#ALSO tanks for the tag....banjo.....

[cubedmango]

once again thanks so much for putting up with my long ass ramblings, and you're welcome too :-) it actually took me a few hours to finish typing out all of it, plus that sort of post-script message afterwards, but it's not like i did it all in one go and there were breaks in between, so it's fine haha. i genuinely appreciate your concern though :') and that's the power of a relatively new fixation i'm really excited about i guess? wjdfjkcnvzs though i did cobble some parts of it from tentative posts and meta i've had in my drafts for a while now, so they're not totally things i had to come up with on the spot the other day at least. and that's okay (i do like what i've seen of your writing though), like obviously no pressure to feel as dedicated as i am when it comes to talking about my blorbos and glup shittos and whatnot - your actual passion for the media is what matters and that ofc manifests in cool different ways for each of us 🫡 [1/?]

(rest below)

ah i'm glad my description of build was intriguing enough for you! i hope i didn't seem like i was laying it on too thick with my constantly paralleling and comparing it to aa though - i mean at first glance, the narratives of aa and build could not seem more different, but in hindsight they both prominently deal with the concepts of truth, justice, corruption, redemption/atonement, identity, and family and friendship in their own ways (though ig that's probably true of kr in general, which then makes sense as for how toku would feature as a major element in many aa cases), even if not always perfectly in either series, but the effort is generally appreciated and still pretty compelling imo. and i really love aa too (i actually discovered your blog and your twitter through your very cool and beautiful aa fanart a while back, and then when i started watching cm, i was pleasantly surprised to also see your fanart in the tumblr tags, so it was nice to see some of my interests align with that of an artist i liked and followed <3) so finding ways to make analogies between whatever i'm currently into with one of my favorite franchises ever seemed like the natural next step haha [2/?]

also let me just say that ryusen is one of the few m/m couples to get me this obsessed apart from narumitsu and the like over the past several years, so that's really my best way of recommending them. again, idk if that will truly be your experience too by the end, but hopefully you'll still find something to like about their dynamic so my being this much of a shill for them won't feel embarrassing later on kjvbrhsfjs [3/?]

and yeah the rings!! they're far from the only gay-coded kr duo to get that kind of official romantic jewelry ofc, but they were apparently one of the first to really make it popular, so yeah their overall cultural impact sure is something to not be underestimated lol. and yup i've found that it's actually fairly common for many companies behind popular japanese media to go for selling that kind of merch, regardless of the actual canonicity of the pairing in question - like capcom, toei/p-bandai, etc. are aware that there's sizeable enough shipping fanbases for said media, and yeah ig selling that stuff while not having the guts to actually canonize said pairings can come off as pretty baity which is not really Great but well that's capitalism and queer/fujobaiting for you ig 😔 and here's what the sento/banjou rings look like btw: www . tumblr . com/kabutoraiger/190132806767/a-new-entry-into-the-growing-selection-of though i can't share a picture of it rn, their names (spelled as sento kiryu and ryuga banjo) are also inscribed on the insides of their respective individual rings :-) [4/?]

as for the 'silly little rabbit with a death wish' part of that post... hehe. you'll Get it if/when you get there >:) btw sento's given name literally means 'rabbit tank' and banjou's given name ryuuga means 'i'm a dragon' iirc (although the former having that name actually has a good in-universe explanation for once, but the latter definitely has no such excuse 😭) - tbh kr (+ other toku franchises i'm sure) is right up there with aa in terms of often corny yet still charming pun names, but because they're mostly in japanese and don't have localized english equivalents, one doesn't always get it right away but i suppose that's what google and wiki are for lol and actually one other particular example that's stood out to me so far is the name of the protagonist from ex-aid (the one played by iijima from odt, and yeah he, inukai, and akaso all knew each other from their time in kr because their shows also had its own crossover movie which also featured a bunch of other popular previous rider protagonists), which is the season immediately preceding build, because it's literally houjou emu - houjou as a pun on the japanese word for 'assistance,' and emu as in short for 'emulator' and derived from the japanese word for 'smile,' because guess what that season was about? doctors who are gamers. so yeah subtlety.exe nowhere to be found here lmao [5/?]

and hell yeah feel free to join me in the madness ^_^ toku can be one hell of a rabbit (lol) hole though, so it might lead you to become interested in other shows and movies of the medium/genre, in which case we'll be in this together as i'm also still beginning to get into other kr shows in particular (like after i finish build, i think i'll be focusing on the earlier heisei seasons of ooo, den-o, or maybe kuuga). as for where to watch it, i don't have one particular strong rec for a site rn, but what i've gone for are kissasian (kissasian . fm/info/kamen-rider-build) or toku . fun (toku . fun/post/watch-online-kamen-rider-build-full-series-49-episodes-english-sub) - obviously kissasian is more of a general site for which to watch asian dramas on, but that's if you don't mind ads popping up every so often and also the subs used are not very consistent like the source for one episode's translation could be a different team/person from the previous episode's, whereas toku . fun is specifically an archive for toku shows and movies, and is more consistent with the subs and is basically ad-free iirc, albeit i think i've also heard said subs on there described as 'usually the most accurate but also the least funny/entertaining' (ig bc tvnihon, their source, tends to err on the side of 'purism' when translating), so whichever is more your style in the end? i personally switch back and forth between the two sites, purely on the basis of if there's a translation i'm not satisfied with, even if i don't know how actually accurate it is lol on a side note, build's opening song 'be the one' by pandora feat. beverly is a nice jam, and it has an official english version where i think the lyrics (+ the original japanese version too) are something that would make one come to realize just how much they fit sento and banjou's relationship by the end of the show :') [6/?]

and thanks again for giving me the go-ahead to keep on rambling ^_^ moving on to build's female characters: there are only 2 really prominent female characters (a few others pop up here and there, or have relatively big roles for an arc or 2, but not throughout the whole show), misora (as mentioned before) and sawa. imo, both are treated decently, being fun and interesting characters with their own arcs not purely tied to the men (although obviously romance with men or the lack thereof are not inherent markers of the quality of a female character's writing, it's worth noting that neither of them are written as love interests (so you'll never get the sense that they get reduced to just that role) to any male character - but tbf, kr and other popular toku aren't really big on romance, even the het ones, in the first place, maybe bc of some japanese cultural conventions or something, but i've heard that the few canon m/f relationships that are present are usually not written very well, which is once more very shounencore of them lol - although unfortunately, there is a guy with a frankly kinda creepy and annoying parasocial crush on misora which most of the other characters don't care for either but it's still played off as comic relief, kinda larry-like in that sense if we're comparing it to aa again, and that's definitely one of the show's major drawbacks; i mean i still think build is overall worth the watch, and again, since you've gone through all of aa already, you'd be a veteran wrt this kind of trope, but regardless i think it's good to give some warning in advance to help you prepare for some of the shit that's about to go down) plus misora and sawa are eventually shown having a personal relationship/friendship with each other outside of the men too :-) however, overall they're still kinda underutilized and underdeveloped (sawa in particular) compared to the guys, plus neither of them are riders, though in kr, that's also definitely not an automatic indicator for whether a female character will be well-written or not, but then again, since we're both aa fans, i'm sure we're already very familiar with the feeling of seeing interesting and compelling female characters not get their full due from their writers, so based on that, build is survivable for sure 😔 [7/?]

and idk how well they would fare next to female characters from other kr seasons, but i also think it's worth pointing out that, for all that build's writer/s are clearly still not immune to misogyny, misora and sawa's overall writing doesn't come off to me as 'so misogynistic it becomes gay' in the vein of idk, naruto or death note, bc again, neither of them were touted as viable love interests to male characters before getting shoved to the side in favor of primarily focusing on homoerotic m/m relationships for most of the story only to still get together with those men in the end, and the only thing build was really marketed as in terms of its relationship writing was the 'heated drama between men' stuff so you already get a sense of what's in store for you from the start, and so ultimately you also don't really feel that annoyed or 'cheated' you know? [8/?]

and then on to akaso: that anecdote was from a full interview with him and inukai from when the show was just starting out - docs . google . com/document/u/0/d/1BwqtHLs5d8Vs2YCJA7XJW3TxhaGta8jo9huEo70ehq0/mobilebasic there's only very mild spoilers for the first episode and then vague allusions to what happens in the next couple of episodes or so, but if you'd still prefer to wait until you've actually watched those episodes to read it in full, i'll just copy here the most relevant parts for what we're talking about: "Inukai: The first scene we appeared together in was…. Akaso: Wasn’t it the first encounter scene? Inukai: [...] At that time, it was really hot at the filming location. During out spare time we just tried to preserve our strength, so we didn’t talk much. Now that I think of it, that day, you were staring at my face the whole time. Didn’t anyone notice? (laugh) Akaso: I was feeling dizzy from the heat, but among all the actors, I suddenly noticed Inukai-kun’s face and was captivated by it, thinking “wow, he is so pretty...” (laugh) The director, Tasaki Ryuuta pointed it out to me. I instantly came to my senses. I’ve never stared at any actress like that before, no matter how pretty, but at that time I suddenly became dizzy and just kept staring in a daze. Turns out, it was a heatstroke (bitter laugh). Inukai: You had a heatstroke because you sensed the dangers of my body (laughs). That was the moment I decided I shouldn’t let my guard down around you. Akaso: Nononono, I wasn’t trying to hit on you!! Inukai: (laughs) Akaso: Please stop, don’t add any unnecessary mental images to the word “partners” (laughs). But when Inukai-kun plays Sento, you get the feeling that he’s a very smart person mulling over a lot of thoughts in his head, I think he looks very pretty and cool. Inukai: That makes me happy, I think. Thank you." [9/?]

so there you have it lol. apparently akaso did use the word for 'heatstroke,' but the translator of this interview pointed out on tumblr that it seems like what happened had no actual severe effects on him, so it was likely just heat stress at most and he just said 'heatstroke' to clearly get the point across or something. in general, akaso during his time on build seemed to have a bit of a pattern of saying some kinda out-of-pocket things that would make one go "oh he really had the nerve to go there huh but like... is he wrong?" like when he also infamously claimed at two separate promotional events that banjou was the real 'heroine' of the story (which makes his previous comment to inukai to not add "any unnecessary mental images to the word 'partners'" funnier) 😭 during the first event, he was asked to introduce his character and then himself, and when he said banjou's name, he added that he was the 'heroine,' at which takada kaho (misora's actor) interjected and pointed at herself to say that *she* was playing the 'heroine' and there was a bit of back-and-forth between them as both kept insisting they were the 'heroine' (all in a lighthearted manner ofc) but in the end i think akaso got in the last word before he passed on the mic to takada so she could properly introduce herself this time, although she didn't bring up the heroine stuff again from what i could tell lol. the video i watched from that first event didn't actually have subs, but you could get the gist of it especially since they said 'heroine' in english. as for the second event, i also watched a bit of its video but i don't think i got to the part where he made the comment, so i only saw later on a screenshot from that same video where what he said was translated as "then, when i read the final script, it said that kaho takada was feeling down because banjo ryuga was the heroine." [10/?]

and. well... neither of them are wrong exactly fnsjngkbs. like ofc misora filled the obligatory female lead role, but generally speaking, it seems like it was obvious even among the cast that banjou, in addition to being the typical male co-protagonist like in a 'buddy cop' type of movie or show, was the one pretty much framed as the story's 'heroine,' imo in the style of a shounen anime or manga to sento's shounen protagonist position (well, the shounen animanga with well-written central m/f romances anyway), with the implication of being sento's love interest in all but name officially also. like... it's still very much subtextual but also wow talk about the lack of subtlety here too 😭 and at that second event, there was another comment he made that made me go "okay come on don't do this to us" but it's related to spoilery series-finale and post-series material, so it's probably best that i save discussing it for when you're done watching, if ever. but well yeah i'm kinda obsessed with his mind for all that like. thank you for continuing to help us fans not sound delusional via all these very enlightening comments (i mean aside from how heavy the subtext already was in the actual story) but also what's his issue 😭😭 [11/?]

btw build isn't actually akaso's first kr show - it's amazons, specifically its 2nd season, which also got released in 2017 some months prior to build's airing. amazons is one of those aforementioned more adult-oriented toku webseries and was meant to be a 'darker and more mature reimagining of the 1974 television series, kamen rider amazon,' but it got more mixed reviews overall compared to build, especially since iirc a lot of fans think it didn't handle said darker themes too well or something (there's cannibal cultists?? i think??? idk if akaso's character hiroki was one of them though). but the upside to it is that it was precisely his work on amazons that got akaso cast on build (from what i can tell, hiroki is nowhere near as dumb as banjou, but there's a similar delinquent vibe, albeit hiroki's aesthetic seems to be somewhat edgier). i find it funny though bc hiroki is apparently a 17 year old high schooler, then a few months later akaso made the jump to playing a 23 year old (which was his actual age at the time of filming) ex-pro fighter... the range of this man jwkfjksfdlms [12/?]

on a final side note about something that's not really relevant to all that other stuff but still kinda funny: i just remembered that apparently back when cm was airing, and that moment in ep. 2 (?) where adachi forces the elevator doors open to ask kurosawa out to dinner happened, people were commenting "well that's kamen rider training for you" and yeah i definitely believe banjou could/would have done something like that. though he probably would have punched the doors in the process too, or because he's a dumbass, he might also let himself get accidentally hit by the closing doors and then that's when he'd punch them in response lmao also i think i'll save my further thoughts on the kamen rider yuri and also the few canon lgbt+ characters the series does have so far + the varying qualities with which they've been written for later messages, bc once again this has gotten far too long and there's already a lot of things here for you to process and respond to so. thank you so much again and bye for now 🙏🏼 [13/13]

thank You again for all the info omg theres so much detail again ur a legend..!! reading it is so fun too i can rlly tell u like the franchise a lot that makes me happy ty for sharing all this w me 🥺 and actually to update u i watched a couple of eps since ur last asks (currently on ep8 kdjfksj i did a littol binging) and 1) it is Very different in tone from what i was expecting! i thought itd be like . moody and serious action etc but its actually rlly silly and thats a huge plus for me i love me some silliness always and 2) did take a bit of getting used to the format (+ to akaso and inukai in these roles theyre so different from cm and odt How are these the same guys) but honestly im rlly enjoying the buildup of the mystery?? and the charas are v endearing i care them already. also i cannot believe they dropped this one me in ep *ONE*

LIKE HELLO??? all i could think at first was "this is so nrmt in turnabout goodbyes coded" with the whole "i believe in you" thing but goddam . u werent kidding about these two huh. i get why the rings now i get it. Man. but yeah big fan of their dynamic so far !! and a little unrelated but im hoping they keep up the bit w banjou figuring out best matches in 1 second its my favorite thing rn fkdjsjfjdfhs

(also also this bit im just . thinking. a lot. kind of a crazy line to drop in the middle of all the silliness isnt it 👁👄👁)

anyway . onto misora and sawa omg theyre so good too ???? misora esp shes so funny and i keep wondering when theyll get into her whole powers deal its been on my mind since ep1 ........ these two are def not getting as much screentime ive noticed but at least the times they show up are great so far and none of that forced romance stuff which is what im used to sadly so ill take it 👍 just hope we do get to their backstories too eventually or im gonna be :(

also little cut to the villains too since theyre p prominent but although i already figured gentoku was involved somehow from the start i cannot for the life of me figure out what blood stalks deal is???? like is he just there for the drama of it all . whys he kind of helping the guys what does it Mean-

THE INTERVIEWS HELPJFKDJF ive heard legends of mr akaso eiji and his out of pocket commentary im understanding now ..... that "heroine" thing is Crazy though like surely he had to have known the implications right ????? doesnt he know that stuff is dangerous to fans come on man 😔 ur right abt the range tho im already so impressed by his and inukais acting in here since its so different from the charas they played in cm and odt but still p similar in how they do emotional scenes so im enjoying seeing those 👀

i think ill keep watching bc mostly i just. Really need to know what the mystery is (and still that "silly little rabbit has a death wish" thing, tho im starting to have a hunch about who its referring to.........) so yeah maybe ill have more liveblogging updates for u next time if ur interested in seeing my reactions akfjkdsjf

(before i go one last thing . ACE ATTORNEY REFERENCE???????)

[sezja]

Just some WoLs

I have a large collection of alts who are WoLs, non-WoLs, Party Members, and OCs I Just Needed to Put Somewhere Because I have a small addiction to character creation and I cannot be stopped sO HERE WE GO:

Warriors of Light (*Azem)

Team "Follow the Giant Pink Idiot"

Ernaswys Lubbloefwyn*: Sea Wolf, she/her, NIN. Very naive, bright and bubbly optimist, keeps dragging her friends into trouble, but she's very good at getting back out of it again.

Silent Fox: Hellsguard, she/her, SCH/SGE. Stoic, no-nonsense. As the name implies, doesn't talk much. The healer in Erna's party, after Erna's best friend, Rusted Knife, steps down from the role and takes up DNC instead. As she also has the Echo, she suspects Hydaelyn's hand in this.

Ibakha Dotharl: Xaela, she/her, WAR. Brash, bold, and sometimes belligerent. Believes the voice of Hydaelyn in her mind is the Dusk Mother. The tank in Erna's party (has another AU where she's @lesenbyan's Eve's girlfriend).

Team "Accidental Heroes"

Tajna Ratyasch*: Hrothgar, she/her, DNC. Shy, withdrawn, takes up adventuring to broaden her horizons, ends up tripping head-first into saving the world.

Lytora Envers: Midlander, she/her, SMN. Polite but forthright, quietly stubborn, determined. More or less the reason Tajna gets dragged into trouble. Tags along regardless.

Team "You're the Reason I Never Learned to Heal"

Coeli Qoet*: Rava, she/her, DRG/RPR. Designated Hero syndrome, throws herself into being a hero, seeks out challenges and dangers, believes it is her duty and her purpose to save everyone. Keeps nearly getting herself killed as a result.

Sleeping Smile: Hellsguard, she/her, RDM. Exasperated but fond of Coeli, the practical half of the team. Helps sort out the logistics for Coeli's mad plans. Refuses to be her healer. Is more relieved than anyone else when the Scions start coming along for the ride in dungeons.

Team "Worst Heroes Ever"

Bjarni Iryut: Rava, he/they, GNB. Twin to @lesenbyan's Slejsa(*), he's a very protective, doting sibling who has always considered himself Slejsa's guardian first and foremost; it is his duty to keep them out of trouble. Unfortunately, he's not... smart.

Furan Banjo: Raen, they/them, NIN/BRD. Washed up in Limsa Lominsa as a child, joined the rogues' guild young, grew up to be a wretched little gremlin. Joins Slejsa's group for a lark because they find Slejsa hilarious, but finds they can't escape once things start getting too serious.

Solo WoL

Hujaghur Bayaqud: Xaela, she/her, WAR/BRD/omicrafter/omnigatherer. Warm and maternal, Huja took up adventuring to support her five husbands and their children; a twist of fate takes her to Eorzea, where things very quickly get out of hand. She continues to send resources home to her family when she may.

Non-WoLs, WoL companions

Urha'to Nelhah: Midlander???, he/him, MCH (but multitalented). Kuja, to a select few. An odd young man who may or may not have come from another world with his equally strange brother. Adopted by Urha Nelhah, mother of one of the Warriors of Light, Qhota Nelhah (both from @mootablemimic), he's made Eorzea his home. Has recently begun traveling alongside the party.

Neirin Nelhah: Midlander???, he/she/they, BLM. A somewhat eccentric dragon-loving mage who claims to be the king of another world. Few take him seriously, and he's more or less made peace with that. He spent several years living among the dragons of Anyx Trine, and has now joined his brother in the quest to... do whatever it is the family is up to these days. Saving the world? Sure, what's another apocalypse?

Ciceroix Greystone: Wildwood, he/him, BRD. Bastard brother of Count Baurendouin de Haillenarte, Ciceroix ran away from home after the death of his mother and has been a wandering bard ever since. His childhood anger and spite have faded, leaving him a fairly mellow and friendly man, always willing to lend an ear to Eve, the Warrior of Light... and perhaps his own nephew, Chlodebaimt, long presumed to be dead in the fall of the Steel Vigil.

Halan Soilanteaux: Duskwight, they/them, WHM. A skittish and insecure Dravanian heretic and healer, Halan follows a fairly infamous heretical leader who stakes a claim on the abandoned Dawn Vigil. When peace is achieved between Dravanians and Ishgardians, Halan reluctantly moves into the city and attempts to set up a life there.

Dhemleita Ernafolgwyn: Sea Wolf, she/her, BSM. A Lominsan blacksmith and childhood friend of Coeli Qoet and her cousins. Generally the most level-headed of the bunch.

Fenumin Inahwen: Wildwood, he/him, ALC/BTN. An herbalist from Tailfeather, formerly of Ishgard. Mostly keeps to himself, but can act as a healer in an absolute pinch. Always polite... but with an edge that the wary usually steer clear of.

Bard Unit

Mordyn Lariat: Midlander, he/him. Born in Limsa Lominsa. Quiet but mischievous, usually seen in company with the Elezen bard, Clotarion Liautroix. His songs tend to be very shanty-like, predictably, and usually rely on the whole unit joining in to achieve their full strength.

Okhi Chelawae: Keeper of the Moon, she/her. Guyelot's childhood best friend. Something of a troublemaker, prone to stirring up arguments. Fiercely loyal. Also skilled with a katana, boasts of her many travels. Pesters Guydelot about 'abandoning' Sanson while he travels. Her songs promote quickness of movement and evasion.

Amianne Grandeterre: Duskwight, she/her. Quiet, often shy, but has a powerful singing voice. Comes from a very large family, well-known and well-liked among other Duskwights. Determined to improve the way her people are treated, and only agrees to join Sanson's unit when he agrees to help her achieve that goal with his own work. Her songs favor strength and stamina. She's the only voice that can sometimes drown out Guydelot's.

[schrijverr]

Flying Solo

Reggie can dance ballet, he learned from his mother and does it whenever he’s feeling low. The band catches him and it turns into a bonding moment.

On AO3.

Ships: none

Warnings: Reggies home life from before they died is mentioned briefly. Tell me if I missed anything or if you want me to tag something!

~~~~~~~~~~

Alex and Luke had been friends since they were very little and had befriended Bobby in Middle School, only meeting Reggie in High School after he had moved to LA from NYC. He had easily fit in to their little group, but they did not know Reggie as well as each other.

Not that Reggie minded, he was a pretty private person. He didn’t like sharing things about himself and had become a pro in talking without ever saying something.

He did not like talking about his home and his parents, so he avoided those topics and made sure to always have an excuse ready about why they couldn't go to his home and he put on an act (partly) of being a dumbass to discourage deeper conversations.

It had even taken the other three a while before they figured out where he was from, only finding out when he had rolled his eyes at the depiction of the Big Apple in a movie.

Reggie liked his new friends though. They let him stay on their couches when the fighting got bad and never pitied him for the bruises.

They were his family.

However, he did not share everything with them, even after they’d gotten close enough to be brothers. Like the fact that his mother had been a professional ballerina, who was still angry she had to give up her studio for his fathers job, nor the fact that he had spend most of his youth there as well and knew how to dance ballet.

He knew they wouldn't judge him for it or think he was girly or weird, he had seen that with Alex. But still, it was his little thing.

The thing he did when he was down, his small comfort that reminded him of better times when glasses remained whole and his mother still smiled.

Ballet was how he had gotten into music, first learning to play pieces on the piano, later violin, then banjo and guitar, which lead to the true love that was his bass. His mother had always been a music person, his dad too. That used to connect them.

So he kept it to himself, only doing small pirouettes and some stretching in his room or old routines on the beach late at night under the stars to the beat of the fighting floating from the house.

But then they died and nothing was the same anymore. His home was a bike shack, his parents were gone and he was a ghost that could only be seen when they sung with a specific girl. The only good thing was that he would keep his flexibility for all of eternity.

Well, that might be a bit dramatic. Julie was super nice, he still had his friend and their music, and Ray was everything he had ever wanted in a dad, even if the man couldn't see him.

It was just that it hurt sometimes.

It hurt that he would never be able to socialize again, that they never had the breakthrough they had worked so hard for, that their music had been stolen by someone they trusted, that the only good father figure he’d ever known only tolerated him because he was invisible, that his friends were finding other people and he was being left behind.

Life, well, death, just fucking sucked and Reggie hated it. Not always, just some days when the loneliness crept up on him and he had no one to turn to.

So he returned to the thing that had kept him going for most of his life, before he had his band, his new family.

Ballet.

First he went to the beach, like he’d used to, but the bike shack was a bitter reminder of what he had lost and the entire area wasn’t the same anymore. So he returned to the Molina house, which used to be the Willson house.

Ray sometimes listened to classical music while he worked and, since he couldn't see Reggie, it was the perfect time.

He started doing his stretches, before he moved on to the basic positions and some other steps. It was nothing fancy, nothing like he’d used to do, but it was calming. Just flying through the space with his eyes closed while memories played on his eyelids.

His mother beckoning him closer with a smile, the older girls at the studio who had adored him when he was younger, his dad at the piano in the living room, while he either sat next to him or twirled with his mother.

The good times.

Soon it became routine to do old ballet routines in the living room while Ray was working and he was sure none of the others would be home or just whenever there was no one at all.

It was pretty handy that he could phase through objects now and didn’t have to deal with pushing everything to the side, although clothes were still an issue. He had a pair of sweats and a tank-top though, but no shoes, so he had to manage on bare feet.

But it was nice, it was comforting, which meant it had to go to shit at some point.

Today had began not that great. Reggie had been awake, like every night, but this time it hadn’t been nice and quiet, just a reminder that he wasn’t alive anymore. He’d gone on a walk, but all the changes were also a reminder and the day had just been doomed from the start.

First he’d wanted to hang with the guys, but Alex had a date (totally not a date, shut up) with Willie and Luke had heard his parents talking about his cousins and aunt coming, so he was haunting them, leaving Reggie on his own.

He had searched for Ray, but the man was away on a shoot and Reggie was truly on his own in the house. Nothing that bad, he’d thought as he decided to dance for a bit.

Quickly poofing over to the garage, he changed into what he had dubbed his dancing clothes, before poofing back and starting up some Tsjaikovski while he did the warming up. He reasoned that if anyone came home, they’d think Ray had left his music on.

He had started with something easy, but he could do that from muscle memory alone, which wasn’t helping him with getting his mind of things. So the routines had gotten increasingly more difficult throughout the day as he forgot completely about the time.

Because he was so focused on jumping at the right beats and stepping in time with the music, he didn’t notice the door opening and the small gasp Julie let out as she watched him. Nor did he notice Luke and Alex poofing back into the room next to Julie.

They had returned to find an empty garage, so they had assumed Reggie would be hanging with Ray, instead they had found Julie staring at something while standing in the doorway.

With their curiosity piqued they had poofed there and looked to find the usually clumsy bassist flying gracefully through the room.

After a fast set of pirouettes Reggie stopped, the dance was over. He stood still for a few seconds with his eyes closed as he caught his breath only to get snapped out of it by the sound of applause coming from in front of him.

He snapped his eyes open and quickly jumped out of the end position as he squeaked: “How long have you been there?”

“A few minutes.” Julie answered, “But Reggie that was amazing! I didn’t know you could dance like that.”

“Yeah, me neither, that’s sick, dude!” Luke also had processed what he had just seen.

“Why didn’t you ever say?” Alex asked.

“Uh…” Reggie gestured to the air helplessly, before he tried: “Never came up?”

Lukes eyes narrowed as he spotted Reggie lying, which Julie caught onto as she said: “Sorry, was I not supposed to see that?”

Reggie rubbed the back of his head as his cheeks started to flush. He said: “I must have forgotten the time, I’m usually gone before anyone sees. Unless you want to count Ray, but he can’t really see me. It’s my own fault.”

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Luke pouted, “Don’t you trust us?”

“It’s just something personal. My mother used to have a studio back in New York, we danced together when I was little while my dad played the piano, you know, before they started fighting.” Reggie explained, unable to deny Luke anything when he pouted.

“Oh.” Luke looked sheepish, “Sorry for pushing, but that was insane, bro.”

“Thank you!” Reggie grinned.

“Wait, New York?” Julie asked.

“We met Reggie in High School, he used to live in New York before they had to move for his dads job.” Alex explained.

In the background Luke pulled Reggie into a side hug, as he asked: “How can you be so graceful and trip over your own feet while walking, dude?”

“I do not.” Reggie exclaimed.

“You once tripped over air, Reginald.” Alex told him with an eyebrow raise.

Julie now finally closed the door behind her and excitedly asked: “Don’t care how clumsy he usually is, can you show me how you did that?”

“Did what?”

“The dancing? Please, I’ve always wanted to try, but by the time I had outgrown my ‘I’m-not-like-the-other-girls’ phase I was too old to get good and get lessons.” Julie said, “Can you teach me the basics?”

“I mean I could, but I you have to warm up first and I don’t know how flexible you are.” Reggie replied tentatively. Julie cheered, before she raced up the stairs to get changed into better clothes for this, leaving the three boys behind.

“I’m sorry if I pushed you to share.” Luke said after a few seconds, “I didn’t want to force you to tell us that.”

“It’s alright, man.” Reggie said, “I mostly have good memories connected with dancing, it’s something I do when I feel lonely.”

“Do you- do you feel lonely often?” Luke asked with sad eyes, making Reggie realize what he had just admitted.

Reggie didn’t want to lie to him again or make him feel like a bad friend after all he had done for him, so he just said: “It’s been hard turning into a ghost, you know I love to talk to people.”

That was not completely false, Reggie had always been the social butterfly of Sunset Curve and the life of the party. Usually talking to twenty people at the same time, none he had known three seconds ago and he did miss that it just wasn’t the whole story.

Luke saw through the words and felt guilty about leaving his friend alone when he clearly needed company. Alex seemingly had an answer, though. He carefully asked: “You wouldn't mind me joining either, would you?”

“No, of course not. You need better moves if you’re gonna keep joining Dirty Candy.” Reggie grinned.

At that point Julie came barreling down the stairs, catching the tail end of the conversation. She said: “Luke, you have to join now too. It’ll be band-bonding.”

The other two snorted at the idea of bouncy Luke trying to do strict ballet and Luke paled. It was too late for him, however, Julie was set on it. So a few minutes later they were all wearing dance clothes as they cleared the instruments to make space for Julie in the garage.

They had done jumping jacks to get the blood pumping and had struggled with touching their toes and keeping them pointed when Reggie moved to the splits.

“What the fuck, Reg.” Luke exclaimed, hissing in pain as he failed miserably in doing them himself.

“I’ve been doing this since before I can remember, Luke. Would be a bit strange, if I couldn't do them.” Reggie laughed, it was nice to make some more good memories connected to dancing, now with his new family.

From where she was struggling with the split herself, Julie huffed: “What else have you been hiding from us, Reggie? More surprises in there?”

“I mean, I don’t know if I ever mentioned I also play piano and violin?” Reggie replied.

“WHAT!”

[ageless-aislynn]

Tag 17

Rules: Answer 17 questions & tag 17 people you want to get to know better

Tagged by @blue-m-d​ Thanks so much! :D ♥♥♥

Nickname: Ais

Zodiac sign: Cancer *snaps crab claws* ;)

Height: 4′ 11 3/4″ but I just usually claim 5′ ;) I’m fun sized, lol!

Hogwarts house: I dunno  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Last thing I googled: star wars black series darth maul sith apprentice release date

Because this is a figure I neeeeeed in my life! ♥_♥

Song stuck in my head: “Willow” by Taylor Swift but I swear my brain has Folklore and Evermore on a pretty constant rotation, lol!

Following and followers: Following 2,447, lol! I’m bad about following a TON of blogs when something catches my attention but then they eventually go dormant and stop posting but I every rarely go back and stop following, even when it’s literally been years since they last posted. O_O ;)

Amount I sleep: Never enough. ;)

Lucky numbers: 7, 8 and 13

Dream Job: Fiction writer 

Wearing: Pink tank top and dark blue shorts, I only vaguely look like I got dressed in the dark, lol!

Favorite song(s): I’m choosing to answer this as song I listen to a lot and that I really love the lyrics to because just trying to pick some fav songs EVER will have me here for hours, lol!  “Right Where You Left Me” by Taylor Swift has some of my fav lines ever because of how cleverly they work: 

“You left me no, oh, you left me no You left me no choice but to stay here forever”

I love how you get two different meanings out of it: “you left me” means one thing but it rolls so smoothly into “you left me no choice but to stay here forever.” I love that! And it also has a line I love for how evocative I find the imagery:

“I stayed there Dust collected on my pinned-up hair”

It’s like I know EXACTLY what that dust on her pinned up hair would look like, despite most people not sitting in one place long enough for dust to collect in their hair, lol. ;)

Favorite instruments: To listen to, I’m assuming? Piano and guitar are always solid go-to’s for me but I also love the energy you can get from... a banjo. Case in point, check out this awesome Loki and Thor vid by gabygal7 from 2012, especially when the banjos kick in at 1:58 (warning for language that nobody probably cares about but Auntie Ais feels compelled to warn for anyway ;) ). So awesome!

Random Fact:  I was surprisingly disappointed when I realized that Taylor (first name basis now since I’ve name-checked her so many times in this already, heh ;) ) was narrating “Betty” as James instead of a female character. ;)

Favorite Authors: Robin McKinley will always have a special place in my heart as the very first fantasy writer I read and I was HOOKED. “Beauty” was the book that turned me onto “Beauty and the Beast.” ♥♥♥

Favorite animal noises: A cat’s purr is just SO COOL to me!

Aesthetic: Steampunk

Tags: Anybody who’d like to do this! *boops 17 noses politely* Lol! ;) ♥♥♥

[fireflythecinnamonjollyrancher]

got tagged by one of my fave mutuals @ringdonuts and decided i needed a distraction lmao

Rules: Answer 30 questions about yourself and tag 20 others you wanna know more about 😊

1. Name/Nickname: Greer is both my name and nickname. you figure it out

2. Gender: hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha i use she/they pronouns? we'll get back to that discussion later

3. Star Sign: virgo sun, taurus moon, cancer rising (i.e. I'm a mess)

4. Height: 5'6"? maybe? haven't checked in a while

5. Time: 6:23 pm

6. Birthday: 9/11 baybee

7. Favorite bands/groups: uh. truly couldn't tell ya. if im feeling nostalgic, fall out boy ig? im gonna co opt this question and say my fave podcasts are wine & crime, beach too sandy water too wet, and that's why we drink, and sounds fake but okay

8. Favorite solo artist: joseph dubay, scotty sire, and watsky come to mind

9. Song stuck in my head: Saint Bernard by Lincoln bc I was thinking of my mental illness playlist

10. Last Movie: Barb and Star go to Vista Del Mar (it was... a trip)

11. Last Show: Psych probably

12. When did I create this blog: jesus, it had to be at least 8 years ago bc my first post was about my 9th grade musical, i remember that much. update: I searched my email and i started my blog in november of 2012. so, there ya go

13. What do I post: anything that induces psychic damage to my followers. its just a hodge podge of things i enjoy tbh

14. Last thing I Googled: smth about resumes

15. Other blogs: i have a side blog (mostly aesthetic) @my-favorite-memory-with where i post all my favorite memories with different people (submissions are always welcome but rarely received)

16. Do I get asks: lmao not often no, usually they come from my friends

17. Why I chose my URL: firefly was a short-lived j*ss wh*don show that my mom and i really enjoyed, and i consider myself akin to a cinnamon jolly rancher in that i probably shouldn't exist but while I'm here I'm gonna make it everyone else's problem

18. Following: 1,338 idk man

19. Followers: 632???? idk why

20. Average hours of sleep: 6 usually does it

21. Lucky number: 7 13 and 21. idk why

22. Instruments: i can play the clarinet and that's about it

23. What am I wearing: blue slacks, a white tank and a gray cardigan. I'm out of clothes

24. Dream job: a stage manager, specifically for k*lli's show.

25. Dream trip: UGH a road trip with the banjo shrimps to a bunch of small towns across the us !!! staying in shitty motels and going to small museums and making food and just doing dumb dumb shit. that's the goal i just wanna tour

26. Favorite food: paastaaaa!!! and bread made with (really, by) celeste.

27. Nationality: American (listen i know)

28. Favorite song: Currently Least Favorite Only Child by Leanna Firestone but of all time probably the theme to M*A*S*H just bc nothing ever gets me as hyped

29. Last book I read: All of the Chronicles of Ancient Darkness by Michelle Paver. Got through that shit with frightening speed. unless you consider k*lli's fic (read here) a book

30. Top three fictional universes I’d like to live in: I love the idea of the CoAD universe, but I would have to be born into it to survive. Obviously, as a gay, I'm a slut for the Percy Jackson universe. And finally the universe of the librarians, if only so magic could be real in small doses

cool that was a fun lil brain exercise. uh if you got this far guess what. you gotta do the thing. also if you're mentioned at all you gotta do the thing. and if you related to ANY of my answers you gotta do the thing. hows that sound for a tag?

[universi-tea]

17 questions

, thanks @just-a-cup-of-anxietea​

Nickname: I really don’t have one! 

Zodiac: Cancer 

Height: 5’8” 

Hogwarts House: Slytherin 

Last thing I googled: fbi bau lol

Song stuck in my head: the dawson’s creek theme song that i can’t understand a single word of

Numbers of followers: almost 52k :) y’all are the best

Amount of sleep: usually around 8-9 lately

Lucky number(s): 13, 27

Dream job: if we’re talking ~dream~ as in i have taken no steps to accomplish this and never will but think it would be really fun -- owning a coffee shop! 

Wearing: pink sweatpants, grey tank top, green fuzzy pullover 

Favorite song: i usually overplay songs until i hate them lol so i really don’t have favorites!

Favorite instrument: ✨banjo✨

Aesthetic: a little granola, a little light academia, with a dash of cottagecore 

Favorite author: i don’t have the attention span for books anymore rip

Favorite animal noise: this is so random omg i love the little grruuff sound dogs make when they want to bark but are also don’t know what they’re barking at 

Random: i accidentally slept so late today and now i have no motivation to do anything but watch netflix!! very lazy sunday around here :)

Tagging: Anyone who wants to do it!! Be sure to tag me so I can see your answers :) 

[ober-affen-geil]

22 Questions

Tagged by @audreyblanche, sorry it took me so long to get to it!

RULES: simply answer the following 22 q’s and then tag 22 (or however many) people you’d love to get to know more!

Name/Nickname: Riley is my internet name and that’s all you’re getting.

Zodiac sign: Libra

Height: 5′5″

Hogwarts House: Definitely Ravenclaw.

Last thing I googled: Uhhhh summer exhibits for a museum.

Favorite musician/s: Sigh. This is a weird mixing of fandoms for me, but my favorite band is The Monkees. Other favorites include Queen, Lady Ga Ga, and Rise Against.

Last song I listened to: “Gimme Three Steps” by Lynyrd Skynyrd

Song stuck in my head: I’ll give you three guesses as to why I was listening to the above.

Followers: 348 on this blog. I have two sides, one of which also has over 300 followers and one of which has under 100.

Following: 507. 

Amount of sleep: ha. haha. ahhahhahahahHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHA In all seriousness I try for 7-8 a night. I have been....unsuccessful lately.

Lucky number: No lucky number, but I really like 7.

What I’m wearing: PJ bottoms and a loose tank. I just got back from a trip so I’m chilling for the rest of the day.

Dream Job: Archivist. I have it!

Dream Trip: Travel isn’t really something I go in for, so I guess I’ve already been on my dream trip. I went with a group around England visiting historic sites and talking about conservation.

Favorite food: Pasta!

Instruments: That I can play? Violin. I can plink around on a piano too but I don’t know how to play it properly. Wish I could play guitar or banjo. I also have a halfway decent singing voice.

Languages: English and just enough German to get myself in trouble. I know a touch of ASL as well.

Favorite song/s: Good lord I can’t pick one! Uhhh “Randy Scouse Git” by The Monkees (”Alternate Title” for you in the UK), “Ohne Dich” by Rammstein, Movement 2 of Beethoven’s 7th Symphony, and “Walking Disaster” by Sum 41.

Random fact: I have been reliably told by two different people that I am so pale I *glow* underwater.

Aesthetic: Bright patterns and bright colors! Plaid, paisley, floral, bring it.

I am very terrified of tagging people, so if you want to do this tag me as the source!

[yellingatmountains]

TAG GAME/GET TO KNOW ME

tagged by: @jjonahjackass

Rules: Answer 21 questions and then tag 21 people who you want to get to know better.

Nickname: “Ari” or oddly enough “Mom/Mother/Ma”. And a brief moment of getring called “Flowers”. That was a fun minute.

Sign: Aries

Height: 5’6”

Last movie I saw: Detective Pikachu, which was fucking beautiful.

Last thing I googled: *goes back to open tab* Uh. Apparently looking up where to buy antlers and/or diy coffee scrubs. Bit of a toss up.

Favorite musician: Walk Off The Earth is my current obsession.

Song stuck in my head: Their cover of High Hopes.

Other blogs: An art reference blog?

Do I get asks: No. I mean. Feel free. Just realize that you get what you’re gonna get.

Blogs Following: Like, that I’m following? Cuz that’s a damn lot of them. Or following me which should be- 113? Which is a lot more than the 20 I thought I had- Oh wait. Half of the are Porn Bots. Thanks tumblr.

Amount of sleep: Ahahahha. It varies from 3 hours to 9 hours a night.

Lucky number: 13 or 21, I guess? Maybe 42?

What I’m wearing: Black tank top and floral print pajama pants THAT I FUCKING MADE. LIKE A BADASS.

Dream job: Paid. With benefits. That is the dream. It’s artist. I want to be an artist.

Dream trip: Ummm.... Copenhagen? It just looks cool.

Favorite food: Coffee. It counts.

Play any instruments: Cello, some electric bass and banjo. Dreams of owning a tenor banjo and a ubass and an ukulele.

Languages: English and just useless little snatches of other languages.

Random fact: I once jumped out of a moving car to avoid a conversation.

Describe yourself as aesthetic things: A desk covered in art shit and books. Conspiracy videos and true crime play in the background as white noise. A mug of freshly brewed coffee sits next to another mug of paint/clay water. I take a sip. It was the art water. I spit it out and brush my teeth as I look up for the millionth time whether or not I need to call poison control.

Tagging: Look. I’m sorry. Also. I meant to do this ages ago but ai forgot and it’s been sitting in my drafts and itriedgdi.

@gbrownco @aw-hawkeye-no @darkersolstice @knickyk @skull-kat @eyehairs @kimkimehface @kitchenwitchupinthisbitch

uhhhhhh....

@chicken-chaser @famishedeye

jesus idk like @whomstthefuckestever

[largebluepanda]

21 Questions

Thanks for tagging me @beansquishy !

1. Nicknames? My whole apartment calls me bub because I'm the only guy in it

2. Zodiac? Sagittarius

3. Height? 5'5 on a good day

4. Last movie watched? Hidden figures for like the 6th time babeeeeeeey

5. Last thing you Googled? "Does Purdue have missiles?" (Supposedly we don't but I don't trust this place not to lol I mean we already have a nuclear reactor why not go all the way)

6. Favorite musician? Agnes Obel hands down

7. Song stuck in my head? Save big money at Menards!!!! 😥

8. Other blogs? nah 1 is enough

9. Do I get asks? nope but I wish I did

10. Following? A few hundred I think (unless this is saying the amount of followers I have then it's like 8)

11. Amount of sleep? no more than 7 hours per night

12. Lucky number? probs 4

13. What I’m wearing? Blue jeans and an old t shirt

14. Dream job? Space explorer

15. Dream trip? Mars

16. Favorite food? Dumplings!!!!!!

17. Play any instruments? Banjo and ukulele (and banjolele) and a bit of piano? I own a djembe and a tin whistle too but I'm still figuring them out. What I really want is a tank drum but I don't have the tools to make one yet

18. Languages? English and limited German

19. Favorite song? Clair de Lune even tho it always makes me cry it's just so beautiful and encompasses the fleeting wonder of life

20. Random fact? I can't taste basil 🙃

21. Describe your aesthetic? Music nerd crossed with Montana detective dad who has been working on the same case for 15 years and can't quite get over it, but also is trying to get in touch with aliens when he's not a Mall Santa™

I'm tagging @the-queen-conquers @lost-bandit @heylissaaaaa @ghostnamikaze

(that's all the people I can think of off the top of my head but if you're reading this consider yourself tagged!)

[vanillarroses]

I was tagged!!

Rules: Answer 21 questions and then tag 21 people you want to know better.

I was tagged by the funky and groovy @lowkey-gilmour ❤️❤️ thank u bby!!

•Nickname(s): rosie, rohzie, kyle, deep_doot, rose, capricorn legend

•Zodiac: Capricorn babeeeey

•Height: about 170cm

•Last Movie watched: Chinatown with Jack Nicholson (1974) ((i fell asleep from my cold medicine but it was good from what i saw))

•Last thing googled: the hours for a local antique store

•Favorite Musician: haaa funny question that i cannot answer (this question is too hard)

•Song stuck in my head: the one part of march of the black queen where it gets really hard (but also roger taylor from killer queen just singing 'ANYTIIIIIMEEEE' like in ur one ear)

•Other blogs: well ive been on here for a while but i have a really old kh blog that i made like 5 years ago but i dont use it anymore. she still exists but she is shameful.

•Do I get asks?: No but i dont really mind!! I just like posting things i like! I dont mind not getting asks, but it is fun every so often!!

•Blogs following: uhhh idk how many i follow but it might b almost 200? Idk how many people follow me but it doesnt really matter to me, it just makes me happy to see you guys on here!!

•Amount of sleep: haa sooo im sick and ive been sleeping a lot thru the day and at night recently 😔😔

•Lucky Number: 420 🍃🔥 (more seriously tho 5 probably)

•What im wearing: like all the jewelry i wear daily, a grey tank top, jeans, and the Classic Rosie Look™ with my rush sweatshirt thats so cozy

•Dream Job: god.... Professional filmmaker! Hopefully landing as a director/producer/editor/cinematographer!! its a lot but if alfonso cuaron can do it then so can i!!!

•Dream Trip: a huge trip all over italy. To everywhere. I wanna retrace my roots!! (And also so i can visit pompeii and find the place where adrian maben filmed live at pompeii with the boys)

•Favorite Food: spaghetti boi!!!! Spaghetti spaghetti!!! I fuckin LOVE spaghetti yo

•Instruments I play: haa well i USED to play the clarinet in like 4th grade but dropped it cause catholic school was stress. But im hoping to maybe take up guitar or banjo or bass or something i dont know !!

•Spoken Languages: english (which is my first language and i cant even fuckin speak it), and like 10 words in spanish

•Favorite Songs: 2 many 2 list... but a song i could never ever get tired of is the live at pompeii vers of echoes. Ive listened to it probably 500 times in 2018 alone and it still sounds new to me (and if im high enough then it feels like im listening to it for the first time again)

•Random Fact: i once fell from like 45 feet in the air (i was harnessed but still it was terrifying!!)

•Describe yourself as aesthetic things: pink things, newly bloomed roses, the smell of an early spring morning, vanilla and caramel flavored tea, lavender, the hum of a purring cat, lit candles and warm blankets, couture fashion, incense and the glow of a lava lamp

Im taggin: @litttlebrave @gilmours @noirwatch @extrasensitiveblackgirl @thethelonemonk @macabremoonlight

Yall arent obligated to do this!! Feel free!! (Also i dont have 21 people to tag LOL)

[elliedoes]

Everlong - Chapter Two

Dean x Reader x Sam

The world has gone to shit. You’ve got the undead trying to eat your flesh, a whining teenager to look after, and a few secrets that you need to keep. The Winchesters are the last thing you need, but the only thing you want.

Warnings: Mild descriptions of violence, adult language, drug and alcohol use, polyamorous relationship (no wincest).

Note: I have gotten such an overwhelming response to this story and I have no way to describe how thankful I am to every one who has read the first chapter. A massive thank you to everyone who dropped a like or took the time to leave a comment or reblog, you didn’t have to, but I appreciate it more than you’ll ever know.

Each and every one of you are amazing and I’m so happy 

Again, I would love any and all feedback, let know if you’re enjoying how this is going. And I’ve been asked to tag people, I’ve done so below. If you’d like to be added to the list, feel free to let me know!

Series Masterlist - Masterlist

Most of the morning was spent searching through abandoned cars for gas cans or anything else that would be useful. Trevor was able to find a suitcase full of books, the pair of you sorting through them as Dean and Sam fanned out to siphon from the vehicles around you. “D’ya know what I miss the most,” you asked the teen as you tossed aside Twilight.

“Showers,” he replied, reading the back of a cover.

“Yes,” you nodded but rounded the car to climb in the back, snatching the floppy sun hat you spotted, “but also the beach.” You placed the oversized straw hat atop your head, the brim falling around you as you searched the rest of the seat.

“I thought you were from D.C.,” Trevor looked through the rear window to watch you curiously.

You deadpanned and looked pointedly at him to roll your eyes at his ignorance. “People once left their houses for vacations, Trevor,” you sarcastically replied, shoving on gaudy black sunglasses. “I wanted to be a mermaid when I was little.”

“I wanted to be a Transformer,” he shared in understanding and went back to his book.

“All hail Megatron,” you cried out and climbed back out of the car to spot a curious walker coming to join you. Trevor didn’t bother to move since you already had out your machete and slammed it into the middle of the creature’s forehead.

“Nice one, Audrey Hepburn,” Sam teased, popping up from the back of a pickup.

You winked, but it was hidden behind oversized plastic. “I also miss movies,” you sighed and wiped off the zombie goo on the poor thing’s dirty shirt. “And sex.”

“Gross,” Trevor gagged and packed away the few books he found interesting, leaving out The Hobbit. He ignored your mocking gags and joined Sam to help if he could.

You wove your way through the cars, peeking in to find nothing of interest, and ended up sitting on the trunk of an Accord as Dean pumped out what little gas it had. “Where in the hell did you get that,” he laughed when he finally shifted his focus.

“Why, does it look bad,” you frowned, grabbing the top of the hat to flatten the sides with your arms.

“Nah, looks a little out of place with dirty jeans and a ratty tank top, though.” Your shocked gasp had him grinning and you leaned across the trunk to punch his shoulder. “There’s gotta be a dress in one of these cars.”

You shook your head, “I haven’t worn a dress since my high school prom and I don’t think it’ll be good for running from zombies.”

“Well, you won’t be running forever,” Dean reminded you, hoping you’d forget your threat to leave.

“Yeah,” you sighed, hopping off the car, “maybe.” You slipped away and searched further ahead, scoring a few abandoned cans of food and possibly keeping a lookout for a sundress to match your new accessories.

Trevor soon caught up with you, his nose stuck in the book. From the way he clutched at its pages, he was still on alert, leaning against the hood of a SUV you were picking through. “You could help,” Sam reprimanded him, setting down a full gas can and started to fill a new one.

“Let him read,” you called from deep within the truck, “it’s not like I’m doing much to contribute, either.” Sam couldn’t argue with that and moved in front of the open door to see what you were doing. “What?”

He tilted his head curiously, looking at the sheer cami you held up to your chest, “Planning on keeping that?”

“It’s cute,” you grumbled as a blush tinged your cheeks. When he chuckled, you balled up the top and threw it at his face. “Don’t you have something to do?” He caught the shirt with a grin and moved back to his gas can. “Oof, score.” You kicked around in the backseat until you reached your claim and jumped out of the truck, guitar in hand.

“Do you play,” Sam asked, holding the hose steady.

“A little.” You slid the strap around your shoulders, carefully cradling the neck. Your fingers danced along the strings, testing and tuning. “My guilty pleasure was the banjo, though.” A somber tune carried with the breeze, your eyes closing as you plucked each note. “At least we can still have music.”

You fought the boys about keeping the guitar. You told them it was too much weight, it wasn’t necessary, but like the big brimmed hat and large rimmed glasses on your head, they deemed it so. Loads were shifted and you were still able to carry your pack and the instrument on your back, half-full gas can in hand.

The plan was to make it Jasper and fill up Dean’s car who he affectionately called Baby, making Trevor giggle every time. According to Sam, the walk was about a half a day, and with you all stopping to scavenge, you’d have to camp at some point. But the sun was still high and you felt rested, there was plenty of time to cover.

“So,” Sam stayed back with you, Dean and bookworm Trevor taking point, “you’re from D.C.?”

“Born and raised,” you trilled.

“Did you ever meet the president,” he asked with a half grin.

“I was in the same building as Obama once,” you bragged with a smug sniffle and pursed lips.

Sam whistled low, “Impressive.” You elbowed him and he laughed freely, causing Trevor and Dean to look over their shoulders at you. “What?” They shook their heads, Dean giving a disapproving frown, but turned back around to keep watch since you and Sam were preoccupied.

“So, were you in D.C. when this started,” he inquired, trying and failing to be nonchalant.

“No,” you replied flatly and turned your attention off into the woods, the memory dulling your playful mood, “I was on vacation in Savannah. The first one I had in a really long time and then some asshole decides to die and start eating someone else’s face.”

“Yeah, I guess that could put a downer on things,” Sam consoled.

You turned to him with a half-confused, half-amused expression and tossed your head back to laugh, “The zombie apocalypse started, Sammy, it’s not like I lost my pet goldfish.”

His eyes bugged slightly, but he was laughing along with you, arms spread, “What am I supposed to say to that?”

“I don’t know,” you returned, “but something other than, ‘Oh, I’m sorry the undead ruined your summer vacation’?”

“But I am,” Sam insisted.

“What, the world ending is your fault,” you snorted.

“Probably,” he answered honestly, “wouldn’t be the first time.” You opened your mouth and then remembered their talks of demons and angels. “This sucks, I know, but we’ll figure out a way to fix it.”

“With magic,” Trevor’s head shot up and around, nearly giving himself whiplash. The smile on Sam’s face grew at the teen’s enthusiasm and shrugged, keeping it a possibility. “Hogwarts,” the boy turned you, sass flooding his voice.

“I’m about to Wingardium Leviosa your ass,” you pointed at him, “and I won’t need a wand or magic to do it.”

“That’s impossible,” Trevor stated matter-of-factly.

You narrowed your eyes behind your glasses and scowled, “I’m stronger than I look.”

“Alright,” Dean sighed, slapping a hand on Trevor’s shoulder, “let’s not upset the lady with the big ass knife.”

“She started it,” Trevor grumbled, but he turned back around and fell into his book once more.

Dean silently reprimanded you with a playful glower and you lifted your shoulders with no regret. “But seriously, can I actually Wingardium Leviosa him,” you asked Sam quietly.

Sam rolled his eyes and sighed, “I don’t think that’s the exact wording, but I’ve been sent flying by enough witches to know it’s possible.” You pulled off your glasses, your head tilted back to see him properly under the hat, lips forming the perfect ‘o’. “You’re ridiculous.”

“I’m fashionable,” you corrected, poking him with the plastic frames, but the two of you continued your talk about witches and actual magic. Dean’s disdain for anything and everything witch related seeped into your conversation, every detail Sam gave was followed by another reason why his brother hated magic. And even with all the bad that came from Dean’s stories, Trevor still wanted to learn at least one spell.

Morning turned to afternoon and the four of you left the interstate, following an exit to head towards the first neighborhood you could find. There were a few geeks along the way, you and Dean took out most of them while Sam kept Trevor close.

A couple gas stations and fast food restaurants lined the road. The group considered stopping for supplies, but everyone was at their limit. The thought of dinner crossed everyone’s mind and it was decided you’d stop by tomorrow to replenish what stock you would lose that evening.

A few miles on, an abandoned subdivision was the best bet for the night. It was well off the main highway, but a few stubborn walkers loitered, Sam and Dean taking them out while you and Trevor searched for a suitable house. “This one has a pool,” the teen called out, face pressed the back sliding door while you cleared the rooms. “The water’s clean.”

“Awesome,” you shouted back, deeming the place geek free. “I call dibs on the master bedroom.” You raced across the house and dumped your things on the bed. Trevor let out a complaining whine, but he searched for the next bed and claimed it as his own.

Sam and Dean secured the perimeter and all of the entrances of the house before finding out that there was one twin bed left or the couch in the living room. “You’re going to leave the tallest guys with the shortest beds,” Sam complained, finding you sprawled on your belly across the king sized mattress.

“You snooze, you lose,” you mumbled into the sheets.

When he said nothing in return, you lifted your head to catch his gaze shifting from your backside to your eyes. “What,” he blinked.

“Seriously,” you snorted, letting your head fall back onto the bed. “If you want the bed, we can share it, there’s plenty of room.”

There was hesitation, but Sam agreed, “Yeah, okay. If you’re sure.” He slipped back out of the room to gather his stuff. When he didn’t return right away, you rolled gracelessly off the bed and went off to investigate.

Dean had already started dinner, using the open kitchen layout to work. Trevor was sitting with him, near the window to catch the last bits of sunlight to read. “Need any help,” you offered, watching Sam open a can of beans with his knife.

“We’ve all agreed to have you not do anything,” Dean informed you, adjusting the heat of the small burner, “at least until you stop looking like you’re about to keel over.”

“I’m fine,” you recoiled defensively.

Trevor turned the page of his book and didn’t bother looking up, “You’ve got these big, dark circles under your eyes. I think they want those to go away.” Your jaw opened in all out offense and the brothers shared a wide-eyed look before turning it on Trevor.

“Dude,” Dean hissed, “you never comment on a woman’s appearance like that.”

“You told her she looked like shit yesterday,” Trevor rebuked, finally looking up.

“Yeah and I’m lucky she didn’t rip off my head,” Dean growled. “Just…if you think a woman should rest, just tell her she’s worked hard and deserves it.”

Trevor put down the book and tilted his head, “So lie?”

“I’ve worked hard,” you interrupted, “you don’t think I have?”

“No,” Trevor said then quickly corrected himself, “I mean, yes, you have, I’m just saying…”

Sam and Dean shook their head slowly, trying to get the boy to stop while he was ahead, but the damage was done. “Wow,” you huffed, taking a can of pineapple and Sam’s knife from his hand, “I’ll be in my room.” You turned up your nose at the three of them and stomped off, snapping the bedroom door closed for emphasis.

You could hear their voices trying to talk over one another and you did your best to quiet your laughter. It was a teaching moment for Trevor, the brothers had to know have known you weren’t actually upset.

After kicking off your boots and wiggling out of your jeans, you climbed onto the bed and rested against the middle of the headboard to have your pre-dinner snack. The voices eventually died down and a knock came to the door soon after. You looked down at your bare legs and asked who it was.

Dean opened the door without invitation and paused, head tilted. “Expecting me, I see,” he grinned and slipped into the room, closing the door behind him.

“What do you want,” you rolled your eyes, pulling chunks of fruit off the tip of the knife.

“Was gonna tell you dinner was ready, but it looks like you took whole relaxation thing to heart,” he moved to the edge of the bed, shamelessly running his eyes up and down your frame. Your dirt speckled body and hairy legs didn’t stop him from licking his lips. “You need some company on that bed?”

“Sam already said he’d join me,” you speared a few pieces and moved onto your knees, crawling over to offer some to Dean. “But like I told him, there’s plenty of room.”

Green eyes flickered down to the knife and back to you before his teeth bit down to the blade and he slowly pulled off the chunks. “I don’t think you know what you’re asking for, darlin’,” he purred, lips shining with juice.

“Oh, I think I do,” you nodded and sat back down on your hunches, “But I don’t think this world is cut out for stuff like that anymore.” You ran you tongue along the knife, licking up the remnants of juice left behind and flipped it closed.

“Wouldn’t be so sure about that,” Dean watched you closely and held his hand out for the blade, “it might be exactly what this world is made for.” You handed him the knife and the half empty can, slipping off the bed to pull on your jeans.

You turned to him, one brow cocked, a playful grin tugging at the corner of your lips, “Yeah, maybe.” Your eyes dragged over his broad frame and you exhaled slowly. “Dinner, right?” He nodded and you lead the way back to Trevor and Sam who were already sat at the small table, their bowls full.

“Y/N,” Trevor greeted you, an earnest look on his face, “I’m sorry about what I said. It was bad wording.”

You flopped down next to the boy and place a hand on his bushy afro, “I accept your apology, kiddo.” Your fingers dug into the thick curls and you clicked your tongue, “You need a haircut.” Trevor slapped you away and did his best to tame his mane.

“Give me ten minutes and some clippers,” Dean nodded slowly, eyes squinting like he was envisioning a masterpiece.

“No,” Trevor shook his head immediately, “I don’t trust you anywhere near me with anything sharp.”

“Smart kid,” Sam quipped, spooning you a bowl. He slid it across the table and you thanked him with a smile. “He gave me haircuts when we were younger, he put a actual bowl on my head.”

Dean, extremely offended, put down his spoon and pointed straight at Sam, “I did my best, okay? I was a kid, too. I got a lot better. Took about 20 years, but at least the lines are straight now. Kind of.”

“I’ll cut your hair,” you reassure Trevor. “I used to groom my dogs, it’s kind of the same thing, right?”

Trevor rounded on you, “Are you comparing me to a dog?”

“No! I was just saying,” you sputtered, kicking Dean under the table when he started to laugh and you would have kicked Sam but your legs couldn’t reach that far, “that I did a good job cutting hair! I can cut yours.”

The teen’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t fight you on it anymore. “Well, we don’t have clippers, so you can’t cut my hair.” That was obviously the end of that conversation and you conceded, at least for now.

“So, do you think we’ll make it to your car by nightfall tomorrow,” you asked.

“Maybe, if we don’t make any long stops,” Dean reasoned. “I don’t think we’ll have enough gas to get home, but we’ll cross that bridge, y’know?” You grimaced, but nodded, the idea of having no what-if plan ready didn’t sit well with you, but you all had plenty of time to figure one out.

Trevor didn’t seem to have interest in the conversation and shoved down pork and beans with a slight annoyed look on his face. He didn’t like it, he’s told you a million times, but he was hungry.

“You know,” Sam cleared his throat, looking behind you and out to the pool, “it might be cold and full of chlorine, but it’s water…” You spun around to look out of the large picture window and nodded. “Ladies first, of course.”

“You are a genius,” you chirped when spun back around to finish off your meal.

Sam shook his head and pointed at Trevor with his spoon, “All his idea.”

You leaned over and pressed an exaggerated kiss on the boy’s forehead. “Love you, T,” you murmured but were pushed back into your chair as he tried to hide away from your affection.

“Better eat that up, kid,” Dean laughed. “Doesn’t look like she gets all lovey dovey with just anyone.” Trevor groaned into his bowl and tried to implode. “Alright, don’t choke on your dinner, I’ll stop.”

“I even have soap, oh my god,” you bounced in your chair, trying to shovel down your food as fast as you could. It wouldn’t be the best bath in the world, but at least you could clean the grime off of you without worrying about wasting good, clean drinking water.

Of course, you were the first to finish your meal, thanking the boys who cooked it and rushed to your pack to get out the bar of soap you found long ago. You searched the house for towels, several left behind by the previous owners and you sat some out for the guys for later.

With towels in hand, you slipped outside at the peak of dusk. Trevor had returned to his room, most likely caught up in his book until his turn. The brothers, however, lingered in the kitchen, you could see their mouths moving through the window, but it was hard to make out what they were saying. Both had their gazes trained on you, so you had some idea what they were talking about.

You peeled out of your clothes, tossing them aside to wash later. When you had nothing left on, you dipped your toes into the water, it was cold, but welcomed in the warm, summer evening. You fought against the chill and descended the stairs, walking until the waterline hit your mid-chest and you waded to the edge to grab your soap and washcloth.

Never in your life had you loved soap and water more than in that moment. You took your time to scrub your body, twice even. And although it was probably crap for its health, you used the soap to wash your hair.

By the time you got out of the water, had a towel wrapped around you and your hair, the boys were gone from the kitchen. You padded through the house, stopping by Trevor’s room to inform him the pool was free and you left what he needed. He hummed dismissively at you, but you pulled the book from his hands and scowled. Even though he rolled his eyes, he got up and went outside while you headed to you room.

Sam and Dean were sitting on the edge of the bed talking quietly when you entered. They looked up at the same time, near identical smiles on their faces. “Feel better,” Sam asked.

“Loads,” you groaned, walking next to them where you pack sat on the bed. “Trevor’s out there now, you might wanna wash up before it gets too dark.”

“Yeah,” Dean nodded, “we will. We just wanted to ask you a quick question before I’m forced to sleep on the couch.”

You tilted your head curiously, “I thought you were gonna sleep in here?” The brothers looked to you, then to each other, each giving a shrug before standing. “Washcloths and towels are outside,” you tell them and pulled out a small travel toothbrush and paste. One they were gone, you used a little of the bottled water you had to brush your teeth at the bathroom sink, Sam and Dean’s toiletries already scattered on the counter. So, they already knew your answer, but it was sweet that they asked.

Fresh and the best you’ve felt in days, you pulled on a clean shirt and fresh undies, leaving your hair in the towel. The pillows called your name, so you dumped all the packs on the floor and crawled up to rest your eyes for just a bit.

You’re not sure how long you were out, but you woke up some time later with Sam next to you, book in hand reading by a kerosene lantern clad only in a pair of boxers and Dean missing. “How long was I out,” you groaned, sitting up to pull your hair free from its hold.

“Couple of hours,” Sam shrugged, looking up from his book for a moment, “you can go back to sleep if you want. I’m on first watch.”

You toss the towel over the side of the bed, running your fingers through your hair to fight with any tangles that lingered. “Where’s Dean,” you yawned, falling back onto the pillows when you won your battle.

“Checking around outside,” Sam replied absently, his attention back on his book.

“By himself,” you turned on your side to face him.

He shook his head, “Trevor’s with him.” When you stiffened beside him, he reached out a hand and wrapped it around your wrist, a thumb running along your skin, “Relax, Dean will take care of him. He wouldn’t take him out there if he didn’t think he could handle it.”

You let out a shaky breath, but focused on Sam’s touch to relax. He gave a gentle squeeze before releasing you and turned the page of his book. “I was gonna wash our clothes,” you mumbled but rolled onto your belly, smashing your face into the pillow.

“Already did,” Sam informed, “they’re drying outside.”

“Jesus, can you guys be any more perfect,” you whined.

Chuckling, he forced himself away from his book to look down at you, “We’re far from perfect.” You could see his gaze wandering, lingering on your backside once more. “You on the other hand…”

“Are nothing of the sort,” you yawned once more and wrapped your arms around the pillow, hugging it close. Sam hummed in reply, hesitation written on his face before he turned back to his book. “Whatcha’ readin’?”

“A Tale of Two Cities,” he shifted, moving just a bit closer to you.

“And you’re still awake,” you snorted, taking his hint and squirming until you pressed up against his side bringing your pillow with you. His hand left the book once more and moved onto your back, absently rubbing as he continued to read. “You staying in here all night?”

“Just until Dean gets back,” he sighed. “Get some rest, we’ve got a long walk tomorrow.”

You rolled your eyes and snatched the book, careful to mark his place and tossed it on the nightstand. “Take your own advice, Sam,” you pulled him down to lay with you. It took some maneuvering, but eventually you got his long limbs wrapped around you and came face to face with his dopey smile. “Hey there.”

“Hey,” he returned, hazel eyes searching your face before falling on your lips. “You sure you’re okay with this?”

“Do you think I’d let you anywhere near me if I wasn’t,” you laughed. “I’m more than okay with it.” With your permission, warm, calloused hands slipped over your backside, gripping both cheeks and squeezed firmly. “I think you might have an infatuation.”

“With your ass? Definitely,” he groaned, kneading the flesh and muscle. You pressed back into his touch, whimpering when he gave you a quick tap with the flat of his hand. “Nope, I’m obsessed.”

Your laughter was eaten by his hungry mouth, teeth and tongue trying to devour you. He pulled you closer, his hold becoming more forceful with every lick into your mouth, so hard that you’re sure you’d have Sam sized bruises the next day.

“Starting early, Sammy,” you heard from the doorway, laughter in Dean’s voice.

Sam’s mouth left yours, but moved along to your jaw and down to your neck, “She started it.”

“Guilty,” you gasped when sharp teeth bit into your skin. “Where’s Trev?”

“In his room,” Dean replied accompanied by the sound of rustling clothes. “The kid did good. We cleaned up a few walkers that were headed our way. Gonna be an easy night, I think.” You could feel the bed dip as he climbed in behind you.

“You smell like rain,” you noted, trying to crane your neck to get a look, but Sam stopped you, capturing your mouth with his again.

“It’s sprinkling,” Dean confirmed, slipping his arms around your torso, his chest pressed against your back. Meaty hands cupped your breasts through your shirt, squeezing just fiercely as Sam on your ass. Devoid of a bra, his fingertips found your hardening buds through the thin cotton outline them with featherlight touches, a contrast to his firm grip. “Let her breath, Sam.”

Your mouth was released, but Sam was there to swallow your moans with devilish grin. “Don’t have too much fun with her, Dean,” he murmured against your lips, stealing quick kisses before untangling himself from the both of you to get dressed. You whined at the loss, pressing back against Dean for warmth and affection, but reached out to try and pull Sam back to you. “Someone’s gotta keep watch,” he winked, gathering his book and lamp from the nightstand.

“But,” you frowned, eyes falling to the tent in his boxers.

“I’ll be fine,” he assured you, leaning back down for one more chaste kiss and slapped his brother’s arm with his book before he headed out of the room.

You sighed and turned in Dean’s hold, reaching up to cup his face and pulled him into a lazy, lingering kiss. He wasn’t expecting your initiative, but it wasn’t unwelcomed. His hands pushed under your shirt and spread along your back, fingertips dancing lightly on your heated skin. “We need to sleep, sweetheart,” he murmured when you parted, “as much as I don’t want to.”

And you hated to admit it, but he was right. If their bunker was as safe as they said it was, you’d have plenty of time to play. “Fine,” you pouted and scratched your nails along his scruffy jaw. “I want second watch.”

Dean pulled back and shook his head, “It’s fine, I got it.”

“You look like shit, too,” you grinned, kissing away the offended frown. “I’ll be fine after a few hours of sleep. You and Sam need a break.” Dean obviously didn’t like the idea and when it came time for Sam to switch out, there would probably be an argument, but he let it go, at least for now.

His arms left you briefly for him to shift onto his back to get comfortable. You curled around him when he opened himself up to you and he wrapped you in his warm embrace once more, topping it off with a brief kiss, which turn into another. “If you want watch you, you’re gonna have to stop teasing,” Dean sighed.

“‘Mnot teasing,” you grinned mischievously and tried straddle his waist, but two strong hands stopped you.

“Sleep. I promise there will be plenty of that later.” You surrendered and kept to your space at his side with your head on his chest, the steady rhythm of his heartbeat lulling you to sleep. But thanks to the Georgia summer heat, at some point in the night you and Dean had separated, both rolled onto your stomachs.

Long, warm fingers woke you, dancing from your calf to your bottom, finishing with a smack. You mumbled in protest, but smiling lips traveled along your shoulders. “Sam,” you whined, trying to bat the hand away, but it held firm, “wanna sleep.”

“Dean said you wanted watch,” he chuckled, kissing the back of your head before pulling away.

You muttered a few explicit words, but eventually sat up and rubbed the sleep from your eyes. Dean was awake as well, a sour look on his face, but you slapped his bare chest and were rewarded with a grunt, “Go back to sleep.”

Sam stretched out on your other side, his hand creeping up your knee and thigh, squeezing it, “He’ll fall asleep eventually. Go on.” You nodded and climbed off the bed to dress, the feeling of their eyes burned into as you pulled on your jeans.

“There’s a toll to leave this room,” Dean rasped, watching you pull on your boots. You tilted your head in confusion and he held a hand for you. When you took it, he pulled you back onto the bed and down for a languid kiss, your tongues sliding easily against the others, drawing out a whimper from you.

Impatient, Sam pulled you away, replacing Dean’s mouth with his own, greedily licking into your mouth, teeth biting into your bottom lip. The contrast of their kisses made your head spin and your knees weak. “Fuck,” you breathed when Sam finally gave you up. “Okay, I need to go.”

Sam chuckled when you climbed off his brother, both getting in one last touch of you before you could get too far out of reach, “Wake us if you need anything.” You mockingly saluted and slipped out of the room to let the brothers finally get some rest.

You spent the first part of your watch cleaning your gun by the lamp Sam left on. When that failed to kill more than a half hour, you lost yourself in a book, realizing it had been years since you actually cracked one open that wasn’t academic.

The boys rose with the sun, finding you spread out on the couch, knees bent, book open and resting on your thighs. “Morning,” you greeted, tearing your eyes away for a moment to see a sleep rumpled Dean shuffle your way. He pressed a kiss to your forehead and headed to the kitchen to brew some coffee.

Sam wasn’t far behind, his hair wild and mouth pulled wide in a yawn. He flopped down near your feet and wrapped a hand around your ankle. “Uneventful morning,” he asked, elbow propped up on the armrest, his head in his free hand.

“Nothing but the rain to keep me company,” you nodded. “Sleep well?”

“Would’ve slept better if someone wasn’t snoring,” Dean griped as he joined you, tapping on your shoulder for you to sit up, which you did. He took his place on the opposite end of his brother and you laid across him to continue reading.

“It’s a sinus problem,” Sam said defensively, “it’s not like I can help it.” Dean obviously didn’t care and still grumbled under his breath. “At least the rain stopped.”

“I don’t want to get muddy,” you frowned, closing your book to join the boys staring out of the windows. “First proper bath I had in weeks.” Sam squeezed your calf in understanding before leisurely running his hand along your leg.

“The bunker might still have running water,” Dean yawned. The thought made you perk up, but you still had to trek through miles of mud and zombies. “Wake the kid, I’ll put on grub.”

You rolled off the couch landing gracefully on your feet. Sam reached out to paw at your side and you batted him away with a wink. “I don’t think Trevor’s ready to see any of this,” you stated seriously. They seemed to understand, thankfully, and you headed to Trevor’s room. He was out and drooling on his pillow. “Hey, bud,” you shook him lightly, “up and at ‘em.” He grumpily swatted at you, but you knew he’d get up if you left him.

Stretching your arms, you join Dean in the kitchen, hovering around the carafe heating on the burner. He slipped behind you, arms winding around your waist and his face tucked in your neck. Your hand reached around and dug into his hair, scratching at his scalp. “Sam,” you asked.

“Went outside,” he breathed against your skin, teeth lightly grazing to draw a shiver out of you. “Trevor?”

“He’ll be up in a few minutes,” you replied, tilting your head to give him more room. A hot, thick tongue licked a wet stripe at your pulse before he sucked at you fervently. A breathless whine puffed out of you and you pushed back against him. “Dean,” you warned. His teeth bit down one last time, but he released his hold.

Trevor joined you by the time Dean poured your cup of coffee. He shuffled and grumbled through the kitchen, finding his way to the table where he unceremoniously dropped into the chair and his head fell onto the table with a loud thud.

“I think we have a zombie in the house,” you teased, joining the teen at the table, rubbing at his back. Trevor didn’t bother to move or reply, just laid there and tried to wake. “Want some coffee?”

“No, it’s gross,” the boy mumbled. Dean nodded in agreement, sipping at the unflavored beverage with a wrinkled nose.

“Dean,” Sam shouted from the front door. All three of you turned to the sound, from your spot in the kitchen, you could see the worried look on his face.

“Stay here, T,” you whispered to the boy, joining Dean on his way to his brother. Sam tried blocking your way, but you pushed passed with scowl that matched his.

“What the fuck?” Dean was already across the lawn, staring up at the crucified zombie at the edge of the house’s fence.

You froze on the spot, your blood running cold. “We need to go,” you whispered. “Now.”

Tag list: 

@pinkcharmd1, @multifandombackpack, @artsyicon, @littlepricknamedrick, @mashed-fandom-imagines, @superdeadlucilenatural, @hobby27, @jaremish

[jasper-quinn]

Interview with The Hound

1. What is your name?

“Jasper Quinn, got anythin’ more interestin’ ta ask me?”

2. What is your real name?

“I jus’ fuckin’ told ya. Jasper. Though, I suppose some folk like ta call me Jay, er Jas, er Red. Take yer pick.”

3. Do you know why you were called that?

“Couldn’t much give you a reason as ta why I was named Jasper, but most folk jus’ shorten my name, or call me ‘Red’ on account of my red ‘air.“

4. Are you single or taken?

“As much as I’d like ta make some cheeky remark, I’m pretty ‘appily in love wit ol Foxy.” ( @flying-fox-of-westfall) 

5. Have any abilities or powers?

"Nah. Jus’ a simple sailor, an’ someone who works wit his ‘ands.” There’s a grin on his lips though, and mischief in his eyes. It’s not hard to tell he’s lying, but getting a straight answer is another tale entirely. 

6. Stop being a Mary Sue.

”I fucked a girl named Mary Sue once. Out in Westfall. Farmers daughter an’ all that shit. Horrible in tha sack, an’ used too much teeth.” 7. What’s your eye color?

“Figurin’ green, ‘least that’s what Foxy tells me.”

8. How about your hair color?

“They don’t call me ‘Red’ fer shit’s n giggles.”

9. Have you any family members?

“Didn’t think I did fer a long ass time, but turns out I got a sister. Names Victoria, but I like ta call ‘er V jus’ cause it bugs ‘er.” His grin is just shit eating. “An’ her Wolfy is a part o’ tha family now, an’ so is Foxy. So. Guessin’ you could say we got a rag tag group of misfits.” 

10. Oh? What about pets?

“Ol’ Giz is mine. Swiped him off tha cobbles stones when he was thin as a pole, an eatin’ ravens ta get by. Covered in mange, an’ other wise yer typical alley cat. Didn’t like folk much, but once ‘e realized I was feedin’, an’ housin’ ‘im, he came ‘round pretty quick.” A pause as he sipped his whiskey. “Ol’ Foxy ‘as Rua, an’ I swear I’d always thought foxes were jus’ outside critters, but damn is Rua jus’ sweet as pie. Little shit head though.” 

11. That’s cool I guess, now tell me about something you don’t like.

“Don’t like a shit load of stuff, ya gotta be more specific than that.” Upon further questioning, he shrugs a shoulder absently. “I absolutely ‘ate those assholes who sit outside tha Cathedral an’ try n’ tell me I’m goin’ straight to the Fel ifin’ I don’t praise tha Light.” He rolls his eyes. “While I ain’t sayin’ tha Fel is a nice place ta be, I’d rather be down there wit’ tha other assholes like me who drink, n fight, n swear than up there with all them goodie goodie paladin’s.” 

12. Do you have any hobbies/activities you like doing?

“Eh, a little a’ this an’ a little a’ that.” He sips his whiskey. “Usually I’m off strummin’ a guitar, or gettin’ inta general mischief ifin’ someone leaves me alone long enough ta find it.” A chuckle. “Though, I’ve been itchin’ ta pick up either tha fiddle, er tha banjo. Foxy say’s the Fiddle is more dignified, but I’d never much thought myself dignified.” 

13. Ever hurt anyone before?

“Buncha times.”

14. Ever… killed anyone before?

“Least not someone who didn’t deserve it.”

15. What kind of animal are you?

“Well shit that’s an odd question, but I’m supposin’ most folk call me ‘The Hound’ ‘cause I got a nose fer things. Don’t really know what that means, but I ain’t complaining. Could be worse.”

16. Name your worst habits.

“Other than bar fightin’ and drinkin’? Prolly smokin’.“

17. Do you look up to anyone at all?

"’Onestly? I look up ta V. She’s always cool, an’ calm, an’ collected, even when shit’s hittin’ tha fan. I’ve always admired tha ‘bout her. She ain’t got my temper. Well, actually, she sorta does, but usually that’s only fer when I’ve really pushed ‘er.”

18. Gay, straight, or bisexual?

Silence as deep as the grave follows this question.

19. Do you go to school?

“Nope. Well, sorta. I got whatever bullshit education the City offers poor Orphans, but that was mostly jus’ readin’, an writin’ an’ basic math. Ain’t much else. Never ‘ad any kinda opportunities ta join anythin’ more prestigious. So, sorta just picked everything up on my own, an’ I’ve done alright so far.”

20. Do you ever want to marry and have kids one day?

“Used ta think I’d never want any of that shit, but damn if Foxy ain’t been changin’ my mind lately.”  

21. Do you have any fanboys/fangirls?

“Pffft. Nah. Just a buncha jaded ex husbands, an’ a few current ones, who want my skin fer fuckin’ their wives better than they ever did.”

22. What are you most afraid of?

"Dogs. An’ a few other things I ain’t much wantin’ ta share.”

23. What do you usually wear?

"ifin’ it’s comfortable, an’ I can work in it? I’m wearin’ it.”

24. Do you love someone?

“I love Foxy with all my damn heart.”

25. When was the last time you wet yourself?

“That’s actually a funny story.” He starts with a chuckle. “There I was, so piss ass drunk, I could ‘ardly walk, an’ after a good fight, an’ another good fuck, I fell asleep in some broad’s bed. I was fuckin’ tanked I fuckin’ pissed myself right there in ‘er bed. Didn’t even wake up, er nothin’. I jus’ remember ‘er screamin’ an throwin’ me outta the house, wit’out no explanation, till the wind picked up, an’ I found my balls freezin’ right off me.” A shrug. “That was a fun night, I think. Don’t remember much of it though.” 

26. Well, it’s not over yet!

“You plannin’ on gettin’ me so fuckin’ tanked I piss myself again?”

27. What class are you? (High class, middle class, low class)

"Ain’t never been a part of a class, but I’d be guessin’ workin’ class, as I ‘ave a steady job, an’ a life worth livin’.”

28. How many friends do you have?

"Couple close one’s, an’ lotsa contacts, but I wouldn’t be callin’ all of ‘em friends. That’s a term only reserved fer folk I trust.”

29. What are your thoughts on pie?

"V says’ Ma used ta make a bitchin’ apple pie, an’ I’d be lyin’ ifin’ I said I didn’t wanna try it one day.”

30. Favorite drink?

“Whiskey!”

31. What’s your favorite place?

“Drivin’ on an open road wit Foxy an’ tha bike. Jus’ goin’ wherever we wanna go. That’s my favorite.”

32. Are you interested in someone?

“Good ol’ Claire Donnovan.”

33. What’s your bra cup size and/or how big is your willy?

“I once ‘eard a gentleman don’t kiss n tell, which, I don’t really know what that means, but I’m guessin’ it means no cock talk. So. Figure it out fer yerself.”

34. Would you rather swim in the lake or the ocean?

“I’m a good swimmer, so of’n I find myself doin’ overboard duty. Don’t mean I like the sea though. Folk drown all tha time, an’ I don’t much wanna join ‘em.”

35. What’s your type?

“Lean, mean, fightin’ machine. Who also ‘as legs tha go on fer miles.”

36. Any fetishes?

“You’d ‘ave ta get me in bed ta figure that one out. Or jus’ ask Foxy. But make sure ya get a buncha gin in ‘er, or else she won’t be talkin’. She’s a gin fiend, that one, an’ usually slips up ifin’ her tongue is loose e‘nuff.”

37. Seme or uke? Top or Bottom? Dominant or Submissive?

He chuckles lightly, and shrugs a shoulder with an innocent look on his face. “Again, you’d ‘ave ta be askin’ Foxy.”

38. Camping or indoors?

"Campin’! Jus’ nice ta get away from tha city, ya know?”

39. Are you wanting the interview to end?

“Some of tha questions are sorta odd, but, I ain’t bitchin’---”

40. Now it’s over! Tag 3 people I will tag as many as I want.

Tagged by: @drustvar-dragonfly

Tagging: @flying-fox-of-westfall @eilitheduskbringer @kurel-andiel

and anyone else who wants to do this! 

[competitivetf2]

Team Fortress 2 Update Patch Notes

BLOG DISCLAIMER: The first thing we would like to do is congratulate and thank @criticalflaw​ from @fuckyeahtf2​ for typing these notes out in plaintext, before realizing later today they would push the patch notes in plain text on the TF2 updates tab. 

We also see language such as “The Hot Hand” being called “The Slap Attack” and “Blood Money” being called “Stars”, meaning these notes may be out-of-date. We will also publish today’s patch notes unless they are the same. Regardless, please give criticalflaw your hands of applause since his hands have fallen off.

October 19, 2017 - TF2 Team

Field Notes

5 featured community maps: Mossrock, Lazarus, Brazil, Enclosure, and Banana Bay

1 new official map: Mercenary Park

5 new community taunts: The Dueling Banjo, The Jumping Jack, The Soviet Strongarm, The Russian Arms Race, and the Headcase

2 new official taunts: Yeti Punch and Yeti Smash

2 community cosmetic cases with 20 items each

2 new War Paint collections made up of community-made War Paints and official War Paints

2 new War Paints collection filled with classic weapons skins being brought back for another tour

4 new Pyro items: The Dragon’s Fury, The Thermal Thruster (with a new kill taunt: The Gas Blast), The Gas Passer, and the Hot Hand

1 new Heavy item: The Second Banana

Free contracts to earn the new Pyro and Heavy items

36 campaign contracts

Mercenary Park Gift Shop to select your campaign contract rewards

Equippable ConTracker to customize and track your campaign experience

General

Significant weapon and class balance improvements (see Gameplay Changes section below for full details)

Increased the maximum number of backpack slots to 2500 (from 2000)

The default voice codec now defaults to Steam Voice

Steam Voice is now using Opus audio at a higher bitrate than the default CELT codec

Added a new vaudio_celt_high option for sv_voicedec, allowing community servers to opt-in to higher bitrate voice chat

Fixed the Engineer being able to store Gunslinger’s melee crit for a future melee attack

Fixed a bug where the ammo from a picked up weapon could exceed the player’s maximum ammo allowed

Fixed a bug where the dispenser would use different bounds checks for distributing ammo and health

Fixed a bug where the player model would not play the attack animation for some weapons that fire bullets

Fixed the Bottle, the Scottish Handshake, and the Neon Annihilator not having their models break on critical hits

Fixed some of the Heavy’s edible secondary items not having the model update when the item is eaten

Fixed some outdated tips

Mannpower Mode

Knockout powerup now collects health pack health without subtracting their health bonus. Results in Knockout carriers collecting more health from each health kit

Resistance powerup now blocks backstabs

Fixed Engineers using the Eureka Effect to teleport out of hell on Halloween maps

Fixed the announcer sometimes saying “The tank is halfway through!” when a tank first spawns in Mann vs. Machine mode

Updated the Pallet of Crates to only drop crates and not cases

Players that have their movement slowed for any reason now have a status icon appear on their HUD (in the same area that displays other player effects, such as Marked-For-Death)

Added first-person inspect animations for all weapons

Added a disconnect sound when the Medic stops healing their target

Added news sounds for the Family Business, the Winger, and the Frontier Justice

Updated sounds for the Brass Beast and the AWPer Hand

Steam controller improvements

When using Steam controller configuration to configure non-Steam controller devices (e.g. Xbox controllers), the proper button icons are now displayer in the UI

Improved controller icon placement in some UI screens, including for players using less-common aspect ratio displays

Where text rather than an icons is used to indicate a controller binding, the text strings are now correct for non-Steam controller devices, and slightly more verbose in some cases to avoid confusion with regular keyboard bindings (e.g. “Press [B button] vs. “Press [B]”)

Fixed miscellaneous corner-case bugs where the wrong action set could be selected, and some edge cases with handling of multiple simultaneous actions during an action-set change

Added new action bindings for the most popular voice-line commands. The default controller template now binds “Call Medic!” to the directional pad. The following voice lines are also available, but are not bound by default: “Go! Go!” Go!”, “Move Up!”, “Spy!”, “Ubercharge ready!”, “Help!”

Community request – Added tf_playrounds/tf_listrounds debug commands to jump between mini-rounds on multi-stage maps

May not work on all maps if the map ties custom logic to entities other than the mini-rounds themselves (e.g. arbitrary capture zones (e.g. dustbowl))

Applied the match rejoin limitations in Casual to Mann vs. Machine as well

Players who leave a Mann vs. Machine match cannot matchmake back into that same game for several minutes

Players who are vote-kicked from a Mann vs. Machine match cannot matchmake back into that same game for several hours

Added Ready Steady Pan Season 3 tournament medals

Added ETF2L Highlander Season 13 and ETF2L 6v6 Season 28 tournament medals

Added TFCL Highlander Season 1, Ultiduo Season 4, 6v6 Season 3, 4v4 Season 1, and bball Season 1 tournament medals

Added AsiaFortress Cup Season 12 tournament medals

Added Insomnia61 tournament medals

Added CappingTV Ultiduo Winter Chalice tournament medals

Added RGL.gg Pack/Ban Prolander Participant tournament medals

Added ozfortress Season 20 tournament medals

Added Tip of the Hats 2017 community medals

Added Snack’s Summery Ultiduo Siesta Season 2 tournament medals

Updated the Mappers vs. Machines Participant Medal 2017 medal so it can be painted

Updated the Arms Race tournament medals so description tags can be used on them

Updated the TFCL Alpha medal to be paintable

Updated the Heartfelt Hug to be paintable

Parties

Parties can now be formed from anywhere within the game and persist through matches

Players are now able to join their party’s match if late joining is allowed

Added a new party interface that allows you to quickly manage and interact with your party

Added a global party chat system that allows party members to chat with each other from anywhere in the game

Party chat is printed in the in-game chat interface when in a game

Added ConCommand “say_party” (default bind ‘p’) that allows for party members in a game to chat with other party members using the in-game chat interface (similar to how “say_team” works for chatting amongst your team) and with members not in a game

Matchmaking

Redesigned the matchmaking screens to be lightweight overlays that can be summoned and dismissed from anywhere within the game

Moved the Casual and Competitive badge panels to the main menu

Casual

Levels now go beyond 150. All players now have a Tier in addition to their Level. All players start at Tier 1. When your Level goes past 150 your Level resets to 1, your Tier goes up by 1, and your Casual badge will change its appearance to reflect your new status

Players who had reached level 150 will have any experience beyond 45500 (the amount required to hit 150) put into an overflow pool. While playing Casual matches, any XP you earn will be matched and deducted from your overflow pool until it runs out.

The “Vote for the next map!” dialog can now be minimized to view the top scoring players

Contacts

The Contacts Drawer has been replaced with the ConTracker, a state-of-the-art PDA

You can now work on contracts at your own pace. It’s up to you to decide which ones to work on and in what order to work on them.

You can now make progress on Bonus Objectives while working towards completing your Primary Objective

Only one Contract can be active at a time

Contracts are now unlocked by spending Stars. Stars are earned by completing objectives.

Contracts can be turned-in once the Primary Objective is complete

Partially completed Contracts can be reactivated, for free, at any time

Party members who are on the same servers and the game team can now help earn progress on each other’s Contracts

Gameplay Changes

Multi-Class

Panic Attack

This is one of our least-used weapons. The main culprit seems to be the queued/delayed-fire aspect, which fights against the basic concept of the secondary slot on classes that can use this weapon (Soldier, Heavy, Engineer, Pyro); players generally expect a secondary that is immediately ready to fire – for the rare case, where their main weapon isn’t available (e.g. out of ammo), or isn’t the optimal choice (e.g. airborne, too close, etc.). Removing the queued/delayed-fire concept basically invalidates the original design, so we’ve started over.

Goal: Make the weapon immediately usable, remove the large burst potential (generally hard to balance), and give the weapon a unique design space to occupy.

New design:

50% faster switch speed

50% more pellets

30% less damage

Fires a wide, fixed shot pattern (regardless of server settings)

Shot pattern grows with successive shots (e.g. while holding down the attack button), but resets after you stop firing or reload

Reserve Shooter

Pyros are too easily able to take advantage of this weapon’s primary feature via airblast (i.e. no-penalty, on-demand launching of their target), and so their damage-potential can greatly exceed that of the other classes that also use this weapon. Rather than take a heavier-handed approach to solve this, we’ve instead decided to remove airblast as a source for mini-crits.

Attacks on target knocked into the air by Pyro airblast no longer mini-crits

Added: Attacks on target flying via the Thermal Thruster mini-crit

Spy

Ambassador

Players that are head-shot from across the map are expecting to see a Sniper in their death-cam, but they sometimes see (more often than we’d like) a Spy with a revolver

Goal: Reduce the effective combat range to something more reasonable and expected with the Spy

Changes:

Headshot damage is now subjected to distance falloff effects

Headshots beyond 1200 world units do normal (non-crit) damage

Dead Ringer

Feign death is an interesting effect, but a good Spy can use it extremely frequently making it frustrating to play against and reducing the risk of using it nearly constantly.

Goal: Rather than make it less interesting, let’s make it more predictable to fight against by removing methods by which Spies can reduce its cool-down. This should create more of rhythm to fighting against a Spy using this and introduce a little more risk to players using it.

Changes:

Ammo kits and dispensers no longer refill the Spy’s cloak meter

Your Eternal Reward

This is the least-used Spy knife (technically, the reskin is, but anyway…). While silent-kill and rapid-disguise-on-kill are good, the downside on this knife is extreme

Changes:

Removed: “Cannot disguise” penalty

Added: Non-kill disguise require (and consume) a full cloak meter

Backstab-based disguise are still free

Increased cloak drain rate by 33%

Scout

The Sandman 

The feedback on this weapon has been fairly consistent for a while: Players really hate losing the ability to fight back. Compounding this, the ball has to travel really far in order to disarm players. Being hit by a long-range ball (more often than not) ends up feeling random, rather than skilled.

Changes:

Long-range ball impacts no longer remove that victim’s ability to fire their weapon (but the victim is still slowed)

We’ve updated achievements that were looking for disarmed player

Max range balls now do 50% increased damage (from base of 15

The flight time required to trigger the “max” effect has been reduced by 20%

Ball regeneration time reduced to 10 seconds (from 15)

Bonk! Atomic Punch

This weapon was designed to allow Scouts to pierce hotly-contested areas. While it does this quite well, it doesn’t require enough skill, or carry much of a down-side.

Changes

Apply a slow effect to the player after phasing wears off, based on the amount of damage they absorbed

From -25% at low damage, to -50% at 200+ damage

Lasts 5 seconds

Pretty Boy’s Pocket Pistol

This weapon is one of the lower owned-equipped items in the game. Looking at the current design, it seems that not taking falling damage ranks pretty low on the value scale for a Scout, and a flat +20% damage taken penalty is basically the kiss-of-death for a low-health class.

Goal: Make the weapon less of a liability and focus it as a “get health quick” tool with decent burst, at the expense of total damage

New design:

+15% firing speed

Up to +7 HP per hit (from +5)

-25% clip size (9 shots)

Crit-a-Cola

The last change to this item added Marked-For-Death when the effect ended. This was okay because it forced Scouts to get out after a little while, but it didn’t add any risk in-the moment.

Goal: Add more decision/thought on when/where to activate and how to manage the risk/reward of the effect

Changes:

Added: Each attack while active adds Marked-For-Death debuff for 5 seconds (does not stack)

Removed: Marked-For-Death when effect expires

Removed: +25% move speed bonus

Removed: +10% damage taken penalty

The Atomizer

Triple-jump as a passive effect is just too strong. It makes combat against the Scout unpredictable because opponents don’t see the bat, and therefore have a hard time anticipating the Scout’s capabilities until late in an encounter. It also makes the Scout very strong against explosive classes – due to a combination of extreme mobility and high close-range damage.

Goal: Require the Scout to deploy the bat to take advantage of the extra jump – which is also a signal to other players that they can perform an extra jump – and reduce the bat’s negatives to compensate

Changes:

Triple-jump is now only possible while the bat is deployed

Removed: Self-inflicted damage when triple-jumping

Removed: Attack speed penalty

Added: Melee attack done while airborne mini-crit

Added: 50% deploy time penalty (to prevent quick-switch bypass)

Reduced damage penalty vs. players to -15% (from -20%)

Flying Guillotine

This weapon is capable of high burst-damage under what sometimes seems like random conditions – such as mini-crits at long-range, and full-crits when the target is slowed or stunned by anything (e.g. Ghost “Boo!” effect, Natasha, etc.

Goal: Remove the feeling of randomness, and reward accuracy

Changes:

Removed: Crit vs. stunned players

Removed: Mini-crit at long range

Added: Long range hits reduce recharge (by 1.5 seconds)

Distance considered “long range” reduced by half of the previous value when determining mini-crits

Soldier

B.A.S.E. Jumper

Players often complain that the B.A.S.E. Jumper is frustrating to fight against because the target is simply too hard to hit. This is mostly due to the combination of being able to deploy/retract at will, and the amount of steering control they have – which makes them too unpredictable.

Changes:

Reduced amount of air control while deployed by 50%

Removed the ability to re-deploy the parachute once retracted (until the player lands on the ground again)

Mantreads

The second least-used item in the game. The aerial stomp mini-game is difficult, and the Gunboats are superior in most scenarios.

Changes:

+75% push-force reduction now includes airblast

Added: +200% air control when blast jumping

Cow Mangler 5000

Removed: Cannot be Crit boosted

Granted/earned Crits (e.g. Kritzkrieg) will be converted to Mini-Crits instead

Righteous Bison

Note: This weapon has been reverted to its previous design

Deals 20 damage per tick (down from 45)

Note: This is necessary because the projectile is no longer limited on the number of times it can hit targets

Projectiles are no longer limited on the number of times they can hit the same target(s)

Projectile velocity increased to 1200 (from 840)

Sniper

Darwin’s Danger Shield

Sniping using this item had an advantage against Snipers who weren’t. As a result, players felt like they were required to equip this item in order to be competitive.

Goal: Remove the increased survivability against enemy Snipers (which invalidates the existing design)

New Design:

Counter ranged burn attacks (e.g. flares), and strengthen melee fights vs. Pyros

Afterburn immunity

+50% fire resist

Razorback

Goal: Reduce the effectiveness of “pocketed” Snipers in stalemates/standoffs (this primarily happens in organized/competitive play)

Changes:

Added: -100% overheal penalty

Added: Shield regenerates after 30 seconds

Medic

Vita-Saw

Ubercharge on death is too valuable of an effect to be passive

Goal: Change the weapon in a way that requires skill and risk in order to gain this effect

Changes:

Added “Organs” collecting concept (…you know, hit someone with a saw, and out pops a vital organ which you then take, and hold). Each hit with the Vita-Saw harvests the victim’s organs (shown on the HUD).

Added: On-death, preserve 15% Ubercharge per Organ harvested. This effect caps at 60%

Crusader’s Crossbow

Bolt healing is very high and significantly out-heals the Medigun when the target is in combat. This might be okay given the trade-offs (risk-vs-reward of ranged shots hitting and the opportunity cost, no overheal). However, it’s also the fastest way to build Ubercharge – under the right conditions (e.g. corner damage farming with the Medic behind cover)

Changes:

Ubercharge gain rate reduced in the same way that the Medigun’s healing (and therefore, Ubercharge build rate) is - based on the last time the target was in combat.

Reduced by a third when 1-10 seconds outside of combat, and scales up to normal over 10-15 seconds

Heavy

All Miniguns

Changes:

The 1-second damage and accuracy penalty now applies to the first second of spun-up time, whether or not the Heavy is firing. Previously, the 1-second damage penalty would only be removed after 1 second of firing

Accuracy and damage penalties now reset when the Heavy spins down, rather than when they Heavy stops firing. This means if you stay spun-up beyond the one second, and fire in bursts, damage and accuracy will remain at 100%.

Gloves of Running Urgently

Speed (lack-of) is used to balance the Heavy’s high health, over-heal and damage output. While we still believe it’s OK to have a class of items that increases Heavy’s movement speed, players have been able to easily bypass the existing negatives.

Changes:

Added: Max-health is drained while item is active (-10/sec), and regenerates while holstered

Health will regenerate only the amount drained while active – minus any damage take during that time

Removed: Marked-For-Death effect while active

Removed: 25% damage penalty

Eviction Notice

Changes:

Added: Max-health is drained while item is active (-5/sec) and regenerated while holstered. Health will regenerate only the amount drained while active – minus any damage taken during that time.

Removed: 20% damage vulnerability

Fist of Steel

The downside of “increased melee damage” doesn’t ever really come into play when it counts (e.g. holding a choke point or objective), and when a Medic is attached, the resulting pool of effective-health is unreasonably large

Changes:

Added: 40% overheal reduction while active

Added: 40% health rate penalty while active

Added the Second Banana

Secondary slot item

When consumed by the Heavy, restores 200 health

Acts like a small health kit when dropped by the Heavy and picked up by another player

Item regenerates after 10 seconds

Engineer

Rescue Ranger

The ability to repair building safely from range without using metal is powerful. Combine this with the ability to instantly teleport buildings from far away – which by itself is interesting and useful enough in many circumstances – and you end up with a package that is very strong

Changes:

Ranged repairs now consume metal (at a 4-to-1 health-to-metal ratio, e.g. repairing 60 damage costs 15 metal)

Doubled the amount of metal applied (per wrench hit) when upgrading buildings during the “Setup” period.

Demoman

Claidheamh Mor

Note: This weapon has been reverted to its previous design.

Removed: +25 health on kill

Added: 0.5 second increase in charge duration

Pyro

Added The Dragon’s Fury

Primary slot item

Uses a shared pressure tank for Primary Fire and Alt-Fire

Primary Fire: Launching a fast moving, limited-range projectile that deals 25 damage and briefly ignites enemies

Deals +300% damage to burning players

+50% repressurization rate on hit

Alt-Fire: Airblast

-50% repressurization rate on Alt-Fire

Added the Thermal Thruster

Secondary slot item

Fires a short-duration blast that launches the Pyro in the direction they are aiming

Deals 3x falling damage to anyone you land on

Has a 1.1 second holster duration

Mann vs. Machine upgrades:

Able to re-launch while airborne

Stun enemies when you land (duration based on impact velocity)

Note: Landing directly on an enemy grants a bonus to stun duration

Faster recharge rate

Added the Gas Passer

Secondary slot item

Creates a horrific visible gas cloud that coats enemies

Flammable material then ignites into 10 seconds of Afterburn if enemies take damage (even Pyros!)

Mann vs. Machine upgrades:

Enemies explode when ignited by attacks

Faster recharge rate

Added the Slap Attack

Gain a speed-boost when you hit an enemy player

-20% damage penalty

Every successful slap is announced in the kill-feed

Flamethrowers

Better visual sync, more consistent (no visuals/damage mismatch)

New particle effects

Applies to all flamethrower variants

Airblast

Hit detection for both players and projectiles is now a consistent cone

Aiming at a player’s feet no longer misses!

Airblasting players now factors in the momentum of the Pyro and target, giving both more control over the interaction

The target’s existing velocity is no longer cancelled

Players moving at the Pyro at great speed will be reflected away at great speed

Players moving towards/away from the Pyro will experience less/more push force

Airblast now causes target players to have reduced footing and air control for a short period

No longer a flat stun

Now factors in the upward angle of the airblast, rather than having a fixed upward force

Total push force slightly increased

Afterburn

Flamethrowers no longer apply maximum-duration afterburn on contact. Afterburn duration is now based on how long the target is in contact with direct flames – starting at a minimum of 3 seconds, and stacking to a maximum of 10 seconds.

Per tick afterburn damage increased to 4 (from 3), for a total of 8 damage per-second (up from 6 per-second)

Flareguns now apply 7.5 seconds of afterburn (down from 10 seconds), resulting in the same total damage as before

Afterburn now reduces all direct Medic healing and resist shields by 20%

Note: This effect was previously applied by direct flames from all flamethrowers (at 25%), but was moved to afterburn, and lightly lowered.

BLOG DISCLAIMER: Jill from Valve has been quoted on reworking the matchmaking system implemented since Meet Your Match: “We didn’t feel what was ready was enough to be a worthy refresh of the mode yet”. Thus, significant matchmaking system reworks will not be in the Jungle Inferno update, but will be in a future update.

[yagyuhayato]

tagged by @peachcryptid this is my favorite shit so like im so glad i got tagged in this Nickname: coco, dru, momo

Gender: 2spirit

Star sign: aries/taurus cusp

Height: 6′1

Time: 5:35 pm yes kween

Birthday: April 22nd

Favorite bands: WEEN, rainbow kitten surprise, prince, ajj, father john misty, tank and the bangas, animal collective, lorde, blackbird raum, star fucking hipsters, miniature tigers, cosmo jarvis, green day, glass animals

Song stuck in my head: birthday boy by ween

The last movie I watched: the crying game.. i fucking loved that movie

Last show I watched: how to get away with murder

When did I create this blog: 2012 lmao kill me 

Last thing I googled: total entertainment forever lyrics because im trying to find new lyrics for my instagram bio

Instruments: banjo, piano, im trying very hard to learn how to play the saxophone i bought but i might sell it to my brother and buy a bass guitar

What I’m wearing: boognish tee and lifeguard shorts

How many blankets do I sleep with: four

Dream job: id really love to be a musician but most likely ill be a lifeguard adjacent for the rest of my life

Dream trip: i want to travel the whole US and just crash with people i vaguely know online, meet up with all my pals

Favorite food: chicken and dumplings or biscuits and gravy or shit on a shingle. i love me some southern comfort food lmao. powwow beans are also pretty high on the list lol

Nationality: potawatomi, iroquois, irish, and welsh

Favorite song at the moment: this is legit the hardest question anyone could ever ask me but i think im gonna go with a three way tie between liability by lorde, seven by rainbow kitten surprise, and birthday boy by ween

tagging: @butchdelight @wearethepigs @wasigoodtoyou if u wanna be tagged in this hit me up and ill add you to it i just dont want 2 bother people​

[rincongamers]

Team Fortress 2 Update Released

An update to Team Fortress 2 has been released. The update will be applied automatically when you restart Team Fortress 2. The major changes include:

The Jungle Inferno Update is live!

Additional information available on the website (http://ift.tt/2yqK6FK)

5 featured community maps: Mossrock, Lazarus, Brazil, Enclosure, and Banana Bay

1 new official map: Mercenary Park

5 new community taunts: The Dueling Banjo, The Jumping Jack, The Soviet Strongarm, The Russian Arms Race, and The Headcase

2 new official taunts: Yeti Punch and Yeti Smash

2 community cosmetic cases with 20 items each

2 new War Paint collections made up of community-made War Paints and official War Paints

2 new War Paint collections filled with classic weapon skins being brought back for another tour

4 new Pyro items: The Dragon's Fury, The Thermal Thruster (with a new kill taunt: The Gas Blast), The Gas Passer, and the Hot Hand

1 new Heavy item: The Second Banana

Free contracts to earn the new Pyro and Heavy items

36 campaign contracts

Mercenary Park Gift Shop to select your campaign contract rewards

Equippable ConTracker to customize and track your campaign experience

General

Significant weapon and class balance improvements (see Gameplay Changes section below for full details)

Increased the maximum number of backpack slots to 2500 (from 2000)

The default voice codec now defaults to Steam Voice

Steam Voice is now using Opus audio at a higher bitrate than the default CELT codec

Added a new vaudio_celt_high option for sv_voicecodec, allowing community servers to opt-in to higher bitrate voice chat

Fixed the Engineer being able to store the Gunslinger's melee crit for a future melee attack

Fixed a bug where the ammo from a picked up weapon could exceed the player's maximum ammo allowed

Fixed a bug where the dispenser would use different bounds checks for distributing ammo and health

Fixed a bug where the player model would not play the attack animation for some weapons that fire bullets

Fixed the Bottle, the Scottish Handshake, and the Neon Annihilator not having their models break on critical hits

Fixed some of the Heavy's edible secondary items not having the model update when the item is eaten

Fixed a case where players could have multiple weapons visible at the same time

Fixed some outdated tips

Mannpower Mode

Knockout powerup now collects health pack health without subtracting their health bonus. Results in Knockout carriers collecting more health from each health kit.

Resistance powerup now blocks backstabs

Fixed Engineers using the Eureka Effect to teleport out of hell on Halloween maps

Fixed the announcer sometimes saying "The tank is halfway through!" when a tank first spawns in Mann vs. Machine mode

Updated the Pallet of Crates to only drop crates and not cases

Players that have their movement slowed for any reason now have a status icon appear on their HUD (in the same area that displays other player effects, such as Marked-For-Death)

Added first-person inspect animations to all weapons

Added a disconnect sound when the Medic stops healing their target

Added new sounds for the Family Business, the Winger, and the Frontier Justice

Updated sounds for the Brass Beast and the Awper Hand

Steam controller improvements

When using Steam controller configuration to configure non-Steam Controller devices (e.g. Xbox controllers), the proper button icons are now displayed in the UI

Improved controller icon placement in some UI screens, including for players using less-common aspect ratio displays

Where text rather than an icon is used to indicate a controller binding, the text strings are now correct for non-Steam controller devices, and slightly more verbose in some cases to avoid confusion with regular keyboard bindings (e.g. "Press [B button]" vs. "Press [B]")

Fixed miscellaneous corner-case bugs where the wrong action set could be selected, and some edge cases with handling of multiple simultaneous actions during an action-set change

Added new action bindings for the most popular voice-line commands. The default controller template now binds "Call Medic!" to the directional pad. The following voice lines are also available, but are not bound by default: "Go! Go! Go!", "Move up!", "Spy!", "Ubercharge ready!", "Help!"

Community request - Added tf_playrounds/tf_listrounds debug commands to jump between mini-rounds on multi-stage maps

May not work on all maps if the map ties custom logic to entities other than the mini-rounds themselves (e.g. arbitrary capture zones (e.g. dustbowl))

Applied the match rejoin limitations in Casual to Mann vs. Machine as well

Players who leave a Mann vs. Machine match cannot matchmake back into that same game for several minutes

Players who are vote-kicked from a Mann vs. Machine match cannot matchmake back into that same game for several hours

Added Ready Steady Pan Season 3 tournament medals

Added ETF2L Highlander Season 13 and ETF2L 6v6 Season 28 tournament medals

Added TFCL Highlander Season 1, Ultiduo Season 4, 6v6 Season 3, 4v4 Season 1, and bball Season 1 tournament medals

Added AsiaFortress Cup Season 12 tournament medals

Added Insomnia 61 tournament medals

Added CappingTV Ultiduo Winter Chalice tournament medals

Added RGL.gg Pick/Ban Prolander Participant tournament medal

Added ozfortress season 20 tournament medals

Added Tip of the Hats 2017 community medals

Added Snack's Summery Ultiduo Siesta (season 2) tournament medals

Updated the Mappers vs. Machines Participant Medal 2017 medal so it can be painted

Updated the Arms Race tournament medals so description tags can be used on them

Updated the TFCL Alpha medal to be paintable

Updated The Heartfelt Hug to be paintable

Updated the localization files

Parties

Parties can now be formed from anywhere within the game and persist through matches

Players are now able to join their party's match if late joining is allowed

Added a new party interface that allows you to quickly manage and interact with your party

Added a global party chat system that allows party members to chat with each other from anywhere in the game

Party chat is printed in the in-game chat interface when in a game

Added ConCommand "say_party" (default bind 'p') that allows for party members in a game to chat with other party members using the in-game chat interface (similar to how "say_team" works for chatting amongst your team) and with members not in a game

Matchmaking

Redesigned the matchmaking screens to be lightweight overlays that can be summoned and dismissed from anywhere within the game

Moved the Casual and Competitive badge panels to the main menu

Casual

Levels now go beyond 150. All players now have a Tier in addition to their Level. All players start at Tier 1. When your Level goes past 150 your Level resets to 1, your Tier goes up by 1, and your Casual badge will change its appearance to reflect your new status.

Players who had reached level 150 will have any experience beyond 45500 (the amount required to hit 150) put into an overflow pool. While playing Casual matches, any XP you earn will be matched and deducted from your overflow pool until it runs out.

The "Vote for the next map!" dialog can now be minimized to view the top scoring players

Contracts

The Contracts Drawer has been replaced with the ConTracker, a state-of-the-art PDA

You can now work on contracts at your own pace. It's up to you to decide which ones to work on and in what order to work on them.

You can now make progress on Bonus Objectives while working towards completing your Primary Objective

Only one Contract can be active at a time

Contracts are now unlocked by spending Stars. Stars are earned by completing objectives.

Contracts can be turned-in once the Primary Objective is complete

Partially completed Contracts can be reactivated, for free, at any time

Party members who are on the same server and same team can now help earn progress on each other's Contracts

Gameplay Changes

Multi-class

Panic Attack

This is one of our least-used weapons. The main culprit seems to be the queued/delayed-fire aspect, which fights against the basic concept of the secondary slot on classes that can use this weapon (Soldier, Heavy, Engineer, Pyro); players generally expect a secondary that is immediately ready to fire - for the rare case where their main weapon isn't available (e.g. out of ammo), or isn't the optimal choice (e.g. airborne, too close, etc.). Removing the queued/delayed-fire concept basically invalidates the original design, so we’ve started over.

Goal: Make the weapon immediately usable, remove the large burst potential (generally hard to balance), and give the weapon a unique design space to occupy

New design:

50% faster switch speed

50% more pellets

30% less damage

Fires a wide, fixed shot pattern (regardless of server settings)

Shot pattern grows with successive shots (e.g. while holding down the attack button), but resets after you stop firing or reload

Reserve Shooter

Pyros are too easily able to take advantage of this weapon's primary feature via airblast (i.e. no-penalty, on-demand launching of their target), and so their damage-potential can greatly exceed that of the other classes that also use this weapon. Rather than take a heavier-handed approach to solve this, we've instead decided to remove airblast as a source for mini-crits.

Attacks on targets knocked into the air by Pyro airblast no longer mini-crit

Added: Attacks on targets flying via the Thermal Thruster mini-crit

Spy

Ambassador

Players that are head-shot from across the map are expecting to see a Sniper in their death-cam, but they sometimes see (more often that we'd like) a Spy with a revolver

Goal: Reduce the effective combat range to something more reasonable and expected with the Spy

Changes:

Headshot damage is now subjected to distance falloff effects

Headshots beyond 1200 world units do normal (non-crit) damage

Dead Ringer

Feign death is an interesting effect, but a good Spy can use it extremely frequently making it frustrating to play against and reducing the risk of using it nearly constantly

Goal: Rather than make it less interesting, let's make it more predictable to fight against by removing methods by which Spies can reduce its cool-down. This should create more of a rhythm to fighting against a Spy using this and introduce a little more risk to player using it.

Changes:

Ammo kits and dispensers no longer refill the Spy's cloak meter

Your Eternal Reward

This is the least-used Spy knife (technically, the reskin is, but anyway...). While silent-kill and rapid-disguise-on-kill are good, the downside on this knife is extreme.

Changes:

Removed: "Cannot disguise" penalty

Added: Non-kill disguises require (and consume) a full cloak meter

Backstab-based disguises are still free

Increased cloak drain rate by 33%

Scout

Sandman

The feedback on this weapon has been fairly consistent for a while: Players really hate losing the ability to fight back. Compounding this, the ball has to travel really far in order to disarm players. Being hit by a long-range ball (more often than not) ends up feeling random, rather than skilled.

Changes:

Long-range ball impacts no longer remove the victim's ability to fire their weapon (but the victim is still slowed)

We've updated achievements that were looking for disarmed players

Max range balls now do 50% increased damage (from a base of 15)

The flight time required to trigger the "max" effect has been reduced by 20%

Ball regeneration time reduced to 10 seconds (from 15)

Bonk! Atomic Punch

This weapon was designed to allow Scouts to pierce hotly-contested areas. While it does this quite well, it doesn't require enough skill, or carry much of a down-side.

Changes:

Apply a slow effect to the player after phasing wears off, based on the amount of damage they absorbed

From -25% at low damage, to -50% at 200+ damage

Lasts 5 seconds

Pretty Boy’s Pocket Pistol

This weapon is one of the lower owner-equipped items in the game. Looking at the current design, it seems that not taking falling damage ranks pretty low on the value scale for a Scout, and a flat +20% damage taken penalty is basically the kiss-of-death for a low-health class.

Goal: Make the weapon less of a liability and focus it as a "get health quick" tool with decent burst, at the expense of total damage

New design:

+15% firing speed

Up to +7 hp per hit (from +5)

-25% clip size (9 shots)

Crit-A-Cola

The last change to this item added Marked-For-Death when the effect ended. This was okay because it forced Scouts to get out after a little while, but it didn't add any risk in-the-moment.

Goal: Add more decision/thought on when/where to activate and how to manage the risk/reward of the effect

Changes:

Added: Each attack while active adds Marked-For-Death debuff for 5 seconds (does not stack)

Removed: Marked-For-Death when effect expires

Removed: +25% move speed bonus

Removed: +10% damage taken penalty

The Atomizer

Triple-jump as a passive effect is just too strong. It makes combat against the Scout unpredictable because opponents don't see the bat, and therefore have a hard time anticipating the Scout's capabilities until late in an encounter. It also makes the Scout very strong against explosive classes - due to a combination of extreme mobility and high close-range damage.

Goal: Require the Scout to deploy the bat to take advantage of the extra jump - which is also is a signal to other players that they can perform an extra jump - and reduce the bat's negatives to compensate

Changes:

Triple-jump is now only possible while the bat is deployed

Removed: Self-inflicted damage when triple-jumping

Removed: Attack speed penalty

Added: Melee attacks done while airborne mini-crit

Added: 50% deploy time penalty (to prevent quick-switch bypass)

Reduced damage penalty vs players to -15% (from -20%)

Flying Guillotine

This weapon is capable of high burst-damage under what sometimes seems like random conditions - such as mini-crits at long-range, and full-crits when the target is slowed or stunned by anything (e.g. Ghost "Boo!" effect, Natascha, etc.)

Goal: Remove the feeling of randomness, and reward accuracy

Changes:

Removed: Crit vs stunned players

Removed: Mini-crits at long range

Added: Long range hits reduce recharge (by 1.5 seconds)

Distance considered "long range" reduced by half of the previous value when determining mini-crits

Soldier

B.A.S.E Jumper

Players often complain that the B.A.S.E. Jumper is frustrating to fight against because the target is simply too hard to hit. This is mostly due to the combination of being able to deploy/retract at will, and the amount of steering control they have - which makes them too unpredictable.

Changes:

Reduced amount of air control while deployed by 50%

Removed the ability to re-deploy the parachute once retracted (until the player lands on the ground again)

Mantreads

The second least-used item in the game. The aerial stomp mini-game is difficult, and The Gunboats are superior in most scenarios.

Changes:

+75% push-force reduction now includes airblast

Added: +200% air control when blast jumping

Cow Mangler 5000

Removed: Cannot be Crit boosted

Granted/earned Crits (e.g. Kritzkrieg) will be converted to Mini-Crits instead

Righteous Bison

Note: This weapon has been reverted to its previous design

Deals 20 damage per tick (down from 45)

Note: This is necessary because the projectile is no longer limited on the number of times it can hit targets

Projectiles are no longer limited on the number of times they can hit the same target(s)

Projectile velocity increased to 1200 (from 840)

Sniper

Darwin’s Danger Shield

Snipers using this item had an advantage against Snipers who weren't. As a result, players felt like they were required to equip this item in order to be competitive.

Goal: Remove the increased survivability against enemy Snipers (which invalidates the existing design).

New design:

Counter ranged burn attacks (e.g. flares), and strengthen melee fights vs Pyros

Afterburn immunity

+50% fire resist

Razorback

Goal: Reduce the effectiveness of "pocket'd" Snipers in stalemates/standoffs (this primarily happens in organized/competitive play)

Changes:

Added: -100% overheal penalty

Added: Shield regenerates after 30 seconds

Medic

Vita-Saw

Ubercharge on death is too valuable of an effect to be passive

Goal: Change the weapon in a way that requires skill and risk in order to gain this effect

Changes:

Added "Organs" collecting concept (... you know, hit someone with a saw, and out pops a vital organ which you then take, and hold). Each hit with the Vita-Saw harvests the victim's organs (shown on the HUD).

Added: On-death, preserve 15% ubercharge per Organ harvested. This effect caps at 60%.

Crusader's Crossbow

Bolt healing is very high and significantly out-heals the Medigun when the target is in combat. This might be okay given the trade-offs (risk-vs-reward of ranged shots hitting and the opportunity cost, no overheal). However, it's also the fastest way to build Ubercharge - under the right conditions (e.g. corner damage farming with the Medic behind cover).

Changes:

Ubercharge gain rate reduced in the same way that the Medigun's healing (and therefore, Ubercharge build rate) is - based on the last time the target was in combat

Reduced by a third when 1 - 10 seconds outside of combat, and scales up to normal over 10 - 15 seconds

Heavy

All Miniguns

Changes:

The 1-second damage and accuracy penalty now applies to the first second of spun-up time, whether or not the Heavy is firing. Previously, the 1-second damage penalty would only be removed after 1 second of firing.

Accuracy and damage penalties now reset when the Heavy spins down, rather than when the Heavy stops firing. This means if you stay spun-up beyond one second, and fire in bursts, damage and accuracy will remain at 100%.

Gloves of Running Urgently

Speed (lack-of) is used to balance the Heavy's high health, over-heal and damage output. While we still believe it's OK to have a class of items that increases Heavy's movement speed, players have been able to easily bypass the existing negatives.

Changes:

Added: Max-health is drained while item is active (-10/sec), and regenerated while holstered

Health will regenerate only the amount drained while active - minus any damage taken during that time

Each time the gloves are deployed, the drain rate is accelerated for a brief period of time

Removed: Marked-For-Death effect while active

Removed: 25% damage penalty

Eviction Notice

Changes:

Added: Max-health is drained while item is active (-5/sec), and regenerated while holstered. Health will regenerate only the amount drained while active - minus any damage taken during that time.

Removed: 20% damage vulnerability

Fist of Steel

The downside of "increased melee damage" doesn't ever really come into play when it counts (e.g. holding a choke point or objective), and when a Medic is attached, the resulting pool of effective-health is unreasonably large

Changes:

Added: 40% overheal reduction while active

Added: 40% healing rate penalty while active

Added The Second Banana

Secondary slot item

When consumed by the Heavy, restores 200 health

Acts like a small health kit when dropped by the Heavy and picked up by another player

Item regenerates after 10 seconds

Engineer

Rescue Ranger

The ability to repair buildings safely from range without using metal is powerful. Combine this with the ability to instantly teleport buildings from far away - which by itself is interesting and useful enough in many circumstances - and you end up with a package that is very strong.

Changes:

Ranged repairs now consume metal (at a 4-to-1 health-to-metal ratio, e.g. repairing 60 damage costs 15 metal)

Doubled the amount of metal applied (per wrench hit) when upgrading buildings during the "Setup" period.

Demo

Claidheamh Mor

Note: This weapon has been reverted to its previous design.

Removed: +25 health on kill

Added: 0.5 second increase in charge duration

Pyro

Added The Dragon's Fury

Primary slot item

Uses a shared pressure tank for Primary Fire and Alt-Fire

Primary Fire: Launches a fast-moving, limited-range projectile that deals 25 damage and briefly ignites enemies

Deals +300% damage to burning players

+50% repressurization rate on hit

Alt-Fire: Airblast

-50% repressurization rate on Alt-Fire

Added The Thermal Thruster

Secondary slot item

Fires a short-duration blast that launches the Pyro in the direction they are aiming

Deals 3x falling damage to anyone you land on

Has a 1.1 second holster duration

MvM upgrades:

Able to re-launch while airborne

Stun enemies when you land (duration based on impact velocity)

Note: Landing directly on an enemy grants a bonus to stun duration

Faster recharge rate

Added The Gas Passer

Secondary slot item

Creates a horrific visible gas cloud that coats enemies

Flammable material then ignites into 10 seconds of Afterburn if enemies take damage (even Pyros!)

Mann vs. Machine upgrades:

Enemies explode when ignited by attacks

Faster recharge rate

Added The Hot Hand

Gain a speed-boost when you hit an enemy player

-20% damage penalty

Every successful slap is announced in the kill-feed

Flamethrowers

Better visual sync, more consistent (no visuals/damage mismatch)

New particle effects

Applies to all flamethrower variants

Airblast

Hit detection for both players and projectiles is now a consistent cone

Aiming at a player's feet no longer misses!

Airblasting players now factors in the momentum of the Pyro and target, giving both more control over the interaction

The target's existing velocity is no longer cancelled

Players moving at the Pyro at great speed will be reflected away at great speed

Players moving towards/away from the Pyro will experience less/more push force

Airblast now causes target player to have reduced footing and air control for a short period

No longer a flat stun

Now factors in the upward angle of the airblast, rather than having a fixed upward force

Total push force slightly increased

Afterburn

Flamethrowers no longer apply maximum-duration afterburn on contact. Afterburn duration is now based on how long the target is in contact with direct flames -- starting at a minimum of 3 seconds, and stacking to a maximum of 10 seconds.

Per-tick afterburn damage increased to 4 (from 3), for a total of 8 damage per-second (up from 6 per-second)

Flareguns now apply 7.5 seconds of afterburn (down from 10 seconds), resulting in the same total damage as before

Afterburn now reduces all direct Medic healing and resist shields by 20%

Note: This effect was previously applied by direct flames from all flamethrowers (at 25%), but was moved to afterburn, and slightly lowered