#After the next post I'll be covering a lot of things in a single post - the next one covers Shadowheart's Sharran confession

[sunsetchicane]

Postcards - Part 3 [LN4]

lando norris x [travel] journalist fem!reader

find the series here

word count: 5.2k

summary: The one where you're in Paris and you can't stop thinking about him and you find yourself giving him a call.

warnings: angsts again (sorry! I swear it's turning around), swearing, innuendo, unedited!

author's note: hey...sorry this took so long??? college is crazy guys. but anyways, I'm a little rusty so be gentle lmao. please enjoy and I'll see you guys SOON!! feedback, comments, likes whatever you feel like is so much appreciated. Lots of love [xoxo elle]

Lando

Nov. 2022

The lights of Abu Dhabi blind Lando as he stands next to his car and removes his helmet from his head. Ending P6 was respectable, a good end to a mediocre at best season. His head swims with the noise that swallows the track and the flashing lights that light up the night race. Another season was officially in the books. There’s always a bittersweet feeling that hits all the drivers as they jump out of their cars for the last race of the season, letting the months past become another chapter of history. An excitement for the break ahead and the promise of a new season buoys their spirits, but it’s a hard goodbye nonetheless. 

Lando absentmindedly walks around to congratulate everyone, shaking hands and sharing smiles. Though, his heart isn’t in it. His focus splintered the second he left the car. Thoughts drift towards you. They always do. There’s never a day that passes that you aren’t on his mind, on his heart.

Flashing cameras surround him, capturing this moment. He thinks of you.

Journalists with microphones tucked into their hands yell words into a camera lens. He thinks of you.

Faces flashing in and out of sight, bodies swarming around him as his eyes search the crowd. He’s looking for you.

But you aren’t there. There was no reason for you to be there. The last time you spoke, the London night surrounded you and held you together. To this day, when he closes his eyes, he can still feel your lips on his. Somedays, he makes it through with just this memory alone spurring him on. He promised to see you in Monaco, but every time he called your office, you were gone. Every time he showed up at your cubicle, it was deserted. A layer of dust collected over everything. 

A thin layer of dust covering a framed picture of Big Ben lit from behind by the setting sun.

After so many futile attempts of trying to find you, to connect again, he slowly stopped trying. There was an obvious truth behind the estrangement of your paths: you were avoiding him. 

At first, he rejected the idea, claiming to only himself that you wouldn’t do that. He was convinced that you felt the same way that he did. There was something between the two of you that was beyond anything he had ever felt. Your passion inspired him. Your humor warmed him. Your presence set him at ease in such a way that the whole world could be burning and he would be perfectly content to just hold you in his arms. 

He’d never felt that way about anyone. Not even close.

So for a long time, longer than he would ever admit, he clutched onto hope. 

But with each passing week with not a single word from you, faith began to slip. With every message that went unanswered and phone call that went straight to the voicemail of your office phone, his grip on you loosened. 

He’d be the first to admit his lack of maturity. He wasn’t ashamed of still being a kid. Instead, he wore it like a badge of honor, making it part of his personal brand. If it wasn’t for you, he would never have thought twice about growing up to be the man that you deserved. But now that you’re gone, slipping into memory, he’s found himself back in his comfortable corner of immaturity. 

So, after hurrying through all of his post-race interviews and duties with the team, he finds himself taking solace in the night life of Abu Dhabi.

Alcohol had never really been his thing, but recently the appeal has been becoming more and more obvious to him. Round after round is poured down his throat, burning every memory of you away for the night. Intoxication holds you at bay, at least for a while. 

“Slow down, mate.” Max laughs into his ear while Lando tosses back yet another shot of something. He’s had enough that everything tastes the same now.

“I’m celebrating!” Lando slurs, shoving Max square in the chest. They stumble together, laughing as they nearly fall over. The world is a haze of flickering neon lights. Music and voices blend into a loud hum, everything becoming one to drunk ears.

Lando collapses haphazardly onto the couch in the club, quickly followed by Max. With hooded eyes, they watch the dance floor in front of them. The mass of the crowd seems to move as one, enchanting Lando’s drunk mind. The night coalesces and crests like a wave, ebbing and flowing as one singular, living thing. Everything seems interconnected and endless. If he could, Lando would stay in this feeling forever. Nothing hurts, nothing is joyful, everything is completely numb.

“I miss her.” He says, but the usual pain that accompanies those words is nowhere to be found.

“I know,” Max says, his head falling back while he closes his eyes.

“I hate her.” Lando says emotionlessly. Max doesn’t respond. It isn’t true. They both know that it isn’t. But for tonight, they can pretend. 

Lando can pretend that it doesn’t matter that he pushes himself off the couch when he catches the eye of a girl that looks somewhat like you. He can pretend that he doesn’t think about you as he dances behind her, his hands gripping her hips to hold her close. He can pretend that he doesn’t wish it was your neck that his lips trail up towards her jaw. He has to pretend when he finds himself asking her to leave with him. 

And when he finds himself that night, tangled up with a girl who’s name he doesn’t bother to remember, he gives up pretending and thinks only of you. Of your lips, of your body, of the way it would feel to have you around him. Your voice calling out his name in the quiet hours of the morning. 

He hates you.

He hates not having you.

This isn’t the first time that he’s tried to heal his sorrow with momentary pleasure. No, in fact, he’s done this a handful of times and each time he tries he hopes that this will be the girl to erase you from his life. But she never is. He’s a fool for trying the same thing over and over again expecting a miracle.

“Stay,” she mumbles into her pillow, a delicate hand draping across his chest. It’s cold against his hot skin. He turns his face away from her so she can’t see him cringe. Gently, Lando slides her hand away and returns it to her side. 

“Can’t,” He says while sliding to the edge of the bed and away from her. For a few moments while he rubs the sleepiness from his eyes, he listens to her groan and complain. He’s so tired. With a huff, he stands and collects his clothes that are strewn about the luxurious room. 

As he pulls his clothes on, he listens to the soft rustling of silk sheets and the steady in and out of sleeping breaths. But everything seems a thousand miles away, so cold and distant. In the slight hours of the morning, nothing feels real. He’s numb and tired. He’s cold and exhausted of feeling the same pain from the moment he wakes up to the time he finally is graced by merciful sleep. 

Spiraling thoughts plague Lando’s mind as he wanders the slips into the back of an uber. Glossy eyes scan the world as it streams by him in the back window of some random car. How many times has he lived this night? Every car ride back to his apartment or hotel room feels the same, blending into one continuous stream of dull memory. 

Stumbling into his hotel room, he heads straight to his bed without a second thought. Discarding his clothes onto the floor for the second time tonight, he can’t help but wish he’d been here sooner. There isn’t solace for him in someone else’s bed, and when he’s alone he doesn’t have to pretend there is. He’s sick of playing pretend and putting a mask on for himself, for his friends, for his team, and the millions of people watching him under a microscope. The truth and the pressure of that truth has weighed on him for months.

He’s heartbroken. He’s suffering. And there’s nothing to be done about it. He hasn’t had the chance to heal and he doesn’t know when he will–if he will. Because when he thinks of you, it’s like a knife of what could have been to the chest; and when he blocks you from his mind he feels guilty and hopelessly alone. 

A spinning ceiling and tears in his eyes coax him to sleep.

He dreams of you, of course. Even sleep can’t free him of you.

You

The City of Love and Lights has been a whirlwind for you over the last few days. This new piece on an up and coming grunge artist hailing from the infamous streets of Paris has become larger than you originally thought. Night and day, you’ve been chained to your laptop, cranking out a story worthy of its subject matter. 

Tonight, you’ve decided to dive into your work at some random cafe down the street from where you’re staying. Headphones on and phone turned off, you’ve been plugged in for hours. Countless cappuccinos have been downed since you came in which could be three days or minutes ago, you wouldn’t know. Only when the noise at the bar grows from a quiet, sporadic chatter to a distracting, constant hum of voices, do you look up from your work. 

The sun has set, giving the streets a chance to live up to the name “City of Lights.” People and cars whiz past you, everyone on their way somewhere. The crowd at the cafe has gone from a few coffee sippers to a mass of people huddled around the bar ordering drinks for them and their friends. 

Realizing you’ve lost yourself in your work, you rub the heels of your hands against your tired eyes. With a sigh, you fold up your notes and tuck them away into your bag along with your laptop. You gather up your empty dishes and mugs, placing them in the bin above the trash.

Just as you turn towards the exit, ready to slip to your bed and sleep for hours and hours, cheering rises up around you. A name you take care to avoid ripples through the crowd. A small group of people are huddled around the bar, chests pressed to backs, heads leaned in, trying to get a glimpse at something.

Biting hard on your bottom lip, you fight yourself. Your eyes flicker out to the darkened streets of Paris and then back to the group of people who must be watching the season’s final race. As much as you hated yourself for it, of course you kept up with the Formula One season. It was the only connection you had to Lando. Distant, impersonal, and safe. You could keep your eye on him, see his face every once in a while, but not fall in again. At least that’s what you told yourself every time you went out of your way to stream a race, no matter where you were. 

It had been ages since you saw him in London. Some days it feels like a lifetime ago, and most times it feels as fresh as yesterday. You wake up with the feeling of his lips on yours, his arms wrapped around you. 

And maybe it’s the romantic in you that you’ve tried to kill and bury your whole life, but the thing you miss most about him is his stupid smile. There’s such complete joy behind that smile. It lights you up in your darkest moments, lifting you up and warming you. There isn’t anything that you wouldn’t give to be able to see that smile just one more time.

But you can’t. So, you turn your back on the crowd of Formula fans and walk out onto the street. 

As you walk, you try to distract yourself by taking in the scenery or by thinking of your story. But of course every train of thought leads back to him. You know Lando would love Paris. He wouldn’t admit it, of course. He would rather die than let anyone know how much of a romantic he is. The two of you are similar in that way.

At least you think so. So much time has passed, you can’t really say that you know him at all. Sure, you’ve spent a little time together, but life is constantly changing. You don’t know who he is today, what he hates today, what he loves. All you’ve ever gotten of each other is fleeting moments. And you’re to blame.

Countless times you’ve gone over it in your head. Playing every single scenario out over and over, trying to find the one where it could work between you two. But every time, you come to the same conclusion: it never will.

Even if you could convince yourself not to run at the first chance, which you always will, your lives are too different. His job would be pulling him one way while yours would be pulling you to the opposite corner of the world. Constantly in motion, but never intersecting. No matter how much you want it to, his and your futures won’t bend to fit. It tears you apart.

When you’re not traveling or writing for work, you find yourself filling pages with his name and the pain that comes with it. Your messy, ink blotted notebooks are filled cover to cover with insane ramblings of a broken heart. You can’t bring yourself to think of anyone else that way. When you try, it falls short and you do what you do best: you run.

The walk back to your hotel is blessedly quick. Being alone with your thoughts right now is torture, especially with idle hands. Everything seems a little bit easier when there’s a pen held in your fingers. 

Walking through the lobby, you try to keep your head down, not wanting anyone to bother you tonight. Bee-lining for the elevator, you wish you were already in your room. But, as the button lights up under your finger and the numbers above the doors make their descent, you can’t help but wonder what solace a lonely hotel room would bring you. Trapped in a shoebox of a room with nothing but an empty bed and a full mind. A premonition of staring at the ceiling for the next few hours, slowly driving yourself insane flashes in your mind’s eye.

Glancing over your shoulder, you look at the small bar off to the side of the lobby. It’s blessedly empty, only a few randoms sitting quietly here and there. Abandoning the elevator, you walk over to the bar. 

Drinking at a hotel bar isn’t an unfamiliar low for you. It might be sad and slightly pathetic, but it’s better than any other option you have right now. Actually, drowning your sorrows in Paris doesn’t really sound half bad, right? It could be an interesting anecdote in the long, melodramatic tale of your life post-Lando that you could tell Bobbi. She would laugh and commiserate with you over shitty frozen pizza that her son loved and a sweet wine that she loved.

With that thought, you order three vodka shots and a Diet Coke. Dropping your bag and coat in the seat next to you, you haul out the book you’ve been trying to chip away at when you have enough focus to read. Then you crack open your Coke and take two of your shots. Tossing your head back, you relish the burn of the liquid as it slides down your throat, but quickly chase it with your Coke to ease the pain.

Leaning forward onto the bar, you pry your book open and try to focus on the words inked onto the pages. 

Within minutes, your fingertips are buzzing and your face feels flushed. The words in front of your swirl and sway. Pausing your “reading,” you toss back your last shot, grimacing at the taste. Still, you tap the bartop with your fingers, signalling the bartender that you’re in need of his services.

The bartender is quick to place a new shot in front of you. Reaching out, you play with the small glass between your fingers while you continue to read. You don’t know how long you sit like that, your head battling between the effects of the alcohol and your desperation to focus on your book. 

Suddenly, a rhythmic buzzing pulls your already splintered attention away from the stupid book. You rummage through your bag, looking for your phone. When you find it and turn it over, you're met with a blank screen. There are a few random notifications from earlier that day, mostly work emails you hadn’t been bothered to respond to yet. 

“Salut,” The bartender says as he presses his phone to his ear. You watch as he turns away from the bar and mumbles into the receiver of his cellphone. Shamelessly, you watch the hushed conversation of the young, brunette bartender play out. He’s splashed in the soft orange light that filters through the rows of bottles against the wall of the bar. He laughs quietly while leaning his hip against the counter. The white button up of his uniform, his dark hair, and tanned skin are reminiscent of someone you’ve been trying to avoid thinking about all night. It’s surprising you’ve just noticed now. 

You don’t have to speak perfect French to know what he was talking about on the call, or who was on the other end. He was swaying and smiling, his fingers brushing across his lips while his eyes lit up with the fireworks you could practically hear going off in his chest.

A sharp pang of loneliness erupts in your chest.

You take another shot and wait. Abandoning your book, you trace the grain of the wood bartop with featherlight fingers. Time slows and your vision goes a little bit hazy. A sweet peace crashes over your consciousness. Your thoughts begin to slide together so you can’t identify where one thought starts and where a feeling ends. Everything feels delightfully airy and heavy at the same time, making your reality feel a little less real.

“Can I buy a bottle?” You ask suddenly. You weren’t really sure if you said it outloud or not, but when the bartender walks over to you with a bottle of vodka he’d been giving you shots from and tells you the price, you don’t even hesitate as you toss a few bills on the counter, covering everything. He bids you a goodnight as you snatch up the bottle along with your other belongings and make your way back to the elevator. 

The walk feels much easier the second time. You feel so much lighter, so much better. Your thoughts are far away, not plaguing you like they were earlier. Laying on your empty bed and losing yourself in an overly expensive pay-per-view movie sounds far more appealing than it did an hour ago as well.

You take the elevator to your floor, stumbling to your door. Fumbling with your key, you open the door, toss your stuff on the ground, and flop onto the bed, bottle in hand. Almost instantaneously, you turn on the television and peruse the movies. You buy The Proposal and lean back into your pillows while the title sequence plays. 

As you take another burning pull from the bottle in your hand, you think distantly that you should be ashamed of yourself. Drowning your sorrows alone in a hotel room in Paris. The word pathetic echoes around your head. You try to kill the thought with yet another swallow of alcohol. 

With a hazy mind, you watch as a badass, albeit definitely bitchy, Sandra Bullock string along a charismatic and endlessly sarcastic Ryan Renolds. 

“She’s not that bad,” You say into an empty room as she tears her jerk employee a new one. “She’s just career oriented.”

Projecting much? Your subconscious whispers to you.

You tip the bottle back.

And that sequence continues to happen as you watch the movie. Every time something touches a little too close to home, you drink. It’s like some sad drinking game that you’ve forced yourself to participate in.

By the time the credits roll, you’re plastered. Eyes trained to the ceiling, you try to sling together a single coherent thought. But you can’t. Everything in your mind seems to pop up quickly and then slip away before you can grab a hold on it.

Everything except one thought, one name. Lando.

Your drunken mind whispers his name. You want him right now, right next to you. The thought of his big hands in your hair, against your skin, between your legs, is nearly enough to be drunk on alone. And nothing is stopping you now, not even yourself. Intoxication has given you the freedom to do whatever you damn well please. 

Fumbling for your phone, you don’t even really think about what you’re going to say. Instead, you open up your contacts and press on his contact for the first time since you made it. He’d called your work phone months ago and left his number. You’d debated even saving his contact, but you couldn’t stop yourself. Though, you’d never messaged him, never gave him a call. Until now.

Clicking on the call button, you don’t flinch as it begins to ring. It rings…and rings…and rings. His voicemail message sounds like heaven to your wary ears. 

“Landooo, it's…uh…it's me. I’m in Paris on assignment. I bought you a postcard, don’t worry. Listen, I don’t really know why I’m calling. Actually, that’s not true. We both know exactly why I’m calling.” A hiccup breaks up your monologue before you continue. 

“Give me a shout whenever you have the chance, alright? Wanna hear your voice, babe. Good nigh–oh! Good job this season, by the way. Ok, good night, Lan.” You slur into the receiver. There are a million things you want to say, but you know you can’t. Not tonight.

Sleep takes you just as you end the message.

–

“Holy shit.” Fear seizes your chest as you pick up your burning hot phone. It’s nearly dead, but alive enough to show you just exactly what horrible decision you made last night. Lando Norris’ name in red is at the top of your recently called list. You called him last night, which is a horrible grievance in and of itself. What’s worse is that you have zero recollection of what you said. And you don’t trust drunk you to keep her cool. 

“Shit, fuck…shit, shit, shit!” You cry as you dig the heels of your hands into your aching eyes. Your mind races with the million and one things that you’ve wanted to say to Lando in the last months, ranking them from most to least pathetic. You can only hope that you were too drunk to make any sense and he’ll disregard the strange phone call from a number he doesn’t know. He must get dozens of phone calls a week, so there’s no chance that he’ll end up listening to your message. Right?

With a hangover made worse by your intense worrying, you crawl out of bed. You’re unsurprised to find you’re still dressed in your clothes from the day before. Not sparing a glance in the mirror, you strip bare and take a steaming hot shower. Unfortunately, the sting of the water does nothing to burn your spiraling thoughts away. 

As you get dressed, you glance at your phone laying face down on the bedside table. You’d plugged it in before getting in the shower, but hadn’t turned it all the way off. Something kept you from ignoring the damn thing. Curiosity killed the cat and it’s well on its way to killing you too. A twisted, borderline masochistic part of you hopes that he finds your message, no matter how humiliating it is. The truth is that you do miss him and maybe it takes a little bit of liquid courage (foolish courage) to do something about it. 

Questions go unanswered as you do everything to avoid opening your phone. Notifications are still silenced, so you would be none the wiser if it was ringing off the hook or completely bone dry. Instead, you fiddle with a coffee machine, do your makeup, iron out your schedule for the day, and send a few emails from your laptop (which you don’t have your number connected to for the sake of a nonexistent work-life balance).

By the time you’re done, a solid couple of hours have passed. It’s time that you check your phone. You’ve been avoiding the inevitable for too long. Plus, you’ve undoubtedly missed a message or ten about work-related happenings. 

Standing up, you push the desk chair you’ve been perched in back with your legs. A slow breath fills your lungs as you flex your hands by your sides and then shake them out. Nerves prickle down your neck, spilling into a shiver that runs the length of your spine. You’ve always been balls to the wall and nothing so trivial should force you to quiver in a corner with your proverbial tail between your legs. A string of affirmations flood your mind as you turn on your heel and trudge over to the bed. 

The affirmations break down into a waterfall of nervous swears as you take your phone in your hands, pulling it off the charger. It feels oddly delicate in your hands, as if you’re deactivating a bomb. Holding your breath, you slide the control center down and turn your notifications back on. When you return to your home screen, you’re bombarded with a constant stream of notifications from a variety of apps. Your mind goes blank as you skim over everything, looking for the green icon of a message or phone call. Everytime you see one, your heart jumps so far up your throat you think you might vomit. But everytime, it’s just a colleague or your manager or an acquaintance you’ve made while traveling.

Not a single message from Lando. Not a voicemail, not a missed call, not even a short text telling you (rightly) to fuck off. 

Your heart drops into your stomach and the nausea you’d warded off this morning comes back at full force. Managing expectations hadn’t worked. All your worrying had been for nothing. And you’d been a fool to hope. With everything you’ve done to him, effectively ghosting him until just now, months after you’d promised to see him, you’re in no position to be upset that he couldn’t be bothered to respond to you. Let alone the fact that he’s a world famous driver that probably doesn't blink twice at a number he doesn’t know before deleting and blocking it. 

You know you should be relieved that he didn’t listen to your message. Though, some undeniably masochistic part of you wished deeply that he had. Was it unfair of you to force him into the battle that you’ve been waging with yourself over the last year. One day you were willing to give everything up just to see him, then the next you assured yourself that you’d made the right decision by staying away. You were a loose cannon and you wouldn’t be able to live with yourself if you hurt one of the only people you cared so much about.

And maybe you did. Maybe he got your message and he chose to ignore it because he was in pain over you.

Or worse, he didn’t care to respond anymore.

Your mind reels and spins and a pain grows in your chest so severe you think you might have a heart attack. Tears prick at your eyes, blurring your vision of your stupid hotel room that holds everything too close. Memories suffocate you as you hold a phone filled with every notification you don’t want to see and lacking the one that you need.

After a few minutes of much needed cathartic sobbing, you stand up and begin cleaning up your room. Packing is what you’re best at. You’ve perfected it over the years. Everything you own could be stuffed into a few suitcases at a moment's notice. Even your apartment back in Monaco was sparsely decorated and home to only a few dishes and necessary furniture. Traveling from place to place for your job was no different. Rarely did you switch up what you packed into your favorite suitcase. Everything had its spot within. Everything knew where it was supposed to be and where you could find it. It was one of the only constant things in your life. No matter how much you needed constant change, you had this one consistency to keep you grounded. 

It’s worked for your entire life. But now, as you pack everything into its place, it seems slightly duller, more futile. 

Once everything is packed away and your room has been scoured corner to corner for anything you might have forgotten (which you know you hadn’t), you sit on your bed with your suitcase and stare absentmindedly at your laptop screen.

You wonder how many dozen times this exact scene has played out in your life. Something comes up that scares you or you can’t handle, you pack a bag, you sit at the edge of whatever you’d been sleeping on recently, and you wonder where exactly it is you plan on going next.

It’s always been exciting to you, adventurous and whimsical. But now it feels hollow and pathetic. You feel hollow and pathetic and all you want to do is go home.

But where’s home? You’ve made sure that you don’t have anywhere to call home because it’s always been exactly where your feet are. 

So, you decide to go to the next best place.

With a few swift clicks, you buy yourself a train ticket to Nice, Italy. You’re going back to Monaco.

Lando

With his headphones over his ears, he sits in the back of the jet while everyone else sleeps. For what seems like the thousandth time, he presses play on your message again. You’re drunk, he can tell. The voicemail is all slurred words and hiccups, but he can’t find it in himself to care. 

When it ends, he’s angry. Angry at you for calling out of blue because it wasn’t fair. Angry at himself for not picking up. Angry that he isn’t there to make sure you’re alright. Angry because he shouldn’t care this much.

But when he plays the message once more, his anger melts away. Relief floods in at hearing your voice for the first time in months.

He doesn’t know why he hasn’t responded yet, or why he didn’t immediately return your call. Instead, he’s decided to play it safe and protect himself for a little bit longer. His plan is already in motion, it has been since before he got on the plane back to Monaco.

He’s going to find you if it’s the last thing he does. He’s going to get real, concrete, honest answers out of you. The game is ending on his terms. 

-

taglist: @sarx164 @f1fantasys

[optiwashere]

So, it's time to meet Karlach, vamp-man, and see a few interesting scenes in the Asheera replay...

Upon first meeting the vampire-that-definitely-doesn't-look-like-a-fucking-vampire, Asheera is pretty much completely ready to boot him for attacking her. However, she remembers her oaths. It's her duty to take in those that need protection, and for her to prefer peace above all else whenever possible. That includes those that attack her if there's a good reason they did so, and especially if they've also got a worm stuck in their gourd.

Then, the party almost immediately meets the one and only.

The bone man. This face about sums up Asheera's reaction to him. She thinks it's a bit bizarre that what looks like a mummy followed them to camp. Surely he's not hiding something else up his weird, dusty sleeves.

Oh, and of course how could I forget! The party takes Wyll to go find this devil he's supposed to hunt. That goes about as expected. Wyll is easily persuaded (and like all of those dialogues have +5 or +10 approval, so he really doesn't want to kill her even though his situation demands it). I think to Asheera this shows that Wyll is exactly who he says he is: she values the high road, she's a paladin of Redemption after all. But this solidifies her trust in him as a real hero.

And when the party goes to deal with the fake paladins asking for Karlach's head... well, they get the jump on the paladin and absolutely, utterly annihilate him.

Not before Karlach gets this banger out though!

Asheera had a little nighttime visitor after this... and let's just say that it actually had the opposite effect to what the little pale boy thought it would. He lucked out when he got roped into a paladin's crew. It's weirdly a part where Asheera can understand him more now.

Now he's someone that needs her. That's a lot easier for her to understand, and especially when it's a monster that needs her help. He very clearly has a lot of weird bullshit simmering under the surface, but she can't quite articulate what it is yet.

Also, Karlach gets another banger line in this scene. This is probably the moment when Asheera starts to really like Karlach. In another world, Karlach...

But seriously, this is the exact ideal Asheera tries to live up to with her oaths.

So around here is where my fic canon diverges from the game. In "It Is the Wound She Gave Me" the druid grove is raided kinda in the middle of the night while the party is sleeping at the grove. A lot of folks are taken, including Shadowheart and Asheera. So now's the part where my slight canon divergence is going to have some pointed commentary for each scene!

Because whew did I forget how easy it is to get Shadowheart's approval up lmao. I wasn't even picking options that I know give the highest approval! There's a couple in there that I know she disapproved of, it's just so easy to get her past that first threshold if you break her out of the pod in the nautiloid.

I could go on and on about how that shows how under all the indoctrination she's constantly searching for an excuse to break out, but that's so... thematic. How under the surface, she just wants to find something that has purpose. How she thinks that's the cult she's been indoctrinated into, but how maybe some of those tenets she's memorized and regurgitated to appease her Mother Superior were just that — regurgitations. False beliefs she tells herself she wants to have so that everything she's endured is for some purpose.

I digress.

Given the canon divergence here between the game and my fics, getting to this date feels so fast. It's just a night between the two of them here, drinking and chatting, but I forgot how rapid-fire the romances could be lol. No wonder I elongated the fic timelines.

I think Asheera is grateful here to see what she hopes is the real Shadowheart. Not the one that's hiding behind a dozen masks, which is funny given that Shadowheart has yet to admit a certain divine proclivity at this point. Even so, it's nice. it's a crack in that shell that Asheera's beginning to see makes up almost everything about Shadowheart. Asheera might be a bit of an idealist at times and that can blind her to all sorts of cues she should have picked up on (for instance, turning her back on vampire boy when they first met) but she can read Shadowheart's reticence for what it is. It's a mixture of fear, uncertainty, and a tinge of embarrassment (you can even tadpole her to see that last one, but Asheera doesn't use the tadpoles after the first time it feels like "something was taken from her" earlier that day).

While chatting, Asheera shares a detail of her life that Shadowheart can relate to extremely well.

I do wish the game would let you explore that half-orc, biracial experience a bit more. I'm a biracial person that feels completely alien to both sides of my family tree, so this line hit me out of nowhere the first time I played. I insist that Asheera is not a self-insert, but sometimes the details line up incredibly well like this lol.

After goading Shadowheart to share a little bit about herself, the night ends with both women looking up at the stars. Asheera turns to Shadowheart and notices she's waiting for something.

What's a paladin to do but take hold and charge headlong into the fray?

[darantha]

How to Spot AI images (Hopefully)

So, I did see GailyNovelry's excellent post on this (Link here), but saw that there also were some confusion and they were using a environment image as their example, so I thought I'd do a breakdown that was more character centric.

The key thing with AI images is that the program does not know what it is making. And, arguably, they thrive on that we are currently conditioned to not really look at things for too long before we hit that engagement button and/or just scroll onwards to whatever next the algorithm feeds us.

It's hard to fight that urge, I know, but if you just pause and look, you'll soon start spotting things that just do not make sense, and I don't just mean that the pretty booby elven fighter is sporting seven fingers on one hand. Those are the obvious things. I'll try to cover the general sort of artefacts that tend to tip me off to the fact that a image is generated rather than actually hand-made by someone making informed design decisions as opposed to trust what amounts to RNG. I think this is important as there's those who do not tag their images as AI generated, and try to scam people with commissions.

And, as the saying goes... The devil is in the details.

To start with I picked this image from deviantuser CeiEllem. At first glance, it looks... very impressive. Sharp looking elf lady with killer hair. 10/10 wish I could rock that haircolour.

But, it is AI generated. Aside from the general tell that is this hyper rendered, near photorealistic style that AI images often have, there's a lot of details that tips it off to just not having been made by a human who actually made the decisions.

Since AI is just working off patterns and not actual decisions, things like hair is a immediate giveaway that you're looking at a AI image.

(Deviantart users: daralyth, DavidZarn and lunayokai)

In all these three images you can see just how hair whisps off into weird nonsense shapes or even meld into the background or clothing. Because, again, the AI doesn't know what its doing, just working with shapes. Similarly, background elements that just stop and start randomly is a dead giveaway, like the tail in the first image.

As I've said, details is the key to spotting these images, and another giveaway is the sheer density of details that is just noise.

This is from users Rigtorok7, and the details are so noisy, absolutely miniscule in scale, and hypersharp, yet have no actual design to them. Artists imply details all the time. We don't render out every single nook and crevice, and since we actually know what we want the viewer to look at, we'll pull back and simplify things so you don't want to look at the big chunk of very noisy hair ornament or necklace instead of the face of the character.

For comparison, this is how it looks when I, personally, indulge in doing 'overdetailing' of something (because I am forever weak for painting jewelry).

BUT I want to stress that the key here isn't that detailing equals AI generated. The key is the lack of design choices IN the details. There's a lot of artists out there, and someone painting out all those nooks and crannies in something doesn't mean they are a AI user. This painting by Leighton is super detailed but you see the intent with all the details. You have a focus with the people in the boat and secondary read of the figure in the door, where the details are a lot more implied and less sharp.

AI can't do that, because AI isn't making any decisions.

I couldn't find any good example once I went looking, but if you're into fantasy art: look for people just holding weird 'swords'.

AI is rapidly evolving, so who knows how much this'll help in 3 months, but for now, this is how I spot things.

But, in the end, the biggest giveaway that someone is using an AI generator is that they've filled up page after page on deviantart/artstation/wherever in the past like... six to nine months, and often swing between wildly different styles. If you're unsure, look up the source of a image. Another clue can be generic 'untitled' or just 'elf lady' sort of titles, since someone uploading 30 images a week isn't going to make unique titles for each image.

Also, commissioners. ... you should ALWAYS get a sketch and progress image from a artist that you hire. My art directors would have my head on a plate if I didn't send them a rough sketch and progress shot before finalising the image.

[pinkydoggy83]

SPOILERS FOR THE DOGMAN BOOKS! HIGHLY ENCOURAGE READING THEM! THEY ARE SO CHARMING!

With that out of the way, I just wanna rant because I picked up the series again. I wanted to read it before watching the upcoming movie. Think of this as a Dog Man appreciation post <3

I stopped reading the series at "Lord of the Fleas" in elementary, so I started my binge read there.

I honestly wish I had never stopped reading so soon because this book is already a banger. I just love the way Petey is slowly accepting Li'l Petey as his son. Even without realizing it, he has grown so attached to his son and cares so much about him. Like, come on, that's hecken sweet.

Not only that, but I wanna mention George and Harold (I also used to read Captain Underpants back in the day). Back then I thought it was cool that it established that they were now fifth graders and were creating Dog Man as their next story after Captain Underpants. Now that I'm older, I feel this fuzzy feeling watching these goofy fifth graders try to be "mature" and in turn try to add some mature themes into Dog Man.

I find that really sweet and amazing! You really don't often see fictional authors of a story grow up like this. The authors themselves are characters. It's one of the most special things about this franchise. I really do appreciate this detail a lot more now. You get to grow up with them…or, I suppose, see them grow up. And in turn you see how the series changes!

The next book has a lot about Petey and Li'l Petey, but I want to cover this Dog Man part before talking about the cats.

Yeah, it's pretty strange to rationally realize that Dog Man is just a normal dude's body with a dog head. So in that way, Dog Man is a bit of an outcast (I can definitely use this for my own character exploration of Dog Man in a hypothetical fanfic). But the words used against Dog Man is"misfit," which I found interesting. Obviously, they are not outcasting him for his looks (that's not the main focus) but how he can't behave like he's expected to.

Dog Man isn't the most perfect hero. He can be clumsy, and his canine instincts can get in the way. It wouldn't be such a problem for him as a dog; however, he's not just a dog. He's a dog with human responsibilities. He's been given expectation ever since becoming Dog Man.

Don't get me started with the whole angst of his owner dying because that's already so much...but you have to realize that he's taking over Knight's job. Which the idea is hecken mind-boggling!

The thing that makes Dog Man overcome these problems is his golden heart. In the end, Dog Man wants to do the right thing and save the day. That's just Dog Man for ya. That's what makes him so much like a dog and a man.

I'm really overreading this all, but I love this idea for Dog Man. It's kinda hard to put it into words, but I hope this all makes sense.

OOOH BOY! This scene actually made me stop and put my phone down.

The sweet, sincere words of Li'l Petey as it sinks into Petey while Grandpa is just breaking stuff in the background. Guys. I wasn't expecting this from Dog Man. I was so shocked reading this part. Like you can see how much Petey loves Li'l Petey but has such a hard time seeing the world like his son does. Which, by the way, is literally his clone, so it's like him arguing with his inner child. That single hug speaks so many words. Petey just wants to protect him.

I love their dynamic so much. You got this old, disheveled cat who became realistic about the world in a sad way, and this young, wide-eyed, optimistic cat who has so much to learn about... but at the same time can teach so much. That's beautiful, man. That's beautiful.

Anyways, there's so much to talk about Dog Man (that's just how fantastic the books are), but I think I'll just end the post here for now. I'm still busy catching up, so maybe I'll share again. I'm just so glad I came back to this series again <3

[imrllytootiredforthis]

Hiya, I was reading your "how txt would sound in bed" post and was wondering if you could do the same for Stray kids :)

Your writing is amazing, thank you so much💙✌️

starting off with channie, he's not too loud i don't think.

he is very breathy and kinda more on the throaty side. that's just when he's trying to be quiet though, when you're in his studio and the boys are in the next room or and your hand just feels so good moving up and down his sensitive cock, he feels like he's losing his mind.

he isn't too much louder when you're alone but i do feel like he would be so much more whiny and when he's not whining, he's moaning and he moans with his accent and dear lord.

lixie's moans would be so pretty, so deep and rich omg. just like his deep voice normally, his moans would be the exact same.

but also in my heart and soul i think that if he got into it (if you played with his nipples), his voice would get several octaves higher.

he'd keen and mewl a lot, getting so much more vocal when he's about to cum, whining high and cute.

he'll be going red when you point it out, fucking hell imagine him with sweater paws, getting fucked out of his mind but you saying his moans are the cute is the most embarrassing thing in this moment and he just covers his face with the sweater paws with a cute little 'stoooop'.

honestly, hyunjin took me a little while because i couldn't figure it out. after some contemplation though i've come to a conclusion,

he'd be kinda a middle range in volume, not too loud or too quiet, but that changes depending on the situation.

he really is a performer and that doesn't change in bed at all. even if he's getting railed so hard he's seeing stars he still keeps note of exactly what sets you off.

exactly which noises he makes seem to illicit that hungry look in your eye. he changes based on what you like, plays with you by using it against you. whether you like him quieter or louder (you better like him louder or i don't trust you) he notices and then it's just a game to see how long it is until he starts making them in a non-sexual way in your normal life, waiting for the moment you'll snap and fuck him against the kitchen counter.

now my sweet little brat lee know would grunt and groan a lot pretty quietly because he doesn't want to moan and let you know how good he feels.

when he gets really close though or falls into subspace, he just gets so completely overwhelmed with pleasure that he really can't care anymore, utterly debauched sounds falling from those puffy lips, all swollen from how much he's bitten them. super loud and super ruined, any and every curse under the sun gasped or whined out.

it's really adorable to see him going from somewhat composed, but clearly trying his best to stay that way and then just melt away with the pleasure, dissolving into a mess, a slave to the sensations that you give him<33

the cute little puppy seungmin, he pants a lot, whimpers a bit, akin to a puppy-

but he isn't that loud in general, he'll have to place his mouth right by your ear for you to hear his tiny mewls and whispers for more, honestly it's pretty perfect for when you're pegging him in mating press or missionary, and his face is buried into your neck

he'll happily make himself a bit louder just for you but only if you ask him nicely-and only if puppy gets a reward

my little perv jisung, babygirl's a shrieker for sureee, gasping, moaning, screaming, losing the very concept of composure, thoughts a jumbled mess just because of how good you make him feel.

gives zero fucks for anyone else around-i've said it a million times and i'll say it again, there is not a single ounce of concern for common decency when he moans out loudly from the vibrating plug up his ass in a public area.

dirty talker 10000%, learned it all from the absolutely sinful-*sigh*, just check his browser search history. baby's got a mouth on him and will not shut up unless you gag him.

he also definitely gets upset when you tell him that he has to be quiet, pouting and maybe even shedding a tear, asking why you don't wanna hear his noises.

binnie, he would sound so cuteee-

it really depends where you are because he's really shy and if you're anywhere that people would possibly walk in on you (gym locker room) it's gonna be heavy breathing and the tiniest n e e d i e s t little 'please' e v e r

and he isn't that loud to begin with but when you're in private, just the two of you, looking up at you with the sweetest cutest doe eyes in the world,

then he really feels like he can lose himself into all of the sensations, he loses it real quick tbh just of how sensitive he is and can hardly bring himself to be quiet.

and lastly, with innie, poor baby just gets so overwhelmed and so flustered, he'll try to cover his face and muffle his moans until you pull his hands away (or tie them over his head). even then though he won't let you really hear him, biting his lip or swallowing the moan crawling up his throat

he'll try to bury his face into your skin, trying to distract himself, take his mind off of how good he feels while marking you all up,

when he finally does let you hear him though-it really should be a crime that he didn't let you sooner, absolutely heavenly, absolutely sinful, wholly and utterly delectable. soft whimpers and full moans, ughhhh.

[hyuuukais]

⋆₊‧⁺˖⋆˚.⋆ ͙͘͡★ LOOK UP TO THE STARS

pairing ▪︎ han jisung x fem reader

synopsis ▪︎ sent out on a mission to a neighbouring QZ that's gone radio silent, y/n falls into the hands of a post-rebellion group after things go terribly wrong. giving up on rejoining her squad, she joins the group on a trek to find a missing member, the group leader's sister. what's supposed to be a not-so-simple trip out and back to their base becomes a one-way ticket to the end of everything they know.

warnings ▪︎ general, amputation, slight inappropriate touching on reader nearing end, yn and another character get into an argument where her insecurities are used against her harshly

MASTERLIST | PREVIOUS | NEXT

CHAPTER FIVE ▪︎ LET ME BE OKAY AGAIN (8.4k)

Infected fill the emergency wing, still in place with twitching bodies and emitting low groans and cries. A lot of them have their heads hanging down, swaying slightly with light jolts upward. They don't appear to be aware of their surroundings, not even sparing a glance at the door as it opens. Some lie in emergency beds, every single one full, their bodies sticking to the beds unmoving. Dark veins creep up their necks and arms, any limb visible to the eye; you assume they've been here since the outbreak, so far gone they're dormant. Sneaking though should be easy enough, that is, as long as you're able to maneuver through the narrow passages their bodies create.

"Everyone knows the drill. Stay low, stay quiet, and stick together." Chan looks everyone over. "Seungmin, you stay here. With your leg, you won't be able to move as fast."

"I'll be fine-"

"No, he's right," Felix cuts him off. "A wound that fresh could get infected easily. Maybe you can stay and help Jisung and Chaerry get in?"

Seungmin grumbles but agrees to stay behind, moving to an area with better cover in case soldiers or infected come stumbling around. Following Chan, you move in. Glass crunches underneath your feet and you pause, but no one is alerted. The infected closest to you makes a kind of whine, high-pitched and long. You keep going and its hand brushes against your shoulder lightly. Fingers slide over the back of your neck, but drop moments later, and you can breath again. You can't imagine how lonely it must be.

As you move past the beds, you can see better now how the infected are hooked up to IVs, syringes and bandages making a mess all over the floor. You notice some of the infected are doctors and nurses as well as patients, their blue scrubs torn and dirty from both caring for the hungry patients and from turning themselves. In front of you, Hyunjin slips on a long, plastic tube, barely catching himself before he tumbles directly into the legs of an infected and you can't breathe until he gains his balance. He looks back at you, your own eyes wide as he gives you a thumbs up.

A thumbs up? Really? You think. I will cut your hand off.

Continuing through the bodies, thoroughly disturbed by the scenery, you reach what looks like a waiting room. Similar to the beds, there are infected sitting very still, too still, in the chairs, every one of them occupied. With the eerie silence, it's hard to imagine how busy this hospital must have been during the outbreak. Behind the desk is a zombie dressed in scrubs so bloody, you can't tell what the original colour was intended to be, a large bite mark on her neck and left hip. Her hands are still resting on the keyboard in front of her, fingernails crusted with the same blood that decorates her body. You're starting to lose hope of ever finding these people.

Chan gestures you close. "Look up."

There's a sign above with an arrow; OPERATING ROOMS. You look around at the others, all of them either looking up too or nodding as you make eye contact. As you begin to crawl in that direction, something sharp pierces through your hand and you bite back a yelp. A long needle sticks out of the back of your hand, spurting blood from the end, the warm liquid dripping down your wrist from the hole.

"Breathe," Jeongin whispers. "In, out. In-" He pulls it from your hand and you wince. "-out. In, out."

You try to control your breathing as he takes his medical pouch out again, a sliver of his stomach revealed as he does so. Taking out a small bottle of alcohol, he continues to instruct you to breathe as he pours it over the wound. Squeezing your eyes shut, your mouth falls open in a gasp and you're barely able to regain your breath pattern. Jeongin wraps bandages around your hand, securing it in place tightly.

The rest of the group has already moved on past the doors you assume lead to the operating rooms, you and Jeongin last to join. All it takes is one misstep and Jeongin has fallen over, grabbing onto a crash cart with no luck. It comes down with him over his body and you're so focused on lifting it off of him, you don't notice the growing cries coming from your right. Chan pops his head through the door, rushing over when he sees the situation. He helps lift the cart, Jeongin letting out a small 'ah', as he shuffles out from underneath.

A zombie comes hurtling into the wall beside you and your neck cracks as your attention is stolen. It jumps at you, but the movement is sluggish and you're able to sidestep out of its way. Jeongin flips onto his back as the zombie is about to fall onto him, grabbing the gun from his side and releasing a shot.

"Fuck." You hear Chan whisper, not that there's reason to now.

The infected are awakening one by one, some moving toward you faster than others. A smaller one that barely comes up to your hip flings itself forward, latching onto your leg and, to your horror, starts to climb up your body. Jeongin takes another shot, piercing it in the temple and it falls to the ground. He scrambles backward pushing open the door Chan came out from.

"C'mon!" He's motioning aggressively to the open door.

"Chan!" You grab his arm, pulling him out of the path of a zombie just in time. "Let's get out of here!"

The three of you scramble through the door, but it swings to the other side allowing the zombies easy access to follow you. Most are still slow from their long slumber, however they're gaining speed rather quickly as you dash down the long hallway, barely pausing to test the open doors. Since Chan came back for you, he's no help in knowing which one the others are behind. The gap between you and the horde is getting smaller and smaller by the minute and soon enough, they're right on you again. Panic swells in your chest as you test the last door, the handle moving but still not opening. Something is keeping the door shut from the other side.

"No! No, please, no!" You cry out, both hands on the doorknob as you push your whole body weight against it again, again, again. "Fucking open!"

Finally, the door opens and you go tumbling through right as several infected reach out for you, eager for a bite. Chan and Jeongin are close behind, guns firing as you push the door closed. You don't register the other bodies moving to push some kind of metal cabinet in front of the door, too distracted by the blood rushing to your head. Someone grabs your arm and you jump, fist flying up to meet their head. They grab you by the wrist seconds before it can connect with their skull, hushing you and soothing you.

"It's just me! Y/n, it's just me." Hyunjin lets go of your wrist, letting it drop to your side limply. "Hey, hey, hey. You with us?"

You hold on to the hand that comes up to cup your face. There's banging on the door, but the cabinet in front is heavy enough to keep the infected out, for now. Hyunjin helps you up carefully.

"I'm here," You say, voice shaking. "I'm here."

Glancing behind Hyunjin, you can see a rusted metal sink lining the wall beside you, and through the window, you see a group of people huddled around a surgical table. "Is that them?"

"Yeah. How lucky are we that they were in the only unlocked room?" Hyunjin shakes his head. "Like you, we had to push through the barrier, but at least with you I recognized your screaming." He pauses, jaw clenching. "Who shot the gun?"

"Jeongin, but don't-" He's already turning to the kid, staring him down.

"Why?" He gets close to his face. "Why did you do that?"

"Sorry, I didn't want my face eaten," Jeongin replies. "Besides, they were already alerted before I shot. The difference is either I took that risk and stayed alive, or I didn't and I'd be lying dead in that hallway, Y/n and Chan probably dead with me."

"How about we don't argue and instead get them talking, yeah?" Chan pushes the two apart, angling his head to the window.

Three people stand around the table with a map and various medical supplies laid out in front of them. You watch them from behind the glass, two women and a man exchanging words and glances, even some laughs. How are they laughing with the danger so close to you? One of the women are in what appears to be a lab coat that's been ripped in half then sewn at the waist to reattach the bottom half, conserving the pockets. Her hair is cut short in a faded pink, the other woman with long, dark locks. Chan nudges your arm and you break your stare, taking one last look at the barred door before walking into the other room.

"We still need to get to the pharmacy though," The pink-haired woman says, her accent similar to Chan's. "The girl's infection will spread if we don't get ahold of those antibiotics and soon. It's the whole reason we're out here!"

"The whole reason we're out here is because you couldn't let some random girl we found in a ditch die because of your own guilt." The man bites. "Leaving her would have meant we'd never be in this mess. You'd still be safely hidden, dead to the world."

"Maybe I'm sick of being dead to the world!" She looks over at you, looks back at the man, looks back at you, and straightens her posture. "Sorry, bad introduction." She laughs awkwardly, sticking a gloved hand out. "Lily."

"Y/n...?" You accept her hand; from in here, you can't hear the banging as well. "What's up?"

"I take it you heard our transmission?" She asks and Chan nods. "Kind of a stupid idea, to be honest, but thanks for coming out to save our asses. Even though, you know, you're stuck with us now, hah. Listen, we still need to get to the pharmacy which is back downstairs, but we have no way through here. Any ideas?"

You take a look around the room, momentarily making eye contact with the other woman, but look away again quickly. Spotting something above you-

"What about the vents?" You suggest, pointing upward.

"The vents-" Hyunjin looks up. "Oh, it's actually kind of big."

"Lift me up." You grab onto his shoulders and he hoists you up, using the momentum to grab onto the vent and pull. Hyunjin lets go of you and you drop with the metal swinging down, his arms catching you as you land back on the ground. "This one goes up and to the left, got anything grippy to put on your hands? It's not a big distance upwards, but if your palms are sweaty you may need it."

Lily offers latex gloves, the only thing available. You move the table over, stepping onto the map of the hospital. A map of the hospital- you look back down, memorizing it as Lily gathers the medical supplies scattered around your feet in your peripheral vision. Standing on the table, you can just barely grip the edge of the inside vent with the tips of your fingers, bending your knees and launching yourself up. Slipping just a bit, you manage to grab on with one hand, swinging your body to grip it with both. Suddenly you're thankful for all the physical training you had to do at the QZ, using your upper body strength to pull yourself up and into the vent. After you shuffle forward on your hands and knees, you hear someone join you, looking back to see Hyunjin climbing in.

"Couldn't let anyone else have this view," He jokes, and you roll your eyes, suppressing a dumb smile.

"Shut up." You mumble.

When you reach another vent grate, you pause to squint through the spaces and see where you are, trying to keep the map in mind the best you can. At one point, you hear voices, looking down to see some familiar faces.

"Your Captain will hear about this, but I'm sure you know that." Officer Song sits behind a desk, contents pushed off to the side. "You'll be in big trouble messing up this badly."

"I already told you, I don't know how they got out. Lucky for me, my Captain trusts me." Minho says through gritted teeth, fists clenched on the arms of the chairs his hands rest on. "How many hours do we have to spend saying the same words different ways?"

Officer Song says nothing in response, but you can imagine the scowl on his face as he gets up and walks behind Minho, stopping a few steps away from the chair he’s in. He glances back, and Minho keeps his head forward like a good soldier.

“I know you two have history,” Officer Song says, looking back to where you assume the door is. “Admit to helping her now, and your punishment won’t be as severe.” Minho stays silent, and Officer Song sighs. “Suit yourself.”

“What’s the holdup?” Hyunjin taps your calf and you jolt.

“Nothing.” You whisper, watching Officer Song step out of view with the door shutting quietly behind him, and continue on.

There’s no point in lingering on a dead conversation. With the map in mind, you take a right turn into a dead end. Underneath is a dark hallway, but you should be close enough to the pharmacy now to sneak through without much risk of detection from soldiers and infected alike. Opening the grate, you drop down carefully, landing with a soft thud. Hyunjin is looking at you from above waiting for a signal to follow after you. You’ve dropped into a long hallway that appears to be unoccupied. It’s dark, no lanterns or candles to light the way like the wings the soldiers are in. Directly in front of you is a supply closet, patient rooms taking up the rest of that side of the hallway; behind you is a bench with a worn backpack sitting on it, an office door down a few feet away.

Lifting a hand over your head, you wave two fingers to let the others know it’s safe to continue. At the end of the corridor there’s a sign directing you to the pharmacy, and you’re there before you know it. It’s small, the glass partition protecting the medication behind the counter somehow still intact. The door beside the counter is locked and Chan takes the lead, pushing against it with his full body. It doesn’t budge. Straining your neck, you can just barely see a filing cabinet pushed down, the heavy drawers keeping the door shut.

“We could break the glass?” You suggest.

“And alert everyone in the vicinity?” Chan looks at you, shaking his head. “We need another way in.”

You cross your arms, eyebrows furrowing in thought. How else can you get in? There’s no other door that you can see, at least, not on this side and-

Glass breaks behind you and you startle, spinning to see Lily moving an arm away from her eyes, an axe in her other hand hovering over the counter. “What?” She brushes the glass away with the sleeve of her coat. “We’ll be in and out in no time, so let’s just hurry and get the stuff we need and leave. Whoever heard that won’t be here that quickly.”

"Where did she even get that...?" Felix mutters, probably to himself, but you agree.

She's climbing over the counter before you can blink and you join her quickly, rummaging through empty bottles to find what you need. Lily runs through a list of what she's looking for, but every bottle you find is either the wrong thing, or there's nothing left. You're starting to lose hope, the others joining you on the other side of the counter and taking the back end.

"I think I found it!" Jeongin calls out, jogging to the front with a few small containers.

"Yes! This is perfect. I'm surprised you found so much." Lily smiles, taking the bottles and slipping them into a pouch hanging on her belt. It reminds you of Han. What the fuck?

"We should go now," You clear your throat, nodding your head to the door. Now that you're on the other side, Chan and Felix work together to lift it up. It's not even all that heavy, but a drawer had gotten jammed under the door handle.

You're about to head down the hall that should lead back to where you came from, able to bypass the group of zombies, when you hear someone call out. "It came from here, sir!"

"Shit." You stick an arm back to halt movement. The voices get closer and the others hear them too now, starting to hurry down the other side of the hall when the beam of a flashlight shines down the connecting hall at the end.

"Where do we go?" Hyunjin whispers harshly. "We're essentially trapped!"

Down one end, there's god knows how many people looking for you, and on the other, you can only see the beams of two flashlights.

"This way would be better, there are fewer people," You tell Chan, grabbing onto his upper arm to get his attention. "Yes, I know, 'you don't know that for sure', but I'm willing to take that chance."

"Okay." Chan says; you find yourself a bit surprised he's taken your advice, again. "Everyone hear that? We go down that way and take them out quickly and quietly. Felix and Hyunjin, I want you both to lead since you're our best in close combat. Y/n, stay close behind with your gun drawn. You're lucky you scored that thing." He gives one last look down the hall where the voices get louder and louder. "This'll bring us back to the side of the operating rooms with that group of infected, so once we get through those doors, run."

As you approach the light, your breathing becomes rapid. The thought of potentially having to harm people you knew now that Minho is in the picture has your mind running a million different scenarios. Although he's outside, the thought that Seungmin may be having a similar stream of thoughts runs through your mind as well, wondering if he's thinking about his old friends in the squad, or if he's moved on enough to be able to do what may be necessary.

"Yeah, so then he fucking yanked me by the leg- oh what the hell? Fr-" Two guns are pointed at your group before you all have your weapons out, causing them to surrender immediately. You know they're thinking they'd rather deal with the consequences of letting a few strangers get away than get themselves killed. "Wait- Y/n?"

One shines her lights out of your eyes and you recognize her. "Yeji?"

"Oh my god, Y/n!" She shoves between Felix and Hyunjin, pulling you into a hug. You give Hyunjin a look to silently tell him it's okay and his fists unclench. "We thought you were dead, me and Yuna. Minho is here, have you seen him?" She looks behind you. "Who are these people?"

"We don't have time-" Lily tries to speak, but is interrupted by shouting down the hall; you've been spotted. Yeji is going to get in big shit if she's seen hugging you, so you push her away hard enough she lands on the ground.

"There! There they are!" A group of about six or seven come around the corner, all advancing on you.

With no time to think, you do as Chan said before and run, heart aching as you hear Yeji call out your name from behind. You don't look back, staring hard at the double doors you're approaching, seeing a blur of movement through one of the windows. You know it's the infected, opting to use the other door as you push through with a force you didn't know you had, the door hitting the wall with a crunch, and the handle getting stuck in the wall. Everything in you wants to turn around and see that everyone else has made it through, but you don't stop running until you hear a shout. Almost to the doors, but someone is in trouble.

One of Lily's crew, the man, has been jumped by an infected, and Chan has stopped to help him. For a moment, time freezes as you watch another infected attack Chan, pushing him onto the ground as the man beside him is getting bitten in the neck, blood flooding out of the wound. There's no chance to save him, no hope for him as his screams of agony are drowned out by the rumbling sounds of other infected and gunfire. You didn't even learn his name. Someone pushes you toward the door, urging you on; Lily.

"No! No, we can't leave him," You plead, seeing Chan struggle to keep the infected's teeth off of him in the back. "I'm not leaving him!"

"Y/n, go!" Hyunjin is beside Chan now, choking the zombie from behind, allowing Chan to roll to the side. Others are catching up and you bring out your gun, shooting any that come near the two. "I've got him- aah, fuck!"

Too focused, you can't see what's caused Hyunjin's cursing, moving closer to help Chan up. The infected drops from Hyunjin's arms and he grabs ahold of you and Chan's shoulders, pushing toward the door aggressively. Light burns your eyes as you exit, already spotting the others in the truck. Outside, Han has parked just a bit further down, closer to the fence he'd have come in by. You jump in the back and help the others in, noticing Jeongin's limp has returned as well as Chan stumbling more after the attack. Infected try to make their way on, but the soldiers who are after you unintentionally help you by shooting them off your truck as Han speeds away. It's bumpy and reckless, but you calm down with every kilometer between your people and that damn place.

"Hyunjin, what- oh, oh no." You look behind you at Felix's words to where he and Hyunjin are leaning against the back windows.

A decent-sized bitemark covers Hyunjin's left forearm, skin torn and bloody; the sight makes your eyes water, barely blinking back the pain as you look up and meet his eyes. As your own travel back up his body to his face, you can see the way he's breathing too heavily, too quickly. You see the way his eyes mimic yours, tears threatening to spill over as he tears them away from the wound and to you. His mouths moves like he wants to say something, but soon his attention is turned to Jeongin undoing his belt at the speed of light.

"Switch sides with me Lix," He orders the older man.

"What are you-" Hyunjin is cut off by the two stumbling over his long legs.

"Hold him back." Jeongin says, just loud enough for Felix, but you catch it too. "Hyunjin don't fight this, please, it'll only make it worse. Y/n?" He nods you over and you obey. "Can you hold this arm out straight? I can't have him moving it."

It finally sets in what's happening, for both you and Hyunjin.

"Jeongin don't fucking do this." Hyunjin tries to move away, but Felix's grip is strong. "Don't do this! Chan?" You almost forgot he was back there with you, but he's in and out of consciousness himself, three large, deep scratches running across his abdomen. "Chan, please, you know they can't do this. You can't do this, I'm begging you. God, I'd rather you let me die-"

"Don't say that." You snap and his attention turns to you again. The look on his face is enough to break your heart.

"Y/n, can I have your knife?" You nod, passing the knife strapped to your leg over to Jeongin. He tightens his belt high on Hyunjin's arm, prepping him as well as he can in the back of a moving truck.

"Y/n, please," Hyunjin begs; you're his last hope. "Stop this. I can't- I can't- fuck! If you love me, if you really love me, you won't let them do this. Just take the blade and make it quick, don't let me suffer. Don't let me turn into one of them."

His words turn hysterical and you watch as he tries to back away, blocked by Felix behind him. Hyunjin's legs kick up in an attempt to get away and the grip you have on his arm grows tighter. You know you're doing this because you care about him, because you want him to survive, and you know he can't see it like that right now. Jeongin presses the blade to his skin, lifts it up, then crashes down with precise force. It only goes halfway and Hyunjin cries out, head rolling back with his eyes squeezed shut.

"Stop... please, stop!" He sobs into Felix, too weak to fight back now as Jeongin goes in for another slice.

This time the limb comes off, becoming limp by his side. Jeongin is quick to bring out a lighter from his medical pouch, cauterizing the end of his arm the best he can at the moment. It's rough work, but it'll have to do. Hyunjin stares in horror as Jeongin tosses the arm over the side of the truck, focused on wrapping his arm and getting to Chan next.

"Hyunjin," You finally speak, scared of his reaction.

Looking up at you, but he's not looking at you. His eyes are unfocused and his mouth hangs open slightly, wet trails down his cheeks dripping down his neck. Sweat shines above his brow, above his mouth. Felix climbs out from behind him, smoothing his hair out of his face, but Hyunjin continues to stare blankly ahead. You can hear Jeongin calling out for Felix, something about getting bleeding under control, but your attention is fully on the man in front of you. He trusted you, and in his eyes? You betrayed him.

"Hyunjin... speak to me," You crawl next to him, holding his face in your hands and turning him to look at you. When your eyes finally meet, his are cold and unforgiving.

"How could you do that?" His voice breaks. "How could you let them do that?"

"It was for the best-" Hyunjin scoffs.

"You should have let me die-"

"No, I already said no. None of us are leaving you behind." Anger builds within you, creeping into your chest and up your throat, hot and wet. "Despite whatever you think."

You can feel the truck slowly coming to a stop; you didn't even realize you were out of the city. Han parked up a long driveway leading to a country home, two stories high with trees lining the front of the yard, hidden from the street. Truck doors open and close, but you're still focused on the man in front of you until someone is trying to tug him away.

"Shit, what happened?" Han nearly shouts as he rounds the truck, eyes darting between his friends. "Someone answer me! What happened in there? Why is he missing and arm and why is Chan... Chan?"

The truck dips under his weight as he stumbles on, panic radiating off him in waves as he grips Chan's shoulders, his face, his arms, wherever he can reach. You see now they've stripped him off his shirt to get to the wound the infected left behind, his shallow breaths clear in the golden sunlight. His eyes are half closed and he tries to speak, but it comes out too quiet; he's lost a lot of blood, it pools around his legs and seeps through the bandages Jeongin and Felix applied.

"Is he gonna make it?" Your voice rings out through the silence that's fallen over the group, wincing when no one answers.

With an arm under his left side, Felix joins Han in taking his right, and they haul Chan out of the truck, bringing him to the porch of the house and setting him down on an old rocking chair. It's only now that you spot Lily and the other girl heading the opposite direction as everyone joins the other three, speed walking down the driveway without looking back. Although you know you should join the others, you jog up to Lily instead. She's the whole reason you're out there, the reason Chan and Hyunjin barely made it out alive. Still no info about Chan's sister, you need to at least try to find something out before they're gone for good.

"You're leaving? With everything that just happened, you're leaving?" You can't help the venom in your voice. "They could have died, and you're leaving? We came out there to help you! You can't even give us the information we want? Who do you think you are?"

The girl with the dark hair turns around mid step, walking backwards and somehow still keeping pace with Lily. "We called for a rescue, not to give up precious info or resources we have. Who do you think you are, demanding that from us when you don't even know us?"

"Lia, please," Lily stops walking, looking at you with something like guilt in her eyes. "What do you want to know?"

"Are you serious?" 'Lia' scoffs. "Either you've turned dumb or don't care anymore-"

"Can you stop it?" Lily asks sharply. "I'm trying to speak. Y/n, listen, I can't say much because I don't want to put everyone else in danger, but there's a town by the coast with a large bunker. You can find us there, okay? You can find the girl there. Take care of your people."

With an awkward wave, she backs away and leaves you staring as they fade into the horizon. Obviously, you can't follow them, you can't leave your people... when did they become your people? Turning around, you see that Hyunjin is still sitting in the back of the vehicle with Han crouched next to him. Admittedly, it's a strange sight seeing them not at each others throats, but to be fair Hyunjin did just get his arm cut off, so. Han helps him up and out of the truck, eyes coming up once, twice, meeting yours as you approach and you freeze. Hyunjin looks at him, questions why they've stopped, follows his gaze to you. The air turns cold around you. All you want is to run up to him, help him, comfort him, but the look on his face makes you shrink away. Before you can even think about saying anything to him, he whispers something in Han's ear and they head toward the house without a second glance.

-

Later that night once everyone is more or less settled in, you hear Seungmin shouting from downstairs.

You'd been with Chan for the better part of the evening, sitting by his side as he sleeps. Jeongin has already had to redress his bandages once since arriving and you're worried about him making it through the night, the amount of blood leaving his body extremely concerning. Each of you have taken on the role of looking after him, making sure his heart is still beating and his lungs are still breathing. In the case of any emergency, you're to grab the walkie-talkie you stole from the soldiers that now lies on a white, peeling nightstand and inform Jeongin or Felix, whoever has the other end at that moment. You know right now it's Felix, he'd called up to see how you were doing not too long before the sudden disruption.

"What's he going on about?" You ask into the device. "He knows I'm on Chan duty right now, doesn't he?"

It takes a minute for Felix to reply. "Yeah, hold on. I'll take over for you in a minute cause you might wanna take a look at this. You're gonna love it."

This concerns you ever so slightly. What could be so important, or just plain cool apparently, that you need to see it so soon? What do you like that could give Seungmin this reaction? He knows you like to collect charms you come across, something you might find on a necklace, but you know that if he found one he'd wait to give it to you later. Or he'd come in quietly and give it to you now, so what else? Knives? You've retrieved yours from the truck, but they are getting a bit dull now. Really any kind of blade would pique your interest, but in an old country home like this? The only evidence of people having lived here were some worn cookbooks knocked onto the kitchen floor and a few personalized crochet blankets on each bed in the house. You're certain this belonged to an elderly couple, so a hidden weapons stash seems unlikely.

"That leaves..." You think for a moment. "Pencils and paper, a guitar, photos of animals in hats... wow, I really didn't get out much in the QZ, huh?"

You laugh at your little joke and lack of real, actual interests. Growing up mostly in the quarantine zone had limited what you could discover, leaving you to mostly occupy yourself with studying, working out, or drawing. Minho had started to bring you little trinkets once he started venturing out, things he thought you might like, that's where the charm thing had started. He always had one of a paw print around his neck and you always wondered where it had came from, asking him all the time, but he never answered, always brushing it off. One day you had asked him if he'd ever be able to help you make your own, even if you didn't know how to, and two days later he came home with one he'd found while clearing out a town on a nearby outpost. Your fingers come up to the chain around your neck, finding the small star shaped piece of silver.

"Y/n?" Felix brings you out of your thoughts. "He's in the basement."

"God, what did he find down there?" You ask no one in particular, rubbing your forehead. "Thanks Lix."

You freeze as you pass him, never having used that nickname with him before. In face, you haven't used a nickname with anyone, not including Han. Even Chaeryeong you only called Chaeryeong, never Chae or Chaerry, like most the others do.

"Lix... I like that." You can hear the smile in his voice and hear the chair creak as he sits down, your nerves calming and allowing you to rush down the stairs to see what all the fuss is about.

"What is seriously so much more important than watching over a dying friend- woah." The words die in your mouth.

So, turns out secret weapons stash wasn't too far off. Seungmin is holding what looks like a long, gleaming machete in one hand, and a baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire in the other. He looks-

"Deadly." You exclaim, running your hands over the blade as he hands it over. "Holy fucking shit dude."

"Technically not as important as watching over a dying friend, but I couldn't wait to show you," Seungmin lets out a small smile, something for only you to see, and you can't help but return it.

"Have I ever told you you're my favourite?" You lean the machete against the stairs and throw your arms around his neck seconds later. "Cause you are! You're my favourite."

"Favourite what?"

"Favourite menace." You laugh as he shoves you off. "My favourite pain in the ass."

"Isn't that Han?" You nearly smack him.

"Shut up right now." Ignoring his continued teasing, you look around the rest of the basement. "Mostly junk?"

The dirt floor doesn't stretch far, just big enough for a small family to take shelter in case of emergencies. In one corner, there's an old freezer held open by a broken cane, and inside must be where Seungmin found your new weapons. There's a few more baseball bats with different modifications, spikes, nails, more barbed wire. As cool as they are, you like to stick to something a little... sharper, more precise? Underneath are a couple of dull knives, so you opt to keep the ones already sheathed on your body.

"Anyone else know about this?" You ask, turning back around to see Seungmin admiring his new bat. He doesn't look up when he answers, playing with the weight and feel of it in his hand.

"Just Felix. I was going to tell Han and Chaeryeong when I got back upstairs since the other freezer-" other freezer? You look at the opposite wall and see it, "-over there has some stuff too. Not much to look at, just a couple of handguns and mods they might be able to attach to their sniper rifles."

Nodding, you walk over and take a peek in- not much use to you. "And Hyunjin?"

"He's resting, so someone can tell him when he's up," Seungmin shrugs. "Something happen between you?"

"Nothing," You say, a little too quick.

"Good," He sighs. "I didn't want to know anyway."

-

You've returned to your spot next to Chan, helping him sit up when he wakes and spoon-feeding him soup Chaeryeong found in a cabinet on the main floor despite his protests.

"I can feed myself," He grunts, moving his head away from the utensil.

"You can't even stand, so shut it and eat." Normally, you would never had dreamed of speaking to Chan like that, but at that point he was getting on your nerves a bit with all his refusals. After that, you managed to get into a light back and forth banter, relaxing with every comment.

"Say ahhhh," You smirk, waving the spoon in front of his mouth.

"Fuck off."

"No, ahhhh," You say. "Did you hit your head too?"

Everything was going surprisingly smoothly considering what happened just hours before. The bleeding stopped for the most part and Jeongin was able to find enough thread in a basket on the main level to sew up Chan's wounds properly, and he only passed out once! When he came to, you wiped his face down with a cloth dipped in lukewarm rain water from outside, talking him down from the sudden panic he woke with. You reassured him that the others were fine, even Hyunjin, who was almost a little too fine. Up until now, you still haven't talked to him, not since seeing the look on his face when he exited the truck with Han.

"He'll come around eventually," Chan sighed. His face is even paler in the moonlight, but you hope getting some food into him will help him regain strength quicker. "He's just... stubborn."

"Tell me about it," You grumble. "Who in their right mind would rather die than cut the problem off? If you're able to be saved, wouldn't you want to be?"

"In this world, I think there are a lot of reasons to not want to be saved," Chan says grimly. "Chaeryeong is coming up here soon, yeah?" You nod. "So, why don't you go talk to him? Clear the air, or at least try to?"

"I'll try..." You agree reluctantly. "Not that it'll go well."

"You don't know that." Chan says softly.

But you do. If you know anything about Hyunjin, it's that he'll draw this out as long as possible. Once, you were witness to Hyunjin refusing to talk to Jeongin for three weeks after he accidentally tore a large hole in the back of his favourite jacket. This will not end how Chan thinks- or hopes- it will.

Careful not to be too loud, you open the door to Hyunjin's room and peer inside only to find him missing. Panic briefly swells in your chest until you hear a familiar laugh coming from downstairs, a smile instinctively forming on your face before you remember the reason you need to see him. The stairs creak underfoot, groaning under your weight and for a moment you grip the railing harder, scared you'll fall through the old, most likely rotting, wood. Around the corner, you see Hyunjin sitting in the middle of the old couch, quilt thrown over is shoulders. His face is lit up by dim candle light, eyes closed as he laughs harder at something Felix says to him. The first to notice you is Jeongin, excusing himself to check on Chan despite the walkie-talkie sitting idly on the table, not even a crackle to be heard. At this, Han looks up and sees you standing in the doorway, offering a weak smile. You feel sick.

"Hyunjin, can we talk?"

"I don't know. If I say no, will you cut off another limb?" He jokes harshly, observing your reaction, but you offer him nothing. "Speak now."

"Don't talk to her like that-" Han sits up straighter, giving Hyunjin a look, but he's cut off.

"Stay out of this," Hyunjin side-eyes Han.

"I didn't even do the cutting-" You start.

"No, but you let it happen." He sits up, blanket falling down around his waist. "You offered the knife when I begged you to stop. I am nothing without this arm. How long until Chan decides to ditch me on the side of the road when he realizes I'm of no use to him? What then? Did you even think of the consequences? No, because you never do."

"What's that supposed to mean?" You ask, voice hoarse.

"You never fucking think! The gas station, you remember that? You could have gotten yourself killed because you don't use your brain, if you have one." His words sting, but you keep listening, internalizing every last bit of venom. "It's a wonder you've made it this far. Hell, even back when we first found you- if you didn't hesitate to run, you would have been back with your squad right now living that cushy life you dream of."

"You think I liked being there?" Your own anger is rising. "And you think I liked witnessing your arm getting amputated? You think I purposefully put myself in these stupid, harmful situations for the fun of it?"

"It sure seems that way to me."

Beside him, Felix shifts uncomfortably. "Maybe we shouldn't-"

"We're all thinking it Felix, you said it yourself. I'm just voicing it."

"Felix?" Eyes stinging, throat burning; you can barely address the boy in front of you.

"That's not what I said," Felix sighs. "Not... exactly. Only that I had doubts about trusting you and your ability to keep up in a fight. But that was before I got to know you! Obviously, I don't feel the same now!"

Part of you believes him, but a much larger, self-loathing part of you overwhelms you with thoughts of inadequacy.

"C'mon," Hyunjin scoffs. "You told me no less than twenty minutes ago you were afraid she'd get us all killed."

"What?" You can barely breathe.

"No, I was joking. Hyunjin don't-"

"Don't what? Y/n, do you want to hear what we all think of you?" Now he stands, pointing a finger at your chest when he comes close to you, breath on your face warm and suffocating. "Felix here thinks you're the weakest link, other than himself. Han hates you, but you already know that. Jeongin is sick of having to patch you up after yet another careless move. Chaeryeong... well, she might be the only one to tolerate you. Seungmin wishes he'd left you under that piece of wall all those months ago, and Chan?" Hyunjin whispers in your ear. "He wishes he never picked up another stray, at least, not one as useless as you. Face it, you're a liability."

One tear escapes as you take a shaky breath in, out, in, out. All of your fears and doubts about your place in the group have been laid in front of you by someone who was supposed to care about you, someone you confided in with those very same thoughts. He knew right where to dig, where the chink in your armor is. Your own blade is stuck between your ribs twisted by his words, leaving you with a bitter taste in your mouth.

"Then I'll leave." You whisper, right as Seungmin joins the four of you. Up until now he'd still been in the basement, but must have heard the commotion. You can hear the crackling of the walkie-talkie, Chan on the other end asking what's going on, but you just pick up your bag, long abandoned by the front door, and head outside.

"Y/n!" Seungmin runs in front of you, blocking your way. "What are you doing?"

"Leaving." You move forward, but he keeps blocking you.

"Did you hit your head or something?" Seungmin frowns. "You're not thinking rationally-"

"So what? So what if I'm 'not thinking rationally'?" You shout, voice wet with anger. "Why should I care what you think, or any of the others, when none of you have the heart to tell me how much of a fuckup you think I am? I'm sorry for getting my leg crushed, sorry for forcing you to stay by my side. I'm sorry for being the reason Hyunjin's arm is laying on the side of the road in the middle of that fucking city, and I'm sorry for not living up to everyone's expectations!" You push him away from you. "We both know I've never been the best at this. It's either I'm too soft, I'm too weak, no matter how hard I work. Clearly, I'm only bringing the group down, so you know what?" You look him directly in the eye, unable to read the look on his face. "I'm doing everyone a favour and leaving, probably off to get myself killed. Not that any of you would care enough to, but do not think about following me. They're your family now. All I've got is me."

Storming off down the long driveway, you consider taking the truck as hot tears run down your face against your will. With your luck, you'll crash the car because you can't see, and no matter how angry you are, you know how important it is for Chan to find his sister. May as well stop screwing them over and let them keep the truck, they'll get there faster. Maybe this whole thing will be worth something in the end, but all you want to do right now is-

"Fuck!" You scream once you're far enough from the house, kicking up some earth with your toe.

All you want is to knock on Minho's door and ask to stay with him tonight; I had another nightmare- That's okay kitten, you can sleep here tonight, I won't tell anyone. You want his warm arms around you and him telling you it'll all be okay. As long as you have him, it'll all be okay. He's your big brother, he'll never let anything hurt you; it'll all be okay. But it isn't okay, nothing's okay right now. Everything is hurting you and nothing is okay. Your legs collapse under you and you fall hard, scraping your hands as you try to catch yourself on the gravel road. A van passes you as you heave, slowing down and pulling over a few metres ahead. Someone is walking toward you, but all you see is the ground coming closer as you lie your head down and sob.

"What's going on, little lady?" A hand touches the small of your back, the other holding your shoulder in an attempt to help you up. "Everyone leave you? Or you left them?"

When you look up, you start to recognize the man in front of you through your blurry vision and try to back away. "Get away from me."

"Now, why would I do that?" The grip on your shoulder is painful now, forcing you up. "You'd run off."

With his hand now fisted in your hair, he starts pulling you in the direction of his van. You fight him, thrashing and shouting before he throws you to the ground with a kick to the stomach for good measure. Coughing, you try to get up which earns you another kick, this time to the back, and his foot stays, pinning you against the ground.

"I would stop if I were you-"

"Dude, how hard is it to round up one little girl?" Another man appears in your vision, someone else by his side.

He pushes the other guy off you with a light shove, picking you up by the underarms. You haven't seen this guy, he wasn't at the gas station and neither was the woman at his side.

"Hold her, I want to check her over." He passes you off to the guy behind you and he holds you up by the waist. "She's out here all alone, could be no good."

"Even if she's bit, we can still bring her back you know," The woman complains.

"Not the same." His hands travel up your sides, lifting your shirt above your comfort level as he goes and says nothing.

Next, he roughly takes your jacket off and flips you over in the other man's arms, bracing yourself with two hands against his chest. With your jacket discarded on the side of the road, he lifts your shirt again and trails two fingers over your spine, making you shiver at the contact. You feel his hands move down your body and cringe at the feeling of his touch. Thighs and calves examined, he hums in approval. At this point your body is feeling numb all over, the foreign touch overstimulating you and making your brain fuzzy. Breathing is taking more effort than it should and you go limp in the man holding you's arms when you can no longer hold yourself up. You barely register the gunshot until you're suddenly on the ground over top a dead body.

"Get him." You don't see where the man is pointing to, but you see the woman run out with a gun drawn.

She's quick, back in no time holding a man by his collar, hands bound behind his back and a new sniper rifle over her shoulder. You realize who you're staring at slowly.

"Han...?" You whimper.

"Shh, it's okay." He manages to wiggle free of the woman, dropping down next to you. "If they lay another hand on you-"

With a grunt, he's hitting the ground and a trickle of blood is spouting from a freshly split eyebrow.

"Help me get them both in the van, now."

---

notes ▪︎ sooo some stuff happened 🫣 what do u think will happen next !!

─── taglist : @chaeryred @toplinelix @channie-143 @staysinbloom @manuosorioh @hanjisunglover @xxstrayland @puppyminnnie @hanjsquokka @kpopsstuffs @ot8girlfie @quokkabite @linoslawayslinos @reapers-lover @hannieslittlerockstar @kiki0113 @nishiriks @nxtt2-u @moonlightjam @hannieslovebot

green means i can't tag you

[luimagines]

Congrats on your 2 year anniversary! As for a request, I really liked your dragon warriors post, could you do one about dragon time? Thanks you!

YES AND YES I WILL I WILL!!!!

Masterlist

Content under the cut!

You screamed and cowered in fear as the monsters closed in on you. You had ran away form the group when they were ambushed, not wanting to be caught up on the crossfire.

You regret your decision now.

You curl up into a ball and cover your head as they approach you.

You would have thought things like this would have only been in fairytales- but you were wrong. It's not like you wanted your life to end here though. Why hadn't you gone in a different direction!?

Suddenly, a thunderous roar shakes the very branches from the trees around you- one even falls over you, blocking your view of the no doubt monstrously huge dragon that crushes the monsters underneath its feet as it lands on them. The branch blocks a lot of the view you had but it's not as if you wish to see what was about to happen.

You look away, not wanting to see the carnage the dragon decimates onto those that wanted to harm you.

It doesn't last long.

Time calls for your name, a growl on his lips as he rushes for you, tearing the tree branch off of you with a single arm.

You look up and gasp- seeing him in his half dragon form. There's monster blood on his pants and sleeves but you elect to ignore it. His eyes are sharp and his fangs are bared in a snarl.

He drops to his knees and put his hands on your shoulders. "Are you hurt?"

You shudder. His voice sounds deeper in this form. You had forgotten about that. "I'm... I'm alright... thank you."

The faint smell of pine and musk wafts up to your nose before it's tinted with a stale after scent. It's... a bit off putting. But calming. Time seems to relax a little more, his tail swinging behind him. "Good.... Good... I was worried when you screamed."

"Sorry." You reply out of habit. "I panicked."

Time helps you stand very quickly wrapping his tail around you before you could get very far. "The monsters aren't fully disposed of yet. Stay close."

And stay close you will. It's not like you're strong enough to fight against the pure muscle of his tail to begin with.

Without warning, he picks you up and hoists you onto his back, settling you between his wings before he starts flying. You flinch, holding on tightly for dear life. "Time! A little warning!!"

"Sorry, my dear." He holds you close regardless. "I didn't want to take any chances."

You make the mistake of looking down as he speaks. Not only are you higher than you would have thought- but you see a multitude of monsters swarm the very clearing that Time took off from.

You hug Time tighter and wait until he lands.

He puts you down gently and kisses your forehead. "I'll be back. Stay here, stay low, stay quiet. This'll be over soon."

He growls again, and shifts into his full form in front of you. You'll never get over just how huge he really is- not will ever imagine what it would be like to have those club-like branches sticking out of his back and tail. He looks as if he would have been a woodland creature had his scales been less akin to marble.

He is breathtaking- but terrifying to be next to.

You gulp and sink to the ground, letting the tall grass hide you from the opposing forces against your group.

There are many sounds of monstrous battle - as the boys fight in their dragon forms as well- you know that the monsters don't stand a chance against them. They scream and wail and rage on- with their respective magics ringing through the air around you.

It's thundering in your ribcage- you can't ignore the way you gasp for breath despite your lack of physical activity.

You better start believing in fairytales.

You're in one.

[alicerosejensen]

Find me pt.1

Warning: kidnapping, mention of blood, two-person narrative (Leon v reader), castle with bioweapons, angst, trauma, dark, forced relationships, hints of sexual violence.

Summary: half a year. That’s exactly how long it took Leon to get on your trail and try to find you. He is ready to do anything to get you back, but hope fades every day.

A/N: I'll probably still post this when I get inspired. The warnings will vary depending on each chapter. You can think of this story as a big reference to another Capcom game.

I apologize for any mistakes because English is not my native language.

Feedback is welcome, but no insults please.

Prologue here.

His eyes closed by themselves from lack of sleep when Leon looked at the received data, which for him is now equal to the treasure, or more precisely, the key to the treasure is to you. Ingrid said that this could turn out to be a false trail, the threads that he had been looking for for so long turned out to be either a waste of time, or led to a dead end stopping the whole thing. And only now, six months later, a single clue that appeared literally out of nowhere makes you drop everything and try to find you.

Hannigan looks at the audio file trying to determine whether it is a fake or not. She runs it through a lot of programs trying to make sure that it's not gluing while Leon is standing next to her, clutching the back of the chair she was sitting at.

"Tell me this is a real recording," the tone of his voice was almost pleading and at the same time scared as he heard your recorded crying over and over again.

"Yeah." Hannigan's hesitant voice made Leon lower his head and look at the woman who continued to click her fingers on the keyboard.

"Hannigan?"

"We don't know when this recording was made…Maybe it's a trap. Another false trail that will lead nowhere. We've checked everything Leon! We found a car with DNA traces, but the trail ended. There were no witnesses, no recordings from the cameras, it was as if she had fallen through the ground."

Leon froze. The arguments were weighty, but what does he have besides this record?

"What's the point of being trapped after six months?" He sees Ingrid biting her lip trying to squeeze out as much data as possible. "If this was a kidnapping for ransom or luring me out, they would immediately get in touch, but nothing. So it wasn't me or the money that was needed, but my wife."

"However, we have not been able to find a motive. I checked all the documents, passport, parents, records from the hospital where y/n was born - there is nothing that could give us a tip. It's all clear."

"Or we don't see something," he sighed.

Leon was sure that something was missing. But it was not on the surface, but somewhere in the depths, which is not so easy to get to. When he was informed about the shots in his house and found a mess with a syringe lying on the floor, he really had hope that he would be contacted very soon. He waited a week, then a second without leaving the search, because with the current level of technology it is impossible to completely cover up all traces so that they lead nowhere, and in the end Ingrid quickly found a car with traces of your hair and drops of blood on the back seat, but that was it. You became one of those who mysteriously went missing.

But no one asked for money, no one sent any extortionate emails or calls. At one point, Hannigan even put forward the theory that you could have initiated your abduction yourself, but he refused to believe it. Why would you leave like that if you could just break up with him, even though on the day you left, Leon was ready to swear that everything was fine between you.

So it just didn't make sense.

Leon speaks softly. He is pacing the room, waiting for additional information, at least from where this recording was sent to him. The sound of the keys echoes in his head and Leon rubs his face tiredly, stopping his gaze at your photo.

"There was a drug in the syringe, there was her blood on the needle and on the floor, in total two shots were fired from the Matilda, one into the closet and the other into the ceiling... traces of a struggle..." Leon quietly wondered out loud, trying to understand what he could have missed, but it seems more there was nothing left that he could grab onto.

"Leon?" Ingrid suddenly called and Leon was next to her in one sharp movement. “I think I found it!”

A map and tracked coordinates appeared on the screen, presumably from the place where the recording with your request for help was sent.

"This..."

“Not low beam”

Leon twitched anxiously, seeing the designated forest area, looking meaningfully at Hannigan, who rested her chin on her hand, not believing what she found. At one time, intelligence discovered Ashley in a godforsaken Spanish village, but she was kidnapped with the aim of infecting her with a plaga and sending her to Graham, and what Leon saw on the map defied any logic. How did you end up in a mountain range in another country?

“This is Leon’s mistake. There is nothing there, mountains and forest, another mistake, someone made a cruel joke.”

“Not if there is any hint of civilization there.”

It was an unnecessary risk. Hannigan is still trying to find at least some information about the nearest village in these places. On the one hand, it’s an ideal place to hide a person, but on the other hand, there are no guarantees that you will end up there and that Leon won’t go to hell in a meaningless search. Suddenly you have been dead for a long time, although Ingrid’s female intuition tells her that until he finds your body or at least clear evidence of your death, Leon will continue to sniff out the trail of his beloved, like a devoted bloodhound, even if there are no traces left.

You are not the daughter of the president, only the forces of Leon and Hannigan are sent to search for you, the latter helps him only out of the kindness of her heart, and no one will send reconnaissance to find at least something that indicates that you were even really in this place. But Leon worked as an agent for too long, he saw the underside of this world and in theory assumed that there might be a house or village in which you are being kept for some unknown reason, but even if it’s all a trap and you are bait, then Leon is ready to go there.

"Nothing, Leon," Hannigan's annoyed voice must cut off hope. He himself sees no signs of human life on the screen. “No one even reports missing people in populated areas”

“I don’t have anything else anyway, right?” he answers confidently, taking his phone to get the exact coordinates “The fact that there is nothing on the map and no one reported missing tourists means nothing. There are places that someone hides very well.”

“This is your personal mission… I won't be able to help you there. I can book tickets, find someone to help with the weapons, but no outside support. You'll be on your own there.” Ingrid drawled sadly, hoping that he would come to his senses or at least weigh everything again before taking an unjustified risk, "You don't know what awaits you there, perhaps there is nothing there except trees, wild animals and mountains. Let's check it out again?!"

"For six months!" he exclaimed, "I've been trying for six months as a bloodhound to find at least something that can shed light on the kidnapping of my fiancee. I have the coordinates and her message for help, which you yourself confirmed was not falsified. Even if I can't find anything, I'll at least try. She wasn't taken away for money or to get back at me… there's something else there, and if she's there…" Leon poked his finger at the monitor, "then she's completely alone there. Defenseless and vulnerable to any danger if they want to harm her."

There was an oppressive silence. It was useless to convince Leon to wait at least a little longer before rushing headlong for a single straw, but she had already delayed him enough. All Hannigan could do for him was squeeze out any crumbs of information about the area, record it, and help with the equipment. At least the technical component. And if they both believed in God, they could pray for a successful return.

"Allright, have it your way." she spread her hands in surrender.

The awakening was painful and difficult. However, between brief glimpses of wakefulness that quickly ended with another dream, you could feel Leon's gentle touches all over your body. His breath on your neck and lips was like an apologetic kiss. You tried to dodge, as you usually did in the morning when you were still asleep, but he was persistent, after which you vaguely heard laughter through the veil… Heavy, broken, unlike Leon's usual laugh. Random images flashed before your eyes, and the last thing that made you fully wake up was the bang of your head on the floor and the sound of a gunshot, after which you abruptly opened your eyes, looking straight at the dark ceiling, trying to figure out what happened.

Tick tock tick tock

The sound of the clock ticking filled the space, remaining for a while the only thing your mind could focus on. Your head was pounding painfully as you stared madly at the dial, standing a few meters away from you, barely discerning what time it was. The lump on your forehead throbbed unpleasantly and may have caused a concussion after that bastard hit your head on the floor with all his might so that you lost consciousness. Feeling with your fingers the place where the skin painfully swelled, you painfully hissed down immediately removing your hand, stopping it and tried to breathe deeply trying to put the latest events in chronological order.

However, nausea rolled in waves, forcing you to squeeze the bedclothes in your hands and finally realize that the environment in which you are unfamiliar.

A dark room lit by a single fireplace in which a fire was still burning warmed the space making it less frightening, but the pouring moonlight from the window made the soul shrink from the horror of the unknown. You slowly looked around realizing that you were lying on a huge bed with a giant canopy of a delicate green shade on silk bedding of the same color. Everything seemed so unreal. As if it were a nightmare and now someone will jump out from around the corner at you and you will wake up realizing that nothing terrible really happened, but after sitting on the bed in one position for several minutes without moving in the hope of waking up, in the end you realized that you were no longer sleeping.

Your eyes involuntarily began to look at paintings by unknown artists. A portrait of a woman sitting at a small table with a human skull on it, an aristocrat with noble features as if carved out of stone, ordinary landscapes… You put your feet down on the cold stone floor, immediately shuddering and slowly wandered to the window to understand your location, but all you saw outside was an endless forest area without a hint of roads.

Listening to other sounds besides the annoying knocking of the clock and the fire, you hugged yourself by the shoulders, thinking that it was definitely not worth shouting just yet. The room you were in was clearly made in the Gothic style and in the current situation it only caused discomfort, given the fact that upon closer examination of the paintings you were able to understand that in front of you were originals and not reproductions. Old Varnish should have been removed a long time ago, perhaps it made these stories less dark, but this is clearly not something that should be thought about now. Turning around in search of some kind of closet to throw on something warm, you could see clothes neatly laid out on a dusty chair: a white shirt with wide cuffs tapered at the wrist, which was probably worn with a short tapered floral pink vest without sleeves, reminiscent of a corset with lacing on the chest, dark trousers and elegant boots next to them that look like they are made of real leather. The sole is small but looks comfortable and is just your size.

Examining the clothes in your hands, it was impossible not to notice the quality of the fabric, for the shirt was clearly silk, and besides, next to it, on an elegant carved table, someone had carefully left a metal box with decoration and a fresh red rose, which until recently seemed , bloomed in some garden, filling the air with its aroma.

You lowered your hands, taking the box in your hands, carefully opening it, as if a spider or other crawling crap might jump out of it, which always filled you with uncontrollable horror, but nothing catastrophic happened. Inside was a cameo brooch, decorated along the edge with fifty small stones resembling diamonds, and at the bottom hung a drop of pearls. Leon once gave you something similar, but it was in no way comparable to what was now in your hands. It was clearly worth your year's salary. It’s not like you had a choice… in the corner of the room, of course, there was a chest of drawers, but you couldn’t find anything in it except snow-white sheets, and you didn’t really want to walk around in negligence. Considering the fact that you were given no choice and that at least the clothes looked comfortable, you decided to comply, scared by the fact that everything fit perfectly as if it was tailor-made for you. You even caught the brooch on your vest because someone probably left it here on the table on purpose.

“Well, at least I feel a little better,” you thought, sighing as you found the mirror. The lack of light made it difficult to judge how bad the bump on his forehead was, but perhaps that was for the best. There were still no footsteps or sounds in the room behind the wooden door, but so you quickly put your hair in a not-so-neat bun so that it wouldn't get in the way while you explored the area and tried to figure out what happened to you after you were attacked and left here.

Perhaps you should find a phone and contact Leon or the police directly… There must be some connection, right? Looking back again, trying not to pay attention to the slight dizziness and nausea, your gaze lingered on a metal plate hanging directly above the fireplace with some kind of inscription engraved on it, but you did not look at it or at other objects in the room. . Not now… all that mattered at that moment was to find someone or something that would help you navigate and call for help.

With a soft tread, almost quietly like a cat, you pushed the door forward and it gave way, making a slight creak, forcing only to pray that it would not attract unnecessary attention, your head poked out looking around. Cold stone walls like in a medieval castle pressed down on consciousness, the wind blew down the gloomy corridor so that even clothes did not save too much and you wanted to throw some kind of jacket on top, but you took a step forward rejoicing that there are familiar lamps here, even if they shine a little badly, but it was better than if there were candles here.

However, the candelabra here were also really empty. When you were completely out in the hallway, you couldn't figure out which way to go to the right or to the left. It was too dark on the left and you wanted to go there the least, so you wandered in the direction where the wind was blowing, listening carefully to everything, trying not to fall off any stairs, although it was not very bright here, but still your eyes could distinguish the situation well and in the end you went down somewhere to a single door. Pulling the handle, it turned out that the door was closed on the other side and except for the old junk lying under the stairs, overgrown with cobwebs in places, there was nothing, which obviously made you turn around and go upstairs again, turning into that dark corridor where you initially did not want to go, but it seems that the choice was small.

Of course, you could go back to the bedroom and wait for a miracle or trouble, the latter seemed like a more obvious scenario, but still you can't leave everything on its own, even if you find yourself in the most non-standard of all situations. Eventually, after passing through the already familiar room again, you breathed a sigh of relief when you realized that the corridor was not at all as long as it initially seemed, and the door at the end was fortunately unlocked and led you to some long well-lit balcony. Your heart was beating wildly from fear of the unknown, but you still walked forward with your hand on your chest, walking to the other end, passing by some more locked rooms, stopping only at the moment when you clearly noticed a bright scarlet stripe on the floor as if something was being dragged… … like a corpse, and the red streak seems to be blood. Your feet were rooted to the ground as you looked around in a panic, looking for potential danger. Despite the disgusting silence, no one was nearby or someone simply did not want to be noticed earlier than expected, so at your own risk you decided to follow the bloody trail that ended abruptly. There were stains on the floor as if someone had tried to wash them earlier, perhaps they didn’t have time to do it or… Well, Leon always said that you have a rich imagination, which no one from your family ever argued with, so you decided not to give it free rein just yet because that otherwise it will drive you crazy.

It was all just disgusting. You realized for sure that you were in some kind of castle or giant mansion that clearly needed cleaning in places, and the worst thing was that all the rooms here practically remained locked. After an hour of wandering through the dark corners, you were damn cold and lost in addition, despite the fact that you found nothing and could not go anywhere except a couple of chambers, although mice ran through there a couple of times and spiders wove a web in the corners, which horrified you, forcing you to quickly slam the door and scream several times. No one really showed up. On the one hand, it was calming, but on the other it was aggravating.

You need at least some kind of map to figure out which part of the building you're in at all, but all you've found is useless trash and increased anxiety. Breathing exercises generally helped, which was why you were on the verge of hysteria. There must be at least a landline phone here! Panic was rolling in and my eyes started to water, I just wanted to call Leon and beg him to take you away from here because every rustle or shadow made you jump on the spot. And if someone really chases you? Where to run to? You don't have a mountain of muscles like Chris Redfield and you're not even Leon's equal. Your brain was clearly no longer trying to think of any plan, and it was at this moment that somewhere in the distance you heard a clock tinkling. It was dark outside, you couldn't see a thing, which made you think it might be midnight.

Startled, you looked around again and still decided to follow the sounds, hoping that they would not lead to your death. Another dark corridor gave way to a lighter one, which led you to a wide oak carved door, which made you even momentarily happy as you entered the wide hall with snow-white marble columns and an almost mirrored floor where a mosaic in the shape of a sun was laid out in the middle of the hall. Everything was luxurious and at the same time forgotten, but the clock that brought you here with a loud blow really showed midnight and it was a real antique! You were ready to swear to God that such a miracle could only be bought by a wealthy well-connected collector. Nearby there were several tables similar to those in your room, and although they were very dusty, in the vases that stood on them smelled sweetly of fresh flowers.

It wasn’t so gloomy here anymore, which helped relax a little. With sincere curiosity, you looked at everything that lay on the tables, and would like to turn the porcelain figurines of animals in your hands, something like this always caught you, causing memories to come flooding back against your will, how during your travels Leon could not tear you away from the souvenir shop where you emptied his card with great generosity, but this was not the case. And although you kept your eyes glued to everything you saw, your feet carefully walked down the steps until you stopped dead in your tracks when you heard loud clapping of hands.

You looked up at the source of the sound but didn't see anyone, however…

"So you've already woken up, my dear?"

[a-star-that-burns-brightly]

CH2-13 Thoughts + CH2-14 Predictions

Hello DRDT Fandom! CH2-13 came out about four or so days ago as I'm posting this, and I finally mustered up the energy and mental strength to write down my overall thoughts, and also general predictions for what I think is to come in the next episode. A lot happened in this episode and we have a lot to cover, so let's get started! Before we do though, I think I should give us a reminder of where we currently are in terms of the swear chart and the bingo card, as of CH2-12 Swear Statistics

Bingo Card

Just like the last post, I'll be separating my talking points into character categories, so let's jump straight in with the big man himself...

Levi

Quick Disclaimer: I myself am still trying to unlearn the mindset that having low or no empathy is in any way a moral failing. If I say anything wrong or rude, please politely correct me. Remember kids: Your feelings, thoughts, and emotions, what you feel and how you feel them if you do at all, do not have any moral weight, they are simply aspects of your brain and you cannot control your brain. The only thing that has moral weight is your actions.

So as we learned in the previous episode, Levi has the murderer secret! And as we learn in this episode, he apparently killed four people, one of which being his father. DRDT continues to take Danganronpa's standard tropes and incorporating them in unique ways, in this case Levi represents the trope of the Chapter 2 Serial Killer reveal (Genocide Jack, Peko, Maki). I love that DRDT keeps doing this and I hope it keeps it up You know what else is staying consistent, though?

(x) Levi: That incident happened when I was in my junior year of high school. Levi: My junior year was also the year that Hope's Peak scouted me as the Ultimate Personal Stylist. Levi: To my understanding, it would've reflected poorly on Hope's Peak to recruit a murderer, so they pressured the court into not pressing charges.

US-HPA being morally corrupt as all fuck, that's what! Like no, seriously, it makes more and more sense as for why Xander David and Mai were most likely forming a revolution against this damn place, cause wow. The choice to scout out Levi during his Junior Year, when he was still in high school, is...interesting. Given that this Hope's Peak takes in College-aged students, why not just wait until Levi has graduated high school? In fact, that probably would've been even better because by then Levi definitely would've perfected his skills in styling by then, and thus would further justify him being enrolled in the academy. We don't know whether or not Levi was scouted before or after his incident, but given how Levi explains the events, I'm willing to bet this was after. Which...makes thing especially strange. But I'm sure it's no big deal. I mean, it's not like we have any evidence of US-HPA preying on vulnerable childre--

(x) Min: The Ultimate Contest for Eminent Students was made for a very specific target audience. Min: Those children who had no talents, who would consider spending their entire lives preparing for one single test for even a chance to become an Ultimate...

Oh. Well isn't that funny, huh?

Part of Hope's Peak's branding in general is the promise of a better future, which is something that Levi clearly wants. So I can most definitely see why the idea of being enrolled in the academy appealed to him. Levi being a delinquent in his teenage years definitely tracks, given how we know that his family was full of bad influences (including himself more than likely). And I am absolutely not surprised that Levi ended up killing his father. I think a lot of us theorized for a while that the person he killed was linked to his family.

I'd absolutely adore to learn more about Levi's family situation and what exactly their relationship with each other was, because "We were bad influences on each other" can mean a lot of things. Given the fact that not even the police cared about the death of Levi's father, I'd be pretty willing to believe that Mr. Fontana is a wanted man who has done a lot of criminal harm to others. That might even be where Levi formed the mindset that people are defined by their actions. Maybe, that's my best guess and it doesn't even include his mother and brothers, lmao. Anyway, that's enough of Murder, Corruption, and Daddy Issues. Let's talk about the other thing that was revealed about Levi this episode, or more-so put into words. His low, if zero empathy. Firstly, those who are headcannoning Levi is ASPD, I see you and I love you. So much. But I would be lying if I didn't admit that my first thought upon watching this scene was "Levi is so Autismcoded" lmao But in all seriousness, I absolutely adore this side of his character. In general something I've always loved about Levi is the fact that he, to put it bluntly, does not know how to act. He's constantly seeing what others do and copying them, and asking them for guidance when he doesn't know what to do. His first appearance shows him using Xander and Teruko's appearances to wager what kind of person they are, which is more than likely how he got into styling in the first place. He's basically masking and trying to appear as what he views as normal because he's aware that his lack of empathy is not something most humans possess. And his actions reflect that of what he thinks a good person would do in these scenarios, whether that be your friends not inviting you to an event, or someone profusely bleeding from their neck. To put it in simple terms: He's masking. I love that. It really reminds me of the experiences had by my neurodivergent friends, and even though Levi is not canonically neurodivergent, the fact that so many people headcannon him with ASPD or Autism really goes to show how DT-Dev nailed that kind of experience, and how well they wrote Levi's low empathy in general. Well-done, DT-Dev :D ...Also I think it's safe to say that Accomplice!Levi is not happening. Damn it, I really liked that theory lmao.

Ace

[not even three minutes later]

...See, this is why I always believed Ace was telling the truth about David and Arei's conversation, because wow this man is competing with the former in the Shitty Liar Olympics.

If Ace's sense of security around Levi wasn't already shattered, it sure as hell is now. Which is very upsetting to see, but also very entertaining to me as an aficionado of toxic yaoi. I was never really an Acevi girl, it was just never something I was attracted to (probably because for a majority of CH2 Part 1's airing I really didn't like Ace lmao), but this combined with the Other Thing I'll talk about later has definitely sold me on it. I hope they get worse.

I can't remember what post it was, but I remember seeing someone talk about Ace very much projecting a friendship onto Levi that was never really there between them, and looking back, I absolutely agree. I mean, where the two of them really friends? I do think that Levi does, or did, genuinely like Ace. I don't think he would've been hanging around him in Chapter 1 if he didn't. But it was simply just that, he liked Ace. Ace loved Levi, and saw him as his lifeboat in the midst of this scary unfamiliar situation. Even if everyone else either was annoyed by or straight-up disliked Ace, even if he could die at any moment, he could still rely on Levi as a presence of safety and security, but that all came crumbling down.

ace can you please change your sprite

The fact that Ace, the man famous for jumping to conclusions, not thinking anything through or in depth, and switching his opinions on others on a dime, is even asking for Levi's defense at all, is proof enough to me that even after everything Ace still wanted to cling onto the fantasy of their friendship he had built up in his mind. But upon hearing that Levi never cared about what happened to him, he can no longer do so. ...And why do I think Ace got attached to Levi so quickly?

(x) Ace: I was totally right all along to burn our friendship--No, I can't even call it it "Friendship." Ace: There's only one person in my whole life who I've ever been able to call my friend. That I ever thought, even for just a short time, that you and I were "friends" is an insult to his memory.

Yeah it's time to talk about this.

So for those who are not in the know, DT-Dev confirmed in a now-deleted ask that this friend of Ace's is named Taylor Riley.

(thank you to @/nicohakobyan / weightedblankett on twitter for providing this screenshot)

We know very little about this man other than his name, his gender, the fact that he was Ace's friend, and that he's dead. We don't actually know that fourth one, but I think "insult to his memory" speaks for itself lmao. As such, we do not know the details of his relationship with Ace... But I've made more out of less before, so let's get to talking. Here's what I think:

I think that Taylor was a presence in Ace's life much similar to how Levi was to him in Chapter 1: A strong protective figure that helped to make the scared-of-everything Ace feel a sense of safety. And then some form of incident happened that resulted in Taylor's death, leaving Ace alone, heartbroken, bitter, and terrified. That sense of security he once had was ripped away from him, and without Taylor, he doesn't know what to do with himself anymore.

And then in the killing game, he meets Levi, who provides him with a similar feeling of safety. Immediately he begins to project the memory of Taylor onto Levi and as such becomes attached, quickly considering Levi a friend because of it. And I'm not entirely pulling this idea that Ace was projecting Taylor onto Levi out of my ass, either.

Ace: dark blue/purple (reasoning: refuses to provide reasoning)

When we first got this answer, most people assumed this was referring to Levi, but I honestly think it is more likely that this is referring to Taylor. But those colors are still part of Levi's design, which automatically sets up a parallel between both Levi and Taylor Ace projected his relationship and the memory of Taylor onto a man he barely knew, and when that man lost his patience with him, his fantasy was swiftly kicked with the steel-toed shoe of reality. Hell, Ace's reaction after Levi snapped at him may had been due to his illusion of safety crumbling beneath him, but going down the road of this theory, Levi snapping at him might've been the first time Ace truly saw Levi and not Taylor. He had been giving this man a script and a role to play, and Levi responded by tearing up the paper and telling him to fuck off. In a sense, you could say that in that moment, Ace lost Taylor a second time.

Since I don't think Ace is going to be the killer as he was knocked out and thus did not have any knowledge of the murder mechanism (at least not including the theory that he tried to kill himself, which... Is a possibility, but I don't think that's the case). And if he does live past his chapter, I honestly think Chapter 3 will mark his breaking point. Any fantasy of Levi that he was clinging onto with his pinky has now shattered into pieces ten times over, the person who tried to kill him is still alive and for all he knows, could do it again whenever the hell they want to and people will take their side over his own. Next to no one in the cast likes him and they make that explicitly clear, and worse of all, he will still be trapped in this godforsaken...whatever facility this place is meant to be. So to cap off this section that got way too long, Ace Trauma Dump is on my Chapter 3 bingo card, and if we get to see Taylor and his design includes dark blue and purple I will actually become spaghettified. Please survive Ace, you are finally starting to become not C-Tier

Hu and Veronika

Lumping these two together because I have about the same amount to say about both of them and their secrets were revealed together. Hu's secret is the Hopeless Child one, and Veronika's is the Self Harm one. I think after CH2 Part 1 most of us predicted as such, but it's still very satisfying to be right. What I'm more interested is this supposed pact that they made off-screen. I have to assume that Veronika went to Hu pretty quickly to reveal her secret to her given her general disinterest in topics of suicide and self harm. So I'd wager this pact was probably made at around CH2-5. Not that that really tells us much about the actual conversation, but it's nice to have a time-frame for reference.

I don't expect the actual conversation to be shown because from what we currently have it doesn't really add much of anything, but it would definitely be cool.

(x) Hu: I've been quite selfish this whole time, keeping my secret because I didn't want you all to think less of me...

I've said this before in this post, but I absolutely believe that David eventually coaxed and pressured Hu into revealing her secret to him, as well as why she kept it for so long. And I also think David implanted, or I guess more accurately watered the seed in Hu's head that she was inherently selfish for not sharing her secret. That, I think we would benefit from a flashback, but maybe I'm just biased because I desperately want Hu lore. Please DT-Dev, I'm on my knees Hmm... what else?

(x) Veronika: After all, my own so-called secret isn't even the worst thing I've done. Isn't that so utterly disappointing for this motive?

Oh yeah there's that. What the fuck, Veronika? Like, I feel like this is something I should've expected this, but for some reason I didn't. I'll be honest here, I really have nothing right now. But whatever Veronika is referring to here, I feel like it has something to do with her 'dearest friend' mentioned in the CH2 Q&A (who's name is Alyssa Belyaeva.) What Veronika actually did? I do not have the slightest clue, you can never know with this girl. But no matter what she did, I will probably love her even more for it. Glad that DT-Dev seems to agree with the precedence of supporting women's wrongs.

Teruko

...So I'm glad to see we're all in agreement that that is not her fucking secret. I mean, I'm sure it applies to her. She is an orphan, her parents are out of the picture, and though we don't know the whereabouts of her brother and neither does she, she most likely assumes he's dead as well. But honestly, given the fact that again this is not her fucking secret, I'm starting to wonder if that's really the case... Can Teacher Tawaki theory still live on? I'll save that for another post.

Anyway what was I talking about? Oh yeah, that is not her fucking secret.

And this little bitch knows that for a fact.

I won't go too deep into this because there have already been people discussing it better than I could, but this silent agreement the two of them have to not share Teruko's true secret is so palpable and interesting to me. David knows that Teruko's secret isn't that, but for whatever reason, he is keeping his mouth shut. And he just gives Teruko that shit-eating smirk. Have I ever mentioned how much I love Teruvid? I fucking love Teruvid. But yeah, I still think 100% that Teruko's secret is that the killing game is all her fault. It just does not make sense for Xander and Min's secrets to belong to anyone other than each other as they are dead. And in general it just makes sense for Teruko's character and her role in the story. And I can't help but feel like Teruko's actual secret will be revealed at the end of the Chapter.

Eden

... I mean. Do I really need to say more? I swear I made this exact joke in the previous thoughts post, but I can't help it. It applies perfectly to this CG. When this CG, this fucking JUMPSCARE of a CG, popped up on my screen, I'm pretty sure I ran around in a circle screaming in my room for a total of ten minutes. The first of two times I would do that during this masterfully crafted scene. I want to think of some kind of insightful analysis, but the truth is basically in your face. Eden was the one who gouged out Xander's eye. Why did she do it? Where does this fit into the overall lore? I DON'T FUCKING KNOW What the fuck am I supposed to say? This CG is basically all we have, and we'll definitely have to wait for more information. Especially since Eden is totally the culprit, but we'll get to that in the predictions section. (yeah if you can't tell my writing juice is starting to run out, but if I get this out any later than today I will kill myself)

David

(...for a scumbag, he's kinda cute.) So first of all, David is slowly becoming the funniest character in the cast in my opinion, which is a huge achievement in a cast full of very funny characters. And in general I think as a character he perfectly captures DRDT's general tone of half-and-half both silliness and angst, like yin and yang. Secondly though, the big thing that David did in this chapter (besides keeping Teruko's secret and being funny) is lying to Eden about the rest of the conversation he had with Arei. Ultimately, I think David himself saw that action as a good deed.

Think of it from his perspective: This is a man who has had hope and change presented to him on a silver platter multiple times, and then had it violently ripped away from him. And the most recent example of that, Arei, presented him with a better future and the possibility of change only to be killed upon trying to act on said change. If he told Eden that Arei still had hope, that she still wanted to change, it would aspire Eden with that same hope that in his eyes is destined to crash down on her. So instead of inflicting that same pain onto her, he instead chose to say nothing at all Maybe I'm giving David too much credit, what he did was still at the end of the day, incredibly dickish. But that interpretation is what makes the most sense to me personally. That's all I really have to say in regards to David... So, let's move onto what was, in my opinion, the star of this week's episode.

Arei

Arei Nageishi.... Ohhhh save me Arei Nageishi.... Arei was already one of my favorite characters in the cast due to her personality, design, voice acting, and most of all the character development she had throughout the course of Chapter 2. But this episode, this scene... It cemented her a well-earned spot in my top four, sitting only behind Whit, Teruko, and David.

The flashback scene of Arei and David in this episode is honestly up there with some of the best scenes in the whole show to me, almost solely because of how it caps off Arei as a character postmortem, and the story that she, along with Chapter 2 as a whole, is meant to tell. This whole chapter has been themed around the idea of what classifies a good person, and this flashback scene provides such a great payoff to that theme and it is everything I could've ever wished for. The message I got from Arei's story is that, ultimately, the idea of a "Good Person" and a "Bad Person" are nothing more than just that. Ideas. And in being ideas, they are above anything else, arbitrary, subjective, and at the end of the day, incredibly meaningless when it comes to discussing actual human beings. Insistence on categorizing yourself and the people around you into boxes of "pure saint that can do no wrong" and "irredeemable demon who will burn in the pits of hell" is a fast track to viewing a complicated, colorful world into a few shades of black and white. That's how David views the world, and has viewed the world probably for years. And I'm going to be honest and say that I think before being confronted with the truth of David's actions, Arei was heading right down the same path that he had headed.

(x) Arei: Of course I wanted to change myself. Who wants to be a grab-bag of negative personality traits? There's not even anything positive you could say about me. Arei: Still, for the longest time, I thought it was stupid to even try. I'm rotten to the core, and I might as well be a different species from saints like Eden and you. Arei: A pig never hopes to grow up into a human, because it knows that such a metamorphosis is impossible.

And this is the line that really, really makes me think that. She calls David and Eden saints because (up until this moment) she viewed both of them as the ideal of what makes a good person, similar to how David views Xander. And on the contrast, claims herself to be rotten to the core, ontologically evil with no redemption in sight. She's even performing David's habit of self-dehumanization, likening herself to a pig in the same way David likens himself to a cat in the LGI video, which goes to show how this mindset of black-and-white is, above all else, a dehumanizing view on the human race that relegates people into cardboard boxes with the flaps taped shut. If she didn't find out the truth of David's actions, I am confident that she would've done down the same path that he did, becoming convinced that she will be a terrible person until the day she dies because she cannot reach this worthless standard of a good person that she has set up in her head. But we know that's not how it goes. Arei does realize that the man she once thought of as a saint might be, in his words, a lying manipulative scumbaggy piece of shit. And upon realizing that, the second half of the message unlocks itself. There is no such thing as irredeemability.

Change is a part of being human. Humans are not built to run in a hamster wheel for the rest of their days, reliving their mistakes over and over again wallowing in their self-hatred and guilt. Eventually, they have to get off the wheel and start taking the steps necessary to grow, change, develop and flourish to properly better themselves. (This applies to yourself just as much as it applies to the worst, most depraved individual you know by the way) The alternative is living in a four-by-four black box of self-loathing and relentless stagnancy, which is not productive for the person or the people they've hurt. It is only when you reject these black-and-white categories of "Good Person" and "Bad Person" and accept that no matter what you've done, you're capable of becoming better, that you can achieve true growth and change. The way this message was executed, especially through a character that dies before the halfway point of the story, is something that I marvel at as an aspiring storyteller. DRDT's beating heart will always be its character writing, and this scene is one of the primary examples of that. Thank you, DT-Dev, for making Arei Nageishi and the rest of your amazing cast of characters. :D

Extra Thoughts !!! - FURUYA FANDOM (me) THE TRACK PLAYED LETS FUCKING GOOOOOO!!! - I am very excited to find out more about Nico's attempted murder given all of the questions surrounding it. If the method of murder really was replicated, and Nico wasn't the culprit themself, you guys should take a wild guess who that implicates. (this is probably obvious by this point, but I really don't believe in the theories that suggest that someone other than Nico was responsible for Ace's attempted demise, be it Hu or Ace himself. I feel like it doesn't line up with the current narrative direction that Nico seems to be going in, the physical evidence of them stealing the turpentine, and...I'm gonna be honest, I just don't like it lmao. I'm sure DT-Dev would do it well, but just as a premise I do not favor it. Nico's attempted murder + subsequent regret from it felt like such a big moment in the chapter's narrative in relation to the themes of All That Glitters and the cast revealing sides to themself that weren't as prevalent before, as well as the themes of change and moving on from the past littered all throughout the chapter. I think if Nico's attempted murder was responsible by anyone but Nico, it would just dampen the impact of their overall story for me. That's just me though.) - WE FINALLY GOT ANOTHER NONSTOP DEBATE LETS GO BOYS!!! Nonstop debates I MISSED you - "Hey why does Whit know so much about hangi--" Look. This man is so unbelievably suspicious in every single way that for the sake of my sanity, I'm just gonna assume DT-Dev chose a random character to give the hanging explanation. It is the only way I will survive this chapter - But hey, at least we got this

- As always, I adore the new sprites we got this episode, especially Ace's new ones. It's probably the first sprite of his that actually appears emotionally vulnerable when he's not bleeding profusely from the neck. And of course, I loved David's shit-eating grin towards Teruko, I hope he never changes. - Speaking of Teruko, us getting Tutor Teruko was lovely. She is perfect, she is a little bit of everything all of the time.

(x) Whit: If you're so inclined to complain, Sir Light Pollution, why don't you try and think of some good evidence? Charles: Light pollution? Whit: You know… Cuz he had stars, and now he doesn't, and light pollution makes stars disappear… or… or… something….. Charles: I am truly impressed…by how bad that was.

- I love these dorks so much. I can tell DT-Dev has a lot of fun writing them.

- Teronika Consent animation! I guess after Acevi's Soap Opera, DT-Dev decided to feed the yuri crowd as well. Love it when we get to see those little sprite animations, too.

Predictions for CH2-14 - The episode is 40 minutes long, the longest episode we have had so far. (40 minutes of DRDT content... I'm excited just thinking about it!) Because of that, I think I will just start with my biggest prediction: I think we're getting the culprit reveal this chapter. I don't think that just because of the length either. When you really look at it, we have basically used every piece of evidence at least once with the exception of three: - The conditions of the gym (which I assume will be discussed next) - The scuffs on the ground - The ball of starchy clothes All three of those pieces of evidence I think can definitely be cleared up in the span of 40 minutes, especially since full focus is now on the murder case. I don't necessarily think the trial will end in this episode, but I think we have at least one more trial episode to go before the post-trial + execution + ending of the chapter. - And as the culprit reveal is approaching, I have formulated a tier list of who I think is least - most likely to be Arei's culprit. I will provide my reasoning for each.

No. 17/16 - Xander Matthews + Min Jeung I mean, what it says on the tin. They're dead, and thus couldn't had committed the murder. No. 15/14 - MonoTV + Arei Nageishi There are explicit rules against them being the culprit. Rule 8 and Rule 11 in particular. No. 13 - Teruko Tawaki She is the protagonist. Didn't stop Kaede, but I highly doubt that's where DT-Dev is going. No. 12 - David Chiem Other than the previous five who I've all disqualified from being the culprit, David is probably the character I suspect the least. He has an alibi for the time of the murder, getting breakfast with J and Veronika, and thematically...well, he's basically being set up as the antagonist. I don't think we'll be rid of him this early lmao. No. 11 - Charles Cuevas Charles has a fear of blood and dead bodies, and though I wouldn't say that completely disqualifies him from becoming a culprit in the future, in a case like this with such a complicated mechanism like this where he'd have to be in very close proximity with the body at all times? I highly doubt it. He also has an alibi for the fish (He was with Whit). No. 10 - J Rosales J both has an alibi for the fish (Arturo following her around), and an alibi for the morning (getting breakfast with David and Veronika), and both of those alibis can be confirmed. I don't think she did this. No. 9 - Veronika Grebenshchikova I'll be honest, I really don't see Veronika committing a murder at all. She clearly wants to see this through to the end, and killing someone would come with the risk of her being executed, which I don't think she would see as a satisfying conclusion to her story. That, combined with the fact that she has an alibi for the fish (bothering Teruko) and an alibi for the murder (getting breakfast with David and J) makes me think she didn't do this. No. 8 - Nico Hakobyan You might think it's weird to place Nico this low on the overall tier-list despite them not having an alibi for the fishes, and their morning alibi being...somewhat flimsy but I'll get to that with Hu, but here's my logic. Nico was driven to attempt murder from very specific circumstances. That being, Ace's relentless bullying and abuse towards them. Nico has said before that they'd understand murder if the perpetrator didn't like the victim, and while I don't think they exactly liked Arei, I do not think they harbor the same animosity towards her as they did towards Ace. I truly believe that Nico would only ever resort to murder if they truly despised the person in question and saw no other solution. So that is why I feel comfortable placing Nico at eighth. No. 7 - Hu Jing Hu is also another character that I think some will be surprised to see so low, but I don't think this was her doing. She has an alibi for the fish (cleaning up with Eden), and though again her alibi in the morning is very flimsy (having tea with Nico in the morning,) I do believe she is telling the truth because if she was lying about her alibi, I think the brutally blunt Nico would call her out for it. I'm sorry, I just simply cannot imagine Nico letting that shit slide regardless of how many theories I read. Not to mention I can't really think of a motive for why she would kill Arei specifically when, if she really did want to kill someone, Ace is right there. No. 6 - Whit Young Whit is supremely fucking suspicious and a lot of his behavior in the trial is literal shenanigans, even more so given the fact that he doesn't have an alibi for the actual murder. But he does have an alibi for the fish (again, he was with Charles) which is the main sticking point of Whit!Culprit. His other sticking point is his lack of motive, both in terms of the secrets and Arei specifically. I don't know like- just look at this man, do you think he did this? /joke

No. 5 - Levi Fontana The number one suspect in the fandom for a while, and he's only at number five. He ultimately lacks an alibi for the morning, and his alibi for the fish was that he was doing his laundry... With no one else around. Shady as fuck. But I think given his principles discussed in this episode ("it is a good thing to make sure someone else doesn't die"), and the genuine desire to be helpful he has expressed throughout this trial, I think him being the culprit is unlikely. That's why I was adamant on him being an accomplice for a while because I still thought he had some role in the case, but oh well. No. 4 - Rose Lacroix I'll be honest, Rose is only this high because her alibi situation is worse than Whit's and Levi's combined. Both of her alibis are that she was sleeping in her room, which cannot be proven and can be very easily lied about. But other than that, I don't think she is the culprit. I think this case requires too many physical maneuvers for someone as lethargic as Rose to pull off successfully, and if she were the culprit I don't think she'd bring attention to the missing grippy tape at all. No. 3 - Arturo Giles Arturo does have an alibi for the fish (following J), but does not have an alibi for the morning. Unlike basically every other character here, something else that puts Arturo above them is that he was capable of overhearing Eden and Arei's conversation and forging the note. But there is also a discrepancy present that is also present with every character here, and that is the fact that Arturo did not witness Nico's attempted murder or the condition of Ace's body and the gym, so there was no way he could've replicated the murder method used for Ace on Arei. So though logistically he is a more likely possibility, I don't think it was him. No. 2 - Ace Markey Ace, to me anyway, is the second most likely candidate to being Arei's killer. He does not have an alibi for the fish and could've very easily grabbed them after David and Arei left the Relaxation Room, and he doesn't have an alibi for the morning either. He has a very clear motivation for taking a chance at killing someone, of "someone literally sliced my neck open not two days ago and I know I am not safe here I need to get the fuck out." If you choose to factor in strength, Ace is one of the strongest members of the cast and would be more than capable of the physical maneuvers made to kill Arei. Though I personally don't believe in this theory, if you think Ace attempted suicide instead of Nico trying to kill him, he has the murder method down lock too because he tried to commit it onto himself. He has been shown to be nosy, so it is not improbable that he listened in on Arei and Eden's conversation. And lastly, he is one of the only two suspects who was capable of stealing the grippy tape that was used in the murder. All of the evidence is practically stacked against him... But there are a couple of problems. One, if you believe that Nico did try to kill Ace, than the point about Ace knowing the exact method of death goes out the window. He was knocked out by the turpentine, and woke up in extreme pain in a blinding fury of rage and bloodlust, I don't think his surroundings would be the first thing on his mind. But a much bigger issue we have is the question of... Why would Ace take the tape? Following this theory, his murder plan wouldn't had started until the day after Nico's attempt on his life, it would make no sense for him to take the tape then. These two sticking points are why, though a likely candidate, I do not think Ace is the culprit. That award of main suspect goes to...

No. 1 - Eden Tobisa Yeah, if you've spent any time on this account you probably know I'm an Eden!Culprit truther. There are many well-written posts about this theory that I'm sure you've seen so I'll try to keep this short, but though the theory does have a few flaws to it, the big one being Eden's alibi for the fish that she was cleaning up with Hu, I think Eden being the culprit makes the most sense from an evidence, thematic, and motive standpoint. I know some people have dropped the theory upon the fork reveal, but DRDT is not unbeknownst to killing off characters with certain mysteries left unanswered. That is basically all for my predictions related to the culprit, but I still have some predictions for the overall episode. - Nico's gonna get placed in the hot-seat, obviously, which will definitely cause a reaction out of both Hu and Ace. And I honestly feel like the two of them are going to keep interrupting Nico until they eventually snap. And I hope that happens honestly because unless you count the "I'll kill you" line, we have yet to see or hear Nico when they're actually angry angry. Nico obviously doesn't like conflict, but they might have to get over that if they actually want to defend themself knowing the other two. - I'm still holding out hope we'll get a Random Guess segment lmao - And lastly: I need Whit to break the forth wall at least once I didn't put that on the bingo card for fucking NOTHING

Conclusion I'm gonna be completely honest, I do not have the energy to write anymore and I just want this out lmao. But overall, this was one of my favorite episodes in the whole series. I loved the Levi and Ace stuff, I like that we now have all the secrets, and like I said, the scene with Arei is probably one of my favorite scenes in the show. CH2-14 is going to be a wild ride I can already tell, and if we do find out who the killer is, you will see me screaming. Regardless of if it's Eden lmao.

UPDATED SWEAR STATISTICS CH2-13

UPDATED BINGO CARD

[intimacyequalsdeath]

Bubz's Slasher Fictober: Day 3 Poly Ghostface Part 1 (Billy and Stu) (Apple Cider)

Day 4! If it isn't obvious by now I wrote like most of these in September so I could post them way easier when October is here so shout out to past me for planning ahead.

Part 2 to this fic here

Notes: Minors DNI, Suggestive themes, Gender neutral reader, no specific pronouns. This is a poly relationship fic so if you aren't into it then this is not the fic for you.

"Stu that's insane" You said as he leaned against the locker next to yours, He laughed.

"Oh come on babe, Billy doesn't have to know anything"

"And you'd really think we'd be able to get away with it?" You asked incredulously, To try and do something behind Billy's back was a risk.

"Yeah babe totally. Me and you, in and out, and good ole Billy would be none the wiser" You closed your locker and leaned against it looking at him.

"Fine, If you really think we'll get away with this, But I swear Stu if Billy finds out-" Stu grabbed your shoulders.

"He won't babe, Stu's got you"

Before third period Stu had approached you with an idea, Billy had some things to take care of and wouldn't be able to do the boys usual Ghostface schtick that him and Stu usually manned. So Stu had come to you, their precious significant other, to help stalk out the next victim.

Billy had always been very much so against you EVER joining them on their excursions ever since they had come clean that they were the Ghostface. Stu had always agreed to keep Billy quiet but he had teased and propositioned you in what you thought was a joking way before until this time around.

The two of you knew that if Billy found out Stu had even so much as thought to invite you to join him while Billy was off doing other things that there would be hell to pay. But it was just a stake out to choose the next victim they wanted to go after, Stu figured it wouldn't be that bad.

"I'll do it then, If you promise Billy won't find out then fine let's do it" You told him, A wicked grin spread across his face.

"Oh babe! I knew you'd say yes!" Stu brought you into a hug and kissed the side of your head "I'll pick you up later tonight and you can even pick who it is!". If Stu Macher was anything, it was enthusiastic.

================================================

Later that night Stu arrived at your house as promised. You left your house through your window as usual and got in the passenger seat of Stu's parents car.

"It's time baby! You're gonna love it I promise" Stu said as you opened the door to get in.

"Sure Stu, I'm more so just interested to see what my boys do when I'm not around" Which was the truth, You'd always wanted to see just how the Ghostface attacks went down and how they singled out who they went after.

"One day maybe it'll be me, you and Billy, Like one big happy family, You pick the victims, me and Billy go after them. It'll be great!" Stu said as he pulled away from your house and heading towards the destination to stake out.

"You know that would take a lot of convincing on Billy's part though"

"That's why we start here, and one day we tell Billy about this and show him how good you did! Then he won't be able to deny how much of a natural you are"

"Stu it's just a stakeout I thought? Like all we're doing is picking one of these sorry pieces of shit to go after" Stu nodded.

"It is, but this is a gateway into your life of the Ghostface, and here we are!"

You looked at the window and noticed you and Stu were pulled off into a shadowy part of the backroad down the road from a house you recognized from a few parties you had went to with the boys.

It was about ten at night at this point and you knew the black car would be almost impossible to see behind the trees you were covered by so you and Stu would be impossible to see.

"Now I do have to warn you this is the boring part, We need to make sure we know when their gonna be home and when they aren't so we know when to strike" Stu told you.

You and Stu then sat in silence for about an hour just watching the house and the people who lives there coming home for the night. You were startled out of the silence by your cellphone ringing.

"It's Billy" You told Stu starting to get nervous, Stu sighed

"Just tell him your sick at home doing homework or something" Stu told you, you shakily answered.

"Hello?" You answered the phone softly.

"Hey baby" Billy's voice poured down the phone like honey.

"What's up?" You asked him "Did you get your shit done?"

"Yeah baby I did, What are you up too?" You froze then remembered what Stu told you to say.

"Oh I'm just laying down and all, I didn't feel so hot after school"

"Really?" Billy asked

"Yeah my stomach started feeling upset" You heard Billy sigh then pause for a second through the phone.

"Well see baby that actually funny, you know why?" Shit.

"Why Billy?" You asked, still hoping to play innocent.

"Well it's funny cause I'm standing in your room right now and you aren't fucking here" You turned your head and frantically tapped Stu on the shoulder to get his attention.

"Billy" You said at a loss for what else to say.

"Don't give me that shit, where the fuck are you?" Billy was angry, You could almost feel the anger through the phone.

Stu now obviously listening in to the call started the car and then grabbed the phone from you.

"Hey Billy man why don't you meet us at my house, We'll see you then, bye!" and then he hung up.

"STU! why would you hang up !?" You knew that would've pushed Billy passed the point of being furious.

"Relax babe just let Stu handle this"

A few minutes late the two of you had pulled into Stu's driveway, his parents way on another trip to some other country. Stu brought you to his room to sit on his bed and wait for Billy to arrive.

A little while later after many hushed words trying to calm you down from Stu, The two of you heard the front door slam open then shut once again, and angry hurried footsteps run up the stairs.

As soon as Stu's bedroom door opened Billy started yelling.

'What in the fuck do you two think your doing?"

"Billy It's not-" Billy didn't stop.

"No, you're gonna wait a second, I fucking told the two of you I didn't want you to be involved in mine and Stu's shit"

"Billy it wasn't all that, It was just a stakeout" Stu piped up. Billy's head snapped to look at Stu.

"Billy c'mon, don't be mad, like Stu said it wasn't all that. I was never in any danger or anything. We kept it from you cause we knew you were gonna be mad" You explained trying to diffuse any confrontation between your two boys before it started.

'That's not the point and you know it, the three of us agreed that you would never be involved at all. The two of you went behind my fucking back and violated something I only put in place to fucking protect you" Billy's anger wasn't dissipating but at least he wasn't yelling anymore.

Billy exhaled and sat next to you on the bed, you wrapped your arm around his shoulders in an attempt to start calming him down.

"Billy we're sorry, we knew you were gonna be mad and still did it, but do you really think Stu would've let me go along if I was actually going to be in any real danger"

Stu appeared on the opposite side of you as you spoke.

"Yeah man, you know I love Y/n as much as you do, If I thought things were gonna get hairy I wouldn't of even thought about the two of us going, especially not without you"

Billy sighed once again but you felt some of the tension leaving his body. You rubbed his shoulder willing him to speak what was on his mind.

"It's not just about dangerous shit like that though, It's also about if for some fucking reason we ever get caught. I want you to have no ties to it at all. You aren't apart of it and you don't know anything"

You nodded in understanding, that anger wasn't cause Billy was actually mad he was just scared. Billy continued.

"When I got to your house and went through your window expecting you to be there only to see that you weren't, I got I don't know, I got really fucking scared. Even though my brain knew you were probably with Stu knowing what we do and what danger you could really be in scared the shit out of me."

Stu scooted closer and wrapped his arm around your shoulders as you brought Billy closer to lean against you as you leaned back into Stu.

"We're sorry we scared you Honey, we honestly just thought it would be a help for me to fill in since you had shit to do tonight and couldn't. Sure we thought you were gonna be mad if you found out but we didn't mean to scare you"

"Yeah man, the last thing we wanted to do was that. I wasn't thinking shit through and thought it would be fun if maybe one day it was the three of us together instead of just me and you"

"I guess it would be nice but I still stand by what I said, for now at least please, I don't want you apart of it" Bill said looking at you, you smiled and nodded before leaning over and placing your lips on his frown.

You felt Stu's hands run up your sides, and tug at your shirt, You playfully rolled your eyes before letting him take your shirt off. Billy let out a laugh before connecting your lips once more.

Stu's lips attached themselves to your neck and Billy's hands made their way down to your pants to unbutton them and move them down your legs. Billy tossed your pants to the floor as you got up onto your knees on the bed in front of him.

Stu wrapped his arms around your middle and placed his chin on your shoulder with a smirk.

"Maybe if I dressed like this you'd let me come with you guys?" You teased.

"Certainly babe" Stu said, Billy shook his head.

"You two spend too much time around each other" he said, placing his hands underneath Stu's on your hips.

"Maybe you should spend some time with us and show us what we're missing" You smirked at him.

"Maybe I will"

[cottonlemonade]

Hello there 👋

It's a bit chilly out, and a warm medium rooibos tea would be great if its still in the menu. I'll also take that to go please 🥺

Thank you!

A Night In

word count: 700 || avg. reading time: 3 mins.

pairing: sort of post-time skip Daichi x chubby!Reader

genre: fluff, a tiny smidgen of suggestiveness

warnings: spoilers

request: fluffy night in with boyfriend Daichi

Daichi sighed when he rebuttoned his shirt once again, trying his best to focus on fastening the buttons in the right hole this time.

When he brought a weary hand to his face he felt some stubble he apparently missed with this morning‘s shave. But as he checked the time he could only mutter a curse. He was already late.

About a year ago when you first met, Daichi had proudly proclaimed that he wanted to become a police officer and had bathed in the impressed look in your eyes. That look on your first proper date was possibly the thing he pictured the most as he was cramming over the mountains of work books preparing him for the exam. He had even kissed you for the first time when one night, as you helped him study, you had suggested to role-play scenarios he had to be ready for during training. You had pretended to be a moody youth resisting arrest, a seedy drug dealer who wouldn‘t give up his supplier and lastly a pretty lady who thought her looks would get her out of a ticket. Having obviously missed your calling by not becoming an actress, you had played them all to perfection. Daichi had a hard time even focusing on his course of action, when you batted your eyelashes at him and even - which had him swallow a lump in his throat - subtly pushed up your breasts to make the last scenario more convincing.

You had called him “officer Daichi“ and made one innuendo after another, until he finally broke and kissed you. You had teased him at first saying that if he was going to solve all his problems on patrol this way, you might have to get into a lot more trouble.

Back then it was already clear to him that he was either going to marry you or stay single for the rest of his life. He had sworn to himself that you would never come second. But now training had him in such tight grips that he hadn‘t been able to see you for two weeks already. Of course you didn‘t complain about it - you knew how important this was and assured him whenever he apologized for not doing better as your boyfriend.

But if he was honest, he wanted nothing more than sleep next to you. He didn‘t have the energy to go out for dinner and a romantic stroll afterwards like he promised. But. He promised. So of course he would stick to it.

As soon as you opened the door, Daichi began to apologize for being half an hour late. He winced inwardly when he saw you wearing pyjama shorts and a t-shirt with the word “police“ across the chest you had bought as a joke a while ago. You must have thought he was standing you up and changed back into something more comfortable. “I don‘t have a good excuse. I‘m so sorry, darling.“

You reached up to cup his cheek and got on your tiptoes to give him a kiss. He melted into your touch, wrapping his arms around your soft form, hugging you closely.

“I didn‘t get dressed up.“, you said once you parted and Daichi looked confused.

“I thought you‘d maybe like to stay in instead. Pizza is on the way, your favorite soda is chilling in the fridge and I made a list of all the movies we talked about seeing recently so you can take your pick.“

He didn‘t know what to say, so he pulled you in for another tight hug, murmuring “I love you“ when he pressed a kiss to your temple.

He changed into comfortable sweats he kept in your apartment and together you snuggled up on the couch under a blanket, enjoying the hot cheesy pizza and ice cold sodas, laughing at the romantic comedy you ended up choosing. About halfway through the movie, you felt his head rest on your shoulder and soon giggled at your boyfriend‘s quiet snores. Making sure he was covered with the blanket you raised your pizza-free hand to play with his hair as you continued to watch the movie, just happy to be with him.

a/n: this was so soft to write, thank you for the request! I hope you enjoyed it ✨

[onthewaytosomewhere]

✨ 16th: Favourites from the past year (another post where i get to go on and on about people who have written things i luv) (in no particular order cuz i could not start to try to do that)

one of my fave fics of the year and one i was so happy to get to see before everyone else is my dear Nico's @priincebutt Some Part of Me Came Alive that was written for the RWRB RBB - if you have not checked this out yet - RUN, DON'T WALK!!! it's so beautifully written you will fall in luv with it too

Leeks @softboynick's it's all in my head (i fuck up again and again) was another fic i was so honored to get to see early and y'all definitely need to check it out! this was a wonderful addition to the RWRB RBB

while we're on the RBB fics - another fic i have luv'd with my whole damn heart this year is Meet Me on the Other Side by @sparklepocalypse Mags wrote the very best horny cowboys period fic and i luv it so damn much!! - if somehow you haven't yet go check it out and fall in luv with it too - now i'm gonna throw links here for two more of Mags fics that i cannot get enough of from this year while we're at it Single Sad-Sack Seeking Same & All the Ocean was Sleeping - go read them!!!

now i'm moving onto a fic that has OC's that stole my frakkin heart and was an utter joy to follow along with this year - Sara @cha-melodius wrote an amazing you've got mail au False Dichotomy - it really is so good - and Sara's Body and Soul(mate) is a great spy soulmate fic that has bodyswapping and so many other great things

so next i got a couple of my faves from MJ kiwiana that when he wrote them they just frakkin spoke to me Like loving the stars themselves - DR Who AU - yes plz - and MJ knocks this one outta the park - so you want a Santa Clarita Diet AU MJ also has ya covered there and it's so damn good!!! - Never want to live (or die) without you now the last one i'm including here is taking the "this year" a lil bit loosely cuz he technically finished it end of last year - but i have definitely read it again this year i'm certain of it - A Practical Arrangement - one of the best arranged marriage fics !!!

@tinyarmedtrex's The only Heaven I'll be sent to is when I'm alone with you Priest!Henry verse which includes An Exquisite Temptation & A Beautiful Reality is so damn good you need to go read it

@xthelastknownsurvivorx's Every Time My Heart Swings Back to You is a great fic that combines college au and reincarnation and was very easily one of my fave fics of the first part of the year

Grace @eusuntgratie's already over was one of those fics that even tho I wasn't reading a lot of fic at the time it came out i had to read it and you should to if ya want a lil alex/raf fic - and who doesn't lolz while ur checking out Grace's fics if ya want a lil firstprince one after hours (mechanic!Alex) is so good and you won't be sorry you read it

okay you also need to check out @cricketnationrise's Yes, it's an emergency! & and now i'm back / from outer space - two very great the martian firstprince AUs

from very early in the year there is @everwitch-magiks Room For Rent (Sex Dungeon Not Included) a roommates fic that is so wonderful and deserves a read

Taylor @tailsbeth-writes has a wondeful Bi² Alex series where Alex explores gender identity that is worth you taking a read (with a co-write from Elle @run-for-chamo-miles on the 3rd fic)

the lovely M @thighzp wrote a wonderful raf/alex omegaverse fic that is so good heat of the moment & while ur there they have so many wonderful fics but i'm gonna tell ya to give put my mind at ease a read as well

@dumbpeachjuice wrote the very best college student alex who really wants to bone his professor henry in you know i can't be found with you

@meraki-yao wrote the tangled au everyone should read All At Once Everything Looks Different (Now That I See You) - you will not regret checking it out!

Stephanie @caterpills wrote this wonderful publicist Alex and author Henry fic that you should really check out if ya haven't This Is More of a Comment Than a Question - it broke my heart so many times and then mended it so perfectly

@smc-27 wrote this amazing age gap that if you have not checked out you really should - take it and have it all - and so many other wonderful fics as well of course

and i'm gonna wrap this up with something current

Charlotte @captainjunglegym wrote this amazing fic just this month about Alex getting railed by Henry while he fucks his pocket pussy and it's so damn delicious! The Image of Your Face Comes To Me (When I'm Alone in the Dark)

there are so many i'm forgetting but I've rambled way too long already so we're wrapping this up ... finally lolz

[trinketfairy]

SQUISHMALLOWS/BUM BUMZ ALTERNATIVE MASTERPOST

After posting my warning on Jazwares for supporting Israel, I've been asked time and time again to make my alternative plushies brands available for non-Twitter users, to which I say "absolutely, fuck that site." It's well overdue at this point, so here's my list of plush brands that are way better than Squishmallows and Bum Bumz!

Unfortunately can't provide images due to Tumblr's image limit, but I'll provide websites for you to search through when available.

Complete list is under a readmore for convenience.

Squishables: If you want that same "kawaii" aesthetic and round shapes, Squishables is your best bet. They're great too because a lot of their plush are designed by fans who are given a cut of their sales. Sign up for their email notifications, they have sales very often!

Amuse/Amufun: If you're really into the "kawaii" aesthetic, then it makes sense to look directly towards Japanese brands! You may know them for their Alpacasso line. It can be expensive to get them imported, but I think they're very much worth it.

Jellycat: I can't say I 100% recommend their newer plush anymore considering their steep decline in quality, but their older plush are still so wonderful and full of character. You're bound to find something by them that you like from their catalogue. (Editor's note: This is what my original thread said, but it seems like Jellycat has improved their quality control, so I feel much better with recommending them again!)

Mary Meyer: If JC is too much out of your price range, then Mary Meyer is what I recommend next to them! Their Marshmallow Zoo line is a huge favourite of mine, I love how full of character they are.

Aurora World: Aurora World has plenty of brands under their belt, so there's bound to be something that tickles your fancy. Brands under the Aurora World company include Palm Pals, Eco Nation, Miyoni, and their baby line, Ebba.

Steiff: Ah yes, the OG teddy bear brand, the one that started it all and is still going strong. Be warned that they can get pretty expensive depending on what you're looking at, but I hear that they're so worth every single penny.

Douglas Cuddle Toys: Probably the quintessential plush brand when it comes to realistic plush, especially cats and dogs, but they have tons of other species available too! Pretty affordable too if you're buying them at retail price

Wild Republic: Another one that does more realistic-looking plush, but I think they have a wider selection of species to choose from. If you're looking for a niche animal, Wild Republic (likely) has you covered!

Shinada Morisaka Global: Another plush brand I have yet to get my hands on, but one that I hear fantastic things about. I mean come on, how can you not love these little guys??

Pokemon Center: Jazwares unfortunately holds the license to make Pokemon plush, but that doesn't mean they're your only option when it comes to Pokeplush! TPC has been making their own Pokeplush for ages now, and they have plenty of different lines to suit your tastes.

Sunlemon: They're expensive to get imported but oh my god are they worth it. The quality is truly umatched compared to American plushies, I adore my tanuki to bits. Please get more eyes on their stuff.

Prime Shiba: Definitely a more expensive option, but I think they're cute plushies for every dog lover. Their stuff often goes on sale often so definitely take advantage of them!

Plushie Dreadfuls: You've probably seen one of their mental illness-themed bunnies before, but have you seen their Pride and Zodiac collections too? They also have many generic-looking plush if the personalization isn't up your alley! Ok so this was in my Twitter thread but apparently since then some shit has gone down with the company CEO making some offhand remarks that got misinterpreted but he acted like an ass in response to it, I recommend doing your own research on it before you buy in case that's not something you wanna support.

StrawbunnyCake: Want to go more small business? Consider supporting a fellow disabled creator, StrawbunnyCake! Their stuff is adorable, and you're sure to fall in love with their characters.

Hannimations: Also on the list of small businesses is Hannimator! Easily best known for their Pride-related Colourful Puppies/Kittens plush lines

Paleoplushies: If you're super into dinosaurs and other preshistoric animals, then Paleoplushies is sure to have something you'll like! They're all handmade by a single artist, so please show them your love and kindness

Cirquell Curiosities: Another great small business to support, most known for their high-end demon goat plushies! A lot of their stuff is one of a kind too, so they're the place to go if you're looking for a unique plush.

Snughouls: The unique and elusive Care Weres line by McMadMissile is sure to win over your heart! It originally started as just being the werewolves, but has since expanded to all kinds of demonic creatures from the Kickstarter! There's even some designs waiting to be funded!

Next are a bunch of brands that weren't personally recommended by me, but get my seal of approval:

AfternoonFika

Creep Cat Toy Co.

Weighted Wildlife

Tasty Peach Studios

Bunnies By The Bay

Snoozimals

Smoko

ChottoBonita

Honeylambs

CraftedCuddlez

Cyborutchi

Fluffnest

MarDeLunaArts (+ on Etsy)

Bellzi

B Softies by B Toys

That's all I have to share, but if you have any other brands you think are worth highlighting then by all means I invite you to reblog with your additions. Please remember that this is a collective effort and we're all counting on each other to act. Keep your head up, don't stop talking about Palestine, and remember to prioritize the official BDS brands list. From the river to the sea 🇵🇸🍉🕊️🫒

[ateez-himari]

Hi bb!!!!! How are you? Happy new year even tho I'm reallyyyy late but it the thought that counts😺I wanna say thank you to the person who sent that ask cause gawd damn was that hot🙏🙏🙏

I obviously had some questions and I'll be limiting my questions to a maximum of 3 in each ask cause I really don't wanna tire you out especially after seeing that you started the year with a 6am shift, you deserve rest from both work and uni

1-Yk how some couples have the person who kind of leads in the relationship, like always takes the first step and ensures that their partner is always safe and well? I was wondering who takes on that role between minari or if they both depend on eachother when they need it

2-what was the teasers reaction to the couple photo shoot, plus did her brothers and oppas react to it as well?(yoongi is planning murder during his military enlistment)

3-do you think that hima would be a great cast member for squid game? I honestly think her personality would fit in really well and obviously she'd take on a persona but still

I love you so much bb🫵💓!! please take care, and feel free to answer whenever you want, your health is more important. May 2025 treat you well💞💞

Hi sweet!! 🥰 Happy late new year to you too! It was honestly hehe the lean absolutely ended me 🤭 Nooo don't limit your questions, I like having a bunch of them at once! It honestly gets my brain working better since that way I can 'bulk think' and just brainstorm everything at once!

Fun story about this morning before I answer; I woke up at 1am thinking it was 5am so I got up, turned on my light and almost started getting ready until my brain registered that I saw a 1 and not a 5...so I went back to bed. I swear I didn't even know what planet I was on, my body was on autopilot and I barely registered that I was out of bed-

• They both depend on one another but on different levels; one thing that's important to remember when it comes to their relationship is the fact that Himari had to be very mature for the rest of her childhood and couldn't really rely on anyone - Hanzo was shutting down, Yoongi needed to be saved, their parents worked a lot and Geum Jae was already out living his own life. While she has no problem being the shoulder for Mingi to lean on whenever he needs to, he knows that while she may not realize it she still needs a lot of support along with someone to look out for her health

Ex (coming hopefully soon); Himari developed a habit of not caring much for her health and was actively coughing up blood while producing 'Golden' (she was straining her voice too much which caused her to develop laryngitis - which made her cough for extended periods of time)

• Hongjoong and Seonghwa will forever see Hima as their little baby so they were shocked once the photos came out, they had to look twice to realize that the woman with Mingi was indeed his girlfriend (they would have beat him up if she wasn't). Yunho literally had their maknae sitting on his lap kissing him while they were filming 'Where We Fall' so he wasn't as phased as the others. Yeosang did NOT want to look - no one told him that the photos were going to be spicy so when he saw them for the first time he nearly threw his phone. San just saw two fine ass people posing with each other half naked, no one knows if he even registered it was his friends-. Wooyoung was the one that sent them to the group chat and was hyping them up so much, asking them when the next shoot would be. Jongho covered her with a blanket but did compliment how well the two posed together

Hanzo was in his sister's messages pointing out that while she chastises him for not wearing shirts in his Instagram posts she posts half naked with her boyfriend ?? Pure irony smh. He did say she looked pretty (he always does after every single photo shoot). Yoongi was absolutely fuming especially when other people serving with him that are fans of k-pop started talking about it - he wasn't mad because she was half naked, he doesn't care about that...but how dare someone touch his little baby sister like that ? Geum Jae kind of had a typical dad reaction where he was like; "oh you guys look good together...but didn't they have enough budget for clothes ?"

G-Dragon and T.O.P came across the pictures because they follow her personal account and neither knew how to react to it. There's more than a decade of difference between them, and while G-Dragon is toying with the idea of becoming her second mentor, T.O.P doesn't know her that well yet so it was slightly awkward for them. Taemin absolutely loves Himari and Mingi's relationship but had a similar reaction to Yoongi's in the sense that he was almost offended that someone would even think of posing with her this way. Stray Kids blew up the group chat with texts like; "himari wtf ??" "what kind of magazine is this-" "why is he GRIPPING your ass"

• I think she'd be amazing! For 'Where We Fall' there was a lot of panic, fear, sadness, etc., which fits perfectly into the emotions actors have to play in Squid Game. Plus she's an idol so she's athletic, which is great for the games!

I love you more sweet 🫵🩷!! I'm taking good care of myself don't you worry! I'm unfortunately still sick (I got really sick 2 years ago and my immune system's been kind of shitty ever since) but I've been sweating it out. I hope you take care of yourself as well especially as uni starts up again, I hope you take time to rest and let's make 2025 a great year!! 😘

[topazadine]

How to Write Faster (And, Hopefully, Better Too)

Estimated Reading Time: 7 minutes

I've shared some tools before to help improve your speed and motivation, which include:

Using a word count spreadsheet

Working on only one WIP at a time

Leverage StimuWrite and Cold Turkey

.... but I still have a few more tricks, which I'll share now.

Why should you listen to me? I've written over 2 million words of fiction since 2021. That's a lot, more than many people write in a lifetime.

This is despite the fact that I also write 22,000 words every week for my day job. I do around 10k of creative fiction a week. And there's also the time I spend writing these articles for you, the lovely people of Tumblr, which is around 4-5k per week.

So, all told, I probably do around 37,000 words (creative, informative, and otherwise) every single week.

I did that by following these tips.

Separate the work into stages.

First, let's outline the stages of work (or at least the stages I use). You may have a different setup, and that's fine - if you do have a system that works for you, then you probably don't need my post at all. Keep doing what you're doing and ignore my advice.

But if you do not have a system, consider mentally separating things into these parts.

Active Writing. When I am busy doing the draft. It is both the most precarious and productive time; everything else related to books goes on the backburner. I am doing nothing writing-related but writing. No discussing the work unless I'm stuck somewhere, no making moodboards, NOTHING. This is my sacred time when I am in the thick of things and I put Writing Blinders on.

Percolation. I am done with the first draft. I set the piece aside and do other things like reading other novels, outlining another story, answering tag games, playing with moodboards, or putting everything aside and focusing on other hobbies. This is so I can come back to revisions with a fresh set of eyes. It keeps the story in my mind and can even help me discover new things I want to add.

Revision. After I have had a beta reader check things out, I go back and start fixing things. Then it percolates again. I repeat percolating and revising as many times as I feel necessary. Many times, I will have one beta reader look at it, then revise, and then have another beta reader look at it, each one getting a slightly different version of the story so I can compare what they liked or disliked.

Prepublishing. Most authors' least favorite part: marketing and telling people about your book so that they want to read it when it is ready. That includes stuff like making mood boards, doing tag games, sending out ARCs, setting up adds, posting on social media, and so on.

Again, ONE STEP AT A TIME. Do not blend all of these into a slurry.

I will say that this time around, with Pride Before a Fall, I ordered the cover before I was done with the book because I had a very clear vision of what I wanted.

Talk less, write more.

This is similar to the problem I highlighted in my Double Outlining post; the more you talk about your story, the more you trick your brain into thinking that you've done the work when you categorically have not.

Plus, the time you spend talking about your book is time you spend not writing your book. We can't do both simultaneously.

I don't really talk about my stories while I'm doing them, not even with my family. I may post a line or two, and I may tell people the basic plot, but I'm not spending hours discussing them with anyone unless I need advice on what to do next. Even then, it's more like "hey what do you think about this? Good? Cool, off I go."

Please get out of the habit of exhaustively picking apart your work with other people during the Active Writing stage. That can come during the Percolating and Revising stages.

Devote all your love and attention to one story.

Yes, I've mentioned this in a whole entire post, but I need to emphasize just how important it is to write stories one at a time. Working on a million things at once is not efficient; it's scatterbrained.

Force yourself to do ONE story. Just one. Not two or three or five. ONE.

Again, I've written 132 stories on AO3 (two of which are 100k+, multiple of which are 50k+), published one book, and written 5 of the upcoming manuscripts for the 10-part Eirenic Verses series. I am a very productive writer, and that is because I do everything one at a time.

Don't tell yourself "oh, I can get more done if I do a little bit on this one and that one and that one."

Can a chess player win three games of chess if they play all of them simultaneously? Uh, probably not. Each of their opponents is devoting everything to one game while their concentration is split between three different boards.

And you're not going to win either if you're playing twenty games of Write the Book simultaneously.

Do not mess around with moodboards, tag games, character questionnaires, playlists, etc, during Active Writing.

I discussed this in my Extremely Controversial Writing Opinions, but it bears repeating.

Do all of that stuff later, after you are done, as a marketing tool. It's procrastination, plain and simple.

Any time I get sucked into tag games or moodboards while writing, I get less done because I'm devoting time and energy to something that doesn't actually enhance my book.

It's one thing to do character questionnaires while you're figuring out a character, but quite another to stop what you're doing and tell everyone what your character's favorite food is.

Is that helping you get the project done? No, it is not. Log out of Canva. Turn on Cold Turkey to block Tumblr or Twitter. Leave that stuff alone.

Read short stories.

You know you need to read to become a good writer, but taking hours out of your day to read a novel while you're drafting your own novel can take away from your writing process.

That's not to say you shouldn't ever read novels, of course, but you can do that while you're in between projects.

During my active writing phase, I like to read a short story before I get started on working. This gives me inspiration and primes my creative pump so I'm excited to do my best.

Reading short stories also helps me focus on brevity rather than long-winded diatribes, which lets me pack more into a story.

Don't reread your work during Active Writing.

It's easy to get sucked into rereading and then not get anything new done; plus, this makes you want to revise, which should come later.

Reread only as much as you need to fix plot holes or remind yourself of where you're going. Refusing to reread also lets you look at your work with fresh eyes during revisions.

Make a writing ritual.

You need to tell your brain that it is writing time. This could be anything, like brushing your teeth right before you sit down to write, or drinking coffee out of one specific coffee cup when you are in writing mode, or putting on a playlist that you only use when writing.

For me, I light incense and ring a bell, then ask my muses to help me. When I take a break, I'll light a new incense stick (it's Japanese incense so very light scent) and ring the bell again.

That's about it, though I may write another post with more tips. I hope these are helpful to you, even if you don't like them. Sit on them, think about it, and give it a try. You might find yourself spending more time writing and less time just thinking about writing.

I've created a masterlist of writing resources that you can peruse at your leisure, all for free.

The posts I write can sometimes take me hours - they're always intricate, always thoughtful. This one took me about 1 hour to write.

I do this as a labor of love for the writing community, sharing what I have learned from almost 15 years of creative writing.

However, if you'd like to support me, maybe you'll consider buying my book?

9 Years Yearning is a gay coming-of-age romance set in a fantasy world. It follows Uileac Korviridi, a young soldier training at the War Academy. His primary motivations are honoring the memory of his late parents, protecting his little sister Cerie, and becoming a top-notch soldier.

The book features poetry, descriptions of a beautiful country inspired by Mongolia, and a whole lot of tsundere vibes.

You can also check it out on Goodreads for a list of expanded distribution.

If you do purchase my book, don't forget to leave a review!

Reviews are vital for visibility on Amazon and help to support indie authors like me. Whenever you love a book, be sure to let the author know! It's much appreciated.

[moonffe]

i lovedddd my lips might've slipped!! please please please make a part 2

ofc. <3

my lips might've slipped

ethan landry pt2

pt1. pt3 warnings: making out, suggestive stuff, arguing, blood. word count: 7k

A/N: the writers block i got while writing this was almost the end of me... came up with a lot of one shot ideas though so I'll be posting those really soon.

“You left him… there.” Quinn repeated after you, looking bored out of her mind like this happened everyday.

“He was being an asshole, Q.”

“You always think he's being an asshole.“ She shook her head with distaste.

You weren't exactly known for being uncomfortable around people. Actually, it was the other way around. But you couldn't look at her as she ambled towards her closet. You felt embarrassed, tracing the rim of your coffee mug with your finger. “That's just how he acts, Y/N. You out of all people should know this.”

“He used to be different.”

This seemed to pique her interest. “In general or towards you?”

You rolled your eyes. “Both.”

“A lot of stuff has changed since we were kids.” She told you, leaving a bag with vials filled with fake blood next to you on the bed. You understood there was privacy in this apartment, but it was risky to leave this kind of stuff just laying there in her closet. How did she do it? “Richie's gone, dad's more distant than usual…”

Quinn bit her lower lip. You hated drawing all the attention to you when she was going through stuff, too.

“You don't need to—”

“It's fine.” She cut you off, her tone slightly aggressive. She cupped your face in her hands and leaned over you before you could stop her. You weren't self-conscious while being this close to her, Quinn was definitely the person you trusted the most. That's exactly why she noticed your lack of eye contact and was now forcing you to look at her. You didn't want to. You had so much shit bottled up you were scared you would start crying. You winced at the idea, stretching your arm to leave your mug on her night table.

“You're amazing, Y/N. I'm not just saying this because I'm your best friend. You really deserve the best out there, and If my asshole brother can't give you that, then move on.” You tried to retort, but her hand quickly slapped over your mouth. Jesus. “If you say you're not into him one more time, I'll jump out that damn window right now.” Her head nodded towards her bedroom's single window. You lured at her, but you could feel your heart hammering inside your ribcage. “You want him, and he wants you back. I'm not stupid and I know my brother— But if he keeps up with all the bullshit, then stop. I love him, but that doesn't make him a better person.”

Your eyes were starting to water, and hers were still fixated on yours. You licked her palm for the fuck of it. Quinn winced, retracting her hand from your face. “Did you have to do that?”

You wiped your damp eyelashes with the side of your wrist, a knot in your throat. “You weren't letting me go.” She snorted, your body barely swaying from her cleaning her palm on your shirt sleeve.

“Still. That ruined my entire speech.” Quinn had to press her lips together to not laugh. You were aware the situation was probably funny, but you couldn't muster a smile.

Her hand covered your mouth again, expression serious. “Understood?” She waited for you to say the words. You surrendered. The fuck else could you do? “Good.”

“I don't want him.” It's the first thing you said when you were able to speak again.

“Are you trying to convince me or yourself? I'll jump out the window, Y/N.”

You sighed, lifting your gaze from the floor to meet her eyes. “Thanks for telling me all that. I'm not sure it helped, but— I appreciate you caring about me and my… complicated relationships with individuals who do not own a uterus. You're a good friend.”

“Best friend.” She ruffled your hair before reclining on the bed, propping herself on her elbows. “Well, are you gonna tell me what happened between the two of you?”

She'd hate you. She'd beat the absolute shit out of you. Your eyes almost widened at the mere thought of telling her— Yeah, you weren't going through that. “Nice try. No.”

“Did you…” Her eyes narrowed, thoughtful. “Get drunk and kiss him?”

“No.”

She elevated her eyebrows. “Did you fuck him?”

“Fuck, Quinn!” Your face scrunched up, she laughed when you threw a pillow straight to her face. “No!”

“Okay, okay!” She glanced away before looking back at you. “Did you maintain sexual intercourse with my brother?”

You had to rub your temples to alleviate your embarrassment. “That made me want to kill myself.”

“So it's a yes.”

“It's a ‘I'm not talking to you for the rest of the night’.”

“You can't talk to the dead.” She reminded you, sighing as she sprawled out on the bed. You mirrored her, lying on your back and staring at the ceiling, fidgeting with the ring around your finger. You missed wearing some of your favorite jewelry, but times were different, and now you had to keep them hidden in your closet. They were gifts from a certain person…

“Go fuck yourself, respectfully.” You shut your eyes closed, a small smile playing on your lips as Quinn's hand slapped over your forehead. She felt up your face until reaching your cheek, your head tilting after she gave it a fake bitch slap.

“I did not take any offense in that.” You couldn't see her face, but the laziness in her voice was obvious.

You stared at the filled bathtub, feeling the weight of your eyelids. Time flew by while you and Quinn were asleep. You usually avoided naps, afraid you'd have that dream again. But this time you were so tired you didn't even think of him. Ethan's presence brought you back to the present. He sprayed fake blood into the water, then turned to you. "You ready?” You hated being this close to him.

“I guess.” You motioned for him to turn around while you took your clothes off and got in the bathtub. You kept your shirt in hand, using it to cover yourself. If you fucking catched him looking at you… “Ready.”

Ethan faced you, eyes briefly lingering downwards before he sighed. “Okay.” He hummed, a small wrinkle forming between his eyebrows as he knelt in front of you, focused on inspecting your torso. “This is gonna hurt.”

“We practiced this.” He nodded, still not looking into your eyes. You had to die. Well, not exactly. The plan was to get injured and just make it look like you almost died.

It would be too convenient if you escaped the apartment clean, and too hard to fake your death like Quinn was. So, since you were such a fucking masochist, you agreed to do this.

Your best friend wasn't as good with a knife like her brother was. He knew what he was doing well enough to not damage anything vital, and you were sure he wasn't evil enough to actually hurt you. "Bring it.”

Was he?

You squeezed his shoulder with all your strength as the blade of his knife found its place beneath your ribs. He pulled you closer, letting you bury your face in his neck. You weren't supposed to scream.

“I know. I know it hurts.” He whispered, fingers sliding through locks of your hair. He was trying to comfort you, anyone would in this situation, but the glare you showed him made the look on his face change. He let go of you. “Have it your way, sweetheart.”

You frowned at the pet name. “I'm bleeding. Do you mind?”

“I stayed on the side and didn't go too deep, Y/N. You're not gonna bleed out.” He spat, applying fake blood to your leg. His hand ran over your skin to disperse it over your shin. He had an attitude, you could see it on his face, but he was still being careful.

“And? It still hurts.” You said, trying to hide how damn flustered you were actually getting.

Your hand remained hardly grasping your shirt, trying to keep it in place. Ethan's eyes met yours after you flinched at the cold blood. He looked away, but his gaze returned to your hands after a while. You didn't like it. “What?”

“You’re shaking.” He mentioned. Discreetly, you checked. Your fingers trembled around your shirt, but he shook his head before you could retaliate. “I'm not looking.” His voice was soft, but your personality wasn't.

“You are, though.” And he probably was. Why the hell would he mention it, then?

He gave you a look, but continued with his work. You were trying to relax, you really were, but his touch was making you feel things. The fabric of his gloves touching you with so much gentleness like you were made of porcelain. It was actions that mattered, not words. His thumb traced up your arm, softly pressing on your shoulder. His eyebrows furrowed. “Did you get that mole removed?”

“Ethan.” You grumbled.

He sat back, looking distraught for a second before he made up his mind and met your gaze. “Was it for that guy?” He asked. You could only close your eyes, trying not to snap. “I'm dead serious, Y/N. I want to know.”

You weren't supposed to talk about anything that could or couldn't have happened in the past. And specifically, of how he could know about that mole. “What guy?”

“Johnny.” He choked out. “Your asshole ex.”

You opened your eyes and realized he was, in fact, being serious. His demeanor solemn as he stared, waiting for you to answer him like you didn't have a fucking agreement. “Surprised you remember him.”

“I remember when it comes to you.” His words made your cheeks heat up, though you weren't sure if it was out of surprise or embarrassment.

“What does he have to do with any of this?”

“Did you get it removed for him?” He looked at your shoulder, a vein throbbing on his jaw. “I liked that mole.”

“I don't know, was Tate dressing up for you at the Halloween party?”

He almost looked like he wanted to deny it, but couldn't bring himself up to the task. “Do you care?”

“It's the second time you ask me that.” You paused, and decided to shoot him back. “When it comes to you, I care.”

“Is it bad that I like the sound of that?” He asked, his voice husky. It made your breath hitch.

“Just answer the question.”

“I don't know— Maybe? I didn't ask her to.”

“That's kinda obvious.” It was. But you still wanted to know if it was fucking intentional. “It would be weird.”

“What? Ask my girlfriend to dress up for me?” He chuckled, his amusement tinged with sarcasm. “It would be plain abusive.”

Girlfriend. Your jaw clenched, you couldn't keep living like this. Why did it hurt so much? Why did it hurt so much to know he did exactly what you asked him to? He got over you, and you were still the same idiot that drooled over him every time he was nice to you. You hated him.

“You know who'd do that?”

Ethan noticed the change of tone in your voice, so he just hummed in response, wanting to avoid an argument. But by that moment, it was your only way of protecting yourself. Of trying to take your heart away from his reach. “Your dad.”

“You always say that.” You noticed how much you got to him by how forcefully he put the vial down. He leaned in, fingers threading through your hair to make it look like you fought back.

“Am I wrong?”

“No.” He paused, his voice wavering. He was struggling to maintain his composure, and you were enjoying it. “But he's my father, and I'm nothing like that man. It's offensive.”

“Nothing like him?” You raised an eyebrow, challenging him. He met your gaze with conviction, looking like he was about to snap at you.

“Nothing like him.”

“I thought you helped him kill your mom.”

“It's different.” He assured you, a flicker of pain crossing his features. You weren't falling for that shit.

“But you have a relationship with him.”

“Not the relationship I'd like.”

Your teeth caught your lower lip as he got busy again. He applied blood on his gloves for realism, rubbing his palms together to spread it over the black fabric. It wasn't hard for you to notice the missing item, since you were pretty much devouring him with your eyes.

You were unaware that you voiced your thoughts out loud until his eyes focused on you. You felt your heart drop to your stomach.

“What?” He inquired, confused.

“Tate's hair tie.”

He just stared at you for a while, lowering his head ever so slightly. “Right.” You frowned.

“Did you guys get into an argument or something?” You were sure the answer was no, but him exhaling took you by surprise.

“It's stupid.”

“What did you do?”

“We were kissing and… I don't know, I was drunk. Mixed things up and called her by your name.”

His confession made your face fall. “Is that supposed to be romantic? Because it doesn't fucking feel like it.”

“She said no strings attached.” He glowered at you.

“Then why did you take it off?”

“Because she was mad.” He bit his lower lip, playing with the lace of his left boot to avoid looking at you. “I never— I never felt something for her, Y/N. But I think she started falling in love with me.”

No, no, no, no— You weren't sitting through that shit. Your best friend was one wall away, if you could just… “Quinn!” You shouted, but his bloody glove clamped over your mouth. When the fuck did he get that close to you?

“No, listen.” He groaned. ”You can't just always push me away.”

You moved your head to the side to push his hand away. His nose only inches away from touching yours. He was breathing heavily, and you were ashamed to admit it was making you nervous, he was making you nervous. “I don't wanna hear it, Ethan.”

“Can you give me one chance?” He begged, his hands moved to the wall, pinning you against it. “Just one fucking chance to talk?”

You started feeling dizzy while his eyes were on yours, and you realized you forgot to breathe. How to breathe. Fuck, you were weak. “Go on.” You wheezed.

“Thank you, I—” He swallowed. “I never felt something for her. I never felt… anything since we broke up. That's why I was using Tate. Because I was trying to feel something, I was trying to feel alive again—”

“So you just used her?” You cut him off, you were gripping your shirt against your bare body for dear life. “Like she was disposable.”

“I never thought you out of all people would care about that.” You rolled your eyes. He grabbed your chin to stop you from looking away from him. “We said no strings attached, Y/N. It couldn't even be called a relationship— It wasn't one. We would just make out and I would go as her date at parties.”

“You still looked pretty damn close.” You huffed, jealousy clouding your senses. “I don't wanna know about how you switched saliva with that bitch—”

“You just asked me to tell you!” He protested, your hand slapping over his mouth. You stayed silent, trying to get a clue on what was going on outside. It was very faint, but you could hear the group still yapping and laughing.

“If they hear you, it's over.” You grimaced.

“I'm sorry.” He coed.

“It's fine…” A low sigh escaped your lips, the soft fabric of his cloak between your fingers as you absentmindedly adjusted the hood.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because you asked me.”

“But you never told me anything before.” You paused, locking eyes with him. His big, earnest brown eyes that held rare vulnerability. You wanted to kiss him. “Why is it different this time?”

His fingers traveled up your arms, cradling your wrists tenderly as they were still pressed against his neck. “You know why.” He murmured, a tinge of pain underlying his words, causing your guts to twist and turn inside of you. Then you realized maybe they actually were. You still had a cut on your side.

“We're not good for each other.”

Ethan grimaced, shaking his head. “You keep saying that, but you're the only person I've felt something for—”

“Do you want me or need me, Ethan?” You interrupted him, he looked confused for a second. “Because they're two different things. And if you need me, it's not love.”

“I need you because I want you.” His face held a sense of urgency. What did he want you to say?

“What do you think is going to happen? If the same thing from last time repeats itself—”

“We'll get through it.” He nodded his head, his features shifting to show a crazed, desperate glimmer in his eyes that made him look out of his mind. “I want a future with you. I want you. Just you. Please, just— just think about it, alright? Please, let me… just let me…”

His plea hung in the air when you pressed your mouth on his. He groaned, his soft lips easily returning the kiss. The two of you grinned when he lost balance and you had to hold his shoulders, keeping him in place. He was still on his knees, after all.

His tongue slipped into your mouth, gliding and rubbing over yours. Your fingers tangled between his messy curls, fingertips fondling his scalp and making him kiss you even more eagerly. It was slow, but you could tell he had been wanting to do that for a long time. Ethan let out a sound, and you questioned if it was a sob or he was just really enjoying himself. Did he really miss you that much? To cry the second you kissed him? His muscular arms snaked around your body, the softness of his cloak against your bare, cold skin feeling like heaven on earth to you.

He was holding you like you would disappear if he let go, and maybe he was right. Ethan was addictive. He was like a drug you couldn't get enough of, and you were just wondering what would happen when he walked out that door and you found yourself alone, feeling guilty for falling into temptation.

“You're ready.” His lips were wet and he was breathing hard when he pressed his forehead against your own. You gave a small hum to acknowledge his words. “Remember the plan?”

You hummed again. “I need to leave you now.”

“Alright.” You finally opened your eyes, a little too bewitched by the boy in front of you for your brain to have any logical structure. His minty breath hit your lips as he leaned in, pressing a quick kiss to your lips you gladly reciprocated.

He stood up straight and grabbed the empty vials from the floor while you recollected your thoughts, a nauseous sensation sweeping over your stomach at the thoughts your brain was, for some reason, forming.

What if something happened to him? “If they hurt you, I'll slit their fucking throat.”

Ethan bit his lip to hold back a smile, his knee bumping against your calf. “Didn't consider you a romantic.” He stared down at you, his grin was contagious.

“I prefer the term psychotic, but thanks anyway.”

His gloved hand affectionately ruffled your hair, sliding down to your cheek as his lips pressed a kiss on it. “Try not to move too much, alright? I promise I'll make you dinner after this is over.”

You snorted, your hands finding place in his lightly muscular chest as you pulled him down to your height. He finally gave in, revealing a set of white, straight teeth as he smiled. “You're gonna burn the house down.”

You had a lot of memories of sixteen year old Ethan trying to cook, he was a fire hazard near a stove.

“We'll order takeout, then." He said in a low tone, giving your forehead one last kiss. Then your temple, then your lips. “It's a promise.” You watched him rise from the floor and leave, chewing on your lip as you heard the faint voices of him and his sister arguing about something.

Quinn was bloody and ready, they just had to start making noise to catch the group’s attention. Your breathing slowly increased in pace as the realization of what just happened started hitting you. You shouldn't have kissed him, you shouldn't have let him kiss you, you practically just told him yes—

Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit. You threw your shirt aside and groaned in pain. You definitely couldn't move much with a wound that big. Successfully grabbing your phone from the floor, you saw Quinn's text.

Took him a while to leave. Everything alright?

Not really.

Your finger tapped on the side of your phone impatiently. Come on. Come on, come on, come on— you sighed when she started typing.

Did he try something?

We kissed.

Was it consensual?

Yes. That's why i feel so fucking shitty. I shouldn't have.

We'll talk about this later alright? I need to get out there.

Okay.

You laid back on the bathtub and your face scrunched up. Fuck, it was hurting you. Was it pathetic that you couldn't even feel the pain before because you were busy worrying about Ethan? It probably was. He was still in your mind, he had been since you were seventeen.

There was a reason why you broke up, a reason why you tried to avoid him all these months. Guess you can't fall out of love with someone this fast, you had no idea why you thought you could achieve that. It was Ethan Kirsch we were talking about. That made it even harder.

Your eyes couldn't stare at the white ceiling for much longer, you were starting to blink a lot and you somehow feeling yourself losing blood. You didn't know if that was possible, or you were starting to hallucinate. Only thing you knew for sure, is you were dizzy as fuck. There were screams and thuds resonating through the thin walls of the apartment, the sounds of footsteps and running.

You weren't sure of how much time passed since Ethan left, but the voices and slams on the door became closer, a lot louder. Your eyes were starting to open again at the closeness of the noises. Someone called your name. Screamed your name, actually. It wasn't hard for you to recognize Mindy's voice. You blinked, trying to adjust to the lighting of the bathroom as Chad's sister noticed the crimson water in the bathtub, panting.

“Fuck, you gotta come with us!” Her eyes drifted somewhere else and yours followed. Sam was holding the door to the living room, with your ex-boyfriend relentlessly pounding on it. She looked horrified.

“Help her put something on. Fast!” She commanded, Mindy nodded and attempted to help you out of the water, but you kept shaking your head and pushing her arms away.

“I can't walk, I can't walk, I can't walk…”

“You're gonna die if you stay here!” Sam yelled.

Mindy choked out a breath, grabbing your pile of clothes from the floor. “I'm sorry about Quinn, but you need to come with us!”

“I can't— I won't. He thinks I'm dead.”

“With all the screaming, no, he doesn't anymore!” Sam ran towards you, hugging your shoulders to pull you out of the water. Mindy's eyes were wide and her hand was clutching at the wound on her arm after leaving you to put your underwear and shirt back on. Ethan was banging on the door harder every time, and Sam was starting to get impatient.

You rushed into Quinn's room and your jaw flew open at the sight of Anika bleeding that much. What did Ethan do to her?

The door creaked as it broke. Sam dashed into Quinn's room, and she and Mindy barricaded it with a closet. Your gaze shifted to Sam's boyfriend, staring at you and Anika bleeding out from the other window. Billy's daughter was looking for a way out, and you weren't exactly sure of what was happening while you stared at the door, wondering how much it would take Ethan to break it like the past one. Anika was whimpering, your arm wrapping around her absentmindedly.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Sam panted, catching your attention. Ethan was taking too long… And Danny was using a… ladder. To help you cross. What the fuck? “You three go first!” Sam turned to you. You glanced at Mindy, who looked offended.

“Someone needs to hold the door, Sam! Anika and Y/N are losing blood!” She shouted. “Go!”

“Shit…” Sam gave you a look before going first. Mindy was still holding the door, and Anika clutched her stomach, trying to contain as much blood as possible. You started blinking, feeling cold sweat run down your temples. You laid back on the bed, knowing you had to stay conscious for this to work. Mindy wasn't getting away from the door…

“I'll hold it.” You offered, stumbling with your own feet as you got up.

“You're practically dying, I'm not leaving you to do this!” She scowled, but you ignored her words and still stood next to her, pushing the closet onto the door.

“So now you're being nice to me?” You bit the inside of your cheek, because you knew this was probably the last time you'd see her.

“I was wrong.” She choked out, giving you a nod. No, she wasn't. Sam yelled for someone to go next. You and Mindy looked at Anika. She was the closest to passing out.

You started falling asleep before waking up again, you had to wait for Anika to get a little closer to Danny's window… when your eyes opened, you realized you fell asleep for another second. Shit. You glanced back, seeing Ethan's arm fully in the room and swinging his knife through the small opening of the door. You glared at Mindy. If she pushed back one more time, she was going to fucking hurt him.

You faked passing out, collapsing sideways to push her down onto the floor. Ethan kicked the door open after you landed on top of Mindy. She struggled to push you from on top of her, but she managed to... without enough time to get to the window. Sam and Anika's screams echoed as Ethan's hands closed around Mindy's neck, choking her right beside you.

You opened your eyes, seeing hers widen. Mindy's lips parted as if to yell something, but Ethan slammed her down on the floor, pressing harder on her neck until she gradually stopped fighting back. Her arms fell limp, and you glanced up at him. Anika was next.

You were faking being passed out, so you didn't really know what was going on until a loud thud reached your ears. Holy shit. Did she fall?

You stayed still, listening to Ethan's footsteps with your eyes closed. He knelt down beside you, you caught your lower lip between your teeth.

"Good girl." He praised, caressing your cheek with two of his gloved fingers. He forgot to turn off his voice changer.

“Do you think they're going at it?” Ethan's head turned to look at you, arms folded across his stomach. His chest rose and fell softly with each breath, the Christmas lights that took you half an hour to untangle and install in Quinn's car hitting his face directly.

You knew he was cold— you could tell. But he wasn't saying it out loud. You felt guilty. He told you to bring thicker blankets, but you completely forgot with how much your best friend kept rambling about her new boyfriend while you packed for your road trip.

Your forehead wrinkled as you munched on a Skittle, nodding emphatically “Is that even a question? Definitely.”

Ethan reached for a handful of candy from the bowl in your hands, propping himself on an elbow. “You think? I thought they only came here because he wanted to know the woods.”

You rolled your eyes, his expression curious as he chewed. “You know Quinn.”

“But I don't know the guy.”

“He's probably a jock who just wants sex, Eth. They all are. and Quinn is…” You squinted, searching for words. “Quinn.”

“Don't call her that.” He protested, pausing mid-movement to glare at you.

“Don't look at me like that.” You retorted, bringing the bowl to your chest to protect it from him. Ethan stared at you through his long eyelashes, apathetic. You let out a groan when he reached out to grab something behind you, his chest inadvertently ending up above your legs. “Personal space, mister.”

“I just want my water…” He grumbled under his breath, the two of you sharing a menacing look after he sat up straight again.

“She's my best friend. I know her more than you do.”

“Is that so?” He twisted the cap open, challenging you. “How?”

“You're like… okay, let's put it this way. You're family.” The way he rolled his eyes made you crack a smile. He looked adorable with his tousled, curly hair imprinted by the pillow. The two of you had woken up from a two-hour nap just about ten minutes ago, and you were a sucker for freshly awake, moody Ethan. “Would she tell your dad what she did last night with a guy she found at a party? No. You're the younger sibling, it's the same principle.”

“She tells me things.” He sounded almost offended, suddenly forgetting he was about to take a sip of his water.

“Yeah, PG-rated things.”

“I'm eighteen.”

“And? Wait til you're 21 to brag about your age.”

He shook his head slightly, wiping his mouth with his wrist. “You're not even 21 yet.”

“Do you see me flexing about my age? No.”

Ethan let out a sigh, probably tired of your shit already and grabbed his pillow, laying his head down on it again. You felt your face fall as your features softened. Maybe you were a little too harsh on him. You stared, because he was probably the most beautiful guy you'd met. The dark circles under his eyes were noticeable, pale skin almost translucent.

He was worried, and him being worried made you worried, so… that was inconvenient. Richie left Modesto with Sam the day before, and while you trusted him to man the fuck up and make things go as planned, Ethan didn't.

“He's gonna be alright, Eth.” You reassured him.

“Why did we come here?” He mumbled, your heart twinging at his small sniff of him. You should've brought the extra blankets…

You delicately caressed his cheek, his eyes surrendering to your apologetic touch. You felt more confident in fondling his skin and feeling the warmth beneath your fingertips. If you could just… Your thumb brushed over his lower lip before you leaned in, pressing a kiss to his soft forehead.

“Quinn's supposed to be with me, so I can't be home or your dad will suspect she lied. And as for you…” You paused, and Ethan's lips began to twitch into a wide smile, eliciting a chuckle from you. “Consider it a favor, you never go out.”

“Oh, yeah?” He teased, his eyes lazily opening. “That's sweet.”

“Never sweeter than you, baby girl.” You caressed his lower lip, his eyes rolling as he pushed your hand away. “You're mean to me.” You showed him a pout, and he just shook his head.

“Deal with it.”

You tugged at his blanket to discover part of his chest, getting a frown you completely ignored when you turned around, showing him your back. Quinn was a few cars away from you, but far enough so you couldn't hear or know what was going in there.

You almost winced. Not like you wanted to know. Apparently this was a popular place for people to come and hook up. You were just closing your eyes and hoping you wouldn't hear anything. Even finding a racoon would probably be better than that shit.

"It would probably be uncomfortable." Ethan mused after a while, and you got on your side to frown at him.

"Are we still discussing this?" Your smile immediately faded at his raised eyebrows. "Uhm— It's cold, they'd freeze."

"Not big enough to move."

"What if a fox saw the lights and started scratching the door in the middle of it?" Ethan frowned before the two of you chuckled. At least you were making him laugh now. You were a bad friend.

"If there's not a blanket under them, it'll hurt their backs." You didn't give it much thought before nodding in agreement, eyes slowly drifting downwards to look at the blanket beneath the two of you. The idea that popped up in your head scared you. He was telling you this because… Lifting your chin again, Ethan's gaze met yours, and next thing you knew, he leaned in, kissing you.

You immediately wrapped your arms around his neck, your hands finding his hair and playing with it while he stretched his arm to grab his pillow. His arms wrapped around your waist to have support of your body and lay your head on the pillow, your back pressing against the fuzzy blanket. His thighs straddled your legs. “Is this okay?” He breathed out, looking down at you, but he didn't seem to have any intention of stopping.

You answered by firmly pressing your lips onto his again. Ethan grunted into the kiss, returning it like his life depended on it. His body was so soft and comfortable against yours, you barely felt any pain when he grabbed both your wrists and pinned them above your head with one hand, but it was still uncomfortable. “Eth, my hair…” He stopped, noticing his arms pressing down on your hair.

“Shit, I'm sorry.” He quickly apologized, eyes darting from your lips to your eyes. “Are you alright?”

“I'll be if you keep going.” He nodded, obeying. Your thoughts weren't the clearest thing at the moment. You wanted this so much and you had been wanting it for a long time, the feeling was similar to being high. Even better. This was it. You had him. He had you. You lost yourself in all the caressing, mind clouding with the feeling of him, the touch of his fingertips on your neck and his big hand wrapping around your susceptible throat as he kissed you.

His body weight on yours was taking the air out of your lungs, but the feeling of being helpless only helped increase the violent hammering of your heart inside your ribcage. You adored him. Every single inch of him. You were panting, the heat all the pillows and blankets around the two of you were providing making you sweat badly.

You helped him pull his black hoodie over his head, his bare arms squeezing you against him immediately after. "I'll take care of you, okay? Just relax." He kissed the corner of your mouth, lips trailing down to press gentle kisses onto your neck. You threw your head back, Quinn's pink knit sweater just lying there in the driver's seat, making your mouth go dry.

Why did she leave it there? As a reminder? A reminder that the two of you shouldn't be doing anything weird because you were just friends? Because the person who was kissing your neck right now was your best friend's younger brother? No, you were just being paranoid. That was straight up fucking schizophrenic.

"You're not letting me lay you down." He uttered in a low, guttural tone. You glared at his words.

"Because I'm comfortable like this."

"With your elbows flexing like that?" He withdrew his mouth from your neck, staring up at you, out of breath. "Really?"

"Are you mad at me right now?" You inquired. Ethan looked away before starting to get up. "Can you please not—"

"No."

"What did I do!?"

"Nothing," he snarled. You sighed as he offered his hands to help you up. Taking them, you brought your legs to your chest awkwardly. It was clear he wanted answers with how he stared at you, and he knew you too well to lie to him. "What's wrong?"

"It doesn't... feel right." You choked out, glaring up at his face, and wishing he would understand. Ethan looked taken aback but quickly recovered.

"This doesn't feel right?"

"Yeah."

"Is it because of me?" He asked, and the look you gave him was offended.

"No, of course not. But you're Quinn's—"

"Brother, yeah. She doesn't care." His eyes narrowed. Was he fucking mocking you right now?

"How do you know?"

"It's Quinn."

"Don't be saying that about my best friend.”

Ethan's jaw clenched, it took him a moment to collect himself before he looked away from your face, exhaling the breath he was holding. “Alright.”

“Alright.” You agreed.

The two of you fell silent, focusing anywhere else that wasn't each other. Ethan fidgeted with the blanket, eyes on your phone laying next to the candy bowl. You stared at the rings wrapped around your fingers, chewing on your lip. You had to get up— you knew that. One of the two of you would eventually have to.

This was the smartest decision, and yet you felt empty. Like you had just closed the door that led to the single thing you had dreamt about for years but weren't able to get. It was alright, you tried to tell yourself. You had a friendship to keep. A great one.

Ethan knew the good and bad parts of you. He had seen you at your lowest, and he still stayed. Why? Because he was your friend. Your best friend. The one boy you had shared everything with. But if that was true, then why was there a difference in what you felt toward Richie and Ethan? Richie was your friend, and Ethan was... something more.

Your chest caved and squeezed your heart as you sighed. The little sound caught the brunet’s attention, prompting you to look up at his zealous face too. It took two seconds of eye contact for the two of you to start making out. Again. You rolled on the blanket a few times, almost dislodging the Christmas lights with how much the two of you were moving. You were on top when Ethan pushed your shoulders, his face scrunched up.

“This is wrong.”

You breathed heavily, confused. “What? Why?”

“I should be taking you to a hotel.” His grip on your shirt tightened, but he looked more mad at himself than at you as he tried to catch his breath. “For starters.”

“Oh my god, Ethan! Why would you—”

“Listen to me.” He demanded. His hands slid from your waist to your cheek, cupping your face in his hands. “We don't even have—”

“I'm on the pill.” You spoke over him. He paused, but he didn't look phased at all.

“That's only 87% effective.” Ethan's lips twitched, displeased, confusing you.

“How do you know that?”

He shook his head, delicately tucking away strands of your hair. “I wanted to be informed when this happened.”

“You were waiting for this to happen!?” The red creeping up to his face made you know you probably came off more panicked than you intended to. Shit.

“Weren't you?” He tried to play it off miserably. You moved away from on top of him, looking around for your missing shirt desperately.

“No. I was just praying every day it wouldn't.”

“Does that mean you—” He hesitated as he swallowed, sitting up. His eyes never left your face, looking vulnerable. Those angel eyes looked so fucking vulnerable you just wanted to hug him. But wasn't this an argument? You had to make up your mind. You found your shirt, but you didn't even care anymore. “Is this a one night stand? I mean— Are we doing this just because we feel like It, or is this your way to say you love me back?”

A shiver ran down your spine at his words. Fuck, no… “Put your hoodie on.” You groaned, and Ethan looked away from you frustratedly

The only reason you weren't answering him was because you were scared. This wasn't supposed to happen, at least not that soon…

“I do love you, Ethan.” The words just slipped out of your lips, surprising both of you. He raised his head, making sure you weren't joking. “And I don't want to break your heart.”

“You will if we keep living like this.” He admitted. “What's stopping you?”

You tried to not look down, you really did, but you were too much of a coward to not start playing with your rings. “Honestly? It's too messy. I don't want things to get weird with Quinn—”

“She doesn't care, Y/N.” He interjected, and you closed your eyes in frustration. That's what he always said, but you couldn't know for sure. You didn't want to find out. “If anything, I think she would be happy you chose someone she approves of.”

“I'm gonna fuck up my relationship with Quinn if this goes wrong…” You rubbed your temples, but looked up at the silence coming from him. He looked tense, like he was about to burst out the car and murder the first person he saw. You moved away slightly, contemplating.

You'd go to hell if you admitted out loud you found that attitude of his… enticing. He let out a breath when he saw you crawling towards him. His arms snaked around you, holding you close and lifting you slightly to move you onto his lap. “Don't be mad.”

“I'm not.” He crooned, you winced slightly as his nose pressed into the curve of your bare neck, next to your bra strap. He took in a deep breath.

“Sure.” You gripped the back of his black tank top, trying to relax. “You'll be wrinkled all over by the time you're 40 if you keep frowning.”

“I'm not mad at you, Y/N.” He repeated, he looked honest as his watery eyes met yours. Why did he look like he wanted to cry?

“And that's it?” You questioned. “I'm supposed to calm down because you told me it'd be okay?”

“Am I lying? Quinn's gonna be happy for us, I know that. But if you don't feel ready… then we can hide it.” He nodded solemnly, you raised an eyebrow.

“So, what? Am I like your lover now?”

“No.” He cringed, you let out a chuckle as he stopped caressing you. “That's not what I meant— We can just stay low for now. Not tell anyone about us.”

He waited, and after a moment of pondering, you sighed. You just had to look for the right moment to tell Quinn. You'd be more prepared by then. “Okay.”

Ethan's lips parted, curls wiggling as he nodded. You didn't know why he was like this, but you had to calm him down. You always had to. Ethan was aggressive, that was obvious. But he also used to be so sensitive.

“It's alright, Eth. It's alright…” You grabbed his face, staring at his big expressive eyes before pressing your mouth on his tenderly. Ethan muttered a "thank you" before slowly burying his face into your neck again. You felt his soft eyelashes against your skin as he closed his eyes, arms squeezing your waist.