#I can’t take the slightest bit of criticism or else I’ll feel like shit for a week

[malachitezmeyka]

Idk why I thought the new year would suddenly bring immense change to me as a person, it was such a childish belief, I can’t believe I let myself fall for it. The years go by but I remain the messed up anxious wreck who starts crying the second she’s left alone with her thoughts. The new year won’t change anything, nothing will

[jingyismom]

Thanks everyone for the prompts! I decided to try and knock these all out in one go:

@thegirlwhotrashcans: remember, you asked for it. au, nobody dies, wwx and yanli bodyswap. they're married to lwj and jzx. 100% crack. bonus points if jin zixuan completely loses his shit and lwj looks very calm but loses his sh*t after everything is back to normal

@alightbuthappypen: Competency kink! One or both of them (when I say 'them' I mean wangxian obvs, I know what I'm about) getting hot and bothered about the other being amazing. On a nighthunt maybe? Or anywhere else that strikes your fancy!

@hearteyeswangji: WRITE MORE P*RN

I think I can manage that. With a few tweaks, accidental seriousness, and broad, ridiculous fix-its tacked on. I have no idea how long this might be. Let’s try it in installments? I’ll reblog and add on as I go. Maybe it’ll be fun. We’ll find out.

Disclaimer that this is just gonna go for it with no revising and no beta readers, so pls do not hold me to any conceivable standard of coherency thx

--

WILL INCLUDE: wangxian, xuanli, let jyl and lwj be friends agenda, canon divergence, fix-it, everybody lives, arranged marriage, bodyswap, light angst, getting together, Attempts at Comedy, eventual (light?) wangxian smut

The Sunshot Campaign has just been won. Everyone goes over to Jin Guangshan’s house after the Nightless City banquet, to Negotiate Stuff, and some hasty political marriages happen resulting in Xuanli Wedded Bliss and Wangxian Un-confessed Wedded Tension. Then, suddenly...a curse befalls our brave heroes.

--

Wei Wuxian wakes suddenly, feeling odd. He’s sleeping on his stomach for one thing, which is not his usual, but he feels warm and comfortable enough that he doesn’t think it strange. But then there is the scent of peonies and gardenias, which is both familiar and alien, somehow. It makes him open his eyes. 

Which is when he sees the hand before him on the bolster. It is slender and elegant. Small. Pale. Familiar? Wearing a jade bangle. He pushes himself up a bit, startled, only to see the hand move when he does. 

The hand. Is his hand. He stares at it. The shock of it, coupled with the early hour, leave his mind working very slowly.

At length, he becomes aware of an odd weight across his back, which then shifts. Wei Wuxian turns.

He is met with the sleepy, moon-eyed stare of one Jin Zixuan, still cradling him in his arms.

“What the fuck,” says Wei Wuxian. His voice is. Soft. And high.

He would think this was all some messed-up dream if not for the fact that his dreams of late have all been messed up in an entirely different way. He’s also certain, in an odd, detached way, that he never would have imagined the battle scars that mar Jin Zixuan’s distressingly visible skin.

Jin Zixuan’s brow furrows, and he blinks. “A-Li?”

“...What the fuck.”

~~~

When Lan Wangji wakes at his customary hour, he is just slightly more tired than usual. The coverlet over him is oddly heavy, but he does not give it any thought until light from the rising sun slips over an unfamiliar sill and into his eyes. His entire body goes tense as he remembers. 

Jinlintai. The long hours of debate, of negotiation. The hasty marriages. 

He sits up in his strange bed and turns. There, in the bed opposite, is Wei Ying’s sleeping form. Close, yet still distant. Safe, at least.

Lan Wangji relaxes, and takes a breath. It was a near thing, keeping the sects from demanding more and more from Wei Ying, from treating him like a criminal instead of the hero he is. But somehow, Jiang Wanyin and Xiongzhang ended up on the same page, defending him, working tirelessly toward a compromise with the more critical parties. And now Lan Wangji has the dubious honor of ‘keeping Wei Ying in check,’ as Yao-zongzhu so inelegantly put it, through marriage. 

A strictly political marriage. A convenient solution. To bind them together, to keep Wei Ying tied under the umbrella of Lan Wangji’s rigid honor. 

It is unclear, as of yet, if Wei Ying resents this arrangement. He has not been himself since Nightless City, and the destruction of Wen Ruohan’s forces. First his long coma, then a lingering tiredness that he has not seemed able to shake, which dampens his normally-vivid expressions of feeling.

Lan Wangji is worried. But this, at least, Wei Ying has made clear is unwelcome. He seems to want to pretend that nothing has changed. Not about himself, and not between the two of them. Lan Wangji has done his best to honor his wishes, despite everything.

Now, he rises and dresses before sinking into his morning meditation. It is still strange to do so fully dressed, weighed down by the propriety required for the public, but it has felt necessary, now that Wei Ying shares chambers with him. A physical manifestation of the barrier between them, more important than ever now that they are, bizarrely, married. 

Before his meditation is finished, he hears Wei Ying stir. It is unusual for him to wake so early. Lan Wangji’s eyes snap open, immediately searching him for signs of pain.

Wei Wuxian turns over, then goes very still. He sits bolt upright, searching the bed with wild eyes, then turns them on the room at large. When they land on Lan Wangji, he curls in on himself, the fingers of one hand tightening at the collars of his sleeping robe, clutching it closed.

“La—Lan-er-gongzi?” 

His voice is oddly breathy, and his eyes...they are wide with confusion, with just the slightest tinge of fear. Lan Wangji is struck nearly senseless by the term of address, aberrant in Wei Ying’s mouth.

“What is wrong?”

Searching the room again, Wei Wuxian moves toward the edge of the bed with a strangely graceful modesty. It looks alien on his long limbs. “My...my husband. Where…?”

The word jolts through Lan Wangji’s entire body. He has never heard Wei Ying say it before. He has...wanted to hear it. Dearly, he realizes suddenly. But it sounds wrong. Distressed. Everything Wei Ying says sounds wrong.

“Wei Ying,” he says. 

Wei Ying’s eyes snap to his. “A-Xian? Where is he? Is he with A-Xuan? Are they alright?”

Lan Wangji blinks at him, uncomprehending, for several seconds. Then he begins to understand.

“You are not—”

The doors to their chambers burst open, and Jiang Yanli rushes in. The tasteful purple and gold robes she has adopted in the few days since the weddings are loose, uncharacteristically askew—not impreprietous, but verging on it. She spots Lan Wangji and her stormy expression clears.

“Lan Zhan,” she says, and her shoulders droop. 

Lan Wangji blinks at her, thrown by her use of this name, then glances at Wei Ying, who has gone completely still, his mouth open in a small, shocked ‘o.’ Jiang Yanli follows his gaze and freezes.

Just then, Jin Zixuan comes barreling into the room, significantly more unkempt than his wife. He has not even tied back his hair. 

“A-Li,” he implores, “what’s happened? We can’t just go barging into our guests’,” he pauses, and bows awkwardly, hastily, to Lan Wangji and Wei Ying in turn, “rooms like this. Please,” he takes her arm, but she shakes him off. 

She’s still staring at Wei Ying. “Sh...Shijie?”

Wei Ying startles, and looks down at himself. He holds out his arms, his hands, and looks at those too. Then he looks up at Jiang Yanli. “A-Xian?”

“Shijie,” Jiang Yanli says, and slumps over to the bed, embracing Wei Ying.

“A-Li,” hisses Jin Zixuan, scandalized. 

Lan Wangji glances at Jin Zixuan’s wife embracing his own husband on the bed, and rises. He walks briskly past them all to shut the door. Then he returns. 

“Wei Ying,” he says again. Jiang Yanli looks up at him.

It is obvious, now that he has realized it. Her face, animated by his personality. The soft warmth of her eyes sharpened just so. The deliberately graceless way she threw herself—himself—into Wei Ying’s—no, Jiang Yanli’s—arms.

Lan Wangji takes a deep breath. “Is this a curse?”

“Yes,” Wei Ying says with Jiang Yanli’s face, but his own certainty.

“How can we break it?” Lan Wangji asks.

“I”m not sure, not yet. I need to try a few things—or—having the original curse would be safer.” He looks at his sister in his own body. “I...don’t really want to experiment with this.”

Jiang Yanli tsks and bumps his shoulder a little too forcefully, jostling Wei Ying in her currently slight form. “Vain,” she says, teasing.

“Shijieee,” he whines. It sounds bizarre in Jiang Yanli’s voice. “I don’t want to accidentally hurt you.”

“I know,” Jiang Yanli says, soothing. 

“Do you feel alright?” Wei Ying goes on, urgent.

“Perfectly alright, now that you’re both here,” she says, smiling at the newcomers in turn.

Something sharply acidic surges in Lan Wangji’s stomach at such a look on Wei Ying’s face, directed at...Jin Zixuan.

“Really, though,” Wei Ying presses, “any nausea? Dizziness? Pain? You’re not worried?”

“Not at all. Our A-Xian will figure it out.”

Lan Wangji watches as the appearance of Wei Ying’s knuckle affectionately brushes Jiang Yanli’s nose. 

Strange. It is all...so strange.

“If—”

“What is happening?” Jin Zixuan interrupts.

All three of them look at him. He stares between them, wild-eyed and desperately askew. Lan Wangji has never considered him to be particularly slow on the uptake, but he supposes allowances must be made for the stress of waking up with a stranger in one’s bed.

He does not care to investigate the perverse pang of jealousy he feels at the thought.

“A-Xuan, it’s me,” Jiang Yanli says. Jin Zixuan stares at her in Wei Ying’s body, uncomprehending. She goes on slowly, but not unkindly. “A-Xian and I have been cursed into each other’s bodies. He’s in there, and I’m in here.”

Her husband blinks several times, very quickly. Lan Wangji recognizes the moment it sinks in by the deep flush that rises across his entire face, and is certain he does not wish to know what precisely inspired it. 

Jin Zixuan takes an involuntary half-step back, then forward again, as he speaks with renewed urgency. “Why has this happened? Can it be undone?”

“Great questions,” Wei Ying says, falsely encouraging. Lan Wangji exchanges a glance with him, and it almost feels natural, to share such a thing with either Wei Ying or Jiang Yanli. “Someone was clearly either targeting me—that’s Wei Wuxian, that’s me, in here—or you...whom you know to be Jin Zixuan. I hope.”

Jin Zixuan turns a deeper shade of red. “Obviously,” he bites out. “But why?”

Wei Ying rolls his eyes dramatically. It is not something Lan Wangji ever imagined Jiang Yanli doing.

“We don’t know yet, but we will once we find and question the person responsible,” Wei Ying says. Jiang Yanli grips his arm suddenly. Wei Ying looks at her. “And yes, it can be undone. Of course it can. I’ll figure it out.”

“Cast a rebound,” Lan Wangji says, brisk. The more quickly they are done with this, the better.

Wei Ying’s face falls. “Ah,” he says, “well, we…”

“My cultivation is too weak for him to reliably use,” Jiang Yanli says suddenly. “And I’m not very good at the method, I’m afraid.”

Lan Wangji nods. Steps forward. Then hesitates. “If the curse was cast in such a way, one of you may end up in the caster’s body. And they in yours.”

They all look at Jiang Yanli. Her expression grows grim. “Alright,” she says, then looks to Lan Wangji. There is something steely in her expression that is familiar on Wei Ying’s face. “Thank you for the warning. Go ahead.”

Lan Wangji hesitates only a moment longer, expecting protests from the other two. But Wei Ying is wearing a small, knowing smile, and Jin Zixuan merely nods at her, reassuring. Lan Wangji senses his esteem for the Jin heir rising at such solid trust in his wife. 

He steps forward and casts the rebound. They all hold their breath. 

Wei Ying glances around, his wry expression entirely foreign on Jiang Yanli’s face. “Anything?”

“No,” says Jiang Yanli.

Wei Ying sighs. “More work for us, then.”

“A-Xian,” Jiang Yanli says, taking gentle hold of his wrist. “You know what this means.”

“Ah?”

“You’ll have to be me.”

“Ah. No, I—”

“A-Xian.”

Wei Ying scratches his head, a not-at-all ladylike gesture. “Or we could just stay in here and let these two investigate?”

The smile Jiang Yanli turns on him is tender, and knowing, and indulgent. “I’d like to see you try to sit still when there’s a puzzle to solve.”

He sighs. “Alright. But you have to be me, too.”

She nods, and theatrically slouches into a sprawling, sloppy posture. Wei Ying laughs, his head thrown back, a hand on his stomach. Jin Zixuan turns around, looking almost ill. 

Lan Wangji understands, and he doesn’t. It is dizzying, and distinctly wrong-looking, to see both of them this way. Yet there is also something endearing about it. About the parts of them that do overlap, and fit into each other better than one would expect. 

“A-Xuan,” Jiang Yanli calls softly, noticing her husband’s distress.

Lan Wangji gets the distinct impression that that tone in Wei Ying’s voice is not helping the situation.

“Jin-gongzi,” he says. “It would be best for all of us to go about our days as normal, and not to arouse suspicion. Wei Ying sleeps late, and will not be missed for the morning. Jin-shao-furen may claim mild illness until the afternoon. But you and I must behave as normal. There are still the other sects to host.”

“Yes,” Jin Zixuan says absently. He runs a hand over his face. “Yes. You’re right. A-Li—” he turns and looks at the pair of them on the bed, and pauses. He shakes his head as if to clear it. “I’ll go back and dress. Join me when—or—Wei—” he stops. “I will be attending my duties. Please let me know what else I can do.”

“Remember to act natural,” Jiang Yanli says. “When A-Xian joins you later, try to look less like a roasted tomato, hmm?”

Jin Zixuan’s mouth twists into a wry smile, and he nods at the floor, then flees the room. Jiang Yanli and Wei Ying turn their eyes to Lan Wangji.

“I shall also depart,” he says. He circles his arms to bow to Jiang Yanli, but Wei Ying stands and pulls him over toward the door. Lan Wangji lets him, and tries not to pull away from the improprietous touch from a married lady. 

“Lan Zhan,” he says, hushed and urgent. “I’m not...you don’t think I’m hurting her, am I? Just by being in here? Can you sense any resentment?”

Lan Wangji feels something tighten in his chest. Wei Ying has not let Lan Wangji so much as examine his pulse since he roused from his coma, but the idea that he is so constantly steeped in resentment as to cause worry that his very soul may be harmful...is distressing. He takes hold of his slender wrist carefully. It is still Jiang Yanli’s body, and he will treat it with the respect it is owed. 

“I cannot,” he says. The only energy in Jiang Yanli’s body is generated by her own small but steady golden core. “I sense nothing that may be harmful.”

Wei Ying lets out a relieved breath. “Alright. But, um. What about the other way? Is her...is my body harming her?”

Lan Wangji turns to go back and perform the same examination, but Wei Ying stops him. “No, that’s alright. I’ll. We’ll just get this over with, and we can. Between the two of us, we can fix whatever...whatever damage I do.”

Lan Wangji stares at him, but Wei Ying refuses to meet his eyes. At length, he nods. “We can.”

“Alright. Ah, thanks. You should go.”

Lan Wangji goes.

[shijiujun]

on the danmei twitter fight

okay guys i didn’t wanna say anything about this and yes it’s that hot danmei twitter translations saga thing that’s going on, because honestly i feel like there’s nothing much to say but when i see dumb posts on tumblr taking about that, by people who present a misleading hot take and their friends or moots run off with it without even knowing what exactly is going on - it really pisses me off.

and also if you shit talk translators for not continuing their translations or locking their translations whatever - the door is that way on your right and left, but anyway here’s a rundown on what happened because i am seeing people make comments without two brain cells put together, without the slightest bit of consideration for the people who bring them translations

here’s my hot take and thesis: if you enjoy english translations made by fan translators, you don’t, in any way, no matter happens, shit talk fan translators. fan translators do this for free, and whatever their intentions are, whether genuine sharing or like some of you like to say, for clout, if you consume, and you enjoy these translations, i’m sorry, you’re not uninvolved, and you don’t get to sit on a high horse and say translators should or shouldn’t do something. you should just keep quiet, honestly, because someone else is doing you a favour, a favour that you are enjoying and taking. that’s what respect is.

i’m presenting both sides or i guess three sides of the story as objectively as i can, altho my support is still for fan translators who were just minding their own business before this blew up.

===

🔺 what happened:

so it started because one of the bigger translators in the fandom did this poll - i’m not blaming her at all, i doubt she had any intentions of shaming anyone or causing any controversy and was plain curious, but her poll asked english speaking danmei twitter how many people buy the digital, print copies of the danmei they read, and who did not. 

in my honest opinion, it’s not strange at all for her to have created that poll, considering just how much work she’s put into making sure things are accessible for the eng-speaking danmei fandom. i mean i’d be curious too, to know out of my thousands of readers, what the reading and buying behaviour is like. do yourself a favour and don’t read too much into it.

obviously in an era where a lot of people do consume content for free whether the underlying content is profit-making (like anime, donghua, manhua, manga etc.) or not (fanfiction etc.), it was unsurprising to see that the last option - the ones who consume danmei without paying a single cent, came out as the majority. i don’t think this is a surprising result at all, for all sorts of reasons that i will not get into now.

anyway, this is obviously kind of a sore point in the fandom especially for translators who want a wider audience to support their fave author’s works - i won’t get into that for now, but the issue began because other translators or fans started to criticize the majority of people who don’t pay for objectively rather affordable danmei and just consume things for free. 

and yes, i don’t deny that the argument on both sides got really heated and emotionally charged with both sides calling each other names which i believe is uncalled for, but it totally derailed the crux of the issue, which basically is that the majority of english-speaking danmei fandom - consumes danmei for free.

anyway this whole thing escalated and fan translators were brought into this for no fucking reason at all except that the people who didn’t want, or were unable to pay for the danmei they usually consume, made what i call a LOGICAL FALLACY in argument by going to the extremes, i will explain why later.

the end result is that fan translators were brought into this (most of them, the bigger ones i know at least) without even participating in the direct crossfire. and obviously, you can see why they’re hurt and decided to lock their translations. let me explain why

===

🔺 kind of like four camps:

(1) translators and fans who criticized those who consume danmei liberally but do not pay for them in any way - no merch, no digital copies, no physical copies, no audio dramas whatever

*** their arguments:

danmei is so cheap right, that technically people should be able to pay for it in one way or another, even if not all

danmei and its authors are, at the end of the day, out here to earn a living, and the industry, like any money-making industry, is a for-profit enterprise - and unlike public goods, if you cannot afford danmei, then there is no obligation for others to make it free for you (fan translators or otherwise, it wasn’t super clearly stated while this shitshow happened) when it is inherently a for-profit industry

yes, i don’t deny that some of them did call the peeps who don’t pay at all, “leeches” and other sort of names. personally, i wouldn’t go that far or even like venture there to be honest because in general, if it’s something that i’ll get punched in the face for if i called someone that in real life i tend not to do it, but i’ll leave my opinions, whatever they’re worth, for later

(2) the readers and fans of danmei who do not pay in any sort of way for them

*** their arguments:

some of them really cannot afford, even the dollar or more, to spend on danmei for several reasons: upbringing, culture, money-spending mindsets, real poverty, struggling to make ends meet etc. - some definitely more valid than others (and when i say not valid, it’s because SOME, a minority or like those few stragglers, say they cannot afford and then you see them like idk, throwing $50 on other merch on kpop and stuff - i’m just bringing up ONE example. not shaming anyone for spending more money on one aspect rather than the other, but yeah you can see why some of them, when making this same argument, are a little invalid, that’s just a small number of them tho)

if translators are blaming them for consuming free of charge, then the fault lies, at its foundation, fan translators who translate illegally, which i mean, in that definition, all of them including me 

did i mention that we were called illegal translators like you know in response to being called leeches? anyway-

(3) others translators who literally were just minding their own fucking business before some smart alec dragged them into it

i don’t think most of us had an argument. we were just quietly munching on popcorn and staying out of it and yeah, can you imagine, we provide a service, however illegal it is, for free on our own time, we don’t even check whether people support legally or not, we just... provide, and pray that those who are able to, at least support in some small way or another do so, on their own time. i mean i don’t check, most of us don’t, not the bouncers at your local club before COVID happened do, and then suddenly, to be used to derail an argument, we were called illegal translators. and that we should stop translating, and that it is our fault that there are free riders in the fandom

(4) people who offered to provide JJWXC credits to those who said they couldn’t afford it etc.

honestly i think they were just trying to help - no different than a gofundme. there’s no shame in taking a free thing that people already weren’t intending to pay for. it’s there, just take it!

===

🔺 the shitshow that led to fan translators locking their stuff up:

i would provide some actual examples in the form of screenshots but i’ve blocked most of them, and i don’t want to direct any sort of traffic to them so i guess you’ll have to take my word on it or go search on twitter yourself but-

(1) the affordability issue: i can understand the frustration at being called leeches, and some if not a majority of people, do have valid reasons for not being able to afford something or anything and end up pirating content they enjoy. hey, i am not about to crucify anyone for pirating at some point in their lives. we all have done it at some point, or for example hate disney+ and that $30 they were trying to rip off us for a subpar Mulan live action. i don’t have anything to say about that. inherently, is it wrong and illegal? yeah sure of course it is. do we call people leeches? i wouldn’t go that far.

if anyone cannot afford, cannot access for whatever reason, fine, i’m not gonna go check if jjwxc truly is banned in your country, or is your postal service so terrible that you definitely won’t be able to receive a hard copy of the book you like at affordable rates.

and if you have to pirate? go ahead. i mean it’s always been a rampant thing. the only thing fan translators and fans can do is encourage, motivate and incentivise as much as possible to get people to support legally. they can only put up REALLY COMPREHENSIVE guides as to how to access jjwxc or taobao or whatever. 

and if you still cannot afford it and pirate, honestly no one cares about the story behind it. you owe no one justification, just as how no other person is obligated to take it into consideration or understand you or empathize with you. i don’t say this in a malicious way - i do think that in general, you just do you. 

(2) the poor people don’t deserve nice things argument: honestly, this was not the point of this entire debacle, altho yes, people were rude to those who could not afford to support legally. but this is not the point of this whole thing.

main point - there are free riders who can support but choose not to because they choose to just consume it for free and if you are able to you should support

everyone going off on a tangent - you guys hate poor people / you guys are leeches

well guess what, no one wins in this argument. 

there were a lot of people saying “reading danmei is our only source of happiness, are you saying poor people who can’t access legally don’t deserve to read danmei” (this is just one example i’ve seen, there are other variations), and it wasn’t put across perhaps in the right way, but the other camp of people were saying “you’re not entitled to it for free if you cannot afford it”, which raised a lot of hackles and anti-poor yellings 

altho i do not deny that there are those who mean it maliciously, i think what everyone is trying to say is - the danmei industry, like any other profit-making industry, is looking to make profits. the people working in the industry, the authors even, are looking at numbers - traffic to jjwxc or other legal platforms, how much revenue they’re making from their live actions etc., comments, rankings, etc. i think @/hunxi-after-hours made a really succinct post on this aspect which yall should read.

it’s the same as - if you wanted to purchase a standee which costs $20 USD, but you cannot afford it = you don’t get it. there’s no way you can get this standee unless some gifts it to you for free. what the camp trying to ask people to support legally is saying, is that danmei is NOT A PUBLIC GOOD. it is a private, for-profit product. it might be intangible, but it is a PRODUCT that has a price that needs to be paid.

if you cannot afford it, you either don’t get access entirely (i’m saying this objectively and honestly from an economic standpoint). if someone gifts that standee to you for free, count yourself lucky - if someone makes a danmei accessible to you for free, COUNT YOURSELF LUCKY. you don’t have to be grateful and treat them as gods or like obey their every word, but it’s not rocket science. someone did you a favour that you accepted and consumed, show some respect. 

if you cannot afford to buy the standee - you do not go on twitter demanding that someone ensures that you have access to the standee for free. do you see how ridiculous this sounds once it’s a tangible product? and danmei novels ARE PRODUCTS. they are not FREE CONTENT. if someone cannot afford the standee, this is the equivalent of people going “we didn’t get the standee for free because poor people don’t deserve nice things”

totally missing the point. i don’t even know how it got to this. once again, i do admit that some users were unnecessarily mean, but going to the extreme of this is ridiculous. in argumentative essay writing we call this a logical fallacy:

e.g. “if you cannot pay for merchandise or danmei, it is a fact that you might not have access to it” morphing into “if we cannot pay for food, does this mean we cannot have access to it?!” - this is a slippery slope, and factors are not equivalent!!!! do they not teach people anything in school

don’t confuse fanfiction with danmei - danmei novels ARE PAID PRODUCTS unless for free chapters, just because it’s released online doesn’t mean it’s free public property, and also selected novels (did you guys know the WHOLE of SCI novel is free? about 500 chapters sorry, random, just a tidbit)

there are of course nuances right, like if anyone told me they were pirating disney+ content i’d be like yeah hey get one over those bloodsuckers, they take enough of our money and produce shit content anyway. the difference is that danmei authors, and the danmei industry itself can still be considered a nascent and not-yet matured industry, with a majority of authors if not all, depending on monetary flow, likes, comments, virality on the sites their content is hosted on, for a living, unlike hugeass MNCs trying to squeeze us dry for content that isn’t even interesting.

danmei is priced rather reasonably - and this brings me to another argument that was made, that the value of money is not the same for everyone. i don’t want to make comments on this because yes this is correct to a large extent. a $6 book might be cheap to most of us, but might be expensive to someone else. i’m not gonna comment on how cheap or whatever it is, if you gotta use your money for other things, definitely! i still maintain however, that a novel less than a dollar should be affordable to most people, a majority of people. and i definitely side eye some users who obviously have money but are just creating noise because they wanna continue free-riding

(4) the “they’re losing out on their international audience” argument: honestly, i feel like english-speaking danmei fandom gives themselves a bit too much credit. danmei has long thrived in china in its domestic market - sure the international audience is a plus to have and i’m sure the authors are grateful and flattered that people who don’t understand chinese love their content and love it a lot, but do they and their companies care about fans who basically don’t bring in money? i’m not sure (okay i’ll get to the fan translators doing illegal shit later okay i got it don’t be impatient)

and international fans are great, i don’t deny that - but when i see arguments like “oh but it’s their loss if they don’t cater or deny access to us, they get more popularity and sharing overseas”, i honestly think they don’t care as much as you think. once again, hunxi made a really good argument regarding non-sinophone audiences, but it really irks me, because this is the same as:

an instagram influencer saying they’ll give a restaurant exposure for free to their followers, if they get a free meal

it’s par for par - danmei authors wants earnings, popularity, tangible results that show that they are succeeding. this is life. if i put something out there for sale, i better be getting returns, simple economic logic. they probably don’t care that a non-paying reader is bringing them greater ‘exposure’ - once again, i mean this objectively. 

and yes if they’re thriving without the international market then why should it matter that people are pirating right? which brings me to the next point~

(5) it’s fan translators faults for so many people pirating, and fan translators are the ones doing the “illegal” work: this one is like... wow where do i unpack this and how-

firstly, we are talking about assholes who can pay but decide to free ride and not pay for danmei, and we assume that if you really cannot afford and have to pirate, no one’s saying anything as long as you don’t go around spreading how to pirate, how the hell did it get to fan translators from “you guys are anti-poor” and whatever

yes, fan translations are indeed illegal, i don’t deny that, and i also don’t deny that there are translators who translate for clout and popularity but putting these aside - here’s what i have seen from people who ran their mouths and made this argument

“if you guys care about us pirating the book so much than fan translators shouldn’t have translated in the first place” and “if you wanna come after us for reading illegally, then fan translators, you guys should go get the copyright for the book and then translate it cuz what you guys are doing is also illegal”

hooooo i’m telling ya, i am all for translators locking up their translations at this point. see how fucking hurtful that is? you eat from my hand and then now you biting at the hand that fed you the gays in love?

honestly if you’ve made this argument or supported this, you can basically go to hell. yes this is personal because what, you think fan translators don’t take out their personal time and effort and hard work to make translations accessible to you? if you’re ever consumed and read translations, don’t be a hypocrite and make this argument. you benefitted from it, now you wanna say it’s their fault? 

most translators want to share and spread the love they have for a novel right, want to show you how wonderful all these authors are, how much enjoyment u get from reading these wonderfully thought out stories of gays in love. yes we all know we are illegally translating, which is why on top of sharing we first, purchase the novels legally ourselves first, and then we try to encourage people to buy etc. and actually put their money to use. it doesn’t make it any less illegal, but we are bridging the gap between danmei and basically the english-speaking fandom, albeit illegally

we aren’t that self-important to ask for gratefulness but some respect would be nice. like i said, you read it, you consumed it, you enjoyed it, you can only access it because of illegal translators - a bit counter-intuitive to yell at these translators, who are simply telling you, if you can, please support. and none of us went “if you cannot afford, begone!”

===

🔺 some people tried to help by offering jjwxc credits so people who cannot afford as they say, can get legal access: honestly, just take it right, guess what some of these users did in response

they said the people giving away credits are trying to redeem themselves for their comments by giving away free stuff

they also said that we are trying to shame the people who cannot afford it with this handout to them, to show that they are the bigger person - the fact that they think this is a handout to them is TELLING. the people offering this is giving their money not to these readers, but to the authors! that’s the point of this exercise!!!

one of them even said “instead of trying to do these giveaways, here, there are greater world problems out there, donate instead to these causes” - love the initiative, but how did we get from being able to afford danmei and entertainment content to saving the world? i just- i cannot

===

🔺 so why i get why fan translators are locking up their translations, because wow, so hurtful:

you have no idea how many fucking assholes went “sure, lock up your translations, deal with the consequences” - ermmmm firstly, thanks for making a threat. like who the fuck do you think you are?

the consequences is... the authors still don’t get the money these free riders weren’t going to give them anyway, so no loss, and they weren’t reading on jjwxc anyway so you know, the authors don’t lose or gain any readership numbers or traffic they didn’t already have. instead, it WILL push and force people to pay for the PRODUCT. once again, it’s a product.

this works, and i’d say Word of Honor’s payment model worked marvellously for Youku, because they fucking forced everyone to pay to access content. ALL OF THEM. sure ok some people still pirated it, but how many MORE people paid on Youku, on Youku Youtube, watched on Viki etc. than if they didn’t? even english-speaking fandom were wracking their brains trying to purchase a Youku pass even if there were no subs initially - and other examples that lovely hunxi brought up in her amazing piece

and for translators?! honestly me for one, i’m glad i don’t feel pressured anymore to churn out a chapter every week since we get called names etc. most of us are glad to have a break to be honest. we’ve lost all motivation to translate because it’s a free service, at the very least we don’t expect like hate, or rudeass fuckers. for those who are doing a proof of purchase thing - go for it honestly! 

hopefully it’ll minimize the free rider problem - some people for whatever reasons really cannot buy or support legally, that’s totally cool and they don’t have to justify it, i get that. but for others making the same argument but obviously are just unwilling to pay because they can’t read chinese, think it’s too troublesome when there are guides and translators provide it for free anyway so what’s the point - we all make concessions and make decisions to grab what we like (not talking about the ppl who have their various troubles and difficulties!)

===

🔺 and those who are saying why is it the ‘rest of us suffer’ from locked translations just because of a few bad apples:

IT ISN’T ABOUT YOU. where the hell were all of ya when we were getting called illegal huh? it’s about us fan translators getting shot at for no reason, and then people still demanding things for free. i don’t see any of the people i’ve seen on tumblr complain about fan translators stopping or locking translations defend any of us in any way. instead, you’re complaining.

it is the translator’s prerogative to start, stop and end translations, unless of course the original author starts to sue i suppose. i see people on tumblr going like if they were gonna do this, they shouldn’t have started in the first place etc. - i don’t what world you live in, but when i do something for free, then get called names and am attacked or get dictated on how i should do something that’s already like free, i tend to be less generous.

i’m sorry, do us illegal and free translators owe ANY OF YOU? i wasn’t aware any of us were being paid for this hobby. readers, especially those who CAN and just refuse to support, don’t get to say SHIT. translators deal with so much shit and so many entitled readers, i say they get to lock whatever they want as long as they aren’t profiting off of this monetarily.

let me give you an example - nan chan, which is translated by lian yin, completed translations by the way for all chapters. it is all free for viewing, and she only locked up one extra and asked for proof of payment. some dumbfuck quotes that locked up extra chapter tweet and said “honestly, this turned me off reading this novel because they restricted access”.

the. fucking. entitlement. the whole of nan chan is free, that’s like what more than 80 chapters. she locked up the EXTRA and the money goes to the author, she doesn’t earn anything. AND HERE THAT BIJ is (yes, i’m going to call them names because you know, fucking asshole who didn’t bother to check) going “yeah i didn’t wanna read because 1/80+ chapters were locked”. 

AN EXTRA. LITERALLY AN EXTRA!!!!!!

at the end of the day, translators are not like DYING to translate, not like some of you are DYING to read the translations. once again, this isn’t a “BE GRATEFUL” message, it’s a please be respectful to the people who put in time and hard work for free and share the goodness ya know? what’s the use of yelling at fan translators as if we owe you anything?

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

🔴🔴🔴 TOO LONG DIDN’T READ 🔴🔴🔴

some people may need really need to pirate - and no one needs to justify why they cannot afford to purchase etc. pirating happens all the time, translators only hope that when you can, and in whatever way you can, to support legally - in general we don’t ask and we get it! we’re just annoyed that some people think that it SHOULD BE FREE, when it is a paid product, especially for those who CAN afford it

readers are not entitled to shit on translators for what they do with their translations - once again, you’re not OBLIGATED to have it. so what if i start and stop? i’m the one doing the work, i get the only say. don’t be a hypocrite and shit on translators, whose works you’ve read - it’s no loss for translators, we read and enjoy danmei just fine

yes, fan translations are illegal, but you can’t read and enjoy them like some of you have, and then turn around and point the finger at translators - a lot of us are happy to stop translating - this isn’t a threat, but at the end of the day, shitting on translators simply decreases access, and sure, some people can indeed live with you know, MTL or shitty translations from people who’ve learnt chinese for only six months or whatever, but you’re gonna be reading an entirely different book tbh

the people saying illegal translators are at fault - funnily enough, most of them consume the translations, so what the fuck? i mean we know it’s illegal, we’re trying to share the love and trying to minimize the illegalities of it by redirecting people to hopefully support legally. it’s still illegal yes, but i think it’s hypocritical for people who have read translations, stab translators in the back. and now that translators are indeed ‘restricting’ and ‘removing’ their ‘illegal translations’, yall yelling again? and threatening?

fan translators aren’t “elitist” or “classist” - just looking for some respect in a community which seems to have taken them for granted, and also looking for support for their fave authors - and honestly a lot of us were caught in the crossfires truly, don’t be an asshole and demand things from fan translators - who are you talking about? do you know why they decided to lock? do you know know what their locking system is like and what for? 

it’s not EASY to lock the translations up - it’s more admin work, it’s putting together a whitelist of people, if given the choice i’m sure translators would prefer to share everything. but not when there are assholes who have a comment on how they should translate etc. and yeah!!! calling us illegal!! i mean we are but still!!

the last straw was seeing that post on tumblr and people in the comments going like fan translators shouldn’t or should do something, without getting the whole picture, without even considering how hard it is for fan translators being caught in this situation. 

whoever puts in the work gets to decide, and everyone else should leave them alone. 

be nice to the people who really cannot afford as they say so (or just don’t think about it), be nice to the translators feeding you content, and the people who free ride and shit on translators - honestly, i’d say ready the pitchforks.

edit: i forgot to mention this is my hot take and i’ve tried to like present all the arguments i’ve seen so far. i’m definitely not doing all of it justice and i don’t claim to speak on behalf of any of them except maybe one or two- and i’ve definitely left out stuff, but anyway, lmao we’re just tiny people doing what we love. i wish we could solve you know inequality or poverty or hunger or other pressing concerns. if i was that great i wouldn’t be stuck on tumblr or twitter or have to make posts like these like a loser.

thanks for coming to my ted talk.

[foli-vora]

more than words - pt.1

A/N: I’ve had this in my head for forever and a half so it feels good to finally sort my thoughts and random notes out. Hope you enjoy!

Summary: The one person who you thought would be happy for you finally getting with someone decent was your best friend. After all, he had set you both up. Who would’ve thought he’d be the reason it all falls apart?

Pairing: best friend!Benny Miller/f!reader, Frankie ‘Catfish’ Morales/f!reader

Word count: 1.6k

Warnings: alcohol consumption, swearing, mentions of sexual acts/sexual refences (no smut yet but it’s coming so this is strictly 18+)

pt.2 / pt.3 / pt.4 / pt.5 / pt.6

+++

Wednesday nights were pizza nights. A rule established in the early stages of your friendship with Benjamin Miller – a loud mouth, golden hearted ex-spec ops mess of a human being. A chance meeting one stormy day on the freeway, led to something you weren’t expecting – a friendship, and a solid one at that.

“– she damn near tried to suck the life out of me!”

“Jesus Ben, there are kids a table over.”

“So? They shouldn’t be eavesdroppin’ on conversations that don’t concern them.” He grins lopsidedly at your scowl of disapproval, ripping off a mouthful of pizza and humming as he chews it, head swaying to the faint music playing behind the bar. “You’re payin’, by the way.”

You snort quietly, “Don’t I always?”

He recoils, blinking in playful surprise. “Excuse you? I paid last…” he trails off, eyes rolling to the wall as he thinks but a frown soon pinches his brows. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is that I love you and I appreciate you.”

You laugh quietly, shaking your head as you signal for another round. “Anyways, reverting to our previous topic before you got carried away with your blowjob story.”

He makes a noise, snapping his fingers as he tries to rush chewing and swallowing his mouthful. “So,” he starts, “I’ve got a friend…”

You groan immediately, letting your head lull back. “Ben –”

This wasn’t anything new. Benny took it as his own personal mission to fix you up with anyone he thought could give you a good time and treat you well. Friends, colleagues, Hell – even his brother at one point. Will was lovely, by all means, but not your type. Both you and Will had agreed you were not a match in the slightest early in the evening, enjoyed a night of beer and pool, and then went your separate ways.

Although, now that you thought about it, Ben hadn’t mentioned setting you up with anyone for a long while. Not since before his mysterious trip.

You still didn’t know anything about it, other than he and some old work friends went on an apparent ‘vacation’. It was more than that – you knew it, and he knew you knew it, but you didn’t push the topic. Instead of interrogating him, forcing question after question on him, you let it go, sensing it was something he really didn’t want to talk about.

He had returned from that trip a few months ago, heavy with exhaustion and usually bright eyes dull and weary. You tucked him into your bed, and left him. He slept for hours. It wasn’t until much later that evening that you crept in to see how he was doing, and found him thrashing silently in the sheets, sweaty and incoherently mumbling, face pinched and puckered in pain. You didn’t wake him. Instead, you knelt beside the bed, softly stroking along his forehead until his erratic movements and breathing calmed. You didn’t bring it up.

“I know, I know,” he threw his hands up in defence with a small grin, “but I think you’ll like this one.”

“That’s what you always say.”

“No, I mean it this time. He’s a real good guy – one of my closest. I think you guys would really hit it off. I haven’t tried to set you up before because he was with the chick but she upped and left him alone with the baby and –”

“Sorry, what?”

“What?”

“He has a baby? Like a… like a child?”

Benny frowns defensively, “You’ve always said you want kids!”

“It’s still a huge commitment, Ben.”

“Jesus, I’m not walking you down the aisle! Just meet him and see where it goes. If it ends in some good sex, you say ‘thank you Ben’ and we move on. And if it ends in something more, you guys take it slow and buy me wings as a thank you.” He shrugs, looking thoroughly impressed with himself, and reaches for his beer, polishing it off in one swig.

“And what if it ends in bad sex?” You challenge, crossing your arms on the table and leaning forward to eye him critically.

He scoffs, “Woman please. I know my brothers. You’ll be in good hands.”

You take a moment to thank the waitress as she stops at your table with your beers. She lingers just a little on passing Ben his, an act he didn’t miss as he shoots her a wink and a honeyed, thanks sugar. She smiles, cheeks flooding with colour before she turns and waltzes off towards other customers, swinging her hips as she goes.

You’re expressionless when he finally turns back to you, “Sugar?”

“Shut your mouth.”

Façade cracking, a snicker falls past your lip and you chuckle. “Alright,” you concede, “you’ve got my interest. What’s his name?”

“Fish.”

… what?

“Come again?”

“Francisco – we call him Fish. Catfish, actually.”

“Your age?”

“Bit older.”

You sigh deeply, rolling your head on your shoulders in thought. You were curious, no doubt about it. Despite never being able to make anything last long-term out of the list of men Benny had set you up with, none of them were bad guys. They were all kind, funny and incredibly respectful. One great thing about Benjamin Miller was that he had an impeccable taste in character.

“I don’t know, Ben –”

He slips his phone from his pocket and swipes away at his screen before wordlessly handing you the device. It was a photo, taken from one of Benny’s many weekend trips into the wilderness. Your eyes are dragged from the incredible background of snow peaked mountains and lush green forests to the man standing beside Benny, tucked under his arm. Average build and height, a well-loved trucker cap hiding dark hair. Warm brown eyes, crinkled from a large dimpled grin between dark patched facial hair.

Benny, seeing the sudden spark of interest, grins around his beer bottle. “So, I’ll slip him your number?”

You tighten your jaw and hand his phone back, sniffing impassively as you reach for your beer. “If it means you’ll leave me alone, then fine.” You mutter coolly, ignoring his quiet chuckle.

+

“Wait, wait – you have a best friend and it’s not one of us? I’m cut, Benny. Cut real deep.” Santiago Garcia was curious, to say the least. For years, he had known the youngest Miller and he had never mentioned anyone beyond their little circle or their families. “She cute?”

Benny huffs a chuckle, leaning across the pool table and lining up the final ball. “Hell yeah, she’s cute.”

“Where you been hiding her?”

“She moved away – only came back late last year.”

Santi hums, “Ironhead – she cute?”

Will half smiles, dragging his attention away from the pool table to shrug. “She’s alright.”

His bait works. Benny snaps it up – hook, line and sinker. He stands abruptly from his shot, cue just skimming the white ball, and points an angry finger in his brother’s direction, “I won’t take that shit. She’s a damn angel and you know it.”

Will chuckles to himself before returning his attention to Santi. “Yeah, she’s cute. Show ‘em.”

Benny briefly steps away from the pool table, opens his phone and brings up your Instagram profile, throwing it to Pope and letting him scroll through your feed.

“How come you’ve met her and we haven’t?” Pope aims his question at the older Miller brother, currently bent over the table and pocketing the black ball.

He half shrugs, straightening. “He set us up. It didn’t work out.”

Santi’s face puckers into a teasing glower, and he pouts at the younger Miller. “So, what? You set everyone else up and just leave me to die alone? What’s that about, Benjamin?”

Benny holds his arms out in obvious exaggeration, gesturing deliberately to himself. “You’ve got me.”

Frankie quietly sips his beer and watches in fond amusement, content to stay in the background and away from the bickering. Like Santi, his interest had been piqued but he was somewhat nervous about the situation. He already had feelings of apprehension returning to the dating scene after the shit show of a year he’d had, and those feelings tripled when it came to potentially dating someone close to one of his longest friends. He hadn’t dated in years. He was rusty. What if he disappointed you and Benny ended up kicking his ass? It could get messy real quick.

“I don’t know, man.” He finally pipes up, crossing his arms comfortably across his torso and reclining in the bar stool after peaking over Santi’s shoulder and at the screen he was lazily scrolling through. Ha. Way out of his league. “This kinda shit never works.”

“You sayin’ she’s not good enough for you?”

Frankie shakes his head, rolling his eyes. “You know I’m not.”

“Sounds like you are.”

“Quite the opposite.”

“I’ll take his spot. Give me her number.” Santi holds a hold out, clicking his fingers impatiently when Benny merely rolls his eyes. Pope grins, settling back into his seat and elbowing Frankie softly. “I think you should go for it, man. She seems great, and you need to get back out there.”

“I can’t, I’ve got Mena –”

“And Mena’s got her tío. Go for it. You’re just looking for excuses – no seas cobarde.”

Frankie chews on his lip as he gives it a bit of thought, wondering what’s the worst possible case scenario that could come from it. A busted lip? His self-image in ruins? Scared off from dating for the rest of his life? All things he could live with.

“… alright.”

Immediately, Benny perks up from setting the pool table with a large grin. “Yeah?”

Fish sighs, long and drawn out as Pope playfully pokes his side. “Yeah. Give me her number, I’ll message her now.” Before he freaks and changes his mind.

Maybe he was just thinking too much. What’s the worst that could happen?

+

Tags: @anu-simps​

[thosewickedlovelies]

AND THEY WERE WALLMATES: Cookies (part 2)

Pairing: Javier Peña x F!Reader

Rating: T for mature themes (implications of sexy times and violence). It will go up later ;)

Summary: You share an apartment wall with Javier Peña, but that doesn’t make it any easier to get to know him. You didn’t think your baking would be the catalyst.

Javi and Reader continue to get to know each other.

Tags: Mention of blood, super vague description of wound care. Additional TW for Javi: the Mortifying Ordeal of Being Known.

Word Count: 3,484

A/N: I was NOT expecting the amount of enthusiasm I got for the first chapter, but I’m so grateful for it!! I struggled a little bit with this chapter because it was the only one I didn’t have a solid plan for lol, but here it is because I’m impatient to share (and also tired of looking at it). I promise the next few will be better ;)

Masterlist

---

The next evening, you give yourself a stern pep talk before going to knock on Javier’s door. Javi, you remind yourself. You’re here to check on his leg, assuming he needs you to.

The door swings open much more readily than it had the night before, and Javier appears, an expectant half-smile curling the corner of his mouth. “Neighbor,” he drawls. Despite the new air of informality about him, his eyes hold a familiar suggestion that makes your heart sink a little. Back to his customary flirting, then.

“Hi, Javier,” you say, more coolly than you had originally planned. “I came over to see if you wanted me to check on your leg. I just kind of assumed that you would have the right supplies and stuff when I was giving you instructions last night, but if you don’t I can give you some, change the bandage for you. The first few days of healing are the most critical,” you explain, willing yourself to cut off your own rambling.

He examines your face for a second, the ready welcome fading. “Why do I get the feeling this check-up is more for you than for me?” He hitches an amused eyebrow back up, stepping back to let you in.

Over the threshold you cross your arms. “I don’t know, did you want your secret stab wound to get infected?”

He puts his hand on his hips with the beginning of a disbelieving frown. “It wasn’t a stab,” he grumbles defensively, with all the dignity of a petulant child.

You roll your eyes at his assertive posturing. “I know. I examined it.” Javier doesn’t move, though it couldn’t be comfortable maintaining such a wide-legged stance in those tight jeans. Your lips twitch the slightest bit as you take in your normally composed neighbor, his conflicted moue suggesting he’s been thrown off.

Taking pity on him, you borrow a page from his communication manual, nodding to a chair. “Come on. Pants off,” you deadpan, letting just a hint of your amusement show.

His expression starts out relieved, then cycles through several emotions in the space of the next second (albeit extremely subtly). He seems to freeze momentarily. “Uh, if you’ll just excuse me for one second, I’ll have these off for you in no time.” He winks, which would be charming if it weren’t Javier and he didn’t look like he had forgotten something important, and hastily strides toward the bedrooms.

Mystified, you look around, curious about the man despite his unpredictable demeanor. The apartment looks comfortably lived-in, yet there’s a distinct lack of personal effects, creating an odd contrast. There’s an empty takeout container by the sink, but you aren’t fooled by that- very occasionally, you’ve smelled amazing things coming from this kitchen. You wonder what sparks his culinary inspiration.

A throat clears behind you and you jump. You hadn’t heard Javi return, but there he stands by the dining room table, the fly of his jeans already gaping. He quirks a brow at you. “See anything interesting?” he asks, tipping his head to indicate the apartment. Apparently at ease, he begins to remove his jeans, and you avert your gaze, a flush creeping up your neck.

What? You saw people in all states of nudity every day at the hospital; why should you be flustered now? Annoyed, you busy yourself sorting through supplies while he sits down,

though not before he pulls out a chair for you.

Just like the previous night, he waits until you’re almost finished working to speak. “How did you know I was in pain last night? I didn’t think I made much noise.” His eyes are narrowed, like it’s something that’s been bothering him.

You reflect on your answer before giving it. “You...moved like you were in pain. Slowly, shuffling. And...you made a noise once you closed the door. I heard it, you know, through the wall.” You admit the last part with your eyes down, focusing on adhering tape to his skin.

“Through the wall, huh.” Something in Javier’s husky voice makes you glance up. He looks contemplative, dark eyes studying you thoughtfully. He angles his head down toward you. “What else do you hear through the wall?”

You’ve walked into a trap of your own making. Those daring insinuations are back in his eyes, but you can’t escape to your apartment in the middle of changing a bandage. So you answer truthfully: “I hear you cook sometimes. Smell you cook sometimes,” you correct yourself brightly. “What do you make that always smells so good, Javier?” You meet his gaze with deliberate innocence, although you would genuinely like to know.

His expression shutters, and he leans back in the chair again. “Food,” he mutters. “Stuff I learned a long time ago.”

An unexpectedly real answer; you quash the intense curiosity it provokes. Not wanting to pry too much, too soon, you just snicker in response. “Food, huh? I think I’ve heard of that.” His attention snaps back to you, but you just let him brood as you finish with his leg.

This time when you stand, you linger over your supplies, leaving some out for him and explaining things to watch out for. “I’ll come by again tomorrow night, but it should be fine as long as you don’t aggravate it,” you conclude. 

“Well, non-aggravating is my middle name.” Javier gives you a winning smile, one that probably would have passed the muster of anyone who hadn’t heard the mocking edge in his voice.

A laugh sputters out of you. “Is that so? I’ll be sure to tell Connie next time I’m over there.”

Something like fascination sparks in his eyes, a hunger he can’t hide propelling him to lean forward. “Oh? You two ladies talk about me?” 

Your lips purse as your mind races through suitable responses. “Well, I had to get the dirt on my mysterious neighbor from somewhere,” you say lightly. Because it sure wasn’t coming from him. Yet the longer you spent in his company, the more you found you wanted to know.

“Hm.” A huff is his only response. His shoulders relax against the chair back as he returns to regarding you wordlessly, but in a distinctly more agreeable way.

You suppress a smile as you pick up your bag. “Well. Goodnight, Javi.”

--

Almost a week after your last checkup, Javier grinds his cigarette butt into the ground and flicks a last glance at your window. He and Steve had arrived home at the same time, so he’d stalled with the excuse of a smoke outside, knowing that if he entered his own apartment, he’d lose his nerve. Gritting his teeth, he limps up the stairs and to your door. He knocks.

The noise of the tv cuts off, and a moment later, you open the door. You blink in surprise. “Javi! What are you doing here?” Concern clouds your face as you take in his rumpled appearance.

The words lodge in his throat. “I, uh. I need your help,” he admits, dragging his gaze up from the floor. “Banged my leg at work today. Think I opened it up again...thought I should let you take a look at it.” He couldn’t stop imagining your reaction if you found out he hadn’t.

Your eyes widen, and you immediately step back to let him in. “Of course! Please, here-” You offer your arm, but Javier has enough pride this time to make it to your dining room table without help. When he looks up you’ve vanished, dashed off to your stash of medical supplies, he assumes.

He takes the opportunity to look around. Your place is cute, homey-feeling, because of course it is. He notes, however, that most of the decoration has been locally bought, and curiosity needles at him. Nothing more personal to bring with you? He gets a fleeting glimpse of the bottle of wine on the coffee table before you return.

“...sorry about that, I don’t know why I stashed this away so well when I knew you might need it again.” Your setup is a familiar scene by now. You keep glancing over at his blood-stained bandage, frowning worriedly, and he wonders how you can be so damn caring when it’s clear he’s interrupted your evening.

He makes a sound of disgust. “Nah, this was a stupid accident,” he says, annoyed all over again. “Normal, routine chase after some narco, but I slid against a wall that had some shit sticking out of it at just the wrong spot.”

Your eyes leap to his in shock, and too late he remembers that Connie gave you the ‘janitorial services’ line. You don’t ask though, pressing your lips together and determinedly refocusing on peeling off the bandage, and Javi can’t help but feel a twinge of respect.

Well, someone in the building would tell you sooner or later. “I’m an agent of the DEA,” he says, monitoring your reaction. “Since you were about to ask.”

You straighten indignantly. “I was not!” you protest, before you see the lazy gleam in his eye and realize he’s joking. You roll your eyes reproachfully, but the press of your lips now looks amused. “I just thought there was probably a reason Connie didn’t tell me.” Javier winces as you gently prod at his injury.

“Well, what’s one more secret between neighbors?” He winks conspiratorially at you. Just like the last time, however, it gets minimal reaction, and it confounds and intrigues him in equal measure. Women usually respond to his efforts. Even if there’s no real intention, he likes seeing them get a little flustered, likes the feeling of having influence, control. And women don’t seem to mind.

But you...you resisted. Javier doesn’t know why, but you don’t react to his usual charm in the ways he’d come to expect. He’s sure you don’t dislike him- but he’s not exactly sure what he’s doing to make you like him, either. There was something...enticing about it.

The familiar feeling of your fingers smoothing tape along his thigh brings him back to the present. He tries not pay too much attention to it, knowing that it would be extremely asshole timing to pop a boner.

“Well, you should be all set. Again.” You look sympathetic, not resentful, and Javier nods, suddenly feeling awkward. How could he possibly make up all of this up to you?

“Just- try to be careful, okay? You don’t have to hurt yourself as an excuse to hang out with me.” Out of nowhere you’re teasing him, with a line to rival some of his worst. His eyebrows raise, and he chuckles as he dips his head.

“I’ll keep that in mind.” He gets to his feet. “...Thank you,” he says gruffly, hoping he’s conveying even a tiny amount of how much he means it. “Enjoy your evening.” He doesn’t let himself look back as he heads for the door.

--

Steve and Connie have invited you to a movie night. Or at least, Connie has. You assume the invite comes from both of them, even if a movie night doesn’t seem like something Steve would initiate.

“Javi will be there too,” Connie had informed you nonchalantly, but she watched intently for your reaction.

You hadn’t even blinked. “Great!” you said easily- until you realized the opportunity this presented and beamed. “What should I make?”

Which is how you end up standing outside her door, one floor up, holding a plate of cookies. You were glad now that you decided to make them today and not yesterday- finishing them barely 20 minutes ago had effectively given you no time to tailspin about what to wear or how you were supposed to act around Javi. Or rather, Javi and Steve and Connie, since although you and Javi had a secret, it was not what they’d imagine it to be.

Connie answers the door, and that’s definitely not a twinge of disappointment you feel, because why would Javier have answered the door of someone else’s house?

“Hey, come in!” Connie gushes. She waggles her eyebrows meaningfully at the plate in your hands. “What are those, and what are you drinking with them?”

Her easy familiarity grounds you. “Whatever you’ve got,” you reply, some of your nerves settling. Your friend leads you to the kitchen, where Steve and Javi stand continuing some conversation at the bar counter.

“The party has arrived, boys!” She announces. “I told you all that smell was for us.” She winks at you, a bottle already in hand to pour you a drink.

“Welcome, welcome,” Steve greets in his easygoing way, gesturing with his beer to encompass the apartment as a whole.

You smile in thanks, your eyes flitting briefly to Javier. He hasn’t said anything yet, but there’s a loose relaxation to him you haven’t seen before, a softness playing on his lips as he absorbs the scene. It’s similar, you realize, to the moment when he complimented your lemon cake, the first time you felt like you were meeting the real him.

This observation only takes a heartbeat to sink in. Tucking it away to examine later, you shyly lift the plate and set it in the middle of everyone. “She‘s right,” you confirm, peeling off the plastic wrap. “Peanut butter cookies.” The next few seconds are spent in an expectant semi-quiet as everyone takes a cookie and savors the first bite.

“Mmm,” someone sighs, and the dam breaks. A flurry of compliments all around, new threads of conversation bursting forth. You absorb it gratefully, relieved at their enthusiastic response and happy to have been able to contribute. You try not to react to Javier’s eyes on you.

The ice broken, you all chat and drink around the bar for a bit, before Connie declares that it’s movie time, leading everyone to the living room. Before following them, Javier grabs the plate of cookies. “We’ll just take these with us,” he says decisively, and you take it as a compliment.

It’s the first time he’s addressed you directly since you arrived, and there’s a knowing glint in his eye. “By all means,” you respond pleasantly, meeting his gaze. Taking your tenuous first step in sharing the establishment of a public-facing persona to your relationship (such that it is).

In your delay, Connie and Steve appear to have gotten into a hissed discussion, standing between the couch and the loveseat. Connie whirls around as you and Javi approach, fixing a smile to her face. She waves you over to the smaller sofa. “Come on, we get to snuggle up on the loveseat, so the big men have more room to spread out.” She aims a cool faux-glare at her husband, but a glimmer of real frustration prevents it from being believably fake.

Steve sends Javi a long-suffering, apologetic look. “Sounds cozy,” you chirp, mediating before anyone else can say anything. “So what are we watching?”

At this, Steve’s face lights up with a grin that almost makes you wary. He takes great delight in announcing the selection, some military action flick with “enough drama and hunky actors to keep the ladies entertained as well,” apparently.

“A true classic.” Javier nods sagely from his sprawled seat on the couch, his smirking grin suggesting that it was not at all true. Steve kneels to put the tape in, and as he and Javi continue to snigger over it, Javi shoots a self-conscious glance in your direction, his posture shifting.

Connie sighs. “They’ve done a few of these now. I should warn you that it’s less about watching the movie than it is about bonding over making fun of it,” she confides.

You keep the two men in the corner of your vision as you turn to reply to your friend, feeling warm with gratitude at being included. “That’s okay,” you assure her. “It’s a good bonding activity.”

Connie smiles, but seems distracted. She lowers her voice to speak again. “I should also tell you that they make fun of it because they know how government/military stuff really works. From their job at the embassy.” She seems unsure if she should say any more.

“Oh!” You realize that Connie has no way of knowing about your conversations with Javi. “I know. I mean, Javier told me. What they do.” 

Connie looks amazed. “Javier told you? When?” Her voice drops to just above a whisper.

“Recently,” you hedge. “I was, um, helping him with something, and it slipped out.” No point in getting him in trouble. 

Connie looks ready to burst, but before she can say anything the tv blares, and Steve pointedly declares that it’s starting.

You settle in for the mock-fest, and sure enough, the men don’t disappoint. It’s hard to follow what’s actually going on through their exasperated groaning, but you don’t mind. Their back-and-forth is just as entertaining, and you even manage to join in occasionally during the medical scenes.

Throughout it all, you surreptitiously watch Javier. His opening up is a slow-building thing, like he can’t decide how much of himself to reveal. He steals frequent glances at you, as if trying to judge what you’re thinking of him in this new context. But he can’t pretend to be his usual lascivious self in front of Steve and Connie, and all at once he seems to decide to just be, and damned if you don’t like it.

You don’t let on that you’ve been paying such attention, only teasing and acting like you normally would around friends. But you can’t help but respond to the way Javi’s eyes crinkle when he smiles; to the hard-won sound of his laugh, sending pleasant tingles down your spine. With other things for him to focus on besides you, you’re able to observe him more freely, noticing things you hadn’t before.

When the movie finally ends, you and Javier stand to leave, managing to only after Connie extracts ironclad promises from the both of you to do this again. The tentative banter you’d fallen into in the apartment carries you down the stairs; it felt rather like you were still creating the steps to a dance in which you weren’t quite sure if you were competitors or partners.

He walks you to your door. “It’s like eight steps down the hall, Javier.” It’s sweet, despite your objection.

“A lot can happen in eight steps,” he counters, undeterred.

At the door, he murmurs your name. You look at him in surprise when he takes your hand, even as your body sings from the warmth of his attention. “I don’t believe I’ve thanked you for all your help yet.” He brings your hand to his mouth and presses his lips to your skin. Softly, lingering. “Properly, that is.” In his hooded eyes is a brazen offer.

His mustache brushes more softly than you would have thought, and your mind immediately leaps to imagine what it would feel like against your mouth. Heat flares within you at the thought, but you pull your hand free and step back from him. You can see his thoughts slow, reorganize at your retreat.

“You don’t have to thank me with sex, Javier.” It would be lying to say you hadn’t considered this possibility; you place each word with care, knowing that any future relationship you might have with Javier would depend on his response to this conversation. “I didn’t help you as an excuse to sleep with you.”

It wasn’t that you weren’t interested in sex with him, exactly. The truth was...you didn’t want to be done with him yet. You wanted to learn more about him, uncover all the little things that made him him behind the gruff armor. But if you agreed to be seduced by him tonight, it would send the opposite message. That all he had been to you was a debt that was now paid.

Javier looks befuddled, the furrow in his brow deepening as his listens. Your next words come out sounding more practiced. “If that’s all you want from me then fine, but...friendship is good too, you know? Friends are a thing people have.” Your gaze drops briefly, a flicker of embarrassment overtaking you. But you’re determined to make him understand that this isn’t a blanket rejection.

His expression turns frustratingly inscrutable as he digests this. “Right.” Slowly he nods, shifting away from your door.

“Just- think about what I said, Javi. Okay?” No pity in your voice, only a soft, steady plea.

Javier continues to nod as he backs away. “Sure,” he replies, step by step, toward his own home. “Buenas noches, Vecina.” Good night, Neighbor.

In a twisted reversal of your usual roles, you watch him walk the length of the hall. A contemplative saunter, hands sliding into his pockets to retrieve a cigarette.

You can only hope you said the right thing.

---

A/N: In the first scene, Javi left the room to go put on underwear lmao.

Fic Taglist: @din-damn-djarin​, @thirstworldproblemss​ 

[thedeadpanblade]

c!techno does not have a victim complex

before you get out the pitchforks and torches, hear me out. nah, mans does not have a victim complex. there's something that fits a lot better and even matches up with shit the chat/the voices have said to him.

c!techno has a pretty intense god complex if you look at how his character behaves.

now, let me explain.

i'd like to preface this with saying c!techno? favorite dsmp character. absolutely hands down. c!ramboo is a close second along with c!wilbur. and i love c!techno and c!philza's dynamic to death. i just like picking characters apart and trying to understand them. so this might come off as critical, but it's more so me picking apart c!technoblade, getting inside his head, and understanding what makes him tic.

now that that's out of the way. c!techno's massive god complex.

the origin of him developing a god complex isn't far fetched. i mean, chat constantly spams blood for the blood god. after hearing that for years and years on end, especially on repeat for hours, there's no way in hell it wouldn't get to your head. and it might've had a slight brainwashing effect but i'll pin that analysis for another day

but, regardless, let's look at what a god complex is to see if the symptoms match up.

"A person having a God complex will always believe that he is perfection personified, and will expect to be treated that way, too. According to him, he will be forever incapable of ever making a mistake, and will never accept responsibility for anything that goes wrong. The rules embedded in society’s mindset will never be important for a person with this complex, as he’ll deem himself to be above these “petty” things of the mortal world." — Psychologenie

this already sounding familiar? sounds pretty similar to shit c!techno has said himself or actions he's taken during events in the smp.

let's dissect some of the character traits of a god complex.

"People having this complex are arrogant to the point that it becomes very annoying for others. These people believe they are the best at everything, and everyone else is très inferior to them." — Psychologenie

hmmmm. gee, this sounds an awful lot like how c!techno talks to c!tommy. if you took a shot for every single time c!techno called tommy useless you'd probably be dead. (please tumblr i'm begging you don't actually do that)

"This complex makes people very judgmental. They constantly scrutinize others’ actions, and label them as bad, or not up to the mark. They cannot stand from not judging everyone and everything apart from themselves, and this judgment is almost always negative." — Psychologenie

hmmmm. again, sounds an awful lot how c!techno talks to c!tommy.

"Similar to narcissists, people with a God complex are absolutely allergic to criticism. They cannot tolerate anything that even mildly contradicts their beliefs or actions." — Psychologenie

i've seen it brought up that c!techno doesn't really take responsibility for his actions. i agree, mans really does not and always excuses the shitty things he's done. he denies taking any responsibility when tommy confronts him about shooting tubbo and in the classic doomsday argument.

but the bit about not tolerating anything that even mildly contradicts their beliefs or actions matches up a lot more with how c!techno obliterates anyone who does not agree with his version of anarchy.

c!techno also does not have the fixed helpless attitude that comes with a victim complex (e.g. "i can't do anything about the bad things happening to me, so why bother trying?"). mans grinded enough wither skeletons to obliterate an entire server and still has some. he does not consider himself to be helpless in the slightest and is very hard working. he's also set a bunch of withers loose on the server multiple times when people didn't agree with him to get his way.

"These people feel the uncontrollable need to influence people, and any given situation. As a result, they are shrewd and manipulative, and feel free to “use” people as and when they please." — Psychologenie

now, this will make a lot of people think of dream. which, duh, mans obviously has a god complex. most of these traits easily apply to him.

c!techno equally shows this trait in my opinion. except instead of emotional manipulation, he uses physical violence to maintain his influence over people and any given situation. he uses his reputation to instill fear in people. think of him merely putting on his armor and tommy changing his mind about trying to attack him.

"More than often, people with this complex are those with a lot of power over others. They feel the ever-increasing need for more power, and to exercise that power in every way possible. They cannot bear to relinquish control, in any situation." — Psychologenie

again, look at c!techno's use of withers. look at the absolutely absurd amount of withers he has. look at the absurd amount of anything combat related he has. look at his reputation as one of the best fighters on the server. despite being an anarchist, c!techno very much relies on power and violence to communicate. one of his most iconic quotes from the dsmp highlights this.

"Tommy, the thing is, you're using words... but the thing about this world, Tommy, is that the only universal language is violence, and we've had that conversation. We've spoken that language in the pit. It's over, Tommy." — c!technoblade

another point i would like to bring up in my argument that techno has a god complex. take a look at this.

"Though people with the God complex seem so sure, and so in love with themselves, some experts suggests that they actually suffer from a low self-esteem, and are insecure about almost everything, which is why they constantly require attention and admiration from others around them." — Psychologenie

c!techno? low self esteem? abso-fucking-lutely. people typically get angry to cover up more sensitive and painful emotions, and to make them feel less weak. anger is used to cover up a weakness. so, if you look at what makes someone angry, you know where their sensitive spots are.

looking at the dsmp, what has made c!techno the most angry?

you can narrow it down to two things really.

people taking his stuff or showing little regard for his gifts/acts of service (i'd assume those are his love languages, fair enough)

people dehumanizing him

a post by @simplepotatofarmer covers this in depth, which i would highly recommend checking out, but for the sake of keeping this part brief.

the best example of c!techno getting angry at being dehumanized is this line from the doomsday argument: "I'M A PERSON, TOMMY!"

c!techno does not shout often. the fact he shouts this line at tommy speaks volumes about how deep the wound goes.

the reason c!techno gets so angry at being dehumanized is likely because he has been repeatedly dehumanized by others.

and as a result, deep down, he likely no longer views himself as worthy of being treated like a person. that's rock bottom in hell levels of low self esteem.

how would he go from low self esteem to developing a god complex when they seem to be polar opposites?

well, if you don't view yourself as being treated like a human, believing you deserve to be treated like a god is a far better alternative than accepting you feel like you should be treated like nothing.

[seerofmike]

The Writing In Apex Kinda Sucks And Also They Use Ship Bait As A Plot Device I Hate It Here

a stupid essay/rant encouraged by @zombiegloss that originally started as a youtube video script so if its like. weird at points. this was intended to be a verbal rant SNZISKSIA

basically i'm gonna talk abt the caustic-wattson-crypto relationship drama and how i think it was mishandled and how much the writers kind of Suck because i Can

you are free to disagree with me on any of my points and think that this aspect of the story was handled well, this is just my opinion, and i'd love to hear your thoughts and counterpoints !

first, addressing some things:

i know this is a battle royale and not necessarily a story-based game, so i can’t expect it to have masterful witcher-style writing.

but with the direction the game seems to be going; putting quests, evolving interactions, and comics in the game, plus coming out with a lore book and hinting at something bigger in the future, i think it’s fair to criticize it for lackluster writing, especially since what i’m criticizing has been something present since Apex’s story technically began.

secondly, i am not a professional writer. i’m a high schooler who writes as a hobby. i don’t have the decades of experience that some of the apex writers do, and i can’t claim to be a better writer than they are--but i also don’t have to be a five-star chef to realize that something tastes bad. when i critique something and give suggestions, i am not saying i could’ve done it better. i’m just bringing up what i think could have worked.

third, before i upset anyone , when i say a relationship is badly written, i’m not telling you that you can’t ship it or that your ship sucks. i’ll briefly touch on the shipping aspect of this and how it’s a detriment to the story but Ye

okay, so with that out of the way, let us Begin

relationships are often the emotional core of a story, and how strong your reaction is to conflict in these relationships depends on how the story sets them up. if you want the audience to care about these characters and what they go through, you need to develop them and establish the type of relationship they have well. it’s why so many people cried in the last episode of telltale’s the walking dead. you’ve spent roughly 12 hours bonding with clementine and protecting her, and your relationship with her is part of several story beats as well as character beats for lee. 

when these two characters’ relationship reaches its peak at the end of the game, it’s powerful, and it’s emotional. you care. you feel something, and the fact that you have to choose what to do to lee only makes it more gut-wrenching. 

now, the walking dead is entirely story-based and especially character-driven, so it may be unfair to compare it to apex, but i just wanted to lay the groundwork down for what i think is a strong relationship that makes you feel something when conflict arrives, in this case the conflict being lee getting bit and clementine having to decide his fate.

the broken ghost in general is kind of not-good sometimes, tom casiello previously wrote for soap operas and you can really, REALLY tell sometimes.

this story feels like it should’ve taken place a little later, and that we should’ve had a season to actually set up the characters and their relationships, but that’s a story for another day.

to put it bluntly, the set-up for the crypto, wattson, and caustic conflict is done poorly. for caustic and wattson's relationship it’s a little better, but not by much. 

wattson and caustic having a relationship was hinted at in season 2, when her lore indicated that caustic was among one of the Legends who comforted her after her father died. In season four lore materials posted on Twitter, an email from Jacob Young states that Caustic is acting paternal towards Wattson. In season five, interactions get added to the Game, and this is the first time we actually see their relationship in action, as they have unique revive voice lines for each other. in the quests, when wattson is injured, caustic lashes out at loba and attacks her out of what seems to be anger at wattson’s current state.

Side Note this plot point was really stupid and done for cheap drama because she literally wakes up like two chapters later and they don’t even give her anything to say it’s just suddenly oh yeah crypto and wattson are working together. the same exact injury thing happens to octane later but nobody gIVES A SHIT because again, it’s just cheap soap opera drama.

their relationship might seem a little bit sudden for anyone who wasn’t on top of twitter lore drops, but like, it’s okay, i guess. i’ll give it the slightest credit for at least establishing something between the two in terms of voice lines and stuff, even if for some it might seem like it came out of nowhere.

what did come out of nowhere, though, was crypto and wattson’s friendship. in the quests, crypto and wattson are tasked with rebuilding the broken ghost because of their respective skills, and they’re seen talking in chapter six while they work on it. we’re not really given a clear timeline on how long the story in the broken ghost is, but i think it takes about a week, maybe.

unlike wattson and caustic, their relationship has been given absolutely zero material to work with before now, not even a passing glance in the trailers--which is a little weird considering crypto took down the repulsor tower and destroyed wattson’s home, but. Whatever.

tl dr of the chapter: crypto and wattson talk to each other while doing nerd shit, crypto laughs at wattson’s bad pun, and then suddenly they’re BESTIEEEES, until a couple dozen lines later in the same chapter. then they’re Not.

crypto’s drone gets hacked by revenant while everyone was kind of on edge after the reveal of a spy in their midst, he gets framed as the spy by caustic, anddddd wattson gets upset.

before i get into how dumb this storyline is, i’m gonna talk about the set-up to this conflict.

we have been given no reason to believe that these characters have ever talked to each other, and quite frankly, their friendship doesn’t really make sense.

ignoring the fact that crypto destroyed wattson’s home--which she probably doesn’t know about, so that’s forgiven for now--crypto is a paranoid guy. in the lore book he makes people stand on fucking footprints in his house so he can scan them for weapons and listening devices, and he apparently doesn’t stick around much after the games and nobody knows anything about him because he doesn’t talk to them.

a key part of crypto’s story is the fact that he is undercover and afraid of anyone finding out anything about him ever. him becoming friends with wattson kind of comes out of the blue, and we’re not even given a reason as to why they supposedly became close in the first place. i would kind of understand if like, maybe he draws parallels with her and mila in his mind and it makes him open up a little more, but that doesn’t happen. he just laughs at her joke and suddenly they’re friends.

maybe they’re trying to go for this ‘wattson can become friends with anybody’ angle, kind of hinted at with caustic but not really we’ll get into that, but that also? kind of doesn’t make sense since so many of her voice lines straight-up say she doesn’t understand people and electricity is more her thing, but honestly, she also does have those really friendly elements in her voice lines too, so its not as egregious as what they did with crypto.

their sudden out-of-the-blue friendship would’ve been fine if they spent a little more time fleshing it out, and giving us something to work with, but instead, the story immediately tries to rip it apart and frame it as this grand conflict where crypto is framed as the mole, crypto then accuses caustic, and wattson feels betrayed.

except it doesn’t really work, because we don’t give a shit. for several reasons. 

one: crypto and wattson became friends and then ended their friendship in the same exact chapter. they did not speak to each other onscreen until this chapter began, you can read the entire quest on the wiki and see for yourself that their interactions up until that point were nonexistent aside from mentions in the narration that they were building something together.

the reason wattson feels betrayed is kind of stupid too. why does she really care that much if one of them betrayed loba? nobody else really cared about the fact that one of them was a spy, in fact, nobody even seems to like loba that much, and they just found out that loba’s been lying to them this whole time, and wattson was conscious for that conversation and had a speaking line, so she’s fully aware of the situation. 

maybe it’s just like, the idea that one of them lied, but that’s still kind of a weak reason. 

this entire betrayal thing is just dumb, and it gets even worse when you realize that there could have been an actual legitimate reason for wattson to feel betrayed by crypto--even if it still would’ve come across as weak conflict because of their newly established friendship, it would’ve made more sense than this. 

Crypto destroyed Wattson’s home. He took down the tower and then all the flyers and stuff invaded Kings Canyon and made it their bitch. Not only that, but Wattson considers the Syndicate her family. The Syndicate are the very people who framed Crypto for murder and he’s trying to take them down. 

They could’ve set up actual conflict with these things, and it almost seemed like they would, because Caustic briefly brings up that Crypto could be working with Revenant because he has something against the Syndicate but then that doesn’t really go anywhere and we’re just back to Wattson feeling betrayed because either Crypto or Caustic was a spy and she doesn’t know who.

Weak conflict could’ve been made better by a strong relationship and a weak relationship could’ve still been interesting with strong conflict, but both the relationship between Crypto and Wattson and the conflict that drives them splitting up as friends were really weak and didn’t make much sense. 

It would’ve been ten times more interesting if Wattson found out Crypto ruined her home, the arena she grew up in, and was now participating in the Games to take out the people she regards as her family. That’s where her distrust could’ve manifested and conflict could’ve began, but instead it was the stupid betraying loba thing. why do you care. you just started talking to this guy like 2 hours ago.

also caustic’s whole reason for framing crypto feels stupid as fuck. he didn’t just frame crypto randomly, he framed him specifically because he doesn't want him to influence wattsob because he likes her Big Brain, but this is the FIRST time we have seen those two interact. 

what influence is he talking about? wraith and wattson have been shown to be friendly with each other in the trailers, according to tom’s tweets, and in the story too so why doesn’t he frame her? at this point the audience had slightly more build-up for those two’s relationship than crypto and wattson and a betrayal storyline would’ve felt a little more deserved if still weak.

this is the point where i briefly want to touch upon shipping, and the fact that part of this conflict feels driven by shipbait. 

aside from their relationship coming out of nowhere and the writers trying to make the stakes seem high and deeply emotional to the characters involved (despite this essentially being the first time they’ve ever interacted) tom casiello literally addresses shippers in a tweet regarding chapter seven, and as the story between these characters progresses, it becomes clear to me, at least that the crypto-wattson thing is just bait for shippers, and it’s lazy. 

it’s easy to get away with giving your characters little to no relationship development if you’re just counting on shippers to do the heavy mental lifting for you

why should i put any effort into making this relationship seem believable? people are going to see a young guy and a young girl having bare minimum interaction and assume there’s romantic interest! then i don’t have to do any work, see look, it’s a ready-made relationship wrapped in a bow for me! all that’s left for me to do is give them conflict so i can keep teasing shippers with lines like ‘you never deserved her’!

i think it’s reasonable for me to suspect shipbait, since tom casiello likes doing darksparks shipbait on twitter, and i’m like, eighty percent sure mirage and bloodhound suddenly being childhood friends in the book is shipbait too, because these characters were the number one ship in apex for a long time despite little to no interaction, and then all of a sudden in the lore book they’re childhood friends despite this literally never being mentioned before?

like bloodhound is set up to be mysterious and nobody knows what they look like, or where they’re from, or who their family is--except for mirage Apparently, who played with them when he was a kid on their home planet, and has seen them with their mask off, because bloodhound did not wear a mask when their parents were still alive.

its weird.

i’m pretty sure they’ve said somewhere they were working on this book before apex even came out, so i could just be completely wrong and they always planned for mirage and bloodhound to know each other, but if that’s the case, why did they never mention it like they did octane and lifeline?

i refuse to believe MIRAGE never brought it up either like ‘heeeeyy bloodhound remember when we used to throw eggs at our parents lab haha wanna go do to that to bangalore’s room’ 

[silence]

‘good talk buddy’

ANYWAYS I GOT OFF TOPIC. POINT IS, shipping is a detriment to the story because the writers don’t feel like they actually have to put any work into establishing or developing the relationship between characters when they know the community’s just going to do it for them anyways, and that they can put in shipbait and it’s fine and it makes sense when it really doesn’t.

imagine watching captain america civil war after not seeing a single other marvel movie.

why would you care about the avengers splitting up or tony and steve butting heads or steve’s commitment to bucky? you wouldn’t care, at least not as much as someone who’s seen all the movies and knows the relationship between the characters and why the sokovia accords exist in the first place. you don’t have context and you don’t have any reason to be emotionally invested in these characters’ relationship.

 this feels like that. the writers tried to squeeze this relationship and stuff into a single chapter and we don’t fucking care unless we were already invested in the idea of their relationship (shippers) because we barely spent any time with it.

so to summarize this little section, the set-up of this storyline Kinda Sucks! crypto and wattson barely seem to know each other, because we the audience barely saw them together and the writers are relying on shipbait in place of a relationship.

wattson and caustic are a little better but not great, but the conflict is stupid and it only gets stupider.

moving onto summarizing the rest of the broken ghost, gibraltar and caustic talk, caustic LITERALLY confesses to being the mole and says he framed crypto so he couldn’t corrupt wattson and to appear innocent because his identity was suspected, then that wraps up the season storyline.

season six begins with new voice lines, where wattson has had enough of crypto and caustic’s shit and is all passive-aggressive and going ‘this doesn’t change anything’. she has to decide who to trust, and how to figure out The Truth for herself because she’s not a little girl anymore. crypto and caustic are both trying to convince her they’re innocent and it creates some interesting conflict.

just kidding. it’s terrible conflict. you want to know why?

BECAUSE GIBRALTAR TRIED TO TELL HER THE TRUTH, RIGHT AFTER THE SEASON 5 QUEST HAPPENED, AND SHE LITERALLY REFUSED TO HEAR IT.

LIKE THERE’S A SEASON 6 LOADING SCREEN WHERE HE’S TELLING EVERYONE THE TRUTH ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED, AND WHEN HE GETS TO WATTSON AND IS LIKE HEY I KNOW WHO THE MOLE WAS AND WHY THEY DID IT, SHE JUST GOES i dont wanna hear it. i need to think

IF YOU WANT THE TRUTH WHY ARE YOU REFUSING TO HEAR IT

SHE SPENDS ALMOST TWO ENTIRE SEASONS MAD AT CRYPTO FOR SOMETHING HE DIDN’T DO BECAUSE SHE TOLD GIBRALTAR TO FUCK OFF WHEN HE TRIED TO TELL HER WHAT HAPPENED

ITS SO DUMB

i think it was towards the end of season 6 or the beginning of season 7 where apex posted this picture of wattson asleep at her desk where she has a letter from gibraltar on it that looks like it tells her the truth, so she knows now, she knows what happened, but NOW her issue is the fact that she doesn’t know anything about crypto.

WHAT THE FUCK. WHAT IS YOUR GODDAMN DAMAGE. YOU DON’T KNOW SHIT ABOUT BLOODHOUND EITHER ARE YOU THIS UPSET WITH BLOODHOUND TOO?? HAVE YOU EVER TALKED TO PATHFINDER. DO YOU HATE PATHFINDER TOO

oh but she was friends with crypto and now she’s mad that he lied to her EXCEPT THEIR RELATIONSHIP WASN’T BUILT UP WELL SO IT JUST FEELS STUPID. THEY SPENT LONGER BEING NOT-FRIENDS THAN THEY SPENT BEING FRIENDS. THEY BECAME FRIENDS IN ONE CHAPTER AND THEN IMMEDIATELY AT THE END OF THAT CHAPTER THEIR FRIENDSHIP ENDED AND THEN WATTSON SPENT LIKE 2 SEASONS MAD AT HIM FOR SOMETHING HE DIDN’T DO . 

AND THE WRITERS TRIED TO RECTIFY THIS BY SAYING OH SHE’S NOT MAD ABOUT THE TRAITOR THING SHE’S MAD BECAUSE SHE DOESN’T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT HIM AND IT’S LIKE WHY THE FUCK DID YOU NOT MAKE THAT CLEAR WHY DOES SHE SAY ‘IT DOESN’T CHANGE WHAT YOU DID’ IN HER VOICE LINES WHY DOES SHE CALL HIM A TRAITOR IF HER CONFLICT WAS HER NOT KNOWING MUCH ABOUT HIM . WHAT DID HE DO. 

HE JUST STOOD THERE AND LAUGHED AT HER JOKE AND THEN HE GOT FRAMED AND THEN THAT WAS THE END OF THE CHAPTER AND NOW SHES SUDDENLY LIKE IM ACTUALLY MAD BECAUSE YOURE A LIAR AND I CANT TRUST YOU EVEN THOUGH I NOW KNOW YOU WERE FRAMED I STILL DO NOT LIKE YOU AND HES LIKE YEAH THATS MY FAULT

The Caustic voicelines are stupid too, again his reason for framing Crypto was stupid and a lot of his voicelines just seem to be that shipbait thing again but like from the angle of overprotective dad who doesn’t like the new boyfriend. it’s stupid but not as egeregious as this next part which is

crypto telling wattson his identity.

CRYPTO was framed for MURDER and is paranoid and can’t trust anyone and doesn’t talk to anyone and the last time he did talk to someone he got framed for Another thing and the person he was talking to turned her back on him and actively refused to know the truth for like 2 seasons and then he went This Is Fine I Can Tell Her My Identity

the stupidest update to this storyline was crypto telling wattson the truth

why did they do it on the dropship where there are presumably syndicate members and other legends around.

why didn’t he scan wattson for listening devices like he did for pathfinder in the book.

why is he telling her his identity when he knows she has very close ties to the people that FRAMED HIM for MURDER. Does he trust her that much? WHY? They spoke to each other in a chapter and then spent two seasons not talking to each other beyond passive-aggressive BS. why are you so fucking stupid taejoon

their relationship was so poorly set-up that even if the writers maybe intended for them to come across as close friends who had spent weeks bonding, it really feels like they became friends in a single conversation, had a falling out, and now crypto suddenly trusts her with his identity after an undetermined amount of time because he wants to be friends again. 

that does not make SENSE this conflict feels contrived AS FUCK and the resolution feels even worse and unearned UGGGHHHH

it honestly comes across as crypto feeling desperate for friendship, and maybe this would’ve worked better if that’s the angle they played it as.

he’s been alone for roughly two years, and just wants a friend, and he’s honestly so lonely he just breaks down to the first person who’s really talked to him. it could’ve been an interesting little part of his character, and they could've gone into depth about how much this situation has affected him, but that’s not what they’re doing. he’s still paranoid and anxious and doesn’t trust anyone, except for wattson, because the plot needs him to or else there won’t be any stupid soap opera drama.

and to rub salt in the wound, wattson’s new voice lines with caustic have him telling her that she forgave crypto.

WHAT ARE YOU FORGIVING HIM FOR. ARE YOU FORGIVING HIM FOR BEING FRAMED? WHY DID HE HAVE TO APOLOGIZE TO YOU WHEN YOU WERE THE ONE WHO REFUSED TO HEAR THE TRUTH?

 did the conversation just go hey my real name is taejoon park and something bad happened to me and she went aight i forgive you WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT

Caustic’s new voice lines to Crypto where he’s like ‘what did you tell her’--YOU TOLD GIBRALTAR STRAIGHT-UP YOUR EVIL MASTER PLAN LIKE A SUPERVILLAIN AND NOW YOU’RE SURPRISED WATTSON AND CRYPTO ARE ON GOOD TERMS NOW?!

THAT’S LIKE TELLING SOMEONE YOUR SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER AND THEN BEING SURPRISED WHEN YOU BECOME THE VICTIM OF IDENTITY FRAUD. YOU SET YOURSELF UP FOR THIS WHY ARE YOU ACTING LIKE CRYPTO DID SOMETHING SINISTER OR LIED OR WHATEVER. WHAT THE FUCK. WHY DO YOU HAVE LIKE 3 BRAINCELLS

this is at like ten pages already so i’m going to just try and wrap this up quickly. 

it’s frustrating seeing this storyline play out when there are actually good relationships and storylines written into apex. i’m kind of getting tired of the loba and revenant conflict, but we at least had set-up to it in the form of a few animated shorts and it doesn’t play out as stupidly as this story does. bangalore and loba’s friendship is actually developed well, even if the point between the end of season 5 and season 6 where they suddenly talk like each other feels like it could’ve used a little more. 

where crypto and wattson having an established friendship in the broken ghost failed, lifeline and octane’s established friendship works because we’ve been told since octane’s release they were childhood friends and given lore materials that indicate they’ve known each other for a very long time.

apex wants this storyline between crypto and wattson and caustic to feel dramatic and tense and ultimately rewarding when crypto and wattson did become friends for real and stuff, but instead it just comes across as hollow and empty. 

there’s nothing there. it’s a case of tell, don’t show, and it looks like this stupid conflict is gonna keep going for another couple of seasons at this rate. 

side note: this entire script was written before the new twitter comics

please tell me ur thoughts and feel free to respond with ur own lil essay

also believe it or not this is not the "shipping is a detriment to apex's story" essay i was gonna write this is a completely different essay that has some overlap SKXISOSOW

[blackgirlsuperherorants]

With more articulation, I'm ready to talk about why the push for Lokius simply bothers me, and this can be said for other m/m or w/w ships that fans push to be canon so hard just because they ship it.

It's the framing. The framing that if Marvel doesn't do it (or whatever the brand is), it's because homophobia, and if other fans don't like it/ship it, it's because homophobia (even if they ship other queer ships and are queer themselves.) And the biggest problem with that is that it overshadows the REAL issue of lack of queer representation on screen in mainstream nerd media, especially from big things under the Disney umbrella (Marvel and Lucasfilm/Star Wars, especially.)

It makes it bad that your ship isn't canon instead of bad that there haven't been any queer romances on screen in the MCU.

And like, as a writer myself, I find myself dissecting the stories of other media all the time. I can watch an MCU movie or series and pretty much assess what direction the story is going in by the narrative points they're hitting. I knew Sylki was basically gonna happen (even if just a kiss) because narratively, that's what the show was doing as soon as they had that "what is love" conversation on Lamentis-1. It didn't mean I liked it. But I knew it was happening.

Similarly, there's no romantic undertones to Loki and Mobius. None. For Marvel to make them a couple, it would mean they'd be doing it simply because the two present as men and it would make stans happy. And while there's something to be said for fan service, it would be annoying to watch them cram two guys together who aren't romantic in the slightest. I'd much rather see Loki meet some guy and have the same type of undertones they were giving to Sylvie and form a real bond to where the kiss feels earned and warranted. Not just put him with the nearest man because "he gay lol."

And how you guys are claiming it's being queer that makes you want this is beyond me. It's not being queer that makes you want this. I don't want queer characters that fuck everyone of whatever gender(s) they're attracted to even when it doesn't make sense for them to. I want real love stories. I mean, yeah, sometimes we can have a slut character, because that's fun, too, but that's not even what y'all think Lokius is. You seem to want them to be in love. But why? Because he's the first friend Loki made that isn't through Thor?

I hate that, too, because I hate this idea that queer people cannot have friends of their same gender without wanting to fuck them. IDK how y'all are, maybe y'all are like that, but I almost never have wanted to fuck any of my friends. The only few exceptions have been when I tried to befriend someone I had a crush on (in which case, usually the friendship can't work, really, because I have a crush on them.) I also think it's okay if you can have casual sex with friends, or if you have a friendship that develops into romance, but Jesus, do you people not have friends that you don't want to fuck? I am bi, maybe more pan (gender kind of doesn't matter to me, I guess) and I'm friends with people of all kinds of gender identities and like... I love them as people, which is why they're my friends, but I DO NOT want to fuck them. Especially my closest friend. I talked about her, before, here, but she's like my sister. The thought of fucking her is gross, to me. Not because she's gross, but because it feels incestuous.

Loki shouldn't want to fuck Mobius just because they developed a friendship. And that's very much how it's written on the series. They almost dislike each other (or Mobius is at least indifferent to Loki) and then they become friends.

That's not to mention the power dynamic that exists, there. And I know some of y'all are subs, but yeah, it's a bit gross to imply a sexual relationship with Loki's captor.

But on to Sylki. It sucks that I feel like most of y'all hate Sylki because Sylvie is a girl, and not just because it's bad in other ways. Like, the reasons Sylki is bad have less to do with "it should have been Mobius" and more to do with it being a lazy 1980s action movie plot that should have never happened. I'm not as creeped out by the selfcest (as many of you wouldn't have been if she was a he, I'm almost positive), but what's bad about it is that they couldn't have a strong female lead character without her being the love interest of the main guy. She didn't need to be, especially because she was a Loki variant, anyway. There was no need for it to have romantic undertones, and there was no need for them to kiss. It was sexist more than it was homophobic (and I can't help feeling like y'all are kind of being biphobic in this case. Maybe I'll talk about that, later, but yeah.) It was sexist bullshit. And there's valid criticism that Sylvie is underdeveloped. She's just angry and something for Loki to project affection onto.

I was also hoping they'd do a "found family" type of thing with Sylvie and Loki and let her be like the sister he never knew he needed, but no, they had to go trope and make her the love interest. It was lazy and bad and basically went "If Loki girl, main Loki want bone!"

Basically, having the main character fall for a character just because of their proximity and gender is bad and I hate it (and it would have been bad with Mobius, too, but yeah.)

Both the Mobius and the Sylvie thing also feel kind of racist, to me, because the show has prominent Black women who aren't even presented as desirable to Loki. And y'all, of course, ship him with anyone but the Women of Color. Y'all can pull true love with Mobius out of your ass, but he couldn't possibly fall for the Black women. lol.

Anyway. Not every show needs ships, and this show shouldn't have had any. I hate it. It's bad.

I guess on the biphobia front, I have heard some takes that it's not biphobic because Loki being queer in the MCU which hasn't shown any queer relationships, and Loki being the first openly queer character means they shouldn't have shown him with a woman presenting character. Which, I guess I get where you're coming from... but I have also been in fandoms for a long time and I see mostly girls saying this shit, which is what leads me to feel like it's simply jealousy. It happens all the time when a long-beloved single male character/celebrity suddenly starts dating a woman. Everyone hates it. And like, we haven't seen Loki be with ANYONE in the MCU, because mostly he's been doing villainy and his dating life hasn't been relevant. If the demigod says he's bi, he can kiss a woman. Especially a woman version of himself. Like I said, I hate it for other reasons, but pretending it's because he should have kissed Mobius is utterly delusional. He probably shouldn't have kissed anyone. Not in this series. There was no reason for any canon romance, especially because the show has a season 2 and we'll have time to see Loki develop earned, deserved romance with someone.

I'd much rather see them create a character just to be his boyfriend than have y'all push Marvel into making Lokius canon, which is a nonsense ship that only happened because Mobius is the only prominent male-presenting character before we meet the other Lokis.

My sincere wish is for people to remember that their ships are just ships and to enjoy them without getting all self-righteous about it. I TOLD y'all that Lokius wasn't gonna be canon like 4 episodes back, and here y'all are acting shocked and like Marvel took something from you. NOBODY expected y'all to ship Lokius. It's not even queerbait.

You can make clear arguments as to why Sambucky was queerbait. It's there in undertones in the actual series.

You cannot watch Loki and tell me you thought it was queerbait, unless you think men can't have conversations or hug goodbye without being romantically involved. Which means, in my opinion, that you need to learn about healthy masculinity.

Again, this is not a defense of Marvel. They DO need to let characters be queer, for real, and not just by saying " A bit of both". Like, let Loki be queer. Let Deadpool be queer. Let these queer characters be queer on screen. Yes.

But please stop making it about your ship. I'd rather see a flashback of Loki dating a guy and see him kiss someone he loved back on Asgard than watch y'all force Lokius. Because my queer rep is not about your crackship. It really isn't. And the fact that y'all keep calling us homophobic for not liking your ship REALLY needs to be addressed.

Like, when will y'all stop? I got on Stucky shippers about this shit in the past. All of us gay as hell, too, we just don't like YOUR ship. A lot of us like other queer ships. A lot of us like queer ships in other fandoms, too, and even have queer OCs. YOUR ship just ain't it. Stop forcing it. Literally, most of the ship wars between MCU fans have been queer ship vs queer ship, not really queer ship vs straight ship. Like, the number one Stucky rival ship was Stony. Not Steggy. People are not homophobic for not wanting your ship.

Sometimes it's because they ship something else.

And sometimes, like me, it's because they want something to make sense narratively and not happen for the sake of it happening. It's always better writing to have a character meetcute a new love interest than to magically turn a platonic friendship into a romantic relationship. Like, even when the characters are straight. Like, when Moesha dated Hakeem. It was just weird, even if he was kind of a great boyfriend. He was just supposed to be her friend, and people didn't really like it because it didn't fit narratively.

And that's why ships for the most part should be left to fanfiction, with the exception of a few where fans are right to call out the writers for not making it canon because it's clearly bait (like what happened to Destiel shippers. To see Lokius shippers compare themselves to THAT was so ridiculous. Destiel shippers had a decade of evidence only to be let down by a criminally unfair ending. Lokius shippers saw two men have a deep conversation once and lost their minds.)

Anyway, I'm not saying don't ship Lokius. I don't even hate it, really. I just think it obviously shouldn't be canon, and fans pretending like they were robbed of it is ridiculous. Literally, Ao3 exists for this reason. I will never see Steve fuck Sam Wilson, so I wrote it into my fanfic. I am not mad that they didn't actually date in the main MCU storyline.

[chickenmcfly1]

Do you have headcanons or thoughts on Marty's relationship with his family in the original timeline? We only get that quick glimpse of them at dinner, & it doesn't look like there's much warmth there, but do you think he had any sort of close connection with them? Or do you hc that it was basically always dysfunctional?

Thanks for the question! I tend to go back and forth about this a lot. Sometimes, I feel like they all do love each other very much and have a lot in common, and just suck at expressing it, but sometimes I do feel that there’s a lot of dysfunction and maybe even genuine resentment between them. We’ll see lol (I’m also writing this in like 15 mins before my rehearsal, so I didn’t proofread. Enjoy deciphering my typos)

Side note: Did George even like Lorraine? Or did Lorraine just obsess over him like she did Calvin Klein and George just kinda went along with it because she’s cute and popular and saying no would involve confrontation? We know he was infatuated with her, but I hardly believe that infatuation and the Florence nightingale effect are enough to base a marriage on. Anyway,

George

George makes absolutely zero effort to reach out to anyone in his family. It’s not that he doesn’t like them, it’s just that he doesn’t know how. He doesn’t understand how to connect with his wife or be a dad to his kids

When the kids were little, especially Dave, George was pretty good with the kids. They’re cute and they’re babies, and he gets flustered when they cry and they stress him out a bit, but all in all, it’s good. But by the time the babies start turning into actual people, and god forbid, teenagers, George is so stressed and afraid, he’s like “oh no better not get involved”

By the time Marty comes around, his marriage is already falling apart, he’s like “oh no, this parenting thing is really difficult,” I should probably just not, and so they just kinda leave Marty to his own devices

He’s severely preoccupied with his work and that always takes priority over family which upsets Lorraine to no end

Just the fact that George let’s Biff hang around and works for him after what he did to Lorraine makes her really uncomfortable and hurt

Speaking of Biff, Biff tends to be a jerk to the kids as well. We see him poking fun at Marty and Marty look very physically uncomfy when it happens. If he’s really drunk, he has gotten physical with them too. We know, Biff can become a cold blooded murderer at the slightest provocation, so I feel like him shoving around a few teenagers just to be like “haha George look what I’m doing to your kids. Are you gonna do anything about it?” Or just out of resentment bc those are George kids with Lorraine is not out of character. George still won’t say anything

On a more positive note, though, he’s very close with Dave. They both have similar interests and Dave was his first kid, after all.

He recognizes how similar Marty and him are, but instead of taking that as a “oh this kid just needs a push of encouragement, and a confidence boost,” George’s mentality is to just protect Marty from any situation where he will face rejection or disappointment. It’s his way of showing love, but it really just hurts Marty more than anything.

This whole combination of George not standing up for Marty when he’s pushed around by Biff or yelled at by his mom and telling Marty “oh you won’t be successful anyway, just don’t try” really makes Marty feel . . . I hesitate to use the word worthless because that’s such a strong word, but for lack of a better term, his dad insinuating the idea that Marty deserves to be pushed around and that he won’t ever have success so he should just give up makes him feel really worthless and bad about himself

Marty sees this, and decides that he will never be like that and he will never let anyone else be treated the way Marty was. So whenever someone’s in trouble or being mistreated or spoken badly about, Marty will step in. And this whole fear of ending up like his dad and that idea of “I feel weak and powerless and worthless right now, but If I don’t let anybody else even think I’m those things, if I can prove them wrong and they validate me, I’ll feel better about myself” just feeds into Marty’s chicken complex.

With George, I don’t even think he makes an effort to make a change. He doesn’t seem like he would take initiative and fix his relationship with his wife and kids. So George just kinda decides “this is my life now, and it sucks, but what can I do” and sinks into this depressed state, making him even more afraid and withdrawn and perpetuating the cycle more

Lorraine

Lorraine is absolutely miserable. She’s lonely, she feels unloved, she’s in a home where someone she is very uncomfortable with pushes her husband around regularly and she knows if it came down to it, George would not tell Biff to leave her alone

She, unlike George, tries to get her family to do normal suburban family things, but they always fall apart. She’s usually drunk and moody and she and George are incapable of setting things up in a way that’ll make them work, but she’ll get mad when things don’t go how they’re supposed to (which they rarely do) and it’ll usually end in George stuttering in fear, Dave escaping to get to ‘work,’ Linda getting out of there, Marty booking it to Doc’s, and Lorraine being absolutely over it

She’s an alcoholic and she’s barely functional enough to do what’s needed of her, but somehow getting along. A lot of drinking means a lot of hangovers, and a good 60% of the time, she’s either drinking, or pretty out of it.

When she’s drunk, she usually retreats away, but if she ends up in a situation with one of her kids when she’s drunk and just wants to be left alone, she can be very mean and critical. Marty is a sensitive person, and we know he really lets criticism get to him, so this is not the greatest environment for him.

Also Lorraine is probably totally over the guitar thing. I speak from my poor parents experience when I say that dealing with a musician in the early stages is not easy. It involves a lot of hearing them practice the same bar over and over and over and over and over and it can drive you absolutely insane. So when Lorraine is hungover or whatever, she just wants Marty to shut up which makes Marty all the more insecure about his music

She’s also very critical in general. She’s hard on Marty, and will pretty much ignore him unless she’s giving some kind of criticism or yelling at him for something or the other. Marty knows at this point not to argue back because he’ll just get his feelings badly hurt. I mean, when Lorraine shits on Jennifer at dinner, Marty just sits silently, looking supremely uncomfortable, which is nothing like how the Marty we know would react when his loved ones are insulted.

I feel like Marty’s desperation for validation comes from this. The way he keeps trying to wrap his arm around Jennifer, the way he’s so latched on to Doc, people who validate him, it’s clear that Marty has not been told that he’s good enough very often, and he’s very eager to prove he is to others and himself. That also explains why he values other’s opinions of him so much, too.

Anyway, back to Lorraine, Lorraine is so despondent at the state of her life that she just sinks further into her alcoholism and depression, once again making their family situation that much worse. She does try to make things work and do normal family things, but it just doesn’t work out

Money must’ve been tight too. I mean, 5 people on one average at best income living in California can’t have been comfortable, which would’ve probably just added more tension

But yeah, those are some of my thoughts on the matter lol. This family is a hot mess, and I’m so glad Marty has doc to reverse all that trauma lol

[egcdeath]

a blip in the reader-verse

chapter 6: extra! extra! read all about it

series summary: a minor mistake causes a shift in the multiverse that only you have the capacity to fix.

chapter summary: you kept your friends close, and your enemy even closer.

pairing: politician!andy barber x journalist!reader, steve rogers x reader

word count: 4k

warnings: american politics, fake dating/marriage, angst at the end, heavy codependent behavior at the end

author’s note: i saw @jtargaryen18 post about politician!steve a while ago and must’ve internalized it because this chapter pretty much wrote itself. just a heads up: all of my political knowledge comes from political sitcoms, so sorry in advance if i get some things wrong. another warning is that there are still some very unhealthy relationship dynamics at play here, so promise me you won’t be like reader okay?

previous chapter / series masterlist

Is Andy Barber Really the Best for Our Nation’s Future?

Opinion

by Y/N L/N

Feb 7, 2021, 4:36 PM ET

After tonight’s debate, the question that’s begged is if Andrew Barber is truly fit to run our country. Although he’s clearly a front runner for his party’s nomination, he’s shown time and time again that he may actually be our weakest candidate.

His weaknesses were highlighted during the debate, with his dodged questions and vague answers. At this point in time, it’s hard to tell if Barber has a platform at all.

With Super Tuesday just around the corner, I ask you to reevaluate your support for Barber. Though a charming candidate, it seems that that’s all he has, his charm. His policies are weak, and borderline impossible, and he certainly isn’t the right person to become the most powerful man in the world.

—-

When you became conscious, you were no better than unconscious. Your eyes opened and were immediately met with a harshness from the sun peeking through a window. You shifted away from the brightness, body sinking into a memory foam mattress while your nude form rubbed against similarly soft sheets. You sleepily rubbed your eyes before they flitted throughout the room you were in. Observing an oddly clean, generic looking area, you’d quickly connected the dots that you were in a hotel room. A rather fancy one at that. 

Soft breathing came from next to you, and as you turned your head a bit more, you were met with the back of a fluffy and dark haired man. You weren’t completely sure, but judging by your history of finding your way to Steve, you’d assumed that it was some alternate form of your partner.

The man in bed next to you yawned, and haphazardly threw an arm in your direction, before rolling over to greet you, “morning sunshine,” he slurred sleepily.

The beard was a bit of a surprise to you. Though you’d begged and begged your Steve to keep it, he often refused for one reason or another. Seeing the man next to you who (what was now much clearer to you) a version of your boyfriend, was a rather pleasant surprise. 

“Morning,” you responded in an equally sleepy manner, ignoring the rhythmic vibration coming from your night stand.

“Mm, you should get that,” he mumbled, pressing a disoriented peck to the side of your head while you reached over to grab your phone, which you could now see was the perpetrator of the vibrations.

“Hello?” you asked into the phone.

“Are you dumb? Or are you fucking stupid?” Aaliyah’s voice scolded through the phone. “Do you know what kind of position you’ve put me in? This is a fucking mess, Y/N. All for some dick? How could you be so careless?! Jesus!”

“What are you talking about?” You glanced over at Andy, and sat up a bit, pulling the crisp blankets over your body in an attempt to retain some form of modesty.

“Don’t play dumb with me. You’re fucking Andy Barber, but you’re writing articles about him like you just watched him kill your dog. You realize that this puts all of us at risk, right? You’re gonna lose your job, I’m gonna lose my job since I decided to edit and publish your shit, and you and I will lose any sort of journalistic integrity we’ve ever had, or will have, for the rest of goddamn time! Seriously, you could’ve had anyone, but Andy Barber? Andrew fucking Barber?” she groaned over the line.

“Uh, I’ll uh, call you back,” you whispered.

“You’re joking right? Are you with him right now?”

“Aaliyah!”

“Oh my god, you’re with him right now. You’re a fucking mess,” she huffed before hanging up.

Why did the universe have to send you off to such a shitshow?

You rolled out of bed, and sulked into the bathroom, desperate to find out what was going on. While sitting on the toilet, you scrolled through the wall of notifications; tweets directed at you, messages from confused friends begging you to call them when you had a chance, and even the occasional concerned email. 

You grimaced as you read through each one of them, eventually clicking on the article that many seemed to be referencing, which included a paparazzi photo of you and this Andy Barber character entering a hotel together sometime in the late night to early morning, partnered with an article or two of your own criticizing him. At first, you wondered if he was some sort of celebrity, but what you ultimately found out was much worse. 

He was a politician. A senator who was running to be president.

You screamed into your hands, before tossing your phone aside, and starting a warm shower for yourself. Perhaps the shower could help jog your memory a bit. 

Stepping into the steamy chamber, and letting the water pelt down onto you did do wonders for you, and it gave you a moment of focus. With both your memories from this universe, along with the information you’d been given through your phone, you were able to piece a few aspects of the universe together.

You were a journalist, a popular one at that, Andy was Steve, but not Steve, and also a presidential candidate. Aaliyah was your editor, and a higher-up at the Times, and you were about to have your ass handed to you over an affair. At least Andy wasn’t married.

Your shower must’ve taken longer than you’d expected, as there was a soft knock on the door after some time. 

“Everything okay in there?” a slightly muffled voice asked.

“Yeah. Just peachy. Why aren’t you more worried about this?” you called back.

“I have a good publicist. And campaign manager. I just have a good team,” Andy paused briefly. “When you’re ready, room service is ready.”

----

Over aggressive mouthfuls of fresh fruit and bitter coffee, you conversed with Andy.

“How are we gonna fix this?” You questioned while setting down your fork.

“Well, it’s simple. We just have to find some kind of spin to this whole story. Maybe you were just interviewing me, or getting a soundbite from me.” “Why would you agree to get a soundbite from someone who clearly has it out for you?” You set your fork down, and crossed your arms over your white robe clad chest. 

“That’s a good question,” Andy nodded a bit, “a good question for someone else to answer.”

“Why don’t we let your publicist figure out how to play this?”

“I’d say I’m a bit of an expert at this at this point, but I’ll call my team.”

“You do that, I need to assess the damage to my career,” you huffed, moving to sit on the bed so that you could aggressively scroll on your phone in peace.

Andy called someone, and you patiently waited while he chatted with them. 

“Okay, Y/N. We can’t leave through the front, so my guy’s gonna pick us up in the garage. We have like, half an hour,” he tossed his phone aside, then maneuvered himself to get in bed with you, setting both hands down on either side of you, and placing a soft kiss on your lips. He slowly began to inch down your body, untying the belt of your robe as he did so, when you interrupted him.

“What do you think you’re doing, Andrew?”

“We have time.” He looked up at you.

“We are not doing this. What do you think got us into this mess in the first place?” you frowned, moving one of his hands so you could slide away from him. 

“Are you serious?”

“Yes! Why aren’t you taking this seriously! Do you realize that both of our careers are at stake here? I don’t want to lose my job because I’m having an affair with you. You shouldn’t want to lose a shot at office for a woman you’re not even with.”

“Come on, we’ve been doing this for almost a year, and you only have a problem with it now?”

“Yes! The public had no idea before! They’re going batshit now! And the worst part is that I’m the one taking the most heat,” you sighed, and Andy gave you a frown. 

“I’m sorry, Y/N. You know I didn’t want this to happen.”

“It’s kinda too late for sorries now.” 

——

You stepped out of your suite about five minutes after Andy left, suitcase in tow, blocky sunglasses on your face, and a heathered grey peacoat draped over your shoulders. Although you were stressed from the controversy you’d found yourself in, you couldn’t help but feel the buzz of excitement from having to hide from the paparazzi. At the same time, you felt quite bad for this version of yourself.

When you finally got out to the designated Cadillac, you asked for his driver to roll up the partition, like you’d done a million times before, then looked out of the tinted windows. The ride was pretty awkward, considering you were in no mood to talk to Andy, and Andy felt bad about the issues he’d imposed on you from his own carelessness. He set a cautious hand on top of yours, and though you were agitated, it did brighten your mood the slightest bit. 

After what felt like forever, you arrived at his campaign building, and you were ushered into a small, soundproof space, with a large and round pine table in the center of it. Surrounding the table was a very tired looking Aaliyah, and… Tony Stark? 

“How’s everyone’s weekend been?” Tony asked, breaking the ice as you and Andy settled into your seats.

“Are we really doing small talk right now?” Aaliyah deadpanned, “sorry, that was uncalled for.”

“Alright, straight to the elephant in the room then. You two were out spotted, big deal, happens all the time to politicians and their mistresses-“

“I’m not his mistress! You know this, Tony,” you huffed.

“Tony knew and not me?” Aaliyah gasped.

“Well-“ you began. 

“Save it.”

“It was on a very need-to-know basis,” you muttered.

“Back to what I was saying. I suggest that we don’t address it, unless addressed.”

“I don’t know if you’re dense, or what, but that’s the exact opposite of what we need to do. We have to get on top of this story before the story is that you,” Aaliyah gestured at you, “are packing your shit at the Times.”

The door shot open, and quickly closed. A slightly flustered blonde man stumbled through. “Sorry to interrupt,” he began.

Aaliyah rolled her eyes at this notion, muttering a ‘sure you are’ to herself. 

“We just finished polling numbers, and Andy, you’re up?” He projected the screen of his iPad onto a TV in the room, then passed the device over to Andy on his way to sit down.

“Thanks, Vis,” he gave him a curt nod.

“Why would our candidate allegedly hooking up with someone who hates him boost him in the polls?” Tony asked.

“Middle America loves a family man, you know that,” Vision said in a matter of faculty manner. “Andy has had a hard time connecting with that demographic because when they see him, they see an Elitist East-coaster.”

“Hooking up with a hot reporter does not make you a family man,” Aaliyah retorted.

“That brings me to my next point. If you don’t mind, I’d like to add a proposal of my own,” Vision stated, and received a shrug from the rest of the room. “Well, if we need to put a spin on this, the obvious choice is to explain that they’ve been seeing each other the whole time. Under wraps, of course. The photos the paparazzi received are not damning by any means, and look more romantic than sexual, to be quite frank. Y/N wrote those articles to throw the public off her scent, and she didn’t really believe anything she said, and Andy? He’s just a good, all American man who was tired of keeping his relationship under wraps. Everything’s to gain from this plan.”

“Well, I lose my journalistic integrity. That’s a pretty big loss to me. I may never work again,” you rubbed your forehead in a distraught manner.

“You won’t have to worry about working when you’re the First Lady. Think about it, if we can get votes from the swing states, we’ve secured enough electoral votes to have a Barber win. All over a little character rebrand.”

“Excuse me, the First Lady?” You nervously glanced between Vision and Aaliyah while you attempted to pick your jaw up from the floor.

“Well, yes. We can’t exactly get the full ‘family man’ look without Mr. Barber being a real husband.“

“Are we talking, real wedding?” Aaliyah questioned.

“Yes. You just have to be legally bound together for around four years, eight years tops. About twelve would be preferable, but I understand that not everything works out.”

“I don’t object to that,” Andy winked and nudged you a bit.

What a mess.

“Back to what I was saying, we’ll probably need about a two week PR period before we do a press briefing announcing the engagement. Give or take. During that time, we could have your publicist arrange all sorts of good photo ops for you two.”

“Either way, my career is ruined,” you sighed, and Andy set his hand on your back.

“Sorry, sweetheart.”

“You don’t have to do that. We’re not currently standing in front of 30 cameras.”

“Well, we should prepare for when we are in front of 30 cameras.”

“Is it though?” Vision interjected, bringing you and Andy back from your aside. “We can just deflect, maybe have a few of your friends make articles about how what you did wasn’t all that bad.”

“Is it not a valid criticism of me that I was sleeping around with the person who I was also slandering?”

“Is it not possible to criticize someone you care about? In fact, helping someone learn how to improve can be very romantic,” Vision shrugged. 

There was a brief silence throughout the bunch while everyone pondered a counter argument. 

“That right there, that kind of insight is why we call you the Vision,” Tony shook his head and proudly clapped the man on his back.

“So it’s settled then? We’re really doing this?” You glanced around at your peers while Aaliyah spoke. “Any objections, love birds?”

Andy shrugged, “I’d be happy to spend the rest of my life with her.”

You, on the other hand, weren’t so sure. 

——

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This was your reality for the next two weeks. The news cycle was filled with a plethora of articles about you, some criticizing you, some criticizing Andy, but most, supporting the two of you in your romantic endeavors. Unsurprisingly, the world loved a good story about two attractive people getting together. 

During this period, you didn’t particularly feel like leaving, though the thought had certainly crossed your mind. You just weren’t sure that you wanted to be dealing with those terrible symptoms again in the midst of an already stressful stage of your life. At the same time, it seemed like the universe was not going to be fair with your time in this reality. You were convinced that you were here for the long haul, or at least, until Andy proposed to you. 

Although it was a bit annoying, cameras around every corner, a watchful eye on everything that you or Andy even considered doing, you found yourself growing on Andy. In some ways, he was a bit more intense than Steve, whose personality had mellowed out a bit since the Snap.

This had been the first time in all of your travels where you felt like ‘Steve’ was the one pursuing you, and in all honesty, it made you feel good. Even if everything the two of you did had an aftertaste of artificiality.

You spent more and more time with him every day, staying together with him in hotels across the country, visiting local businesses with him to get the perfect photo op, and attending galas with donors. It seemed like in every candid photo of Andy, you weren’t too far behind. By the time the day of your proposal arrived, you weren’t even all that opposed to the marriage. 

When the proposal finally arrived, the two of you were sat inside a rather fancy restaurant, finishing up your meal when Andy settled on one knee in front of you, “Y/N,” he began, and you felt the all too familiar tremble of your watch on your wrist. 

You almost had to restrain yourself from exclaiming out loud. It’s not that you didn’t like Andy or anything, he’d genuinely grown on you. In the least cheesy way, it wasn’t him, but you. Being somewhere so unfamiliar for so long had begun to create a cumulative exhaustion that wore a bit more on you every day. Feeling homesick was an understatement.

You brought your hands up to your face, and gasped dramatically, squeezing your eyes shut to see if you could possibly produce a few tears, while mobile cameras and a few professional flashes were directed towards you. A few warm droplets slipped down your face, and for a moment you weren’t even sure how fake they were. It seemed like once they started, they couldn’t stop.

You missed Steve, your Steve, the man you’d fallen in love with. You missed your friends, teammates, and family. You missed the stability of knowing what the world held for you next. 

In the midst of Andy’s proposal, in what should’ve been the happiest moment of your life, all you could focus on was your overwhelming desire to have a sense of normalcy in your life once again. 

——

You woke up in a cold sweat, heart racing in your chest, and shaking your ribcage. You looked up to the ceiling of what you had grown to know was your room in the Compound, your real room, and felt your eyes well up in tears that stung you. 

You sat up, and took as deep of a breath as you could manage, when you noticed Wanda sitting by your bedside.

“Oh good, you’re awake,” she said softly, coming closer to you, offering you a glass of water before sitting at the foot of your bed. 

“Where’s Steve?” you asked, trying to gauge where you were. 

“Honey,” she sighed softly. “I’m so sorry. He’s still missing.”

Your lip trembled as you took a sip. You really were back home. 

“I know you’re hurting, but when you feel a little better, we’re going to Medbay. Banner decided that we should probably keep an eye on your vitals, but you were gone before we even had the chance to get you there.”

You gulped down the water, then set it on your bedside table, “so was that all just a dream or something? Why isn’t Steve back?” you huffed frustratedly.

“I don’t know why he isn’t back, but I don’t think you were dreaming. I was trying to watch your dreams, but I couldn’t read you, or your thoughts at all.”

“Hmm,” you mumbled, throwing your legs over the side of the bed, “let’s go.”

As you settled into the cold, and sterile medical facility you were hooked up to a plethora of monitors, and a cacophony of devices beeped as they read your physical state. 

You tuned out the words being spoken around you, zoning out and looking forward to your vital signs monitor. Your mind wandered to your last few thoughts in your previous reality, the desperation to come back, to see your estranged lover again. You couldn’t help but to feel disappointed, lamenting the fact that you’d found your way home, yet felt the ever present void in your heart where your Steve used to be.

“Y/N?” a voice asked you, and you glanced in its general direction. “What happened while you were out? What did you see? Did it work?” Bruce pelted you with questions.

“I don’t know if I’m ready to talk about it yet,” you sighed softly, bringing a hand up to your neck and rubbing it. “The watch worked though, I was definitely in other universes. I just couldn’t reach him. Bring him home. I failed.”

“Do you think he’s really out there?” Bruce whispered to Wanda hoping that you might not pick up on it.

“I’m… I don’t know. I just don’t know how likely it is that we’ll manage to find him,” she responded in a hushed tone. You bit back tears as she spoke, resuming your empty gaze on the pixelated green text of your heart rate on the monitor.

“I’m sorry, guys. I have to go back,” you interrupted. “I can’t give up on Steve yet. I know he wouldn’t give up on me.”

“Y/N, you could be gone for centuries before you find him, then return back here with no time passed at all, and possibly no Steve. You don’t deserve to take on all of that pain,” Wanda set a hand on your shoulder. “Steve would’ve wanted you to move on from him. To find happiness without him.”

“I can’t do that, Wanda. Without him I don’t even know who I am,” your voice trembled as you spoke. “He’s literally been my only tether through all of this.”

“I just don’t know that this is the best thing we could be doing. Sure, you’re physically fine, but it almost seems like you’re doing worse emotionally than you were before you left,” Bruce added.

“I’m not!” you sniffled before continuing. “I’m just tired from going to all those new places.”

Bruce and Wanda didn’t seem too convinced. “Don’t you guys believe in me? When have I let you down on a mission before? I’m gonna find him, okay? I’ll find him if it’s the last fucking thing I do,” you blubbered.

Wanda’s hand slid down your shoulder, and to the watch that was currently on your wrist.

“Don’t,” you uttered, swinging your opposite hand to grab onto your own wrist. You were aware that there was absolutely no way you could overpower her in taking the watch from you, but even in your minor hysterics, you were able to think fast enough to press the round button before the watch was able to be taken off of you.

You, and your wrist shook. Wrist shaking from the watch, and promise of sending you elsewhere, and you from a mixture of sobs and adrenaline. Though not the most ideal exit, it was an exit nonetheless.

You weren’t even sure if you cared that you were on good terms with your teammates anymore. 

You just needed to be with Steve again.

[hs-devote]

18. E X C L A M A T I O N

Moodboard // Content // Masterlist

Disclaimer:

All characters and situation in this story are fictitious. Resemblance to any person living or dead is only God knows.

Previous chapter;

It took a few moments for Y/N to connected the dot. One thought came up yet she really didn't like this, “So, you said that Dale Jespersen–”

“Jaden Peesel and Randell are the same person, and he's Dale Jespersen.” 18. EXCLAMATION

Cutting someone off was rude. But, she didn't mind, for now, since she didn't think her tongue could spill whatever she was having in her head. However, what Douglas just said earlier made her blinked.

“How come?”

She tilted her head toward her boyfriend, watching Harry gave Douglas a keen look. His voice was surprisingly steady yet firm as always. His demeanour was nothing to worried about.

For now.

"Randell didn't take the payment through a bank account, the media paid him cash. Meanwhile, Dale's account was increasing high a week before the tape being published. His transaction record shows money out to Victoria's account three days since she sent the video to Jaden Peesel, and some certain amount made into his account in three consecutive days a week after the media gave the cash to Randell."

“He might look like shrewd, but he made one omission, Mr Styles.” Eric added, “Randell's signature is exactly the same with Dale Jespersen.”

Eric gave him a copy of agreement where Randell sold the video and the media must keep his identity secret. Then, gave him another one of Dale's signature.

How could Dale be smart and stupid at the same time?

“That's a stupid move if he wants to be anonymous but make an agreement like that." Roman murmured.

Douglass nodded, “Not only that, Victoria once sent a message to Dale that she succeeded to steal the tape from Ms Powell and sent it to Jaden Peesel and Randell's number. Here.”

The man gave Harry another copy transcript of the evidence, only made the CEO of Erskine furious. Y/N could tell her boyfriend now was suppressing his anger, it was clear from how hard he gripped the papers of evidence in his hand.

“Jaden Peesel and Randell are Dale Jesperson. Victoria Selley is the one who worked with him and it obvious that the two of them started this commotion."

“Fucking hell!”

Everyone flinched in their seats as Harry punch the table with his bare hand. The atmosphere felt thick and intense, no one dare to open their mouth. Y/N watched Harry lowered down his head, gripping his hair hardly and growling fumingly. Exhaling deeply, all she could do now is rubbing his back up and down to soothe him.

“But, what's the reason?" Elle cried, "Vic and I are best friends! We're good with each other!"

“At this point, Ms Powell," Allen began, "We all know Mr Styles and Dale Jespersen are eternal enemies if I could say. They haven't had a good relationship since back then. As for Victoria Selley, we don't know yet what her motive is. But, all I know is Victoria was bitter about her break up with Mr Styles."

“And now, both of them teamed up to take revenge on Harry.” Y/N mumbled, “How could they both know each other?”

“Those two are still on my list, Ms Y/L/N. After this meeting, we'll file this case immediately with all this evidence. We don't yet know their reason. However, they got arrest, we can get that answer."

All of them was mind-blowing. Never crossed her mind, someone who made this mess was the one who was always looking for trouble with Harry. Dissatisfied with the previous one, Dale now came up with a bigger issue. And to make the matters worse, he teamed up with someone she didn't think of.

“I don't know your friend is such a snake, Elle.” Sebastian sighed, “A true friend would never do that.”

“It all makes no sense. I can't believe it.” whined Elle, “We're still in touch until now for fuck sake!”

“How could you not see that, Elle. The fucking footage proves your rotten friend betrayed you. That bitch doesn't deserve to be called a friend.” Harry snarled, raising his head to stare at everyone in the room. Even though his eyes weren't on her, Y/N could feel he wasn't Harry. His persona turned 180 degrees different.

“I want that pile of shit and the cheap whore get arrested the day after tomorrow at most.” he seethed, “I don't care how much I will pay the police to quickly arrest them. I want the news of their arrest in three days. Widespread throughout the entire earth if necessary.”

Without any other words, he got up from the chair and exited the meeting room – leaving the loud bang of the door echoed in the air.

“I'll come with you. Because it's not only Mr Styles who's a disadvantage here, Ms Powell lost 30% of her contract just because of that." Roman spoke, "I believe we better go today."

“Just, just do what must be done, Allen, Mr Kane. And thanks for the hard work, also for Eric and Douglas." Y/N drew a heavy breath, "And for Elle, I'm sorry for all this mess. You're not the only one who hurt, many parties feel the impact."

“As for Harry, I believe he's unstable right now. You guys know how hard he holds his temper." she added.

“I'm sorry for that old video, Y/N. I intended nothing for keeping the video."

It felt like a dream for Elle being nice to her. Because the first time they met, Elle was uncomfortable with her. And how she was apologising about the tape, made nice progress. Y/N bit her lip before giving the woman a small smile, "It's the past we couldn't get rid of. Some of our younger behaviours are stupid, reckless, and questionable. This has all happened, so.." she shrugged, "The most important thing is, we have to quickly close this case so it doesn't get worse."

Elle frowned, “But, what stuck in my head is.. why?”

“Their reason is still mysterious, Elle. Once we meet them, we have to force them to speak.” she sighed, “No matter what.” . . . .

Some days were still needed before the files completed and submitted. At the same time, it was reported that Dale had submitted his resignation from Machtig. Even his house, which had been spied by Allen's worker, hadn't shown the slightest bit of activity during the last three days of spying.

It was no secret Harry went on a rampage. His current level of anger surpassed anything else, and it was the worst everyone have seen. It all went more and more disastrous when the client bluntly revealed the reasons for their backing out.

We couldn't work with 'someone' like you

How the hell Erskine have porn crazed man as their leader?

It would damage our image if we continued to work with Erskine

All of those made Harry almost destroy his own office. He was seeing red, the only thing he knew was a burning fire – as in his head and feelings right now. He felt like being surrounded by flames that were ready to devour him.

Erskine's stock fell dramatically, he was forced to close several branch offices that weren't profitable and resulted in laid-off his employees. This was the darkest stage in his life; never thought he would step into a black abyss like this.

Every night, Y/N would always accompany Harry on late-night meeting with the finance staffs, HR staffs, and several related divisions to calculate how much money left for Erskine could pay their employees. And it ended with them deciding which candidate to get layoff next.

This wasn't an easy task to write down the names of employees to be fired. Harry knew his soon-to-be fired employees have obligations and responsibilities of their families. However, it was the best choice and he hoped they would understand and get a better job.

How was Marcel doing?

Oh, the man loved it so much.

The anger, the stress, the betrayal burnt his emotion and let Marcel smirked in his glory. Marcel was still Marcel, with his arrogance and extremely temper. The broken door, shattering glass, and pieces of papers were his masterpiece. All the shouting and yelling were him. The office atmosphere was unpleasant and less comfortable. Even when Harry or him passed in front of the employees, everyone seemed afraid albeit in their hearts, Y/N knew they didn't like him. All they could do was stay silent rather than be his target or be the next employee to get layoff.

But, one thing surprised her. He could be a little rational when in a meeting even though a few harsh words slipped out. Hell, even he was nice enough to her.

If he barked at employees, tore their papers, slammed doors in their faces, or smashed glass to intimidate them, Marcel was never more than scowled at her – unlike their first encounter.

Of course in this kind of state, Marcel was more dominant than Harry. No wonder if Marcel was more present than her actual boyfriend. And it made her worry since it had been five days in a row Harry couldn't switch his position. Y/N had started to panic, she couldn't think of Harry wouldn't come back again.

“How's he doing?”

“Awful.” she sighed, “I don't know what to do any more, Niall.”

Since Marcel had been here long enough than Harry, and of course he missed the therapy, Y/N took initiative to meet with Niall herself – without Marcel knowing. She was sure Marcel would go mad if he found out that she secretly met Niall to fix him. Both of them now were in a coffee shop somewhere in Borough, and had been talking for half an hour – about none other than Harry Styles.

“Where is he now?”

“In his penthouse. The last time I checked he was playing FIFA when I said goodbye.”

Niall raised an eyebrow, “And Erskine?”

“We're on the most critical stage since it was founded, according to the legal team. Marcel even want to retire and sell the company for fuck sake!”

“H would smack him for that.”

“Absolutely," she nodded, "Since the client doubt Harry's performance and scoffs at our leader is a porn star – according to them, we now just have five companies remaining. And we don't know if when they will announce the back out."

“I'm sorry for that, Y/N.” Niall smiled apologetically, “God knows how strong you're guys.”

“That's why we think to change the CEO's position temporarily until Harry and Erskine are completely clean from this case.” she shrugged, “At least it may growth their trust again, while we rest Harry and help him to find his way back.”

“How did he respond that?” Niall sipped his coffee, “That's a huge step.”

“The directors and I haven't told him yet. But I think, we'll kinda lie at him. Says he definitely needs his leave while someone will take over the position. And of course, we'll lend that important seat to the rightful person."

“Do you have the name?”

“We have. But, I'll discuss this thing with his mother first. It's her late husband's company after all.”

“If I could be honest, Y/N, this is the most Marcel has been in Harry's body in consecutive days. And if we don't help him, it might get worse than we thought. I bet he threw the medicines away.” he stared at her, “Why don't you take him on holiday? It can help him to clear his mind.”

Y/N squinted her eyes, “Don't you think it's a bit risky? He'll reject it at very second.”

“From what I've heard from you, Marcel was likely growing an attachment with you." he smiled, "Which something I was surprised."

“Take the advantage and bring Harry back with us. I can't lose my best friend and we'll work together for that, Y/N.” . . . .

To Y/N dismay, Marcel rejected her offer first, said it wasn't important. Yet, she managed to persuade him and said he needed some time away to shut off this mess. She wouldn't take a risk to bring him far away from London, and her choice fell on Windermere.

The natural beauty of England's largest lake could be enjoyed directly through the cottage she rented for a week. She didn't know how many days they would need, that made her rent the contemporary property for the whole week. The house was lying on the shores of the lake, offering four bedrooms with four bathrooms also. The kitchen and dining space holding magnificent views across the lake, not to mention they had private shoreline and jetty mooring. Such a unique escape and worth the four hours drive from home.

It had been three days they were there and Harry seemed to be enjoying his rest here. The new situation and different vibes calmed him and made Marcel less frequent. Everything Harry did was cycling around the district, took a long walk, even swimming in the Lake Windermere. The lake itself was well-known as the largest and deepest in England, it made her nervous because Harry was so stubborn and insistent to do wild swimming there.

However, a few things happened and made him changed upon his return. If he left as Harry, he would back as Marcel. Like this morning, he was her Harry. But, when he got back after finished his jog, his aura was different. He was cursing all the time, ignoring her questions. And from that moment, she knew he was Marcel.

“What happened, Harry? You were fine this morning." Y/N asked her tenth question for him, didn't give up to get the answer she wanted. She knew the man who was drinking in front of her was Marcel, but if he didn't want to answer, Y/N would find it difficult to find out the case.

“That fucking asshole got on my nerves,” grunted him, “He threw his water on me. Who does he think he is?!”

She raised an eyebrow, “He threw water on you? What was the reason?”

“Like the hell I care?” he rolled his eyes, “But, I think the bloody nose will teach him the lesson.”

“Harry.” Y/N stressed her words, her legs stepping closer to him, “Did you punch him?”

“Of fucking course! What do you expect me to do? Doing nothing like an idiot?” Marcel tilted his head, “He got my face wet, and I got his nose wet. Paid off.”

Her shoulder fell off, "The wet is a different kind, Harry. But, you just punched him, right? Nothing more serious?"

“Why do you ask me like that, darling?" he smirked, "That's a bit weird. You seem don't mind me punching someone."

She gulped, feeling overwhelmed by the fact that Marcel brought his face closer. His eyes which although almost resembled Harry's, still kept her struck in the place. Albeit Marcel inhabits the body of her lover, the feeling of intimidation by someone who wasn't so familiar still made her skin tingled.

“That better than you drown him on the lake.” she murmured, yet at once she cursed her stupidity for saying like that. She had to quickly cover it before Marcel got suspicious, “I'm joking. I don't know if he was rude to you or not but I think he kinda deserved it if he had no reason to threw his water.”

“You're funny," he shook his head before pulling his face away and walked inside, "Would you fancy home-cooked meal? I'm not into a take away for today."

“Would you do the dish afterwards?" Y/N wiggled her eyebrow, looking at Marcel who was digging the shelves in the kitchen. One thing she liked about him was, he loved cooking more than Harry. Harry loved to cook, but not as often as Marcel if he was here. Marcel would almost cook every day if he was present, even though he had a rough day or his anger was on the cloud.

“Only if you clean the table beforehand.”

“Only clean the table?”

“You heard me m'lady.”

“Deal.”

. . . .

The holiday originally was for them only. But, Y/N invited Anne to come two days before their return to London. This short escape was help Harry to rest and gather his energy, as evident from Marcel that barely appeared since he admitted he punched someone's nose.

The morning was only seven straight, Harry was still sleeping safe and sound while Y/N just opened her eyes five minutes ago. His heavy arm draped her naked side tightly with his other one was folded behind his head. She brought her fingers running along his chiselled jaw, down to his lower lip and made a stop in the chin. He was so peaceful and fragile when he was sleeping, yet once he opened that damn gorgeous pair of green eyes, he would turn into a solid one.

Her memory took her back to the last night sex. She didn't lie when she said both of them were sex-crazed. They were always constantly had sex everywhere or whenever they had the chance. Either a wild one or the gentle one. Y/N also didn't understand why her intercourse activity was high, whereas previously with Elliott, she wasn't that frequent to have sex.

She drew a smile remembering how beautiful the sunset was while she moaned Harry's name. Since their bedroom had windows overlooking the lake, it was a nice addition to heeding their sex activities. The warm sunlight cast Harry's beautiful face sweating as he deepened his thrust, grunting deeply while the woman beneath him squinted her eyes in pleasure. And when they both reached their high together, the sky was already dark since the sun had gone down, their hot bodies shivered from the cold wind kissed their body.

Hell, even thinking about that made her down there throbbing nervously.

Y/N never denied that Harry was the greatest sex she ever had. His little seductive comment would always get her wet. And sometimes made her think there was something wrong with her because she was so easily aroused.

She was too busy with her own daydream to notice that Harry had opened his eyes and was watching his girlfriend stroking his cheek slowly. He intentionally didn't make the slightest sound or movement, waiting for Y/N to realise that he was awake.

“Enjoying me that much?”

The way his morning voice was raspy and thick out of his mouth, startled the girl all of sudden. Her hand jerked away from his smooth cheek, tucking it below her chin. Harry giggled of the way she blinked her eyes, before throwing the sharp look on him.

“Good morning, baby.” he snuggled closer to her neck with arms tightening around her waist, his naked fingers drawing the circle on her lower back seductively.

“Good morning, golden.”

“Golden?” raised an eyebrow, Harry gave her a questionable look while head tilted up to her. “What's golden?”

She hummed, stroking his sharp jawline playfully, “Mmhm. The way your face lit up when the ray of sunshine glistened your pretty face, it has the golden beauty, H.”

“Such an unusual nickname,” he shrugged, “But, I like the definition.”

“Glad to hear that.”

“Anyway," he sighed, placing his palm on her hip instead, "Mum will come today, right? What time will she arrive? I think we can get her from the station?"

“Around four? But, she told me earlier we don't need to pick her up since she will take a taxi to get here.”

“All right,” he yawned, “Let me stay still like this for a bit before we have breakfast.” said him before nudged his head on the crook of her shoulder, his index finger stroking her hip gently.

Harry and Y/N were silent for five minutes, didn't say a word – just enjoying the closeness to each other. She almost fell back asleep if Harry's cheeky hands went down her stomach, teasing her down there. She gulped and whined at the same time when his fingers nudged her core, playing with her clit before gone to feeling her inner thigh.

“Harry..”

“Darling..”

A frustrated sigh was coming from her mouth when Harry rolled his finger up and down her cunt, feeling the sticky and wetness of her before taking the next step that made Y/N shake. She let out a whimper when his thumb nudged her clit, moaning deeply when she felt his two fingers being pushed into her.

“My sweetheart is always wet and ready for me.” he hummed in her ear, still with his fingers pumping in and out of her, “Such a beautiful morning, yeah? Me and you, after our endless sex last night and waking up aroused and loaded.”

“Harry..” she whined, her chest rose up and down to catch the breath since she was running out of the oxygen. And all of that because how magically his fingers worked her out.

“Come for me, baby. Come in my fingers, I know you need that. Want you to clench my fingers.” muttered him while fastening his fingers' thrust on her, “Do it, darling. Do it for me.”

Harry didn't need much time for lifted his body and hovering the girl he was fingering, while he added the third finger, he leaned down to kiss her. A satisfaction smirk formed on his lips when Y/N buckled her hip and lolling her head, feeling the overwhelmed of his three fingers working on her. She cried out when her man picked up the speed, only for made her moan even more.

“Harry..”

He kissed her throat, “Such a good girl. You feel so good.”

Y/N felt that. Her stomach twisted in pleasure while she screamed out his name, feeling the high came to reach her. Harry smiled, shaking his head looking down at his wet-sticky fingers after he pulled out. Bringing them on his mouth, he licked all of them clean.

She was gasping for a breath while her eyes set off of her boyfriend who was licking her sweetness on him. Her droopy eyes stared dreamily on him, watching the way he was naked with all of his glory and his pride resting stiffly between his thick thighs. She gulped, thinking how easy for him to get horny and now, the way his length sprung confidently in front of him, she was sure they wouldn't get off this bed for another hour.

“Your cock is cocked.” she bluntly said, giving him an unbelievable look.

“Love that my baby paid attention,” he chuckled, “Thinking you can handle the loaded morning?”

“I th–”

The way Harry frowned over the ringing phone showing he was annoyed. He was about to fulfil his lust but the damn call in disturbed their morning. Y/N giggled softly when Harry moved away from the bed and stomped his footsteps, acting like an annoyed little kid.

“It's Allen." he murmured while looking at the bright screen, then exchanging a look with Y/N.

“Harry." she gave him a warning look before shaking her head – no. Along they spent the time here, both of them agreed to not picking up a work call. Whatever it was. She wanted to make this short holiday their temporary escape from work, she just wanted to unwind and forget about problems for a moment.

“This must be important." he looked at her, like he was asking permission, "Please?"

If it was Allen, something must have happened. And Harry was right; if Allen called him, he would deliver important news. And maybe, maybe it would bring some relief for both of them considering how much they were facing right now.

“Put on the speaker, I don't want you to take the news yourself."

Harry just nodded, before swiped up his screen and put his phone on the bed – leaving the speaker on. She mouthed a thank you, then focusing on what Allen would tell them.

“Allen?”

“Hello, Harry. How are you? How's the holiday?”

He stole a glance from her before shrugging his shoulder, “I'm fine, thanks. The holiday is.. amazing. What made you call me, Allen?”

“Something with the case, H.”

Again, he looked at Y/N who was also staring at him. The way they exchanged looks telling each other they didn't know what the lawyer would tell him. Y/N just nodded her head, letting her boyfriend continue.

“And.. what's that?”

“We knew we've taken this case to legal action. With all of the evidence lead to Dale Jespersen and Victoria Selley, they were being sought while this escalates the lawsuit in court. Victoria Selley has been arrested at her house, but for Dale Jespersen, they still couldn't find them." he paused, "We have a suspicion that he changed his identity. Or the worst, fled out of England."

“I thought you should know what to do, Allen." he scoffed, "Spread out his picture and activity record! Ban him for travelling overseas. Should I be the one who tells you such a simple thing like this?"

The rage on his eyes wasn't something difficult to understand, Y/N might never know what it was like if she was him for now, but she knew well the anxiety and anger flooded on him. She couldn't reprimand him who was currently yelling at his lawyer, all she did was wait for him. She flinched when he was screaming at the top of his lung at Allen when he got the dissatisfaction, only to get him angered even more. Raised her hand to try to ease him, she was flabbergasted when Harry quickly shoved her palm away – grabbing his mobile phone and walked out of their room. Y/N could no longer her Allen's voice, it seemed her boyfriend had turned off the speaker.

Harry never shied away from her, no matter what.

She didn't know what are they talking any more or how he cursed his lawyer. She would take a guess he was on the other side of the cottage, or even on the patio. But, that was impossible considering he was still naked. He didn't even take his shorts on him before walking out!

“Fucking moron!”

No, it wasn't the curse made her flinch. The way Harry slammed hard the door made her jump on the skin, along with the banging wooden table. She just prayed that Harry didn't break something here, but she had to get prepared – especially Anne would come today. She didn't want Marcel's presence today.

Should she do that?

Her phone was in her hands, but she was still hesitant to call someone she wanted to ask for help. She didn't want to bother that person, especially they were on holiday. However, her determination was unanimous when another slamming door being heard again. Y/N didn't know if it was still Harry, or Marcel. Quickly she found a name in her contact and pressed the call button without hesitation.

. . . .

Anne knocked on their door exactly at four while her son was out from an hour ago. Both of the women hugging each other before Y/N helped Anne with her suitcase, and of course the mother would ask her son whereabouts since it was only Y/N who opened the door for her.

“Harry is out. I think he's taking a walk, or cycling?” Y/N mumbled after escorted Anne to her room.

Anne just nodded, but, she quickly noticed something was wrong when her son's girlfriend looked off. Squinting her eyes, she took Y/N's arms and bring her down to sit with her.

“Are you okay, sweetheart? You look.. off.”

A nervous laugh came out from Y/N's mouth, "I'm fine. It's just.. well, Harry is in a bad mood today, so don't be surprised if he's a little grumpy."

“You two didn't fight, did you?” Anne frown, “Did I come at a bad time?”

“No, no. We didn't fight. We're fine, really fine.”

“Good then. The bruised on your neck told me so.”

Y/N gaped at what Anne just said, her face flushed in embarrassment and reflexively covered her neck. While she was feeling awkward, Anne just winked at her – laughing softly before patted her arm.

“Do you want me to look around? We have our private dock and I believe you'll like it.” she quickly changed the subject, hoping Anne would do that. She couldn't linger staring at the older woman after she was being caught for her sex life.

“Sure. This cottage is so pretty, you know?” Anne smiled, getting up from the bed and went out with Y/N.

“Definitely. I rented this right away when I saw the description.”

Y/N happily guided Anne to each room while Anne admired every corner of the cottage they rent. She squealed in surprise when her eyes caught an outside hot tub with the lake viewing. But, the things she liked the most were the massive kitchen and the terrace with the beautiful lake view every day.

“How's him, Y/N? How's Harry coping with all those problems?” asked Anne, sitting in the iron chair. Her eyes stared warmly at Y/N, soft yet worries smile adorned her lips, “He wouldn't tell me about that in the slightest, and I'm worried about him if he keeps it to himself.”

“The good news, Anne, we're going to file a lawsuit in court with all valid evidence we have, and I'm sure Harry will win this case. One of the subjects has been arrested while the main man is still out there. And it leads to the bad news."

“That was... fast?”

Y/N nodded, "I know. But, it's not – according to Harry. He thinks Allen and his team are taking too long to deal with all of these, and he has been emotionally unstable since Allen called him this morning for only told him another subject still hasn't caught."

“And.. Erskine? Lucas would take over his job for a while, wouldn't he?"

“It's the best choice at the moment. We thought with Harry being so unstable controlling his anger lately, and the client's currently waning trust in him – we asked your nephew to help us at our headquarter since he already understands his duties and not someone else for the company – especially he's the family. I apologise if our plan is presumptuous, we're just trying to keep your family's business."

“I understand, Y/N. Lucas told me your plan to try to foster the client's trust by temporarily changing Harry's position. He also said you guys lost a lot of clients, and that's obviously a big problem." Anne sighed, "This isn't easy for my son."

“I can't even imagine being him, Anne. With so much to endure, he must be so depressed. I don't blame him for always having a hard time holding back his anger.” she mumbled, “He didn't even take his medicine! He needs them to help him relax.”

The sound of the opened gate made the two woman pause, turning their gaze to Harry's figure who had just returned. Anne hurriedly walked in to meet him in the hallway, while Y/N following behind her. Harry wasn't so surprised to see his mother in front of him, he quickly greeted her and hugged the woman who gave birth to him.

“I'm going upstairs. Just call me if the dinner was ready." he gave them a small nod before jog up to the second floor. Y/N just smiled apologetically at Anne who was shrugging her shoulders, "That's what worries me."

“Was he like that from the start of this holiday?”

“He was unstable. He was fine at first, but if something ticked him, he just threw rude or harsh word. Then, this morning became worst – like what I told you before. He was screaming, even slamming the door.”

Anne pinched her temple, “I'll try to talk to him at dinner. Maybe he'll listen to his mother. He shouldn't be so tense on his break time.”

. . . .

“What are you doing here?”

Yesterday, exactly when Harry was on the phone with Allen, Y/N took a risky decision. With doubts put aside, she called Niall for advice. Since their holiday should go well, it turned a little unpleasant because a few small things bothered Harry and even got Marcel had the chance to swap their positions. Being the kindest person he was, Niall offered to visit them. Mainly last night Y/N sent him a message that Harry or Marcel, had yelled at Anne. And that wasn't a nice thing to see.

How did Anne respond? Of course, she was shocked. Her son had never yelled at her for such a small thing. No, Anne wasn't angry. Anne was concerned and worried about him.

Niall's smiled faltered when his blue eyes seeing Harry was standing in front of him. The way his best friend's green eyes showed displeasure at his presence, and from then on he could tell Harry was in a complete mess.

“I met him at a cafe not far from here this morning, he was ordering his breakfast when I said hello. Turn out he's in a symposium. And I invited him over for lunch.” Y/N lied, exchanging the look with Niall beside her. Impossible for her to be honest with her boyfriend, he could have thrown his best friend out if she intentionally invited Niall to come over.

“Hello, H. It's been so long since your last session.” Niall shrugged, “How are you?”

“Fine,” Harry muttered, then he flicked his eyes to her, “Mum was asking for you. She needs your help with the noodles.”

She nodded, “All right.” then smiled to both men, “I'll leave you two.”

Y/N rushed to meet Anne in the kitchen while occasionally glancing out the window watching Harry and Niall who started talking while walking towards the patio.

“Do you think this is a good idea?” Anne threw a question while stirring her pot, “Is he suspicious?”

“I told him I met Niall just this morning and he's on.. a business trip, kind of. Then, I asked him to come over.” she answered, “He was a little unfriendly to Niall. But, he did nothing.”

“I just wish he could open up to his friend, at least. Maybe he's a bit hesitant to talk with me.” Anne sighed, “I can't believe he hesitated to talk to his mother or girlfriend.”

“Maybe he would feel comfortable talking to another male."

If only Anne knew..

Niall was her son's doctor, a psychiatrist. It was very easy for a professional like him to get Harry to talk to him. He wasn't only acting like a best friend, but also a doctor to his patients. And Y/N put hopes on Niall, so at least her boyfriend could hold his emotions and let this short getaway be a success for him to calm down.

“Harry doesn't look that tense any more. The way he's standing more relaxed now.”

“Should we call them in? I think they'll be more comfortable talking with stomach full.”

Anne just smiled and nodded while preparing the plates. The conversation between Niall and Harry stopped as she slid the door and invite them for the lunch.

During the lunch, Harry had his mouth shut closed – just enjoying his meal. Sometimes it made Niall had to led the conversation so he would join them. Y/N and Anne sighed in relief when Harry was laughing a little for whatever jokes that Niall said. At least, that's a good thing Y/N had seen since he received the call from Allen.

Talking about that, Harry still hadn't told her what made him so annoyed when his lawyer called him. She also didn't dare to ask him straight forward, just let him took his time to come and told her – if he wanted to.

The sun was getting dimmer, and Niall was still talking with Harry – took him to the dock and making Harry unconsciously undergo his therapy session. It took them almost two hours before they get back inside.

Y/N paced back and forth waiting for Niall in the hallway, while peeking at him who was saying goodbye to Harry and Anne. She exhaled in relief when Niall approached her at the door.

“Is it done?” she bit her lip, whispering to Niall since she didn't want Harry to hear them.

“He's fine,” Niall nodded, “He's unstable, even when I talked to him his emotions were volatile. His resentment towards Dale greatly affected his mood.”

She lowered his voice, “Was Marcel there? He showed up this morning, I think. It was when his lawyer called him.”

“Even Harry behaved as normally as possible, I think a third of our conversation – I spoke to Marcel. And that was the most friendly conversation with Marcel. If usually he always bitter to me, he just told about his grudge and disgust – albeit he had snap at me beforehand.”

“Will he be okay? Do you think this will be successful?” she worried, “He could stay away from his phone and not think too much about all of these. But, Harry is still Harry.”

“Honestly, he refused when I asked him to take his medicine. Which I think it was Marcel who refused me, not Harry. But, you may try dissolving the medicine and mix it with his food.”

“I'll try.” she mumbled, then smiling sincerely, “Thank you so much for taking your time to come here. That's very helpful.”

“My pleasure, Y/N. I happen to be in Leeds, so not that far to drive here. Besides, I'm also worried about him.” he sighed, scratching his nose, “How's Erskine, anyway? Heard from him, he has no more control in the company.”

“He's exaggerating too much. Lucas, his cousin, currently takes his place for a moment only until Erskine gets its clients back. His job is nothing more than restoring public confidence in Erskine. When it starts to recover, Harry will return to the office.”

“Fine then. I hope everything goes well.” Niall smiled, “I should go now. Thank you for the lunch.”

“You don't wanna stay for dinner?”

“Ah, thank you. But, I have to go back to Surrey tomorrow morning.”

Y/N nodded in understanding, then escorted him out and waited until his car left her cottage. A small smile on her lips faded when she turned around – finding her boyfriend standing just a few feet away. The man was just silent while staring at her, his eyes sharp made her shudder.

“Harry?” mumbled her, taking a few step forward carefully. Her eyes were still staring at him who hadn't respond. Her heart rumbling, was it Marcel in front of her right now?

“Mar–”

“You invited him on purpose, why?”

Y/N froze. Did Harry hear her conversation with Niall? Since when was he standing there?

She wanted to lie, but if she did, Harry would be furious at her. His cold voice indicated that he didn't like what he has accused of her. And she had no choice.

“I talked to him about your session. And he told me he was in Leeds and would come over if he had time.” she said, “And then he came over. So, I assumed he had spare time.”

“And you lied to me.”

“I have no intention of lying to you, H.” she pleaded, “I was just asking for an advice and he offered to help, by coming over.”

She wasn't lying but that wasn't the truth.. her inner goddess facepalmed.

Harry snickered, shaking his head, “Don't lie to me.”

“H..”

“What are you hiding from me?!”

She paused her step when Harry shouted at her. Her heart was beating wildly yet he still dared to look into his eyes. She wasn't sure, was this Harry or Marcel?His irises were still bright like Harry's, but suddenly darkened a second later – before brightened again.

“I'm not hiding anything from you.” whispered her, “Don't you trust me?”

A deep frown formed on the forehead when Harry was laughing, shaking his head like she just told him something funny. But, what came out of his mouth struck her.

“How can I trust you if you lie to me? What's your intention brought Niall here? Trying to give me a ted talk and tell me everything is gonna be okay?! Bullshit, Y/N! All is not well.”

His loud yelling made her shrink and it was depressing. It might not be good for her to lie to her boyfriend but she did it for his good. She just wanted him to recover and stay positive through the problems.

“Harry, can you lower your voice, please? I don't want Anne to hear." she begged, "I'm sorry if you don't feel that way and I don't understand how you feel. But, this isn't the end. Soon, you'll be free. Victoria had been arrested, and the case still running while they hunt Dale down. Once he's caught, everything will slowly return to normal."

Taking a step closer, Y/N placed her palm on his bicep – stroking the tense muscle, trying to ease him. “At least your anger and resentment will pay off.”

Harry roughly brushed her hand away, looking at her sarcastically then left her alone.

“Don't repeat that bullshit again," he scoffed from the dining room, "How will everything be all right? You don't know how hard it is to grow trust. Not everything will be. Maybe for you, but not for me. Everything won't be the same."

“Harry,” she walked to him who was standing by the sliding door, looking through a glass the like across them, “We'll go through this together. If everything will no longer be the same, we'll face it together. And I believe, good fortune will be on our side.”

Y/N thought Harry heard her when he didn't argue. Yet, she was wrong when the man smirked at her. He turned his body to face her with his eyes gazed at her so scornful.

“How many times have I told you, how can I trust you after you lied to me about that fucking doctor?”

“HOW CAN!?”

She flinched when his loud voice rang in her ears, reflexively kept her head away from him. She didn't lie when she felt like wanted to cry. This was the first time Harry screamed at her after a long time. The feelings of worry and disappointment stirred in her heart.

“How can I trust you when you have another intention with that fucking psychiatrist?! How can I trust you after you made my directors agreed to have Lucas as your new boss and kicked me out of my own company?!” he screeched, “How can I trust anyone when they can betray me?!”

“How could you say that?" her voice trembled, "I don't kick you out from your own company. We all know Lucas is just for clout. You still hold the highest position, and the most important one."

“You know very well I hate a liar, Y/N.” he rolled his eyes, “I can't just believe what you say while you keep a lot of things to hide. I don't know as much and as important as how much you cover up. I can't believe with people around me just like that.” he growled, “Everyone always put on a mask before it finally disappointed me.”

“I don't hide anything from you! Why are you doubting me, H?" she cried out, "If I lie or was pretending in front of you, why am I always beside you? Don't you think I'm not tired? I'm exhausted! I'm exhausted of all these problems!" her panting breath suffocated her, "Who's not tired of dealing with problems of someone disordered?"

Harry clenched his teeth, “Watch your mouth, Y/N. You can't carelessly call me abnormal.”

“I don't call you abnormal? You're just.. different.”

“And now you're just lying to me.”

“Harry?” she looked at him shocked, “I'm not lying to–”

“Yes, you're. You just called me abnormal, different, someone with disordered and won't admit it. What's the difference between abnormal, different, and disordered?"

“Don't twist my words, Harry..”

“Fucking liar!” He violently hit the glass door until she could feel the vibration, her breath caught off when he leaned forward – staring at her coldly while his raged breath kissed her skin. She noticed his pupils were dilated and irises grew darker with face reddened with anger. Was Harry so annoyed with her?

“I'm not fucking liar!" she shook her head, "Stop accusing me of being a liar!"

“Then, what's the right nickname for you?” he challenged, “A fucking slut?”

Hearing your significant other uttered something that you never imagined before, of course it would break your heart. Y/N had never thought before her Harry would shatter her feelings – her heart. Especially she was aware enough it was really him who said that, not another one. When the rude nickname slid out of his mouth, she looked him in disbelief. The way her eyes flashed how upset she was, her breath was short as if there was something suffocated her.

“Excuse me, Harry?” her voice was low, “A slut? Really? What do you mean by that?”

“What other nicknames suits you if you don't want to–”

“I'm not a fucking slut!”

This was the first time, and Y/N hoped would be the last time, she raised her voice in front of Harry. They would never yell at each other if they got into a small argument. For Harry himself, it was no secret he had shouted in her face, well it was Marcel actually, but what he just said was completely out of his own soul. Somehow if he was annoyed and uncomfortable, everything would look wrong for him. Even if he could be honest, he thought this holiday was useless since that made it difficult for him to monitor his company, and all of the problem he had.

“What's better than slut for someone moaned another man's name when she had sex with her boyfriend?" he laughed derisively, his eyes refused to look at his girlfriend who saw him with a dropped jaw.

“Are you fucking mental, Harry? When did I ever do that?" she gritted her teeth, "Don't make up something that–"

“Marcel was laughing at me after that night. He's always bragging how he could make you moan his name.”

It was like being thrown to the bottom of the ocean when Harry muttered something she never expected. She was dizzy, she felt she couldn't breathe. The nape of her neck was hot, her tongue locked leaving her speechless. She never found out Harry knew the accident that night, in which they were – or she and Marcel, drunk and ended up taking off each other's clothes, – and you knew what happened the rest. In her mind, he never remembered it since he was drunk and never brought it up later.

“And you just realised it, Y/N?” he tilted his head with the look in his eyes was piercing through her heart, “You don't know how disgusting it was to see you fucking him, Y/N.”

“And now tell me..” his chest panted, “WHAT'S MORE FITTED ON YOU THAN A SLUT!?”

His voice boomed around the cottage making Y/N turned her head away. She could feel the flames of rage roiling within him, and she wasn't brave enough to go any further. Her heart pained by the way he called her, but she realised that Harry was hiding his pain and pretended that he didn't know that his lover was having sex with another man.

“Harry, we were drunk that night and–”

“And you realised that he wasn't me, didn't you? And yet you still let him fucked you.” he scoffed, “You were aware he's Marcel, Y/N.”

“I– ”

Harry turned his body, his hands crossed on his chest. And at that time, Y/N wanted to cry because she couldn't recognise the eyes was staring at her. No, not whose eyes they belonged to. But, the way he was looking at her like she was a trash.

“Or maybe you enjoyed being fucked by Marcel?”

“Harry, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to–”

Her trembling voice was refuted by him who looked so done, "You don't know the feeling. My heart broke to see you did that but on the other hand I couldn't do anything. I am sick of being helpless when something that should be mine is being used by others."

“Now, tell me, Y/N. What would you feel if you were me?”

Y/N shook her head, her eyes were squinting. No, she couldn't imagine it. She couldn't imagine it because she didn't want her heart break. She couldn't imagine the disappointment she had to accept.

“Why, Y/N? Why did you do it? Why did you let it happen?”

She shuddered, his whisper right in her ear made the goosebumps appeared on her skin. She could feel how close his face was to her right now albeit her eyes still shut closed, refusing to look at his eyes. She couldn't bear the eyes of someone who disappointed with her.

“Do you want him instead?”

“TELL ME!”

With the blink of an eye, Harry grabbed her hand and pushed her down to the floor, sending her squeezed into the corner of the kitchen. His rough behaviour once again made her frozen in place, never in her head she thought he could rude to him. And this was Harry, not Marcel.

His slow steps took him to the woman who was curled in the corner. She gulped harshly when he squatted in front of her. She couldn't make a sound, her adrenaline was racing, her heart was pounding with fear. She felt like a lonely deer ready to be pounced on by a hungry tiger.

“How could I trust someone who lied to me?” he worked his jaw, “And the most pathetic thing is, she's someone who's important. But, she played me with lies and bullshit.”

“I'm not, H..” her voice quaked, “I'm not lying anything. And for Marcel incident, I couldn't say how wrong I was.”

“You know I don't like liars and traitors, Y/N. We've talked about this before. I even entrusted my big secret to you but this is what I got?” his voice was cold, sharp and heart-wrenching, “You have no idea how disgusted I am for thinking my girlfriend fucking someone. And both of them seemed enjoyed it so much.”

“Harry..” she began to sob, “I don't mean that way..”

He got up, walking away from her. With a huff, he paced back and forth in front of her. For a moment, he rubbed his face before shaking his head with a chuckle. She cautiously watching him carefully, she didn't dare enough to move from there since her body becoming numb.

“We both knew we enjoyed that night, darling.”

She had never turned her head this fast, staring at him who suddenly was standing in front of her. Oddly enough, he was smiling at her. Smiling like he wasn't mad at her like a few moments ago. And now, she recognises the pair of eyes that always haunted her nightmare. She saw Marcel there, smiling sickly at her.

“What do you want, Marcel?" she growled at her, muster up the courage to confront the creator of all these messes, "Don't you feel enough? Don't you feel enough to ruin Harry's life? My life?"

“Oh, darling.” he cooed sweetly, “He was very upset. He was crying because he couldn't stop me and saw with his own eyes how much you enjoyed our sex.”

“I was drunk, Marcel.”

“I'm aware. But, whose name did you moan that night? Harry or me?” he smirked, “I'm flattered that you knew I was there and still let me made you orgasm.”

“Stop it, Marcel.”

“Why? I'm talking the truth, am I?” he arched an eyebrow, “You have no idea how much I missed the feeling of your skin on me. Can we do that again? And maybe give Harry a little show?”

Y/N didn't think twice as she stood up to attack Marcel. She didn't care that the person in front of her now shared the same body as Harry. All she wanted was to punch Marcel. But, he quickly stepped back before turning his body away.

“No! Go away, Marcel.”

She heard he was talking to Marcel. Was this Harry talking to Marcel?

“Stop!”

He grabbed his own hair with knees fell to the floor. He grimaced, as if in pain, with his fingers still tangled between the roots – pulling them harder. Y/N hesitated. What should she do? Should she approached him or keeping the distance?

Because what she was paying attention to at this time, Harry was trying to prevent Marcel from taking over. His hoarse voice repeatedly saying no to the person who tried to control his mind.

Yet, everything went silent when no more sound came out of his mouth. Only their ragged breath filled the open air. Y/N still huddled in the corner while Harry still backing her. She thought this was the right moment for her to approach him. She got up and took her steps painfully slow, hand reached out to touch her boyfriend's arm. Her heart was pounding so heart like she could hear them clearly in her ear, cold sweat pouring down her neck like she was about to experience something. Everything was so quiet, painfully quite that it scared her. Never once did she feel like this even when Marcel was around.

“Harry?”

Not for a second she landed her hand on his arm, the man quickly turned his body making her flinched. She didn't know why Harry scared her so much with the way he glared at her. She ventured back into touching him, but what happened next made her gasped – again. He pushed her again until she fell near the dining table, made her head hit the edge of the table. What's wrong with him?

“What's wrong with you?” she cried out, touching her temple which seemed to be swollen. Hell, she wanted to scream at him. She really understood his emotions were unstable but pushing her away wasn't something nice.

“Sometimes I think, maybe it was a mistake to let you knew my secret.” he murmured, eyes looking away from her, “At the end of the day, you would use that for your own good.”

“Pardon?”

“I trusted you with my secret. I trusted you with him. If I never told you about him, I would never see you were fucking with him!”

Harry thought everything would be fine if he pretended to know nothing. Yet, every time he thought about it, his chest was aching. Like something was giving him a pressure. The feeling of betrayal and guilt, always haunted his heart and mind. He felt betrayed by the two of them but it was all his fault. Who wouldn't get mad if their girlfriend betrayed him in such a thing like that?

“But, you're the one who chose to tell me, Harry! I never asked you. You told me you thought I was the right person to deserve your difference. You trusted me, Harry." she panted, "Let me ask you right now. Where's your trust in me? Why do I even think you don't trust me any more?"

“Don't you think I'm tired of all this? I'm tired of your erratic temper. With your emotions that I couldn't guess. I'm sick of you not being able to control yourself when I know you can! But, guess what? You chose to won't try.” she screamed, didn't care if Anne heard them upstairs. “Do you think it's easy to handle someone like you? Absolutely not! God was very kind to give me patience all of this time.”

“Now, I'm thinking. Maybe all this is God's way of repaying everything you've done. As Harry, or even Marcel.”

Harry didn't even need to think twice when he grabbed the nearest pitcher and threw it to her. Y/N couldn't even dodge it since it was so fast hitting her. She looked at him dead in the eye, not believing what had just happened. But the pain in her head seemed to make her realised that the man who was supposed to protect her, treated her harshly and didn't hesitate to hurt her.

She blinked her eye, trying to digest what just happened. Y/N didn't know how hard the pitcher hitting her head until it was shattered and hurt her. She felt the pain just after a drop of blood ran through her face. Then, she shifted her eyes to him. Harry. She couldn't trust her voice at this point, just giving him a look of disappointment and pain to him to understand. And for Harry, he was still had his eyes on her with a reddened face, jaw tightened and both fists were clenching tightly.

Both of them didn't say a word, just exchanged glances. Y/N didn't feel the pain, her adrenaline was racing so hard that she felt like he was numb.

“How many more times do you need to hurt me, Harry? Have you not realised all this time, the way you closed yourself for me is also hurting me? And do you realise that too makes me question your trust in me?” whispered her, “Tell me, H. How can we restore the trust and be optimistic about everything we face?”

Harry still had his mouth closed, eyes sharp on her. During the silence, Y/N felt the excruciating pain in her bloody head. But, she ignores it. She needed an answer from him, now.

“TELL ME!”

Harry was seeing red. No one ever tested his patience like this. Not his family. Not the company. Not even Marcel. Maybe Marcel would applaud him seeing he couldn't make peace with himself. After all, that was what Marcel wanted, right?

Hearing his girlfriend raised her voice at him, he felt she was insulting him. With jaw clenched tightly, he pulled her away before smashing her against the wall. Y/N felt her back and head hit the wall hard. She couldn't count the number of times her body being slammed, she was too busy trying to get Harry's hand off her and begging him mercy.

“This is what you've got for betrayed me.” Harry gritted his teeth, no longer slamming her body but hands still tightly gripped her hair, “Don't even test my patience if you can't handle it.”

“You're the one who tested my patience, Harry.” her breath stammered, her head was burning.

She cackled slightly, before coughing because her breath was shortened. Her eyes glanced slightly at Harry who still gripping her roots, “Do whatever you want, Harry. I can't stop you, can I?”

Everything went creepy silence along with Anne's deafening scream. She blinked softly, lolling her head towards her boyfriend. She didn't know why she was smiling like nothing happened. The last thing she knew, she smelt her own blood soaking her face as her breath slackened. . . Please excuse some errors Talk to me :)

[on-fic-writing-spree]

Chapter 10: The Split (Reprise)

Notes: I think I’m funny. Also @justfor2am wrote about half of this chapter (maybe a little more) and will be continuing to work with me on this book!! Which means longer chapters and better interaction scenes!! ALSO there’s some triggering stuff in terms of suicide (the sides can’t actually die, but the scene is very alluding to suicide.)

Word count: 2772 words

Next Chapter: Pride

Find the rest of the story here!

——————

There it was again, that incessant nagging in the back of Roman’s head. Truth be told, he’d done his best to ignore it, it’s been there for almost an impossible amount of time now, but it still managed to drive him nuts. Usually only about as loud as a whisper, today the buzzing was consuming his every thought, and no matter whom he spoke to or what he did it was still there, almost speaking over his own voice at times. But he could fight it. He knew why it was there and it was his own fault. A prince doesn’t ask for help, he solves his issues on his own, and this was just another one of his many “tasks” to attend to. And yet, something felt off about it today. Even something so simple as standing to his feet made his skin crawl, as if there was something else besides his own soul within it. But that was foolish to think, a child’s fear. He was not weak, he could not afford to be. At least, Roman hoped this was true.

The voice really seemed to criticize Roman’s every move, telling him to do this better, or do that differently, and why can’t Roman just let him do it! Which was odd because it was still Roman, wasn’t it? After hearing that Virgil would be coming back, the voice was not happy, making harsh comments about how Roman should just tell Virgil to pack it up. He’d done it once, why couldn’t he do it again?

Virgil had strolled in with their suitcase in hand, giving a greeting to both Logic and Patton. Patton had greeted with a hug, which Virgil had to take a moment to accept before smiling and hugging back. Clearly, they had been crying, their eyes puffy and face still pink. Virgil had considered going to talk to Roman, but didn’t know if it’d be the best choice. They weren’t stupid; they knew Roman didn’t want them there. They could ask a little later where their room was.

Roman… was in the middle of a dilemma. He heard the voice’s stern yelling to dismiss Virgil, but he forcefully put it down. He was older now, more aware of how he could affect others, Roman wasn’t about to push someone away and become the bad guy. Besides, Virgil was his, and there was a part of himself that had always nagged with worry about how Virgil was doing, if they were even still alive. But he wasn’t stupid, he knew Virgil must have some sort of sore feelings towards him. Honestly, he’d feel the same way after being treated so horribly. So, in spite of the angry voice yelling within his mind, Roman decided to wait for Virgil to come to him, not wanting to push them outside of their comfort zone anymore than he had to. I mean, the poor thing just left the only family they ever knew, that alone was a lot to deal with.

Patton had been quick to hop to making some breakfast for Virgil, though it was only about five in the morning. Virgil had left very late at night and had arrived at the castle only roughly four hours later. Logic and Virgil spent some time chatting, and Virgil found the more time he spent, the more time he really felt like he belonged.

Too bad the voice didn’t think he belonged in the slightest.

The voice did anything but halt, constantly complaining that Virgil was nothing—that paranoia was nothing. A mere mistake, like Roman’s brother and Janus. They weren’t helpful, all they did was weight Thomas down, and drag Roman’s ideas down with them.

“You really need to shut up,” Roman muttered to himself through gritted teeth, finally making up his mind to at least go check up on their newest ‘roommate’ of sorts. “Their name is Virgil, not Paranoia. That name means nothing now, so stop acting like it does,” he added, barely noticing the fact that Roman was arguing with himself. He peeked down the hall where Virgil’s new room would be, and as he walked up, took a deep breath. “Don’t fuck this up,” he thought as he knocked. ‘You’re just as useless as it,’ the voice had snarked, but went quiet as Roman headed towards Virgil. The voice could argue more later, but it knew it was practically stupid to waste any energy here.

Logic was the one to open the door. “Prince Roman, please come in,” Logic stated, flashing a polite smile and gesturing for the other to step into the room. Virgil gave a tiny wave from where they sat, but was half expecting for Roman to say something about how they shouldn’t have come. They really hoped Roman wouldn’t though. They liked it here, and they didn’t want to leave. But it was Roman’s castle, and they wouldn’t overstay their welcome if Roman didn’t want them here.

Not wanting the moment to become anymore awkward than it could possibly be, Roman flashed a smile at them. “I’m glad to see you, Virgil. I’m sure you’re tired and there’s probably some things you want to talk about, but right now it’s best that you rest and get adjusted. I’m sure these two are more than capable of taking care of you,” he added. In truth, Roman wasn’t sure how to feel about Virgil coming back now that the two were face-to-face, but at the very least he wasn’t about to embarrass them.

Virgil couldn’t help letting out a little breath, their tense posture softening some. “Yeah, that’d be appreciated, actually. I haven’t slept yet... I promise Ree I wouldn’t leave a trace when I left,” they admitted. “Where’s my room—or bed—or just whenever I’m going to be sleeping? I don’t want to inconvenience you too much about it.” Virgil and Logic had mostly just been spending time in Logic’s room.

Patton stepped in with some pancakes, handing them over to Virgil. “I’ll make some for the rest of you guys in a few hours, but for now, I think the rest of us should be resting,” Patton piped up.

“I actually have a place set up for you down the hall, if you want to get situated now.” Was Roman about to acknowledge that it was what would have been Virgil’s original room? Absolutely not. If he was lucky enough, Virgil wouldn’t even notice. Roman frowned slightly, “And well, you’ll have all the time in the world to rest now that you’re here.” Roman stepped back slightly and gestured to the door as if to guide them, “I’ll have my staff fix your things for you, if you’d like?”

“No, no, it’s alright, I got it,” Virgil assured, pulling their suitcase along while balancing the pancake plate in their other hand. They were mostly nervous about possibly dropping the plate, knowing that it’d just cause a mess. If Virgil was going to fit in here, they’d have to be careful not to stand out. They followed Roman to the room, meanwhile the voice spoke up for once, making a comment about how Paranoia should be sleeping on the floor. When Virgil got to the room, they put the suitcase towards the corner of the room before sitting on their bed. They took a smile bite of their food, but mostly wanted to wait until Roman left, not wanting to be rude. “Thank you, Roman,” they murmured softly.

Roman winced at the whisper and willed it to shut up, keeping a careful eye on Virgil. He took his cue to leave, saying, “Of course, let me know if you need anything, alright?” She tried her best for a smile before shutting the door. As soon as the ‘click’ of the door handle was heard she pressed her hands against her skull, wincing slightly. “Do you ever shut up?” she whispered harshly to the voice.

“I will,” they wouldn’t. Virgil wanted for Roman to step out before taking another bite of its pancakes, looking around the room. It looked rather similar to Logan’s except a lot of the accents were purple instead of blue. Virgil found they rather liked the purple. They stood up, glancing around and opening drawers and closets, just to see everything that was there. Occasionally they’d go back to eating a few bites, then look through something else. After a bit though, they grew wary and headed to sleep.

‘No, I don’t, but I will if you just get rid of it,’ the voice answered. ‘Get rid of it or I will myself, and I won’t be so nice.’

“Gods you are insufferable!” She grumbled, walking away from Virgil’s door and towards the throne room. “What is your problem with them? I thought we agreed we were going to be nice to Virgil. After the shit they must have been through, it’s only right. Besides,” Roman added, finally reaching his desk and glancing over a few papers, “What are you going to do about it? You’re just a stupid voice, you have no say over me!” she snapped.

‘We didn’t agree on anything!’ the voice answered, louder now. ‘You decided, I didn’t. But I won’t just be a voice, not for long, enjoy being a princess while you still can’ the voice added. There was a short second of silence before there was a harsh tug on Roman’s body, throwing her into the wall. ‘You’re not the only one with control you know. If you want me gone, you’ll have to get rid of me.’

A sharp pain shot across Roman’s shoulder as she felt her body betray her and slam against the wall. Her blood ran cold and her head was spinning with questions. Finally speaking out loud, Roman asked, “What the fuck was that, and what the fuck are you?” The strange skin crawling sensation was back, and for whatever reason, it felt more like burning in Roman’s eyes.

‘Well I can certainly say I’m not you,’ it answered. ‘Truthfully, I don’t know what I am. I guess we’ll see, right?’ It threw Roman to the ground in front of her, only allowing for her to catch herself out of mercy. ‘Just let go Roman. Let me take over. I can be out of your head in a breeze, but you have to let me... or we could do this the hard way,’ the voice convinced.

“Absolutely not!” she shouted, shakily pushing herself up to a kneeling position on the floor. “Whatever you are, there is no way I’d ever allow you to use my body! At least if you’re in my head you can’t hurt anyone else, and it’s staying like that.” Roman slowly stood up, leaning back against the wall for stability, “I’m not giving you another choice; either shut up or go back to being nothing, that’s all you get.”

There was laughter at first, dark and low and sinister. It had to resonate in every part of Roman’s body straight to the core. ‘Oh but Roman, I’m not nothing. Like I said... easy or hard, I’ll get my way. But don’t worry, your body will be useless to me soon,’ it remarked once more before throwing Roman back against the wall, then pulling Roman to her feet and dragging her to her room. It didn’t bother to make Roman shut the door—why waste the energy? Instead, it lead Roman to the window, unlocking and opening it. ‘Last chance, Roman.’ It wouldn’t kill Roman, the voice knew that, but Roman wouldn’t be conscious for enough time for the voice to do what it needed to.

“Is… is this supposed to be a threat?” Roman cursed himself for the quiver in his voice but carried on. “If I die you die with me, and besides that, I can’t die here. At most you’ll just hurt the both of us, and I don’t think it’s worth the effort you’re putting in. What’s your grand plan anyway, then? To feel my bones reform themselves as we lay on the ground, bleeding out? You must be more clever than that.” She wasn’t sure if any of her words were sticking but it was worth a shot.

‘It’s only a threat if you want it to be.’ I don’t feel the pain that you do, Roman. Your suffering is purely your own,’ it answered. ‘If I’m truly nothing, you shouldn’t be worried. I can’t force you to do anything, can I? But you are worried. You see Roman, when you sleep, your mind is still active... when you’re unconscious, it’s no different, except you’re much easier to suppress. I’ll have my way princess, with or without your help,’ it assured.

“Can’t force me to do anything my ass,” Roman grumbled. After having been forced to almost jump out a window and her body slammed into a wall, this just felt cruel and ironic to say. But somehow this fact reassured her, and she grabbed the open window frame and slammed it shut, clicking it back into place. “You’re not hurting me. And you’re not hurting anyone else. I don’t care what you’ll try to do to control me, I won’t let it happen. Even if it means never sleeping again, I won’t let you have your way with me, and whatever devilish plan you have.”

‘Whatever you say Roman. You can’t let your guard down then, can’t rest, you’ll slowly weaken yourself over time. Whatever way we do this, the outcome is the same. Let me out and I’ll leave you be, I swear. But keep me trapped here, and I’ll make your life a living hell, and Paranoia’s while I’m at it,’ the voice lead on.

“Stop calling them that!” Roman yelled, curling up his fists. “What’s your problem with Virgil anyway, huh? We haven’t seen them in years and the first thing you want to do is throw them out?” Roman was ignoring the voice’s first comment, because so long as she didn’t think about it, it wouldn’t be true. (This obviously doesn’t make sense, but so is little of Roman’s logic.)

The voice went quiet for now, already knowing it had won. It didn’t need to say anything for now, it could wait.

And it wasn’t long until it had waited enough. When Roman got just tired enough, the voice had dragged Roman around, a step out the window and that was all it needed. Roman would be in a lot of pain, of course, but that didn’t matter to the voice. All they needed was to gather enough control to cause the final split, and Roman would be utterly useless. Actually... with Roman so weak, there was plenty the voice could do, lock Roman away and keep her from any plans it made—oh this would do just lovely.

The voice hadn’t spared Roman an ounce of pain, doing nothing to hurry the process despite the damage it caused to itself. Roman’s half conscious body was forced to stumble, trip again and again, until it crashed, a bright light appearing like lightning, gone in a quick flash. And there were two.

There probably was a more efficient way of staying awake for the rest of your life, but obviously Roman had not found it. But what else really wakes you up besides every single atom in your body destroying and rebuilding itself at the same time over and over and over again until you could no longer tell where you ended and this parasitic life form started. It was more than agony, more than just pain, it was familiar in a way Roman hated that she could not place. Even when the burning stopped and the twisting and pulling ceased to be, Roman felt herself feeling… smaller, like a piece of herself stood up and walked away. Funnily enough, that was exactly what happened.

The new side... whatever it was to be named, hadn’t wasted any time. They had dragged Roman back inside, down to the lower levels. First, they had left her chained up in the dungeon until they could finish their creation—a new garden, a perfect way to get rid of Virgil. The new side had figured the dungeon and new garden were close enough they could keep up with both Virgil and Roman. The dungeon hadn’t been used in years though, and that played to their advantage. No one would think Roman was there. And the bonus of it all? Virgil would be locked up away, and happily at that. And if it wasn’t? Well, there’s no reason Roman couldn’t learn to enjoy it’s company.

——————

Tag list:

@genderfluidmoma

@sinuous-scakt

@youremotionallystablefriend

@alinatheanimelover

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 252: Suplex of Feels

Previously on BnHA: Deku, Kacchan, and Shouto visited Todobrook Heights one time, just the one!!, so of course it just so happened to also be the one time that Natsuo got straight up kidnapped by a villain for no reason because THAT’S JUST HOW LIFE GOES. Thankfully for Natsuo, the Terror Trio had kind of a Cinderella thing going on where if they didn’t beat a villain before Endeavor by midnight, their character development would turn back into a pumpkin, and I’m not really sure I stuck the landing on that metaphor but anyway! So Shouto used Flashfire to roast the villain alive, Deku used Blackwhip to save some hapless civilians who got caught in the crossfire of everything, and Kacchan used his cool fast explosions which don’t have a new name yet because he’s focused on more important things to rocket over and save Natsuo from becoming roadkill. And then Endeavor gave him and Natsuo a BIG OL’ HUG and my heart went, oh.

Today on BnHA: Horikoshi grabs a handful of raw, squishy feels out of a bucket and just full on slaps me across the face with them. Endeavor has a moment of agonizing, excruciating vulnerability and apologizes to Natsuo for everything -- like, everything -- and says Natsuo doesn’t have to forgive him, and that in fact he doesn’t want him to forgive him, and that he just wants to atone for everything he’s done. And just, I can’t even describe the scene, but it’s just perfect down to the last detail, and exactly what I wanted. And meanwhile Deku, Shouto, and Kacchan stand there watching, and then Kacchan has a fucking epiphany and FINALLY DECIDES ON A HERO NAME!!, and I completely lose my goddamn mind, only to then be brought down to the lowest of lows when he immediately says that he’s not going to reveal it yet because THERE’S SOMEONE ELSE HE HAS TO TELL FIRST. So once I’m done sighing, we cut to later and Endeavor is all “Fuyumi I’m gonna buy a house for you guys so you can all live a happy life with your mom and never see me again,” and yeah. You guys I am in shambles.

hey everyone, whoever is doing Mangastream’s thumbnails every week deserves a raise though

especially since they’re not actually getting paid for it at all lol. their resolve to find the most ridiculous Kacchan expression every week and slap it on their home page is 100% a labor of love. AND IT SHOWS

lol and here I was half-worried the chapter would pick up after all the dust had settled, and we’d miss out on this glorious scene of Kacchan acting like he’s the goddamn wicked witch of the west and the sprinklers just turned on. anyways, I know what I’m thankful for this holiday

HAHAHAHAHA

I’D LIKE TO TAKE A MINUTE AND THANK ALL OF OUR SPONSORS AND OUR GREAT CREW WHO MADE THIS ALL POSSIBLE. SHOUT OUT TO ENDING, YOU’RE THE REAL MVP. BIG “HEY WHAT’S UP” TO TOUYA, WHO STRAIGHT UP DIED JUST SO ENDEAVOR COULD HAVE ANGST AT A CRITICAL MOMENT AND FORCE KACCHAN TO BE THE ONE TO SAVE NATSUO INSTEAD. AND A HUGE FUCKING “YOU THE MAN, BRO” TO THAT MORON SPEEDING BLINDLY IN THE TAXI CAB WHILE ON HIS PHONE AND NOT PAYING THE SLIGHTEST BIT OF ATTENTION TO THE ROAD IN FRONT OF HIM! WITHOUT YOUR RECKLESS DISREGARD FOR YOUR OWN SAFETY AND THAT OF OTHERS, THIS NEVER COULD HAVE HAPPENED. OH GOD, THEY’RE PLAYING THE MUSIC NOW, I GOTTA HURRY UP... AH... I’M SO GRATEFUL TO ALL MIGHT, GIVER OF SO MANY LEGENDARY HERO HUGS, AND TO SLIDIN’ GO, YES REALLY SLIDIN’ GO, WHO ESTABLISHED THIS GAG BACK IN CHAPTER 219. YOU BOTH WALKED SO ENDEAVOR COULD RUN. AND LAST BUT CERTAINLY NOT LEAST, TO HORIKOSHI KOUHEI, WHO IS ABSOLUTELY FUCKING DETERMINED TO HAVE EVERY PRO HERO IN THE COUNTRY HUG KACCHAN BEFORE THE SERIES IS OVER. YOUR TIRELESS EFFORTS ARE THE REASON I GET OUT OF BED EVERY MORNING. GOD BLESS YOU ALL AND GOOD NIGHT

anyway

sorry Kacchan this is just your life now. you’re just stuck here. by the way, Endeavor really is just an absolute MOUNTAIN of a man, though?? like, a whole, absolute unit. like remember a few chapters ago when I was joking about how he was eight feet tall? well Natsuo is 5’11” according to the wiki, and you can tell by looking at him that he is a solidly built guy. like, he eats his fucking Wheaties. and Endeavor is still able to FULLY WRAP HIS ARMS AROUND both him and Katsuki together WITH ROOM TO SPARE and just. ?????? WHAT EVEN IS THIS MAN good grief

anyway poor Natsu looks close to passing out though so maybe you fucking should let them go Endeav

SDLFKJSDLFKH

1) seriously though look at how big his hands are jesus christ is he even a human!?!?

and 2)!! the amount of sheer detail which was put into this panel, with the facial expressions and the shading and all, only for Katsuki to open his big fucking mouth with ABSOLUTELY NO REGARD! like, this could have been one of the most heartrending panels in the entire series. but instead it’s forever immortalized with Bakugou fucking Katsuki and his brutal fucking speech bubble interjecting with the most vicious insult his angry toddler brain could think of. this panel has the same energy as Deku receiving a heartfelt thank you letter from a child whose life he saved only to unfold it and read that iconic opening line, “SORRY FOR PUNCHING YOU IN THE BALLS LOL”

oh my

boy took matters into his own hands. after Enji just STRAIGHT UP IGNORED HIS PLEAS lmao. this entire chapter is a gift, and we’re only on the second page. also that katakana there is all “SUPON”, which I don’t know what that means, but I have to tell you that to me this felt more like a “ZWOOP.” but that’s just how I personally read it

eyyyyy and there’s our half-naked lukewarm boi

and look, I’m not advocating for Shouto to actually be walking around half naked, because this is a children’s manga and Shouto is just a baby, and that kind of thing is obviously inappropriate unless you’re [checks notes] one of his female classmates, who just like Shouto are also only teenagers, but it’s okay for them because they have boobs. hey wait

but anyway, I will say that I appreciate that his uniform really did burn off just as you would expect, and that he used his ice quirk to preserve his modesty lol. quick thinking on his part

meanwhile all the people Deku rescued are stumbling out of their cars nauseously and thanking him. I like how all of the other traffic on this highway has apparently just come to a halt now. I wonder if the Endeavormobile also came equipped with some traffic cones and road flares that launched out of the trunk along with the costumes

oh hey a BakuDeku interaction, don’t mind me, I’m just... [folds hands on desk and leans forward]

someone please tell me what he actually called Deku here because I’m dying to know. anyways whatever it was, “dumb-ku” is a great translation. it’s just the right amount of stupid and immature, and I love how Deku just fucking answers to it anyway like shrug, whatever

also love how the first thing Katsuki asks is whether anyone is hurt. swear to god this kid makes me love him more with each passing week

fond sigh

okay guys, I’m getting more and more excited here now, and let me explain why. it’s because Katsuki, despite having achieved (as Deku points out) a complete and perfect victory here, is very obviously agitated and angry still. and I think the reason for that is because even though he’s achieved the goal Endeavor set out for them, he still hasn’t achieved what he wanted from this internship. the other two have! Deku accomplished his goal of gaining more control over Blackwhip, and Shouto is now well on his way to mastering Flashfire. but Katsuki specifically came here with the intent of discovering something intangible that he couldn’t put a name to. and even though he’s gotten stronger just like the others, he still hasn’t achieved what he set out to do yet, and I think he’s getting frustrated by it. and the reason I’m so excited is because I think we’re inching closer and closer to seeing that finally get resolved. ahhhhhhh

(ETA: THIS CHAPTER IS THE MONKEY’S PAW WISH OF CHAPTERS.)

anyway I’ll shut up now and read. here’s Katsuki bragging to Endeavor, and Endeavor doing his best All Might impression what the fuck

that line could have come straight out of All Might’s mouth and it would have sounded 100% natural. well everyone, we did it. we fucking broke Endeavor. I hope you’re happy. lol what the fuck is happening what is this

DFKLSLDGHK

I fucking see those wobbly speech bubbles Endeavor, are you crying, because -- !! holy shit this chapter is taking my emotions all over the place

lol Kacchan’s pissed off that Endeavor isn’t more pissed off about being shown up by some punk kids

Deku’s eyes. this chapter. I just

ohhhhhhhhhhhh shit here we go

for everyone out there who was worried that Natsu would just forgive Endeavor outright after the events of this chapter, I think we’ve arrived at the part where your fears are assuaged. I pretty much expected this was how it would go down, because for all the criticism he’s been getting week after week, Horikoshi has been writing the Todorokis realistically and consistently throughout this entire arc, and this was the natural conclusion based on what we’ve seen up till now. Natsuo won’t just forgive Endeavor just like that, because why would he? and Endeavor just has to deal with it. and it’s all very sad and painfully real

SON OF A BITCH

the fucking words “I’m sorry” really just came out of his mouth at last, holy shit. this is the first time, right? as far as I can recall, anyway. oh shit

oh shit

my fucking jaw. just dropped. just. fuck me, I wasn’t ready for this. sure Enji, just go ahead and pour your heart out. lord

imagine if his voice actor goes all out in this scene like Katsuki’s did in episode 61. holy shit, I never thought the thing that destroyed me would be a sad confession in a fucking shounen manga by the character I used to despise. life is funny

ohhhhhhhhhh

[awkward glance around the fandom] soooo. how’s everybody doing? aheh. [coughs]

oh shiiiiiiIIIIItttt

oh look at that, Endeavor didn’t actually murder his child, who could have predicted that. but maybe I’ll just shut up now though since I’m not here to start any shit

and the pain train to feels junction just keeps on chugging. fuck

YOU SEE!! BRUTAL!! RUTHLESS!! SO REALISTIC IT HURTS. Endeavor is genuinely sorry, but it’s all coming way too late to be of any use! and Natsuo is so pained because he honestly probably would like nothing more than to be able to forgive his dad, and for them to all just be a happy, normal, loving family again, but he can’t. because they’re not. and apologies can’t erase the past, or make up for it. there is no way to change what happened. Touya’s still dead, and the scars from all those years of neglect and abuse are still fucking there, and they’re not just going to go away, even if Enji is remorseful. Enji becoming a good man now doesn’t make up for all the years that he wasn’t! he can’t just undo it! and that’s the tragedy of it!! you feel so bad for the man -- or at least, I do -- but at the same time, part of the atonement process is to accept the consequences of everything he did!

and also, for everyone saying he hasn’t faced any actual consequences yet -- one person in particular sent me a very detailed and thoughtful ask, which I apologize for not responding to yet -- I say this with all due respect: there. look. there are your consequences, right there. everything he will never have. everything he can’t salvage. the pain of knowing he was the cause of all this. the pain of seeing the misery in his son’s eyes and knowing he can’t fix it, and knowing the hurt he’s caused to the ones he loved most. that is karma. that’s a fucking punishment. that’s an agony beyond any physical torture that anyone could ever possibly dream up. his punishment is that after all these years, he finally gets to feel all of the suffering he’s inflicted on them, and he’d do anything to take it back now, but he can’t. that’s it! and we all fucking hate it, and no one is happy! and it’s not fucking fair! haha! but that’s how it fucking is, though. and I swear to god, I keep saying it, but it’s some of the most brutally realistic shit I’ve ever seen in a fucking manga. fuck

anyways, I need to stop monologuing or else I’m never going to finish this fucking chapter, but rest assured my soul is being ripped the fuck apart. hmm

:’)

(ETA: note the conspicuous lack of a Kacchan reaction panel directly after the “I’m never gonna forgive you” panel. everyone else gets one. but not him. in fact, there are no more reaction panels of him until this speech ends, and then we get one zoomed far away where we can’t really see his face. but I’m sure that’s all just a coincidence and means absolutely nothing! oh baby. what a chapter.)

:’)))))))

by the way, quick shoutout to that person in the taxi giving them the Rock Lee Eyes and having just no idea what the fuck is going on sob. thanks to you for keeping me from breaking into full on sobs here. I’m holding it together for you, random deer-in-headlights citizen

[INHALES!!!]

that’s it. I don’t. fuck. anyways. I ranted about all my feelings already, so just. ... you all get it by this point, right?

oh Kacchan. penny for your thoughts. I’m almost done with that essay I keep rewriting. you have a lot to think about right now huh

and Shouto. oh Shouto. safe to say this is a side of his father he’s never seen nor imagined he would see before

YOU GUYS THIS IS SO FUCKING IMPORTANT THOUGH, SHIT

[GRABS THIS PANEL AND FRANTICALLY WAVES IT ALL OVER THE BNHA TAG] I’M!!! JUST!!! SAYING!!! THOUGH!!!!!!!

oh, we’re still going? SURE WHY THE FUCK NOT

WHATEVER HORIKOSHI!!! JUST KEEP COMING AT ME, THEN!! GO AHEAD AND FINISH ME OFF WITH A FUCKING SUPLEX OF FEELS!! YOU SON OF A BITCH

and now Ending’s freaking the fuck out and screaming for Endeavor to stop. lol it’s like the villain version of Can’t Ya See-Kun. Endeavor you jackhole, this isn’t on brand! CUT IT OUT

forget it, Jake. it’s Character Development

now the police are arriving and Deku’s like THANK GOODNESS because the awkwardness was about to go critical here. meanwhile, pay no attention to how Katsuki is staring at him despite having no real reason to be in this panel!

[sidles up next to Kacchan] so hey fella. did any of that hit a nerve, perchance. did it open any metaphorical eyes. dust off any momentous revelations that you’ve been valiantly trying to keep shelved in your mental basement. have the SEEDS of your PERSONAL GROWTH been CULTIVATED. are the JEHOVAH’S WITNESSES of NOT BEING A DICK knocking at your inner door!?

anyway so now we’re cutting to Endeavor talking with the authorities while Chauffeur Armstrong tells him he needs to watch his back

friendly reminder that a bearded hermit flew around town on a glass hoverchair singing a song about Endeavor bringing darkness to the world or some shit not too long ago. that’s still a thing! better watch it Enji

HOLY FUCKARONI

(ETA: shoutout to that “neither does the light” line because that’s some straight up Harry Potter quotable bullshit and I love it and Endeavor’s character development continues to slay me that is all.)

FUCKING!!! CHRIST!!! OH GOD!!! OH JESUS!!!!

HMGGHHHHAAAA SOMEONE HELP ME OH MY GOD I’M SHAKING, AHHHHHHH

(ETA: listen you guys, in all of my “!!!!” I didn’t stop to appreciate all of the other things about this scene. but Shouto has changed into his hero costume which is a great little detail that I love because he obviously didn’t feel like standing around freezing his butt off and being oggled by the crowd. and then we have Natsu coming over to thank them all for saving his life, which is great, and he’s such a sweetheart. and then Deku actually saying “Bakugou” for probably the first and only time in his life lmao. and then, finally, his fucking face when he realizes Kacchan has finally chosen a hero name. he’s fucking ecstatic. he can’t wait!! anyway so Deku is me.)

NO BUT I’M FULLY SERIOUS YOU GUYS, I’M TREMBLING LIKE A FUCKING LEAF, IT’S PROBABLY THE CAFFEINE IN ME BUT STILL, OH MY GOD, I’M PARALYZED, I CAN’T SCROLL DOWN, MY HEART IS POUNDING, MY LIFE IS ABOUT TO BE FOREVER CHANGED, OH FUCKSTICKS, OH SHIT

NOOOOOOOOOOO

FUCK MY FUCKING -- WHERE IS HAWKS!!?!? WHERE IS HE!?!? I SWEAR TO GOD IF THAT FUCKING MAGPIE DOESN’T SWOOP DOWN RIGHT THE FUCK NOW WITH JEANIST IN TOW ALL “HAHA IT WAS ALL A MISUNDERSTANDING” I’M GOING TO --

(ETA: but lmao at the fact that Shouto was all “okay, so you’re not going to tell him, but what about me, your Best Friend?” like he really heard “DROP DEAD ASSHOLE” and thought “well, that was Midoriya though, LET ME TAKE A STAB AT IT.” this is the most earnest child in the universe and this OT3 continues to bring me boundless joy.)

FUCK

LISTEN YOU KNOW I LOVE THAT TODODRAMA, BUT YOU CAN’T JUST DO THAT TO ME!! I’M A HUMAN BEING!! IF YOU CUT ME I BLEED!! WHAT DID I DO TO DESERVE THIS. I’M GOING TO STRAIGHT UP CRY ALL OVER AGAIN YOU HEARTLESS PIECE OF SHIT

looool

“and his friends.” you hear that, Kacchan. now COME BACK OUT HERE AND TELL US YOUR HERO NAME RIGHT NOW YOUNG MAN!!!

Endeavor you better save this chapter. I’m counting on you dog

oh. oh shit

hahaha. well fuck

first of all, look at Mr. “la dee dah I’m just going to build my family a new house on a whim because I’m so fucking rich” over here, like, damn, Endeavor. and second of all my heart is just a bludgeoned hemorrhaging mass of feels at this point and I’m not even going to try to salvage it. and third of all, this is exactly the type of resolution I wanted, pain and all, and I’m so goddamn satisfied with it it’s almost ridiculous. because the man fucking gets it. for everyone who continues to doubt Endeavor’s intentions, look no fucking further than this. this isn’t a narcissist trying to gaslight his victims and get back in his family’s good graces and make it all about him yet again. this is a man who understands that the best thing for his family right now is for them to be allowed to piece their lives back together without him. and so he’s enabling them to do that, and voluntarily stepping out of the picture while still providing for them. and damn but I respect that so much. fuck yeah, Enji. this was the right thing to do. it doesn’t make up for all the mistakes you’ve made, because nothing can do that. but you’re a better man now, and this right here is exactly the type of thing people mean when they say actions speak louder than words. so, respect

and that’s it! we’ve officially experienced all of the human emotions in this chapter! oh and also that’s it, as in the chapter is done. so yeah. well that sure was a whirlwind now wasn’t it

[indiavolojones]

anon your MIND… 

 YE━(｡･`ω´･｡)ゞ ━S!!

Idk if you meant this as a request but I did it!!! I hope you like this incredibly spur of the moment, university wicked au lmfaoaoooo

5kish words, gen, asmo/solomon

“I can’t concentrate on coursework or go to bed if you’ve got someone moaning in your bed every other night.”

“Sounds like a personal problem,” Asmo sniffs, and Solomon very quickly finds the situation slipping through his fingers. All of his phenomenally constructed arguments for why Asmo should be a respectful roommate have disintegrated in the face of Asmo’s pure obstinance. “Besides, where would I take my partners if not to my room?”

“Their rooms. A car. A bathroom.  A dark alcove somewhere. I don’t care--anywhere else but here.”

Pls keep in mind a bunch of small notes:

-I haven’t seen Wicked, only listened to the soundtrack! I don’t remember what happened to make them room together/much of the plot hahaha. This is less of a wicked au and more a magical college au, whoooo~ -I made up so much shit for this. I was pulling lore outta my ass like nobody’s business -Everyone is human! -I skipped around a lot, so if there’s something that doesn’t make sense pls ask and I’ll clarify hahaha, I wanted to keep this short!! (is,.... 5k short...)

-

-

-

“We're all supposedly the best of the best, and yet none of us could stop a burst pipe," Solomon bemoans the status of their old dormitory.

“In our defense, it happened in the middle of the night and we had no idea what was going on?" Simeon offers, tilting his head with a sympathetic smile.

"But midway through the semester!" Solomon won't admit that the loss of one of his few friends being constantly at his side is more daunting than he thought it would be. Simeon is a phenomenal roommate, and understands Solomon better than anyone.

With the unfortunate mad dash to get all the affected students into new, undamaged rooms, the two of them are being split up, and now Solomon will have to get used to another, likely annoying roommate.

"I never realized you were this dependent on me." Simeon teases, and Solomon glares at him. Simeon swirls himself around in Solomon’s desk chair while Solomon walks by, cardboard box in his arms. Just to annoy him, his foot shoots out to stop Simeon mid-spin, and Simeon huffs, looking up at him.  

“Didn’t you say you were going to help?” Solomon asks.

Simeon laughs.

“You asked me to come help move boxes? I thought it was for sure because of you freaking out at getting a new roommate.” Solomon’s lips quirk downwards, and turns his head away with a scoff as he brings the box to the corner of his new dorm. Simeon props an elbow up on Solomon’s desk and watches the other.

“What could you possibly do to help with that?” Solomon asks, palm pressing to the box and releasing the sealing spell on it. “Do you have a solution for this?”

He gestures at the other half of the (thankfully) large room.

Instead of the traditional bunk bed and lower desk set like on Solomon's side of the room, the other half of the room consists of a large wardrobe as additional closet space, an extravagant vanity filled with beauty products, and a nest. A massive nest of pillows, sheets, and blankets—describing it feels ridiculous, but to look on its glory is surprisingly enticing. It does look… very comfortable.

“I think it looks rather nice,” Simeon examines the fairy lights strung up around the walls near the bed. The edges of his roommate's influence barely encroach onto what Solomon would consider to be his side, but as he’s the one imposing on this person’s space halfway into the year… he’ll bite his tongue.

Realistically, there’s no reason for RAD to have shared dorm rooms--the school is prestigious enough that each student could probably get their own living suite… but the chancellor of their particular location is the direct son of the president. He’s a bit eccentric, and enthusiastically vocal about the benefits of shared dorms as integral to the relationships they develop with their peers.

(There are things Solomon’s heard of him too: how he’s the youngest person in his role, how despite the accusations of nepotism he’s completely taken the magical community by storm in his unconventional approach to education.

An interesting man that Solomon would enjoy meeting face to face, rather than admire on a podium, even if he is quite handsome.)

Simeon purses his lips, before snapping his fingers, “A privacy screen?”

Solomon rolls his eyes hard enough that they feel like falling out of his sockets.

“I don’t know why you’re so up in arms about this. I’m sure your roommate will be fine,” Simeon says then, gentle--Solomon looks at the opposite side of the room and has his doubts. “It’ll be good for you to try making more than three friends, you know.”

Taking the books out of the box and lining them up on the shelves of the book case, Solomon tosses a glance back at Simeon.

Simeon isn’t wrong.

Solomon could be the most powerful sorcerer in the world, but it means absolutely nothing if he can’t effectively operate in the modern magical community. Maybe if he was born several hundred years earlier he could have swept up the world in the sheer magnitude of his power, but nowadays, politics infect everything. Solomon can’t patent a spell to wipe his ass without a sponsor, and no one wants to sponsor the intense kid with a bad attitude.

His ability to cast magic without any kind of aide or incantation launched him into the spotlight at an early age. Solomon has always been aware of what other people thought of him. When empty praise didn’t ingratiate his sycophants to him, it just as easily turned to criticism; kids are cruel, after all. As a result, Solomon has always struggled connecting with others.

By the time he realized he would have to work on his people skills to get anywhere, he was halfway through high school with a bad reputation, no friends, and no open doors.

(Funnily enough, it was around the same time that he met Simeon that he realized he needed to be less of an asshole if he was to ever get anywhere in life.

Simeon has been integral in teaching Solomon "how to person", as he puts it.)

“Who’s your new roommate, anyway?” Simeon asks when Solomon doesn’t respond to his comment. “I don’t think you said their name.”

"Did I not?” Solomon hums, “It’s someone named Mephistopheles.”

“Mephistopheles?” Simeon parrots, head tilting to the side, “Didn’t he get expelled?”

As Solomon opens his mouth to question Simeon, the door handle jiggles as someone unlocks it.

It swings open unceremoniously, followed by the quiet moans and shuffling of clothes as two people stumble inside the threshold. Simeon and Solomon can only watch in stunned silence as the taller, curly haired man presses a shorter woman against the wall, his face fully obscured in the curve of her neck as he lavishes it in open mouthed kisses.

Her eyelids flutter, he must be doing a great job--but the second she makes eye contact with Solomon, she shrieks.

“Asmo, Asmo wait--” The girl bats at his chest, her face bright red, “There’s people here!” Asmo pulls his face away from her skin to look at the room, a gorgeous smile on his face as he notices the others does not falter in the slightest.

“Oh, you’re Solomon!” Asmo smiles, before looking at Simeon, “And you’re Simeon. Lovely to meet you both.” Solomon looks at Simeon for some kind of hint as to what the fuck he should do here,  but Simeon also seems at a loss. Before either of them can say anything, Asmo slides a hand up the girl’s side to cup her cheek, speaking to them even as he stares deep into her eyes.

“Now, would the two of you kindly get out?”

-

-

-

The rest of living with Asmo is pretty much a continued repeat of their first meeting. Multiple times a week, sometimes once or twice in a day. Solomon has no fucking clue how someone like Asmo gets any schoolwork done, or hell, when the other gets sleep?

Regardless, it’s two weeks of Asmo getting laid and Solomon not getting proper amounts of sleep, and he’s sick of it.

“There need to be,” Solomon grimaces, swirling around in his desk chair but faltering as Asmo emerges from the bathroom, toweling his hair and jeans hanging low on his hips, “...ground rules.”

Asmo tilts his head, “Rules?” He says the words like it’s a foreign language, new and clunky in his pretty mouth. Solomon wants to sock him.

“You can’t keep bringing partners back here,” Solomon says. Asmo goes back to toweling his perfect fucking hair.

“And why is that?”

“I can’t concentrate on coursework or go to bed if you’ve got someone moaning in your bed every other night.”

“Sounds like a personal problem,” Asmo sniffs, and Solomon very quickly finds the situation slipping through his fingers. All of his phenomenally constructed arguments for why Asmo should be a respectful roommate have disintegrated in the face of Asmo’s pure obstinance. “Besides, where would I take my partners if not to my bedroom?”

“Their rooms. A dark alcove somewhere. A car. A bathroom. I don’t care--anywhere else but here.”

Asmo ponders this for a moment, before he shrugs his shoulders as he walks across the room to his drawers by the window, “Nope. I don’t think that’s considerate for them.” He digs through to presumably find a shirt, and Solomon bites the bullet.

“You’re on academic probation, aren’t you?” Solomon says, and Asmo freezes with his back turned to Solomon, tension evident in the line of his shoulders. When he turns around, his expression is colder than anything Solomon’s ever seen directed at him. In his brother Levi’s words, there it is: the infamous Bitch Smile.

“I didn’t know you cared about gossip,” Asmo looks like a dragon picking his teeth with human bones as he sits against the window sill.

The afternoon light drifting in through the sheer curtains casts him in an ethereal glow, and Solomon bites back his unnecessary request for Asmo to move out of such flattering lighting so he can negotiate with him properly.

“I don’t, which is how I know it’s true.”

“And? What? You’re going to try and blackmail me with this information?” Asmo sneers, but even crippling distaste is an attractive look for the other.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Solomon scoffs, “I’m offering to tutor you.”

Asmo blinks at that.

“I won’t tell anyone. You know my grades. Half of our required classes are together, so it’s not like it would put me under any more stress than not sleeping. And I’m not unreasonable,” Solomon says, “If you must bring people over, just let me know in advance and I’ll go to a coffee shop or the library. I do need to sleep, so I want them out by nine or ten at the latest.”

Asmo doesn’t immediately say no like Solomon thought he would, so things are already going much better than he expected. However, it still does not prepare him for Asmo’s response.

“Fine. Is that all you want?” He asks, and Solomon pointedly ignores the double entendre.  

“I want one of the shelves in the bathroom cabinet,” Solomon blurts, because Asmo has too many beauty products and there’s no space for him in the current set up. Asmo’s brow rises, even as his mouth twist into a wry, surprised smile.

“Maybe.”

“I can work with maybe,” Solomon smiles in return, standing and extending his hand out for a shake. “It’s a deal, then?”

Asmo stares at the hand, his expression unreadable, before something seems to break. He pushes off the window sill and in a few short strides, huffing with laughter, “What’s with the handshake? So formal.”

Solomon doesn’t rise to the bait even if there is a light dusting of pink on his cheeks. This is the first time they’ve touched, he realizes as his magic hums as Asmo’s hand is warm and steady in his own.

“It’s a deal.” Asmo says, and there’s a hint of interest in his eyes as he seems to see Solomon in a new light.

-

-

-

Solomon doesn’t mean to overhear it. He spends so much time in RAD’s library that it’s essentially his second home.

“How’s your shady roommate?” He hears a voice say, and it’s familiar enough to jarr Solomon from his thoughts.

A tinkling laugh, and Solomon blinks in realization. Asmo? Solomon tries to not eavesdrop, tries so hard to not let his interest wander from the potion formula in front of him, because it really has been giving him trouble...

“He’s not bad. Too stiff. Looks great when he comes out of the shower,” Asmo purrs. Solomon feels the bright pink blush rise to his cheeks. They’re talking openly about this in a library, of all places. RAD’s library is unreasonably huge, though--even on a busy weekday, one could be several aisles away from another human being in this space.

They’re both taking the same potions class, so it’s not too far off the mark that they’d both be in the same area looking for reading materials. Solomon should really just leave before he hears anything else that makes his ears burn.

“I don’t trust him.” Asmo’s brother, Satan, says. Of course. Solomon grinds his teeth. Asmo hmms.

“He definitely has a weird powerful vibe about him. I don’t blame you. His face just looks like he’s up to something,” Solomon swallows the spike of hurt that hits at Asmo’s words, even if he’s heard them before. Two months since he started tutoring Asmo. Three months since he moved in. Their cohabitation isn’t domestic, but it is at least civil. “I’ve seen him sleep but I don’t believe it, you know? I’ve never seen him do anything for fun. He’s so pent up and proper that I’m not sure how he does it.”

“He doesn’t.” Satan tsks, “You’ve heard about what happened, right?” Solomon feels his blood run cold.

That was different. It was an accident. He was a child. He was weak then. Solomon would never do anything like that on purpose again. Surely, surely Asmo wouldn’t--

“Of course! It figures though, all the super powerful kids are fucked in the head. But other than that, he’s not bad.”

But he’s not bad. But he’s not bad. As if Solomon would ever settle for not bad after such an callous description of his person. Fury, the kind that makes his magic churn under his skin at a rolling boil, rises in him: at Satan, at Asmo, at himself for.. For what? Believing that Asmo may actually have been different? That they could have been friends?

“What was that?” Satan asks, likely sensing the swirl of Solomon’s magic.

Cursing inwardly, he wrangles his wild emotions under control through years of practice. He will not prove them right. Solomon closes his textbook. His chair screeches against the floor as he stands, Satan and Asmo crossing out of the aisle into the open study area where Solomon has been seated, completely unhidden.

“Were you eavesdropping?” Satan accuses, his bright green eyes sharp and disdainful.

Years and years of diligently studying. Never losing his temper. His single minded determination to better himself has erected a wall that others look on in contempt. Do not prove them right about you, Solomon tells himself, nails digging into his palms hard enough to leave red crescent marks. Do not let the rumors be true.

He cannot look at Asmo, so instead, he smiles at Satan.

“No,” Solomon laughs, and the politeness in it is so fake that it hurts, “I was studying for the same test that Asmo is studying for. Voices carry quite well in a library.”

Satan glances at Asmo, but Solomon still cannot look at him. Tossing his book haphazardly into his bag, he throws it over his shoulder.

“I’ll leave the two of you to it, then.”

-

-

-

“Solomon, hey, wait!” Solomon is not running away, but he has a very brisk pace and does not feel bad when Asmo has to job to catch up with him. “Listen, about what I said--”

Solomon stops sharply enough that Asmo almost runs into him, but Solomon uses his magic to help steady Asmo. It isn’t to be helpful, it’s to stop Asmo from getting close enough to touch him, as if that will protect him from all of these hurt, churning emotions. He exhales through his nose.

“Since you’re actually taking the time to go to the library… I don’t think you need my help anymore.” Solomon forces himself to look at Asmo, steeling himself against whatever petulant expression is probably on the other’s face.

“Right?”

Asmo’s face is not petulant in the slightest. He seems… upset? Solomon feels the beast snarl inside him, a lick of rage at the downtrodden expression on the other’s face. He gets caught shit talking him openly and then has the gall to look hurt when he gets his free tutoring cut off? Asmo’s family is disgustingly rich and well connected. Let him lose his pride and ask them for help.

Solomon will last the year. He and Simeon will room together next year. Asmodeus will not be what breaks him.

Asmo falters at the intensity of Solomon’s gaze, the severity of his words.

“... Right.” Asmo says, and Solomon lets his feet carry him away before either of them say anything else.

- - -

After a week of tense, peaceful avoidance, Satan dropping into the seat opposite him at the campus coffee shop is the last thing Solomon expects.

“I apologize for my conduct the other day.”

Solomon blinks at him.

What is Satan doing here? Irritation immediately blossoms in his chest--he may not be furious anymore, but that doesn’t mean he wants to see Satan, nor had he expected to.

After cancelling their tutoring sessions, he’s made it a point to spend as little time in their (when had it become their room? It was always Asmo’s room at first) room as possible. Sure, it means spending garbage amounts of money on overpriced coffee and shitty wi-fi when the library gets too stuffy, but at least he can breathe.

None of that explains why Satan is here. Apologizing to him. Surely it must be some kind of a trap? A childish prank? Really? Would Asmo stoop so low? He doesn’t know either of these brothers enough to truly say. It’s best for him to be polite for now, until he can figure out Satan’s true motiv--

“You realize that a lot of people don’t trust you because there’s a moment on your face where you look like you’re actively plotting, and then you say some polite nonsense,” Satan says, and Solomon’s brain stops like a record screeching.

“Is this really an apology.” Solomon says, drily. Satan shrugs his shoulders.

“That was an observation. This is the apology.” Satan clears his throat, looking Solomon straight in the eyes. “It was unbecoming of me to speak of you like that in public. I should know better, and I’m sorry.”

“It’s what you thought,” Solomon says, because it’s true. It’s what they all think, and for a good chunk of his life, Solomon rarely tried to make them think differently.

“It was ignorant.” Satan’s bright green eyes stare into his own, and Solomon senses no dishonesty in his words. When Solomon speaks, he finds that he actually might believe them.

“Apology accepted.” Now leave me alone.

Satan narrows his eyes, “Really?” Solomon resists the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose.

“Yes, really.”

“Will you speak to my brother again, then?”

“It’s a little presumptuous of you to ask for my forgiveness and a favor in the same breath.”

“Asmo flunked the last test,” Satan says, in lieu of a proper answer, “He’s in a world of shit at the moment.”

“Why doesn’t he try flirting with the professor?” Solomon scoffs.

Satan props his chin up on his hand with a lopsided smile that’s far more relaxed than he’s ever seen from the fourth brother, “That’s the thing, he hasn’t. Lucifer chewed him out about it and he took it with his tail between his legs rather than kick up a fit about it too.” Solomon’s quick mind lets him skip over the next lines of whatever shitty banter they’ve got to reach Satan’s point.

“You want me to tutor him again.” Solomon asks in disbelief, despite himself. Satan snorts and leans back.

“Nothing so pedantic as that,” Satan waves the notion away, “Just stop avoiding him at every turn, and hear what he has to say. If you’re still mad at him after that, then that’s perfectly reasonable too, considering my brother is one of the biggest assholes to ever exist. He’s unbearably dramatic when he gets into fights with his friends.”

“... Friends?”

Satan stares at him like he’s grown another head, “Obviously.”

Solomon laughs so hard, he’s sure that he’s confirmed all of Satan’s weird opinions of him.

-

-

-

“Solomon?” Asmo breathes his name, hand lingering on the doorknob as he enters the room to see Solomon sitting in his desk chair.

“Satan talked to me,” Solomon says, reveling in the stunned look on Asmo’s face, before crossing his arms, ”He apologized for what he said. And then he asked me to at least hear you out because you’re sulking.”  Asmo pouts at Satan’s words, and Solomon quirks his brow.

“Is he wrong?”

In response to this, Asmo’s face looks pained, lips pressing together as he glances to the side. He’s like a petulant child, Solomon thinks, even if he’s somehow still amused by the other’s expression.

When Asmo looks at Solomon, and he throws his hands up in the air,  “I shouldn’t have said it. There, are you happy?”

“Not really,” Solomon admits, “I understand why your brother might think that of me, but to hear it from someone that I’m helping out...” He adds a little bit of a softer, sadder tone to his voice to make Asmo writhe, and ha, does it work.

Asmo groans, ruffling his hands through his hair, “Alright, I’m a dick! Are you happy? I’m a gossipy bitch and I say things I shouldn’t. You helped me out and I.. took advantage of it. I’m sorry!” Asmo’s arms cross, and he looks so genuinely uncomfortable that Solomon wants to laugh.  

“You’re terrible at this. I was confused as to why Satan might say I can still be mad at you after you say your piece but.. I get it. You’re even worse than he is at it, dare I say.”

“You haven’t met our eldest brother,” Asmo sniffs, before continuing, “Besides, words and emotions are hard, bodies are easier,” Asmo shrugs, like it’s the simplest thing in the world.

“You sound like a bad high school drama,” Solomon scoffs, rolling over Asmo’s affronted gasp, “In any case, I heard you flunked the last test we shared. Maybe if you spent less time flirting with the TA in that class, you could retain the information on the board.” Solomon brings his knuckles to his chin, holding his elbow in his other palm.

“It can’t be helped. If we can get you set up with some extra credit there and you ace the next few exams that should keep your grade above water.” Solomon runs the numbers in his head, but Asmo is waving his hands in the air.

“Wait, wait, waaaait! You’re forgiving me?”

“I’m considering it. You have to make it up to me somehow, but as for the tutoring.. we’re too close to exams for me to want to deal with another roommate if you get yourself suspended. I don’t have blackmail material on anyone else, unfortunately.” Solomon’s kidding about the blackmail, but Asmo deserves a little ribbing after that awful apology.

Although Asmo doesn’t seem offended by the joke. No, it actually seems to be... the opposite? As he speaks, Asmo’s looking at him with a blinding smile.

“Are you listening to me?” Solomon frowns, knocked off balance by Asmo’s expression, “Because if you aren’t, I swear i’m going to--”

A flurry of motion, Asmo crosses the space of their room quicker than Solomon’s ever seen him.

Asmo’s hand cups his face, the other lands on his hip; Solomon has very little time to think, because Asmo’s gorgeous face is in centimeters away from his own. The scent of Asmo’s perfume fills his senses, rendering him stunned--Asmo glances down at his parted lips, and then back up at Solomon’s eyes.

Asmo kisses him, and Solomon’s magic blows out the fuses in their entire building.

-

-

-

In the chaos of their plunge into darkness, Solomon’s hands shooting out to shove Asmo back accidentally activates his magic, and Asmo stumbles a few paces further before falling to the ground.

“Ah,” Asmo yelps, at the same time Solomon rises from his seat, “What the hell, Asmo?”

They’re not in total darkness, thanks to the dim light from the streetlamps outside, but it still takes Solomon’s eyes a few seconds to adjust. Asmo’s vague form is still seated on the floor, propped up on his elbows.

“What was that?” He demands, still haunted by the firm press of Asmo’s lips against his. Asmo shifts to get up, and Solomon’s arm immediately reaches out to offer his assistance. Asmo huffs at the motion, but takes his hand anyway.

“I thought I could make it up to you this way.”

“By offering to, what, make out with me?” Solomon says, disbelief mounting. Asmo shrugs his shoulders, one hand trailing up Solomon’s hip.

“Sure, we could do that. We could do whatever you want,” and now that Solomon’s eyes have adjusted to the dim lighting, he can see the coy smile playing at Asmo’s lips, “I see how you look at me, how could you not? Besides, you’re quite handsome yourself…” Asmo purrs, his free hand reaching up to graze against Solomon’s blushing cheeks.

For a moment, Solomon hesitates--Asmo is gorgeous. Even if Solomon were deaf to the campus’ adoration of him, he would have to be blind as well to not realize that just by existing near Asmo. There’s always a mix of challenging and inviting in his eyes, an ease that shows itself in all of his movements. Asmo exudes a level of sensual energy that is a powerful skill in its own right, and Solomon is a healthy young adult…

But Solomon has no desire to fall into Asmo’s bed like another one of his hundreds of admirers, clamoring to get into the other’s bed space. He has more important things in mind.  

“That’s not what I meant by making it up to me!” Solomon is very proud of his voice not cracking as he pushes Asmo’s hand away, and the coquettish expression is quickly replaced by Asmo’s pout.

“Well, how else am I supposed to show you how truly repentant I am!” He whines at his failed seduction.

“I can’t even begin to explain how screwed up that is, Asmo.” Solomon groans, running his hand through his hair, “You could have offered me another shelf in the bathroom cabinet or more sink space and I would have considered it a start.”  

Asmo blinks, tilting his head to the side, “... Really? That’s all you want?” He seems stunned that someone would turn down his body.

“Now that I know you were going to offer your body, half of the sink sounds too fucking small, doesn’t it?” Solomon retorts, and Asmo laughs.

A loud knock startles both of them out of their conversation, and he hears the muffled voice of their RA from the other side.

“Are you alright in there? There’s been a power outage -- will you be alright casting magelight, or do you need flashlights?”

Solomon, in desperate need of a reprieve from Asmo’s… Asmo-ness… goes to open the door as the RA speaks. After a quick exchange of assuring the doting senior in their pajamas, Solomon shuts the door with a sigh. When he turns around, Asmo is seated in his desk chair with a soft pink magelight floating idly nearby. Asmo seems to be deep in thought, and Solomon approaches him with slight hesitation.

As soon as Solomon gets closer, Asmo’s gaze snaps up to look at him so suddenly that Solomon almost balks.

“I know what I can do for you,” Asmo says, his eyes twinkling with mischief and utter glee. The pink light casts an almost eerie, and somehow still enticing shadow on the other’s face.  

Solomon isn’t too proud to admit he’s terrified by whatever Asmo is about to offer.

-

-

-

“... So you didn’t sleep with him?” Simeon asks, and Solomon chokes on his tea.

“What! Of course not!” He coughs through his instantaneous response, pounding his fist on his chest. “He said… oh hell, I can’t say this, it’s ridiculous.” Solomon covers his face with his hands, an unbidden blush rising to his cheeks.

“He said he was going to make me popular,” Solomon groans, a little quieter in volume. Simeon is silent for a long enough time that Solomon takes his face out of his hands to look at him questioningly, but Simeon’s got one hand over his mouth as he shakes in stifled amusement.

“Wh--” At Solomon’s confused expression, Simeon is unable to contain himself any longer, bursting into a loud fit of laughter. Simeon throws his arms around Solomon in a crushing hug, even as Solomon tries to shove his way out of it.

“Oh, this is going to be great.”  

-

-

-

I feel like this would definitely be considered #crack or #ooc slightly because it’s always hard to translate personalities that are defined by specific experiences (such as being alive for thousands of years) into any AU, but especially ones where they’re only 19/20 year olds lmaaoo

Facets of their personalities I tried to keep: Solomon’s ambition/the fact that people think he’s so shifty, and Asmo’s sexual bravado/blatant insecurities of his person. Who knows if that comes off here, but hey, I had fun lkajflaks

As always, ty for reading!!! I appreciate your kind words and responses on my stuff ;w;

[caelesjjk]

Forget Me Not

I hope everyone enjoys a little calum angst today.

She wasn’t allowed to force it.

The doctors said that he would have to remember all on his own. And that part tore her apart the most. Because what if he never remembered her? What if he found someone new and the life they had together just became something in the back of his mind that would never surface again?

But she had to let Calum heal on his own. He needed to be able to put the pieces together himself, or it could have consequences. So London had tried to keep her distance. She let his friends take him home after he was released from the hospital so that they could help him remember things. Things that could jog his long term memory, things from his childhood when they were all growing up together. They wanted to give him time before they brought London back into his life.

But she just kept thinking that maybe she was all that he needed to remember. She knew things that no one else would know because he had been hers for years. Belonged to her in ways that he didn’t belong to his friends and family. She knew him. And he knew her. At least, he did.

It had been 3 weeks. 3 agonizing weeks of waking up in their bed alone. She could smell him on the sheets, but didn’t have the heart to change them. The guys had come over and taken most of his things back to Ashton’s house. They only left a few things here and there. Little things, like his silver chain necklace that she had given him for his birthday two years ago. She left it sit on middle shelf of the bookcase in the living room because that’s where he had left it last.

He had taken it off and sat it there the night the accident had happened. London hated to think about that night. Hated to think that if she had just asked him to stay one more time. If she had just gone with him, maybe things would be different. Maybe he wouldn’t of taken the road he chose, and maybe he wouldn’t of run off the road and hit that tree. Too many what ifs to sort through.

She didn’t want to give up. She loved him. So when her phone started ringing on the side table next to the couch, she grabbed for it immediately, seeing Luke’s number pop up on the screen. She took a few deep breaths before answering.

“Hi, Luke.” Her voice came out weak and scratchy.

“Hey there, Lons. How are you?” Luke said, concern in his voice as usual.

“You know the answer to that.” London sighed, leaning her head back against the couch. “How is he?” Her mouth was dry.

“He’s better, physically. All healed up for the most part. But he still doesn’t remember much, except his mom and his sister. He asked about them yesterday. Things are looking better.” London could here Luke scuffing his boots on the concrete.

“Has he…has he said anything about me?” She knew the answer, but asked it anyways.

“Nothing yet, Lons. But…but Ashton thinks that maybe you should by. Just to push him a little, ya know?” Luke explained.

“The doctor said not to push.” London sat up, her heart racing at the thought of seeing him.

“The doctor doesn’t know him like we do. Calum is so damn stubborn, I just think if he saw you. Heard you talk. Maybe he would start remembering.” The sound in Luke’s voice was just the slightest bit hopeful.

“And what if he doesn’t?” She asked.

“Then we keep trying. We keep trying every day until he does, okay Lons? We just…keep trying.” London could tell Luke was upset. Frustrated. And he wanted his friend back just as much as London wanted the man she loved to come back.

“Okay.” London whispered, biting at her bottom lip, trying to keep the tears at bay.

“Just come by today. See you soon.” Luke said quietly before hanging up the phone.

London was panicking. She had been waiting for this. Tirelessly pacing the floors hoping that they would call and ask exactly this. And now that it was happening, she was frozen. She didn’t know how she was going to control her emotions. She needed to keep them in check so that she didn’t confuse him. So with trembling hands, London got dressed and fixed her hair. She hadn’t really done either of those things since all of this happened. But now that she was going to see him, she wanted to look like she still gave a shit.

As she drove towards Ashton’s house, all the memories of the night of the accident came flooding back. London had tried so hard to push those thoughts away, but the closer she got to Ashton’s the more they came flooding back in.

“Is this London Baxter?” The unfamiliar voice said.

“Yes, who’s this?” She replied, confusion all over her face.

“This is Francis Dougherty, I work for Mercy Hospital. We have you as contact person for Calum Hood?” The woman said quickly.

“Y-yes. Whats going on?” She could feel her heart plummeting to her stomach.

“He was just transported to Mercy by ambulance after being involved in an accident. He’s in critical condition, you should get to the hospital as soon as possible ma’am.” The woman explained, and London stopped breathing. “Ma’am?”

“Yeah…I’m on my way, I’ll be right there.” London forced out the words, sprinting for her car and driving to the hospital for more recklessly than she should have. She called Ashton from the car, but didn’t bother to wait for him to get to the hospital.

London pushed through every door and ignored every security spot that tried to stop her. When she reached the emergency room, she didn’t wait in line. She forced her way to the front of the line and begged the old man behind the desk to tell her where her sweet boyfriend was. And after he pointed towards the surgery unit, she took off running again. She had no idea what was going on around her. She just needed to get to him, right now.

When London arrived in the surgery unit, she was stopped by some nurses who wouldn’t allow her to go any further. They wanted her to sit down so they could explain what had happened. But she couldn’t hear them. Nothing made sense. How could he be hurt so badly? She just saw him a few hours ago? He had just left their apartment to go get some Duke some dog food. How could he be lying unconscious on a hospital bed now? Battered and bruised from the impact? How could the beautiful man with the perfect dimples and glowing smile be just lying there with neither on his face?

They had let her see him after surgery, but he wasn’t awake. They didn’t know when he would wake up. But London never left. She stayed in that tiny hospital room with him got two weeks before he finally woke up. And London thought that Calum waking up, would be the best possible thing, but as it turns out, it was the most devastating thing that could have happened.

When he stirred awake for the first time, London was at his side almost immediately. Carefully touching his swollen face when his eyes fluttered open.

“Wh-who are you? Where am I?” He said, trying to move away.

“Calum…Cal its me. Whats the matter?” She asked him, fear rushing through her veins.

“I don’t know where I am…what the hell happened to me?” His voice was getting louder and more scared by the minute.

London tried to console him as all the doctors and nurses came rushing into the room. She had to watch from the door as they calmed him down enough to explain things to him. And when they realized that he didn’t remember anything, a whole new journey had begun.

Ashton’s house wasn’t far from hers and Calum’s apartment. That was something that killed her even more. He was just a few minutes away but further away than he had ever been. Her heart was pounding in her chest as she turned off her car and walked up the driveway. She wasn’t sure if she should knock, she never used to. But this place different to her now, just like everything else, it had a shroud of sadness on it.

Thankfully, Luke was waiting outside for her when she arrived.

“Hey, Lu.” She walked up the few stairs and stood in front of him.

“Glad you’re here, Lons.” He wraps his long arms around London’s shoulders and pulls her against him. She wrapped her arms around his waist and hid her face in his chest. They were all friends, but never had much of a chance to properly decompress together.

“Where is he?” She asked, eager to see him, but terrified at the same time.

“Inside with Ash and Mike. He’s more comfortable now than he was when he brought him here. Sleeping a little better.” Luke gives her one last squeeze before he pulls back to look at her. “Doesn’t look like you’ve slept much.”

“Do you blame me?” London asks.

“No. No, I guess I can’t.” He shoves his ring clad fingers into the pockets of his skinny jeans, before nodding towards the door. “You ready to go in?”

“I think so.” London sighs, and moves to step inside when Luke opens the door.

Almost immediately, London is met by a bear hug from Michael, and before she can take another step inside, Ashton comes to stand in front of her. He looked pitiful. Like he hadn’t slept. London could feel the emotion building up in her throat as she looked at him. Calum was Ashton’s best friend, and London knew that this was hurting him so badly. Ashton’s mouth was turned down in a frown as he walked a little closer to her, and she could see the tears at the corners of his eyes threatening to spill over. London wasn’t sure she could open her mouth to talk without sobbing.

“Hi, Lons. We missed ya.” Ashton says quietly, stopping to stand in front of her, just a foot away.

Part of London, was so angry with Ashton. He was keeping Calum away from her, but deep down, she knew he was doing what was best for him. But the bigger part of her, missed Ashton too.

“Hi, Ash.” She blubbered out, but couldn’t hold back the sobs anymore. And Ashton was quick to wrap her up in arms and let her cry against his shoulder.

“S’alright love. I’m here.” Ashton patted her back softly and let her cry as long as she needed while Luke and Michael stood by. “M’ sorry it took so long to get you over here. I guess I thought I was protecting you.” Ashton said when London finally pulled away.

“Protecting me? Ashton I don’t want to be protected, I want Calum back. I want to help.” London wiped at her eyes and nose trying to straighten out her appearance before she saw him.

“Just…don’t get your hopes up, okay? He gets frustrated easy…” Ashton starts to walk down the hallway towards the living room, and London starts to feel her heart pound again.

Ashton walks into the room first, and London watches as he goes to stand in front of one of the couches. Her eyes follow Ashton, and then land on him. She can only see the back of his head right now, but the messy bunch of black curls on top of his head are undeniable. Her breath is stuck in her chest as she walks around the couch so she can stand next to Ashton.

“Hey Cal, someone came to see ya.” Ashton says as London stops in her tracks. He was everything she remembered and more.

Lips were pouty and pink like they always were. That hadn’t changed. His eyes were still dark and inviting, but they held a confusion that practically broke London’s heart. She watched him look at her, but he didn’t react to her the way she was reacting to him. Calum looked up at Ashton and then back ot her once more.

“Who’s this?” Calum asked, his voice was husky and deep. One of London’s favorite sounds. But the words cut straight through her like the sharpest knife.

“This is London, buddy. Do you remember her at all?” Ashton said as he sat down next to Calum on the couch. London stood frozen in place.

“London…” Calum said quiety. The sound of her name coming from his mouth made her heart try to escape its cage in her chest. “I…no. I can’t remember.” He ran his hands through his hair in frustration.

“That’s alright, Cal. You will.” Ashton pats Calum’s shoulder.

“No. I’m not ever going to remember any of you fucking people. I just can’t fucking remember!” Calum stands up, pushing past London and making her stumble before she can even get herself together.

London knows there are tears on her face and a look of distress in her eyes. She wants to go after him. She wants nothing more than to follow him and comfort him. But she knows that she can’t do that, because to him she’s a stranger, and she can’t imagine there would be anything comforting about a stranger.

“It’s okay, Lons. It’s just been like this the last few weeks. You know how he is with his temper.” Ashton tried to explain. But London just wants to see him more, 20 seconds was never going to be enough.

“Will he let me talk to him?” She asks.

“We gotta let him come to you, when he’s ready. Why don’t you just stay around here? The more he see’s all of us the better.” Ashton suggests, his shoulder drooping a bit.

“You mean stay here all the time?” She asks.

“You should be here too.” Luke says from behind her. London isn’t sure what to say, she’s feeling the slightest bit of happiness for the first time in weeks. She could be around him all the time, even if he didn’t remember her. And that was better than nothing. So she nods yes.

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

Day 36

It’s been over a month since the accident happened, and two weeks since London had moved into Ashton’s guest bedroom. Even though he still didn’t remember much, London felt better just being closer to him. He didn’t quite understand her presence there, they had told him she was a friend, because they didn’t want to overwhelm with the thoughts of a relationship that he couldn’t remember.

They took things slowly, tried to remind him of his favorite foods and favorite beers by bringing them around. He would try things that he normally liked, and not feel anything when he tried them now. But one thing that had seemed to jog his memory just the slightest, was when the boys played music. They had all been in a band, playing gigs now and then for a few years. Calum played the bass, and he was so damn good at it. He seemed to open up the most when they took him into the practice space that Ashton had in his basement. He listened and closed his eyes and tried to soak it all in. He even picked up the bass and remembered a few chords, but no particular song had come back to him yet.

London couldn’t stop watching him. The way he moved, the way he talked, and the way she felt when he was around was all so routine for her. She was watching him from the couch now, as he walked around the room and looked at some of the pictures Ashton had framed on his mantle and side tables. She watched as his eyebrows scrunched together as he tried to remember the faces in the photos. When he came to one particular picture, he stopped in front of it for quite some time. It was a group photo, the boys and lots of their friends during a party in Ashton’s yard. And London. Calum had his arm wrapped around her shoulders and his lips pressed to her temple in the photo.

“Is this you?” He finally asked, not turning to look at her.

“Yes.” She said quietly, sitting up straight.

“Were…were we close?” He asked, turning to look at London as she stood from her seat on the couch.

“Yeah, we were close.” She bit her lip, trying not to smile as she remembered just how close they were.

“I wish I could remember something. Anything about you. Because I feel something every time you’re in the room and I don’t know what it means.” He walks closer to her and London feels her chest tighten.

“You’ll remember soon. The doctors said it just takes time.” London says.

“Why won’t you just tell me? Tell me what you meant to me.” He looks at her, frustration evident on his features.

“We have to let you remember. If I tell you anything it could mess up all the progress you’re making.” London explains.

“Progress? What fuckin’ progress?” He huffs with annoyance and steps away from her. She missed his close proximity already.

“You remembered your mom and Mali. And the music is helping.” She says, grabbing his hand to hold him there.

Calum stops in his tracks when he feels London’s hand in his. His shoulders rise and fall over and over as he tries to control his breathing and the way his heart is pounding. He looks back at her and wets his lips with his tongue.

“Why are you here, London? I don’t know who you are.” He gently pulls his hand away from hers.

“Because you did once. And I want to be here when you remember.” She doesn’t move to grab his ahnd again, he needs his space now.

“What if it takes forever? Or what if I just don’t fuckin’ remember?” His voice is louder and shaky.

“It’s okay, Calum. I’m not going anywhere.” She says, jaw tightening.

“Maybe you should.” He shakes his head before walking away towards the room he had been staying in.

London couldn’t deny the fact his words hurt her. It broke her heart every time he said something like this, but she knew he was just frustrated and confused. And she wasn’t going to give up. Not ever.

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

Day 66

It’s been another month of trying to help Calum remember. The biggest break through so far, was Calum remembering who Ashton was. He and Ashton had gotten into a heated argument because Calum was sick of Ashton pushing him to remember. But his best friend knew what he was capable of.

“You can remember, Calum. I fucking know you can. You have to try, you’re giving up and we all can see it!” Ashton had said.

“What do you want from me? I’ve been tryin’ for months and I can’t remember.” Calum was standing in front of him, his jaw tightened and his chest out.

“You’re not trying, mate. Stop being such a damn baby and dig down in that mind of yours and find it!” Ashton was yelling now as well. And London knew she should stop him, Ashton shouldn’t be pushing this hard, but she was desperate for him to remember something.

“Are you listening to a fuckin’ word I’m saying?! I don’t know you! I don’t know any of you! It’s like living in a house full of fuckin’ strangers!” Calum was right up in Ashton’s face now.

“Yes you do, Cal. You know me. You remember that time when we were kids, and I beat you ridin’ bikes down Old Terry Hill? I know you remember that!” Ashton was still yelling, but he was keeping his cool.

“You didn’t fuckin’ beat me, I left you in the dust!” And then everything stopped. Calum had a look of shear disbelief on his face as he looked up at Ashton.

“There you are, brother.” Ashton said, grabbing Calum into a hug. After that, Calum slowly started to remember more and more about Ashton, and even bits and pieces of Luke and Michael.

It was like the anger set something off, something that they been trying to reach for months. They just had to figure out a better way for him to reach those memories. After he started remember, he seemed to relax a little more. He was friendlier, with the other boys at least. But London couldn’t expect him to understand why she was still there.

When she woke up to the sound of a guitar being played one night, she assumed it was Michael. London dragged her tired body from the now familiar bed, and walked into the hallway. The sound wasn’t coming from Michael’s room, but from Calum’s. And the sound was one that made London’s heart soar, because it was her song. He might not know what he was playing, but she did. With her hand cupped over her mouth to keep from sobbing she quietly walked across the hall and nudged his door open a bit more so she could see him. He was sitting at the edge of the bed, his feet were bare and his hair was disheveled. Calum’s eyes were closed as he played the chords and London knew that she needed to pull herself together. She wiped away the tears and smoothed back her hair before lightly knocking on his door. He jumped a little, before opening his eyes to see her standing there in her pajamas.

“Hey.” He said with a sigh.

“I um…just heard you playing.” She walked into the room a few steps. “What’s that you’re playing?”

“I don’t really know. I just started playing it.” He said, sitting down the guitar and turning his attention to her.

“Are you sure?” She asked.

“Yeah, Lons. I really can’t remember where I’ve heard it before.” When he used that nickname, it stung. He had started calling her that after hearing the other boys say it. But that wasn’t his name for her. London sighs before sitting down next to him.

“You used to play that for me, all the time.” London made herself meet his eyes, even though she knew it would hurt. His eyes were warm and always the most perfectly chocolate colored.

“When?” He simply asked.

“When I was sad. Or when I was happy. When I had a bad day and you wanted to see me smile.” She smiled a little at the thoughts.

“We were more than just friends, weren’t we?” He asked.

“Much more.” London said. She wanted to tell him something that would make him remember. She missed him so much.

“I want to know how much you meant to me. Please. I want remember.” He stands up from the bed and starts to pace.

“I was yours and you were mine. I’m still yours…that’s why I wont give up.” London stands up as well, watching him move back and forth.

“Its like its right there. It’s right there on the surface and it won’t come out. Why can’t I remember you?” He’s standing a few feet away, shoulders heaving with his heavy breathing.

“You just have to keep trying. Just try, Cal. I’m here, sweetheart.” London tries to take his ahnd but he moves away again.

“I can’t. I can feel something, but I don’t know what the fuck it is or why I feel it.” He keeps pacing.

“Yes you can.” She tells him.

“No! You just aren’t there! My body is telling me one thing and my mind just doesn’t know!” He’s frustrated and yelling as he paces. London knew she was getting somewhere, she had to.

“What does your body tell you?” She asks.

“To grab you around the waist and kiss you against that wall until neither of us can breathe! But I don’t know why?? Do you understand how fuckin’ maddening that is?” Calum walks back over to her, his eyes wide as he stares down.

“Because you know who I am. You do, you fucking know Calum!” London knows shes crying now, and she doesn’t care.

“Why are you pushing this?! I cant remember!” He angrily kicks over the chair in the corner that had been piled with clothes.

“Look at me, Calum!” London shouts, walking over and grabbing his arm to turn him towards her.

“Dammit, Lonnie! I said I don’t remember!” He freezes, goosebumps covering his skin.

“There, there that’s me! Not Lons, you call me Lonnie. You know me, baby.” She takes his hand and brings it up to her cheek and he immediately cups it.

“You…fuck. I know you. I know you, sweet girl.” He wipes at her tears with his thumb and brings his other hand up to cup the other cheek.

“I found you back.” London allows herself to finally touch him, her entire body practically convulsing at the feel of him.

“How could I forget you.” Calum whispers the words as his forehead rests against hers.

London can see the boys waiting in the doorway, huge smiles on their faces letting her know that they must of witnessed most of what happened when they heard all the yelling happen.

“We can go slow, okay? Until you remember more. All the time you need.” London says, her hands lacing into his soft curls.

“Can’t wait to remember every little thing.”

[ihaventspokenyet]

Nothing A Little Red Lipstick Can’t Solve (Mando x Reader)

Word count: 2.1k

Warnings: language, flirting, suggestive language (no actual intercourse), drinking, make-out (kinda?), reader insert (idk if that’s a warning), this was made and edited around 4 am soooooo yeah

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the mentioned characters from, “The Mandalorian”. I do not own you and have no affiliation with Disney, Disney Plus, or The Mandalorian. This is simply a fan fiction story.

A/N: It’s like 4 am and I just needed to get this out of my system. It’s not like super smutty, but I’ve been dying to write about Mando for some time and just needed to post something. Please leave back constructive criticism if you can and I hope this isn’t too bad. ALSO this is a repost bc it wasn’t showing up in the tags

—

The yearly ball was being thrown and everyone who was somebody or extremely wealthy would be there. Famous across the galaxy for being lavish and full of women and men who held a high status in their planets, it was only accessible via an invite or through connections. Your father had been a contributor for the event since you could remember, so he and his family were always welcome at the event; however, you were never really one for a crowded dance floor full of sweaty bodies and girls who acted a little too helpless in hopes of luring in a sugar daddy. But this week was different, you had been stuck inside your home with little entertainment due to a security breach and your father wanted to ensure his families safety. You were antsy and deprived of your fun for far too long so you decided a night of messing with the hearts of “pretty boys” who only wanted to get in your pants would be great entertainment for your dull week.

So here you are, preparing with your friend ,Seliah, since you didn’t want to be alone all night. Deciding to dress less flashy than most, you opted for a long pale pastel-blue satin dress with a slightly slightly plunged neckline and a slit in the middle starting from just above your knees. You decorated your outfit with a white shawl that hung just below your shoulders, nude heels, and a deep red lip.

Looking at yourself in the mirror and satisfied with your appearance, you made your way to the ball. The evening began a little hectic as men and some women swarmed you for pictures, a chance to engage with someone of such a high profile, or in attempts to pursued you into participating in lewd activities.

After successfully shooing everyone away, you had settled down to talk with Seliah and decided to order a drink in hopes of replacing the boredom with a little booze. You had noticed a handsome young man eyeing her all night and–deciding to be a good friend, encouraged her to talk to him--but now you were completely and utterly drenched in boredom.

A metallic glint caught your attention and you were surprised to see a fellow (or perhaps toned lady?) decked out in beskar, extremely unfitting of the occasion. Surprised you didn’t see him sooner and pleased to see such a change in pace in this type of event, you smirked to yourself; you smelled adventure. This person was either important, intimidated their way in, or had manage to gain entry by lying. A tingle ran down your spine, boy were you feeling mischievous at thought of stirring up some trouble with the helmeted being. Downing the last of your drink and re-applying your lipstick, you sauntered your way over to the Mandalorian.

“I have to say, I absolutely love the way you’re dressed. Very fitting for the occasion,” you purred and slipped into the chair next to them.

The person snorted and, although slightly distorted by the modulator, sounded like a man.

“Man of few words huh? You don’t see many Mandalorians often, especially not here. I’m guessing you’re here to stir up some trouble,” you speculated.

“You’re Aldone L/N’s daughter. It’s a surprise to see you at an event like this.” He finally spoke up, turning his head to look at you.

“So I was right, there’s no way you’re a casual attendee would pay attention to me,” you smirked. “So what’re you here for? Let me guess, one of these assholes got themselves into trouble and managed to get a bounty on their head?” you questioned.

“I have no business with you. I suggest you turn away before you get yourself into trouble,” he responded, looking back at his untouched drink.

You chuckled and leaned in close to his helmet, “That may work on anyone else, but I’m sure you know that if you tried to lay as much as a finger on me, my father would put a bounty on your head and that would risk your little operation.” You speculated in a hushed tone, “Am I wrong?”

“What do you want?” He finally asked, standing to look at you and clearly readying himself to leave.

“I want in on whatever you’re going to pull tonight.. You can’t deny that I would be a beneficial ally.” you proposed, standing in an attempt to match his demeanor but he was much taller, despite your heals.

“What do you gain from helping me?” He asked, puzzled and hesitant to believe that the daughter of a powerful man who he was going to rob from would help him.

You grinned, with mischief was prominent in your eyes, ”to ruin the fun of all the dirty bastards here and to minorly inconvenience ‘daddy’s’ event… also, why would I miss the chance at fun night with a Mandalorian?”

“Fine. But if you try to sell me out-” he started.

“Yeah yeah big guy, i’ve heard it all,” you shushed him and took a sip of his drink.

He had hesitantly explained part of the plan and omitted any specific information; grab some documents that held information regarding someone he had captures (can you guess who? ). The hardest part would be making your way up with such a flashy man.

“Follow my lead.” you whispered to him, grabbing his hand and placing a flirty smile on your face.

He definitely didn’t trust you yet, so he was hesitant to follow you and he wasn’t one for physical touch; you were only slightly overstepping his boundaries. Your sudden grasp of his (armored) hand threw him off. If the touching wasn’t enough, he definitely didn’t expect whatever the hell you were going to do next.

“Ma’am nobody is allowed to-” a guard had attempted to stop you, but you flashed a pass.

“I have special access. And I just want a room, if you catch my drift.” you said flashing Mando a flirty look.

The guard became embarrassed and uncomfortable at your insinuation.

“Ye-Yes ma’am,” he stuttered, stepping aside.

You pulled the Mandalorian up the stairs and he followed closely, albeit a bit flustered at your actions--he’d never admit it though.

“Didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable there. It’s just that stuff like that makes people more vulnerable to persuasion,” you threw him a smile.

You turned a few hallways and finally made your way to the one that held the papers. This hallway was forbidden, even for you, so you’d have to be extra careful. You heard a guard approaching so you quickly messed up your hair and wrapped Mando’s hand across your waist.

Leaning in close, you whispered a quick, “Take me to a room, I’m drunk.”

He thankfully got the message and gave a curt nod.

“Hey! You can’t be here!” An armed guard made his way to you both.

“Mr. Aldones daughter needs a place to sober up, we’re just looking for a room.” he spoke as you acted like the best damn drunk you could concur up from (many) passed experiences.

“This is a forbidden area.” He cautioned.

You immediately pretended to cry, “Don’t yell at me! I’m going to tell daddy you’re being insabordinate!” You slurred and hiccupped.

“Nice going, you made the girl cry,” the Mandalorian spoke up. You could hear the slightest hint of amusement from him.

“No I-I didn’t mean to- Please don’t tell your father,” he begged.

“I’ll make sure she keeps quiet, but you should get out of here. You know what her father would do to someone who makes his daughter upset, don’t you?” Mando warned.

The guard nodded and thanked Mando before running off.

“You don’t seem like the type that would act so well.” You replied, wiping a bit of mascara and loose tears from your eyes.

You took out your key and fiddled with the lock.

“Shit..” you mumbled. This lock was reinforced much better than the rest, “I can’t-”

“Move aside,” Mando spoke.

Pressing some buttons on his wrist cuff, the Mandalorian successfully shot the lock. He entered quickly and looked through the papers inside. He found a locked box hidden between a messy pile of books and smashed it with his fists. The grunt he let out from the power of his punch caused a shock to course through your body and your thighs to clench.

“I got it-” he was cut off by a screeching alarm.

“Shitshitshit..” your eyes widened with  genuine fear of being caught filled your body.

You must’ve been blinded by your want of fun because you genuinely didn’t think about the consequences of being caught. Mando quickly took your wrist and ran down to the hall into the nearest bathroom.

“Okayokay, it’s fine this is fine,” you breathed, beginning to hyperventilate.

You liked to cause chaos, but you might’ve gone too far this time; why was this document so important? If you survived this, you were never coming here again. Suddenly, an idea popped into your mind (definitely not a good one, but it was really your only chance of running free).

“I got it!” you yelled, digging through your purse for your dark red lipstick, “if there’s one thing i’ve learned from years of fucking around, it’s that theres nothing a red lipstick can’t solve.” you said while you pulled out the delicate tube.

Quickly leaning over the mirror, you applied a coat of the silky crimson color and then smeared it with your hand. You went to apply a second coat and then turned to face him.

“Not to sound thirsty, but we have to make out so they think we’re doing it.. and I know the faces of Mandalorians can’t be seen so you’ll have to give me some marks as proof, I can wrap my eyes with this shawl” You spoke urgently, but awkwardly.

He seemed to stare at you through his visor for a good minute, likely looking for an alternative to making out. You began to feel small under his gaze, maybe the idea was THAT terrible and he was rethinking his alliance with you? You hoped he wouldn’t think you’re too strange after this. The bounty hunter tried to think of an alternative, coming up with nothing, he sighed and went to lock the door and shut the lights.

“Turn around and close your eyes,” he ordered, waiting for you to comply.

You hesitantly turned your back to him and heard the sound of something popping off and then hissing. You won’t lie, the authority in his voice was very… alluring. You felt a heavy pressure over your head, before realizing he was sliding the helmet onto your head and your vision was purely black.

“… I’m sorry about this..” He spoke, seeming genuinely apologetic.

“No worries cowboy, you’re not the worst person I could be stuck doing this with,” you joked, hoping to ease his tension, “in fact, your voice tells me you’re a real looker,” you teased.

Snorting, he held your hip and hesitantly dove for your neck. All he needed to do was leave two or three marks so it would be believable. Your breathe hitched as he began running his lips over your throat. Biting your lip and gripping his shoulder, you forced yourself to swallow gasps he gently coaxed reddish-purple bruises to the surface with his lips; you didn’t want to seem too eager.

“They won’t think anything’s happening if you don’t make noise,” He warned with an even voice, only slightly breathless from his actions.

Was he unfazed by all of this? Here you were struggling to contain ALL sorts of noises, only for him to be nonchalant about the whole situation. Hurt because of his seeming lack of interest, you were pulled into your thoughts. Trying to feel where you were (and trying to not accidentally touch you too inappropriately) he slid his hand to your knee and gave it a good squeeze; a warning that you had to make this believable. Increasing the pressure of his kiss to you throat, you let out a few breathy groans just as someone knocked on the door. Mando quickly took his helmet off of you and placed it on his head. You slid your dress straps off of your shoulder and pretended to cover your chest with your shawl before opening the door.

“Y-yes? Is there a problem,” you asked flushed and breathless because you felt like a mess and because you were (unfortunately) turned on.

“Oh um.. I don’t suppose you heard anybody sneaking around here, down that hallway,” a female guard asked, flustered and pointed to the hallway you had just stolen from.

“No, I’ve been..” you cleared your throat and smiled, “busy in here.”

She nodded and ran off to check the rest of the rooms. Checking the hallway, you pulled your straps up and pulled the Mandalorian down the stairs and back to the first floor. Amongst the commotion, you had managed to escape the building and ran with Mando to wherever he was going. Embarassed that you looked like a mess from the fake “sex”, you covered your face with the small shawl. You stopped behind an alleyway and caught your breath.

“Thank you.. It couldn’t have gone better without you,” Mando spoke up.

You looked up at him, flushed, and nodded your head slowly while wiping away the lipstick you had smeared on your chin.

“No worries, this was exciting. A little too exciting.. I doubt I’ll be doing any shenanigans anytime soon,” you laughed awkwardly.

He let out a chuckle and pulled out a pouch.

“I’m sorry for the..” he trailed off pointing to his neck, “Take this, for your trouble.” he handed you a pouch of money.

You shook your head, “Keep it. This was fun and in case you’ve forgotten, I am wealthy,” you joked in a stereotypical pompous accent, “If you ever decide to come back, maybe we can spend some more time together,” you suggested, hoping you’d see him again.

He thought about it, nodded, and turned to leave with a final thanks. You sighed and leaned up against the wall; he turned you the hell on and you’d be lying if you said you didn’t want more. Biting your lip you began to walk home, smirking to yourself as you remembered the red-lip mark you’d left on the inside of his mask; he had to have seen it and you were curious as to why he didn’t mention it.

“Y/N! There you are! Where the hell did you go?” Seliah yelled in the distance.

“Hey Sel? Where did you buy me this lipstick again? I accidentally broke it,” You spoke.

“Um? Are we going to ignore the fact that you look like a total mess?” She sighed, “let’s take you home, we can shop for it tomorrow… wait where did you get those hickies?! Your father is going to kill you!”

“He can’t if he doesn’t find out,” you sung and began walking home.