#I am challenging myself to make more than one attack this year lol

[pencilcat]

Let's get ready to RUMBLE~~~

[stuffyflowers]

Started playing PS Outertale a few hours ago and I have, thoughts.

For the most part, geno has been a chill time. There are some tweaks I really appreciate, like the grinding being so quick and skipping dialog by holding C. Asriel was a little jarring at first, really did not like the way he talked down to Papyrus (and that bit where he's pretending Sans is still there? eugh), but once we were past not-Snowdin I really started to appreciate him. His relationship with Frisk/Chara/The Player/Whatever is really intriguing, especially how Frisk or whoever genuinely seems to reciprocate his feelings. Love the Best Friends Setting The World On Fire vibe we got going on.

I did kind of feel like the game was just, really easy? I beat Undyne the Undying without dying, and that's without knowing what the new spear attacks did. But a lot of her normal attack were just like, easier versions of her original attacks? I did like the extra attacking mechanic and how it was still loosely DDR esc like green soul mode.

Beat Mettaton on my second try. Orange soul mode was neat. A little weird to get used to but it didn't offend. Defiantly a little harder that Undyne but not a huge step up.

Alphys... I REALLY do not like this fight. As of writing this I have not beaten it and I don't thing I will. There are a just, lot of little things that just drag the whole thing down for me. For one, Screen Shake. Lasers shake the screen, the expanding rings shake the screen, hell, even the damn MUSIC shakes the screen! I can't see where I am or what I'm supposed to be dodging! Second, the obnoxious spinning background. It's distracting and bugs the hell out of me. Third, the music. It's very meh imo, gets grating after a bit and just sounds like noise now. So far my biggest issue is that her attacks are 1000 years long. Each one feels like three for four attacks in one. Sometimes I'd get most of the way through an attack and just, get fatigued and take my hands off the keyboard cause I'm so overwhelmed.

I've never felt like this before. I don't usually mind a challenge, I actually like throwing myself at a problem until I break through. I loved beating UTY geno without using any equipment (Only Rubber Bullets, the Patch and the Toy Gun. Honestly if you're looking to play UTY geno again but harder I highly recommend), and that was a grind that took weeks. But this? I have absolutely no desire to return to this. I can't honestly say the fight is even good or bad cause I just can't get into it. This is the worst time I've ever had fighting an UT boss, and I don't think that was the intention.

I don't know where I was going with this. I just had a lot of thoughts and felt the need to share them.

Fun fact u can hold alt+press left twice to open the debug menu and get temmie armour infinite hp etc etc would highly recommend using whenever a fight annoys u lol im not grinding for this game. I agree w ur alphys boss complaint so much, I almost got my ass beat WHILE using th temmie armour, the patience soul mode is just not made for a boss fight of that scale I don’t think, especially not one where it piles on what feels like 20 attacks in one turn. It’s so sad bc I was genuinely pretty hyped to see final boss alphys, seeing herself as the one to blame for everyone’s deaths in this route coulda made up for the nothingburger she was given in pacifist but it was just. Eh.

Also asriel is just very funny to me. This au really only cares abt asriel and twinkly seems to exist just to fill floweys slot which is smth I don’t care for, but I at least appreciate they let him be an edgy little shit rather than playing into the idea that having a soul would magically fix flowey/twinkly and make him a normal kid again. I like that frisk is kind of just fucking around ig, it makes a funny contrast against asriel. I wish the route used the frisk/asriel/mk trio more also. Idontknow I still haven’t fully figured out how I feel about this route it’s so weird. I did enjoy it more on average than lv0 pacifist tho so that’s. Something?

[golbrocklovely]

since i have nothing else to post right now…

here’s the last of colby’s tweets from 2020.

i don’t have proof that these are his tweets, but believe me, they are his.

if it’s bold and italicized, it’s someone’s tweet to him.

if it’s in (), that’s just me commenting lol

added bonus: if they have a * next to them, that means it’s been deleted

~~~~~~~~~~

Oct. 1 - love doing things for myself

Oct. 4 - i’m in so much pain. sos

fan: u ok?

poison oak. everywhere …. everywhere.

Oct. 5 - i like the simple things

Oct. 7 - less is more

Oct. 10 - i wanna make you happy

how am i so busy during the day but still manage to find 2 hours to mindlessly scroll through tik tok? i can’t be the only one

Oct. 14 - i care too much

Oct. 15 - somehow it wasn’t enough

Oct. 18 - fan: I CANT BE THE ONLY ONE WHO ALWAYS WONDERED WHAT COLBY SMELLED LIKE..I WANA KNOW WHAT COLOGNE HE WEARS

mayonnaise

(i hate this man so much lmao)

Oct. 19 - Justin Bieber’s new song made me tear up, that dudes been through so much. no one could even imagine what that’s like.. achieving everything and being in the biggest spotlight at such a young age.

Oct. 20 - @/samgolbach: less than 6 months ago i broke my back. and i decided to take that as a challenge to get healthy again. and today i ran the fastest mile i’ve ever run. so yes, i might be an idiot but i’m a determined idiot 🤘🏼🏃🏼

🙌🏼🙌🏼🙌🏼 that’s an insane accomplishment ! i remember when it was a struggle to stand up out of bed

new day, same cycle

Oct. 21 - my mom is texting me all the young pictures of me and it’s bringing me memories i didn’t know i had

Oct. 25 - panic attacks late at night are the worst

Nov. 1 - @/colbybrockscar: reminder that it’s no nut November!!! @/ColbyBrock doesn’t even have to try. He’s got this shit in the bag. It probs comes out like baby powder if he tries

did my car just roast me ?

Nov. 4 - this is scary

cuties! all 3 of you! (reply to fan in merch with friend and cat)

Nov. 6 - @/GracynCarr: I can’t believe the audacity of a high school tweet to pop up on my timeline lmao.. miss u tho @/ColbyBrock :)

hope you're well xx

Nov. 8 - so much talent thank youu love (reply to fan's art)

fan: Um. So I tweeted this to you before but alot has also changed since then sooo wanted to say thank you 🖤 🖤 @/ColbyBrock

proud of you, and good luck with your dreams darlin 🖤 you can accomplish anything with the right mindset and hard work. i believe in ya

time flies, and i’m so scared of losing my youth. it’s inevitable i know, but damn makes you wanna cherish every moment you got

Nov. 11 - i hate when nothing is wrong but nothing feels right

Nov. 12 - the person who makes you forget about the rest of the world

Nov. 13 - today marks 6 years since we posted our first YT video on the MAIN S&C account .. 🖤 what a wild ride

Nov. 14 - promise you i’m a good waste of time

Nov. 15 - @/katstuartmusic: “sunday is my funday” - colby brock 2020

🥂💁🏻‍♂️💁🏻‍♂️

fan: Colby u get drunk off of one white claw

fight me

other fan: my money is on mags

round house kicks to the face don’t feel too good

(is it bad that i like when colby gets weirdly violent with us sksksks)

Nov. 16 - the Why Dont We dudes are some of the nicest people in LA

*Nov. 17 - @/gabytriana: It’s out! Sam and Colby were so much fun to work with, and despite what Colby said, I did not hate him when we first met! 😆 Both he and Sam are super kind, smart, generous entertainers who know how to tell a good story! I love them both!! Happy Book Birthday, @/samandcolby

hahaha thank youu so much for all the hard work ! so excited it’s finally here

(interestingly enough, colby didn't delete his tweet… gaby did)

Nov. 19 - went to a Pyschic Reader tonight. my mind is blown. im not a skeptic anymore, video coming tomorrow

fan: Get ready for religious people to freak out

the psychic i talked to was religious, i’m not sure how but i think the two concepts can exist at the same time

Nov. 21 - hard to trust

fan: @/ColbyBrock hey, i love u lots

love you 🖤

Nov. 23 - fan: imagine if @/ColbyBrock responded to this

could you imagine

Nov. 24 - fan: lmao okay so my friend put this together when I FINALLY received Colby's reaper merch yesterday and I had to laugh, I am actually stupid. But I thought it was a lil funny so y'all can see it too then xx

hahahha love it. thank you. you’re not a sack of potatoes in my eyes

Nov. 27 - happy b day @/SamGolbach you know this and imma save the sappy shit for your big 25th bday but i wouldn’t be here without you. you’re the most intelligent, deep thinking dude i’ve ever met and i feel pretty damn lucky to be able to call you a business partner AND best friend

Nov. 28 - take it easy

Nov. 30 - should i hop back on tik tok?

Dec. 2 - @/aaron_doh: At least I got a photo shoot out of it 😄

whaaat. dude i wish you a speedy recovery

Dec. 3 - it’s hard to move on

Dec. 5 - a nice escape is all i need

welp. i guess i’m a lightweight

Dec. 9 - miss you

Dec. 14 - all the baggage that comes with me

Dec. 15 - been workin hard for you , announcement tomorrow

fan: omg are you pregaganant

how'd you know

@/samandcolby: announcement tomorrow… 2021 will be the best year of our lives (and probably most difficult)

fan: are we getting married?? is that why?

yes

i hate how having anxiety makes me nauseous. it’s the worst feeling

Dec. 16 - it’s all about living in the moment and making every. second. count.

fan: yeah @/ColbyBrock how much are you charging for tattoos…

free for you

Dec. 18 - big tool pic but i’ve been workin hard

@/mannymua733: we absolutely do not mind

hahahaha

(god damn… this pic is still so good lol)

also cold weather always makes me want a special someone to spend time with. cuddle buddy is neeeeeded

fan: okay but can we just take a second to appreciate how hard colby’s been working in the gym because dayum

thank you sweeeetheart

fan: HELP COLBY IS TRENDING

yoo i love you guys 🥺

Dec. 20 - got tatted last night and i barely remember

how i feel this morning (pic of him floating)

fan: you’ve seen elf on the shelf… but have you seen cole in a hole? (@/ColbyBrock)

i’m mad i laughed at this

Dec. 23 - why’d ya have to change on me

so bittersweet saying goodbye to my childhood home of 18 years… i’ll only be back to kansas to visit and sleep in hotels from now on. strange feeling, but so happy for my mom and dad for taking a chance and moving

it’s like i don’t have a real “home” anymore. since i move so much anyways it’s hard to find a spot to actually call home

fan: i just want to say that colby has helped me through so much this year. i had a tough year as many others did but you’ve seriously have helped me through so much. i love you so so much @/ColbyBrock

awh that’s why i make videos in the first place. for people like you

Dec. 24 - addicted to you

my mom and i are the weirdest duo on the planet when we’re together i swear

fan: Make a video with her for Christmas

my whole family despises being on camera 💔

Dec. 25 - fan: momma brock is the sweetest ever

she’s my favorite woman in the world

Merry Christmas friends ! 🖤

i wish i could have face tats for like one week but it doesn’t really work like that huh

Dec. 26 - everyone’s battling their own demons

Dec. 28 - fan: Colby drinking wine but he's such a lightweight that he's probably drunk, lmao @/ColbyBrock

🤫🤫🤫

fan: the vibes are fucking ethereal i’m guessing @/ColbyBrock

you got it

[jariyala-string]

QUESTIONS ANSWERED.

Has anyone asked me any questions about Jariyala? Actually, yes… But only family and some friends. Most of these questions are ones that I think would be asked, so, I’ll just answer them here.

Read tags before reading this if you’re here for Saku content! This post doesn’t actually have anything to do with Sakuverse, I just mentioned him lol

What is ‘The String Of Jariyala’?

It’s complicated. Years, millennias ago, the Gods of Dochke created the first planet ever (to be known by them), Crenat. This planet was beautiful. Trees covered the lands, pools of water peppered across the plains and mountains. It was luxury, paradise. It was so beautiful, they wanted more planets like this. 27 total planets were created over the course of 900 years, each one having different people, cultures, landscapes, yet all of them were gorgeous. The greenery, the clear water, the birds that flew overhead. It was perfection.

But, of course, bad people must revoke others pleasure. Unknown beings came and attempted to colonise these planes, unaware of the almighty God, Callitri. Her power was like no other, she was the creator of Jariyala and majority of its contents. She created the other Gods using matter of space. She was the ultimate creator. It seemed like they wanted to challenge that, though.

Liviam, the person leading the attack on Jariyala taunted Callitri — leading to a battle. It was lengthy and tense, though the people on Crenat (where the battle took place) did not worry as they knew Callitri always came out victorious. And that she did, yet her power was stripped from her being. No more planets or supernatural life could be created, leaving the 27 planets to stand as they were.

There was another problem though. With the arrival of Liviam and her ‘minions’ from a different time line and dimension, it broke the time string in Jariyala. Time splits and threads connecting and straying from the planets were now visible. Although it created a fine piece of art, the time gaps were presumptuously dangerous.

What’s Vaularan and why is it important?

Vaularan is not technically anymore important than the other planets, though it’s the planet I’ve been putting the most care into. I don’t know why I’m so attached to it, I just am…

Who is Callitri?

A star. One singular star in an epitome of darkness. The only source of hope, the only light, the only life. This star developed for billions of years, until it finally exploded and a being was born. A woman. Long, white hair, pale skin, rose tinted cheeks. A radiating complexion, delicate features. She was Callitri.

Who are the Gods of Dochke?

Ah~ I couldn’t possibly answer this all in one post. Their lore and stories are so incredibly lengthy, I’d have to make a post for each individual God! In short, they are all ‘humans’ born from Solar matter. All of them contributed to the making of Jariyala, and each God has at lease one planet to their name. There are 11 Gods total. There is also a superstition with the people that the reason Jariyala was invaded was because they didn’t have an even number of Gods.

Why are you making a fantasy world?

To occupy myself for the next decade.

How long have you been doing it for?

Around 4-5 months. Not super long, although, I feel as if my progress in that time is quite commendable.

Do they speak English in Jariyala?

No. I am working on a universal language for them called ‘Faytir’.

How do you come up with names for planets, languages, people, etc.?

I’ll be honest… I just put a bunch of letters on a page and combine them together LOL. It usually comes out with a good name, though I should’ve really started the language first as I’ve made it harder for myself.

Are you going to turn the story of Jariyala into a book?

Hm. I have thought about it, yet I’m still not so sure. I think I’d have to really think about it. But, the chances of me doing so are low.

What made you want to start a fantasy world?

*Sigh*. I listen to a lot of ASMR boyfriend type audios on YouTube… yes, I know. It’s strange. But, if I didn’t, I wouldn’t of started doing this. There’s this one VA called @/zsakuva, his story audios are INSANELY good btw. He focuses more on lore and not gushy mushy romance, so I’d recommend checking him out! But, yes, Saku has been making his own world for 10 years I believe? And the amount of progress he’s made and the WORLD he’s made is fascinating. I was so unbelievably impressed with what he has done, and my mind was like ‘woahhh I wanna do that!’. So, here I am! Thank you, Saku! (If he for some reason sees this plsplspls I need another Xanthus audio… his story is so interesting!)

Do they have holidays like Earth do?

Yes! But, not like Christmas and Halloween and all the other corny, expensive holidays.

Each year, in June (I haven’t thought of names for months yet), they have the ‘Soldena Xyomen’ [pronounced sul•den•uh uhks•yo•men]. The Soldena Xyomen translates to ‘Summer Starting’ and the event is literally that. The Jariyalan’s LOVE soldena. The food, the dancing, the performances. Everything about soldena is exciting for them. So, the seventh Dochken God (Ywoei) decided to make it a holiday.

Another large holiday is the opposite of Soldena Xyomen, it’s Kaopana Xyomen (Winter Starting). Again, they love kaopana for the same reasons they love soldena. There are more holidays, but they’re still a WIP.

So, that’s all the questions I can think of for now! If anymore get asked, then I will add them to this list.

[queervegancryptid]

My dad and I are trying to talk every week on Sunday evenings. Last night's conversation was a lot.

I woke up early and couldn't get back to sleep, so I'm watching 90s Sailor Moon. I stumbled into the last episode of Sailor Moon R, the Black Moon Clan arc, live on Pluto TV, so I decided to start Sailor Moon S. It's where I really fell in love with the series, when I found a few issues of the manga at the local Sam Goody. Now I'm really dating myself lol

But I still don't fully understand, after all these years, why they did such a shit job of recutting and dubbing it for Toonami and such. I mean, I do understand how and why it happened, but I feel like it shortchanged an entire audience in a big way, especially when the dubbed version of S came out.

It was a real "disappointed but not surprised" moment, but it was also a moment where I knew something was bullshit and couldn't tell others why.

That drags us back to last night's conversation. Let's just say, it's abundantly clear to me now that my dad and I have wildly different understandings of my childhood and overall development into an adult. He also said some crazy shit about aliens and mind control and Matrix-type simulation possibilities. None of that is implausible, but it was the way it came out that made it nonsensical.

Anyway, I kinda wish they would recut and redub it, but Sailor Moon Crystal, Eternal, and Cosmos are really more faithful to the original manga in general, so I guess that's a good compromise. Like not asking my dad if he's on meth and just ignoring it when his explanation for something in the news is mind control and hyper-advanced aliens and just letting it go, saying, "Well, tell you what. If you're right about this being part of an October surprise and Harris losing because of it, I owe you a coke."

Jesus fuck balls Christ. I am going to lose my entire mind. At least my partner helped take my mind off it before we went to bed ;) but this is another of those things that hangs over me because I know I'll have to deal with it eventually.

It got to the point where I was just exhausted. The crazy part of the conversation meandered somehow into us talking about my childhood, by which I mean, we went to abstract and bizarre crazy to personal crazy, and I found out he definitely has no idea about... a lot.

It got to that point when I realized what I was up against there and understood that I would not be able to help him understand, that night or possibly ever, what he clearly doesn't understand. But on the bright side, he knows that he probably doesn't understand, and he wants to, and that's a lot better than a lot of people can expect from a parent. I'm grateful for him in a lot of ways. I'm also frustrated with people in general, and I'm even more frustrated after that conversation.

So maybe I'll start a Sailor Moon blog as a secondary one to this. Gotta do something to take my mind off this bullshit so I can force myself to eat. Because another thing that's happening lately is that extreme hunger gives me panic attacks. Multiple times a day. I have to avoid it by making sure I eat, which is its own challenge, but if anytime I get anxious or my blood pressure spikes lately, my chest hurts, which is concerning.

Anyway, I'm on meds for that, and they're helping to manage the symptoms. Meantime, I don't know what to do aside from distracting myself and stumbling my way through this. So I guess that's what I'm gonna do.

It just sucks to feel like you don't have any good options. It sucks almost as much to find out your dad thinks you were born really smart but lost about 50 IQ points by the end of high school. I didn't get less intelligent; I learned to doubt myself more and more over time. And not being able to explain that to him in a way he could understand was just more than I could take.

All my life, people have blamed me for shit that resulted from what they or other people have done to me. They blame me for what they don't understand or see it as an immutable characteristic rather than what it is: the result of one or more fuck-ups in my psyche that never fully healed.

Anyway, I can't solve that today, or maybe ever. For right now, I'm putting it out of my mind as best I can and looking for distractions.

[imtryingmymd]

Well, it has been a hell of a rollercoaster these last couple weeks. I had to start going to therapy. I was in such overwhelmed state of mind that it feel absolutely uncomfortable to be in my head. Felt like my thoughts were running while at the same time id be static. One day I thought it was just a bad day, a day I couldn’t cope with, then I realized I had this s**cidal thoughts (again lol) which got me in a panic attack. The next day, didnt matter how much it was the consult, I texted my friend’s psychologist and since it had to be online, luckily I got an appointment the same day. So, I was diagnosed with depresion and anxiety, also was referred to a psychiatrist for medication.

At the beginning I was like “well im not crazy” and automatically I thought wtf I am a health worker and I know more than anyone who’s not in the health system a mental disease isn’t crazy. So even though I am a doctor, unfortunately I thought anyone could be saved but me.

Im still in therapy, it has been a month. Shes really professional and has this warming personality of “you’ll be okay” that I love. Ive heard many stories with psychologists that definitely dont know how to be professional and would come with things like “oh my god if I was you I would have k*lled them”, so on and so forth.

Ive learned a lot about my inner kiddo in this last weeks, and why I do or respond to situations the way i do. She’s (the psychologist) teaching me how to deal with situations better even when they represent a challenge to my inner child, because now I am an adult and I must protect and represent myself even when its an uncomfortable truth to my parents. But I decided that from now on I should step up for myself the way I deserve, however only I can do that.

Most of my traumas are family related. I wish I could just point out a stranger or someone not as close. I told her about a situation that couldn’t really let me sleep, and would keep me having these breakdowns; she told me that no matter how hard, uncomfortable, challenging, disturbing the truth is, its a truth that needs to be addressed.

So here I am. My inner child is basically moving my throat like a puppet so I can tell what I must, but “me” adult thinks that it has happened so long ago, its like making wholes in hearts that might never get over it, or, simply will not understand it, or would balms it on me, or, downplay my truth.

I just want a healthy end of the year for me. Im tired of thinking about others.

So I guess the bible in this instance says the truth: ✨You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free✨

But truth hurts.

[maybege]

Here Comes The Bride I - Scent

Summary: On your way to marry Dreks, you are attacked. (Part 1 of Here Comes The Bride)

Pairing: alpha!clan leader!Paz Vizsla x omega!fem!Reader

Wordcount: 1.0k | Rating: E (18+ only!)

Warnings: A/B/O dynamics, Western-esque AU, friend to enemies to lovers, mentions of forced marriage, abduction

Whoop whoop! Welcome to Part 1 of 4 of this shrt series for @clydesducktape May Writing Challenge! Every week will be a new short chapter based on a prompt that you selected❤ I challenged myself to at least try and use every single trope that you suggested in the votes as well which is why this might be a bit mish-mashy but it is a lot of fun! This is Old West inspired but honestly it is more about the vibes than historical accuracy and I actually see it more as an Old West Planet rather than a historical AU if that makes sense? Either way, don’t @ me about historical inaccuracy because I really don’t care about it at this point lol The parts will be a bit shorter than other series as I am writing this on short notice but I hope that you all enjoy it nonetheless. As always, let me know what you thought in a comment or reblog!

masterlist | crossposted on AO3

“I think this is a horrible idea.”

“Well, too bad nobody cared what you think, princess.”

“I could still be a medic! I have the training! I don’t understand why Dreks wants me as his wife when I could be much more of an asset if he would just let me –“

“Shut up!”

You took a step back, offended at the harsh tone your guardian for the journey had taken with you. Briggs had never talked to you like that. He was the oldest of your father’s advisors and indisputably the most loyal. There was never a time when you had not seen him at your parents’ sides and

To be fair to him, if you were in his shoes, you would have been tense too. You had stopped in the middle of the valley, surrounded by sandy rocks and desert beyond to change a broken wheel at the carriage. The sun was beating down on your back, the heat almost unbearable and it did not help that in your hurry this morning, you had managed to bind your corset the wrong way and the pain in your back and chest made the already bumpy journey even more uncomfortable.

But Dreks had insisted on your wedding taking place as soon as possible and your father did not want to risk the wrath of the neighbouring clan, especially now that your numbers were so weak.

And now here you were, stranded on an abandoned stretch of street, an old man with his best years behind him, a grumpy carriage driver who did not talk and you, a miserable but duty-driven bride who would much rather work in the healing wings than become some clan leader’s trophy wife. Because that was all you would ever be for Dreks, an omega trophy wife he could show off to his business partners. You shuddered at the thought.

Briggs was still listening out for whatever he had imagined hearing moments before. His head tilted. “Did you hear that?” he asked you, turning his head this and that way as he tried to get a better view up at the mountains.

“The only thing I hear is your stubbornness,” you huffed, crossing your arms in front of your chest as you tried to arch your back this and that way. If only you could manage to retie this dammed corset on your own …

A weathered hand landed on your upper arm and you flinched, fear spiking your scent as you turned to see a worried look on the carriage driver’s face.

“Get inside, girl,” he grunted, “I think we have company.”

“I can help,” you said, your heart racing in your chest, “Briggs, please, maybe we can negotiate –“

But the older man would not hear it. “Get in there,” he hissed, “I don’t want to be the one to explain to your parents why I could not protect you on your way to your groom.”

“If you get the chance, tell him none of this would have happened if he didn’t make me marry this horrid man,” you retorted but nonetheless made the climb into the carriage. At least you were out of the sun this way, even if the air felt stifled with heat.

Briggs closed the door, a frown on his face and that was when you heard it.

Horses.

Many of them.

Before you could fully grasp what that meant – you were being robbed! On the open road! – the first gunshot fell and you cowered in the corner, trying to make yourself as small as possible. The horses neighed and you could hear shouts, screams, and the scatters of the falling gravel as the men clamoured down the mountainside.

You tried to think of any money you might have – that Briggs might have – maybe even the jewels adorning your neck and hands. You would give them anything if they would only let you pass in peace. Stars knew it wouldn’t hurt Drek’s financial prospects he liked to brag about buying more jewels if he thought you really needed them.

“Tie him up!” you heard a deep voice and suddenly became aware of footsteps nearing the door to the carriage.

Frozen in fear, you tried to calm down your breathing. You knew that the fear would make your scent extra prominent and hope that maybe the presence of all these alphas and beats would simply … cover yours. The last thing you needed was the robbers realizing that there was an omega hidden there.

Closing your eyes, you tried to imagine yourself somewhere else, somewhere safer with someone who made you feel safe. The images in your head morphed into the healing wings a year ago, a warm and deep voice, large hands that touched yours so gently, and a scent that made you feel all kinds of things.

It was like it was in your nose again, that mixture of woods and smoke and herbs that made butterflies appear in your belly. You had teased him, once, about how tasty he smelled, unable to hide the tremble in your voice at being so nervous to speak with him. The large warrior had only laughed, his body bumping against yours as he had crowded you against the counter in the pharmacy and you had let him. “You are the one who smells all sweet and fruity, omega,” he had rumbled, his nose brushing against your jaw and your heart still skipped a beat at the memory, “Are you going to let me have a taste?”

The door to the carriage was ripped open and you squeaked, trying to make yourself feel small when faced with a giant of an alpha. He was truly huge, filling out the small doorway almost completely. His eyes were piercing and you frowned when you saw a familiar dark blue bandanna covering the lower half of his face.

But you did not need to see everything to know who was standing in front of you. Because it was the same smell as in your memory, the same man that had made you feel safe and who had abandoned you only weeks later.

“Paz,” you breathed, feeling like your stomach dropped.

“Hi there, omega,” he grinned, the corners of his eyes crinkling, “You are coming with me.”

[lovlydovlyjaycie]

Ævi - The Protector

Hey, so this is going to be a mini series on something I have tried to do before. But I thought of a different way to make it shorter and to make it make more sense. I hope you like it, this idea has been in my head for honestly.. a couple of years now lol. I just decided I really want to put it down somewhere. And where is better than here? Am I right?! lol

Summary: This is set in 2010. There are no such things as superheroes. Right? Maybe Iron Man, but that is it. It has to be. Y/n was just trying to celebrate her birthday, but that quickly changed when she got a gift from a mysterious man.

Warnings: Fluff, violenc

Characters: Y/n, Bjorn Ironside, Odin, Heimdall, Thor, Loki, Freya, Hela, Ragnar Lothbrok, Floki, Lagertha, Ivar, Ubbe, Hvitserk, Sigurd, Rollo, Mentioned: Iron Man, OC Emma, OC Lars, OC Sanna, OC Nils, OC David

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Part 4 - last part, with a little sneak peak ;)

Bjorn had brought me to the longhouse where everybody already seemed to get ready for battle. Ragnar, Lagertha and Floki were suited up. I looked around and saw there was a gaping hole in the roof of the longhouse that people were trying to fix. “What happened here.” I asked, that seemed to gain everyone’s attention inside. “Uhm.. well, you. When that rainbow came down that was what we were left with.” Bjorn explained. “You are back! I knew the Gods were on our side.” Floki said as he walked over to me and hugged me tightly. I just awkwardly hugged him back. “Yeah, I guess I’m not dead.” I laughed awkwardly as well. “The Frost Giants are coming back soon. It is good you came back when you did.” Ragnar told me. “You look like you can fight.” He noted, looking at my clothes. I just nodded, still a bit unsure of myself and what I could do. I mean I trained, but actually having to fight.. I wasn’t sure how I was going to do that. But I will non the less.

Then Sigurd came running in. “They’re here!” He said, referring most likely to the Frost Giants. “Let’s go!” Ragnar ordered and walked out to where the fight was.

We all followed him. And more people joined in. The people that couldn’t fight locked their doors in the hopes of surviving. “Where did you go?” asked Lagertha who started walking next to me. “I guess I was on Asgard.. I trained with Valkyries.” She seemed to light up by that comment. But besides that we were all quiet, getting ready for whatever we were soon going to face.

We were set up outside of Kattegat by a big field. Under any other circumstance it was beautiful here. The field was perfectly surrounded by trees and on both sides there were tall mountains and cliffs. But on the other side of the field was a large army of Frost Giants. The army parted and out walked what I guessed was the leader another Frost Giant and a woman with deer like horns on her head. 

“Are you ready?!” Ragnar said to no one in particular. 

“ Skeggǫld! Skálmǫld! Skildir ro Klofnir! Skeggǫld! Skálmǫld! Skildir ro Klofnir!” Floki was chanting and repeating, axe time, sword time, shields are splintered! These people were ready to fight for their lives. Everybody was chanting, waiting in anticipation until Ragnar would give the signal to attack. Behind us everybody was chanting and hitting their swords and axes on their shields. The Frost Giant army was also waiting on the signal to attack. You could hear awful screeches coming from there. Then the head of their army gave the signal to charge and the Frost Giants came running towards us. They were still far. “FRAM!” Forward, Ragnar yelled.

We all charged at the army of Frost Giants. We all ran as quickly as we could and I soon has a head start from everybody else. There were no excuses I had to fight. The Giants came closer and closer. I held my sword a little tighter and when the first few Giants were in reach I gave them my first blow as hard as I could and tried to use my energy I had in me with it. Tens of the Giants flew back hitting others in their army. I was a bit shocked for a brief second it actually worked, but I quickly recollected myself and charged at the other Giants coming for me. I kept on doing the same blow and making them fly back and hit others on their way to the ground. I now saw that the rest had caught up with me and started to fight. They were all good especially Ragnar, Lagertha, Floki, Bjorn and Ivar. Everything that came in their way they put down. Bjorn came next to me. “I knew you had it in you!” He yelled over all the commotion. “Learned from the best.” I retorted. “You definitely did not learn that from me.” He said jokingly. I smiled as at him before I took down another Giant.

Suddenly it felt like it started to get a lot colder. Freezing even. Looking up at the sky it was very clouded and it started to snow. “What is happening?!” I yelled. “I don’t know.” Bjorn answered back. But it clicked, it was the Frost Giants. They wanted another Ice age. “It is them!” I pointed briefly towards the leader and Hela with my sword. “Go! We got it handled!” Bjorn yelled. I saw Lagertha behind Bjorn and she gave me a nod.

But how was I supposed to get through this? There were so many of them. I walked back slightly before I charged at them again hoping to get through. I had an idea, but it was crazy. As I started running faster and faster right before I would come in contact with the Giants I jumped. And I flew over before I came to the ground again. I decided to do it again hitting the Giants out of the way before I jumped again. Soon I was out of the battlefield. I looked behind me and saw that some Giants noticed I got out. They charged at me, but I gave them another hard blow, I repeated it until they were all out of the way so I could move on to the leader and Hela.

I turned around and Hela was standing right in front of me. “Where is it?! Where did you hide it?!” Hela demanded. “I don’t know what you are talking about.” I told her before she gave me a blow to my stomach that sent me flying back a couple of yards. “The stone! I could feel it on you! Where did you hide it?!” She demanded again standing over me. “I still don’t know what you are talking about lady. I don’t have any stone.” I retorted. “Fine have it your way than.” She was annoyed and pulled a knife out and held it in both hands. She came closer and I quickly kicked her feet and she fell stumbled back. I quickly gathered myself and stood up holding my sword in my hands pointing it towards her. “Oh, so you trained little girl. Still pathetic.” She gave me a sinister smile and charged at me. When she came close enough I gave all the strength I got and tried to hit her, but she easily caught me sword with her knifes. “Is that all you got?” She said mockingly. I decided to do what she did and kicked her in the stomach and she flew back. This wasn’t over, so I ran at her before jumping when as I was going down I pointed my sword at her to the ground. But she quickly stood up and hit me in the side with her foot again and I flew back.

Again I stood up ready to go at her I ran and jumped this time she dodged it and ran out of my reach. She went towards the mountains and I quickly followed her. She was very quick. I was keeping up and it felt like I came farther and farther with every jump I took, but it was all still new to me. She must have had year in experience of fighting, how was I going to win from that. In the mountains she used whatever power she had to throw rocks at me. At first I hit them out of the way with my sword, but soon it became too much and I had to shield myself. I was able to make a shield with my energy and protect myself. I still felt every rock that was being thrown against the shield I made.

“I see you still have it.” Hela stopped throwing the rocks, but I still kept my shield up. “How are you able to hide it now. She came closer and I followed every move she made, ready for whatever was going to happen next. “How are you now able to hide the stone?” She wondered out loud. “I don’t know what you are talking about.” She rolled her eyes at that, but kept stepping closer. She was inspecting me, it felt like she was sniffing me out. “Ahhh, you had some witch spell put on you by mommy dearest.” She gave me that sinister smile again. “So you’ve been to Asgard and got some witchy training and now you think you can take all of us on?” This made me think she is not expecting for another army to come, which was good. “You don’t think I can take you?” I retorted challenging her. “Oh little girl, the only advantage you have is the stone, but you don’t even know what it all can do on it’s own. If you give it to me I can show you.” She stepped closer and put her hand out expecting me to just give her the stone. “I’m not giving you anything.” I told her. “You really don’t understand little girl. Life is literally in your hands. You can take it away just as much as giving it back. Let me show you.” Hela came even closer. Too close. So I blew the energy at her that was holding up my shield at her and she flew back, down the mountain.

I looked from my spot what was happening on the battlefield. Ragnar’s army was getting in trouble. I could see and almost feel that we had lost many people already. I wanted to help them, so I made a start down the mountain jumping towards the battlefield when I got hit by Hela. We both flew back towards the mountain and hit it hard. Rocks where flying everywhere. I quickly looked around and saw I lost my sword. I had nothing to defend myself with anymore. Hela noticed and again gave me her smile. She pulled her arm back and got her knife again I quickly out my hands in front of me to not her hit me, but she cut in my right arm doing so. I would need something after this on my arms to shield myself with..

I gathered all the energy I had and threw it at her making her stumble back again. I decided to not stay around and just jump down the mountain in the hopes of finding my sword. In a way I felt much stronger now, like I was letting the power in. I realized this as I jumped from a very high mountain and landed on the ground without falling. “This is something I could get used to.” I said under my breath. In the distance I could see my sword laying on the ground. I quickly ran towards it when I noticed something came behind me. It was Hela again. Why won’t she just.. die. I quickly turned around and blasted energy at her which made her fly back. She quickly stood again and threw knifes at me that appeared out of thin air. I dodged almost every single one of them until one cut me badly in my upper leg. “Ahh!” I groaned. Hela came closer and pushed me over. She put her foot on my chest and pushed me down. I couldn’t move. “Ready to tell me where the stone is?” She asked. I tried to struggle out of her grip, but to no avail. She made a bigger sword appear and cut my right arm. It burned a lot.

I tried again to get out her grip and in my struggle I noticed my sword only a few feet away. It felt like it was mocking me. So close yet so far. In a weak attempt I reached for it, but it was nowhere near close to reaching it. For some reason I still kept trying and then I noticed the sword moved. Like it knew I was reaching for it. “Where is the stone?!” I heard Hela say, but I ignored her and tried to reach for my sword again. And then it moved! It flew right or my hand. In a quick swing I hit Hela in her side.

Then looking on the other side of the battlefield the rainbow appeared and a whole army of Asgard was charging at the Frost Giants. Odin was going straight for the leader and started fighting him. He was gaining the upper hand until the leader was holding a blue square. The space stone. That’s how they got here. The Frost Giant used it to blast something out of it. Odin dodged it easily, but others fighting were frozen until the scattered. That’s why it turned cold. He was somehow using the stone. He needed to be stopped.

But I was still busy with Hela, I was hitting her with my sword over and over, finally gaining the upper hand. I hit her by her shoulders legs sides. Enough to do damage, but not enough to make her stop. I had an idea. It might not be good, but it would be something. I quickly ran towards the line of fire and Hela followed closely. Hopefully not noticing my idea. Right in front of me there was another blast that I barley missed. I lost my footing and Hela hit me with one of her knifes again hitting me by my cheek. “Give me the stone little girl.” She demanded. “Come and get it.” I retorted making her follow me again. As she started to come at me again she was perfectly lined up with the blasts from the space stone and she froze. Not the same as the others who shattered after. She was unable to move, but you could clearly she she still knew exactly what was going on. On my left I saw that the Asguardians had helped defeat the Frost Giants and Bjorn, Lagertha, Floki, Rollo, Ragnar and his sons were safe. On my right I saw Odin had gained the upper hand again and made the Frost Giant drop the space stone. With one swift jab the Frost Giant was no longer alive. We had won. We were safe.

Odin walked over towards me with the space stone in hand. “Daughter, you will no longer roam free in any of the nine realms. Your life will be bound to mine and for as long as I shall live you will be locked away.” Odin told a non moving Hela. I could see in her eyes she would want to scream at him, but she couldn’t. Though luck. “You did good y/n.” He told me as he put his hand on my shoulder. “Thank you.” I was proud of myself. I knew and felt I could do so much more, but this was a very good start at discovering my powers. Odin dropped his hand from my shoulder and handed me the space stone. “As the safe keeper of Life it might be a good idea if you hide this somewhere safe. I also heard of the other stones and where they might be. I think it would be best that you get them and hide them somewhere out of reach from everyone.” He went on the explain. I would be the safe keeper of all the stones, but where would I start hiding them? “But there are five other stones out there. Knowing it’s power, it probably wouldn’t be good to hide all of them here.. on earth.” I wondered out loud. “You have a whole galaxy to hide them.” He answered. With that he walked back to his army. “You are always welcome on Asgard. Just call for Heimdall and he will bring you to us.” He said as he was walking away.

“You were amazing!” Bjorn said as he was running up to me. “You were flying and then the all father came and helped us defeat them. This will go down in history as the greatest battle.” He told me excitedly. But this will go down as a myth. A story to tell children before they go to sleep. Nobody will believe what happened here. I would know. But I just nodded at Bjorn. “You are safe.” I told him, more reassuring myself. Nobody that I knew lost their life this battle, but if it is true what Odin said and I would love for maybe a thousand years, I knew that some day I would lose everybody I know. This thought I quickly pushed aside and decided to live in the moment. Bjorn embraced me, probably sensing I had some lingering thoughts of all of this. “You are safe.” He repeated. Before we locked lips for a brief moment. “What are you going to do with that box?” He asked looking down at the space stone. “I am going to hide it along with some other things. It is my job.” I explained.

-

And so I did just that. First I hid the space stone and for a while I stayed on earth. I had lived a full life, or as full as it could be, you know without the aging. Bjorn had been by my side the entire time and this life, this Viking life was coming to an end. I had explained Bjorn that soon there wouldn’t be any Vikings anymore. This broke his heart and I decided to do something about it. I asked Frey’s for help with a spell and put a barrier around the island of Kattegat. This way nobody from the outside could come in and disturb it. But if people wanted to leave Kattegat to live a more modern life, they were free to do so. They could only never return. Having this is something that made Bjorn very happy, something that would stay the same for as long as possible. But his last day came quickly.

I told him he was one of the lucky ones. He got to live a full life and have his last moments surrounded by family. “I love you Bjorn.” I told him crying. “I love you too. Now soon I will feast in Valhalla with my father and mother, drink with my brothers and when it is time for you, you will join me. Al though comparing yourself to me that might be a while. You have not aged a day since I met you. My beautiful y/n. I will love you in this life and the next to come. Live your life like your days are numbered my love.” And those where his last words. “Bjorn?” No response. I closed his eyes and kissed the top of his head. “I will always love you. Now go meet your family, they have been waiting for a long time.” I told him. Tears were falling down my cheeks.

For a while I still decided to stay on earth, but I had some work to do. Find the other infinity stones and keep them safe.

...

1941

“Oh come on Loki it’ll be fun! And besides you owe me. You were the one that convinced me to go to America in a time like this. We will just dance and then we’re out. Just an hour.” I told Loki excited to go dancing. “I told you I’m not dancing.” He responded. “Fine I’ll find somebody else to dance with than.” I looked around and saw a man with dark hair and broad shoulders standing by a bar. Perfect! I walked towards him and tapped his shoulder. His eyes were a beautiful steel blue color and it looked like he had a permanent smirk stuck on his face. “Hi! Would you like to have a dance with me?” I asked.

..

.

Let me know what you think :)

And there obviously is a little sneak peak of what the next story will be. I had so much fun writing this, it had been in my head for such a long time!

[quarantineddreamer]

i’ve been absent, and i can’t be sorry (it’s been necessary), but i do miss this community and having the energy/time to participate.

in truth, it’s been a challenging past few months for me...

don’t want to bore anyone, so details below (tw: depression, anxiety, parental troubles, covid)

i was really fortunate to be really close to my family growing up. i had a great relationship with my parents. which is why it has been that much more painful for me this past year to have them slowly driven from me by the absurdity of current politics. i didn’t see it coming, i didn’t think my parents could become science deniers. and yet here i am...

i tried with everything i had to teach/reach them, but ultimately the stress of it all was causing my anxiety to reach extremely unhealthy levels. for my own health and sanity, i wrote them a long, heartfelt letter explaining why i would not be talking to them for the time being (as they refused to get vaccinated and began to behave dangerously, no masks, frequent outings, seeing lots of people). that was july. 

august my parents visited my hometown. i did not see them or speak to them. my birthday passed, i did not see them or speak to them... 

i spoke with my mother once, in september...and it’s all still just as bad. there was shouting, cursing, crying (mostly me tbh). she’s stubbornly clinging to her beliefs drilled into her by right-wing media. i wont get into them, but it’s conspiracy level bad... she got covid, she kept it from me and my brother until afterwards. miraculously she was okay despite taking “medicine” that has been proven to be ineffective against covid and potentially dangerous while sick to boot... it’s made her even more determined to cling to her insane theories about the vaccine, covid treatments, the government all of it... 

i told her my life would continue without her and dad: i might get engaged (probably would have on my anniversary except my partner felt bad i wasnt talking to them at the time), married, who knows... covid isn’t going away anytime soon, and i cant agree to disagree with her on this. it matters too much to me that they be safe. if i let it go and something were to happen to her and my dad...i’d never forgive myself for it. 

i’m not saying mine is the correct approach. i have been plagued with doubt and guilt off and on. my mom has used language that makes me feel like this is all my fault, for being anxious, for being depressed, for not just letting her have her dangerous opinions... but at the end of the day despite the pain and grief i feel for not having my parents right now, i am still better off than i was before. fewer panic attacks, able to focus at work, able to at least sleep some now. 

i started anti-depressants when my mental health hit an all-time low during all of this, and they’ve been helping too. i really didn’t want to get back on them, but i believe they’ve saved my life. 

sadly, between all this (and busy times at work) i’ve had very little time, focus, or motivation to write. i’ve barely been on here. to be completely honest, naps after work are common. the extra rest has become important. i’ve developed a sudden interest in true crime documentaries and sad movies?? i was very confused by this at first, since i’ve never ever had an interest before, but my therapist says its how im processing my trauma and grief lol 

but why write all this out on tumblr, B? well... i like to scream into the abyss here, and i also want to be completely open about my struggles and mental health, because i was at my worst when i felt utterly alone, and if this post helps even one person who might be experiencing similar feel less alone than it’s worth it.

and i also wanted to let this community know why i’ve suddenly dropped off because it is a place that has brought my joy even during the chaos of the past year or so. i am going to be participating in the upcoming zkmbb and still have my other projects ready and waiting for me to return, but for now, the queue is going to be up and running and i’ll be a bit quieter as i fight my way through this and have to dedicate extra time to self-care.

i hope no one relates to this post, i really do, because it all hurts a lot and i dont want anyone to feel this pain, but if you do? you are a warrior, i admire your strength and courage --and i am sending you so much love.

best wishes all,

B

[nightswithkookmin]

You need to back up your ON break up theory with more than just fake subs and vague statements about 'claiming behavior'.

During the period you allege they were broken up, Jimin pulled Jungkook in a hug on run behind, Jungkook called Jimin sexy at a press conference, Jimin and jungkook did that whole 'how does it feel to be in the same unit'/'time to change' flirty thing, Jimin grabbed Jungkook by the lapels... and more. Begging pardon but if they were grieving the loss of their romantic relationship while trying to be professional colleagues and pals.... isnt that sort of insensitive? Like I know you admitting you might have read it wrong and have changed your view in light of new footage might be a blow to your ego, but I don't think you are thinking rationally when you insist on this break up theory. It's sad because I found so much meaning and connection in some of the stuff you have written, particularly pertaining to internalized homophobia, racism, mysogynoir and bts changing over time to become more enlightened, but your devotion to this ONE theory, and defensiveness whenever it is (rightly imo) challenged makes me wary of your theories in general, which might be extremely unfair to you, as a thinker. Your log is really funny and great in a lot of ways so i cant really quit you.

Ahhhh it's been a while I got one of these...

Hello, how you doing! Lol. Silver is that you?

Chilee, it's the name calling for me.

Ego, irrational, charlatan, Tuktukker- I'm desensitized to such ad hominems at this point. You don't throw words like these around and expect me to sit at the table and talk. Imma yeet myself out real fast. Lol.

There's just something different, wholesome almost, about this post though. Sounds constructive I think. Or maybe it's because I just woke. Chilee. Lol.

It doesn't feel at all like you are attacking me. It's strange...

You're gaslighting though but it's fine. I've built a resistance to that from years and years of dealing with my abductors or family. Potato potahto.

I often put my sanity before other's insanity which is why I don't indulge posts such as these and I'm not sorry about that. I mean is this an Ask or Submission? I don't- what am I supposed to say? What is the call to action?

Sigh.

If I come across as defensive sometimes, 10 out of 10, it's probably because the person on the other end is being offensive. Straight up. Cause and effect, the science don't lie.

You don't expect me to not defend when I'm being attacked. That's just tacky.

I don't think there's anything wrong with challenging views and notions because at the very least, that's about the exchange of ideas and I welcome it.

I set the limits at the racial slurs, the mocking tones, the emotionally charged rants meant to disparage me and my entire ancestry rather than argue a point, the interference with my personal life and business all because I hold a different view on a topic, the doxing, gaslighting, the bad mouthing, spreading lies about me, turning my friends against me, stripping away my rights and copyrights, harassing people who enjoy my work among- other things.

I usually exercise my right to self preservation in these instances- imma block, delete, ignore, forward or clap back. Word. Lol.

I'm sorry, but if you have to attack the individuality of a person to argue your point, you've lost the argument and you never had one to begin with.

Take for instance, the bit you wrote about me taking a blow to 'my ego' - do you see the problem with that?

What has holding a view different from yours on a particular subject got to do with the ego?

Do you mean to say the only way I can hold an opinion different from yours on a matter is if I were hubristic?

Are you projecting? What's happening? Lol

And if I call you out for this, I'm defensive? Way to add gaslighting to your bigotry and intolerance of opinions that don't align with yours. No offense.

I give myself permission to hold unpopular views. I give myself permission to think differently from others. I give myself permission to see what I see and believe what I believe and form an opinion on what I see and believe divorced from others' views and based on my own understanding of the workings of this world or in this case Jikook.

No amount of name calling will change this fact. We see things from different perspectives after all.

You need to back your ON break up theory with more than just fake subs and vague claims about claiming behavior.

Lol. Fake subs? You mean the Hajima bit from the On comeback special I put in my video? Interesting.

I think I see what you mean about my break up theory and I agree to some extent. Like, come up here with charts and paragraphs and excel spreadsheets on why I think Jikook were broken up?

I would be happy to do that kind of analysis.

I think the problem for me here is, I feel tasked to convince rather than to share my opinion on the matter or even expand on my theories for discourse sakes and that makes me really uncomfortable.

Not to psychoanalyze you, but I feel when you ask this of me you are not just asking me to divulge my thoughts on a topic but to disabuse you of your own biases surrounding the topic.

I don't think this is about my opinion at all. I think it's about your own beliefs about Jikook. And there's nothing wrong with that. If you believe in something you need to stand for it. Just don't mind if others do same and don't call them names for doing so. Because if you do mind, then that's bigotry.

The fact is my opinion contradicts your beliefs about Jikook and you either want to punish me for it hence the slurs, are in denial, or you want to believe my point of view- can't really tell.

I think there is a limit in general to how far I can prove Jikook in anyway and that has nothing to do with lack of evidence, my ego or my rationality. And yes, I often shroud my beliefs in vague expressions because I don't want to set myself up or open myself up to legal suits. I can only prove Jikook to a point and nothing beyond my belief. Beyond that, I would be skating on thin ice and making bighit a tad richer.

During the period you allege they were broken up, Jimin pulled JK in a hug, grabbed Jungkook by his lapel, JK called Jimin sexy, they did the flirty challenge...

So if I understand you correctly, all these is what makes Jikook a couple to you and indicate they are dating?

Alright then.

Hobi calls Jimin sexy all the time. BTS calls eachother sexy all the time. I don't think that's a sign they are in a polyamory.

Jungkook plays with his hyungs' dick and ass and talks about falling for them most times. I don't think that makes him gay or in a relationship with any of them.

Lemme just cut to the chase. I've reached my photo limits. I have said a countless times now, that I don't view skinship and all these interactions you've pointed out as indication two people are dating- especially not two Koreans working within the homoerotically charged space of Kpop.

And I have given out a few of the metrics I use in considering whether any ship in BTS is real over the course of my blogs- intimacy, exclusive behaviors such as and not limited to claiming eachother and exercising certain rights and authorities over eachother and against the group, stress trails as a result of keeping their relationship a secret, the microaggressions, breaching the fourth wall and others.

I think what this comes down to is differences in perspectives on a fundamental level. Not egos.

I don't see the things you see as the signs Jikook are real and dating, as signs Jikook are real and dating. If I did, I would be seeing every ship in BTS as real but I don't.

And you consider the metrics I use in ascertaining Jikook as vague something something. I think we are at an impasse.

But explain the bit about 'insensitive' to me please. I would love to engage in that discourse. Why would it be insensitive for two exes to act cordially with eachother within a workplace in the aftermath of a breakup?

Then the bit about grieving...

So grieving is one of your metrics for accessing whether or not two people are broken up?

That's interesting. I mean I don't disagree but I also don't think Jikook are gonna come to work with oversized pajamas, dark shades, boxes of tissues and a blanket slung over their shoulders because of a broken heart... it's 2020 not Manila. They've grown, are learning and getting better at dealing with their emotions on camera because, as Suga pointed out, they are aware the least bit of tension translates to the screens.

I mean Jimin said it himself in his 2020 interview, he's learned to react less intensely to certain things. And sometimes, he tries to downplay certain things. He tries to perform Jikook when Jikook are not in a great place. It's only in recent times, On era, where JK has opted out and not gone along with it.

I think he does that and uses their shared 'Jikook agenda' and performances of Jikook as a means to fix things or break the ice between them at least.

But clearly Jk wasn't having it that day as he kept putting up boundaries with Jimin throughout that Run episode- unless of course you are disputing this as well on the grounds Jimin dragged his ass into a hug. Chilee.

I think most people wouldn't have felt there was something off with Jikook in that On period at all had it not been for Run 116. It's similar to how, had it not been for Jimin's birthday saga, the Esquire shoot behind scenes and Grammy reaction video, no one would have felt there was something going on between Jikook in the October timeline.

I think we would have seen and felt the less interactions and professionalism between them in the aftermath of it but for the most parts, moments like the couch scene in the Grammy reaction video wouldn't have made sense to any of us especially as we had just witnessed JK in the ON:E concert rushing to comfort and console JM when he was tearing up at the end of the concert.

At least when he pushed JM into a ditch somewhere in the dark in Soop we know he had been drinking and they were playing competitive sports. Even with that he still showed some concern when Jimin fell and injured himself afterwards.

I think we would all be wondering if Jikook were fanservice at that point, a fanservice relationship where JK only consoled Jimin when he cried infront of thousands of people at concerts and nibbled his ear while he was at it.

And I think we would be on opposite sides of the argument: me, arguing Jikook were experiencing a hiccup in their relationship and you, rationalizing that moment with anything from 'JK don't have to be at JM's beck and call' 'he is an introvert who is shy to show affections publicly' to even something about the weather.

But I would have looked at this moment from the October pop up video behind scenes and assumed JK was mad at Jimin for something JM had done and had done something in retaliation and was now feeling sorry he did.

And I would have based it off of this moment, or a countless similar ones from around On era or the previous eras where JK had done this exact same thing- frozen in place and staring at Jimin in the middle of a shoot or interview after sliding his hands down Tae's chest, clung on to the others unnecessarily to get a reaction out of JM.

Would I have been right? It really doesn't matter to me as long as it makes sense to me. I ship Jikook in a way that makes sense to me. Jikook are gay, in a gay relationship with each other and are human like anyone of us- that makes sense to me. Whether I am right or wrong.... who cares and why does it matter?

Personally, I think the only person grieving in that period was JK not JM and I don't think he grieved for long before he switched off his humanity and went stone cold tit for tat terminator on JM and BTS's ass. Lol. He had JM looking all kinds of subdued in that era. Lmho.

People grieve in various ways. In my opinion. For Jimin, I feel he puts on a strong facade most times when he has to film during such times and lately I feel he masks his emotions with anger.

Jk masks his pain with anger too sometimes but I feel in recent times, he is leaning more towards indifference. I think he tries not to be as affected by certain things as compared to the early half of 2020...

But I understand what you mean when you talk about grieve. I think for me rather than look for physical evidence of grief like a sad face, a tear drop dripping down a face, I love for vulnerability in them.

JK's is easy to tell because he tends to open himself up to others such as Tae or Jin or Hobi- and I don't mean like his interactions with them. I mean he leans on them for moral or emotional support.

In the Holiday remix video where he was hiding behind Jin, I felt he was feeling very vulnerable and exposed after that intense moment with Jimin.

It's what he does when he is feeling vulnerable. He turns to others especially Jimin and if Jimin is the cause of his vulnerability he turns away from him like he did within On era or even in Run 116.

When he is in a good place with Jimin, often he is closed off to the others. Jimin does the opposite. He shuts himself up entirely from the group. I don't think he likes to go through his pain by himself.

I've always found that bit fascinating about them. Jk opens himself to people when he is at his lowest while JM closes himself off when he is at his worst.

It played out in their rainy day fight as well. In JK's vulnerability, that's when he let Jimin in, lowering his walls while JM on the other hand closed himself off to him.

Can you give me more than they were together in that period because they played with eachother's lapels?

You don't think I'm thinking rationally when I insist on my theory? Uhmmm... okay? What is rational in this case?

Listen, I recieve a lot of hate for my 'irrational thoughts and opinions' out in these streets. I've lost potentially great friendship on this platform because of it. As I type this, there is someone in someone else's DMs persuading them not to read and engage with my posts because I'm extremely evil I think Jikook break up from time to time in their relationship.

If I genuinely believed in the slightest least or had the least doubt that Jikook were together in that period I would change my mind on the topic- damn my pride and ego. It simply isn't worth the hustle.

If it helps your sanity, please stop reading my blogs. My blogs are not for everyone. It makes some people happy, it makes some people mad and some people experience both.

My gratification is in sharing my thoughts and chronicling Jikook's journey for my own appeasement and support of Jikook. I owe it to them as a believer and a supporter to humanize them as much as possible.

I do not seek to convert others, change minds, or convince anyone of my opinions or to disabuse anyone of theirs.

Let's just agree to disagree on the matter please. Or if you can drop the ad hominems, I would be more than happy to go back and forth with you on this very topic. It's actually shaping out to be one of my favorite Jikook eras. I love me some terminator JK. Lol.

Signed,

GOLDY

[givemeonebreath]

A big, messy Linked Universe playlist

Link for Links

Heavy on the angst, because of who I am as a person. (At the same time, don’t take it too seriously, man.)

Influenced by canon, manga (TP Link is really Going Through It™ ), my personal perceptions, and popular fandom canon.

A pretty wide variety of genres, with a bias towards metal and prog rock.

I kept snippets of lyrics for most songs, also because of who I am as a person. (Some were particularly hard to narrow down to just one verse or chorus.) Those - and a little more rambling - are under the cut if you really want, in the order of the playlist. But. It’s long.

I didn’t initially make this with the intent to share, but hey. Throughout my past year+ of listening, I’ve been haphazardly adding songs to a playlist I very creatively named Links. If something reminded me of them, whether through the music or lyrics or both, I threw it on the playlist, so some songs might seem odd or vague. Some are really on the nose, as subtle as a sledgehammer. (Sky for Sky? Dude. Sorry.) Some are there because of a fitting line or two that stuck in my head. Ultimately, music - like any form of creative expression - can be interpreted in a multitude of ways. 

My listening habits and tastes are erratic, which is why this is one big, jumbled playlist and not separated for different Links. Not to mention if I did that, some (Wild, Legend) would have a lot and some (Wind, Four) would have none, both because of my own familiarity with them, and because of the general themes of the music I tend to listen to. Most songs are a general ‘hero’s spirit reborn’ mood, anyway - those are the first part of the playlist. The second half is more nuanced to specific Links, plus a few Ganon vibes.

1. Deep Purple - April (Koji Kondo, composer of the original Legend of Zelda theme, was into Deep Purple as a kid, and it shows.)

2. Kamelot - Regalis Apertura

3. Au4 - So Just Hang On, Beautiful One (I’ve posted this here before. I can’t hear it without thinking of LU now.) So I slipped in through the gate almost unknown. All my border stamps were late. Seven days old. Cold hand griped my shoulder blade, broke the bone. Bloody nose and turned away, all the way home.

4. FC Kahuna - Hayling Don’t think about all those things you fear, just be glad to be here

5. Glass Animals - Youth Boy, when I left you you were young I was gone, but not my love You were clearly meant for more Than a life lost in the war

6. Pain of Salvation - Restless Boy A restless boy in a world too slow A flame born into cinder, ash, and glow I've given everything I gave it all Yet find myself alone

7. Haken - The Endless Knot Our design shifted frame by frame! Across the line our cycle starts to fail. Our design shifted frame by frame! Across the line we die to live again.   We need a story to believe in. We need a hero to prevail. We need a challenge we can overcome, it takes a tragedy to make us one 

8. Kamelot - Memento Mori (I particularly associate this with Time and Twilight) I am the god in my own history The master of the game I may believe if she would come to me And whisper out my name Sometimes I wonder where the wind has gone If life has ever been Sometimes I wonder how belief alone Can cut me free from sin

9. Katatonia - Fighters Look I told you so We never stop If we said that We'll back it up For sure You know We're fighters

10. Megadeth - This Day We Fight! (I mean, all Links, but particularly Warriors) For this I was chosen, because I fear nothing With confidence I tread through the dead of the night Off to another war-torn, faraway battlefield Wherein lies a demonic enemy horde

11. Moon Tooth - Igneous Well, the spirit took me And this old broken body leapt up and danced Settin’ out Settin' out with all my heroes in a bundle at my back Hawk am I More wings span in my shadow than overcast Yeah, you know what they say Always need something to look up to, ha

12. Samael - Moongate Destiny, tomorrow is today Destiny, without boundaries How many nights will we spend together traveling infinity back and forth and again How many times will we go together questioning eternity about us about our wonders...

13. TOOL- Parabola This body holding me reminds me of my own mortality Embrace this moment, remember We are eternal, all this pain is an illusion

14. Lunatic Soul - Blood on the Tightrope No matter how hard you try To shut down your feverish thoughts They hunt you down with no regret Cause you have to fix it all

15. Hybrid - Keep It In The Family

16. Soul Savers - Unbalanced Pieces Gone, now carry on Through violent seasons I call you mother, mother, mother In vain, absent chain The twilight's bleeding And the playing board has two unbalanced pieces

17. Steve Von Till - Valley of the Moon All she gives is a stone facade Like ill-given flowers at a dead man's wake Here we slave for the dreams of another And fight over scraps like wayward dogs

18. Ludovico Einaudi - Experience

19. Lunatic Soul - Summoning Dance Three stones on the right side Three stones on the left My vicious circle of life and death   “Oh you want it” I hear it again “Oh you want it” My burden Curse to break

20. Lunatic Soul - Through Shaded Woods Run through your shaded woods Run through your shaded mind Run through the night Run away Run through the darkness Run

21. Lunatic Soul - Naavie

22. David Bowie - Nature Boy There was a boy A very strange, enchanted boy They say he wandered very far Very far, over land and sea A little shy and sad of eye But very wise was he

23. The Dandy Warhols - Sleep Well, I could sleep forever But it's of her I dream If I could sleep forever I could forget about everything 

24. Au4 - Everyone is Everyone (and Everything is Everything) Tripping and tumbling, Flipping and fumbling. Flowing on the rivers of sadness That have been forever rumbling.   But from dawn until now Of all the paths that I could have gone down Of all the valleys That I could have been flowing through.   In spite of all the chaos And all that has come between us, How is it I still find myself Here with you. 

25. Kingcrow - Everything Goes Your hands again upon the ground Falling rain for hours and hours As you learn the game Time dispels the fog ... Ever been there? Ever felt like prey? Ever thought your mind was feeble? Lot of things that don’t make sense

26. Pain of Salvation - Icon As a child I felt too old And now when I'm grown-up I feel too young A different kind so I've been told Just slightly out of reach and out of time

27. Sophia Loizou - Divine Interference (I got spooky dungeon vibes. Also, the title.)

28. Carpenter Brut - Fab Tool Runnin Gunnin Forward in the phantom shatter so grand Splatter grand, arcanum fuel Wrought iron out of the sky Over me, tells no lie

29. Blue Stahli - Death Will Have to Run All on the open road Where none will ever grow A journey toward the known With countless miles to go

30. Gyroscope - Mistakes & Ladders I am the first? No I can't be the first A continuous nothing, destined for something Tell me who you are and why you trapped me here

31. Queens of the Stone Age - Run, Pig, Run Run, pig, run Here I come

32. Chali 2na & Krafty Kuts - Guard The Fort The swords are drawn and odds are stacked And we clash the impact's a thunderous clap Calm demeanor Even though we are under attack [...my turn to guard the fort ready for combat]

33. The Great Discord - Army of Me (lol)

34. Kongos - Terrified I think I'll start again and change my name You only live once or twice, what a shame Somebody fucked up when designing this game

35. Woodkid - Run Boy Run Run, boy, run! This ride is a journey to Run, boy, run! The secret inside of you Run, boy, run! This race is a prophecy Run, boy, run! And disappear in the trees

36. The Beta Machine - The End A million miles away from you this time I'll do what it takes I'm on my way If lines are in the sand I'll go under If I can make it in time I will bring you back with me

37. Devin Townsend Project - Gump When we last met who was I? I'm sorry we no longer see eye to eye The energy to keep you in while keeping myself out I'm sorry how you'll take this  But I just don't have the patience anymore 

38. Arrested Youth - Riot! I can't get much satisfaction living in this cave It's tough to breathe, I'm in the belly of the beast Can't sleep with all my rage With me and all my generations living in this cage Pick up your guns and tell your sons, tonight we break the cage

39. Led Zeppelin - Friends So anytime somebody needs you Don't let them down, although it grieves you Some day you'll need someone like they do Looking for what you knew

40. Faunts - M4, pt 2 (Wild) Fight your foes you're not alone Holy war is on the phone Asking to please stay on hold Bleeding loss of blood runs cold And I need you to recover   Because I can't make it on my own

41. Faith No More - Ashes to Ashes (Wild) I want them to know it's me, it's on my head I'll point the finger at me, it's on my head Smiling with the mouth of the ocean And I'll wave to you with the arms of the mountain

42. Devin Townsend - Jupiter (Wild) I know you At least I think I do Everything's changed But in the days that are so dark It's wonderful

43. Katatonia - Neon Epitaph (Wild) Shadow of my shadow Cling not to my grief I am long left behind now You are free

44. The Smashing Pumpkins - The Beginning is the End is the Beginning (Wild) Time has stopped before us The sky cannot ignore us No one can separate us For we are all that is left The echo bounces off me The shadow lost beside me There's no more need to pretend Cause now I can begin again 

45. Katatonia - Lacquer (Wild) My voice travelling Soaring bird above your head The house we lived in Ridden with disease ... The levee breaking I can't live to fight once more The road to the grave is straight as an arrow I'm just staying around to sing your song, baby

46. Eskimo Joe - This is Pressure (Wild) There is no romance in suffocation  The walls fall down like your expectations You want to scream  And you want to shout But you've built up steam  And you can't let it out This is pressure 

47. Portugal. The Man - 1000 Years (Wild) We'll wait 1000 years  Until the end of time We'll wait 1000 more Dressed up in gold and white We'll climb the mountain sides  To find what's in the sky We'll dig through mountain sides  To find what's deep inside

48. Au4 - An Ocean’s Measure of Sorrow (Wild) Forgot my name and who I was. Memories of nothing floating up. All of the sorrow we once knew, Colours the ocean's water blue.

49. Band of Skulls - Carnivorous (Twilight) I am corrosive and cohesive Like a chemical bond I'm all together undone I am the broken kingdom I'm just so, so, so  So carnivorous

50. Glass Animals - Flip (Twilight) I wanna go back with a club and attack I wanna take to my guns and break you I gotta make my little foe take his own

51. TV on the Radio - Wolf Like Me (Twilight) My mind has changed my body's frame, but, God, I like it My heart's aflame, my body's strained, but, God, I like it

52. Kamelot - The Spell (Twilight) All my demons cast a spell The souls of dusk rising from the ashes So the book of shadows tell The weak will always obey the master

53. OSI - Radiologue (Legend) I was dreaming I was heading west thirty days faster Had a fever woke up in a sweat bailing out the water  Can't go on Can't go back   Heard your voice coming through the noise wrote it in the radio log Hurt my head, wondering what you said so I threw it overboard  

54. Katatonia - Don’t Tell A Soul (Legend) I have been destroyed by the perfection that is a lie see I'm moving soon see my feet are already on the road and if you know where I’m going don’t tell a soul

55. Haken - The Mind’s Eye (Legend) The shape of things to come are closer than they seem Changing your design every time you disappear I'm planning my escape through portals of your mind Where people seem to drop like flies

56. Pain of Salvation - Species (Legend) Sometimes I hate my fucking species Yet most days I'll do anything to please it  My generation was fooled to pursue our dreams But it is not what it seems You never need what you want And you rarely want what you need

57. Euringer - Do You Kiss Your Mama with That Mouth? (Legend) All my life, misunderstood I'm fuckin' too smart, too smart for my own good The last question, before I go is "Hey motherfucka, do you kiss your mama with that mouth?"  Yes! I kiss your mama with this mouth

58. !!! - Pardon My Freedom (Legend) Like I give a fuck, like I give a shit Like I give a fuck about that shit Like I give a fuck about that motherfucking shit

59. Team Sleep - Ataraxia (Legend) Froze asleep Coma deep I dream I'm out with you Alone at sea

60. Oliver Tank - Embrace (Legend) You're in my dreams The world is torn apart at the seams And I don't wanna leave Wearing my heart on it's sleeve

61. Machine Gun Fellatio - The Girl of My Dreams (Is Giving Me Nightmares) (Legend) The girl of my dreams is giving me nightmares I don't know what it means but she's got multi-coloured hair When she stands in the sand I dream of peaches And I'm not sure what that means either

62. Earl Greyhound - Shotgun (Legend & Hyrule) I am nobody, nobody is who I am I am a traveler on this land And nothing, nothing, nothing in my hands

63. TV on the Radio - Staring at the Sun (Hyrule) You're staring at the sun You're standing in the sea Your mouth is open wide You're trying hard to breathe The water's at your neck There's lightning in your teeth Your body's over me

64. Echo & The Bunnymen - The Killing Moon (Time) Fate Up against your will Through the thick and thin He will wait until You give yourself to him

65. Sufjan Stevens - Sugar (Sky) Don’t break my heart, don’t break my flow now And all this rage has got to go now Let’s take up this lifeline Come on, baby, gimme some sugar Don’t make me wait Don’t make me wait too long Don’t make me sing the sad song Come on, baby, gimme some sugar

66. Obsydians - Ascension (Sky) Rise above the hardships you’ll face I will sign and keep on rising As long as you are giving me your soul and keep me awake Feel like home and spread your light around I will listen and just be there As long as you are giving me your love I’ll give you my soul

67. Sonique - Sky -_-

68. Enter Shikari - The King (Ganon) Watch your back, my friend I'm about to kickstart a cycle Of never ending revenge And this time it's primal, it's tribal

69. Saul Williams - WTF! (Ganon, Hylia) "You've been polluted, uprooted by time You have been muted, computed but I'm A living vessel of the one, of the moon, of the sun" Hey! You ain't as dead as you seem, what the fuck? Hey! But you keep living your lies

70. These New Puritans - We Want War (Ganon/ Dark Link/ any nemesis I guess) Shadows dance back up, it's happening again If you listen carefully you might hear them whisper: "We hold all the secrets, we hold all the words; But they're scrambled and broken so you'll never know" Can't you see them Floating like black ash? Can't you feel them Crawling down your back?

[lilallama]

(Sorry if I spell something wrongly lol) Idk, This is my opinion? Gryffindor, Jungkook. Hufflepuff, Taehyung & Yoongi. Ravenclaw, Namjoon & Jin. Slytherin, Jimin & Hobi??? I literally just searched the meaning of each house and just picked one based on the personality shown. Also, If you don't think this matches them, Sorry ;-;

[Don't worry, sweetie ^^. You don't have to apologise! 💕🍑]

Hoseok is a lot more two faced than I actually tend to show. The way he presents himself is mostly a mask. While he seems mostly calm on the outside, he's actually quite the opposite on the inside. Out of all the boys it'd be easiest for him to manipulate/influence Y/n (@bangtans-apollo Tae is quacking-) and he's aware of that. That's one of the reasons why they started the club 1. To protect Y/n, 2. The club concept came because it'd be easier to meet up and they would automatically get a clubroom and 3. Hoseok threatened to tell on them if they don't join, he'd make Y/n despise each one of them.

He is a strong leader (one of the Slytherin traits), I try to make him resourceful (but I am not myself so that might not shine through too much), he is definitely cunning. The whole ordeal with wanting to be with Y/n no matter what is pretty ambitious, I'd say. And lastly the traditionalism trait, he is very into tradition and has to keep his domestic fantasies with Y/n a secret. His parents raised him very traditional, he would hate it if (female) Y/n would ask him out first or would propose first and would at first frown upon his attention to (male or non binary) Y/n.

All in all Slytherin seems very accurate.

Now concerning Jimin; similar to Hoseok he too can be a two faced snake. He doesn't hide his true thoughts from Y/n or the boys, if anything he overshares sometimes (one time he started talking to Taehyung about some... rather inappropriate things concerning Y/n. That got his Y/n privilege taken away for a whole month). And despite practically pleading to be the "dumb bimbo" stereotype, he is surprisingly clever and intelligent. Before Highschool, before he made his first experiences with popular boys, he was a straight A's and B's student. Yet once he had his first boyfriend, he discovered that the people surrounding him typically preferred the dumb blondes. (He actually broke up with the captain of the football team for Y/n.)

He also sometimes displays ambitious, just in a whiney sort of way. Self preservation is definitely something. Unlike Taehyung, Yoongi, Namjoon or Jeongguk, he wouldn't let himself be killed for Y/n's sake. If Y/n were to be killed he would end up deluding himself into thinking a person who looks similar to them is them and would force Y/n's personality and style on them. Cunningness is 100% accurate. He's fake. He pretends to be a silly sweetheart who loves everyone but will spread rumours about you, blame things on you etc. and everyone believes him. His cunningness concerning Y/n is more whiney than anything.

So I do think Jimin fits Slytherin.

Namjoon was raised by strict parents who forbade him a tremendous amount of things and painted his world for him. It was engraved in his head, he was going to be the CEO of their company one day. Yet despite everything he still had a head of his own. Maye it was because if his high IQ that he understood that his parents weren't the only opinion in his life. Don't get me wrong, they still left him scarred (sadly literally, as his father once hit him bloody) and traumatised but not without a mind of his own. Ever since he was small creativity and originality was something he admired and loved. It was partly reason of why he fell for Y/n, their individuality, their mind, their heart, their soul.

We will not need to discuss intelligence, it's a trait he undoubtedly has. He is always willing to learn and showed interest in many different things before Y/n captured his focus. He is most likely one of the wisest members as he is aware of how twisted his love for them truly is (once again something I tend to fail at portraying) and tried to stop it when it started. But somehow that only made everything worse and by now he doesn't care anymore at all. When he was a child he used to be more openly curious than nowadays (as it caused him many punishments from his parents).

I feel that Namjoon would fit Ravenclaw.

Seokjin was spoiled all his life. His parents adored him, other kids adored him, everyone adored him. While he might've acted oblivious he knew that it's because of his money. Similar to Jimin, Seokjin changed when he entered high school. While he always was a pretty intelligent and well behaved student (still very arrogant though) he then became less concerned with studies and once made a teacher cry (that was before he met Y/n). He loves standing out as an individual, that includes making anyone change who crosses his path with the same outfit (not in school as they wear a school uniform. But outside, yes, he has that much power. Everyone knows Kim Seokjin).

As said before, Seokjin is far from stupid. He is a very intelligent individual but doesn't show the extent of his nolage. Instead aiming for a cool "Queen B" persona. He is witty with his comebacks (something I cannot write because I do not possess that superpower), he's quick with his words. He holds respect for people who are 60+ years old as he believes they've been through a lot in life already. These people have wisdom he could only gain by experience and that he respects (there is one very sweet lady that lives alone in a very big mansion a few streets away from his penthouse. He always visits her because he loves her genuine kindness. When he met Y/n she recently passed away and he saw a part of her in them).

Seokjin could qualify for a Ravenclaw.

Taehyung was raised by a very Christian family that he still cherishes very much. Because of their intense belief he was raised to worship. He never fell in love, so when Y/n crossed paths with his, he started showing love how he's used to it (Out of all the boys Taehyung is straight up insane. Something in his brain might be wired wrong, there is no explanation on why he likes them, on why he believed that's what love is because his parents treated him with normal, familiar love. So he is simply sick, there is no "saving" him. He's better of in a mental hospital). But he was always a very kind boy. Giving instead of taking, never wanting anything in return. Out of everyone, Taehyung was the one who welcomed new students and made tons of friends. But he grew out of it as his focus turned to art. He aimed to make his parents proud so he didn't have time for friends.

His loyalty is unlike any other. You could torture him half dead and he'd still forgive you, stay loyal to you, serve you. He is Y/n's servant. He works hard on improving his artistic abilities and also to maintain fairly good grades. For Y/n any labour he'd have to be put through would seem like a blessing. Another trait for Hufflepuff would be fairness and he surely is fair. As one of the least jealous members of the club he really only cares if Y/n's okay with what's happening or could get hurt (he always kets the other members have more privileges than he has because he believes it'd be not only greedy but prideful to want Y/n to hinself. He avoids any sin when it comes to Y/n, envy, wrath, pride, sloth, nothing will ever come near his modern day Jesus).

Taehyung definitely is a Hufflepuff.

If the boy who works two parttime jobs, to pay for rent, bills and food, cleans the shabby apartment by himself because his alcoholic mother is busy messing it up again, yet still treats his mother with kindness, only to be treated like trash by seven more powerful and successful guys in his school who all like the same person he does and still manages to maintain the position as intern and honour roll student at a prestigious school for roch people, isn't in Hufflepuff then I don't know what. This poor soul is incredibly sensitive and kind. He isn't judgemental (as he himself is used to people judging him). All round very sweet.

I think it's very clear that he's very diligent and hard working. He holds great passion for music and enjoys writing poetry, a very sensitive soul. Yoongi isn't someone to complain about something being unfair (cough cough Jimin cough cough) or try and steal Y/n away from them. His day dreams consist of imagining Y/n liking him back, but he is certain that would never happen (according to you guys, it seems a lot of you would pick Yoongi if you'd get to decide). Not only is Yoongi kind but loyal as well, he'd never imagine leaving anyone behind even his useless mother.

Yoongi is 1000% a Hufflepuff.

Jeongguk tends to be hot tempered, he goes from zero to a hundred in a matter of seconds. Everything in life seems like a challenge to prove he's better than others think (his father was a notorious serial killer who killed twenty one people yet got away with a ten year prison sentence and got released after six, ten months later Jeongguk was born). In truth he did not care for anyone else, only Y/n. So all tge chivalry he could muster was directed at them.

He is one brave guy who doesn't get easily scared (I guess living with as well as being a serial killer at sixteen years old desensitised him). Jeongguk is courageous just not in/for a positive way/purpose. He deluted himself into thinking that Y/n needs protection, HIS protection. He once attacked a teacher because they were helping Y/n with a question, that's very daring (more like stupid) just not in a good way. A (still not) more positive example of his daringness is when he wants to impress Y/n. He hung from a skyscraper for five minutes doing pullups, just to inpress them. One time he also jumped across his luxurious pool at home (and almost slipped, almost bashing his head in) just to prove that he can jump further than someone they talked about.

I could very much picture him as a Griffendor.

If you enjoyed reading my work, please consider reblogging it. Thank you for reading

[makeste]

not a cavalcade of Katsuki panels

damn, anon. you stone cold came for me with that last part. and just fyi to all onlookers, this was before I had posted the headcanons ask proving this exact point lmao.

but a challenge has been issued now! so I will do my best to pick a variety of impartial panels featuring a veritable medley of characters. not sure I can really provide much in the way of insightful analysis of symbolism and metaphors and stuff, but I can certainly type a lot of words about the pretty pictures, and about how cool people look when they’re standing around all serious surrounded by clouds of billowing smoke.

why I like it: I figured we’d start off strong. no point in holding back. can the other panels possibly even hope to compete. maybe. we’ll see.

why I like it: because, you see, he punched a giant robot, and it exploded. you see that, there? and the text was all “SMAASH” in humongous comic book letters, and it was pretty cool. also Deku is very tiny and the robot is very big. and just to clarify, most of the time if a tiny fifteen-year-old child tries to punch an 80-foot robot, it’s not actually going to go all that well, and the robot probably will not explode. but in this case it did! and so this is a very novel and unexpected outcome, which makes it all the more visually striking, which is a very good thing to be when you are trying to show off the brand new superpower which your protagonist just inherited, and letting people see it in action for the very first time.

why I like it: so you may have noticed we just skipped a whoooole bunch of chapters lol. this is because there are almost 300 of them, and so I’m going to have to use a bit of discretion. anyway so this is a gorgeous panel. just, everything about it. the lighting; the expressions; Shouto’s hesitation; and his mom facing away, not looking back yet, and us not yet knowing how she’ll react. and the fact that they’re visually separated by as much distance as possible -- at opposite ends of a two-page spread -- and yet they’re so close, closer than they’ve been in years. mm. anyway it’s pretty.

why I like it: first of all because there’s nothing like seeing a deserving character get punched in the fucking face, and few characters IMO have been as deserving as Stain. and second because this is Deku, showing up to save the day out of nowhere at the last minute, because excuse you, but he’s a motherfuckin’ hero. sorry to interrupt your evening plans of stabbing a kid while lecturing him about why, philosophically, he deserves to die. but I’ve got a package here for a Mister Stain. it’s from Mister Smaassh, with two A’s and three S’s.

why I like it: fyi, anon said nothing about a cavalcade of BakuDeku panels. you didn’t think I’d let that loophole go to waste, did you? but nonetheless I will try to restrain myself until we get to the second ground beta fight. anyway, I like this panel because All Might’s canonically 7′2″ self looks about twelve feet tall here, and he is just TOWERING over these two boys, who’ve been tasked with somehow outwitting him during this curiously sadistic final exam. and it’s just an interesting perspective, because we know they both look up to him, and here they are physically looking way, way up, up, up at him.

why I like it: now this is how you do a villain entrance. I love absolutely everything about this. the sheer scale of destruction, and the way he’s just sort of casually hanging out there in the middle of the panel almost dwarfed by all this dust and smoke and carnage, and yet is unquestionably the focus of the page. the way that you can’t actually see his face, not yet. not until the end of the chapter. the way the clouds are drifting so calmly and peacefully in the night sky in stark contrast to the horrific events that are about to take place on the ground. this panel gives me literal chills, especially when I think about All for One’s creepy theme music playing in the background.

why I like it: this panel is so iconic to me that it’s one of the first ones I immediately knew I had to go and find when I got this ask. this entire fight is perfection from start to finish, and there are other panels that are more artistically striking if I’m being honest (in particular, the ones where he’s half-transformed with his face perfectly split down the middle between Muscle Might and Skinny Steve). but there’s just something about his determination in this panel, though. something about the fire in his eyes, and the way he clenches his fist. “my heart is still the heart of the Symbol of Peace.” I remember being sooooo fucking anxious when his true form was revealed, wondering if this was it, if the people watching were going to turn on him, if he was going to lose both the fight and their faith. turns out I was wrong on both accounts. basically what I am trying to tell you guys is that this panel was and is still the most badass thing I’ve ever seen.

why I like it: because he’s just a frail old man doing what he can to protect the last flickering embers of the thing that enables him to fight on. there’s something so fucking desperate and yet so determined about this image. he knows it’s futile, but still he persists.

why I like it: damn it was hard to find a “you’re next” panel with just the right angle I like best. this is probably as close as it gets, but I kind of wish Deku was somehow visible in this image as well. but at any rate this is an amazing moment, and All Might is dramatic af for basically no reason but IT’S BADASS. “no I’m not going to actually look where I’m pointing. it’s cooler this way.” or was it because he wasn’t sure if he could keep the emotion off of his face if he actually turned and looked? in this moment of knowing that it was finally over for him, that he would never be the Symbol again, and knowing that he had no choice but to move on and entrust that burden to the next generation? damn.

why I like it: I... fucking... okay, here’s a fun fact. did you know that I still get emotional over this panel almost a full two years after reading it?? obviously a good 84% of it is the context -- All Might losing his power; Deku being forced to take up the mantle before he feels ready; All Might feeling responsible for him; and both of them being so desperately grateful to have each other in that moment. but don’t underestimate that remaining 16% either though! this is just an extremely well-drawn hug, on top of everything else. All Might pressing Deku’s head to his shoulder with his fingers laced in his hair is some mighty fine fiercely protective hug tropes there, you guys. and the way Deku is clinging to his shirt so tightly his knuckles have probably gone white?? while he cries?? while both of them cry? ON THE BEACH? WITH THE WAVES LAPPING SOFTLY AT THE SHORE IN THE PEACEFUL NIGHT AIR?? jesus fucking christ. this hug contains more emotions than I am capable of carrying inside me at once. I just sort of have to let them flow in and out little by little until they finally subside.

why I like it: you bet I skipped right from Kamino straight to Deku VS Kacchan Part 2. no regrets. anyway, so these two panels are an absolutely gorgeous one-two punch. so much has changed from the days when they were innocent little kids marching off into the woods to have adventures. they’ve changed. their relationship has changed. and yet, at the end of the day, Izuku is still willing to follow Katsuki even without being given any kind of explanation. and Katsuki still seeks out Izuku when he’s on the verge of having a spectacular emotional breakdown. because he doesn’t know who else to turn to. and because despite everything, there is trust there still, on some deep, fundamental level neither of them fully understands or knows how to acknowledge. anyway, so these two panels just give me a ton of feels all about the passage of time and how everything changes and how you can’t get back what’s lost, but also sometimes if you look deep enough you find that parts of it were never fully gone.

why I like it: because in a striking display of dramatic main character energy, these boys decided to stage their life-changing destiny-affirming rival fight on the coolest possible stage in the middle of the goddamn night. and then Katsuki made it even better by producing WAY MORE SMOKE than his attack by all rights should have produced! and then they went and crouched down all symmetrically so as to more poetically make intense eye contact at each other. I really like panels with smoke and/or dust clearing dramatically. there are like four more of them coming up on this list. what can I say. it’s cinematic.

why I like it: I actually had this one as my icon for a while. it’s rare imo to see an action panel that’s so balanced and has so much going on and is so clean and easy to read. both of their poses are so dynamic. I like the way the arc of Izuku’s kick is drawn, and I love the way you can clearly see that Katsuki propelled himself backwards with his quirk in order to dodge it. it’s just a really cool little panel that for me perfectly sums up the general feel of this fight, and its awesome choreography.

why I like it: actually you know what, before I go any further, let me skip ahead a bit and add three more panels with this same energy.

I just really, really love these rare moments when all differences between them are momentarily forgotten and they’re just two teenage boys caught up in the intense pressure of an awkward social situation. the one enemy neither of them is the least bit equipped to handle. anyways Horikoshi clearly enjoys it too because he seems to delight in drawing it over and over and over.

why I like it: because it’s more billowing smoke and dust. because it’s Endeavor, the guy we all swore we would never ever root for, and then 160 chapters later Horikoshi pulls this shit without an ounce of shame. because it’s All Might’s pose, but tweaked juuuuuust enough so that Enji can avoid copyright claims. because he knew that pose well enough to know which arm not to use. because Endeavor is a profoundly flawed human being, wholly incapable of filling the void All Might left behind. and yet he still tries. because it’s better than nothing, and because it’s all he can do. it’s the one thing he can do, his sole redeeming virtue. he tries. he doesn’t give up. anyway so yeah, Horikoshi didn’t have to take the single most unlikable person in the entire manga and give him the world’s most controversial and openly scorned redemption arc. but he did! and I think it’s one of the best things about this entire manga.

why I like it: because nothing in BnHA is just black and white!! it’s messy and layered and complex, just like in the real world. Shouto despised his dad for almost his entire life. with good reason! Enji was abusive and selfish and treated his son more like a prized possession than a person. we as readers are fully aware of all of this, and we sympathize with Shouto 100%, and that’s completely by design. Horikoshi is well aware of this. so for him to still give us this little moment, where Shouto is so relieved that Enji survived that he drops to the floor and presses his face against his hands in this little prayer gesture -- whatever you think it might mean -- is just so fucking powerful, and again speaks to his commitment to refusing to let anything in this series be completely clear-cut and unambiguous. I love that the characterization of Shouto and Natsu hating their dad exists side by side with the equally authentic characterization of them being terrified that they’re about to watch him die. because those two things aren’t contradictory! sometimes that’s just how it is. anyway so this is a beautiful moment of nuance that instantly adds so much to this relationship with just a single panel.

why I like it: for once the symbolism is so obvious that even I can’t fail to miss it! Izuku’s face half in light and half in shadow as he thinks about the power bestowed on him. “All for One’s power.” anyway so in my mind Izuku having AFO could not be any more fucking foreshadowed if he was wearing a freaking t-shirt with the Musketeers saying on it and the background was peppered with little Sistine Chapel-esque images of AFO giving his quirk to his brother lmao. but regardless of how it does end up playing out, this is nicely done.

why I like it: I wasn’t sure whether I should include this image, given that I just made a whole separate post about it a few days ago. but I just really like it, okay. this is one of the all-time great entrances in the series. Bakugou being perched on that pole for absolutely no reason other than to add visual interest. Todoroki’s hair blowing dramatically in the wind. Katsuki’s frayed pant hems and characteristically asymmetrical facial expression. the fact that you just know both of them spent the ride home with their faces pressed to the windows of their taxi cab hoping desperately for an opportunity to break in their brand new licenses, and then lo and behold. that’s amazing you guys. it’s almost like you’re main characters or something.

why I like it: they did great.

why I like it: because I lost my fucking shit at this fucking reveal and can you even blame me?? we knew coming in how much trouble Endeavor and Hawks had dealing with just one of these Noumus, and then Horikoshi goes and divulges that the villains have at least A DOZEN MORE waiting on standby. including Hood right there in the foreground, which is a fantastic touch! this panel, for me, almost instantaneously established the League as a legitimate threat once again, and gave me the kind of spine-tingly evil vibes I hadn’t felt since the Kamino arc. and while the payoff might not quite have lived up to my expectations, the Mirko fight at least was more than worth it.

why I like it: BILLOWING SMOKE AND DUST CLOUDS. you just see this vast landscape of destruction that Tomura has oh-so-casually wrought, and this once-powerful enemy utterly defeated on his hands and knees bowing before him. and it’s just like, oh. Tomura just became a fucking king, didn’t he. he finally stepped up and became the main villain. really the main villain, not just an awkward fumbling NEET whose adopted dad is not-so-secretly pulling all the strings. he did this himself. he went out and conquered and Awakened and won himself a fucking army. and he’s just standing there so cool and casual in the aftermath of it all. and then he goes “oh wait, you guys have money right, that means you can buy us the good sushi.” yes, Tomura. yes.

why I like it: um because this panel is fucking amazing?? hello?? do I really need to explain this one. the detail is jaw-dropping. he’s got the little scars which are either from the head wound that caused his death, or from his Noumufication. his expression is fucking heartbreaking, and the transition from Kumo to Kuro is so subtle and seamless, and yet it distinctly is both of them. this panel is gorgeous and fucking haunting and almost made me gasp when I first saw it.

why I like it: the decision to have the night sky take up so much of the space in the panel was [chef kiss]. nothing says existential like the night sky on a cold winter’s night.

why I like it: this is the best panel in the entire fucking series.

why I like it: dude. showing his actual family holding onto him with their hands in the same spot as the severed fashion!hands was a stroke of genius in and of itself. but combining that with the emotional tension of them desperately trying to hold him back and protect him from AFO?? that’s just so fucking smooth it’s almost inhuman. just how much meaning can you cram into a single image?? sometimes I wonder just how far in advance Horikoshi plans these things.

why I like it: guess I’m just a big fat sucker for panels of Tomura calmly standing around in the ruins of his own senseless destruction. the sense of scale on this one is really great, too. and yet again, those dust clouds. gotta love it.

why I like it: because Tomura literally appears out of nowhere, like he’s ripping a hole through the fabric of time and space. it’s so fucking sudden and he looks evil as FUCK, and Deku and Kacchan are totally caught off-guard, and it is scary. this is one of those panels that made me say “holy shit” out loud. in fact I practically screamed it. and the angles are all funky and weird, and the sky is all BLACK FOR NO REASON, and it really just feels like Tomura could reach right over and just MURDER THEM like it was nothing. just like that. this panel is so incredibly effective at conveying how hopelessly outclassed the boys are. they’re not even in his league, and it’s honestly terrifying.

and on that happy note, we have come to the end of my list of favorite panels! and I gotta say, it’s really gratifying that a good deal of them are from this year alone. I said it in another post a few days ago, but imo the overall quality of the series has been insanely high as of late, and it honestly just blows my mind whenever I stop to think about it. the art is still this good six years into the game. the story is still this good. we are spoiled goddammit.

[not-poignant]

Hey Pia hope you’re doing well

I was wondering, is the thing where Arden picks up a bunch of random hobbies and commitments a part of his ADHD or does it have like a name?

I’m a highschool student and I get told by all my friends and teachers that I have overcommitment issues and part of it’s just for uni and whatever ofc but it’s also that I want to do ALL THESE THINGS

Like I’m in 4 different science competition teams, the school debating team, school orchestra, scholarship classes, editor of my school newsletter, I lead the school amnesty and unicef clubs plus the IB program and being in the national maths Olympiad team lol and I don’t want to let any of these go but it’s so stressful and I’m so tired and ppl say I have to say no to stuff which is also stressful!

Also, doing more is always portrayed as such a great thing and I feel rlly guilty letting stuff go? So I’m just reaching out because you portrayed it in such a refreshing way and I was really curious!

Firstly, massive respect for your ability to fit this ask into the Tumblr ask limits. Seriously :D

Okay secondly, Arden’s habit of picking up a bunch of random hobbies / commitments is part of his ADHD. People with ADHD have this to different degrees, and my beta in particular relates really hard to this habit of Arden’s.

But actually, one of the reasons I put this in is because this is a very bad habit of mine - which is overcommitting, and overworking. And not wanting to let anything go.

People teach you a lot of skills in your life on how to pick things up, but almost no one teaches you what to do when you have many hobbies you love, and they’re hurting you because you’re working too hard and don’t have time for your loved ones (or to even really have loved ones) as an example. And it absolutely is a crucial skill to learn for people who are dealing with this, though capitalists don’t want you to learn it.

In the media what I see is most folks having no hobbies and someone being ‘oh you have to learn some.’ I liked Arden as a contrast to that ‘no, that’s too many things, put some back.’ Where Arden’s ADHD manifests - though it’s much more controlled than it used to be - is that he desires to spend a lot of money on the thing as soon as he gets into it (because he only wants the best of the best - which wasn’t great when he wasn’t earning much money), and that he starts really hooking into it in an obsessive kind of way. Spending a night making bows for your dog is one thing. Then wanting to spend $500 and start an Etsy store small business is like...from one day of work, not great.

A lot of Arden’s life has involved choosing to let go of things he’s loved doing, for his own sanity. This is something I’ve had to do as well and I fucking hate it, and these are the techniques I’ve developed for myself (and my still frankly overcommitted ass, who has people saying ‘when are you going to do LESS’ all the time to my face).

* Remind yourself that dropping some things now doesn’t mean you’re dropping them forever. It doesn’t have to be permanent. Sometimes it’s good to put a time limit on something. ‘I’m going to drop this for four weeks / four months and put a note/reminder in my phone about it right now.’ Chances are high you are not going to be as interested in that thing in four weeks/four months. (Chances are sadly also high you may have replaced it with something else). Like, there will be science groups you can join for the rest of your life. And debate groups. And newsletters.

(That being said, none of those things count towards our grades in Australia? So I don’t know how much these things are counting towards your grades in general and I’m not going to like, touch that side of things - however overcommitment is a super fast way to do a lot of things not that well, or to suddenly get so sick you can’t do any of the things and then feel terrible while you’re sick, more on that later!).

* Time caps on certain hobbies and activities and commitments. This is to actually shoot my habit of hyperfocusing in the foot. I don’t have time to play piano for four hours, but I’m allowed to play it for ten minutes a day (sometimes more but not often). And ten minutes a day adds up over time. I literally sit down and put the timer on my phone. If say there’s something that meets up twice a week but some people only go once, be one of those people!

* Rate the things based on how they contribute to your a) career and b) quality of life and c) happiness. Anything that rates lower on the list compared to the others (that isn’t like, literal money-making work or literal classes) needs to be dropped.

* Dropping things is just actually one of the hardest parts and there’s no real trick to making this easier. I just remind myself: ‘Just because I can do this thing, and do this thing well, doesn’t mean it’s good or healthy for me to do this thing. I need to spend time with people I care about, and I need rest, and those things matter more even if they feel less like ‘accomplishments.’ I want to care for myself through my hobbies, not punish myself.’ That goes some way in keeping perspective, but look, ngl, it sucks to drop commitments if you have an accomplishment/achievement/job satisfaction addiction. It just sucks.

* Accept that you are going to feel guilty, and that guilt is just an emotion, and it doesn’t mean you’ve done something bad. Look sometimes guilt gets it wrong! Sometimes you feel crushingly guilty just for breaking a bad habit, it’s not useful, you just have to kind of be like ‘huh I’m feeling a lot of guilt for trying to look after myself, that’s really interesting, I guess I can understand that but I’m also going to try and praise myself for doing a great job. Just because this isn’t an obvious kind of achievement, I know I achieved something really big and difficult today.’

* Oh yeah, use achievement and ‘job’ type language for doing things that involve successfully taking care of yourself and your energy levels. Just...sometimes you have to ‘if you can’t beat them join them’ - chances are you’ve never been as kind to yourself or proud of yourself for resting and taking it easy and seeing friends, than you are for taking on too many commitments. So...challenge yourself to be kind to yourself and proud of yourself for resting and taking it easy and seeing friends and committing to less. Trust me, you are never going to forget how to overcommit, and you are never going to become lazy or lax because you dropped a few of the (billion) things that you’re committed to. You can afford to praise yourself for this! And generously!

* Seriously, seriously consider seeing doctors or psychologists about this. Despite a TON of PTSD, I actually see my therapist most for working too hard and overcommitting. We spend a lot of time talking about why I might not be the worst person in the world for taking a break. Take it seriously. Your list alone made me feel like I was about to have a panic attack, lmao, your friends and teachers are right, you have overcomittment issues.

* Workaholicism and work addiction is real. There is a growing amount of information about how to deal with it and it’s worth googling.

***

Er anyway that’s what I do. It doesn’t always work. I have a lot of rules in place and I abandon half of them about halfway through the year and then s u f f e r. And have been doing that for over 25 years and I’m going to say bluntly now - it’s why I’m as sick as I am, and some of that sickness is irreversible. If nothing else, if you want to stay as active as you are now, I do not recommend that anyone push themselves so hard that they can no longer even do things that they enjoy on a regular basis, because they’re too physically debilitated to manage it, because they pushed their bodies too hard during the university years and just after. Because that is 100% why I became so sick in the first place.

And even extremely healthy people who have no history of chronic illness often develop something, in conjunction with years and years of working too hard or overcommitting. I’ve seen it happen to far too many of my friends, and you might feel like ‘just another six months’ or ‘just another three years’ but you’d be surprised how quickly you can go from ‘I’m doing it I’m doing it’ to ‘I keep getting migraines all the time doctor how do I fix this so I can go back to working as hard as I was before’ and your doctor being like ‘...yeah this isn’t curable. I’m going to give you some meds, that all come with horrible side effects, and you simply can’t do what you were doing before.’ Game over.

Trust me, that shit catches up with your body always. It might not be now, and I hope frankly it’s never, but overcommitment and workaholicism are the two fastest ways I know to chronic illness and once you get there, you can’t work your way out of it again.

Though god knows I have tried.

[notjustabooksims]

(Lol it’s not a writing challenge wtf Louise - it’s a writing tag, but in my defense I made the graphics while waiting for my job interview and I felt like I was dying).

I was tagged by @thesimperiuscurse​ for this, which I am legit hype for because I saw this one and thought it was so cool. And well - here we are. Thanks, Lila. 💕

R U L E S | List five things that you, without fail, weave into or explore in your stories, whether it be specific themes or tropes, character archetypes, allusions to other literary works.

This is basically every story I’ve written. Thinking back, almost all the stuff I’ve written has included some type of (mostly emotionally) abusive relationship, whether it’s with a parent, a romantic partner, a friend, or some combination of these. It has long weirded me out that I had this fascination, but it made sense once I realised that some of my familial relationships are marked by, if not outright emotional abuse, then at least by a good deal of neglect and controlling behaviour. A lot of my stories explore the after-effects of abusive relationships, the damage they do to a person, and how those effects come to light when seen through the lense of a loving, supportive partner or friend. Case in point: Vittoria’s whole relationship to Carlo brings to light how messed up her youth was. Enzo’s relationships with Lorenzo and Gina make him stand up against abuse. Lia’s relationships with her brothers and later Teo do the same for her... it’s all over the place! (It would have cropped up in the sequel to CoM as well for Nadir). And if there’s one thing I want to say through my stories, it’s that it’s always okay to cut someone out of your life if they’re no good for you. Family or friends, it doesn’t matter - you never have to let people hurt you.

Nadir has anxiety which makes him seem like a brooding dark boi and Enzo gets anxiety attacks when he stands up to dad. If I’d ever made the direct sequel to CoM, Genevieve would have had some anxiety/PTSD related to the experiences in the Tournament as well. It’s no secret I deal with anxiety issues myself, so I add anxiety into a lot of stories. One thing I’ll never do, though, is make any character heal via insta-cure. Hence why both Enzo and Lia (and probably the whole family) are in therapy even years after leaving. Therapy, therapy for everyone!

Mmm, yes pleeease. There are usually elements of this to the stuff I write. If it’s not an outer conflict like “rich bois aren’t supposed to love thieves” or an inner one like “I shouldn’t love you because I’m too dangerous for you”, I love me some forbidden love. (Wow, that’s a lot of love). There’s something so delicious about characters who want each other badly, but they can’t or won’t be together... of course it aaaaall builds to that moment when they just can’t help it and give into the feeling. Oh, it’s just the best.

This is even more pervasive than even the abusive vs. healthy relationships in my writing. As mentioned before, Nadir looks like a brooding dark boi, but he’s really a soft nerd boi. Celeste is a pretty, fun-loving blonde who will absolutely wreck your shit. Carlo is a dangerous gang leader, but also the softest soft boi who loves his family and whose main kink is consent. Gina is a gun-toting badass lady, but she loves art and family and she’s terrified of being hurt. Enzo acts cold and arrogant, but is actually a soft boi who cares a lot about his sister. Lia is a pretty, spoiled rich girl who’s actually perceptive, intelligent, and hard-working. Teo is a grumpy grumpster who’s... yeah, you guessed it, he’s a soft boi. I could just have said “soft bois” here, but I think it holds true for so many of my other characters. It’s a good way to subvert expectation while also making a character likeable, I think.

I tend towards bittersweet endings. It’s not because I think happy endings are dumb or for kids - fuck that noise. Optimism and happiness are valid as heck, thank you very much. But I like just that little bit of bitterness in my endings, because I think the good stands out stronger in contrast to the bad. Case in point: in CoM Nadir isn’t completely bad and Genevieve gets a purpose other than the Tournament, but they’re also not together and it might before she can really be comfortable with him after what he did. In the ending to gen 1, Carlo and Vittoria are both alive and well, but they’re forced to live apart. For gen 2, Gina and Enzo are together and happy, but Enzo still suffers from anxiety and other after-effects of abuse, plus he’ll never be able to reconcile with his dad.

I’m tagging @storiesbyjes2g​, @itssimplythesims​ and @amphoraesims​, if you guys want to. If not, that’s okay. And if you want to do it, go ahead and do it. I love this tag a lot and I want to see tons of them.

[goldeneyedgirl]

TwiFicMas2020 Day 1: Anathema

It’s that time of year again - when I bombard you with fic I’ve written over the year and haven’t posted, whether it is an outtake, part of a WIP, or something that ended up going sideways but still had some cool bits I was proud of. 

Everything will be tracked under the ‘TwiFicMas2020′ and ‘FicMas2020′ tags. Most fics are incomplete scenes - “--” is a scene break, “//” means that there’s a cut - it’s probably not yet written. 

--

First up is Anathema, the fourth or fifth attempt at the ‘Alice works in a mortuary/funeral home’ idea that refuses to solidify itself - though I think I’m getting closer. I enjoy the idea that Charlie Swan is in on Forks’ secrets (before Jacob strips in front of him, lol) and I am always here for the supernatural world being more than just vampires and shifters. 

I hope you enjoy and thank you for reading!

The day the Cullens arrive in Forks, two things happen.

The first, I draw both Death, and the Wheel of Fortune. A combination that, frankly, sounds time-consuming. I lie in bed and contemplate them for awhile. The cards are soft, from lifetimes of passing from hand to hand (my dearest and most beloved Great-Aunt Jeanne passed this set to me when she died. At the time, I was too young to understand the true gift in cards that had never before been touched by Brandon hands - before mine.) The cards are illustrated so carefully, so detailed. They smell like dried lavender and the scrap of linen that I wrap them in, and there is something so reassuring about each and every card.

I draw my cards every few days before I get up. I find it calming, the shuffle of them against my fingers, as I let my dreams fade. It’s a quiet time, and one I savour.

Eventually, I do have to get up, though. No rest for the wicked. The cards go back into the wooden jewellery box some young man carved for some young woman in Jeanie’s family long before I was even a glimpse of a thought, and back into my nightstand drawer.

I - we - live on the first floor of the Brandon Funeral Home, a perfectly respectable converted Georgian house at the end of Main Street, where it sweeps around to Cedar Road. It’s a shit place to have a corner, and more than once speed racers have spun out; whoever’s scraped off the road and our front walk usually end up in the freezers in the basement.

But I digress.

Breakfast is mundane. Dulcie is there, hair in curlers, and a frown on her face when she realises I am not dressed. I sit crosslegged across two thrift-store chairs in my camisole and booty shorts, spooning jam onto toast with the precision of a good scientist and ignore her reminding me of my dressing gown (a sturdy pink-flower print flannel that is buried in my closet. My preferred robe, a thin grey kimono, is currently in my laundry pile) and ‘common decency’, as if my elderly great-uncle is looking to leer at the decided lack of anything I have up north or down south.

Dulcie is… Dulcie. No replacement for Aunt Jeanie, but a good woman. I find it funny that Uncle Freddie is an old man now, and he still reels ‘em in. Or he would if Jeanie’s death hadn’t broken, shattered, and wrecked him. Dulcie worked for us for a few years before she set her eyes on the top bedroom and changing ‘Dulcie Dunn-Stanley’ to ‘Dulcie Brandon’.

Oh, that sounds very jaded. It’s mutual, Freddie and Dulcie. Their courtship was glacial and it’s really only recently that Dulcie’s been hinting about heading to the court house. And, honestly, whatever makes Uncle Freddie happy. Dulcie’s kind to me, we mostly get along, and her attempts to mother me are so far inconsistent - but she is usually pretty respectful.

My uncle lingers over his food; he’s got a new book open at his elbow, and no one can pry my uncle away from his books. They’re usually hardcover, non-fiction. Most of the boxes stored in the third floor are my uncles books.

After breakfast, I am banished to get dressed for work, which is in the basement today, where I am to be the hands as we prepare one Lewis Fletcher for his Saturday morning funeral. There’s a sack of bagged organs resting in the chest cavity, from the autopsy (elk or deer attack, the report says), and I get to stitch Lewis back together, get to fill him full of chemicals, seal things with putty, and get to face painting. The Fletchers are a pretty ordinary family locally, and the service will be simple - they were very agreeable when Freddie met with them last week.

I put my music on and hum as I prepare my kit. It’s no secret that an unqualified teenage girl doing this work probably breaks a lot of laws, but Freddie’s hands aren’t as steady as they used to be, and he’s old enough to remember when a family business meant that the younger generation was trained by the older at home, no degrees or certifications necessary.

Sometimes I wonder what Jeanie would have thought, me working down here like this. Would she have understood? Would she have been mad or upset or disappointed?

We’ll never know.

Freddie fetches us both a cup of tea, and hovers at my shoulder as I piece together Mr Fletcher’s chest cavity.

“Smaller stitches, Alice,” Freddie says, inspecting my work carefully. “Redo that section, stitch closer together, and small stitches.”

I nod, turning around to grab a scalpel from the tray beside me to cut the wonky stitches free and start again, and I freeze as the ice-cold feeling envelopes me. No, no, no it’s been so long…

For a moment, I am unfixed in time and space. I am still in the basement, with the buzzing fluorescent lights, and smooth metal drawers and cupboards, the stink of formaldehyde. But instead of a clean, bare second table, I am lying there. But I’m not dead, and I’m not alone. It’s him. The boy - man? - I’ve been seeing for so long, in visions and dreams. He’s hovering above me, a veritable sculpture of pale flesh as he peels off his shirt, our mouths still fused together, my hands gripping his hips. I am a much less collected figure, with my tights around my knees, one shoe still on and my shirt hiked up over my bra. Vision-Me pulls away to say something, and He laughs, and it’s then the light catches his eyes. Dark gold.

Golden-eyes.

“Oh fuck,” Real-Me says, and somehow Vision-Him knows I’m Seeing and looks right at me, where I’m standing with a scalpel in my hand.

“Alice?” My uncle’s hand on my shoulders brings me right back to the right point in time and space.

It’s at the point I hit the floor, manage to stab myself quite viciously with the scalpel and my uncle starts cussing.

It’s been a while between visions.

//

The Council was basically the reason Freddie and I stayed in Forks. It was a fifty-fifty split between honouring Jeanie’s wishes, and keeping me safe and out of sight - as if my aspirations were towards a Vegas nightclub act or international pop star. I wasn’t entirely clueless.  

Forks was built in a special place. A place where the barriers between the ordinary and the extraordinary were a little thinner, where the supernatural were drawn to. Jeanie had theorised that was why the Quileute were able to tap into their spirit wolves so easily, and why the gene remained so strong, father to son without a constant presence of their enemies. I didn’t know enough of their history to have an opinion, but Forks was definitely a place with an interesting history that very few people knew - even I only knew a fraction of everything that happened, past and present. There were very few written accounts; most of the histories were oral and passed down on a strict need-to-know basis.

The Council were definitely in the know, and had been for generations. There was Billy Black, Sue and Harry Clearwater representing the Quileute tribe, there was Charlie Swan representing Forks and everyone not in the know, and there was Freddie and I. Freddie, was technically Jeanie’s representative, and was the Mediator between the Ordinary and the Others. Jeanie’s family had been Mediators for generations, but she’d never had children, so all of that had somehow fallen onto Freddie - and me.

It was extremely useful to have the Police Chief and a Mortician working the Council - we’d had to fudge more than a few deaths. There was always someone or something passing through the Olympic Peninsula, and we’d negotiated, challenged, threatened, and banished more than a few creatures over the last few years.

Technically, all parties were allowed to bring their apprentice representative, but I was the only one of the next generation who attended. Charlie Swan had made it clear he didn’t want his daughter involved in any of this, and both Billy and the Clearwaters had decided that their kids were too young to know exactly what went on around here. I figured in a decade or so, it would just be me, Seth, and Jacob Black (no way would Leah hang around just for this shit show), drinking beer in the woods and deciding whether to burn or bury.

But tonight’s meeting was Special. Despite the fact I’d been drawing nonsensical cards for days now - the Star, the Tower, and Justice - no visions had appeared beyond a dream about a locket with ‘W’ engraved on it. I’d expected a fairly normal meeting, until Freddie had let me in on the plan - we were, apparently, meeting with the Cullen family. No one had informed me exactly what or who the Cullens were, only that they had a ‘fourth seat’ in the Council that they’d been entitled to since the ‘30s. I’d have to go through Jeanie’s diaries again - there were boxes of them in storage, and Jeanie had useful tidbits dotted throughout.

So that was why I was in the forest with my grandfather, shivering underneath two coats and in my new fleecy boots, standing around a fire pit that didn’t really do much more than illuminate the burning wood; the lanterns we’d brought were more effective.

Some days I really wished Leah or Seth or Jacob Black would attend these meetings; they’d certainly liven up these meetings a bit.

“They’ll be here soon,” Billy Black said grimly. Billy Black had it worse than the rest of us - getting out to this part of the forest was awkward and time-consuming with his wheelchair. Since these meetings were clandestine, we couldn’t build a proper track.

“The terms are staying the same?” Charlie asked, sipping from a paper cup of coffee Sue had pressed on him.

Billy frowned. “We aren’t here to renegotiate, but we will listen to their petition if they have one,” he said finally.

“What are the existing terms?” I asked, nudging a mossy rock with my toe.

“We’ll go over that later on, Alice,” Freddie said, watching the woods carefully.

Fine, obstruct my completely transparent attempt at finding out what was actually going on. I was definitely intrigued by the idea this clan had a ‘seat’ at the Council, but it involve negotiations? The only creature I could think of that would fit that kind of profile would be some kind of shifter.

I was bored.

And then the mysterious Cullens arrived.

They came out of the woods like a mist; slowly but all at once. They kept a respectful distance away from the fire pit, clad in pristine new clothing that was a touch too light for the cold weather but was good quality. There were three of them - a blond man, a brunette woman, and a red-haired boy - all three of them taller than average, and pale as snow. And they were lovely, as if Grecian statues had climbed down from their plinth and wandered off.

“Hello,” the man said, nodding at us politely. “Thank you for welcoming us to this meeting.”

“You’ve a right to be here, as outlined in the treaty,” Billy Black said sternly. “This is the current Council - Charlie Swan for Forks. My self, Billy Black, and Harry and Sue Clearwater for the Quileute tribe. Fred Brandon as Mediator. Carlisle Cullen for the Cullen Coven.”

Coven meant vampires. That dampened my spirits a little; my history with vampires was messy. Plus the few vampires that had ventured into this area had been unpleasant experiences. But as I stared at the Cullen coven, I noticed their eyes.

Golden, like liquid light.

Was He one of them? Was the Cullen coven only these three, or where there more?

“And the young lady?” Carlisle Cullen said, looking in my direction.

“My niece,” Freddie said in a no-nonsense tone. “Shall we begin?”

“I assume Ursula Altis has since passed? My condolences to her family,” Carlisle Cullen said. “I had a great respect for Ursula.”

“Yes. Ursula’s apprentice passed on several years ago, and she named Fred and Alice as her successors,” Harry said.

“I am sorry for your loss,” Carlisle Cullen nodded at Freddie and I. I half-smiled back at him. Jeanie had been gone a long time but I still missed her.

“This is my wife, Esme, and my oldest son Edward,” Carlisle gestured to his two companions.

“Oldest son?” Charlie Swan said sharply.

“Yes - I have three others, but we did not want to overwhelm you,” Carlisle said. “They are here, if you would like to meet them?”

“Yes. We want to know the entirety of your coven,” Harry said bluntly.

Carlisle grimaced and nodded. “Of course. My other children - Rosalie, Emmett, and Jasper.”

Three more Cullens materialised from behind Carlisle Cullen - a tall blonde girl who was utterly breathtaking to look at, had a displeased expression, and was wearing the genuine designer version of my knock-off winter coat. The second was a bear of a man, with the friendliest face, and curly black hair, who winked at me as he wrapped an arm around the blonde girl’s shoulders.

And then a lanky blond boy with a dark expression and wavy blond hair, who hovered in the shadows, his features mostly obscured. All of them had the same golden eyes, the same pallor and dark under-eye circles. But they didn’t look or behave like other nomads that had passed through. They looked… like a nice family.

Maybe in a decade, Jacob, Seth, and I would be joined by Emmett Cullen for the ‘burn or bury’ booze up. He looked like he’d be the most up for livening up these meetings.

“Your family has grown.” Billy’s voice was accusing, and I turned to look at his stern expression.

“My son, Jasper, joined us in 1965,” Carlisle Cullen said politely, “Looking for a different lifestyle. We have abided by your terms, and would not have returned to this area if we were not prepared to continue to do so.”

The Quiluetes weren’t thrilled with that news, and Charlie just looked kind of tired. Freddie was taking notes on his phone, and I was just cold and getting bored again… until I noticed movement out of the corner of my eye.

Jasper was prowling away from the others, closer to me, where I stood at my uncle’s side. Both eyes were on me, like liquid amber, and I finally got a good look at him.

Jasper was Him - the boy hovering over me, half-dressed on the gurney; the boy kissing my scar, and sliding in behind me in the shower. The boy that had hovered at the edges of my visions and dreams since I was young, with adoration in his eyes and gentle touches.

The boy I’d love so fiercely and deeply…

Talk about a terrible time to finally meet.

“Oh fuck,” I said, as I looked at him, eyes wide. All those wretched cliches that terrible books write about happened at that moment. I was enchanted, besotted, and absolutely irrevocably attached to this Jasper Cullen. He was mine.

“Step back!” Harry barked out, but Jasper Cullen ignored him, watching me carefully. I couldn’t help myself; I smiled brightly at him, and he kept moving towards me. Flashes of knowledge were appearing in my head, and for some reasons I kept seeing the Lovers card, still in my deck at home. I could hear people talking, getting angry, but it was like the buzz of insects as Jasper Cullen got closer to me. His hand reached out slowly, to stroke the curve of my cheek, studying me with the strangest look on his face.

And then the pain hit, like someone had shoved an ice pick through my left eye and into my brain. The visions were folding over and over, like origami, before I could decipher them. Choices being made, minds changing, so fast I could keep up. I heard myself cry out as I fell, and then everything was dark.

Then I was seeing things in real time. The way I fell, blood running from my nose, to everyone’s utter horror. My eyes were rolled back in my head, and my body jerked in a seizure a few times before I was still.

But no one could get near me. As soon as I had fallen, Jasper had crouched over my prone form, with a horrified look on his face. Everyone was yelling and trying to get closer, and Jasper let out a snarl that was, frankly, terrifying before refocusing on me, taking my hand and plucking my glove off it, to rest against his own cheek. Whatever that was supposed to achieve did nothing, and whilst everyone else was yelling and bickering, he let out a low whine that was so pathetic, if I’d had any control over my body, I would have sat up and given him a hug.

Then Carlisle Cullen placed his hands up to the Council in a gesture of peace and nodded to Emmett before approaching Jasper.

The conversation would have been too low for anyone else to hear, but not me, in whatever kind of vision this was.

“Jasper, I understand,” Carlisle Cullen said in a low voice. “But she’s got a medical condition, you need to let her people take care of her.”

Jasper growled low, Emmett’s hand on his shoulder.

“Bro, c’mon,” he said. “You’re scaring them,” he nodded over his shoulder. Sue’s face was white with fear, and I was scared that Harry was going to stroke out on the spot.

And I was there, Sleeping Beauty, with a smear of fresh blood on my face.

“I can’t,” Jasper seemed to force out between gritted teeth. “She’s mine.” It was said with determination and desperation, and a deep tenderness.

I was pleased that whatever my embarrassing collapse had been, at least I knew we were on the same page -that we knew each other and we knew each other.

And just like that, like they were magic words, my eyes open and I was back in reality, staring up at the man-boy who was staring at me like I held the secrets to the universe.

“Alice, did he hurt you?” Freddie called out in a strained voice.

“No, that was me. Too much new information,” I said, as I began to sit up, Jasper sliding my glove back on my hand before I realised it was still missing. He held out his hand to help me up, his touch so careful and gentle.

“Okay, good. Come over here,” Freddie motioned for me to move to where the group seemed to have bunched across from the Cullens. Charlie Swan looked murderous. “She’s nothing to you, boy, just let her go.”

I winced when Freddie said that, realising immediately it was like a red flag to a bull, and all of a sudden there was a lot of motion. Jasper growled, attempting to shove me behind him - to protect me? - whilst Emmett and Carlisle Cullen decided it was time to get Jasper physically under control, and pulled him back towards where the rest of the family was standing.

I tripped over a rock and stumbled but righted myself as Jasper was bodily dragged back to where Esme, Rosalie, and Edward Cullen were waiting, looking worried.

“Are you okay, sweetheart?” Mrs Cullen asked as I moved back to Freddie’s side, where he quickly clasped me to him, giving me the once over.

“I’m fine,” I said before catching Emmett having bent Jasper’s arms behind  his back at a hideous angle, his knee digging into Jasper’s spine. “Oh, don’t hurt him! Please!” I made a move towards them but Sue grabbed my arm, and Jasper turned to stare at me with what I can only describe as hope.

“I think this meeting is done,” Charlie Swan said finally. “You agree to maintain the existing treaty - that’s all we need. Thank you for coming.”

“Of course, we don’t want to cause any issues,” Mrs Cullen said, and Freddie snorted, shielding me with his body.

I felt like a prisoner being frog-marched back to the car.

“Back at the Brandon’s?” Charlie said, as we arrived at the cars.

“Of course,” Freddie said. “Coffee and debrief.”

//