#I guess I can just live in google docs forever

[adelineiserman]

I'm gonna do it, I know it.

[yourlocalsmutwriter]

Bookish girlfriend you're my yum yum - Mark Webber x reader

Summary : After going viral on book social media, you give the fans a completely new side of you. It catches the eye of an author (who happens to be a 9 GP winner)

FC: Mima by Cami

inkscentedglamour: Squeezing in some last girly romance books before I film a new video for you 👀

username: Our queen is finally trying romantasy, I can feel it.

username: I need another object x human romance. I know it was an April Fools thing, but I need her to read Double Stuffed

username: DARK ROMANCE. DARK ROMANCE. DARK ROMANCE.

username : I know the sports romance PR is talking to her like the Green Goblin Mask

> username : Especially the new book with the MMC inspired by Danny Ricciardo

> username: need to rewatch her F1 romance streams on patreon.

username: Do you think this is after Two Girls One Formula podcast backlash?

> username: The girls brought her on to talk about books, specifically romances. I don't understand why the fans were attacking her for not talking much about the current grid and things like that and focusing on the fiction.

> username: Especially when she has said many times that she's easing into the fandom. How would you feel if people bullied you for starting with edits/ fanfics and books, like she's doing?

inkscentedglamour: Writing my script for the upcoming video and staring at what got me here

username: Throttled slander era, you will forever be famous

> username: The way she started off so hesitant to give it a bad review or DNF it. This was her first 1 star. People died.

> username: Asking people to still try it for themselves and to not just judge it based on her review. Cemented her as my favorite BookTuber, I fear.

username: The fact that she still followed through and read the entire series. And rearranged her entire Goodreads ratings after that? Iconic

> username: I miss her giving 5 stars. But the quote "if I can be cruel enough to give 1 star, then I don't think I should be generous to give 5 stars to any book, but one" will forever live on.

inkscentedglamour: New video, out now

username: MARK WEBBER????? OVER EMILY HENRY????

> username: over Christina Lauren?????? Ali Hazelwood? Katee Robert

username: you're telling me an Australian driver who retired like 10 years ago is her favorite author??? And was the driving force for her to get her to watch a GP?

username: she's the queen of Booktok, has talked about every book boyfriend, and now she's into cars that go fast?

aussiegrit: Talked about Porsche, F1, Mentoring Oscar, and my book, somehow. Why is Aussie Grit trending?

username: Oh no, our little Booktuber girl bossed too close to the sun (she has a million subscribers and multiple brand deals)

> username: she got it to 5 stars on Goodreads and onto the trending page on Amazon.

username: Mark, wear the My fake boyfriend drives for F1 mech, and my life is yours

username: @inkscentedglamour, look who sorta knows you exist.

inkscentedglamour: Oh oh

inkscentedglamour: Reading the book 😄🤩🥺 vs. having to describe its impact on you, your career, and the future 🙃😑☠️. If you see me verbally abusing a Google doc at the airport, no you didn't

username: Mark Webber in the likes?????????

> username: I guess he found out why Aussie Grit was trending

username: reading video hiatus is over, society is healing

> username: we haven't gotten a part two of her trip to a random destination yet

> username: true, she just packed and left us on a cliffhanger. Surely we're getting that first

> username: her caption says it all. For book lovers, some of you have no reading comprehension.

inkscentedglamour: I finished reading my book, so it only makes sense to hit the thrift, right? Reading vlog will be up when I'm back home (I was strictly told to relax)

username: the two glasses (which could mean nothing)

> username : this is the girl that relies on our discord pins to drink water, what is going on in the house of commons

username : Mark Webber, here again????????? Before me?????????????

> username: she sped through her book cause she has his new book on pre-order

> username: I just know she'll get it on Kindle too, no way is she waiting til it ships to her house

username: Mark's pr team was sleeping because wdym they didn't reach out to her

> username: And apparently, he's got a launch party coming up with "surprise BookTube influencer" attending

inkscentedglamour : Photographic proof that my favorite author knows I exist. Thank you, @aussiegrit, for the invite. And thanks for getting a decent picture before I cried at the blurb and dedication

aussiegrit: Figured you'd wanna skip the queue at Waterstones. Can't wait for your review of this one (also please re-read the new prologue before posting)

username: Mark has been secretly divorced for a year and was writing this whole book as a therapy exercise??????

> username: he couldn't tell anybody and felt like he was slowly fading into obscurity, which affected his mental health

> username: he was not thinking of releasing this until the OG Aussie Grit review

> username: Mark saying that the YouTube video changed his life, just as much as it did hers

inkscentedglamour: Night and day

Comments on this post have been disabled

14.02.2025,approximately 3 months after the book launch

inkscentedglamour: Valentine's Day, Book Buying Day, and Merch Drop Day. Shop the My Real Boyfriend Drove for F1 tee. And yes, he signed off on this specific hard launch

inkscentedglamour: time to be sappy real quick after the merch plug. Mark has been inspiring me, guiding me and showering me with praise ever since his second book launch. I'm so happy he's in my life and I intend to keep him there for as long as I can. He beats all the bookish boyfriend one can have (yes, even Zafir)

aussiegrit: I'm so glad to have you in my life. You see me and be with me, sharp tongue,flaws and all. I wanna build you bookshelves and watch you put my books on them last. Now stop being a YouTuber for a second and get back to being my girlfriend.

[sleepanonymous]

i saw in a passing comment somewhere, i believe it was on a video of iv’s vocals in rain, someone said he previously did harsh vocals in another band and my brain.. oof. if that is indeed true i wish there was a way to listen to them without things being spoiled. but for right now if the closest we get to appreciating his growls are from rain, vore and tmbte we are blessed. and the antIVist performance, never forget 🙏🏻 that one altered my brain chemistry in the best way

I’m feeling ballsy today, I guess, so I’m gonna answer this one. Under the cut though, so people can scroll past if they wish 🖤

Okay Anon, ty for bringing this up because I’ve wanted to talk about this forever. It’s likely, of all the band's he's been part of, that the comment you saw was talking about an EP IV made with a total of five members from two other bands, one being Wilderness. (UK) and the other being another band that IV was a tech/guitarist for.

This group called themselves Mourn, and IV was the vocalist. They unfortunately only released four songs on an EP titled The Next Life. Mourn’s genre was metalcore, and they described themselves as delivering “a powerful sonic experience of crushing instrumentals, vicious vocals and relentless energy.” The lyrics have a heavily religious undertone, backed by the The Next Life’s artwork being a distorted rendition of the Annibale Carracci painting Christ Crowned with Thorns.

It’s unclear exactly who wrote what for Mourn, as all five members are listed as composers. There are also no credits to a producer, so the EP may have been produced by one or multiple band members as well. In Wilderness. (UK), Mourn’s bassist is credited as the lyricists, and Mourn’s drummer is credited as the recording, mixing, and mastering engineer. In a playthru video on the band’s YouTube channel, IV is the lead vocalist and he is backed up by the bassist (he’s definitely been working on breath control and stamina, compared to some recent videos of his screams in Rain). I was thinking about taking the Full Band playthrough on YouTube and editing IV out, but I have no energy for that 😅 I do have the ripped MP3 in the Lost Media folder, if you want to give it a listen.

The Next Life EP was released September 3, 2021, just a few weeks before TPWBYT. The band was only set to have played one live show, in February of 2022 supporting Decapitated, but it’s possible the band dropped out or the show itself was canceled. All I could find online for the date were some news articles/Facebook posts from the announcement but no photos or videos from the actual concert for any band listed on the bill.

It's theorized by fans that this band dissolved after IV left to focus solely on Sleep Token, but I’m not entirely sure that’s the case, or the sole reason. The first tour Sleep Token did in 2022 began in August, and the last tour they did ended in November 2021, so it’s not exactly like IV would have been incapable of performing with both bands. It wouldn’t be the only instance of one of the members of Sleep Token performing in multiple projects at one time.

I’m not confident enough to upload the music onto Tumblr, but I’ll happily share the band name and YouTube/Spotify links with anyone who asks. I ended up compiling the lyrics to the four songs on the EP in a Google Doc a while back for a fan who wanted to avoid IV’s name (since his name and face are plastered onto this band). Also, there were two posts from last month (? maybe September) that brought this band up, and I’m pretty certain they both had audio attached. Unfortunately, I could only find @kaddyssammlung's post for one song, and its the studio version of the same song I added to the Lost Media folder.

If anyone can direct me to the second post, please do so and I will link it here 🖤

I’ll leave you with this gem of a photograph from the band’s Facebook page. Man loves his hoodies and sneakers istg.

[alrondrondwell]

Okay I was going to do something more fancy but I realized that's going to take forever so here's a more goofy and watered down post of my OCs because I need to have them somewhere that isn't on a google doc (because docs are hard to get to on phones)

Under the cut, because I want it to be

Octopath Lads

Oswell - Cleric - 41

He lives in the middle of nowhere in the Leaflands, and he has a bunch of sheep. He isn't really a legitimate cleric due to "retiring" and is now just really a shepherd. That doesn't stop him from being forced out into the wild because oh no everyone in his village is disappearing for some reason. He is trans, because why not and also I personally need a character to have "__ is pregnant??" meme for. He was also a part of the Moonshade Order before he transitioned.

Casimir - Thief - 20

Definitely not my favorite what are you talking about (he is suffering the most). You know that child Claude had in his boss? Yeah that's Casimir now, sorry guys. He somehow survived in Lostseed for 10 years, but not after getting his left eye basically cut out, thanks to specifically Ruined Vessel. Later after he ran off from Lostseed he got adopted and oh no he's gonna be king now. But his new younger brother didn't like that very much and tried to kill Casimir. So now Casimir is on the run. He also may or may not have Vide in his head nooo of course i wouldn't do that to him he's just a little guy.

Tyra - Warrior - 18

She is making me suffer because I don't know what to do with her story wise. She is literally the only one who isn't connected to Moonshade/Vide at ALL she is pristine. She also isn't supposed to even be in the group, and they might be trying to kill her just to reduce the moral of the rest of the squad. She doesn't die though, nuh-uh, the gods like her too much apparently.

Orial - Merchant - 26

Ms. Anti-Monopoly and Black Market Dealer I love her. I listened to "Feed the Machine" and "Give and Take" (both by Poor Man's Poison) making her. In short her father is a bitch, divorces Orial's mom and does everything he can to make sure they're both in the pits of poverty because he's a bitch. Oh he's also buying the rights to the steam engine from each town under Partitio and Roque's noses. How is he getting away with that? I don't know but he is. Orial doesn't like that. She also tries to drop kick Partitio because she blames some of this on him. Good times.

Premysl - Dancer - 19

I HATE HIS NAME but it's sticking now. It's pronounced "SH EH - m ih - sh uh l" by the by. Have fun. Anyways he is like Tyra and not supposed to really be here, except he gets so caught up in Moonshade's business that he's basically assimilated into their dumbass plans to bring Vide back in record time. He's also half Cait because plot, with specifically Cait ears, tail, and feet. He doesn't wear shoes but at least he has toe beans so it's fine. He's also pretty much openly gay. What is a woman he only goes "woah. man".

Actaeon - Hunter - 20

The kid that was announced to be born on the Night of the Scarlet Moon? Hey guess who that is now, Actaeon, yeah. Since there was a lot of darkness and Shadow around and since he was, well literally a newborn he ended up taking a lot of that energy in so now he is Not doing well. He's also a half beastling, and also kinda is like a werewolf (or I guess, were-dhole) because he can shift into just a fully beast form. Can he control it? Sometimes. He definitely won't be the cause of another calamity on Toto'haha, what are you talking about. His beast companion is named Nagi, I don't have the exact looks but if you know what a markhor is, yeah that.

Tomo - Scholar - Unknown

The final character that is based on something else in Octopath 2, that one humanoid figure in Harvey's lab (Osvald's chapter 4), that's Tomo. She does Not know how to be human but dammit she is trying her best. She also asks questions, a lot of questions. She can and will ask you "why" like a four year old, so many times. She also barely sleeps, who knows if she even can or needs to. Almost every time the party stops at an Inn she is Not There she is either wandering or in the lobby reading or writing. She was also made to be a vessel for Vide when the time comes but well thankfully she doesn't exactly get that treatment. Doesn't mean she's treated any better by Moonshade.

Hanako - Apothecary - 37

She is like Tyra and I have no real idea what she's doing, but she's supposed to be here and she is not having a good time. Her girlfriend I MEAN best friend was kidnapped so now Hanako has to go around and get a hold of some ingredients that are very much illegal and dangerous just to get her back. Hanako is going to do that anyway no matter what because love is dangerous and so are lesbians. She herself though is the most closed off out of anyone else in the group, and yes she will help anyone who needs it but unless it's a friend she'd rather just hand you the medicine and leave. Then again this could change at any moment oops.

There is another half of the Octopath lads,

but I don't have much information so instead here are names, they spell out Traveler but they don't match up with the others spelling wise:

Talon (she/her) - Merchant Risque (he/him) - Thief Azalea (she/her) - Apothecary Volkan (he/him) - Warrior Ezra (he/him) - Dancer Lyam (he/him) - Cleric Eldric (he/they) - Hunter Raine (she/her) - Scholar

And then I might mention two characters named Harmony and Kali, only one person here knows them but there's so much about them I will leave talking about them in detail until LATER

Alrighty that's it, have a good day ":3

[tamarieatsbatteries175]

ok so some people wanted my rw lore dump so so here it is ::3 i just copied and pasted it from discord lmao i am NOT taking another 20 minutes to write that shit

okay so first i gotta explain the main components:

1. the cycle - Basically everybody is in a timeloop. nobody can die permanently without ascension [dying permanently], so when you die you wake up again.

2. the ancients - Basically humans who want to break the cycle and die permanently. most of them see the cycle as suffering so they want to die lmao

3. iterators - big sentient supercomputer that reach higher than the clouds thats how fucking big they are. they were created by the ancients to help them find a solution to break the cycle [called the great problem]

ok now the storyline

an iterator by the name of seven red suns sends the potential solution to five pebbles. but the solution requires intake of a shit ton of water to be done successfully which causes problems bc of his neighbor, looks to the moon uses the same water supply as him [iterators need water to function] so uh. pebbles is taking all the water and moon is like "oh my god you are fucking killing me please stop" and pebbles is like "STFU UR NOT MY MOM" or smth and bc he had to lock in like crazy to do his project correctly he fucks it up bc moons message distracted him so now he has robot turbo cancer [called the rot]

seven red suns sends out a messenger, spearmaster, to deliver a pearl [pearls are data storage. like google docs] telling pebbles to stop immediately. hes like "NO STFU GTFO" and spearmaster goes to moon and shes like "yo can i rewrite this? k thanks" and she rewrites it and gives it connection to the communication arrays [iterator discord] to announce shes fucking dying. spearmaster takes it there, the message has some soppy bs in it about how moon is thankful for everything everyone has done n whatever but thats it then she dies

so another iterator, no significant harrasment [weird names ik] makes like a fuckin slag key thing to get her atleast slightly functional again and sends out the hunter to give moon the slag keys and they r successful and moon is like "thank you bro but uh you have cancer get well soon 🙏" and idk man hunter dies and i get sad

im keeping out irrelevant/slugcat only bs btw play the game urself for that [or ill make another infodump just on the slugcat campaigns]

so giant fucking timeskip to the far future!

pebbles is fucking dying to the rot and some slugcat, rivulet shows up and pebbles starts venting to it like "i feel so bad for what i did to moon shes like my sister and everything wah wah wah take my last power cell and give it to her i dont deserve to live anymore" and riv is like "alr sure i guess" and takes his fucking heart out and riv makes its way to moon like "hey man i got ts for u" and shes like "omg i think u just killed somebody anyway go put that in my superstructure for me will ya sweetie" and riv is like "ok anyghing for god 💚" and blah blah it puts the cell thingy in moons systems and shes able to work better now and shes like "i can finally read all my missed messages yay" and she sends out a message to the communication array and is like "hey guys im back online i missed so much also i forgive you pebbles" and pebbles is like "ty bro🙏🙏 while im still alive lets be best friends forever"

anyways more timeskip to the far future!

its fucking cold and snow is everywhere. some slugcat, saint, has some weird ass attunement to the world and can like ascend stuff so he ascends everybody and whatever 💚 he cant die tho so. uhh everybodys dead the end i dont know man play the game the dialog is a fuckibg masterpiece

[olderthannetfic]

I want to try writing, my kink would be noncon/dubcon so that's what my stories are going to be about but I haven't really written anything before and I just realized in addition to very common reasons for not writing like procrastination and what not, I'm having weird anxiety bullshit about writing on my computer and.... it being tied to my name I guess?(my emotions are confusing and me trying to figuring out what I am afraid of that is making me anxious is exhausting) anyway I think I'm scared or uncomfortable with the idea of someone being able to find what I write on my computer, or a company like google or apple going through my stuff and seeing what I wrote. The idea of writing things like noncon(or just porn honestly) and someone or something could see it and get mad at me or judge me makes my skin crawl. This is definitely irrational especially because I've thought about what I would do if I got a mean comment or something and I'm pretty confident that I would tell the commenter to go fuck themselves. I think the difference would be if I posted something to ao3 even if people hate it, I'm posting it to public and I know that's a chance. The idea of someone seeing something I'm not finished with or is private really freaks me out. It doesn't even have to be porn or even typed! just the idea of trying to be vulnerable and honest in my writing and someone seeing it without my permission gives me goosebumps(and if I am trying to write something to make me horny that is very vulnerable for me. I went through a time where I wouldn't let myself think about stuff that makes me horny because I thought it dirty and wrong and made me gross and a bad person) not going to open that can of worms right now but I was just wondering if you had any advice. It doesn't help that most things I write with are on the "cloud" I use google docs a lot but that makes me very anxious because it would just exist at google forever. I have word on my computer but its through my school and I never paid for and it is attached to my school email so I don't want to do that either. I could hand write everything but honestly that sounds annoying. Wait could I type it in ao3 would that work? The actual answers of this is now that i realized it bring it up with my therapist but I was wondering if you had any thought on where I can write my stories(preferably with a computer) and be confident that's no one is spying on me? Thanks and sorry for the long anon!

--

Well... as you point out, most of this is just emotional stuff for your therapist.

But in terms of security, yeah, I do think the cloud is freaky and we live in the fucking panopticon now. It's not weird to feel surveilled all the time.

For me personally, the convenience and backups are worth it. I use Scrivener + Dropbox for my writing.

But if you want something more secure than google drive, maybe somebody here will have suggestions.

[hyukassubi]

🎟️ Meet me at the shore ⋆｡ﾟ☁︎｡ ⋆

Pairing: Huening Kai x Fem!Reader

Content/Tags: best friends to.... Still best friends 🫶🫶, fluff, reader is a writer, Huening Kai is a ball of sunshine, beaches, bookstores, best friends reunite

Summary: You're burntout as hell a month going into your author career. You can't pinpoint exactly why, but for all you know, you don't want to continue like this forever. That's until your childhood best friend knocks on your door, suggesting to spend the day off together with you. Really, how can you say no to Huening Kai?

Genre: fluff. Some bittersweet moments, but mostly fluff 🫶🫶

Warnings (?): Mild cursing here and there, bullying, reader feels lonely at times, burnout, otherwise nothing too explicit

Wc: 10k+ <33

Dedicated to: All the burnt out fanfic writers out there who need a little bit of cheering up!!

Taglist! @kaisdefender

| Masterlist | Moodboard | Playlist |

i.

When was the last time you felt happy?

You immediately knew the answer to that.

A month ago, your dreams came true. Your world came to life. What started as a small project turned into something much, much larger. And now, your novel is out there for readers to feast their eyes upon. 

Seeing this word document become a book, and then holding it in your hands, it was like holding a newborn baby for the first time. Sparks rushed through your body like fireworks, screaming ‘we did it, we made it.’

And then a month passes by, and all the sparks were just… gone.

The rush that coursed through your body from publication and stuff just... it wasn't there anymore.

You spent the month taking a break from writing. After all, Hyuka did recommend you to take things easy. And you did. You didn’t write for a whole month, even when the urge to spam words on google docs came itching inside your brain. 

So. Why instead of feeling rested, you were restless? Thumping the heel of your foot over and over again, biting your lip while staring at a random corner in your living room.

Now comes the big question of 'what's next?'

You stared into the distance. It was twelve in the afternoon and you're on your couch doing absolutely nothing.

You shook your thoughts off, forcing yourself to scan the room. This room- this apartment- you've always wanted to own in the future.

The couch that felt more like resting on a giant maltese cat, the shelves of books you've collected over the past decade, the balcony outside where your favorite small coffee table resided. There, you can look down at all the google corporate workers having a miserable day as you write your next best seller.

You love this place so dearly. You knew that well in your head. But you didn't feel it, for some reason. Not now, not anymore. Even if you're forcing yourself to right now.

Rest, Y/n

You repeat Hyuka's words in your head.

Take it easy, okay?

You had emails to reply to today. 

You had to keep going. Just because you aren't writing doesn't mean you're jobless.

You exited your living room. 

The more cooped up you were there, the more tense you'd feel.

That's when you noticed, at the corner of your eye, a caller by the name of Hyuka was, well, calling you.

You picked up, "Hyukaaa, how've you been?"

Huening Kai is your best friend, the only guy who can make you smile, the only person you share your projects to. The both of you have been at it since high school, and you have always kept in touch since then.

He whined, "Y/n, I've called you so many times. Why didn't you pick up?"

You checked your phone.

11 miss calls from Hyuka

You paused, your shock evident in the short moments of silence. "Did something happen? Were you injured during practice-?"

"Nah, I was just bored."

This guy.

"Oh. Sorry I... slept in." You lied.

And Hyuka knew it. "It's not like you to sleep in. Miss calls? Yes, you don't want distractions when writing. Sleeping in? No. Hot girls don't ‘sleep in’."

"You really had to call me out like that huh? But yeah uh I guess today wasn't so..." You couldn't finish your sentence. You didn't know how to. In all honesty, it wasn't just today you felt this way.

"Y/n?"

"Yeah?"

"Are you okay?"

"...Yeah?" 

"No you're not."

You clicked your tongue. "Bruh."

Hyuka wheezed, and you did too.

Then the both of you balled out laughing. 

It wasn't even funny, not at all. 

Hyuka's laugh was just contagious.

After calming down a little, you proceeded, "Okay, yeah maybe I'm not."

“Hmm. Is it because of debut?”

You thought for a moment.

You can't just not write, even though you know taking a break is what you need before getting into a burnout but you got into a burnout anyway and now your life feels short lived and meaningless and what was this all for again?

You sighed. "I don't know."

Hyuka hummed on the other end of the line. 

You could picture him nodding at your profound words. You wish he was actually here. Just calling him makes you happy, but you'd definitely feel a lot better if he was actually next to you talking about... literally anything.

You didn't expect him to say anything.

You didn't want to pressure Hyuka to listen to your venting sessions regardless. He just wanted to hop on in because he was bored, after all, you don't want to put all this sudden weight on him.

What you also didn't expect was for Hyuka to leave the call without a word.

No goodbyes, no nothing.

Just a beep, and then silence encapsulated the whole room.

A grueling three seconds passed by.

You... plopped onto your chair. Your heart nothing but... it's nothing. It's empty. Hollow. Everything's so fuzzy and quiet. Way too quiet.

You got back to work, trying not to make a big deal out of it.

Ten minutes later, a voice sounded from behind y- wait you live alone-

"Y/n! Pst!"

Who the hell says pst when they're yelling from your front door? You got out of your bedroom and made your way to-

"Hyuka? What are you-"

Donut sunglasses rested on Huening Kai's hair like eggs on a nest, a funky piece of accessory for his rather plain white button up and black khaki pants.

All negative thoughts from before evacuated your headspace. You held in your laughter.

Your fashionista blew you a kiss.

You caught it and blew one back. "What's with the… dunkin donuts aesthetic outfit?"

Hyuka didn't answer your question. He's smiling from eye to eye, and you kinda felt grateful to have someone this happy to see you. 

He bounced up and down his heels, fiddling with the strap of his backpack. "I know this is all unexpected, so, sorry if I’ve interrupted you by any chance-"

"No. No it's perfectly fine." You reassured him. "It's more than fine actually... its been a while since we've..."

"Met in person?”You raised your brows. “Yeah, it's been a couple months, but we call each other pretty much everyday anyway, right?"

"Yeah?"

"Yeah.” Huening Kai walked closer to you, as if letting you in on a secret. “I thought maybe it would be better if we could hang out together."

You blinked.

He blinked back.

You blinked a couple more times. "Today?"

"Yeah, right now." Then he got on his knees and hugged you, locking your legs together. He's still such a kid, you thought. "Please Y/n, it's been soooo long. I miss you so so much."

"I mean- I miss you too but... right now?"

He looked up at you, arms still latched. "Are you busy today?"

"..." 

Anything to escape emails, you thought. Anything. "Not really, no."

He got off of you and front rolled into your apartment, his sunglasses defying the laws of gravity, remaining stuck on his head. "Then let's go!" He jumped up and down, more vibrant than the power of a thousand beams of sunlight.

Perhaps it was the way he held onto you, or the way he smiled, or the way he made a grand entrance by frontrolling into your apartment from the doorway, but something just tickled your gut, and in a good way. All you knew was that your heart melted through your chest the way ice cream drips down the cone on a hot summer day, and you didn’t hate the feeling. It's been a while since you had someone… since you had someone.

You chuckled. "Where to?"

"I don't know!" Hyuka said helpfully. "And that's the fun of it!" He grabbed your wrist and ventured ahead of you further into your writing coven. "I'll help pack your things, just put on some good music and the both of us will be done in no time."

God, this man still really is a kid.

Til this day, you still question why he's still by your side. Even when you don't get to hang out a lot with him these days, somehow, the both of you just make it happen.

Through short texts or hour-long calls, not a day goes by without either of you hyping the other one up.

The moment he left the call earlier, the world pauses and your mind starts making up excuses. Bad wifi? Something came up in the studio? Were you bothering him? Your brain starts clogging up with all these possibilities that may not even be true. 

But, now he's here. Maybe this was his master plan after all? "You left me hanging on that call.... because you were secretly planning to do this?"

Hyuka stopped on his tracks. He had a lot going through his mind, even though he didn’t show it. What if you didn’t like this? What if he was bothering you? What if he’s just, simply, annoying?

At the end of the day, voices were just voices. He knew you wouldn’t get annoyed, he knew you never found him a bother.

He looks back at you like you, smiling dearly because you mean so much to him.

And he means so much to you, too. You both knew that. 

You smirked, now crawling to his side. "You know just how to make me feel better, huh?"

A low, short chuckle.

He held onto you tighter, and you held back.

ii.

You were a kid once, in highschool, all alone with nobody to talk to. Not a loser, but nowhere to belong. It wasn’t until the ninth grade, you found someone you care about.

While everybody sprinted out the door to go eat at the cafeteria or play outside or harass each other, you could be spotted sitting on your assigned desk, doing your own thing. The classroom seemed more tolerable that way. It didn’t matter if you missed out on drama, scandals, opportunities to develop deep connections with people. That all happens outside the classroom, and you want to keep things that way, even when you start feeling left out, it doesn't matter.

You're better off creating stories in the classroom by yourself rather than talking to anyone in this damned building. 

You can feel a keen pair of eyes still looking at you.

You prayed that whatever God up there would make this guy stop looking at you, it ruins your focus-

Oh. It was just Huening Kai, your seatmate. 

He was. Okay. He didn't give bad enough vibes to pick on you, at the very least. Or ask for self-inserts in your stories.

"You know, y/n, I am still so very confused why you’re constantly taking notes in class. I've never seen anyone this dedicated to using all their recess periods for studying."

Oh. So that's why his self-insert requests haven't been coming in.

Huening Kai is the type of kid to talk with everyone, and no, not just classmates. Literally everyone. You don't know how he does that without draining his energy. 

The both of you don't necessarily talk a lot, however, but considering he's your seatmate and all that, the weight of first impressions kind of just disappears on its own.

"I'm not studying, actually."

He said in a monotonous voice, "Oh. My God."

You hold your laughter at his shock yet deadpanned reaction. "Truth to be told, I am not in fact a hardcore nerd."

"Then what are you doing sitting around with, like, twelve thousand notebooks."

"It's just three extra notebooks."

"Close enough." Something about the way his eyes… sparkle… with intention, like he’s actually looking at you, with interest. It’s kinda like a child begging their dads to play outside and have some fun.

You pressed your lips into a needle-straight line.

You, a reserved writing machine, having fun with ... (you eyed Huening Kai) a corgi.

"... We could chill and talk about my mystery notebooks?" You shrugged your shoulders, suggesting the choice was up to him. He'd probably say no, you thought, I mean, usually people would not be interested in books and ask questions just to look polite and all-

"Okay." He smiled, sliding into his seat. "So, what are they for?"

You tidied your desk a little, making yourself look more 'presentable'. "These are for writing purposes."

"Writing stories?"

"Exactly, I write everything in my notebooks."

He grabbed your notebooks, looking at them in awe as if they were newly refined portraits from the Renaissance era. As long as he doesn’t open them, it’s all good. "Is it like a full length novel or short stories?"

"Both." You grabbed this one notebook in particular that was so thick it looked like a dictionary got a BBL. "This notebook in particular is for the novel."

"Really? This whole thing?"

You nodded.

Huening Kai couldn't stop making goofy gasping faces at your hell of a thick notebook. "What's it about?" He asked.

You take a deep breath, preparing yourself for the inevitable rambling that’s about to occur. "It's this historical piece where this ballerina, our main character, who comes from a low income family, dances to earn money. She catches the eye of the prince. This prince wants to learn to dance with her, to which the king and queen strictly disagree with considering that form of dancing is too 'feminine'." You pause right then and there before you unleash your inner sociology professor and ramble on and on and on and on about your fantasy worlds. "That's it. The plot is pretty simple, I know-"

"Ooooo I love dancing." He said the word ‘love’ with at least thirteen syllables.

You knew that, though. Everyone knows Huening Kai’s quite the dancer.

"Oh yeah? You think you'll really enjoy reading my book then?"

"Yeah, yeah! Ask me for any dancing advice if you need it for your book... wait never mind, I don't know anything about ballet..."

"That's alright-"

He turned a page. "May I read it right now?"

It was then you snatched your book from his hands, clutching it defensively. You wouldn't even let yourself re-read the first draft of your own novel. "What? No, it's not finished yet."

"But you'll take long to write it." He said not unkindly, putting his hands together as if praying to God. "I'll be patient, I promise."

Some part of you thought you'd regret the rest of your life giving anyone else your 'mystery notebooks'.

You took a look at Huening Kai, his puppy dog eyes staring back at you.

Does this man really look like he'll rip your baby into shreds? Or publicly read out your novel word by word to a sea of musically stars and pencil chewers?

His puppy dog eyes blink back at you. It really was like he had sparkles in his eyes, through that way-too-neat bowl cut his irises shone with… something unfamiliar. Something non-existing in your brain textbook.

"Hmm...”you pretended to think, ”you sure you like the premise of the book?"

He nodded furiously.

"You sure you'll be patient enough to see it til the end?"

Another aggressive nod.

"Okay, then it's settled, looks like I'm not-"

"Huening Kaiiii!" Some random guy- Hueing Kai's friend probably- sounded in the distance. A head popped out the door frame, "Huening Kai come here!"

Huening Kai and you exchanged a glance.

"Oh, uh, sorry y/n, I have to go now." He stood from his seat, and never would you've ever thought you'd wish to have someone stay by your side just a little longer.

"I'll talk to you soon, okay?" He stared at you a little while before rejoicing with his pals.

You waved him off, knowing in your head you won't be talking with him, or anyone, for the next couple of days.

And you were right.

You tried to not let this get under your skin.

---

Something about watching the way you shut the world out while writing makes you appear... quite mysterious. That's one way to put it.

But also unique. While everyone goes to make friends, you are ignoring studious lessons to keep up that writer grind. Even during boring classes, instead of sleeping over muffled lectures, you're wide awake writing stories. It's a cool tactic. Whenever Huening Kai looks at your direction, he now knows damn well you aren't jotting down the teacher's explanations, and it's hilarious to him, how slick you are.

It was an ordinary day like any other. The class was writing up biology notes.

Huening Kai was sitting next to you, you were sitting next to him. 

He pauses writing notes for a moment, taking glances at the girl next to him.

You're so cool, he thinks.

I want to talk to her some more. 

He looks over his shoulder during class again. 

Your hair drapes the entirety of your face as you wrote on your 'mystery notebook', pen gliding across the paper like pipe line icing on cupcakes.

This time, he pouts instead of holding back soft chuckles. But she's always writing.

It's so easy to spark up a conversation with other kids.

It's easy to not feel like a bother, to talk to people looking forward to talk to you. But, since you're always on your notebooks, he didn't want to disturb your laser focus, even when he feels like talking to you more than the others.

He sighed.

Huening Kai went back to his notes. 

If you aren't willing to talk with anyone, there's no reason for you to be talking to him.

His pen glided across the page with you in sync. 

So what? 

He wouldn't let your book destroy you and your potential friendship with him.

Recess is your golden hour for writing. So, imagine Huening Kai’s shock when he waltzes into the classroom to find you missing. 

It didn’t sit right with him, seeing you not sitting in your usual spot. It’s like a cat hasn’t returned home to their owner late at night. It makes their owner anxious, worry shooting the pit of their gut.

He walked out of the classroom to the schoolyard. He scanned the crowd. The sky was infiltrated by thin clouds, there were girls and boys, but no you.

At least, you weren't a part of the crowd.

You were sitting under a tree, contempt, writing that novel of yours.

The sight of you under that tree at uttermost peace, it made Huening Kai smile.

Hope you didn't mind a little company.

He approached you.

Your pen stops. 

You lock eyes with him.

Huening Kai brought a hand out. 

"We meet again."

And then you burst out laughing.

He stood there, head empty. Was his shirt back forward? Was his lips still stained from eating chocolate sandwiches? Was his hair a mess?

"We meet again? Usually it's like a hey or hello."

Huening Kai replayed it in his head again. 

Oh. 

Yeah that was unintentionally funny. A cool wave washed over his chest by then. Relief, sprinkles of pride. Joy. It was nice seeing you laugh, he guessed.

"Next time, I'll cartwheel my way under this tree." He teased, and you can't tell if he was being serious or not. "How about it?"

You looked up at nothing in particular for a moment. "Eh, not like you'll see me here again anyway."

"Why?" Huening Kai stood next to you now, connecting his spine with the tree trunk and then sliding down right by your side in a seating position completely different from you- his thighs on his chest while your legs sprawled out and free.

"I came here to write because of the ambiance," you faced forward to where the rest of the school resided, "but then, turns out, this is the ambiance." you pointed towards the crowd ahead.

You shut your book, a soft thud escaping its pages. 

Huening Kai's attention was right back at you, and he knew just the words to motivate you. "Hey, why don't you take the day off writing and talk to me?"

Huening Kai expected a chuckle, a death glare, or reluctance, a bit of something that goes like 'in what world do you think I'll ever let you– or anything else for that matter– put a halt on my creative prowess?'

You shrugged your shoulders and nodded along, "Sure, why not?"

That cool wave washed over his chest again, and it felt better the second time. He wasn't even trying to repress his lips from curling into a smile. You're just so... unbothered.

It's your loneliness that made him a bit more interested in you, how someone could possibly be the way you are. The way you bring yourself with calm confidence, your warm energy that makes him feel cozy and relaxed.

Or your dedication to your books. Your passion, your quietness, your warmth.

Or maybe Huening Kai didn't really need a reason. 

Your existence is a good enough reason.He just wanted to talk to you.

He hugged his shins, fiddling with his fingers. "You know, I haven't told you this but I think what you're doing is exceptional."

You rested your head on the tree trunk, looking at him in the corner of your eye. 

"You've already said that, actually."

He didn’t. He hadn’t And even if he did, what’s the problem with saying it again? "No, I said your book is great, and it really is, but like. You too, ya know?"

You sat quiet for a moment.

Those words, you received them a lot, from yourself.

Hearing them come from somebody else’s mouth…

Clarity rippled through your head, like those gentle waves that leave white seafoam behind, dissolving into the spaces between the speckles of sand on shore.

You chuckled.

You swung your hair behind your back with the flick of your wrist. "Of course I am."

Huening Kai wheezed, flicking his short hair in the breeze too. "Of course you are."

The both of you did model poses back to back.

You both were idiots. Idiots that go a little too well together, idiots that were meant to cross paths with each other.

"I think you're cool too." You started. "You're... funny. Vibrant. And," a solemn look casts over your face. There were so many good things to say about Huening Kai, and somehow, you were able to condense it into a few words. You blanked out, looking into a void, waiting for the right words to simmer to the surface."... you just might actually care."

If lightning could be struck on someone, and instead of agonizing pain, they felt an immediate consolation course through their body, then Huening Kai has just been abused by a thunderstorm. 

The relief in his chest, surging through like hands running down silk gloves. 

But also, sadness.

Even though Huening Kai has only actually known you recently, he wants to tell you that so many people care about you. He doesn't know precisely who, but... there has to be someone. 

Anyone.

Instead of saying any of that, Huening Kai chuckled. "Of course I do, I expect you to care about me too." His throat was getting tighter, and tighter.

Why hasn't anyone bothered giving you a second chance? Why do they just assume you liked being alone? Why haven’t they reached out to you sooner? 

No. Why didn't he reach out to you any sooner?

"Huening Kai?" Your voice was low and soft, nearly a whisper. "Mhm?" Huening Kai put on his best smiles.

"What if I told you I actually wanted to become a ballerina?"

Another bolt of lightning, and this time, it was a little more exuberant than the previous ones. "...Wait, that's just like..."

"The main character?"

"Yeah! Her! I can totally see you doing the curtsy." Was that even a ballet move? Huening Kai didn't know. He just knows you'd be a stunning ballerina. It fits. 

He can imagine you twirling your way across the room with elegance, then, performing on stage while the crowd roars, and then he'd... he was getting ahead of himself.

You chuckled, and there was... something off about the way you chuckled.

The way your eyes stuck on the ground. "Yeah, but then I quit."

Just when Huening Kai thought he found someone more like him, you shattered his credence. "Aw, no... why did you quit?"

"It's complicated."

"Tell me everything. I can't fathom how someone as determined as you just..." gave up like that, Huening Kai didn't say.

An indefinite look casted your face, looking into the void of the past. "It wasn't my choice. My parents got broke, like, really really broke when I was in sixth grade. It was to the point they had to put me into the foster care system, and I kinda just moved from house to house from there."

Huening Kai shifted closer to you. You know that feeling when you’re a little kid, you’d never think any of your family members would pass away? That’s the type of disbelief Huening Kai felt towards you, not that he couldn’t believe tragedies like these could happen, he just didn’t think it could happen to someone he loves, to you. 

"Were those other families nice to you?"

You chuckled, not unkindly, gaze shifting apart from Huening Kai’s. A reel of memories in a photographic fashion flashed before your eyes. 

You remembered the many adults that looked after you, how bitter it slowly grew the more you moved houses. 

The expressions on people’s faces when you’d make a family tree of sorts, for a project, and they see the saddest looking tree to ever exist– faces of strangers where mom and dad and daughter all don’t look the same. 

You told yourself it wasn’t a big deal. You kept telling yourself just that. "Yeah, but they only last a couple months. All of them do. As soon as I meet some random nice lady I call my 'mother', she's gone and another stranger awaits me at their front porch. It's exhausting, meeting so many new people like that. And it's so ironic, it's just." You looked at the crowd ahead of you for a moment. "If I can't even stick to a proper family, then how am I sure I'll remain friends with anybody?"

Huening Kai can't even imagine what it must be like- to not be able to do the things you love. "I'm so sorry... I mean, I talk with lots of people too but it’s different, that just sounds tiring." 

"It's alright, I guess I just... write so that... Like, I believe somewhere out there, my work is a reality, you get me? That, somewhere in this universe, I do exist as a ballerina with a loving family and a friend and... I'm sorry, that sounded so stupid out loud."

"No, it's not stupid." He had a lightbulb moment. He understood now, why you were the way you are. "You know what?"

"Huh?"

"I'm forcing you to join the dance club."

You blinked at the boy sitting next to you, because that's all you knew how to do at that very moment. 

"Huening Kai that's very nice of you but-"

"I'll suggest some ballet, to the club, I mean, from time to time," His words were a mess, just like his thoughts, but, point is, Huening Kai will make your dream a reality.

He will take it upon himself to make this the universe where you get to be a ballerina, so you won't have to exclusively exist as words on paper anymore. "I'm not sure how," he admits, "but I'll make it work." He stood now, taking his hand out. "I promise."

You stare up at his tall, determined figure. 

For once, you were genuinely speechless. You continue staring at his hand for an uncomfortable amount of time. "Well, that's quite ambitious of you."

"You still love ballet deep in your heart, especially if you're still writing about it. I want to help you, even if it isn't much..." Huening Kai racked his brain for anything that'll possibly convince you to join the dance club, "I mean... it's free...?"

You smirked, "Ahh yes that's the best part." And you shook his hand.

Huening Kai chuckled. Don't worry, if you had forgotten all the moves, we'll learn to dance together, he wants to say.

Don't think about the others, they'll probably watch and stare but their opinions don't matter, he wants to add.

We could dance together, the look on Huening Kai's face was more than enough to portray those words.

An all-too-familiar clanging noise ripped through the air. The school bell went off. Recess was over.

You sighed, getting up from the hard ground with Huening Kai's hand still in yours. "Come on, we gotta head back to class." You grabbed your notebook and let go of his hand, still walking close to him.

"Just tell me if you're interested," Huening Kai hoped you were, "and we'd be happy to have you there."

You gave him a small nod, "I will."

Huening Kai gave a small nod back, "Just call me Kai... or... Hyuka."

"Hyuka? That nickname is so adorable, wait-" You grabbed a notepad and pencil out of your cardigan pocket, "Do I have your consent to use your nickname as a potential character name for my future writing projects?"

So 'Kai' isn't a cute nickname, huh? Huening Kai chuckled. "Ooo, having a clone of myself sounds so chaotic, I love it.” Huening Kai had too many thoughts in his head, but he didn't mind the clutter. He promises that in this lifetime, as selfish as he sounds, you’ll both be dancing partners. In this way, he'll get to revive your love for ballet, and he won't have to dance alone anymore.

Huening Kai plopped down on the floor of the practice room, wiping his sweaty face off with a towel. A few girls gathered around him. They were dancers too.

He didn't really feel like talking to them, or anyone for that matter. He was beyond tired.

"Huening Kai!!" some random girl skipped towards him. 

Have we talked before? Have we met before? Wait, who are you? He didn’t really care, he didn’t want to know.

"You looked sooo good dancing just now!!" she screeched.

"Yeah right?!" Another girl butted in. "He's literally so hot."

"I wish I was as good as him." Another stranger sat beside him.

"And just as cute." The first girl added.

They all chuckled amongst themselves while Huening Kai sat right there fighting to breathe. They probably just joined the club to get to talk to him. Probably. Unfortunately.

Another girl walked in.

Blood pulsed in his ears. Huening Kai fought the urge to just walk right out the door-

Until he realized he knew this girl.

"Excuse me?” You looked at the tired boy. ”Uh, Hyuka? Are you okay?"

Huening Kai's face lit up, quite literally like electricity in a theater room just switched on back after a blackout. "Y/n?"

You eyed him, saying not unkindly: "Hot damn bro, look at you-"

"I know right???? Look at him!" One of the dance club girls interrupted.

You looked at that pick me with your typical resting bitch face. "Yeah, he's a sweating mess and you guys aren't helping.." You gave her a full body eye roll, then flapped your hand. "Move."

The girls did as they were told to. They gave you looks, but you didn't care. Huening Kai was the only one giggling.

You squatted in front of him, wiping his face clean like a puppy just hopped out of the bath. 

Some girl whispered not too quietly, "I wish I could touch him like that." 

You and Huening Kai positively heard her, and that just made the both of you red in the face from trying so hard to hold in your laughter.

"There," You still tried hard not to burst out wheezing, "all clean. Go drink some water."

"I did though."

You grabbed his bottle. "More."

Huening Kai's eyes were somewhere else, but he was definitely still talking to you. "Why are you here anyway?"

You set the bottle down.

"Thought I'd give modern hip hop a shot," You said.

He wanted to hug you right then and there. 

He gave you the brightest smile he could muster, and you copied him.

It’s like magic. The moment you entered the room and took care of him, his energy is back to its maximum capacity. 

And just like that, he was on his feet again. "Come on, let's dance together."

iii.

The bus ride to the beach was anything but quiet.

The bus was a cute thing. It was petite, teal, not so crowded. And the windows were wide open, allowing you to view the wonderful rows of shops outside. There were florists, fruit stations, kitten shelters, aligned shoulder to shoulder with each other, settling down for off-hours. The 4 pm Sun dipping down the skyline, blasting subtle hints of yellows in the sky.

The bus came to a halt.

But… (you looked up) this isn’t the beach…

Huening Kai got off the bus before you. “Thought we’d stop by here first before going to the beach.”

You nodded along, your focus however was entirely on the bookstore, looking at it like a painting in an art museum. But the words that left your lips didn't portray your enchantment of this building bestowed upon you. "Hyuka, are we really gonna go here..."

If anything, you sounded bored.

Hyuka faced you, not disappointed, not surprised. "Don't you love bookstores?" He knew you love bookstores, how wouldn't he know that?

"You said we're heading to the beach."

"Oh- yeah that can wait." He grabbed your hand. "Come on, have you been here before?"

You followed along. "Not here, no."

"Me neither." He smiled his cute smile. "Explore we shall!"

We shall indeed, was what Hyuka expected you to say. You shook your head instead, stopping at the entrance. "Hyuka, no, I won't go in there."

Huening Kai eyed you suspiciously again. "Ouch. Okay. But like. Why?"

You took a step back. "We should just head to the beach, somewhere both of us could have fun."

It finally clicked in his head, why you don't want to enter such a place. "Hey, you think just because we're in a bookstore I won't have any fun?"

He was right. "Well... yeah, I guess."

Huening Kai walked up to you at his own pace. There's something about the way he's looking at you that's just... it was off. But a good kind of 'off'. Like it was a hidden intention to it.

He says, "Artists support artists, remember?"

Your breath hitched.

A long lost memory resurfaced in your head.

---

At the end of every school day, you’d walk out the class putting on a tune on your phone. The bus ride home was noisy as is, you got to block those around you out. 

You’d put on any song. Hip-hop, indie, vapor trap, anything you felt like listening to at the moment. Any tune that would spark creativity for a new writing piece, something to distract you for the time being.

Today, however, as you stood under the bus stop, you turned the volume down.

It was raining, a light drizzle. It was the softest of pitter-patters, a delicate thing. Like each drop was a unique tune of its own, and you were enchanted by its melody.

Sometimes, perhaps the life around you is more beautiful than you make it up to be.

Something bothered the harmony, splashes that seemingly grew louder...

You took your headphones off, looking to the side.

Huening Kai’s head down, sluggishly making his way through the empty street drenched in rain..

He didn't even bring an umbrella! You clicked your tongue, not necessarily disappointed, but very much concerned. "Hyuka, come here. It's me. And only me."

Huening Kai looked up. The moment he recognized you, he walked just a teensy bit faster. You chuckle at him. He looks just like a corgi walking his way to you.

"Huening Kai, you're a wet mess. Do you have a towel on you?"

Huening Kai didn't respond, not a single word. 

He just sniffled.

"Hey... Hyuka?" 

The sight of Huening Kai in front of you, puffy eyed and hiding, trembling in fear.

Your gut twisted. "Who is it? Did one of those girls bother you? Which bitch do I need to come after tonight?"

Huening Kai shot up a glance at you so violent he almost toppled over. "WHAT?!- No-" and then in a much softer voice, "No, it's... not about them."

"Just because it isn't specifically them doesn't mean I'll leave my kill list empty." Behind all this determination, your heart stung so bitterly, so dense, all because of the sight right in front of you: The happiest boy you know pouting in front of you, shoulders sagged, a sobbing mess. Eyes red and puffed in horror because of something vile he must've experienced. 

And you weren't there to protect him.

You felt so bad, so guilty that you weren’t there for him.

But you’re here now. And you’ll hear him out til the end.

"It's the boys. My friends." He continued, voice so low as if those same 'friends' of his were right there next to him.

Your one and only Hyuka, you failed to protect him. 

What were you doing instead? Listening to your spotify playlist on loop?

You cursed at yourself. "What did those guys do to you?"

"Made fun of me." Hyuka laughed. He laughed and it hurts so so much to see him laugh right now because you know damn well he's only doing that because he's hiding his pain thinking it’ll bother you. As if he is bothering you. "I tried to push it off but..." Another chuckle, only this time his voice croaked and more tears spill out.

You held his hands, so he won't have to fiddle and pick on his fingers anymore. So they would feel even just a little bit more at ease in yours. "Aw Hyuka- it's okay. I mean this is not okay but..." You too were a mess, looking for the right words.

Y/n! You're a writer, think! You paused for a moment.

Speak from your heart.

"Hey, Hyuka? Look at me."

He looked at you, and the sight of his face bore into your head, and not at all in a good way.

"Let's sit down, yeah?"

Huening Kai sniffled some more. "But I'll get the seat all wet."

"That's fine, that’s not a problem at all, I'll cross my fingers and hope the seat won't get cleaned, so the next person to sit on it are those same boys who made fun of you."

Huening Kai sat down, but he wasn't laughing.

The pain he felt, the guilt you felt, it's all completely unimaginable. And it's not like you even know the whole story yet.

It's so easy to let the words out on paper, but in real life? Your body kinda acted on its own, you don’t know what you’re doing, what you want to say. The words just came out, and, you just, did it.  "Here... come on-"

Huening Kai flinched, eyes wide and pure. 

He’s scared, and you didn’t expect that to hurt you so much. "No, I don't want to hug you, you'll get wet and sick, too."

You scoffed. "So?"

He blinked, and for a couple seconds he didn't know what to do, whether to keep pressing on the fact he's fully soaked or take a step back.

It was then he chose not to go with either of those options.

He squeezed you to death.

The rainwater seeped into the fabric of your uniform, you couldn’t care less. You clutched onto Hyuka tight, worried that the slightest breeze will push him away and you'll never get to see him again. He continued sobbing into your shoulder.

"Okay." You patted his back. "Okay, tell me everything."

"The boys- I was- We were just talking and then I brought up that I'm taking dancing seriously and want to be an idol when I grow up and... they made fun of me for it. Maybe they were just joking around but... I didn't think of it that way. I feel stupid for-"

"No, this isn't stupid, they are. They have no right to make fun of you." The irony of it all.

Huening Kai, known for his smashingly good looks and cute demeanor, known for being a bubbly ray of sunshine, praised for his talents and social skills and dancing- oh especially dancing- was being made fun of because he wants to become an idol? "I think there's nothing wrong with you for wanting to be an idol." You let go of the hug, but still sat close to him. "Nothing at all."

Huening Kai looked around. He looked anywhere else but you. He just couldn’t, he just couldn’t. "It feels... I don't know. I just... sometimes I don't believe I could make it, too. Regardless of my friends making fun of me."

You took a deep breath, slinging an arm over his shoulders. "I know." You chuckled, the look in your eyes now reminiscing the distant past, that is, your middle school years.

Only this time, Huening Kai turned his head. "Hm?" Even while crying, he’s still an angel.

"I know what that's like." You rephrased. "People also don't believe I'd make it as a writer, but it's people like that who probably only have money-related goals anyway, right?"

He nodded, letting your words sink in.

"At the end, we all die in the same coffin, and, I believe when that time comes, money doesn't measure someone's life well lived, but instead, their happiness. If being an Idol makes you happy, please, by all means go for it. And then, the good people in your life will stick around and be there for you." You stuck your thumb out, pointing it in your direction. “Like me. Let me be your biggest fan, other than yourself.” There was no lie in your words, only compassion.

For a while, nothing happened.

The raindrops continued drumming the street, the salty taste still looms close. 

Your arm is still rooted along Hyuka’s soggy shoulders. You can hear him breathing deep breaths, long and draggy, very much needed breaths. 

He brought his head up, looking at you. Still trembling whether it's from the boys, the rain, hell, maybe even you but he’s trying. 

Once your gazes meet, something far deeper than words can portray settled in hos eyes– admiration."You're very smart."

You smiled all smug. "Of course I am, a genius like me only shares their knowledge to those I find worthy of trust." You leaned closer to him by then, digging a finger into his chest.

"You're also a bit over dramatic sometimes."

You clicked your tongue.

This dude. 

"Hey-"

"I'm kidding!" Huening Kai wiped his tears away. "But it's true though."

The two of you chuckled, and for a moment, you both were just two goofs again, just tiny little specks of dust pre-existing in this vast universe. 

That.

That feeling right there was, somehow, comforting.

Huening Kai's hand flipped over, reaching for something- your hand. "Okay," he grasped it firmly, "I'll go for it. I won't let my friends tell me what to do with my life."

It didn't matter if anyone was watching you guys. They, too, are also just little specks of dust in this big, big world. "Hell yeah, that's great. That's fantastic, actually." You gaze at Hyuka, making sure he knows that if no one's proud of him, not even himself, you got his back. "I will cheer you on until the end, I promise."

"Good to know." Hyuka couldn't thank you enough. There's just too many words to say.

Huenin Kai wonders why you haven't laughed at him yet, or degrade him or something. Anything. And looking at you now, he knows the answer as to why.

You truly, truly believe in him. 

Huening Kai never knew a person like that could exist, someone who is completely different from you, yet, they get you all the same.

"I'll cheer you on for sure." He meant those words the most, more than any 'thank you' ever could.

It was then you brought out your fist. "Artists support artists."

Huening Kai fist bumped you, thinking to himself that sad, rainy day,

She's so cool, I’ll love her to death.

---

Huening Kai brought up his fist.

You smirked at him. "Artists support artists." Your fist clashed into his. 

You thought, I'll definitely add this to one of my books.

The bookstore was entirely made of wood: The shelves, the floor, the staircase. It even left this woody scent while also maintaining this fresh, indie vibe.

"What book did you get y/n?" Hyuka strolled next to you, side by side walking in between random isles with no sense of direction, kinda like a prince and princess strolling down a courtyard.

You shrugged your shoulders. "I don't know, I think I might want to try out some romance though."

You had peculiar taste. Everything about the novel you bought didn't have to be perfect, no, however, if it didn't speak out to you, if it didn't remind you of you, there's a high chance you'll not buy it.

So imagine your surprise when Hyuka pulled out a random book from a random shelf at a random aisle suggesting you should give it a read. "What about this one?" He scanned the summary, "Err, some high school girl and high school guy fall in love."

You snatched the book from him, the cover so glorious and extra and fancy, it was so made for you. "Hyuka, I love you so much." It had to be on your bookshelf, right now.

"Hehe, I know.” He flipped his hair like the genius he is. “What should I get?"

You look at him with that look. That look that says ‘but I thought you don’t like reading?’ "You're also getting something?"

Huening Kai nodded. "I want to get into reading too, a little, just for you."

You eyed him, and you can tell, he knows just what you're gonna say. 

"Read my book then."

"But, y/n." He whined, to which you gave him your evil writer smirk. You know, the face you make after writing an unexpected character death scene which leads to your readers coping by posting to their shattered-hearts desire on multiple social media platforms, bonus points if it's the love interest you're killing off!! "I don't need to read it,” He complained,”I know everything already!"

He isn't wrong.

You didn't write your novel all on your own.

You contacted Hyuka all the time for a reason. When brilliant ideas shoot you like an RK62 rifle, Hyuka is the first person you ramble about it to, and poor poor boy has to sit there listening to all your rambling.

Or on the flip side, when you're having those slower writing days, you hit him up too, and he comforts you through those uninspired time periods.

So it doesn't necessarily surprise you when Hyuka told you he hadn't bought your book. He did know everything about it, things that didn't make it to the final cut, the things that did, the ugly first couple of drafts.

There was no point in reading it, you thought. "You're not wrong."

Hyuka looked elsewhere, head in the clouds. "Hm. I'll read it anyway."

"Seriously? I was just joking, you know." No, you weren't. "You could read literally anything else. What about some romance? Or high fantasy?"

"Nope, I'm sure now, I'll read your book." Hyuka pressed on. "It's yours after all, you wrote it, and if I liked listening to you talk about it, then I think I'll enjoy reading it, too. Now..." He clutched your hand, jogging down the aisle without warning. "Let's go find that book."

iv.

At the beach, you thought you'd read your books together while the waves crash and the sun sets and the sky is a gorgeous shade of pink and the salty air wafts in your nose as you take deep, meditative breaths.

But no.

On this empty beach, Hyuka whipped out a cylindrical block from his backpack- a speaker.

If this were a scene in a movie, this would be the part where the happy music stops and the characters are wide eyed and crickets sound effects commence. "What are you doing?"

Hyuka smiled at you the way a seven year old child would at their father after scribbling his monster truck with crayola markers, cuteness overpowering guilt. 

"Y/n," Hyuka says slowly, in that adorable voice he knows you can't resist. "since I made a promise to read your book, promise me you'll dance with me-!"

Bile shot up your throat. "No. Not here."

"Huh? Why?"

"I'm not dancing in public."

Hyuka looked around. "But the beach is empty, I'm the only one watching. Come on y/n, it'll be fun!"

Hyuka's cute demanding voice was working on you. No it wasn’t… Okay maybe it was.

Your toes curled, further planting yourself in the ground.

God you don't wanna do this. "But- Hyuka, I know you have good intentions but it's so. It's been so long, I don't know if I still got the hang of things-"

"Sure you do. Hang on, I know the perfect song for this." He plays your favorite song (or at least your favorite song of his) on the speaker- Our Summer.

The familiar tune runs laps in your mind, goosebumps blooming across the valleys of your arms. Music does sound prettier aloud than plugged in with headphones on. It does make you… less stiff.

"I don't know how to dance to this-"

"Me neither?" Hyuka proceeded to fix the speaker, placing it upright on a blanket over the sand. "We never had an official choreography for this song, so I thought the both of us can just make it up as we go?” He drags you by the hand, causing you to lose grip of the sand and stumble as you walked. “It doesn't have to be serious or anything. It's for fun, is all that matters."

Fun.

Yeah, that’s right.

"Y/n?"

It hit you like a plane hit a bus hit a car hit a person. "Fun..." That's what mattered at the end of the day. 

We all die in the same coffin, and by that point, only one's happiness is the proper measurement for a life worth living. 

"Okay.” You spoke to no one in particular. “No one else is watching..." and even if they were, does it matter?

Hyuka looked at you, like, really looked at you.

Did he feel concerned? Confused? Scared this is a bad idea and he shouldn't have bothered you in the first place? 

"Y/n." He called your name once more, extending his arm. "Join my dance club?" He smiled his perfect smile. "Please?"

You stood frozen, unsure why your throat started closing up.

Hyuka continued, "I'll suggest some ballet." A giggle. "I'm not sure how, but I'll make it work."

Memories bubbled to the surface. You were sitting under a tree, this damningly uncomfortable tree, thinking today will be peaceful, today will be different and it really was so peaceful and different because this boy– this young boy beaming with curiosity and innocence– comes up to you and changes the world around you.

You held Hyuka's hand tighter. "I still love ballet deep in my heart." Your feet did its thing, they stepped this way, they skipped that way.

You spun Hyuka around, laughing along with him, sand flitting around, your hair in your face but it didn’t matter that neither of you were completely off-beat because you were having fun.

The variations of ballet and hip-hop dancing are so unfittingly perfect, so freeing, so you.

Memories rush back to you like wildfire.

The classroom, the mystery notebooks, the noisy corridor, the tree, the rainy day at the bus stop, Huening Kai.

Huening Kai, who was a small corgi with a dream to be a star, turned into a golden retriever idol with the same heart of gold. The same boy who you parted ways with after graduating high school but never parting ways with you.

Everything was a massive blur. One moment, you're under that tree talking with your best friend Hyuka, the next moment you're alive and free and so happy in this empty sunset beach. One moment you are comforting this poor soaked boy at the bus stop, the next moment he's a full grown man holding your arms swaying to the rhythm.

The song closes, and you're standing right as the waves hit your shins in sync. 

Your heart is pounding, it's pounding so loud but it feels so good to be young and free again. You walk further away from the shore, not looking or going anywhere in particular. You pant, not able to take a breath.

Just then, your feet left the ground.

"Hyuka- HYUKA PUT ME DOWN!"

Hyuka lifted you up bridal style, with such ease as if you were nothing but a hydrogen atom, running back to the waves.

You want to punch him. He was running at Godspeed, and. You didn't want to get your outfit wet. 

But he's too pure to be punched. 

BUT YOU WANT TO PUNCH HIM SO BADLY. "WAS THIS YOUR MASTER PLAN ALL ALONG???" 

Hyuka wheezed hard, not having heard you scream this loudly up until this point.

"YOU'LL NEVER KNOW-!" Just as he screamed, he slipped and fell frontwards into the waves, him too getting all soaked in sea water. Now both of you looked like something out of the Titanic.

"DUMBASS!" You shrieked, but Hyuka couldn't hear you... because he was in the water... and couldn't get out for some apparent reason. "Oh." You got your hands around his waist and pulled him out, "Hyuka, you okay?"

Hyuka held onto your arms, cheeks red, cackling like a maniac. "I wasn't supposed to fall. I swear I did that accidentally on purpose."

You knew he did that on purpose. As you dragged your bedraggled corgi out of harm's way, where the knee-deep waves can't drown him, you... you wanted to say something.

You had to say something. The words 'I love you' didn't feel right. You had to say something else, something more.

The sun dipped halfway into the horizon, the sky frosted in thin clouds. It was just you and Hyuka, Hyuka and you. You never felt more at peace... with someone.

You squeezed his waist tightly, not too tight so he won’t choke, just enough to get him to notice, which he did.

"Never leave me, Hyuka."

Hyuka fell silent for a moment, letting those words melt into his head.

Because he understood just how important those words mean to you and him. "I love you too."

Epilogue

A couple months go by.

Huening Kai walked down the pavement, heart pounding in anticipation.

It wasn't hard to find the signing for your second published book, not when the entire bookstore was plastered in eye-catching posters and, moreover, crowds of fans lined up for an autograph, to be able to see you.

Huening Kai didn't have to wait, though. As per your request, he could skip the line and get a pre-signed copy... for free. 

He bragged about this to the other members, to which they said things such as 'aww she's so sweet' (everyone) or 'why can't I get my own copy?' (Beomgyu) or 'dumbass, we could just share.' (Yeonjun to Beomgyu). 

Huening Kai waddled into the bookstore, ignoring the quizzical stares he got from people. The line wasn't any shorter inside.

Huening Kai's jaw dropped. If it detached from his skull, it would be rolling off the floor like unraveling the red carpet. The line was so huge your signing podium was on the second floor. That's right, the line continued as he crab-walked up the stairs.

And there you were: In a suit, taking pictures with fans, piles of books resting on both your sides.

Huening Kai never saw you in a suit, but he must admit, you rock a suit better than he ever could.

He shifted towards you.

You look up, pleased.

"It is I."

You stared at him with an expectant gleam in your eyes. "Hello, my little corgi." Then you passed him what seemed like... a violet parcel tied with twine? "A special copy for a special person." You winked so very discreetly.

He nodded, bowing down before you. Like. Full on kneeling, hands together, forehead kissing the ground type of bowing. "I am honored."

As he was still on his knees, you whispered, "Meet me at the cafe."

He nodded once more. "Good luck with your signing."

He walked away, vanishing into the crowd, leaving you just as you saw him. But that’s okay. You’ll see each other… in a while...

An hour or so had passed. Or maybe two. Perhaps three.

Huening Kai stayed put in the cafe, the ice cubes that once piled in your matcha latte he bought for you now melting away. He read three chapters of your newly published book, which, wasn't a world record for speed reading or anything, but he enjoyed his 'mysterious cafe booktok girl' moment while it lasted. Because of you, he got motivated to indulge into this new cozy hobby.

Huening Kai yawned, not because the story was particularly boring, he just needed a break. He stared at the violet parchment paper and unraveled twine, sitting on the edge of the table.

A special copy for a special person.

He folded the paper neatly, spun the twine over his fingers, then snuck it in his pocket for safe keeping. He couldn’t just throw it away, he thought.

Finishing the remnants of his grape smoothie, having nothing better to do, he scrolled through the book, flipping pages mindlessly, checking each and every minor detail: The title of each page, a font change, an image, a picture of him and you on the beach he never forgot taking-

Wait-

He flipped the pages back, nose butting in the spine of the book. His eyes locked on that one page.

That one,single page.

'Dedicated to Hyuka'

He closed the book. 

Opened it. 

Closed it again.

A minute passes by. Maybe two. Perhaps three.

He opened the book.

He got to that page.

And once he got there, he couldn't rip his eyes off the picture. Its printing quality is spot on and the both of you look so so pretty and he couldn't be any happier.

Back when he had black hair, back when your hair too was long as a ghost's in need of a fresh chop. 

Back when you were in an author slump and he was in need of- he choked, and not in a bad way- you.

Curious (and also not ready to read the hell of a paragraph underneath the picture), he turned to the acknowledgements section to see if you spared any comments for him.

You did.

To Hyuka, the boy who taught me how to dance, I thank you for bringing this book (and its author) to life.

His heart thawed when reading that. 

So he read the sentence. 

Over and over. 

And over again.

How were you able to make him feel this way?

How could he be this lucky?

He forced himself not to curl the pages, a bad habit of his, because. This book was just too precious. If he left even one page damaged, wrinkled, unstraight, he'd sob knowing the fact he practically ruined the most precious gift you could offer.

He flipped to the next page. 

That page.

The page.

Years ago, this boy came to me. He was the only person who ever cared for my writing back then, the only person who believed in me. He helped bring this book to life, and the book before that, and older works I haven't gotten to publishing yet. He encouraged me to partake in my other hobbies too, to give them more attention. Because of him, he ignited my love for writing and ballet. He's quite literally my will to live. I appreciate him more than words can say for simply existing as the same timeline as me. Hyuka, you helped me so, so much. Even if you think you're doing the bare minimum, just know, bare minimum isn't really common these days, as well as endless gratitude. So, from the bottom of my heart, thank you.

His fingers stayed clamped to the page. Why were you such a good writer? How did you know the exact words to not only translate the fictional world from your mind to paper but also the exact words to make your best friend cry?

"Hyuka! Hey, sorry to keep you waiting. The fame is really getting to me." You fanned your hand. "My hands hurt from all that signing."

Huening Kai almost fell off his chair. 

He sucked back his tears. Act normal. "Y/ndon'tscaremelikethateveragainplease."

Somehow, you were able to make up most of what he was saying. "I texted you that I'll be here soon though, didn't you see?"

He did not. "Sorry. I was reading your, uh, masterpiece hehe."

"Oooo d'you like it so far?" And then you kicked it off from there, rambling about your book, the signing, and random topics here and there.

Huening Kai forgot he was crying for a second, but his heart still remained sore, his body still tender from reading that paragraph. No birthday wish or late night appreciation text on WhatsApp could top that off. He wants to hug you so bad right now.

"Hey, Hyuka?" 

"Hm?" He still has that angelic smile, even when he's in pain (the good type of pain) on the inside.

"Wanna go to the beach again?"

He choked. "Of course. Uh, when though?"

"Right now."

He blinked. "... Right now?"

"It'll make my book signing day even better." A pause. "I mean- this is very short notice and maybe bad timing if you think about it actually but-"

"Yes," He spoke quietly at first, "please, let's go."

You blinked at him. "Wait really?" With how busy the both of your schedules were, what are the chances the two of you would-

"Yes really! I want to dance with you. Be it ballet, or hip hop. In another universe maybe we could be dancing together all the time." His voice cracked. "Do you know how much I..." It's been so long since Huening Kai has ever felt this small, since Huening Kai felt so... appreciated. The type of appreciation that isn't related to his work or his face but him. He sunk back into his seat, eyes distancing off of you. "Is this what you felt when I asked you on that beach escape?"

You stared at him, wondering if he'll ever look back up. It, too, has been a long time since you've seen Huening Kai like this. "Hyuka, I'm sorry I don't-"

Hyuka waved his hands around, "No. Don't be sorry I- I was sputtering nonsense I-"

"No, no, you weren't saying nonsense Hyuka." You started. "I felt really happy when you asked me on that beach escape. It's like... The feeling transcends words, the burst of energy I felt, the rush of old memories with you, the way I can feel my heart pound loudly in my chest again." You smiled, and it meant the world to Hyuka.

Huening Kai couldn't wait any longer, he knew just what he had to do.

Huening Kai grabbed his drink. He didn't have a speaker, so he settled with his phone. He reached his hand out. "What are we waiting for?"

You stared back at the boy, now a man, in front of you. "Let's go."

When was the last time you felt happy?

The ground shifts from soil to sand, the sunset is more orange than pink at this hour.

You look at Huening Kai.

The image of a fifteen year old boy smiled back at you.

You whisper to him now, “Meet me at the shore”

a/n: I spent about a month and a half writing and perfecting this piece to the best of my capabilities, but even then, I wasn't so strict with myself on this piece, because, that's quite literally my point of writing this: To have fun. to let loose, to enjoy writing again. I do genuinely hope this fic makes all the tired, underappreciated artists out there feel more loved and respected; I genuinely hope this work has touched the hearts of those lonely souls in need of a friend, seriously, you guys are so independent and such awesome people, it baffles me how you haven't found your special someones yet; and to all the ningdungies who came here for Huening Kai, thanks for stopping by, I hope this fic fed your hyuka-content-deprived souls *brings forth spoon and bowl*nomnomnomnom* Thank you for reading up until this point, I greatly appreciate you and hope you stay tuned for more!!

Reblog and review if you like my work 🫶🫶 they are greatly appreciated!!

[sedgwickpdf]

hey do u still have your spn/mbmbam crossover fic somewhere? the link from 2021 doesnt seem to be working and ive just been reminded of how much it slaps

omg hi!! so i just went back in to update it but it seems like they've changed the settings on celtx so i can't just share a link. SO what i've decided to do is put the pdf in a google doc where it will simply live forever: HERE IT IS

hopefully this works!! the link should be set to "anyone can access." i'll put an addendum on the post proper too i guess. thanks for your continued interested in himbo bim bam, hahaha. tbh i can't believe that this thing i wrote in december 2020 at the height of my destiel fever still has a readership!!

[thephantomchronicles]

Oh, choices choices. Ok, know about the wedding. I can guess about the Boggie. Can I have Pregnancy AND A voice I can't forget? Pretty please? 🙏

okay, I'm finally home and can answer this😅

You definitely can have both because I love talking about my WIPs😅

The pregnancy fic was supposed to be part of my jatp kid fics about Julie being pregnant with little Rose but it's been left unfinished for a while now, although I do want to get back to it at some point!

I had shared a little part of it on another ask game so here's a little more :D

“Julie is pregnant?” came Reggie’s shout from the living room.

“What?” Julie turned around. She walked right back inside, staring at Luke.

“I didn’t say anything!" Luke was quick to defend himself.

“Reggie just shouted, Julie is pregnant!” Julie retorted.

“That could mean anything…” Luke trailed off.

According to Google docs I started writing a voice I can't forget on October 2021 which was so long ago😅 but I really had it all planned out and then I kind of started writing other things and forgot about it😬

It's a 5+1 (addicted to the format😂) where Julie and Luke are neighbors - Julie's still trying to move on after her mom's death and Luke has been on an accident that has changed his life forever👀

"I’m sorry again, I promise you this is not how I usually am with people," she said, trying to be polite and not completely embarrass herself with her hot neighbor. "I’m Julie," she said, holding her hand out for him to shake.

The guy looked between her and her outstretched hand for a second without saying anything. He held a finger up, gesturing to her to wait as he disappeared behind the door for a few seconds. Julie was confused, not sure if that was weird or rude, but she had just unloaded her bad day on him so she could probably give him the benefit of the doubt.

He quickly came back holding his phone and typed something. He turned the screen towards Julie who was only getting more confused, until she read what was actually on it.

I'm Luke.

ask me about my WIPs!

[wr1t3w1tm3]

Live Blogging My Reaction as I edit a Fic - Part 1

The fic is SEAWOLF on AO3. I'll link it at the bottom of this page.

First, I'm not even sure I want to keep the current story line. Currently the main OC - Theresa - is Rooster's kid but she may become Mav's kid in the rewrite.

Secondly... I'm copy and pasting this from AO3, so I'm gonna have to format.

Third: I'm editing the first chapter, but there is a chapter before that in the book that I'll edit at the end (bear with me). The link below is the link from Chapter 1, not the dossier.

Just changed my page layout to match what an average book setup would be and ooooohhh, pretty!

"A couple of nights later, Rooster learns why they got certified."

First line. This was a reference to a cut prologue which I published as a one-shot. In the early to mid-plot plan this was important. Now it's not.

Getting rid of these details is killing me, but there's so much superfluous stuff. It has to go. I have the original copy saved somewhere.

Just spent forever figuring out how to get rid of the spaces between paragraphs in google docs. Maybe I should've done this in word...

I really needed to declutter this chapter. At this point I'm just smoothing everything over.

Damn it, now I wanna split the chapter.

Ya'll I was in AP English in HS. I have spell check. I just can't spell worth shit.

I've always prided myself on realistic dialogue, but sometimes it's hard to differentiate my dialogue between characters because obviously, I'm a college student. I have one experience. But I'm working with characters that can't know normal college lingo. So I'm working on that while doing this and... it's a bit rough.

I was definitely trying to flex my limited medical and anatomical knowledge with this. Trying to be humbler now... but I actually have my CNA and Med Tech so...

Mmmm... I like hurting characters a bit too much.

Should I add page numbers now or...

*I'm hurting Rooster a lot. I like teenage trauma a bit too much...

Head canon: Carole had breast cancer which came back as breast as ovarian cancer after a couple years remission and thats what eventually killed her. This is due to the BRACA1 mutation, which wasn't well known until the 2010's ish. (BRACA1/BRACA2 will have implications down the line.)

My phones at 15% and my computers getting close and it's almost my bedtime. Can I finish the new chapter 1 in time?

This time I actually described the transformation. Kinda avoided that with the first draft.

In the og draft they didn't even call 911, but now they did so I guess the EMS guys are gonna show up this time.

That's all for tonight. Nearly done with new chapter one.

With the book page format, I'm at approx. 8 pages (7 full with like, 1/8 of the 8th filled) and 2,169 words. For reference, the original first chapter has 3,805 words. I think splitting will be the right decision because this book got big fast when I initially wrote it and I have got to get it down.

Is not a bad time to mention that it's also an Ice!Lives fic?

Original Fic link, as promised:

I know it says chapter two but it is really chapter one.

[ferny-berny]

there's a first for everything

I’m finally doing it. I’m writing my first blog post!

For a long time now, I couldn’t tell you if it’s been months or years because I guess I’ve always wanted to share my thoughts with the world, I’ve wanted to make a blog. When I was younger the idea of being a youtuber was super cool, but I always told myself that I should only post online if I had something genuinely interesting and original to contribute. That’s a lot of pressure to put on a kid who clearly just had a desire to be creative. It honestly stopped me from doing a lot of things, but I can proudly say I have a very clean digital footprint :p

Always a passive scroller, never a poster. 

Growing up as a child with unsupervised access to the internet, media consumption was my number one hobby. Too old to be an iPad baby, but too young to know what life was like before Google existed; the sweet spot, really. Maybe I’m biased, but the internet I grew up on is not the one that lives today. It’s really a reflection of the collective mind, all the misinformation and lack of critical thinking… don’t get me started. The internet I grew up with was an option - available, but not necessary. None of us were taking it too seriously because, honestly, they hadn’t figured out how to make money on there yet. Even making money on a site like eBay felt like a fun little game, but maybe that’s the childhood nostalgia warping reality. 

You get my point though - it used to be fun and now it’s not. At least not for me. It’s just doomscroll, laugh at tweet, post cute pic, repeat. It really can’t be normal to be going through as many emotions as you do when you scroll down the timeline. Amygdala going crazyyyy.

I know that this is just a string of tangents so far, but I promise I’m going somewhere with this -

The internet can be fun again! It’s special because it’s a place to connect and share. As fun as it is to watch my shows and listen to my little playlists, the thing that really feeds me is being able to talk about it with someone. I am a certified yapper, like my roommate says.

Funny thing though: as I close out this chapter of my life, I am also done with what feels like the research stage of it. The time I spent simply sitting back and observing the world is very important to me. It wasn’t all happy, but it taught me a lot. I am raising my hand in the classroom of life (hahaha). I would like to participate now. 

There’s a lot left to explore, I’m only 23 after all. Which if you’re younger may feel old, but even if that were true, it’s cool to age. You couldn’t pay me to be ~young~ again. Who knew it could hurt so much to be in the dark? The growing pains still come and go, but are much easier to bear nowadays. I have at least found the switch to see things more clearly. 

A big realization was that I don’t want to waste any more time. It took me a while to come to terms with my anxiety, but one of the things that I had to accept was that thinking about anything too hard will make me not want to do it. Like this. This is being written on a google doc because I can’t figure out what to name the actual blog. But that just cannot be the reason I don’t do it. There won’t always be more time.

This past year has been a big one for me. It was my final year in college. I’m a super senior, so I got an extra year and it honestly ended up working out, but until about last week it didn’t register that I won’t be a college student forever. After this I’ll never have another finals week, study sesh in the library, or a casual chat at the english department… no more dumplings from the dumpling cart, pizza from Christian’s (at 2am after a night out), or basil fried rice from my favorite Thai place on campus. It just started setting in that my weeks are, in fact, counted. That maybe there won’t be a next time for certain things; that museum visit that I’ve pushed off since moving down here could simply not happen if I don’t carve out the time to actually do it because it is ending. Things do end, (un)fortunately. I thought it never would. 

Yada yada, I’m getting sappy. And we don’t know each other yet.

The point is: you won’t always have all the time in the world. I get it now. So I want a place to talk about it. That and music, social issues, self-care, pop culture, books, movies, etc.

I want my voice to be heard. I’ll admit it’s a little scary to speak up, but I have so many thoughts that I’m going to try and just post it before I find a reason not to. I hope you join in because I hate talking to myself :)

[seashellblue]

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle (Part 1)

I'm going through my Google Drive and have a bunch of old story ideas that I know in my heart I'm literally never going to see to completion.

But, I also don't want to just throw them in the trash, because even if they don't really spark much in me, maybe someone else will want to do something with them.

So! I'll be posting at most one story idea a day, though there might be some gaps for the longer ones that'll need extra time spent formatting.

I want to say these are under Copyleft, but I'm also not a lawyer and I'm not sure if I fully understand all that entails. But, if I'm not wrong, I think it means you can use any settings, characters, or plot points in these documents, as long as you let anyone else who wants to use them do so too.

First story under the cut.

Alright, here's the first of two stories collecting dust in a folder called "Cyberpunk Story". I guess I should warm y'all that I did not check this for spelling errors and / or cringe so good luck.

Silver & Sheen

Premise / Core Draw: Playing with themes of humanity / inhumanity as shown through two cyborg protagonists. Sheen embraces her inhumanity, while Silver rejects his. A twist in the final third of the story reveal that Silver is a fully synthetic android operating off the digitized mind of his dead "original", while Sheen is entirely human, remotely piloting the false body she believed to be her own.

Now, on the the stuff from the Google Doc:

Cyberpunk story, the big thing about this story is that it’s about a robot and a cyborg. The robot embraces their inhumanity and thinks themselves above weak humans (Sheen), while the cyborg rejects their artificial nature, and wishes they could go back to being a true human (Silver). Then at the end it’s revealed that Sheen is actually a %100 pure human who was remotely piloting a robot without realizing it, and Silver is actually an android with the digitized memories of a human that died decades earlier.

Moments:

Silver and Sheen stand on a rooftop overlooking the home of someone who got on the bad side of the city’s megacorp. On receiving the order to initiate their assassination, Sheen jumps headfirst into battle, but Silver stays behind even as screams erupt from whatever havoc Sheen is causing.

Silver stays on the rooftop waiting, until his cybernetic implants force him to enter the fight. Even then he resists for a few moments longer, just to see how long he can hold off his handlers this time.

…

Silver’s backstory is elaborated on. He wasn’t just some street kid his picked off the street and experimented on. He was actually the son of the very C.E.O. of the company that currently owns both him and Sheen. Injured during a hover-car accident, cybernetics were the only way to save Silver, but ever since his father has disowned him.

This flashback occurs in the middle of a heated argument in the C.E.O.’s boardroom. Silver screams at his father to look at him, and that he can’t ignore Silver forever. The C.E.O. tells his security personnel to get “that malfunctioning copy” out of his office. Silver is dragged out screaming epithets.

…

Sheen shoots Silver’s robotic cat because it annoys her, an apathetic Silver just rhetorically asks Sheen if she realizes that was expensive. Sheen bites back saying that Silver has plenty of money to get a new one, and that it doesn’t matter because the cat wasn’t real anyway, does he even realize that? Silver only says that he considered the cat a kindred spirit.

…

Silver asks Sheen why she chose to live in such a run-down house, when the pay given to them by their megacorp is more than enough to choose from the most expensive penthouses in the city. Sheen points to a structure on the horizon resembling a radio tower, then explains that the tower was once used to send signals between earth and the moon.

Sheen continues that the tower is now defunct, but it’s still kept under heavy guard, because if someone was able to get it working again, it would allow every A.I. in the city to upload themselves and escape to the moon.

The moon no longer houses any humans, though they say it still has a thriving population of A.I. who found the place much more suitable. They say it’s a utopia up there, no sadness, no death. The A.I. who made it carrying on humanity's forgotten dream of exploring distant stars.

So that’s why Sheen lives on the fringes of the city, so she can plan and scheme and dream. One day she’ll escape, and since she’s nigh immortal, it’s only a matter of time. She then begins to go on about how it must feel bad for a mortal like Silver to see the tower, considering he’ll never be able to use it. Silver doesn’t particularly care about what Sheen says.

…

Silver and Sheen are fighting, and Silver is winning. It’s explained in part through narration, and in part by words Silver says aloud, that Silver was always the faster of the two, his reflexes much better than Sheen. Sheen acknowledges that, but before Silver is able to defeat her, she reveals she manipulated the fight so they would be standing over an unfinished construction site.

As Sheen dislodges a pile of rebar on the floor above them, she tells Silver it will never matter how fast he is, because she was always the more creative of the two. A piece of rebar crushes Silver leg as Sheen leaves. She ignores Silver screams of pain and hate directed at her.

…

Sheen pushes a hard drive into Silver’s hands as the sound of security trying to breach into the tower control room grows louder. Silver tells Sheen he’s not leaving her, Sheen says this is his only chance, his and every other A.I. in the city. Sheen tells Silver she’s not afraid to take away the one reason he wants to stay, so don’t don’t force her to.

From the outside the red light of the radio tower turns on for just a moment, a candle next to the spotlights of the city. Sheen smiles as the city drops into a blackout. A single gunshot is heard from outside the tower, its light the only one remaining after the mass exodus.

…

Epilogue: Silver’s new home has a window, its view outlooking into a black sky and grey moondust. He has a new body now, now older and clearly an android, but still recognizable and resembling a human. It seems in his time since arriving on the moon, he’s taken up creating his own robots.

Amongst the half-finished projects is an android about the same age Silver was for the majority of the story. They look feminine and have human features like Silver. Silver inserts the hard drive Sheen gave him into a port in the android’s neck. She wakes up and asks what her name is, Silver tells her it’s Sterling. Sterling asks Silver who Sheen is. Silver says she’s their big sister, and that he’ll tell Sterling all about her. Sterling is led out of Silver’s workshop with a smile on her face.

[it-lives-in-westchester]

ILITW Reunion fic

Hello so this fic has been in my google docs forever now, and I decided to finally finish it, so it stopped haunting my google docs.

Anyway hope you enjoy, to summarise this one shot. ILITW Gang meets Redfield!Noah again after the events of It Lives Beneath. It's awkward as hell but what did everyone expect

------------

Claudia’s last talk to Mai Vance about what to do with Noah was still on her mind. The rest of her friends still did not know what she had been doing this past year and she knew deep down they deserved to know. So she finally got around to tell them. It went as well as she expected, a lot of yelling, a lot of questions and some people asking if she was being mind controlled. After a while they had accepted it….mostly. 

Well, at least they had agreed to meet him again, for closure she guessed.

There wasn't any real talking when walking into the woods between them. Some murmuring, Claudia didn't catch any of it, she couldn’t be bothered.

"So you are sure this is safe…right?" Claudia heard the voice of Lucas next to her. 

"Yeah of course I wouldn't bring you guys here if I didn't think this was safe"

"It's not like he's going to try to kill us again?" Stacy said under her breath, Claudia pretended not to hear that, she didn't feel like doing the same conversation she has had with them a million times before. She knew Noah would not intentionally hurt anyone…pretty sure. It was that bird incident a few weeks back but she wasn't gonna mention that now.

When the group arrived at the familiar clearing, Claudia stopped and the rest of the gang followed suit. Claudia tried to feel for it, the power that was thriving in these woods. It seemed calm enough for her to try this. The rest of her friends looked at her kind of unsure what was gonna happen next. 

“Hey Noah, I brought our old friends with me, you know the old gang wanna come and meet them again?” Her words seemed to be carried away by the wind. Everyone in the group seemed to look around the place after she said that.

"So how does this even work?" Lucas asked.

"I call out to him and he shows up if he feels like it," Claudia answered. 

"... that doesn't answer my question" he replied with "Just trust me, okay, I know what I am doing, been doing this for a while" 

“Sure you do,” Ava said while she was laying down on the forest floor. Claudia was about to protest but could not bother. If they wanted to, they could leave, but she wasn't gonna force them to stay here.

After a few minutes, Noah had still not shown up. Claudia was used to it, like whatever, maybe he was doing something he thought was important. Like scratching up the walls of the old ruins, playing with the vine dog Cora gave them, or just sulking. However, when Claudia looked over at her friends, they didn’t seem to have the same patience as her and seemed to have gotten more fidgety. 

"Is he even gonna show up or what?" Andy snapped while pacing back and forth impatiently. Claudia felt like everyone was thinking the same thing, but he was the only one brave enough to say anything about it. 

“He’s gonna show up, ” She tried to reassure her friends. "He wouldn't let me down like that" 

She hoped the others in the group didn't hear the uncertainty in her voice.

Suddenly she noticed something through the trees. A shadowy figure standing staring, well speak of the devil as they say.

"Noah you're not slick, I can see you" 

The rest of her friends started to look around

"You can come a bit closer, I promise they won't bite," she said, suddenly the figure disappeared, and then she felt a presence behind her. By the others' reactions, she could already guess what was behind her. So she turned around to face the lanky shadowy figure with glowing eyes. 

“Hey dude, for a moment they thought that you wouldn’t show up,” Claudia said pointing behind her where her friends were standing.  

“Crazy right!? like you would ever do that” Claudia said in a half-joking manner, trying to ease down the tension that she felt was already building up.

Noah was staring up into the sky, avoiding eye contact with the rest of the group at all cost, as Claudia suspected. Claudia tried to wave to get his attention, then he looked down at her. She was used to his eyes feeling like they were staring through her soul so she didn't flinch away. She pointed behind her where the group was standing. He was still looking at her with the same intensity as before, she gave up trying to give hints and just said it like it was.  

“You know you can at the very least greet them. They did not come all this way for you to say nothing to them” Claudia tried to encourage him. Noah then quickly glanced at the rest of the group, raising one hand. 

“..sup...” he said hastily and glanced back to look at Claudia again just as quickly. 

“Well, there’s no denying it’s him at least,” Andy commented. Claudia noticed that Noah glanced at Andy after he said that. Andy started to tense up a bit and Noah just as quickly glanced away again. 

“Hello” Dan finally said after what felt like minutes of awkwardness. Claudia and Noah turned their heads towards Dan and he started to wave weakly.

“How...How are you feeling today?” he continued trying to give a small smile. 

"Dan, that's the question you're going for?" Ava said 

"Well, what would you have gone with?"

"Not the one that makes it obvious what you are working as a therapist"

"That is not telling anything, a lot of people start conversations that way"

 "Eh kinda agree with Ava there" added Andy.

"Oh not you too!"

Claudia turned back to Noah. He was looking at the three of them who had started to bicker with each other. She was hoping he did not get too confused by it. 

"Hey are you okay?" she whispered to him, trying to make sure no one was listening to what she said. Noah started to nod a bit and then turned to look at his old friends. 

“I feel….fine…” Noah finally said, which made everyone go silent and turn their heads towards him. Claudia saw that Noah was not used to all this attention so he crossed his arms defensively.

"Well that's good to hear," Dan said with a smile. "Like Ava mentioned I'm working as a therapist now so that's been fun, been enjoying that" 

Noah kinda just stared at Dan for an uncomfortable amount of time before giving him a thumbs up. 

"...Claudia mention…" he replied. 

The group looked at Claudia.

“May have told a bit about you guys to him. Try to make him remember stuff and catch up with stuff that has happened since…it all happened" 

"Really? So what do you remember then?" Stacy asked towards Noah. 

"Noah.." he pointed towards himself "....Stacy..?" He pointed back at her. Claudia nodded to tell him he was correct. 

"you…write..?" he said, while mimicking how people type on a computer keyboard. Someone gave a nervous laugh, Claudia wasn’t sure who.  

"You are correct I guess," Stacy replied. Noah looked happy with himself by that, Stacy less so. 

"What about me?" Lucas asked seemingly a bit curious.

Noah thought a bit longer on that one before he pointed at Lucas.

"...Lucas…know-it-all…” Noah said, Lucas stopped smiling after he said that. 

This time Claudia was sure it was Ava that was laughing. 

 "Speaking of remembering stuff, isn't there something else you want to tell them?” Noah stopped looking at the group. “Like the whole reason, we are even here to begin with” 

Claudia stepped aside so Noah was just standing in front of the group. He tried to follow her, but she gave an angry glare back at him and he stopped in his tracks. Then he turned his gaze back to the group.

"..sorrrrry…." he looked just at a point above where everyone was standing. 

"..so so so so...sorry…" 

"...messed up...bad...sorry…" 

The group didn't say anything back, like what more was it to add to that. Claudia could see that Noah started to fidget with his fingers again. 

"...at least…happy end.." he added at the end. 

"It’s not all happy though?" Lily said

Noah tilted his head and turned his attention to her. The sudden shift of focus made her jump a little, which Claudia did not think Noah had noticed. Claudia could also see that Lily avoided looking directly in his eyes and continued talking:

"As this whole thing must be awful for you, isn't it?" He stopped trying to look into Lily's eyes and looked down at his hands. Claudia wanted to ask if he was okay again, but he said something before she could ask anything:

“...Everyone alive… Noah dead...happy ending…” then he gave two thumbs up with a stupid grin to the rest of the group. Lily’s eyes widened in horror and the rest of the group gave a similar look as well. 

Claudia hid her face in her hands and started to groan quietly to herself. She should have planned this better. Of course, he would say stupid shit like that. It was probably his way of making everyone feel better. In his undead funny way and not having proper human contact with anyone except her, she was terrible with social interactions as well. Poor boy didn't stand a chance.

At the same time, it's not like her just writing him a script or telling him exactly what to say would have been better, probably way worse. Why did he have to say that? C’mon!

“...said...wrong..?” 

Claudia sighed deeply and was about to answer him but before she could, she got interrupted:

“No of course not, it’s just a depressing thing to say” Ava answered him. Unlike Lily when he turned his unnatural gaze towards Ava she did not try to look away, almost looking like she tried to hold a staring contest with him. 

“Like jeez, yeah you messed up, but like even I am not sure if you deserve…. this?" she gestured towards him. 

Suddenly Noah’s eyes lit up with a neon blue color, he pointed a finger at Ava. She started to frown, looking straight at the long shadowy finger. 

“..wait…” and suddenly he was gone. Everyone was standing around shifting around a bit, staring at Claudia like she had answers to what he was doing. She had no idea what he was doing.

“We came all this way for him to just bolt after five minutes,” Stacy broke the silence in frustration. Claudia was not sure if it was directed at her or if it was Stacy just talking to herself

“Nah, he’s coming back, trust me,” Claudia still answered. After a few seconds after she said that, he came back again. It looked like he was holding something behind his back. 

"...yours...sorry.." he said and dropped a long shiny object on the ground in front of Ava.   

"Wait, is that a..?" Dan started to say. 

“A knife? Oh yeah, that's my knife alright,” Ava realized while picking it up. Parts of the knife were shining in the moonlight, but a lot had gotten rust on it after those three years and was probably completely useless now.  

“...sorry...” Noah said again. 

Ava looked at Noah and then at Claudia. Her eyes were going back and forth between the two of them. In more rapid succession, before she settled on looking at Claudia. 

Ava widened her eyes and shrugged towards Noah like she was not sure what to do or say next. Claudia just shrugged back at her. She was not even aware that Noah still had that thing after all those years. Why would he even bother keeping it? Guess he could not exactly get rid of it when she was thinking about it. 

"Thanks...was missing that one," Ava said reluctantly, taking her thumb over bits of the handle that was falling off. Ava pressed her lips together into a forced smile.

“Thanks...I appreciate the gesture man” She said and put the knife away in the pocket of her jacket. 

Noah didn't seem to notice her reluctant tone, or maybe he did but didn't care. Because he looked back at Claudia rather proud of himself.  

"...anything else?.." Noah asked, trying to look at the group again. 

No one answered him, they were mostly looking at each other.   

"Well I don't know" Andy started. "I don't think there is anything else"

Noah's eyes brighten up when Andy finished talking   

“....leg?” 

“....huh?”

“Your Leg…” He pointed a finger at Andy's leg "broken…right?" 

"Oh well it's not broken anymore, it's been like 3 years dude" 

"three…years…" Noah looked down at his hands again "…three years?". It looked like Andy realized what he had done and quickly changed the subject.

"Heard you saved Tom's life?! That's pretty cool" 

"Tom?….yes Tom…friend!" Noah exclaimed. He then calmed down and crossed his arms again.

"..was nothing…"  

“Dude c’mon! You saved my best friend and other people as well when the dam in Pine springs broke. Claudia told us” Andy pointed towards Claudia who nodded to confirm that she did indeed tell them that. 

“Besides, my leg is doing fine now, see!” Andy started to demonstrate by doing a high kick with his leg with no problem. Which almost hit Claudia in the face.   

“And besides with both my legs working, I could kick your ass now if I wanted to, trust me” Giving a smug smile.

For a few seconds nothing was happening, but then Noah started to laugh. Andy looked at the others frowning. 

“...good luck...” Noah finally managed to say and continued to laugh at Andy's comment while hiding his face behind his hands. 

“Huh?”

“I think he's challenging you, you should go for it dude” Ava tried to encourage Andy.

“Nope, no fighting” Claudia interrupted the banter between them. 

“Well it's getting late, so better go back," Stacy said. 

“Yeah I agree,” Lily added on.

“Well we’ll see eachother soon” Claudia said to Noah before she was about to follow the others.

“Wait!” Noah said

“What is it No..” before Claudia could finish the sentence Noah was hugging her, well more like curling around her. 

“Oh,” she blurted out. It did not feel like much, kind of like a cold mist.

“Thanks..for...everything,” It sounded more like how Claudia remembered Noah to sound like. Which made her smile a bit, it would sometimes happen when they hung out long enough. 

"Yeah of course Noah, we're friends, right? I know we'll figure this out" 

He pulled away holding his hands on her shoulder. It looked like he wanted to say something else, but he stopped himself before doing that. 

“Bye…” he said and then he dissolved into the air and was gone. 

"Was that sweet or weird" 

"Kinda weird" Stacy admitted

"But mostly sweet" Lily tried to add

"Let's say both," Dan smiled. 

"Okay, can we go back now, these woods are still really creepy," Lily said and pointed in the direction where Claudia’s house would be. 

"Yeah, of course, we can even order pizza, I’m starving" Andy suggested 

"Sounds like a plan" said Lucas 

The rest of the group walked way ahead of Claudia. She turned her head around back to the wood, she saw that Noah was watching them walk away. She gave a weak wave at him, before joining the others. 

[lostinfantasyworlds]

Baby talk???

Hi @lavendertwilight89!!  😁❤️ So sorry for taking forever to get back to you, things got crazy and I wanted to wait until I had enough time/brain power to provide another snippet 🥰. This is still super rough, but it’s at least readable compared to the random jumbled mess I had in the google doc before 😂 . 

Previous background info + snippet for Baby Talk can be found here!

“Hey, kid, it’s okay. Don’t cry!” Inuyasha pleaded, his voice just above a whisper. “Just let your mom sleep a little longer, please? Just a little more. It’s been a rough day for her, y’know.” 

As he spoke, Moroha seemed to calm some. The wild flailing of her arms and legs had slowed, and her head turned a bit as if to nuzzle closer to the vibrations of his chest.

“Oh…so you like the sound of my voice, huh?”

Warmth flooded his body, leaving him awestruck for what felt like the millionth time in the last several weeks. He smiled down at the tiny bundle in his arms, but even in the few seconds since he’d stopped talking, Moroha’s face began to scrunch up in frustration again.

“No, wait!” Inuyasha whispered frantically. “I’ll keep talkin’, just — what do I…”

What the hell was he supposed to say to a baby?

He felt a little stupid talking out loud, essentially, to himself. Still, he knew he’d better think of something before Moroha burst into tears again and woke up Kagome, so he blurted out the first thought that came to his mind.

“It’s, uh, been a crazy couple of weeks.” He scratched the side of his head with a claw. “I can’t believe I’m really a father now...even after all those months we knew you were comin’. It still doesn’t feel real.”

Studying her tiny features, he lowered his hand to carefully brush the pad of his thumb across her chubby cheek. 

“I hope I’m alright at it.” His voice went even softer, somehow, as he looked into her brown eyes that were exactly the same shade as her mother’s. “I never knew my old man, so I have no idea what I’m doin’. Just gotta figure it out as I go along, I guess.” He shrugged. 

“Kagome said that’s pretty much what everyone does, but….” He trailed off, letting out a small sigh as her little hand found one of his fingers and wrapped around it. The corners of his mouth lifted a bit.

“All I know is that...I want you to have a better life than I did growin’ up, and I’m gonna do everything I can to make sure of it. As long as your mom and I are around, you’ll always be safe, and cared for. Never alone.”

He knew he couldn’t technically promise such a thing, what with how dangerous the world was. But he’d pay any price imaginable to ensure that his daughter never had to experience the all-consuming terror of having to survive on her own. If it came down to it, he would claw his way out of hell to ensure no harm ever came to her.

Holding her a little tighter as his protective instincts kicked in, he paused to place a comforting kiss on her forehead before straightening up with a slight burning in his cheeks.

Aw, fuck. He had turned into such a sap over the last several weeks, hadn’t he? 

From the moment he first met Moroha, he had become an embarrassing puddle of mush that he never would have imagined himself capable of. He would be forever grateful that Kagome was the only one there to witness the tears that flooded his eyes the first time he held his daughter, because he was sure that Shippo and the monk never would have let him live that down.

At least here, in the dark, with just the two of them, and his wife slumbering peacefully in the background, he supposed he didn’t mind so much. 

Thank you so much for the ask @lavendertwilight89!! 💕

[polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup]

for the ask post, 7, 8, and 17

for number 19: my favorite work is probably NHTHCTH, i absolutely adore it! especially the fairy tale parts and the way you wrote Jon and Geryy's relationship, it's amazingly heartbreaking



7. What’s a troupe you love to write?

I answered that here, but i think another trope that I really would love to write when I have time is Time Loop AUs.

I have one plotted for TMA that I really loved, and Bojack Horseman. I feel like there's a lot of room for artsy mindbendy stylistic decisions and tragedy in time loops.

8. What kind of document do you use to you write? Microsoft Word? Google Docs? Straight in the AO3 text box?

Google docs. it feels more secure for me. i've had word files that end up horribly corrupted in a crash and lost forever, but google docs is autosaving for me every few seconds.

there's like. a shit ton of fun fonts in my google docs that never see the light of day--mostly for nhthcth. I change fonts for some of the stranger stuff, like the theatre script, the delivery notes, etc. one day i'll figure out html in AO3 and figure out how to change the fonts there too. right now, there's only one person who gets to see the fonts on the original google doc. she knows who she is.

17. Are there any writers and/of stories that you consider an influence?

I answered that here, but I'd probably add to that list the poetry of César Vallejo and the works of Carmen Martín Gaite.

I was like. obsessed with Vallejo for a while. I don't really write poetry, so his influence on my life, writing style has been minimal compared to like, Vonnegut, but I think his way of discussing human suffering like, moved into my head without bothering to sign a lease. probably my favorite of his was "Piedra negra sobre una piedra blanca".

He has this really famous compilation of poems called Trilce which like, admittedly, not my favorites of his work. I have no idea why, it's objectively his most famous work and rightly so, I just got weirdly fixated on some of his other stuff. anyway, he had this convention in it which i really liked, which was to title each of his poems with numbers. like, it wouldn't have a title, it'd just be "Poema XVI", and so on and so forth. Most of the versions that I've seen have roman numerals for it, but for some reason i'm convinced that the copy i originally read this in had just the arabic numericals at the upper lefthand corner of each page--just like, a hard "16." and that was it. I've lost the copy since, so I can't verify it. for some reason, i loved the vibe of that. Like, I can't really put my finger on it, but for some reason the act of numbering poems instead of giving them titles felt visceral to me.

there was this other book I read called Hocus Pocus by Kurt Vonnegut where the premise is the story is being told on margins of scraps of paper in a prison library, and the line break would come where the "paper" would run out, and that resulted in this really cool, fragmented, stylistic effect that also lived in my head rent free afterwards.

porcelain chips' weird structure was sort of a sloppy attempt to kind of chase the way that those structures in Trilce and Hocus Pocus made me feel. I'd seen something similar done in other fanfictions--there's this one daredevil fanfiction that uses an out of order numbering system whose name I cannot remember for the life of me, but it was really good, and a spiderman fanfiction that had used a similar structure to great effect. for some reason it just feels cool to me.

I dunno, sometimes you don't really know why a stylistic convention works, but you know it's a gut punch. i highly recommend looting every single work you love until you come up with something you like.

El cuarto de atrás by Carmen Martín Gaite was the book that kind of made me like, get metafiction as a literary device and understand how powerfully it can be used. I also, like. Named my animal crossing island after bergai. so i guess it influenced me there.

i think the post-Franco period had some really cool experimentalism, especially with female authors like Carmen Martín Gaite which I really recommend checking out. My favorite authors tend to be like, the weird experimentalist ones? Spain and Latin America both had really cool funky experimentalist phases. Probably check out works made during El Boom too if you're interested in that kind of thing.

[attllhak]

Hey, uh, @lemonlurkrr I uh, I saw you asking about FD stuff a few days ago, and I remembered I wrote a thing based on the mythology my best friend and I came up with a while ago, so I dug through my google docs and found it again. I dunno if you’re still looking for stuff, but uh, here you go regardless, I guess

-----------

Termanius huffed, hands on her brother’s shoulders. The Fierce Deity was groaning, bent double and grasping his middle to stem the flow of dark and tarnished ichor originating there. His left hand was still wrapped around the grip of his sword, the massive double helix blade buried in the ground.

Majora stood a few feet away, cackling like a maniac. They found this whole thing hilarious, as only something born of Chaos could.

Termanius grit her teeth. No help would be coming, Hylia and Lolia both busy with their own Chaos entities, fighting their own demons. This was a battle she and her brother must face alone. And she was done sitting back.

Termanius was a Guardian Goddess, a protector of the Triforces. Termina was her domain. Time, Light, Protection, each Guardian Goddess was all three, though they each embodied one more than the others. Hylia was Light, magic poured and focused through her harp and sword, her smile and laughter bright. Lolia was Protection, her scepter and shield dangerous weapons when raised to defend others, and she was unwilling to ever back down when people needed her.

But Termanius was Time, and time was a passive force. It passed no matter what occurred, and it’s flow was impossible to stop. Termanius had no harp and sword, no scepter and shield. She had no artifact to wield against evil, because she wasn’t active like Hylia and Lolia, she just watched and oversaw. All she had was an ocarina, an instrument and not a weapon. Instead she had her brother, her precious twin, the terrifying War God, the Fierce Deity. He was meant to fight for her, his double helix blade wielded in battle in her name. Termanius was not a fighter, and so that was all the Fierce Deity was. They were meant to be a balance.

He was not supposed to die for her.

He was not supposed to die doing her job.

Termanius was the Guardian Goddess of Termina. She was meant to guard these people and their Triforce from evil. The Fierce Deity was only meant to support her.

She would just have to guard him too.

“Terma,” Fierce Deity reached out to grab her wrist as she stood, lifting his head to her, glowing eyes full of pain and worry. “Stop, what are you,” he cut off with a cough.

Termanius reached down and set her hand over his, ignoring the warm and wet feel of his ichor on her wrist from his grabbing her. “Relax, Oni,” the nickname rolled off her tongue with a pain she didn’t understand just then. Time was a fickle thing, and seeing through it a curse as much a blessing. She remembered giving it to him like she’d lived it again just seconds before. “I’m just going to be doing my job,”

“Hey, Fierce Deity!” Hylia waved the towering man over, a mischievous glint in her eyes. “I just realized, Terma has a nickname since her name is so long, but your name is two words and you don’t have one. What gives?”

The Fierce Deity shrugged, confused. “Do I need one?” His voice rolled over the plains like a rumble of thunder, powerful and wild.

“Cut the dramatics, Fiercy,” Lolia waved, rolling her eyes and adjusting the bracers on her arms. “You don’t need the voice with just us,”

“Fiercy?” Termanius repeated.

“No,” was the only response from the Fierce Deity, though he had dropped the voice.

“I’m with Dea here, that sounds like something an 11 year old human would come up with,” Hylia smiled, even as her sister stuck her tongue out at her.

“Dea?” Termanius echoed.

“No,” Fierce Deity repeated himself.

Hylia threw up her arms as Lolia laughed at her.

“What about Oni?” Termanius offered, both her sisters giving her a weird look.

“Doesn’t that mean ‘demon’?” Lolia asked. “I thought I read that somewhere,”

“Oh, but he’s our demon!” Hylia cooed, leaning over to him. “A demon to fight the demons.”

“I can fight demons just fine on my own,” Lolia huffed.

Hylia waved her twin off. “Sure, you can. And I’m no pushover myself, but Terma’s not a fighter. She could use a demon to help her out,”

“True,” Lolia agreed.

“Well,” Termanius looked at Fierce Deity. “How about Oni?”

Fierce Deity hummed, then nodded. “Acceptable,”

The girls cheered, then Lolia and Termanius convinced him to sit down, shortly before Hylia started draping him in flower chains without letting him know. She got to ten before he noticed he was wearing flowers this time.

It seemed so long ago, that life belonging to another person now, though her domain over time made it seem like it was mere minutes ago, simultaneously. Now, her older sisters had both been slain by demons of Chaos themselves, Demise and Ruin stealing the twins from divinity and trapping them in mortal reincarnations. And now this Majora threatened to steal not just her brother in the same way, but threatened all she was meant to protect. Termanius would not lose anything else. Lolia may be the Goddess of Protection, but Termanius was meant to protect this world and its people. Hylia may be the Goddess of Light, but Termanius had magic too, and she planned to use it. 

She reached out her hand, pulling forth all the power in her possession, her might and desire and desperation and hope pooling together and spilling forth with a cry. She wouldn’t let this demon hurt her people, her brother, her home. She was the Guardian Goddess of Termina, and she would guard her plane.

Majora stopped laughing.

When the light dimmed, all that was left was a barely visible goddess and a floating mask, Majora’s twisted and grotesque visage in all it’s markings. Termanius couldn’t seal like her sisters, but she could do something they couldn’t. She could transform.

The mask that used to be Majora dropped, their screams still echoing in Termanius’ mind. She dropped to her knees a moment later herself, weak and tired. She wasn’t meant to do so much at once.

“Terma,” there was a cough and a soft thud, and Termanius twisted to see Fierce Deity collapsed behind her.

“Oni!” She crawled to her brother’s side, turning him over, struggling as her hands clipped through him. His injury had grown. “Easy, easy there brother. You’re gonna be okay,”

“No, I’m not,” the amount of words used had Termanius pulling back. He wasn’t usually so vocal. “Neither are you,”

“Don’t be so pessimistic, we’ll be fine,” Termanius tried to smile at him to reassure him.

“No,” his voice was firm, and he grabbed Termanius’ wrist, the fading appendage not affecting his grip. “No, it’ll be back. You can’t fight it when it does. I can’t heal from this. A reborn god alone can’t beat a demon. You know what needs to be done.”

Termanius would deny the tears started here. “No, we’ll be fine, you’ll see, we’ll, we’ll be fine, you just have to hold on,”

“Terma,”

She broke, sobbing into her brother’s chest, desperate for another way, but knowing there was none. “I’m sorry,”

A bloody hand in her hair. “I am too,”

She hid Majora’s mask, deep in the woods of her world, hidden and buried where none would find it if they were lucky. Her brother she took up to the moon with her, the plains within it where they and their sisters used to play a fitting last place for them to be, she felt. The Moon Children hovering around, waiting. They knew what would come, and what she would ask of them. They had agreed.

Termanius pulled her brother close, sobbing into his chest as she held him in her lap. He cried tears of his own, silent and sad and accepting, holding her in turn.

The siblings were engulfed then in light, a final act of protection from the both of them for their people.

When the light faded, all that was left was a white haired mask with blue and red markings sitting on the ground where the twins used to be.

...

Eons and eras later, after a violent split of the timelines in Hyrule, Majora’s mask was found and donned. With a heavy heart, Termanius looked out and knew there was no one in Termina now who could host her brother and defeat him.

She needn’t have worried, as when she heard her name cried out in desperation, looking down had her noticing a small deku scrub, no a Hylian, who was strong enough. A fairy called out for her aid, and that’s when she realized this small Hylian had her ocarina. A savior sent to her by her sister when she needed one most.

He made it to the moon, spoke with the Moon Children. He took her brother’s mask.

He put it on, and he and Fierce Deity defeated Majora, finally and forever.

This boy, this Hero chosen by Hylia, saved Termina. This eleven year old Hylian boy named Link who did with her brother’s power what the two gods could not.

He called Termanius’ brother ‘Fiercy’.