#Could this be a ship? Destiny deserves some love. She could handle him. Would that be some kind of fandom heresy. Would I care of it was? 😆

[windsweptinred]

My last piece of fanart for a while I reckon. (Thank you to everyone who left a bit of love for my random scribble binge, I know I'm no great fanartist but I've had an absolute blast doing them). I wanted to do a Sandman/Good Omens crossover thing, because that's where my head is currently at. And since I'm being such a Destiny simp at the mo (why can't I be normal? 🙈) I decided to do Destiny of the Endless and the great Lancashire lady herself, Agnes Nutter doing a bit of collabing.

[dogbearinggifts]

What are your thoughts on tua S2? Did you feel like the characters grew? What did you like? What did you not? I’m interested in your perspective. Your analysis are super thoughtful and interesting!

Aw, thanks, Anon!

Overall, I really enjoyed S2 and thought it was a solid follow-up to S1. I do have my quibbles about it, so I think (for ease of reference and because my thoughts are a little scattered today) I’ll list some of my personal highlights (in no particular order) before getting into what I didn’t like as much.

Big spoilers ahead.

Allison. I thought they handled her storyline especially well. Of all the siblings, I think she had the most difficult obstacles placed in her way (not only is she a Black woman landing in 1961 Dallas, but she’s a Black woman landing in 1961 Dallas who can’t even speak in her own defense for a year) and they sugarcoated exactly none of it. The writers pulled no punches when showing what civil rights protesters went through, which just made their nonviolent response all the more breathtaking. Allison’s fear and anger during those scenes were palpable even as she kept them hidden. But along with that horror, we see the kindness and warmth of the Dallas Black community, the women who take her in simply because she needs their help, and her love for Ray, perhaps heretofore THE most thoughtful husband ever portrayed on screen. I loved him, and I loved him and Allison together. While I understand and respect his choice to stay in 1963, I wish they’d gotten more time together. They both deserved it.

Vanya. We got to see how much the baggage from her past affected her by glimpsing what she might be like if it were taken away. It’s an interesting philosophical question, and it was explored well, in my opinion. She finds it easier to love and be loved, and she stands up for herself more readily—but she also doesn’t hesitate to use powers she can’t quite control and threatens Five without fully realizing how dire her threat is (or how it might dredge up traumatic memories she doesn’t know exist). The moment where Ben finds her curled up, fully convinced she’s a monster, was heartbreaking. I loved watching her find happiness with Sissy, even if that was fleeting (and dear god, Sissy deserved her happy ending with Vanya, dammit, I don’t care if it would fuck up the timeline). Her patience and sweetness with Harlan were just beautiful. And the way she used the confidence she gained during her amnesia to fully come into her own not to exact revenge on her siblings, but to save them, was fucking phenomenal.

The humor. There was a lot more humor this season, and it was awesome. So many iconic scenes—Olga Foroga, Luther babysitting two homicidal Fives, Elliot awkwardly lecturing his guests on the history of Jello, “NEW TIMELINE NEW ME,” “Your vagina needs glasses,” AJ the fish gobbling up the cigarette bubbles, Five getting to say “fuck”….this season was a lot funnier than the previous one, and I think that was one of its strengths.

Klaus’ cult. It was played for laughs, which I both expected and thought was the best way to handle it. He didn’t want to start a new religion with himself at the center; he just wanted to not get thrown out of any more diners, but Destiny’s Children had other ideas. The “I too am a fraud!” scene was hilarious and tickled the question of whether or not a religion founded on false pretenses can still help those within it find meaning.

Luther. Getting him away from his dad, his siblings, and the Academy was exactly what he needed to become the pure of heart and dumb of ass genius we always knew he was, but his first major step in that direction was heartbreaking. We all knew he’d be rejected once he got to the Academy. We all knew Reginald would rip his heart out and stomp on it in his admittedly fashionable shoes. It gets Luther out on his own and forces him to become his own person apart from his dad, but that doesn’t make it any easier to watch. He got the positive character development he needed, but the catalyst was tragic.

Diego. We see, for the first time, exactly how Reginald kept him in line—not with meds or with PTSD-inducing torture, but with words. Even when he knows Diego as little more than a stranger, Reginald is able to rip off his skin and fling it in his face with a single diatribe; and even at 30, with years away from his dad, Diego is left unable to speak, feeling as if all of his accomplishments up to that point were the work of a dumb kid who thought he was smarter and more capable than he actually was.

Luther and Diego sharing a braincell. Luther has bad ideas. Diego has bad ideas. When they put their bad ideas together, they get terrible ideas. I loved watching them work together as a team, rather than being at each others’ throats for most of the season, even if I’m left hoping Olga Foroga had a pleasant and quiet day after that phone call.

Reginald. At first glance, it may look like the writers were trying to make him likable so they could parade him around as your average abusive-parent-with-a-soft-side. But it’s more nuanced than that. Abusive parents (and abusers in general) often fly under the radar because they fool outsiders into thinking they’re good people. They’re active in their communities. They give to charity. They have friends who attest to their virtue, significant others who think they’re the greatest. And that’s what we see with Reginald. We see him as the rest of the world did: an intelligent, eccentric man with a sharp sense of humor who cared deeply about scientific advancement. That’s how he evaded suspicion—because there were stories from years past of lively parties at his mansion, of what a gentleman he was to Grace and of how he did everything he could to save little Pogo. But those stories would all have come from people he considered his equals. When he’s with people he considers his inferiors—aka, the Umbrella kids—he’s openly condescending and demeaning. We get to see how he fooled the world, and it is chilling.

Elliot. He deserved better, and you can ship him with any one of the Hargreeves kids and get the cutest thing ever. 

The Swedes. They said so much while speaking very little.

Ben. He got more personality and screen time, and it was glorious. His love of his family and resentment toward Klaus practically leapt off the screen. The way he says “I’ve missed you all…so much” once they’ve all left was one of those right-in-the-feels moments; and watching him get so much of what he’s wanted for years when he possesses Klaus was beautiful.

Now, as for things I took issue with….

Ben. I understand why they ended his arc the way they did. I get that they were probably afraid the Klaus/Ben dynamic would grow stale if they didn’t change it somehow and wanted to give him a larger role in S3. His death(???) was heartbreaking and extremely well-done. But it also wasn’t foreshadowed. We never got any sense of what ghosts in the TUA ‘verse are, so the fact they can be destroyed by a ton of sound-turned-energy or by going too far into someone’s psyche or whatever happened….it’s not that it doesn’t make sense so much as there’s not enough evidence to determine whether or not it makes sense. It feels like the writers just kinda made that up so they’d have a reason to change Ben’s relationship dynamics, but if that’s the case, couldn’t they have done it another way? Couldn’t they have made it so the immense energy or psychic woo-woo or whatever gave him a power-up instead of destroying him? Vanya transferred some of her energy into Harlan and brought him back to life. Couldn’t something similar have happened with Ben? And if it tied him to Vanya as well as to Klaus, great! More fodder for angst and humor! (”Vannyyyyyyyy, stop hogging Ben!” “You got him for 17 years, Klaus, you can part with him for 20 minutes.” “Guys, don’t I get a say in this?”) I’m glad they didn’t write him out of the series entirely, but I still wish they’d kept him and all the character development he’d gotten throughout S2.

Episode 10. It looks like they tried to cram half a season’s worth of developments into 45 minutes. Twenty minutes in, I’d already said “Wait what the fuck” half a dozen times. A lot of those moments were explained later on, and I was able to make enough inferences to fill in any lingering plot holes, but…still. Too much stuff, too little time. E9 was a perfectly satisfying ending to the season. Yes, it leaves the siblings stranded in 1963, but they could’ve tied up those loose ends in the S3 premiere.

Lila. She’s an incredibly fun character, but her arc is kind of a mess. Most of that is due to E10, and I do feel that more time to let her arc breathe would’ve worked wonders, but I’m left feeling like her turn from “Handler is the best mom ever and I lurve Diego too” to “KILL DIEGO AND HIS EVIL FAMILY” to “Handler is a bad mom and Diego is right” happened too quickly.

The Commission. Okay, so, the Handler announces the entire Board has been killed, and she’s stepping in as director even though everyone appears to know she’s been demoted (and demoted pretty severely—she went from having an office bigger than some apartments to being a case management drone). There’s suspicion and lots of it. But then, La Resistance is….ten or so people in a single room? And when she calls the temps agents to her side, thousands of them show up ready and willing to fight and die? I dunno. Just seems like there should’ve been more splintering going on there. Again, I think they needed more time to tie everything up.

Aside from those complaints, I loved the season. I set aside most of a day to binge it, and I do not regret that decision at all.

[miraculouscontent]

“Truth”-related asks:

Anonymous said:

I just watched truth and man, we didn't need any of that... I'm so tired...

Anonymous said:

Me after reading that summary: We coulda had it aaaaaaaaaaallllllll, decent wri-itiiiiiiiiiiiiiiingggggg

Anonymous said:

oh. lukanette breakup. how surpri— oh wait, no it wasn't.

bunnybunblitz said:

Me, skimming your summary of truth: life is a nightmare life is a nightmare life is a nightmare abort abort

Anonymous said:

Truth was a living nightmare, and that's the truth!

*defeated sigh*

Anonymous said:

The way all that just make me start disliking Adrien so hard wow I have enough of him so hard can they get ride of him for one damn episode?

Anonymous said:

Wow! Writers got on completely new level. They somehow made people to be annoyed with Adrien, even without putting him in episode.

My meme image of “I’ve had enough of this dude,” about sums it up.

It’s almost impressive???

Anonymous said:

I have the impression that you should slowly gather materials for "Treatment of Marinette S4"

You know, when you’re right, you’re right.

Anonymous said:

Hey there... Got a lil rant, I hope you don't mind in sea of anons you're probably getting. I guess if show didn't treat Marinette as their favorite punching bag and lukanette as a thing to get over with to be back on love square bullshit I wouldn't be this salty. We all knew lukanette isn't a endgame, but we actually care about Luka ans Marinette as characters and as a couple, and we knew there was a break up brewing.

But I mlb writers for setting things up, canonizing them over provocative tweet and leave them to dust right at the beginning of s4. And, oh sweet irony as they kinda accidentally made Lukanette totally better than love square (let's be honest if they knew what they were doing we wouldn't get any breakup from narrative and character development standpoint),,, because their heroine for once is loved and appreciated but that's another discussion and they hate that for her. Also, thomas arstruck can suck my toe.

I don't know what's your opinion on soulmate and destiny thing, but I'm totally in opposite. I remember The Good Place (love the series btw!) quote about how soulmates are made with love and nurture of people and not some cosmic forces. And to see how show is pushing for Destiny ™️ I'm kinda disheartened. But I guess I never really liked love square execution in the first place when it turned out that Marinette is butt of the crush joke for 3 seasons and there's 0 development from that. Like Thomas, that's not funny running gag. Thanks for reading! Hope you're doing well!

Thank you for the rant, and I agree!

It’s so strange how all their attempts to push for the love square just push me more towards Lukanette. How do the writers do that???

Anonymous said:

Yeah that point where she exclaims Luka in shock just angered and confused me. She LITERALLY transformed because Luka was akumatized. And her being shocked is only there to get her under the truth spell.

This episode is held together by knots and strings at this point.

Anonymous said:

Wow, "Ladybug likes Chat Noir humor." Then why every time Chat Noir makes puns, Ladybug looks like she wanted to strangle him on spot.

Ladybug = us

At that point, they should’ve just said, “[The writers] like Chat Noir’s humor.” Like--writers, please don’t use Ladybug as a tool to simp for your sunshine boy, it looks really pathetic.

Anonymous said:

Based on the ellipses you used I'm guessing you're not a fan of Jagged talking about the "Guitar is my only family" song.

Oh, no actually... I mean, I do because it’s there to torment Luka, but the ellipses was because of the intentional pause in the episode. Jagged was looking sympathetic

Anonymous said:

Truth was awful, the only good thing we got out of it was a Lukanette date (yay :'D) and we got to know Luka's father (although we all been knew).

Honestly if we could find a way to edit it so Luka and Marinette properly kissed then we’d just chop it out of the episode and call it the only canon thing.

asexual-individual said:

So, given that "Truth" didn't introduce the protection charms, I'm going to take a wild guess that they're not introduced until after "Gang of Secrets", meaning that Marinette won't get any close friends that it's safe to tell her secret to.

I was legit so sure that it was a guardian benefit and now I’m just left confused/curious about what causes CharmBug. Like, what, do you get CharmBug by purifying your one thousandth akuma???

Anonymous said:

I am absolutely positive no one quality checks these episodes before they’re sent out. Ladybug getting caught off guard on Luka being Truth even though she knows he was akumatised, and the horribly upbeat music playing as Marinette lies in bed absolutely defeated is so bad there’s no way this was double checked before it was sent out to TV stations

At this point, I’m convinced that they don’t care and are jamming through episodes as fast as they possible can.

cobraonthecob said:

I'm willing to bet that the writers go through critical and salt blogs just to see what the fandom's thinking, and then they think we're serious and they sprint with whatever we say.

guys please reconsider and also lower your alcohol levels

Anonymous said:

It was awful in general, but why add the paternity thing in the break-up ep? It detracts from, well, everything else and makes obvious they are copypasting fan theories instead of thinking of plot points.

I really do think they knew that Luka being upset over Marinette’s secret wasn’t enough to akumatize him so he needed something else.

Anonymous said:

Let me get something straight: The episode was explicitly about Marinette going on dates with Luka and that they were together. Yet Juleka is once again part of the shipping squad with obligatory "Marinette is only weird because she's with Adrien"-theories, and she's totally cool with that?

Yup! :3

guys I just adore mob mentality, did you know.

guys--

Anonymous said:

Ok, but the fact that everyone considers Marinette’s crush on Adrien to be her big secret is stupidly unrealistic. They KNOW they’re all aware of it - the girl squad even figured it out by themselves before they were told and think it’s totally obvious (as long as you’re a girl cause guys are clueless about feelings right). As far as they’re concerned it’s not actually a secret so they SHOULD be spilling the things they think only they and Marinette know. I mean, I can think of dozens of possibilities for Tom and the rest of the girls already, but Alya?

We had a front row seat to the damning secret Alya knows from back in season 1, but I guess asking this show to acknowledge continuity is too much. Still, the episode could have been so much more interesting if Alya had said, “Marinette’s the one who really gave Adrien the scarf for his birthday, but he looked so happy thinking it was from his father that she couldn’t bear to tell him that Gabriel hadn’t actually gotten him anything.” (I suppose reminding people of that wouldn’t fit into the writers’ poor attempts to make Gabriel sympathetic though 🙄).

Lol, just imagine the entire battle being sidetracked by Luka being brought to tears by how selfless and sweet his girlfriend is while Shadow Moth is too distracted by how this will ruin his reputation to get him back on track.

JKHJDSKGFSG

YES.

ALL OF THIIIIIS.

THIS IS AMAZING.

Anonymous said:

Marinette deserves to tell Luka she's Ladybug and have some support on her side tbh, it's disgusting to see the writers breaking up clearly the only thing that brings her joy and peace currently

HONESTLY.

And judging from that one trailer, she IS going to tell someone her secret and it’ll probably be freaking Alya; you know, the girl who blabbed about her Adrien crush to Nino and is thus THE LEAST TRUTHWORTHY PERSON. (”bonus” if it’s before the amulets)

I’m having nightmares already about Alya distrusting Lila because Marinette is Ladybug and not because Alya believes in Marinette. DX

Anonymous said:

Now that it’s been confirmed (in the worst way possible) that Jagged Stone is in fact Luka’s (and possibly Juleka’s?) father, how would you handle the whole mixed family aspect considering Jagged and Anarka’s relationship, Jagged and Penny’s, Anarka and Penny’s, Jagged and Luka’s (and Juleka’s?), and Penny and Luka’s (and Juleka’s?)? Topics like mixed families and family relationships are something that needs to be handled sensibly and sensitively given how it hits home for a lot of real-world people. Since we obviously can’t trust the ML writers to handle such topics the way that they deserve to be, how would you go about it knowing what we know up to this point about each character on their own and how they interact with one another?

Luka and Juleka were “accidents,” but Anarka kept it a secret from Jagged since Jagged was already hyped up to go on his next tour and Anarka knew their relationship was crumbling (possibly he already dumped her as his guitarist and she was annoyed about it). Jagged eventually learns that he has kids and is hesitant towards the idea, but because of him doting on Marinette (who’s the same age as his kids), he opens up to the idea.

Anarka and Jagged in present are mixed between tolerating each other for the sake of their kids and being chaotic best friends. The bad blood died out a while ago and there’s occasional tension but because Anarka is a single woman not interested in Jagged and Jagged is single with a possible thing for Penny, they make it work

Anarka and Penny have an awkward relationship. Penny wants to schedule time for Jagged to hang with Luka and Juleka and Anarka is confused at the very concept of a schedule, like just take them whenever okay??? isn’t it easier that way??? and Penny is like, “...oh, I guess so?”

Jagged and Penny, it depends on if they’re in any sort of relationship. If they’re in a relationship, Penny is either open to the idea of him learning to be good with kids if she’ll eventually want kids with him, or mixed because these are another woman’s kids and it’s really awkward. If they’re not in a relationship, then Penny could also be mixed since she’s crushing on him but I could also see her either finding it sweet that Jagged wants to hang out with his kids or finding it a hassle to schedule them in.

Jagged and Luka is rough. Luka has so many conflicting feelings on his idol ending up being his father. Jagged will probably even comment on Luka’s shirt + necklace and all of Luka’s merch in an attempt to bond but that kind of comes off desperate/awkward and Luka’s not about that life. I could also see Luka taking all the stuff down and swapping out his shirt, but being hesitant to remove the necklace because it’s a gift from Marinette. He might try to wash off the signature. He knows it’s not Jagged’s fault exactly but Anarka seemed to have bad blood with him and even if they get along now, Luka’s bitter. Jagged meanwhile wants to connect with Luka because hey musician energy!! but is gonna mess up a lot and say a lot of awkward things. Marinette will probably have to be a middle man between the two because it’s easier for them to talk with her around.

Jagged and Juleka don’t have a significant relationship at first. Juleka never care who her father was and she wasn’t crazy about Jagged Stone like Luka was. Jagged does try to connect with her but they clash majorly due to Jagged being so “loud” and Juleka being so quiet. Jagged will see it as a huge accomplishment the day where Juleka says something coherent (i.e: not a mumble) to him.

Yeah though, keep in mind for all of this that I’m not a family relationship kinda girl, so this isn’t my forte (I’m probably the most sympathetic to Jagged out of the whole fandom; not to say I agree with his actions but I have a history of hating babies and children, so not cool of him if he ditched Anarka but like, I get it, doesn’t make him better but I get it from a non-realistic standpoint of “ew, parenting”).

Anonymous said:

You know what? Imma gonna ignore canon for a bit more than I’ve been doing. The only thing I take away from “Truth” is that Marinette loves Luka and Tikki looks adorable in hats. That’s it have a good Saturday! 💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙

Anonymous said:

If there’s one small detail that I thought was genuinely cute this episode, it’s Tikki posing in the mirror with her little hat collection.

Ahaha, those are good takeaways!

And yes, Tikki looked good in hats, but at what cost. (guys, where’s our jealous Tikki episode where Tikki is jealous of the attention Marinette has to give the other kwami wait no they’d just make it Marinette’s fault go back go ba--)

Anonymous asked:

Am I the only on squicked out by how Adrien acts all noble and claims he would never force Ladybug to tell him anything, but when it becomes apparent that he has to ask her a question before the akuma can he goes all ‘what are your three favorite things about me?’ :3c I mean, he had decent amount of time to think up a bunch of innocent questions that couldn’t hurt her in any way like ‘what is your favorite color?’ or ‘do you like cookies?’ or even ‘what’s the capitol of France?’ But instead he basically demands she compliment him. Coming from a guy who spent most of the last two seasons refusing to take ‘no’ for an answer that’s a bit… icky.

THIS

He could’ve phrased it in any way and he used it to get compliments from her. :|

At least Ladybug asked a legitimate question about how he felt about her guardian status.

Anonymous said:

I had this idea for an episode: Luka finds out that Marinette is LB because he is in danger. Let's say he gets yeeted off a building by an akuma and Marinette (in her civilian form) jumps after him, transforms while Luka sees it (he's shook, obviously), she grabs him and saves him from falling. I think that would be pretty epic, do you think you could write a one-shot based on that idea if you feel like that? I would forever be thankful. Have a nice day!

I like the idea, though I feel like that’s been done a lot before in identity reveal fanfics.

Anonymous said:

You know, despite them all getting interrupted, I thought the attempts at Lukanette dates was really cute. Luka picking up Marinette from school, the two trying to see who is the biggest jagged fan, getting ice cream at Andre's, it's really cute! I only wish Hawkmoth and the writers weren't such dickheads.

It’s so adorable!

Like--show, you aren’t doing a good job at getting me off the Lukanette train.

Anonymous said:

Are you sure the Lukanette breakup wasn't Marinette's fault? I mean, the episode frames it like she's refusing to tell the truth, even if it's for a good reason.

I’m not sure when I said that the episode didn’t frame it as her fault?

Things are ALWAYS Marinette’s fault, it’s literally a rule of the show.

Anonymous said:

You know the truth episode actually gives more reasons for lukanette in my opinion based of its description you said. Luka is ridiculously understanding and also almost manages to fight off hawk moth as well as taking probably a week at least for him to get to that and yet he, while he’s upset, still tries to be there for marinette. Also makes the relationships she has with her friends and family worse if the secret they think she has is that she likes adrien while dating Luka.

YES!!

And oh my gosh, I feel the friends and family comment so badly. Just throwing it out there, maybe you guys don’t actually support her???

Anonymous said:

How do you feel about Luka having no negative reaction to this whole "Marinette loves Adrien" thing? I understand that he isn't exactly the jealous type, but still, it seems weird to me that he just accepts it while Marinette is dating him. I love Luka a lot, but in this situation his reaction was just so unrealistic...

Honestly, I find it really interesting. Plus, it’s Truth who’s being told those things, not Luka, and Truth has other priorities.

And--I mean, I’m positive that Luka got into the relationship knowing that Marinette wasn’t completely over Adrien. She wanted to see if they’d work and he wanted to date her. It’s both of them being a little selfish in a way and I like that.

That’s why I think he doesn’t have a big reaction to the Adrien call. He seems amused more than anything, and Luka is empathetic also so he knows not to take Marinette’s stammering/mistakes to heart because she doesn’t mean them. We already had evidence of that in “Desperada.”

writingamongther0ses said:

Even if Lukanette had stayed together, I have a feeling Alya would complain that it's not Adrien...which could lead to a character growth opportunity for her when her complaining leads to Luka getting hurt when he overhears and becomes an akuma. But that's too interesting.

Interesting character relationships??? In THIS show???

never

Anonymous said:

After watching Truth the only thing I can feel at the moment is bitter. Not angry, not sad, not disappointed. Just bitter.

Bitter’s a good way of putting it, yeah. *sigh*

Anonymous said:

The fact that the second episode released managed to get a bingo really says a lot about how predictable the show's garbage fire writing.

I KNOW, RIGHT??

I knew the Lukanette episode would be a big card filler but DAMN.

Anonymous said:

I hated all of Truth, but perhaps the worst part was how hard they tried to remind you that, no matter how much of a good time Marinette and Luka have together, it's Adrien who Marinette will end up with in the end. From Alya rudely insinuating "girl, you're acting stupid, is Adrien at your house?", to Luka receiving a PICTURE of Adrien from a kwami, to Marinette talking on the phone with Luka while her Adrien pictures are in the background, to Marinette CALLING LUKA ADRIEN, to Truth demanding that people tell him Marinette's secret, only for them ALL to say "She's in love with Adrien Agreste.".

It's absolutely anger-inducing because it tries too hard to let the audience know to forget about Luka because Adrien is lurking in the corner and he and Marinette are endgame. The fans are right, Luka IS a second choice, but not in the way they think. Luka's a second choice, not for Marinette, but for the Miraculous Ladybug world. for the WRITERS!!!

But what bothers me the most is that everyone saying that Marinette loves Adrien is accepted as truth even when Marinette herself says she's over Adrien. Her words are ignored, how she feels is ignored, because everyone else(including the girl squad, when they're supposed to be her "friends") tells her that she's supposed to be in love with Adrien, and so she "has" to go along with it because ENDGAME. It's the show saying "stupid naive Marinette, you're too immature and dumb to know how you really feel, let someone else do the thinking for you!"

Meanwhile Adrien moving on with Kagami is accepted even when he still flirts with Ladybug(and forces her to build up his ego when he asks her what she admires most about him; I know it was a spur of the moment thing, but meta-wise, it was obvious love square pushing.), because "he's trying to respect her feelings and date someone else!" It's one of the main gripes I have with the show: that teenage girls are too emotional and confused to know what they really want, but teenage boys are mature and rational enough to make up their minds about who they love without holding any animosity towards anyone.

The all-white, all-male writing team pushes the Chinese girl's feelings aside and forces her to hide and erase them if they're not want they want her to feel, while the white boy gets congratulated with a pat on the back for doing the bare minimum and always, ALWAYS, takes the moral high ground(even in superhero form when he's supposedly goofy.). When she's the lead.

"Luka's a second choice, not for Marinette, but for the Miraculous Ladybug world. for the WRITERS!!!“

LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK

It’s just tiring. It’s not even me being sick of the love square, but it being forced into everything when it’s not even relevant. The episode strategically throws more and more of Marinette’s Adrien crush (I did the math, I know this) into the mix and it provides nothing but the same tired jokes. Heck, they keep leaning on the lucky charm Marinette let him borrow (not GAVE, let him BORROW) back in Season 1 because they basically have nothing else to go off of.

[intothewickedwood]

Once Upon A Time Rewatch: 6x19 The Black Fairy

Peter Pan! So weird to think they were married but I mean they’re both kinda obsessed with collecting children that aren’t their son which is a weird coincidence.

Aww baby Rumple!

Malcolm looks so happy to have a baby. It seems it was the loss of Fiona that made him resent Rumple. Perhaps he could have been a father with her support but he just couldn’t handle being a single father. 

I wish we got to know more about fairy lore

Rumple was born in winter. He’s totally a Capricorn!

Aren’t Saviors meant to save realms from dark curses? But the dark curse wasn’t created yet. Maybe they retconned it and they’re just meant to save people.

That dragon egg is awfully convenient. What happened to the characters going on quests to find things like this? It’s too easy to wake Blue up.

Snow straight up strangling the Blue Fairy. I know it’s not her but I think Snow deserves that opportunity. 

Quick thinking Rumple with that cuff! 

Why does Emma have to have sleepy time too?

Is the shack Rumple was born in the same place he and Milah lived in? Probably not.

Yep. Really shouldn’t have given her that book of prophecies. What did they expect? Fiona to be overjoyed her son would die at the hands of a great evil?

Wait. It’s not possible for someone to turn themselves into a fairy? There must be something about Fiona. There’s something about that family, I swear. It seems they were all destined for great power and great evil.

Regina teaching Zelena to drive is the best thing ever but she totally could have escaped with Henry on her broom if things went wrong. If people in New York saw her and Henry flying high defying gravity they’d just think it was promo for Broadway’s Wicked.

Lmao! Omg Zelena! This scene is glorious!

Oh yeah, baby Robin could fit on the broom too. They’d make it work!

Regina: “I trust him to raise you.” Lol. So true but now I need all the fics with Henry raising his little cousin and Auntie in New York. 

The Black Fairy is so freaking creepy singing a lullaby to Blue.

The hatred emanating from the Black Fairy for Blue gives me shivers. 

And then she’s like “I’m so happy we get a chance to play,” and sits down like a child. Chills, I tell you! Like, Blue has completely destroyed who she used to be.

What was she going to do to the child if she’d found one with the crescent mark? 

Aww. Rumple breaking down and saying “I would do anything for you, son.” This man freaking loves his children. 

How did they end up in Rumple’s dream when Gideon was the first to be sprinkled with the night night sand?

Hook: “How do we know you are actually you.” Regina: “Because it’s me!” Sounds legit.

Aww, Hook just called Regina “love”. Are they getting along again, now? I saw a meta the other day that noted how Regina only started to dislike Hook when he got serious with Emma and I’m pretty sure that’s true. Interesting!

I wanted to see a proper witch fight dammit! For a show with so many sorcerers, we deserved more magical duels.

But omg Zelena suddenly running the Black Fairy over and her flipping over the car is the best thing in existence! 

Aww the sisters’ little smiles to each other. 

The sacred vault of the fairies? Are they, like, religious? 

This poor woman. I feel so sorry for her. She’s just desperately and feverishly trying to protect her baby. What did they expect from her? Most mothers would go to those lengths if they were told their child would suffer such a horrible fate. That would bring anyone to the end of their tether.

Omg wtf. “He’s destined to die so that other children may live.” That is a beyond cruel thing to say to the face of a mother. What the hell? Omg the pain on Fiona’s face. No child should be sacrificed for another. How heartless of the fairies.

So did Emma replace Rumple as the EF’s Savior or can their be multiple Saviors? 

Agggh this is so horrific. Poor Fiona finding out she is destined to kill her own child. She’s devastated. 

Oh, did she get the crescent scar when she was disarmed? 

Oh cool, the Black Fairy can project memories! That’s quite a unique power.

Blue could have saved a lot of people by remotely teleporting their hearts into her hands from the EQ’s or Cora’s and yet she didn’t.

She has a point. Even if she severed her destiny so she wouldn’t be the one to kill him, he could still be in danger from some other threat.

Blue, what the hell! Summoning a portal was absolutely uncalled for. What because she dared to upset you as you were so desperate for him to become the Savior for some reason? Probably part of her long-game evil plan. So what if he didn’t become a Savior?! Blue’s going on like that was the worst crime. She was just trying to protect him and you separated a doting mother who was no longer a danger to him from her child! You had no right! She is so self-righteous, I swear to god. It’s nothing to do with her. Who does she think she is?! Blue has ruined so many lives and gotten away with it because she believes she’s all high and mighty. She’s just as much of a villain as any other on this show. It makes me so mad. Poor Fiona. No wonder she hates Blue. 

Fiona: “I promise you son, I will spend every moment of every day trying to find my way back to you!”

I think she let Rumple hate her because it was too painful and she didn’t think she deserved his love. 

There are a lot of parallels between Rumple and his mother’s stories. They are much alike. 

Malcolm genuinely loved Fiona. He said she was the love of his life. Gosh I needed backstory with those two! After her he felt the only way he could be happy again was to return to childhood and Neverland so he didn’t have to think about Fiona. It was too painful. Easier to pretend he’d never loved. 

Malcolm must have lied to Rumple and told him his mother had abandoned him.

The fairies imply Fiona is dead to cover their own asses. They won’t say they banished her because they damn well know he’d fight them to get the love of his life back.

Lol. Sorry but calling your child Rumplestiltskin just to spite him is hilarious. What does it mean? Oh! It means “Little Rattle Stilt.” I mean it could have been worse it could have been “Little Sh*thead.” 

Also the Fairies hearing him blame the baby for his wife’s death should have rung alarm bells. They should have put him in a home where he’d be loved and cared for. Nope, just leave him with this guy who hates him.

Eww. They put a heart on the dinner table.

Giddy Up’s got his heart back! Yehaaaw!

“A seafaring man does not take superstitions likely.” So he is superstitious! He allowed a woman on his ship for years so maybe superstitions are different in the EF.

Oh my God, next week’s the musical episode!!!! I can’t wait!!!!

[nebulousfishgills]

My thoughts on the finale (long post)

Okay, I really just wanna put some thoughts down and I need to do it here. Spoilers and opinions, you can choose to agree or not, but please be respectful

I usually try to have a good attitude about things, pointing out the best in everything.

I'm having a really hard time right now.

That's not to say the episode was bad, it's just...

Well, I feel like I'm watching the Game of Thrones finale again. I just feel so unfulfilled. Then again, my hormones are a little out of wack at the moment (thanks mother nature) so my odd feelings could be because of that. I feel so angry and upset and hyped and... I don't honestly know. I really don't. I feel like I want to throw up, but not in a bad or good way.

I guess I just...

Feel.

I've stayed up every night for every episode because I just adored it so much. Yet I feel like... there should be more. I know we got a second season confirmed, but we don't know when. We don't know what it means for the future of the MCU. We don't know anything.

I guess we should have expected this because Loki was supposed to be this new horizon for the MCU. Doctor Strange 2 needed a plot. Someone said this show was just a big ad for MoM, and I find myself disagreeing with that, but only a little.

I think the best way to describe it is it's like the show suddenly decided it wanted to be something else. It's not a bad thing necessarily, but after episode 3, the tone really shifted.

I'm trying really hard to hold off on my more detailed thoughts, but they just keep creeping in, so I'll just wrap up this... intro? Idk.

I think the TLDR is that I feel disappointed, but I don't really blame anyone. Kate Herron, Mike Waldron, they all did AMAZING jobs. They really deserve the highest of praise for this. Is it my favorite MCU project? Yes. Am I excited for season 2? Absolutely.

But Game of Thrones can still be my favorite show and I can still dislike the ending.

I find writing this out is helping me feel better. Once I sleep it'll probably feel less... hopeless.

Now, next section. My thoughts on key plot points.

We all figured Kang would be introduced. I'm actually very excited to see what they do with him. The actor was just phenomenal and I can't wait to see him later on. Someone call up Erik Voss because he redeemed himself after the whole Mephisto deal

I guess the Multiverse was reborn, but not in the way I was expecting/hoping. I feel like there's a large gap between when the timeline shattered and the final scene with Loki, Mobius, and B-15. What happened? Though, I guess it makes sense. We all wanted a multiverse. We never considered the consequences.

I'm angriest about Mobius losing his memories and not getting his jetski. Like I said, Yelena can get a dog in BW after mentioning it once. But as someone on Reddit pointed out, they had to make sure Marvel would greenlight a second season. It does not mean I can't have a huge cow about it. That's what we get for jinxing it, friends.

I think I understand what Star Wars Sequel haters went through. Getting all these grand (maybe... glorious?) ideas about the ending and what a hopeful message about destiny and identity the series could give us. And the series gave us... none of that. Hell, I was so sure these would be used, and I was bamboozled. I'm sure others saw it coming, but they just looked too good to be fake out shots. My best guess is that they're gonna use this footage in season 2 for a plotline and they stuck it in here to trick us... but maybe that's just me being desperate

It was barely 1 AM here, Marvel. The Miss Minutes jumpscare was NOT COOL. I mean, THIS IS HORRIFYING IN LIGHT AS WELL

I'm really confused about Ravonna now. Is she good or is she bad? Where did she go? And why was it important we see her backstory and not any of the others (say, B-15 or Mobius)?

God, okay, I guess I have to address the elephant in the room now.

The Sylki kiss and then betrayal fight thing.

Let me get one thing very extremely clear before I continue: I do prefer Lokius, but I am FINE with Sylki. I think I've just been desensitized to any ship that ends with -cest because, as I've made clear here and in the past, I adore Game of Thrones and Crimson Peak.

I honestly think my main reservation about it is a flaw within myself that I dared not admit until I saw it staring me in the face: I'm probably a little possessive. I can admit this and I really dislike it about myself. But I think I'm just not a fan of Loki having a love interest in general. What makes Lokius different, I have no clue. Maybe deep down I knew Marvel was too much of a pussy to ever make it canon... then again, I was begging for a last minute kiss or something. My feelings on the matter are complicated.

But the way they handled the kiss in this episode? Gotta say, not too much of a fan. I know some antis like this, but it just felt too... not genuine. Maybe I'm just an idiot who thinks all kissing should have a meaning. A purpose. The Reylo kiss in Rise of Skywalker? Ben just saved Rey's fucking life, I think that warrants a large gesture of affection.

But this?

I think I get bad juju from the kiss, not the fact that they made it Canon. You can disagree or agree any way you want, you can even send nasty anon messages. That's my opinion and I'm choosing to stick to it.

And sending nasty anons won't do squat, I don't give a shit about faceless threats and hate.

Anyways, back to my point

The fight felt like a mutual betrayal, but at the same time it felt like neither really wanted to go through with it. I admit I felt Sylvie was more in the right and that Loki seemed a little too complacent, especially after everything he went through and saw. But like Sylvie, I didn't consider the consequences and now everything is fucked. But I still don't think Loki was right.

I think it boils down to being an impossible choice because no matter what you pick, everyone loses.

I believe that my main gripe with Sylvie and Loki's ideology split is that it feels a little too rushed and/or, dare I say it, out of character. I've agreed with Loki's characterization up until this point (again, you can disagree with me, that's your opinion and you have full right to it), but... man, I don't know. It all feels like an impossible situation.

Then again, I'm not the one in the director's chair. I'm not the team in the writers room. I don't know the first thing about making a project like this. I like taking solace in the fact that Tom had some creative control in the series about the character he loves so much. And, let's be real, he knows Loki the best out of all of us. None of us can hold a candle to that.

We can call ourselves experts, but Tom is the real expert. I trust him more than anyone. If he hated how this was turning out, he probably would have said something.

We just have to trust in the creative process

So, at the end of the day, this series was (and still is, remember, season 2 is on the way) absolutely phenomenal and I think it's Marvel's strongest work in a very long time. They know Loki is a character we all love and adore and I feel like they've done their best in honoring that. Besides, what other character is getting a second season? How awesome is that??

I found writing this out helped me process my thoughts and emotions IMMENSELY. I don't feel as... angry? Hopeless? I don't know. I keep comparing this to the end of Game of Thrones, and I feel like that's doing a disservice to Loki. Game of Thrones' ending was just absolute dog shit and there was no chance to redeem it because it was the last season.

Loki has a second season on the way.

It's not over yet.

Nothing is ever final until the universe forces it.

Kang can be stopped

The Multiverse can roam free

Loki can learn to find true happiness

Sylvie can stop running and fighting

Ravonna can redeem herself

The TVA can burn or reform (whichever you choose)

And yes

Mobius can get a jetski

We know nothing yet of season 2, what it will entail, how it connects to the rest of the Marvel Universe, or even when it will be out. But I know that I will eagerly await it when that day comes. I will once again put on a smile. I will wait hours to watch the new episode the moment it drops. I will be excited for it and enjoy it.

Because, at the end of the day, that's all it's about. Telling a story. And, mother of God, Marvel sure is telling a good one.

Until next time, my friends.

For All Time. Always!

-FishGills

[panharmonium]

okay.  

i realize this might be a kind of a weird thing for me to devote time to when i’m one episode from the end but honestly?  i just have to.  i have to.  i have a longer piece of meta in this vein that i’ll deal with some other time when i’m less focused on the end of season 5, but given the content of the last couple episodes i just - cannot restrain myself.  the stunning level of deliberate, unnecessary cruelty i witnessed in that one moment yesterday (guess i was WRONG omg i STILL can’t believe i heard that with my own two ears...i probably have the lowest expectations of arthur pendragon out of anybody in this fandom but even i was shocked) - it tipped me right over the edge.  it threw me for an entire loop.  

so, what i have to do right now is take a second to acknowledge the one character who a) predicted this bullshit a long time ago, and b) could have been relied upon to react to it appropriately, that is to say by punching arthur pendragon in the mouth.

fig. A: my Son, ‘I Would Sell Arthur Pendragon to Satan for One Corn Chip’ 

i love him.  

i know we only saw him once.  i don’t care.  he’s the only non-villain across five entire seasons of this show who ever told arthur pendragon to get fucked, and that makes him an absolute hero.

this kid snuck up on me and became my most beloved minor character.  when i first met him, i liked him a normal amount, but i wasn’t as deeply invested in him as i am now.  it wasn’t until i got a little further along in the show and started to see how truly painful merlin’s situation becomes without a friend who knows him that i started thinking about him again, and realized how much i actually appreciated him.

so.  will.

will occupies a...fairly unique position in merlin’s circle.  all of merlin’s other friends eventually become knights, or become queen, and they all hop aboard the arthur pendragon train as they get deeper entwined in camelot’s renaissance.  even gwaine, who is a little iffy about arthur in the very beginning, becomes as loyal a knight as camelot has ever seen, and he’s just as invested in camelot’s flourishing as anyone.  and i don’t say this to throw shade at him, or at lancelot, or anybody; those two in particular have absolutely always been true friends to merlin, regardless of the vows they took to camelot.  but there is just something to be said for like - merlin does not have a single person in his life right now who cares about him without also being beholden to arthur.  gwen and gaius and all of the knights are sworn to serve and protect the king.  they are all fully aboard the arthur pendragon train, and on board with merlin’s mission to aid arthur and keep him safe.  gwen, gwaine, gaius, lancelot - even merlin’s own mother is on that train, when she tells merlin he has to go back to camelot at the end of 1.10, saying “you belong at arthur’s side.  i’ve seen how much he needs you.”  

these people would not argue with merlin over the merits of sacrificing things for arthur, because they, too, would do anything for their king.  they wouldn’t necessarily challenge merlin on statements like “his life is worth a hundred of mine,” because they understand what merlin means.  they’re on that same page.  

and that’s nice and all, but given recent events (and forthcoming events, i suspect) i suppose i just am feeling.  a little tired of that.  

i’m tired of the arthur pendragon train.  i want to get off.  i want MERLIN to get off.  and the only other person in the world who ever believed that merlin deserved to get off the arthur pendragon train was will.

all the most recent episodes i’m watching are highlighting for me once again how little merlin settles for in his life.  he can’t be known.  he can’t be seen.  he can’t be accepted.  he can’t be listened to.  he can’t be believed.  he can’t be respected.  he can’t be safe.  he can’t be loved.  he can’t say ‘i am sorry that i can’t go with you to this place’ (for the first time in HOW many years?) without receiving a deliberately nasty, cutting slap across the face.

and we try to rationalize this away; we try to look at the good parts (and yes, there are good parts, of course there are good parts; of course arthur and merlin care about each other) but the ultimate truth is that arthur isn’t merlin’s real friend, not yet.  he thinks he is.  but he isn’t.  a real friend isn’t someone who might kill you if they knew who you were.  a real friend isn’t someone who makes you feel like you have to pretend to be someone you’re not.  

you cannot be loved if you aren’t safe. 

the only person who ever acknowledges this dynamic is will.  will sees the parts of arthur that merlin tries not to look at, and will loves merlin enough to say ‘this situation you are in is messed up.’  he’s the only one, across five seasons of this show, who ever comes right out and says that merlin is fooling himself when it comes to this ‘friendship.’  merlin might have other people who care about him, later, but all of them are as wrapped up in arthur’s well-being as merlin is.  they don’t tell merlin he deserves better.  they don’t tell merlin ‘this is shitty.  this is a shitty situation you’re settling for.  you deserve more than this.’

five seasons, and will is the only person who ever says this.  merlin’s own mother won’t tell him this.

i’ve been thinking about will kind of a lot as i watch these episodes.  

i think...i think will would lose his mind if he could see merlin at the end of this show.  at ANY point in this show, practically.  he would be so devastatingly angry.  if he ever heard “his life is worth a hundred of mine” come out of merlin’s mouth - i mean.  he’d kill somebody.  he'd thump merlin upside the head and then go kill somebody.

will was only ever in this for merlin.  he didn’t save arthur’s life because he’d started to like the guy; he did it because that’s just who he is.  he saw someone about to get shot and his first instinct was to get in the way.  he’s not riding the arthur pendragon train, and he’s certainly not riding the camelot train, but he still makes sure merlin can go safely back to the citadel, because for some unfathomable reason, merlin seems to feel that it’s important.

because - and this is so important here - will doesn’t even know anything about merlin’s ‘destiny.’  they didn’t have time to talk about dragons or destinies or any of that.  all will knows is that it’s important to merlin, for whatever reason, and that’s enough to make it important to will.  even though he doesn’t understand it.  even though he doesn’t agree with it.  even though he personally thinks arthur’s a loser.  he does what he does so that merlin can have what he wants, so that merlin can be safe and happy in the city of his choice.

SAFE and HAPPY.  and merlin isn’t either of those things.  merlin has never been less safe than he is now.  and merlin hasn’t been happy for a very long time.

will would be rolling over in his grave if he could see merlin now.  he would have fought against the sort of...slow self-immolation we see merlin surrendering himself to here every step of the way.  will told a prince to fuck off in front of the entire population of ealdor; he wouldn’t have any qualms about telling ‘destiny’ to get stuffed, either.  and i find myself missing that single-minded devotion, that uncompromising affirmation of merlin’s intrinsic worth, as opposed to merlin’s importance as a prophesied figure out of myth, as the skies darken over merlin’s head and i see him getting ready to (i think) do something that would send will into an absolute rage.  

none of merlin’s friends or family have ever wanted him to suffer, but will was the only one who saw where this was going, a long, long time ago.  he knew from the beginning that it wasn’t right.  and like...people can complain about him refusing to jump on board the arthur+merlin ship all they want, but the reason he doesn’t get on that boat is because he’s always been captain and sole passenger of the HMS Merlin, and he is the only one who has ever understood that these two boats, with the way the world works right now, just can’t sail together.  so much would have to change first.

so like...i miss this kid.  i really do.  and i think merlin misses him, too, but not in a way that he can afford to let himself think about.  how can a person in merlin’s position afford to remember someone who always thought that merlin’s happiness and safety were more important than anything, when merlin has, by necessity, spent all these years forcing himself to finally accept that his own happiness and safety will always have to be his last priority?  how can he handle being reminded of a time when someone unconditionally believed that merlin deserved to live in this world and be happy, not because of what merlin could do or what great purpose he would serve, but simply because he is.  just because he exists.  because he’s enough as he is.  he matters just as he is.  he deserves to be safe and happy just because he is, not because of what he can do for his majesty the prince.

i don’t think someone in merlin’s position can afford to think like that, especially now.  i think it’s like - when you’re overwhelmed or stressed or upset and you’re holding it together but then somebody does one simple nice thing for you or gives you a hug and that’s when you lose it and start bawling - it feels like that.  i don’t think merlin could handle being gentled in that way.  i think it would be similar to when gwaine tells him “not arthur” - that inability to conceive of somebody who only cares about him, who puts him first.  i think if merlin allowed himself to remember that there was in fact a time in his life when he was someone’s first priority, if he remembered what that felt like - he would crack right down the middle.  

i think if someone were to really remind him of what he deserves from this life, to remind him of what he used to hope he would one day have, he would never be able to do what he thinks he needs to do.

anyway.  

the point of all this is just that as i enter the very end of this show and see merlin still - still - being deliberately gutted by someone who is supposed to love him, someone for whom merlin has been totally willing to give up his life a hundred times over, despite never being recognized and never being accepted and never being free - it is making me appreciate even more keenly the very few people in merlin’s life who chose not to treat him that way.  the very, very few people who knew him and loved him just the way he was.  and in particular it makes me appreciate will, who never had eyes for anybody but merlin, and who, uniquely among merlin’s friends, could not care less about arthur pendragon if you paid him.

after the last episode, i’m just really feeling his energy.  

[zachsgamejournal]

PLAYING: Breath of Fire IV

I think we’re closing in on the end. But in good ole BoF fashion, the last leg is taking the longest. Also, Nina is totally the main character of this game.

NINA

I’ve only ever beaten BoF 3, 4, and 5--though I’ve played 1 & 2. It’s a constant that Ryu is the main character, and that Ryu is the player. Ryu is never (to rarely) given dialog because the player is meant to imagine the voice of Ryu. And while this definitely works for BoF 3 and 5, Nina is clearly the main character in 4.

1. We Start the Game as Nina

In both BoF 3 and 5, we start the game as Ryu, and that’s basically where we stay for the whole adventure (occasionally controlling other characters). BoF 4 has us start with Nina. It’s a simple distinction, but sets up my next point.

2. Nina Makes All the Decisions

My screenwriting professor said the main character makes the decisions that drive the story. In this sense, Ryu is extremely passive. He’s mostly just along for the ride. It’s Nina that offers to help him, Nina that decides he should tag along, and it’s Nina’s quest he joins. Later, Nina decides to rescue Cray. Nina goes to her father for help. Nina asks the gods for assistance. Nina insists they save Ryu. Nina encourages Dies not to abandon Ershin. Nina insists on the helping that furry...thing. All the while, Ryu is just like, “...sure.”

I vaguely know how the game will end, so we’ll see if this all holds up.

3. It’s Nina’s Quest

The game starts with Nina and Cray on a mission to find/rescue her sister. While Ryu is integral to the plot, he doesn’t have a lot of skin in the game. Nina is also royalty, and this game has some Games of Thronesian politics going on. While Ryu’s actions carry little weight beyond the act itself, everything Nina does has the ability to affect policy and international relationships. We see this when the Empire pressures the Alliance to cede territory post Nina’s rescue op failure.

Also, Nina just told Ryu that she loved Cray. Ryu isn’t even the love interest in this game.

I’m actually really happy that Nina is the star. Female characters aren’t normally given the respect they deserve. Maybe instead of Breath of Fire, they should have called this “Wings of Destiny”...cause Nina has wings.

Back to the Plot

So, Ryu went super-Dragon and killed some imperials. The gods have offered to help Ryu, (as long as he plays hide and seek first), and Fou-Lu has escaped the village in which he had started to feel at home.

Nina and the team discuss things and decide that if it’s Ryu’s destiny to meet up Fou-Lu, they might as well confront him proactively. They seem to be under the impression that the empire is using Fou-Lu gain power (if they only knew).

Ursala is the Imperial captain that captured us, but now she’s our captive. The team asks her to help them get into the Empire. She’s confused. It was her mission to bring the dragon to the Empire, so this kind of works out...She agrees and is now a playable party member.

I like her.

Heading back to the warp gate, we learn that it’s broken because of our previous activities (and because we were attacked by Captain Jackass). Ursala tries to make us feel bad, but she works for an evil Empire--so jog-on. We have to head north and need a sandflier but don’t have the cash. This is comical, cause I put in a cheat for infinite Zenny way back when...

We’re supposed to ask a merchant sandflier for help, but we’re too late. Ursala immediately jumps to action and without a word, Scias follows her lead. They take the merchant ship like a band of pirates and it turns out to be a French-accented froggy friend from before that sexually harassed Nina, Marlok. He tries to make use feel guilty, which works on Nina and Cray--but the rest of us know he’s a POS. He offers us a bond to buy a ship, expecting that we’ll do great things and thus able to cash in on our success.

We get to a checkpoint, but it’s blocked. Ursala wants to fight the guards, but Nina is against it. We do the non-violent solution of trampolining over the wall. We get to a ship yard...I only now realized in the game that the oceans aren’t water--but mud. weird...where’s all the water? So the only seas are up north.

The captain doesn’t want us on without the blessing of the sea god. We got to coastal cave and find the Sea Dragon there...I think. We get his blessing and are good to go. The captain now doesn’t want women on board. The women insist that they are tough and have been through a lot. The muscle the dude we keep fighting shows up, and it’s implied that his defeat would prove we’re tough. Ursala shoots him and falls off the mass of the ship. So  a new test of courage is needed. Ursala and Nina must stay within the hull of the ship over night with ghosts and bugs. They succeed.

As we travel across the sea, we fight muscle dude again (he was much stronger this time). And then the wind stops. The sailors think this area is haunted, maybe by a god. We go check it out. The dungeon is interesting, but frustrating. You have to walk across planks to get to the other side, but the planks break and drop you down into the hull. There’s a light over your head to warn you when you’re about to fall, but I still fell a lot. In the hull, as you walk, skulls that are spread about rattle and vibrate: it’s eerie and entertaining. Eventually we find a rock creature that thinks of itself as a god, but it’s just a rock powered by god-power. So we kill it.

No remorse.

The wind returns and we make it across the sea. After traveling through a jungle, we meet a furry thing. I feed it some food and it seems happy...I think. At the end of the jungle we find a treehouse and are attacked by more furries. The previously furry comes to our defense and we meet Beyd. He has married one of the furries and maybe these are his children? Cray had my reaction and was like, “Well...uh, anyway--how do we get to the empire?”

One of the furries gets sick and Nina vows to save it (cause she’s the main character!). This brings us to an interesting, but not super fun mini game. We get to sail the boat, but you have limited supplies. Every second you’re on the seas, the supplies get used, but they’re used faster if you row. Rowing is necessary because the wind doesn’t always blog in the direction you need. So you have to decide whether to burn supplies by rowing, or wait for the wind to change directions. There’s places to find and treasure to discover. It is, kinda fun...

While we’re out here collecting medicine on the high seas, I also find the sea god: SCORE!

We save the furry and are guided to some islands that are available to walk across when the tide is low. So we venture a cross some tropical keys. It’s pretty. The group gets tired and Nina insists on taking a break: cause she’s the main character. After our rest, the tide has risen and the group is trapped. Cray is pissed and Nina feels responsible.

This is an interesting part of the game cause the group has to survive on an island and reflect on their mission. Ursala warns it could be months or years before the tide recedes. Chill Ursala. The group explores the island and finds both water and and great fishing spot. We’re gonna be fine. Just delayed.

Scias likes the island, as he just sleeps all day. After a while, Cray chills out and apologizes for his temper. While Ryu is casting a line, Nina reveals that she’s in love with Cray, causing Ryu to trip. Nina reflects on her feelings, unsure if they’re true and doubtful that Cray feels the same.

The tide recedes and the team escapes. We come to a riverlands that requires some log riding and log dodging. It’s cute, but I want to get out of here...

Fou-Lu, after escaping the village, receives a direct hit from the hex canon. They apparently used the friendly lady that help Fou-Lu as a “sacrifice” to power the canon. EVIL! Fou-Lu survives and arrives at the capital. He meets statue guardian that recognizes him as the first emperor. Fou-Lu orders the guardian to destroy the imperial city. Fou-Lu is pissed, and just doesn’t seem to think humans are worth it...

As the guardian destroys the city, Fou-Lu cleans up loose ends, finally killing the general that ambushed him on the night of his awakening, and then killing the current emperor. The Emperor first tries to act subservient to Fou-Lu, but then stabs him with the “dragon slayer” sword. It doesn’t work and Fou-Lu laughs in his face.

Similar to Breath of Fire 3, the game has reached a point where it doesn’t have more story to tell, but wants to add hours. So there’s tons of little quests and obstacles that have little to do with the overall plot. It’s sad, because the minigames and mini-nations they’ve created are really interesting.

I tried to think back to how Final Fantasy 7 handled this. I think, for the most part, the game doesn’t make its endgame clear until much later. Most of the game is, “What should we do now?” So I don’t feel there’s as much a “rush” to get to the end. Also, much of the game is about tracking Sephiroth, so you’re really looking for clues as you find obstacles, vs having an end destination and just running into a million reasons why you can’t get to it. You feel out of control and inconvenienced. But these obstacles would make really interesting and fun side quests. Having them as options would absolutely make them more interesting.

Another thing that Final Fantasy 7 really succeeds at is making each new area a new piece of the puzzle. You’re always learning history about the world or a character. So while it might be a brief obstacle, it’s also an interesting deeper dive into the world. Breath of Fire’s diversions don’t feel as enlightening.

Still, BoF4′s diversions still feel like progress cause we inch closer to the goal...it’s just that we’re not getting much character or world development in the process.

Combat

I do prefer the combat over BoF3 (and many RPGs). I like that the other characters are always on-call in the battle, and it’s easy to switch out (more so than Final Fantasy X -- how I remember it anyway). I’ve done zero grinding, and I’m pretty proud that I’ve survived so far. After crossing the sea, it seemed like the enemies were getting ahead of me, but I got better at using the spell combos (which are cool!). So surviving a few battles usually meant getting a few levels up. When I first played the game, i was cool with grinding, but I’m glad I don’t have to now. The only thing that is cheating: I gave myself 99999+ zenny. So I’m able to stock up on healing supplies. Though it helps, I’m sure a few hours of grinding would have me being just as well stock on healing supplies.

Is it better than Breath of Fire 3?

I’m a little torn. Breath of Fire 4 is “epic”. There are multiple nations that have a strong sense of culture and history. The mythology around the dragons is of the galactic scale. World War is in the balance and my party includes two members of royalty and two semi-gods. The world feels huge even if the story is pretty linear.

In contrast, Breath of Fire 3 had three nations--that I could tell: Wyndia, Eastern Kingdom, and across the sea. Strangely, Wyndia had gangster cities, gangster markets, and amoral lab that was accidentally making mutants. While eastern kingdom seemed pretty chill and peaceful--but lacked a ruling entity. Hmmm...

Where Breath of Fire 3 feels “better” is that it feels more personal. The story starts small: a lost dragon-boy found my starving thieves. We live in a small town and solve small-town issues. This slowly grows to include local gangsters, a kingdom, and a dragon holocaust before we battle God. I like Breath of Fire 4′s characters, but I feel like I have a stronger bond with BoF3′s. Also, I felt like BoF3 tried to explore the grey area: killing monsters that had feelings. I felt emotionally challenged in the different scenarios. Whereas, BoF4 is always: “We’re the good guys, and we do the good things!”

[ranger-jedi-knight]

This Unusual Love: Dexter’s Turn

AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23365357/chapters/55982161

Ok, so this is salt cause I’m bitter bout Apple. So ya, characters MAY be OOC but whatevs. Also, so in this, me n my friend were talkin bout this fic I’d write n we’d thought it’d be fun if Raven actually had brown hair like her father. So ye, Raven has brown hair(but with small purple high lights). Finally, this was inspired by virgil-is-a-cutie and thyladyanput on Tumblr talking about different salt ideas. I hope you enjoy it!!

All Raven wanted to do was decorate the float for Thronecoming.

But NO!

Apple just had to come up to her and try once more. She kept saying everyone was at risk if she didn’t sign. How her Happily Ever After was in RISK. It didn’t help that every time Dexter thought about talking to Raven he’d get glared at by Apple. Hell, even Daring was chill with Dexter talking to who he wanted.

Though Raven had to admit it looked like he only did that since he was seriously questioning his destiny with how Apple was acting. Not that she could blame him. With every day that passed since the failure of Legacy Day, she’s gotten worse about it. Everyone could see how different Apple was. She kept going on about how unfair it was. How she needed Raven to sign to become the new Evil Queen to poison her. How she just wants her Happily Ever After.

And they could see how she kept harassing Raven.

“How can you be so selfish, Raven!? If you don’t sign the Book of Legends, everything is ruined! No one gets their Happily Ever After!” Apple yelled and all the students present watched the fight warily. They didn’t know what to do. Dexter wanted to go to Raven but Daring was holding him back, wary that something may happen to him if he went over there.

“Selfish!? Is it really that selfish to NOT want to be evil!? To not want to be put into the mirror realm with the Evil Queen!? I DON’T want to be like my mother! Why can’t you understand that!?” Raven shouted back turning to walk to the lake they were near. “Oh wait, I know. You’re too selfish thinking about your own Happily Ever After to care about anyone else.”

With that, Raven stalked over to the lake and went up to a small outcropping and sat down. She pulled her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs and watched the lake. It was clear, allowing everyone to watch the Neverland Mermaids and their children swim around. They glanced up at her quite a few times as they swam. Once they stayed looking at her she looked around and found Apple standing behind her. Hiding among the trees, Raven could just barely make out her sorta friend Blondie. “What do you want? I just want to be alone,” she asked standing up slowly to face Apple.

“I’m not done talking to you, Raven. You need to sign the Book of Legends. You’re destined to become the next Evil Queen. It’s just a matter of time. You know it,” Apple said cooly and Raven didn’t like the look in Apple’s eyes.

“Apple, how could you say that? You’re Snow’s daughter,” Raven said and Apple tilted her head with a sneer.

“It’s true though. Faybelle thinks only of herself. She’s the daughter of the Evil Fairy. She’s following her nature. You will too. But apparently, you need to make it difficult. Why can’t you just sign the damn book? Why can’t you let me have my Happily Ever After!?” Apple demanded stepping closer to Raven who looked at her shocked and scared.

“You don’t need an Evil Queen or a damn book to give you your Happily Ever After, Apple! Why do you want to follow that anyways!? Briar would never see any of us again. She’d sleep for 100 years with her family and staff. She’d have to make new friends. Marry a man she doesn’t even know. Do you truly want that for your friend!?” Raven demanded and Apple looked shocked at that.

“She’d get her Happily Ever After. I don’t see the problem with it,” she answered back coldly and Raven gasped.

“That’s a horrible thing to say. The other Royal’s even understand Briar’s worry about it. How could you not!?”

“How can you keep thinking about yourself!? Principal Grimm has said that terrible things can happen to everyone if you don’t sign the Book of Legends!” Apple shouted angrily before pushing Raven harshly. Raven gasped as she stumbled back towards the edge. She could only scream as her foot missed the edge and she fell down into the water below. Nearby shouts could be heard and Apple turned to watch as they ran to the edge’s of the lake and watched as the mermaids pulled a struggling Raven down.

“Raven!” Dexter shouted giving his glasses to Cedar before jumping into the water after her. Daring and Darling were quick to follow, knowing he’d need help getting Raven away from the deadly mermaids. Blondie snarled at Apple, glad she was doing the live stream. She heard rustling and Apple could only pale when she saw Milton and Giles behind her.

“You are in deep trouble, Miss White,” Milton said tersely.

“She’s not breathing!” Dexter shouted and Giles ran down while making sure they can get Raven to the hospital.

“I can’t even look at you, Apple. I don’t even know who you are anymore,” Blondie whispered before walking down to the others. She could only watch numbly as Giles took over CPR for Darling. Raven coughed out the water harshly but her eyes didn’t open. Soon, Raven was in the hospital with the Charming siblings, Giles, Blondie, and her parents the Good King and Evil Queen. Mira was seething when the doctor told them the news. Her husband did what he could to calm her, but nothing was working well.

Blondie went into the hall and held up her tablet to start the live stream to tell everyone when Dexter left the room in tears with his siblings walking him outside. Blondie only sighed when she held the tablet up and started the live stream. “Hello everyone. Blondie Locks reporting outside Raven Queen’s hospital room. The doctor has just informed us that Raven is in a coma. He nor his coworkers know if or when Raven will wake up. If you don’t know, earlier today, Apple White viciously attacked Raven Queen by pushing her into the Neverland Mermaid’s lake when she decided not to sign the Book of Legends. With permission from her parents and the hospital, I’ll be setting up a continuous live stream of Raven’s recovery. I’ll keep everyone up to date on any updates about Raven’s health,” Blondie said before ending the live stream and walking into the room once more to hear Raven’s parents arguing on a mirror pad. When she got closer she saw that it was Apple’s mom, Snow.

~~~~~~~~~~~~(⋟_⋞)~~~~~~~~~~~~

Two weeks.

It’s been two weeks.

Dexter could hardly believe it.

Two weeks and the doctors still don’t know how to wake Raven. The school has been abuzz with gossiping. Apple was exspelled from school and Daring told her he wanted nothing to do with her. People couldn’t believe Apple did that to sweet Raven.

They started calling her Evil White.

Evil White.

It fit her.

She changed.

Dexter could barely handle being in the same room as people talking about her. He stayed in Raven’s room primarily, accompanied by Daring or Darling, along with Maddie or Cerise. The others came by occasionally to give their well wishes.

But the most shocking thing?

Snow let Mira out of the mirror dimension.

Once Mira was out, she quickly took care of the book, making sure no one had to follow their destiny for their Happily Ever After. If they wanted it, they’d get it now. Except for Apple.

She wouldn’t get her Happily Ever After. No one wanted to be around her after what she did. After making sure she wouldn’t get her Happily Ever After, Mira willingly went back into the mirror dimension but made sure everyone knew that if she got out, she’ll be going after Apple.

Just thinking about it had Dexter sneering.

He shook his head free of all those thoughts and simply help Raven’s hand in both of his. Their combined hands rested against his chin as he looked at Raven sadly. He startled when Daring put a comforting hand on his shoulder. “Want any water, Dex?” he asked and Dexter didn’t answer at first.

He shook his head after a bit but then hesitantly started nodding it. “Actually, some water sounds good,” he replied and Daring gave his shoulder a pat before leaving to get them both some water. Dexter just looked at Raven’s face briefly before looking at their hands. “I’m so sorry, Raven. You didn’t deserve this. You just wanted to be able to be yourself, to make your own choices. But Apple wouldn’t let you. I-I should have intervened. If I had, maybe-just maybe you wouldn’t be here. You’d be safe hanging with your best friends,” he said quietly and finally looked at Raven’s peaceful face once more. “You shouldn’t have to put anyone else’s happiness before your own,” he whispered so quietly that it was hard for he himself to hear. He then moved his hands closer to his lips and pressed a soft kiss to Raven’s fingers before setting her hand down onto her bed.

As he got up to head out, those beautiful purple eyes he adored opened. “D-dex?” Raven asked hoarsely and Dexter could only look shocked.

“Raven? You’re awake?” he asked softly shocked. Raven just looked shocked as she nodded slowly. They heard a clatter and turned to see Daring standing in the doorway shocked, two plastic cups on the ground with water all over.

“Doctor! Raven’s awake!” he yelled out and a doctor came running in with a nurse. It was safe to say that everyone was shocked to learn that Dexter’s kiss woke Raven up. Dexter was blushing when he explained what happened and held Raven’s hand. They shared a smile as the doctor did a check up and Daring sat down next to Dexter.

Ok so here it is!! I hope you enjoyed it!! And remember, the next two chaps are the same as this one just for different ships. Until next time!!!! -Love Willa<3<3<3

[boomcomplains]

It's typical. A loud noise sends a character back into a hostage situation, a war, or a gunfight. When faced with the majority of reporting on PTSD centers around combat-related PTSD (source), it makes sense that it's the shellshocked veteran we often see in books, TV, film and comics.  However, the civilian population that experiences PTSD is 13 times larger than its military counterpart. Of course, there are more civilians than those in the military, so naturally, that population is bigger. This article is not meant to dismiss those in the military who deal with very real and terrible side-effects from their time serving.

However, it does beg the question, what does a character with PTSD look like when their trauma is outside combat?

I think a very good study of this sort of character is Dr. Nicholas Rush from Stargate: Universe. There are many other characters out there that I could use, but I'm in a SGU mood today, so I hope you'll forgive me.

At the beginning of the show, Dr. Nicholas Rush is a difficult man. Unable to deal with his wife's terminal cancer, he drowns himself in work so he can avoid the pain of losing her. When she dies while he is off-world, this complicated grief drives him to focus on the mission of the ninth chevron because he has to make his absence from her deathbed mean something. After all, if he didn't succeed, he would not have an excuse. Without the excuse, he would confront the nasty truth that he didn't support his wife in her dying days because he couldn't handle the grief.

The ninth chevron leads him to the Destiny, a ship far beyond the reaches humanity could ever dream to go, with a singular but ultimately mysterious mission. His doggedness to stay on the ship, and follow the mission is likely a reaction to his own inability to come to terms with the trauma of losing his wife.

Because of this, he approaches situations from an ultra-logical world that doesn't exactly coincide with the emotional gray side of the human experience. That's why when he felt that Colonel Young was repeatedly putting lives and the mysterious mission of Destiny in danger, he decided to... frame him for murder... and when that didn't work, stage a coup.

I promise, within the confines of the show, those were actually both very rational decisions.

The coup was the last straw for Colonel Young, so he abandons Rush to die on a desert planet that has no stargate and therefore no possibility for escape. So, metaphorically, Young essentially commits the murder that Rush tried to frame him for.

It is there, on a sandy planet without food or water, that the narrative of Nicholas Rush's PTSD starts.

While attempting to escape, Rush alerts an alien race called the Nakai to his presence as tries to fix a crashed alien spaceship. For the Nakai, it's a lucky find because they are hell-bent on boarding Destiny. Why do they want to get on Destiny? I don't know. They're aliens. Sometimes you don't get to know the why when it comes to aliens.

On their ship, Rush is tortured and imprisoned in a water tank (this is important later). So for the PTSD counter, we have both abandonment and abuse to contend with. His feelings about Young essentially murdering him for doing what he thought was right for the ship are compounded with being mentally torn apart by the Nakai.

Flash forward, Rush is accidentally rescued from the Nakai's clutches due to a lot of plot points I'm not going to go into. Frankly, it's very likely most of you haven't seen the series—or have forgotten more about it than you remember—and the last thing I want to do is turn this article into a Stargate: Universe season recap.

So, back on the ship, Rush isn't sleeping, which you find out after he commiserates with fellow torture victim Chloe. It's assumed that it is for the same reasons as Chloe, which are vivid nightmares. For those of you keeping track, that is a classic sign of PTSD. The subsequent not sleeping because you're afraid of having more nightmares is also a very strong indicator.

Unfortunately, insomnia leads to emotional decision-making, usually based on your experiences in that trauma. But let's put a pin in that for just a moment, and we'll fast forward to a later episode entitled "Pain."

In "Pain", the crew accidentally bring a tick onboard that causes vivid hallucinations, some of which are paranoid delusions. For everyone who experiences this, there is little rhyme or reason why the hallucination starts, and they go with it unquestioningly.

Rush, however, is different. His hallucinations are all triggered. When under the influence of the tick, Sergeant Greer (a proponent for Young's leadership) threatens Rush. Because of this, Rush experiences flashbacks to the Nakai ship and sees everyone as a potential Nakai threat. Paranoid ideation is a symptom of PTSD. When I say "paranoid" though, I fear that this may be read dismissively. PTSD, in many ways, is a survival mechanism. It's a set of prefab reactions because you have already experienced something similar. Essentially, it's not paranoid ideation to you, because it's happened before.

It is unclear if Rush himself was affected by the alien organism, but it seems very likely that his reaction was hinged on the perceived/very real threat to his survival. The fact that it has been established that he has not been sleeping for episodes now, and his hallucinations are of past experiences—such as the room flooding with water, or seeing other members of the crew as Nakai —it seems more than likely that Rush's experiences in this episode are PTSD-related and not due to the tick.

This, however, is not our only brush with PTSD. Let's move forward to the next season, where he finds the bridge of Destiny and hides that discovery from the rest of the crew.

One of the cool things about Stargate: Universe in the first season is that they never find the bridge of the ship. They don't even know there is one because Destiny is so massive and broken, they haven't found it yet... or perhaps the Ancients were so culturally different at the time they didn't design the ship with a bridge in mind. Even if they did, there would be a fair chance the crew would have no idea how to use it.

So, Rush—who is established to still not be sleeping after an incursion with the Lucian Alliance—finds the bridge of the Destiny. Until now, he and the Science Team had been interfacing with the ship in what I think is probably a janitor's closet, so this is an incredibly important find because it is vital for the survival of the ship and the crew. Naturally, that means Rush should want to share it, knowing what we know of him from before he was abandoned on the planet and then tortured by the Nakai. Before, it was the greater good. Now, it's survival is first and foremost.

But no. Rush, instead, reasons that Young cannot be trusted with this find, and starts to lead a double life of surreptitiously guiding the ship (to disastrous results) and pretending like he's still doing things from the Control Interface Room/Janitor's closet.

But what led him to do this? After all, keeping this find under wraps leads to dire situations that compromise the survival of the crew, and indeed causes the death of one member. It is not a rational decision.

Except that it is. If there is one thing I want to make very plainly clear in this article, PTSD-sufferers reactions are rational, even if they don't seem that way to an outsider. I think oftentimes we nitpick plots in fiction because characters make decisions that seem illogical to us. Sometimes this is deserved because an author did not sufficiently help us empathize with a character, other times I think it is because we don't understand what it means to have PTSD.

You don't have to be triggered to have PTSD affect your decision-making process. You see, unmanaged, PTSD gets you stuck in survival mode. It's an undertow that drags you down with things that were true but aren't necessarily true now.

So in Rush's sleep-deprived, and exhausted state-of-my-mind, he reverts back to Young being the threat despite all the work they had done to repair the relationship. While some may be frustrated with this backstep, I can't tell you how much I appreciate that about his character. It explains the rationale for doing something irrational, and makes his character so much deeper.

The beauty of Stargate Universe is that it shows PTSD as it is. Even better, no one is excusing Rush's actions because of it, and/or invalidating his experience. It simply is.

PTSD is so misunderstood, it deserves logical, rational representation, and it gets that with logical, rational Dr. Rush. I mean, let's face it, there is logic to what goes on in a PTSD-sufferers brain, but it's logic from a different time period. Dismissing it as irrational is insulting, and I love that Stargate: Universe never does that, and I think it is exactly why Rush is such a deep and meaningful character.

In the end, I think there is a lesson writers can draw from this: don't be afraid to explore this within some of your characters. Understand their viewpoint, and what drives them to make their choices. If you do that, you will never have a boring story.

[mediaevalmusereads]

On Stranger Tides. By Tim Powers. New York: Harper, 1987.

Rating: 2/5 stars

Genre: historical fiction

Part of a Series? No

Summary: Aboard the Vociferous Carmichael, puppeteer John Chandagnac is sailing toward Jamaica to claim his stolen birthright from an unscrupulous uncle, when the vessel is captured . . . by pirates! Offered a choice by Captain Phil Davies to join their seafaring band or die, Chandagnac assumes the name John Shandy and a new life as a brigand. But more than swashbuckling sea battles and fabulous plunder await the novice buccaneer on the roiling Caribbean waters–for treachery and powerful vodun sorcery are coins of the realm in this dark new world. And for the love of beautiful, magically imperiled Beth Hurwood, Shandy will set sail on even stranger tides, following the savage, ghost-infested pirate king, Blackbeard, and a motley crew of the living and the dead to the cursed nightmare banks of the fabled Fountain of Youth.

***Full review under the cut.***

Content Warnings: sexual assault, violence, body horror, microaggressions; references to incest, rape, slavery

Overview: I originally picked up this book because I was in the mood for a pirate story, and On Stanger Tides kept popping up on online lists of “greatest pirate novels.” I can see why, to an extent. Powers writes good ship battles, and most of his descriptions of the setting are lush and evocative. However, I couldn’t give this book more than 2 stars on account of the pacing and the treatment of women, people of color, and fat people. I know that, being written in the 1980s, it’s not going to be as “woke” as contemporary readers would like, but even so, there was a lot about this book that made me uncomfortable - things that even “historical accuracy” can’t cover.

Writing: Powers’ prose was something of a mixed bag for me. On the one hand, there are some absolutely stunning descriptions of the environment, and Powers has a knack for writing compelling action scenes. I really liked the way Powers would compare resurrected crewmates to “chains and jelly in a wet leather bag” or the eerie look of ships gliding through mist. These descriptions really immersed me in the setting and elicited feelings of horror, so I think Powers deserves praise for that.

On the other hand, however, I think that some parts of the book dragged. It took forever for characters to actually get to the Fountain of Youth, and all the things that were happening in the meantime didn’t hold my attention well. Some of the battle scenes also felt slow at times, in part because Powers is so invested in describing every little action.

Plot: On Stranger Tides primarily follows Jack Shandy as his ship is attacked and he is forced to join a pirate crew. During his adventures, he is forced to accompany Blackbeard to the Fountain of Youth, and must fight a number of sorcerers who seek to control Beth Hurwood, a British woman who seems to exist to be a damsel in distress.

There’s not much to say about this plot. It’s a swashbuckling adventure, to be sure, but nothing really stood out as unique to me. Of course, I could be biased, since I’m reading this story in 2021, not in the 1980s, so take my reaction with a grain of salt. I think to make this story more compelling, I would have liked to see more personal stakes for Jack Shandy. It seemed to me that Shandy mostly went along with the pirates and accepted the existence of magic. Combined with the fact that his desire to reclaim his inheritance wasn’t all that present, I think filtering the plot through the perspective of someone with stronger convictions and goals would have done a lot to create more suspense.

Characters: Jack Shandy, our protagonist, is a bit bland. He originally had some interesting qualities in that he was able to use his background as a puppeteer to get in the pirates’ good graces, but that’s about the only thing I liked about him. He doesn’t seem to have any real flaws and is good at whatever he does, such as handling a sword (despite having only done theater swordplay). He also doesn’t seem to have any strong convictions or goals; other than rescuing Beth and one time shooting a Naval officer because he was about to murder someone in cold blood, Shandy just seems to exist in the world and go along with the flow. His initial motivation - reclaiming his inheritance - also didn’t seem like an important goal; for one, Shandy forgets about it pretty quickly, only retuning to it within the last 70 pages or so, and never seems determined to escape the pirates after 100 pages. Second, his inheritance is a plantation in Jamaica, which gives me icky colonialism feelings.

Beth Hurwood, our damsel in distress and Shandy’s love interest, has no personality traits and serves no role other than being a victim. I hated that her main purpose was to be victimized by her father and her father’s accomplice, Leo Friend, and I hated that her agency was stolen at almost every turn. Beth did have one good moment when she tried to persuade a disgruntled pirate to abandon Blackbeard and escape with her, but since that plan failed, she had no scene where she attempted to seize control of her own destiny.

Beth’s father, Benjamin Hurwood, could have been a compelling antagonist if the focus was solely on his obsession with magic, but Powers had to go and make it weird. Hurwood is obsessed with putting the soul of his dead wife in his daughter’s body, a process which will effectively kill her. The incestuous undercurrent was a bit too gross for me, and I couldn’t get on board with it.

Leo Friend, Hurwood’s accomplice of sorts, is another powerful sorcerer whose goal is to take Beth for himself. Powers also made Friend more gross than he had to be: Friend desires to dominate Beth, body and soul, by using his magic to make her want to have sex with him. On top of that, Friend also wants to use Beth as a stand-in for his mother, who he was also sexually attracted to. To make matters even worse than that, Powers never, ever lets the reader forget that Friend is fat, using lots of adjectives like “pudgy,” “bloated,” and “round” in every scene, seemingly as a way to disgust the reader. This character was so over-the-top. I hated it.

Other supporting characters were ok. Blackbeard was as one might expect: self-interested and intimidating, but ultimately, he became kind of bland when his sights turned towards Beth Hurwood. Davis, a pirate captain, was a kind of loveable rogue with a nice rapport with Shandy. Stede Bonnett had some interesting motivations and hurdles to overcome, but I couldn’t get interested in his story. Anne Bonny makes a surprise appearance, but her entire purpose is to be a sex object, and I hated it.

Surprisingly, there were black characters in this book. However, rather than being complex, they seemed to only exist to be comic relief (such as one named Mr. Bird whose only job is to periodically scream “I am not a dog”) or to embody the magical negro trope (such as Woefully Fat, a deaf “bocor” who delivers weird messages and conducts odd rituals).

TL;DR: On Stranger Tides has some wonderful descriptions and does a good job evoking a supernatural atmosphere, but ultimately, the weak plot, flat and/or offensive characters, and pacing prevents this from being a memorable pirate story.

[jedi-order-apologist]

I finished reading Yoda: Dark Rendezvous, and I have to say, I really, really loved it! Everyone who recommended it to me was 100% right - this book is great, and especially great in its representation of the Jedi. I think I like it even more than Shatterpoint, and I really liked Shatterpoint.

There are some weak points - it was a little slow to pull me in, and there’s a couple of Weird Legends Things™ that, with me not being particularly immersed in that continuity, don’t quite fit in with my conception of Star Wars (Dooku apparently having had a Master that was not Yoda; the infamous 13-year-old age limit (though I was at least familiar with that one), the Jedi being so far in the public eye that there exists a famous Yoda impersonator, etc), and I was a little iffy on how it handled the “Jedi shouldn’t be in the war” angle (I’m fine with there being Jedi who think that the Jedi shouldn’t be in the war. I’m less fine with an author deciding that other Jedi can’t find the words to defend their involvement, because that’s a cheap way of framing the argument), and a small moment of the “everyone falls in love” stuff I dislike.

But those were very small aspects of the book, all things considered, and pretty much everything else about this book is really, really good, and very Star Warsy - a very healthy mix of the wacky as well as the philosophical sides of the franchise, which suited my tastes really well. This book is fun - Yoda is the grumpy grandpa that he deserves to be, and spends a good portion of the book disguised as an astromech that gets into all sorts of trouble. Obi-Wan and Anakin have peak sibling energy in the handful of scenes that they show up in - Anakin at one point insisting that a woman would have to be desperate to want Obi-Wan, and only a younger sibling could possibly say something like that with a straight face to a man as attractive as Obi-Wan, as well as Obi-Wan lying to Mace Windu’s face to cover for Anakin and then immediately grumbling about it to Anakin that he doesn’t know why he does these things for him is such an older sibling thing to do.

Where this book really shines, though, is the serious stuff - the philosophy and the dark side and especially grief. What absolutely sold me on this story, and what made me sit up and go “this is going to be one of my favorite Star Wars books”, was the part where Yoda speaks to the padawans and helps them address and work through their grief. It was phenomenal, and beautiful, and absolutely everything I want out of depicting the Jedi - especially in the context that only a chapter earlier, Ventress had been hurling those standard accusations of “the Jedi don’t let you feel”, and this book wonderfully, completely demolishes that nonsense. This section is absolutely amazing:

Yoda set his bowl of gumbo regretfully aside. “Hear it working, do you?”

“Hear what?” Whie snapped.

“The dark side. Always it speaks to us, from our pain. Our grief. It connects our pain to all pain, our hurt to all hurt.”

“Maybe it has a lot to say.” Whie stared at the starscape hovering over the projector table. “It’s so easy for you. What do you care? You are unattached, aren’t you? You’ll probably never die. What was Maks Leem to you? Another pupil. After all these centuries, who could blame you if you could hardly keep track of them? Well, she was more than that to me.” He looked up challengingly. Tear tracks were shining on his face, but his eyes were still hard and angry. “She was the closest thing I had to a mother, since you took me away from my real mother. She chose me to be her Padawan and I let her down, I let her die, and I’m not going to sit here and stuff myself and get over it!” He finished with a yell, sweeping the plate of crêpes off the projection table, so the platter went sailing toward the floor.

Yoda’s eyes, heavy-lidded and half closed like a drowsing dragon’s, gleamed, and one finger twitched. Food, platter, drinks, and all hung suspended in the air. The platter settled; the crêpes returned to it; Whie’s overturned cup righted itself, and rich purple liquid trickled back into it. All settled back onto the table.

Another twitch of Yoda’s fingers, the merest flicker, and Whie’s head jerked around as if on a string, until he found himself looking into the old Jedi’s eyes. They were green, green as swamp water. He had never quite realized before how terrifying those eyes could be. One could drown in them. One could be pulled under.

“Teach me about pain, think you can?” Yoda said softly. “Think the old Master cannot care, mmm? Forgotten who I am, have you? Old am I, yes. Mm. Loved more than you, have I, Padawan. Lost more. Hated more. Killed more.” The green eyes narrowed to gleaming slits under heavy lids. Dragon eyes, old and terrible. “Think wisdom comes at no cost? The dark side, yes - it is easier for them. The pain grows too great, and they eat the darkness to flee from it. Not Yoda. Yoda loves and suffers for it, loves and suffers.”

One could have heard a feather hit the floor.

“The price of Yoda’s wisdom, high it is, very high, and the cost goes on forever. But teach me about pain, will you?”

“I...” Whie’s mouth worked. “I am sorry, Master. I was angry. But...what if they’re right?” he cried out in anguish. “What if the galaxy is dark. What if it’s like Ventress says: we are born, we suffer, we die, and that is all. What if there is no plan, what if there is no ‘goodness’? What if we suffer blindly, trying to find a reason for the suffering, but we’re just fooling ourselves, looking for hope that isn’t there? What if there is nothing but stars and the black space between them and the galaxy does not care if we live or die?”

Yoda said, “It’s true.”

The Padawans looked at him in shock.

The Master’s short legs swung forth and back, forth and back. “Perhaps,” he added. He sighed. “Many days, feel certain of a greater hope, I do. Some days, not so.” He shrugged. “What difference does it make?”

“Ventress was right?” Whie said, shocked out of his anger.

“No! Wrong she is! As wrong as she can be!” Yoda snorted. “Grief in the galaxy, is there? Oh, yes. Oceans of it. Worlds. And darkness?” Yoda pointed to the starscape on the projection table. “There you see: darkness, darkness everywhere, and a few stars. A few points of light. If no plan there is, no fate, no destiny, no providence, no Force: then what is left?” He looked at each of them in turn. “Nothing but our choices, hmm?”

“Asajj eats the darkness, and the darkness eats her back. Do that if you wish, Whie. Do that if you wish.” The old Jedi looked deep into the starscape, suns and planets and nebulae dancing, tiny points of light blazing in the darkness. “To be Jedi is to face the truth, and choose. Give off light, or darkness, Padawan.” His matted eyebrows rose high over his swamp-colored eyes, and he poked Whie with the end of his stick. Poke, poke. “Be a candle, or the night, Padawan: but choose!”

Whie cried for what seemed like a long time. Scout ate. Fidelis served. Master Yoda told stories of Maks Leem and Jai Maruk: tales of their most exciting adventures, of course, but also comical anecdotes from the days when they were only children in the Temple. They drank together, many toasts.

Scout cried. Whie ate. Fidelis served.

Yoda told stories, and ate, and cried, and laughed: and the Padawans saw that life itself was a lightsaber in his hands; even in the face of treachery and death and hopes gone cold, he burned like a candle in the darkness. Like a star shining in the black eternity of space.

I want to show this passage to every hot-take Yoda-critical fan who’s ever leveled that kind of nonsense at him. I want every one of them to read this and still try to tell me that Yoda is detached and uncaring of the galaxy around him. I want every fan who thinks the Jedi are expected to be unfeeling to read this and understand what the Jedi actually say and do and why giving into these feelings is the issue, not the feelings themselves.

The confrontation with Dooku is also amazing. Yoda challenges him to explain why the dark side is so great, and Dooku only gets more and more frustrated as Yoda is unswayed by any of what he tempts him with. I especially love this bit where Yoda lays out exactly why what the dark side promises is false:

“Want something else. Want power.”

“Power have I.”

“Want wealth.”

“Wealth I need not.”

“Want to be safe,” Dooku said in frustration. “Want to be free from fear!”

“I will never be safe,” Yoda said. He turned away from Dooku, a shapeless bundle under a battered, acid-eaten cloak. “The universe is large and cold and very dark: that is the truth. What I love, taken from me will be, late or soon: and no power is there, dark or light, that can save me.”

That then leads into a bit where Dooku has a vision of what a dark!Yoda would look like, and realizes how utterly terrifying that would be.

Dooku also has abandonment issues on full display - lashing out at the lady who had given her son up to the Jedi, getting furious at her on the son’s behalf (but so clearly, his own, speaking of his own resentment towards his parents), and throwing an absolute hissy fit because he’s convinced Yoda likes Anakin more than him. I’m not kidding, he’s so offended by Anakin’s entire existence that just his mere presence in his house is enough for Dooku to stop feeling conflicted about the whole thing and jump right back into the dark side.

And there’s just so many good little moments throughout it all on top of all that. Whie’s dreams - and oh, I knew exactly what his dream of his own death was when he described it to Scout and it hurt at the end when he hugged Anakin while saying “I’m so glad you’re not coming to kill me!”. And Ventress, calling Dooku out on the fact that it’s so obvious that Sidious will end up replacing him (also for a more humorous bit - the fact that she apparently has some petty grudge against Anakin and Obi-Wan for stealing her ships so she goes out of her way to steal their ship at the end), and the droids, and Scout’s cleverness in winning the tournament despite her disadvantages, Jai Maruk’s last stand and refusal to fall when he was at the edge, and...so much, really.

And above all else, the book really latches onto the idea of Jedi as family, and you all know how much I really, really love the idea of the Jedi as a big found family. The idea that they consider each other to be family is driven home again and again, in their words and in their actions, and I absolutely adore this book for that emphasis.

[nightinngales]

Dear gays and fans of Skyrim in general... 

Ever wanted a real slowburn fanfic for Serana/Female Dragonborn? Perhaps a fic that addresses Serana’s trauma and builds a relationship naturally over time?

Vigilance is an epic length novelization with F!DB/Serana as the main ship - wherein their relationship progresses organically, and Serana’s traumatic backstory is not sidestepped or ignored. 

Currently at over 470k altogether, there are 6 full acts or “books” available within the Vigilance series of varying lengths, with the 7th act currently in progress and updated regularly. 

Some links to get you started: 

Vigilance wiki: A more in-depth look at the series including relevant lore, timeline, current progress on the series, and character blurbs. Spoilers up to the end of act 5. Updated sporadically. 

Vigilance Series landing page: The series on AO3 - you can find all the links for each work here, or continue below the cut for a more in-depth explanation of the series. Updated regularly, usually at least 1-2 times per week.

Not a fan of Skyrim? Never played it? Vigilance is written in a way where it can be enjoyed regardless of your knowledge of the Elder Scrolls franchise. My so-called “beta” hasn’t played Skyrim and she’s more pushy about me updating than most lol. So, if you’ve never played Skyrim but want to read about a vampire lesbian? Try it out anyways, you might like it.

For more regular updates on progress, you can follow me here on tumblr.

This post may be updated on occasion with new information or mod credits below the cut.

About:

The series itself is broken into acts, which each follow a particular segment of the Dragonborn’s life. These acts can be further bundled into Arcs. So far, I would say there are three major “Arcs” of the story, broken up into the separate acts, not including the prologue. 

Vigilant Arc - Acts II - V: This arc of the story is, essentially, the first half of the series. Beginning with the prologue, the Vigilant arc covers Eres’ journey as a Vigilant of Stendarr, the Dawnguard DLC (and Serana), and finishes with her retirement as a Vigilant. Wordcount: ~316k, completed. 

Dragonborn Arc - Acts VI - VIII: This arc is currently in progress, and covers Eres stepping into her role as Dragonborn. This will include the main quest as well as the Dragonborn DLC. Currently we are on Act VII. Current wordcount: ~155k, ongoing. 

Final Arc - Act IX: Currently in the concept phase. This will cover what happens once Eres has stepped into her destiny as Dragonborn and fulfilled her role. Essentially - this is the end of the fic, and will serve to tie up loose ends and provide a nice ending to the series. ...For now. :)

Total current wordcount: ~471k, with around 2.5 acts remaining. The full series may reach somewhere between 6-700k - which will put it around the length of the entire LOTR series. 

Why the fuck is it so long? 

There’s three main reasons for this. 

1: I love slowburn fics, so when I say slowburn - I mean slowburn. 

2: Vigilance isn’t just about the pairing. In fact, Serana does not even enter the story until Act 3, where Eres tackles the Dawnguard questline. As the fic continues forward from there, obviously Serana becomes a secondary main character and is just as important as Eres, but I didn’t want to just start the fic with the pairing and leave it at that. I wanted it to be a journey, from beginning to end, from Eres’ arrival in Skyrim, to meeting Serana and falling for her, to facing her destiny as Dragonborn, and so on and so forth. 

3: Most importantly, I have read a lot of Serana/fem!DB fics, and to be clear I am not disparaging any of them. There are some incredibly talented authors out there who have written some of my favorites. But there is one thing that I always wanted from a fic for Serana/DB, and it was something that I hadn’t seen: An indepth handling of Serana’s trauma, front and center, showing how it affects her and how she might heal from it through love. As a survivor myself, this was an issue that was deeply important to me, and I was disappointed that even some of my favorite fics in the fandom had not addressed it more deeply. So I started writing Vigilance, and here we are nearly 500k later. 

That’s why I wanted to write this. I wanted to show, through my fic, a relationship developing between two people who are broken in different ways, and how they might come together, help each other heal, and lift each other up. The pairing of Serana and Eres, for me, is meant to be an ideal, something to aim for. With Eres’ help, and those around her, Serana will work through the issues she has due to her trauma. She will recover, and heal, and find the happiness she feels she doesn’t deserve. 

I hope, reading this, that maybe you take a bit of time out of your day to give it a chance. I know it’s long. I know it’s a hell of a thing to look at a fic that’s nearly 500k and decide to try reading through it all even knowing it’s not finished yet. But give it a chance... you might find that 500k doesn’t seem long enough once you catch up. 

CREDITS: 

Vigilance is a series that follows a modded playthrough of Skyrim. As such, I could not have written this fic without the following mods which provided the inspiration. 

VIGILANT LE / SE : Provides the basis for the Vigilant arc within the series. The basic plot of both Act 2 and Act 5 are based upon this mod. Please download and drop an endorsement, for this fic would not have been possible without the work of Vicn which it is based upon. Note: it requires an English addon if you plan to play it with voice acting, which can be found here: LE / SE 

LC BUILD YOUR NOBLE HOUSE LE / SE: Fellburg, Eres’ estate within Falkreath, is based upon this player home mod by Locaster. Highly recommend either this or LC Feudal Keep if you would like an idea of what the estate is supposed to look like, though the Keep mod is located near Loreius Farm instead of Falkreath. (However, the “Build your own” version needs to be built, obviously, whereas the Feudal Keep version is plug and play.) 

INIGO LE / SE: This companion mod by smartbluecat is one of the most life-like on the nexus, with thousands of lines of dialogue and quest and location-awareness. Inigo makes his first appearance in Act IV. I would highly recommend him if you’re looking for a game-long companion. 

Serana and Claire LE / SE: This is more of a cosmetic thing, but this mod is replacer I use for Serana to make her appearance mesh better with the other NPC appearance mods I use (such as WICO, Bijin etc). It’s close enough to her default that it doesn’t feel like a complete replacement. I use the Thorns (short hair) version with the Glowing red eyes option, pictured above. 

Mods that have been mentioned: 

Darkend LE / SE: This is only mentioned in passing by Mirabelle in act 3, where she references a cursed shipwreck to the north. More of an easter egg than anything else, but still well worth playing if you like. 

More to be added later as I remember them, I’m sure. 

[lets-play-gwent]

Concerning Yennefer and Geralt

I would like to posit my two cents on the debate between shipping Geralt with Yennefer or with Jaskier. I’ve seen several posts talking about how they’re perfect for each other and Yen just has some flaws, but I politely disagree. (I don’t meant this to be a callout in any way-- we can all enjoy this fandom with our own opinions I just really want to be involved in The Discourse. Full respect to everyone who ships yennefer x geralt.) Rant ahead. 

I think Yennefer is demonized by some people a lot, and just generally gets a bad rap because people are intimidated by powerful women who don’t take nay shit. She’s not purely evil. She’s a complicated person with flaws, and her arc is unique and interesting to read/watch. 

However, I think she uses her power to manipulate people around her and treats Geralt like shit. I don’t think he is truly happy at many points during their relationship, but rather tolerant of her behavior because he’s infatuated and doesn’t believe he deserves or will get any other meaningful romantic affection in his life. He can’t be honest with her, walks on eggshells constantly to avoid pissing her off. “I’d rather drop dead, he thought. But he did not say it aloud. Contradicting Yennefer, as he knew, inevitably led to a fight, and a fight with Yennefer is not the safest thing” (Sapkowski, Sword of Destiny). A relationship with one person who has virtually no sense of self worth and another person who will fly off the handle and break things or hurt people if you disagree with her is not functional. She constantly invades his privacy by reading his mind; she knows he hates it, because he has told her multiple times, but she doesn’t listen and does whatever she wants. Yennefer also can give off rapey vibes, like the scene with Jaskier & Djinn in the Netflix series or all the times she uses the boner spell on Geralt when he’s tired after a hunt or distracted. Yes he wants that some or a lot of the time, but she just kind of does it without asking, which makes me feel icky. In a Shard of Ice, which is when Geralt and Istredd get in a cockfight because Yennefer can’t commit to either and strings both of them along, she tries to tell Geralt her feelings but turns it into a metaphor with an ice queen who throws shards of ice everywhere instead of saying “I care about you but I’m not in a stable enough place to be in a relationship right now” and gets angry at him for not understanding her cryptic messages.  

I absolutely agree that it is fantastic and important to portray relationships realistically, without all sunshine puppies and rainbows, because there is an ‘after’ to the happy ending that ought to be explored (I generally dislike the American version of The Office but they did a really good job of portraying Jim and Pam’s relationship realistically with ups and downs once they got together, I think). However, I also don’t want to perpetuate the narrative that you should stay with someone even if they treat you really badly, as long as you eventually have moments of bliss (especially during sex-- most of the sweet lovey dovey stuff between yen and geralt is when they’re fucking) and I think the way Sapkowski writes Yennefer x Geralt does the latter rather than the former. Don’t get me wrong, though, I do absolutely think that Geralt and Yennefer have to be together. Their destiny is tied to Ciri’s, specifically teaching her Witcher stuff and magic so she can do the child of elder blood thing. Geralt and Yennefer do not have to be in a romantic/sexual relationship in order for that to happen successfully! In fact, it would probably be better for Ciri if she could see a functional, loving relationship not based in competing power dynamics, unlike all those she had been around previously.

I’d like to reiterate that these are just my opinions and preferences-- no shade to people who ship Yennefer x Geralt! This is all super subjective, and I don’t think it is necessarily ‘toxic’ or ‘perpetuating abuse’ especially because we as fans, artists, and writers can insert consent and other functional relationship attributes into our ships. I personally would just rather give Geralt a sweet and loving boyfriend who cares about his feelings, as Jaskier/Dandelion does, in literally every single iteration of the Witcher. And I crave the gay representation. Therefore, I ship Geraskier, or maybe a nice polycule for the three of them.

[diamond-pearl]

A/N: Last part guys!

Warning/Genres: Violence. Spoilers. Angst (Kind of?). Fluff. Mom & Dad goals! ~

Pairing: The mandalorian x Fem!Reader

Words: +2K

Summary: With the duty to find and protect baby Yoda, you didn’t know sweet trouble will come to you.

-|- Previously    

On the way back, the egg carefully in hand, Kuiil  was relieved to see you three.  

— “Mando!”, he shouted towards us.

— “Mando? Is that your name?”, you suppress the urge to smile. “I finally know your name.”

— “Not too late Y/n.”

— You stopped walking. “How did you—. It was Kuiil who told you?”

— “I have it.”,he stated, out of breath. “I’ve got the egg.” 

With the little engine filled with all the parts of Mando’s ship, you drove off to your next quest: repairing the ship. With the baby napping at the back, along with all of those stuff, you were forced to share the little seat with Mando. 

So you just sat there, at the little end of the little box. You were too close for your liking; you were even uncomfortable. You decided to move away a little; a little too much because if Mando haven’t caught you by the waist, you would have sure regained the ground. You lowered your head with pinkish cheeks and thanked him with a voice so low he wasn’t sure at first what you just said.

Back to the ship, Mando, Kuiil and you started right away the reparation. You have a ship of you own so you know exactly what you were doing and with your help, it’ll go faster. After working tirelessly, you give yourself a break well-deserved. You searched for Mando and after finding him, you started chatting with him; more like doing a monologue.

— “Many people of mine tried to achieve the mission before me and failed. I strongly believe in a form a destiny you know? Maybe I have something that they don’t. I… I wasn’t sure that I was made for this kind of mission, I mean an important one. They, even, didn’t believe that I could make it. They said that growing unsupervised, because I’m an orphan, makes me under-qualified.”, your eyes got lost in the distance.

He examined your face, a face filled with sorrow. He could even sense a hint of guilt. But why would you feel guilty? He then realized that looking at you, was like looking at his reflection in a mirror. You strengthen your posture, trying to shoot this sad feeling away. You turned to him with a smile.

— “But hey, I’m doing my mission pretty well, don’t you think? I even came to conclusion that you were pretty truthfully. I kinda have this ability to discern if a person have a good heart or not.”

Without letting Mando respond, Kuiil came to us, rushing us to get back work.

The next day was the day of departure, you were watching over the sleepy silhouette of Ayod, absent minded. Mando and Kuiil was talking at the back but your ears were like, shut off. Going away with Mando meant abandoning your old life, even abandoning your ship here. He even didn’t push you off, he said nothing. Was he going to let you just… keep following him? 

— “I can use a crew member of your ability, and I can pay handsomely.”, informed Mando to Kuiil.

— “I’m honored, but I have worked a lifetime to finally be free of servitude.”

— “I understand. Then all I can offer is my thanks.”

— “Besides, you already have a crew member with you.”, affirm Kuiil before turned to at you.

— He glanced at you, “Y/n?”

— “You said it yourself. She’s well-skilled, fast, great abilities that I’m sure will go in your favor. Good qualities for a crew member.”

— “I agree.”, he added, contemplating you.

You came paying your respect to your host, alongside with Mando. And like that, you were flying away with him, him and the baby.

Time passed by, you didn’t say a word, kinda afraid, as if talking will remind him of your presence, causing him to change his mind. You didn’t even say a world when he started shaking the cradle, trying to wake up Ayod. After being comfortable in your seat, you started to doze off. You woke at the sound of a voice and when you opened your eyes; you saw a hologram transmission, only the greetings at the end of the message. That’s when you noticed Ayod sitting on the board control. You quickly get up to him.

— “It’s not a toy”, Mando said before taking back what belongs to him. He catches Ayod by his clothes and tuned around to see you. “What are you doing?”

— You froze. “I.. Um… Maybe he can just have it and play with it?”

— “No.” He finished, leaving no room for conversation.

You sat back in seat, looking out the windows, fighting the urge to stop sleep. Always keeping an eye after the baby was exhausting, leaving practically no time for resting. Your eyes, now too heavy, started to close slowly.

At dawn, the ship arrived at destination. When Mando get up to take the child without hesitation, he paused when he saw you sleeping, peacefully, with no worry in mind. He looked at the baby, then back to you. It wasn’t in his habit to even doubt. So he brushed everything, every feeling as far away as possible. He gets off the ship, along with Ayod.

You finally woke up, feeling uneasy. Looking around you, you noticed that you real, well, alone. You hurry yourself back to your feet; sensing the panic overwhelming you. Without losing a single second, you ran out the ship, repeating yourself that they were just maybe outside; trying to calm you.

Now you were outside, you recognize no one. You covered your mouth with one hand, suppressing the urge to cry. Not Ayod! You prayed, over and over, running everywhere to find him.

After what seemed ages, you finalizing find a person, a single one person. Mando. You ran to him and blocked his path. Your eyes grow wide when you saw his brand new armour.

— “What did you do?!”, you cried your lungs out, eyes red from tears.

— “...”

— “He’s just a child for god’s sake! He trusted you!... I... I trusted you...”

— “I’ve done what you were supposed to do, achieve a mission.”  

He sharply stated, before walking past your frozen silhouette. You were horrified. He was awfully right. You didn’t succeed, in all of this mess, it was you’re one and only fault.

Before entering his ship, he glanced at your back and figure that haven’t moved since. He then took plate on the pilot's seat.

He nodded to himself. At least some peace he thought. But... this thought sounded wrong in his mind. It should make him feel lighter, it should have be. A profound feeling of loss was devouring him, drowning him even. More than he wanted to. A feeling that enraged him because against all of his likings, he wouldn’t admit that he missed having you and the baby around, missed hearing you scold him, hearing you laugh, hearing your voice.

When he saw this little metal ball, he turned on his heels, determined to get back this little Ayod, first, and then go get you back. He has entirely faith on your potential; he knows you could handle yourself.

When he finally stepped out of the client’s den with the baby, Ayod looked around, then back to Mando.

— “Don’t look at me like that. She’s not here.”, he informed the child and with an almost whisper he added, “She wasn’t where I last saw her.”

— “Maybe because I’m right beside you metal bag.”

— He turned around. “Y/n…”

— “Don’t be too happy to see me. I’m gonna make you regret what you did.”, you assured before following him closely.

— “I thought you left.”, he admitted.

— “Never without Ayod. I’ve told you I’ll stick around. I tried entering this fortress, but it was harder than expected.”

— “How’s your arm?”, he pointed at your wound bleeding.

— “It doesn’t matter right now.”, you reassured him. You then noticing all of those people following you three. “Um… Mando?”

— He slowed down progressively, asking you in a low voice, “Are you armed?”

— “Yes.”

— “Good.”

A black man appeared in front of you, a man you recognized from the transmission.

— “Now put the package down.”, ordered the man.

— “Step aside. I’m going to my ship,”, required Mando.

— “If you truly care about the kid, then you’ll put it on the speeder.”

— “Y/n, listened to me carefully”, he whispered so only you could hear.

— “Yes?”

— “When I tell you, jump into the speeder.”

— “What about you?”, you asked worriedly.

—  “Trust me okay? You can do that?”

— “Yes.”

— “How do I know I can trust you?”, replied Mando to the black man.

— “Because I’m your only hope.”

Mando looked around; analyzing and evaluating the limits of his plan. He then ambled to the speeder and shouted: “Now!”. You jumped into the small engine, quickly followed by him and Ayod in his arm. He threatening the droid and it drive you out.

 It was raining fire shot, from the enemy and from yours and Mando blaster. Rapidly, the situation became overwhelming. No one wanted to give up.

Mando approached you. You were holding Ayod tight, eyes squeezed shut, heart pounding in your ears. He looked at the sleeping child in your arms, then turned to you, as if trying to remember your face. When you opened your eyes, you both looked each other.

The unexpected sudden happen. Dozen of Mandalorian on jetpack came at your rescue, fighting the enemy away.

 One shouted to you both.

— “Get out of here! We’ll hold them off!”, he then turned to you both. “This is the ways.”

— Mando nodded, “This is the way.”

He rushed you to follow him. 

You let out a sigh of relief when you three entered the ship safe and sound. Your hope vanished right away when you heard the voice of the black man. Mando automatically raised a hand toward you and Ayod still in your arm, in sign of protection. He proceeds to broke a pipe, letting out white and heavy steam. With this diversion, he easily shot the man away.

The ship fly out, above a place still in chaos.

You rested your head on the seat, finally at ease for good. After a moment, a thought came happily in your mind.

— “I knew that you have a good heart.”, you said.

— “...”

— “I know that you get attached to him and you can’t help loving him”, you paused for a moment, glancing at the back of the Mandalorian. Then you added with a sweet and gentle voice, “I do, too.”

— “You’ve known it for just few days.”

— “Stop referring to him like that, he’s a child. Now, look at him and tell him you love him. I’m sure he'll be pretty happy.”

— He sights for a split second and mumbled under his breath, “You’re a child too.”

— “You know I’m still mad at you right? And you want to make it worse?”, you take Ayod in your arms and repeat yourself, “Come on it’s not that hard, look at him.”

— “...”

— “Come on Mando! Turn around.”

He dropped his shoulder, along with a long sigh. You’ll not stop until you’ll get what you want. He knew that. He learned to know you. Therefore, he finally turned to you both.

— “See? It’s not that hard. Now look at his big beautiful eyes and tell him you love him.”

— “...”

— “Come on ~!”, you encouraged him, lifting Ayod up so both of your cheek collided smoothly; smile on your lips.

— “I… love you.”, he then turned around quickly, clearing his throat. “Happy?”, he asked with a tone full of fake frustration.

— “I… I guess…” 

Wasn't he… Didn’t he just looked at you saying those… words? You immediately shake your head. It can’t be. You can’t even see his face and most importantly, why would he? 

You turned your head to the windows, admiring the scenery, without noticing the curious expression on the baby's face, looking at Mando, then back at you.

[noonachronicles]

Everlong Pt. 9

Kwon Jiyong/ G Dragon X Reader

Word count: 16k (LOL WTF)

Warnings: Language, Smut.  

Genre: Hades/Jiyong. Greek God AU. Fantasy.

A/N: I had been feeling confident about this but then got nervous because....this is longer than most of my one shots and if everyone that’s been waiting so patiently hates it and it flops I’ll probably cry. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Update Tag: @kathrynwynterbourne , @keepthelightoff​, @blue-lungs, @violagoth , @un-idntfied , @optimizche , @de-gabyconamor , @134340-cm @wonderful39530​ @ohgeezitsbreadgenie​

Moodboard by bae @memoiresofaneternaldreamer​

“Who is she?”

Hades burst through the entrance to the Hall of Destiny already panting. He didn’t have a lot of time, he’d left you asleep in the forest of Asphodel and had to make sure he was back by your side before you woke up. The Fates, with no surprise to him, sat unbothered by his abrupt entrance. Having already expected him.

“No one.” Lachesis grinned.

“Someone.” Clothos smacked her sister.

With a sigh Atropos finally looked up from the work in her lap. “We already warned you of her. I’m not sure why you’re coming to us now, Hades.”

“Why? Why did she come into my life? How is she connected to this world? It’s as if she is one of us without being one of us. This is impossible. I need an explanation.” Hades was frustrated. “Tell me what I’m supposed to do, tell me what it means!”

Clothos found his emotions interesting. Hades most typical manners were anger or calm. To see him merely frustrated was curious. “She is bound to you.”

“How?” He asked, his heart was racing, he needed to know. He had to make sense of you.

“We don’t know. Perhaps it was fate.” Atropos smirked. “She was born a mortal. And then by chance, it would seem, her thread intersected with your own. Now she is becoming one of the immortal, becoming... more.”

“Immortal?” He nearly shrieked, “I don’t understand. How does this happen? You don’t just become an immortal. You are born into it or you do something so worthy it’s gifted to you. It’s not as if she’s done something to deserve the right. You have to do something to become immortal.”

Lachesis grew annoyed by his claims. “You speak as if this was her choice, Hades. As if she asked for this. As if we three played a hand in it…This was you. Your thread found hers. Your thread intertwined. You made it your fate to never let her go and now she is bound, likely forever.”

“Show me.”

“You know we cannot.”

“SHOW ME!” Hades bellowed, his voice echoing through the hall.

Clothos stood reluctantly. Of the three sisters she feared him the most and thus was most willing to break the rules for fear of his wrath. He followed her as she slowly made her way through the hall to a door that stood wide and bright. Made of solid gold. She placed a gentle palm on the door, there was no handle or knob, and it seemed to have swung open of its own accord. The walls were dark stone but you’d never notice. The room was glowing bright, like looking into the sun. Hades squinted for a bit until his eyes finally adjusted.

The light from the room came from the strings that draped the walls like curtains, there were hundreds. All of them a warm and glowing gold that matched the door to the room. The Chamber of the Immortal. In the center of the room were five gold threads, thick as ship rope, hung from the ceiling. His and his siblings ropes. Clothos made her way to the five threads and beckoned Hades to follow.

“This is you.” She said placing her hand onto one of the ropelike threads.

As she did several smaller gold threads started to appear. Some of them disappeared into his entirely, some of them pulled away and then would attach back further down, some would attach and break away and never came back at all. They were all of the different immortal souls that had come into contact with the god in his lifetime.

Clothos lifted her other hand to one of the threads that seemed to appear out of nowhere, starting a few feet above where her hand was placed, nowhere near where his began. “And this is her.”

His eyes started at the top of your thread and followed it down. “So she really is no one?”

“She was no one and then she became someone to you. We don’t know how. We almost didn’t notice at all.” Clothos said quietly as he looked at how the two threads intertwined. “You can see it happened quite slowly at first. Barely meeting, just here and there. Now hers aligns with yours side by side, and may soon become fully encompassed, making her a true immortal.”

Your thread began as mortals threads do, as a twine. A normal and dull, beige tone. It remained the same for quite some time, the majority of your life so far. Then there was a slight unraveling of both your thread and his. They hooked together once or twice, a thin and weak connection. And then, as Clothos had said his thread had started to encompass your own. Pulling unraveled bits into his golden thread until yours had nearly disappeared into his completely. Only a single strand of beige was still visible. Towards the bottom your thread started to break apart from his once more, only this time your thread was gold like his. Smooth and silky like the immortals. His eyes followed the thread for a bit longer until it seemed to disappear. It didn’t end, an immortals thread didn’t end. It just simply faded from view.

“What’s this?” He asked the concern in his voice undeniable.

“A choice.” She answered softly.

He didn’t understand. “A choice that I make?”

Clothos shook her head, “A choice for her to make.”

“When will it happen?”

“Soon.”

“What will happen once she’s chosen?”

“It depends on the choice she makes.” Clothos felt pity at his exasperated sigh, “I can not tell you, Hades. You know too much now as it were.”

He held your thread in his palm and barely above a whisper he said, “...but she ate the fruit.”

Clothos nearly laughed, “That only works if you’re willing to reinforce it.”

“I’m going to!” He pouted, “I might...I could.”

“You were never going to make that girl stay here against her will.”

“I love her.”he was so frustrated he thought he might cry.

He was a god! He could have anything he wanted, do anything he wanted to. He made the rules. However he also knew Clothos was right. He would never make you do anything you didn’t want to.

“You love her so much you gave her immortality without even thinking about it. That you love her is indisputable.”

“But I could still lose her?”

“It’s her choice, Hades.” she said with a hint of pity. “You’ve given her a gift no god has ever given a mortal before. Absolute free will, completely unrestricted, no caveats.”

“Cou-“ he took a nervous breath, “Giving up her soul for someone else, could that do this?”

“Well, yes. In that case she would relinquish her immortality and her thread would be cut immediately. That could very well be why her future is so uncertain.” It was curious to the sister to see Hades in such turmoil, in this moment she didn’t fear him but she chose to help him regardless. “Perhaps... her decision could be persuaded.”

“Persuaded?” he asked hopefully.

“You are the god of the underworld, Hades. Use your tools.”

“Tools? What tools?” He asked more confused than before.

“You’re a clever god, you’ll figure it out.” She said with a small smile before going back to join her sisters.

Hades stood in the Chamber of the Immortal for quite a bit longer. He held your connected threads in his palm and thought back to every moment the two of you had shared together. The night you’d met, your first real conversation, the dream you’d shared…He inhaled quickly and patted his jacket where he felt his notebook. Maybe there would be some questions to answer. Perhaps he’d have to explain who he was. Despite all that he knew what he had to do now, this might be his only chance.

-

When you woke up the next morning Jiyong was by your side. Your arm was still wrapped snugly around his waist and his arm was thrown over your shoulder. You rubbed the sleep from your eyes before leaning away from his chest, which you’d been resting on. He’d been watching you quietly, curiously.

“Good morning.”

“Morning,” you blushed, your eyes moved down his body in an effort to avoid his soft gaze. You realized your leg had wrapped around his. You quickly removed yourself from him and sat up, “sorry...”

He chuckled lightly at the panic that was clear on your face. “Don’t worry about it. Are you ready for more walking?”

You groaned, your feet were so sore, just thinking about walking had them screaming. “Where we’re going, is it far?”

“No, not really. And we can stay there for a bit if you want, really get some rest. Eat something nice.” he said enticingly.

“Real food?” you asked, stomach grumbling as you stood up, “What are we waiting for?”

You followed Jiyong through the rest of the forest, amazed that all of the souls you’d seen the night before had just disappeared into the trees like they’d never even been there. Part of you hoped that when you died that this is where you’d come. You hoped you’d been good enough for it. It was such a neutral feeling being in the forest, no melancholy or pain. If you got to choose this place is what you’d pick.

Just out of the forest there was another path to follow. The two of you didn’t speak too much on the walk, but you did bask in the comfort of his presence. It was nice to have a moment where the two of you weren’t tense and arguing or angry with one another about something stupid. It felt like there had been too much of that recently.

You’d always thought you’d known comfort with Jiho. The way the two of you kind of just fell into one another so effortlessly. It had felt comfortable with him. Nothing had ever really felt different between when you’d just met to becoming his roommate and, finally, his girlfriend. There was just something easy about each transition, something so natural that had made complete sense at the time. Being around Jiyong was different, you had to admit. You weren’t even dating but there was still this feeling in your gut that drove you crazy. With Jiho it was always so simple. It just was. There was never anything to question or to worry about.

With Jiyong there was comfort, yes. There was an ease to being near him, absolutely. However, with Jiyong there was also this vibrating energy just under the surface of every other feeling you had. You realized after really thinking about it that the energy flowed through your veins constantly not just during moments of comfort and ease. It didn’t matter if you were yelling at each other, or if he was making you laugh or if everything was calm and it was like this, just the two of you in silence, existing together.

There was always this extra level to how you felt when you were with him. It was like an energy telling you how much you wanted it, every second of it, all the good and all the bad. If you were going to fight you wanted to fight with him. If you were going to laugh you wanted to laugh with him. If you were crying you wanted to cry with him near you. Taking the time to think about it you realized that the underlying current was passion.  

You tried to think back to when you and Jiho first got tog

ether, tried to remember if there had been passion then. You knew there hadn’t been recently, just before he died. The two of you had started just going through the motions. You genuinely believed that it’s just what happened in relationships as they aged. Jiho had been your only real relationship, it was the only one you knew. You had no comparisons. But something sat heavy on your chest the very second you met Jiyong. Something that made you wonder if you were wrong all along about... everything.  

“Do you see that?” You asked after quite a while.

Finally climbing out of your own thoughts you had noticed the silhouettes of flying figures just ahead. They seemed small at first, the size of crows, but as they grew near you realized they were much, much larger. Nearing the size of small planes. They looked like a bird of prey at first, but as you looked longer you realized they were some sort of bird, reptilian hybrid. Their teeth were razor sharp and several feet long. You jumped back, completely disturbed by the vision of a bird with teeth like that. As if sensing your fear one of the birds turned towards the pair of you with a squawk that blanketed the open air around you and appeared to descend.

“Oh my god, Jiyong!” Trembling in fear you threw yourself into his arms for protection, burying your face into his chest.

His eyes grew wide and he slowly wrapped his arms around you. He had been thinking a lot on this trip, about who he was before you. He realized that he’d actually been very unfamiliar with the urge to alleviate someone else's anxiety. He’d never been overly affectionate, the way he’d wanted to be when you were around. While he was being painfully honest with himself, he recognized that he never connected with Persphone like he did with you. He had been far from the perfect husband, he knew that. Even though he tried to make her happy, beyond that, he never really paid attention to her needs. He’d been selfish. He didn’t want to make those mistakes when it came to you.

He dipped his face closer to yours. The floral and spice scent of you clouded his senses momentarily. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath before whispering against your ear, “You’re okay, I’ve got you.”

The aviguis, one of Hades beasts, often searched the underworld for attempted escapees, though they usually stuck closer to Tartarus. The bird, upon seeing his master was only diving down for attention and maybe a snack, as Hades often kept treats for his pets. Jiyong waved the bird away as discreetly as possible, keeping one arm tightly wrapped around you. Although slightly put out, the bird left without much of a fuss, just one more loud screeching squawk. It’d been so close when it released the loud cry that it shook the ground you stood on, causing you to press yourself into Jiyong even further.

Continuing to rub your back his fingers tangled in your hair. He lifted his hand up further, his palm cupping your neck, his fingertips gently massaging your hairline. You leaned your head back, into his hand, with a small sigh. So comforted by the feel of him your eyes had been closed. When your eyelids finally fluttered open he was staring down at you. Your eyes locked with his and you felt breathless. Overwhelmed by the perfectly curved shape of his eyes, the rich chocolate color, the surprising amount of affection reflected in them. He tilted his head ever so slightly and leaned in, brushing his nose against yours. You closed your eyes again, but then squirmed reluctantly in his arms.

“I can’t.” You said softly. The two of you already so close that your lips brushed against his, even as you declined his proposition for a kiss. “...Jiho.”

“Right...I’m sorry.” Jiyong took several deep breaths, collecting himself, before moving his lips just passed your mouth and leaving a small kiss against your cheek.

The second he pulled away from you, removing his arms from around your body, you missed his presence. He was only inches from you but suddenly he wasn’t close enough anymore. He started walking away, it wasn’t in heated frustration like it had been in the garden. It was relaxed, his hands in his pockets, on a leisurely stroll. As you followed you thought for sure you were more upset right now than he was that you hadn’t kissed just then.

“I was married once.” Jiyong said simply, casually reaching down and grabbing a small stone from the path.

“What? Seriously?” you asked, completely surprised by the confession.

“Yep.” he tossed the rock up high before catching it in his palm.

“You seem too young to have been married and divorced already. It must not have lasted long.”

“I don’t know.” he sighed, “felt like a milenium to me.”

“Such a drama queen” you said giving him a nudge. “Why’d you split up?”

“She was...we were young...and she never really wanted to be with me anyway. It got tiring, always trying to make someone so stubborn and so miserable happy.”

“You’re kidding. That sounds like the ideal circumstance for a marriage. A really stable foundation for a relationship.” you grinned.

Jiyong scoffed as he looked over at you, “You think you’re so cute when you’re sarcastic.”

“Maybe, but you think so too.”

“Yeah.”

The single word stopped you. You stood staring at him as he continued on walking. It took him a beat to realize you weren’t by his side any longer.

He paused, turning back to look at you. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I just-” you shrugged before slowly making your way to him. “I expected you to say something snarky, not just agree with me.”

“So what? I think you’re cute.” he admitted as if it were nothing, “Beautiful even. Gorgeous. Stunning. Radiant. Breathtaking.”

“Stop.” you blushed furiously.

Jiyong laughed, “Why? Are you embarrassed?”

“No, it’s just…you don’t really mean it.”

It was his turn to stop in his tracks. Only he grabbed your wrist, stopping you with him. His eyes locked with yours, making your breath catch in your chest for a second time in all of ten minutes. “I do mean it. Of course I mean it. You know that, don’t you?”

And suddenly it was there again. That unshakable urge to kiss him and touch him. To give into every sexual impulse you’d ever known. Obviously you thought he might be interested in you. At the very least he’d wanted to kiss you, but even that didn’t have to mean anything.

It could have just meant that you had shared a very close proximity to each other for the last couple of days and there was some naturally built tension between the two of you. You looked at him and wondered how someone so beautiful could ever think you were attractive too. The subtle pout on his lips, the softness in his eyes, even his cheeks and his nose. With a deep breath you turned away, unable to take him in any longer. Instead you looked passed him a little ways away.

“What are those?” You asked eyeing a pair of large ivory towers in the distance.

Distracted, Jiyong turned to look as well, “That’s the towers of Elysium.”

“Towers? I thought Elysium was a field, like Asphodel was supposed to be.”

“Consistent.” He grinned. “Elysium was meant to be a paradise for fallen gods and the worthy at heart. Being stuck in a crowded field of wandering souls isn’t exactly a paradise for anyone. So some adjustments were made.”

“What’s inside of them?” You asked curiously.

“It’s hard to explain.” He said before biting his lip trying to think of how to describe it to you. “I guess, they’re paradises.”

“Paradises? More than one?” You asked and started to walk towards them.

“Not everyone is going to have the same expectations of paradise. Each tower has hundreds of stories and each story has hundreds of doors and through the doors are personal paradises of each of the worthy souls. Different souls, different versions of paradise.”

“And that’s where we’re going?” He looked over at you all wide eyed and excited.

“It was thinking it would be a nice, safe place to spend the day, maybe even stay for the night.” He shrugged.

”Wait...you mean like stay in one of the paradises?” You asked, looking over at him, “Ji, that would be so cool. I really want to see one. What if I never get the chance again? I’m not...like a great human specimen. I don’t know where I’ll go when I die, besides possibly getting stuck in the valley of sad roses.”

He groaned, dramatically throwing his head back. “I told you, you don’t belong there!”

You only hummed skeptically in response as the two of you continued down the path towards the towers. After just a few moments of silence between the two of you, you asked “Is that where you came up with your Hades story? Your own experience?”

He almost seemed nervous, but quickly wiped the look from his face with a smile. “I’m disappointed it took you so long to realize…”

You scoffed, “Yeah well, I figured you were too smart to get stuck in a shitty relationship. Apparently not.”

“Ohhh, okay.” he chuckled, “Smart people make relationship mistakes all the time. You should know.”

Your mouth fell open with a gasp, you tried your best not to laugh. “That was a good dig. I concede.”

“Thank you.” he said with a dramatic bow.

“Seriously though, sorry about your wife.”

He just shrugged, “It’s fine. My story isn’t over yet, right?”

“Definitely not.” you thought maybe you responded a little too enthusiastically and followed up with, “Probably.”

“Well which is it?” he laughed, “definitely not or probably not.”

“A guy like you? Definitely not.”

“What does that mean? A guy like me.” he asked

You blushed, “Just, you know…”

He turned to look at you but you’d been staring at your shoes as you walked, “I really don’t. Please tell me what kind of guy you think I am.”

Perfect. You thought to yourself.

“You’re like...really pretty or handsome...both. You’re just good looking or whatever. Obviously you have a career. Although I’m still not clear on what you do what is clear is that you make bank. You dress nicely and take care of yourself. You’re a real man in a sea of manchildren. You’re-” you paused. You knew if didn’t stay on surface compliments you might go too far. You could say too much and get yourself in trouble.

“Please?” he asked again, softer this time.

“It’s nothing I haven’t told you before.” you thought back to your embarrassing unrequited boat confession.

“Then it should be no problem telling me again.”

You clicked your tongue in annoyance and sighed, “Fine. I’ve never not felt safe when you were around. You have a fearlessness and an arrogance that just makes me certain that no matter what the circumstance you’d be able to take care of me. Which, you know, is something a person likes to have in a partner. You drench everything in sarcasm and humor. Sometimes it makes it really difficult to know when to take you seriously. When you are serious, you’re always very warm, and kind. You are unbelievably thoughtful. You care. You try to appear nonchalant all the time, but you aren’t…”

“Stop.” he said suddenly and cleared his throat uncomfortably.

“There’s more.”

“I can’t...it’s fine, just stop.” he wanted to cry or kiss you. Or he wanted to kiss you so hard he could cry. You saw him so differently than everyone else did. You saw him how he wished he would be seen.

“Pearly gates?” you asked looking up at the gate you’d come to that surrounded the towers. You could tell Ji had shut down a little and wanted to change the subject for him.

He rubbed his eyes, hoping to come off tired rather than emotional before looking up at the gate. It was made of white marble and gold but the marble did look like a pearl. He shrugged as he moved to unlock it, “Yeah, kind of a joke I guess.”

“Do you think Hades thinks he’s a really funny guy? He seems like he might.” you commented as you walked into Elysium.

He didn’t respond right away, just walked you towards the closest tower, and up the few marble steps towards the entryway, “Do you think he’s funny?”

You shrugged, “I don’t know him...but there’s potential for him.”

“Do you think I’m funny?”

“Comedic genius.”

“Well thank you,” finally he smiled as he opened the large glass door for you, “and welcome to paradise.”

Stepping inside, your mouth fell at the sheer size of the lobby. It was easily three stories high. The floor was a polished white marble, almost blindingly white. You actually felt guilty taking your first few steps inside. Your sneakers didn’t seem appropriate attire for walking on such beautiful, clean flooring. There were massive black marble pillars that lined the sides of the room, and you realized between each set of pillars were gold doors. Looking up at the arched ceiling you noticed the painting that covered every inch. Very sistine chapel vibes.  

“Wow,” you muttered unable to look away from the ornate painting on the ceiling. “I was not expecting anything this fancy.”

“Is this fancy?” he asked curiously, as if he really couldn’t see it. “What were you expecting?”

“It’s just so renaissance Italy, I was expecting more futuristic hospital.”

Jiyong let out an uncharacteristic snort, “Your idea of paradise aesthetic is a futuristic hospital?”

You rolled your eyes, you guessed it did sound pretty stupid. “Maybe! Maybe I like a very clean hospital look, very high tech, space stuff.”

“Lies!” he laughed, “Such a liar.”

He kept laughing as he brought you over to one of the many gold doors. You realized as he pressed a tiny button beside it that they were all elevators. Once inside the elevator he told you to pick a floor, any one you wanted. So you closed your eyes and pressed. The elevator ride to the 62nd floor was quick and smooth. It felt like nothing at all before the doors opened.

The hall was very quiet and looked mostly like a ritzy old hotel. There was a maroon carpet that lined the dark wood flooring, white doors with gold trim. Beside each door was a gold plaque with a number engraved. Jiyong hummed thoughtfully as he walked you down the hallway before finally stopping in front of one of the doors. 6233.

“Ready?” He asked placing his hand on the doorknob.

You nodded enthusiastically and he opened the door to let you inside. It was just like walking through the front door of a poorly lit apartment as the lights were off and the drapes were closed. Even still it was light enough to see the walls of the living area were a mint green that made you cringe. There was a gilded crown moulding along the ceiling and a beautifully designed persian rug on the ground. Off to one side was an office with a small writing desk, at least the walls in that room had a dark wood paneling and wasn’t the horrible green. The couches and chairs were all made of elaborately carved walnut with pink velvet cushions. There was a porcelain tea set on the table that looked like it was from a thousand years ago.  

Grabbing the tiny silver teaspoon between your fingers you gave the tea a stir. “This place is very fancy too. Very European, but less like Italy, and more like an old lady's house.”

“Do you not like it?” He asked moving around the room with his hands clasped behind his back.

“It’s very pretty, don’t get me wrong. It’s just not my,” you were going to say ‘cup of tea’. You thought the joke would have been worthy of Hades himself. Instead your voice caught in your throat.

You had moved to the window to pull back the curtain for more light. Plus you’d been curious about the view. Eyes wide with enthusiasm you dragged the curtains open completely and looked over your shoulder at a smirking Jiyong.

“We’re in Paris!” He nodded as you looked back out at the view. The Eiffel Tower sitting smack dab in the middle of the picture window. “Wait, is it real? Or is this like a smoke and mirrors, visual effects thing?”

“This is really, truly, Paris.”

As you looked down below you took in every fascinating detail. After what honestly took too long, you realized there was something very off about the scene in front of you. “Where are all the cars? Why are there so many horses? Jiyong...when are we?”

“We are in Paris in the 1890’s. This is the home of Oscar Wilde. There is a cafe a few blocks away that he really likes to frequent for writing.” He was being so nonchalant, you wanted to scream. “This is his paradise.”

“Are you joking? Is this a joke?” you practically shrieked.

He watched with much amusement as you revisited every inch of the apartment and all of its telltale details. The coat on the rack by the door, black with a thick fur collar and wrists. Cluttered writing desk in the office by the window covered in loose leaf papers, some blank and some covered in lines and scribbles. In the corner was a brown leather chair and beside it was a stack of books piled up to the arm rest.  

You dragged your hand over the writing desk and looked over at Jiyong, “So, does your paradise have to be somewhere you’ve been before? Some place real? What’s the deal?”

“A person’s paradise is limited only by their imagination.”

“Elysium,” you shook your head in surprise, “I never would have guessed that for Oscar.”

“I-” Jiyong paused as you looked over at him, “I think Hades has a fondness for the classics.”

“Huh.” you mused, making your way back over to him, “Hades is an art snob. Who knew?”

“He scoffed, “He’s not a snob. He just has an appreciation for a creative, original mind.”

“Is that how you move in and out of the underworld so easily?” you asked, “By being an ass kisser?”

“I’ve never-” he started to defend himself and then stopped, “Seeing as you’ve never been nice a day in your life, I can see where you might confuse kindness with ass kissing.”

You pouted, “You don’t think I’m nice?”

“Try.” he grinned, “Say something nice.”

With your lips slightly parted, as if ready to respond, you froze. Everything you thought to say was too shallow. Comments about how good he looked standing there with the stubble that had been collecting on his usually clean shaven face. Or they were too deep for such a lighthearted conversation like this. I love you, you’d thought. I love you was something nice to say.  

“No thoughts,” you muttered grumpily, “ head empty.”

“Not a single nice thing to say?”

“You really think I’m mean?” you asked quietly.

His shoulders fell immediately, “Y/n, it was a joke. Honestly? I think you’ve never been mean a day in your life.”

“I can be mean.” you argued, “I’m not a pushover. Am I? Do you think I’m a pushover?”

He scratched the back of his head and laughed, “Do you want to mean or do you want to be nice? Pick one so we can move on.”

“I want to be both!” you said in a gentle whine.

“Fine!” he grabbed your face in his hands.”You’re equal parts mean and nice. There’s never been a more perfectly balanced human being.”

A pleased smile spread across your face as he dropped his hands.”Thank you, that's all I wanted to hear you say. You think I’m the perfect human being.”

“Except that’s not what I said.” he responded, following you as you made your way out of the room.

“It’s what you think though. You think I’m perfect.” you said stepping out of the Paris Paradise and into the hallway. “Don’t you? Don’t you think I’m perfect, Jiyong?”

He gulped as he shut the door before turning around to face you. That’s actually exactly what he thought. When he looked at you. When he thought about you. Perfection. You were everything. He sighed, “Maybe. I might.”

“Oh please, that’s obviously a yes.” you laughed, “What’s next?”

“Want to see something really cool?” he asked. You scoffed at the question and he nodded, “Right, stupid question.”

He brought you back to the elevator and you both stepped inside. The doors had already closed as he stood for a moment looking at the numbers, trying to remember the correct one. With a sudden realization you watched as he pressed the button for the 158th floor. You were a little surprised when you stepped off on the new floor. You’d expected a bit of queasiness or dizziness from being up so high, but you guessed that was just a perk of being in paradise.

“Where are we going again?” You asked knowing full well he hadn’t told you yet.

“Do you want to ruin the surprise?”

“Yes! That’s why I asked, duh.”

“Duh…” he said mocking you as he finally found the door he was looking for. 15868. “I wanted to show you what I meant about limits only being those on your imagination.”

He opened the door and you stepped into a hallway. At least that’s the only way you could think to describe it. It felt like a corridor on a ship. All metal shiny metal walls with big bolts, no windows and low lighting. You were reminded of the corridors they showed in movies about submarines. It was also freezing cold. Even with your sweater on you were shivering. As you made your way down the corridor Jiyong threw his thick coat over your shoulders, you didn’t even need to ask.

You passed one door that opened to what appeared to be a living space. A tiny bed, barely big enough for one person. A metal desk with journals lined across the top. There was a set of blue striped pajamas folded nicely at the end of the bed, but not really much else. Nothing too telling about the occupant. The next door you found opened to a garden of sorts. The ceiling was lined with special lighting and what looked like sprinklers. They hung over large wooden boxes filled with all sorts of greenery. You looked over at Jiyong as if for permission and he just shrugged, so you went in.

There were vegetables and berries, against the walls were actual fruit trees. There were flowers and regular old green plants. And towards the back there was a collection of strange plants, ones you’d never seen before. There was one that was the most astounding blue color you’d ever seen, it’s petals appeared to be lined in purple led lights. You found two plants that were underneath a bell jars. One looked like it was a flower made of crystal but without knowing for sure you felt it was made of ice. It was spinning, suspended in air. You thought it might be ice by the way snow was falling around it, seemingly from nowhere. Beside it was a bold red tropical looking flower. But as you had been standing there, fascinated by the ice plant, you realized it had turned a bright yellow, and then a deep orange.

“What are these?” You asked, “I don’t understand.”

“Keep looking, you’ll see.”

He followed you out of the room and further down the hall. Finally it opened into a larger area. It was the bridge of a ship. A single captains chair sat in the center. You watched fascinated as, what was clearly a robot, moved around the room checking buttons and charts and screens. When you finally tore your eyes from the very Rosie Jetson-esque robot you caught the view out of the window that wrapped around the room.

“And to think I thought Paris was cool.” you muttered, walking over to the window.

As you looked out at the unfamiliar looming red and blue planet in front of you, you gulped. Immediately surrounding you there was nothing, emptiness. Passed the planet was nothing but stars and planets as far as you could see.

“Space? Seriously. Someone’s idea of paradise is alone in space.”

“Neil Armstrong.” Jiyong shrugged. “He always wanted to go further than the moon. So now he spends his time visiting different planets. Sometimes he picks up plants from them and studies them. Writes about his experiences in his journals. Mostly I think he just visits planets he saw on episodes of Star Trek, but you get the idea.”

“It’s beautiful, don’t get me wrong, but it must be so lonely, right?” you asked, taking in the quiet hum of the empty ship. “Is everyone always alone?”

“Oscar isn’t, he spends most of his time with a partner. Neil prefers solitude for the most part but he makes friends on every planet he visits. That’s what makes it a paradise for him. Every day a new adventure, a new friend.”

You bit your lip, looking out into the emptiness of space before you. You wondered what your paradise would look like. Who would be with you? Where would you go? How would you spend your days?

You looked over at Jiyong with a small smile, “Do you think we can find somewhere warmer?”

He nodded, “I think we can find somewhere perfect for you.”

While you did actually enjoy being in space and the phenomenal view, you made quick work of the dark, cold corridor. You had stopped once, to go back into the garden room and relook at the plants. In the hall you semi reluctantly handed Jiyong his coat back and followed him to the elevator.

He brought you down several floors but instead of taking you to a room he brought you to a long walkway that was showered in the sunlight coming from the glass archway covering it. It was a bridge from one tower to the other. The archway was designed to look like cut crystal and the way the sun reflected onto it made the floor beneath your feet look like a rainbow.

Through the window you had a pretty decent view of most of the underworld. On one side of the walkway was a view of the gates that greeted you, and in the other were the mountains near Tartarus. Once you’d reached the other tower he brought you to another elevator which led you up. It was the highest you’d been yet, the 300th floor.

Jiyong paused in front the third door of the day and turned to you. “You open this one.”

An immediate excitement surged through you, “Am I allowed?”

“I don’t make the rules, but I don’t see why you can’t.” he shrugged.

Taking a cautious step forward you placed your hand on the doorknob and gave a turn of your wrist. The smell of the ocean breeze moved passed you before the door was even all the way open. The room you walked into was basking in sunlight. A true gust of ocean air blew through sheer white curtains that opened to a modest oceanfront deck. It was the most beautiful ocean view, the water was a dazzling blue. You had never seen anything like it before in your life. You continued to explore the quaint bungalow. There were two bedrooms, each with their own en suite bathroom. One of the bedrooms had a sliding door that opened to the same ocean view you’d seen from the living room. The other room had a door that opened to a patio with a thick forest view, which made you feel like it had the best of both worlds.

Besides the two rooms there was a living room that separated them. The floor was wood but there was a massive, fluffy white carpet that covered most of the area. There was a plush, oversized sectional, and a couple of bookshelves. A huge television hung over an equally large fireplace. Separated from the common area only by a long counter was the kitchen, which truly caught your interest.

All of the rooms had been littered with vases filled with fresh flowers. Red gerberas. As he walked around the rooms, Jiyong curiously took in the details of everything. A small smile spread across his lips as he noticed each vase held one flower that had nearly snapped off and was dangling precariously. He gently fingered the soft petals and wondered if you’d realized the small detail too.

“This kitchen!” you cried out dramatically.

He moved casually from the bedroom to find you with the biggest eyes and the brightest smile as you checked every cabinet and drawer and opened every appliance.

“Is it nice? I don’t really use kitchens.” he asked rounding the counter.

“Four ovens!” you said looking over at him, “and watch!”

He leaned against the counter and watched you move over to one of the ovens and open the door.

“It’s off, it’s cold.” you said sticking your hand inside and grabbing the rack. You closed the door and pushed several buttons. There was a long beep and you opened the door once more. A gush of hot air flowed into the room. “Ready for baking in...what? A second?”

“That’s a neat trick.” he smirked.

“Okay fine, that could be nothing. It could be crazy advanced technology, but this?” you moved over to the large stainless steel refrigerator and opened the door. It was filled with everything you could need. Milk, eggs, beautiful fruits and colorful vegetables, perfect cuts of meat. You looked over at Jiyong and pressed your finger into a stick of butter, “hard as a rock. Touch it.”  

“Oh, I believe you.”

“Touch the butter, Jiyong.” you said with a serious glare.

He reached passed your shoulder and pressed a finger against the solid stick, “Yep, that’s cold butter.”

“But wait,” you said dramatically, “there’s more!”

“If I call now it comes with a free knife set?” he asked sarcastically.

With a massive eye roll you grabbed the stick and held it in the palm of your hand and then looked at him pointedly.

“Touch it?”

“Touch it.” you nodded. He pushed his finger against the butter once more, only this time it went nearly all the way through. “Slightly warmer than room temperature. Perfect for baking.”

Jiyong didn’t say anything to that. He just looked at you with an adoration that brought a blush to your cheeks. He looked at you like he’d be happy to hear you go on about the temperature of butter for hours.

“Anyway…” you turned, suddenly feeling embarrassed, and put the butter back in the refrigerator. “Whose paradise is this? Because it’s actually kind of perfect.”

“Whose do you think it is?”

You leaned against the counter opposite him and looked around for a moment. Once realization hit you grinned over at him. You stood up straight, looking enthusiastic. “Bake something with me.”

“Oh,” he shook his head, “I’m no good at things like that.”

“This is my paradise, it would be impossible for you to fuck this up.”

“Ehh.” he made a very skeptical face, “I can probably do some damage.”

“Please!” you begged, “Anything you want. Anything at all.”

Foot tapping against the tile of the kitchen floor he contemplated for a moment. “Chocolate cake. Kind of like the lava cake at the bakery?”

“Hades cake?” you asked with a hint of excitement, “How appropriate.”

He stood back and watched as you maneuvered around the kitchen to pull out the necessities. You figured out pretty quickly that all you needed to do was think of the thing that you needed and open a cabinet, any cabinet, and it would be there. In barely any time at all you had everything laid out. Bowls and pans, spatulas and whisks, eggs, flour, butter, chocolate. Everything you needed, at your fingertips.

“I’ll give you an easy part.” you assured a nervous looking Jiyong.

“And what’s that?” He asked cautiously.

“Stirring.”

You set him up in front of the flat top oven with a double broiler. You handed him a whisk and he watched as you started to fill the bowl. Butter first, and then freshly shaved chocolate, fresh ground espresso beans, and freshly ground chili.

“Just stir?” He asked when it finally looked like you’d moved to somewhere else.

“Slowly, and with love.” You smiled as you prepared the eggs in one bowl and the dry ingredients in another. Jiyong was staring into the bowl like it was a witches brew.

He was fascinated by the way you moved around the kitchen. The way you mixed things together. He’d never seen you cook before and there was an art to it that he found beautiful and contagious. Once the cake was in the oven, you showed him how to make the frosting too. And he had to admit that you even cleaned things in such a way that it looked like a dance. When you were done it looked like you’d never touched a thing.

With your head in the refrigerator you said, “We should go swimming.”

“In the ocean?”

You turned around and shook your head, “There’s a pool outside and a grill. I think we should swim and barbecue. It would be fun. And when we’re done we can comeback in for cake.”

He nodded in agreement, “Yeah, that does sound nice.”

“Great! I’m going to go get ready.”

He watched you take off to one of the bedrooms to change before moving to the opposite. It was unsurprising to him when he found his clothes in the dresser in the bedroom. What did surprise him was how nervous he’d been in deciding how he wanted to look in front of you. He stood in front of his mirror for a long while in his bathing suit. Tried it with sandals on and then sandals off, shirt on and then shirt off, sunglasses and hats. He tried every possible combination before finally just running his hand through his hair and biting the bullet.

When he came back out you were already back in the kitchen. There was a tray of food ready to be taken outside and you’d been putting the finishing touches of frosting on the cake. When you looked up from the cake you’d been smiling but the moment your eyes hit Jiyong you froze. Your face flushed and you felt like you looked crazy staring like you were but you couldn‘t look away.

“What?” he asked. He thought if he brought the attention to you, you wouldn’t notice the way he’d been looking back.

You shook your head and dropped your eyes immediately. “Nothing. Can you bring the tray outside?”

“Sure.” He grinned and moved over to the counter. “You okay?”

“Perfect. I’m fine.” you said before clearing your throat.

You waited until he’d gone outside to collapse against the counter, distraught. You hadn’t expected to react so spectacularly to a shirtless Jiyong. To a Jiyong that was in something other than his typical fashion model-esque attire. You hadn’t expected him to look so casual and comfortable. Truthfully you hadn’t expected him to look like someone you wished was your boyfriend. His hair pushed back so sloppily and the scruff that had been growing on his face over the past few days. And the way he carried himself around like none of it was a big deal at all. You had to take a minute to collect yourself before heading outside.

Outside you were able to relax quite a bit, mostly because there had been a pitcher of margaritas on the table out by the pool. The two of you drank and cooked together. Shared a meal by the pool and went for a swim after. Before you noticed it happening you felt you’d been transported. Thoughts of the underworld and of finding Jiho had vanished. Now you were just simply on a beach vacation with someone you loved, having the time of your life. Nowhere to be and nothing to do except for playing silly games and snacking on delicious food while you watched the sun coming down on a gorgeous afternoon.

Leaning against the side of the pool you admired Jiyong as he swam back and forth, the entire length of the pool. After several laps he stopped and stood up. He pushed his dripping wet hair out of his face with both hands. You watched with fascination as water droplets fell from the ends of his hair, down his neck, sliding over his back. You felt slightly faint at the sight, it was honestly more breathtaking than staring straight into space.

His body was on the thinner side, which wasn’t a surprise to you. You’d known he was an average height but had more of a petite build. You hadn’t been expecting him to be so toned all over. Or to have so many previously hidden tattoos to expose. You hadn’t been expecting your mouth to be pooling with drool at the sight in front of you. The sharp angles of his profile, along with the setting sun as the backdrop, left you yearning. You were also certain that standing waist deep in the water wasn’t the only thing that had you wet.

“Beautiful.” you muttered to yourself as you stared.

Jiyong looked over at you with raised eyebrows. “What was that?”

“This place,” you choked out. “It’s beautiful. It’s perfect.”

“I would hope so. It’s your paradise.” he smirked before diving underwater once more to take several more laps.

A pout passed over your mouth as you watched him and you muttered, “I don’t know, feels like torture to me.”

He swam laps for a little longer while you contemplated swimming out into the ocean and never returning because you genuinely weren’t sure you’d survive the night with him looking the way that he did. What you didn’t know was that he had to keep swimming laps because looking at you standing there in your bathing suit with your lip tucked between your teeth every time he came up for air was driving him insane. It was the only way he could think to blow off steam. He moved through the water towards you and popped out of water. He leaned against the side of the pool after his last set of laps.

“I think I’ll go in and clean up. Shave, maybe.” He said running his fingertips over the scruff on his chin.

“No!” You shouted, surprising even yourself, before sinking back down into the water.

“No?” He asked, amused, “Do you prefer me this way?”

You shook your head. “I don’t prefer you any which way. You should do whatever you want...”

“Mmhmm.” He grinned and ran his thumb over his jawline, watching the way your lip rolled between your teeth once more. “Maybe it’s not so bad. I guess I’ll keep it.”

“Yeah. You should. That’s cool. Or don’t. Whatever.” You rambled as you moved to get out of the water, “I think I’ll clean up too.”

You cleaned up the mess you’d made with lunch to distract yourself as Jiyong got out of the water and dried off, though you imagined with it being paradise you could have just wished it away. You were pretty sure he knew it too, with the small smile he kept on his face. He’d asked you if you needed help and you assured him you didn’t.

Then you watched as he walked back inside, watched the way his skin moved over his shoulder blades when he lifted the towel to dry his hair once more. You hands shook with a mighty need to touch his bare hips, to trace the tattoos on his torso. With a sigh you looked back down at the table to find it was cleared and your idle hands were empty. So you went inside for what you hoped would be a relaxing shower.

-

Stepping out of the shower into the steamy air of the bathroom you felt much better. When you moved into the bedroom you pulled the towel tighter around you, and walked across the floor to the dresser. Pulling open the top drawer you found two sets of underwear. One was your usual, comfy, mismatched bra and panties and folded neatly beside them was a set of what you could only refer to as lingerie. A sexy, strappy, lace bra in blacks and reds with a pair of barely there black, lace panties. Your mouth felt dry as you looked over at the closed door. The only thing separating you from Jiyong. Your hand hovered between both sets of underwear. Knowing this was all you, you wondered exactly what kind of paradise you’d created here. With a quick gulp you grabbed the matching set, better safe than sorry.

You also grabbed a pair of jean shorts and a thin tank top, throwing your hoodie on over the whole ensemble, wanting to look as casual as possible. After brushing your hair and getting dressed you opened the door. A grin spread across your lips when you saw Jiyong had the same casual vibes idea as you. He was standing barefoot with his back to you. Wearing a black hoodie, the hood of his sweater pulled over his head. A pair of black jeans that had been cut just above the knees left loose threads dangling over his thighs. Your eyes snapped up as you felt your mouth start to water.

He had turned to you at this point and there was a small smile on his face as he caught you staring. “What?”

“Nothing…” you gulped, “you look very punk rock.”

“It’s fashion, y/n. Look it up.” he laughed as you rolled your eyes at him. “I was, um, gonna go sit outside for a bit and read. Would you like to join me?”

“That sounds very nice.” You smiled, “I’ll grab a book.”

You walked over to the bookshelf next to the sliding door that was opened to the deck. With an amused hum you picked up the only book on the shelf laying flat on its side.

“Find something interesting?”

You shrugged, “Sort of. This is the book I’d been working on back home. This place is a trip.”

“Paradise,” Jiyong said moving behind you, his hand brushed your hip as he passed, “anything you want, everything you need.”

It took you a moment to catch your breath as he walked outside. With your book in hand you made your way to the deck. Strings of white lights were hanging all over and around keeping the space warm and welcoming. Jiyong was sitting on the long cushioned bench that lined the banister that overlooked the beach, the water. The moon was full and bright, glistening against the soft waves like diamonds. His legs were stretched out, crossed at the ankle as he rested his feet atop the table. His hood was still up and his eyes were already diligently moving across the pages of his notebook. Moving around the table you tucked yourself into the corner of the bench, pulling your knees to you chest before opening the book in your hands.

For the first ten minutes you sat there not a single word was read.You’d realized that if you kept your gaze right at the top of your book you could watch Jiyong inconspicuously. Even though the only things you could see from underneath his hood were the tip of his nose and the pout on his lips. You still ached. Every once in awhile he would clear his throat or his tongue would poke out to run over his lips. You started to anticipate when he would turn the page because he always fingered the corner of the page for a minute before flipping it over. Your teeth dug a little deeper into your lip every time.  

Finally realizing that you’d been staring for too long, you looked down at your own book. Still you could not read. Instead you tried to quick math to figure out how long it had been since your last time with Jiho. Then you tried to calculate your cycle because clearly this had to be some pathetic and annoying pms thirsting. In the end you hadn’t figured out anything useful. All you knew was that his voice was stuck on repeat in your head like some catchy song, “Okay. I’ll wait. Okay. We’ll kiss the right way like you want.” again and again and again, “Okay. We’ll kiss. Okay. We’ll kiss. Okay. We’ll kiss…”  

Mad at yourself for wanting to wait, and mad at yourself for wanting so badly to break your waiting rule, you were finally able to read your book. If only as a way to get out of your own head. The book had been a good distraction at first and the plot line had hit a good twist. Then there was an unfortunately placed, very steamy, very intimate sex scene. It seemed very suddenly like your head was spinning so you closed your eyes for just a moment, to try and calm yourself. Your brain was not on the same page.  

The scene in your head was set up exactly like this one. Full moon blanketing the deck with light, accompanied by bright whit fairy lights hanging above you. Jiyong sitting on the opposite side of the bench with this notebook in his lap.You stretched out one of your legs until your foot was pressing against his hip. He continued to look down at his notebook but dropped a hand onto your ankle. His fingers slid slowly, gently, up and down your shin and you were glad you’d shaved in the shower earlier.

It wasn’t enough, you needed more of his attention. You needed all of it. You pushed out your other leg, stretching until your toes were touching the outside of his thigh. You wiggled them underneath the ragged  hem of his shorts. After a moment he dropped his legs from their resting place on the table and tossed his book to the side. With a quick turn to you he snatched your ankles in his hands. When he looked up at you from beneath his hood his eyes were bright gold.Your breath caught in your chest.

“You can’t handle me.” he said, but you knew it wasn’t meant as a threat.

“Let me try.” you whispered nervously.

Hands tight around your ankles he pulled, roughly dragging you towards him. With you on your back before him, he moved over you. His hand, smooth as a snake, moved up your sweater. You moaned as his lips met your neck, the stubble on his chin scratching your throat. Your eyes closed as he massaged your breast over the lace bra. His lips moved up to your jaw, your cheek. Another moan was teetering off the edge of your lips but he caught it with his own. Your first real kiss together. You might have cried if you’d given yourself the chance to think about it. Instead you pulled him closer. One hand dug deep in his hair, the other one clutching desperately at this collar of his hoodie, not wanting him to move even an inch from you.

“Y/n?” his voice was floating through your head but his lips were pressed against yours, “Y/n?”

Your eyes snapped open and you inhaled deeply. Jiyong was sitting across the bench from you, exactly as he had been before you closed your eyes. Only this time he was looking over at you.

“Uhhh, yeah, what’s up?”

“I’m going to grab something to eat. Can I get you anything from inside?” he asked with a small smile.

“Oh, no. I’m good, but thank you for asking.” You wondered how badly you were blushing as you reached your hand to your neck. You could still feel the scratch of his chin against you.

He stood up from the bench and dropped his notebook on the cushion. Stopping in front of the door he turned and watched you stare dreamily at the space in front of you with a smirk.

“Hey,” he called, and you turned to him with big doe eyes, “You’re sure you’re not...thirsty?”

“No…” you choked out, “No...yes! No, I mean yes, I’m sure I’m not thirsty.”

You groaned, covering your face with your hands as he walked inside with an upbeat hum. Pulling your hands back down to your lap you noticed the notebook where he left it lying on the bench, open to the center page. For the briefest moment you could have sworn you saw your name. You looked away, feeling uncomfortable. That was his private notebook, it wasn’t for your prying eyes. On the other hand...you were pretty sure you’d seen your name, and what could it hurt just to take a peek.

Leaning forward slightly for a closer look, you saw it. It was for sure your name. Jiho’s name had been there too and several other familiar names as well. Your heart was racing. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if you just read a few lines, just to get the general vibe. He would never have to know you even saw it. You turned towards the door to look inside of the little bungalow, Jiyong was nowhere in sight. Biting your lip so hard you tasted copper, you leaned over and snatched the notebook off the cushion.

Confusion hit first. You didn’t understand what it meant. Dates and times, starting from the day you were born up until earlier that day. Names of everyone you knew with what looked like correlating page numbers. Actions listed out like crimes, Forgery, age 10, mother's signature on field trip participation slip. Petty theft, earlier today, Oscar Wilde’s fountain pen. You looked down at the page, mortified, as you thought about the pen laying on the dresser in your room.

Realization hit quickly after, shock followed then. A flash of pain tore through your chest as you continued to read. As the pages flipped before you fell into anger, confusion again, and then more pain. You imagined that nothing would hurt as much as the list of times Jiho had committed adultery against you. Many of the names of the women looked familiar. Women you’d asked him about. Women he’d sworn you never had to worry about. His list of lies was so much worse. They left you feeling genuinely sick. There were so many you remembered not believing but pushing the feeling aside. Excusing him. Always making excuses for him.

I love you. Lie

You’re my everything. Lie

There is nothing more important to me than you. Lie

I love you. Lie. I love you. Lie. I love you. Lie.    

Your lip was trembling. Tears fell onto the pages like raindrops as you continued on. Your grandmother, your mother, old friends, coworkers. Your father. The father you never met. He was nowhere near the monster your mother always made him out to be. He hadn’t abandoned you, he never knew you existed. She never told him. You met him once, completely by chance. He’d come back to the city for work and came into the bakery for coffee and wfi. He told you that you reminded him of someone, joked that you even looked a little him. He’d been polite and made you laugh. He died a couple years after that. Saved a teenage boy from a shooter at a gas station robbery. He was here somewhere in Elysium. You had two half sisters, still alive. Your chest felt tight. You flipped back and forth and back and forth again. Reading everything you could find. It took you some time but you finally realized there was someone missing.

Jiyong was in the kitchen shoving a forkful of cake in his mouth. His eyes raised in surprise when he saw you.

“You caught me.” he mumbled with his cheeks full. He looked at you for a long moment, swallowing the cake in his mouth and then frowned. “What’s wrong?”

Still quite dazed you made your way into the room fully. You kept moving forward until you were standing in front of the counter. You lifted the notebook onto the polished marble and pushed it towards him.

“What is this?” you asked calmly. Calmer than you ever expected you could.

“It’s my notebook.”

You let out a long sigh, “It’s fine. Don’t tell me what it is. At least tell me if it’s true. What’s in the notebook. Is it all true?”

He nodded, “Yeah. It’s true.”

“And you knew?” You whispered the question. Jiyong nodded but remained quiet. “All the lies, the cheating…the things he manipulated me into doing for him. You knew? You must have. You must have read it all. You’re always reading this stupid notebook, how could you not know... You really knew this whole time?”

“Yeah.” He knew you deserved so much more but he couldn’t think of anything else to say.

“Why didn’t you say anything? You could have told me. All those times you tried to get me to leave him, why didn’t you just tell me the truth?” you quickly wiped at the few loose tears on your cheek.

“I couldn’t. It’s not what the notebook is used for. I couldn’t just abuse my knowledge for personal gain.” he swallowed the lump in his throat. “I wanted to tell you. Every time I saw you, I wanted to tell you to run from him...to run to me.”

“I would have kissed you. In the garden, you could have had me, if you’d just said something. If I’d known.” You said and tucked your lip between your teeth. “All of this time we could have been us.”

“Well now you know so what do you want to do?”

Minutes ticked by as you tried to think. What did you want to do? Keep going? Go home? Should you confront Jiho or leave him to rot? Every thought came out dull and incomplete. All of them overshadowed by one simple, carnal urge that was overwhelming every single one of your senses.

With a gulp you looked up at Jiyong, “I want you.”

“What do you mean?” He asked shakily.

“You know exactly what I mean.”

He looked you over for a long time, as if he didn’t believe this was really happening. With a single look from him you moved around the counter so you were standing in front of him. He slipped a hand over your cheek and cupped your neck, his fingers buried in your hair. Already there was a tremble in your knees and he hadn’t even kissed you yet. Leaning in his nose brushed against yours, your mouth was watering.

“Is this a dream?” he asked.

“If it is…”you whispered against his lips, “don’t you dare wake me up.”

“Agreed.” he grinned before sucking your bottom lip between his.

Inhaling sharply, you fell forward into him. If he hadn’t slipped his arm around your waist you were sure you’d have collapsed. You were unsure if it was because it had been so long or if it was because it was Jiyong, but you felt euphoric. It wasn’t until many delicious minutes had passed that he pulled away.

A whine escaped you immediately, “No.”

“No?” he chuckled.

“Come back.” you forced another kiss on his lips.

“I’m right here.”

You pushed your hips into his, “Not close enough.”

“Just breathe for a second.” he laughed again as you tugged at the strings of his hoodie.

You shook your head defiantly, “I don’t want to breathe, I just want you.”    

He dragged your bottom lip between his teeth and smirked when you whimpered after he released it with a pop. “I told you, you couldn’t handle me.”  

“Kiss now, gloat later.” you whispered against his mouth.

“Mmm.” he hummed happily, “but you know how I love to gloat.”

Tired of talking you hooked your hand behind his neck and pulled him forward. You moaned into his mouth in satisfaction of getting what you wanted. His hands slipped up your sides, dragging your hoodie with them. His fingers felt cold against the heat coursing through you. As the kiss continued your lips started to swell and became sore. Kissing was starting to hurt but you couldn’t pull away. He was like the first good meal you’d had in weeks and you couldn’t get enough.

You moved to unbutton his pants but his fingers grasped yours gently before muttering against your lips, “Slow down.”

“Slow down?” you asked, pulling away in surprise. “Haven’t we waited long enough?”

“Y/n,” he whispered against your neck before leaving a small tickle of a kiss. “I want to take my time. I want this to last an eternity. I want to treat you how you should have always been treated.”

“I don’t deserve you.” you muttered, eyes closed, head tilted back as he kissed your neck

He stepped back and eyed you curiously, “I disagree. And I’m always right, as we know now.”

Leaning in once more he captured your lips in another kiss and you could think of no complaints. Well you could think of only one complaint. The edge of the counter was digging painfully into your lower back but Jiyongs hands were in your hair and his hips were pressed against yours and his lips were on your lips. There was no way you were about to push him away or ask him to calm down, if anything you wanted more. You needed him closer. You needed there to be a way for him to mold around you and seep through you like the oxygen through your blood. Instead of that you moved your hand behind you to leverage yourself away from the counter.

“Oh, no.” you cringed and Jiyong pulled away looking mortified at the disgusted look on your face.

“What’s wrong? What did I do?” he asked.

“Not you, never you.” you groaned and brought your hand in front of you, the whole side of it covered in chocolate cake and frosting.

Jiyong laughed at the sight. “Oh baby...what to do with you.”

You pouted as he reached around you, grabbing the plate his cake had been on. As he dropped the plate in the sink you cursed yourself internally for ruining the moment. Jiyong didn’t think it had been ruined at all. With a grin he wrapped his fingers around your wrist, lifting your chocolate covered hand.

“You always have me eating out of the palm of your hand.’ he muttered as your eyes met, and he dragged his tongue over your palm.

Your jaw dropped open as you watched him lick and suck until your hand was practically clean. When he was done there was some chocolate left on his lip and you couldn’t help yourself but to pull it into your mouth.

For awhile there was nothing else but this. Time stood completely still, space was irrelevant, no one else existed. It was just Jiyong and his kiss and it felt so good. At one point he pulled away with a pop of your lips and trailed kisses over your face, down your neck. Your hand moved over his shoulders s up his neck until your fingers were in his hair. Holding him close only encouraged him to leave little marks all over your skin.

He mumbled against your skin, “kissing is nice.”

“I think so too.” You said massaging the back of his head.

“Is it selfish for me to want more of you?” He asked, fingers toying with the waist of your shorts.

You leaned back and slid your hand around to cup his cheek, “Are you always so respectful and considerate?”

He smirked, “I’m trying, you make it difficult.”

“What if you stopped trying?” You asked. He looked confused by your question. “What if for tonight you just take what you want from me? I just want all of you in return.”

“Are you sure?”

“Jiyong, if you move your hand down my shorts like you’ve wanted to this whole time we’ve been talking, you’d find I’ve completely soaked through these panties for you. I’ve almost never been so sure of anything in my life.”

With his fingers tucked into the waist of your shorts he tugged your hips forward roughly. Keeping his heavy lidded eyes on you he unbuttoned them and then dragged the zipper down as well. Your fingers curled around the edge of the counter as you leaned back in anticipation.

Lip tucked between his teeth he reached his fingers between the lace fabric and you. “Fuck.”

“Told you.” you grinned but only for a second before your mouth fell open at the feeling of two of his fingers easing inside of you.

“Needy.” he noted as your hips rolled you further into his palm. “This is going to…”

“What?” You gasped as his nimble fingers curved. “Just say it. Let go.”

He leaned in, cheek pressed against yours, and said, “It’s just, this is going to feel so good on my cock.”

“Oh, damn.” You groaned, surprised by the tone in his voice, your thighs tightened around his wrist.

He didn’t drop his eyes from your face as he pushed his hand knuckle deep. Instead he studied your expressions as he searched for that specific spot. He thought you looked so peaceful. Head thrown back and your eyes closed, he was enamored by the stretch of your neck. He’d been able to elicit some delicious moans, but he was really living for the way your lip trembled into a pout every time he dragged his fingers from you. However, he wanted something else. Something more.

Suddenly you gasped and shot forward, “oh shit!”

Jiyong grinned as you peppered his face and neck with kisses filled with gratitude. “I think I found it.”

“I’m so close. Don’t stop. Please, just don’t stop.” You begged against his mouth.

“I won’t. I’m not.” He promised, going even faster as if to prove a point.

“Jiyong!” You cried out his name, and he thought it felt good but he knew it would feel better if it was his true name falling off your lips. You whined against him, m “If you stop we can’t b-be friends.”

“What? Stop this?” He chuckled, adding more pressure with his fingertips and dragging them excruciatingly slow against your g spot.

You sputtered out something incomprehensible and slumped against his shoulder. Your orgasm pulsed around his fingers.

“I wouldn’t dare.” He murmured into your hair.

The two of you stood there against the counter for sometime. You’d kept your arms around him, knowing you’d collapse otherwise, your thighs still shook like jello. He’d removed his hand from your shorts and sucked you clean off his fingers. He let out the tiniest groan as he did so, wishing he was devouring you, but he could wait.

After awhile you leaned back to look at him. “Did you ever try that with your wife?”

“Try what?” He asked brushing hair from your cheek.

“The thing with the hand and th-“ your eyes rolled back and you sighed, “I can’t even talk about it, it’s too soon.”

He laughed and moved to kiss the skin of your neck. “Probably. Once or twice I think.”

“You’re sure you did it just like that?” You asked with some uncertainty, “because if you had there’s absolutely no reason for her to have left you.”

Leaning his forehead against your shoulder he laughed again this time so genuinely your heart nearly melted. “Stop, you’ll make me blush.”

Running your hand through his hair you gently turned his face to yours, “I can really make you blush if you want me to.”

He looked at you for a long time as if contemplating the offer and then he smiled, “You don’t have to do that.”

“I want to.” Your tongue moved over your lip and you said, “I wasn’t lying when I said I want all of you.”

When he didn’t say anything you grabbed his hand and brought him into the living room. Once your toes hit the soft carpet you turned and pulled him into you for a kiss. His lips curved into a smile as your hands moved up his sides.

“We don’t need this.” you pulled away before dragging his hoodie over his head along with the shirt he’d had on underneath. Tossing his clothes to the side you looked back at the man you’d been thinking about all afternoon. Your fingers traced the black ink on his side. “Forever young?”

“Yeah.” he smirked, “Why don’t you join me?”

Laughing lightly you sunk down to your knees in front of him. As you unbuttoned his jeans he let out a long sigh, unsure of how he’d handle you. He already felt ready to burst. You looked up at him quite cutely as you dragged the fabric of both his shorts and underwear down his thighs. You couldn’t help but grin when you took in the look of him. Everything about this man was pretty, of course his dick would be pretty too.

One hand squeezed his thigh, just above the knee while the other one lead him between your lips. He jolted slightly as soon as your tongue brushed against the sensitive skin. His teeth clenched as you eased back and forth. Your tongue and head moving in tandem to create the desired effect.

Jiyong didn’t say much, he was finding breathing to be enough of a challenge. You hummed with your lips around him as you felt his fingers slip into your hair. If you were going to try and swallow him whole he figured he might as well try and help. His thighs were trembling underneath your hands. When you looked up he was bent to the side, one hand clutching the arm of the couch as he tried to remain on his feet. Every muscle in his arm was shaking and you knew he must be close.

With your best efforts you took him in as far as you could several more times until he gasped, “That’s it...oh shit…”

It surprised you when he dropped to his knees when he was finished and pulled you into a kiss. Jiho had always been the type to get grossed out by the idea of kissing you after head. Clearly Jiyong had no qualms.

During the kiss he leaned you back against the carpet, as his fingers made their way back down to your thighs and under your shorts until they were consumed by your warmth. They brushed gently against the patch of warm wet lace and he inhaled deeply at the feel.

“Oh my goddess.” He muttered before burying his face in your neck, his slightly bearded cheek sending a tingling sensations over your already overly sensitive skin. He sucked onto the skin at the base of your throat, salty with sweat. You lunged forward slightly as his fingers found their way beneath the lace and slipped inside of you with ease once more. “I’m going to build you a temple. Biggest temple anyone’s ever seen.”

You pushed your hips up into his hand greedily. “I don’t need a temple.”

“You’re too tight, too wet to go unpraised by the masses.” He disagreed.

You laughed, embarrassed. “Shut up.”

“Fine, a statue. Marble. Sculpted of this very moment.” He compromised, “The smooth arch of your back. The hair falling off your shoulder. My hand between your thighs.”

Your eyes fluttered shut, and you hummed at the image of a naked Jiyong fingering you carved into marble. “That’s very...erotic. And I would also like one.”

“There’s just one thing that I’d want to change.” he muttered against your mouth before pulling back. “You should be naked too.”

You lifted your arms over your head and he pulled the sweater from your body. He rolled the fabric into a ball and tossed it to the side. Both of you jumped at the loud crashing noise that followed. Your head fell back with laughter at the sight of the lamp that had been on the side table laying smashed on the floor.

“So smooth.”

He shook his head as he tugged at your top, “Just ignore it. Please.”

You grabbed his face after he threw the tank top to the side as well, a little more gently, and pressed a kiss to his lips. “It’s forgotten.”

“Sexy bra…” he noted, “have you been wearing that this whole time or did you conjure it up just for me?”

“Does it matter?” You asked with a slight flush of your cheeks.

“Not at all.” He dropped his hands to your hips and pulled your shorts from your legs.

Propped up on your arms you watched Jiyong slink down until he was laying comfortably between your legs. His lips teased the soft skin of the tops of your thighs. The stubble on his cheek and chin leaving light scratches in their wake. Scratchy little kitten kisses as he moved towards the warm, moist patch of lace that kept you from him. His teeth dragged gently over your mound and a desperate hiss escaped your mouth.

“Oh my god.” You panted.

“Which one?” He asked quietly between your thighs.

“Wh-what?” You watched his arm snake around your thigh. His thin, nimble fingers trailed along the edge of your panties.

“I asked which god is your god.” He locked eyes with you as he move the fabric of your panties to the side.

“I...I,” you stuttered as the pink muscle that was his tongue flicked gently against you. “Ummm. Any...all of them any of them.”

“Let it be me.” He said before pulling you into his mouth with a light hum.

You whimpered, head losing thoughts and function with every movement of his mouth against you, “Do what? Do you want…”

“Say I’m your god.” He whispered before running his tongue deeper than before.

“Yes. Yes!”

You panted heavily and gasped for air. Every move of his mouth on you was methodical. He had you teetering on the edge, ready to fall completely. Whimpering was close to becoming real tears as he locked your trembling thighs into place. You were so close already, and for a second time. And then it just stopped. For a moment you laid there confused.

“Why?” it was all you could say when you looked down between your thighs to see Jiyong running his tongue over his glistening lips.

He sat up between your legs and hooked his fingers under the elastic of your panties before dragging them down your legs.

“You didn’t say it.” He said once he’d pulled the fabric from you and flung it across the room.

“What?”

He shrugged, “You didn’t say, you’re my god.”

You sat up and reached between your legs to grab Jiyongs shoulders, pulling him towards you. Your forehead pressed against his, you whispered, “You are my god. The only one for me.”

He leaned in for a kiss while he removed your bra. With your arms wrapped around him you laid back down bringing him with you. Your lips glued together once more.

“Can I?” he asked between kisses.

“If you can’t, we’re about to have a real problem.”

“May. I.” he growled against your neck, making you shiver.

“Yes, you may.” you gasped slightly at the feel of his teeth dragging over your skin.

He reached between the two of you and eased himself in. A long satisfied sigh escaped your lips at the stretch. There was a real sense of perfection in the way he felt to you. The way you fit together. It was as if there was nothing more for you to imagine in your paradise. You had it all. Realizing you’d never had a moment so flawless in your life before made your eyes well with tears.  

“Does that feel okay?” Jiyong asked sweetly, planting a kiss against your cheek, “Do you feel good?”

“Mm, yes. It feels…” the words stuck in your throat as you looked up at him. His eyes caught yours. They were so gentle and made you feel so cared for. With a blush you ducked your face near his shoulder.

“What?” he whispered and eased you back so he could see you, “Tell me what it feels like?”

“I can’t, you’ll run away.” you pouted.

He just laughed, “I promise you, I’m not going anywhere anytime soon.”

“Just, it feels like I’ve been waiting for this. I’ve been waiting for you.” The way he looked at you made you want to both look away and never take your eyes out of him. “Does that sound crazy?”

“No.” he leaned forward, pulling your lips between his for a kiss, and you felt yourself relax.

Your teeth dragged against his lip while he inched his way inside of you and then rolled back again. There was a full feeling throughout your body. Your thighs tightened around his hips as they started to make quick work of you.

He trailed scratchy kissed along your jaw and you groaned when he whispered against your earlobe. “I’ve been waiting centuries for you and I didn’t even realize it. Now that I know I would have waited a hundred more if I had to.”

“Don’t stop.” you gasped, feeling that familiar tightening in your abdomen.

“I won’t.” he promised. His fingers tangled into your hair and he pulled your head to the side so he could drag his teeth across your neck.

“Fuck!” You moaned, digging your nails into the skin on his shoulders. “Jiyong...my god.”

“I am.” he muttered against your collarbone through his own heavy panting, “I am your god.”

You wanted to say something about his god complex, you knew there was a joke on the tip of your tongue, but his fingers trailing goosebumps down your abdomen and slipping between your thighs left you distracted. You dropped your arms to your side, fingers curling into the rug. He found your clit with ease, at this point he’d spent so much time with it you felt like they were best friends. His thumb rubbed you in slick circles, watching your reaction almost curiously. Finally reaching your breaking point your back arched so far off the ground you’d lifted yourself like the living dead. Your arms wrapped around Jiyongs shoulders.

“Oh, hello there.” He chuckled against the side of your head as you dug your teeth into his shoulder.

“I...fuck.” you whimpered as your body tensed.

Jiyong was grunting ever so slightly, and when you looked up at him, his eyes were squeezed shut. He looked like he was between agony and euphoria. He didn’t stop a single thing he was doing until you were limp and satisfied in his arms. He laid you back down making sure your head was resting gently before he rolled beside you.

You smiled quite happily and said, “Maybe this really is paradise.”

With a half groan half laugh he turned and kissed your shoulder. “Shower?”

“Together?” you asked turning towards him.

He grinned, “Of course.”

You dragged your fingers down his bare chest and smiled, “Again?”

“Again?” He asked incredulously.

Big wanton eyes met his when you looked up, “please?”

He huffed and rolled his eyes, “Alright, yes. Again.”

“You, um,” you teased the skin of his hip with your fingers, “don’t have to be so sweet about it this time.”

“I won’t.” He hooked his finger under your chin, lifting your eyes to his. “But you have to say it.”

“Say what?”

“Say what you want from me.” His tongue moved over his bottom lip, he looked devious.

“Why?” your cheeks burned with a blush.

Your stomach twisted at the small smile that spread over his face, “It’s going to sound so sexy coming from those lips.”

You released a long slow breath.

“I want you to fuck me.” He hummed pleased with himself. However you weren’t finished. “I want to be hand around my throat, hair ripped from my head, ass stained red with your handprint fucked.”

Jiyongs mouth fell open and he looked at you wide eyed and quite shocked. “Wow.”

“Did it sound as sexy as you expected?” You grinned.

“Sexier.”

You’d thought once more in the shower would be enough to successfully exhaust you but it had turned out Kwon Jiyong left you insatiable. Luckily one more time in the bed after the shower seemed to do the trick. And you were finally able to tuck into his side, ready for some much needed rest. Your eyes were closed while he left soft kisses everywhere he could reach.

“Don’t give up your soul for him.” he whispered after a particularly long kiss against your temple.

“What?”

“It took me so long to find you.” he sounded so soft, “I don’t want to lose you now. I can’t.”

“Okay.” you didn’t understand what he meant but you weren’t about to deny him a single thing.

Your thigh was draped over his, both of your legs tangled in sheets. You rested your cheek on his shoulder, tracing his prominent collarbone with your finger tip. Kissing the part of his chest that was nearest to your lips you smiled.

“Why aren’t you in book?” You asked quietly, you didn’t want to ruin the atmosphere, but the question had been eating at you.

He hummed, gently rubbing his hand up and down your back, “what do you mean?”

“The book. Your notebook, your name isn’t in it. I looked for you, I wanted to know more about you, but you aren’t in the book. Why not?” You placed  your palm flat on his chest, his heartbeat was racing beneath the warm skin.

“I don’t need to be.” He said simply and looked down his face at you.

He hooked his finger beneath your chin and turned your gaze up to meet his. You pouted slightly, “What makes you so special?”

“Nothing.” He grinned and pressed a chaste kiss against your lips. You whined slightly and quickly lifted your lips to his for another.

You pulled away after a minute of his soft, swollen lips against yours, “You’re trying to distract me.”

“It’s working.” He smiled and leaned in once more. As he kissed you he shifted your bodies so that he was above you. Forehead presses together, noses brushing gently. He sighed, his lips tickling yours as he said with a sadness, “I don’t want to wake up.”

You laughed lightly, but then there was a sudden sinking feeling in your stomach. It was then that you realized that yes, this was a dream. “Me neither.”

-

You laid in bed for what felt like hours. Eyes closed, willing yourself back into the dream, but you knew it was done. Even if you did manage to fall asleep you knew you wouldn’t get it back. When you finally opened your eyes it was to a dark empty room. You could hear the sound of the waves through the closed windows. Sitting up on the mattress with a sigh you noticed the glow of light coming from under the door.

You wondered if Jiyong was awake. You wondered if he’d had a dream that matched yours and was now laying restlessly in bed with thoughts of you. You swung your legs over the side of the bed. You’re feet were silent against the hardwood floor as you made your way to the door. Before opening the door you looked over to the dresser where the pen you stole was laying beside a vase of flowers.

The common room was empty, it was only the single light on side table shining with a sigh of life. As you passed by it you could still imagine the sound of it shattering against the floor. You’d swear you could hear the sound of Jiyongs laugh and yours mixed together. The spirit of your perfect moment, haunting this place.

In front of the door to his room you bit your lip nervously. As slowly and quietly as you could you opened the door. You’d been needlessly cautious as Jiyong was wide awake, lying stretched out the length of the bed, ankles crossed. There was one arm behind his head and the other was draped over his bare stomach.

“Everything okay?” He asked with the raise of a single eyebrow.

“Yeah. Everything is perfect.” You shrugged, “it’s paradise. Remember?”

“Right.” he grinned, “Well what has brought you to me at this very late hour? Do you have a scandalous request of me perhaps?”

“Ugh,” you rolled your eyes, “I just...couldn’t sleep. So, can I come in or what?”

“Sure.” it was a simple response but his face looked unbearably smug.

You crossed the threshold slowly, taking him in. All he had on was a pair of pajama pants, that hung loose at his hips. He looked like you remembered from the pool and the dream, unless the pool had been the dream too. You realized you weren’t sure where reality had stopped and the dream had started. He watched you, watching him, as you made your way from door to the bed and sat beside him. He knew you were looking at him and had been trying to figure out your thoughts but mostly you just gave off curiosity.

You gulped at the sight of the notebook lying face down on the bed beside him. You wished you could tell if that part had been a dream or reality. It had to have been a dream, right? You convinced yourself that it had been. It had to have just been a mixture of guilt from stealing the pen, and uncertainty you had about Jiho. The guilt of wanting Jiyong the way you did crashed over you. You’d convinced yourself Jiho was a monster to justify a second dream about someone who was meant to be  your friend. You felt disgusting.

Jiyong saw the way you looked at the book. He wanted you to ask about. He wanted you to lunge over him and tear it open to see how real the dream had been. Even if he knew what you’d find inside of it. Even if it meant answering hard questions and ultimately confessing who he was. He was halfway there. Halfway ready to confess everything, but not quite enough to just offer it to you on his own. He thought if you’d only ask, then he’d be able to tell you.

You didn’t ask about the notebook. Instead you reached over him and grabbed it. He watched a little disappointed as you closed it and placed it on the nightstand before switching off the light.

“Oh, have you decided it’s time to go to bed?” He asked with a laugh as you laid down beside him.

“Yes.” You answered, slipping your hand over his bare stomach until you were wrapped around him like you’d been the night before.

“What? Now that you’ve had a taste of me, pillows don’t do the trick any longer?” He joked in an effort to downplay how he felt in this moment.

“You don’t always have to ruin everything by talking.”

Despite the bite in your words he could feel the grin on your face as you laid with your head rested on his chest. He wasn’t going to be able to make you feel embarrassed for needing him like this. Not with the way you could hear his heart racing under your ear.

[ninjago-monster-au]

For Her

Prompt: Knife

Extremely short explanation of AU (required in rules): Everyone’s a monster, The forbidden spinjitzu scroll is a talisman, elemental dragons = spirit animals, and the Ice emperor wasn’t an amnesiac. 

Tags: @entersomethingcreativehere (for your uno reverse thing) @mrgamecube64 (for the prompt) 

The Destiny’s Bounty was deathly quiet, lacking the various ninja who usually called it their home. There was a good reason for this, however, since just last week the video game called Prime Empire had taken the city by storm, and the non-mechanical ninja had to enter the game in order to defeat it. Master Wu had taken Misako to a safer location, leaving the mighty ship alone for the time being, and so the Bounty was abandoned, sitting on its mountain, devoid of all organic matter save for the plants in the windowsills. 

Key words: organic matter. Nindroids were not organic. 

A titanium kitsune stood alone in the kitchen, silently slicing tomatoes. His fox ears twitched every so often, on high alert. The faux fur that made up his fluffy tail lay low and still, dragging on the floor when he went to grab a cutting board. His white and silver gi had various splatters all up the front; remnants of vegetables long past. He didn’t need to eat, persay, but he liked to. It made him feel like things were normal. Like he was normal. LED eyes barely paid attention to the knife, relying on muscle memory as his mind wandered. 

Snow. Screams. His own distorted laughter. Fighting. Winning. The pull of his growing  power. Whispers. Rumors. Vex’s voice in his ears. Memories replayed in his mind on a loop. Every town he’d buried, every family he’d frozen, he remembered it all. 

He was willing to forgive himself for some of it, some things that he couldn’t control. He forgave himself for putting on the talisman the first time, to defeat Aspheera. He forgave himself for dealing with Vex after it was all over. What he couldn’t forgive, was the actions that he could control. The thoughts that, while originally inspired by Vex, became actions that he took too far, that he, using his ice, had eventually wanted to do. He had let his anger and his hurt get the better of him, and millions suffered because of it. 

It sickened him, that this stupid talisman could bring him so low. That he allowed himself to be brought so low. He had given the word, as his elemental animal laid waste to whole cities. He had waved his arm, sending volleys of snow rollers onto fleeing innocents. He had watched, as the lives of countless people were slowly snuffed out, frozen by his ice. He could not forgive that, he would not forgive that. 

The knife in his hand was brought down with much more force than he’d intended, skidding off the cutting board and slicing deep into his other hand. Blue blood oozed from the cut on the palm, and Zane stared at it numbly, slowly turning it side to side. 

He sighed. He should wash that off, get it repaired, before things got messy. He hated to make a mess. If he made a mess, then others would have to clean it up. 

But…did he really want to? He should, but did he want to? He was being stupid. Of course he wanted to…of course…

A drop of the blue liquid fell from his hand and splattered onto the edge of the counter. He would have to clean that later, before Pixal saw it and approached him. 

Pixal…

She was too good for him. Always asking how she could help, always supporting, always loving. He didn’t deserve her, yet she chose him for reasons unknown. The other, beautiful kisune saw something in him that he could not see, and he had no idea what it was. 

He looked at his bleeding hand again, before running it under the faucet. Pixal would not like to see him like this. 

His self-repair systems began to kick in, knitting the metal skin back together slowly. It would take a while, but he would be good as new. Throwing his chopped tomatoes into his newly made salad, he grabbed a rag to clean up. 

Wiping down the counter and putting his blue-stained knife in the sink, his mind wandered back to ice. Specifically, his ice. He hadn’t used it much since he had shattered the talisman, for fear that he would not be able to handle it. He had frozen the floor in Borg Tower to halt the thugs from venturing closer, and he had nearly had a panic attack right there in battle. 

No, better to not use it than give his brothers more to worry about. Or Pixal, she needn’t worry either. 

His thoughts always went back to Pixal, and he wasn’t sure if that was because she held half his heart (both literally and figuratively) or because she had saved him, but it always happened eventually. He wasn’t sure if that was a bad thing or not. 

He sat down at the newly clean table, his salad in front of him, and began to eat. He was not normal, no matter how hard he tried to be. He had done too much, seen too much, to ever possibly be considered normal. He was a lost-cause, but she always believed in him. So if he couldn’t try to get better for himself…

He would do it for Pixal.