m sorry but I have been wanting to kiss you since the moment I left you three months ago.”

You say nothing, watching him, listening. You’re searching your soul to see if this is okay with you because it feels okay. Despite the sirens blaring in your mind about the restrictions you’d set for yourself when you’d decided to come back home, your body is telling you it needs this. Your heart is painfully aching at Thor’s touch.

You’ve missed it. You’ve missed him. 

“Is this alright? I can go.”

The idea of him going now feels like the end of the world. Rationally, you know that isn’t an appropriate response to his offering to leave you be, especially when you know you asked him for space for specific reasons.

“No,” your hands grip the sides of his t-shirt tightly, holding him in place without any actual strength since compared to him, you’re as mighty as a little mouse.

You refuse to look up at him, despite the crumbling of your resolve.

“No, don’t go.”

It’s an almost involuntary shy response to your diminishing shame at losing all control after his touch. After one kiss. You should be disappointed in yourself. And part of you is. However, that part of you grows increasingly small as Thor gently takes hold of your chin and guides your gaze up until you can meet his.

“I’m sorry, cherub. I will try and be worthy of you again.”

“I know,” you admit, knowing how sorry he’s been from the moment he realized that he’d done something that hurt you badly. “I know you are.”

“Can I kiss you, cherub?”

His voice is so deep, so alluring and coaxing that you drop your gaze again, fixing it on his collarbone before slowly you nod.

His arm winds its way around your waist and he pulls you to him before dipping down and catching your lips with his again.

He pulls away after a second because the swell of your belly gets in the way, but he laughs and looks down at it.

The pleasant sound of his happiness gives you too much joy.

As you begin to smile, Thor reaches down to press one hand to the side of your stomach while he pulls you against him again and kisses you this time with more fervor.

The longer he has his lips pressed to yours, the more enthusiastic he gets until finally you’re breathless and you pull back but instead of pulling away, you wrap your arms around him and fist the back of his t-shirt,

You bury your face against his wide chest and Thor brings his hands back up to caress the sides of your face, his lips kissing the top of your head.

“I know I may not have a right to say this, but thank you for coming home. Thank you for coming back to me. I thought I’d lost you."

His arms grow a little tighter, his heart is in an absolute stampede.

You turn your head sideways so that you can listen to his heartbeat.

"This is what I'd wanted," you whimper, starting to be overcome with the emotion of being reunited with Thor and things falling into place more easily. "This is how I'd wanted us to share this moment."

Thor sighs heavily, giving you one more squeeze before he pushes you back a little so that he can look at you.

“I’m so sorry that I robbed you of that. I was a fool,” he nods, his eye intense as he stares into yours with wordless declarations piercing into you.

The memory of your speech with the people when you arrived pops into your head and now with Thor’s arms around you it all feels a little like an overreaction. The past three months feels like a distant nightmare.

Or does this feel like a dream?

“Thor,” you begin but Thor’s lips are on you again, drowning out your words.

“Oh, to hear you say my name,” he declares and kisses you again.

Your mouth opens for him and you absolutely melt against his chest as he nearly dips you in passion.

He pulls back again, “Is this real?”

He kisses you.

“You feel so good in my arms.”

He kisses you.

“Your skin is so…” but then he hums and kisses you.

He dips down and with his arms tight around your waist but also careful with the swell of your stomach, he lifts you so that you’re level with his eye.

“I love you, so much, my cherub. Thank you, thank you for coming home. Thank you.”

“I’m sorry I stayed away,” you sigh. “I need to be strong without you, Thor. I was hurt but I never stopped loving you.”

His face goes through shame, understanding, and then elation.

In a burst of subdued anger and aggression for what he put you through, you reach up and grab his shoulder. You dig your fingers in against the taut muscle then reach up to pull one of his ears.

You’re clearly not hurting him but he allows you to move his head, understanding the need to express your anger even if you’re not doing any damage.

“Never do that to me again,” you growl. “Never say that you’ll leave me. Why would you say that? Even in passing? You were so damn sure.”

“No, Y/N, I wasn’t. The moment I saw you, I knew that I could never leave you. I’m sorry. I could never even think those thoughts again.”

“You better not, or I won’t come back next time. I’ll disappear and you’ll never see me again.”

Thor takes your threat for what it is. A promise. Truth.

He shakes his head as he leans forward to press his forehead to yours, shutting his eye.

“I swear,” he begins. “On my life.”

He keeps you there, hovering over the ground with your heads together for a few minutes before he slowly lowers you to the ground. You realize it’s because he wants to stroke your belly and you take a slight step back so that he can.

He smiles, happy. It reminds you of the look your people had when you’d arrived only a hundred times as possessive and joyful.

Again, your speech intrudes on your reunion and this time, you won’t let him distract you.

“Thor,” you coax, placing your hands over his where they rest on the sides of your stomach.

“Yes, my cherub?”

He’s excessive in the affection he puts in his voice but you know that he must be floating on cloud nine after what you both went through when you made him leave you at your house.

“I-I did something and I’m not sure if it was right of me to do it,” you watch his brow wrinkle and for a split second you almost lose yourself in the beauty of his face.

Has he always been this handsome?

“When I got back I kinda made a speech? Everyone was so happy to see me and to see me carrying our heir and I wanted to apologize to them for leaving and for making them worry. I wanted to share in their excitement for the baby and with that stupid tabloid having come out yesterday-”

“Right, the article,” there’s guilt in his voice despite there being no truth to the rumors it printed.

“I wanted to put their minds at ease and I...I did confirm that something happened with Jane but not what they were thinking.”

Thor’s expression hardens just a tad and he pulls backs towards a large armchair. He grabs your hand though and pulls you along with him until he can sit and then carefully attempts to offer you his lap, unsure if you’ll sit.

You do, because you’re tired and because you’re not eager to be away from him again. Now that you’re touching him, you’re not in a hurry to change that again.

“What did you say exactly?”

Swallowing hard, you lick your lips nervously, “Um...I told them the truth. Not exactly the truth, but enough of it that they’ll understand that Jane isn’t welcome here. I said that the only reason I left is for my health and the health of the baby, which is true. I didn’t want them to worry about us because even if we didn’t reconcile, I want us to be united for them at least.

“But I don’t trust Jane, Thor. Not after what she did. Not after how she treated me when you weren’t looking, and the people need to know that I will protect them from anyone, no matter who they are to you or me.”

Thor’s face grows pained as you speak, his arm wrapping around your waist as his other hand caresses the side of your stomach. You’re starting to realize that it’s going to be hard to get his hands off it, but that doesn’t seem like a terrible problem.

“I wish you had told me that she’d been rude to you,” Thor sighs, taking his hand off of his stomach to stroke your cheek. “If I had known-”

“She wasn’t rude to me Thor, she dismissed me. I wasn’t even worth acknowledging to her and now I know it’s because she was jealous and wanted you back because what? She saw what we had together and suddenly it was good enough for her?

“I was in her way. That’s all I was. Even if in the end she couldn’t go through with it whether it was because she felt guilty for doing this to us or for lying or for having second thoughts and knowing that she doesn’t want to be Queen or a mom, she’s a bad person to me. And I have every right to protect myself, my baby, and our marriage from her. She’s not welcome here Thor. I never want to see her again. Ever.”

He’s cradling you now, holding you close because the intensity with which you're telling him that Jane is not welcome in your home is transferring to him.

“And if you’d known, you wouldn’t have done anything, Thor. You’d probably have talked to her and asked her what was going on and she would have lied to you and you would have believed her.”

He doesn’t deny it. He does look like it hurts him to know that you know though. That’s enough for you.

“I think it took her lying and doing this to us to make you see what she’s capable of.”

Thor shuts his eye, resting his head against your chest as he wraps his arms around you again.

“I’m sorry.”

“I know you are, Thor. But you weren’t the one who lied. I mean, you didn’t tell me what was happening, but you weren’t the reason that this happened. If Jane hadn’t lied-”

“But she did,” Thor says, his deep voice anguished. “And I failed to honor my vows. You are my Queen and I should have come to you the moment she told me she was pregnant.”

You both fall into silence as you reach over to stroke his bicep. His skin is so soft. Touching it gives you comfort in a way you weren’t aware you needed. The more you touch it the more you need to feel it.

A finger stroking his skin turns into two, then four, then your entire hand is running up under the sleeve of his t-shirt.

With the way his hand curls around your thigh, you know that both your bodies are responding to your touch. Both of you are heated but instead of giving into that because you aren’t ready for that yet, you lay your head on his shoulder and curl in closer to his chest.

Thor sighs heavily, wrapping you up in his arms as he cradles you close.

“Now we know better,” you whisper.

“Now I know what losing you will do to me,” Thor agrees. “I’ve missed you so much, cherub.”

You don’t respond. You’re too choked up to say anything without your voice cracking so both of you stay like that for a while.

The cocoon of Thor’s arms is toasty and from the exhaustion you’re feeling plus all of the emotions that have drained you, your eyes are heavy and difficult to keep open.

“What about you?”

Thor’s chest rumbles with a chuckle.

“We can talk more tomorrow, cherub. Sleep.”

“I’m not sleepy,” you lie.

“Very well, then. What about me?”

“You’re sleepy?” you look up at him, full of concern.

He chuckles again, “No, cherub. What were you asking?”

“Oh! I just wanted to know if you’re okay. What Jane did to you can’t have been easy. Despite what she did to us as a couple, she said she was pregnant. You’ve been wanting a baby for so long and she dangled that in front of you like the rat that she is. And then she wasn’t even pregnant?”

Thor’s arms constrict around you as he pulls you up towards him to kiss you.

It’s slow and full of emotion.

“Even after all of that, you’re still worried about me?”

“It took time,” you admit. “Once I wasn’t so angry and I thought about what Jane really did. I hate the idea that your heart broke over her lies. I can’t believe she ever loved you if she was willing to make you feel that way.”

Thor just stares at you, searching your eyes before he rubs his nose gently against your own. When he speaks, his voice is so low, so deep, an intimate whisper. It burrows into your chest and settles right there underneath your ribs and makes you breathless with missing him and desire.

“That’s why you’re my Queen, Y/N. And she is not.”

You’re not sure if it’s an Asgardian ability or if maybe it’s something specific to Thor, but he has a way of making you swoon.

“I missed you so much,” he confesses again, that whisper sinful. “Did you not miss me?”

You nod because you can’t speak. There’s a lump in your throat made of both sadness and want.

“Was your bed as frigid as mine was in your absence? Did you miss my breath on your neck as I did yours? Or the steady beat of your heart when you pressed your breast to my back as you held me while I slept?”

Fuck, he’s making this so impossible.

“I hate you so much,” you counter, but his lips stretch into a small knowing smile as you take a tight hold of the neck of his shirt and pull him up to meet your lips.

He exhales heavily into you, tasting you, relishing in every pulsating touch as both your hearts ache and yearn almost in disbelief as if both of you can’t believe that these wants, these needs are finally being met.

As he pulls back to tilt his head the other way, he takes hold of the sides of your face again, his lips grazing yours, “I love you.”

Before you can reply or yank him back into that torturous yet blissful kiss, a voice at the doorway clears their throat.

“Well, that was fast, what happened to keeping him at a distance?”

Loki’s voice pulls your gaze and you can feel your cheeks and neck burn at how easily it seems you’ve crumbled when finally face to face with Thor.

You frown at your brother-in-law, while Thor ignores his brother and leans up to press very non-chaste kisses to your neck, “I told you coming back was a bad idea.”

But Loki’s smile is blinding and with one chuckle he backs out of the room, shutting the door quietly as Thor turns you back to him so that he can get back to kissing you.

[imasimpforshanks]

Hello author! Can I ask for K and L for Sanji/Ace please. (Fluff) thankyou!

Fluff Alphabet - Portgas D. Ace

a/n: hiya!!!! Here is ace’s fluff alphabet! 💗I know you only asked for K & L but I hate only answering a few letters of these at a time LMAO 💀ALSOOOOO I’m going to Sanjis at some point too, because I got a lot more angst asks than fluff so yahhhh! Anywayssss hope you enjoy<3333

A-Activities (what do they like to do with their s/o? How do they spend their free time with them?)

Ace absolutely loves to pull pranks on you AND he loves to pull pranks with you. Once a month you actually have an all-out prank war against one another where even the crew fear that they will be caught in the middle of it.

Oh, and true to his character, the two of you spend a lot of time eating food together. It’s very difficult for any normal human being to eat anything close to the amount Ace eats, so more often than not, it’s you staring at him in awe while he scoffs down another plate of food.

B-Beauty (what do they admire about their s/o? what do they think is beautiful about them?)

He finds your smile to be one of the most beautiful things he’s ever seen, it’s even more beautiful when the smile is directed at him. The moment you smile at him everything else in the world seems to melt away. Ace does everything in his power to bring a smile to your face, because when you smile everything else seems to fall into place. (SO CLICHÉ I KNOW BUT IT’S TRUE!)

C-Comfort (how would they help their s/o when they feel down/have a panic attack etc.?)

His go to method of comfort is cuddles. He just wraps his arms around you and gives you lots of forehead kisses. He’ll say all these kind things about you and ask what you need from him. If you’re not sure, or if you don’t feel like talking, he’ll patiently wait until you’re ready to talk.

D-Dreams (how do they picture they future with their s/o?)

In every possible future he envisions, you are there. To Ace, there is no future unless you are with him. It’ll be the two of you living life to the absolute fullest, taking it day-by-day.

He isn’t too keen on having (biological) children as he doesn’t want them to be burdened with the blood of Gol D. Roger.

E-Equal (are they the dominant one in the relationship or rather passive?)

He tends to take the more dominant role in the relationship. It’s just his natural personality that seeps through, it’s truly not intentional. He’s confident and loud so there’s not really any way you can’t not listen to him. However, if you were to voice any opinions or comments, you’ve got all his attention!

F-Fight (would they be easy to forgive their s/o? How are they fighting?)

I talk about his fights with his s/o a little in his angst alphabet. Here it is again!

Fights with Ace, although they don’t happen often, can quickly get out of hand. He’s stubborn and his inability to accept that he’s not always right can cause a minor disagreement to escalate into an all-out fight. On a few occasions you have argued about him never turning his back on an opponent.

Your fights tend to be followed by cooldown time. Things can get quite heated (no pun intended) so you need some alone time and space to breathe. After that though, you comeback together and apologize.

G-Gratitude (how grateful are they in general? Are they aware of what their s/o is doing for them?)

Ace felt unloved and unwanted by the world growing up (save for Luffy and Sabo, oh and Dadan), so it was quite the change to experience the unconditional love you provided him. He will forever be grateful for what you have done for him, in fact, he’s so grateful about it that he can never shut up about it! Much like how he gushes about his ‘stupid kid brother’ to the Whitebeard Pirates, Ace will also never shut up about you to anyone he talks to. Your name somehow always makes its way into any conversation he has.

H-Honesty (do they have secrets they hide from their s/o? Or do they share everything?)

The only secret he kept from you was that he was the son of the Pirate King. He was scared that once you knew, you would view him differently. But over time he was able to see that that would never be the case. So, after telling you that, he never kept anything from you ever again. Ace actually finds sharing secrets with you to be a weight off his shoulders.

I-Inspiration (did their s/o change them somehow, or the other way around? Like trying out new things or helped them overcome personal problems?)

You were another person that was able to show Ace he is worthy of being loved. It’s an insecurity of his that will probably never go away, but that’s okay because you’re more than happy to remind him daily.

J-Jealousy (do they get jealous easily? How do they deal with it?)

I talked about Ace’s jealousy in his angst alphabet! But I’ll go over it again here!

When he gets jealous he turns into such a man child. He’s pouting and moping around while mumbling to himself. He develops quite a petty attitude. If you were to ask him “want to go get something to eat?” he’d respond with “why don’t you just go and ask ____ for some food.” But, as soon as you begin commenting on how jealous he’s acting he’s going to deny it to the end of his days.

K-Kisses (are they a good kisser? What was the first kiss like?)

I feel as though I may give Ace a little too much credit when it comes to this because I want to think that he’d be one of those amazing kissers, like he just has a knack for it. But in reality, that probably wouldn’t be the case.

Ace is more likely to be quite an overexcited kisser. He’s keen and passionate, that’s for sure. But with your first kiss, he’s a little too keen and tries to move way to fast. After some calming down and a little bit of a giggle to one other he’s in the zone.

L-Love confession (how would they confess to their s/o?)

The two of you are just talking and he’s, unsurprisingly, brought up his brother, Luffy. What is surprising however, is when he tells you how badly he wants you guys to meet each other. Your first reaction was “yeah that stands to reason he wants all of us to meet luffy” but before you could say anything Ace is already going on like “yeah, I just can’t wait to have the two people I love most in the world meet. It’d be real cool” (or something along those lines and probably a little less cheesy LMAO). You just stare at him like “heh?” and he stares at you like “uhhhh… yeah I said what I said?”

M-Marriage (do they want to get married? How do they propose? What would the marriage be like?)

Heck yeah, this dude wants to get married! Getting to show you off to everyone? Yes please! Getting to tell you in front of everyone he knows just how much he loves you? BIG YES. Oh, AND a big ass party afterwards? THIS DUDE CANNOT WAIT! Being able to marry you is one of his dreams, and he’s actually been thinking about since the first date you guys went on.

But, he’s really struggling with how to propose to you. He’s gone through every cliché in the book. A ring at the bottom of your glass, in your food, a carriage ride etc. They’re all great ideas but he doesn’t think they suit the dynamic of your relationship. So, he’s going to enlist the help of Whitebeard Pirates and create an elaborate prank (that has a 50/50 chance of going wrong but also still working out exactly as he wanted).

N-Nicknames (what do they call their s/o?)

He likes to call you hot stuff or baby. Initially, these nicknames resulted in a lot of teasing from the other whitebeard pirates but neither of you cared.

O-On cloud nine (what are they like when they are in love? Is it obvious for others? How do they express their feelings?)

Whitebeard and a few of the other division commanders are the first to notice. I mean, it’s not that hard… He is constantly bringing you up in every conversation (if you’re not there) and if you are there, they can’t even get his attention for a moment. You have his undivided attention! It isn’t until Marco or someone says “You’re down baddddd, Ace” that he’s like HUH?

P-PDA (are they upfront about their relationship? Do they brag with their s/o in front of others? Or are they rather shy to kiss etc. when others are watching?)

Ace loves PDA. He is all about kissing you in front of everyone else. So much so that you constantly get told to “get a room!”. Ace loves to show off his relationship with you to the whole wide world. He’s incredibly proud to have found someone that loves him wholeheartedly.

Q-Quirk (some random ability they have that is beneficial in a relationship?)

Well, thanks to his devil fruit, his body temperature tends to run pretty warm, so you have your own personal heater.

R-Romance (how romantic are they? What would they do to make their s/o happy? Cliché or rather creative?)

Ace is romantic in his own way, that’s for sure. He expresses his love through teasing and jokes, but also through quality time. He’s big on that. Making sure all his attention is on you so you know just how much he loves you.

S-Support (are they helping their s/o achieve their goals do they believe in them?)

He has so much faith in your ability to achieve your goals. He wants to be able to help you in any way he can, so if you come to him and ask for help, he would be absolutely ecstatic! Ace just wants to be a part of your success story (in the best way possible, I know some people only want to because then they get credited but that’s not why ace wants to do it at all! Nothing makes Ace happier than seeing those he loves achieve their goals).

T-Thrill (do they need to try out new things to spice out your relationship or do they prefer certain routine?)

Your relationship is already spiced out enough as it is. He’s got an extremely mischievous personality so is constantly getting up to god knows what, and some how always manages to drag you into it. If anything, your relationship could do with a little more routine (but you both are extremely happy with the way it is).

U-Understanding (how good do they know their partner? Are they empathetic?)

Ace is an extremely empathetic individual. He understands a lot more than most, just how awful negative emotions can be (whether that’s sadness, insecurity, anger etc.). So he is quick to your aid whenever something seems to wrong.

V-Value (how important is the relationship to them? What is it’s worth in comparison to other things in their life?)

All relationships in Ace’s life are extremely important to him. He even values them more than his own life. Your relationship is no exception. You’ve shown him love, and accepted him for who he truly is, so there’s nothing he wouldn’t do for you and he makes that very clear every single day.

W-Wild card (a random fluff headcanon?)

He knows all your food orders off by heart. And when I say all your food orders, I mean ALL of them. He knows your food orders for each of your different moods. He memorised them pretty quickly so that he could surprise you with food regardless of your mood.

X-XOXO (Are they very affectionate? Do they love to kiss and cuddle?)

He is an extremely affectionate individual. Ace is practically attached to your hip at every possible moment. An arm will always be thrown around your waist or shoulders, and he literally wants to spend all day smothering you in kisses. He’s shameless when it comes to affection.

Y-Yearning (how will they cope when they are missing their partner?)

He copes by talking about you to EVERYONE. He tells the crew stories about you (mind you these are stories not only that they’ve heard multiple times, but they were also there to witness themselves). It gets to the point where even Whitebeard is like “ya know what Ace, you can go visit them.”

Z-Zeal (are they willing to go to great lengths for the relationship? If so, what kind?)

As I said previously, all relationships in Ace’s life are extremely important to him. We saw what lengths he was willing to go to when Thatch was killed by Blackbeard, and you would be no different. In fact, Ace would be willing to do all of that and so much more, if it was for you.

[softyoongiionly]

Sulky💭

Yoongi has a weekend at home for the first time in awhile.

There are three things on the agenda

1. Food

2. Sex

3. Informing Yoongi that he looks like a video game character

Pairing: Yoongi x Reader

Genre: FLUFF, references to animal crossing, smut (18+ only plz), established/new relationship au

Word Count: 4.2k

Warnings: smut, language and, an overwhelming amount of fluff

A/N: well hello there beautiful reader! I hope you enjoy this little piece of mine. It’s kind of silly but, honestly ever since I started playing animal crossing; I cannot get this comparison out of my mind. If you haven't played the game, you can still read though! The main point of the fic is Yoongi and the reader’s relationship.

Yoongi hasn’t had a night off with you in weeks.

And he doesn’t want you to know how much he’s looking forward to it.  

He has a particular way he wants these kinds of nights to go but, they never really follow the pattern he expects.

Tonight, it starts with a small glass of whiskey.

Yoongi drinks the old stuff cause he’s secretly a 300 year old hipster who can’t be bothered with cheap liquor.

Instead, he grabs a lowball glass and pours himself a drink as he plops onto the couch and, slowly sips until the amber liquid has disappeared down his throat.

It’s kind of hard not to notice the way his lips curl around the glass, the way his tongue collects any misplaced whiskey, the way he seems to savor the taste...

He leans back against the sofa, legs spread carelessly across the cushions and, although you usually find manspreading unattractive, there’s something about the way Yoongi does it that makes it so hot.

The chatter is minimal on days like this because you both appreciate comfortable silence.

The low hum of the television is enough to fill the room and, although Yoongi doesn’t speak, he says so much with his body language.

Yes, Yoongi values being alone and he isn’t much for frivolous displays of emotion but, he still loves affection.

His nimble fingers find their way to yours and the way he slides his fingers against the palm of your hand is enough to send a shiver down your spine.

Yoongi doesn’t notice of course as he’s dealing with his own feelings at the moment.  

Holding hands on the couch is a part of his bedtime routine and if he’s being honest, it's one of his favorite parts of his day.  

He smirks at something on the TV, squeezing your hand a little tighter as he chuckles to himself, taking another sip of his whiskey.  

You watch the way his throat bobs as he swallows and god help you, you feel like a creep for how much you want to just sit there and stare at him.  

He notices you looking at him a little longer but, he doesn’t comment on it.

He’d stare at you all the time if he got the chance.  

His thumb is rubbing over your knuckles now, taking it’s time to caress the space between them, sending you further along the path of no return.  

Subconsciously, lean closer to him, resisting the urge to rest your head on his shoulder.

You know he’s going to get up soon to shower.

With a heavy sigh, Yoongi turns toward you, “I need to get this makeup off. Do you need to get in the bathroom before I shower?”

You regret having showered before he got home now because, with your still damp hair, you can’t really request that you join him without him raising an eyebrow.

Which he would, cause you know, it’s Yoongi.  

“No I should be fine. Have a good shower.” You smile, squeezing his hand before releasing your grip to allow him to get up.

He returns your smile, ignoring the twinge of regret he feels as you let go of him.

“Thanks. I’ll be out in a bit.”

You nod and return your attention back to the TV but, your boyfriend lingers around the entrance to the living room a little too long and, it’s enough to make you giggle and call him out.

“What?”

He smirks boyishly, jerking his head in your direction, “What do you have planned tonight?”

The look in his eyes makes your stomach flip but, you play it cool as you don’t want to assume the hidden meaning in his question.

“I’m in for the night. I just have to go over a few things of tomorrow morning but, otherwise I was going to hang out with you since you’re off. Why?” You tuck your legs onto the couch to fill the space that Yoongi once did, awaiting his response.

“Just wondering. I was gonna order something from the restaurant across the street, does that sound good to you? If not, I can probably make something.”  

His smirk doesn’t fully disappear but, he masks it well enough with his further inquiries.

“The restaurant sounds good,” You smile, “I know we’re both off this weekend if you want to cook then. I miss your cooking...”

Yoongi’s heart is a flutter then, he’s lowkey obsessed with any compliment you throw his way but, he doesn’t necessarily want you to know that.

“Yeah? I can cook whatever you want this weekend, you just have to let me know so I can get the ingredients. I’ll cook all of our meals though, so we don’t have to waste money on take out.”

He emphasizes the second point, trying to mask his reaction and, you resist the urge smile at how cute he is.

“Really? You don’t mind doing that? I would literally die happy, I haven't had your cooking in so long. It’s better than all the delivery places we get anyway so, I wouldn’t mind taking a weekend off from that.” You flop back against the couch, sending a longing look his way.

Your heart stutters a bit as the gummiest of smiles present itself on your boyfriends pretty lips.  

“You’re uh- you're sweet ha-” He rubs the back of his neck shyly before gesturing to the shower, “I’ll try and come up with some recipes in the shower.”

He disappears down the hall rather hastily then, not bothering to fully conclude your conversation.

It’s very much on brand for him though.

Yoongi craves validation but, its often too much for him to handle so, he often gushes over you in private.

He spends the duration of his shower thinking of all the different ways to impress you in the kitchen, meticulously sorting through all of his current favorite recipes and the ones he knows you love.  

When he strolls back into the living room, he’s wearing nothing but his boxers, his damp hair haphazardly pushed to the side.

It’s hot outside so, it’s justified but, it’s unlike Yoongi to walk around shirtless.

Modesty and all that.

“Hold on...is that? My boyfriend??? Looking fine as hell on a Wednesday afternoon like it’s no big deal?” You look him up and down which prompts him to roll his eyes.  

With a smirk on his lips, he waves you off but the blush on his cheeks contradicts his actions.

“Shut up. You're so weird.” He mutters, his arms subconsciously moving in front of his stomach.

You laugh before rushing over to him, attempting to wrap your arms around his waist.

“I’m not weird!? I’m just admiring my boyfriend’s natural beauty; excuse me.” You huff, still trying to hug him as he pretends to wiggle away from your grip.

“Yah! What’s wrong with you???” He shouts playfully when you place wet kisses against his cheek, which is afire with the effect you have on him.  

You giggle when you finally succeed at securing your boyfriend in a hug, your lips inches away from.

“You look good. I wanted you to know...” You murmur simply, your laughter fading slightly whilst you lean in towards his mouth.  

Yoongi’s breathing stalls a bit when your lips press onto his.

No one kisses like you do. It kind of sickens him honestly.

It always fucks him up.

You’re just so tender and sensual.

It makes his head spin.

Tucking your lips between his, you slowly slide your hands up his torso, delicately brushing against his ribs as you hold him.

Yoongi reciprocates your motions, his fingers holding onto the fabric of your waistband, his eyes fluttering shut when he settles deeper into the kiss.

You decide you want to take a step further and, continue touching him.

You brush your fingers over his chest, admiring the tightness there that’s developed from longer hours spent in the gym.

Yoongi’s chest is very sensitive so when you brush over his nipples, his hands are quick to settle over yours.

“W-we haven’t had dinner yet...” He stutters, nervous laughter emanating from his lips, “d-do you want dinner?”

He doesn’t move away from you though, he’s just shy.  

He hasn’t totally figured out how to initiate sex or to receive attention.

You’ve been dating for six months now.

You’ve had plenty of sex but, it still makes him nervous.

Even though, he wants you so bad.

You smile softly against his mouth before patting his hips, “Sure yeah-” You step away from him and nod towards the kitchen, “I’m gonna get the menu. I think I want something different tonight.”

Yoongi feels a little twinge in his heart when you pull away but, he knows he hasn’t offended you.

That’s the thing about you.

The reason he fell in love with you.  

He doesn’t always need to explain himself; you just get it.

“I want steak. I’ve been craving it all week. I’m a little tempted to get more than one but, I know that it’s gonna hurt my stomach.”  

He follows closely behind you, his heart still unsteady from the effects of your kiss.

“You can always save one for tomorrow? Knowing you, you’ll probably re-heat it and make it like 1,000 times better anyway.”

He scoffs playfully, “You can’t re-heat cooked steak Y/N. It gets all rubbery....”

Yoongi? Defensive in the face of a compliment?

It’s more likely than you think.

Rolling your eyes you concede, setting the menu on the countertop, “I’m so sorry for even suggesting that you could deviate from your very specific rules regarding leftovers.”

Yoongi snickers before wrapping his arms around your waist, “I’ll find a way to forgive you I guess. I can’t fault you for having poor taste.”

A gentle elbowing is in order but, otherwise you relish in the warmth his embrace is providing, “You’re such a dick.” You smirk before flipping the menu over.

His rickety laughter continues as he tightens his grip on you, “What are you thinking of having?”

“I don’t know; I think I want the chicken/steak combo bowl but, I’m also feeling the ginger-sesame salad. Ugh- but maybe I want the alfredo? There’s so many choices.”

During your minor breakdown, Yoongi feels his lips twitch in amusement.

You’re really cute.  

He wants to kiss you again and now that he’s pressed against you, he kind of regrets chickening out a minute ago.  

“What do you think?” You turn slightly in his grip to look at him and right as you do, he pecks his lips against yours.

“I think you’re cute.” He says simply before nodding to the menu, “Order all three. Eat the salad tonight and save the rest for tomorrow.”

“I like the way you think Min.” You smile, a bit dazed from his kiss, your cheeks warmer than before.

Delivery arrives in no time and the two of you spend a good half an hour shoveling takeout into your faces before you settle back against the couch to relax.

This is one of your favorite parts of a night off with Yoongi.

The two of you just do your thing together, side by side.

There isn’t much talking but, its so comforting to be near him.

He’s scrolling on his phone, checking out new equipment for his studio and, you’ve delved into your most recent obsession: Animal Crossing.

Yoongi often pokes fun at how into the  game you actually are but, truth be told, he actually enjoys watching you play.

Although, he’d never admit it.

“Oh my god Marshal, my sweet beautiful boy, how are you?” You coo to your screen, your thumbs furiously moving your character towards the fluffy little squirrel in question.

Yoongi smirks  but otherwise he keeps to himself, his arm wound around your shoulders.

“Do you like your flowers? I planted new ones behind your house, aren’t they pretty?”

“You taught me how to smirk? Of course you did, that’s literally your specialty.” Marshal responds off topic because, he’s literally a video game character and cannot hear you as a look of disgust comes over your face, “Ew Canberra no, leave me alone, I’m hanging out with Marshal.”

Yoongi finally chuckles, shaking his head, “Yah, who is Marshal and why are you always talking to him when you play that game?”  

You tilt your Switch towards him, showing off your favorite villager, “This is Marshall. He’s the love of my entire life.”

With a quirked brow, Yoongi looks at the screen blankly, “This mouse is the love of your life?”

You laugh at his expression, moving the Switch closer to his face, “He’s not a mouse! He’s a squirrel!”

Yoongi’s stoic expression cracks at the sound of your laugh, “OK fine, he’s a squirrel,” He chuckles, “Why is he so special? What does he do?”

You narrow your eyes at him, “He- What does he do? He is a future coffee shop owner/actor/fashion extraordinaire thankyouverymuch...”

Yoongi snickers, “Wow he has a lot going on. I didn’t realize mice could own property...”

“He’s a squirrel!!!” You whine and Yoongi’s head falls back as he cracks up at your outburst. “You know I only like him so much cause he reminds me of you...”

Yoongi’s laughter fades slightly, “What do you mean?”

“Look at him-” You shove your Switch back in his face, “He’s literally you. He's cute, he’s cranky, he likes music and coffee- He's basically Animal Crossing Yoongi. That’s why I worked so hard to get him on my island. See? I put his house right next to mine...”

Yoongi is going to spontaneously combust.

You are the cutest thing that has ever set foot on this earth and, he’s quite certain you were sent here to destroy him.

“You worked hard to get a villager who reminds you of me...on your island?” He clarifies, his eyes holding something new in them.

“Yeah- so don’t be mean to him.” You respond matter of factly, giggling before returning to your game.

You notice the blush that creeps across Yoongi’s lips but, you elect to ignore it.  

“You’re ridiculous.” He smirks and despite resuming his activity on his phone, you don’t miss the way his hand begins rubbing circles against your shoulder.

“You’re ridiculous.” You retort  

A part from a bit of laughter, silence quickly settles between the two of you once again.

Yoongi slipped on some actual clothes before dinner and the scent of his citrus fabric softener is a welcome addition to the comfortable atmosphere of your living room.  

You wish every night was like this.

After an hour or so, your lids begin to grow heavy.

Yoongi’s presence is soothing enough but with a full stomach and a bit of Animal Crossing, you’re struggling to stay awake.

“Jagiya?” He whispers, brushing his fingers over your cheek, “Yah, let’s get you to bed ok?”

A grumble leaves your lips then because your exhaustion is fucking with your plans for the rest of the evening.

Nights like these usually end with sex.

Sex isn’t something the two of you get to do as often as you’d like.  

You both have demanding jobs that keep you apart more often than not.

Sex is usually on the agenda because, the two of you miss each other so much.  

“But we didn’t have sex...” You grumble against his chest which suddenly shakes with scratchy laughter.

“We can have sex tomorrow. I’m off all weekend.” He murmurs through his chuckling as he ushers you to your feet, “C’mon, I’ll come to bed too...”

“Mkay. Promise?”  

Yoongi smiles, fondness exploding within his chest whilst he helps you to your feet, “I promise. Let’s go.”

Moments later, your head is on your boyfriend’s heart.

It takes no time for you to drift back off to dreamland but just as you do, you hear Yoongi whisper:

“I love you so much.”

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

The following morning comes about slowly.  

The two of you sleep in past 10am, which is a rare occurrence.  

You’re the first one to wake up but upon noticing that Yoongi isn’t awake yet, you opt to snuggle against his chest.

His t-shirt has risen enough to expose the lower half of his stomach which you brush gently with your fingertips.

Your intention is to fall back asleep as you know very well how long your boyfriend is capable of staying in bed.  

However, you notice Yoongi stirring beneath you which prompts you to turn your head towards him.

Sure enough, he’s awake: he’s blonde hair is a mess atop his head, his babydoll features scrunched up with remnants of sleep.

A wry smile is present on his lips though and, it makes you grin just at the sight of it.

“Good morning.” You murmur  

Just like a cat, Yoongi offers a slow blink before replies, “Morning.”

“How did you sleep?”

His smile broadens, “Mm really good. You?”

You nod, resting your cheek back on his stomach, “I slept like the dead. I haven’t slept this long in weeks.”

“Yeah you passed out last night. You tried to protest when I told you to come to bed.” He recounts, his lips turning up in a smirk.

“I did? I don’t even remember that. What did I say?”

Yoongi clears his throat then, beginning to blush, “Uh you said you couldn’t go to bed because we couldn’t have sex.”

At that, you laugh and shake your head, “Oh my god. I mean-” You prop yourself a bit, “I kind of had a point but, I couldn’t have rocked your world in that condition. What did you say back?”

Yoongi’s lips are curved into a shy smile but, his eyes are lit up with his usual snark, “I told you we could have sex tomorrow and, that I was off all weekend. That seemed to be enough to get you in here.”

“That sounds about right.” When he mentions sex, warmth rustles around in your stomach, “I can’t believe you’re off all weekend...”

His hand comes up to rub against your back, his smile never fading, “Me neither. They haven’t given us a weekend off at home in months. Thank you for taking time off too, I feel bad that you usually work around my schedule.”

You scoot up more to be closer to him before leaning in to press a kiss against his cheek.

“Don’t feel bad. It’s a little easier to do on my end and, I’ve been working 60 hours a week for the past 3 months, my co-chair was begging me to take a few days off.”  

Both of his arms wrap around you now, hugging you to his chest, “You work so hard jagi. You have to make sure you don’t overdo it.”

You wanna throw a “right back at you” his way but, Yoongi’s been at the all work/no sleep lifestyle a lot longer than you.

Plus, he has a point.

“I am. That’s why I’m staying with you all weekend duhhhh.” You smile, craning your neck to kiss him.

The action immediately causes his smile to return whilst his hands slide down to your lower back.

Kissing turns into making out much quicker than you expected but, you’re not complaining.

You’ve missed your boyfriend’s mouth so much.

“Can we- can we uh...” Yoongi breathes a little heavier now, his request sounding very shaky, “Can we fuck?”

Logically, you can blame this statement on the fact that Yoon’s first language isn’t English and, that he likely heard this phrase from Namjoon but, with his hardening dick digging into your hip, you can’t help but feel like he knows exactly what he’s saying.

“Mhm...”

Yoongi rolls over so he’s resting between your legs, his hips grinding eagerly onto yours.

Still, he kisses you deeper, introducing his tongue into your mouth.

You accept him eagerly, allowing your tongue to brush against his.

“I love it when you do that...” He confesses, nudging his nose on the side of your own.

With determination, you usher his mouth back into the kiss, ensuring that you allow your tongue tease his own.

One of your free hands slides down his stomach and tucks into his black boxers, encircling his dick.

It’s throbbing which prompts you to begin guiding a firm fist up the length of him.

“Oh-” Yoongi grunts softly, his brow furrowing whilst he tries to focus on kissing you.

You smirk into his mouth whilst continuing to jerk him off, swiveling firmly around his swollen tip.

“Shit.” He can’t help but break the kiss now, his head falling into your neck, “That feels so good.”

“Yeah?” You coo, kissing the side of his head, “You like it when I touch you?”

He nods rapidly, sucking on the exposed skin of your neck, his hips beginning to rock with the motion of your hand.

Sweat is starting to appear on his hairline but that doesn’t stop you from pressing kisses up the side of his face.

“I wanted this as soon as I saw you last night. Ugh-” He grunts again but, its starting to sound very much like a whimper, “I wanted it but- fuck I’m so awkward still. If I wasn’t I- oh fuck...I’d be all over you.”

His honesty warms you from the inside out.

You love how vulnerable he’s being and, you want to make sure he continues to feel safe enough to do so.

“Look at you now though, you are all over me. You're doing so good.” You whisper and tilt his head back towards you so you can look him in the eyes, “You don’t have to worry about how awkward you are- I’m so wet right now and, you haven’t even done anything yet...”

Suddenly, Yoongi’s expression shifts to one of pure lust as he glances down at your underwear, “You’re wet for me?”

“My panties are ruined.”

Yoongi wastes no time, although pulling away from your touch is a hard decision, the next thing you know; he’s sliding a hand inside your underwear.

Nervously he giggles, his mouth hanging open in awe, “It’s so wet- do I really make you this wet?”

“Everytime.” You whisper, a soft moan brewing in your throat as the pads of his fingers find your clit.

With his mouth still parted, Yoongi smirks a little, enjoying the sight beneath him, “Back and forth?” He moves his fingers against your clit, applying the perfect amount of pressure, “Or in circles?”

“Back and forth.” You reply, eagerly straining towards his lips, “Please.”

“So polite.” He notes, still smirking as he follows your instructions, “That good?”

You part your legs for him, “Mhm...”

Yoongi touches you with confidence now, bringing you quickly to the edge.

“Are you close jagi? I really want to be inside of you after you cum all over yourself.”

That's enough to warrant an orgasm that causes your toes to curl into the sheets.

He kisses you all the way through it before lining himself up at your entrance.

He’s different this time, he’s faster, he’s harder...it doesn’t take long for the warmth of a second orgasm to begin approaching.

Baring his teeth, he looks down at where you’re joined, chuckling incredulously, “I swear- I didn’t know sex could feel like this. Not until I met you...”

His laughter his infectious so you follow suit but, his lips are so tempting you have to kiss him again.

“Yoongi?” You grunt into his mouth.

He nudges your nose, “Yeah baby?”

“I’m gonna cum again.”

A satisfied smirk comes over his lips, “Yes you are. All over my dick huh?”

All you can do is nod and let the wave of pleasure crash over you once again.

Surprisingly, Yoongi is still fucking into you but, the desperate look in his eyes signifies how close he is.

Nudging your nose again, he kisses you sloppily, “Can I cum? Please?”

With your fingers in his hair and your lips on his, you nod, “Cum for me...”

“Oh fuck- fu-fuck fuck fuck fu-fuck ah...oh shit...” With a string of curse words, he buries his face between your breasts and empties himself inside of you.

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

After your morning rendezvous with Yoongi, the two of you eventually make your way out to the kitchen to make some coffee.

You just bought a fancy new espresso machine for your apartment and, you’re about ready to make Yoongi an Iced Americano.

He’s at the counter, chopping up some sausage for breakfast, quietly humming to himself.

At first, you think nothing of it until you slowly start to recognize the song he’s singing.

“Is that- is that Bubblegum by K.K?” You giggle, turning towards him.

He grins but he doesn’t look up at you, “I don’t know what that is...”

“Its the song from Animal Crossing- did you go and listen to it???”  

He shrugs, “I looked into Marshall and one of the first videos that came up was him singing this song.”

“You-” You smile, slowly moving towards him, “You looked up Marshal?

Still grinning, he avoids eye contact with you, placing the sausage into a bowl, “I wanted to see what you were fussing over.”

“And? Do you get it now?” You venture hopefully and he finally looks up at you with a straight face.

“No I don’t...sulky...”

“Ah! You said it! You said his catchphrase!” You giggle before rushing over and wrapping your arms around him, “I love you...”

His expression softens as he kisses the top of your head,

“I love you too- sulky...”

[zmayadw]

Hello to all :)

So, before I run off for the weekend and from this unberable heat to my own little personal Duskwood (by which I mean a house in the woods :D ), I promised to someone I would post the epilogue to my story by friday, and I keep my promises :)

Anyway, I wish you all to have a great weekend! Take care :)

CALL OF THE RAVEN

PART 27 - EPILOGUE

And so a year passed. One year since Hanna was found, one year since I met my wonderful friends. And one year since the most beautiful blue eyes I ever saw stopped haunting my dreams and became my reality.

It's been almost six months since I decided to move in with Jake and make Duskwood my new home. It was the easiest decision I ever made. They all became the most important people in my life, and I couldn't even imagine a day passing without beeing close to them. We shared a bond stronger than anything. They became my family, and family definitely doesn't start or end with blood.

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

„You said five more minutes. Almost twenty passed!“ Jake announces from the doors. „I know, I know! I'm done!“ Turning in my chair, I just stare at him. „What? Do I look that bad?“ he asks worryingly after a moment. He was wearing black pants and a dark blue formal shirt, wich made his eyes color even more intense. That always amazed me, their color changing from greyish-blue to such an intense blue, I got lost in them so manny times. „Maya?“ His words snaped my attention back. Getting up I smile walking to him „Oh, the opposite, babe. You look very handsome.“ He smiles back. Wrapping my hands around his neck and kissing him softly first, then pulling him closer intensifying the kiss, hinting him more than clearly where I'm heading with this. He moves away raising his eyebrow „Oh, no, no, no.“ „What's a no?“ I ask, biting teasingly at my lover lip. Groaning he takes another step backwards from me „Argh, don't do this to me, angel!“ „I have no clue what you're talking about.“ I say taking a step towards him, playfully twirling a strand of hair arround my finger. „We don't have time for this!“ „Oh, well then.“ I say dissapointed and with a sigh start towards the bedrom. Passing him, I take my shirt off droping it on the floor at his feet „I suppose I'll go get ready then.“ I could feel his lustful stare following me. I barely stepped into the bedroom when his hand comes around me, pulling me to him, his other hand moving the hair from my neck. His soft lips on my skin sent tingles all over me. „You are driving me crazy.“ He whispers to my ear. „And you love it.“ I hum back. Turning me to face him he grins „But just so we're clear, you are going to explain to my sister why we were late to the wedding. And I'm dying to hear what excuse you will think of.“ Laughing I put my hands around his neck „Don't worry, babe, I can get quite creative when needed.“

„So, tell me you two, what was it that made you almost end up late for the wedding?“ Lilly was looking inquisitive at Jake and me. „Yes, Maya, please tell Lilly why we were almost late.“ Jake grins at me. Oh, he is so gonna get it for this! „There was...an emergency with my dress.“ She snorts „Right, I'm sure there was.“ Flashing her the most wonderful smile I could make „Oh, come on, Lilly, don't be like this. Hannah just got married, we should all be happy.“ „You two are impossible. I need a drink.“ She shakes her head before leaving us. „Emergency with the dress? That's the best you could think of?“ Jake raise his eyebrow at me. I grin „Shush it. It worked..kinda.“ „No it didn't.“ He laughs. „Fine, it didn't.“ I agree. „Then next time, you think of something better.“ He chuckles „Oh no, I'm not letting you make a habbit out of it.“ Turning to him with a wicked smile and going for a kiss, but stoping so close our lips barely touch „Whatever you say, babe.“ Without finishing the kiss, I slowly turn and head for the bar. „You are killing me!“ he yells after me. I turn my head and wink, just as Dan shows up next to him. „Troubles at paradise, man?“ he asks him. Jake grins, not taking his eyes off me „Quite the opposite, man, quite the opposite.“

The cool night breeze swirled arround me as I lean on the railings of the terrasse. Watching my friends looking so happy and laughing makes me smile myself. Seeing them like this, no one would ever thought that a year ago their lives turned into a nightmare. Even if the scars of the past events might not be visible to the eye, they are there, imprinted deep into each one of them. With time, they will fade more, and become just a distant memory.

The scars on my body are a different story. They will always be there, a reminder of bad days. But that's all right, I don't want to forget anyway. I want to remember, that no matter what shit life threw at me, I survived, I came out of it stronger. And no matter what might come my way next, I will be all right. They are also a reminder of all the good things that came along with them – new unbreakable friendships, and love, the purest and strongest love. Non of it would be able to exist without all the bad thats happened.

A raven perched on a tree cawed, calling for my attention. His beady black eyes curiously observed me. It's caw echoes around me again, it's sinister voice carried deep into the forest. That sound was frightening to me, sending shivers down my spine, bad memories resurfacing with it. But not this time. With a smirk I look at the bird straight in the eye „Don't waste your time with me, you don't scare me anymore.“ The raven continued to stare at me, moving it's head from one side to the other, as if searching to find just a hint of doubt in my words. Unsuccessfully. It's wings flapped, it's caws echoing as I watch it fly away, getting lost somewhere deep in the forest. „Everything all right, angel?“ Jake voice comes from the doors. With a smile I move from the railing and turn to him, call of the raven falling more silent behind me „Everything is perfect.“

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

„Finaly! I was beginning to worry.“ I almost yell in my phone. „Sorry, angel, I just stepped outside a minute ago.“ „Well that took forever. At least tell me you have good news?“ I ask impatiently. „Let me pick you up, then we'll talk.“ „Oh, no, no, no.“ I protest. „I've been waiting for hours, I can't wait anymore, I'm going crazy here!“ „All right, all right.“ He laughs. „Sooooo, what's the verdict? Is it over?“ I was so nervous to hear his answer. „It's over, angel.“ I screamed so loud from happines, scolding myself instantly for doing so in a place that I was at the moment. „Oh, babe, I'm soooo happy to hear this!“ I laugh „You haven't called back for so long, I was beginning to play the worst scenarios in my head. I know Dan said I can ask him for anything, but I doubt he would agree in helping me busting you out of jail. With a mention of it being a federal one, the chances are even slimmer. “ He chuckles „Yeah, I doubt that, too.“ „Tell me, did they agree to your demands? Is your record clean again?“ „Let me put it like this“ he says „They were more then extremely satisfied with the results they got from the informations I provided for them, that I could have asked for an island and they would say yes to it.“ I burst out laughing „Well, owning an island is a new trend these days.“ He laughs back. „Jake?“ I say serious. „What's up, angel?“ „Do you regret doing any of this? I mean, this was something you were forced to do, and honestly, I don't want you to end up hating me one day for any of this. I know I asked you that before, but still..“ „Listen to me, angel. I would do all of this the same way every time, without hesitation, through a thousand lifetimes, if in the end it would mean I get to have you.“ A tear escape my eye, more threathening to follow „Gosh, don't you get me in tears, silly! Now, come and get me, so we can go celebrate properly!“ He chuckles „All right, angel. And where are you?“ „You don't know?“ I ask surprised. „Don't tell me you stopped tracking my phone?“ „I will never do that.“ I laugh „Good, then you'll know where to pick me up. Love you.“ „Love you, too. See you soon, angel.“

I know why I decided to come to this place while nervously waiting for news from Jake. First time he brought me along, there was such calmness radiating from him, just sitting here, in the same spot I am sitting now. I never seen him being more at peace anywhere else but here. I guess I hoped coming here would do the same for me. And I was not wrong.

Collecting my stuff I stand up and look at the tombstone that I was sitting in front all this time.

Here lies Anna

A beloved daughter and mother

You will be missed forever

„Don't worry, Anna“ I smile at the tombstone throwing my backpack over my shoulder „Jake will be all right, I'll take good care of him. I promise.“

THE END

A/N: All right, so this is it, the end. I want to say a big 'thank you' to anyone who read it! :) I had fun writing it, and I hope you had fun reading it :) And honestly, I am a bit sad it ended, but we all know all things must come to an end eventually. Anyway, thak you again, much love to you all :)

[ihatetaxes99]

Well, hello all once again. Considering that the last time I discussed BNHA, it was in an overwhelmingly negative context, I've decided it would be a good plan to actually talk about an aspect of the series that makes me really happy and one that I constantly eagerly await new content for. And yes, it's none other than the good old League of Villains. 

So, since I have nothing better to do, I've decided to discuss each and every Leaguer in order of my favourite to least favourite (although I at the very least appreciate all of them.) Keep in mind that the rejected Vanguard Action Squad members who were either written out of the story during the Training Camp arc or shortly afterwards will not appear on my list (Although Muscular and Moonfish and hopefully Mustard do seem to be making a return), nor will I discuss the additional members that came with the formation for the PLF, because although I really like Re-Destro in particular, none of them really give me enough to work with and I'd be writing like two sentences for someone like Geten, which would just be a slap in the face to people who do care about his character. Also, Doctor Garaki and All for One also won't appear. Basically just the core members who have been present with the League from the Training Camp up until the War will be featured.

Anyway, I've wasted enough time, let us proceed without any further ado.

Tenko Shimura [Tomura Shigaraki] - Yes, it really shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone to see good old Shig ranked at the very top of my list. Yes, as I have said before, Tomura tends to flip between being my favourite and second favourite overall character, but the reason I have listed him as the best League member is simply put, his development. My God, it is absolutely sublime. I legitimately adore it. When we first saw Tomura emerge from the underbelly of society during the USJ arc, he was a pampered, whimpering brat, a manchild who threw tantrums after he lost and essentially threatened to kill everyone, ranging from random children to his butler. I mean, can that even be compared to the same person who took command of an army, broke past his potential and meticulously pulled apart every threat he's stared down? Here's some food for thought, Shigaraki has never lost to another villain. He emerged the clear victor when facing Chisaki and the Meta Liberation Army and in the long term, proved to usurp Stain's legacy and make it his own. The growth is just amazing and Shigaraki is genuinely a more interesting character to follow than our door mat of a protagonist. I have very rarely seen an antagonist start out as exceptionally weak, essentially being a comedy villain of the week, and slowly growing in power, intellect and ferocity. Just a fantastic character overall.

Atsuhiro Sako [Mister Compress] - Alrighty, now we get down to the interesting stuff! Mister Compress is, without a doubt, my favourite Boku No Hero Academia character, he holds the top spot more consistently than Shig does. But why is that? After all, Sako had done essentially nothing from the Training Camp up until his reveal. Well, you see, I am of the belief that a character need not be particularly deep as long as they have an engrossing personality. And Mister has that in spades. I am a huge fan of characters who know how to articulate themselves well, so of course Atsuhiro's constant metaphors and showman persona appealed to me instantly. But not just that, his design (and no, I'm not just talking about how hot we now know him to be) is just brilliant. The top hat, the masks that change to reflect his general emotion at the time, his bolo tie, he has a fucking badass prosthetic for Christ's sake. And remember, as the great Joseph Joestar proved, prosthetic hands in fiction are kickass. I just love him, even as a character who never contributed all that much overall, and I certainly hope for his return in some capacity following the shocking twist of him actually doing something during the war.

Jin Bubaigawara [Twice] - Rest in peace my friend, rest in peace indeed. But really, what can be said about good old Jin? Well, he was fantastic, easily one of the best in the League. A truly sympathetic figure within the group, someone who we the audience could truly feel sad for. Out of everybody, Twice likely went through the worst of the trauma and at the end of the day, he just wanted to fit in somewhere, anywhere. He wanted friendships. And friendships he found in Mister and Toga, and to a lesser extent, Dabi, and a boss he truly respected could be found in Shigaraki. I was, as many others were, completely torn by Jin's death. This was the first major death of the war, and as we soon found out, unfortunately one of the only few overall (sorry, I know I promised to be positive, the war arc just really went to shit after chapter 294, which by the way was so far the last really good chapter to me.) Alas, the death made sense; Twice's arc was complete, he had overcome his fears and finally found a place of belonging. If any villain were to die, it made sense that he was the one. Truly a legendary character, one of the greats.

Himiko Toga - Ah, yes, the blood-soaked minx that has proven herself a constant thorn in the side of UA, whether they know it or not. Her whereabouts are currently unknown (maybe she's doing something involving Mister? Please, Hori?), but from what she has featured in, I have certainly loved her every appearance. Initially a typical psychotic "yandere UwU" girl, she's certainly evolved over time. Her proactive nature was revealed during the License Exam arc, In the Overhaul arc, we saw her care for others, during the MLA skirmish, we saw her backstory and motives made a little clearer and finally, during the war, she was pushed to her breaking point, in a rare example of a character from Oceaniz' War arc video who actually belonged in the tier he assigned them to. Yes, Ms. Toga has been one of those characters who has been given so much screen time due to her popularity that it has definitely benefited her in the long run, at the expense of characters like Mister and Spinner. She's not my favourite Leaguer, but still a brilliant character in her own right.

Shuichi Iguchi [Spinner] - Well, nearing the end of the list, we approach the first character that I am leaning more towards just liking as opposed to really liking. Spinner for the longest time, did fuck all. Actually, he's still basically done fuck all. Mostly a self-admitted aimless Stain fanboy who provides running commentary. But, remember what I said about a good personality making up for a weak presence? Well, Iguchi is not quite as strong as Sako in that regard, but the little lizard boy has certainly grown on me. We've seen him grow into the moral centre of the League, being the only other member aside from Mister Compress to presumably have a body count of zero, and as I mentioned above, has even admitted to himself and Shigaraki that he's a hollow fanatic of Stain, that he leapt on the bandwagon because he thought it would give him purpose in his meandering life. And ultimately, it did, as Shuichi has evolved to becoming one of the most positive members of the team. I mean, for God's sake, he even pleads with All for One to rescue Compress and Toga before they fled the battlefield, that alone skyrocketed my respect for him as a character. 

Touya Todoroki [Dabi] - Well… Here we are… The only League of Villains member that I would generally say I dislike. And that's not to say I don't see the merits to him, I'm just not huge on it. Dabi is the League's edgy boi, he dresses up in a way that only a blind person would approve of, is too cool for anybody else and is essentially a big bundle of daddy issues. Now, the recently-released Chapter 301 absolutely tanked my respect for him as a character, with him being portrayed as an awkward, foul-tempered brat, but I never have held him in the highest regard. The whole bad boy shtick just isn't my thing, Dabi is a shining example of the opposite of my belief about a character; I really dislike his personality, but he contributes enough to the overall plot that I wouldn't quite consider him a bad character. I don't know, he's a weird one, and not one I've ever been fond of. Different strokes for different folks, I guess. I mean, when even pre-Overhaul arc Shigaraki calls you out on being a rude piece of shit, you know there's a problem somewhere.

Well, those are my collected thoughts on the members of the League of Villains. Maybe I'll do another one of these sometime, talking about the Vanguard members, maybe combined in a double feature with All for One and Garaki. Another time, perhaps. Another time…

Moral of the story, the villains are the best BNHA characters, fight me on this.

[august-anon]

LERning New Things About Ourselves -- Pineapple’s Fics!

Note From August: With Pineapple taking a break from tumblr until she’s an adult, I will be hosting her fic on my blog for the time being. You can find them under tags like pineapple fics and pineapple writing. Once she is back, they will be deleted from my blog and reposted to her own. Thanks for being understanding to her during this time! Don’t forget to show her your love!

Word Count: 9111 words

Characters: lee!Virgil, ler!Roman

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

Virgil’s heart thudded out of his chest as he stared up at the maliciously coy smile leaning over him. He had never been so excited yet so terrified in his life. “So, darling,” cooed his captor. “Shall we begin your destruction?”

~~~~~~~~~~

It all started on that fateful day when Virgil Anthony decided to post an ad for a new roommate. His previous roommates, Patton and Logan each got married and moved away, leaving Virgil with an empty apartment and no friends. 

 He was surprisingly content with that reality had it not been for a silly little thing called “rent” that incessantly found itself worming its way into Virgil’s life, and grew impressively large throughout the months. So, deciding he wished to eat this month, he begrudgingly settled on posting a chipper little advertisement on their community college’s website requesting a new roommate, provided they could come up with $450 a month. Weeks passed by and he was starting to lose hope until finally, he got a reply. After a quick online interview, he found himself with a new roommate. Before Virgil knew it, it was moving day.

 And that was when he met Roman Prince. Roman was… eccentric.. to say the least, but despite their slightly awkward interview, Virgil knew he was the one. And maybe it helped that he made twice what Virgil made in a week, and brought with him a flatscreen TV and a Switch. Just a little.

 “Ahh! Hello!” greeted the man as he set down his suitcase on the steps leading to the apartment. “You must be Virgil!” He stuck out the newly freed hand to shake Virgil’s. Virgil accepted.

 “Hey, dude. Yeah, and you must be Roman,” he acknowledged with a smile. “Do you need help with your stuff?” 

Roman waved his hand. “Nah, a couple of buddies of mine are coming by later to help me. For now, it’s just me and my suitcase,” he answered, pointing to the suitcase he left by the staircase. Virgil nodded. 

 “Okay, cool. Well, why don’t you come in, and we can chat.” Virgil wrung his hands slightly as he spoke, his nerves lit up from the social anxiety. He was trying his best to be friendly and not scare this guy off. Fortunately, Roman seemed to do most of the talking for the both of them. Only a couple hours in, the two found themselves seated on the sofa, sipping wine, and getting to know each other. Well, it was mostly Virgil getting to know Roman.

 “So, how long have you lived in Cheyenne?” Virgil asked him.

 “About three years now! We moved right after I graduated highschool, my parents grew up here, and I decided to go to college here too,” he answered, pointing to the east side of the apartment in the direction of the community college.

 Virgil smiled. “That’s nice you all can live in the same area. You get along with your family well, I take it?”

 Roman bobbed his head. “Oh yeah. I’m an only child, and it’s safe to say they spoiled me,” he chuckled, and Virgil joined him. Roman shrugged, smiling wryly. “I mean, I’m sure you figured that out considering no sibling should ever feel this confident,” he joked.

 Virgil snickered. “Yeah,” he agreed. “Coming from a kid with three older brothers, I know.” He poured some more red wine into both of their glasses. “So, where do you work?” he inquired, ignoring the urge to ask where he makes so much money,

 “I work at the bar across the street, Rattlesnake Juice Bar. I’m the manager,” Roman said, bringing the glass up to his lips. Virgil’s eyes widened slightly in surprise. 

 “Wow, that’s impressive! Normally at twenty-one, employers don't offer management positions at bars,” commented Virgil, sipping his own drink. Roman swallowed his drink and shrugged.

 “I guess it was because I had some experience, you know? I’ve been in management since I was seventeen.” Virgil nodded his head with a smile. 

 “Yeah, that’d do it,” he chuckled. Virgil shifted so he sat on his knees. “So, are you going to do management for a major?” he asked. 

 Roman shook his head. “No, actually, although it’d probably be a better career plan. Instead, I’m majoring in Journalism with a minor in Creative Writing.” Virgil brought the glass up to his lips, preparing to drink again. 

 “Oh wow, that’s cool. What do you like to write?”

 “Tickle fanfiction.”

 Virgil coughed violently, and spit the wine he just had in his mouth onto his shirt. Roman’s eyes widened in panic. “Oh, oh my gosh, are you alright?” he asked, hurriedly grabbing paper towels and handing them to the still sputtering man. Virgil snapped back to reality and finally noticed the spill.

 “Oh, for heavens’ sake-“ he muttered, graciously accepting the towels and dabbing at his shirt. Roman furrowed his eyebrows as he helped Virgil clean up.

 “Are you alright?” he asked again, his voice laced in genuine concern. Virgil looked up at him for a moment and examined his eyes for any signs of malfeasance. Nothing.

 “Um, yeah, I-“ he coughed again, his cheeks turning a light pink. “Yeah, I just, you know, went down the wrong pipe,” he stuttered, gesturing vaguely to his throat. Roman nodded in understanding.

 “Yeah, that happens to me all the time. Are you sure you’re good?”

 Virgil nodded a bit too earnestly as he got up to go throw away the wine-soaked paper towels. Once safely in the kitchen, he refocused his breathing and tried to calm his beating heart. It was a good thing too, because as soon as he returned, Roman continued the conversation right back up where it had left off.

 Virgil barely had time to sit down before Roman began speaking again. “Yeah, so anyways, back to our conversation, I write tickle fanfiction,” he explained with a smile. “It’s super fun. I have quite the following on Tumblr too! Over three hundred followers and they're growing by the minute!” Roman raved. Virgil just started in utter disbelief.

 “Oh, well. That’s, uh, cool.”

 Roman’s face lit up in excitement. “I take it you know what tickle fanfiction is?” he asked eagerly.

 Virgil’s face heated to a thousand degrees. “No! I-I mean, no, not really. I just, I was being supportive. Yeah.” Virgil cringed at how painfully obvious he was being. This guy had to know his slip up. At least he clearly didn’t have to worry about being judged with Roman. But alarmingly, Roman actually appeared to believe him.

 “Oh! Well, it’s the coolest thing. Basically-“ he paused for a moment. “Hm, actually, I guess the best way to explain is to start at the very beginning!”

 And there Virgil sat, for an entire hour, as he listened to Roman in great explicit detail explain every aspect of the fixation of tickling, the community he was in, and everything he wrote about without a single stutter or slip up. And Virgil listened the whole way through, flinching at the subconscious wiggling of fingers as Roman discussed teases, and thanking whoever the genius inventor of foundation was, for it was the only thing keeping him from blinding his new roommate with the power of his flush as Roman described lees and lers.

 Virgil also found out that apparently Roman was a ler. How…interesting.

 Finally, mercifully, Roman stopped talking. “Oh goodness,” he laughed. “I’ve been talking for almost an hour, haven’t I!”

 Exactly fifty-six minutes, thought Virgil. 

 “Sorry, I just get really excited and passionate about tickling and writing! Writing is my biggest hobby, and I love it so much. I try to be in touch with all my followers too, you know? I message back to anyone who messages me first, and reply to comments when I can.” 

 “Um, yeah. Well, I, uh, better throw this shirt in the wash,” Virgil interjected, leaping from the couch and scurrying out of the room.

 Roman stared, watching his roommate in confusion, but ultimately shrugged it off and went to go find his new room.

It had been a week since the incident, and frankly, Virgil had not fully recovered yet. He didn’t even know how to begin to process the fact that a proud, confident ler was now living with him. He desperately wanted to know what Roman’s Tumblr account was to see if he could follow him. But discreetly of course, because even though Roman may be secure and confident in his quirk, Virgil was not, and that was just how it was. It would be easy, right? Just ignore him when he talks about it. Virgil was sure Roman was probably used to it.

 Later that afternoon, Virgil was sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee, and was intensely scrolling through Tumblr on his phone trying to find Roman’s blog, when the man in question walked into the room.

 Virgil all but threw his phone across the room in a panic when he heard the heavy footsteps behind him. He spun around. “Uh, y-yes?” he asked, closing his eyes in an attempt to slow his pounding heart rate. Roman didn’t seem to notice the odd behavior.

 “Hey, Virge! So, you’re an English major, right?” He pulled up a chair at the dining room table and sat down. Virgil nodded, happy for the change of conversation.

 “Yep. Whatcha need?” 

 Roman pulled out his phone and scrolled for a bit before handing it over to Virgil. “Do you mind proofreading this for any grammar or spelling errors?” 

 Virgil nodded and accepted the phone, squinting to try and read the tiny print. This wasn’t uncommon for Virgil. Many of his acquaintances often asked Virgil to proofread their emails and letters to bosses and businesses. It wasn’t until a few seconds of staring until he noticed.

 It was a tickle fic. Virgil’s face blossomed into a bright red, as he glanced up at Roman who was sitting stone faced and calm.

 “What-” he cleared his throat, “What is this?” he asked, trying to appear nonchalant.

 Roman tilted his head. “One of my fics! I’m not the best with grammar, and I was really hoping you could help me edit. You know, as a writing major I really want to get better,” he responded with a smile. Virgil took a shaky breath. No, this was fine. Completely and totally fine. He was just reading a fic in the direct presence of a ler, and then giving him pointers on how to make it better. 

 “Well, um, you could, maybe, reword this better,” he finally said after a minute. 

 “What part?”

 Virgil pointed to a sentence on the screen. “That one.”

 Roman looked at him and giggled. “Virge, do you really think I can see that? Just read it to me, silly.”

  Virgil’s face felt like it was on fire. “Oh, um. Okay. So you w-wrote, ‘He laughed, squirming all over the bed, as Chuni followed him, massaging his r-ribs.’ Yeah?” He glanced up at Roman to see him listening intently. Oh, this was hard. “Um, so, to make it flow better you can reword it slightly by changing, changing the order.” He cleared his throat again. “For example, ‘He laughed and squirmed all over the bed and Chuni followed him, m-massaging his ribs.’ Does that, um, make sense?” he clarified.

 Roman smiled and nodded. “Yeah, it does! Thanks! Anything else?” Virgil shut his eyes in an attempt to control his breathing.

 “Well you, um, spelt t-tormenting wrong,” he grimaced. Roman leaned over. 

 “Oh did I?” Virgil nodded, propping his head up on his arm in a weak attempt to hide his face. “Can you go over the rest with me?”

 Virgil pinched his arm. “Yep, sure thing,” he squeaked.

 That was by the longest afternoon of his young adult life. But if he thought that was bad, nothing compared to what happened a month later. 

Virgil had still not yet found Roman’s blog, and he kicked himself for not checking to see what the title of the one fic he proofread was so he could search it up later. Regardless, he was still very closeted in his secret fantasy, and somehow managed to keep his cool throughout the many conversations where Roman brought up his ler moods, and writings, and such. 

 “Virgil!” exclaimed Roman, bursting into the room. Virgil jumped slightly from his seat on the couch, nearly dropping his phone. 

 “Um, yes?” He turned to see Roman holding a ukulele. “Why do you have a ukulele?” 

 Roman smiled excitedly. “Well, so you know how I talk about teases, right? How they’re essential to the wreckage of a lee?” Virgil forcefully shoved the embarrassment panic creeping up down his throat. “Well, I thought how cool it’d be, as a new type of tease, to write song parodies of nursery rhymes, but make them tickle related!”

 Virgil’s stomach twisted in a pleasant coil as he sat in complete shock. Surely not. “I, uh-“

 “You wanna hear some?” he asked, bouncing up and down excitedly on his toes. Virgil continued to ogle as he begged his 

voice to work.

 “Um, s-sure,” he stuttered out, his voice cracking at the end.

 Roman beamed. “Perfect! Okay, so you know the song Tiny Tim, right?”

 Virgil coughed. “T-the turtle song?” Roman nodded.

 “Yep! But I changed it.” He did a strum of the ukulele before beginning to play the catchy tune. “I have a little feather,” he sang out, his voice ringing out with the chords of the instrument. “His name is Tiny Tim, I used him on my lee, to see if he would grin!” Virgil blanched at the teasing lilt in his voice. “I drank up all his laughter, it made him buck and squeal, and now he’s nice and flustered, his smile oh so real!” 

 Roman finished the song and looked at Virgil expectantly. Unfortunately, at that moment Virgil’s voice decided to duck out and leave him. Roman giggled at him. “Are you speechless at my talent or something?”

 Virgil, horrified, frantically willed the embarrassment away as he finally found his voice. “Oh, no, sorry. Uh, yeah no. It was good. Good,” he took a breath while rubbing the back of his neck. “Job. Yeah,” he finished lamely.

 Roman pumped his fists in excitement. “Yessss! I was super proud of it! You wanna hear another one?” Rather than wait for a response, he strummed the ukulele again. “Oh, so this tease requires a specific name for it. Do you mind if I just use yours?”

 Virgil swore he was going to have a stroke.

 “Oh I know a little lee,” he sang, this time playing a new tune. “His name is Wiggle Virgey,” he paused his singing to look at him. “Adding y’s at the end of names makes it teasy,” he explained. 

 Virgil said nothing. 

 “He is so very nice, but oh he is so giggly, and so goes his arms, and his arms go like so, and his arms are always so-oh-oh!”

 Yep. Virgil was going to die. 

 After two more verses, Roman finally finished his song and Virgil was all but willing to sell both his kidneys to disappear from this conversation.  

 “So, what did you think? That one isn’t my best, but I liked it!” Roman commented nonchalantly.

 Virgil simply stared and nodded. Roman furrowed his eyebrows in concern. “Are you feeling alright?”

 Virgil blinked. “YeAh, why?” His voice cracked as he tried to speak. He quickly coughed to cover it up.

 “I don’t know, you just seem sick or something. You’ve been coughing an awful lot. Your face is like bright red and you’ve been oddly quiet,” said Roman. That only made Virgil blush even more. 

 “No, yeah, no I’m fine,” he answered, waving him off. “Yeah, but I really gotta go work on, um that thing, for school, see ya around.” And with that, Virgil darted out of the room for the second time, leaving Roman standing alone in utter bewilderment.

Virgil had done his very best to avoid Roman after the whole tease incident, which was difficult considering they lived under the same roof. And even worse considering Roman was the most oblivious guy on the planet. 

 Virgil was in bed, scrolling through Tumblr on his phone, when he saw another post from his favorite writer, TheLeringPrince. He felt his lee mood spike as he saw it was a new tease post. Eagerly, he tapped the post and began to read. Slowly as he read though, something seemed off. The tease post was various nursery rhymes all modified to fit into the theme of tickling. And Tiny Tim was one of them.

 Virgil’s heart began to race and his mind started spinning as he hurriedly tried to calm himself down. “No, Virgil,” he breathed out. “No, it’s just a coincidence. Roman probably stole it from this guy or maybe just thought of the same idea.” Ironically, he found himself wishing his roommate was a thief who stole credit from his favorite Tumblr user’s work, rather than admit that Roman was said favorite Tumblr user.

 But right at the bottom of the post, there was a little bold sentence that truly made Virgil’s heart stop.

 ‘And many of you have been wondering about my sudden improvement in my grammar and spelling. Well, you can thank my brand new roommate for helping me proofread all my new fics and teases!’

 What was Virgil’s luck? Of all the people on this planet of seven billion, he gets a roommate who, not only is a confident and charismatic ler who happily reads his teases and fics to Virgil, but is also the specific ler that Virgil had been daydreaming about being destroyed by for years.

 Virgil wasn’t sure if he wanted to hug whoever ordained this or punch them.

 Virgil contemplated it for a while before finally deciding to tell his anxiety to hit the road, and take this glorious opportunity by the horns. So with a deep breath, he clicked on TheLeringPrince’s profile, then DM’s, then opened his keypad.

 Immenslee_Ticklish: Hey, just wanted to say that I really like your stuff, and that you seem like a pretty cool dude. Would you want to chat sometime?’

 Immediately, he received a reply.

 TheLeringPrince: Why thank you, Immenslee. And yes, I would love to chat ;)

Days went by, and Roman and Virgil were talking through their blogs constantly. Roman had taken to teasing Virgil quite thoroughly on the platform, and Virgil obviously ate it up. Roman even mentioned wanting to meet up sometime. Virgil would be lying if he said he didn't nearly pass out at that.

 Of course they still talked in real life, only Roman didn’t know who Virgil was. Oddly enough, Virgil almost felt safer talking to his Tumblr handle rather than to him in real life. He had to laugh at that. Six months ago, Virgil would have fainted at the idea of living with his favorite ler. And now, here he was, finally having something to satiate his ever present, insatiable lee mood! And he was hiding. 

 He just wasn’t sure how to tell him! Leave his Tumblr open? Text him? Tell him through Tumblr DMs? For goodness’ sake, what was he so afraid of? This guy was clearly accepting and non judgmental about the whole thing. Most people would kill to be in this position. Well, most lees anyways.

 Little did Virgil know, but Roman was already pretty suspicious. He didn’t have any evidence of the fact, but he was pretty certain that Virgil had to have some lee in him somewhere. His blush and stutters were getting increasingly obvious and even though Roman could be an idiot, he wasn’t stupid. It took him a while to figure it out, but once he did, there was nothing stopping him. Except of course, if Virgil for some reason just didn’t want to be tickled. That was fine too. But there was something in him that made Roman sincerely doubt that was the case.

 Roman had never had a problem about being open with his fixation. He figured that if people were going to judge him based on a silly little liking, then they weren’t worth being in his life. He could understand why some people hid it, sure. It was scary to be so open about something other people found weird. But Roman just never had that fear.

 But one day, Roman got a message. It was from a follower named Immenslee_Ticklish. Now Roman recognized this user, as they often commented, liked, and reblogged alot of his works. They were great fans, and apparently very much lee themselves. And all of a sudden, after two whole years of following Roman, they decide to message him. 

 Interesting.

 But Roman ultimately decided to keep quiet about his suspicions because if Virgil wasn’t saying anything, then he didn’t want Roman to know. And Roman respected that. Even if he really wanted to tickle him.

 Turns out he didn’t have to wait much longer.

Virgil had practiced it for weeks. He knew exactly what to say, and how he was going to say it. But that all flew out the window as he stared at Roman.

 “Virgil, buddy, you’ve been staring at me for three minutes now,” commented Roman, raising an eyebrow at the man in question. “You came to tell me something.” Virgil inhaled deeply and tried to speak, but the words got caught in his throat. Roman gave him a sympathetic look. “Hey, it’s okay. No need to be scared.” Virgil just stared at him. Roman’s heart broke for this kid, who was obviously scared out of his mind. “I promise I’m not going to be upset, or judge you, or do whatever your pretty little head is thinking might happen.

 “I’mImenseleeTicklish!” he spat out suddenly. Roman jumped in surprise, but as soon as it hit him, he grinned.

 “Oh, are you now?” he hummed, a sly smile watching the flustered boy with great amusement.

 “Wait, no, I meant like the username. I’m the user Immenslee_Ticklish. I didn’t mean it like I’m immensely ticklish, well, I might be, but-“

 Roman’s amused look caused him to stop talking. “So, yes?”

 Virgil nodded. “I’m, uh, I’m a lee. Yeah.” The two of them stared at each other, neither one breaking the deafening silence or the intense eye contact.

 “Well that’s very valuable information,” Roman stated calmly, being the first to speak, and before walking away and into the kitchen.

 Wait?! Before walking away?!

 Virgil’s mouth dropped open as he watched Roman walk off. “Wait!” he called indignantly. Roman paused, smirking away from Virgil. 

 “Yes?”

 Virgil just stared for a minute, waving his arms dramatically as if it would help him speak. “Aren’t you going to, um, do something?”

 Roman turned around to face him, as Virgil paled at seeing Roman smile darkly at him. “Like what?”

 Realization hit him like a truck, and Virgil gaped in absolute horror. He was going to make him ask, wasn’t he? Oh, this was mean. So, so, so mean. 

 But at this point the lee mood was so bad that his dignity was going to have to leave him.

 “I- were you, um,” he covered his face with his hands. “Were you gonna tickle me?”

 He could hear Roman’s evil grin. “Do you want me to?”

 “Um, yes. Please.” He swallowed harshly.

 Roman clapped. “Why look at those manners!” he praised, gleaming at the whining boy in the living room. “I would love to. But to be clear, what exactly do you want to happen?”

 “W-What do you mean?” Virgil asked, peeking from behind his hands. 

 “Tell me exactly what you want for me to do. In explicit detail, or I won’t do any of it,” cooed Roman. 

 “You’re so mean,” Virgil whined into his hands again. Roman laughed at his expense.

 “I’m waiting~” 

 Virgil glared at him through his hands. “I want you to wreck me and tease me and destroy my resolve, and I want you to do it now! Please.” He added, lest he be made to repeat his request in a more polite manner. Roman reeled back, a tad surprised at the direct request.

 “Well, good for you. I’d be happy to,” he nodded, impressed. “Very well. Meet me in your room in ten minutes~” he teased with a wink. 

 After he left, Virgil let it sink in. He was about to be ruthlessly teased and broken by his ler idol in ten minutes.

 Oh he was going to die.

Virgil’s heart thudded out of his chest as he stared up at the malicious coy smile leaning over him. He had never been so excited yet so terrified in his life. “So, darling,” cooed his captor. “Shall we begin your destruction?” Roman’s voice lowered significantly into a husky tone that sent shivers down Virgil’s spine. He tugged on his restraints, waves of excitement and panic flooding his body, and feeding his lee mood from before. He had waited years. Years and years and years for this day. To be in this position, and about to get wrecked into oblivion. He had no idea what Roman was going to do, but he was excitedly terrified.

 Roman took a single finger and began aimlessly swirling around Virgil’s belly, going in zigzag patterns, curlicues, and idle shapes while he rested his head on Virgil’s chest. Virgil’s breath hitched, the gentle touches not quite tickling, but was setting an amazing precedent for what was about to take place. Roman let out a deep breath, purposely aiming it for Virgil’s neck, rewarding him with a satisfying squeal as the man scrunched up his shoulders as much as he could.

 “I have a dilemma, Virgil,” sighed Roman melodramatically. “I feel like, since you’ve waited all this time for some expert ler to completely wreck you, destroy you, and undo your very resolve, that you ought to have a good experience, hm?” he commented, glancing up to look at Virgil’s wobbly smile. “I mean you’ve been so patient! It’d feel criminal to deprive you of the best possible experience. Don’t you agree?” He paused, waiting for a reply while still mindlessly twisting his finger on the pale expanse of skin, but all Virgil did was squeak softly in embarrassment.

 Suddenly, Roman snapped his fingers, causing Virgil to flinch slightly. “I’ve got it!” he announced, smiling darkly. “Let’s let you choose.” 

 Virgil’s eyes widened in pure horror. “What?” 

 “Why choose your own teases, of course! Who better knows exactly how to tease and fluster you, and turn you into a giggling blushy pile of goo then yourself?” Roman enunciated his point with a few teasing pokes to his chest. Virgil squirmed in an attempt to get the pokes to hit his stomach but he had no such luck. “So, Giggles, you want to try it?”

 Virgil bit his lip and bounced his legs anxiously. “No!” he whined, his wobbly smile growing by the minute.

 Roman grinned. “No? But it’s like a choose your own adventure! You choose your own teases and tools! Won’t that be fun?” Virgil shook his head violently. Roman mock pouted. “But I think it will be fun!”

 Virgil made a strangled guttural sound in reply. “I-“

 “Yes, dear,” he urged, resting his chin on Virgil’s chest once again.

 Virgil sighed and closed his eyes in frustration. “I-I can’t tease,” he mumbled under his breath. 

 “What was that?”

 “I can’t tease!” he repeated, only slightly louder this time. Fortunately, Roman heard him.

 “Oh well, that’s not a problem, silly. You aren’t saying the teases. I am!” he replied with a smirk. Virgil peaked one eye open.

 “But I thought you said-“

 “Oh, I know what I said,” he answered, cutting Virgil off. “No, I already know what teases you chose. You don’t have to say a word.” To Virgil's confusion, he pulled out his phone. It wasn’t until Roman started scrolling and grinning that Virgil’s eyes widened in panicked realization.

 “No, no, no, NO!” Virgil called out, bouncing in anticipation. He tried lunging for the phone but his bonds held him back.

 Roman pretended not to hear him. “Hm, let’s see. Posts, then notes, then-“ Roman grinned up at Virgil. “Ah yes, reblogged by Immenselee_ticklish! Oh, look there’s a comment too!”

 “No! No, don’t read the comment!”

 “It says, ‘Ahhhh!! Oh gosh, I’m blushing so hard!!’ Hold up.” Roman turned to look up at Virgil who was fire engine red. He smirked. “Would you look at that. Anyway, it continues to say, ‘I would die if anyone said this to me!’ And then there’s a blushing face.” 

 He smirked again as he faced Virgil. “So, would you say you’ve died?” Virgil whined longingly. Roman nodded while looking back at his phone. “I’d say yes.”

 Roman continued to scroll only for his eyes to light up in delight. “Oh looky here!” Virgil slammed his eyes shut, not daring to. 

 “No, no, no, no.”

 “Virgil look! It’s a gif! Oh wow.” 

 Oh yeah. Virgil definitely wasn’t going to look. He was strong, he was resilient, and nothing could break him!

 “Aww and they’re getting their bellybutton tickled! Isn’t that your most favorite spot in the whole wide world?”

 Um, yeah. It was easy, mind over matter. He wouldn’t look. Easy.

 “Hey! And it’s your best friend! Mr. Toothbrush!”

 Yeah, he... What was he saying?

 “Roman, please,” he begged, eyes still clamped shut. The endless teases were killing him. His ever present lee mood had grown into a ravenous monster that he thought would never be satiated. His body screamed for tickles. It was more than a want, or even a craving. It was a need at this point. And Roman knew that and it only fueled his evil ler facade all the more. 

  “Aw, poor baby. Don’t worry, we’ll start soon,” he cooed.

 Roman made Virgil lie there, flustered and helpless, and oh so terribly lee, and wait as he read out tease after tease that Virgil reblogged from his Tumblr, and even read the comments from the lee himself.  Virgil wished with every second of every minute spent lying on that bed he had never made that Tumblr account. 

 After ten or so teases, Roman finally, mercifully, put the phone away. Virgil sighed in relief. Finally! He was going to be tickled to his limits, then past them, then have them pushed even further. He didn’t just want to be broken. He didn’t just want to be destroyed. No, he wanted so much more.

 Roman marched up to the table and placed both hands on Virgil’s thighs. “So, a little birdie told me you like baby talk,” he teased. Virgil blushed, which Roman took for a yes. “So would a, oh I don’t know, little kitchy, kitchy, coo would get you all flustered, hm? A little-“ his voice dropped an octave. “Tickle, tickle, tickle~” his face morphed to a maniacal grin. 

 Virgil's face turned crimson as he wiggled around on the table. “Noho!” He barked out a laugh. Roman raised his eyebrows in surprise.

 “No? Hmm. What about nursery rhymes, huh? You sure liked the ones I sang to you earlier this month! Do you want to hear some of those?  ‘Cause I got some good ones~” Roman whipped out a feather seemingly out of nowhere and waved it teasingly in front of Virgil’s nose. Virgil yelped at the sensation.

 “I have a little feather,” sang out Roman, his voice rising and falling with the feather. “His name is Tiny Tim. I used him on my lee, to see if he would grin.” He winked at Virgil who just blushed deeper. “I drank up all the laughter, it made him buck and squeal, and now he’s nice and flustered,” Another wink. “His smile is so real.” 

 Virgil was already softly giggling at the song, and it only encouraged Roman to keep going. “You got a little giggle button, right? I have another fun song, just. for. him!” he cheered, punctuating each word with a poke to his bellybutton, making Virgil squeal each time. 

 He took the feather and ran it in a large teasy circle all around the vast expanse of vulnerable tummy. “Ring around the belly, a button full of jelly,” he heard Virgil snort when the feathers hit a particular spot on his waistline. “-tickle, tickle, they all fall down!” Roman ended the verse with several flicks of the fluffy feather to Virgil’s bellybutton, causing him to buck and laugh, but it was still technically soft tickles. Virgil didn’t want soft tickles right now.

 “Rohohoho,” he whined through the giggles. Roman ignored him. 

 “Let’s see. Oh, here’s another favorite of mine!” He cleared his throat and lifted the feather again. “Oh head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes! Head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes~” He ran the feather all over the respective places, and it didn’t tickle much, but Roman’s plan was working. Virgil was getting more and more flustered, and more and more ticklish. 

 “Oh feet, tummies, arms and chins, arms and chins. Feet, tummies, arms and chins, arms and chins~” Roman watched in glee as Virgil’s face turned darker and darker with each song, and how even though the tickling was so light, his giggles were still sharp.

 All of a sudden, with zero warning, Roman ditched the feather and attacked Virgil’s tummy with all ten fingers. “Oh, she’ll be tickling Virgil senseless when she comes! She’ll be tickling Virgil senseless when she comes-“ Virgil fell into deep belly laughter as he thrashed and pulled desperately. “She’ll be tickling Virgil senseless, she’ll be tickling Virgil senseless, she’ll be tickling Virgil senseless when she comes!” 

 Virgil had never felt more embarrassed in his life, but that made the tickling so much more fun. After two more verses, Roman stopped. Virgil whined again at the loss of contact. 

 Roman chuckled. “You really are a hopeless lee, aren’t you?”

 Virgil scrunched his nose. “Shut up.”

 Roman’s eyebrows raised in an accusatory way. “Do you want to say that again?”

 “What? Shut up?” snarked Virgil, trying to wind him up to get wrecked and forced to apologize, but unfortunately, Roman saw right through his plan.

 “Wow. You really are desperate. Stooping so low as to provoke me to lash out and wreck you right this minute?” Roman tisked lightly. “Imagine! You honestly think that I’m going to fall for the oldest trick in the book? I hate to break it to you, Stormcloud, but I’m far more experienced than you think I am,” he added, shaking his head in disapproval. “I ought to make you wait longer just for that.”

 Virgil gasped and shook his head desperately. “No, no, please no! I’m sorry!”

 Roman shook his head again. “Poor little lee. So desperate you’ve lost your dignity. Here you are, begging like this for me to so horribly wreck you until you can’t even remember your own name.” Despite his words of disapproval, he smiled. “Oh course, I don’t blame you. I am very talented so I understand your eagerness. For that reason, I will grant mercy and not punish you for your lousy attempts at brattiness.”

 Virgil let out the biggest sigh of relief imaginable. At last! He was going to be wrecked!

 “But I still have one more game before we start.”

 Virgil threw his head back onto the bed with such a force it almost hurt. “Oh my gosh, Roman please,” he begged, whining at a new frequency.

 Roman sighed. “One more! You can do it. I have to make sure your ticklish little body is at optimal sensitivity! So, here’s an easy game to finish you off.” He walked around to the side of the bed. “Just gotta warm you up,” he winked before wiggling his fingers menacingly above Virgil. Virgil asked, and sucked in his stomach, but Roman simply drew in closer. The fingers were so tantalizingly close to the tickle spot, and Virgil swore he felt them already. And in his mind, he pleaded and begged with Roman to hurry up and get on with it already, but on the outside he was completely stunned into silence. 

 Until Roman did a fake out.

 Roman launched his wiggling fingers at Virgil full speed without any sort of warning, and Virgil lost it. He laughed, he snorted, he cackled, and he squealed. He jerked and thrashed all over his limited free space for a whole minute until he realized. Roman’s hands were behind his back, as he watched Virgil with the most evil look you could imagine.

 “You're awful!” screeched Virgil, both mortified by his own reaction, and furious at Roman’s trick. Roman laughed out loud.

 “Hmm, okay, okay. I’ll wreck you now. Besides, I can’t just keep you here, endlessly teasing and torturing you forever?” He paused with a smirk. “Actually-“

 “Roman!” Virgil cried out, laughing in both frustration at his lee mood, and anticipation from what was coming.

 Roman laughed at his panic. “I’m just kidding, jeez. You poor lee. Alright, I’ll wreck you, on the one condition you tell me your worst spots.”

 Virgil’s eyes turned to saucers. “I-what?”

 “You heard me! Give me those death spots or else no tickles~” he sang, thinking the nerves were from his tease.

 But strangely, Virgil turned more bashful, rather than flustered. It was almost a sheepish look on his face that replaced the embarrassment. That certainly got Roman’s attention.

 “What’s wrong?” he asked, eyebrows furrowing in slight concern. Virgil scrunched his face up and looked down.

 “I-I well, I don’t know what my worst spots are,” he replied with a shy smile.

 Roman was confused for about two seconds before it dawned on him.  “You-“ he stared in utter wonderment. “You‘ve never tickled before, have you?”

 Virgil’s face flushed under the attention. “Well, yeah, no not really,” he mumbled sheepishly.

 Oh, this was a game changer. Roman beamed. “You mean to tell me, I’m your first time?” Virgil smiled again, and nodded hesitantly. Roman had never been so excited in his life. “Well then, I guess we have work to do!” he commented, a wicked grin and a twinkle shining in his eye.

 Roman turned and walked down to the end of the bed, clicking his tongue as he examined the body in front of him. “I suppose the best thing to do would be to either go bottom to top, or top to bottom.” He tilted his head up at Virgil while smiling. “Would you by any chance have a preference?”

 Virgil huffed. “I guess, I don’t know. Bottom to top?” he suggested, more or so not caring as he really just wanted to be wrecked already. Roman clapped.

 “Perfect! That means I get to play with your cute little feet!” he cheered. Virgil blushed. Roman held tight of the right foot’s ankle and took the same pointer finger and carefully slid it from the tippy top of the toes all the way down to the heel. Virgil immediately started his giggles anew, wiggling his upper body at the light touches. “Oh good! It seems you’re ticklish here! What else can we try?” 

 Roman soon added the other four fingers into the fray and began ruthlessly scratching up and down and all around the soft tender arches, making Virgil snort and fall into deeper laughter at the feeling. He tickled all around the foot, being very thorough and detailed in his methods, making sure not one inch of ticklish skin was left unscathed. Then, without warning, he moved up to the toes. He wiggled each little toe and scolded them if they curled up. Eventually, he pulled them back and gave them a good scratching underneath as punishment for their misbehavior. Virgil thrashed like nobody’s business, finally getting exactly what he wanted, and it was so much better then he had ever thought. And he certainly didn’t complain when Roman informed him that his other foot was getting left out, and needed the same tickly treatment.

 After both feet were thoroughly assaulted (Roman may have had to go back to the right foot again, it seemed to be getting lonely),  he spidered his fingers all the way up to Virgil’s knees. Virgil smiled in anticipation, bouncing his leg as he waited. 

 “Ah yes, the knees. Such an underrated tickle spot! Very few people think about the knees being so terribly ticklish, but they can be! It all starts with this little pressure point, riiiight here.” Roman began rapidly wheezing the muscle right above Virgil knee, making him fall into deep laughter. “Oh wonderful!” shouted Roman above the loud laughter. “It seems as if your knees are just as horridly sensitive as I thought!” His squeezing fingers quickly switched to spidering ones, and darted right on the underneath of his knees, sending Virgil snorting.

 Roman awed at the adorable sounds. “Aww, aren’t you just the cutest little thing? Are my tickly, tickly tickles making you giggle, hm?” he cooed, relishing in the deep red color that was Virgil’s face and the tiny snorts mixed in with the hysterical giggles.

 “Nohohohoho!” Virgil giggled out, trying to kick his legs but the restraints keeping every inch of ticklish skin in place.

 “No?” questioned Roman. “Well, that’s a shame! Why don’t we try something else then,” he pondered and immediately grabbed the young man’s thighs, squeezing sporadically and rapidly every area of muscle. Virgil’s eyes bulged out as he flung himself to sit up right and cackle.

 Roman’s eyes lit up with mischief at the extremity of Virgil’s reaction. “Oh, what's this? Does this tickle? Are you ticklish here?” he asked, the teasing lilt in his voice making the ruthless squeezing at his thighs all the worse. Virgil fell back on to the bed to wheeze with laughter when Roman moved up closer to his hips. “Virgil!” scolded Roman. “Hello! I’m talking to you! Does this tickle?” he asked again, not for one second stopping the wretched attack on the loathsomely sensitive muscle.

 When Virgil still didn’t reply, Roman felt a spike of worry, and slowed his squeezing fingers just a little. Virgil’s wheezy laughter died down, until it was more or less hysterical giggles. 

 “Yes!” Virgil called out. Roman was confused for a minute until he remembered the question he had asked a few minutes earlier. He took his hands off his legs, leaving Virgil limp and giggly. 

 “Oh good! See I guessed it did, but I was just checking,” he winked. “Congratulations, Virgil. I think you might have your first death spot.” 

 Virgil weakly held up a thumbs up, his giddy smile bright enough to blind someone. Roman smiled at him softly. “How about we take a break?” So he sat next to Virgil on the bed, gently rubbing his shin comfortingly, waiting for Virgil to regain all the breath he’d lost until finally-

 “Um, I think I’m ready to go again,” piped up the younger man. Roman grinned. 

 “You sure?” Virgil nodded eagerly. Roman leaned next to Virgil’s ear, making him squeak. Oh he’d have to remember that. 

 “Well then,” he purred, his voice sending shivers down Virgil’s spine. “Allow me to continue your destruction.” He peered down the bed where Virgil was stretched out, and examined it carefully like a puzzle. He walked down the side to the right of his hips. “Now if my memory serves me, correct me-” Roman began, but Virgil barked out a laugh. Roman glared at him. “What?”

 “Dude, what did you say?” he asked, laughing again. Roman crossed his arms.

 “If my memory serves me, correct me. It’s a saying!” Virgil burst out laughing again. “What?!”

 “The saying is, ‘If my memory serves me, correctly,’ not correct me,” he teased, still laughing at Roman’s miss interpretation. 

 “Okay, yeah, laugh it up, Virgil,” he retorted, immediately squeezing his right thigh again. Promptly the teasing man burst into laughter at the feeling, and proceeded to howl on the bed. “Don’t correct me again!” he playfully scolded before ceasing the tickling. 

 Roman crawled up on the bed in between Virgil legs in hopes of being able to navigate better. “Now, I say we try hips next. Some people overlook it, but they look wonderfully ticklish to me~” he sang, already the tone giving Virgil the giggles. Roman grinned at the pink color once again rising to his cheeks. “Aww, does mentioning the tickly tickles making you a little neeeervous?” he sang again, whilst skimming the skin of his waist and pant line. Virgil’s giggles greatly increased from both the tickling and the teasing alike, as he began wiggling around in the bed.

 Roman’s scratching fingers followed the wiggly hips with great ease, smiling in adoration as he listened to the sweet soft giggles come from his captive. “You’re adorable,” he commented without really thinking. 

 “Nuhnuhnuhuhu uhuhuhuh!” the giggling man protested, yet his denial only further proved Roman’s point.

 “Yeah huh!” argued Roman. “Alright enough softness, I want to watch you scream.” He put on his best evil ler face as he watched Virgil turn a bright crimson at the threat.

 Roman crawled up further until he was practically sitting on Virgil’s hips. “So, let’s test the waters for what are the vast expanse that is Virgil’s tickle spots, shall we?” Virgil pulled up his legs out of reflex, but they were blocked by Roman’s back. He whined.

 “Oh, whatever is the matter, dear?” he cooed, leaning in so close Virgil could feel his breath on his neck and ear. The man made a strangled noise in reply. “I’m sorry, darling, I don’t speak lee. Would you mind rephrasing your statement?” 

 Virgil just shut his eyes, trying to smother the wobbly grin that was slowly creeping up onto his face. Roman took that as a sign to continue. 

 He spidered his fingers up to Virgil’s sides, and kept them there, smiling as Virgil shuffled all over the bed in anticipation. “Gohohoho ohohohon, alreheheady!” he giggled out.

 “Is that anyway to ask for something?” Roman playfully scolded moments before digging into the boy’s sides. Virgil bucked and burst into giggles, thrashing and pulling. Roman didn’t stop for even a second, mercilessly tickling, squeezing and scratching all over the sides and even migrating to the soft skin of the belly. Virgil was in proper hysterics and was loving every minute of it.

 “Aww, aren’t you just the cutest thing! What? What’s the matter? Are you ticklish?” Roman teased, digging into the lower belly. Virgil squealed, and fell into even deeper laughter as Roman took to blowing raspberry after raspberry onto Virgil’s poor ticklish tummy. Virgil was in tickly heaven, for sure, but he still hadn’t been broken yet. And that was fine, but his growing hunger still hadn’t been filled, and he couldn’t help but wish deep down that there was somewhere to truly make him scream. He contemplated asking Roman to go for his thighs again.

 But then.

 As Roman paused the tickling on his sides and began to feel around, something happened. 

 Virgil could only possibly describe it as maybe a jolt of euphoric electricity that shocked him into the pit of his stomach. Something that found the roaring lion that was his lee mood and slapped it in the face. Something that sent shivers to his spine and butterflies to his stomach. Something that made him shriek at the mere feeling of Roman’s presence. If Roman’s dastardly laughter upon finding the spot was any indication, Virgil was screwed.

 “Well, looky here,” he noted, looking up at Virgil with a gleam in his eye, further confirming the reality that Virgil was about to experience. “It seems we’ve found something.” 

 Roman tested the spot again: a rib, nestled warmly in between a tiny layer of fat, and the beginning of his armpit. He sharply poked the rib, eliciting a similar shriek as before. Virgil’s eyes grew like saucers as he fought with his own mind on how he felt. Was he terrified? Was the overwhelming amount of ticklish sensations about to course through his body like an electric current terrifying? Or was he excited? That after all these years of begging and pleading for someone to come into his life and do this very thing to him? 

 Virgil didn’t have time to decide, as Roman promptly dug in.

 Virgil said he wanted to scream, and scream he did. His body was too overwhelmed to even thrash at this point, no, it merely fell limp and took every bit of torture Roman was giving to it. Roman took his pointer finger and thumb, making them into a claw motion, and pinching all over the bone. He pinched up and down, left to right, and repeated the sequence, soaking in every plea and beg and cry from Virgil. He wiggled in between the bone, and even took to scratching the armpits as well. Virgil was happily losing his mind. But it wasn’t over.

 No, because out of nowhere, Roman pulled from under the bed a bottle of oil, and immediately began pouring it into his hands. Virgil greedily sucked in the oxygen as he waited for Roman to start again. His eyes followed him, watching Roman complete his moves with an eagerness about him. He was ready.

 Virgil only had to wait a minute longer before Roman took his sweet time, slowly covering every inch of both armpits in the slippery liquid, purposely sliding his fingers and nails in such a way to make Virgil start to laugh. And then with both hands, he dug in again. 

 Oh, if he thought it was bad before, no, this was true torture. The oil made the fingers glide pristinely on the sensitive skin, and thereby ticking seemingly everywhere at once. Roman still concentrated on squeezing both top rib bones on either side at the same time, while allowing the nails to scratch along the armpits and other ribs as he did it. 

 And Virgil screamed. He screamed and screamed louder than he had ever before. He couldn’t even be concerned at the fact they were living in an apartment, and if they neighbors would be worried. Virgil screeched at the top of his lungs, his voice no longer even saying words or please at this point, just pure unshackled ecstasy in waves unmeasurable. He screamed and laughed his voice hoarse, kicking and tugging in desperation to escape the torture he was being subjected to.

 “So,” commented Roman nonchalantly, yet very loudly to be heard over the booming laughter. “I was wondering if you could give me a quick performance review. You know, it is my first time and all.”

 “AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA-“

 “Okay, so that’s not too bad. Anything else?”

 Virgil silently screamed as he felt Roman vibrate his fingers into both bones once more.

 “Oh good! Well, I appreciate your input, thank you.”

 Virgil was loving every solitary second of this, after all, this is what he had wanted. He wanted exactly this. But, unfortunately, he needed to breathe. So he called out.

 “YEL-“ he stopped mid screech, his own laughter cutting him off. Roman stopped immediately. 

 “Was that yellow?” he asked, face contorting with worry. Virgil didn’t answer at first, only focused on taking in as much oxygen as he could get. 

 “Yeheheah,” he replied, the leftover giggles still dying out.

 Roman’s evil ler face melted as a fond one replaced it. “Wow, I’m impressed. That’s definitely your death spot, and you only called out yellow. I could never last as long as you did,” he marveled. 

 Even with as winded as Virgil was, he was still trying to tease back. “Oho, so you have a death spot, then?” he teased with a smirk. Roman blushed.

 “Oh shut up. Just so you know, you still technically haven’t called red yet,” he retorted cockily. Virgil nodded before laying his head down for a minute to rest. “Do you want water?” Roman asked him. 

 Virgil shook his head. “No, I’m almost done. I’d rather not get up then get back down.” His insatiable lee mood was shrinking drastically. But, there was one more thing he wanted. “So, um,” he looked up at Roman sheepishly. “Can I do a request?” 

 Roman smiled fondly. “Of course. This is your session after all.” 

 Virgil fidgeted as much as he could despite his hands being tied. “So, I kind of have a favorite spot. Like, after you tickled me. I realized I might have a favorite.”

 Roman’s heart practically burst on the spot. “Oh yeah? Let me hear it.”

 Virgil wrinkled his nose in embarrassment, and stayed quiet for a minute. Roman chuckled. “Come on little lee, I can’t help you out if you don’t ask,” he cooed, gently spidering his fingers on the tops of his feet, making him let out a quick giggle at the touch. 

 “Ohohokay, okay. Um,” he looked away bashfully. “Can you go back to, back to my stomach? You, you can tease. Too. If you want, or whatever,” he added quickly, still refusing to look Roman in the eye. Roman beamed.

 “Why, I would love to.”

 Roman sat down next to Virgil, and actually undid his cuffs, much to Virgil’s surprise. “Alright, now keep your arms up,” he whispered, sending a pink flush to his cheeks. 

 “W-what?” he giggled shyly. Roman poked his tummy. 

 “You heard me. You gotta keep them up aaaaall by yourself.” 

 Virgil giggled again, and cautiously raised his arms above his head and gripped the headboard. “Okay, I’m ready.” 

 Roman nodded with a smile and began lightly skittering his fingernails all over Virgil’s quivering tummy. Virgil immediately burst into soft, sweet giggles, the ones he could probably stop if he tried, but definitely didn’t want to, and rocked back and forth onto the bed. Roman kept the fingers teasing his sides gently, then lifted up his shirt slightly and started peppering cute little kisses all over the pale skin. Virgil squealed lightly and giggled slightly harder at the wonderfully maddening feeling, drinking in every bit of feeling he could. 

 Finally after about ten minutes, Virgil slowly lowered his arms from the headboard and Roman stopped. Overwhelming exhausted overcame him like an ocean and he yawned. “Thank you, Roman. This was the best day of my life.” Roman smiled at the compliment.

 “Why I’m so happy it was, Virgil. We will certainly do it again.” He stood up to leave, but Virgil grabbed his arm. 

 “Stay with me?” he asked, pulling on his arm like a child. Roman chuckled.

 “Of course.”

 And the two of them napped together, each so peaceful and happy in that they found each other, and waking up wondering if it was all just a dream.

[yeosangs-horizon]

Shared Stars (Changkyun x Reader) Roommate! AU

Genre: Fluff -> Smut Word Count: 4.8k Member: I.M/Changkyun | Group: Monsta X Warnings: Heavy smut at the end! Slow burn from roommates to friends to lovers! 

You gazed over your newly posted ad for a roommate in your apartment. You had just begun to rent the place out and being a nearly broke college student, you knew that it was impossible for you to keep up with rent and get an education at the same time. If worst comes to worst, you’d have to have a roommate, and being the only supporter of your finances you had to resort to that. 

Your apartment has two bedrooms and one shared washroom which wasn’t an issue but you weren’t used to living with others besides your family, being an only child. Either way you’d have to learn to adapt one way or another as you are now an adult. You exited out of the web page that you had posted your ad and got up from your seat to continue about your day, hoping somebody would contact you soon.

After a couple hours of finishing some schoolwork, you heard your phone buzz and you instantly widened your eyes, excited but also anxious to check the notification. ‘Hi, is this (Y/N) I’m writing to? I’m very interested to take you up on your offer for a roommate. Please send me more info about it, thanks. -Changkyun’. You beamed up, knowing that your wallet may be saved pretty soon. 

You replied back quickly. ‘Hello yes this is me! Thanks for expressing interest! I have a copy of the lease and regulations if you would want to see them. If you wanted to meet somewhere I could bring a copy for you and we can go from there?’ You stretch your legs after sending the text message and decided to get up from your seat to make a cup of coffee. It was still fairly early in the morning and you didn’t have a class that day until late afternoon.

You were rummaging through your cabinets to find a coffee filter when you hear the notification ‘ding’ sound again. ‘Sure! Does this evening work for you at the bakery by your address?’ He included a pinpointed location on maps as well, how convenient. You replied, tapping your fingers against the device. ‘Yeah that’s cool by me. Is 5 pm alright?’ ‘Yes. See you then.’ You sighed in relief as you viewed his last text. You had no idea what to expect out of this entire situation and secretly hoped that he wasn’t just a serial killer or some creepy old man.

Some hours passed as you walked out of your last class for the day, rifling through your notebook to see what other assignments you had to complete before the next day. You pulled out your phone from your back pocket and glazed your eyes over the time displayed.. ‘4:43 pm’ You just remembered your appointment with your new potential roommate. You took long strides towards the street, apprehensive about possibly being late. 

You turned the corner at exactly 5:00 PM and saw the lit up sign of the bakery just a couple buildings down. You let out a breath and smiled, wanting to make a good first impression of yourself. You turned the handle to the establishment and saw a man sitting near some tables towards the corner of the shop. His black locks of hair illuminated from the dim lights of the bakery. He had a piercing gaze that was directed towards his phone and smooth soft skin. ‘Could this be him?’,you wondered silently. He was beautiful at first sight.

“Um are you Changkyun?” you anxiously called out. He turned his head and directed his attention towards you whilst nodding. “Is this (Y/N)?” you smiled and affirmed his question. “Nice to meet you! I have all the info you’ll need so don’t worry about a thing,” you reassured while shaking his hand in a professional matter. 

You laid out the lease agreement, regulations, terms, and all of the knick knacks that had to go hand in hand with renting property out. You gazed towards his milky brown eyes as he skimmed the words etched in black ink on the papers below you both. He looked up after he was finished reading and remarked,” Everything is easily to abide by. I’ll take your offer and be your new roommate.” 

You clasped your hands together, feeling excited. “Amazing! When will you be moving in?” He scrolled through his mobile calendar and looked back up at you. “Tomorrow night if that’s fine. I know it’s abrupt but honestly living in a two bedroom studio with six other guys is really overwhelming. As much as I appreciate them I’d love to have more space,” he mused. “Six others? That’s quite something, I welcome you to do so right away then!” you let out a chuckle as the two of you stood up from your seats.

“Just drop by tomorrow night, I’ll be home and I can give you the keys and help you get situated. See ya then new roomie!” you called out whilst walking back to your own place. You saw him wave at you while striding in the opposite direction with a small smile on his face. You turn the corner and trudged up the stairs to your home. ‘He is so attractive, there’s no way this is happening.’ Your mind was boggled as you recalled the past half hour that has happened. You were only a bit intimidated by him but you were very excited that he was going to be your new roommate. 

The following day breezed by as you attended your classes in the morning, stressing over the workload again and remembering that you had to rush home to clean up your space in order for Changkyun to move in that night. You wondered slightly about what he was doing at the moment. Your thoughts concluded as a box you moved slipped out of your hands and fell on your right foot. “Shit! We love a good clean up,” you mumbled arrogantly while picking up heavy objects again. 

Time seemed to fly by as you shoved all your excess boxes in the multiple array of closets you had in your apartment. You heard the doorbell ring whilst putting up the last decoration you had by your windowsill. You rushed towards the door and turned the knob to see Changkyun, just as expected. He was dressed in a white hoodie and shorts, and damn did he look adorable standing right before you.

“Welcome to your new home! I can help you carry your stuff inside if you’d like!” you offered with enthusiasm. He looked back at the suitcase and multiple array of bags he had and nodded. “That would be wonderful, thank you.” After a couple minutes of carrying his belongings inside towards the couch, you sat down and stared up at him. “Make yourself at home, because you are at home now! Before I show you where everything is, do you want a drink or something?” 

He shook his head while placing his hand up. “I’m fine thank you, it really does feel very homey in here,” he remarked. You stifled a laugh as you replied,” If only you saw it a couple hours before.” You bounced from the couch and headed toward your drawer where you pulled out a spare key you had, just for him. “Here’s your key, don’t lose it because I don’t have another one. As you can see here this is the kitchen, utensils and plates are in this general area and the cleaning supplies are near the sink and uh, the miscanelous stuff is kept here,” you pointed out, trying to be the most helpful guide you could have been.

He took in the words coming from your soft voice as he looked around his new abode. He gazed at you walking as you made your way towards the living room again and started to speak. “The TV and lounging area is here as you can see, feel free to watch as much TV as you’d like, I don’t use it too often anyway. And over there in the halls is where your bedroom and washroom area will be.”

He picked up his bags with the help of you and made it slowly into his new room. The clean scent hit his olfactory bulb as you set his items down on the floor. “Welcome to your room! Not much to say here but if you have a question about where things are and all I’m just in the room next door so literally just knock on the wall, or text me if you’re like that too,” you remarked. “The washroom is just the door we passed and there’s a couple spare cabinets I think there to keep your stuff if you wish to do so.” He nodded while sitting on the bed already provided by you and looked around where he was going to be spending the nights for a long time.

His moment of tranquility was interrupted when you spoke again. “I’ll be in the other room if you need me, I just have some work to finish,” you dismissed. “Wait (Y/N), I never asked but what year are you and what’s your major? Excuse my interrogation but I’m really just curious,” he perked up with interest. “Oh y’know just your average psych major here. I’m a second year actually, what about yourself? You seem like you’d still be attending university,” you remarked. “Yeah I am! Third year as a matter of fact. I’m a chemistry major and minoring in music with digital media as well. If you ever need help or anything I’m always here,” he smiled. 

“Thanks Changkyun! Now to be enslaved by my work for the next couple hours,” you called out laughing as you slipped into your own room. You felt a smile slowly tug at your lips as you sat down and pulled out your assignment log. He already had captivated your attention and not to mention your interests. He did seem a bit cold but it was to be expected as you just started talking to him about a day ago but your senses strongly emphasized that you could trust him. 

You stared down at your assignment log as you skimmed over the two essays you had to do and a worksheet you had to complete before the next day. You sighed as your stress flowed back into your veins. You started to skim the prompts of your essays before deciding that you had to get a coffee. You wormed your way out of your room before you felt your body crash into another physical figure. You looked up and was flustered after you had ran into your new roommate who just so happened to step out into the hall from the washroom. You jumped back, a little bit startled and nervously laughed out of habit. “Sorry! I was too zoned out and didn’t see you!” “It’s alright, don’t worry about it,” he softly spoke out while snaking his way past you towards his room. You felt your cheeks flush up as you realized that you had embarrassed yourself in front of your new roommate. You shake off the thought quickly as you turned towards the kitchen to make yourself a cup of coffee. 

The rest of the night consisted of you working for hours on your essay and sipping your coffee. The night slowly slipped away into day time as the sunlight gleamed straight through your sleeping figure and into your eyelids. You were awoken by a soft singing voice from the walls next to you as you realized that last night your new roommate moved in and you weren’t alone anymore. His voice was angelic, beautiful, ineffable. You were touched by his voice. He was practically flawless in every way. You shake off the thought as you perked up in bed and got ready for the rest of your day. 

----- 

The day seemed to mesh together as you experienced your new lifestyle with Changkyun. The first week he seemed pretty cold towards you. You hadn’t bonded emotionally or anything yet which was to be expected nor did he share too much of his past and information about himself with you. Eventually, you both started opening up to each other as you saw each other more often and the weekend approached. He asked if he could bring a couple of his friends over to hang out from his old place of residency and of course you obliged. You got to meet Minhyuk and Jooheon and those three together were total goofballs. 

You enjoyed their company a lot and began to understand Changkyun and his personality more. You didn’t have an emotional bond yet until that fateful night when you felt so distraught that it sent you into a spiral of whirling emotions that couldn’t have been stopped.

-----

It felt like your entire world was collapsing when the stress that you had felt accumulated drastically and looking at your grades, it seemed like you weren’t going to pass your maths class. On top of that, you really missed your family who was on the other side of the world and you missed your friends who you haven’t seen for what seemed like ages. You scrolled past the post of your old group hanging out and felt tears streak down your face. You were experiencing an anxiety attack, something you don’t get too often anymore compared to your days in high school. You stifled back tears and sniffled. 

Suddenly, you heard the door crack open as Changkyun stepped inside your room. You had told him he never needed to knock if he needed anything and to just come in because you were trying to be a very open person. He was only going in to ask you where the blender was kept but it seemed that now he had other priorities over that. “(Y/N), what’s wrong?” he inquired as he stepped closer towards you. You buried your head in between your knees, not knowing what to do or say as you had never been confronted during an anxiety attack. “Talk to me, I’ll listen to you until the end of time,” he comforted as he sat on your bed. You turned your head slightly, tears in your puffy red eyes as you had been crying for awhile. 

As a matter of fact, you normally suffered through these tough periods alone. You never had anybody to comfort you, being an only child and all and living alone, so it did feel odd to have someone who was willing to hear you out. Feeling weak and mentally exhausted, you slowly got up and sat next to him. Wanting physical comfort, you wrapped your arms around his figure for the first time and started to softly shed tears on your shoulder. His warm arms seemed to engulf you and make time stop. You felt your heart rate start to decrease as you sniffled and found your words to begin talking. “I’m sorry Changkyun, I just really miss my family and friends and it seems like they’ve all forgotten about me. I’m not doing the best with my schoolwork and it’s almost the end of the semester. I feel like a failure Changkyun,” you vented as your head remained down, staring at the floor. 

He gently stroked your back and wiped the tears from your eyes. “Listen (Y/N), from the time I’ve known you, I know you’re super hard working and you have to believe in yourself. You’re not going to fail, and y’know, your friends may be experiencing something but you’re living a completely new life here and probably encountering way more than they do. I know you miss them but you wouldn’t be here if you were stuck over there.” Changkyun was so glad to have met you and be in your life. Deep down inside, he already had started to develop feelings after the first couple of weeks of living with you. You embodied so much positivity and optimism, he needed that a lot of the time and you unknowingly brightened up his day. 

“Thank you Kyunnie,” you mumbled, not knowing you accidentally gave him a nickname during now of all times. He felt his chest pounding as he stared at your adorable form, leaning against his and the cute nickname that fell from your lips. He started to accept in that moment that he felt something more than just friendship for you. 

------

Another week or so passed after your break down. You and Changkyun seem closer than ever. You both started adjusting your schedules to one another, wanting to spend more time with each other. The sweet gestures he would do for you practically made your heart melt. You both also started incorporating weekend movie nights with each other, that resulted in you using your TV way more than ever. This weekend just so happened to be horror night, as it was Changkyun’s time to pick. 

You hated horror but would stick it out just for him. You both sat on the couch with comfy blankets draped over the two of you. The movie started to play as the dramatic intense sounds began to surface to life. You were already frightened as you looked up at Changkyun, his eyes intensely entranced into the screen. “Goddamn Kyunnie why did you have to chose this one? You know I absolutely despise clowns and jumpscares,” you mumbled while peeking once at awhile to the movie. 

You felt fear bubbling inside your stomach as another jumpscare lashed out at the both of you. His figure jolted as well, scaring you even more. You gravitated towards him and pretty soon, you were pressed up against his side and burying your head in his shoulder when an unpleasant scene showed up. As if on cue, the lights in your own apartment flickered and completely blackened and so did the TV. Your breath came to a halt as your heart rate quickened by the second. You had power outages before, but from the given atmosphere, it seemed like somebody was playing a prank on you two, and you hated it. You buried your head deep into Changkyun’s side as he held you tighter to him, also atmospherically frightened. 

“K-Kyunnie, I’m fucking terrified right now,” you whispered out, not wanting to look into the depths of your own living room. He tightened his arms around you as if to protect you. “It’s okay, I’m uh, sure the lights will come on, soon…” he trailed off. As if on cue yet again, your apartment lights flickered on and so did the TV. You jolted up out from his arms at that moment and declared,” Okay that’s it, no more for tonight. My heart is weak and I can’t take all of this!” You laughed at your own words and saw his face light up in a smile. 

You turned towards the darkness of your hallway and back at him. You were anxious to admit that you were scared and wanted company through the night. You were not a child but you had a faint heart. You slowly approached him with your head downs and cheeks flushed. “Can I uh, stay with you tonight. I’m… scared,” you confessed. Changkyun’s heart almost jumped out of his chest, he wanted you to himself and in his arms everyday, but was too afraid to confess. “Of course, we can be scared together,” he mused while looking up at you. 

You both made your way back into his room. You were already wearing comfy clothes and didn’t mind sleeping in them. As you slipped into Changkyun’s bed, you were shrouded by his scent and you instantaneously felt comforted. He as well got into bed shortly after you did. His arms snaked around your waist almost instinctively to protect you. You smiled and felt your heart beating quickly. You loved him at this point, but didn’t utter a word about it. Whatever happened in that moment, it felt so right. You were amazed at how close you two have gotten within the past two months of living together, and you felt true happiness in that moment. His slow breathing sent a comfort into the rhythmic atmosphere as you were taken into a deep slumber.

The following morning, you winced as you opened your eyes from the sunlight that you were so used to. You looked around, realizing that you were not even in your own room. A slight moment of confusion engulfed your cranium but you had quickly come to realize that you slept with Changkyun because you were terrified from the movie you two had watched the previous night. Your breath hitched as you couldn't’ believe that you had been so open about your emotions. You looked around for him but he was nowhere to be found. You rolled out of bed with your messy hair and headed towards the kitchen for a drink of water. You saw his figure turned towards the coffee maker and instantly the strong smell of espresso hit your sensory receptors. 

He seemed to have picked up on your presence as he turned around with a gentle smile, something that you loved seeing. “Good morning (Y/N), I hope you slept well. I uh, made some coffee for you. I thought that you’d like that....” he added while feeling a bit shy. Your face gleamed and lit up into a smile. “That’s so sweet Kyunnie, thank you,” you remarked while striding closer towards him. “Sorry about last night by the way, I don’t exactly know what I was thinking,” you apologized while looking a bit flustered. He shook his head as if to dismiss your thoughts. “Don’t worry about it, it was really nice,” he admitted. You felt yourself gravitate towards his form and wrap your arms around him as if to say ‘thank you’. He found himself doing the same while stroking his fingers through your luscious locks and his feelings for you blossoming even more. 

The fact that you two acted like a couple even though you weren’t was already enough for you. You didn’t want to confess and have a possibility of ruining the bond that you two have formed for so long. Sooner or later, if one of you didn’t, you probably had to get yourself to seeing as you didn’t want to wait any longer to officially be his.

-----

 It happened sooner as you would have thought, and in a way completely different as you would have thought. You were getting ready to shower one night and you had gotten so comfortable around your own home and Changkyun as well that you didn’t even bother to head to the washroom with a shirt on. You were just in your bra and panties as you made your way to the washroom. Changkyun had just gotten home as he passed you, just so happening to get a glimpse of you with barely anything on, heading into the washroom. 

He instantly felt his face flush and was thankful that you hadn’t seen him. He always thought that you were attractive and hot. Ever since you two shared intimate moments with each other, he fantasized about having you but of course you had no idea. He kept quiet to himself about personal details and his thoughts most of the time. He quickly headed towards his room and dropped his backpack off while laying on his bed. 

His thoughts kept replying the two seconds he caught a glimpse of you and felt a bulge start forming against his sweats. He could only imagine you in the shower as he started to rub himself with his palm against his pants. He started to softly let out grunts and moans as he thought of you over and over again. Eventually he shedded himself from his pants and palmed himself as he looked at the selfies that you sent him occasionally that he had saved. He pulled down his boxers as his erect cock sprung free, red in colour and dripping from his sensitive tip. He rubbed his finger on his own hard tip, wishing that it was you that was playing with him. He softly moaned your name out and continued doing so as he took hold of his shaft and stroked himself. He didn’t realize the shower water had turned off and still continued to gasp your name out while playing with himself. 

You thought you vaguely heard your name whilst wrapping a towel around your figure. You pushed into Changkyun’s room, wondering if he needed something. You were met with his figure lying on his bed with his hand on his leaky hard member. You gulped as your face flushed and felt heat pooling down to your core. You had imagined him like this before, but never imagined that you would see him in such a vulnerable position. His eyes lustfully stared into yours as he continued to move his hand up and down his rock hard cock. 

“I thought you called me Changkyun, I’ll uh, leave you in peace if you’d like…” you trailed off as he cut you off. “Wouldn’t you rather stay to help me?” he offered lustfully with an airy voice. In all honestly, you really did. You nodded as you dropped your towel, revealing yourself to him as he scooted back and allowed you to climb in between his legs. You lowered your mouth on his shaft as you licked the tip, stimulating him to bits and pieces. He moaned as he thrust into your mouth. You began to take his member whole and bobbed your head up and down his dick, taking it all in. You lifted your head up and began to suck on his tip, tasting his juices leaking out. He let out a soft moan of your name as you felt his cock twitching. You removed your mouth from his needy member. He felt the cold air hit his sensitive organ as your core was dripping and craved his touch second by second. 

“Can I ride you?” you asked lustfully while closing in on his mouth for a kiss. He nodded as your tongue slipped into his warm cavern as your lips interlocked with each other. You placed a hand on his member and directed it towards your wet hole. You lowered your hips and felt him penetrating you easily with how much arousal fluid you had collected while sucking him off. You felt him fully enter you and an immense amount of pleasure surged through your insides. You slowly rocked on him and found a medium paced that you both enjoyed. 

“Mm that’s it baby, you feel so damn good,” he mumbled with a deep voice that turned you on every time you heard it. You felt yourself being more aroused as his cock slipped in and out of you. You felt your core tighten as the wet sounds of your love making filled up the room. You meshed your lips into his again, craving his touch as he gently rubbed your perky breasts, stimulating you more. You felt your climax come quickly as your core started tightening on his cock. You slowed down your movements, taking every single inch of him in and grinded your hips against his. You fell into an orgasmic state as you moaned out,” Kyunnie, I’m gonna cum.” He stared up at you, and you looked breathtaking as you leaned your head back with him inside of you. He felt your walls pulsate against his throbbing member as you released onto him. The warm fluids surrounded his dick as he felt himself thrusting into you, overstimulating you at the same time. “Fuck (Y/N), I can’t hold back much longer,” he confessed while grinding his hips into yours. He reached his orgasm and bucked his hips forcefully into yours as he let himself release his seed into you. 

You both panted heavily as he went to go pull out of you. “W-wait. Can we stay like this, for a little bit longer?” You asked shyly as you stared down at his toned chest. “Y-yeah, I don’t mind,” he replied as he slowly came down from his high, moaning every couple of seconds from the over stimulation he felt from being inside of you. 

“I should’ve told you this a long time ago (Y/N), but I love you. With ever fiber of my being. I wanted you like this for so long. Please, be mine,” he confessed while staring up at your flushed being, taking in every single curve that he could see with his eyes. “I never thought you’d ask. I love you too, you weren’t the only one craving this Kyunnie,” you snickered as you leaned down. Your lips both interlocked again and it felt perfect. He was no longer your roommate, but your best friend and your lover. 

[silvia7272]

3 ~ First Meetings Aren’t Normal Part 2

Well, here's another one folks. Also, I might struggle with original Akuma motives, designs and powers, feel free to suggest ideas to me. Also, if you have any character drawing requests for me please tell me and I may consider it if I have time. This is probably my longest chapter yet. And I really hope you like my OC’s. If there's any other type of information you want, I’ll try to provide it.

Word Count: 4266

Tags: @queenmj10​ @fangirl39​

***

“Marinette are you ok? You look slightly pale” Sabine mentioned but Marinette just ignored it.

“What is she doing here?” Confused by her daughter's random outburst, blinked.

“Rosina had wished to speak with you about something, and she seemed so friendly, so I offered her some new types of macarons. She is such a sweetheart” Sabine pinched her cheeks lightly while Rosina blushed from embarrassment.

“I’m sorry for seeming to barge into your home Marinette, but my Aunt wanted me to talk to you.” The bluenette stared at her. No way was she a fighter, without a Miraculous there's no way they could fight any enemy, Akuma or not. She hoped she wouldn’t intervene in any of the battles. With Chat as he was, she didn’t want someone else to goof off.

“Ok, Maman I’m going upstairs, we err have some… Stuff to sort out” Her Maman looked so happy at the news.

“Oh, I’m so happy you’ve made a friend you can truly trust Marinette.”

“Huh? But I thought-” Marinette grabbed her collar before dragging her off.

“Ahh wait. Thanks, Mrs Sabine, I love the macaroons I’ll be sure to take some to gooooooo~” Sabine giggled before taking care of the next customer who just came in at that moment.

‘Master Fū why didn’t you tell what to do?’

***

“Wow, your room is so cool, there are so many materials around here. -Gasp- you have cotton, ah, so soft to the touch” She continued to ramble on about anything within her room. But Marinette still wasn’t pleased.

“What exactly are you doing here?” Rosina paused, turning around with a confused look.

“Complimenting your room?” She answered hesitantly.

“No not that I mean here in Paris. Why are you and your Aunt here?” She questioned further.

“Didn’t Aunty tell you? Aw man, long explanations really aren’t my thing” Crossing her arms and looking in deep thought, a realisation came to Marinette.

“You know my identity, don’t you?” She knew already just wanted to clarify before her next statement.

“Y-Yeah, so-” She was interrupted.

“Are you going to try and become Ladybug? Are you and your Aunt going to take the Miraculous?” Rosina widened her eyes.

“No of course not, I would never even think of that”

“Then why are you here?” Marinette really didn’t trust this girl. Was she lying?

“W-Well Aunty said we’re here to assist the young heroes of Paris. And err yeah that’s it, Hehehe”

She was lying. She was so hiding something Marinette was determined to get to the bottom of it.

“Look if you're trying to get on my good side you can forget it. You won’t trick me like-” She stopped mid-sentence; she really didn’t want to think of that.

“I promise I’m not lying. Aunty researched everything, Mr Wáng once saved Aunty before so this is us repaying him, so that may help, right?” Marinette still narrowed her eyes at her.

“Then why now, this has been happening for a year now, why not before?” She flinched at her words, as if she were on the blink of finding the truth.

“We were… Preoccupied with other events” She looked down appearing to be nervous.

“Really? If you’re just going to lie to me forget it, I don’t need another Lila around me”

“Huh so you know she’s lying too, was that why you didn’t hang out with the class at lunch?” She paused.

Rosina knew Lila was lying?

“How did you-”

“She said she knew Mandarin but didn’t know what dă shì qīn, mà shì ài was, of course, she’s not multicultural, I doubt she’s even Italian, I mean I know Aunty researched the class but she wouldn’t miss something like that” The girl nodded her head in thought while Marinette stood there.

‘She knew? She knows she’s really lying. Can I really trust her?’ She thought until she spoke some words that seemed vaguely familiar.

“I’ll stand by you as well” No, nonono not those words, anything but those words. Please not like he said.

“S-Shut up. Stop lying to me”

“But I’m not-” Rosina tried to explain herself but to no avail.

“Get out of here, I never want to see you again”

Boom

“Akuma Alert!! Akuma Alert!!”

“I have to go”

Before the redhead could respond Marinette had already gone up to the balcony when the red Kwami came out.

“Marinette that was rude of you. She was only trying to help. I may not like Mrs Franchezca but that doesn’t mean Rosina is like her. And what if she had been Akumatized? Or even you, Marinette? You need to apologize afterwards” She fretted at the thought, she had just been tired of being backstabbed by the people she thought cared about her.

But maybe she wasn’t like them.

“Yeah Tikki. I’ll apologise and hopefully, I’ll hear her out. But for now…”

“Tikki! Spots On!”

***

“Well, M’Lady looks like our fates have crossed again.” Chat Noir was seen racing across the rooftops when he was following where the Akuma was going to be.

Ladybug was swinging her Yo-Yo after him, even if the previous events were still on her mind, she couldn’t let them distract her.

“Not now kitty, I have to finish this as soon as possible” The cat in question tilted his head in confusion.

“Aww M’Lady I can’t be that bad, can I? What's your reason for this quick evacuation?”

“Chat, please. I don’t want to talk about it” Naturally Chat wanted to pry, secrets shouldn’t be kept between both of them. He had told her time and again that if she trusted him there shouldn’t be anything he wouldn’t know.

As he was about to snoop, the sight in front, stopped him.

Someone was running along the rooftops!

With a fencing sword no less.

They nodded before rushing towards them. This wasn’t the first time one of the Parisians had tried to help out with an Akuma.

Kagami sure can prove to be a pain in the butt with the number of times she got caught up in the mess.

And don’t get them started on Alya.

They were just about to reach them… When suddenly.

She leapt off the building.

“H-Hey! What are you crazy!?” Ladybug leapt to catch them as Chat Noir continued to run along the buildings, his Lady could take care of that, until they turned around and whispered.

“Marinette” Her eyes widened; it was Rosina. How had she gotten here so fast, and how did she get a fencing sword, they don’t have a Miraculous?

She didn’t catch instead swinging away, before Chat could intervene a light surrounding her sword appeared and turned.

“What the!?” He exclaimed before it died down.

She was safely on the floor but with something moving around her finger.

“Hello, you two. Please inform me of the current plan” Her smile was bright but that didn’t matter to the 2 heroes. They noticed the thing on the girl's finger, but they needed one answer at a time.

“Who are you? And what are you doing here you could’ve got hurt!” She had to pretend she didn’t know her; she didn’t want Chat accusing her of more as well.

But before that happened there was a crash as more people ran away. The thing following the girl whirled around her before turning into a… Gravelling hook.

“Crisono Tassa is my name, I hope you’ll all take note of me” She winked before going off into battle using her newfound object, with Ladybug fuming ever so slightly.

“I knew she was going to come here, damnit, she can’t do anything without a Miraculous” Chat heard her, and he couldn’t keep his anger.

“What? You knew who she was and lied about it. M’Lady, that’s not fair, don’t you trust me?”

“Chat!? I do but first we-” He interrupted.

“You shouldn’t have lied to me how can I trust you if you won’t tell me everything, it's bad enough you deny my affections!” He pouted, waiting for his Lady to apologise like always.

“But I told you, I don’t love you Chat, you’re my frie-”

“But I want to be more than that! You just don’t see how we're meant to be, just because you can’t see it yet” He was annoyed, irritated even.

“Fine, it doesn’t matter because obviously, if you really don’t trust me, I’m leaving. You don’t need me anyway.”

“Chat? … Wait Chat!” Using his baton, he scurried off.

“No, wait!” Ladybug panicked, would she go after him to get some support or put the people first? She knew what she had to do and begrudgingly without her feline, went off to fight the Akuma alone.

But she wasn’t really alone.

***

Arriving on the battlefield held, an unexpected view.

The girl, Rosina, was battling the Akuma, and rather efficiently too.

“Wow, she’s actually handling herself out there. Maybe I was wrong” She looked on in amazement, this was the first time someone without a Miraculous or Akuma was fighting fiercely, dodging expertly…

Until she saw the Akuma, a giant being who grew after every minute, was about to swipe her feet from under her.

“I knew it was too good to be true” She was about to interfere, until…

That bright light again!? What was happening?

She was being protected, like Carapaces’ Shelter, except it was just a large square, with a circuit board design?

With the Akuma distracted she jumped onto its arm. She successfully dodged all attacks made by its other arm and raced up its arm looking around.

“She’s looking for the Akuma.” She realised before looking herself. In her Ladybug vision, she finally noticed it.

“Ros- I mean Crisono it’s the handkerchief look” Luckily the redhead acknowledged the Heroine's words and jumped into the air, making a bee-line for the object.

She caught it in her sword.

“She did it, she really did it.” She sooooooo owed Rosina an apology but that was incredible. No wonder Fū and Tikki knew they could handle themselves. The guy was back to normal as she gave the handkerchief to Ladybug.

But before she could congratulate the girl, a familiar reporter, and a reluctant brunette, beat her to it.

“Wow that was incredible, are you going to be a new permanent hero? Which Miraculous do you have, what's your name and where did you come from? Are you a new hero Ladybug came to get? Could you spare a few moments of your time to give me an interview?” The young reporter didn’t let the poor girl get a chance to speak before she put a finger to her lips.

“Please no more questions Alya, but I can say a few words to you. My name is Crisono Tassa and I don’t have a Miraculous.” The brunette gasped in surprise; how did she know her name? And how did she fight without a Miraculous?

“Ladybug and I may work separately, I’m not sure about what will happen in the future, but I guarantee to help out whenever, I wish to become a number to each and everyone here. So, I bid you adieu Alya, Lila.” It appeared she flew off, amazing the Parisians enough with a round of applause but with both girls confused about being a number.

What did that mean?

“No more evil-doing for you little Akuma” Her usual De-Evilising routine continues before she overhears her ex-best friends’ conversation.

“Wow, a new permanent hero, and she knows my name? My blog is going to get so many hits.” Alya exclaims gleefully.

“Well, of course, it was meant to be a secret but Crisono and I know each other personally. And I told her all about you and your blog. I can help get you an interview if you want?” The girl with glasses squeals with delight and hugs her.

“Oh, Lila you’re the best” Normally the bluenette girl would be irritated with what Lila said but it was somewhat true. She threw up her lucky charm, having to do it before using the Miraculous Ladybug.

What came down confused her. It was a DS.

“What!? What does this have to-?” She looked over it.

It had a game over screen, with the main menu, restart and quit button there. In the background, there was a redhead. She was still so confused. What was she meant to do, surely the battle had already finished what did she have to figure out? But then she saw it.

Restart

Restart

Restart

It had flashed along with the background character.

She knew what she had to do; it was clear to her.

‘Rosina, please don’t go too far’

“Miraculous Ladybug” She yelled, repairing everything in her path.

“Oh Ladybug, can you spare just a few for me please?” She couldn’t stop the smile spreading.

“Sorry, I gotta go I’m about to Detransform. Bugout” She Yo-Yoed away leaving the reporter denied of having two interviews that day.

***

‘C’mon c’mon where is she? I only have a few minutes left’ Running along the houses to search for the redhead was like finding a needle in a haystack.

“Wait I see her. Crisono wait!” She shouted and luckily for her she turned to look at the Heroine.

“Ladybug?” Her mask was off, but something felt different. She wasn’t smiling.

“I’m sorry, I’m really really sorry. You really can fight that was amazing. I- Are you ok?” Rosina was still looking down. Her arms hugging her tightly.

“I was lying to you Ladybug. We’re weren’t really here for Akuma’s, that was just extra, and I know I need to tell you, but Aunty said not to tell anyone yet. I feel as if I’ve betrayed you.” Solemn her gaze continued to the ground.

But Marinette wasn’t concerned with that, if she continued to feel bad then an Akuma would come.

“Wait, don’t feel bad. It doesn’t matter, your secrets are yours you don’t have to tell me until you want to. It doesn’t matter ok, just please stop being sad you’ll attract an Akuma?” Rosina widened her eyes, she had almost forgotten.

“Ahhh, I’m so sorry I forgot. Aw man, Auntie’s gonna kill me” Ladybug was able to laugh, so much had happened it was good to let it out.

Until she heard that familiar beeping sound.

And to make matters worse.

“Ladybug? Where are you? We need to talk”

‘Oh no, if he comes now, he’ll see me as Marinette. I’m doomed, I’m going to lose my Miraculous’ Ladybug panicked, while Rosina looked deep in thought.

“Ladybug I can help but you have to trust me.” A serious expression donned her face, surprising Ladybug.

“Huh? How?” Rosina touched something on her cloak.

“There's no time to explain, please” She extended her hand out to her.

‘Trust me’ She spoke with no words needed.

“Ok I trust you” she grabbed it.

“Priselio” She barely heard her before she had to shield her eyes.

And just as Chat peered into the alleyway…

There wasn’t anything there.

***

Ladybug had her eyes closed; she still didn’t have any idea what was going on.

“Hey, Marinette. You can open your eyes; this part is my favourite.” She hesitantly opened one eye. But her other one opened soon after.

In front of her, would be an experience she would never forget.

“Where are we?” Around her seemed to be a galaxy of some sorts. They were in a tunnel with stars surrounding them in a seemingly endless array of space.

“When we get there, I will explain more. Or at least try to” She wanted to ask further, but it looked like she was concentrating so she didn’t want to interrupt.

She looked at her hands, or rather her costume in fact. Shouldn’t she be De-Transformed by now?

“This place has no concept of time, it’s as if it doesn’t exist. That’s why you won’t De-Transform here unless you choose to. When we go back the amount of time you should’ve spent here would’ve passed… At least that’s what Aunty tells me” She assumed she saw her confused face and answered her question.

Marinette could feel a change in the air, and it seemed like Rosina noticed it as well. Soon it appeared they had arrived with Ladybug astonished at the view. It looked like a forest, but the sky was green, and the grass was blue. The trees were purple and the river running through was pink.

“Wow, this place would give me loads of inspiration for my drawings” Her eyes bored into everything she could see.

“Yeah, I still remember my first time seeing this place. Its where we train and battle against the Revenant”

“Revenant? What's that?” They sat crossed-legged towards each other. Tikki was there to hear it for herself after Rosina told her it would be best.

“It's like our version of an Akuma or Amok. There are these Trinkets that are spread around the country that I have to collect before they either awaken or worse crack”

“It doesn’t ring a bell for me. Do you have a picture of what one looks like?” Tikki questioned. Maybe it went by a different name?

“Well, actually it's all of this. Plus, this Trinket I have on my cloak, don’t worry I err purified it? Is that the correct word?” She muttered the last part before continuing.

“It is like an Akuma if I have to be honest, except when you touch it, you get transported into its world. I should take you one day. There are more things to fight though so Akuma’s are by far easier, at least if they’re like anything by today's standards.” Marinette shook her head quickly.

“But they shouldn’t be underestimated. You must always be vigilant whenever you go into a Revenant, one wrong move and you’re done. I doubt Aunty would ever let me tell Chat”

“What!? But Chat Noir is my partner, he could help us with this!”

“No! I mean, sorry for raising my voice but he wasn’t there today, why should I rely on him?” Her voice wasn’t accusatory, more confused and wanting to understand.

“But he… We”

“I understand that you two are partners Marinette, but I can only trust you today. And by what he’s shown me I doubt I could ever trust him by his immaturity.” She nodded to herself, a habit the girl was accustomed to.

“You’re, right” She lowered her head causing Rosina to worry.

“But hey that isn’t to say he isn’t a bad guy anyway; I don’t even know him” She was rambling now. Someone stop her.

“But… He is immature, and always thinks it's like a game to him. I’m always the one who has to carry the responsibility. He doesn’t realise how much I have to figure a plan out or it will all come tumbling down. He doesn’t comprehend the burden I carry if I might screw up one day. And with everything that’s been going on, I just don’t know how I’m going to handle it anymore” Rosina stopped. Mainly because she saw the tears rolling down the poor girl’s face.

“Marinette you’ll attract an Akuma please don’t be sad” Tikki commented, she hated seeing her cry.

“She won’t Tikki. Nothing from Paris could ever come here, I’ve tried it. We’re blocked out from there. And besides, I think it’s good if Marinette lets it all out. Never being able to express your emotions could make her have a breakdown in the future.”

She could cry and not have to worry about being Akumatized?

“R-Really?”

“Yeah of course, please Marinette it's not healthy for you to be like this. You need to let it-” She was stopped when arms flew around her neck. The poor girl was crying heavily in her arms. The redhead couldn’t help but feel sorry for her, had she really been holding all of this back. Whoever Hawkmoth is would get a serious beating when she finds out.

Tikki felt guilt rising in her at the sight of her holder. The inconvenience of being Ladybug and living in Paris meant never being able to be a normal teenaged girl. She too let out some tears and hugged the girl.

Rosina could only try and soothe her with gentle pats and a song.

***

Night had fallen.

The girls didn’t notice how long they had sat, talked, cried and laughed in that world before returning to the girl’s home.

Marinette was worried her Parents had checked up on her, but it appeared that hadn’t been the case.

“Thanks, Rosina, I really needed that, more than I thought I would.” She scratched her head before blushing. It felt like she had made an embarrassment of herself on the first day of meeting her. Rosina seemingly noticing waved her off.

“It's no sweat Marinette, I couldn’t imagine never being able to cry for a whole year. I always stub my toe on something.” Both girls giggled again before the silence settled. Marinette scratched her head again.

“Hey so err, are we- we can- I mean can we be friends?” She was hopeful, but she also knew she shouldn’t be too hopeful.

But Rosina’s cheerful smile cleared her doubt away.

“You really want to be friends with me? Wow, this is such an honour. I would love nothing more than for you to be my first friend Marinette”

“First?” Rosina slightly grimaced.

“Because Aunty and I travel to different countries, I’ve never really been able to have any friends. I had to either study or train because of the, you know what. But I would love to be your friend Marinette” She grabbed her hand in glee.

“Now my first friend what activity do we do first? Painting nails? Popcorn and movies? -Gasps- Can we have sleepovers?” Marinette had to cover her mouth to stop the further questions that tried to fly out her mouth.

“I think it's getting late now and we’ve gotta go to school tomorrow, but we can do whatever you want tomorrow if you want. Unless if, you know what happens” She was the only one to laugh at that as Rosina looked on with a sheepish smile.

“Yeah, of course, you’re right. It's just that, the place we went. It needs to recharge and err that was where I live”

“So that means-” Marinette felt guilt ridding in her.

“I don’t have anywhere to stay” Rubbing her head she prepared for the voice of concern come out of her friend’s mouth.

“WHAT!?” That voice of concern didn’t come from Marinette. It came from the little hatch that entered the girl's room.

“Maman? Papa? What are you doing up here?” Without meaning to they ignored the daughter's wails of embarrassment to turn to the new guest.

“Oh, you sweet poor girl, where are your Parents? They shouldn’t leave you all alone in Paris, if you were attacked by an Akuma who knows what would happen?” She slightly winced but she knew they were just concerned.

“It's alright really. My Aunt just has a lot on her plate at the moment, she just accidentally took the key to our apartment. I know she didn’t mean to” Wow, if Marinette didn’t know the truth she would’ve brought that lie, she was good. Not like Lila because hers were actually convincing.

“But still, oh I know, you can please stay with us. You’ve been so kind and helpful towards Marinette it would be so nice for her to have a proper friend.” Marinette couldn’t believe her Mother’s words. She was so kind to even a stranger, it was commendable.

“Oh no I couldn’t possibly do that, Sir, Mlle that offer is so kind, but I’ll be fine”

“Nonsense, a friend of Marinette’s, is a friend of mine. I’ll just get some blankets for you” Tom, Rosina had to guess was Marinette’s Father, proclaimed and walked down the stairs while she shuffled from spot to spot.

“But I- you’re not going to let me deny are you?”

“No honey, now I’m sure Marinette has some spare pyjamas for you, you two look roughly the same size, now you two get changed and go to bed, I don’t want you both being late in the morning” She mainly aimed that at Marinette leaving her giggling.

“I’ll try not to Maman and thank you.”

“Yes, thank you, Mlle Sabine, I will help in the bakery whenever I can for allowing me to stay here.”

“Oh, sweetie you don’t have to. Although it would be nice to have some new company” She teased before walking down the stairs.

“So, err what just happened?” Confused they sat on the sofa Marinette had, the day's events exhausting the two.

“I think you just got adopted into my family” She answered honestly. It had never happened before, she was still in a state of shock.

“…Neato”

***

There was much talk the next day at Dupont. Since they had all followed Alya’s blog plus Nadja’s official announcement on the topic, it had the whole of Paris talking.

‘Just who was she?’ That had been on everyone's mind.

However, that hadn’t been the most shocking thing that had happened.

When Rosina, the one they wanted to get to know after her compliment introduction, had walked with someone besides her. Laughing and chatting as if they had been long-time best friends.

It was Marinette, she had somehow tricked her to be her friend!

Crisono was the least of their worries at what they saw next.

Their arms were linked together.

***

Well, that’s it, I hope you’ve enjoyed their meeting, and I hope I’ve kept everyone as much in character as I can. Do you think I should add some more information for Rosina, or should I just state it in later chapters? Do you like the OC’s or do you dislike this idea? Also, I made a drawing of what Rosina would look like as Crisono. I hope you enjoy.

Also, can anyone guess what the meaning of Crisono Tassa is?

What should my next chapter be? Chloé becoming friends or meeting Piper or something completely different?

[starscheme]

Lost Stars

A/N: This is a SodaLars Fanfiction involving an Original Gem I created and introduced in another FanFiction titled "With All My Heart." Though I still provide Sodalite's background in this story, you may be a little confused if you haven't read the other. Still, Hopefully you can read this story and follow along even without having read With All My Heart.

Chapter One: To Help You

The sun was setting along the horizon of the ocean water and the day was finally coming to an end. This was a huge relief to the pink young man who was sitting on the sand, his appearance rather disheveled from a nasty fall he'd taken earlier. After closing his bakery for the evening, Lars had spent the last few hours trying to locate and calm a Gem named Sodalite.

This Gem was the only one of her kind. A Gem created by Blue Diamond to ease the negative feelings of Pink Diamond. With the ability to absorb dark feelings and purify them within herself, Blue thought Sodalite would be of use in keeping Pink calm and happy. However, Sodalite was only able to absorb Pinks fears and anxieties, not her anger, resulting in many more temper tantrums than before.

Because of this, Sodalite was deemed useless. It was decided that no others would be made and the one remaining would be shattered as she no longer had a purpose on Homeworld. Fearing for her life, Sodalite fled the palace and managed to hide herself away. When Sodalite heard of Pinks new colony, she hoped to seek refuge there. Unfortunately, during attempt to get to Earth, Sodalite's Gem was cracked. As a result, Sodalite was unable to control her ability and would absorb all the fears and anxieties of all the Gems near her. She also found herself unable to purify those emotions. Instead, they filled her to the brim, until the poor Gem was frightened of just about everything. Not to mention that when those dark feelings overflowed, any Gem close by would experience their worse fears, nearly causing their own demise with the pressure on their gems.

Luckily, Lars was able to help this Gem when she finally came looking for Pink Diamond. Since he was human, Sodalite didn't feel his fear or see the dark feelings that surrounded him. Though she had caused some trouble for Steven and Spinel in her need for healing, eventually, Sodalite was fixed. However, after nearly eight thousand years of being filled with fear, Sodalite wasn't so easily fixed. Like Pinks first Pearl, she was left with a permanent defect. Sodalite couldn't help being afraid of nearly everything and was too anxious to go near Gems again. She'd also found that her power could now extinguish all light around her, covering everything in pure darkness. Which happened often when she panicked.

Since Lars was the only one Sodalite was not afraid of, he was often called on by a Gem from little homeworld when Sodalite was having a bad episode. Today seemed to be no exception. Sodalite had fallen down on her way home and when several Gems tried to offer help, Sodalite blacked out the area and caused a bit of an uproar before running away. It took some time, but Lars finally tracked her down and took a terrible tumble in the dark while trying to reach her blind.

"I'm sorry..." Sodalite began, her voice soft and trembling as she hugged her knees to her chest. Finally feeling at ease as she stared out at the setting sun.

With a sigh, Lars reached over and gently pat the Gems head. Sure, he was tired and needed a shower after that fall he took in the dark, but he didn't hate her for it. "You're fine. Hey, you went a whole week without a blackout this time. I think that's pretty good."

Sodalite glanced cautiously at the pink human and felt even worse when she saw his dirt patched. He was always so kind to her. Even when she caused him no end of trouble. Surely she was making his life difficult. "You...didn't call my Steven this time..." she pointed out quietly, turning a bit and reaching for his face to brush some of the mud from his cheek.

"We don't have to call him every time. It would just stress you both out," replied Lars, stiffening his shoulders a bit as Sodalite's fingers gently wiped the dirt from his face.

"Every time this happens...My Steven seems disappointed in my lack of progress. ...I just can't seem to fit in here. I didn't belong on Homeworld either..."

Lars was quiet for a moment, glancing down at Sodalite's sullen expression. For all the trouble that Sodalite caused, some wondered why Lars bothered to help her. She wasn't his responsibility after all. However, the reason Lars was fine with Sodalite staying near him, was because she reminded him so much of himself and how he used to be. Never feeling like he had a place in this world, feeling alone, always being afraid. "It's only because you're not used to it yet. Remember what Pearl said? It's gonna take time to adjust. You're not the only Gem having trouble."

"..." Sodalite pulled her hand back to herself and stared down at the sand. "...I guess."

Lars felt at a loss. He wanted to cheer her up, but he still wasn't sure how to do that. She wasn't like the others yet. There wasn't anything on Earth that she enjoyed. Was it always this hard to make a girl smile? He wasn't ever very good at that. "H-hey, why don't you try helping Blue Lace at the front counter tomorrow? It would be good practice interacting with people and you know, mostly humans come in, so you won't have to see that weird, fog, smoke stuff that you normally do."

Though Sodalite liked having an excuse to see Lars, she worried about her impact on his store. "What if...I make a mistake and something bad happens? I could black out the store and ruin something again. Remember what happened before...?"

"That...was different?" Lars tried again. "I mean, you had just—-no, yeah, it was pretty bad." He admitted finally. "But I think you'll do better this time. Why not give it one more shot?"

The freckled Gem was apprehensive, but eventually nodded her head. If Lars really thought she could do it, she wanted to try her best and make him proud. Even if the idea of greeting strangers made her stomach turn. Satisfied with her answer, Lars stood up and proceeded to pat the sand from his pants before offering her a hand up.

"Cool, now let's get you home so that I can shower and change out of this ripped shirt."

"I'm sorry," she said again, allowing Lars to help lift her from her seat on the sand. "If only I could heal like My Steven. You must feel rather sore after a fall like that..."

"Yeah, but then you'd have to slober all over my face and—-" as the words came out, Lars felt his cheeks begin to burn and he quickly cut himself off. "—-I mean—-you know, cause he uses...never mind. Forget I said that." Lars stammered slightly, glancing away from her silver eyes as she stared up at him.

"I understand. You must be feeling ill from all the stress. That...I cause," added Sodalite, feeling slightly downhearted by her own words.

"I'm not sick. Now that I think about it, I haven't gotten sick since...I changed color." Lars thought aloud, turning to walk Sodalite towards the nearest Warp Pad that would take her home. Depending on how nervous she was, Sodalite traveled with him in two ways. If she was still feeling scared, the blue Gem would cling to the back of his shirt and stick close behind him. If she had calmed down, she'd hug tight to his arm. Each option made it a little difficult to walk comfortably, but it was a way he determined her mood. Considering that Sodalite had hugged his arm, she must have felt better.

Though it was always a good thing when she was calm, Lars was still a young man and Sodalite was quite well endowed in the chest, which always pressed against him while she hugged herself close. It often made their walks rather quiet since Lars would be replaying old wrestling matches in his head to distract himself.

"Oh, hey Lars," greeted Sadie as she was just leaving the boardwalk.

Lars stopped and Sodalite felt him tense up as the blonde human approached them. "H-hey, Sadie. How's it going? I thought you and Shep already left town..."

"Ah, mom sort of strong armed us into staying a little longer. Who's your friend?" asked Sadie, leaning to the side so that she could get a better look at the Gem who was slowly edging herself behind Lars to hide.

"Huh? Oh, um, this is Sodalite. I was just uh...walking her home." Lars answered awkwardly. Should he have phrased it differently? Walking her home nearly sounded as if they had just finished a date or something. "Sodalite, this is Sadie."

Sodalite hugged Lars' arm a bit tighter, staring back at Sadie cautiously. She'd heard some of the off colors mention that name before, but Lars had never said anything about her. So why did he seem so nervous? Regardless, since Lars was introducing her, Sodalite didn't want to appear rude. "...h-hello..." mumbled Sodalite quietly.

"It's nice to meet you, Sodalite. Are you staying in little Homeworld too? I bet you guys will have to expand soon with all the Gems that keep coming. Do you like Beach City?"

"I don't like it," replied Sodalite, her voice just above a whisper. "I only like Lars."

With a sharp inhale, Lars froze in place. Stunned still by Sodalite's choice of words. Sadie also seemed a bit taken aback. "Y-yeah?" Sadie began, feeling slightly embarrassed now.

"N-no! She doesn't mean it like that!" Lars added frantically, his blush burning all the way to his ears. "She-she's just a little attached to me! I was the first human she met, so, ya know, I'm just kinda...looking out for her."

Sodalite couldn't help noticing how panicked Lars was now. Had she said something wrong? She thought if she spoke with the human girl Lars would be proud of her. Instead, he seemed upset.

Sadie took in his words and appeared confused now. "Is...this why you postponed going back into Space?"

"...back into space?" repeated Sodalite.

Once again, Lars panicked a bit, pressing his finger to his lips to insist that Sadie not go any further. If Sodalite knew he might leave earth, she would just freak out. It would ruin all the progress she had made and he was trying his best to help her adjust before he left.

Sadie was quick on the uptake, but she didn't exactly approve. Why was he hiding such a thing from this Gem? It was a little disconcerting. "Um, sorry, guess I was confused. Well, I should head back. We should talk more soon. See you later, Sodalite."

Lars nodded his head and waved slowly as Sadie walked away. Glad that she didn't spill the beans, but always a little disappointed when he had to watch her walk away.

Sodalite said nothing, glancing up at Lars to examine his expression. He didn't look sad, but he didn't exactly look happy either as he watched the human girl get further away. In fact, it seemed as if he wanted to say something, but Sodalite wasn't sure what that could be. "...Lars?" tried Sodalite, tugging on his arm lightly to get his attention.

"Huh? ...oh. Sorry," Lars began with a forced smile. "I was thinking about something."

"About what?"

Now Lars felt stupid for lying. Of course she would ask him a follow up question. He should've expected that. "Ah, um...I was thinking about how well you did just now. You didn't panic at all. I'm really proud of you."

The blue Gems eyes brightened and a warm smile laced her lips. "R-really?" Sodalite asked hopefully.

The way she looked up at him, so happy to be praised, it made him feel even worse for lying. Though he was proud that Sodalite did well, it wasn't what he had truly been thinking about. He wasn't about to admit that and ruin her mood. "Y-yeah," Lars began, using his free hand to reach over and pat her head lightly. "I know you don't think so, but you have been doing a lot better."

Sodalite's Gem began to glow as she raised her chin, happily accepting Lars' small show of affection. Nothing made her happier than when Lars praised her. Since being deemed useless almost immediately after being created, Sodalite had always felt useless. Almost more so now that she had left over damage from being broken. She was always messing up even here on earth. So when Lars told her she was doing well, it made her feel as though she might actually be useful to someone. "I'll do even better tomorrow, I promise." replied Sodalite with an elated smile, more determined than ever before to do a good job.

Lars smiled back at the Gem. Though he felt guilty, he was glad she seemed so determined. He didn't want to go back into space until he was sure that Sodalite could function without him around. Once she got used to things, she'd make more friends and she wouldn't need him as much anymore. That was the goal anyway, but the thought that she wouldn't depend on him anymore did feel a bit lonely. "Let's get you home so you can res—I mean, so you can prepare for tomorrow."

With that, Sodalite nodded her head and continued to walk with Lars towards the nearest warp pad. Though Lars' conversation with the human girl concerned her a little, she convinced herself that it was simply the normal paranoia that she often experienced. If she told Lars it made her anxious, he would find out that she didn't actually do as well as he thought. For now, Sodalite would attempt to put it from her mind and focus on what was to come tomorrow morning.

A/N: Well thats it for the first chapter. I hope you will follow Sodalite and Lars for a while. Also, don't worry, I'm working on my Other Fic's too. I've just been out of Insulin for a little while, so focusing on anything was nearly impossible while trying not to die. lol

However, a new chapter of Change My World and Only You will be out in the next few days. Thank you for all the support and love! Love you all!

[thestudyfeels]

🎨 Graphic made by @indiaisstudying​: India is brilliant my pals, and I recommend checking her out for studyblr/artblr inspiration. My girl tHIRIVES.

The singular takeaway from this post: Do a creative binge. Much productive than a Netflix binge. Period.

Two months ago, I reached my peak when I coined the term ‘bood day’ (a bad to good day, in my article How To Flip A Bad Day By 180°). Today, puppies and kittens, I present to you— a creative binge.

*crickets chirping, that one dude in the audience scratches his nose and turns away* 

…This one actually works but okay, we get it, y'all are bitches. But gonna do my job anyway– if you're a creator reading this, please do a creative binge at least once every two weeks.

I started doing these binges two months ago, and I've seen a VAST improvement in my creative energy. I feel my commercial voice coughing and saying hello to the mic, so before I start listing side-effects for a sponsored pill, let's dive into the basics. 

🍵 Quick PSA — 

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100 Days of Sweat: This challenge starts TOMORROW (10th of April), so if you wanna hustle on your bod this year, join us! Accountability does crazy things.

Ever questioned your life, experienced writer's block, painter’s pain or blogger’s… block? (Narrator: aaaand she's back to advertising.) A creative binge helps deal with fixing exactly that.

“A creative binge is based off the equation of quality in = quality out.”

A lot of creators feel that they're supposed to magically create out of their head, and that's just ridiculous. It's ludicrous considering you don't know shit, read shit, do shit and watch shit.

Even to write fiction, my pal, you'll have to expose yourself to the world to know its ways, read great books and take tips (not to mention stock up on coffee, and prepare to cry a lot) before you start cranking out the pages. Everything you create is ultimately inspired by the Ways Of The World. (And that's a fantastic novel title)

So in short, you’ve got to consume content, to make content. And in a creative binge, you conscious choose content that'll help you create. Genius, I know!

Okay, but what if I'm not a creator?

Brilliant question! Wanna become more valuable and leave the people you interact with better? Take a creative binge.

Allow me an elaboration: Take a janitor and a neurosurgeon. The said janitor is paid much less than the neurosurgeon. Why is that? Is the neurosurgeon a better person? That's debatable. Is the janitor less efficient at his work? Again, debatable. The primal reason lies in the neurosurgeon acquiring more valuable skills than the janitor. Society rewards them by paying more since there are less folks who can do what the neurosurgeon does.

To recap: In order to be indispensable in the role you play (whatever it is, a student, calligrapher, CEO of the Janitor Club), you HAVE to become valuable. Grow your curiosity & know more than yo’ buddies (also bring more value than anybody else). And to become valuable, you consume value. Tada!

(And if you still ain't convinced, I'll pull out the Netflix card. You'd really rather watch shows? Or binge YouTube? Than learn a new skill, or develop existing ones? Question your priorities, my friend. Victims love entertainment, victors love learning.)

Cool, you're joining in then! Not that creative binge is NOT an entertainment binge. It's a value providing binge. What you ‘consume’ has to bring you something in return— whether that's creative inspiration, motivation or skills. *Swing arms* yup! We’re one gay, productive household. Someone remind Hallie to buy the groceries though, the Cheerios are going mouldy.

By my dictionary, a creative binge is a slot of time, 1½ to 3 hours I'd say, when you watch/read/listen to some good stuff.  Basically, binge content. 

THE 101 OF A CREATIVE BINGE 

🌿 Basics:

I conduct one every week (usually Wednesday mornings), lasting around 1½ to 2 hours.

I'll also keep a notepad and a pen nearby, to take notes and jot ideas as they come. Again, this is NOT an entertainment binge, even though it's a chill job.

Sometimes I'll get passive things done (like wiping my desk, eating breakfast and taking out textbooks) while watching. We maximize our time. 

🌿 What Do I Watch: 

The stuff I watch falls into 3 categories: creative/humor (for inspiration), business/skills (for skills) & motivation (for, um, motivation). Fair warning though, a lot of the stuff these folks make overlap, but that's alright. This is just a rough demarcation. 

Creative/Humor: some YesTheory, maybe some MacDoesIt, sprinkle in some Ryan Higa, perhaps an episode of a show with an amazing script, some stand-up comedy from my favorites. Or maybe trash that and just watch Sherlock. (Geez, Netflix, I hate you, I love you.)

Skills: Gary Vee, some artist channels, that random video on how to thrift shop even though I don't shop.

Motivation: Be Inspired, Tom Bilyeu, Mel Robbins and random videos which look nice.

🌿 What Do I Listen To: 

Oof, I love music tremendously! If you're a pal, you know it's time to RUN when I come around being like, “soo, I was wondering what's your favourite–”.

Yet, during a creative binge, I'll only listen to stuff that 1) inspires me, or 2) is creative in a way I can't explain. Some recommendations! 

Hype music:

The Score

NF

Imagine Dragons

Creative music:

Billie Eilish

Lana Del Rey

Sleeping At Last

Lorde

Conan Gray

Harry Styles 

🌿 What Do I Read: 

Usually the book that I'm reading at that point if I'm being lazy.

POETRY: It's my belief, but poetry is a writer's most powerful device. There's a novel to be said in a simple sonnet.

FICTION: I dig great fiction. PS, please read (and sob over) Away Childish Things, by @letteredlettered. It changed me as a person, changed my entire perspective about kids. I'm much kinder and softer now, and my pimples are gone. I'll literally never get over drarry too, so thanks lettered, love you.

ARTICLES: Bookmarked psychology, productivity & fitness articles on Medium. Maybe check out James Clear's & Gary Vee’s blog for new posts.

Because I wanna drive this home, here's what I did in my last creative binge as a concrete example —

Care to Note that:

All of the stuff I consume is pre-planned.

I add videos throughout the week to my Creative Binge playlist on YouTube, download albums from Amazon Music and articles for offline reading.

DON'T leave this to the last moment, you'll more likely pick entertainment vs learning then. 

Watched–

Why I'm done trying to be "man enough"

Redecorating my room 2017 (I wanna decorate my room this year so)

How to Squat Properly (I’m trying lmao)

Giving a 9-Year-Old Her Dream Job for 24hrs!! (I stan YesTheory so much)

How To NOT Be A Starving Artist (A mood. I love Sorelle)

Couple more, I could go on & on, but you get me.

Listened–

Every song on YouTube by Bruno Major

Born to die: paradise version (album) by Lana Del Rey 

Read–

Articles from James Clear's blog — (x) (x)

Articles from Gary Vee’s blog — (x) (x)

HIIT workouts for beginners

All of this birthed–

Ideas for future articles, titled: How To Be Great & Solomon Letters #2: Question Your Faith, Not Your Dreams, among others.

A small poem about faith– posted on my IG, check it out!

New content ideas, like value chains (upcoming!)

Bunch of other small rants for everyday posting

Some business and life advice that might be useful later.

Gotta say goodbye now! (literally too... but post about it coming on 12th so wait for it) Try this one out, and let me know how your binge goes (tag it with #team conquer). Mine usually end with a bucketful of philo notes, a recharged left (right? psychology? idk) brain, and a fresh perspective towards the rest of my week. 

This is the #1 strategy I've adopted to sustain creative energy when it's sapped all around by negativity and school & I promise it helps. No side effects, no sponsored pills needed. Thanks for reading!

Related: How To Get Back Into The Creative Process (if you're in a blogger's block or experiencing painter's pain)

Have something to say? I treasure all feedback! If this post inspired you to do something, or you wanna throw some love/constructive criticism at me— hop into my ask box, or reply to this post itself!

Thanks for dropping by! Major articles, like this one, come out every Thursday! Join my taglist by to read them when they do. I also post daily wins, journal entries, rants & photos of my plant babies throughout the week, so follow me if you’re into conquering life. I vow to be the loudest cheerleader. ✧

Sending you love and good energy, talk soon. 

Nandini 💌 (´｡• ᵕ •｡`) ♡ 

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[the-real-xmonster]

What’s Next for Yuzu?

Hello girls/guys, apologize for suddenly going MIA this past weekend - I was out of town and didn’t bring my laptop with me. I’ve got tons of questions sitting in my inbox about the men’s event (as well as leftovers about the ladies’), which I’ll try to get to in the next couple of days. First, though, in this post I’d like to put together some general thoughts regarding our beloved Yuzu.

What Happened

The margin of 22.45 points between Nathan and Yuzu sounds awful on paper, but it could be accounted for in a fairly straightforward manner using the 2 jumping mistakes that Yuzu had: the popped 4S in the SP and the UR 4S in the LP. If Yuzu had landed those 2 Salchows properly, all else being equal, he could have won. That’s not my crazy Hanyu fan persona talking, it’s math.

His (relatively) clean Otonal SP was awarded 110.53 at Rostelecom Cup so that mistake in the SP in Saitama cost him upward of 15 points - 14 of which was because of the missing element itself, and the rest because of the reduction in PCS it induced (and I’d be the first to admit that it should’ve cost him even more had the judges strictly followed the ISU recommendation on PCS for programs containing a serious error).       

His clean 4S in the LP at GP Helsinki was awarded 13.44 points, so the UR in Saitama cost him about 7.5 points.

(at least) 15.00 + 7.5 = 22.5, which is enough to cover the margin and allow Yuzu to win, and that’s before we account for the fact that a cleaner LP would’ve easily netted him more than 95.84 in PCS.

I’m not throwing these numbers out here to kick off a game of what-ifs. I’m doing this only to show you that the hot take of “Yuzu couldn’t have won even if he had skated cleanly” is bullshit. You don’t have to swallow it from anyone, not even Yuzu himself.

Do I think that the margin of victory should’ve been narrower than 22.45? Yes, I unequivocally do, not because I think Yuzu was underscored (I do not think so) but because I can poke a bunch of holes in the scores Nathan got. +4/+5 for his quads/3As were excessive, mainly because he didn’t have much in the way of creative entries, his landings were still a pain point because of the lack of flow, and while the size of his jumps on average was acceptable, it wasn’t outstanding. His LP ChSq was still blink-and-you-miss-it. His edgework and control have improved this past year, but were still not enough to justify +4/+5 on his StSq and +9 for his SS. His transition or lack thereof (and that’s not only my opinion but reportedly his coach’s too) should’ve resulted in a TR score well below 9. The list goes on.

What We Can Do

Trigger Warning: the stuff you’re about to read is not rosy.

A few people have been asking me what we, as fans, could do to let the ISU know what we think of their arbitrary judging practice. My answer is: we can make as much noise as we have time for on social media and we can reach out to them directly. For the latter purpose, yes, they have a Contact Us page on their official website. Select Figure Skating from the dropdown list and unleash on them your choice message. Only remember, if you will, to keep your arguments logical and your tone civilized. Much more likely than not, they'd go silent for weeks before replying to you with a polite little piece of mail saying your concern has been duly noted and will be looked into. (Why do I know that? Because I sent them just such a message after the disaster that was the score Mao received for her free skate at Sochi 5 years ago.)  

I would advise you to keep trying and at the same time I would advise you not to have your hope up that it will do much good. Sporting governing bodies for the most part are not known for either their responsiveness or their tendency to eventually honoring fans’ wishes. Accountability and transparency are concepts as foreign to them as a double Axel is to Yuzuru Hanyu. It took, for example, an FBI investigation and brazen corruption in the realm of hundreds of millions of dollars for some changes to be done to FIFA. Considering the scale of the ISU and its weight on the public’s mind relative to FIFA, I can’t imagine any such drastic thing is going to happen to it anytime soon. In fact, the last time a major change was introduced to figure skating was 15 years ago with the establishment of the Code of Points, and back then it took an Olympic-scale scandal involving blatant misconduct to bring about the changes. What happened in Saitama last week was nowhere near as grave (at least I haven’t seen any evidence of anything more nefarious than your garden variety judging biases / irrationality) so to hope that we could leverage it to change the ISU’s way forward is close to magical thinking. 

So let me tell you what will, in all likelihood, happen next season. Provided that he continues landing his quads regularly enough, Nathan’s PCS is not going to go down from 94-95, on the contrary it will go on to increase since he’s now a 2-time World champion and generally speaking the number or World titles one has tend to correlate positively with one’s PCS. He has no reason to regress on the base value of his layout either, so a back-to-back clean Nathan is going to score in the 320+ range. You don’t have to like it and it’s completely within your rights to be mad about it / keep writing to the ISU about it, but unless and until any material change is forthcoming, you’ve got to accept that as the baseline of your expectation.

Which brings me to the next and last section of this wall of text:

What Yuzu Can Do

If there’s anything I’m sure of about Yuzu’s personality, it’s that he is not prone to mere wishfulness, he’s a man of action and he loves to win. I’m also 100% certain that he is capable of logically coming to terms with the reality of the competitive landscape as I’ve described above and of figuring out an action plan for next season.

So if I were Yuzu, I’d reckon that I cannot rely on my PCS alone to carry me to titles so in order to stay ahead of the field I’d need to up my TES. Now, if the last week in Saitama has taught me anything, it’s that I can’t rely on getting decisively higher GOEs either. So what do I do? The natural conclusion is that I need to increase my BV, which means adding more quads, which, under the revised Zayak rule, means adding more variety of quads (with the way the new SOV scales according to an element’s BV, doing this would help maximizing my GOE potential too). Hence, you heard Yuzu’s take that next season he needs to aim for 4A, 4Lz, and possibly 4F. Some people have asked if I thought Yuzu was just being reckless when he stated that - I don’t think so, I believe he’s smart enough to have thought about it and arrived at the logical conclusion.

As a side note, I also believe Yuzu is smart and self-aware enough to, once the disappointment has cooled off, understand that it’s not because he’s lacking something or he didn’t work hard enough or his skating somehow had gotten worse, it’s just, matter-of-factly, how the system currently works and thus there are extra steps involved in regaining his World title.   

I guess what I’m trying to say with this extremely very long note is, yes, it was disappointing, yes, the magnitude of the loss, on paper at least, was hard to swallow, and yes, things could have turned out differently had Yuzu been injury-free and able to compete in his top form, but don’t let all that frustration make you forget to appreciate the miracle he conjured (normal people don’t just take half a season off because of a serious injury and then come back to win a Silver medal at Worlds) or to celebrate the fact that he’s staying and he’s still hungry for success. If Yuzu himself can continue loving this sport enough and being hopeful enough to stay, you should be able to do the same without giving way to bitterness - that, I think, is the least of what we can do for him. After all, if, as Yuzu said, he is coming home, we’d need to be there to warmly welcome him back, right?      

[315-no-stage]

[20190827] TFG 「My dear Summer」Release Event Photo Session fan report

(Yeah, I know it’s been over two weeks since the event. LOL I’m not much of a timely blogger but if you want the blow-by-blow as it happens, my Twitter is the best bet. I tend to word vomit especially when I’m going through an anxiety episode... as you would see later on. I’m mostly doing this for memory keeping, for myself lmao. And for information too, if you’re interested, especially if you’re a fan living outside of Japan. Please keep in mind that my listening skills are stronger than my speaking skills. However, when put on the spot, under pressure, that goes all away ahaha. I can’t read Japanese apart from name kanji.)

I guess I should begin when I first heard about this event. It was around May 2019 when the TFG twitter announced that they are holding a two-shot cheki chance event to celebrate the release of their first single My dear Summer. At that time, I simply wanted to get my hands on the CD lol. We had dreams of going to Anisamano plans of going to Japan any time soon (since I only just came back from my Tokyo no Jin trip earlier that month). 

I had my brother help me out with buying the CDs (Google Translate can only do so much) when he actually encouraged me to try for the cheki. He said it’s a lottery system, as usual, and it won’t hurt to try since I’m buying stuff anyway. So I did. I bought both the First Press Limited Edition sets A and B using my boy Haruto Sakuraba’s link and didn’t really think much of it. They said they were going to announce winners on July 24. The event was the following month, August 27.

The ball started rolling after that. July was the 2.5D Actor Appreciation Month. #25DAAM on twitter.I featured Haruto and Mayu Yoshioka on mine. Then we somehow secured tickets to Anisama 2019. A small part of me was hoping... what if I hit for that cheki chance with Haruto. Anisama was happening the weekend of the cheki event after all. My brother was willing to either go to Japan early or stay late. Our schedule all depended on the cheki event results.

The day before results were to be released, I was a mess. It’s been a long time since I got a panic episode but something was in the water that day. Add to that, the results. The time difference threw me off and I was obsessively checking my email. My brother told me to give it a full 24 hours to account for the time difference. So what did I do? I distracted myself with Kenji Arita lmao. My brother and I had been fairly lucky with chuusen whether it be for tickets or fan events. The last time I attempted a lottery was for the Nelke Planning panel with Shiratorizawa at JF19. I didn’t hit for that because they only recognized actual JP addresses and my proxy wasn’t allowed. (But it was all good because the standby crowd got so large they allowed us to watch behind the ticket winners anyway haha.) I was praying that that won’t be the case here too.

When I woke up the next morning for work, I checked my email... and it was there.  I had my brother actually open the email and translate for me. We were looking for a "できません" but instead, it was a long email full of instructions and congratulations. I actually got picked! I read and re-read the email many times just to convince myself that I actually won. The email said that exact time and place of the event was to be announced only to winners in a separate email nearer the date. Cool cool. I felt so special LMAO.

I actually got the specifics about a week after the first email. The directions were weirdly specific... and helpful for someone like me who doesn’t know what to do with North-South-East-West directions; I work better with “Turn right when you see a Mini Stop across the street from a pachinko parlor” types AHAHAHA. Time frame was 5pm to 8-ish, then they specified that Haruto would have less than an hour to get through all the chekis with fans. They also said something about which forms of identification were required, which gifts/letters are accepted, even how the poses were chosen. 

But even with all that... I had no idea what to do. I tried lowkey Googling and stalking butai/idol social media for fan reports and... I couldn’t find anything that answers my questions (and quelled my anxiety over the matter haha). So I hope if you find yourself in the same situation later, AND IF YOU’RE AN OVERSEAS FAN, I hope this long ass post is going to be helpful to you. I’ve been to one other cheki event - with Hiroki Ino in Cosplay Mania 2018 in Manila - but that’s more straightforward than this one. 

(My slogan should be “Will travel for cheki” ahahaha.)

Now that you’ve read through all that, let’s fast forward to August 27. After a hearty lunch at DiveryCity Tokyo, I made my way to the venue using the EXACT directions they provided in the email. I got there at exactly 5PM. I get by okay by myself in Tokyo but my brother usually acts as translator for me, like a crutch. But like on my May trip, I was by my lonesome on this adventure. 

I see a couple of girls in skirts (I was in a skirt too and it was a good call because it was pretty much dress code lol) waiting by the lobby. The sign said B2F so I go down and see more dressed up girls, some even in a yukata. They started lining up so I do the same. I was trying to make myself look small because I was playing everything by ear. They started calling out everyone who hit for Kento so the line thinned a little bit. I got to the registration desk and the staffer who looked so much like Maki Kawase took my paper confirmation and ID. After looking through her sheet, Nobu’s, she politely corrected me that “Sakuraba-san isn’t until...” she said a time but in my flustered and frankly, embarrassed state, it took me a while to figure it out. She even referred to another staffer behind her for the correct time. I apologized and made my way out but then she pointed to a nearby bench, gesturing for me to stay there instead of going back up.

That was when I started panic tweeting HAHAHAHA. If you don’t want to read further, then please just click on this Twitter Thread instead. Thanks! But if you want Stephen King-level of detail, keep reading. XD

Watching those little kids do scales and random dances calmed me down. Miss Staff-san (let’s just call her that) kept tabs on me, glancing at me from time to time and whenever we’d meet eyes, she’d smile. That kept me grounded. Also, talking to my mutuals who were humoring me was a huge help. I managed to laugh and distract myself. When I started seeing a new batch of girls lining up with Haruto pin badges and an excess of purple on their person, I followed. When Miss Staff-san saw me up next, she gave me a huge smile and a thumbs up. I went up to register and.. my name was easiest to find since it was the only one in the Roman alphabet. I was number 50 in a list that I think went up to 75. 

We were herded into an honest to goodness dance practice studio. You know, with all the mirrors and low ceilings. Picture samples of the poses were on the wall, as done by Reo and Haruto. Pose A was your generic “double peace” sign. Pose B was doing an “Asian squat” and the photo was taken from above. Pose C would have you back-to-back with the member. Then there’s the special pose. Haruto teased that he was inspired by Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure. Hello, Pose C. Haruto Sakuraba is 6′2″ and I am a hobbit. Nope. Plus I’m very basic when it comes to poses. Ask Ino hahaha.

As the room filled, it drove home that I was the only foreigner there. Normally, it wouldn’t have mattered to me but at that moment, I was under a lot of pressure, my earlier faux pas still had me embarrassed, plus my severe lack of Japanese speaking skill was getting to me. I know, it’s all in my head; obviously I overcame it but if you have anxiety, you know how stressful that can be. I tried keeping myself small, trying to blend in. All the while, I kept seeing Miss Staff-san in my periphery and that calmed me down somewhat.

Then they lined us up according to the number on the ticket. I know what 50 is in Japanese so I just kept my ears open for that. I dropped off my fan letters before I could forget (Nobu got one too, handwritten in English but with a typed up translation sheet) then we were led to another, larger dance studio area. At the opposite end of the room were room dividers. They had My dear Summer on loop but I was so in my head that I didn’t even suffer from earworm. I just kept updating Twitter. More for personal sanity than anything ahahhaa.

Haruto took his time with fans. I noticed Reo’s line went by much faster. By the time he was almost done (his started a bit later than ours), I think Haruto’s only on his 20th fan. I calmed down enough to get my bearings back and I was glad to know that I wasn’t the only one losing her mind. The other girls were talking amongst themselves about the back-to-back pose and what they want to say to him. He seemed so friendly, if the laughter and chatting we were hearing from behind the dividers were any indication, and all of us wanted to make a good impression. Giiirl, I wasn’t even sure if the boy spoke a lick of English! XD

Then. It was my turn.

The staffer asked me which pose I want to do and being the boring person that I am, I chose A pose. Another staffer took my purse but all I saw was Haruto up close in his TFG get up.

Haruto: ありがとうございます Me: OMG Hi! 海外 fan  です!  *Haruto’s eyebrows disappear into his fringe. Staff takes pic* Haruto: Ah double peace. Er so... Me: I'm from California. Los Angeles. Haruto: Ah, California. So you don't speak Japanese? Me: A little bit. Your English is good.  Haruto: Aaah, not so much. I try. So when did you get to Japan? Me: Sunday? I'm here for Anisama and to see you! Haruto: Ah thank you so much. Staff: Next! ありがとうございました  *Haruto hands me the cheki. we bow at each other* Haruto: ありがとうございました. Bye-bye! Me: ありがとうございました.

I mean, the whole thing couldn’t have been more than 30 seconds but it felt so much longer. His final  ありがとうございました has a bit of emphasis as if trying to teach me. Oh you! I knew at least that much. 

Then was I was leaving the booth, I heard the staffers go, "Whoa... I didn't know you can do that!" And he was all "Ay-yah... hehe." GUYS. GUYSSSS!!!! I couldn’t stop smiling... from the moment I just had to the moment he just had to... ALL OF IT! And as I left the venue, Miss Staff-san was right there waiting for me at the door. When she was my delicately holding the cheki in my hand, she patted me on the shoulder and said  “ よくやった!” I never thanked anyone that profusely in my life. (Honestly, her kindness made me tear up.)

I have no flippin’ idea how I kept it together in there. It was a total Yuri On Ice moment where Yuuri just let everything go at that moment and let it all out on the ice when it mattered. I said pretty much everything I wanted to say which wasn’t much. All I wanted to do is to let him know that he has overseas fans. And to test how good his English skills are. 

And let me tell you, it was more than okay. There was absolutely no hesitation in his words. He kept eye contact and oh lawd, his SMILE up close? I don’t know how I’m still here telling you all this. Now every time I hear his voice, I hear it in English ahahaha. (I know he spoke Chinese at a radio show but I wasn’t able to catch that and they haven’t put up the archive at all. Pfft.)

What made me so happy was he ended up impressing not only me but the staff too!!! He even took control of the conversation. The staffers were like "What's going on?" smiling at him as we talked. I'm sofkng proud.

(I should mention that this is technically my 8th time seeing Haruto in person. I saw Tokyo no Jin seven times in May. I figured that would help me a bit with the stress but nope. Although, I cannot wait for everyone to see the TnJ BD and experience his take on Bokuto. You’ll understand this admiration all the more lmao.)

So there it is. If you’re still with me, thank you. I hope I didn’t come across as annoying. I was - am - just so excited that I was able to do this and I wanted to share my experience. Haruto is such a precious sweetheart. I wish him the best of everything.

[jojo-shojo]

Day 1!

Hey everyone this is only my 2nd time writing a fic so I hope it’s ok! I hope you like it!

Josuke’s hospital room fell quite as his best friend was trying to figure out what he had just said

“Oi- what do you mean you told her the truth?” Okuyasu asked quietly,

“ I mean, I told her. about Kira, about stands, about Mr. Jostar....about everything” a worried look formed on Okuyasu’s face. Josuke hated making others worry, but it seemed like that’s all he’s been doing for the past 48 hours.

“Come on man, what should I have told her? I’m hurt too bad to say I got in a fight at school and it not like anyone can heal me...” Josuke had already been scolded by Jotaro for telling Tomoko about the events of the past few months.

“I just couldn’t keep lying to her.... she deserves to know what’s going on in my life. We’re too close for me to keep big stuff like this from her...” Josuke’s was a bit shaky now. He hasn’t been emotionally stable for the past few days but that’s to be expected... Josuke had just been through so much trauma with his best friend almost dying on him and getting so hurt after fighting Morio’s most prolific serial killer and only barely making it out alive...

“Did you tell her about the hand?”

“Well kinda, it’s more like she guessed that you had one and when she guessed I kinda just nodded” Josuke felt sick now, was it ok that he told his mom about Okuyasu’s stand? Was Okuyasu gonna be angry with him? Was it something that he wanted to keep to himself? His mind was racing “I didn’t tell her what the hand did though, i-if that makes a difference at all “ Josuke losing confidence with each word

Okuyasu thought for a second before speaking.

“ I guess it don’t matter too much” he stop and thought more. “ I mean that you told her about mine, it’s still a big deal that you told her in general..... so how did she react? To all this new information?”

Josuke felt so relieved that Okuyasu wasn’t mad at him. The sick feeling starting going away now. He cleared his throat “ s-she didn’t believe me at first!” He almost yelled making the wound on his side hurt, Josuke gently grabbed it to try to numb the pain “ aaahhhhh, fuckin” he looked back up to Okuyasu and continued “ I couldn’t get her to even kinda believe me without providing it” Josuke was huffing remembering the stressful conversation with his mom.

“ How didya get her to believe you? She can’t see Crazy D” he said bluntly

“ oh I that was easy, I smashed my followers and fixed them again, of course I told her that Cazy D can’t fix me before she could even ask and-“ Josuke was cut off by Tomoko entertaining his hospital room not bothering to knock. Both boys looked at her feelings a bit awkward about just having been talking about her.

“Ah, hello Okuyasu dear.” Josuke’s mom was always very friendly and sweet to Okuyasu. Josuke figured it’s cuz she knows Oku hasn’t had a mother figure in a real long time so she tries to be that when she can. “ I’m sorry,did I interrupt an important conversation?”

“No not at all!” Okuyasu said quickly and a little quietly

“Yeah kinda.” Josuke said over him bluntly and kinda irritated “ were talking bout personal stuff “ a small amount of blush grew on Josuke’s cheeks, he felt like a kid, whining to his mom about privacy but he couldn’t help it right now.

Tomoko was obviously trying to read him, she noticed the blush for sure “ ahh, are you telling him about our talk earlier? “

“Yeah, kinda...” Josuke mumbled

“Honey I didn’t think you’d confess to him so soon, I didn’t mean to barge in on THAT kinda talk, I’m sorry dear.” Tomoko said kinda embarrassed herself

“NO MOM NOT THAT TALK!!!!!” Josuke was sputtering his words out frantically, face bright red “WE WERE TALKING ABOUT STANDS MOM NOT THAT WHY WOULD YOU THINK-“ he stopped mid thought and look at Okuyasu who seemed wildly lost trying to keep up with their Conversation. Josuke just hid his face in his hands, this sucks, he can’t even run from this embarrassment he has to just sit here in his hospital bed.

“OH, YOU DIDNT MEAN, I’m sorry josuke.... yes the stand thing you told me about of course that’s what it was, silly me haha well I’ll leave you two to talk about it then!” Tomoko set down the lunch she had made in a chair and hurried out of the room.

“Mom! Don’t leav-!” And with that she was gone.

“Oi, Josuke, I don’t think I followed that conversation too good... what other important stuff did ya tell her since getting put in here?what did ms.Tomoko mean by ‘confess’?” Okuyasu was concerned and confused. “ you know you can talk to me about anything, we’re best bros ya know? Or at least your my best bro... we have lots of fun together and you never make me feel bad about myself, even when you do poke fun at me I can tell ya don’t mean nothing by it. Your the person that I tell almost anything to so-“ Okuyasu was trying to say everything he wanted to before he forgot anything so he was talking a bit fast “ so tell me what’s on your mind dude.”

Josuke’s head was spinning, this isn’t the time or place he wanted this to happen at “I don’t wanna talk about it man, my hairs not even done... it’s nothing bad though! Or- I uh don’t think it is? I hope it’s not...” he force himself to look to his best friend and he tried to smile but his nerves weren’t letting it be a convincing one.

“Dude you can tell me, your hair being done up all pretty ain’t got nothin to do with this so don’t worry, just tell me so I can help!” Okuyasu said in a cheerful manner

“No way! You could hate me, you could laugh at me... a-and the hair matters to me!” Everything was so much right now, too many feelings, fear, embarrassment, physical pain, lots of physical pain actually.

“Hey, Josuke, I couldn’t hate ya... and I won’t laugh, I promise!” Okuyasu gave Josuke a tender look and gently sat on the edge of Josuke’s hospital bed.

“I- I know Oku, I’m just... nervous or maybe scared is the word...but, well you see” Josuke took a breath to collect himself, he looked up at Okuyasu “ Okuyasu, I’m gay... and I- I know your uh not gay but uh I still ended up getting a massive crush on you.” Josuke quickly looked away not wanting to look at what ever reaction Okuyasu was having.

After taking a full minute to process what had just been said to him Okuyasu spoke up “ so like, I ain’t too smart... but you just said that your gay, and you like me? Like, you like like me? Me?” Josuke nodded “ and you ain’t yanking my chain? Cuz if you are-“

“I’m not” Josuke cut him off “ look I know I’m not your type and like it’s ok that you don’t feel the same just can we still be best bros?” His eyes were welling up and tears treated to spill over

“Who the hell said you ain’t my type?” Okuyasu snapped

“Wha-“

“ my type is some who is beautiful and a bad ass! How the hell are you not that? And you assume that I don’t go for guys but you never asked!” Okuyasu was now also at the brink of tears “ Josuke I’ve liked you pretty much as soon as I meet ya! Your just out of my league so I never really tired to make a move...”

Josuke was shocked, tears now freely falling down his face “ but you like girls! You say that my mom is your type and that Reimi is really cute!”

“ so? I do like girls, I like men too, just don’t say it out loud cuz it’ll make everyone uncomfortable... and josuke, your mom is my type and your JUST like your mom... YOU are my type, josuke.” Okuyasu spoke firmly.

“Oku, you like me? Like in a romantic way?” Josuke was almost in shock

“Yeah, I’ve been feeling like that for a long time.” Okuyasu’s face was now covered in blush but he as stayed cool and collected as possible.” So like I don’t know but if we like each other then we should probably start dating right?”

Josuke just started at him for a second, was This happening? He could hardly believe it, up until now he had just assumed that Okuyasu was straight, so this, this was the best possible outcome! “ Oku, as long as your not joking around I’d like nothing more I’d like then to date you... that would make us boyfriends? Right?”

Okuyasu was beaming at the word ‘boyfriends’ “ yeah! Let’s be boyfriends! C-can I hug ya? I know your pretty hurt so that’s why I’m asking.”

Josuke looked down at his side knowing a hug would hurt a lot right now, it made him a bit sad, that it is until a different idea popped into his head. Josuke looked back up to Okuyasu’s adorable face still waiting for a response.

“ you know hugging may not be the best idea right now buuuutttt I think there is something better for us to do “ Josuke said with a devilish grin. Josuke moved over to the edge of the bed

“ here sit next to me” Okuyasu did what he was told and when he had sat down and looked over to Josuke he was leaning in....? ‘ wait is he gonna kiss me?’ And as soon a the thought came in to Okuyasu’s mind sure enough Josuke lips where on his own. Okuyasu’s eyes fluttered shut and he kissed back. It was small and shy, both of them were new to this after all. When they broke apart the kiss they just looked at each other. Taking in everything that was happening, it felt so right.

“I Aint ever been this happy before bro “ Okuyasu hummed quitely.

“Me too” Josuke said as he rested his head on the shorter boys shoulder “ I’m gonna have to thank mom for making us talk about this.“ Oku rested his head on Josuke’s “Yeah, and I’ll have to talk to her about stands! Make sure you didn’t say anything weird about the hand!” He said with such a matter of fact way that Josuke couldn’t help but laugh ‘my boyfriend is too cute’ he thought as they fell into a comfortable silence.

[fearofaherobrine]

Roleplay Server Log #377

“Karla’s Anxiety, Hg's Dress, Trender Steps in, Time for Pirates and Suspicious Words”

[Splender] Teleports into Lie's backyard, having been shouted at by Trender for not checking on Pinwheel- Pinwheel!

[Pinwheel] Lifts her head with a slight irritated flick of her tail, she's grown again and is laying in the shade of Karla's house-

[Karla] Looks up from the book she's reading on the porch. - Someone is calling for you.

[Pinwheel] - It's Splendy

{Splender] - PIIIIIIINWHEEEEEEEL!

[Karla] Puts the book away - Are you hiding from him?

[Pinwheel] - He's gonna get huggy

[Karla] Well he did raise you. And he is more then a little fond of you. Despite the biting.

[Pinwheel] Huffs-

[Splender] Spots her and teleports right over, squealing over the fact that she's grown- YOU GOT BIGGER!

[Karla] She's a fine dragon. You should be proud.

[Splender] Goes for the hug-

[Pinwheel] Bites-

[Splender] Oh you're getting so big and pretty!

[Karla] I presume that's much less painful then it looks?

[Splender] - Oh!  I'm sorry, I'm being rude, I didn't even see you there.  No, it's not painful at all for me

[Karla] I'm Dr. Emmerich. Karla is fine though. And I presume from your rather impressive stature; you're one of the Slenders?

[Splender] - Yes!  I'm Splender!  The youngest!

[Karla] And I'm guessing the happiest? I met your brother Offender briefly as well. How's your mother adjusting? I heard she'd joined you.

[Splender] - Well!  Trender is currently watching her

[Pinwheel] - Splendy!  Let go!

[Splender] - Awwww, but you're so soft and fluffy

[Karla] Stands a bit closer - She might need a little air there?

[Splender] Finally lets go and Pinwheel scrambles up onto the roof-

[Karla] Chuckles - She can move quickly when the mood strikes her. I find her most pleasant company.

[Splender] - I'm glad, she needs more friends

[Karla] I think Ever is trying as well, but with less success.

[Splender] - I'm sorry, I don't believe I've met him

[Karla] Blonde fluffy hair? Cat ears and a tail currently?

[Splender] - I'm sorry, I've been busy trying to keep my mother happy so I don't think I've seen him, but I do appreciate you looking after Pinwheel

[Karla] Ah, you'll run into him eventually. He said he was going to the village a little while ago. And I've just been providing a bit of shelter in between her playing with Crim. They've become quite close.

[Splender] - I do need to head over there to feed soon, have you been?

[Karla] Shifts uncomfortably- no... I have not... I have had rather bad luck with small towns in the past. I don't want to upset anyone...

[Splender] - Then come with me!

[Karla] Waffling-

[Splender] Grabs Karla's wrist- Be good Pinwheel!- He then teleports them into the village

-There's a bit of commotion as they pop in but the people quickly relax and wave before going about their business.

[Karla] That was... unusual...

[Splender] - They're used to it- Children are now spotting him and gathering excitedly, wondering what sort of treats he has for them this time

[Karla] Is edging away from the kids uncomfortably-

[Pinapple] Are you new here? You don't look like a brine or an Alex?

[Karla] I'm not...

[Splender] - She's a doctor!  And she's been keeping an eye on Pinwheel for me- He's passing out some candy

[Pinapple] Another one? Are you going to work out of Doc's office?

[Coffi] What's your specialty?

[Karla] I wasn't planning on it.... And I'm a field medic...

[CN] Comes in through the gate, making the vanilla delivery for Lie-

[Creme] Spots him- Oh! It's the teeny NOTCH. Hello Cn.

[Karla] Is very unsettled and it's showing-

[Pinapple] Are you okay miss?

[Karla] Too fast nod-

[CN] - Hi!  Lie wanted me to bring in the vanilla since she can't leave the house according to the Big Meanie

[Splender] - Calm yourself Karla, you're in no danger, they're just curious

[Karla] Shoots him a look that's very slightly panicked.

[Coffi] Is a bit too close and she scoots away from him-

[Splender] Glances at the testificates sending a bit of happy energy to them to distract them a little-

[Creme] Breaks out in a blissful expression-

[Pinapple] Gets distracted by the playing children and smiles-

[Karla] -jimmies definetly rustled-

[CN] - Crème?  Where does Lie usually put the vanilla?

[Splender] Creates some small toys- Would you like a tour Karla?

[Creme] She usually gives it to Eggg since him and Basquet run the kids cafe. He portions it out so the other places with food get some too.

[CN] - Where are they?

[Creme] Stands on tiptoes and looks past the crowd of kids- Go through the gate and it's the building on the right.

[CN] - Okay- He starts making his way through the crowd

[Karla] Has backed up against a wall and is nervously watching everyone.

[Splender] Notices this and sends happy energy directly to Karla, hoping it will relax her a little-

[HG] -runs into the dessert kicking up sand as he goes-

[Mix] -Is out in a skirt, no shirt. She's just working on some building with a bit of shade.-

[HG] -sees mix and stops- hello mix

[Mix] Hey.. HG? Why you coming through the desert?

[Mix] -Wipes sweat-

[HG] Just wanted to see if I could water some cacti while I think

[Mix] Oh sure! There's a whole bunch over there! -Gestures at a collection of Cacti off to the side-

[HG] -waters them- so what are you doing?

[Mix] Been thinking of building some more so I figured I'd start!  -Gestures at the barebones design-  And I couldn't be bothered to actually get dressed so! Skirt

[HG] what are those full body flowy outfits gem wears one all the time but I don't know what it is called

[Mix] A dress?

[HG] is that right I don't know but I wanted to get one a soft pretty one with flowers

[Mix] I could make you one if you want? I have some left over fabric at home...

[HG] you can? Oh thank you mix - is clearly excited to get their own dress-

[Mix] I'll go get my stuff and come back, that way you can see it while I make it. I need a bit of a break anyway. -Starts off toward her house-

[HG] - is bouncing in place because he is super excited-

[Mix] -Is gone for a bit before returning with a handful of cloth and some tools.-

[HG] - watched mix work-

[Mix] -Soon has a rough dress made, it's got some flowers along the hem and is a soft green shade.- How's this look so far?

[HG] it's so pretty so far

[Mix] Any changes you want?

[HG] uh can you please make it have a very easy sleeve in the top part?

[Mix] Of course! Anything else?

[HG] could it also have a belt?

[Mix] Uhhh.. Sure! -Making the changes-

[HG] Your very good at this mix

[HG] I can't wait to wear It - HG is getting suepr excited again-

[Mix] I've had a lot of practice! -Is adding finishing touches before giving it to HG-

[HG] -holds the dress- it's so perfect thank you -back away from mix and kicks up a mini cloud of dust enough to switch into the dress with-

[Mix] -Puts things away- How's it feel?

[HG] I love it feels so soft and it fits perfectly thank you mix for helping

[Mix] No problem! Enjoy it! -Big smile-

[HG] -offers Mix one of the ice cream saplings because they would help keep her cool in the hot sun-

[Karla] Feels Splender's energy and tries to shake it off, she's not comfortable being influenced.

-As Karla becomes more uncomfortable she feels something else grab her and teleport her to a different part of the village, a quiet corner of the villages park-

[Trender] - Discomfort does not suit you

[Karla] Shudders- Who are you?

[Trender] - I am Trender, one of Splender's older brothers.

[Karla] Brushes herself off a bit- Thank you then. Too long avoiding people makes one immediately unhappy in a crowd.

[Trender] - So I could feel, but I assure you, my brother meant no harm in bringing you here.  He likes to make people happy, that is all

[Karla] I've noticed. He's much my opposite. I prefer making people delightfully uncomfortable.

[Trender] - You'd get along with Offender then, and possibly our eldest brother too

[Karla] Offender I've met. He seems rather charming in a dangerous way. I believe I've met your eldest brother too, though I was rather... we'll say in an excited and rather blood splattered mood.

[Trender] - It wouldn't have been with Herobrine, would it?

[Karla] Smiles in a rather predatory way - Yes indeed. He and I seem to be getting along decently well too. If only because he likes me being around to help care for his wife.

[Trender] - Is his wife ill?

[Karla] Quite the contrary, she's great with his child.

[Trender] Is silent for a moment- ...  I need a door

[Karla] Why?

[Trender] - To get to my workshop

[Karla] Ah, wanting to add to the pile of baby things? Their friends threw them quite a lavish shower with all the pastel trimmings.

[Trender] - Making outfits is most certainly a hobby of mine, but I suspect they only have baby clothing, they will need clothes for as it grows- He settles on one of the doors to the post office and focuses a bit of power on it.  It opens to reveal his workshop on the other side, the massive room stretching into the distance and a more recent work resting on a mannequin nearby

[Karla] Peers in, obviously interested. - Ah a fellow of the cloth. I like sewing as well. Though it's usually not so wholesome in form.

[Trender] - Nor is mine always, ah, Scarfy, did you need something?- There's a bit of movement in a shadow as Trender's proxy steps out and shakes his head.  He wears a mask which looks like a mime's face and a bright red scarf is wrapped around his neck

[Karla] How interesting.... I see your assistant is equally unusual.

[Trender] - He is my proxy, just as Ringleader is for Splender- He begins searching the shelves for just the right fabrics

[Karla] Follows him, she's obviously marvelling at his horde. - Any love for... leather? [She slips slightly as she speaks] It's one of mein favorites.

[Trender] - The section that is kept in is a few aisles that way- He motions with a tendril towards his right- I have at least a sample of everything I can possibly get, including some things from the game we are currently in

[Karla] Examines her hands - Not quite real, but closer in here. How strange. My... assistant is rather enamored with the enchanted cloths. Heh. My work is often done with real hide, feathers and sometimes bones.

[Trender] - Those I have by practically the mountain load if you ever need some

[Karla] I used to take commissions, but it seems pointless in a world where massive diamonds and pure gold is there for anyone willing to spend a few hours digging them up.

[Trender] - But that shouldn't stop you from doing it simply out of enjoyment, plus it would allow you to have money for out there

[Karla] Oh, I am doing it just for fun. Perhaps when I venture out again I'll put those works up for sale. If I tire of viewing them myself. It's nice to have so much free time. But I don't have easy access to travel back and forth. I'm not a creepypasta that can make portals.

[Trender] - You could always just have Herobrine scare them by dropping it off on their door step- He's sewing now and cutting fabric at the same time

[Karla] That's a delightful thought, but again, I don't want to put him out. It's difficult for anyone to entice him to leave Lie's side for even a moment. Even with her fluctuating mood.

[Trender] - Yes, that is one of the things about pasta's and their mates, the bond shared is nigh unbreakable, although it is possible

[Karla] It's fortunate. I suspect that their progeny will have a mix of their powers. I think it may take both of them and several helpful friends merely to babysit the child.

[Trender] - It should be entertaining- He folds several now finished articles of clothing up and puts them into a bag- We should be getting back to my brother, before he gets into a worried frenzy

[Karla] Gracefully gestures - Lead the way my good Slender.

[Trender] As he leads her out they pass the mannequin and a whimper escapes it as pleading eyes follow Karla's retreating form-

[Karla] Glances and wonders, but doesn't say anything.

[Trender] Holds the door for her- It was a pleasure spending some time with you

[Karla] Thank you. You as well.

[Yaunfen] Is running egarly with a book in one hand and Waffles trailing behind them-

[Lj] Sees them pass and follows curiously-

[Yaunfen] Spots Cn coming back from the village- Hey Cn!

[CN] - Oh, hey!

[Yaunfen] Are you busy? Would Lie care if we played for a while?

[Lj] Perks a little at the word play-

[CN] - I don't think she'd mind, I just finished delivering some vanilla for her...

[Yaunfen] Okay! I'll tell her so she doesn't get mad again- chats to Lie- can Cn play for a while?

[Waffles] Sniffs out LJ- mrrrrr [Lj] hi... - he's a bit uncomfortable

[Lie] - Sure, just be back before dark

[CN] - So what do you want to play?- He glances at LJ briefly

[Yaunfen] This! I've been reading a really cool book- he holds it out for Cn to look at the inside, there's an illustration of a pirate with a smoldering twists in his beard and a sword held high on the front of an old sailing ship-

[CN] - What is it?

[Yaunfen] Pirates! They were really interesting. And they had the first dem-o-cracy! But they used to sail in big ships and steal stuff from navy ships-

[Lj] ...

[CN] - There's some big ships in the water!

[Yaunfen] Yeah! And I have a boat so we can get there.

[Waffles] Looks annoyed at the prospect of water.

[Lj] Is trying to restrain himself from asking because of how small Cn looks -

[Yaunfen] Lj? Do you want to play too?

[Lj] Maybe...

[Yaunfen] It's okay! Cn isn't a little kid. He's just a really short NOTCH!

[Lj] Looks skeptical-

[CN] - Yeah! I've been around for awhile!

[Yaunfen] He's a midget.

[Lj] Still skeptical but willing to suspend disbelief. His words are barely a whisper- Issac used to like to play pirates... When he was so young....

[CN] - You know how to play pirates?

[Lj] Absolutely!

[Yster] Is lounging and exhausted. - you're true to your words... That was amazing...

[Locklear] - Well, I have had plenty of time to practice the craft

[Yster] Curls against him, tangling her fingers in his hair - Happy we came?

[Locklear] - I don't know, perhaps a bit more convincing needs to happen- He teases her gently

-Slowly the two of them become aware of the sound of children playing on the deck above, and an adult voice with a slight accent singing -

"Farewell and adieu to ye young maids of Valen

Oderin and Presque, Fox Hole and Bruley

I'm bound for the westward to the wall with the hole in

I can't marry all or it's yokey I'll be

We'll rant and we'll roar like true Newfoundlanders

We'll rant and we'll roar on deck and below

Until we strikes bottom inside the two sunkers

When straight through the channel to Toslow we'll go!"

[Locklear] Groans- I know that voice...

[Yster] Whoever he is, he's got a pretty good singing voice-

-There's the sound of two younger voices belting out the chrous with most of the words correct and giggling-

[Locklear] - That would be Laughing Jack and some children

[Yster] Then I guess I should put my gown back on, for the sake of modesty.

[Locklear] - Yes we wouldn't want to ruin the children's innocence

[Yster] That sounds slightly sarcastic. Would we be inturrupting something that should be inturupted?

[Locklear] - Laughing is a child murderer

[Yster] Dresses quickly- Then we should- we should- Just to be safe, check on them!

[Locklear] - Precisely- He pulls his own clothing on as well.  As he pulls on his coat he heads up the stairs

[Lj] Is wearing a small paper hat and waving a stick around in lieu of a sword, he freezes at the sight of Locklear.

[Yster] Yaunfen? Does Doc know you're here?

[Yaunfen] Pulls up a bandana that was covering one eye - Yster? Um... Mama knows where I am. She kinda knows where everyone is.

[Locklear] - Laughing, what are you doing?

[CN] - Lie knows that I'm here!

[Yster] [Didn't see Cn right away] And she said it was okay?

[Lj] Deflates a little- Just playing...

[CN] - So long as we came home before dark

[Locklear] - With children Laughing?

[Yaunfen] Yeah, I don't want to get him in trouble again.

[Lj] Small voice - They're not exactly children....

[Locklear] - They most certainly look like children to me, plus they still seem young enough to enjoy partaking in make believe

[Yaunfen] Mada says you're never too old to imagine stuff. It helps you be more creative. And Cn is a NOTCH. He's super important in guarding our friend Lie.

[Lj] And this one's a dragon...

[Locklear] - Yes, but I also know your penchant for adding to your circus

[Lj] The circus is empty now...

[Yaunfen] Oh, you mean his house?

[Locklear] - Is that so?

[Lj] Some of them are in town, most of them are gone forever.

[CN] - Yeah, there's lots of kids in the town!

[Yaunfen] Very proud- Mada fixed them.

[Lj] Ashamed and guilty- It's true.

[Locklear] - I doubt that

[Yaunfen] But it's true!

[Yster] Actually this sounds familar. I wasn't there for it obviously. But something about a bunch of zombie children being healed.

[Lj] Shrinks in shame.

[Yaunfen] I wasn't hatched yet, but mama said that mada made everyone who was there help. You can fix zombies here.

[CN] - I hadn't been let onto the server yet...

[Locklear] - Yet I doubt that's made you stop using your...  Special, candies

[Lj] But I haven't! And I especially wouldn't hurt these two. I mean, I knocked out Steffan once because he was panicking, but I didn't hurt him!

[Yaunfen] Mada said that Lj had a withdraw and he's okay now. Besides. Mama would catch me.

[Locklear] - I still don't trust this

[Lj] It's okay Locklear, she doesn't talk to me anymore. Issac... he's gone too.

[Locklear] - Well yes, Isaac has been dead for a very long time now

[Yaunfen] Hushed whisper- I heard he went to a bad place...

[CN] - Like the Nether?

[Yaunfen] Maybe!

[Lj] He's just gone. I watched Death himself banish him.

This message has been removed.

[Lj] No.

[CN] - But deaths not permanent here?  Or did you go somewhere else?

[Lj] We went outside Cn, irl. And Death has a face, and wings, and a daughter.

[Yaunfen] Oooooh! You met Dawn's dad?

[Yster] I was there. He's quite impressive.

[Locklear] - You were there?

[Yster] It was uh.... when Doc grabbed me... they took me along because I was already here and well... how often does one get the opportunity to rub elbows with the Death angel?

[Locklear] Just sighs and rubs his face a little before turning back towards the children- We should be getting these two back to land

[Yaunfen] Awww....

[Waffles] Scratching on the side of the wheelhouse-

[CN] - Why?

[Locklear] - Because I don't trust the clown being out here with the two of you alone

[Lj] I deserve that.

[Yaunfen] But he's okay. He doesn't have the crazy anymore.

[Yster] Suddenly gets in between them- crazy....! Shit! Don't touch him Locklear!

[Yaunfen] Wide eyes and backs away from Locklear a bit- Is he still infected?

[Locklear] - Touching him?

[Yster] He's one of Doc's carriers!

[Lj] Yes...  Not only is my Insanity gone, I can drive her out of others as well. It's why I stayed away from the manor.

[Locklear] - How interesting, and I assume that might be why your colors have returned?

[Lj] Nods-

[Yaunfen] Stands close to Lj- Are you okay Yster? You can't trust him if he still has Insanity, she's a mean lady and she hates mada!

[Locklear] - I would never harm my mate

[Lj] I thought she was scared of you anyway? I heard she ran away from you, what, twice?

[Yster] Well.... he's kinda grown on me....

[Locklear] Scowls and his hands tighten into fists-

[Lj] Smiles faintly- better not touch me Locklear. I see that look in your eyes.

[Yaunfen] Please don't fight.

[Locklear] - You absolute prat!  Perhaps you should have been burned in that box of yours!  At least I focus on saving children, can you say the same?

[Lj] I'm getting better. I haven't killed anyone since I came here.

[Yaunfen] He can't be all bad. Waffles likes him!

[Locklear] - Judging by how they look I'n going to guess that's because of diet

[Yaunfen] It's the same stuff I eat too.

[Locklear] - Still, you shouldn't trust the clown

[Lj] I fully expect to that I'll have to earn what trust I'm given. But Yaunfen knows at least second-hand how far I've come. And as aggravating as Doc can be occasionally... they have helped me.

[Locklear] - That doesn't erase what I know you're capable of

[Lj] It was fun because Issac thought it was fun, with him gone I feel... differently. It's nice to be around people.

[Yster] I'm glad the going gave you some closure.

[Locklear] - And just how certain can you be that a taste of blood won't return you to how you were?  I've seen it happen before

[Lj] I can't be certain of anything. I've been... oddly empty. But lighter to be sure.

[Locklear] - Then maybe you should go and find something other than children to fill that empty space

[Lj] Actually I've been doing some gardening.

[Yaunfen] He's pretty good at it!

[Yster] Let me guess, is it stuff from your seed?

[Yaunfen] Yep!

[CN] - His seed is fun!

[Locklear] - That is not what I'm concerned about

[Yaunfen] You worry like Cp.

[Yster] Little snort- Considering how he's been all over Lie worrying, that's kind of a compliment.

[Locklear] - Well she is his mate and pregnant

[Lj] Yeah, I know, he warned me away in no uncertain terms and I have abided by that. I don't care to be set on fire. Even if I know it won't kill me.

[Locklear] - He does enjoy his fire

[Yaunfen] Looks up - Awww... it's getting late. We should head back.

[Locklear] - Yes, you should

[CN] - Lie probably needs help with her animals too...

[Yaunfen] Oh! Cn! I know what would be fun! - they turn to Lj quickly- Can you take Waffles so they don't get wet?

[Lj] Nods with a small smile. - I'll get your kitty to shore.

[Yaunfen] Thanks- They climb up on the railing and reach back for Cn-

[CN] - What is it?- Takes their hand

[Yaunfen] Big smile and they just fall off the rail with Cn-

[Yster] Runs to the rail in a panic-  Yaunfen!

[Yaunfen] Twists artfully and shifts as they hit the water, Cn plopping down between their horns as they paddle for the shore. - Bye Locklear, Yster!

[Locklear] Sighs- Children

[Lj] They learned that one from Doc.

[Locklear] - We should be heading back towards shore ourselves- He watches the retreating forms as they go through the water

[CN] Shrieks in delight-

[Lj] Heads for the sabertooth which is rolling contentedly on the deck- Come on Waffles-

[Locklear] - Stay away from the children Laughing

[Lj] Just gives him a cold look- You're not in charge of me Locklear. Not you or Issac or Insanity. I'm my own person now.

[Locklear] - We'll see, after all, you and I have always been at odds

[Lj] Yes, we shall. I've been welcomed here, and I don't intend to make anyone sorry for doing so intentionally. - Picks up the cat with his arms wrapped around them twice.

[Waffles] ???????

[Locklear] Scoffs and turns away-

[Lj] And we'll see how long it takes you to emotionally scar your 'mate' with Insanity still inside you.

[Yster] Her mouth is a hard line, but she can't deny his words. She was scared to see him murder up close.

[Locklear] Draws Yster closer to himself as he watches LJ leave-

[Yster] Do you... do you really have it under control Locklear?

[Locklear] - I believe I do

[Yster] I hope you're right

[thedragontamerying]

Stand By Me

Long time no see! I’m sorry that I’ve been quiet for a couple of months, life has been really busy and just overall choatic for me. I’ve been trying to send stuff to a school I’m transferring to; I’ve been working frantically on art show works; we had to put one of our dogs down (RIP my big Beauty girl ;-;) and just recently an extended family member has been in the hospital. So yeah, I’ve been busy. But I have been working on writing on the periodic free time I’ve had and I’m ready to start posting again. So thank you for being patient and I hope you enjoy the newest chapters!

EDIT: I forgot to mention that Gallina in this chapter is @seal-pai‘s FFXV OC that I decided to add bc I love her and I do what I want. So if you’re interested in Gallina, go to seal-pai!

Tagging @insomniasix @theyearofdiamonddogs @zoeyredbird1 @seal-pai @ffxv-ocs-unite

Ch 1 <<< Ch 6 : Ch 8 | [Masterlist]

                                  Chapter VII: Where the Chocobos Run

It had been a couple of hours since the company had taken to the road again, leaving Cor and Monica to their own back in Leide. Artemisia was concerned about their whereabouts and doings, but Noctis insisted that they shouldn’t worry about them; the two could handle themselves. So to distract herself, she focused on the wonders of the Duscae region. The wind blew through the five’s hair, the atmosphere much more tolerable than before. The scenery that was once filled with desert sand and a scarcity of vegetation was replaced with mixes of green as far as the horizon and trees just as tall. The air no longer threatened to dry one’s skin if they left the top down too long. Instead, it was moist and refreshing thanks to the abundance of water in the region, something that Leide was lacking. Although, the humidity was no doubt going to be the source of many complaints from Noctis and Prompto, worried about their hair getting limp or frizzy. Artemisia couldn’t help the small huff of amusement at the thought.

“Look out world!” Prompto declared loudly from the front, startling Artemisia from her thoughts. “Here we come!”

“We can finally leave this dust bowl behind,” Gladiolus said with breath of relief.

“The lands beyond are vast by comparison to Leide.” Ignis stated, keeping his ever vigilante eyes on the road.

“Bigger’s better!” Prompto claimed with a saccharine tone, “More stuff to see and do.”

“First comes Duscae, a region known for its wetlands.”

“Really? Wetlands?” Noctis raised a brow at Ignis’ comment, failing to see the excitement in mucky water and mushy grass that sinks if you step on it the wrong way.

“Wetlands are really cool, Noct!” Artemisia urged, nudging his arm insistently.

“I think you’re the only person I know who finds grass cool.”

“No really! From an ecological standpoint, they’re really interesting! They’re one of the most biologically diverse biomes in the world, which means that so many different types of organisms can live together --” Gladiolus watched Artemisia go on her enthusiastic lecture, occasionally listening in on what she was saying out of genuine interest, but mostly enjoying Noctis’ bored and desperate look for escape. “-- And they’re so important when it comes to naturally purifying water. But they’re also really sensitive to pollution, which means that scientists can see early effects of pollution by studying how it affects wetlan-- MMPH!”

Gladiolus quieted her by covering Artemisia’s mouth -- and almost her entire face -- with his hand, pulling her into a playful headlock against his chest. “Okay nerd, we get it.” He smirked when she half-heartedly glared up at him, relinquishing his hold on her and letting Artemisia straighten her posture back to normal.

“Besides the ever exciting ecosystems,” Ignis gave a teasing look to Artemisia from the rearview mirror, “There’s also a chocobo forest.”

“Now we’re talking!” Prompto chimed in.

“Further west lies the Cleigne region, where we’ll find the town of Lestallum.”

“Oh, isn’t that where Iris is heading?” Prompto ask, turning in his seat to look at Gladiolus, as did the other two in the back. Ever since Insomnia’s destruction Gladiolus’ worry over his sister had been obvious. The two had always been close, what with Gladiolus practically raising Iris himself due to their father’s work making him absent a lot. During the trip Artemisia had caught him texting who she assumed was Iris, noting that he had been texting more since the news of their home.

Gladiolus glanced down at his phone before looking back at the others, the usual strength in his eyes. “Barring delays, she should have arrived by now.” He sighed, looking off to the horizon, “Maybe even had herself a look at the meteor.”

“The Meteor of the Six?”

“The same,” Ignis answered Noctis, “Its heat is harnessed to power Lestallum.”

“Whoa, that sounds way cool!” Prompto said, his interest piqued.

Noctis nudged Artemisia. “You going to explain how that works?”

“Would you actually be interested in the complexities that go into making a meteor into electrical power for a whole city?”

“Probably not…”

“Then I’m not going to bother.” Artemisia huffed, a stubborn pout on her lips.

Gladiolus chuckled at the two. “I’m actually looking forward to this.”

After a while more on the road, Ignis spotted a gas station and suggested that they refill the tank. “It will be a long drive.” The group pulled into the station, parking the Regalia next to one of the gas tanks. Everyone exited the car and took a moment to stretch their muscles, having been stuck in the small space for a couple of hours. Artemisia offered to fill the tank while Ignis and Gladiolus visit the shop to buy more potions. Prompto insisted on Noctis posing for a photo, stating that their first steps into the unknown should be documented. One photo turned into another which turned into a whole photoshoot, with Prompto wandering around with his camera and snapping anything he could find interesting. Artemisia failed to see the general interest in a photo of her filling the car’s tank, but she wasn’t going to get in the way of an artist and his muse.

Artemisia had just returned the gas pump to its original place -- she didn’t understand why Noctis always has to grunt when he takes care of the gas; the pump wasn’t heavy -- when a ringtone from Noctis’ phone went off. “Who could this be?” Noctis answered the phone right as Gladiolus and Ignis returned. “Hello?” Gladiolus gave a slight jerk to his head towards Noctis while giving Artemisia questioning eyes. Artemisia could only shrug unknowingly. “Iris?”

That caught Gladiolus’ attention. Him and the rest waited patiently as Noctis continued his conversation. He soon ended the call with a quick “Will do.”

“Was that Iris?” Gladiolus asked, stepping closer to his friend. Gladiolus sighed once Noctis nodded, before crossing his arms and giving a small huff. “Can’t even call her own brother…”

“In all fairness,” Ignis interjected, “Yours wasn’t in the obituary broadcasted all over Lucis.”

“What about me?” Prompto questioned hopefully, “She say anything about me?

“Guys,” Artemisia laughed, “Don’t worry, you’re all beautiful. Now why don’t we get a move on so we can meet up with her.”

Gladiolus was quick to agree, packing away their purchases in the trunk so that they could get on the road again. Noctis was about to go take his usual seat when Prompto grabbed his shoulder and turned him around. “See that sign?” Prompto pointed out further down the road at a giant billboard. The board had a large yellow bird on it and read Wiz Chocobo Post. “Chocobos! Chocobos!” He chanted excitedly, his voice dripping with utter joy. The enthusiasm was contagious as Noctis’ eyes were filled with the same interest as his friend’s.

“Hey, no time for that,” Gladiolus quickly shot back, shutting the trunk with a satisfying thud. “We need to get to Lestallum.”

“It’s still ages away. C’mon, just a quick visit?” Prompto pleaded. He looked over at Artemisia with a quick turn of his head before dragging her to his side, making Artemisia blink in confusion. “Back me up, Artemis! One chocobo lover to another.”

“Uh…” Artemisia interrupted, “Actually, I’ve never seen a chocobo.”

Prompto gasped, dramatically grasping his shirt over his heart as though he had been shot. “What?!”

“Okay, even I’m surprised by that.” Gladiolus added.

“Well w-we have to go now!” Prompto insisted with urgency. “We can’t let her be deprived of the joys of chocobos! Twenty-one years of life and none of it spent with chocobos is a crime! C’mon Noct!”

Noctis shrugged, “He’s got a point.”

“Whoo hoo! Chocobos here we come!”

Artemisia glanced over at Gladiolus, seeing the concern for his sister still present in his eyes despite how he was trying to cover it up. He seemed willing to make the stop at the chocobo ranch, but he obviously wanted to get to Lestallum as fast as possible. “Let’s make it a quick trip at least, guys. We really should get to Lestallum soon,” she insisted.

“Deal! Now c’mon, let’s go!”

With Prompto ushering everyone back to the car, the group was on the road again. They followed the directions provided by the multiple signs along the road, arrows indicating what turns to take. The entire way Prompto was going every mile to display his excitement to see the giant, friendly birds. He had turned on a very hokey pokey song on the radio that was about the creatures with him humming along to it with lyrics like ‘I want to ride my chocobo all day’. It was after the others had asked him to stop his singing that Prompto turned to look at Artemisia in the back seat. “I can’t believe that you don’t know what chocobos are. I would have thought you would have been all over them.”

Artemisia pouted. “I know what chocobos are, I just haven’t gotten the chance to see one in person.” Her busy schedule didn’t leave much room for miscellaneous adventures or outings unless it was either with Ismene or Noctis. Those outings were also a rarity considering that Ismene focused more with academic studies and Noctis always had Gladiolus or Ignis with him as his entourage.

“Well that’s all about to change.” Prompto pointed at another sign, this one including the word Entrance on it. “Here we are!”

Driving off of the main road and down a dirt path, the group came upon the ranch. It was a quant little abode, with a small windmill and tiny picket fence nearby at the front -- most likely where the chicks would go. Behind that was the business building, where a small shop was placed for chocobo lovers to buy antiques, or feed for their feathery friends. In front of that were some umbrella tables for customers to enjoy a meal while watching the animals. To the left were some storage buildings where the birds’ food and water was most likely being held, and to the right were some posts where the birds would be tied to interact with any visitors. The only thing that was missing from this chocobo ranch were the actual chocobos. There was no hide nor feather of the creatures; it’s hardly possible for them to be hiding, the birds were larger than most people.

“Odd…” Ignis mumbled.

“Do you think that they’re closed?” Artemisia asked.

“No way, chocobo ranches don’t close.” Prompto confidently answered. “Maybe they’re just giving them a break from the crowd. It’s hard being a celebrity, y’know.” Prompto joked, gesturing for the others to follow him. “C’mon, let’s go get us some chocobos.” The group followed him to this older man who was working around the meal tables. “ ‘Scuse me,” the man turned around after hearing Prompto’s voice, a name badge on his outfit reading Rancher Wiz. “We’d like to ride the chocobos.”

“The chocobos, huh?” Wiz sighed, a disappointed frown on his face. “I hate to break this to y’all but we can’t permit our birds to leave the post, not while Deadeye’s still about.”

“Deadeye?” Artemisia questioned.

Wiz nodded. “He’s an uncommonly ferocious behemoth that’s taken to prowlin’ these parts of late. His scent makes our birds nervous, and to prevent accidents or tragedies, we have no choice but to suspend rentals.”

“Aw man,” Prompto pouted degernatedly. Noctis also looked incredibly disappointed at the situation. Artemisia rubbed Prompto’s shoulder, trying to comfort him. “I’m sorry guys, but we can always come back later. Hopefully the behemoth will move on.” Wiz stared at the group inquizitively, his eyes narrow in thought before it dawned on him. “Hold on now, ain’t you the hunters that’ve been makin’ a mark?”

The five looked at each other confused, unaware of their recent claims to notoriety. “It would seem so…” Ignis answered.

Wiz tore down a flyer from the nearby notice board where bounties for hunts were presented and handed it to Noctis. It had a rough photo of a behemoth on it and a listing of a reward for the creature dubbed Deadeye. “You reckon you could handle the likes of Deadeye?” Noctis showed the others the bounty, “If you could bring the beast down, there’d be a reward in it for ya.” The group was always in need of more money, that’s for sure. “But knowin’ the danger, I wouldn’t blame ya for saying no.”

“What do you guys think?” Noctis asked, though his smile showed that his mind was already set. “We up for it?”

Gladiolus smirked. “Go big or go home, right?”

“Rest assured,” Ignis directed at Wiz, “You nor your birds will have none to fear once we are done.”

Wiz thanked them for their courageous service, giving directions on where the beast was last seen on Artemisia’s map. Once the group felt like they had everything they needed to know, they set out in the dense woods beyond the ranch. They followed the small dirt path through the forest until the path started to disappear as they moved further in. The edge of the trail was overridden by grass and weed due to the lack of explorers that venture out that far. So the group had to rely on any signs of the beast that they could find to direct them.

“Are we sure we’re going the right way?” Prompto asked, no doubt the ominous atmosphere of the forest making him nervous. The trees were so large and close together that it barely allowed any sunlight to shine through the collection of leafs at the top. And with the knowledge of a famously dangerous creature prowling the area, Artemisia couldn’t blame him for feeling intimidated.

Gladiolus, who was at the front of the group, took in the area before confirming “Oh yeah, we’re heading the right direction.” He gestured to large claw marks that were left in the large rock formation to their left. Prompto gulped at the sight.

Suddenly a blood curdling howl echoed through the area, the group flinching at the sound. “The hell?” Gladiolus growled, reframing from summoning his weapon but ready for action if need be. Birds flew above them as the sound of trees breaking and falling to the ground followed the howl. “Something’s amiss.” Ignis said, his guard up as well.

“We’re getting closer. Everyone stick together.” Artemisia instructed, slowly walking ahead as the others followed.

As the group traveled deeper into the forest they found more evidence of the behemoth’s presence. Claw marks and broken trees littered the ground, and growls echoed out as they walked, each one louder than the other. Artemisia decided not to the alert the others to a small pool of dried blood that she saw, not wanting to put them on edge even more; though her heartbeat definitely picked up after the sight. The further they traveled into the forest -- and closer to Deadeye -- the area became encased in fog, making visibility poor.

“So, Artemis,” Prompto walked closer to her, “as our residential beast master,” Artemisia wasn’t sure if she considered herself that, “got any advice for us?”

“Well… from what I understand, behemoths rely heavily on their sight and sense of smell since their hearing is horrible. And if the name implies, the fact that this one has a bad eye is actually a small advantage for us.” Another crash from a falling tree sounded out. “And we’ll definitely hear it coming before it hears us.” Prompto gave a weak smile, not sure if she helped his nerves or not.

“Don’t worry, Artemis isn’t gonna let us get eaten.” Noctis reassured, confidence all over his expression. “She’s got this.”

“Uh… Right.”

What am I suppose to do I can’t stop a claw that weighs over a ton from slicing right through you better hope that you see it first because you can’t outrun that thing oh by the Six that thing could snatch Noct out of the air with its giant teeth without a second thought if he’s not fast enough oh Astrals why did we do this why did we do this

They followed what evidence of the behemoth they could find through the fog, coming upon a small man-made cavern created by a huge, abandoned construction pipe. It was big enough for someone to crawl through, if one was willing to uncomfortably arch their back or scrape their boney knees on a hard surface that will more than likely result in bruising. Not to mention the idea of being trapped in a small space with a ginormous predator on the prowl wasn’t a pleasant one. But there was no way forward that didn’t involve going through the pipe, so it’s a risk they’ll have to take.

“Noct, wait!” Noctis was about to be the first to enter the pipe when another roar from Deadeye rang, this time it was close enough that the growl vibrated through the metal under Noctis’ hand. Gladiolus had stopped the prince in his tracks, holding his arm out in a protective stance to keep Noctis back from the potential danger. He looked into the dark pipe, investigating for any sign of the beast that was nearby. Artemisia poked her head under his arm to look too, only seeing some vegetation that was able to grow inside the pipe despite the small amount of sunlight. She gulped, taking a deep inhale of breath before slowly exhaling and ducking under the taller man’s arm and heading in first. “Hey,” Gladiolus whispered, urging her to come back behind him. Another growl vibrating down the pipe silenced them. Artemisia waited until it was quiet again, making sure the behemoth had moved on before looking back to the others and gesturing for them to follow. “Stay close.”

Gladiolus released a frustrated huff of air before following her, with the others close behind him. They crawled down the tight clearing, turning along with path. The pipe lead out to another small cavern, this one created with sheets of metal acting as a barrier around them. Whatever they were planning on making here that included such an uncomfortable walking space Artemisia had no clue. She was thankful for the bit of cover though, no matter how much it has degraded over time. Artemisia looked back at the others, checking on them when she heard heavy footsteps coming closer. She jumped forward to the other side of a small hole to where secure cover was, giving Gladiolus a signal to stay put.

“Hold up,” Gladiolus instructed. Soon a behemoth stood just inches away from the group, letting out a roar as it sniffed the air. The beast’s right eye had a scar going down its face and its eye was clouded over, no longer useful. “Deadeye,” Gladiolus pointed to his own eye, “The name says it all.”

Deadeye sniffed their direction inquisitively. Artemisia worried that they had been found before the behemoth looked away, grabbing something in its jaws and starting to feast on it. Based off of the sounds of muscle tearing and bones breaking, Artemisia had an idea as to what preoccupied the beast’s focus for now. She let out a shaky sigh, thankful that it wasn’t one of them. She glanced over to check on the gorging animal before waving her hand in a motion to follow her. Gladiolus nodded, giving the others the same instructions.

The group slowly started to crawl passed the giant beast as it ate, being cautious as to not tip off Deadeye to their presence. Artemisia peeked back to double check that it was still distracted before she started to move ahead, another large hole above her as the protective metal sheets were no longer there. As she crawled she noticed the end of tunnel, breathing a quick sigh of relief.

“Artemis!”

Artemisia whipped her head around when she heard the alarm in Noctis’ voice, seeing the large teeth coming down towards her at the last second. Before Deadeye’s jaws could clamp down on her person she was tackled out of the way, soon finding herself face down in the dirt with a large weight on top of her. Her protests were muffled by the soil as she pawed at the hand on top of her head, taking in a deep breath and spitting out grass once she finally was able to lift it off. “Gladi--”

Gladiolus shushed her, caging her under him as he stared ahead. Artemisia held her breath when she noticed how close Deadeye’s blood stained teeth were as it sniffed down into the tunnel. She could smell its putrid breath, a nauseous mix of the creature’s mouth bacteria and the remains of its recent kill. Noctis and the others were on the other side, eyes wide and frozen to their spots. Ignis had his hand over Prompto’s mouth to keep the blonde from screaming.

Deadeye removed its jaws from the hole and roared above it, splats of its saliva hitting the five’s faces as its breath sent their hair back. It inspected the area once more before walking away with a low growl. Artemisia released the air she didn’t know she was holding once the beast was gone, taking deep breaths to calm her rapid heartbeat.

“Thanks for the save.”

“Don’t mention it.”

“...” She squirmed uncomfortably under him. “Could you get off of me now?”

“Oh,” Gladiolus flinched, realizing how awkward her position was before carefully crawling off, “Sorry.”

The group made it to the tunnel’s end, Artemisia peeking outside first to make sure the behemoth wasn’t closeby before exiting. Everyone stretched once out, their limbs sore from being in such a restricting space. Another familiar growl interrupted the small moment of relief, the group being on the defensive once again as they moved on. This area of the forest had even worse fog than before, reducing visibility to only several feet.

“It’s weak on its right,” Gladiolus informed, “No eye, no horn.”

“We’ll stay in range until we can exploit its blind spot.” Ignis instructed as they carefully moved through the mist.

They moved onward, following the sounds of the beast. The group came upon a clearing of the forest that had large boulders laid out around the area; most likely the rocks had come down from the nearby cliff side, or perhaps Deadeye had moved them there itself. Moving closer, they saw a shadow move amongst the rubble, revealing a tail as the shadow moved. “We got the beast in our sights.”

“But no plan of attack,” Ignis added to Gladiolus’ comment, “The behemoth should be heading back to its lair, where we can catch it fully off guard.”

“Yeah,” Noctis grumbled, “As long as we stay on guard ourselves.”

“If we stay to its right and use the rocks and trees for cover, we should be able to follow it unseen.” Artemisia added. Agreeing, Ignis took the front, leading the group through the mist. He carefully navigated the group close behind Deadeye, using the beast’s tail as an indication to the creature’s location. There were a few times that the creature’s tail was almost within reach, close enough for someone to reach out with their hand. One false move, one accidental brush and the beast would know they were there. One eye or not, the five would be easily taken down by the giant in the thick fog.

The group was in the middle of crossing the clearing, hopping behind cover from one large rock to the other when the behemoth stopped in its tracks. Gladiolus and Prompto hurried over to cover with Ignis, but Artemisia froze in the middle of the clearing as the beast sniffed the air. A deep growl vibrated down its throat as it turned to its right, looking with its good eye. Artemisia pushed Noctis back behind the previous boulder, avoiding Deadeye’s view in time. Deadeye approached them, its large head sniffing the clearing where Artemisia stood just a moment ago. Ignis and the others moved to avoid its left eye, but Artemisia and Noctis stood still as it continued to sniff out their scent.

Artemisia held her breath as she guided Noctis to walk backwards with a gentle push of her hand against his chest. They stayed light on their feet as they backed away, trying not to disturb anything that would give them away. The water in the air must of made finding their individual scent difficult to track as the behemoth took its time.

With one more big sniff, Deadeye slowly turning its head towards the two stranded friends.

Except there was no prey.

Noctis, in the nick of time, had pulled Artemisia down with him into a large patch of tall grass. The two laid on their stomachs, completely engulfed by the long whisks of turf.

The behemoth growled, searching for what had caused the faint scent it had caught, baring its teeth before huffing out through its nose. Seeming to have given up on the hunt, the beast turned around and continue onward to its lair. Artemisia and Noctis slowly rose from their hiding spot once the predator left, disappearing into the fog. The two hurried across to join the others.

“Are you alright?” Ignis asked, brushing them both off the best he could.

“Yeah, we’re good…” Noctis shivered.

“J-Just… really cold now.” Artemisia trembled, trying to stop her teeth from chattering. In the heat of the moment the two failed to see the large amount of mud accumulating in the patch of grass they hid in. Now that they were no longer fearing for their lives, they suddenly became very aware of the chilling muck now plastered to their uniforms.

“At least you’re alive.” Prompto tried to brighten their spirits, though there wasn’t much he could do besides possibly hugging them to warm them up. But he’d rather not get any of that on himself.

“Once we get back to the post we’ll see if Wiz would be kind enough to lend us a washing machine.” Ignis said handing the two handkerchiefs to wipe the mud off their faces. “If they have one, that is.”

“Until then you’ll have to warm yourself up with the heat of battle.”

They both whined at Gladiolus.

The two tried to clean themselves off the best they could with what they had before moving on to find Deadeye, baring with the uncomfortable sensation of their slick clothes sticking to their bodies. When they last checked, Deadeye had hopped over a wall of rock formations before disappearing into the mist. The group followed, squeezing through a tight crevice through the rocks. Once through to the other side the five found themselves in an abandoned, decrepit building. The metal foundation bars of the would-be structure were exposed now due to the decaying concrete falling off its support. Even the entryway was nothing more than an outline of where a door would be. From the there, the company hopped down to lower terrain in what looks like a potential future storage room. Now, all that remained was an wide open area where the behemoth -- who had to be close due to the audible hisses -- decided to make his home.

They stepped carefully, investigating the tree line for any movement that indicated their target. As they moved cautiously, the mist had slowly started to dissipate, allowing Artemisia to notice several barrels sprawled around the area. Noctis had accidentally walked next to one and looked it over before flinching back as though the object had burned him. “Heads up,” Noctis announced, pointing to a caution sign on the barrel. “The barrels are flammable.”

“Eyes forward,” Gladiolus said, pointing to the forest in the distance. Trees snapped as a hulking figure moved through the woods, a familiar one eye zoning in on the group of friends. “We got company.”

The behemoth let out a blood curdling roar, baring its teeth as it leaped down to their level and crushed a barrel with its claws. The oil broke free and stained Deadeye’s foot. Noctis motioned for everyone to step back once they summoned their weapons, breaking out a magical flask filled with elemental fire magic. He chucked the flask at Deadeye’s slick foot, the fire igniting the oil on the beast and catching its clawed paw in flames. Deadeye cried out at the pain, stomping its foot against the ground to kill the fire. The weak fire only seemed to have agitated the creature more as it charged at the group with no hesitation.

The team separated, avoiding the lunging beast. Deadeye turned mid landing, causing it to skid until it hit what remained of one of the walls of the would be storage area. Some of the concrete fell on top of the behemoth, aggravating it even more. The bad landing had caused Deadeye to destroy more barrels, spraying more flammable grease on its body and causing the predator to slip before charging again.

Everyone scurried away from the rampaging beast like mice avoiding the prowling feline; ironically fitting. Deadeye ran after the group, changing its focus from person to person depending on who was closest. Noctis warped away from its attack while Prompto fired at it as he ran, frantically calling for help. “Prompto!” Gladiolus signalled his friend, charging his direction with his sword at the ready. Deadeye’s jaws almost caught Prompto before he fell to the ground, skidding under Gladiolus’ sword before he brought it up in a uppercut, slicing the behemoth’s face. Noctis warped on to the back of Deadeye’s neck, stabbing the muscle with his longsword. Deadeye roared and reared back on its hind legs, sending Noctis flying back despite his best attempts to stay on.

“Noct!” Artemisia and Ignis ran to their fallen friend, helping him up. “Are you okay?”

Noctis pushed away Ignis’ worried hands, forcing himself up. “I’m fine… Would have been better if it had gone down with that first barrel.”

“Your idea was in the right direction,” Ignis assured, “Unfortunately, it didn’t have the impact that we were hoping for.”

“We need more firepower if we’re going to take it down.” Artemisia looked over to where Deadeye had originally slipped, oil everywhere and a huge dent in the unfinished wall with small plates of concrete falling off. Ignis followed her line of sight, taking in the setting too before the two nodded to each other. “Noct,” Artemisia put her hand on his shoulder, “We need you and Gladio to keep it busy while we set up.”

“That’s a big order just for the two of us.” Noctis complained. “What are you setting up for?”

“Why for your original plan to flourish, of course.” Ignis explained, “You and Gladio will keep the beast distracted while we collect more barrels. Once we have enough the two of you will corral it to the spot and then--”

“Boom.”

“Precisely.”

Gladiolus summoned his shield, his only barrier against Deadeye’s claws pushing down on him. “Make it quick.” Noctis groaned before warping at the beast again to help his struggling companion. Ignis and Artemisia hurried to collect what they needed, grabbing Prompto to help. They dodged the hulking behemoth as they ran back and forth, carrying the bins over to the targeted area against the wall. Gladiolus and Noctis kept the beast off of their busy friends, baiting it away from the others and trying to survive in the meantime.

“Whoops!” Prompto rolled the last barrel over, accidentally kicking it over and spilling the contents onto the ground.

“Don’t worry, we should be good to go.” Artemisia secured a barrel against the wall, signalling Ignis. Ignis nodded, joining Noctis and Gladiolus with his daggers ready while Artemisia and Prompto secured themselves on higher terrain. “Corral the beast back against the wall. Artemis and Prompto are at the ready.”

Following the Strategist’s orders, the three men gradually forced the beast back towards the targeted area. The pooled oil was making Deadeye’s feet unsteady and the fluid was coating most of the creature’s body due to its thrashful movements as it fought back. Gladiolus forced Deadeye back against the wall with a strong push from his shield, surrounding the beast with the collected barrels. “Now!” Ignis yelled out to their far ranged companions as he, Noctis and Gladiolus hurried away from oil.

Artemisia smashed a fire flask against her crossbow, encasing her arrows in the magic before Prompto and her shot down at the barrels. Two explosions rang out before they caused a chain of explosions from all of the barrels, throwing Deadeye against the wall behind it. Deadeye cried out in pain as its whole body was engulfed in flames, the oil luring the rampant fire like food for a starving animal. Despite Deadeye’s attempts to run away from the fire, the ground was still soaked and in its frenzy Deadeye couldn’t manage to control its legs well enough to escape the burning pain raking up its body. Artemisia couldn’t help the sympathetic grimace, turning her head away from the scene. If her and Prompto could feel the heat from their perch, she could only imagine what agony the poor creature was in.

Soon the oil was all burned away, scorches left on the ground where grass once was. Deadeye, just barely standing, was covered in horrendous burns and embers still lingered on it. Deadeye breathed heavily as it tried to force itself upright but its legs were burned beyond use, having taken the brunt force of the fire. Noctis, Ignis and Gladiolus approached the pained creature, their weapons still on their persons. Deadeye growled at them, defensive in its weakened state.

With what strength the behemoth had left, it let out another mighty roar, trying to intimidate the others away. Rubble from the wall fell on top of its head, with bigger chunks starting to come down on Deadeye’s head. The explosion had created a deep crack in the wall’s concrete and Deadeye’s roar vibrated up the weakened structure. The wall broke apart, all of the concrete falling on Deadeye.

A large dust cloud erupted, hiding Deadeye and stinging everyone else’s eyes as the impact kicked up dirt. Noctis and the other two rubbed their eyes, blinking away the debris. The dust started to clear, revealing what was left from the collapse. A large claw laid motionless under a hill of rubble, all signs of life absent.

“Magnificent,” Ignis sighed, dusting himself off. Artemisia and Prompto joined the others on the ground, the three taking a moment to breathe. “Nicely done you two. We’ve taken down the target without nary a flame on ourselves.”

“I’m honestly surprised that we didn’t,” Gladiolus touched his forehead lightly, “Pretty sure the tips of my eyebrows burned off.”

“Huh, sounds like that would an improvement to me.” Noctis joked, him and Prompto laughing at his little jab at the big man’s equally burly brows. Gladiolus raised one of said brows, staring down at the laughing two. With a flick of the wrist he pushed the prince, causing Noctis to fall again into the wet dirt below him with a splat. Now it was Gladiolus’ turn for a laugh; Prompto quickly redirected his laughter at his bestie. Meanwhile, Ignis and Artemisia looked on like two tired parents with their rowdy kids. Noctis lifted himself up from the muck with a groan, the earlier discomfort from the first layer of mud coming back ten fold. Artemisia felt an empathetic chill go up her arms; the fight hadn’t warmed her up as much as Gladiolus had said it would. If anything the addition of sweat and the diminishing effects of adrenaline made her feel even colder.

Ignis sighed as he helped Noctis off the ground. “Now you’ll really need to bathe.”

We all do…

Noctis tried to wipe off the dirt on him, only spreading it across his face. “Then we should get back now.”

They could all agree to that.

By the time the group made their way back to the chocobo ranch, the sun had made its slow descent down the horizon, coloring the sky in blues and pinks. Hopefully Wiz would still allow them to see the chocobos despite the early evening sun. Artemisia wasn’t sure what time chocobos usually fall asleep but if Prompto didn’t get to pet some chocobos today, the poor boy might cry. He had been singing the earlier chocobo song almost the entire walk back, the excitement in his eyes overflowing.

Wiz noticed the group coming, meeting them by an umbrella table. He looked at them expectantly, waiting to see what news they brought with their arrival. Artemisia reached into her small belt pouch, handing Wiz a small chip of the dead behemoth’s claw. Wiz’s face broke into a giant smile. “Ya guys did it! You took down Deadeye! The area’s safe again an’ we owe it all to you.” He took Noctis’ hand, not minding the dirt and grim on it, and gave it a firm shake. “On behalf of the locals, I give ya my heartfelt thanks.”

“So…” Prompto scooted forward, “About the chocobos…”

Wiz laughed. “Our birds are at your disposal. You can rent them any time you like.”

“Can we ride some now?”

Wiz hummed, looking at the clock on his wrist before tipping his hat. “I reckon there’s enough time before dark for our heroes to get a few laps in. Let me get some out for ya.” He snapped his fingers. “In fact, since y’all risked so much for us, why don’t ya stay the night at the caravan and have some supper with me and the others? My treat.”

The five were quick to accept the offer; who were they to decline free food and a warm place to sleep. “We appreciate your hospitality.” Ignis thanked him. “If we could trouble you with another thing.” He presented Noctis and Artemisia in their dirty state. “Do you have a washer we could borrow?”

Wiz laughed. “Son, we live on a chocobo ranch. ‘F we didn’t have some kind of machine we wouldn’t look much different than the chocobos themselves. I’ll find you two some clothes to borrow while we throw those in for a cleanin’.” He looked at Prompto. “And I’ll see about those chocobos.”

“Alright!” Prompto squealed, practically jumping with joy. Artemisia envied his enthusiasm, the chill from her dirty clothes making her feel lethargic.

“Gallina!” Wiz called out, peeking through a door that led to the chocobo stalls. “We’re gonna need five birds. Do you have any spare clothes, too?” Him and this Gallina continued talking through the door before a loud kweh rang out. Soon a train of squawking and kwehs followed the first. Prompto grabbed Artemisia, forgetting about the crusty mud on her, and pulled her closer to the small pasture for the birds. “Get ready to be amazed, Artemis!”

Quick flashes of yellow ran past Artemisia’s eyes, all squawking and feathers abundant. Five of the giant birds ran together along the fence that caged them in the pasture, flapping their small wings excitedly as though to simulate flying. A few were leaping into the air, almost skipping as they ran. The birds were big enough that they could easily jump over the fence and run off if they wanted to, but they seemed more than happy to stay in their enclosure. “No jumping!” A woman’s voice called out to the birds. “One of you is gonna fall over the fence again and then no one will be happy.”

The woman walked out of the stall into the pasture; she must be the woman that Wiz was talking to. The woman, Gallina, definitely looked like someone who dealt with chocobos. While she was nowhere near Gladiolus’ muscle definition, she had a solid build with strong shoulders and thick limbs that no doubt could handle a thrashing chocobo. She had her giant, wild hair tied back in a ponytail that reached her rear, pieces of hay and various greens sticking out occasionally. And despite her uniform, there were various visible scars on her person, the most obvious and painful looking ones were the many that covered the majority of her face. Artemisia had never thought of chocobos as violent creatures but even the most tamed animals could be dangerous, especially the ones the tower over most people and were equipped with sharp talons.

Gallina walked over to the group, leaning against the fence. “You the group that Wiz said took down Deadeye?” The five nodded. “Well thanks for that. You have no idea how antsy the birds were the entire time that beast was around.” She looked back at the birds, some were still running in circles while a few ruffled their feathers against the grass, causing their feathers to puff up adorably. “All of that,” she pointed at the happy birds, “Is thanks to you guys.” She opened the hatch on the fence, opening the small gate. “So you ready to ride them?”

“Oh yeah we are!”

Ignis held back the excited Noctis by the back of his neck line. “My apologies, but these two need to bathe first.” He gestured to Artemisia as well.

Gallina blinked. “Oh! That’s why Wiz was asking about uniforms.” She started walking back to the stalls. “Give me one minute and I’ll set you up with a clean pair of clothes.” She was gone for a moment before coming back out with two sets of absurdly yellow clothes. “I know they’re not exactly high fashion, but they’re comfy. I can take your other clothes once you two are done showering. In the meantime,” she looked down at Prompto, who was giving her the biggest sad puppy eyes ever, “The rest of you are welcome to the birds.”

Prompto practically ran into the pen, chanting the birds over to get their attention. Gallina laughed at his enthusiasm; he was fitting in with the chocobos nicely.

“Noct, do you need any assistance?”

“With showering?” Noctis scoffed at Ignis. “I’m not a baby. It’s not like I’m gonna drown in there.”

“Stranger deaths have happened.” Ignis muttered before casually following Prompto. “Just be sure to clean thoroughly.”

A tint of embarrassment colored Noctis’ cheeks as he coughed awkwardly. He looked at Artemisia and vomited out a quick “I’m showering first” before dashing to the caravan before Artemisia could even react.

Artemisia sighed, rubbing her hands over her arms in an effort to warm herself. She couldn’t be mad at him for rushing for the shower, he was twice as dirty as she was. Unfortunately that meant she was going to have to wait until he was done. While her small stature was useful for combat, it wasn’t the best at keeping herself warm. No doubt Noctis was going to soak up the caravan’s limited hot water, too. She felt like it was fair enough for her to be peeved about that.

She suddenly felt a warm weight on top of her shoulders. She looked down and saw Gladiolus’ leather Crownsguard jacket draped over her shoulders, the size difference hilariously noticeable. She looked at Gladiolus, who’s decorated torso was now bare for all to see. “Thanks, but won’t you be cold too?”

“Don’t worry about it, I got my shirt in the trunk.” He assured, patting her on the head before walking away to where the Regalia was parked. Artemisia could see the many stares by the various ranch workers directed at him as the man walked past them to the car. He didn’t seem to mind, especially since the flustered stares and embarrassed giggles only boosted his ego more.

“Heh...”

Artemisia looked back at Gallina, who was leaning on the fence and supporting her head with her hand against her cheek. She had a giant grin on her scared face, directing it at the red head before her. Artemisia blinked curiously. “What?”

“Oh nothing, nothing,” Gallina chuckled. “Hey, we have a couple of showers inside if you want to use one of them. Better than standing around cold, right?”

“Yes, thank you!”

Gallina called for another post worker to watch the chocobos with Prompto and Ignis before she led Artemisia inside. They passed by the few other chocobos that remained in their stalls, Gallina petting them on the heads as they continued. “This your first time here?”

“Yeah, first time with chocobos too.” Artemisia admitted.

“Really?” Gallina looked back at Artemisia over her shoulder. “Huh… Well there’s a first for everything.” Gallina grinned at the smaller woman, her lips clipped by the healed scars on her face. “Don’t worry, I know these birds like the back of my hand. I’ll set you up with the perfect one for you.”

“Have you worked here for a long time?”

“Here: No,” Gallina said, holding a door open for Artemisia. “My family owned our own chocobo ranch in Galahd before we had to move to Insomnia.” Artemisia perked up at the name of her home. “Lived there for a while but then… Well, you know, recent events.” Artemisia’s mood dropped and based off of Gallina’s tone she wasn’t the only one who was feeling for their home, even if it was only temporary for one of them. “We moved out here and been working for Wiz since.” She smiled at Artemisia again. “I will say, Insomnia was never really home for me, but it is nice to see that refugees like you guys seem to be doing okay.”

Artemisia felt a different kind of chill go up her spine. “Was it that obvious?”

“Heh, I know those city clothes anywhere. Insomnian clothes stick out like a sore thumb compared to what most people out here wear.”

“Ah…”

As long as she doesn’t know about Noctis being the new king we’re fine. As nice as these people are, the group couldn’t risk Noctis’ security.

Gallina had her hand on a door knob before she looked at Artemisia again, tilting her head curiously. “But I don’t think I’ve seen those type of clothes very much, even in Insomnia. Were you guys Crownsguard or something?”

Crap!

“Oh no, it’s just a fashion statement.” Artemisia lied, keeping her voice even. “Going for that quirky, punk-rock look. The guys are really into that sort of thing and I just do it so that they don’t look too ridiculous, y’know?”

Gallina stared at Artemisia with a raised brow before shrugging and opening the door to a communal bathroom with a couple of stalled showers. “There’s soap and standard hair products in all of the showers and there’s a bench to lay out your clothes on. Once you’re done showering, you can hand me your dirty ones and I’ll throw them in the wash.” Artemisia thanked her and scurried in, eager to wash herself off of all the grime plastered to her.

After a enjoying her shower -- it was nice not having to worry about one of the guys accidentally walking in on her again -- she changed into the spare clothes that Gallina had left for her. While the outfit was a bit much, what with the shirt being brightly yellow and the small chocobo mascot advertising the ranch, it was better than her having to wear what spare clothes she had. Those clothes were beyond appropriate for a ranch setting and would surely be ruined with all the dirt and chocobo feathers. At least this uniform was comfortable, definitely the kind of material working people would prefer.

Leaving the bathroom, Artemisia went back to the pasture and found Gallina over by the fence, watching Prompto and Ignis interact with the birds. The woman greeted Artemisia when she saw her and took her mud covered clothes. “I’ll be right back and then I’ll set you up with your chocobo.”

Artemisia was about to thank her as the other woman walked away when an awkward cough behind her caught her attention. She looked back and had to stop herself from laughing. Noctis stood there, cheeks red, next to Gladiolus in a ridiculous outfit that differed from her own. This one seemed to have been some kind of festival uniform, the words Moogle Chocobo Carnival written on the torso and the back. It had a picture of a chocobo being ridden by some kind of alien, fairy, devil creature, if such a thing existed. She supposed that it was a moogle, as stated by the shirt. The colors on his shirt, with closer inspection, were just extreme close ups of the two festival subjects’ faces, coloring the shirt yellow, white, pink and orange. The best part of it was the hat that Gladiolus kept insisting Noctis to wear despite his protests. It had a chocobo’s face on the front with little wings sticking out on the sides, and a moogle’s face on the back with an antenna standing up on top. It was all absurdly wonderful.

“Don’t. Say. A thing.” Noctis emphasized, swiping the comedic hat off after Gladiolus put it on him again.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Artemisia giggled, a big amused grin on her face. “You look… stunning.” Noctis groaned, pushing Gladiolus off of him as the bigger man continued to annoy him. “Come on,” the embarrassed man insistently pushed the two into the pen towards the chocobos, ignoring the looks Ignis and Prompto gave him once the three joined them. A rancher had set up a saddle on to Prompto’s chocobo and now the blonde was getting ready for a ride. But it seemed like the chocobo wanted to play a game of tag instead as it lightly pecked Prompto on the head before running off, running circles around the man playfully. The rancher was obviously frustrated that the bird wasn’t behaving and tried to make it stand still while Prompto took some slightly dazed but loving photos of the silly bird.

“Alright the clothes are washi-- What’s going on?” Gallina returned and saw the little spectacle before her. The excited chocobo had gotten a couple of the other birds to join in on its game of chase and the other rancher begged for her to help get them all settled. Gallina sighed, muttering “This is what happens when they’re stuck in their pens for too long…” before joining the fray. She grabbed the reins from the main chocobo as it ran by her, stopping it in its tracks with a yank. The other worker wouldn’t have been able to stop the giant bird with just the reins, but Gallina’s build wasn’t for nothing.

“You,” she tapped the bird’s beak and pointed at it like a mom disciplining her child, “need to stop that, mister. You’ll get to run around in a minute.” The bird leaned forward and starting nuzzling into her neck, shaking its head side to side that made her own move in response. Gallina patted it on its neck before pushing it back once she felt the bird’s beak pecking through her hair. She gave the reins over to the other worker and calmed down the other two excitable birds in a similar fashion. Once all of them had settled down she guided them over to the group of five.

The birds walked over to the guys, introducing themselves to their new riders with little actions of affection. Gladiolus’ chocobo flapped its wings happily after Gladiolus patted it on the head before trying to return the favor and laying its own head on top of his, making a noise almost similar to a purr. Ignis’ bird was the most calm in its greeting, sniffing Ignis curiously before chirping in hello, to which Ignis rewarded it with some satisfying chin scratches. Prompto’s bird finally decided to behave and stand still so Prompto could love on it. Prompto was enthusiastically fluffing the bird’s feathers, rubbing his hands all over it and giving it little scratches. The bird responded with another peck to his head, which must be that bird’s odd way of showing affection. Noctis’ bird acted aloof when Noctis tried to coo the bird closer, only to to start begging for attention when Noctis looked away in defeat. Artemisia giggled at how perfect the combinations for everyone were.

“Artemisia,” Gallina nudged her, guiding Artemisia to the last chocobo as the guys started to situate themselves on their chocobos’ saddles. The last chocobo was sitting in the grass still, perking up when it saw them approach. “This is Dottie,” Gallina patted the sitting chocobo on the head. “She’s your chocobo. She’s super patient and she’s the one that most first riders go with. She’ll be perfect for you.” Dottie shook, ruffling her feathers before standing up and looking at Artemisia expectactly. Artemisia hesitated, standing a distance away from the bird. She knew that chocobos were usually super friendly and tame, but she couldn’t help but be nervous. “Come on,” Gallina urged, waving for her to move closer. “She’s not gonna do anything.”

Artemisia approached slowly, holding her hand out for the bird to smell as she came within reach. The large bird sniffed her hand inquisitively, sneezing lightly -- Or at least as lightly as a giant chocobo can -- making Artemisia flinch her hand back slightly. Dottie let out a little “Kweh!” before bumping its head against Artemisia’s hand, requesting to be petted. Artemisia let out a small sigh of relief, happy to see their first introduction went well and indulged herself in the sensation of the charming chocobo. Dottie’s bright feathers were incredibly soft and acted a lot like fur with the way it responded to be to touch; when she ruffled them it only made it more convincing.

“She’ll keep ya safe when you guys are out and about.” Gallina stated, watching the two bond. She laughed when Dottie forced herself forward to wrap her long neck around Artemisia’s shoulder in a hug. “Aw, see! She likes you.”

Artemisia chuckled at the cute display of affection, smoothing Dottie’s neck feathers in return. She heard a small click and looked over her shoulder to see Prompto with his camera in hand and a giant grin on his face. “Gotta capture the moment!” He proclaimed happily. “Oh. Em. Gee. Cutest bird ever!” Prompto proclaimed, referring to the photo he had just taken of the two. His bird immediately bucked him a little with a sharp squawk, almost like it was insulted that he wasn’t admiring its looks instead.

“We got a course ready for you kids if ya wanna race before nightfall.” Wiz informed, leaning against the otherside of the fence.

Prompto was urging Artemisia to hurry up and board her chocobo, eager to get some racing in. “How about a little competition?” Noctis offered with a confident grin. “The person with the best time gets to sleep on the bed in the caravan.” The caravans only had one queen sized bed, and while they weren’t the highest quality, they were still preferred to the rickety pull out futon.

“You can’t occupy an entire bed to yourself, Noct. You must share the other side.” Ignis interjected sternly.

Noctis sighed, a defeated frown on his face. “Fine…”

“But what’s a competition without a little wager.”

“Heh, I’m down for that.” Considering Gladiolus’ size it’s no guessing why he would prefer sleeping on the big bed instead of the futon.

“Oh yeah!” Prompto laughed over at Artemisia who was having a hard time getting on her bird’s saddle. “Come on Artemis! Don’t want to be left in the dust.”

Gallina helped lift Artemisia the rest of the way over her chocobo, giving Dottie a few secure pats as the rider fixed herself. “Just a heads up,” Gallina whispered in Artemisia’s ear, “Dottie hates losing.” She winked.

In the end, it was Prompto who was sleeping in the bed with a happily full stomach thanks to Wiz’s cooking. And despite the others’ losses, everyone was able to enjoy their time and had some much need laughter amongst themselves and the new friends they found on the ranch.

Though Noctis was a bit insulted that Prompto wanted to share the bed with Artemisia instead of him.