#I own this now. and it's special because it was once her highest level card

[yugiohcardsdaily]

Thoughts on Ultimate Obedient Fiend?

not taking into account personal connection: 6/10 taking into account personal connection: special/10

[inkbyajm]

Something Brewing

pairing: C.H. x fem!reader

category: fluff

warnings: anxiety attack

word count: 1.5k

notes: felt like angst, felt like sobbing uncontrollably, but my body wouldn’t cooperate, so imagining it will do for now. this was supposed to be a one-shot, but i didn’t realise how much i had written. now i’m splitting it into two parts. next part will definitely be more angst than fluff, so stay tuned for the terrifying sight that is angry corpse :) (p.s. don’t mind the occasional use of british english, it’s my default lmao)

next >

A peculiar thing it was, the concept of love. It was very personal and feelings about it varied from person to person. For some, it had existed since the beginning of time, when Adam and Eve first walked the Earth, when the Almighty willed his beloved humans to lead their own lives with him in their hearts. For others, it is a feeling to long for, to crave, a feeling they found themselves daydreaming about often. And for the rest, love is a tool of ruin, potentially driving people who cared for one another away from each other, instilling at least a smidge of repulsion in each one of them. However, humans are social creatures after all, and sometimes, attraction was unavoidable no matter how much one tried. And try he did.

━

Living in California could get hard and stressful at times, but at least Corpse didn’t live at the heart of the city of anxiety-inducing social interactions and constant chaos that was Los Angeles. Sure, it meant that he didn’t live close to his friends, but he wasn’t far away from her, and that was enough for him.

A few soft grunts and sounds of slippers landing on the hardwood floor echoed from the kitchen of (Y/N)’s apartment. He got up from the couch in her living room and decided to investigate the source of the noise. Coming into the room, he saw her jumping to reach the highest shelf in one of the cupboards. Looking at it, he noticed her favourite mug sitting at the edge of said shelf and, afraid she would knock it over whilst attempting to grab it, he effortlessly got it for her. “Thank you. God, I was about to grow a foot taller trying to reach for this thing.” she sighed, eliciting a deep chuckle from him, “See, this is exactly why you’re my favourite friend.” Friend? Well, yes, of course a friend, what else would he be? Corpse felt an uncomfortable tug at his heart, and he couldn’t pinpoint the exact reason why he was feeling that way, so he brushed it aside. “Why was it that high up if you can’t even reach it?” (Y/N) wasn’t a short person, she was perfectly average, and he himself wasn’t that tall of a guy either. But when it came to situations of this kind, he couldn’t help but feel good about his being taller. “It usually isn’t, but I let (F/N) use it once the other day because she refused to drink out of any of the other mugs, that stubborn bitch.” she replied, pouring her homemade Italian hot chocolate into the acquired cup. (F/N) was also taller than (Y/N), so it was only natural for her to be putting things in higher places. It was done out of habit.

(Y/N) and Corpse walked back to the living room to once again settle into the couch. He glanced at her as she sat with her legs crossed, concentrated on blowing on her moderately hot beverage, while the light from the moon peeked through the curtains of the balcony door, illuminating her face ever so slightly. Since when did he start noticing these things? Looking away to set his eyes on the TV in front of them, he sensed his heart beating at an usual rhythm, palpitating, and along with it came slight lightheadedness. Was he having a heart attack? Were these signs of atrial fibrillation? Or was this simply the start of an anxiety attack? Surely any of these would be more...recognisable, to say the least. The only situation he could think of with similar reactions was when one would develop a crush. A fucking crush? At his age? How old was he, ten? “Earth to Corpse? Please don’t tell me you’re one of those people who sleep with their eyes open, that’s fucking creepy.” Her finger snaps pulled him out of whatever trance he was in. “Sorry, were you saying something?” “I asked you if you had watched Bly Manor like three times. You were very far away.” she answered, emitting a few giggles. “Sorry, I uh- I was thinking of something, but it’s stupid. And no, I haven’t, I’ve been meaning to, though.” And just like that, they settled on the show they were going to watch for the next couple of weeks.

━

“NOOOOOOO,” (Y/N) yelled, voicing her defeat “WHAT THE FUCK KIND OF LUCK IS THIS.” Corpse lay on the floor, slamming his palm down onto it out of hysterical laughter. They had been playing Unmatched for the past hour, this being their third round, and after many cards and a level of tension that could only be cut through with a saw, his Robin Hood had finally defeated her Alice. It was Corpse’s first time playing, so to say that his winning of all three games was a crushing moment for her was an understatement. “This is not normal, you lied saying you’ve never played before!” she pouted, putting everything back into the box, “I’m usually really good at this game.”

He wiped the tears from his eyes, struggling to keep a good composure. “I’m sorry, I guess I’ve found my talent,” he joked, but he did feel bad for stealing her thunder, “Would it make you feel better if I said that my Robin Hood is, like, extremely hurt right now? You have a fucking gigantic knife as a weapon, I only have, like, a bow and arrow. That’s kind of unfair.” (Y/N) bit her lip in hesitation, then picked up her figurine and lightly tapped it along the table to approach his. Putting Alice at a slight angle, she made a kissing sound as to imitate her character smooching his. “There, a kiss to make it better. I promise not to hurt you too much if you let me win next time.” 

The same strange feeling he had experienced for the first time two months ago, when they were sitting on the couch of her living room, and many more times after that, had come back. He would’ve blamed it on heartburn, except it was nothing like it. It wasn’t anything he was used to. “Hey, you alright?” (Y/N) furrowed her brows in concern “You’ve been doing that a lot lately, rubbing your chest like that.” Fuck. He had never noticed the habit he had developed. “I’m fine, just me and my heart problems, nothing unusual.” Filthy liar. Brows still furrowed, she moved closer to him and, with her legs tucked under her, she put her hand above his heart to check. “Jesus, Corpse, your heart is going a million miles per hour! Are you sure you’re okay?”

Looking up at him, she noticed how red he had suddenly become, and this worried her even more. “Bubs, you’re literally changing colours.” How did she expect him not to when she was doing this? (Y/N) further inspected his condition and put the back of her hand on his forehead, then his cheeks, to check his temperature. Expectedly, he was getting warmer. She stopped for a second and listened intently, only to hear his shallow breathing fill the silence. She then glanced down at his left hand resting on his thigh, and surely enough, found it trembling. “Alright, Corpse? Hey, can you hear me?”

His breathing only picked up its pace as the seconds went by. On the spur of the moment, (Y/N) placed herself in front of him, her legs on either side, and gently cradled his head. “Corpse, darling, I’m gonna need you to look at me, okay? Focus on me, focus on my breathing, mm?” He forced himself to tear his gaze away from the ground and did as he was told, eyes darting around, analysing her expression. He’s never found himself having an attack in her presence, it was surprising how well she was handling it.

Wait- darling? Bubs? “Now, can you name four things that you see? Can you do that for me?” He briefly scanned the room for answers, his mind still cluttered. “The fridge, the couch, the light and-” Did she mean to call him that? It was probably nothing, she could be using it with any of her friends for all he knew. He wasn’t special. “and the game, the board game. On the table.” “Good, now can you name three things you hear?” This one took a lot of concentration, there weren’t many obvious sounds for him to point out. “The motorcycle outside, your hands rubbing against my skin, uh-” What the fuck else? Was he losing his mind? The task was simple enough, why was he having so much trouble with it? “I’m sorry, I- I don’t hear anything else.” “No, it’s okay. You’re doing splendid, see? Your breathing is much more stable.” she reassured him, squeezing his upper arms.

“Lastly, can you give me two things you can smell?” Nodding, he closed his eyes. “The coffee you drank earlier.” It took him a moment to come up with something else, and just as she was about to get off of his lap, figuring he had done a good enough job, she heard him mumble “your perfume”. Scared he’d get another attack, Corpse avoided looking into her eyes, which he could feel the gaze of. He only picked up on the scent from her shifting closer in the last second. “That’s funny, I had forgotten to put perfume on this morning.” 

[drabbles-of-writing]

Reverse Au! Dump

Don’t mind my idea dumping here. Brain decided to have fun while I was at work and I have too many wips as it is, so… Thought I’d ask before I dumped, experience. Used morningmark’s comics as a base, so if you want reference. Now this isn’t all that well compiled, but here it goes.

~

Magic in the Other World is varied as it is crazy. So many styles over the generations and not a lot of organization. There are some that try to categorize it all, but that works as well as you’d expect. Some were lost, some erased, some weren’t passed down/recorded because “the power is all mine! Ahahaha!” It took a lot of time and collaboration, but eventually a sort of system was installed to help out. Still a lot of work to do, but its a step forward. Nowadays the term Wild Magic is generally reserved for those that aren’t all that well documented and understood.

Some Magics are very powerful and desirable, but also tend to be very high risk/high reward, kinda pass/fail, pretty literally Do or Die most times. So not a lot of people can use those or are even willing to. Story says this one guy named Odin hung himself on a massive tree by his own spear for nine days, no food water or rest in constant pain before he could unlock the secret of Runes. But it’s also said he gouged out his own eye to drink from the Well of Wisdom so… 

There are lots of different ways to channel magic too: wands, staves, jewelry, certain gems, familiars, potions, enchanted armaments, chants, scripts, etc. Each tool has its own advantages and disadvantages and play into a Witches’ style. Every Witch has at least two methods of spellcasting. Only children have one. Haven’t thought of how Luz gets her Palisman though. Maybe its one of those magic Artifacts like Dr. Strange’s cloak, Elder Wand, Thor’s hammer, or a Green Lantern’s Ring. Something that can’t be recreated because the secret is lost, materials no longer exist, too hard/dangerous to make, accident that can’t be recreated, etc. Happens more often than people like.

Camilla is sometimes called the Blue Witch. She’s a healer by heart and trade, but push her and she will become a one Witch Battleship. Bismark who? Aaaaand she just deleted a whole battalion. And the fortress behind them. Hide me. There are the very rare occasions, like count on one hand rare, when someone near and dear to her heart is in trouble that she takes up her other job. She’s especially terrifying when she decides to torture, those who know how to heal the body know best how to break it. Many shades of Blue, some are very close to Black. She doesn’t necessarily hate Humans exactly, but doesn’t have the highest of regard from past experiences.

Luz has training and is a proficient Witch for her age. Camilla and her father were adamant about having a general knowledge/skillset alongside her specialized skill. Jack of all trades and a master of none, still better than a master of one. She has gone through the system for her magic with varying success. Oracle magic? Zero talent. Bard classes? She can play an instrument, but can’t sing at the same time. When she does sing she tires too hard and messes up. It’s only when she doesn’t try, like absently singing along with a song or playing by her heart, that she’s good at it. Beasts? Can use them, but would rather play with them. Bleeding heart and all that. She does have a good handle on healing magic partly due to Camilla drilling necessary skills into her and partly osmosis. Her father arranged for some CQC lessons from an old friend of his which the girl loved. You get the idea. It wasn’t until she discovered Glyphs that she found her niche and her skills took off. Glyphs are one of those ‘eccentric’ or 'archaic’ styles since they haven’t been used in so long after being lost and are barely understood. She still has a long way to go, but she is on her way.

Luz never really had much in the way of friends, partly cuz of high profile parents which leads to certain pressures and a target on her head, partly because of her magic style and personality, and partly because of the trouble been going on. Luz grew up her whole life with this tension of a group of anarchists trying to burn society that’s just trying to do the right thing. The anarchists started small, but have been a growing problem the past few decades with talk how to 'reshape the world’ in not a good way. Anyone with critical thinking skills can tell this is a bad idea, but they are too brainwashed to notice. They harass anyone who doesn’t follow their rhetoric and attack anyone who even questions them. Luz’s parents put a real kink in a lot of their plans for years, which makes Luz guilty by association. 

Luz got caught in one of those sudden larger scuffles and was accidentally chucked/blown through a portal created by an attempted tactical retreat that went off course. Hence why she can’t go home because she hasn’t learned how to do portals yet. Those are high level anyway so how did these guys pull it off so easily? Luz has a hard time blending in obviously. Learning how to use a phone was a fun endeavor. Internet was a trip. Luz is amazed how these people can do all this cool stuff without magic. Keep a low profile sure, she can pass off as a weird out of town kid. Keep the beanie on, underperform in gym and stuff because some things don’t change, like genetics. Someone sharp eyed will see discrepancies. The Beanie has a small Glamor spell built in that covers her witchy traits but she forgot the ears which is why it sits like it does. Luz can erase memories in case she has an accident, but it’s less of a 'remove my face from this picture with a scalpel’, and more of a 'lemme just hack off the past hour or three from your brain with an axe.’ If she tries to take any more then she starts burning into some more dangerous territory and those Wiped are groggy and disoriented for a while after already. Then the magic attacks start happening and her heroic instinct/anti-bystander complex kicks in and there goes that. It runs in the family so Camilla isn’t surprised in the slightest when she finds out.

“Oh titan, why did you curse me with another me?” “I’m right here Mami!”

Eda has a shack very akin to Grunkle Stan. Lots of junk that Lilith can’t believe that people are dumb enough to buy. She’s also involved in some not so legal dealings on the side. Well, Eda isn’t actually hurting anybody and the tax dollars she should be paying would only go towards some politicians’ next yacht or another pointless overseas 'investment’ instead of where it’s supposed to go so. Eda does give some good intel on occasion and a place to vent so Lillith overlooks her. Lil’s more of the secret police for witches and a petty crook isn’t part of her job anyway. Eda understands Luz’s predicament and is willing to help. The cover story is that Camilla work in hospitals and has to work crazy hours while her dad passed away so is living with Eda for a while. King is that kind of critter that grew up weird and acts like ten different animals all the time.

Gus is the nerdy kid who infodumps on everybody, even if they’re not listening. Loves anything fantasy/sci-fi related and plays Minecraft too. A good kid at heart, but needs some social skills. Keep him away from anything more sugary than tea. Luz learned a lot listening to him. Not all of it is entirely useful, but still. Some of his ramblings give her some good ideas for magic and stuff, like putting Glyphs on cards.

The Blights are the cool rich kids obviously, and have some discipline and social issues. Big family name makes them intimidating for normies and a meal ticket for the unsavory. These kids need real friends. They decided to act out to get some attention from the parents who then decided to ignore them. “If you’re going to act like a child tantrum, get treated like one.” Ed is perfect for Drama classes, if he were allowed to partake. Can’t decide what Em is great at, hacking perhaps? Amity’s car is an inheritance from the only family to treat her as such Twins aside, even if she’s too young to remember it. She only remembers that she has feelings surrounding the car. All three of them were pretty impressed with Luz for standing up to them, calling them out on their shit, and not giving a crap about their family name. Being treated like a normal person is pretty weird. Can we get her to do that again?

Amity tried dating Boscha once, didn’t work out very well. Boscha is still hurting over Amity’s comment of “I’d rather go date the new weird kid (Luz) than go back to you.” It’s one of the reasons she goes after Luz. She has that kind of Bud personality from Spider Man, feels lesser and so acts out so much. 

“Wow, this new Witch is amazing. Not as cool as the original Witch.”

“What is it with the Witch with you?”

“Oh, she’s a hero. Looks out for the city and the little guy. She inspires me. Makes me want to be a bigger person. *sees Luz* What’s up Luz-er?”

~

And that’s what I got right now. I know there was more, but it’s lost to the void right now. Might come back later, maybe not. Lemme know what you think.

............

DAMN you weren’t lying when you said you had an info-dump this is *chefs kiss* you got me intrigued now

[ey8508]

Hidden Weapon [暗器迷局]

Rumors and Secrets: Li Zeyan (李泽言）| Victor

Li Zeyan SSR: A Great Secret

【 Everyone wanted to know how he sat on the highest chair with confidence.】

Note:

R&S for this card (CG above)

Chapter SPOILERS up to Season 2: Chapter 6-9 (read at your own risk)

Contains 5 chapters

Translation isn’t 100% accurate (or include grammar errors)

Every part for LZ’s dialogue would be in “this setting”

Do not repost to any other site (reblog is fine)

Chapter 1 Page 1 BLACK SWAN Investigation Log. Permission level: normal Name: Small syringe experiment Experiment recorder: Senior Experiment Researcher Jagger Experiment contents: [Day1] Investigated the illegal drug "small syringe" that is popular in the underground market and secretly went undercover. Page 2 .... [Day4] Send a preliminary investigation report to the BOSS, and receive a reply instruction. Nox will take the lead in handling this task, and everything will be under her command. [Day5] Seized samples of suspected small syringes from special channels. [Day6] The sensory organs can’t distinguish the components of the sample, and decided to make the injection. The experiment risk: high.  This application was rejected by Nox on the spot. [Day7] The experiment sample is missing. [Day8] Received BOSS order, this experiment was terminated and abolished. Page 3 This is the first time Jagger has been frustrated in an experiment since joining BLACK SWAN. Fortunately, before he became a BS member, his life has not been smooth, so he can bear it. Since he was young, he discovered that his Evol distinguishes chemical components through his body, he has been struggling to become a scientific researcher.  It's just that he behaves badly and has a violent personality, getting narrower and narrower in his career.  Finally, after conducting an experiment that violated the bottom line of ethics and morality, he was jointly expelled from academia and was not allowed to step into the laboratory for life. Page 4 The night when the people from BS found him, he was living alone in a warehouse somewhere in the suburbs.  So he picked up the beer can beside him and slammed "What BS! Don't bother me!" Looking at Jagger on the ground like a puddle of mud, the member had to take out his mobile phone and made a brief report to his superiors. "....Okay, understood, I'll start preparing now ." He hung up the phone, took out a delicately designed holographic projection metal box from his arms, and placed it in the open space in the middle of the warehouse.  A few minutes later, I only heard the box "drop" shooting a blue light from the dot in the center. After the light shot up and down in the air for a circle, a slender shape figure slowly emerged. Page 5 Jagger narrowed his eyes and looked at the holographic projection in front of him, and saw a man sitting on a leather chair, his entire face hidden in the shadows, only his bright leather shoes and neat suit trousers could be seen. Jagger couldn't help but spit into the air. "What is this shameful sight!" As soon as the voice fell, the BS member beside him looked up at him almost immediately and even took two steps closer.  Jagger shrinks his neck subconsciously. "Look- " Page 6 The man in the projection knocked on the armrest of the chair twice, and the member immediately retracted his gaze and stood back to where he was before. "As far as I know, you were jointly expelled from academia three years ago and you are forbidden to participate in any experiment for life." The man spoke slowly, his voice low, but he revealed an unstoppable momentum. "So what?" "BLACK SWAN can give you the opportunity to re-enter the laboratory" Page 7 "Heh, BLACK SWAN is so famous, so many eyes are staring at it in the society, once my name appears in the laboratory, someone will immediately take notice and you'll be in trouble." "Who said that your name will appear in the laboratory?" "How do you contradict yourself? You said that BS gave me a chance to re-enter the laboratory, and you said that my name would not appear in the laboratory. Could it be you," said Jagger. His eyes suddenly widened. "Giving you a new identity is not difficult for BS." Chapter 2 Page 1 The turbidity in Jagger's eyes lit up instantly.  He opened his mouth and didn't know what to say. "Since you have some knowledge of BS, it is not difficult to know that BS's social resources are top-notch. BS's power is more than enough to support you to do experiments and..." Although he couldn't see the man's face clearly, Jagger felt the man's direct gaze. "Join BS, the worst situation is better than you are now." Page 2 Jagger realized that this holographic projection is a bidirectionally visible BS technology that has already reached this level of advancement. He lowered his head and glanced at himself, his face suddenly hot.  After the man behind the barrier said these words he slightly cleared his throat as he raised his hands signaling to cut off the phone. Blood instantly rushed to the top of Jagger's head, and he unwillingly picked fresh from the opponent. "Since BS is so powerful, why should the superior BS leader had to invite a little man with a poor clothes?" In such a big pomp, he had guessed the identity of the opponent just now, and he broke this point, it was just a momentary quick guess. The other party's movements seemed to give a chuckle. Page 3 "For talents, I will do my best." The tone was steady, without a trace of irritation. Jagger suddenly felt that he had lost in the game. But it is precisely because of this sentence that he willingly joined BS. It takes seven inches to strike a snake. This is the first thing Jagger learned from the BOSS. But that was the only time Jagger had direct contact with the BOSS. After joining BS, he never saw the BOSS again. Not only him, but almost all the members around him.  Perhaps it was the first meeting with the BOSS that left a deep impression on Jagger, and when he has nothing to do, he put this sentence on his lips- Page 4 "Have you seen the BOSS? I mean, the BOSS himself." The member who was asked was stunned for a moment: "How is it possible? Seeing BOSS is like seeing an ancient dragon. I heard that even during the board meeting he's behind the barrier and no one can see him at all. In our organization, I heard that there is only one person who have actually seen him. Jagger nodded, indicating that he knew this person: "You mean Nox?" The other party sneered: "Don't call them just by their code names, we are below them, but we call them with the honorable 'Miss' " Jagger was puzzled, and the man came immediately interested. Page 5 "Don't tell it to others. I have something else to tell you..." The member looked around again, then lowered his voice, "They all said that the relationship between BOSS and her is unusual. Although the they remain anonymous from the outside world, BOSS is often doing things from behind the scenes to maintain Nox. Some time ago, have you heard about the leak of the Evolver identity of artists under Nox? It is said that after this incident, many board members asked to punish Nox at the meeting, but they were all blocked by BOSS. Jagger snorted, but didn't answer.  Although he is very curious about the identity of BOSS, he has never been interested in this kind of gossip. Chapter 3 Page 1 Soon after this conversation, Jagger was appointed to join the investigation and experiment of the illegal drug "Small Syringe", and the leader of this mission was Nox. He was in trouble for a while, not because he discriminated against women, but since joining BS, BOSS closed one eye to his "pioneer" experimental methods. At least, his experiments have been carried out very freely. However, Nox's acting style is notoriously conservative. If she is told that he is doing bold experiments, she should be taken earlier notice. In addition, if the relationship between Nox and BOSS is really unusual according to what the member said last time, then Nox's opinion will be adopted by the BOSS, she is 'a hot potato'. He has to seek the consent of the BOSS before Nox can stop him. So he pretended not to know, and after obtaining the preliminary investigation results, he sent the investigation report to the BOSS as usual, but he did not expect to receive an immediate reply: Page 2 "Nox will take the lead in handling this task, and everything will be under her direction." The next day, the informant sent a sample that was suspected to be a small syringe. He flexed his hands and went to his head for a while. First, he experimented with the sample by smell and taste, but he could not distinguish its components. So he made a decision to inject the samples to himself.  After deliberation, he asked Nox for instructions. Sure enough, he was directly rejected by Nox on the spot. Out of desire for the results of this experiment, he decided to lie about the loss of the sample and intend to conduct the experiment secretly.  Unexpectedly, he was caught by the BS inspection team that night, and even reported the situation to the BOSS himself the next day. Jagger didn’t expect to see BOSS again, this is actually the case. Page 3 "Since the application has been rejected, why did you still do it?" 

A familiar voice came from behind the barrier, mixed with a trace of fatigue. "It stands to reason that I can perform general drug component analysis from sight, taste, touch or smell alone, but the composition of this sample is complicated, hence these are not enough. If I allow injection, once the sample enters my blood,  I can feel the state of its movement in my body. Through my body's reaction, it should be possible to analyze it." "Do you know why Nox rejected your proposal to do the self injection for the samples?" Page 4 "This is because there is only one sample. If there is no experimental progress after the injection, all the efforts will be ruined." "She checked your information. Every time your body is injected with a drug, it will cause irreparable damage. It will not take long for you to die in this type of experiment." Jagger was stunned. "Although BS is in a critical position, it never needs to use the lives of any members as a stepping stone." "This experiment stops here." Page 5 "Also, Nox's orders, should not be disobeyed anymore." .... After the meeting with the boss, Jagger's heart was mixed, and he sat in place and meditated for a long time. It's just that the brain, which has been in contact with the most direct chemical elements all his life, will not know this inexplicable emotion. However, he knew very well that this BS 'Miss' was indeed a bit capable. Chapter 4 Page 1 BLACK SWAN meeting minutes Permission level: advanced Recorder of the meeting: Member of the board of directors, Assistant Mr. W. Content of meeting: Page 2 【Previously, the "small syringe" incident set off a huge wave in society. This meeting mainly focused on "whether BS should develop a drug similar to the small syringe O-tube". During the meeting, some members expressed support for this approach, believing that BS, as an organization centered around Evolver and human evolution, should take the lead in researching such drugs to screen ordinary people and accelerate human evolution. Another part of the members believes that it is too early to invest in development projects before investigating the main cause of the small syringe incident and the role of the drug, and even BS should crack down on the market value of small needles from all aspects to restrain such cases. Drugs are being re-developed to fundamentally eliminate such drugs. Page 3 The two voices stayed at each other during the meeting. In the end, the BOSS decided to investigate the small syringe incident first and postponed the development of such drugs indefinitely. 】 From the beginning of this meeting, Mr. W's heart has been hanging. Since the introduction of the small syringe, the internal voice of BS has become noisy, and those desires that have been hidden have begun to move around. Many people want to get a share of the small syringe. However, what worries him is not these noisy sounds, but the thoughts of the person behind the barrier.  If that person also thinks that the power of BS is enough to develop EVOL!  Evolution potion, then the road behind BS may be even more difficult. Page 4 Mr. W looked at the faint figure behind the barrier, and seemed to be sitting upright and calmly at the moment.  Even though there was a verbal battle in the conference room, the man always looked like he was out of the picture. Until a member spoke: "I don't know about this, what is the BOSS's opinion?" Everyone finally calmed down and looked at the barrier at the end of the round table. Mr. W leaned forward unconsciously, and had to admit that he was looking forward to know what the BOSS would answer. .... When the young BOSS first took over the office, Mr. W also had a questioning attitude. Page 5 After all, BS had just experienced a mighty internal turmoil at that time. Whether the BOSS was a hero created by the time or whether it was really capable of this position, no one knew. In addition, BOSS has never announced his identity since he took the office. Except for Nox, no one has seen him in the entire BS. Whether it is the core mysterious high-level Twelve or the board of directors, they can only communicate with him through a barrier, which has caused dissatisfaction among many members. These people formed a small group in a very short period of time, trying to pull him into the abyss before the BOSS sits firmly on the throne of the BS leader. Before they did it, even in the early days of their small group, they had already been taken up by the BOSS.  He quickly uprooted the group and carried out a cleanup inside BS. Overnight, these people disappeared from BS without a shadow. Page 6 Mr. W has inquired about the whereabouts of these people through various channels, but has never found any clues. These people seem to have never existed in this world. Mr. W still remembers that in the earliest meeting after the small group was eliminated, the BOSS was silent for a long while. After sometime, many people who had been eager to move in their hearts and had not had time to put it into practice almost lost their breath. The person behind the barrier spoke: "The remaining few people who plan to instigate rebellion, the reason why you are left is because you are still helpful to BS." "Take care of the extra hands and feet within three days, don't let me do it myself." Page 7 As soon as the voice fell, many of the people present changed their faces slightly. Fortunately, he was used to looked calm under such situations. After re-adjusting the rigid posture, he realized that there was actually cold sweat behind his back. Since then, the noisy sounds inside BS have finally quieted down. Mr. W began to appreciate the decisive decisions made by the BOSS and is actually celebrating with the new change. Page 8 But that was the only time Mr. W heard such obvious emotions in the mouth of the BOSS.  Later, many meetings were held in BS. He observed that no matter what level of personnel the questioning voice was, whether they agreed with the other party’s point of view, BOSS always respected the other’s point of views and stood at a higher level. Neither makes people too ugly, nor does it show one's position too much. This allowed the members of the organization that had always been fighting to put down the war for a while, and the internal balance of BS reached an unprecedented balance. Mr. W believes that at the age of BOSS, few people can do this. Put aside the identity of a member of the BS organization, Mr. W has never seen such a method in business for so many years. If you have to name someone who can be compared with him, Li Zeyan, the president of Huarui, has a style similar to that of BOSS. It was not that he had never suspected that it was the same person, but no matter how he investigated and inquired, the information he got was very few. Chapter 5 Page 1 Maybe he stayed in a high position for too long, and there was nothing new to pass the time, so Mr. W gradually regarded the inquiring of the boss as his personal task. In addition to trying his best to investigate the identity that matches it in society, he will deliberately talk against the BOSS during meetings in an attempt to find clues.  However, no matter how he made a fuss, the people behind the barrier will always stay calm and undisturbed. As the leader of BS, BOSS can handle everything without any leakage. Page 2 At first Mr. W just felt dull. But over time, as an older member, he found that this was a serious problem. He realized that there seems to be a certain trait missing from the BOSS, which is a human commonality that any ordinary person should have. If you have to be clear, you can call this trait a human touch. For a while, this is indeed not a great thing, but it is precisely because this thing is so common, so precious enough. Mr. W is worried that people who lack this trait will not sit in the position of leader for too long, or that such person will once again lead BS to an extreme. Page 3 "What is my opinion, it is up to you to convince me." The deep voice pulled his thoughts back to the meeting room, and seeing the other members in deep thoughts, he realized that the BOSS had just answered the question of the member just now. He lowered his head and modified the voice in his heart a bit, then raised his hand signaling to speak. "What we should do now is to figure out the ins and outs of the main incident, who developed the small syringe and for what purpose the opponent is an enemy or a friend. These key information are very important." Page 4 After hearing this, many members tried to refute, but they were preempted by the BOSS. "All the resources of BS have always revolved around Evolver's evolutionary issues. At this time, instead of developing evolutionary drugs, they are investigating small syringes. Is it not upside-down?" Members supporting the research and development of drugs echoed. Mr. W's heart sank. Does the BOSS support the development of such drugs? He tried to swallow the suspicion that was surging up, and couldn't help but tried to make an excuse. Page 5 "On the contrary. At this stage, ordinary people already have a lot of opposition to Evolver. In addition, after the main incident, many ordinary people and Evolver's body have suffered varying degrees of damage. The development of small syringes is very powerful. It may come with a hostile attitude. In the long run, Evolver evolution is a major event for all human beings. If we do not investigate clearly and blindly follow the trend to develop evolutionary drugs, then we are likely to fall into each other’s trap. It'll makes things difficult for BS to move forward with evolution in the future." Page 6 Perhaps he said too much. Once again, there was silence in the conference room, only the sound of regular fingers tapping on the tabletop came from behind the barrier, which sounded a certain kind of calmness. Mr. W has a foreboding that perhaps BS's development of evolutionary drugs is already a certainty, and perhaps his painstaking persuasion is just futile. Just when he was frustrated, the sound of the man's fingers tapping on the tabletop stopped. "The reason is good enough to convince me." "The development date for the evolution drugs will be postponed indefinitely." The meeting room became noisy again, and many members were angry. Page 7 "I said, my decision is determined by your rhetoric." "Of course I respect different opinions. As long as your reasons are valid." Those members who had been crying out to support the development of the drug were hesitating at this moment, and could not give a reason strong enough to bring the situation back, and had to accept their orders and took their seats. "Since there isn't, that's it for today." The BOSS issued an eviction order and the meeting room was cleared within a minute.

Page 8 Only Mr. W is still sitting on the spot, he has an important question that he wants to confirm to the BOSS. "BOSS, what is your side of position in this matter?" The BOSS seemed to stand up, walked behind the chair, and finally stood by the window behind the barrier. "My position has been made very clear." Mr. W walked out of the conference room with this answer, which was not an answer. Page 9 The moment he stepped out of the door, he suddenly remembered that before he had a long discussion in the meeting, the BOSS raised a sharp question uncharacteristically.  This question seems to be on the side of the members who support the drug, but it was after answering this question that the BOSS was quickly ‘convinced’ by his own reasons. Mr. W stood there thinking for a moment, then he stretched his brows and frowned all day. It turned out that today, I was ‘utilized’ by the BOSS. Everything he said today was just that the BOSS used his own mouth to silence other members. But this kind of use is very useful. Page 10 After thinking about this, Mr. W let out a long breath. The problem he had been worried about had been settled.

[wonderlustlucas]

four - hwang hyunjin

⇢ prompt They say good things come in fours. Who? Couldn’t tell you, but they especially do during Christmas. Maybe that’s just Saint Nick. ⇢ pairing hyunjin x female reader ⇢ word count 11.7k ⇢ genre fluff ⇢ warnings swearing. mentions of alcohol & s e x. teenagerz being teenagerz. insane amount of fluff & stupidity. kind of ends w a smutty cliffhanger. ⇢ summary After suppressing how you felt about Hyunjin back in high school, you thought you were done going back on your feelings. Turns out, a little time apart, the spirit of Christmas, and an accidental nap is the perfect cocktail for falling in love with your best friend.—friends to lovers!au ⇢ a/n hello & merry christmas! here is a gift for you all on this very merry day. also, thank you for 1,000 followers! that in itself is one of the best presents i could ask for. thank you for all your kindness & support on my blog & for following me in the first place! it truly means so much to me. i hope you enjoy reading! ♥︎

big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇[now] Sorry! I just woke up

big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇[now] Whats wrong fool

big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇[now] Did u rlly think 12 texts were gonna wake me up?🤦🏻‍♂️ godt damn u on some WACK shit

You roll your eyes in time with each consecutive text that Hyunjin sends, waiting for the lock screen of your phone to blacken after reading them. He’s about as useless as pedals on a wheelchair, you think, ignoring the texts and forcing the device into the snug back pocket of your jeans before transferring the last two excessively packed grocery bags into the trunk of your car with an exhausted huff. Christ, if the bagging lady put one more item in those bags, she would be the one to blame for six cans of soup rolling about the parking lot.

The license plate rattles when you slam the trunk lid closed before hurrying around to the driver’s side and anxiously hopping inside to start blasting the heat. It is obnoxiously chilly for the first of September. Well, not really. Your body is just beginning to get used to the ungodly wrath of summer’s sweltering heat leaving you in a constant state of sweat and nausea for the past three months. Not that you’re complaining, of course. You nearly did somersaults of joy when the morning news reported a temperature of sixty-one degrees with some wind gusts and welcomed the beginning signs of autumn with open arms.

You would never admit to Mom who told yo uon the way out to change out of a tank top or at least wear a jacket, but yes— you are, in fact, cold. But now you have godsent warmth blowing from the vents and the seat warmer on its highest setting beginning to thaw away the goosebumps painted on your skin. Giving your arms one last rub, you lean up enough to retrieve your phone and open the conversation with Hyunjin.

[2:37 PM] YN: please. smell my balls

[2:37 PM] YN: nothings wrong btw. i was GOING to ask if u wanted any specific snacks for tn buttttt someone didn’t answer

[2:37 PM] YN: and excuse u i called too. i may be an idiot but im not stupid

[2:38 PM] YN: ik u would never hear a text when ur having wet dreams of yeji

You stop there with a smug smirk when the three dots on his side appear, knowing you’ve hit his funny bone with this one.

[2:38 PM] big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇: Bruh

[2:38 PM] big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇 :I’ve literally never have had a wet dream ab Yeji pls stop

You cannot fight your shit-eating grin, thumbs circling over the keyboard in thought as he apparently deletes whatever other text he was going to send when the three dots disappear.

[2:38 PM] YN: mmhmmmm

[2:38 PM] YN: because last time you slept over you weren’t whimpering her name in ur sleep

[2:38 PM] YN: sureeeee

You decide to end your teasing there and continue once you’re home. It is starting to get late, after all, and Mom will begin to worry that the creepy employee always in aisle sixteen has abducted you. Plus, you’re cruel and like to watch Hyunjin suffer. Switching the ringer off, you throw your phone into the cupholder and drastically lower the heat and turn off the seat warmer. It’s starting to feel like a sauna in here, and not in a fun way. Can’t understand how anyone enjoys hanging out in a sauna to begin with anyway, but to each their own, you guess.

In the five-minute drive it takes until you are pulling into the driveway, Hyunjin calls three times. He is incredibly peeved at your lack of a response to his distressed texts and still wound up from your text about Yeji. As if! You’re already a clown not realizing his ever-growing affections for you, but to think he had a crush on Yeji? You’re the whole damn circus!

By the time he calls a fifth time, now sat up on his elbow in bed and strumming an annoyed beat of his fingers at his thigh because he really just wants to yell at you for being the most annoying person alive (and maybe to hear your voice, too), you have brought in the last of the bags and look to Mom who has started to put the groceries away and expects you to half-heartedly do the same.

“It’s Hyunjin. He’s having an existential crisis because I haven’t answered his texts,” you explain to her, unenthusiastically holding your phone as it vibrates against your palm. Half of you wants her to ask to finish putting everything away first just so you can torture him even longer. Alas, such extravagant wishes are denied, because when it comes to Hyunjin, your parents would undoubtedly throw you under the bus just to keep that boy happy. And so, just like any other time, Mom’s undying love for Hyunjin has her dismissing you from the kitchen with a hearty laugh.

“Jesus Christ! What?” You hiss, halfway up the stairs when you tap to answer his call on the last ring.

“Wow! Look who finally decided to answer!” Hyunjin shouts back, the swoosh of his sheets once he finally falls back against his pillow again rustling all too loudly through the phone. “I was driving,” you spit, marching into your bedroom and collapsing against your bed, the same rustle of your blankets sounding loudly into his ear. “There’s a thing called the speaker, ___. Ever heard of it?” He retorts, evidently shutting you up and he knows he won this round if your silence is anything to go by.

“Whatever,” you groan, using all your toe strength to kick the sneakers off your feet by their soles, “what was so important that you couldn’t wait and had to call me five billion times?”

“I had a question. And you hurt my feelings.” Well, shit. You can practically hear and see his pout through the phone and your heart positively swells in your chest at how undeniably, unjustifiably cute he is. You sigh.

“I’m sorry for making fun of you about Yeji. I’m going to do it again but next time I promise I won’t pull the wet dream card,” you apologize frankly; because, in all honesty, it would be worse to say you are not going to do it again when you most certainly will. Bullying Hyunjin is fun, what can you say?

Hyunjin heaves an exasperated breath from his lungs because he knows there is no point in arguing with quite possibly the most sarcastic human he knows and that’s the best form of an apology he’s going to get. Whatever. He’ll make sure to wipe his morning snot and droll on your shirt in the morning. “Anyway,” he grumbles, in the background you hear Kkami bark from a few rooms over, “I was going to ask if you wanted to come over my place instead? I know your parents probably want to see me and stuff but mine are out of town for the night so we can sleep in my bed until like three without Mom waking us up to force feed breakfast.” You roll your eyes. Of course your parents want to see him.

“Plus, Mom just put that grey comforter I know you really like on my bed so we can cuddle all night and watch stuff on YouTube,” he quickly adds as a convincing afterthought. He’s really got his sales pitch going on this one. Truth is, you have only slept in his bed with that stupidly soft blanket twice last winter break, but it’s still sweet that he remembers how much you loved it (aka how quickly you fell asleep and how grumpy you were being woken up because it’s just that darn cozy). Either way, you would never pass up an opportunity to snuggle up with Hyunjin in the comfort of his own bed with his citrusy, floral scent on the pillows luring you to sleep.

“My Mom is going to be heartbroken, Hyunjin,” you tease, “but who cares. You had me sold at sleeping until three. Do you still want me to bring the snacks I got?”

“Oh, thank God. I love your Mom’s cooking but I haven’t left bed all day and I really want to keep it that way. And yes, please. I’ve been eating dry cereal for the past two hours.”

“Hyunjin, have you brushed your teeth yet?”

“No. Didn’t you just hear me? I said I’ve been in bed all day. Eating cereal. When would I have brushed my teeth?”

“You’ve officially taken breakfast in bed to a whole new level, Jin. I’ll see you in a few hours. Oh, and please, you have no concept of personal space so make sure you brush your teeth before I come over.”

“Yeah, yeah. Whatever. Love ya, bye,” Hyunjin promptly hangs up, probably eager to get back to binging whatever drama he’s watching before you lecture him about his hygiene again. Not that it matters, anyway; chances are, it went in one ear and right out the other and you’re going to drag him out of bed later to brush his teeth.

Damn. You didn’t even get the chance to say love you back. Not that it matters.

It doesn’t, you quickly shut down the pesky thought that keeps you up at night and force it back into the storage part of your brain labeled ‘Deal with Later,’ because, really, you’ll have to think about that later. It’s not that you don’t want to think about it yet… you just don’t have the time to stop and really figure out what your feelings toward Hyunjin actually are. Yeah. That’s it.

And now isn’t the time, you tell yourself, scooting up the mattress in order to bury your face in the pillows to suffocate the pounding throb in your head. Hyunjin is nothing special.

Well, no. That’s a lie. Everything about Hyunjin is special. Anyone with eyes, ears, even a nose can sense that. You had quickly found out just how wonderful he is when you met him freshman year of high school. At the time, he was everyone’s sweetheart by the first day, but it just so happened his eyes were all on you.

He was obviously adorable, and every class you had together he always made a point to talk to you and returned your sarcasm with an impressive level of expertise. So, when it came to him asking you to the first homecoming, the answer was yes without a second thought. But during the last slow dance of the night, with his hands gently holding your waist, he at last listened to his conscience and revealed that as much as he liked you, he truly did not want to date in high school. Or right then, at least. And honestly, you were glad; Hyunjin was quite possibly your favorite person you had met thus far, and you would have rather kept him as a friend than commit to a relationship the second month of school and risk losing him later down the road.

And boy, keep him as a friend you did. As it turned out, Hyunjin grew to be your truest, best friend in high school. Sure, you each had your own friend groups, but the two of you were the iconic pair everybody knew. But strictly platonic, despite the rumors and wishes that went around for the next four years. You like to think that neither of you ever developed feelings past what everyone feels toward their best friend— an innocent, wholesome sort of love.

But when had things changed? Hormones, as always, were definitely a big part of it. Hyunjin was always a cutie, but it wasn’t until he grew into his own skin and developed a newfound confidence did you start to see him differently. Until everyone saw him differently. Neither of you missed the way people stared him down, pupils dilating every time he ran his fingers through the black tufts of his hair, hearts aching for some sort of interaction. Or when you started attending parties, groups of girls would fling themselves at him in a blundering disarray, most of which he would turn down with a gentle dismissal that flew over their heads, too drunk to actually care.

But then there were times his dick made the decision for him, desperation and deprivation weighing in on him and you’d watch with a tight jaw as he’d leave the room with the pretty girl of the night skipping after him. You never realized it was only on those nights did you wind up in the back seat of Han Jisung’s car.

But even after the physical attraction sizzled out over time, things were not the same. Hyunjin wasn’t your hidden little treasure anymore. All eyes were set on him and it took more than a glass of water to swallow your jealousy. But why? Why were you so resentful all of a sudden?

It’s hard to share Hwang Hyunjin, you decided. Once established that you were his main hoe and he was yours, it became a significant burden watching others try and get in between. Not that they did it with a malicious attempt to separate you, but it still hurt. You’re selfish, and you admit it— Hyunjin, quite frankly, is the love of your life. Romantic or not, nothing could change your feelings toward him. It goes beyond his unfathomable beauty and spunky personality. Everything about him from his nose to his hands, to his distaste for onions and the way his face scrunches up when he lets out that giggle of his and even to the way he prefers to sleep against the wall but will force you to when you’re over so he can “protect you in case there’s a monster” all mount into this big, giant section of your heart set aside for Hyunjin.

So despite your efforts to ignore the pang of jealousy each time he would find a potential someone or the joy whenever he’d find his way back because “they kept wanting to hang out in the morning even though I said I don’t wake up before noon,” this Hyunjin-shaped hole in your heart seems to only grow the longer you ignore it. Kind of like every medical condition out there: the longer you ignore it, the worse it gets. So, basically Hyunjin is your heart disease.

Yikes. Sounds a lot worse when you try putting it into words.

Well, he won’t be your heart defect for long if he keeps ruining those pearly whites of his by only brushing once just before bed, you chuckle to yourself, rolling to your side at the sudden lack of oxygen between your face and the pillow. There’s a fleeting moment without thought when you unconsciously reach for your phone to check for any notifications before the fattest revelation of them all falls from the ceiling and smacks you right upside the face.

Shit. Looks like you’ve gone right ahead and totally dissected each and every fiber of your feelings for Hyunjin.

Blinking up at the ceiling, the weight of your emotions isn’t as heavy as you expected them to be. Instead, it’s more of a breath of fresh air, as if you have finally accepted the way things fell instead of ignoring them. Your feelings for Hyunjin have always been there. It just took a little effort to get them out.

Nevertheless, it is going to be difficult hanging out with him in a few hours with your exposed emotions still needing to be processed. Especially when he will pull you to his side and keep you nestled there the entire night. Rubbing your temples, you realize it will take some serious self-control to put everything on the back burner and just enjoy the time spent with Hyunjin.

Sighing, you check the time on your phone again. 3:21 and a text from Hyunjin asking if you could bring green tea.

“Mom!” You yell, defeated. “You were right!”

You used to think Hyunjin lived far away. Truthfully, he’s only fifteen minutes away if you go ten over the speed limit. But the only way to get to his house entails driving through the chaos of the mall and town center, which adds an extra ten minutes sitting through traffic no matter the time of day.

Now, Hyunjin’s college campus is two hours away. Well, technically five from you, since you’re almost three hours away in the opposite direction. So you’re lucky if you get to see him once a month with how hectic school becomes and how difficult it is trying to plan to come home the same weekend. Fortunately, it has worked out this semester. And while you should spend this time with your families, they know how much you crave one another’s company as the weeks drag on. The twenty-two minutes it takes getting to each other’s homes is totally worth it.

You expect Hyunjin to tell you to use the key hidden underneath the resin meditating frog statue in the front garden to unlock the front door when you text him you have arrived, but to your utmost surprise, he’s there, awake, to open the door for you.

“Stinky!” You yell, dropping your things on the floor to burry yourself in his embrace, standing on your tippy toes to wrap your arms around his neck in order to really get the full experience of hugging your favorite giant. “Poopy!” He shouts in return, long arms winding tightly around your waist and even going so far as to lift you up a few inches. God. Hate when he does that.

“Why are you up? I thought I’d have to let myself in with you sleeping all your problems away,” you ask, smiling gratefully when he bends down to pick up your bag. “I realized Kkami hadn’t been out all day, so I came down to let him out and find actual food,” Hyunjin explains as he makes way into the kitchen, opening the back door to let said dog back inside. “Aw, poor thing,” you pout, squatting to scratch at Kkami’s neck when he zooms faster than the speed of light to you, “does that mean you brushed your teeth?”

“I did, actually,” Hyunjin snorts right back, scrunching his nose at you before turning away to open the fridge. Sitting on the floor with Kkami in your lap, you take the opportunity to finally get a good look at Hyunjin now that he’s distracted. And of course, he looks good. Really good. Last time you saw him he still was a brunette, a look he rocked during the spring and summer months. This is the first time you’ve seen the freshly dyed black hair in person. Even though he always looks handsome, something about Hyunjin with black hair completely changes his aura. Brings back memories of how badly you wanted him in high school. You shiver at the thought.

And, to top it all off, how he manages to stay in such disgustingly good shape despite his atrocious eating habits never ceases to amaze you. Like, come on. The boy eats worse than a raccoon seven days out of the week, lives off boba, works out maybe five times a month, dances in his free time and still keeps his body in tiptop shape. God, you hate him. His pediatrician probably hates him, too. You even go as far as to sniff the fries in your dining hall and you gain five pounds.

Even now, he looks unnecessarily regal in the baggy material of his sweatpants and flannel. And the warmth of his kitchen’s ambient lighting does nothing to suppress the heavy thumping of your heart. So casual is his dress, yet how immaculate he looks rummaging the cabinets for a snack.

“Are you hungry?” He asks, the familiar softness of his voice shaking you from your daze as he closes the refrigerator door after his unsuccessful search. Here’s the thing: you really aren’t hungry, but Hyunjin clearly is, so if you say no then all he will be thinking about is food until you decide that you are hungry. “Yeah,” is what you say, nudging Kkami off your crossed legs to stand, “I brought green tea and a few snacks, but we could order Chinese food or something. The place near Dunkin’ and the gas station makes bubble tea now, too.”

Hyunjin’s brows shoot up, flashing his boxy smile. “Is it good?”

“I mean, I’ve only had their pork dumplings and mango tea before, and it was pretty good. I don’t know about their noodles or anything, though,” you shrug, moving to stand beside him at the kitchen island. Distracted by Kkami trying to jump onto the sofa in the living room, you don’t look to Hyunjin until the poor dog is successful in doing so. Startled to find him already gazing down at you, your heart truly is not prepared for him to go right ahead and wrap his arms around your waist, resting his chin on your shoulder. Totally not freaking out or trying to overthink his need to constantly cling, you justify his actions by quickly recalling the time he said, “My head is too godtdamn big for my godtdamn body.” More like his head is too heavy because instead of a brain it’s just a chunk of cement up there. He just needs to rest his head sometimes.

Yeah.

“Mm, I don’t know,” Hyunjin hums, swaying your body with his to an unheard tune. By now, any coherent thought has dissipated into thin air and all you can do is melt against him. “Why?” You manage.

“’Cus if we order anything that means I’ll have to get up and get it.”

“Oh my God, Hyunjin, really?” You laugh. Your hands naturally glide to where his are linked at your stomach, pressing to interlock your fingers overtop his. “If that’s the only reason for your uncertainty than I could always come get it, idiot.”

“No! It’s okay,” Hyunjin says, jumping back before you can even process it, “I’m not that hungry anyway.”

“Ohhh ‘kay,” you laugh breathlessly, whiplashed by the whole thing. Good thing you aren’t hungry, because when was the last time Hyunjin turned down food? Blinking at him precariously, he doesn’t seem to notice until one too many seconds of silence pass by.

“C’mon,” he demands excitedly, jumping back into reality, “my roommate told me to watch this anime called Soul Eater but I wanted to watch it with you.” Once again, before anything can even register past every single That Was Cute™ alarm ringing in your brain, Hyunjin is grabbing your bag and reaching for your hand, leading you out of the kitchen and upstairs.

You and Hyunjin binge aforementioned anime until he falls asleep first around 2 AM, only stopping to order food an hour in (he’s an indecisive man indeed), to get up to retrieve it, and to actually eat while catching up. For most of the night, you are able to forget the way his heartbeat against your back mirrored your own in the kitchen. But then, a little while after you fall asleep yourself, Hyunjin unconsciously shifts closer and you spend another hour blinking at his relaxed hand twitching against your abdomen, trying to keep the hurricane inside your heart at bay.

You can’t make it home October. Hyunjin texted you to let you know he was going to be the third weekend in, and you tried desperately to manage your time in order to make it work. But one group project in chem lead to another paper in psych and before you knew it, your roommate was listening to you sob over a boy and curse out your classes.

September left you emotionally wrecked, to be totally honest. You hate Hyunjin and you hate the way he makes you feel and you especially hate how realizing you have a crush on him makes you unsure if everything he does is his way of hinting he feels the same or if he’s always been this touchy and you are just now recognizing it. So, missing a month of seeing your favorite human being essentially means missing another day of trying to decipher which actions of his go in the Friend list, and which go in the Questionable list. And that, my friend, is unacceptable.

You absolutely cannot not go home this month. November is the calm before the storm (the storm being exams looming the second week of December), and while it would be beneficial maybe staying on campus to continue preparing, you tell yourself going home will be just as helpful. Mental breaks, and stuff. Totally not just to see Hyunjin.

Either way, Hyunjin asks you if you would join him on the seventeenth to go to his second cousin’s christening and you absolutely cannot say no when you know how bored Hyunjin gets at family events when they aren’t for him. And so, fast forward to the third Sunday of November and you are ready to pass out ten minutes after entering the church.

“I’m so happy for you two! I always knew you would last into college,” one of Hyunjin’s aunts exclaims, pinching your cheeks but the only pinch you feel is that of your heart.

Clearly she is misinformed, or just prone to jumping to conclusions but yet again, you can’t really blame her with how couple-y you and Hyunjin are. Past the single tunnel vision of your gaze, you watch her smile falter when Hyunjin goes rigid beside you and oh my God this is the most embarrassing moment of my life, his whole family thinks we’re dating and here we are still stuck in each other’s friendz—

“I’m glad you think so, imo,” Hyunjin suddenly picks up, sneaking an arm around to rest his hand on your hip, tugging you close, “I don’t know what I’ll do if she ever decides to leave me.”

It’s nice to think that he means it, to imagine that you are here not as a tag-along but to join him in a family ceremony because you are part of the family. The thought turns your blood to sugar and everything surrounding you falls apart; you listen to the rest of their conversation without processing it, the precise detailing in the marble pillars blurs into a mass of white, and you still feel his strong hold on the curve of your waist yet you are lost in the swam of possibilities.

How lovely it would be to live up to her assumption. To ‘last into college’ as a couple, not as best friends. To be able to call him yours even when you’re not together, to come home and kiss his lips, to sleep in his bed and it mean more than the laziness of blowing up the air mattress. At some point, he leads you into the third pew to sit beside his parents, and when you greet them with a hug all you can think about is them viewing you as more than their son’s friend.

God, you hate it.

You’re not as religious as Hyunjin and his family. But for the first time in years, you find yourself looking to the crucifix during the service and praying to whoever is up there to give you some strength and patience, because Lord do you need it.

Hyunjin is a funny guy.

Or so he thinks.

It’s not that he isn’t funny. It’s just— compared to your friends Minho or Changbin, he isn’t at the top of the list. When you think of Hyunjin, the first words that pop up are soft, loud, and dramatic.

It’s not that he isn’t funny. He’s just weird.

Insanely, ridiculously weird. For example, the time he called Jeongin a vitamin. Or the time he slapped half a bottle of sunscreen on his face. Or his random bouts of dancing at inappropriate moments. Just to name a few.

After the Baptism, Hyunjin acted like nothing happened. Didn’t even bring it up. Not even a joke. After the ceremony, you joined his family for a luncheon, which just involved the two of you being weird and making peculiar dancing videos on SnapChat with the swirly filter and complaining about school for a few hours until he drove you home. Obviously you stopped for food again on the way.

But that was it. Things went on as normal, and you returned to campus later that night and forced the whole experience to the back of your brain. It was officially grind season, and grind season meant studying for exams. No parties. No boys. And certainly no Hyunjin.

You both were home for winter break in the blink of an eye. And in normal Hyunjin style, he sort of vanished for the first week. Probably catching up on his strict sleeping schedule, you presumed, and accepted the fact that it was going to be a few days before you saw or even heard from him. The only anticipation you felt was wanting to give him his Christmas gift.

After what seems like an eternity away from Hyunjin, you get out of the shower on this fine Saturday before Christmas to find a slew of texts from him.

[5:52 PM] big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇: Aloha mamacita

[5:52 PM] big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇: How do u feel about getting froyo tn

[5:52 PM] big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇: We can get fat and then u can sleepover aaaand

[5:52 PM] big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇: We can stare at the wall for a few hours

[5:52 PM] big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇: And

[5:53 PM] big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇: *cough*

[5:53 PM] big tiddy jinny🍯🧸🌟🖇: Exchange Jesus gifts

See? Weird. Who wants froyo when it’s thirty degrees out?

[5:53 PM] YN: “aloha mamacita”

[5:53 PM] YN: uHmmmMMM

[5:53 PM] YN: im down mr president

[5:54 PM] YN: why do u want ice cream in winter tho. don’t u want like

[5:54 PM] YN: hot chocolate or seomthing

Obviously not. Two hours later, Hyunjin arrives to pick you up for froyo despite all your efforts in convincing him maybe you could take the train to the city and watch a light show, or simply drive around and swoon over the rich people houses and their Christmas decorations. He didn’t budge. This leads you to your second question of the day: why is it that when you threw on sweats for the occasion you called yourself a hag, but upon entering Hyunjin’s car you make a mental note of how hot he looks when he’s wearing the same exact thing? You groan at the thought. It’s because it’s Hyunjin, of course.

“Bonjour, mademoiselle,” he greets, flicking your forehead once you settle into the seat of his Subaru WRX because he’s a hotshot and likes to flex that he can drive a manual. Not really— the car is absolute garbage by now, having been his Dad’s old car (his Dad likes to flex too, apparently). However, Hyunjin takes care of it enough for it to seem five years old instead of ten, and, either way, watching him work the stick shift is unexplainably hot.

You swat his hand away. “Drive, bitch,” you huff, twisting to buckle yourself in. Once he’s reversed out of your driveway, you glance back to find him fighting against a devilish smirk.

“So,” you start once he has navigated out of your neighborhood. His brow twitches up. “Are you taking Hawaiian and French at school? You’ve been throwing quite a lot of languages at me recently.” Hyunjin shoots you an unamused look. You return it with a wrinkle of your nose.

“Anyway,” he ignores your teasing, pausing to switch gears for whatever reason so he can make it through a yellow light, “how did your exams go?”

“Well, you know…” You trail off, looking to your window. It feels a lot later than eight o’clock. With it getting dark so early in the evening nowadays, it feels as if nighttime is always following you.

“You know… what?” Hyunjin interrupts your daze, concern laced in his voice. “They were fine. I passed everything, I’m just worried about my major,” you explain sadly, barely glancing at him before you are turning back to the window to stare at the moon. Must be nice being a moon. Just get to hang out in the sky watching everyone and being watched.

“I mean, if you want to switch, now’s the time. Better do it now before the second semester,” Hyunjin advises, wise as always. Not really, but he’s right. “What are you thinking of going into?”

Yikes. He’s going to kill you.

“Nursing,” you blurt.

“Oh my Lanta, ___, are you serious?” He groans, stopping at a convenient red light presenting the perfect opportunity for him to smack his forehead on the wheel. Dramatic. “How are you gonna manage that? You’ll practically be two years behind everyone else!”

“I know,” you sigh, throwing your head back on the headrest, “that’s the problem. Bio just isn’t doing it for me. I don’t think I can spend the rest of my life in a lab watching mitosis. I need something more rewarding, so theoretically nursing is a perfect start. I don’t know, though.”

“Why don’t you switch to interior design or something? We could get our own HGTV show, ___,” he says, but you don’t meet his gaze when he glances over because beneath his words, you can sense some serious hopefulness. Interior design would be cool, but you’ve never considered that as a career choice. You once helped your parents pick out everything when they redid a bathroom at home and that turned out great, but as a major?

“I don’t know, man. I’ll have to talk to my counselor about it, I guess,” you shrug, pulling the hood of your sweatshirt over your head and tightening the drawstrings until the material covers your eyes, “why can’t you audition to be a K-pop star or something? I could be your manager. Heck, even your makeup artist. I’ve done your makeup before, remember?”

Hyunjin laughs, loud, and the sound sinks deep into your heart and makes you feel warm all over. Stress? Gone.

For the next few minutes or so, the ride is comfortably quiet. At some point, he turns on the radio and Mariah Carey’s “All I Want For Christmas Is You” floods your brain and reminds you to look forward to exchanging Christmas gifts later. God, you hope he likes it. You really went out on the sentimental gifts this year.

Hood shielding your vision, you jump when his large hand suddenly comes to grab the top of your head, squeezing hard and you imagine he’s trying to press some hopefulness into your brain. “Hand on the penis stick, Hwang,” you bark, blindly reaching for his own head across the way and pulling his ear when you do so. Good Lord, you hope no one can see into the car because… what.

Hyunjin lets out a giggle this time, reaching to pull you into a headlock and even though he’s got your head shoved up against his sturdy chest and goes on to give you a noogie, you’re stuck being all high and loopy on the sound of his happiness. And hey, it’s nice to know you’re the cause of it.

“We’re literally parked, idiot. If you had your hood down you would’ve realized,” Hyunjin snickers, releasing you after watching you struggle for a few seconds. Jerking away from him, you swiftly pull back your hood. “Oh,” you laugh, reading the flashy Yogo Factory sign above the building in front of you, “you could’ve just told me instead of watching me bask in misery.”

Hyunjin suitably ignores your moaning and groaning by getting out of the car and standing in front of the car, illuminated by the headlights. Why? Why must he look so scrumptious in his black hoodie and grey sweatpants and four-year-old white Nike sneakers? He has no gosh darn right!

After fixing the mess he made of your hair, you at last join him outside the car, shooting him another glare and moving ahead of him to open the shop’s door without waiting for him. “From now on, we have to start texting each other what we’re wearing before we go out, ‘cus this looks a little ri-donk-ulous,” Hyunjin whispers in your ear as you make your way to the cup selection, trying to ignore all the stares you— no, he is getting along the way.

“What do you mean?” You ask, plucking two medium sized cups up before turning to look at him. Then you look down at yourself. Oh. Looks like you’re both wearing the hoodie from junior spirit week. “Nice.” Just Couple Things™!

Back to Hyunjin being weird— why did he drag you all the way out here just to get a cup of chocolate frozen yogurt and maybe half a scoop of peanut butter chips?

Meanwhile, he watches in absolute disgust as you blow through your own dessert. Vanilla yogurt with probably every topping offered because you physically cannot make a decision, especially when they have chunks of cookie dough up there.

“So,” Hyunjin starts, trying not to look you in the eye considering you look like a goblin shoveling globs of diabetes down your throat, “have you talked to Jisung recently?”

You choke on a Fruity Pebble at his inquiry, prompting him to reach across the table and slap your back a few times until your esophagus is cleared. “Ugh,” clearing your throat one last time, you take a few sips of water while shooting him a glare. Jisung? Really? “How dense are you?” You hiss unintentionally.

Hyunjin raises his hands in defense. “Just a question.”

Yeah, just a question. Dumbass. “I mean,” you laugh awkwardly, “not really. We have a streak on Snap and sometimes we’ll talk occasionally but I don’t text him every day or anything. How about you?”

He shrugs, concentrating instead on stirring his yogurt into a goopy mess. “Eh. We still use our group chat a lot but that’s it. He’s too busy making music in Malaysia.”

You chuckle at this, picking out the boba from your own cup and leaving the rest now that it has started to look like something sold at the Chum Bucket. “That sucks,” you offer, not the best at giving him consolidation, you opt for linking your feet around his own in some weird act of intimacy, “isn’t he coming home for the holidays, though? I’m sure you can all have a reunion soon.”

“Yeah, he is,” Hyunjin hums, suddenly too focused on trying to escape your trap under the table. Annoyed Hyunjin is cute. “Stoooop,” he whines, kicking at your shins before breaking into boisterous laughter at your relentlessness, “I will not hesitate to throw this cup at your face.”

“Yeah, right,” you scoff, “I’d like to see you try.”

At this, Hyunjin drops his stupidly long arms beneath the table and easily captures your foot by the ankle, pulling hard enough for you to slip down your side of the booth. “Hyunjin!” You shriek, panicking slightly at your sweaty hand’s insecure grip against the leather. You’re going to fall. You’re going to fall flat on your ass underneath a table at a frozen yogurt place because the boy you like pulled your foot too hard. Fantastic. Ignoring you, he starts to wiggle your shoe off your foot no matter how hard you try to squirm out of his relentless grip. “Stop trying to eat my toes in the middle of Yogo!”

Finally, he releases your foot, letting it fall limp against his thigh.

“God,” you huff, breathless as you squirm back up your seat, cheeks burning ferociously, “you are such an ass.”

Behind the playful smirk he fails to hide, something darker glints in Hyunjin’s eyes and it makes your heart skip a beat. Then, “We should go.” The suggestion makes the heat of your blush scorch even hotter down your neck and you instinctively turn away, only to find the customers on the other side of the shop watching you with just as perturbed looks. Fantastic, part two.

“Okie,” you squeak out, blinking after him in complete and total bewilderment as to what just happened when he gets up to throw his trash away. Whatever. Following after him, you too toss your cup out before quickly finding your hand engulfed by his larger one as he leads you back outside, the sudden sharpness of the cold air bringing tears to your eyes. You desperately want to ask him what that was about, or why he’s acting so sneaky, but you stay silent, too afraid your voice will come out shaky and vulnerable. Instead, you let him tug you into his side and try to keep up with him no matter how badly your knees threaten to buckle with each glance you sneak up at him.

It’s silent when you enter the car, watching warily as he reverses out of the parking spot and maneuvers through the lot. Your heart rate seemingly cannot slow itself down, adrenaline taking the place of oxygen the longer you stare at him, at the concentrated scrunch to his face, at the cute tip of his button nose and at the swell of his lips and you distantly wonder what would happen if you pulled him into a kiss at the next red light.

In the midst of your daydream Hyunjin clears his throat, bringing you back to reality and you realize with a startle that he has caught you. Jesus Christ! What has gotten into you? You mentally smack yourself upside the head, instantly turning away from his cocky little gaze and staring straight ahead in search of something else to focus on. “___,” he sing-songs, slow and sensual and entirely demolishing the walls you have built around yourself. It is at this red light you wish to simply open the door and run.

“Yes?” You manage, wincing at how small your voice sounds and while looking out his window instead of into his eyes, you notice him grip the steering wheel hard enough to turn his knuckles white. The tension is insurmountable, weighing in heavily on your chest and you desperately wish to arrive home, even though that means having to survive the next twelve hours with him. Anything is better than the small confines of his car.

“What do you want to do when we get home?” He asks, cool as a cucumber. You pale. It is a dangerous question and you do not know if he realizes that. “Um,” you cough, scooting to sit up straight, “whatever you want.” You whisper the last part, genuinely petrified because you have absolutely no idea if your brain is twisting everything to make it seem like Hyunjin is flirting or if things are totally normal. No idea.

“Hm,” he offers, tilting his head in thought, “we shall see.”

Yeah. We shall.

The rest of the ride is quiet, comfortably or uncomfortably you cannot say because you are too busy trying to calm the Spongebob burning office scene occurring inside your own head, hopelessly telling yourself that everything is fine, Hyunjin’s fine, you’re fine. Just pretend like nothing happened, you tell yourself when Hyunjin pulls into his driveway with practiced ease. “Ugh,” he groans after retrieving your bag from the back seat, and you watch with a raised brow as he skips up to his porch, yelling, “I have to pee!”

“Begone with you, piss boy,” you tease, holding the screen door open for him as he struggles to unlock the storm door and pulling on one of his hoodie’s drawstrings just to annoy him. “Stop,” he growls, low and playful but nevertheless sending a swarm of butterflies to your tummy. You ignore him. Finally unlocking the door, Hyunjin shoves the keys into his pocket and seizes your wrist, yanking your arm down with enough force to nearly topple you into him. “Why are you being so annoying tonight?” He frowns at you, nose and brows scrunched in irritation and it is only because of his proximity do you finally soften up.

“Sorry,” you pout back, bringing your other hand up to boop his nose, “I just missed ya.”

“Ew,” he snorts, stepping past the threshold and kicking off his shoes. You follow suit, closing the door behind you and clicking the lock into place as Kkami comes sprinting over. “B-R-B,” Hyunjin announces, presumably bouncing away to the bathroom.

“Oh, boy,” you huff, squatting to pick up the fluffy little dog and hugging him close to your chest, “your dad is making my life very difficult.” Pressing a quick kiss to the top of his head, you put Kkami back down and grab your bag before heading upstairs, knowing Hyunjin is going to take his grand old time and probably take a shit while he’s at it. Plus, you’re impatient and dying to take your bra off.

Aside from what light his Gudetama nightlight offers, Hyunjin’s room is ultimately left dark. Here’s the thing: he used to have a lamp on his dresser, but then he took it with him to college and only brings it home for summer because he’s lazy and sleeps the majority of the time he’s home, anyway. Instead, he put up his little remote-controlled Christmas tree in addition to the lava lamp he has beside his bed. Perfect. For Hyunjin, at least.

Switching both of these on, their subtle glow offers just enough to keep you from banging your toe against something. It’s happened one too many times. Hyunjin’s room isn’t messy— he really isn’t a messy person to begin with, but he will reorganize the furniture in his room fifty times a year and you never know where the crooked leg to his bedside table will be to ambush your pinky toe.

Setting your bag onto his bed, you excitedly fumble past all your layers and unclasp your bra, maneuvering out of it with a delighted exhale just as Hyunjin begins his ascent up the stairs, steps creaking loudly under his heavy trudging. “I’m an idiot,” he grumbles, leaning against the doorframe to catch his breath.

You don’t bother to look at him, opting to quickly retort instead, “We been knew.”

“Ugh,” Hyunjin groans, exasperated, and you finally turn to him after successfully jamming aforementioned undergarment into your bag, “anyways. I don’t know why I didn’t just come up here, because I have to wash my face anyway and you do too and now we’re both going to have to share a sink.”

“Aw,” you coo, tone dripping with sarcasm as you pat his arm, “poor baby has to share the bathroom.”

“I’m actually going to strangle you,” he sighs, nevertheless following after you into the bathroom.

“Kinky.”

Hyunjin glares, unamused as he opens a drawer for his pink bow hairband and your striped pink and blue one that he bought for you, but keeps here for sleepovers. Yeah. He throws it to your face. “Sorry,” you offer, pulling the soft headband up to hold your hair back, “I’ll try to stop. I’m just so used to annoying you.”

“Clearly,” he scoffs, flashing his stupidly cute teasing smile and in your head, you imagine raising a white flag in surrender— he’s got you, he’s won, it’s over. Time to call it quits and head home. Evidently shut up (for now), you offer him a roll of your eyes before turning on the sink to wet your hands before pumping out some of his scrumptious watermelon face wash. Maybe if you scrub hard enough, you’ll manage to rinse away all the overwhelming thoughts of the night, too.

Barefaced Hyunjin is immaculate. Well, Hyunjin is immaculate twenty-four hours out of the day, but barefaced, freshly washed, hair messy, ready for bed Hyunjin is immaculate, and you are one of the few people lucky enough to see this eighth wonder of the world as often as you do.

Now, maybe it has something to do with the unexpected ambiance the light from his laptop, Christmas lights, and lava lamp have created together that makes him look so unfairly beautiful at this given moment. Or, you’re just insanely pussywhipped and looking for an excuse. You try not to think about it.

“Why are you so squirmy tonight?” He asks, frustrated enough to interrupt Kermit singing ‘Shawty I don’t mind’ playing from his laptop. “I’m not,” you defend, a weak argument indeed, given that you have just finished adjusting your position beside him for the umpteenth time.

“I mean, four female Ghostbusters? The feminists are taking over! I’m an ad—”

“___, you’ve touched my dick like four times. Don’t try and tell me you’re not squirmy. What’s wrong?” Hyunjin interrupts a second Vine, and even goes on to talk over ‘I have the power of God and anime on my side!’ like a lunatic. Oh Christ, you have? Surely you would have noticed. “Sorry,” you mumble, embarrassed as you bury your face into the curve of his pectoral and instinctively move your leg settled between his away, “I’m just hot, to be honest.” Technically, it is not a lie. Hyunjin’s family definitely keeps their thermostat at a higher temperature than yours and you always manage to sweat your ass off every time you come over. This time, however, you are certain it has more to do with the assault your heart is facing rather than your sweat glands.

At the sound of his tap against the spacebar to pause the video, you wordlessly and reluctantly sit up from your comfortable spot beside him in order to rid yourself of your heavy sweatshirt. Now, here lies the problem. Sweatshirt: off. Nipples: out. Realistically, Hyunjin has seen your boobs a number of times over the past few years, and even if he hadn’t, he probably wouldn’t even bat an eye. But right now, your heart is on the line, you’re embarrassed and you’re trying to play it extremely safe.

You toss the hoodie to the floor and nestle right back where you were anyway, slinging your right arm over his torso and ignoring his sharp intake of breath when you snuggle closer. “Better?” He asks, voice strained and it literally makes you nauseous. “Yep.”

He resumes the video. You had started early in the night watching Pom Poko, which unsurprisingly ended with the two of you crying at the bittersweet ending, then moved to TikTok compilations on YouTube to cheer up before moving on from them and onto the classic Vine compilations. You paid good attention for the most part, chuckling along with him to ‘What up, I’m Jared, I’m nineteen and I never fucking learned how to read,’ ‘Bruh chill, I don’t know why you in a big time rush,’ and all the other absolute comedic masterpieces. But after the fourth or fifth video of the same six second clips with an occasional rare one, you began to grow bored and decided to do what you do best: admire Hyunjin.

Sure, ‘Come get yo juice!’ followed by the loud smash of the oven made you smile, but you found the flashing lights casting shadows beneath Hyunjin’s eyes and lips much more fascinating. Of course, this is not the first time you have been held so close to him. But it is, however, all too easy to get lost in the sight of him and you’ve noticed recently that you are in desperate need of a map. Whether it’s due to your time away from him or simply an appreciation for untouched beauty you do not know.

Even now, your gaze flickers to his laptop once you hear ‘Get to Del Taco,’ but having already watched it five thousand times you tilt your head upward to catch Hyunjin’s silent giggle at ‘free-sha-voca-do.’ It’s a vicious cycle, really, going back and forth between wanting to simply enjoy the night and realizing enjoying the night lies totally in Hyunjin’s presence. And so, you continue to fall into this trap each time until you pay no mind to the videos at all, basking in the brilliance of Hyunjin’s joyous smile and the warmth his happiness makes you feel. It is this thought that slowly tugs you to sleep, a fight to keep your heavy eyelids open lost until finally, you give in to the comfort and allow yourself to drift off to the sound of ‘Step the fuck up, Kyle.’

You think you are dreaming.

You think.

“___,” the softness of Hyunjin’s voice at the crown of your head eases you from the clutches of sleep and you stretch your locked limbs before curling further into his side. “We didn’t open presents.” Even though you can’t see him, you can hear his pout, and you realize you must be awake to hear the disappointed words caught sluggishly between his lips so vividly. You hum, hesitant to open your eyes because you really want to go back to sleep. Just for a little while. And so, you ask, “What time is it?”

“Just past two,” he whispers.

You hum again, trying to formulate a sensible sentence in the parts of your brain still asleep, “We can… wake up at four. And open gifts. Okay?”

“Okay, weirdo,” Hyunjin chuckles to himself, sliding lower down the mattress after shutting his laptop.

You think you are dreaming.

You think.

You can’t remember ever falling asleep facing each other. But yet again, your brain is clouded beyond capability and now, you know for certain you are dreaming. Hyunjin never faces you.

Blinking slowly, it takes a few seconds for your eyes to adjust to the impenetrable darkness and you struggle to make out the features of Hyunjin’s face. You know you are dreaming, and so you tug him closer, throwing a leg over his thigh and an arm over his waist. Even in your sleep, you feel the sadness pricking at your heart, for even it knows this is only what dreams are made of. You like to make the best of it.

“You know I love you, Jinnie, right?” Your voice comes out funny, drawn out and mumbled like your tongue is numb and you fight the urge to feel for yourself.

“Of course I do. I love you too.” His reply surprises you. You thought he was asleep and, either way, hearing such fond words from him puts your heart at ease. He must be misunderstood.

“No. I mean like… I like you, love you. Like I want to kiss you… kiss you good morning and before bed love you. Send you hearts and take stupid couple pics and… go on dumb dates love you. You know?” Your words feel garbled and incomprehensible the longer you go on, trying to express how you feel when nothing is real proving to be increasingly difficult. God, if only you could do it when things are real.

You start to feel yourself slipping as he mutters a reply, mind in free fall and fuck, fuck, fuck, he’s whispering and you can’t hear him but you are too tired and helpless to wake yourself up to hear it. No, too lost in the next dream to go back. You can’t tell what is real and what isn’t. Christ, were you awake? You can’t tell. All you know is that you are warm, so, so warm and letting sleep take over you once more is the best answer to all your questions.

Hyunjin always says he hates waking people up. Because he’s normally the one needing to be awoken, whenever the roles are swapped he doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do.

This time, however, he takes it upon himself to repeatedly smack your face with his pillow. Not a fun experience when it’s coming from someone who fails to recognize his own strength. “Jesus, fuck! Okay!” You hiss, the cloud of sleep abruptly ripped away from you with the slap of his pillow against your skin. Arms raised defensively in front of you, you catch his next swing and tear the pillow out of his grasp to shield yourself all before you have even opened your eyes. When you do so, with the blatant intention just to find where he is and hurl the pillow at him, you are met with the harsh light from his ceiling fan and have to squint past the stinging white light to see his shit-eating grin.

“Was that necessary?” You groan, undeniably annoyed and wanting to glare at him more but needing to rub the ache out of your eyes. “Yes,” is all he says, reaching for your bag and catapulting it to you. He is incredibly lucky you are quick enough to catch it before it thumps against your head. What has gotten into him? Did he eat an entire bag of Pixy Stix while you were asleep? You watch, still dazed from sleep and reeling from the whole pillow smacking attack, as he flings open his closet door and turns back around with two neatly wrapped boxes. You squint to make out the dancing Santa T-rex wrapping paper.

“Oh,” you chirp, understanding, and you unzip your bag to retrieve the large box taking up the majority of space, “thanks for waking me up. I’m surprised you remembered. Did you stay up?”

A rosy blush burns its way across his cheekbones. Odd. “I, um— yeah. No, actually,” he stutters, really odd, given he was bouncing off the walls not even thirty seconds ago, “I set an alarm. You made me sleepy.” Hyunjin sits beside you once you have scooted over, leaning against the wall and crossing his long ass legs. He keeps his eyes trained on the boxes in his hands. “Oh,” you hum, looking to your own gift and suddenly wishing for the mattress to swallow you up, “sorry. I haven’t gotten as much sleep as you on break so far.”

“I don’t think anyone ever has,” he jokes and you finally look to him, sharing a cheeky smile before he gets all shy again, tongue darting out to wet his lips, “um, Merry Christmas, ___.”

It’s a simple phrase, but it makes your heart swell. “Merry Christmas to you too, Hyunjin.” Leaning over, you wrap your arms around his shoulders in an awkward side hug, but still end up feeling all drunk and loopy on love when he eagerly returns the gesture, arms curling around you.

“Okay,” you huff, sitting back, “me first.” You dramatically hold your gift out to him, jittery and nervous all over. Buying for Hyunjin is always hard. He’s just so easy to please, but when you want to do more than just please him it’s a constant battle trying to decide how far out you are going to go for him each year.

You watch impatiently as he tears the wrapping paper open first, and then finally lifts the flaps of the box up. “Aw,” he whimpers, pulling out the quokka plushie and attached certificate, “you adopted a quokka for me?”

You grin when he hugs the soft stuffed animal to his chest, the weight on your shoulders partly lifted from his positive reaction. He reaches back into the box, brow scrunched in thought as he regards the framed picture. “The First Day…?” Hyunjin asks, perplexed as he reads the title above the constellation poster. You scoot closer, leaning over to look it over once more. “This was the constellation of stars on our first day of freshman year. The day we first met.”

“Oh,” Hyunjin sniffs, “that’s really awesome, ___. Thank you. This is coming with me to school.” At this, he hugs you again, probably to hide the tears you know are threatening to spill because Hyunjin is Baby and cries every year. “Anything for my favorite fake Aussie,” you smile, leaning your head on his shoulder as he reads through the quokka adoption letter.

“Okay! Your turn!” He exclaims, setting his gifts back into the box and passing you the smaller one of his. He catches your curious glance to the second one he keeps by his side. “We have to open this one together.”

“Christ, okay. Looks like I’m gonna be crying tonight, too,” you sigh sadly. “Ooh,” jumping ahead of yourself, you wiggle your eyebrows at the white box before you, “Hyunjin if you bought me a Fitbit… I swear to God. How many times have I said I am not working out with you?” However, once you finish tearing open the wrapping paper you find it is not, in fact, a Fitbit.

“It’s not a Fitbit, idiot,” Hyunjin scoffs a second too late, waiting for you to slip the lid off the box. “They’re bond touch bracelets.”

“Explain,” you murmur, enamored but confused at the two little house arrest looking bracelets.

“So basically, we each wear one,” Hyunjin starts, taking one of the bracelets out and a burst of color blooms across its small screen at the motion, “and if you touch it, mine vibrates and I ‘feel’ your touch.” As he explains, he buckles it around your wrist, twisting it so it lies correctly. You silently take the second one and help it on him, brain too caught up to actually say anything.

“Try it,” Hyunjin whispers, suppressing his excitement.

You gingerly bring a finger to the little screen, tapping it once, twice. Nothing happens. Frowning, you try again, tapping and holding, then a second time, and finally— a strip of pink light appears and the bracelet gently vibrates as you tap and hold a random pattern. In response, the bracelet on Hyunjin’s wrist lights up blue, buzzing in the same pattern.

“Oh, Hyunjin,” you sniffle, fighting back your own tears because you refuse to let yourself ugly cry in front of him, “this is amazing. Now I can annoy you year-round. Thank you so, so much. I love you so much.” He hums, pulling you close when you turn to give him a proper hug. To your utmost surprise, however, instead of letting go he curls one fist into your side and helps swing your legs over to straddle his lap. “Oh.”

“___,” Hyunjin sighs thoughtfully, fingers playing with the sleeves of your tee, “I love you, too.”

You nearly spit up your coffee. If you were drinking coffee. Instead, you’re left with a dry mouth and a slack jaw at his words. Huh?

Glancing to the constellation picture peeking out of his box, and then to the matching bracelets you both wear, you find your mind reeling trying to make sense of it all. Yeah, you say the forbidden L-word to each another all the time, but most certainly not with you on his on lap and his lips mere centimeters away. The answer is so obviously clear as day you have trouble believing it.

“Fuck,” you laugh all of a sudden, as soon as the realization hits you, “I wasn’t dreaming, was I?”

Hyunjin lets out a joyous giggle, hands linking behind your back. Unable to hide his smile any longer, he clarifies, “You were not, madam. We literally just finished talking about when we were going to open gifts and then I got ready to sleep. Two seconds later you dumped your heart out to me, but when I answered, you were asleep.”

“Bruh,” you wince, hiding your face with your hands, “I am so sorry you had to deal with that.”

“No, don’t be,” Hyunjin comforts, reaching to tug your hands away. Your gut does somersaults when he intertwines his fingers with yours. “I was actually, uh, planning on doing some sort of confession to you anyway, but then you went right ahead and did it for me. So thanks for that.”

“Wow,” you chuckle, trying to wrap your mind around it all, “does that mean you, ahem, perhaps like me too?”

“No, I just got us really couple-y long distance relationship bracelets, pulled you onto my lap, and kissed you because I just want to be friends.”

“You didn’t kiss m—”

The sly little fucker interrupts your retort by quickly dipping down to press a fat smooch to your lips, missing miserably and you don’t know if he did it on purpose but you quickly fix the problem, releasing his hands to cradle his jaw and tilt his head the right angle. Finally, finally you kiss him, breathing in the smell of him like some sort of aromatherapy and whimpering into his mouth when his tongue swipes against your own. It is like nothing you have ever experienced, the taste and feel of him making you tremble and igniting a burst of electricity through your veins. You could kiss him forever, you think, sucking on his plump bottom lip greedily until he finally pulls back, desperate for air or trying to reel himself in you can’t say.

“You have to open your other gift,” Hyunjin reminds, chest heaving, and your gaze follows his long fingers as they comb his hair away from his forehead. Automatically, as if kissing Hyunjin once grants you some kind of free pass to do the same, you brush a few stray strands away from his face before leaning back to admire him. “Stoooop. You can’t do that and not expect me to kiss you again. Open. Your. Gift.” Hyunjin whines, squishing your cheeks and turning your head away.

“Okay, don’t blame this on me,” you huff, reaching for the second box before jabbing a finger into his chest, “you, sir, need to stop being so beautiful for like, two seconds.”

He scoffs, helping you rip off the wrapping paper, “You’re the beautiful one here.”

“Ew,” you wrinkle your nose, most certainly not used to Hyunjin dishing out such compliments, “this is too Hallmark Christmas movie for me. Let me open my gift in peace, ugly.” This box, unlike the bracelets’, is simple cardboard and when you lift open the lid, a brown leather book looks back at you. “You remember Up?” He asks.

On the leather, it reads Our Adventure Book in mismatched colors. “Yeah,” you whisper, flipping open the cover to find two baby pictures glued on the paper, one of Hyunjin, and one of you. At the top, it’s labeled ‘Before Shit Went Down.’ You laugh.

On the next page, there are random photographs from middle school, and then finally each other’s eighth grade graduation portraits. Then, written at the top is ‘Here It Begins,’ followed by a selfie he randomly took with you a few weeks into school freshman year, and then some from homecoming. Silently flipping through the rest of the book, your tears flow freely now, touched beyond comparison at all the photographs and all the memories accompanying them. Some are from large events like prom, others from random moments you don’t even remember, but each and every one comes together to form a special mold fitting perfectly into that Hyunjin-shaped hole in your heart.

The last picture is from the christening last month. Of course, it isn’t one of the nicer photos his mom took of the two of you, but a SnapChat selfie with the flaming sunglasses filter. He’s mid-laugh and you’re pressing a kiss to his cheek. Funny thing is, you don’t even remember taking it.

The page next to it is blank, aside from what’s written at the top of the page. “Togetha Foreva,” you read aloud, voice choked up and God, you cannot fathom how gross you look right now. “What the fuck, man!” You sob, punching Hyunjin’s shoulder before wiping your nose and cheeks with the back of your hands. “I didn’t sign up for this cock and ball torture.”

Hyunjin laughs loudly at this, pulling you into a hug and giving you a few seconds to recover. “Hyunjin, this is like… seriously the best thing anyone has ever done for me, holy shit. God, you Pinterest son of a bitch, this is such a good idea,” you groan, flipping back through the pages and getting teary-eyed all over again, “I can’t express how much this means to me, Jinnie. Thank you, really.”

Flashing that toothy grin of his, Hyunjin tugs you to lie back down with him and tilts your head up to press a much more accurate kiss to your lips. “I meant what I said before, ___,” he murmurs, “I don’t know what to do without you, and I know we only get to see each other once a month but I can’t keep living as just friends. You’re so much more than that. And I hope all the pictures we add from now on will show this new chapter of our lives. If not, well, then I guess I’ll just burn the book.”

“Are you asking me to be Kkami’s official poop-picker-upper?”

“Yes. Wait— what? No!”

You break into a fit of laughter, only to be interrupted with him pinching your side and causing you to let out a yelp. “Hey!” You bark, jumping closer to him and away from his hand until, finally, you give in to your self-indulgence and go right on ahead in swinging a leg over his hips and pinning him beneath you.

“You ruined my serious love speech, ___,” Hyunjin pouts, face scrunched up at you.

“I’m sorry, baby, go on.”

You pause, blinking slowly at him. He blinks back, the silence in the air weighing in heavily as both of your two brain cells bounce around trying to figure out what did you just call him?

“Never mind,” Hyunjin says, voice a low rumble of thunder as he reaches for your hips and easily flips positions, “I think you’re on the same boat.”

You laugh, tilting your head back and eyeing him indignantly. Fuck, he looks unfairly delectable hovering above you.

“Okay, how many more times do I have to tell you I love you for you to formally ask me to be your girlfriend, stupid?” You scowl, bringing your hands to cradle his neck, thumbs brushing delicately against his jaw.

“Call me baby again and we’ll see about making that happen.”

You raise a brow, tugging his face closer by the chain of his necklace. “You’re lucky it’s Christmas, baby.”

[dammitadolfnomorecake]

Once Bitten, Twice Stupid prt 138 prt 2

“I don’t think I want to imagine that”

Mami would have rocked it. Keith imagined her sneaking her chocolates with a bottle of vodka giving the double finger to Sendak if she could have. Chocolates and her abundant supply of love were the only two things she zero self control over. Lance nodded, sucking down a breath, tone slightly dejected before levelling then growing wobbly

“Probably safer... but, yeah. I... the family gave me a lot of things that she’d left behind when we moved. I tried to go to the nursing home, you know, to thank them, but Coran made me stay in for observation. Luis cleaned her room out and took her things. He had the nerve to lose it at me for paying for her funeral...”

Lance started shaking again in his arms. Keith rubbing the top of his arm as if he was trying to warm him up

“Babe. Don’t go there. Luis isn’t your responsibility”

“I know, but without Mami... I won’t hear about them again”

That was true. Luis wouldn’t be rushing to call

“Pidge could change that. She can stalk down thin air and pull up all its credit card charges”

“I think Pidge would bite his ankles in real life if she knew. I wanted to... to be able to talk to them at the funeral, but Coran pulled enough magic to get me there as it was... and I wasn’t ready yet. She and Papi are together now. I wanted her buried in Garrison, but she’s in Platt. I’m talking too much”

Lance wasn’t talking too much. He’d held all this in as he waited for Keith to come home to him. He was glad Lance was telling him what he wanted in his own words instead of by letter

“You’re not. You miss your mum. From what you’ve said, you’ve made a lot of good memories”

“I suppose. I mean, I did. I know I’m very lucky I had all this time with her... really lucky considering all things. I wish I hadn’t broken my phone”

“Shouldn’t it back up?”

“I don’t know how it really works. It’s like one of your Blade phones but it’s pin locked instead of iris encoded. Laptop’s kind of the same. It’s a Coran special”

“We can ask him”

“I hope it’s backed up... I need to stop talking about this... I can’t... I’ve been so whiny. Even when I came back from Sendak, through to now, my mental health’s been shit and all I’ve done is worry everyone. Four months isn’t like long for a vampire but it is for a human”

“I literally think you’re entitled to let it out”

“I keep showing... I keep showing the wrong sides”

There were no wrong sides to Lance. Okay. Maybe 4 months wasn’t that long to a vampire but it was a fucking looooong arse four months. They’d barely had three weeksish before he was off to Rome... meaning... it was like 6 weeks he’d had quality time with Mami... and shy of a month since her passing.

Lance was allowed to have feelings. His feelings made him who he was. It wasn’t like Keith didn’t feel guttered over the loss of Mami too. He kind of wanted to just lock Lance away and cry until his head throbbed and the pain was gone

“Because I’m so much better?”

“You are. I haven’t asked you much about Europe. I haven’t asked if you’re okay. I haven’t asked how things went down. I haven’t asked about the court case or this thing about Lotor killing Zarkon. I... haven’t... even asked you... how anyone is...”

“Babe. I only got in last night. This is our first proper conversation. I want to know what you’re feeling and thinking”

“I don’t know what I’m thinking or feeling. Running seems so much easier. But... then there’s all the things I’m waiting to hear back about. Mami’s will. Her accounts. What to do with her things she’a got stored at home. If the nursing home got the flowers I sent as a thank you for all they did for her. If I chose the right clothes Mami. If I did the right thing. If it wasn’t her time to go and I did nothing...”

*

Lance kept telling himself to shut up. To stop talking about Mami. That Keith had been through so much away from him that he was probably more tired than he was letting on. He tried to shut up but he couldn’t not think about Mami. She’d adored Keith. She kept a photo of him on her nightstand. Well, it was him, Keith and an ultrasound photo between them.

When Keith started leading him away from the kitchen, Lance didn’t want to move. He had to have breakfast, have his shot, then have something actual to eat. Instead Keith tugged him along, pulling him down to sit in his lap on the sofa. That Keith had come back was a miracle. That he’d stayed... Lance couldn’t describe how much he’d needed to see Keith. Then he went and ruined things because he couldn’t stop thinking about his Mami...

“You’re overthinking”

Geez. No shit. He’d expected a joyous reunion with Keith. Mami teasing them. Not Keith coming home to this. He wanted to feel happy so badly, but Keith... Keith made it too easy. He’d feared last night they’d never talk again as they had. Now he’d word vomit... after too much actual vomit

“I think I’m... not being strong enough”

He’d cried as he confessed his sins to his Mami. How he’d killed Sendak. His Mami taking his hands and telling him that it wasn’t fair for him to be blaming himself. She went to church with him. Before God he’d prayed. He’d confessed everything, as if it’d offer some absolution for his sins. He did feel marginally better when he didn’t burst into flames. It was hard to accept that the world was safer by taking a life. Mami pointing out that Sendak was the worst of everything a vampire could be, though she got it. She got that he grieved not for the monster he’d killed but at the loss of Sendak ever changing his ways. Vampires didn’t really work that way, but she... she got it because she wasn’t a hunter. She could see that he was worse than Nyma and Rolo, but she could see that he felt worse about the actual ending of potential than killing the monster inside Sendak’s skin. She was a better therapist than Coran.

They’d headed to the beach that morning, after his nightmare. Blazing hot sun didn’t exactly lure vampires out for a spot of sun baking and spontaneous combustion between snacking on the necks of tourists. Setting up the umbrella, chairs and fetching drinks, they’d settled down and Mami had told him about his first time swimming there. Rachel carried him everywhere. Made him a “hat” out of seaweed. He’d screamed and screamed, until Mami took it off his head. The sun had felt amazing. He wasn’t too pregnant looking, so he enjoyed taking his shirt off, only to burn himself for his efforts. Mami had laughed at him as she rubbed aloe vera on his sunburn.

It’d been hard to hear about times when they’d been so happy together. Just kids doing kid things. But a lot of Mami’s stories he hadn’t heard before, and some stories he heard over and over yet didn’t mind in the slightest. She was so proud of her brood. Making all these future plans and laughing over how he and Keith were going to be clumsy parents, but that was okay because no one knew what they were doing at first.

“You’re strong. You’re so strong”

Keith kissed his cheek. Lance knew he was starved of physical affection. He knew because he’d been depriving himself of it. He felt like “King Douche” that his boyfriend came back to this. That he needed to stiffen his upper lip and carry on. He knew he’d been a total dick not contacting Pidge or Hunk, but to begin with it’d been for their safety. He hadn’t let them see him at VOLTRON, though knowing they were also grieving Mami’s loss. Asking for more space on top of so much space already granted to him seemed incredibly selfish. He loved Pidge and Hunk, but it was like with Sendak again, he was scared of losing himself in his grief and hurting them.

He’d never wished he was more human than in the aftermath of that shit with Sendak. Lance knew if it was his friends going through this he’d be telling them it was okay. To let go. To grieve for as long as they needed and that he’d be there the whole time for when they were ready. But that didn’t apply to him. He had... he had o carry himself a certain way... anxiety fed paranoia that if he wasn’t the perfect friend they’d never speak to him again. Keith... Keith just... all he had to do was breathe and Lance was falling more in love with him. He’s tried building his walls back up when he set his mind to Keith never coming for him, but all his walls were sandcastles, crumbling under Keith’s feet as he trampled over Lance’s attempts and wrapped him up in love. He... he’d been so awkward and embarrassed how easily he’d caved into Keith. Now Keith was taking the time to fix his broken bits. His boyfriend hated the tourist masses but that was Varadero’s main source of income.

Placing his hand on his belly, Lance settled his breathing back down slowly. Keith didn’t hate his belly. He’d felt their twins starting to move. Like little has bubbly gas bubbles. When he’d spotted blood coupled with weird stomach pain, he’d thought he was dying but his Mami explained to him about things stretching and moving to make space. Coran was worried about his body not being strong enough to make it to term. Despite brewing in a vampire filled with vampire blood, both their kids returned human DNA. Never did he want another long arse needle in there again. Their babies passed their genetics tests. They just had to put up with him and Keith now

“Babe?”

“It’s okay. You said you wanted to see Cuba?”

“Well I came all this way. I’ve never been here before and I’m already madly in love with my tour guide”

Lance groaned at his boyfriend. If Keith turned that charm on everyone he’d probably be an unstoppable conman of the highest degree. His ego loved the flattery. He and it had many an mental disagreement. Now Keith was fanning it back to life

“You’re a menace. I have to eat. I’ve... been going through the motions but I have to eat before we go out. And... we’ll drive. I’ll drive. I don’t have much to hide this bump”

“I don’t mind it. I think it’s cute”

“The world isn’t ready for a pregnant vampire and his lover. This is Cuba. I’ve got a jumper I use if I absolutely can’t avoid going out...”

“In this heat?”

“You get the boyfriend with a covered outside or you get the boyfriend inside with the bump showing. You can’t have both”

“I definitely want both. I love your stomach. You looked so good bouncing on my dick with that bump showing”

Lance choked on air. Keith was a damn horn dog!

“I’m going to punch you in the dick if you don’t start thinking things through. I’m going to put you in “Horny Hunter Jail” if you don’t settle down”

Keith shrugged

“I can live with that”

[tired-college-student-writing]

Tim’s secret Weapon

I’ve been slightly obsessed with  @ozmav​ ‘s Damian Wayne/Marinette Dupain-Cheng pairing as of late, and just saw a post that has inspired me more than anything else has in months, so I felt the need to write it

Summary- Tim has always seen the numbers floating above people’s heads, been able to perceive their threat levels with a single glance. After being a hero for so long he thought he was desensitized to seeing high numbers above people’s heads until Damian brings a new friend home. 

Part 1 (HERE)

Part 2 _______________________________________________________________________

The first number Tim Drake remembers seeing were those of his parents. A small purple 4 floating over his mother’s head, while the bold green 3 bobbed over his father’s. For several years he thought the numbers were there for everyone to see, but he only made the mistake of mentioning the numbers to his father once, after a salesman with a greasy looking 6 had left. 

“Don’t trust him,” Tim remembered saying as climbed onto his dad’s lap at the tender age of three. 

“Why shouldn’t I, Timmy?” 

“He’s a six,” he mumbled as he snuggled into his father’s chest. 

“What do you mean a six?” 

Tim froze realizing what the question meant, making him refuse to elaborate. 

His father couldn’t see the numbers? Did that make the numbers special to him? 

As it turned out, yes, yes they were. These numbers were a dangerous tool. 

They allowed him to see the thick black 11 over Bruce Wayne’s head, the same 11 that he would later see over the Batman’s head. 

He saw the curly-cue baby blue 5 over top Dick Grayson’s head climb the longer he stayed in Wayne’s mansion until it settled into a royal blue 10 when the first Robin vanished, leaving Nightwing in his place. 

He saw the softly curving, deep red 10 over Clark Kent’s head before he ever met Superman as the third Robin, but that no longer startled him since Alfred, in all his polite butlerly ways, had a firm white 12 over his head in the highest calligraphy Tim had ever seen.

 He saw Jason return with his old scratchy red 9 shifted to a toxic green 10 after he came back to life. 

He saw the rogues rainbow of 8s, 9s, and 10s, dance around their minions 5s and 6s. 

He saw when Commissioner Gordon had realized their identities because his neat tan 7 had flipped to maroon 9 before his eyes, even as the Commissioner never mentioned his realization to any of the bats. 

By the time he saw the demon spawns blood red 9 shift to a soft yellow 11 as he started listening to Bruce’s teachings instead of the al Ghul’s he didn’t even have to put in any thought as the brat slide up his mental rankings, marking it in the secret he kept hidden in his room as soon as the mission they were on was done. 

His numbers were his closed kept secret, even over his secret identity. It was something he had carefully trained himself to never react to, his most useful weapon. 

And yet all of his training didn’t stop him from yelping when Damian introduced him to the pen pal he had been forced to make for the first time, drawing a concerned look from Marinette, and questioning looks from Tim’s family. 

After all, Tim never expected to see a fucking 15 over anyone’s head, not when Wonder Women and Martian Manhunter only had a 12, and yet there it stood over a tiny little french sixteen-year-old’s head who was staring at him with the most earnest concern, cursive numbers written in the softest baby pink he could imagine. 

The eyes around the room bore into him all he could think was how typical it was of the demon spawn to make friends with the most dangerous person Tim ever laid eyes on.

_______________________________________________________________________

After the initial meeting Tim did his best to curve his nerves around Marinette, seeing as Damian seemed to try and fly her out to Gothem every other weekend, his feelings for her clearly eclipsing that of friendship. 

The assignment that had made them meet in the first place had ended months before Tim had met the Parisian, but the girl made Damian so soft it was almost as startling as her number. Seeing the brat smiling and laughing with his angel would never stop being confusing. 

Not that Marinette wasn’t straight up confusing on her own. 

She was just... so nice. She went out of her way to make baked goods for everyone every time she came to the Manor, learning new recipes to make each member of the family something they would enjoy, never even put out when  Alfred tries to politely turn her down the first few times before he gives in and enjoys her sweets as well. She’s made more clothes and accessories for them then any of them could count, finding inspirations form each of them to add to her growing resume as a designer, but refusing to let Bruce pay her a single cent for any of them. 

Not only that, but she manages to keep up with the family almost instantly, never missing a chance to sass with Alfred as they trade recipes, watched bad movies with Dick, got into friendly debates with Jason over the most nonsensical topics and even managed to call Bruce out on his ditzy playboy routine, telling the man that he didn’t need to keep up his act for her. 

Tim didn’t want to admit that his investigation on her was still ongoing when he started spending sleepless nights with her, talking quietly over tea she prepared him when she realized he was just as much of an insomniac as he was. He was no closer to figuring out how she could be so dangerous when he realized that he no longer spent the late evenings in his room or the Batcave when she was over, instead gravitating to the library where he knew she’d check for him first. 

He didn’t know how to feel when he realized he was so comfortable with her when he still had no reason for her danger levels to be so high. It was just... so easy talking to her. She wore pigtails for god’s sake, she made him caffeine-free mocha macaroons, how could she be a freaking 15?

“Drake!” 

The sharp bark broke him out of his thoughts and made him look up from his desk to where a seething Damian stood, his knuckles turning white from where he gripped the doorframe.

“Whatever you think I did, I didn’t do it, brat,” He snapped at him only to earn a growl. 

“Family meeting,” was spat at him, “Father wants to see you in the cave now.” 

Tim just raised an eyebrow as he got to his feet. Family meetings weren’t rare, nor was it rare for them to be in the Cave, but usually Bruce waited until after dark, Alfred hadn’t even called them for dinner yet. 

“Coming,” He replied as he walked towards his wardrobe, “But what crawled into your cape and died?” 

“No costumes,” was the last thing Damian said before disappearing. That made Tim paused, hand on the hidden hatch where one of his costumes was stored. 

Not wearing costumes in the Cave was not something unheard of, but if they were going to be there for awhile Bruce usually inforced them being at least in masks, just in case they received a call from another hero.

He wasted no time getting to the closest entrance to the cave, mind going even faster when he sees that Damian didn’t even bother to close the entrance, he never seen the demon spawn this careless. Something major was wrong. 

His heart was nearly beating out of his chest as he sped down to where his family was gathered, only for it to sink when he saw what was pulled up on the Batcomputer’s screen. 

His carefully hidden file on all the information he found on Marinette was pulled up, displaying every tiny piece of info he could find on her. 

Her medical recorders

Her school report cards from all the way back to from first grade

Every mention of her name on social media

Lists of every activity she partook in since she was three years old

There was more info on the screen right now then he’d ever found on any target Batman had asked him to big up, more than he ever found on anyone else, and he knew that not all the data was displayed. 

“You better have a damn good reason for all this, Tim,” Jason practically hissed, as the suspicious eyes from every bat burned into the paling hero. 

Well shit.

[bythehalfpint]

I've been dabbling in fanfiction a little, so here is a weird west gtn au

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`~`````

Yee’d your last Haw

Desert nights are different from most others, it's a kind of cold that creeps up on you. A reprieve from the unending sun, that turns sharper than broken bone if you aren’t paying attention and this far outta town there's nowhere to hide from it. See at this time of night I’d rather be bosom buddies with the beautiful babes at the Ida Palace, but alas, The Reverend Daughter is always one for the dramatics. 

As such, she deemed it necessary to dual the pale priest at midnight, miles away from Caanan and the boy’s “congregation.” The stark white tent resembled more of a shark’s tooth against the star lit sky, under the milky way, “Ha, looks like a big, white, di-”

 “Griddle, don’t-”

“Right, you gotta focus. You’re shifting into bone mode.” 

And as if on cue the wind stopped, the cold air hanging heavy in the lungs, small white puffs forming with every exhale. Harrow pressed on, unphased, pushing aside the tent flap, I stay in toe with sawed off shotgun at the ready.

“Cultists have no right to call themselves Reverend anything,” the pale priest, 16 at most, sat in an ornate wooden chair at the far end of the tent. All the pews, stacked neatly off to the side, a show of strength that this noodly teen could in no way accomplish on his own. He was finishing the last length of braid on his bleach white hair, same color as the tent, same color as his suit, and boots. “Shame” I grinned, “that would’ve been a lot more intimidating if your balls didn’t decide to drop midway through it.”

“Silas Ocktiseron,” the Reverend Daughter stepped out into the open, the sounds of the bone rosary rattling at her side, “you have something of mine, and I’m taking it back one way or another.” Now if this is the first time you’d ever seen the Reverend Daughter you’d think her just a small, angry, pup, all bark not bite. Black hat sitting pretty on top a head of black curls, edges of her dress and veil starting to fray. Just another old house that went west to die. Right there, that’s where you’d be dead wrong. Harrowhark “eternal pain in my ass” Nonigesimus is more lethal than dynamite in a chapel, more lethal than buck shot to the teeth, more lethal than falling in love. I ain’t nothing to laugh at either, I just happen to be a whole lot of handsome, dark and mysterious gunslinger.

“By Divine Right these are my keys, ghoul. For mine is a pure and righteous power, ask my congregation! I reach into their very soul.” His smug air seemed to be suffocating the room, or was he actually suffocating the room? Yop, definitely the latter. In a blink it was a flurry of bones and shells and wooden shrapnel as Colm Asht, honestly forgot about him for a second, swung wide with the nearest pew. A well placed bone bracelet gave me enough time to redirect my shot from the boy to his puppet, as a half formed skeleton knocked the giant of a man off kilter. Enough time the blast half the pew that would have ruined my money maker. 

Scars are great, ladies love scars, collapsed orbital bone? Not so much. 

   

    Using the kick from Baby ( the shotgun is named Baby, cause she’s my baby) I managed to get some distance between me and the big man. Pump, second shot should have popped his shoulder clear across the room and dropped the brick house of a man on his back. That would’ve been too easy, wouldn’t it? He stumbled back and as he was about to fall it looked like someone grabbed him by the front of his shirt and put him up right. His eye’s now  a white hot flame inside his skull, and like a puppet on a string he raised the remaining pew high in the air. “This is it,” I thought, which is always a mistake, before realizing I wasn’t his intended target. “Shit, HARROW!” I screamed.

Without changing his gaze he threw the pew with a sniper’s precision towards my lady in black, and time seemed to stand still for just a moment. No panic in her face, at least none to be seen underneath the veil, just a small, wicked, smile. Time returned to normal as a wall of skeletal remains burst from the ground, interlocked like they were climbing over each other to freedom. They held fast, grasping onto the broken pew. This time I know the air left the room from the sheer badassery, but Harrow’s ego was already bigger than our wanted bounty and she will never know I stood in awe at her grace and poise. Especially when she says cool shit like,

“ Silas, you should really do your research before you set up shop” and the bones part like silk drapes as she almost glides out of the protective barrier. “Burial grounds aren’t a good look for you.”

 I am the cool one in this outfit, I got the sunglasses and big fucking gun to prove it! So I might as well prove it.

As Colm began his barrage of pews, I slipped behind the rubble and reloaded with the special shells. Blessed in the same way Harrow was blessed, a gift for the undead and bringing pain. Two shots is probably all I have, two shots is hopefully all I need. Peering around the pile of collapsed bones and broken wood (sounds like a night at Ida, honestly) I had front row seats to a necromantic battle on a level I had never seen before. Silas had finally raised from his seat, and he looked pissed. Waving his boney hands in the air, fingers twitching as he puppeted the now meat suit that was Colm Asht currently engaged with the onslaught of skeletal remains being thrown at him. 

And Harrow danced.

It always looked like dancing to me now, the way she would glide and spin and step as she raised the dead and propelled them forward. When we were kids, I never saw it like this, too busy trying not to die as I was her main target practice. But now, it's hypnotic, like she’s listening to a melody no one else can hear. As precise as every insult she ever threw at me, as every bone she ever conjured, as every side glance at me she thought I missed. But it wasn’t enough, you can only dance so long without a partner. So I took her dance card.

The shot rang out as I fired into the big man’s torso mid swing at Harrow, he stumbled and was pulled up by the scruff of his shit by the unseen force of Silas. Who was now even more furious as the spray of blood marred the front of his pristine shirt. “That ain’t gonna come out, boy, hope you got a spare,” I say mid pump. One more shot, no time to reload. “Hey Harrow, don’t suppose you got anything fancier than the rattles and skulls here cause I got one --”Trust me, Griddle, please?” Without thinking, because its best not to over think it when she says please, I replied “ Sure thing, sugar lips.” I didn’t hear any snide remarks or cutting words, the world just rang high pitched as golden spots started to appear on Colm Asht’s body, and then music. A melody so sad, and so soft, and so comforting I almost dropped Baby “ Don’t let it take you, Griddle, just keep moving.” I tighten my grip and I dance, dodging the blows waiting for instructions. “ When I tell you to, shoot the brightest point, I can get the rest, till then just move” and sure enough she did. Her newly employed minions wrestled and pierced and pinned the man once Colm Asht nearly to the ground. I watched as each golden light diminished till one remained brighter than the rest “ Do it.”

 Bang, and the music stopped.

Both the pale priest and the puppet collapsed to the floor, the air seemed lighter and more readily available than when we had entered. Silas lay crumpled in the dirt, covered in blood, breathing heavily like he had been donkey kicked in the chest. He clutched his vest pocket as Harrow approached “ the Keys to Saint Peter’s belong to me, witch. I am” he wheezed, voice cracking as he attempted to breathe “ the chosen and the righteous. The angel chose me, the angel-” Harrow unceremoniously rolled him over with her foot, and took a ring of keys from his pocket. “Ocktiseron,” she let his name linger in the new air for a moment “our gifts are the same, our angel is the same, our vows are the same.” Another pause, her and her dramatics, “ and I hope you choke on that knowledge.” 

Outside the night air was as sharp as the angles on the face that awaited us, “ Reverend Daughter,” Palamedes took off his hat and placed it over his chest “ Might I suggest y'all lay low for a while? Ya took out the town’s darling, might be best to let the boy throw his tantrum and cool down before you finish your business here.” The torch light being held beside him by his partner lit up his cool, grey, eyes. “And where would you have us go, Warden? Nearest town on foot is Caanan, we did a favor for the Ida’s they should happily put us up.” Gideon can have some titties, as a treat? “ If I can be so blunt,” Camilla started “ you have no money, they’ll turn you over to the highest bidder and then turn them in for the bounty reward.” I hate this family. Newly disheartened I asked “Then what would you have us do? Die in the desert? Be eaten by vultures? The only thing I wanna be eaten by is a beautifu-” “Cam and I are heading back to The Library, its north of here in the mountain range, no strings attached” Pal raised his hand, two long fingers to the sky “I swear on the Key’s.” I looked at Harrow, waiting for the cue to either pump him full of lead or take the offer. “Where’s the coach?”

So in the back of a wagon heading north to an unknown location with a newly formed alliance we headed to The Library, tired, bloodied and worn. I slipped on my sunglasses, remember I'm the cool one, and made myself comfy. There was a shift, then silence, then pressure as I felt Harrow cozy up beside me. Just enough to feel comfort, not enough to commit or admit what she felt. I get it. So I pretend to sleep till she curls up around me, and when I know she’s out I drape my coat over her with my free arm and I hum a new song till I too drift into unconsciousness.    

[pikapeppa]

Fenris/f!Hawke and the Inquisition: Tell Me (NSFW)

Chapter 50 of Lovers In A Dangerous Time (i.e. Fenris the Inquisitor) is up on AO3! ~5400 words; read here on AO3 instead.

In which Fenris and Rynne have some religious chit-chat and some sexy times in the Frostback Basin.

*******************

Fenris took a sip of his ale, then set the stein aside and loosely wrapped his arms around his knees. At this hour of night, the treehouse camp was mostly quiet and still; Inquisition sentries spoke softly to each other as they patrolled each level of the sprawling structure, and half of Fenris’s companions had turned in for the night. One level below, Hawke was embroiled in a game of twenty-one with Bull and Varric while Sera variously encouraged and jeered at them, and Fenris could tell who had won each hand by the quality of their laughter as it floated up to the highest level of the treehouse every few minutes. 

He tilted his head back to study the stars. The sky of the Frostback Basin was thick with them, twinkling like fireflies captured in the navy-blue net of night, and it was lovely enough for Fenris to nearly understand why the Avvar revered the sky so much that it warranted its own goddess.

The Lady of the Skies, he mused. But if the Avvar considered their Lady to be a goddess, that meant she was really just a spirit, if she truly existed at all.

Fenris frowned slightly at the thought. It was still odd to think that the Avvar revered spirits as gods and welcomed them so openly, given how feared they were in the rest of Thedas. Aside from in Tevinter and Nevarra, of course, where the necromancers and mortalitasi performed their dubious rituals.

He looked down at his left hand and studied the flickering in the fissures of his palm. It was also odd – and disturbing – to think that spirits in the Fade could track him down by virtue of the mark. To imagine that at this moment on the other side of the Veil, just a mere hairsbreadth of magic away, spirits were hovering near his hand and watching his every move, like ghoulish spectators at some kind of show…

He shifted his shoulders uneasily the thought, then closed his fist and leaned his head back once more to look at the stars. Truth be told, he was feeling quite drained by all this talk of spirits. Talking about spirits, talking to spirits, finding out that the Avvar gods were spirits… it raised so many questions about spirits and gods and… and religion in general. Questions that Fenris hadn’t been forced to think too much about before the Inquisition, back when his understanding of the world was far more clear-cut.

The more I learn, the less I know, he thought ruefully. It was an uncomfortable truth, and one that Fenris was still having trouble coming to terms with, even despite everything that he and Hawke had seen and done in the past few years. And not for the first time, he wished he could be as lighthearted as Hawke when it came to the unknown. 

Her lightheartedness, Fenris thought, was one of the things about Hawke that had always struck him as strange and special. She was hardly the most knowledgeable person in Thedas, but she knew what she didn’t know, and she cheerfully acknowledged her own ignorance. When Hawke found out that she was wrong about something, she owned up to her incorrectness with a laugh. She was always happy to learn new things, incorporating new and seemingly insane information into her worldview as easily as though she was adding a new patch to a quilt.

Hawke certainly wasn’t ruminating about the nature of spirits and godhood, for instance. If anything, she seemed fascinated that the Avvar’s gods were simply spirits, and she was positively tickled by the Avvar’s respectful treatment of Cole. But this religious issue was different for Hawke. She didn’t believe in any gods at all, so questions of gods and mortals and reality and fiction were all purely academic to her. Fenris, on the other hand… 

He ran his fingers through his hair. He still didn’t know where he stood when it came to Andraste and the Maker. Ever since he’d woken up with this damned anchor on his hand, he’d been forced to consider his own religious leanings more deeply than he had since his discussions with Sebastian back in Kirkwall. And some two-odd years later, Fenris still didn’t know where he stood. 

He didn’t think he could be faulted for his confusion. After all, he’d been praised himself as Andraste’s holy herald, seen the Black City with his own two eyes, watched an Old God soul being taken from Kieran’s body, and met with an elven goddess wearing a human witch’s skin. The inconsistencies, the seemingly contradictory stories… of course Fenris didn’t know where he stood.

He sighed and stared blindly up at the sky. A moment later, he heard Hawke’s footsteps padding up the stairs to the platform where their little shared tent was pitched. “Hello, handsome,” she chirped. “Is there room on this platform for one more?” She plopped down beside him and started pulling off her boots. 

He smiled faintly at her. Her breath was scented with ale, but her gaze was bright and alert, and he admired the smile crinkling the corners of her eyes as he replied. “There’s only room on this platform for the winner of your tournament of twenty-one,” he said. 

She laughed and poked his arm. “I see how it is. I’ll fetch Bull to come and keep you company, then. I have it on good authority that he gives excellent cuddles.” She started to push herself to her feet.

Fenris grabbed her arm and pulled her back down with a smirk. “You are aware of why you constantly lose at that game, aren’t you? You always demand another card when you ought to hold. You always go over.”

She grinned and leaned into his side. “If you’re such an expert, why don’t you play with us?”

“Because Varric always fleeces me,” Fenris said dryly.

She laughed. “He does not! You always just lose because you don’t demand another card when you should. You always fall short.”  

He casually lifted his stein to his lips. “An interesting perspective. I’ll consider it.”

She chuckled and settled her head on his shoulder, and they sat in a cozy silence for a moment. 

Then she lifted her head and looked at him. “Seriously though. A royal for your thoughts?”

He raised an eyebrow. “I believe the expression is ‘a copper for your thoughts’.”

“I know,” she said. “But you’re so clever, your thoughts are worth an entire royal.”

He shot her a chiding look, then chuckled at her winsome smile. “Do you never tire of flattering me?”

“Never,” she said cheerfully. “I’m Rynne Hawke, Champion of Flattering Fenris.”

“That title is terrible,” he said. “No one will respect it.”

She grinned at him. “Fine then. What title should I have instead?”

Fenris thought for a moment, then smirked at her. “Rynne Hawke, Champion of Dirty Double-Entendre.”

She let out a throaty laugh. “Oh yes. I love that. I should have Josie order me a gilded plaque for our bedroom door.”

Fenris huffed in amusement, but before he could tease her any further, she reached up tweaked his earlobe. “Come on, Fenris, tell me what’s on your mind. I know you’ve been thinking about something serious up here all on your own.”

He shrugged. “It’s… nothing. It’s not important.”

“If it’s keeping you awake, then it’s not nothing,” she said.

He gazed at her sympathetic face for a moment, then sighed. “I was just thinking about… about gods, I suppose. What they are, and… whether they exist.”

Her eyebrows rose, and he hurried on before she could respond. “We know now that an elven god exists: this Mythal woman that we met. And the Old Gods of Tevinter existed; they were dragons that rose up as archdemons, so their existence is uncontested. The Avvar’s gods are spirits, so they exist. But…” He broke off, feeling rather sheepish about the next thing he was going to say. 

Hawke saved him by saying it instead. “You’re wondering whether the Maker exists, too.”

He nodded. “Or… or something that corresponds to the Maker, I suppose. If Mythal and the Old Gods and the Avvar gods exist in some form, then… perhaps there is something that corresponds to a Maker, as well.”

“Could be,” Hawke said casually. “Maybe he’s just a spirit too.”

Fenris didn’t reply. He’d been circling around this idea himself, but he’d been reluctant to fully voice it for some reason.

When Hawke spoke again, her tone was tentative. “You don’t, er… Do you still think the Maker’s out there?”

He shrugged. “I… don’t know, Hawke. I have never known what to think. You know that.”

“I know,” she said softly. Then she smiled at him. “You know what’s funny? Andrastianism is the most powerful religion in the world, but it’s the only one we haven’t seen any evidence for yet. There’s a terrible sort of irony in that, don’t you think?”

Fenris huffed. “Of course you would find that funny.”

She laughed. “All right, not funny exactly. But I am thrilled that there’s no one who’s going to smite me for thinking such impure thoughts about that huge Andraste statue at the Kirkwall Chantry.” She held her hands out in a suggestive gesture. “You know, the one with the really shapely—”

Fenris tutted and pinched her waist, and she cackled before snuggling against his side once more. He draped his arm around her shoulders. “This really doesn’t bother you at all, does it?” he asked.

She lifted her head slightly. “What, the Maker maybe not really being a Maker after all?”

“Not… not just that,” Fenris said. “All of it. All of the gods. You were wrong too, after all.”

She tilted her head curiously, so Fenris went on. “You thought there was no such thing as any gods at all. But you were wrong. They do exist; they’re just not what everyone thought.”

She nodded an acknowledgement but didn’t speak, and her expression was expectant, like she was waiting for him to say something more. He shrugged and rubbed a hand through his hair. “I… I’m not sure what I am getting at. It just…” He gazed at her. “I envy your ability to take this all in stride.”

She slipped her hand through the crook of his elbow. “Well, it’s not like it changes anything for me. It’s not like I was shaping my life around religion or gods or anything, right?” She waved her hand dismissively. “Besides, if the gods are all just spirits or souls or whatnot, and Solas always said spirits are just conscious beings of a different type, then… gods are just people. They’re not special, they’re just people.” She grinned at him. “That’s interesting, isn’t it? The so-called gods are just as fallible as the rest of us.”

He raised his eyebrows at her blunt words. “And that comforts you?”

“I think it amuses me more than anything else,” she said.

Fenris frowned thoughtfully. “But… they aren’t like the rest of us. Those who are called gods have an uncommon degree of power, whether it’s literal magic like that Mythal woman or the pull of leadership like Corypheus. They aren’t truly like the rest of us.”

Hawke tilted her head. “Do you think they deserve the title of gods, then?”

“No, it’s not that,” he said. “It just… surprises me, I suppose. To think you are amused that those with such power also wield titles that place them on a higher pedestal. One that allows them to control others.”

Her expression became a bit wary. “That’s not what amuses me. I’m just amused by—”

“ —the irony of the situation,” Fenris finished. “I know.”

They fell quiet for a moment longer, and Fenris listened idly to the shifting leaves and the creak of nighttime insects as Hawke’s body heat seeped into his side. When she spoke again, her voice was quiet. 

“You know, I keep thinking…” She trailed off, and Fenris looked at her quizzically.

“What?” he said.

She shot him a slightly apologetic look. “I keep thinking of Solas and what he’d think of all this.”

Fenris wilted slightly. “Ah.”

Hawke squeezed his arm. “Come on, you have to admit it would be sort of funny if he were here. He’d be so thrilled. An entire group of people who love spirits and welcome them and let them teach their mages? He’d be thrilled!”

Fenris didn’t reply, and Hawke blithely went on. “Actually, that reminds me — remember how we found all those inscriptions in the Hinterlands about Tyrdda Bright-Axe and the Lady of the Skies?”

“The Avvar poems?” Fenris said.

“Yes, those,” she said. “I don’t remember the details of those poems, but I do remember they referred to the Lady of the Skies as Tyrdda’s leaf-eared lover.”

Fenris smirked at her. “Of course that’s what you would…” Then he trailed off in his teasing and raised his eyebrows in genuine surprise. The Lady of the Skies appearing as a ‘leaf-eared lover’?

He looked at Hawke. “The spirit took the form of an elf.”

She nodded and poked his arm. “Just like our lovely bald Solas. See, more evidence that we’re right about him! Well, that Dorian was right, really.” 

Fenris frowned. “Hmm. That is interesting.”

“I know, right?” Hawke said brightly. “Imagine Solas being revered as a god. Can you imagine?” She snickered.

“I can, in fact,” Fenris said. “If he was seen as a god, everyone would have to listen to him.”

Hawke sobered somewhat at his acidic tone. “Well, that’s a bit unfair. I actually think he wouldn’t want to be seen as a god.”

Fenris grunted. “He had the arrogance of a god.”

“Hardly,” Hawke retorted. “I mean, yes, he had his little moments of being a know-it-all. But he backed down if we called him on it.”

Fenris shrugged and didn’t reply. Another moment of silence fell between them, but it was a bit awkward this time.

Once again, Hawke broke the silence. “I still think—”

Fenris sighed. “Hawke, please.”

“Look, I just don’t think he’s doing anything nefarious,” she said defensively. “I think it’s entirely possible he just went back home to the Fade.”

Fenris gave her an exasperated look. “Then how do you explain the last words he said to me? ‘No matter what happens’...”

She shrugged and dropped her gaze, just as Fenris knew she would; she’d never been able to come up with a truly convincing explanation for Solas’s ominous parting words to Fenris.

He ruthlessly pressed on. “And he wanted Corypheus’s orb. You can’t deny that. Why would he want that blasted orb?”

“It was old and elven,” she said. “He probably wanted it for the same reasons as Merrill would.”

“You know that doesn’t particularly comfort me,” Fenris said flatly.

She shot him a slightly resentful look, and an odd twist of annoyance and affection pulled at his heart. As much as Hawke’s sunny outlook was enviable, it was times like this that Fenris found her optimism frustrating: even when faced with clear evidence of wrongdoing or poor judgment, she was reluctant to see the worst in her friends. Anders, Merrill, Solas… even Isabela when she’d left Kirkwall for three years. Even Fenris himself, when he’d distanced himself from her for the same amount of time. She refused to see any of them as harmful, simply because she loved them.

She released his arm and stretched her legs out in front of her. “I think Solas just wanted to know more about the orb. Which elven god it belonged to, how it worked…”

“You think he was collecting knowledge,” Fenris said.

“Yes, of course,” she said. “Like Merrill was trying to do.”

He ignored her pointed tone. “Knowledge is power,” he said. “Solas said that himself.”

Hawke wilted. “Fenris…”

He pressed on doggedly. “What did he want that power for?”

“Knowledge and power aren’t the same thing,” Hawke insisted. “Learning can just be for fun. Like my magical macaron recipe, for example. Now that I’ve perfected it, I can basically snap my fingers over some sugar and eggs and almonds and have a plate of macarons.” She gave him a knowing look. “You have to admit, that’s pretty fucking fun.”

Fenris tried to scowl at her; really he did. But the image of her standing in Skyhold’s kitchens, snapping her fingers repeatedly and materializing plates of macarons… 

He couldn’t help himself: a little snort of laughter escaped him. He rubbed his mouth to mask it, but it was too late. 

Hawke grinned and pulled his hand away from his mouth. “Ah-ha! A smile. I knew it was hiding there somewhere.” She pinched his chin playfully.

He tutted and dodged away from her hand. “Fasta vass. You will truly be the death of me.”

“That’s a shame,” she said cheerfully. “Because that smile of yours brings me to life.”

He shot her an incredulous look, then laughed more openly. “Now who is the smooth talker?”

She giggled. “I learned from the best. Now come on, let’s get some rest. Big day tomorrow of slogging along the riverbank and killing giant spiders.”

He huffed – she wasn’t wrong about that – then followed her into their little tent. A few minutes later, Fenris was stretched out on their camp bed while Hawke extinguished the little alchemical lamp. 

She slipped under the covers and rubbed his bare foot with hers. “Goodnight,” she whispered.

“Sleep well,” he murmured. He let out a long, relaxed breath and folded his arms behind his head. 

A few minutes later, just as his mind was starting to settle from its usual buzz of thoughts, Hawke spoke into the darkness of the tent. “Fenris?” 

“Mm?”

“Can I kiss you?”

He turned his head and gave her an odd look. “Of course,” he said slowly. “Why do you ask?” 

In the dimness of the tent, he could see the shape of her shoulder as she shrugged. “Just checking,” she said. She shuffled closer to him and slid her bare leg over his thigh, then pressed her lips to his in a soft kiss. 

He let his eyes drift shut once more. Hawke’s kisses were soft and slow, more a caress of the lips than a true firm kiss, and Fenris followed her lead, parting his lips slightly when she gently kissed his lower lip.

Her lush lower lip brushed between his own. He nipped her lip very lightly, and she gasped. 

It was a soft gasp; a tiny intake of air, but a very telling one, especially when she pressed her groin to his hip at the same time. 

His eyes popped open. He hadn’t realized she was in the mood, given the chaste quality of her kisses. 

He slid his hand beneath her loose linen shirt and over her hip, and to his surprise, she moaned into his lips. 

He pulled away slightly to look at her. “Do you–?”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she breathed. She rolled away from him onto her back and pressed her knuckles to her lips. 

He rolled onto his side to face her. “Why are you apologizing? What’s wrong?”

“N-nothing,” she said. “I just…” She let out a breathy little laugh. “You must be tired. I don’t want to… It’s just been a while since we, um, went to bed at the same time.” 

He frowned slightly. It was true that he’d been coming to bed later and rising earlier than Hawke for some time now, but it had just become a part of their routine. This was the first time she was mentioning it.

“Is that a problem?” he said.

“Not a problem,” she said hurriedly. “You’re busy, you have busy – important things to do. It’s… it’s nothing.”

He frowned at her more deeply. Then he pressed his fingers against the apex of her thighs. 

She arched instantly into his hand, and he stopped breathing for a moment. She was already so wet that her smallclothes were damp, even though all they’d done was kiss.

He slid his fingers over the damp fabric of her smalls. “This is not nothing,” he told her.

She moaned softly. “F-fuck…”

“Do you want me?” he whispered. 

“Of course I want you,” she blurted.

“Why didn’t you say that in the first place?”

She let out a shaky breath. “I… I don’t know. It’s been a while, I didn’t want to pressure you.”

He paused in his stroking. Had it really been that long? When had they last had sex? Was it… two weeks ago, perhaps? He wasn’t sure.

He looked at her. “When was the last time?”

“It doesn’t matter,” she breathed. She lifted her hips toward his hand. “Fenris, please…”

He refused to move his fingers. “How long ago, Hawke?”

She released another tremulous breath. “A month, give or take,” she murmured. “Maybe. Something like that.”

He gaped at her in surprise. Had it really been that long? He hadn’t… how had he not realized it had been that long?

He pressed his fingers between her legs again. “Well, we should rectify that.”

She jerked her hips eagerly, but her words belied her body. “You don’t have to,” she gasped. “I don’t want you to–”

He grabbed her hand and pulled it down to the hardening bulge in his leggings. “Do you think I would do this if I didn’t want to?” he whispered. 

She didn’t reply; she was too busy rubbing her palm over his hardness. Her fingers slid along the margins of his cock, and Fenris indulged himself in the sweet pressure of her fingers for a moment before pushing her hand aside. 

She whimpered in protest, but the protest was short-lived; he was crawling over her now and pushing her thighs apart, and before he’d even settled between her legs, she was gasping fitfully and lifting her hips in anticipation. 

He peeled her smallclothes down. A liquid thread of arousal stretched between the fabric and her folds, and for some reason, his heart fluttered painfully at the sight. Seeing Hawke so ready for him, wanting him so badly despite barely a touch… It made his chest ache for some reason. 

Worse yet was the thought of her wanting him like this every night. The thought of Hawke waiting for him to come to bed, then keeping her wants to herself as he collapsed onto their mattress before rising just a few hours later and leaving her alone…

A lump rose to his throat. He swallowed hard, then tossed her smallclothes aside and ran his tongue between her legs. 

She jammed her fist against her mouth and jerked her hips, and Fenris grasped her thighs as he lapped up the sweetness of her musk. He tasted her thoroughly, treating her lower lips as though he was kissing her mouth, and although her sounds were muffled by her fist, the language of her body was more than clear enough. She twisted her hips slowly when he smoothed his tongue lightly over her clit, so he continued to lick her gently, stroking her swollen little bud until her writhing told him that she wanted a firmer touch. 

When she rose to her peak a mere minute later, her fingers scrabbled down over the planes of her belly to scratch her skin, and Fenris reached for her hand. She grabbed his hand, digging her fingernails into his palm as she shuddered with pleasure, and he carefully brought her through her rapture until her fingers loosened in his palm. 

A moment later, she was sliding out from beneath him and pushing him back, plucking at his tunic and his leggings at the same time, and Fenris’s breathing grew harsh as her obvious desperation fed his own desire. With Hawke’s overeager help, he freed himself from his clothes without dislodging her from his lap. She dragged her shirt off and threw it aside, and then she was clutching his shoulders and rocking her wetness over his length. 

He braced one hand on the bedroll and pulled her eagerly against his cock. “Hawke,” he rasped. “Please–”

She lifted her hips and adjusted his cock, then came down hard on his lap. Surprised and pleasured by the hardness of her thrust, he just barely managed to muffle his groan of pleasure by biting the side of her neck. 

“Fuck,” she gasped. She craned her neck to the side to give him better access, all the while digging her fingers into his shoulders as she rolled against his hips in a hard grind, and Fenris breathed hard against her neck, silencing himself against her salty skin as the rapid rise and fall of her hips brought his lust roaring to life. 

A rapturous minute later, she released his right shoulder and slowed down to a stop, and Fenris opened his eyes. “Do you want to switch?” he panted.

“No,” she breathed. She lowered her left hand between her legs. “I want to touch myself while I fuck you.” 

Her blunt words lit a fresh flare of want low in his belly, and he shamelessly watched as she parted the curls between her legs. She pressed the swollen bud of her clit with the flat of her fingers, holding her breath and holding still on his lap as she petted herself, and Fenris’s hungry gaze darted from her hand to her face, his entire body tense as he tried to control his rising impatience. 

A torturous minute later, her face twisted into an expression of utter rapture. She gasped loudly, then burst out a sob. “Fenris–”

He kissed her hard and thrust into her even harder. He could feel her pleasure cries echoing in his mouth, heightening his impatience to a fever pitch. A second later she was riding him hard and fast, and the force of their fucking and the sheer obviousness of her desire was driving him swiftly toward his peak. 

She broke away from his lips and clasped his neck. Without slowing in her zealous rhythm, she pressed her forehead to his. “I love you,” she breathed.

“I know,” he rasped. “I – I know, Hawke. You…” He broke off with a soft moan as she ground herself firmly against his lap.

She stroked his neck her thumbs. “I know you know,” she whispered. “I just…” She kissed him again before speaking in a breathless voice. “It feels like a while since I said it.”

He shot her a brief odd look. She’d just told him she loved him earlier this evening. 

She pressed her lips to his cheekbone and trailed her fingers down his chest, and that’s when he realized what she really meant. This was her way of saying it. This was how and when Hawke showed him that she loved him: by stroking his arms and his chest and showing how much she cherished his every scar and line. By lifting him to peaks he would never have otherwise had, and by kissing his lips and breathing her love against his ear in the throes of their mutual pleasure. 

The love they made together was how Hawke told him she loved him. And it always had been, ever since their first time over ten years ago. 

He slid his palms up her sweat-laced back and brushed his lips to hers. “Fuck me hard,” he whispered. 

She smiled and wrapped her arms around his neck. “My pleasure. Literally,” she purred. A moment later, she was rising and falling on his lap in a frenzied rhythm, her gasping breaths ghosting across his ear while he panted against her shoulder, and his climax was climbing, roiling and building between his legs until it finally burst through his limbs in a shock of ecstasy.

Mired in the pulsing of his pleasure, he mindlessly bit her shoulder. She gasped and fucked him even harder until he ran his hands down her back and squeezed her waist. 

She carefully slowed to a stop, then rested her cheek against his temple with a happy sigh. Her arms were still around his neck, and Fenris lazily ran his palm along her tattooed back and inhaled the sandalwood scent of her skin as their sweat started to cool. 

She brushed her lips gently over his ear, then nibbled the tip of his ear with her lips, and he smirked and tilted his head away. “That tickles,” he murmured.

She chuckled and nuzzled his ear again. “But your ear is so tasty.”

He grumbled, and she giggled again before starting to shift off of his lap. “All right. Now that you’ve fucked me so nicely, I think I’m going to fall right asleep–”

He grasped her hips to keep her on his lap. “Rynne,” he said. 

She stopped and met his gaze, and he carefully brushed her damp bangs back from her forehead. “You can tell me when you want me,” he said quietly.

She laughed and idly brushed her fingers along his collarbone. “What a silly thing to say. I always want you.”

“Then you can always tell me,” he said.

She smiled and shrugged. “But I’m always gagging for it and I don’t want to make you feel bad.”

Her gaze was downcast despite her smile. Fenris tipped her chin up, forcing her to meet his eyes. “You think it would make me feel bad to be told that my wife desires me?” he said.

“No, no,” she said hastily. “I mean…” She licked her lips nervously, then sighed. “I don’t want to make you feel guilty. We both know you’re busy. We can’t… sex isn’t going to happen as often as it used to,” she said bluntly.  “And that’s fine, it’s just the way it is. But I don’t want you to feel guilty when you’re not in the mood.”

He brushed his thumb along the line of her jaw. “And I don’t want you to feel like you are alone.”

Her gaze dropped again, and she laughed lightly. “Look who you’re talking to. I’m never alone.”

He gazed at her seriously for a moment. She could deflect as much as she wanted, but he knew that he was right about her feeling lonely sometimes, especially since Varric and Dorian had left.

“Tell me when you want me,” he insisted. “I want to hear it. Even if I am tired or preoccupied, tell me anyway.”

She shrugged. She was still smiling, and her eyes were still on her fingers as they trailed across his collarbone. “And then what?”

“Then we will see,” he said. “Maybe we’ll make love. Maybe I can watch you while you pleasure yourself. Maybe nothing will come of it. But if you tell me, then I can tell you in return.”

“Tell me what?” she asked.

“That I love you,” he replied.

Her eyes finally returned to his face, and a smile lit her lips. “I’m sorry, I didn’t quite catch that,” she said. “Can you say it again?”

He tsked and pinched her waist, and she squeaked with laughter and smacked his hand. A moment later, they were curled together under the covers, and Fenris could just make out her cheeky grin in the darkness of the tent. 

She stroked his chin gently with her thumb. “Come on, tell me again,” she murmured.

He huffed. “I love you, Hawke. Even when you’re an idiot.”

She laughed softly and tucked her knee carefully between his legs. “I love you too, you handsome fool,” she whispered. 

Fenris smirked, then kissed her smiling lips. Hawke could smile and joke if she liked, but Fenris knew the fears that lived behind the cheeky curl of her grin. To counter those fears, he would tell her he loved her every day. She would tell him when she wanted him, and he would tell her of his love, and they would walk through the rest of their days knowing neither of them would ever be alone. 

[kraztaco]

Smash Bros Move Set for Quote from Cave Story

Been a while since I posted here, huh?

Anyhoo, I made a Smash move set for Quote for a contest a while back, and I figured I’d share it here.

It’s long, so I’ll make a cut here.

Quote is a zoner with Curly Brace as an echo. The two characters being echo fighters rather than alternate costumes is more of a Peach/Daisy type of thing rather than any difference between the two play styles. Quote is a stoic, silent, protagonist, while Curly is far more outgoing and expressive. This would be reflected in their animations, idle poses, and one different move. Curly is playable in Cave Story, and plays identically to Quote after all. Any time Curly Brace has a different quality, I’ll be sure to say so.

Along with Cave Story, both Quote and Curly Brace appear in the fighting game Blade Strangers. While I will be using some moves from that game, Cave Story will be the primary source for the move set.

I’ll try to avoid spoilers as much as possible, but some things are unavoidable due to the nature of the set. Quote’s name isn’t revealed until late in the game, so that is a bit of a spoiler but, going from his guest appearances, I doubt they care much anymore.

I couldn’t come up with anything else for the logo. I considered the island, but it would look too much like Castlevania, and a star would just be KoF.

Stats:

Height - Below Average (most crossover media portrays them as on the shorter side) Weight - Average (Can’t be a lightweight, being a robot and all) Walk Speed - Average Run Speed - Average Jump Height - High Fall Speed - Slow Air Speed - High Jumps - 2 (Normal) No additional movement options Takes damage while in water.

The Gimmick -

In Cave Story, each weapon in the player’s inventory has EXP. Leveling up your weapon will change its effect slightly, making it more effective (there are exceptions, but that’s not too important here). Enemies drop EXP, and gathering it levels up the weapon the player is currently holding. Conversely, taking damage will decrease the EXP of the weapon the player is holding.

Things will be simplified a little here. In Smash, Quote will have one EXP meter which applies to his entire move set.

Quote’s EXP will be displayed above his portrait.

Quote will start each stock at Level 1 with 0 EXP.

Every time a fighter takes 10% of damage from Quote (cumulative), they will drop a bit of EXP, which is a yellow triangle.

If a fighter takes 20% of damage or more in a single hit, they will instead drop a larger EXP triangle.

The triangles will disappear after 5 seconds, and no fighters other than the Quote player whose damage spawned them can interact with them.

If Quote touches the EXP, it will be collected.

If Quote is damaged, he will lose some EXP, if he has any. (being at 0 EXP is punishment enough)

Gathering enough EXP will level Quote up to Level 2, then Level 3. Gathering more EXP at Level 3, will give Quote Level MAX. Just like in Cave Story, this is a small buffer that lets you take some damage without dropping to Level 2.

Level 1 - Level 2 - About 10 EXP

Level 2 - Level 3 - About 20 additional EXP

Level 3 - MAX - About 5 additional EXP

(these numbers can easily be adjusted)

Leveling up will make Quote’s moves deal more knockback, but no additional %. They will also alter Quote’s special moves.

TL:DR - Quote is playing Coin Smash.

Quote’s moves in general are long range without much knockback or KO power. He will need to level up if he wants to reliably take stocks, meaning he has no choice but to get close to enemies and become more vulnerable when EXP is on the stage.

A Moves-

Quote’s Jab is a 3 hit combo taken from Curly’s Blade Strangers move set. Since Quote doing this little butt bounce would be ridiculous, his Jab 3 is a simple punch, taken from his own Blade Strangers move set.

The knockback angle on each Jab 3 would be slightly different, with Quote sending at more of an upwards angle than Curly.

Dash Attack is taken from Blade Strangers, having them both perform Curly’s elbow dash.

Tilts are pretty simple. Drew little pictures for them. F tilt is the only one that has any real reference to the game, being a down angled version of Quote’s most basic attack.

Conversely, F Smash is his most powerful attack; The Spur. It’s a beam that has a bit of startup, and travels further the more the attack is charged.

Down Smash is a spin from the Whimsical Star. It’s a multihit that hits on both sides then launches.

Up Smash is a Missile Launcher shot upwards, which falls to the ground. You know, like Snake’s.

Neutral Air is a two hit kick.

Forward air is a downward angles shot. It’s more powerful than the forward tilt.

Up Air is two shots fired upwards. Drifting during it means the shots will land in different spots.

Back air drags the for up with it and launches them. I considered it going down, but that would be kinda OP.

Down Air is your standard delayed spike with the Missile Launcher.

Grabs-

Grab and Pummel

Forward Throw

Up Throw (has the highest knockback of them, so it would be a kill throw earliest.)

Down Throw

Back Throw

Specials... oh boy, this is where things get complicated.

Neutral Special - Fireball

Quote fires a shot from the Fireball gun. It could have some start up lag, but that would be up to balance. Its a basic projectile that can just be thrown out to take space, like Mario’s Fireball. It will bounce on the ground at a similar arc to Ridley’s fire. At level 1, the ball will move at a moderate speed, and there can only be one active at a time.

At Level 2, the fireball increases in speed, and there can be two active at a time.

Same for Level 3, except the fireballs are now blue and slightly larger. They travel faster, and there can be 3 active at once.

The speed increase isn’t that much, but Level 3 fireballs can be tricky to avoid. Also, this is less fireballs than you’re allowed in the actual game (2/3/4 opposed to 3/4/5), but balance.

Side Special - Blade

Spoiler territory here.

Quote throws King’s sword, goes spinning a good distance in front of him. Quote has plenty of Blade Strangers moves that use the sword which could work very well for his moves, but I wanted to capture the main game more. In the main game, he just chucks the dang thing. It also seemingly comes back to him once its done doing what it does.

The blade flies about 2 character lengths in the direction Quote throws it, then disappears. It doesn’t go very fast, but it has good launching power and not much start lag. There can only be 1 active Blade at a time, regardless of its level.

At Level 2, the Blade moves faster, but not as far, about half of the Level 1.

At Level 3, the attack becomes truly dangerous. Instead of throwing the sword, the spirit of King himself will emerge and fly forwards. If he comes into contact with anyone, he will stop, and become a multihit cutting attack.

The Blade is a powerful projectile, but is fairly easy to read, and can’t be spammed since it sticks around for a bit. It can always be reflected, even as King’s spirit.

Down Special - Bubbline

There were some choices here, but I went with the Bubbline, mainly because it changes the most between levels (and the Nemesis gets weaker with levels, defeating the purpose of this gimmick).

At Level 1, holding down special will have Quote fire a pathetic stream of bubbles forwards. They deal damage, but don’t flinch. Quote can move and jump around as long as he holds the special button, but the attack will end if any other attacks are used. This is a pretty bad move, but it comes out very fast, and the bubbles linger, so it might be good to throw out from time to time.

At Level 2, more bubbles are fired at once, making the attack deal flinching damage directly in front of Quote. The attack still deals poor shield damage, and can’t hold foes in place.

At Level 3, the bubbles will now circle around Quote for as long as the special button is held. They can block weak attacks, and damage opponents who touch them. When the special button is released, the bubbles will fly off in whichever direction is being held at the time.

The Bubbline is a useful tool for defense, but it’s sub-par damage and shield pressure mean it isn’t a get out of jail free card.

Up Special - Booster v2.0

Holding Up special lets Quote use his upgraded jetpack. It has a fuel meter, and will continue to go until the special button is released, or the fuel runs out. Quote can have a second meter by his portrait, displaying his fuel.

Using the move does not put Quote into special fall.

While holding the special button, Quote can change directions by holding up, left, right, and even straight down.

The jetpack is great for mobility, but isn’t too fast at Level 1. Each level increases the jetpack’s speed and improves its fuel consumption.

Fuel works just like R.O.B., refiling when on the ground.

Final Smash - Super Missile Launcher

Both Quote and Curly have cinematic Final Smashes which trigger in different ways. For Quote, Balrog drops down from slightly above Quote. His hitbox starts in front of, and above Quote, and falls to his level. Anyone who Balrog hits is dragged in. Kind of the opposite of how Banjo and Kazzoie’s Final Smash works. Quote rides on Balrogs head, and barrages the caught foes with the Super Missile Launcher, with Balrog’s signature HUZZAH! text box displayed at the bottom of the screen.

For Curly, her four Migima friends, the Colons, pop up in front of her, and anyone hit by them are dragged in. Their hitbox is on the shorter side, but it goes a fair bit in front of her.

The cinematic has the Migima beat the caught foes with sticks in a cartoonish manner, they then leave as Curly readies her own Super Missile Launcher and blasts the foes.

I didn’t have many ideas for the Final Smash. Sure, the Spur is the most powerful weapon in the game, but I figured the Super Missile Launcher has more oomph. Curly’s take is inspired by her super in Blade Strangers. Also, I just like Balrog.

And colors for both of them.

And that’s all, hope you enjoyed it. I don’t see Quote getting in realistically, which was why I was comfortable making this move set. Honestly, I’d be ecstatic if he got a Mii Gunner costume with the level of love Sans got.

Making this set got me worried I was making another Belmont. In the end, I realized, I made something much worse.

[sunshineandfangs]

Klarosummer - Great Barrier Reef || Memento Mori

@klarosummerbingo​ 

Bingo!

The RNG gods have finally given me a bingo, not that it really matters since my goal is to do the whole card, but still.

Warning: this one is on the darker side. It’s not too bad, but just heads ups. Also semi-graphic violence toward the end.

Caroline stared out into the blue-green sea (maybe in another life, she’d call it aqua or turquoise). And it was beautiful. Her keen eyes were able to see the shadows and distortions of the coral formation, even from her place on the shore.

A tiny smile broke the smooth lines of her face. She had promised herself that one day she would come here. Feel hot sand under her feet. Have the Australian sun glint off her hair. Dive into the Coral Sea and witness the beauty of the reef for herself.

And yet it still felt like a dream (no matter that her actual dreams were only blood and darkness). She had cradled and nursed the idea so carefully, so delicately for nearly two decades. And now she was here. Standing on the beach. 

Alive. 

In person. 

Her golden dream turned to reality.

She could still remember the day that sweet dream was coaxed into existence. How the Caretaker spoke to them, voice infused with trained softness.

“Alright, little ones, are you ready for your next assignment?” He paused, waiting for the acknowledging nods and polite, yes,sir’s. “For the next several months, I want you all to pick and then research one place you would like to go above all others. And then, we shall discuss them all together at the end of that time frame. But for today, we’ll start with suicide sprints. Line up, little ones.”

How months later he congratulated them all for their hard work and dedication. Telling them to hold onto that drive and spirit, infuse it into every one of their assignments. That one day their reward would be the freedom to visit those glorious places.

How a few years after that he told them to crush that dream. That as Soldiers in the war against The Scourge, desire was the most dangerous thing they could possess. Desire meant leverage. Leverage meant death.

Caroline closed her eyes. Remembered the shock and sadness that appeared in some of the children’s faces.

Of course, some rebelled. And those that did quietly disappeared. 

”No need to fret, little ones. Not everyone can be Soldiers. They have been transferred elsewhere, to a place where they can still be of use in our fight.”

By their late teens, those that remained, were frighteningly lethal little creatures. Obedient and cutthroat. The pinnacle of physical and mental performance.

“Congratulations, little ones. You are ready. Ready to become Soldiers.”

Despite their training, all of them screamed that day. Screamed until they fell silent. Came out the other side as Other, a few faces missing from their number. 

But that was alright, not everyone could be Soldiers.

---

Caroline shook her head, compartmentalizing that mindset. It didn’t belong in this place.

On silent feet, she made her way toward the water.

“Soldier 31185.”

Caroline froze. No. How could he-? 

Explosions. Fire. The entire complex and all of its inhabitants, burning to ash.

Yet, even as part of her scrambled to make sense of this ghost, the rest of her categorized the facts and her surroundings. 

Director William Forbes survived.

And he was here for her.

---

Klaus had been observing the lovely blonde for some time now. At first he had been planning to have a little bloody snack, maybe more if she was receptive. Her legs were lovely after all, and he was sure they would look equally fantastic wrapped around him.

But something had made him pause. 

He noticed she was rather quiet for a human. Oddly graceful as well. And he recognized that type of fluid lethality. She was neither a vampire nor a werewolf, so what made such a young woman a predator in human skin?

---

Caroline turned, keeping the man firmly in her line of sight, as she contemplated her options. No one was around, at least not within a human’s sensing range. She had picked a swath of private beach after all, desiring the peace and solitude. 

And now she was unsure if it was to her benefit. 

“Daddy,” she finally acknowledged. 

It had been what she always called him in private. For years, it had made her proud to know the Director was also her father. Thought it made her special. And she supposed it did, in a way. She had been the most successful of all the Soldiers. The most efficient. The most obedient. The highest kill count. 

But now she could only wonder if it was fanaticism or monstrosity that enabled the man to use his own daughter. The others carefully selected from a pool of street urchins and orphans, those who would be unnoticed and unmissed.  

But not the director, no, he handpicked her. Reinforced all her lessons with his own brand of manipulated affection. Called her Care when he praised her. Braided her hair while he drilled her on her mental exercises. Tucked her into bed every night with a kiss to her forehead.

Now, the man just eyed her with disapproval.

“You are a disappointment, Soldier.” 

Caroline couldn’t suppress her slight flinch, feeling something twist inside her when he only frowned more heavily.

“Such a waste,” he continued, derisive. “How you bring me such shame. After all I did for you, and you repay me by destroying some of my best work. Though I do congratulate you for your ruthlessness. You spared no one.”

This time Caroline’s face was stone. She had seen it as mercy to end the existence of her once companions. There had no longer been a trace of life in any of them.

“How can you hate me so much?” she asked, tone carefully level despite the words.

And her father’s face softened. “Oh, Care, because you are a monster, sweetie. And the Augustine Society destroys monsters.”

Her voice was ice when she replied. “I am only what you created, Director.”

He had the audacity to smile at her. “And you had been my greatest creation. That is why it is my duty to end your disgrace now, before I start my work anew.”

She didn’t want to hear anymore.

In a flash, she removed her dagger (her father had once given it to her. “Make me proud, Care.”), throwing it with honed expertise and unnatural force. The weapon buried itself to the hilt, tearing through his heart with unerring accuracy.

It was almost a surprise, when the man simply pulled the blade out again. His skin sealing shut in an instant.

“At least you can still do something right. The heart, though, 31185? Such sentiment.” He threw the dagger back, aimed for her head. Even with her own abilities such a blow would render her unconscious for a few moments.

He was right, aiming for the heart had been sentiment. An ordinary human would not have survived her path of destruction through the Society. And Caroline didn’t make amateur mistakes; William Forbes had been in the compound that night.

She caught the blade, spinning it dexterously to hold it properly. “Perhaps, Director, but I had expected a human opponent not a fellow monster.”

Rather than becoming angry, the man just laughed. “We need monsters to hunt monsters, 31185. You know that. It has always been this way. Why else did you think your enhancements were so much more powerful than the others?”

That did actually surprise her, enough that she nearly failed to block his sudden attack. Her dagger awkwardly dug into the flesh of his black, mutated arm, his skin unbroken.

Then, he backhanded her, sending her flying a few feet into the water. Strong.

She stood up in a flash, eyes fixated on the man who was nearly on top of her again. Fast.

Abandoning the dagger, Caroline extended all the nails of her hand, transforming the weak keratin into an arrangement of carbon nanotubes. Their near monomolecular edge sliced clean through the Director’s strange black form. 

For a moment, she held him suspended there, impaled on the end of her arm.

“Is that all? Weak, girl.” 

The man further sliced his own body as he shifted, rearing back and punching her, sending her flying back into the water.

She landed with a splash, floating among the coral, trails of his blood coloring the water as her nails washed clean.

She truly did only dream of darkness and blood.

---

It was an unusual feeling for Klaus to experience, wanting to defend another person. Yet he stayed his hand. He knew all about disappointed, murderous fathers. She would have no peace unless she ended him herself. 

Or died trying.

Though, that would be a shame.

---

Caroline’s heart clenched, stuttered a beat, then set a pounding, unnatural rhythm. Her senses sharpened. Bones hardened. Muscles condensed. Stronger. Faster. 

Enough.

She propelled herself toward the shallow bottom, bracing herself in the sand and rocketing herself up and out of the water. She cleared the surface and shore by tens of feet, using the vantage point to extend her nails farther. This time she sliced, tearing through the man’s limbs, even as they regenerated nearly as quickly.

Gravity eventually took hold, dragging her back toward the Director. She pursed her lips, using the added momentum to power a heel drop kick. It sent him (her Director, her father, William), into the ground, his skull and upper spine crushed.

She doubted he was dead. 

Using the brief respite, she pulled a second dagger. It was nearly identical to the first one except for one special component. She hurriedly twisted the handle as she watched her father’s body rapidly heal. A little chamber opened up, and an odd purple-tinted fluid coated the blade. Nails retracted, dagger in her right hand, Caroline pinned her father to the sand, and waited for him to wake up.

She stared him in the eye, blue to blue, as she plunged the blade into his heart and twisted.

Unlike before, he couldn’t nonchalantly shrug off the blow. And though his body struggled to heal the wound, the mutated black pigment faded from his skin.

Caroline watched as bulging gray-blue veins crawled across pale, pink flesh. Kept watching until the life faded from her father’s eyes, his whole body covered in the raised veins.

Ironic. He almost looked like a vampire.

She twisted the handle a little more, ensuring all the fluid was dumped into his corpse. And then, just to be thorough, she stabbed a second copy, chamber open and blade coated, into his brain.

She wasn’t sure how long she stared at her father’s remains, but her own anatomy had returned to near-humans levels. When she stood, her legs felt almost cramped from kneeling for so long.

“Goodbye, Father,” she whispered, her next exhale shaky.

She closed her eyes, saddened, how even now the Society managed to taint a bit of her golden dream.

---

“That was very impressive, sweetheart.”

Caroline whirled around, startled that she had been caught off-guard twice now.

A tall, blond haired man stood several feet behind her. A little smirk, highlighting the dimples on his face. She frowned, realizing quickly that he wasn’t human, dreaded that he had seen and hear everything.

He clasped his hands behind his back as he took a few steps toward her, keeping a human pace though the motion was supernaturally graceful.

“My name is Klaus, and I would be most intrigued to hear more of your history. Never have I seen your like before.”

Caroline froze for a split second and his lips quirked a bit higher, his eyes flashing gold for an instant.

“And you’ve heard of me. Fantastic.”

---

Author’s Note: Memento Mori is the rather famous Latin phrase meaning “remember you will die.” I thought it rather apropos for this version of the Augustine Society. Fun fact: the symbol is a reference to St. Augustine and vampires, so very on the nose. Fun? fact #2: Translate Caroline’s number back into letters (3-1-18-5). Bill is a rather fucked up guy in this. And yeah, I used some blatant anime references here  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[ilikeoldchangke]

Good citizen centre

This is a work of fiction

All good citizens should be taken care off.

........................................................................

I walked into the large imposing lobby in the spanking new building in the middle of marina bay with the card clutched tightly in my hand.

Aside from the single security guard shaking dry his umbrella at the lobby, there was no one else in sight.

He looked at me and I showed him what I have on my hand.

He immediately gave me a wide smile and gestured to the self service kiosk in front of me.

I keyed in my ID number and verified my identity with a facial scan. As I waited for my data to be generated, I was seething with anger. In fact, I was trying hard not to curse out loud.

I wanted to scream in the quiet lobby but I know I must control myself.

I am a good citizen.

The kiosk, as if sensing my short fuse, immediately displayed my full name with my particulars on screen.

The kiosk directed me to lift number 2 and I walked over to the lift lobby.

Lift 2 opened as if it was waiting for me to get near.

The moment I got in, it closed with the top floor button lit up.

37th floor.

I’m about to enter a newly set up government agency.

Ministry of anger management.

Yes, you read that right.

With the fast pace of life in Singapore, you need a whole new ministry to manage people’s anger and resentment, but this is no ordinary ministry.

This is no ordinary building.

It’s one reserved for good citizens.

Good model citizens who behave.

The government understands that everyone gets angry from time to time.

However they want to better manage the population by managing their anger.

Good citizens like me gets special treatment.

Good rationale and level headed citizens like me gets extra attention and perks.

If not for my flawless records, I would now have been even to get a lift sent down to me.

And to have the lift take me up to the highest floor, it’s the greatest honor a model citizen can ask for.

When the lift door open I could see a customer service officer waiting for me.

Dressed in formal black pant suit with a white inner blouse, the lady introduced herself an Felicia.

Felicia : Hi there Mr James….. my name is Felicia, I will be attending to you today… please follow me….

I followed Felicia and appraised her body from behind.

She’s pretty, with a nice perky butt.

I would fuck her but that’s not why I’m here today.

I’m here because I’m fucking angry.

I’m fucking pissed and angry with the government.

And I want my voice heard and issues addressed.

Entering a sound proof room, Felicia sat down behind her terminal and asked me what can she do for me that day.

Felicia : I can tell from your body language you are fuming Mr James…. May I know the cause of your anger …. So I can better address your needs…..

I could no longer hold it in and I exploded right there and there in the room.

James : yes !!!! FUCK YOU…. FUCK YOU… FUCK ALL OF YOU !!!AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!

I screamed and kicked the chair in front of me while Felicia remained calm as if she had seen it all before.

James : why do you make it so hard for singles like me to get my own flat !!!!! fuck !!!!why !!!!

Felicia nodded with genuine empathy.

James : I’m already 35 !!!!.... I want my own place to live !!!! and how many fucking times you want to fucking make me ballot for a place to call my own….!!! And even then… it’s a small fucking place !!!!.....how to live in such a pigeon hole !!!!! FUCK YOU UNDERSTAND !!!!!FUCK YOU !!!! AHHHHH….

I lifted the chair and slammed it against the wall. Knocking 2 wheels off the chair and denting the wall.

Part of me is glad that my good citizen status enjoyed immunity once I’m inside these walls.

I kicked the wall, threw my body against the door and I hammered my fist on the table that Felicia is using, causing her stationary to bounce about.

This is so unfair.

I tried to get a small place to call my own for more than 4 times through the balloting system. Each time I was rejected because the number of applicants is too many.

I tried to get my flat from the open market but my high income restricted me only to bank loans and not the subsidised loans the government is offering.

I tried appealing to the PHB , Public housing board and they bounced me from one officer to another.

James : you know the feeling of being passed around from one officer to another…. ??? FUCK!!!!! You know the feeling of being on the phone and listening to recorded messages, asking you to press one for English…. Press 2 for Chinese…..PRESS YOUR FUCKING CUNT I’M TELLING YOU….!!! AHHHHHHH!!!!

I was perspiring badly by then while Felicia remained calm as ever.

I was given a few moments to calm down and Felicia opened her drawer to give me a bottle of water.

James : thank you…

Felicia : please drink Mr James… and allow me to help understand your problem….. Housing issue has always been at the heart of this government and…

I could feel Felicia about to cough up another line of well rehearsed line so I took it out.

I took the card out.

That treasure of a card.

The card given to good citizens.

Felicia paused mid sentence and her entire demeanour changed.

Felicia : May I have a look at that card Mr James….

I handed it over and she scanned the QR code beside my face and ID details.

Felicia : Please face the camera Mr James…. For authentication…

3 seconds later Felicia looked at me with the widest smile her face could muster.

Felicia : Congrats Mr James… you are a model good citizen….. and as you know… the criteria for getting a good citizen card is really tough…..

James : Yes I am aware…

Felicia : As a reward for being a law abiding citizen, paying your taxes on time, voting for the ruling party and being pro government for the past 5 years…. You have been awarded the good citizen card….. can I confirm you would like to use it now…. ?

James : yes… I want to fucking use it now….

Felicia : very well….

Felicia started typing on her keyboard as I sipped the water from the bottle she offered me.

Felicia : Alright Mr James… I can see you are in the queue for the new  construct to order ( CTO ) flats that will be launching at the waterfront site in the new southern waterfront ….

James : yes.. it’s my 5th attempt !!!

Felicia : well… I’m pleased to inform you that you will be getting a single digit queue number for this application…

James : what… really ?

Felicia : yes… and despite your high income threshold…. You are eligible for a subsidised government loan for the entire purchase sum….

James : are you serious !??

I could hardly believe what I was hearing.

Felicia smiled.

Felicia : yes I am…..

James : wow….

Felicia : It’s the least we can do for our good citizens…..

James : I’m…. I’m speechless…..

Felicia continued typing on the terminal before going on.

Felicia : I can see your pent up anger and frustration stems primarily from dealing with the public housing board PHB……

James : well… i….

Felicia : as such… I believe we need to address the root cause of your anger…. So that once that is resolved…. You can continue in your role as a model and good citizen of the country…..

James : ermm… wow… yeah…. How do you propose….

Felicia typed away on the terminal before turning the screen to face me.

Felicia : I’ve isolated 276 female staff from PHB that works in the balloting, customer service and loan disbursement department….these are the staff currently not having their menstruation period….. May I know your race preference…. ?

My heart started beating faster.

I don’t believe this.

It was a rumour.

A quiet rumour in the web that on one can verify but it’s happening to me.

There were rumours online that says the new ministry would do everything to satisfy the citizens needs and manage their anger.

It’s happening right in front of me.

Felicia : Mr James ?.... race preference… ?

James : Chi…. Chinese….

The screen refreshed itself and the number of candidates got lesser.

Felicia continued without batting her eyelid.

Felicia  : marital status…. Married or single… your preference….

I was trying not to shake in the broken chair.

James :married…

Felicia : age range….

James : 24- 32

Felicia : ahhh…. Young Milf in the making….. hold on….

When the screen refreshed itself again, I was presented with the pictures of 18 girls. From frontline staff to senior executives, they were all employees of PHB.

Felicia : may I suggest filtering down to those recently…. Married…

I looked at Felicia who maintained expressionless.

I nodded.

The candidates reduced to 6.

Felicia : Mr James… you are now looking at the staff in PHB, all married within the past 2 years, within the age range and race preference….

I was nursing a full hard on by then as I look at the 6 pictures of the PHB staff smiling at me.

3 are pretty average, 1 is totally out but 2 are pretty much my cup of tea.

James : can…. Can….. can I look at these 2…. ?

Felicia : of course….

Felicia called up the social media profile of both girls and I could see the 1st one was a bit big bone and her complexion isn’t really good. The 2nd girl however was perfect.

She’s sweet looking and petite.

I like petite girls.

Felicia : seems like you have made your choice Mr James….

James : yes… yes… this.. this 1….

Felicia brought up the full profile of the girl of my choice.

Felicia : Elena Qiu… recently married… about 6 months ago… a pretty new staff at PHB…. Less than 3 years…. She’s pretty… good choice….

I could not stop looking at Elena.

I could feel precum leaking from my cock.

Felicia : I will make the necessary arrangements….. for tomorrow…. And Mr James…. I sincerely hope your anger will subside after this….

James : of… of… of course…

Felicia : It is the government’s wish for all our model citizens to be happy…..

I nodded eagerly.

Felicia : I would like to remind you that Elena will not be a willing participant even though she is required to by contract….. she might get a little resistant…. Base on the aptitude test we administered during recruitment….

James : oh…

Felicia : as such… we will be giving her something to calm her down…. No she won’t be a dead fish…. She is still conscious and aware of what is going on…. She can still fight but… with say 50% of the strength and intensity… that should make the session enjoyable for you I think…

James : that… that sounds good….

Felicia : Elena will be asked to attend an offsite meeting tomorrow…and she will be delivered to you…. And to appease your pent up anger and frustration, I shall make a note for her to be formally dressed with heels and her PHB staff pass…..would that be ok ?

James : yes… perfect…

Felicia stood up and shook my hand.

Felicia : I hope you would not remain angry with the government after this…. And continue to be a good, model citizen for the rest of your countrymen….

I was shown the way down to the ground floor where a concierge handed me an envelope with a hotel key card of a 5 star hotel in town.

Concierge : Mr James….. I am pleased to inform you that Elena from PHB has confirmed her attendance to the meeting tomorrow…. May your anger be appeased after your meeting….

I nodded, speechless and unsure of what to say.  

Concierge : Have a good day….and remember… the government needs good citizens like you…. For us to thrive and prosper….

I dug into the envelope and there were several print out photos.

Photos of the PHB staff I’m going to meet tomorrow.

Photos of Elena.

…………………………………………..

10500+ words

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[acespirit]

DnD 5e - Anime Edition (Part 1)

Hey! So, I’m new here, and if you’re reading this, thank you! This is my first ever post! I wasn’t sure where to start with stuff, but a project of mine I was doing for a friend gave me the perfect opportunity to show off the kind of fun stuff I’m going to try to post semi-regularly...

Back in July, I was running the second session of a new tabletop game with my friends when I mentioned how cool it would be to run a campaign with a bunch of Player Characters just fighting each other to see who had the strongest build. Then my friends suggested that it might be more fun if we tried to make already existing characters from other shows, games and such fight it out. At the end of the session, one of them asked me if I would actually be willing to run a campaign like that, and, if so, if I’d be willing to do so as a one-shot for her birthday party. I said that I could, and for the past few weeks I’ve been researching characters, mechanics, and everything I could possibly need. So, not only will I be able to share this cool project with you all, but I’ll also have a place to keep my work after I send everyone home with their character sheets. This is going to be a series of posts over the next 2 weeks detailing the format of the tournament, the 9 characters I made for it, and how it went down in the end. This post is going to cover the format, as well as the 10 characters competing in it. That said, here we go!

The first thing to consider when making this was how the bracket was going to be laid out - it is a tournament after all. Because I was dealing with 10 PCs, not exactly a bracket-friendly number, I had to alter things from how a normal system might work just a tad - making the tournament split into 4 rounds!

Round 1: 5 separate 1 v 1 matches between characters, letting 6 people through. Now, with 10 people, you’re probably wondering how a 6th person gets through to round to, right? Well, in addition to the 5 characters that win their matches, the 5 losers get to convene, and from them select one “wild card” they believe has the highest chance of winning, whom they send on to Round 2. The win conditions are one of 3 things: causing your opponent to fall to 0 HP, causing your opponent to willing say ‘I surrender,’ or knocking them unconscious without knocking out their hit points.

Round 2: The 6 remaining competitors enter the arena all at once, but their goal is not actually to fight each other. Instead, the DM selects a boss, series of enemies, or anything intended to whittle down the number of players. (In my case my prime candidate for this job was a Tarasque. Why this works will become clear soon.) 4 characters move on from this round, with the first 2 to fall to 0 HP being eliminated.

Semifinals & Finals: Here return to basic 1 on 1 fights, with the last remaining character being crowned victor.

Now, for those, Round 2 is where most of the messing around with went in, and ideally, anyone planning to run a campaign like this will have more control over player numbers than me, and will be able to use a normal bracket system.

The rest of what went into this was basic rules and levels, which worked out like this:

Every PC is set at 20th level from start to finish, ignoring money in their creation. (It’s less fun if the characters can’t fight to their full potential.)

The breaks between each fight, no matter how short they are technically, are treated in-game as long rests for the fighters, and any injuries incurred outside of the arena space in RP segments or otherwise will have vanished by the time you enter for your next match. Because of this, broken items are fixed, you start every fight with max HP, magic users recover any used spell slots, and special abilities only usable once per short or long rest are usable in each match.

No self-destruct devices, spells, or anything of that ilk are allowed - the match won’t have a winner, which would be problematic.

Defeated characters aren’t dead, rather, they just watch the competition as outsiders and can appear in RP in between matches. They’ve been the defeated, but the apparent restorative properties of the tournament space stop them from actually dying.

PCs can only use abilities, classes, races actually available to players under normal circumstances. This does allow for expanded content, for example, the Warforged race and the Mystic class, neither of which are in the starndard 5e Players’ Handbook, were both allowed and used over the course of making the characters, as you’ll see when I release separate character posts.

No double classing - you must take 20 levels in 1 class. However, this does not bar you from gaining abilities from another class if it’s a built in feature of yours - such as Rogues with the Arcane Trickster archetype being able to cast Wizard spells up to Level 4.

You are not allowed to play or make characters that are specifically deities, gods, etc. (The exception being if they’re explicitly shown to be on the same basic level as normal people except for the title - such as, say, Aqua from Konosuba.)

Any ability that allows you to glean information about another character - be it ability scores, items, race, class, whatever - must be used by a player at the very top of the match, the DM will not provide the information of a player only remembers to use it during the middle of the fight.

Finally, with the format and ground rules out of the way, we can get to the characters that my players actually chose to have compete in the tournament - I’ll be posting their full stats and how they work over the course of the next 2 weeks!

Yuri(o) Plisetsky from ‘Yuri!!! On Ice’ *Altered for combat viability* (Race: Human | Class: Rogue - Arcane Trickster Archetype)

Killua Zoldyck from ‘HunterxHunter’ (Race: Human | Class: Rogue - Arcane Trickster Archetype)

Korosensei from ‘Assassination Classroom’ (Race: This guy literally said F-all to fitting into a race. | Class: Mystic)

Matthew (AKA Zecaeru) from ‘Seduce Me - The Otome’ (Race: Tiefling | Class: Wizard - School of Conjuration)

Baki Hanma from ‘Legendary Grappler Baki’ (Race: Human | Class: Monk - Way of the Open Hand)

Gowther from ‘Seven Deadly Sins/Nanatsu no Taizai’ (Race: Warforged - Envoy | Class: Wizard - School of Illusion)

Maou Sadao (AKA Satan) from ‘Devil is a Part-Timer’ (Race: Tiefling | Class: Warlock - Patron of ‘The Fiend’ - Pact of the Blade)

Generic Black Haired Anime Protagonist #952 (Totally not Kirito from Sword Art Online) An original creation based off of the fact that there are too many of them (Race: Human | Class: Fighter - Champion)

Wild Card original DnD character made by the only player who knew how to make their own character (Class: Cleric - War)

If you’re still hanging in here after all of that - heck, if you somehow happened to find this post anyways - thank you! The rest will be out over the next 2 weeks and I look forward to sharing them with everyone. As I release the character sheets, feel free to take them and use them for your own games, for art, or for anything else you might want them for so long as you credit me in anything you post! I put a lot of time into building this campaign and look forward to sharing it with you all!

[aaronlaughswithcancer]

Ball for a Ball

I thought we were going to dinner. 

Last year, Sarah and I decided that we’d commemorate my five-year anniversary of being cancer-free by going to Craft, Tom Colicchio’s restaurant in Century City. We’d only been there once, when I surprised her right after we got engaged, and we agreed that we could only ever return to Craft for a very, very special occasion. The five-year mark felt worthy. 

And Sarah, to my surprise and delight, wanted to make our Craft date fancy. Like, ultra-fancy. She took me tuxedo-shopping for the occasion. (Because most of the men in her life are professional musicians and Southerners, I was one of the only men she knew who didn’t own a tuxedo.) We found one with cool curved lapels. I cannot lie, I looked quite fly.

The day before our big dinner, I got home from running errands when Sarah called. She has pulled into the driveway and needed help unloading some heavy things from the car. 

Her car was not in the driveway. 

My parents were. Even though they live in the Seattle area. And her parents were. Even though they live in the Atlanta area. I was, uh, pretty shocked. Sarah beamed: “They’re joining us for dinner tomorrow!” As she relished the surprise and I slowly got my bearings, we all drank wine on the front porch. Everyone shared stories about how they almost ruined the surprise or how I didn’t pick up on obvious clues. “We made a pot of chili this morning that could have fed us ten times over,” Sarah said. “You didn’t think that was weird?” I didn’t. We like leftovers. But, of course, hindsight is 20/20. 

Sarah had rented an AirBnB a couple blocks away for all the parents. We carried the barrel of chili over to the house and settled in for a fun dinner. We kept chatting it up, delighting in the surprise — we discussed travel arrangements, the menu at Craft, and which of our friends my dad enjoys following on Instagram. As we did the dishes, I got an Instagram message — from the very friends my dad had just been talking about, friends who live in England. The message was a graphic… of their corgi… landing in California? (I know, this story is very white, but oh well.)

I didn’t know what it meant at first (#Slowontheuptake) but then there was a knock on the door of the AirBnB. “Are Molly and Greg… here?” Sarah, with a level of casual indifference usually reserved for sociopaths and undercover spies, said, “I don’t know. Why don’t you answer the door?” 

It was Molly and Greg. Obviously. I was so surprised that I sat down on the floor. Being closer to the Earth seemed like a good way to recover from the shocking one-two punch. 

As I recovered and transitioned to more appropriate seating, I was informed that the whole giant group of us would be going to Craft the next evening. Yeah, we’ll be dropping some serious change into Colicchio’s pockets, but how many times does one get to celebrate beating cancer? I couldn’t have been more excited. 

We all met up for a late breakfast the next morning and went to The Grove to mess around and kill time. Sarah had made plans for the girls — manis, pedis, etc. — and she told me to go take the guys to a movie and then a nearby bar. So, one Quiet Place and two old fashioneds later, we returned to the AirBnB… where Sarah had hung up my tux and spread out a collection of things to enjoy in preparation for dinner (mostly bourbons, cards, and cheese because she knows me well). She left a note that said all the ladies were getting ready at our place and we’d all meet up right before dinner. I bet you see where this is going. But I did not!

Partly because Greg blindfolded me. 

After putting on my formal attire and going hogwild on a cheese platter (not in that order, thankfully), Greg told me it was time to meet up with the ladies. And to do so, I had to be blindfolded. Why did I need to be blindfolded in order to go to MY OWN HOUSE? Well, the answer was pretty obvious. Sarah rented a limo to take us to Craft, I thought, with what I assume was a satisfied smile on my face. We’ll get to the house, they’ll pull off the blindfold, and there’ll be a big, ridiculous limo parked in front of our driveway. 

Greg and my dad led my blinded self down the sidewalk to our place. But when it was clear we were in the driveway area and no one reached for my blindfold, I realized it wasn’t a limo. They led me into the front yard--I felt the grass under my feet--and it all hit me in an instant. There is no limo, there is no Craft--

“SURPRISE!!”

Let me interrupt the flow here for a second. When I was sick, Sarah and I had always joked that when this—and “this” meant the whole damn cancer experience—was over, we should throw a ball for my ball. It was a running gag we had, this ball, how it’d be black tie and we’d serve ball-themed foods. It would be a unique way to celebrate the end of testicular cancer, but we’d have to go all out. Would we rent a yacht or the Kodak theatre? 

Turns out our own place was more than sufficient. Sarah had created a Surprise Ball (for my ball) and thought out every detail. And it was black tie! And there were so many ball-themed foods! She transformed our entire house and yard into a party zone. There was a bar with a signature drink: the Tom Ball-ins. A photo booth. And she planned it all for months right under my nose, hiding dishes in the back of the freezer and decorations at friends’ houses.

And, most importantly, she got so many of the important people that I love—people who were there for us during the toughest time of our lives—to show up and celebrate. Most were local, but some came in from out of town. And we all partied deep into the night while stealing moments, here and there, to honor what the last five years have meant. How far we’ve come. These were the friends and family members who made care packages, cooked me dinners, visited me in chemo, and let Sarah and I cry on their shoulders. I may be oblivious to when someone’s planning a party, but it is not lost on me how truly special the people in my life are. 

Or The Person in my life. I’ve always known Sarah is a creative of the highest order. As a composer, she turns the music in her imagination into a reality so that we may all share in it. And she does the same as a party planner/surprise attacker. This Ball, clearly, had been in her imagination for years and not only did she make it a reality, she made it better than anything I ever could have guessed. For Sarah, the word “celebrate” isn’t taken lightly. It’s always an all caps word, with underlines and exclamation points with monkeys drinking champagne dancing around it. It is one of our most important verbs. And my God, she honored the word beautifully. 

I was so lucky to have Sarah by my side when I got sick and I’m just as lucky to have her by side when I’m healthy. She believes in fun but she also knows that sometimes you have to do a lot of hard work to get to the fun. And she’s always willing to do the work. It matters to her. And it’s one of the things I love most about her, and about living my life alongside her. She astonishes me daily and I highly recommend being astonished. It’s great. 

I’m also very glad she married the kind of idiot that doesn’t question her suspicious explanations for why there are 80 meatballs in the freezer. 

One year later, I still think about that Ball everyday. And I’m glad that, now, it’s usually the first thing that comes to mind when I hear the word.

[olgagarmash]

Federal COVID-19 Relief Package Includes Help With Health Insurance Premiums : Shots – Health News – NPR

Unless the rules change soon, Stephanie Salazar-Rodriguez of Denver expects to spend more than $10,000 on health insurance premiums this year. That’s after losing her job last month — which meant losing her employer’s contribution to her health plan. Rachel Woolf/KHN hide caption

toggle caption

Rachel Woolf/KHN

Unless the rules change soon, Stephanie Salazar-Rodriguez of Denver expects to spend more than $10,000 on health insurance premiums this year. That’s after losing her job last month — which meant losing her employer’s contribution to her health plan.

Rachel Woolf/KHN

As President Joe Biden’s pandemic relief package steams through Congress, Democrats have hitched a ride for a top health care priority: strengthening the Affordable Care Act with some of the most significant changes to insurance affordability in more than a decade.

The bill would spend $34 billion to help Americans who buy insurance on the health plan marketplaces created by the ACA through 2022, when the benefits would expire. The Senate sent its relief package, one of the largest in congressional history, back to the House where it could come up as early as Tuesday. where it is expected to pass and then go to Biden for his signature.

Those who have studied the legislation say it would throw a lifeline to lower- and middle-income Americans who have fallen through the cracks of the government’s eligibility requirements for ACA subsidies. Stephanie Salazar-Rodriguez of Denver, for instance, is hopeful the changes the federal bill includes will make a difference. Without those changes, she expects to spend more than $10,000 on premiums this year after losing her primary job — and her health insurance — last month.

Under the current system, if her annual income were $3,000 less per year, ACA subsidies could have reduced her premiums to as little as $3,000 a year. But until and unless the COVID-19 relief bill passes, she’s above the cut-off that makes her eligible for ACA health plan subsidies.

“To me, that’s not affluence,” Salazar-Rodriguez says. “You’re talking about people who are struggling to survive.”

The legislation could also provide relief to others who purchase health insurance on the exchanges: people with lower or middling incomes who currently choose policies with lower premiums but high deductibles. Many with high deductible plans often avoid seeking medical care because they don’t have the cash to cover those costs. Most of the nearly 14 million people enrolled in plans sold on the marketplaces would pay less under the new provisions — with the option to use those savings to buy a different plan with a lower deductible.

The Congressional Budget Office also estimates an additional 1.7 million people would enroll in the exchanges under the proposal, about 1.3 million of whom are currently uninsured.

Republicans, who have repeatedly tried to repeal the ACA, have hammered Democrats over the years with allegations that many of the marketplace plans are not affordable and prevent people from buying insurance coverage. They also have argued that the proposed change in the legislation offers unnecessary help to wealthier Americans while doing nothing to lower the cost of insurance.

Now that Democrats have control of the White House and Congress for the first time since the passage of the ACA, they are moving quickly to make changes they believe improves the landmark health care program. Citing the pandemic, Biden opened a three-month special enrollment period the federal health exchange, allowing people to buy new plans there through through May 15.

The COVID-19 relief package under consideration also includes proposals to increase the affordability of health care for the unemployed.

Those receiving unemployment benefits, who are typically ineligible for subsidies on the exchange, would be eligible this year. The Senate version of the bill would pick up 100% of the cost of premiums for those on COBRA, the program allowing recently unemployed workers to privately purchase coverage offered by their former job, often at a high cost. The House had included a similar provision but it provided only an 85% subsidy. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the House’s COBRA changes would cost nearly $8 billion with about 2.2 million people expected to enroll. The version of the bill the Senate has passed would cover the entire COBRA premium.

The legislation, which includes a bevy of anti-poverty provisions, offers a more generous funding match to about a dozen states that have not expanded Medicaid (the program that covers low-income Americans) in hopes that they will soon opt to do so.

Pandemic spurs effort to improve ACA

Advocates and public health experts say it is critical to help people afford health insurance since millions lost their jobs and their job-based health insurance in the pandemic and another 59,000 Americans, or so, are contracting COVID-19 every day.

Health insurance “just becomes the thing people can’t afford when they’ve lost their job,” says Katie Keith, an expert on the Affordable Care Act with Georgetown University’s Center on Health Insurance Reforms.

About 15 million uninsured people are eligible to buy insurance through the exchanges, most of whom would also be eligible for new or larger subsidies under the proposal, according to KFF. (KHN is an editorially independent program of KFF.)

Under the ACA, subsidies are calculated based on the recipient’s income, age and their area’s average premium costs.

Frederick Isasi, executive director of Families USA, which advocates for health care affordability and supported the passage of the ACA, says that right now more than half of those eligible for coverage cannot afford it. “Health insurance is about financial security and health security,” he adds.

The proposal in the relief bill that was passed by the Senate would ensure that no one who buys a health plan on the exchanges pays more than 8.5% of income for that plan. Currently, subsidies are available only to those making between 100% and 400% of the federal poverty level. (For those seeking subsidies in 2021, that income range that qualifies an individual for a subsidy is between $12,760 and $51,040.)

Some marketplace customers near the federal poverty level who now must pay some of the premiums out-of-pocket could qualify for a subsidy that pays the entire cost of a silver, or midlevel, plan.

The change would also benefit Americans who make more than the subsidy cutoff. About 3.4 million uninsured people fall into this category, according to the KFF analysis.

For example, currently, a 60-year-old who makes $50,000 annually pays no more than $410 per month out-of-pocket for a silver plan on the exchanges, with the government chipping in $548 per month.

Meanwhile, a 60-year-old who makes $52,000 annually – just $2,000 more per year — receives no subsidy under the current rules, and is expected to pay the full premium herself, KFF found, at a cost of about $957 per month for the same plan.

For Salazar-Rodriguez, that cutoff has carried a heavy cost. She was recently laid off from her job at a community health organization that has struggled during the pandemic, and now she pays $913 per month out of her own pocket for insurance.

In a little less than a year, at age 65, she will qualify for Medicare. But for now – and unless and until the COVID-19 relief package passes — her age is a liability. Older, pre-retirement Americans pay some of the highest health insurance premiums in the nation.

Having once worked assisting people enrolling in the health insurance exchanges, Salazar-Rodriguez went straight to the marketplace for coverage when she lost her job. But she was startled to discover how high her premiums would be — and surprised and distressed to see that, because of her income from her other work as a consultant, she is ineligible for a subsidy or Medicaid.

She opted instead for COBRA coverage, which she said was comparable in cost and had more of the benefits she needs than the unsubsidized plans she found on the ACA exchanges in that price range.

Unless something changes soon, she worries she will have to run up her credit card and find extra work to afford her premiums. The pandemic has made forgoing insurance unthinkable, she says. Many of her loved ones have come down with COVID-19. Some friends are still suffering symptoms months after falling ill. She lost a brother-in-law in Texas.

“That’s why I am paying that nearly $1,000 a month,” Salazar-Rodriguez says, “because I know one hospitalization could bankrupt me if I didn’t have it, and I can’t take that chance.”

Some changes to subsidy rules might become permanent

Though the subsidy fixes are temporary, lasting two years to address the economic impacts of the pandemic, experts and lawmakers expect the new subsidy criteria would eventually become permanent.

The KFF analysis found that subsidies would gradually phase out for those with higher incomes — for instance, a single 60-year-old making about $160,000 would not receive a subsidy, because no silver plan would cost more than 8.5% of his income.

Republicans oppose the bill’s proposed enhancements to ACA subsidies. Brian Blase, a senior fellow at the Galen Institute, a nonprofit group that researches free-market approaches to health reform, has criticized the proposal in a recent analysis, saying it shifts the burden of paying premiums from private payers to taxpayers without addressing the causes of high premiums.

He argues a family of four headed by a 60-year-old earning almost $240,000 could, under the proposed restructuring of the law, qualify for a nearly $9,000 subsidy.

The Wall Street Journal seized on Blase’s example in a recent op-ed. “These are not the folks hit hard by the pandemic,” the editorial staff wrote.

Many of the changes the relief package proposes date back to the original passage of the ACA — President Barack Obama’s signature domestic policy that overhauled the nation’s health care system. At the time, those who wrote the law expected Congress would observe how it worked and make adjustments and improvements in it over time. But the law instead became a lightning rod for GOP opposition.

The latest proposal is part of the ACA’s “unfinished business,” says Keith of Georgetown University.

She notes there are other improvements that could be made – remedies for coverage gaps not addressed by this package, such as the so-called family glitch, in which a family’s eligibility for marketplace subsidies is based on the cost of job-based coverage for one individual rather than whether coverage for the family is affordable.

The current bill “is narrow compared to the wish list Democrats have, but it would do so much with premium affordability in this way right now,” Keith says.

Kaiser Health News produces in-depth journalism about health policy issues, and is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente. Together with Policy Analysis and Polling, KHN is one of the three major operating programs of the Kaiser Family Foundation, an endowed nonprofit.

source https://wealthch.com/federal-covid-19-relief-package-includes-help-with-health-insurance-premiums-shots-health-news-npr/

[horrificmemes]

LOTS O’ Tips on Writing: Blindness

Hey y’all, so I’m not really a reference blog exactly, but I figured I would share some of my experience in writing (and in life) with a character type that a lot of people seem unsure of how to represent. That would be characters with partial or complete blindness. I myself have one character who is completely blind, and I too am on the low-sighted spectrum, so I figured I’d clear up a few misconceptions about characters with blindness! This is a long post, so part of it is under a read-more, but I include subjects ranging from medical details to describing non-visual senses to handling romantic relationships.

1) Blindness is totally a spectrum. Someone who is legally blind at 20/200 vision doesn’t see “nothing but black”. In fact, people who are legally blind can sometimes see enough to use some adjusted devices or read large-print books! Legal blindness (or low vision) means that someone’s eyesight is very poor even with their highest corrective lenses. 20/200 means that something 20 feet away from them has the same definition as something 200 feet away from a well-sighted person. That’s why 20/20 vision often represents “perfect” vision, because objects at 20 feet look like they’re... well, 20 feet away. Sometimes, legal blindness can be caused by natural degeneration from severe myopia (nearsightedness) from age, extreme strain, or just genetics.

2) When thinking of what a visually impaired person experiences as far as sight, ask yourself if the description is necessary first, then listen to interviews or podcasts for a description if you do need it. Please don’t take the word of someone with no eye function at all and apply it to someone with severe myopia or cataracts, because blindness varies. People with one cause of blindness may have cloudy vision, extremely blurred vision, ‘missing’ spots in their sight, or lack of color, while someone without any eye function (or without any eyes at all) will wonder why you’d even ask! Often “a black void” or “nothing but white” isn’t exactly true. Someone who doesn’t see color or light won’t see a lack of light either! Black? White? What? You really don’t have to even describe what they "see” unless they are partially-sighted.

3) Characters with all forms of disability can still do some badass shit. They can defend themselves as well as another character, they can learn to navigate a new space, they can play games and run and be athletic. They can be artists, musicians, or even own their own business. They can do their own household chores. They can be great parents. They can use modern tools and devices with the right adjustments. Don’t be afraid to let them accept - or ask for - help, but please don’t make it seem as though they’ve become useless. Give them all kinds of talents! (for example, my visually impaired muse can channel spirits, tends to her own herb garden, and is a classically-trained soprano. Possibilities are endless, you guys!)

4) Cause of blindness should be known if you insist on describing your character’s full facial appearance and how their blindness affects them. But remember this: you don’t have to draw attention to the appearance of someone’s eyes constantly. Don’t let that be the only thing that defines them. Here are a few tips though: many people who are legally blind have very ordinary-looking eyes. The cloudy white/blue eyes you often see is usually from diseases like cataracts, while paled eyes without visible pupils may be from congenital (childhood) glaucoma. Other forms of glaucoma cause black spots in the iris. Cataracts and glaucoma can coexist in one person. Eyes can have an inflamed red sclera from bacterial infection-induced blindness such as meningitis. Some infectious diseases require removal of the eyes (we see this in cats and other animals all the time). There are tons more reasons. When researching the cause of your character’s blindness, pay attention to the level of impairment, because not all causes of blindness have the same outcome!

5) People whose eyes have nerve damage don’t always move perfectly together. As tempting as it is to give your visually impaired character the ability to eerily stare directly into someone else’s gaze all the time, often people who lack nerve control in the eyes have issues of mobility now and again or even constantly: eyes that move independently, one or both eyes that won’t move at all, one pupil stuck in full dilation (anisocoria), and they may not be aware that their eyes are moving in odd places. Please don’t use this as fuel for humor, as some folk go out of their way to cover their eyes constantly because of this. Speaking of cover, not all visually impaired people wear sunglasses like the cliche in movies. Many will wear them in public because their eyes are very sensitive to light rays or because the light gives them horrible headaches, while others choose to cover their eyes because they’re aware that their eyes lack mobility control or they’re shy about a drooping lid/etc. Not everyone who has problems with vision wears something over their eyes.

More information on memories, relationships, and making the best of five senses are in the read-more!

6) Memories - let’s talk about memories. Often, someone who goes completely blind before the ages of 7-8 won’t have many visual memories at all once they reach adulthood. They may not recall color, details of faces, or how to visually recall the shapes of objects. Objects may be described with adjectives such as “sharp”, “bumpy”, “dry”, “cold”, etc. Dreams are often not visual in this case. Please avoid the stereotype of “my character has been blind since birth, but they can see perfectly in their dreams and recognize everything just fine” unless something wickedly supernatural or divine is at work. People who are blind still dream! Some have reported extremely vivid dreams that are a lot like their waking life - full of smells, taste, tactile senses, emotions, sound (and fury, signifying nothing). That was a Shakespeare joke. Fight me. Also remember that if your character has recently gone through surgery to regain sight, they could likely still automatically rely on other senses out of habit or to ‘check’ what they’re perceiving. Sure, they can see that flower pot in front of them now, but maybe they want to touch it too. Who wouldn’t? Flower petals are super nice and soft.

7) The other five senses are amazing. Did I say five? You bet your ass, I did. Because there’s one sense people tend to forget, and that’s ‘aura’ or ‘proximity’. Have you ever been sitting with your eyes closed, but you can feel someone walk behind you even if they’re trying to be super quiet? If that can happen to you, it can happen to someone without vision also! Don’t be afraid to note that your visually impaired character isn’t so vulnerable that they’re startled by everything. It’s fine to let other characters be delicate or careful with them, especially if they’re still getting to know one another and their friends are being considerate, but you don’t have to make them so paranoid that they never trust their surroundings. Have them smell someone’s shampoo as they walk by. Have them hear a whisper from an adjoining room. Have them sense the electricity of their partner just as they’re about to embrace them, or lean in for a kiss without having to be guided because they can find their lips by feeling their breath. Let them be courageous with their hands, identifying objects or people confidently through touch. Let them initiate. 

8) Speaking of partners: just because your character may not be able to see someone’s face/body doesn’t mean they can’t be attracted to them, have crushes, lust after someone, or fall in love. Think of a sighted character for a moment. What do they love about their partner or crush? I’m sure you’ve got a list of over a dozen things unrelated to appearance, and guess what? Those are perfect here! Your visually impaired muse may adore someone’s voice, their scent, their laugh, how soft their skin is, their calloused well-worked hands, how long/short their hair is, playing with their thick curls, how warm their hugs are, their sense of humor, their determination, or some talent they have that makes them incredible. Don’t refuse your character an experience without a solid reason.

9) On that same subject, it shouldn’t even need to be said: visually impaired characters cover all ranges of sexual and romantic preference. Absolutely your character can be ace, aro, or a combination. But please avoid the excuse of “they don’t feel attraction because they can’t perceive beauty, so therefore they aren’t fit for a relationship”. If sexual preference was all about how nice someone looks, I’d have 4000 pictures of Ryan Reynolds on my bedroom wall. A+ face right there. Then again, I may still make a collage of his twitter posts.

10) Give your character tools. Not just a cane, but let them use their whole body to help them navigate. Counting steps, listening for cues in a certain area, touching the furniture, and relying on memory as well. Let them walk the streets about town, remembering a certain smell from the restaurant two blocks from home, or the sound of the coffee grinder from the bookstore at the corner. In a modern verse, using an ATM card is a great way to let your character make purchases without making them worry “shit, did I just give them a $20 for my $5 purchase?” Let your character organize their things in such a way that they can pick out their necessities confidently. Independence, people!

11) Here’s a bonus note: some people have used echolocation to help them navigate (usually by tapping a cane or other tool against surrounding surfaces to feel/hear the vibration return to them). This is super cool but also super rare to do perfectly. If this is your character’s thing, it’s very significant and special to them - unless they live in a society where everyone is capable of it, this is a talent that will make them stand out and should be used wisely. It’s easy to collect lots of super cool talents and abilities and realize all too late that some people might be rolling their eyes at a very over-skilled character.

12) Your visually impaired character can be clumsy. They can have terrible sense of direction. They can be anxious or easily startled due to their natural disposition. They can mix up their night and day. All of that is fine, but it’s not all necessary. Don’t forget to sprinkle in some useful skills or even a positive outlook! A character with blindness is not a useless character or a helpless character, and one person with a visual impairment may handle their daily life completely different than another. You can have a character who is blind but not a source of pity.

This is not a complete list of everything you’d need to know, but it’s a start if you’re very interested in RPing as a character with some level of blindness. I hope this helped, and if you have questions, please feel free to IM me or ask a question off anon so that I can answer privately. :)