#I really hope it's a satisfactory resolution

[vero-valzer]

"I don't understand! I did exactly what Arceus asked! I caught and cataloged all Pokémon across the entire Hisui region. A-And I thought, once I did that, when I finally saw Arceus again... It would send us back to our time... Send us both back home..."

It's the Pokémon Legends: Arceus game's 3rd anniversary today! Have some angsty hurt-comfort sketches to celebrate! 😅

This absolutely not ship art! 🙅🏻🚫 That. is. his. (adopted) NIECE! I am a sucker for the fanon found-family bond between these two! 🥺

A few more rough sketches, snippets of abandoned comic ideas for PLA that I will never finish, and more thoughts below the cut!

All sketches are from 2022 but I tried to touch-up the topmost two a few nights ago and I'm still pretty proud of how the first two turned out (both drawn by closely referencing several sources.)

Sometimes, it's easy to forget that Akari is only around 15 years old. Shouldering a task like the one Arceus demands is A Lot, especially for a kid, and even more so in a world like the one Hisui pits against us.

I knew, going into the game, that even after logging all 242 Pokémon into the Pokédex, like Arceus bids us at the start of the game, that to continue feasibly playing the game, things were highly unlikely to actually change--our protagonist wouldn't be sent back to the present day and back home--and yet... I think some small part of me hoped. Hoped that maybe we'd get some sort of bonus cutscene of Arceus returning at least our protagonist or (ideally) both of our wayward spacetime travelers back home and to their present times.

I think that hope and how it was quickly dashed once I realized all we unlocked was the "privilege" of battling Arceus again in our dreams (no joke) made me wonder: How would young Akari feel about that outcome if she'd had the same expectations that I did after weathering all the trials and tribulations to complete the entire region's Pokédex? And, of course, her amnesiatic-adoptive-uncle, Warden Ingo, isn't about to let her despair without at least trying to comfort her!

He doesn't completely remember what he's missing from the time he was ripped from, but I'd imagine he feels some sense of emptiness and strange longing for it... and I'd bet he might not realize Akari was putting that kind of pressure on herself for not just her own sake, but his, too. He likely wouldn't have wanted her to bear that burden, and at the very least, not alone.

I'm not holding my breath that Gamefreak will ever really give us a satisfactory or official resolution to Akari and/or Ingo of PLA getting back to their respective times and places in the Sinnoh and Unova regions... so maybe that's partly what this fanart is about, too? But who knows! Maybe someday!

[sirfrogsworth]

I had a bad feeling about sending all of my camera gear to Sigma. I sent my camera body and only 2 lenses to get calibrated because they were wildly out of alignment and all attempts to adjust them myself failed miserably.

Sending my only means to create photography across the country just felt scary. And it turns out my fears were somewhat warranted. Though my big fear was my stuff being pulverized during shipping. I paid for insurance, but I've heard stories of USPS not honoring that or making it a lengthy and painful process.

But the frustrating happenstance ended up being less smashy-smashy and more bureaucratic in nature.

I previously asked Sigma's service department how much it would cost to get each lens calibrated. They told me $100 for a zoom, and $50 for a prime. And there was no hesitation in their wording. There was no "it could be more or less depending on these circumstances." They said very definitively those were the prices.

So the final repair quote was sent today and it is... confusing.

Wut?

First of all, the total should be $400. So they can't even get their own math correct.

But this is not what was agreed to and I risked sending my entire photography setup to New York under the assumption it would only cost $150 plus shipping and tax.

So, I sent screen captures of my quotes to the service department. But I also mentioned how I have had frustrating experiences with them in the past with no satisfactory resolution.

After an unscrupulous Amazon seller sold me a fraudulent lens, I asked Sigma's service department how I could prevent this from happening in the future. They told me to only purchase their lenses from "Authorized Dealers" listed on their website.

And that's exactly what I did.

And I got scammed... AGAIN.

An "Authorized Dealer" sold me a refurbished lens as new. I paid full price for it. And when I asked Sigma what to do, they said they would "investigate" and that was it.

To this day, that dealer is still on their authorized list. And I have a lens I paid full price for which has no warranty.

I love Sigma lenses. You get as-good or sometimes better quality for half the price of the name brand lenses. I really don't have a choice but to purchase their lenses. And I don't think the company as a whole is bad. But their New York service department is failing to live up to the brand's standards.

I'm hoping after seeing my receipts, they will honor their original prices, but I am really frustrated with my entire customer service experience.

[therhythmafterthesummer]

Five-Point Star: The Aftermath (M) ~Bang Chan

Pairing: Bodyguard/Assassin!Chan x Mercenary/Assassin!F.Reader Themes: Smut | bit of Fluff | Angst  Word Count: ~17k | AO3 Synopsis: After months of hindering a mercenary’s attempts to get to the person Chris was hired to protect, after months of many fights, injuries, and plotting, he had expected for the resolution to be much more satisfactory than this. [This is the second and hopefully final part to Five-Point Star]. Warnings: pet names · cold weapons · firearms · questionable morals · graphic depictions of violence · mentions of cheating [not involving the main characters] · graphic depictions of intercourse (smut warnings under the cut) · open-ish ending.

Author’s Note: here’s the promised second part to FPS! i just couldn’t bring myself to leave these two the way i did in part 1… like, part 1 can totally stand as its own thing, but i HAD to have some closure. i’ve been working on this one for quite some time, so here it is! i hope you enjoy it💜 especial thanks to @notastraykid & @channieskies for beta-reading this one💜

Due to all the abovementioned warnings, this story is intended for an adult audience only. Minors please do not interact.

Part 1 | Part 2 (you're here!)

Smut Warnings: fingering [F.Rec] · oral [F.&M.Rec] · unprotected penetration [piv] · no thoughts, head empty sex [aka having sex in questionable locations].

Disclaimer: the story presented in this work does not represent Stray Kids in any way; anything described in this story and all actions performed by the characters are purely fictional, this was created just for good fun.

After months of hindering a mercenary’s attempts to get to the person Chris was hired to protect, after months of many fights, injuries, and plotting, he had expected for the resolution to be much more satisfactory than this.

Well, he wasn’t sure if this was a resolution, if the problem had been eradicated or not… He wasn’t sure of anything anymore.

Seungmin, along with Chris and his team, had nicknamed that mercenary the Wraith, since it was hard to predict when they would strike, and it was pretty much impossible to find traces of their identity no matter how hard they tried. 

Whenever Chris managed to once again frustrate the Wraith’s attempts at–presumably–harming Seungmin, there simply weren’t any signs that they’d been there in the first place at all. Well, save for any injuries Chris sustained during their encounter.

He had no doubt as to what drove the Wraith to do what they did–or at least he thought he didn’t have any. This hadn’t been the first time someone had been hired to do something to Seungmin. After all, being the child of one of the most powerful families in the city certainly put a target on his back. However, this had been by far the most difficult enemy Chris and his team had to deal with.

It was frustrating, really. The Wraith seemed to always be one step ahead of them no matter how hard they tried to keep the young Kim’s schedule and plans a secret. It wasn’t until they discovered that the phone of Seungmin’s personal tailor–Hyunjin–had been wiretapped, that they were finally able to get the upper hand.

Chris had conjured this plan to get the Wraith to believe Seungmin would be attending an event in one of the oldest theatres in the city. There, Chris would be waiting for them. 

He’d admit he was cocky. He’d asked his team to not come with him, he’d told them he had to do this alone, giving them a bullshit excuse.

‘If we’re all there, Seungmin won’t be as protected as he should be, so I’m gonna be there on my own while you guys make sure he’s safe’, that was exactly what he’d told them back then, but, in reality, Chris just wanted to do this on his own because his own pride was hurt.

Chris was decent at his job. Sometimes–admittedly most times–he even believed he was good at it. But in the deep recesses of his mind, he couldn’t help but feel like the Wraith was better than him. It was more than obvious. If they hadn’t been, he would’ve been able to kill them on their very first encounter. 

Regardless, he’d gone to the theatre on his own, where he waited for the Wraith to make their expected appearance. He figured that playing the piano would elevate his plan. He hoped it’d give his opponent the impression that nothing was out of place, that this was a normal concert, and they had nothing to be suspicious of.

Funny thing, how after so many months of pushing and pulling, it was almost like Chris could already tell when the Wraith was close. So the moment they’d stepped into the hall, he’d immediately stopped his piece and shot on sight. 

It all became a blur of flying knives and missed shots, until there was no other option but to physically fight. 

The Wraith was better than Chris, and he came face to face with this fact the moment his back had hit the floor and a knife had been pressed to his neck. He’d been, once again, defeated. He was blinded by rage, by frustration…

How could this person be better than him? No one had been until this point. Sure, he’d sustained many injuries throughout his career as Seungmin’s personal bodyguard, and he’d certainly been close to dying many times, but the Wraith had managed to beat him every single time they met. It irked him beyond belief.

Chris liked to cover his face when he was on duty, at least when he was out in public. He didn’t want people to know his face, he liked to be able to go to the grocery store or meet his girlfriend without having to worry about someone recognising him and trying to kill him, so he wore his mask diligently.

But, of course, his opponent had to remove it.

Of course they wanted to see his face, it made sense to him. But the fact that it made sense didn’t diminish the blow to his pride, though.

‘…Chris?’

No one had ever spoken his first name out loud while he’d been on duty outside of the Kims’ estate. Not even his team members, they knew not to expose him like that. He liked to keep his civilian side and his professional side separated, so he figured he’d give some use to both of his given names. 

Which was why, hearing it in that context, from the Wraith, made his blood freeze in his veins. He was beyond confused, borderline panicking, but even then, the voice sounded… familiar.

Chris realised then he’d never heard the Wraith speak. And as he looked into their eyes, even the shape of their eyebrows–the only discernible feature on their face under the hood and kerchief they wore to keep the rest concealed–recognition started to settle in his brain.

But there was no way. It couldn’t have been… 

His opponent was stunned, as was he. But that didn’t stop him from slowly reaching for that kerchief covering half of their face so he could pull it down.

Nothing would’ve prepared Chris for what he’d find under that piece of fabric. 

Chris always loved to see his girlfriend whenever he could. It was honestly a miracle that he was able to have a relationship in the first place, but she’d just made it so easy from day one, so he always tried to make time and space for her in his life. Seeing her always brought him this immense sense of comfort and familiarity that just couldn’t be matched.

However, this was a setting in which he would’ve never expected to see her face. This didn’t feel comforting at all.

Your name came out of his mouth in a breathless whisper, almost as if he needed to say it outloud for his brain to truly process that it was you on top of him, pressing a knife to his throat. His head started to spin right then and there.

Had you… had you known all this time? Had you been using him? There was no way. Something in the back of his mind told him it was just impossible. He’d been careful…

The few times he actually wanted to reveal his profession to you, something always seemed to prevent him from doing so, and he always took it as a sign that it wasn’t the right time. But maybe you’d known who he was this whole time…

‘I had no idea…’

The look on your face, coupled with the way your voice trembled, made him believe you. And maybe, he wanted to believe you. There was no way the love you’d shown him all these months could be faked, not when it’d felt so genuine…

How fucking twisted… What were the odds of you being both his girlfriend and one of the most annoying mercenaries he’d had to deal with?

God, these past handful of months… He’d been dealing with you.

He’d been trying to kill you.

He’d aimed and shot and hit you with the intent of killing you.

Chris wanted to vomit. He was disgusted with himself, confused, he wanted to cry. This was all so absurd and cruel… It’d been a long time since he’d felt this way, but at that moment, he genuinely just wanted to die.

He was used to killing and hurting people. He was never fazed by any of it at this point, but he’d done it because he wanted to protect the people he cared about. You being on the receiving end of this treatment was just completely wrong. You were one of the people he cared about. He’d never wanted anything other than to protect your safety and wellbeing. 

Chris was a firm believer that men who mistreated their loved ones were just scum, that they deserved to die. He’d often killed men like these and felt absolutely no remorse about it.

But now he was one of those men.

How could he go on after this? After knowing what he’d done to you? He couldn’t… He didn’t want to.

At that moment, he firmly believed he deserved to die. He’d hurt you, not only that, but Seungmin’s life was way more important than his own, so if you absolutely had him as your target, he’d just have to continue fighting against you.

And, again, he didn’t want to…

So he asked you to kill him.

However, you refused.

The fact that you wouldn’t take his life puzzled him. How could you not want him dead? After all that had transpired, why wouldn’t you? 

Chris had always known he wasn’t a good man. At least, not in the eyes of some. But, he’d made it his mission to be a good man to you, for you… And, most times, when he was with you, he truly felt like he was. 

This changed it all. His own perception of himself had just been shattered to pieces. Who was he now? Who were you?

‘Baby…’ Chris honestly almost started sobbing when you called him that. It was his preferred pet name, he’d told you many times before how much he liked it, how it made him feel all warm and fuzzy inside… Right at that moment, it didn’t make him feel that way. It felt like one of your knives had just stabbed his heart. ‘I’m sorry… I don’t think I’ll make it to our vacation this weekend’.

Oh, that stung.

Your vacation this weekend… He’d planned it all out. A relaxing getaway to the coastside, perfect for enjoying each other’s company… He’d even wanted to seriously tell you everything about this side of his life, and if you’d been fine with it, he wanted to ask you to move in with him.

Clearly, that wasn’t going to happen now.

Chris was too stunned to move from his place on the floor. Too stunned to move and do anything to stop you from leaving. He was torn, confused, he was here to kill the Wraith, and not only did he not achieve that, he’d also found out that the person he’d been trying to kill was one of the people he loved most in this world.

The rage he felt coursing through him was uncontainable. So much so, the moment he did manage to stand up from that floor, he started thrashing the stage.

Every piano had been turned to nothing but a pile of useless pieces of wood and ivory. He’d emptied his guns by shooting at the seats and walls. He did all that as tears wouldn’t stop running down his cheeks.

How fucking pathetic.

He was pathetic.

Even when he had composed himself enough to return to the Kims’ estate, Chris still felt like he was nothing but the worst man on the planet, like he was useless as a bodyguard, like he was useless as his loved ones’ protector, and like he’d become the universe’s punching bag…

“Based on that look on your face, I’m gonna go out on a limb and say you didn’t get the target?” Felix’s voice greeted him as soon as he entered Seungmin’s home, further aggravating those feelings inside of him.

“No, I didn’t”, was the only thing he said to the younger man as he walked past him and made his way straight to his assigned room. 

Chris was in no condition to speak of the matter. He needed to sort his thoughts out. He knew he had to tell his team about what happened, he had to tell them who you were. He had more than enough information about you to finally stop you from getting any closer, he had enough information to end you.

As he entered his room and started taking his gloves off, as he looked at the tiny plastic gnome figurine he kept on this room’s bedside table, Chris wasn’t really sure he’d be able to do any of that.

The sound of choked coughs filled the previously quiet space.

Chris sat up abruptly on the bed, coughing violently since he, once again, had choked on his spit in his sleep.

With a trembling hand, he reached for the bottle of water he kept next to the bed. When the coughing had lessened, he chugged half the bottle in one gulp. 

‘You should really go to the doctor’s, baby…’

Your voice resonated in his mind, an echo of the mix of memories from the numerous times you’d woken him up before he started coughing. He remembered the gentle murmur like it’d been whispered to him yesterday. He could practically feel the soft caresses of your fingertips on his back.

It made him feel like his throat was closing for real.

After placing the bottle back on the bedside table, he plopped back down on the bed and stared at the ceiling. Chris couldn’t help but remember you. It seemed like it was all he did these days. 

His brain was certainly his worst enemy, especially at times like these, when he wasn’t on active duty, when he was just trying to get a few hours of sleep in his assigned room. Within the solitude of these four walls, it was easy for his brain to attack him, to send him in a spiral of memories that did nothing but make his heart ache and his eyes sting…

“Aaahhh… The food was absolutely delicious”, you rubbed your belly as you walked, with a big smile on your face. “I feel like I’m about to burst… But seriously, though, you should’ve at least let me pay for my food”.

Chris looked at you, amused at how you slightly swayed side to side with each step. He, too, felt like he was about to burst. The meal had been good, it’d been amazing, but… the company had certainly been much better.

When was the last time he felt like this? This… calm? Calm, but somehow still a bit giddy. He genuinely couldn’t recall…

“Nonsense”, he waved his hand in the air as if to dismiss the thought. “I invited you for dinner, didn’t I? ‘Least I could do was pay”.

You turned to look at him, pouting, and it was honestly… adorable.

You were adorable, he’d known this since the very first day he met you, but every time he saw you after that, you somehow managed to step it up a notch. And he truly couldn’t cope.

Chris could hardly believe he was here tonight, having a date, and with a person he genuinely liked at that. It’d been a long time since he’d done anything remotely close to going on a date, but a few nights ago, after spending another evening talking to you at one of his friend’s gatherings, he found himself asking you out before he could stop himself.

It was unplanned, uncalculated, which was so unlike him… He always tried to plan ahead. Considering the profession he was in, he had to carefully choose who he associated himself with. Chris hardly ever mingled with civilians, but when he did, it was usually with this particular friend group from his childhood, who you seemed to also be acquainted with through a friend of yours.

The first time he spoke with you, he thought he was making a fool of himself, but as the night progressed, something started to linger between you two… Call it tension, or chemistry, but he was certainly intrigued.

Every time he went to his friend’s house to socialise, you were there. And every time, his always ended up with him sitting next to you, talking well into the wee hours of the night, about the silly shows you watched, or anything you felt like talking about, really.

Chris genuinely enjoyed talking to you, which he figured was exactly the reason why he’d asked you out on a date. He was honestly tired of seeing you only in the confines of his friend’s fence, it just wasn’t enough. He wanted more.

“C’mon, no pouts”, Chris chuckled, taking your hand. You seemed to be a bit surprised at the action, and, being honest, he was surprised at the action. But he’d already done it, so he wouldn’t back down. Thankfully, even if it had surprised you, you didn’t seem to mind. If anything, you intertwined your fingers with his, effectively agitating the butterflies in his stomach. “Let’s take a walk, hm?”

With leisure steps, you walked until you found yourselves at the pier. There were people here, but it wasn’t overly crowded, which Chris was grateful for.

Just before you both made it to the railing so you could look at the sea, you exclaimed an excited ‘Oh!’, and bent down to pick up something from the ground.

“Look!” You showed Chris what you found, and he couldn’t keep the smile from forming on his lips. “It’s just a little guy!”

Chris chuckled at your outburst. He giggled. You’d just made him giggle… When was the last time he giggled like this? “It really is!”

“D’you wanna give him a home?” You wiggled the figurine in front of him. “I heard these can be tokens of good luck”.

Chris immediately extended his palm, and you carefully placed the plastic toy in his hand. A gnome, around half the size of his finger. For having been found on the ground, it didn’t look in bad shape, it was honestly cute, so he put it in his pocket, and placed his hand over his heart after.

“Promise I’ll take good care of him”, Chris smiled at you. “I do need some luck”.

You chuckled at that, before you tugged him along so you could finally make it to the railing. With your elbows propped on it, you both spent a good while there, just talking, joking, and enjoying the sound of the waves crashing against the breakwater.

It was… nice. Relaxing, even. 

He didn’t really know how he found himself standing so close to you, moving a few strands of hair away from your face and caressing your cheek with his knuckles. Most shockingly to him, was how you let him do these things. You looked comfortable, like you were genuinely enjoying spending time with him.

“If I tried to kiss you… would you let me?” The words escaped from somewhere deep within him. A question that he’d had in the back of his mind every time he looked at your lips, every time he saw you smile or laugh. He’d never thought he’d say it out loud, but here he was, saying them to you directly.

“Yes”, there wasn’t a single gram of hesitation in your voice, although he was sure he could hear a hint of surprise. It was almost like, just as his question, your answer had come out of your mouth before you could stop to think about it.

Your lips were so soft… you tasted like the balm you’d applied a few minutes ago, and the minty gum you’d been chewing earlier. Your cheeks, too, were soft under his palms when he held them between his hands.

Chris was certain you were soft all over. You looked soft, and maybe that was why his hands had found their way to your hips, where he could mindlessly knead the flesh over your jeans while his mouth was too busy getting acquainted with yours.

He pulled away from the kiss briefly, only to be met with a shy smile on your face before you wrapped your arms around his neck and pulled him in again. He couldn’t stop the delighted laugh that bubbled within him, nor the way he dived in fully into your kiss.

Maybe that gnome was lucky. Maybe it was thanks to that gnome that he’d somehow managed to come back to his flat accompanied for once. At least the one time he did want to come back with someone…

Chris could barely remember the last time another person was here with him. It must’ve been with one of his siblings, for sure. He had no doubts that he’d never brought anyone he was remotely attracted to in here, but he figured tonight was a night of trying new things.

Like pretending he could be just some guy… that he could be normal.

He hadn’t truly processed what was going on until you were both on his bed, dressed in nothing but your underwear. Propped on his elbows, he just looked at you.

You were wearing a black set, with a repeating pattern of red hearts on both pieces. It was… cute. In his humble–and absolutely correct–opinion, it fit you amazingly, you looked gorgeous under him like this, looking up at him like you genuinely wanted him. Like you saw him.

Which… made him feel nervous. 

Anyone else would’ve told him it was a silly thing to feel in this context. Chris had had plenty of sex in his life, but right here, right now, he wasn’t sure if this was anything like the sex he used to have. It didn’t feel like it, for sure. Mostly because he was feeling things. It wasn’t a chore or a commitment, there was genuine desire spreading within him, and it was a bit scary…

“What’s wrong?” you mumbled, cupping his cheeks.

Chris swallowed, suddenly aware that he’d zoned out for a moment there, long enough for the need reflecting in your eyes to start mixing with concern. Should he tell you what was going through his mind? If he did, would you mind…?

Tonight was indeed a night of firsts, but he wasn’t sure if he was ready to open up fully. It was enough of a miracle that he’d let you into his flat, that he himself had willingly brought you here after a date.

“I…” Chris figured there were things he shouldn’t talk about just yet, but he really, really liked you, so saying something that was true, without revealing any details of his past, felt right. And he did just that. “I haven’t really… It’s been a long time since I’ve done this, okay? I guess I’m just… a bit out of my element”.

“Oh…” Your eyes widened in surprise, and your hands moved away from his face to rest on his shoulders instead.

Fuck… He fucked up. He probably shouldn’t have said that. Why did he have to be honest? He should’ve pretended, like he always did…

“Yeah, sorry to be a disappointment”, he chuckled, although it didn’t sound very humorous, not even to his ears.

“What? No, no”, you squeezed his shoulders, and your gaze immediately softened. “I’m just surprised! I just wasn’t expecting someone like you to just… y’know, not be having sex”.

That made him chuckle, genuinely this time. “What do you mean? I can’t even believe you’re here. I’ve got no idea how we managed to get to this point, honestly”.

“You’re very charming”, bringing your hands to his face again, you smiled at him. “If it makes you feel any better, I also haven’t… really done this in a while. I don’t usually go on dates at all… but I guess you’ve really made an impression on me. Clearly”.

That did make Chris feel slightly better.

“We don’t really have to do anything, y’know?” You said it very seriously, with no hesitation. “It’s fine by me, really. Although, I’d appreciate some cuddles anyway, if that’s okay with you”.

It was such a simple thing.

He didn’t have to do anything.

He could say no if he wanted to, and, somehow, he knew you’d respect that. Or, at the very least, he wanted to believe you would respect that. You hadn’t shown him any differently so far.

“Oh, we’re definitely cuddling…” Chris dived in, finding your neck with ease to attach his lips to your skin. “Later, though…”

“Later?” You chuckled, burying one of your hands in his hair, and placing the other on his lower back. 

“Mm…” With a trail of kisses, Chris made his way down your neck, your chest, finally using his hands to further push your breasts together so he could bury his face between them. “I really want you”.

And he really, really did. Probably more than he’d wanted anyone in a long time.

“I want you, too”, you replied simply, honestly.

It was one of the things Chris had liked about you since the very first moment he spoke with you. Your honesty, your transparency… you never really seemed to care about keeping pretences, always went straight to the point and voiced your thoughts.

Chris was a taker. He took lives, took money, took territories… he took things from people as he saw fit. Whether it was the right thing to do or not he didn’t care. 

But that wasn’t his inherent nature, and he’d always been painfully aware of this. For a long time, he’d been trained to take things, he was good at it, but, deep down, he was a giver.

To the people that were close to him, to the people that really knew him, he yearned to give all he could offer. 

That night, he really wanted to give you everything. So he did.

It was all so vulnerable, but so exhilarating at the same time. To not feel judged, nor belittled, to be open with his wants and needs, to be consumed by fire and passion… It was something he wasn’t used to, but the more time passed with you two in his bedroom, the more he realised just how much he liked it, how much he liked you…

With the first orgasm he managed to coax out of you, he realised just how much he wanted this to be a thing, he felt that you were just so compatible. Physically, emotionally, and, with a bit of luck, romantically, too.

Even after a couple of hours, when he was already giving you those cuddles he’d promised, when he asked you to stay the night, basking in the post-orgasm buzz, he believed wholeheartedly that this could work.

‘You’ll call me back, right?’ Chris couldn’t help himself when he asked you that the morning after your date.

It was crazy. There was no real space in his life for a relationship, not when he had to hide his profession from you. What would you think of him once you knew that the majority of the time he was a cold-blooded assassin, and not the dorky guy you met through a friend of a friend?

He would’ve liked to be like you. Honest and straightforward, but maybe it was for the best to not mention this just yet. It was only just one date, just one night of quite possibly the most fulfilling sex he’d ever had, but he already knew that this was something he wanted. He wanted to hold onto this feeling for as long as possible, he wanted you.

‘Would you like that?’ You’d asked amusedly, before you kissed him, standing right on the entrance of his flat.

‘I would’. 

You’d smiled at him. After pressing one final kiss on his cheek, you mumbled against his skin. ‘Maybe I will, then…’

And you did.

In recent years, Chris had never felt as happy as he did when he was with you. He wholeheartedly believed that his relationship with you was one of the best things to ever happen to him.

At least, until that night in the theatre.

Reminiscing the past was hard these days, especially after the first month without hearing from you. He’d gone through so many different emotions. He felt angry, sad, and sometimes even betrayed…

He’d always believed you to be a transparent person, and maybe you were, but, just like himself, you clearly wanted to keep this part of yourself in the dark. He supposed he couldn’t blame you, but it still bothered him. 

Why didn’t you tell him before? 

If you’d told him, you would’ve probably never been in this situation. The Wraith’s attacks started well after you’d gotten together, so, if he’d known who you were, and you’d known who he was, he was convinced none of this would’ve happened at all.

Chris would’ve liked to tell you all this, to shout and get all these thoughts and feelings off his chest. But every time he picked up the phone to call you, he chickened out.

At first, he told himself that it was to keep things less complicated. In reality, he just couldn’t stand the thought of the call not going through…

So he didn’t do anything.

He was too tired, and maybe too much of a coward to face this.

Maybe one day, he’d grow the balls to do it. Maybe one day he’d get some sort of closure, but that day clearly wouldn’t be any time soon.

Chris often spent his nights on patrol around the Kims’ estate. He couldn’t really bring himself to sleep at night, so he was usually working well into the morning, until they changed guard.

Although, no one really dared come here. Since he became one of Seungmin’s personal bodyguards years ago, there’d been only two instances in which someone tried to infiltrate his home. 

Both times, the person had ended up dead, of course. That was the Five-Point Stars’ sole purpose, to keep the young heir safe. Chris was genuinely proud of his team, they always carried out their task without hesitation, and he was convinced their skills were unmatched.

Tonight, though, something didn’t feel quite right. There was this feeling of dread inexplicably pooling in Chris’ stomach, and it was making it really hard to focus on doing his job.

It was close to midnight when the feeling started intensifying, so Chris moved from his post outside Seungmin’s wing of the estate, leaving Jeongin on his own to guard the space. If anything went down, the younger man would be more than capable of taking care of it, Chris was very confident in this, so he felt no reservations when he started patrolling the outer areas.

After a while of just walking, he just couldn’t ignore his gut feeling any further.

There was someone sneaking around in the Kims’ estate, Chris could feel their every move, but he couldn’t see them, and that made that feeling of uneasiness grow inside him. Not because he was scared, by any means, but because it all felt just how it did whenever he had to deal with the Wraith… whenever he had to deal with you.

Chris hadn’t heard from you in three months, not from the you that was his girlfriend–…ex-girlfriend?–nor the you that was the Wraith. He supposed, ultimately, you were both, just like he was both Chris and Chan, but it was still just so surreal to him…

Three months and his head still couldn’t wrap around the idea that you were both the person he loved, and the one he despised. Anyone that dared come anywhere near Seungmin with ill-intent was an enemy to him, but the more he pondered on the fact that you were doing that, the less he could see you as an enemy… And that, maybe, just maybe, did scare him.

You’d become his weakness, to the point where if he were to see you now, in this estate, trying to kill Seungmin, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to carry out his one and only task. He’d spent these last few months begging to the stars above his head that you wouldn’t try to get to Seungmin again, because he genuinely didn’t know if he’d be able to stop you.

As Chris followed his gut instinct, trying to chase that phantom of a presence that seemed to glide through the corridors, he started to come to terms with the fact that the possibilities of the intruder being you were just way too high, it was all too familiar… 

And he hated it.

He hated it all…

He caught a shadow moving in his peripheral vision, and not even thinking twice about it, he chased it–as quietly and stealthily as his skills let him.

Before he knew it, he had raised his gun and pressed it against the back of the person’s head, right against their hood. They raised both of their hands to signal they didn’t have any weapons at hand, and even if the movement should’ve eased his mind, it didn’t. It only confirmed his worst fear.

Knowing what he knew now, he could just recognise the fingers poking through the gloves’ holes, and the overall frame.

There you stood, after three months of nothing, dressed just how you had been the last time he saw you. Chris tried his best to ignore the lump that seemed to be growing in his throat, the desperate need to both scream and cry and hug you and push you away. 

Instead, he just pressed the muzzle of his gun a bit harder against your skull, taking a deep breath before he spoke. “What’re you doing here?”

Your shoulders seemed to relax the tiniest bit as you heard the sound of his voice, which, in other circumstances, Chris would’ve deemed a very foolish reaction on your part. But, being honest, he wouldn’t be surprised if you already knew it’d be incredibly hard for him to harm you.

“Looking for you”.

Cursed be his heart for jumping in his ribcage, it was almost embarrassing how quickly and easily the sound of your voice was able to kick-start it into a messy, erratic pace. Chris couldn’t let that show, though. He needed to bluff, and he needed to do it well. 

“Bullshit”, he swallowed, trying to get rid of that knot in his throat. It just made it worse. “What are you truly here for?”

Your shoulders rose and fell with your deep breath, and slowly, so very slowly, you started to move, to turn around so you could finally be face to face with him. You kept your hands up in the air, to show him you weren’t going to attack, but he just couldn’t let his guard down. Not any more than it already was.

As usual, the lower part of your face was covered by a black kerchief, and the hood of your outfit almost fell over your eyes. The sight was almost revolting, if he thought about it too deeply… His gun raised, pressed against your forehead, ready to be shot at any second. It was something out of his worst nightmares, of those that showed him himself hurting the people he loved.

“I’m telling you the truth, I’ve been looking for you. I’ve come to warn you”.

“Warn me?” The statement was so unexpected Chris couldn’t even hide the surprise in his voice, but he recovered quickly, trying to mask his emotions with a condescending scoff. “What could you possibly need to warn me about?”

“They’re coming for you”, you said simply, your eyes unwavering as they stared deeply into his.

“They being?”

“The Guild”, your fingers moved, but you weren’t doing anything particularly malicious, you simply used your thumb to crack each knuckle, a gesture he knew you did only when you were nervous.

You must’ve known he knew this detail about you. He’d tried to stop you from cracking your knuckles many times in the past, whenever you were watching a scary movie that made you anxious, or whenever you had to order at a new restaurant. Back then, he would always take your hand in his, and drag his thumb on the back of it to help ease those nerves.

Chris couldn’t do that now.

To display such weakness in front of him messed with his head. Were you doing it out of real nervousness, or were you doing it as a tactic to distract him…? 

Regardless, he knew of the Guild. He’d heard of them before. Essentially a hub of guns-for-hire, with an extensive catalogue of many different mercenaries, who specialised in different activities. At this point, he wouldn’t be surprised if that was who you really worked for, that it’d been through them that you were hired to get to Seungmin.

“Someone has been hired to do what I couldn’t do. I heard them talking and I just… I felt like I needed to warn you”.

“You could’ve just called, why come all the way here for that?” Chris’ arm was getting tired from holding up the gun, but he just couldn’t lower it.

“I tried”, you sighed. “I tried, but you wouldn’t pick up, so I came here…”

Chris’ eyebrows furrowed in confusion. You called? There was no way… He would’ve seen it. Hell, he would’ve picked up. Unless… “When did you call?”

“Around thirty minutes ago”.

That’d explain why he wouldn’t have heard it. He never carried his personal mobile phone with him when he was on duty–or at least he tried not to. He used to do it a couple of times a week, on the days that he missed you, that he wanted to know anything that had been going on in your day–what you ate, what you were doing, what you were watching, anything that could make him feel close to you… He hadn’t done that in three months.

“And it couldn’t wait?” Chris was doing an excellent job at keeping the scowl on his face and the annoyed tone in his voice, probably because he was feeling exactly like that. Annoyed. “You tried to hurt Seungmin and now you care about what happens to him? Hard to believe”.

“I don’t fucking care about Seungmin”, your eyebrows knitted together, and in a movement way too fast for someone that had a gun pointed to their forehead, you pulled your kerchief down, revealing your face fully to him.

It was almost pathetic how his heart skipped a beat at the sight.

“I’ve got no ill feelings towards the kid, truly, but I also don’t really care about him. The people talking… They said they were going for Seungmin’s guard dog first, in hopes of debilitating his security system, so I… I just…”

You closed your eyes, taking a deep breath. When you opened them again, the glint of vulnerability shining in your gaze made his heart ache.

“I know it’s crazy, fuck… I didn’t think this through. They’re planning on striking sometime this week, and I just felt like I needed to come and tell you, so you could be prepared”.

Chris swallowed thickly. His hand trembled the tiniest bit, he wasn’t sure if you could feel his gun tremble against your skin, too. “If any of this is true, how could I even know you’re not here to distract me from doing my job? That this isn’t one of your schemes?”

“You can’t know”, you said, matter-of-factly. “There’s no way for you to confirm what I’m saying is true. All you can do is trust me and my word. I dropped the job after our encounter in the theatre. I just can’t do it when I’m this emotionally involved”.

When I’m this emotionally involved…

When I’m…

I’m…

I am…

I am…

I am…

Present tense.

You said that in present tense, like you were… like you were still emotionally involved.

Chris was weak. He was weak for you. Three months with no contact couldn’t change that, the fact that you had tried to kill him couldn’t change that, and the fact that he had tried to kill you also didn’t seem to be able to change that.

He was weak, and he couldn’t hide it.

With a sigh, he lowered his gun, and your frame immediately relaxed as soon as the weapon wasn’t pointed in your direction. “How infuriating…”

“What? Me? Or the people coming for your boss?” There was the tiniest bit of a humorous tone in your voice, and it just made him sigh again.

“Both”, he took his communicator from his belt, and clicked the communication button to speak with his colleague. “SpearB, do you copy? Over”.

There were a few seconds of silence, until the communicator crackled and Changbin’s voice resonated from the device. “I hear you, Channie. Over”.

You arched an eyebrow and crossed your arms over your chest, mouthing a ‘Channie?’ at him, which Chris decided to ignore completely. 

“Check in with Yongbok and make sure the perimeter is secure. Something doesn’t feel quite right, so we need to keep a close eye on each and every entrance. Over”.

The device crackled again. “You think it’s the Wraith? Over”.

Chris looked at you, and you looked right back at him. Your body was tense once again, and a spark of doubt flashed in your eyes. Licking his lips, he clicked the button on the device once more. “No. No, I don’t think it’s the Wraith. Just do what I said, and let me know if you find anything out of order. Over”.

‘Roger that. Over!’ was the last thing Chris heard from Changbin. He returned the communicator to its holster on his belt, all without taking his eyes from you.

There was a moment of silence, a moment that seemed to be stretching far too long for his liking, so he cleared his throat, crossing his arms over his chest. “So… You’ve delivered your message. What now?”

You attempted to pop your knuckles again, the action obviously gave no results, since you’d done this already earlier, but Chris knew that wouldn’t stop you. It never did, your nervous habits always shone through.

You opened your mouth to speak, but before you could, a door opened somewhere in the area, and the sound of Changbin’s whistling filled his ears. Your eyes widened, just like Chris’ did as you stared at one another.

This was dangerous. If anyone saw you, you were at risk of being tortured for information, or straight up killed because of your numerous attempts to hurt Seungmin.

Chris wasn’t thinking, he just had to act, and he had to do it fast. Taking your hand, he quickly pulled you further down the corridor, where he could push you against the wall, right behind a column to hopefully hide you both from his teammate. 

You opened your mouth again to say something, and Chris simply placed a hand over your mouth to stop you, bringing his index finger to his lips to signal you to not make any noise. 

As the sound of steps drew closer, Chris mindlessly pressed you further against the wall, hopefully minimising the chances of Changbin seeing you.

He held his breath, waiting patiently as he looked at the shadows his friend’s body casted against the nearby wall. 

When it seemed like the steps were becoming more and more distant, Chris looked back at you, and only then did he realise just how close you both were. Your bodice was rigid against his chest, and the handles of your knives poked his abdomen. Noses almost brushed against each other, the hand he’d placed on the wall was itching to hold your waist, and as he looked into your eyes, as he saw galaxies and a plethora of feelings swimming in them, he was almost winded by how warm you felt. 

Chris could barely hear Changbin’s footsteps over his heart beating this fast and loud in his ears.

Fuck, he was a weak man. 

A weak man who was still hopelessly in love. 

It took a couple of minutes for Changbin to finally leave the area completely, his exit was signalled by the sound of a door opening and closing. Just to be safe, though, he kept quiet for a while longer, he kept pressing you against the wall and his hand firmly on your mouth.

Just to be safe… No other ulterior motives at all…

After a few moments, he finally removed his hand away from your mouth, slowly, so very slowly moving it to rest against the wall instead, right next to your waist as well. You mindlessly licked your lips as soon as his hand was off your face, and Chris couldn’t help but focus on the movement. 

Oh, your lips… how he missed them… He missed the way they moved with every word you said, how you would mindlessly chew on them when you were focused, how they felt like against his own, against any and every part of his body… 

“Why are you here?” Chris’ voice was barely a whisper. He didn’t intend for the words to come out unsteady, nor for his hands to start trembling slightly against the wall, but it was hard for his body not to react this way when he’d spent all these weeks just steeping in his own misery. 

You took a deep breath, your chest rose and fell against his own, and right then, with the barely there illumination of the bulbs on the roof, he could see your eyes start to shine with the tears that welled in them. 

“Because I care about you”, you said it so easily, like you weren’t just reaching inside his ribcage and squeezing his weak little heart with such a simple statement. “I know it’s stupid. That it’s insane, considering everything that’s happened. But I really can’t help it. Every day, all I can think about is how you’d be. If you’re eating well, if you’re getting enough sleep… And I hate it”.

You were trying really hard not to let the tears fall, it was obvious to Chris, yet your voice didn’t waver, not a little bit.

“I hate that I worry about you knowing what I’ve done to you. I hate that I can’t stop caring. When I heard them talking tonight about how they wanted to hurt you I just… I couldn’t think straight, I had to do something”, you took a deep breath and closed your eyes, leaning your head back against the wall.

Chris couldn’t say anything. He just couldn’t. He wanted to tell you that he couldn’t stop caring, either. That he felt guilty, yes, but he still cared. That he’d always care, but the words just wouldn’t come out.

When you opened your eyes again, those tears you were trying so hard to hold back started to silently fall, and he wanted to cry himself. “Warning you… it’s not much, and it’s probably more a selfish act than anything else, but I had to do it. I had to… had to see you. Because I miss you, Chris, fuck… I miss you so much it hurts more than any blow Chan has ever landed on me”.

Chris was doomed. He was weak, and in love, and he was absolutely doomed.

His brain shut down completely. He knew it the moment he felt his lips on yours, the moment your fingers tangled in his hair and the quietest moan escaped your mouth. 

The kiss was messy and desperate, he couldn’t seem to be able to be any closer to you, and yet he still tried. He held your waist tightly, like you would vanish if he didn’t. He pressed you further against the wall, dizzy with the violent stir of his feelings, with the feel of your tongue against his own and your yearning kiss.

At that moment, the fact that he was Chan, bodyguard of Kim Seungmin, didn’t matter. The fact that you were the Wraith, an assassin that had been hired to harm the person he was supposed to protect, didn’t matter, either. All that mattered was that he was Chris, that you were you, and that he’d missed you and that he needed you.

When he pulled back from the kiss, panting slightly, the sight of you, all flustered, breathless, of your blown pupils, was enough for his walls to crumble. That look in your eyes was unmistakable to him, it set his insides alight and sent his mind into overdrive.

“Come with me”, without hesitation, Chris took your hand and tugged you along the corridor.

He vaguely recalled taking his communicator and calling Jeongin to ask him to continue covering for him as there was something he needed to attend to, just like he vaguely recalled the younger man telling him he had it covered. The only thing he could register for sure was the tight hold of your hand in his, and the moan that came out of your lips when he pushed you into one of the supply closets and kissed you again.

Chris blindly reached for the lightswitch before he pushed you against the closest wall. One of your legs wrapped around his hip to pull him closer to you, and he immediately took a hold of your thigh to keep you securely in place.

“Have you… been with anyone after…” You started to ask, your words broken between desperate presses of lips and tugs of teeth.

How absurd. As if he could have. As if he would’ve ever even wanted that in the first place… Regardless, even with the hazy state of his mind, he knew exactly why you were asking, so he shook his head. “Have you?”

You shook your head as well, further pulling on his hair so your lips wouldn’t detach from his. Although there was a part of him that kind of expected you to not have been with anyone, it still made him feel relieved. It made him feel… hopeful.

What a dangerous emotion to feel.

Letting go of your thigh so he could free his hands, your leg fell to the floor while Chris unbuttoned his gloves. “Are you still on birth control?”

“Yes”, your reply came immediately, eagerly, and his mind just fogged up further.

“Good”, he pulled his gloves off and dropped them somewhere on the floor.

With a tight hold on your hips, he flipped you around and pulled your hips back a bit towards him, so your ass could be flush with his crotch. Chris kept kissing your cheek, your neck, any bit of exposed skin he could, just as you ground your backside against his growing erection, while he frantically fumbled with your belt buckle and the buttons of your trousers.

“How many fucking buttons does this thing have?” Chris mumbled against your skin, quickly popping open what seemed like hundreds of studs. “How impractical…”

“Looks better than a zipper–Oh!” 

Chris pushed your bottoms down as soon as he’d popped open the very last button, just enough to expose the delectable flesh of your ass to his hungry eyes. He wanted to smack the luscious fat so badly, but even in his desperate state, he knew it was a really, really bad idea, so he settled for holding one of your buttocks tightly with one hand, while he brought the other close to your face.

“Open up, bun”, your lips parted as soon as he’d asked you to, and he quickly pushed two fingers inside your mouth.

A moan muffled against his digits when you sucked on them, and Chris could almost start feeling his head spin with arousal. God, your mouth… He’d always known it’d be the death of him one day…

“That’s it, baby. Make sure you get them drenched”, after letting go of your buttock, he hastily unbuckled his belt, unbuttoned his trousers, and pushed the zipper down so he could reach inside his underwear and finally free himself. 

The air was cool against his heated flesh, especially at the tip where pre-cum had started to leak. He pumped himself a couple of times, it was nowhere near as satisfactory as he knew your cunt would be, but it was certainly a pleasant warm-up.

As soon as he removed his fingers from your mouth, he brought them to your centre, where he made sure to coat his fingers in your essence to spread it all around your opening before he finally stuffed those two digits into you. You bit your lip to muffle the noises threatening to escape your throat, leaning your forehead against the wall as Chris tried his best to prep you in such an unfortunate setting.

“Tell me if it hurts. Hm? You know you can tell me, right?” Chris whispered in your ear, and you immediately nodded in response.

“Just… Fuck, just get inside, baby, please”, how could he stall any further when you sounded so eager and desperate for him, in the same way that he was for you? When you called him ‘baby’?

So he pulled his fingers out, making you whine at the loss of contact. It didn’t last long, though, because he stepped closer almost immediately after. He spat on his hand, and smeared his saliva all over his length before he lined himself with your entrance.

As he started to push in, he brought his free hand to your front, finding your clit with expert ease, rubbing slow circles on it to hopefully aid his intrusion. There was a whine, a quiet one, and Chris hushed you, kissing your cheek. 

“It’s okay, baby. You’re doing well, so well. Remember to tell me if it’s too much…” He mumbled. It was almost funny how quickly he got into his role, he was so used to treating you like this, to checking in on you, that not even the place you were in, or the outfits you were wearing could stop him from doing it. All he got from you was a nod, a sigh that vaguely sounded like his name, and a push of your hips. “Impatient, bun? Hungry for my cock, are you, baby?”

You nodded, pushing back as much as you could to get him all the way in, making him hiss. “I am. I fucking am. Need you to fuck me, and I need it now, Christopher”. 

“Fuck…” It was an awkward angle, but he needed to kiss you. There was hardly anything he enjoyed more than kissing you while he was balls deep inside your warmth. Every push of his tongue, every bite on his lips, everything made it so your walls continuously clamped around him, all of it combined made him delirious, and even more so when he finally started to move.

Chris was trying his best to go slow, his mind was hazy with lust and need and want, but he still wanted to make sure he didn’t hurt you. You, however, weren’t making it easy. You pushed back to sharply meet his calculated thrusts, and all he could do was match your pace, until the only noise in the room were the contained groans and moans and the obnoxious clattering of metal as both of your belt buckles swayed with your movements.

His fingers sped up, and very quickly, the obscene sounds produced when your bodies met joined the messy symphony playing all around you. Your grip on his hair was tight, the way your moans were catching in your throat was getting him impatient, he wanted to hear you properly, he wasn’t used to you holding back, and the sudden increased speed of his motions felt like it was his subconscious desperately trying to pull all those delicious sounds out of you.

He was talking. He knew he was talking, but he could barely hear what he was mumbling to you, all he knew was that, whatever it was, it had you whining quietly, meeting his thrusts harder, mumbling things back to him. 

Chris wanted to feel more of you, as much as he could, so he pulled his vest up, and took the hem between his teeth. He couldn’t talk like this, but he figured it was a small price to pay so he could feel your bottom freely bounce off his skin. Returning his hand to your hip, he held your soft flesh tightly, relishing the way the flesh dipped under his grip.

“C–Chris… Gonna–gonna come…” Your fingers flexed against the wall in what looked like a futile attempt to get a hold of something, to keep yourself grounded.

He wanted to tell you to come. Hell, he needed you to come around his cock right now or he would die, he was sure. But he couldn’t speak with the stupid fabric in his mouth, so he simply fucked you harder, faster, diligently rubbing that sensitive nub between your legs in that way he’d learnt to do throughout your numerous intimate encounters since the very beginning of your relationship.

Your relationship…

Were you two still in a relationship?

In all honesty, right then, with your presence consuming him, he hoped you were. 

The sight of you biting your fist to keep your moans contained, coupled with the feel of your warmth fluttering around his length as a result of your orgasm, made him lightheaded. His pace didn’t relent, though. He fucked you through it, just how he knew you liked it, while you did your best to weakly keep meeting his movements.

His lower abdomen tightened, he could feel his own climax nearing increasingly fast, and God, if he wanted that feeling to wash over him right the fuck now… 

He finally let go of the hem of his vest so he could speak. “Where–Shit… Where do you want it, pretty?”

At this point he would come anywhere, in you, on you, out of you… But he needed to do what you wanted, and what you wanted became painfully clear to him when you hastily removed one of your gloves, pushed him away from you a bit, and dropped to your knees.

Oh, how he’d missed the feel of your hand on him, and the squelching sounds it made when you jerked him off while he was still covered in your juices. You held him with that perfect pressure that you’d learnt to use all those months ago, looking up at him with dark eyes and your moist lips slightly parted as you still tried to catch your breath.

“Look at you, fuck–!” Chris threw his head back the moment you took him in your mouth, getting in as much of him as you could while gently squeezing his balls.

You hummed around his length, trying to get his attention, so Chris opened his eyes again, finding that look in your eyes that always got him close, the one that begged him to move. So he did, placing a hand on your head and shallowly thrusting into your mouth to complement your own movement.

“Fuck, bun… Gonna blow, shit–”

It was his turn now to bite his fist to contain his desperate noises. Three months of tension seemed to evaporate from his body when he found his release. He could only feel the tingles of pleasure shooting to every one of his limbs as your lips dragged around his cock, as you hummed and moaned in your own bliss.

His legs felt like they were going to give out, his arms felt like jelly, and his brain was void of anything other than you and your devious mouth. For a second, Chris wondered if you were going to try to overstimulate him, but you didn’t. You simply got your mouth off of him to lick the remnants of his cum that beaded at the tip.

Before he could even think about it, he was already helping you to your feet. Cupping your cheeks, he kissed you. Slowly, deeply, getting the combined taste of him and you from your lips and your tongue.

Your arms wrapped around his waist, and Chris wrapped his around your neck as he waddled forward to press you against the wall again. Partially because he enjoyed the feeling of it, partially because he felt like his legs were really going to give out, and the wall certainly provided much needed support.

As his kiss slowed into simple pecks of his lips on yours–and yours on his–the haze that seemed to have clouded every single one of his senses started to clear up.

In what was quite possibly the worst case of post-nut clarity he’d ever experienced, it started to dawn on him just how stupid and reckless this was. He shouldn’t have brought you in here, the longer you stayed within this estate the more at risk you both were.

You seemed to be coming to the same realisation, because the gentle pecks of your lips on his stopped, and you pulled back to look him in the eyes, nervously chewing on your bottom lip. Your arms unravelled from around his waist, only for your hands to rest on it. “Chris…”

He closed his eyes and sighed, resting his forehead against yours. “I know…”

Stupid. You wanted to tell him this was stupid, he didn’t need you to say it to know.

Pressing lingering kisses on your cheek, he pulled up your trousers, and started fastening the trillion buttons, just as you did the same to him. You gently buckled his belt, and it was now your turn to start pressing kisses on his cheek, just as he finished with your belt-buckle.

His heart felt as if it was both swelling with love and being harshly squeezed with agony. 

What was this? What did this mean for you two now? He couldn’t undo the past, what he’d done, what you’d done… It was going to have repercussions, ones he didn’t even want to think about right now.

When he took a step back from your space to finish fixing his clothes, he watched you as you did the same.

“Need to get you out of here”, Chris mumbled, trying to fix the mess his hair had become from your continuous pulling and his own sweat–all that time straightening it this morning for nothing… “You’ve been here for way too long”.

“I can get out. That’s no problem”, you sounded confident in your statement, and, honestly, based on what he’d seen the Wraith do, he wouldn’t really be surprised if it truly was no problem for you to sneak in and out… Good for you, but bad for their security system, he figured…

There was a moment of deafening silence, a moment of you looking into his eyes and Chris looking into yours. Dragging his fingers through his hair, he sighed.

“We need to talk about this. But not now, not here in these… circumstances”.

“I agree”, you replied simply, picking up your glove from the floor and grimacing when you put it on your still sticky hand.

Chris reached for his own gloves he’d haphazardly dropped on the floor earlier, and tucked them in his back pocket before he opened the door and looked out the corridor to make sure no one was there.

Coast clear, so he turned back to look at you. “If… If you want, I’m free tomorrow evening. You could… drop by. After eight, preferably”.

You took a deep breath. It took you a moment to do anything, but when you did, you moved into his space, placing a hand on his chest and the other on the nape of his neck. You leaned in, and pressed a lingering kiss on his cheek.

“After eight”, you confirmed, and it was honestly pathetic how fast his heart started to beat when he heard those two words.

After offering him one last, small smile, you finally removed yourself from his space. Pulling the kerchief back over the lower part of your face, you went through the door and eventually disappeared somewhere by the end of the corridor.

This was completely crazy, insane, and the fact that you were still pretty much considered an enemy in his circle should’ve filled him with anxiety. He’d just had sex with you, after knowing who you were and what you’d tried to do…

And yet, oddly enough, he could only feel relaxed. Like he had finally breached the surface after swimming underwater for too long.

Seven forty-five in the evening.

Chris had arrived home two hours ago and had done nothing but try to get his flat to look presentable.

When was the last time he slept here? Probably a few weeks ago… It was hard to be in his flat when everything reminded him of you. After all, he’d mostly stayed here when you did.

He honestly hadn’t spent as much time in this flat as he did after he started a relationship with you. He’d been living here for around three months before he went on that date with you. He used to only come here to sleep on his days off, and even those days he tried to spend them out of the flat as much as possible.

After he met you, though, every day off he had he either invited you over, or went to your place. Week by week, the place started filling up with your stuff as well as his. Things you left behind, things you brought on purpose, things he himself placed there, like that one picture you’d asked a stranger to take of you two by the lake in the park… The place was filled with your presence, and being here, on his own, only reminded him of that night in the theatre, of the fact that you weren’t here and what he’d done to you.

Thankfully, the place wasn’t too bad, it was mostly just dusty. Chris didn’t bother hiding anything of yours that was still on display. There was no point in that when his feelings were more than obvious after what happened last night.

So, fifteen minutes before the agreed time, his flat was clean, his hair was damp from the shower he’d just gotten out of, and food had been ordered. He was starving, and, since you had a tendency to not eat dinner because you got too overwhelmed sometimes, he figured ordering for you as well wouldn’t be too risky of a move. Worst case scenario, he’d just have extra left-overs tomorrow…

Seven fifty-two.

Chris looked at himself in his bathroom mirror. His hair was already starting to curl, there was a bit of a flush on his skin still from the hot shower, and he was second-guessing his outfit choice.

A cropped top he’d cut himself out of an old, oversized band t-shirt he’d thrifted, and shorts… Was it too casual? He hadn’t really thought much about what to wear, he had grabbed these on auto-pilot. Whenever you came over, it was usually just to relax and spend some time together, so it was a no-brainer for him to wear these two garments.

That was before, though… What if you came to his door looking like a goddess, all dressed up and he was like this? Would it matter? Would you mind? Three months ago, you wouldn’t have, but three months ago you were still together. Maybe things would be different now…

Seven fifty-eight.

What if you didn’t come? You did say ‘After eight’ before you left the Kim estate yesterday, but what if you changed your mind? It was a complicated situation, after all. Maybe too complicated. Why did he even invite you over? It would’ve probably been best to just meet at a café or a neutral place, why did he even suggest his home for this?

And, most importantly, what did he want from this encounter? Chris hadn’t even thought about it, and, honestly, he kind of didn’t want to think about it. He’d asked you yesterday to come here because he figured talking about whatever the fuck was going on would be the only way to get answers, to get this heavy feeling in his chest to go away, but he hadn’t thought ahead.

You were a mercenary that had tried to hurt Seungmin numerous times, he was risking everything by keeping quiet about your identity, by asking you to come here even knowing who you were. So why? Why would he do this?

The doorbell startled him.

Slightly panicked, he ruffled his hair and looked at himself in the mirror–admittedly, he’d been standing there the whole time, but he wasn’t really looking at anything…

It was too late now for an outfit change, too late to back down from this insanity he himself had started. So, he bolted to the door, and his heart almost leaped out of his chest when he looked through the peephole.

Once Chris opened the door, and came face to face with you, dressed in your comfy clothes, still pretty much looking like a goddess regardless of your outfit, he remembered the reason why he was risking it all. 

Because you made his heart rate spike. You made him feel again. After years of having seemingly nothing but a hole where his heart should’ve been, you had managed to defrost his insides with your warmth. 

“Hey…” You fiddled with the straps of the backpack you always brought along with you, shifting your weight from one foot to the other right where you stood.

“Hey”, Chris wasn’t really sure what to say, he just looked at you for a moment, and you looked right back at him.

Silence enveloped you two. You wouldn’t move, save for your fiddling, just like he wouldn’t, he remained frozen on the spot with the doorknob in his hand. Normally, he would’ve kissed you to greet you, but… should he do that? Was it appropriate? You did fuck last night, but that was a heat of the moment thing… Maybe you wouldn’t want him to kiss you at all.

He opened his mouth to speak, but before he could say anything, the delivery guy popped up right behind you, startling the both of you. So Chris just asked you to come in, and quickly got his card from his wallet that he had discarded by the kitchen counter earlier to pay for the food.

“Have you eaten? I ordered some for you just in case…” Chris asked as soon as the guy was gone, just as he placed the food on the counter.

“No, I haven’t”, you replied simply, finally putting your backpack down on one of the chairs. “What’d you order?”

“Cantonese…” Chris didn’t look at you as he took the containers out of the bag, nor did he acknowledge the quiet ‘Oh…’ that came out of your mouth in response. “Wanna eat on the coffee table?”

“Of course”, you said it like it was an obvious thing, and, honestly, it kind of was. Whenever you both met for dinner, especially when it involved your favourite food, you’d always eat at the coffee table, why would it be any different this time? Not like three months had passed since you last spoke or anything…

While Chris brought the containers with food to the table, you got a couple of plates, two glasses, and the necessary cutlery. By the time you were at the table yourself, he had already gone to the fridge and taken the pineapple juice you both liked.

It was all so… normal. Normal, but like things had been placed slightly to the left. The motions were the same, the same routine you had as a couple, but there was something odd lingering between you two, and Chris figured it made sense, all things considered.

When he finally sat down next to you on the floor, with his back against the sofa, you were already serving the food. Chris busied himself pouring the juice, and in no time, you both had started eating. 

It was silent for a while. Well, save for the murmurs coming from the television after you had switched it on for some background noise. Reality was seemingly looming over your heads, or, at least, that was how it felt to Chris. Yet, none of you said anything, you both just ate your food.

It almost felt like an eternity, honestly–even though it’d been probably just shy of ten minutes since you sat down to eat. But, eventually, you took a deep breath, swallowed the food in your mouth, and finally spoke, reaching for your glass of juice.

“I’m sorry this is so awkward… I just don’t know what to say”, you took a sip of your drink, finally looking at him.

Immediately, Chris’ shoulders slumped, and he placed his plate on the table before he turned his body towards you. With an arm on the sofa, he propped his head on his hand while he looked at you. “Me neither, honestly”.

You took a deep breath, chewing your food slowly, deep in thought.

“I’m… I’m gonna be fully honest. I’m tired of secrets. Sick of ‘em. And I feel like you deserve better than that”, you placed your plate on the coffee table as well, and took a napkin to wipe your hands. “I’ll just… I’ll start from the beginning, okay?” 

Chris swallowed, nodding to let you know he was listening.

“It started with my dad…” You wouldn’t look at Chris, you just placed your arms on your bent knees and fixed your gaze on the table. “He joined the Guild when he was a teenager. It was tradition in his family, you see? His mum had been a member for years, so she taught him everything she knew. Eventually, he made a name for himself, and he actually managed to get quite high in the ranks… But then he met my mum”.

You took a deep breath, leaning your head back against the sofa, staring at the ceiling. “He fell deeply in love with her. To the point where he realised he wanted to have a peaceful life, so he retired and did just that. Certified himself as a PE teacher, of all things, and then they had me”.

“Problem was… my mum isn’t exactly a good woman. She wasn’t good to him, or me. When I was still a child, she took everything my dad had and left us both, ran away with some guy she’d met… She’s still with him, last I heard. Good for her, I guess”, you chuckled, a chuckle that lacked any semblance of humour. “After she left, my dad just… he went through a deep, deep depression, lost his job, we could barely make ends meet… That was when he decided to return to the Guild, and, of course, like his mum had done to him, he brought me along…”.

You spoke a lot from then on. How you were taught to fight, how your father passed on to you his stealth technique, which was your signature trait to this day, how many people you’d had to kill, kidnap, or extort. You kept a tally, apparently, which in Chris’ experience wasn’t an uncommon thing to do. He himself kept records of his own milestones, as gruesome as that might sound to some people. It always helped put things into perspective, in a way.

“Seungmin… He was just another target. I wasn’t even going to kill him. I try not to kill when I can. It’s too messy… But, I must admit, at some point I was trying to kill Chan”, you finally turned to look at him, and the pained look in your eyes must’ve been a perfect match to his own. “In all honesty, I’m glad I failed. You’re really good at what you do, you know? If you hadn’t been, I would’ve succeeded, and being honest, I don’t think I would’ve been able to continue going on with my life if I had killed the man I love”.

The man I love…

There you were again, using present tense. Was it stupid of him to feel hopeful about that?

Maybe it was.

Before Chris could say anything, though, you looked away again, straightening your head to reach for your plate of food. “What I told you last night… Dropping the job, in the eyes of the Guild, is a sign of weakness. We are supposed to carry out our tasks or die trying. The fact that it took me so long to do what I was hired to do, and the fact that I essentially gave up, it’s all enough for them to consider me a burden, so I’ll have to either prove my worth again, or they’ll just get rid of me”.

You said it so nonchalantly, like you had accepted this as your fate. And Chris honestly hated it.

“How long do you have to prove it?” He couldn’t help but ask.

You shrugged. “It’s hard to say. I could either be given a super hard task soon, or they could’ve already decided I’m no longer worth their time and just try to kill me. I need to be wary now. You’ve got no idea all the trouble I had to go through just to make sure no one was following me when I was coming here”.

As the guard of Kim Seungmin, as Chan, there was a small spark of pride at the fact that he had managed to stop anyone from doing harm to Seungmin. But, as your boyfriend–ex-boyfriend…?–as Chris, there was also guilt pooling in his gut at the fact that you were now being targeted by your own people because of him.

How fucking convoluted this all was…

You remained silent after that, just slowly putting food into your mouth, chewing leisurely. Chris knew you were waiting for him to speak. You had bared your past to him, and it was now his turn to do the same. 

It wasn’t like he didn’t want to speak, he wanted to do it, he’d wanted to do it for months, way before the theatre situation, way before the Wraith came into his life, back when it was just you and him. But, even though the fact that he’d tried to kill you didn’t seem to have fully pushed you away from him, he was sure that what he was going to reveal to you now could potentially do so. As odd as that might sound…

Chris figured it was now or never. Everything was already complicated, the future of you two was already murky enough, so he took a deep breath, closing his eyes briefly only to finally open them again when he started to speak.

“You remember I told you… about my brother and sister, right?” 

You nodded, focusing your entire attention on him.

Chris hadn’t disclosed much of his family or career to you, but he had told you about his siblings. Not in detail, but you were important enough to him that he wanted you to know, especially when sometimes he’d get texts or calls from either of them and he didn’t want you to get the wrong impression when you saw their contact names with hearts and random emojis next to them.

“We didn’t really… have much. Our father abandoned us right after my brother was born. He left my mum on her own to raise three children, one that wasn’t even a month old, while she was still recovering from her difficult pregnancy…” The memory always made him angry, his father embodied everything he ever hated in this world, and whenever Chris thought of him, he had to make the conscious effort to not give into this need of looking for him and give him the beating of his life, preferably kill him if he could… 

Chris shook his head, trying to once again ignore the thought altogether. “Anyway, mum worked really hard to keep us three fed and to give us proper education. She really did her best, and even if we didn’t have much we were at least somewhat pushing through. But…”

It was always hard to talk about these things. Chris hardly ever allowed himself to think of this period of his life. He much preferred to remember his mother as the loving, hardworking woman he knew her to be, but he wanted to tell you this, he needed you to know the whole context, so he kept talking.

“She was sick. We didn’t really know, one day she was seemingly fine and the next she was in a hospital bed, telling me it would all be fine…” It wasn’t fine, clearly. His mother had always been overly optimistic, and even back then he knew this was just her holding onto the foolish hope that she’d make it.

She didn’t.

The very next day, she had passed away, and Chris and his siblings had been entrusted to their uncle.

“It was all so sudden… Very quickly, we realised our uncle just wasn’t a good man. I put myself as the shield between him and my siblings, but even that wasn’t enough. I had to find a way for us to leave, I couldn’t just let my brother and sister live with this guy, it wasn’t safe”, Chris tapped his fingers on his thigh, looking at the only picture of him and his younger siblings he had placed on one of the shelves close to the television.

After a few moments of silence to gather his thoughts, he took a deep breath and started talking again. “I was sixteen, what can a sixteen year old boy do? It was so frustrating, and I was incredibly desperate, so I…” Fuck, this was much harder than he expected it to be, but he swallowed regardless, pushing away the little voice in the back of his mind that urged him to shut up. “Back then, all I had was my charm and my body, you know? So I used just that”.

There were a lot of cruel, disgusting people in this world. People that didn’t even stop to ask how old he was, people who could clearly tell how old he was but weren’t put off by it–on the contrary, those were usually turned on by that fact.

For many years, Chris sold himself to other people. He became whoever they wanted him to become for a few hours, and eventually got himself enough regulars to financially support his siblings and himself. He managed to keep the three of them well fed and studying. 

Only problem was, the psychological toll such a profession took on him was almost immeasurable. It was hard to remain empathetic towards other people when he’d had to constantly experience physical and emotional abuse, when he had to do things he just didn’t want to do every single night. But he had to. For the sake of his siblings and himself, he just had to.

You didn’t seem at all surprised by what Chris was telling you, but he could see the look of disgust on your face. Knowing you, his logical mind told him it had all to do with his clients, with the situation, not with himself. But, there was a small part of him–a very self-destructive part of him–that was sure you’d be disgusted at him. After all, you’d been physically involved with someone who was nothing but a whore for a good chunk of his life, with no knowledge of the fact.

Chris swallowed. His mouth was suddenly dry after telling you all this, so he reached for his glass of juice and drank some to quench that nervous thirst. All while you looked at him, clearly deep in your thoughts.

“Mmm… So that’s why you’d been so insistent on me getting that STD test when we were talking about dropping condoms… Why you were so sure you were clean yourself”, you said simply, just as he was placing his glass back on the table. “Not gonna lie, I found it odd back then, considering most guys don’t really think about that stuff, they just want to get it wet”.

“Yep. I always made sure to be careful and keep that in check. I couldn’t afford to catch something dangerous. Who would take care of my brother and sister then?”

You hummed in understanding, but you didn’t really say anything else, and suddenly looking at your face was too much…

“Honestly, I almost never had unprotected sex with any of my clients, but whenever I did, I was super insistent on this, and old habits die hard, I suppose…” Chris picked at some loose threads of the rug under the coffee table, and he swallowed, avoiding your eyes before he braced himself for what he was about to say. “I’m… By the time I met you, I was no longer an escort, obviously. But you… That night with you after our first date was the first time I was able to actually enjoy sex in a long, long time. It was all just so… intimate. The fact that sex could feel like that… I don’t know, it absolutely blew my mind”.

Chris went silent after that. His fidgeting increased considerably, and very quickly, he realised he was nervous. Even before the whole theatre situation, he’d always been more scared to tell you about this part of his past than his current job. He’d always considered telling you about the Kims, about what he did, but whenever he thought about telling you what he used to do for a living, his mind would always convince him you’d just see him differently, and losing you was something he just couldn’t afford.

Maybe it was silly of him, considering killing people for a living was probably way more morally incorrect than having sex for money, but unlike the former, the latter was something he never truly found pride in. On the contrary, he was ashamed of it.

All of a sudden, Chris felt your hand on his knee, and his eyes immediately zeroed in on the movement of your thumb against his skin. It wasn’t until you muttered a soft ‘Hey…’ that he finally pulled his eyes away to look at you instead.

“I hope you know I don’t… I don’t think any differently of you because of your past. You did what you had to do to survive, and that’s completely respectable”, you squeezed his knee a bit, almost reassuringly, and for a moment, Chris feared he was going to cry. “Even knowing what you do now… I get it. I truly do. I’m totally no one to judge, all things considered”.

Once again, you’d shown him why he had fallen in love with you in the first place. And, once again, he couldn’t help but feel that the world was just so unfair.

Out of all people in this whole wide world, why did it have to be you under the kerchief that night…

Chris took a deep breath, looking away from your face to your hand on his knee. Warm, familiar… Your touch seemed to shoot straight to his heart. Without thinking much about it, he placed his hand on top of yours, and held it firmly, as if you would disappear if he let go.

He wanted to tell you more. He didn’t just want to leave it at that, he wanted you to know everything, he needed you to know. So, after a few moments of silence, he started talking again.

“How I transitioned from what I did to working with the Kims was a very circumstantial thing… Turns out one of my clients had business with them. Problem was, he was trying to scam them, which, in retrospect, was very stupid on his part”, he had found himself tangled in this guy’s mess, he was setting Chris up to take the blame, and as soon as he realised that, he immediately ratted the guy out to the Kims.

In doing so, they had offered him not only protection, but also a different career path. 

“They found me a mentor, trained me, all while I was still pretending to be this guy’s fucktoy. And, eventually, when the Kims got what they wanted from him, I got to kill him”, even as he said it, Chris knew a normal person would’ve felt some remorse when telling this story. But he didn’t.

Very quickly after that, he realised that killing, torturing people, deceiving them, were much more dignified ways of using his body and his skills, which was exactly what he told you.

“To me, it feels like the Kims gave me my individuality back. I do what I do because I like it, because I am grateful for what the Kims did for me, and because I feel proud of it, as twisted as that might sound…” Somehow, Chris knew you would understand the feeling, considering what you did for a living yourself. “I’m able to provide for my brother and sister by doing something I can find pride in. I love my team, they’re like family to me as well, but I suppose all these things I learnt throughout the years ended up making me a bit… cold”.

“Oh, I know all about that…” You mumbled, with a small smile on your lips.

Chris chuckled at that, maybe a bit incredulously.

He looked at your face in silence for a moment. There was no judgement in your eyes, and the soft caresses of your thumb on his hand had his heart fluttering in his chest.

“Seriously, though…” Chris said after a while. “When you appeared in my life, I was reminded of how it was like to feel normal. I feel like I’m a bit more human”.

“It’s a very mutual feeling, you know?”

Chris remained silent, looking at you, until your words registered fully, and he offered you a nod. Somehow, what you said had heat pooling on his cheeks, and he looked away from your face to stare at your joined hands.

“I was even… Before it all went down, I was genuinely considering retirement”, taking a deep breath, you brought your free hand to hold his hand between your palms. “I should’ve told you what I did for a living. Maybe this whole thing could’ve been avoided if I had, but I was afraid you’d just… leave”.

“I wouldn’t have”, Chris replied before he could think twice about it, but with the words out there, he realised he meant them. How could he leave? You were just like him, after all.

“I know that now”, your hands were so warm, so familiar… 

“Come here…” Wrapping an arm around your waist, and taking a hold of your thigh, Chris guided your body to move, until you settled on his lap. 

Your hands immediately found his face, just as his arms wrapped around your waist. You looked him in the eyes, in a way that made him feel exposed, like you were reaching deep within his mind and soul. He realised then that he wanted to be exposed. He didn’t want any more secrets or half-truths, you were already his weak spot, so might as well let you fully in. 

“You’re so handsome”, you said all of a sudden, with a bright smile on your lips, and Chris immediately chuckled, looking away and shaking his head. “Don’t laugh! You are”. 

“You want me to blush? ‘Cause it’s working, baby”, Chris tucked a strand of hair behind your ear. With the same motion, he found your earlobe, and he caressed the skin while his other arm was firmly around your waist. 

“Maybe I do want that. It’s my only ulterior motive”, you chuckled, tracing patterns on his cheeks with your thumbs.

“Mmm… Is that so?” Chris supposed this was your way of confirming to him that you, in fact, didn’t have any ulterior motive. He also supposed he could do nothing else but believe you, to trust you.

“Mm”, you leaned in, leaving a tender kiss on his forehead before you pulled back to look him in the eyes again. “It is”.

The warmth of your palms, the soft drag of your thumbs on Chris’ skin, your weight on his lap… All combined had Chris closing his eyes, it had him leaning into your touch, and even questioning if this was a real thing that was happening, if you were truly there. You were. Logically, he knew you were, but it was hard for his brain to catch up with the fact after spending so long doing nothing but yearning for you.

There was a sigh, a sound of relief that further anchored Chris to reality when it came out of your mouth. 

“You, too, make me feel alive. These past couple of months… I’ve just missed you so, so much, Christopher”, your voice was so quiet, it was steady, but Chris could’ve sworn he felt your hold tremble on his face. He didn’t dare open his eyes, just took a deep breath and brought one of his hands to lay on top of one of yours on his face. “I know it’s… weird. All of this. It’s weird and complicated and there’s a lot we’d have to work on, but I… I don’t want to lose you. I can’t”.

Chris could feel your words reach deep within him. They might’ve sparked some doubts, maybe even a bit of anxiety at the prospect of facing the results of both of your actions, but… they also warmed him up from the inside out. 

He figured that, if there had ever been anything worth protecting, what you both had was one of those things, no matter how difficult it could be. And right then, when he finally opened his eyes and looked at your face, he wholeheartedly believed it was possible.

Swallowing the lump that had formed in his throat, Chris nodded. With a hand on the back of your head, he pulled you closer to him, close so he could press his lips to yours, and the soft whimper that escaped your mouth was enough to make him want to cry right then and there.

Your hands left his face so you could wrap your arms around his neck. With his arms around your waist, he pulled you further into his lap, chest against chest sharing one breath. Your words kept resonating in his ears ‘missed you so, so much…’ Added to the feel of your tongue against his own, to your hand playing with his hair, he was sure his heart was about to burst.

You kissed for a while. Slowly savouring the feel of one another, almost like you both wanted to catch up on all those kisses missed in the past three months. Quiet moans slipped between your lips, his hands roamed your back, confirming that this was, in fact, very real. Even more so when your hips started to roll, grinding against him when his hands settled to squeeze your backside and your thighs.

“Missed you, too”, Chris breathlessly mumbled against your lips, taking a tight hold of your hips to guide your movement. You just nodded and kept kissing him, more frantically this time, and all he could do was match your pace, in hopes to convey just how much he had truly missed you.

His mind fogged up. There was nothing but you, and you, and you… He didn’t want for there to be anything else. Before he knew it, articles of clothing started to be removed and dropped on the sofa behind him, until skin was touching skin and even the minimal distance between your bodies felt like it was just too much. 

Chris needed you closer, as close as you possibly could be, and in his haze, he’d found himself kissing down your body while you laid on his rug. Slowly, he left kisses on your cheek, your neck, between your breasts–where he took a brief pause just so he could be smothered by them for a bit before he continued his path…

With your legs over his shoulders, with his mouth at the apex of your thighs, Chris couldn’t help but groan at the familiar, undeniable taste of you. Oh, how he’d missed this, too… Your hand gripping his hair, and his own roaming the softest areas of your body while he got to drink you up, was absolutely how he’d been dreaming to be, especially when you started making the prettiest noises, those that made his chest swell with pride and satisfaction.

He supposed it was more than fair. You’d gotten your taste of him last night, and it was now his turn.

Your words of encouragement, your sighs of his name, and the quiet sounds coming out of your mouth made his head spin. How had he even survived all these weeks without this? Without you? 

As he fixated on gently sucking on that sensitive nub between your legs, as your thighs started to shake a bit around his head, Chris just felt lucky. As unfortunate as this whole thing had been, he had to cherish this second chance. There was a lot to talk about, a lot more truths to tell to each other, but all that could wait. Until later or tomorrow or the day after… It could all wait.

Right now, all that mattered was to feel. 

For him to feel you, for you to feel him, and for both to just satiate the burning need for each other.

Getting you to come with just his mouth and his fingers was certainly one of his favourite things in this world. Hearing you gasp and moan his name made him lightheaded, filled him to the brim with arousal and love… Especially so when your legs trapped him right there, when he got to pin you down by the hips so you couldn’t pull away from him while he continued to drink up your essence.

Your body slumped a bit when Chris finally found his way up your body. As soon as he was within reach, you simply pulled him down to you with a firm grip on his hair, sealing your mouths in a slow kiss, uncaring of your taste on his tongue, his lips, or even his chin when you started to leave kisses all over his face.

Chris gave you time to catch your breath. However, when he told you he was doing just that, in that teasing tone that he knew would just rile you up, you just chuckled and told him it was difficult to do so when his lips so deliciously gave attention to your neck.

“What? Want me to stop?” He couldn’t help but chuckle as well, leaving lingering kisses on your skin.

“As if”, was all you mumbled back when you hugged him close and buried your hand in his hair to keep him right there.

After a couple of minutes where Chris just got to place his lips on every centimetre of skin they could find, you pulled him by his hair in that enticing way you always did, and brought him close to you once again, muttering his absolute favourite combination of words you could ever say.

“Fuck me”.

Gladly. 

Chris was hard, leaking pre-cum, needy in ways that only you had ever made him feel. There was not an ounce of restraint in his body tonight, no wish to tease or delay the inevitable. There’d be time for that in the future. Or so he hoped.

So when he finally pushed himself into your sopping warmth, when he started that slow, but precise pace of his hips that he knew you enjoyed so much, he was dead set on diving fully into it, into you. Just like he’d done countless times prior to that night in the theatre.

“I love you”, Chris mumbled in your ear, and even before he said it, he had already started to feel his eyes water.

“I love you”, you mumbled back, further digging your nails on his back, tightening the hold of your legs around his torso. “With my whole heart”.

Your words coming out as a shaky whisper were enough to shatter the remaining protective layer around his heart. He could feel himself tremble, and even though he saw the tears running down your cheeks when he kissed you again, he hadn’t really needed to do it to know they were there. Just like he was sure you hadn’t needed to see his to know, too.

Chris had almost forgotten how it was like to sleep with you–in the literal sense of the word.

Your warmth, the way you clung to him sometimes in the middle of the night, how you’d wake him up when he was about to choke on his spit… It was all so, so familiar, it was comforting, and last night, even if you both had gone to sleep late after a couple more mind-numbing orgasms, after finishing your food, and after even more cuddles and deep emotional talks, this had probably been the best he’d slept in weeks.

Which was why, when he turned to drape an arm around your waist because he just needed to pull you closer to him, he almost got whiplash from the feeling of the cold sheets under his hand.

Chris’ eyes snapped open to find your side of the bed empty. Why was it so cold? Had you just left? When did you leave? Had you woken up today filled with regret? Had you decided that trying to work things out was actually too complicated and not worth your time?

Chris’ heart was beating fast in his chest, and just before he flung himself from the bed in a panic to see if the things you brought last night were still in the flat, he heard a sound. It was quiet, but he definitely heard it, and that feeling of panic was quickly changing to one of dangerous hope.

He didn’t even bother putting clothes on, just stood up and walked all the way to his bedroom’s door. As soon as it was opened, he could hear things more clearly. 

Music.

Very low, but it was certainly playing somewhere down the hall.

He could hear the sound of a spatula against metal, as well as the crackling of oil, and the unmistakable hum of the airfryer.

“Morning, sleepy bear”, you said as he stepped into the kitchen, not even turning to look at him. Chris had light steps, but he supposed it made sense that you of all people were more than capable of hearing him walking closer. “M’making some eggs and bacon”.

Chris couldn’t help the small smile that came to his lips. He walked into your space, and wrapped his arms around your waist to hug you from behind. “So, the only things that were in the fridge”.

“Basically. You should really go grocery shopping. How are you gonna have energy for work if you don’t eat proper meals, hm? Who’s gonna protect Seungmin then?” There was a hint of a smile in your voice, and it only made Chris’ own smile widen.

It was odd to hear you talk about his job, especially so… neutrally. Resting his chin on your shoulder, Chris watched you carefully and methodically cook the eggs, and he couldn’t help but tighten his hold around your waist.

There was a moment of silence as you placed the two perfectly fried eggs on a plate, next to the already cooked ones. The airfryer timer went off, you switched off the stove, but you remained standing there in Chris’ hug.

One of your hands came to his arms, and you started to softly caress his skin. “Baby… I don’t wanna get you into trouble, you know?”

Chris knew. Being with you would definitely get him into trouble if the Kims found out who you were. He was aware of this, there was no way he wouldn’t be. “I know, love”.

“I’m gonna be honest, I don’t… don’t really know what to do. How to fix that. I can’t let them hurt you because of me”.

Taking a deep breath, Chris let go of your waist to take a hold of your shoulders instead. With a gentle grip, he coaxed you to turn around so he could cup your cheeks in his hands. “We’ll figure something out. About the Kims, about the Guild… We’ll just… figure it out”.

You swallowed, but a small smile found its way to your lips. “Why do I get the feeling that this is gonna be some ‘you and me against the world’ bullshit?”

“Because it is”, Chris chuckled, squishing your cheeks, making your lips jut out into a pout. “It’s you and me, bun. We might need to improvise a bit, walk around the truth, but I have hope that we can find a solution to this”.

He pecked your lips briefly, and his hold on your cheeks relented.

You immediately looped your arms around his neck, pulling him close to you just as his hands found the small of your back. “I suppose we can put our two scheming brain cells together to think of something. I must say… doesn’t seem that difficult of a task when you’re here with me”.

Chris agreed completely. As long as he had you there, with him, it didn’t seem a difficult thing to achieve. Either getting the Guild to trust you again, or for you to defect, or even getting him to come clean to at least Seungmin, or keep you a secret, or for both of you to disappear completely, maybe leave the country and get new identities… It didn’t matter what course of action you both decided to take. 

As long as you got to be together, happy, and in love, it just didn’t matter.

Even when he leaned in to press a kiss on your lips, when he hugged you close, Chris held onto that possibly foolish hope that everything would be okay. That you both would, in fact, figure it all out.

tagging (people from my taglist + people that asked to be tagged in this part 2 specifically):

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© therhythmafterthesummer 2023. all rights reserved. do not repost or translate my stories.

Constructive feedback (or even keysmashes, really) is always welcome :) feel free to leave your comments in the caption/tags when you reblog, or by sending me an ask !

General Masterlist

[bird-inacage]

Only Friends Finale: Ray & Sand vs Boeing

Admittedly it's taken me a few days to unpack the resolution to the Boeing conflict (aka final boss arc), how Ray and Sand went about this, and how they came out of it unscathed as a couple. There’s a fair bit to cover here so hang in there folks - this is a long one.

Sand's Uncertainty: Questioning the Present or Tributing the Past?

I can see why people had grievances about Sand not being more assertive, why he allowed Boeing to kiss him, why he wasn't definitive when Ray accused him of still having feelings for Boeing if he did not.

The scene in which Sand apologises to Ray briefly touches on this but doesn’t really convey the extent of it. By Sand's own admission, it is hugely difficult to be confronted by someone you used to love, especially a first love. Sand had planned his hopes, dreams and future with Boeing very much in the picture. Boeing's sudden return brought that all back and the lack of closure that came with it. Sand’s hesitancy to act is not due to a resurgence of his feelings from back then, but rather the nostalgia and sentimentality attached to this chapter of his life. Boeing very knowingly plays on this too.

During the pool scene, Sand hasn't made this distinction yet, and is generally lacking clarity on what exactly he feels for Boeing. So when Ray suggests they kiss to find out, Sand does question himself. The 'what if' from his past makes him wonder; an open-ended question he never got an answer to. 'What if Boeing came back to me?' But indulging in such a curiosity is never going to be satisfactory because the circumstances are no longer the same. Time has moved on and Sand along with it.

I believe Sand was also keen to pass Ray's test. He later refers to the kiss as Ray 'challenging' him to do it. We've seen him rise to Ray's goading before, only he's never quite as assured in his execution as he thinks he is. The most obvious example being when Ray suggests they have sex first and initiate a friendship second. Sand agrees with a sense of misplaced confidence that Ray will be hung up on him, when he's promptly the one to catch feelings. As much as Sand tries to be objective, he's consistently tripped up by emotion. Boeing's return is no different. His downfall is that he cares too much.

The way Sand behaves when Boeing kisses him is extremely telling. It feels like an attempt at muscle memory, retracing something he can't quite recall anymore. He looks lost, detached, slightly thrown and overpowered in Boeing's presence. This may be residual patterns of behaviour caused by Boeing controlling the end to their relationship. This is in stark contrast to how Sand kisses Ray, which is passionate, needy, mutually engaged and eager.

Sand's inability to push back against Boeing's advances is because his judgement is coloured by their history, their shared past, the feelings he used to have for Boeing. Not by the present. In an ask I received last week, I mention that Sand's apparent leniency is out of politeness, a final act of kindness even. It's his way of saying 'I don't like what you did to me but I'm trying to be civil because I owe it to who we once were to each other.' Sand's attributing that last bit of leniency to the Boeing he used to love, not the Boeing in the here and now.

Sand doesn't like to hold grudges. If someone apologises to him sincerely, he can let it go. When Ray does this back in Episode 1, he immediately forgives him. Since Sand has now moved on, it doesn't serve any purpose to harbour animosity with Boeing or to go out of his way to actively hate him. It's a lot of wasted energy to be resentful and Sand has far better things to do. So when Boeing makes his reappearance, Sand's initial reaction is not anger. Therefore I do believe his sentiment to "let bygones be bygones", which may explain why he was willing to let a few indiscretions slide. What he didn't anticipate is that Boeing would try to manipulate him, and cause a wedge in his newfound happiness with Ray as a result. Having his final act of decency thrown back in his face was rightly the last straw for Sand, and irrefutable confirmation that he doesn't owe Boeing anything. Sand wants to continue looking forward, not back.

Ray's Ultimatum

As much as I praise Ray for being noticeably more level-headed and mature in this episode, he still falls prey to being over-zealous; boxing Sand into an highly uncomfortable and sexually charged battle between himself and Boeing. Ray initially expects Sand to take responsibility, even if Boeing is the instigator. Largely because Ray presumes what Sand is feeling. "You still love him," he claims, though Sand is yet to confirm or deny. And that is the exact genesis for Ray's concern, because he can't fathom why Sand is puzzling over what this means to him and why he can't provide an immediate answer.

The fact that Ray thinks Sand's kiss with Boeing proves he's "second string" is absurdly untrue. Anyone with eyes can see Sand is miles more passionate and responsive with Ray. "Anyone can see he wants you back," Ray echoes (ironically), which is later debunked by Mew. It just goes to show how blindsided you can be when you're in the situation itself. Ray is misinterpreting this as a 'me vs Boeing' issue but it's really not about that at all. Sand isn't trying to compare the two. Neither is he planning to make a choice between them, because that wasn't even on his radar. What Sand is unsure of is how he feels about Boeing, irrespective of Ray. He never managed to reconcile his feelings for Boeing after his betrayal.

I don't think Ray is wrong for demanding that Sand determine this. However, the man probably had emotional whiplash from seeing his ex and boyfriend in the same room together, let alone watching them aggressively make out, all in one night. Sand was hoping to deal with this on his own terms, without Ray complicating the equation. Whilst Ray proceeds to do exactly that, hastily jumping the gun in order to provoke the answers out of Sand by force.

Essentially they wanted the same result but didn't discuss it. So it’s no surprise when their separate approaches don't sit right with one another. Sand appears far too permissive and ambiguous by Ray's standards, and Ray appears far too irrational and defiant by Sand's. This is partly due to Ray feeling compelled to intervene as Sand was struggling to be decisive, but Ray is also hugely impatient by nature.

Once Mew tells Ray that Boeing is intentionally trying to rock the boat, Ray recognises this is no longer Sand's burden to resolve alone. His concerns rested on the belief that Boeing genuinely wanted Sand back, and attempts to display guilt or regret may have tugged on Sand's heartstrings, causing him to waver. But since there's no truth to this, there's no basis for Sand giving him another chance. Sand's past with Boeing is very much 'dead and buried', with Boeing being the one who put the nails in the coffin.

Mutual Respect or Ownership?

By the time Ray and Sand have their final confrontation with Boeing, they are both on level footing. They have aligned their intentions. When Ray says "he's my boyfriend", what he's saying is 'his problems are my problems'. Similarly when Boeing quips "that's up to him", Ray retorts with "that's up to me too". This is what they've learnt from their earlier run-in with Boeing. As a couple, they will stand as a united front going forward.

Ray defending Sand on his behalf does not belittle him in any way. Sand allows him to do it. You see the air of pride he has in watching Ray fight for him. Besides, Ray is merely saying what Sand is already thinking, he's just allowing him the satisfaction of hitting back at Boeing for trying to demean his position at Sand's new boyfriend. What little leniency Sand may have reserved for Boeing is now gone because he actively tried to exploit Sand's good will and patience.

This is further supported when Sand states himself as being owned by Ray (only because Boeing started the analogy of referring to him as a dog). Sand is purely making a point about his loyalty. His loyalty will be steadfast based on the sincerity of the recipient. Ray has proven himself worthy of Sand's loyalty, and that's why he's happy to let Ray take control or be more dominant at times. You can only do this with someone you truly trust.

Though declarations of ownership such as 'you're mine', 'you belong to me' can sound like there is an inherent power play, but actually the language of 'owning' someone is a more possessive way of saying 'I take responsibility for this person and their wellbeing'. If I own them and they belong to me, I will be responsible for their everything.

As Sand has generally taken the care-taker role in their relationship, Ray's way of returning this sentiment is often through this love language, "I'll handle it." "They're gonna have to deal with me." The least Ray feels he can do is to defend his boyfriend's best interests and honour if the situation ever calls for it. Sand no longer has to deal with things on his own.

[oxittocin]

I was wondering if you could write

How robin would react to aftercare from a gn reader after first time like a hot bath or a massage just to help her sore body parts if it's not too much to ask of course....

soft (nico robin x reader)

nico robin masterlist

thank you for the request, my friend. here's my take on this - i hope you find it satisfactory. i am just a nico robin simp and i am not a writer by any means so please accept my humble offerings :]

cw: suggestive (mdni!), gn!reader

Love is a funny word that evokes a spectrum of emotions, depending on its adjective. Love can be sweet, secure, overbearing, suffocating, dark, temporal, lasting, kind, chaste, lustful, conflicted, permanent - anything, everything, or nothing at all.

You’ve experienced plenty in this lifetime. Whirlwind romances that make your heart run wild and free, taking risks with a kind of reckless abandon that only youths can afford. Or perhaps even sweet dates under cherry blossom trees and spring, like splitting a banana milkshake and sharing a cone of ice-cream. Maybe you’ve even had a few one-night stands, drunk on the taste of liquor and sin on a faceless stranger’s tongue. One or two committed partnerships, even, months spent mapping out a future, only to see it go down the drain.

You thought you’d seen everything love and life had to offer, until you met her.

How could you even begin to describe her? Words fail you before you could even form a coherent thought. Nothing you say, write or think could ever do her justice.

She, who carries the weight of the world on her shoulders. She, who continues to live on resolutely, in spite of the injustice that life had done unto her. She, whose will to survive seems to only grow stronger, in response to the tragedies life inflicts on her. A woman, whose life is shaped by the roughness of destiny and fate. Still, her softness is what shines through.

Soft smile when she says the spookiest thing. Soft gaze that she reserves mostly for Chopper, but you catch her sneaking a couple at you secretly too. Soft skin that you can’t help noticing, whenever she leans against you, head on your shoulder while she’s buried in yet another book. Soft touches that leave a burning and yearning on your skin whenever she brushes past you, or touches your hand.

It makes you want to love her softly. Tenderly, gently, kindly, lovingly, purely, compassionately.

——————————————

Loving her softly.

Bringing her a warm cup of tea before bed every night without fail. Lazy kisses by the deck as the breeze carries with it an air of serenity. Holding her hand under the dining table, rubbing comforting circles around her knuckles absentmindedly, as though it was the most natural thing in the world.

Loving her softly was the only way you knew how to.

She had asked you once if you were afraid of her, and what being with her entailed.

“The World Government, the organisations I betrayed and the mistakes I’d made. The whole weight of my existence. Are you certain you are fine with me?” She asked, slight desperation in her voice begging you to reconsider your choices. Her typically calm demeanor started to crack as she pushed you for an answer. This must mean a lot to her, you thought.

“It’s never been a problem for me.” You responded simply.

“Why?” She asked, unconvinced that you fully understood the gravity of the situation you were getting yourself into.

“You’re so easy to love.” You say with a shrug, “That alone makes everything else easy, too.”

She tilted her head away from you before you could catch a glimpse of her expression. You waited for a response, but her silence tells you that it was a moot point. You contemplated whether it would be a reassuring gesture to slip your hand into hers, but you decided against it. If she needs time, then you’ll gladly wait. An hour, a week, a month or a year, it doesn’t really matter. Wait you shall.

——————————————

Making love, softly, too.

Brushing your thumb against her cheek as your body coaxes pleased moans out of her lips. Delicate kisses, running your mouth along her curves as you paid attention to every inch of her beautiful skin. Fingers that trace up and down her back, tenderly tingling her senses, reminding her of your presence that has since taken over her life. Slow, steady rocking against her hips as her palm grips tightly around your wrists, as if begging you not to leave her after this was over. You take her hand, gently interlocking your fingers with hers - a silent promise that you wouldn’t leave in the morning.

The pinnacle of love is vulnerability. To bare your soul for another to see, shedding layers of clothes, shame, ego to present yourself in total unadulterated being. It’s scary because it transcends lust, into the dangerous realm of intimacy. It’s the same way she always insists on pulling you into a hot bath after the night’s activities. Burying her face in the crook of your neck, small splashes in the water as she attaches herself closer towards you. With her eyes closed, breathing steadily against your chest, she looked so at peace. It must mean a lot for a Devil’s Fruit user to be in a bath, completely unguarded around you. Reaching out gently to knead the knots in her shoulder, you feel a warm glow on your cheeks and you’re not sure if it’s from the skin-to-skin contact or the steam from the bath. She sighed, breath tickling your neck as she lets out a pleased groan.

“You always insist on taking a bath together after.” You remarked.

“I do.” She responded simply, slightest hint of a grin gracing her features.

“It’s intimate.” You pointed out.

She nodded, planting a tender kiss on your forehead.

The intimacy made you feel alive. Human, even - scared, confused, loved, anxious, grateful - all at the same time. You wonder if it’s the same way for her, but you never dared to speak your thoughts into existence. In case, just in case, she doesn’t feel it like you do.

There is nothing inherently remarkable about being naked or sleeping with someone else. After all, sex can happen between two strangers without even a thread of attachment.

This, though, is nothing ordinary.

You feel it in your gut. The butterflies in your stomach tell you so.

——————————————

With love, comes expectations. Love is ultimately a commitment and there are duties that one cannot run away from. In this case, blow drying her hair after a hot bath.

To be fair, she could probably have it managed herself with a simple flick of her wrists - summoning one arm to get the hairdryer, another to comb through her hair, another to get the towel - you get the gist. She insists you do it for her, and you pretend to complain, scoffing and telling her she’s lucky she’s cute enough to make demands from you. Secretly, it’s one of your favorite parts of the night.

Fingers running through her hair as you meticulously held the hairdryer a safe distance away from her scalp, careful not to accidentally burn her. She sits still and upright, patiently letting you work your magic on her. You lightly drag your fingernails against her scalp and the back of her neck. You feel her body jerk slightly, shiver running down her spine. You bit your tongue to stifle a chuckle, thinking about how cute it was that she’s so sensitive. The scent of her floral shampoo overwhelms the room. Lavender, you think.

It is the small moments like these that make you so painfully aware of how insignificant everything was.

The storms that rage beyond the Thousand Sunny, the seas teeming with unthinkable lifeforms, the skies that hold islands so vast. So tiny and unimportant are our lives in the grand scheme of things.

Still, in the limited time that you have to exist, there is no where else you’d rather be than here with her, hairdryer in your hand.

[malichev]

Attention: This publication has sensitive topics, talking a little about the current situation of CC Forever and my position in relation to future posts. If you don't feel comfortable, please skip it.

------------------------------ I confess that, because I wasn't on Twitter VERY much, I wasn't up to date, but I started seeing posts here and decided that I needed to update myself a little on the situation. Apparently, tweets were unearthed, with comments and interactions'' from Forever with a minor, for those who don't know, in Brazil, under 18 you are a minor. At the time he must have been 19 or 20 years old. Despite understanding that people change over the years, technically, he committed a serious crime for which, it appears he never received a type of punishment, it appears that it was kept in the closet'' and has now been unearthed. So, it's a delicate topic, so I understand those who no longer want updates on it. Now, for those who were waiting for a statement, he opened a live to talk about the subject, but people were disappointed, especially the way he dealt with the topic, he said that they distorted his tweets, so he deleted them (in fact more than 900 tweets disappeared), and then said that he will sue the people who made a thread on Twitter with his posts. Honestly, I decided to go after these supposed tweets, and to be honest, the things I read were a bit…bizarre? I understand why people are not comfortable, I don't know how the case will go, but apparently the ´´victim´´ exists, he made strange tweets and she was indeed a minor. So I think Forever saying they distorted his tweets wasn´t the best argument. Overall, I didn't find it a really satisfactory statement. And honestly, some of their fanatics, because it's not a fan thing, it's a fanatic thing, are making the situation worse by trying to erase the problem, wanting to use other CCs' mistakes to defend Forever, they just forget that if the other CCs have already recanted, or even ``paid for their mistakes''. They are not going to save Forever by using other people as a shield, especially since the Forever case happened years ago, BUT it has now been discovered even by the Brazilians themselves, and it is something that is STILL open, there has not been any kind of resolution and, the worst part, is that it can still be considered a serious crime depending on the justice system, because apparently there will be a legal fight.He said he hired lawyers.

What will this result in and how will it affect his presence in the QSMP?

Let's find out, I just ask that you be patient with Quackity, the team and even the others CC´s, many of them probably don't know anything because they are on vacation, and even if they don't want to get involved that's their right since, because currently, they are not actually involved in the problem. I honestly don't even know how the information will reach them, especially those who were closest to Forever. I believe that, just as the community is in shock, not wanting to believe, whoever is his closest friend will also be in denial. In conclusion: Because I was also uncomfortable, I'm going to avoid talking about qForever and Forever as much as possible in future posts, unless there's no way out, after all, the sad thing is that he made a memorable character in Lore, and it seemed like he was going to have more about him. Now I don't know what happens. Anyway, I hope you take care of yourselves, don't stress, and if you want to take some time off social media, I recommend it.

[iced-coffee-jesus]

https://www.tumblr.com/iced-coffee-jesus/767235683936075776/yall-watch-one-episode-where-we-dont-get

Except the majority of the complaints aren’t about buddie?

They are about the lack of progress regarding Eddie and Eddie and Chris.

But some of you guys sit here and think it’s fine to ckmpl about Bucks storylines and keep it separate but the moment people complain about how things are being handled with Eddie it’s an immediate “omg it was one episode not everything is about buddie chill out”

Eddie has had almost zero development. The only thing that has had less development than Eddie at this point is Eddie and Chris’s relationship. Way too much focus is being given to side characters at the expense of the mains. And Eddie is taking the brunt of it.

Another way to look at it? Buck has had some story focus in every single episode this season so far. Including the majority of 8.5 and a chunk of 8.6. With a big thing happening to him at the end of 8.6.

Eddie has been basically background comedy every episode except for a moment or two here or there and then we were told by Tim after 8.5 Eddie would be the focus as he’s now the next big part of the story. Hell even Oliver said in a post 8.5 interview that 8.6 was Eddie’s. But then oh hey it wasn’t. Not really. It was Madney (super excited for their second child 🥹) and BT with some Eddie thrown in. And a big thing happening to him at the end of 8.6.

And this is now where the frustration boils over for 8.7. Buck had at least 3 full scenes given to him as he talked about Tommy, was sad about Tommy, tried to figure out what to do about Tommy. His big thing was addressed. Eddie’s? Not a word. Not a single thing. No one mentioned the mustache being gone. Eddie didn’t mention his new lease to find joy. Not a single word about Chris. Just more comedic relief Eddie in the background. Chris has been gone for month and months now. And per both Peter and Angela in post 8.7 interviews we are getting a time skip when we come back from the winter hiatus which will put Chris as being gone for 10 months when we come back in March. He’s been separated from Eddie that long and zero progress has been made. And that circles back to the frustration with Eddie’s lack of storyline attention because Chris can’t come back till Eddie is taken care of because that’s the entire point of Chris being removed from the narrative. But instead of focusing on any of that at all we get 3 scenes of Buck sad baking over a man who dumped him two different times. We get a scene of Gerrard crying over Brad not liking him.

That’s what people are frustrated about. The only ones making “one episode not about buddie” are those of you who keep saying that and refusing to acknowledge we can be unhappy about the way Eddie is being handled separately from buddie because you refuse to separate Eddie from buddie.

This is such a long rant that I almost didn't answer it, but you pissed me off anon so I will!

The post that you linked to doesn't mention either Buck or Eddie's individual storylines you'll notice, because that isn't what that post is about! I am specifically talking about people freaking about about not getting progression in the buddie storyline in one (1) episode when we had a lot of development in 8x05 and 8x06. That is what that post is about, so please calm down and re-read the post.

I'm not sure if you follow my blog or have seen my posts, but I haven't been complaining about Buck's storyline; I have been annoyed by fandom response to Tommy and people willingly ignoring what has been shown on screen. I think Buck's bisexual storyline has been handled relatively well and I hope to see him casual dating different genders to hammer home that he's bisexual. I am desperate for more resolution on the Chris and Eddie front, but I am also aware that the actor who plays Chris moved away, creating problems for the show that make it harder and not as satisfactory to write a storyline for. I would have loved to see Eddie go to Texas in 8x04 to go get Chris back, but Gavin's availability is different now. I'm also not throwing in the towel when we have an episode left and then the whole of 8b to resolve and get more Eddie episodes.

I completely disagree with you about the Eddie development we have gotten so far. Eddie had more storyline in 8x04 than pretty much anyone else but Hen and Karen, with Eddie seeking out Weston's dad and having moments where we see him missing Chris and feeling like he failed him. We see more of that in 8x05 when he talks to Hen about Chris thinking that Halloween is 'cringe' now, and that he feels like that door has closed and worrying about other potential doors closing. We also see that scene at the end with him taking down the Halloween decorations and the pictures of him and Chris on the mantle, paired with Buck's voice over about dying alone. Plus, the way they show Buck leaning on Eddie and trusting him over Tommy felt important, even if that was more of Buck's story.

And then 8x06 we had very big movement in learning that Eddie is punishing himself and finally decides to choose joy. Eddie has historically been hard on himself and doesn't live for himself or make choices that are about what he wants. He and Shannon got married because they felt pressure from the church, he enlisted to provide for his family, he dates people he thinks would be a good replacement mom for Christopher. I wanted to see Eddie realizing that he needs to value himself and his desires and that doing so doesn't make him a bad father. Seeing Eddie choose joy was huge for his character, and something we saw in bits and pieces in this episode with him being silly and joyful with his teammates. I think Eddie deserves that at this point.

Eddie is my favorite character on 9-1-1, I always want to see more of him. And then episodes like 8x07 happen and I remember it's an ensemble led by Angela Basset. She gets top billing and we are going to have episodes that feature her heavily, even at what may feel like the expense of other characters. In my experience, that's how it is on all shows with a cast as big as 9-1-1's.

I don't know, anon. It feels like you're mad the episode didn't put Eddie back into the torment nexus for one episode and decided to yell at me for fandom takes I don't agree with and didn't say.

[stagefoureddiediaz]

I am so excited about the finale and what it could mean for Buddie. Eddie wanting someone to be there after a tough call.. But we know both Marisol and Natalia will be in the finale. Couldn’t it be that both Buck and Eddie will “sit” with them after the tough call? I mean, I know the couch is about the Buckley Diaz family. I just think it’ll be in season 7 when we get the conclusion of the couch theory. I don’t know, just knowing that they are there, makes me very careful about what I hope for in this finale.

I'm going to answer all of these together because I do not have the energy to rinse and repeat answer the same thing over and over!!

I am excited - very excited about tonights episode - so many things set up and so many things going on from what we've seen already.

first things first - I'm going to deal with Natalia. I genuinely don't think she's going to be about for more than this episode - I'm very much expecting some form of resolution with her - she is now tied into the sperm donor story as well as Bucks death story arc and from my position that is intentional - the contrast between life and death - Bucks choice is clear in this - he'll choose life because he is realising he has so much to live for and all Natalia has ever seen in Buck - really is his death. So I have no worries about her appearance - I'm simply intrigued to she how it plays out and how Buck goes about choosing himself and choosing life!

As for Marisol - I'm putting it under a cut because this got a bit long!

Firstly - where have you found confirmation of a stunt double listed for Edy/Marisol?? I've never heard of her having one listed anywhere and no one else has either - if she had one listed anywhere then 911bts would know about it and would've let us all know. You bringing it up is literally the first I'm hearing about it. So I think its safe to rule her out from actually being at the big disaster - there is already enough going on there, and with far more important characters in relation to the firefam for her to fit in those scenes. feel free to come back to me if I'm wrong, but personally I can't see it.

We don't have any context for her appearance, and that includes if there is going to be anything romantic set up with her and Eddie. for all we know they're setting her up to be a friend to Eddie (because Eddie really does see all women as friend shaped) My feeling is that the show won't go that far with them and will at most leave it ambiguous - its a season finale and the showrunners didn't know if this was going to be the final season of the show so the likelihood of them going big on starting something of a romantic nature is fairly unlikely - its far more likely that they'll leave it open and in more of an ambiguous place that is satisfying to viewers but leaves them enough wiggle room to play on it in season 7if they got the green light for said season 7.

911 has always been about leaving its characters in good and hopeful places at the end of all its seasons and that uncertainty around renewal would've been something they were aware of going into the writing of this script. That means they would've chosen to write a season end that was fitting as a series end as well - something that left enough threads in play that they could pick them back up again if renewal came, but at the same time wrapped things up nicely for everyone if not. this is something the show has been very good at doing as a whole - if you rewatch any finale episode from any season as view it as a last ever episode you will find all arcs have been wrapped up in a way that is both satisfactory if there were no further episodes, but also open enough that lots of seeds for future storytelling have been planted.

there are other things to consider here as well. This season hasn't really been about romantic love - its been about family, the changing dynamics of family, building and strengthening the family you have, actually understanding the family you have/have been building. that is what we have seen for all the characters all season long - Bathena figuring out the next stage for them as empty nesters and having grown up children. Bobby admitting he views buck as a son, his struggles with Wendell's death - his AA family. Athena dealing with her parents - when the child becomes the carer, and solving something that had haunted her family most of her life. Hen and Karen dealing with Hen taking on too much and neglecting her family as a result, having to deal with adding another parent into the mix as well as the exploration of how their family came to be in the first place. Madney - growing back together again, choosing to take the risk and be a family in everything, not just in parenting Jee, actually building a house of their own together - not one that was either of theirs from before, but one that is both of theirs from the beginning and one that allows them to take any next steps they want. the engagement whilst romantic etc is also about choosing family - something Maddie wasn't able to do with Doug because it wasn't safe, and something Chim never had with his own father - their engagement was as much about overcoming family trauma, learning from and healing from it as it was about romantic love.

Then we have Buddie - the family on paper (thanks to the will) even if they haven't figured themselves out yet or even talked about it. They sit in parallel to all of the other couples on the show in so many ways and that is very deliberate. For Eddie this season has been about his changing dynamic with Christopher as he grows up and seeks independence and who Eddie is if he doesn't have father and firefighter to hide behind - if he just gets to be Eddie. Its also been about him putting the ghost of Shannon to rest and being in a place where he can move on and create something new (even if he sucks at dating and has never actually questioned what it is he wants). While for Buck it has been about reckoning with ghosts and understanding that DNA doesn't make a family. Its been about Buck recognising which family is more important to him - the DNA family or the found family and choosing things for himself (which is why his new couch has to go) its been about him figuring out his place and where he's at peace (you know the place he can fall asleep as soon as he sits down - like Eddies couch maybe). The entire season has been spent building up Buddifer as a family dynamic and showing how much they all mean to each other and how much of a co-parent Buck is with Eddie. We've even had his relationship with Chris very loudly contrasted with the one Chim has with Denny just to make it extra obvious.

All this to say that the show hasn't been doing all this for nothing and I'm pretty convinced that they will send us into hiatus with all the pieces set up ready to build on in season 7.

Back to how Marisol fits into all of this - its pretty simple - the show is great at giving us lots of subtext - we just have to choose to read it. I've already answered an ask about how the name Marisol means our lady of solitude - the thing Eddie is feeling right now because he is focused on the concept of everyone dying alone and isn't quite in a place to look more deeply at the Buck of it all - he's getting there, but he isn't quite ready yet.

Then we have the construction aspect of the Eddie/Marisol dynamic - everything around them has been in relation to construction - but always about constructing something for someone else - Eddie goes to her house to help with repairs (with Buck and other fire fighters) - not something for himself. They meet again at a DIY store when both of them are looking for something for someone else - her for her brother, him for his son. The focus of their interaction was very much about other people and helping other people so there is something to be said about the idea of construction on sunset (a metaphor for Eddie thats been in play for a long time) and her helping him to figure out and fix whatever that construction is so that the road ahead is clear for his happily ever after (the sunset) - she isn't the sunset, she's just the construction worker - to help Eddie with the final piece of the puzzle.

The other thing to keep in mind is costuming for both Marisol and Eddie. We are pretty sure that one of Marisol's costumes tonight is an olive green and blue tie dye sweatshirt - literally the Buddie colours of the season, because we have a bts photo of Edy in what looks very much like a costume (her hair and makeup have also been done as Marisol).

Eddie is green and Buck is blue (Eddie has worn green 11 and blue 4 times this season and Buck has worn blue 22 times and green 7 times - far far more than any other colours they've worn except black for Eddie which he has rarely worn around Buck - except when in his widows weeds) , from the clothes they wear and the cases they have on their phones, the blue and green has been a very deliberate choice - Eddie is growing and Buck is water trying to find its level. Putting Marisol in a top that is a literal mash up of their two colours is telling me that whatever her scenes are, her role will be one that in some way brings Buddie together, not one that creates a wedge between them because up to now the costume department has been careful to steer clear of any Buck or Eddie related colours on either Natalia or Marisol.

That isn't to say that I don't think Marisol will feature in some way - I do and I think we will see her carry over into season 7, but there is literally nothing the writers (and all the other departments) have done that makes me think she is anything but someone who is meant to help Eddie get to a place where he is ready to see what he has already built - what is already in front of him - that Buck is the person who will always sit with him in the mess and make it his mess too.

Literally all the things the show is doing is pointing to Buddie and to expect it to happen and for them to go canon tonight is just foolish - neither Buck nor Eddie are ready for that, both have some more healing and growing to do before we get to that point and they need to have a conversation - a big massive conversation which tonights episode doesn't have room for because its a conversation that an entire episode will be built around. There is already some amazing Buddie related stuff that we've had in the sneak peeks and we will likely get more, all of which builds on all the things we've already spent this season discussing. Everything has been set up for Buddie canon in season 7 and it seems Marisol is part of helping us get there so if i were you (that means any of you) I would sit back and enjoy the storytelling because it all has a point and has been done with the intention of giving us Buddie - we made it through an entire season of Taylor Kelly and she gave us plenty of Buck growth in the middle of a slow and torturous spiral, so we can deal with a few episodes of Marisol who is going to help Eddie figure out that he isn't actually lonely because he already has what he's looking for!

If you choose to not learn how to read what a show is doing, and also come into peoples inboxes (who are actually doing a huge amount to help you read that information that the show is giving you by interpreting and discussing it) and behave negatively then I and others cannot help you because you've already chosen negativity and doom and gloom. I fully expect to have my inbox flooded with negativity, poor takes and dissatisfaction (and probably a fair amount of nastiness as well) after the episode tonight simply because the show had the audacity to have Eddie interact with someone who isn't Buck and is female - they will all be blocked and deleted - I'm over trying to explain to people who clearly don't actually read and think about all the things myself and so many others put out and I don't have the time to deal with it - I just want to enjoy my weewoo show and have fun with people on tumblr as we actually look at what we've been given in canon for all our firefam. So if you want to keep seeing what I post and my costume metas my advice is think before you type and press send on a message coming towards my inbox. I'm all for open discussion and I have lots of conversations with people who see things differently to me - but we are able to do it in a grown up and mature way, I don't pop into their inboxes and spew nastiness and hateful rhetoric.

This wasn't specifically aimed at you 5 nonnies I'm just using the opportunity to make people aware of how they will be treated if they try anything!

This got so very long 😳😳😳 soI'm ending here and I hope it all makes sense!

[doodlebug091]

hey, call me dustin or doodle or amethyst, any pronouns are fine i don’t really care

i’m just a silly little scavenger on the internet, or a weevil, whichever thing you want go call me

i bite and meow and yip at people i like to say hi to them

reblogs > likes

|-/

fandoms:

rain world

outer wilds

hollow knight

worldless

cobalt core

terraria

risk of rain

tvruhh

satisfactory

deep rock galactic

the binding of isaac

& more! just ask if you want to know if i’ve played it or not, i can’t remember every game that has consumed me off of the top of my head

(not objectum (i think))

header by @mrplagues-authentic-blog, stamp by @voldkat, pfp by meeee!!!

i’m still trying to figure things out so please forgive me if i do something wrong, just tell me what i did and how to fix it

i am a minor so please don’t be weird in an nsfw way i guess

feel free to send asks or dms, as long as you aren’t weird (negative) about it

i run @restart-the-cycle and @fred-the-lizard

art blog @doodles--doodles

feel free to make art of any of my creatures, just tag me because i wanna see

google drive with full resolution art (i hope this works like i want)

art tag: #doodle's doodles

original post tag: #bug’s pearls

ask tag: #doodle gets a pearl

[bruisedconscience-reblogs]

wishing you a Happy October 2024 Next Fest from me & my steam deck!

Games I kept in my wishlist: (5/5)

Botworld Odyssey: IMMEDIATE 10/10 the vibes are stellar. Poké reference immediately? GOTY 2024. Literally grown in a lab for me. (Only one I have 100% the Demo for!)

Windblown: 10/10, played for far too long (apparently it was only 30 mins but bro it’s 1am now so I call…falsehood!). Felt fair and I still think I am capable of changing my weapons around during expeditions, so I can keep the not-default one forever as a starting weapon right? RIGHT???

Usual June: The simlish scared the heck out of me cuz I expected voice acting or nothing, but this game seems stellar! Combat took me a minute to sort out, I kept using items instead of fighting lmao. 10/10!

Graveyard Gunslingers: Absolutely immaculate time sink game. Vampire Survivors-Forager lookin’-ass-stupid, addictive masterpiece. (I think this one needed Experimental Proton?)

30 Birds: Awesome art & style! Atmospheric and entertaining point & click vibes, will return.

I’m not a pro gamer/I’m bitter but wrong about it: (4/5)

Enci’s Solution: dripping with class & polish, but after the 15th time not hitting the narrow window to progress, I got tired. Reminds me of Hob. I hope this becomes somebody’s favorite game from when they were a kid tbh. (Maybe this one needed Experimental Proton?)

Prospector: I wanted to love this one. But I couldn’t like find the EXACT ore the TUTORIAL wanted (I found 2+ others?) and that felt a little counter intuitive… It’s everything I want in a game (Satisfactory Forager) but… I dunno. I am keeping it probably, not uninstalling!!

Permafrost: I played this game singleplayer for 35 minutes. The game defaults to Gamepad no matter what even after I changed it, and this led to me stuck in the main menu in Desktop Mode. I soon got frustrated that head-sh*tting a deer wasn’t enough to k*ll it… But I’m sure somebody else playing KBM (I had to re-map a lot, no built-in controller support) would have more fun.

Toads of the Bayou: This one played “Ok” after I changed the resolution & the default controller scheme to WASD/Mouse. I had a tough time navigating outside of battles (menus, environments), but the battles were satisfying. I also couldn’t spend my final piece of gold on an item that costed 1 gold, which was weird & I reported using their bug report form. I might pick this one up once it’s been ironed out! Into the Breach/Slay the Spire, except I am not too simple for it.

Games that were fine or good/not for me/I uninstalled: (3/5 - 2/5)

Hail to the Rainbow: Absolutely BEAUTIFUL dripping with atmosphere and frighteningly easy to get the mechanics down with limited cues or guidance. Love the AI (speaking russian?) in my eyeball giving me hints. I am a WIMP and this game didn’t seem to have a Horror tag or I wouldn’t have tried it. But beautiful!!

Broken Alliance: The voice acting was stellar, but the pacing was way too slow & I skipped lots of the wonderful voiceovers. Battling seems fair, traversing the map is slow. This is a game for board game lovers, I think, which I so totally am not to be fair.

Chrono Sword: Right in, the vibes are nice. Why am I dressed and then putting on other clothes though? Also, pixel Dark Souls/Elden Ring. edit: found myself wanting to play this one hours later. Hm!

Great God Grove: This has awesome art, unique gameplay, and has lots of polish and style and heart. However,,, I’m still on the fence about it, solid 4/5 though!! Might not just be my speed/current kinda game I’m into.

Wild Planet: This game was awesome, don’t let it being in this section fool you. It took me forever to build a campfire using a controller— you need to double-click the item in the build menu to be able to place it in the world!! What a frustrating 5 minutes I had lmao. Really cute game. Some janky physics, not worth reporting as a bug. It has some charm, the style isn’t my fave personally. Stellar music though!

Floridale Man - The Joy of Chaos: I am just not chaotic enough! I picked up some items, talked to folks, didn’t combine anything successfully…and left! ✌️

Tiny House Sim: This one ran pretty well, which was a surprise. (Even after I quit to main menu suddenly on accident!) The game didn’t have native controller support & I found it pretty cumbersome, but it seems well-made, for KBM.

Games that didn’t run: (1/5 - 0/5)

Keep Driving: Really upset I couldn’t play this one. I created my character just fine with WASD/Mouse controller preset, but couldn’t do anything else. No controls listed in the game options to manually input. The grapevine says it needs KBM to play.

Cube Hero: I got the “Choose Language” screen and selected UK, then I got an error code, even tried Experimental Proton. No dice (no cubes?).

New Arc Line: This one technically ran. With SD Overlay, I had it: capped at 30 fps, Allow Tearing and Half Rate Shading. I made my character and skipped the cutscene (it usually went by too fast for me to read completely & there’s no voiceover) and…the game stopped moving. I tried to open my Overlay (using my external controller’s shortcut) and then this game crashed my Deck. Didn’t respond to my hitting the power button for a while. Had 3 scary vertical lines light up when I held down the power button. Then turned back on when I pressed it once. Will not play again until others verify it won’t crash using default settings/no Cryo Utilities!

Anterris: This one eventually booted (because I pressed random buttons after the Unity screen? Coincidence?) but I had to map several of the controls, and I could not capture any creatures. I was riding on one I owned randomly before understanding why I would need to do that. The creature screen was zoomed in on my TV and I couldn’t really play the game. Not made with Deck (or even a controller!) in mind.

[part-time-zombie]

🖤 & 💙 for the fanfic ask game! ^^

Ooh these are good ones!

🖤: Absolutely! I think about fic ideas all the time, usually more than I'm actually writing them lol! It helps alot with figuring out the direction I want the story to go and if there are any details/dialog I want to change in any way. A fic can be mentally rewritten and revised in so many ways before I even get back to the keyboard!

💙: It's hard to pin down exactly what inspires me to finish a fic, especially since I often don't have the ending in mind right away and I figure out the resolution as I go. I usually just keep writing it out until I find a satisfactory ending for me to finish the fic on.

Since most of my fics are usually pretty short I don't really end up quitting them all that often to be honest. However, I have tried to work on a longer fic in the past but I didn't feel like the plot was proceeding as well as I had hoped, so I set it aside for now. I guess if I feel like the plot is escaping me or the pace is slowing down too much I decide to walk away from it for a bit.

Thanks for the ask! :)

[elysian-drops]

I'm so excited about Harri and V's conversation in next chapter. I mean what he is gonna say to her? He is definitely not the one to apologize. And Order will try to kidnap Harri right? Oh god, it will be a disaster.

Hi there!

I'm glad to see you're excited! 💕 But you're absolutely right: V isn't one to apologise. I think a lot of readers are expecting him to get on his knees, say 'sorry', and beg for forgiveness. Now don't get me wrong, I love moments of angsty grovelling as much as the next person, but that's not how it's going to play out— it doesn't really fit this universe's Voldemort, you know? 😅 Mostly because I've always approached him as an incredibly proud character with pride simultaneously being his greatest asset and his greatest fault. And sure, in the last chapter, he recognised that he messed up— however, it's one thing to do so in the safety and privacy of his own mind, and entirely another to verbally admit it by saying "I'm sorry". I just can't see him putting himself in a situation where he acknowledges/accepts culpability in front of another person (even if said person is his horcrux).

Admittedly, that's been the most difficult part in writing the next chapter: finding a resolution that will be satisfactory for you all as readers, while also remaining true to his character/faults. So to that end, I will say how he approaches the situation may be unconventional and not quite what you're expecting— but it is a very V way of handling it 😂😅 And, at least in my opinion, it doesn't disappoint. I'm actually quite happy with what I have planned, so I hope you'll be as well 💕

As for the Order, that's a whole other issue I'm going to refrain from commenting on for now. But I will say, true to the general vibe of Appetence, things will get very messy very quickly 😅

Anyway, thanks for the message and for the show of enthusiasm! I always love getting to hear from you guys 💕

[inevitably-johnlocked]

Hi dear librarian! 1/? I was wondering if there's a term to describe a phenomenon that plagues so many films nowadays and partially responsible for the downfall of BBC Sherlock and MCU: it appears that the creators/screenwriters are afraid of or uncomfortable dealing with strong negative emotions. It's very obvious in Sherlock S3,S4, and MCU after Infinity War. They immediately interrupt an emotional scene with a quip, joke, or a solution. It really disturbs the plot flow, emotional buildup,

2/? and the tension of the show. E.g., in Sherlock S3E1 the reunion scene and the underground scene, in S4 the ghost Mary non-stop quips before the emotional hug. In S2, they really shouldn't have revealed Irene or Sherlock survived immediately after the event. I don't know what the writers were afraid of. Without a proper buildup, the resolution doesn't feel satisfactory. I'm very happy that in GOTG 3 they avoided this problem and it's probably the only MCU film worth seeing recently. 3/3 Another example is the Thor series. I know Thor 1 has many plot flaws, but they got the aesthetics right and with a Prometheus type of self-sacrifice, it feels like a proper fusion of technology and mythology. But later they wrote Thor as a laughing stock for his depression and in his own 3rd and 4th film, every remotely serious emotional scene was undermined by something. Just why?! That's part of the reason people say MCU doesn't feel relatable anymore. Thx for reading and stay cool!

Hey Nonny *HUGS*

Thank you for this insightful ask, and my answer is essentially this: shareholders and studio meddling, and probably bad writing by people who think they know better. A lot of the MCU, for instance, is SO boring and repetitive right now because they're too afraid, it seems, to stray from "what is safe", stuff that won't have people bitching at them, or they're trying too hard to recapture what made the Infinity Saga so amazing. They spent TOO long being praised and in turn stopped trying so hard, and under Chapek, dude was a greedy bastard who worked Feige to stress. I'm glad that they pulled back, it seems, and I hope it stays that way, hopefully so they can make new movies up to the quality of GOTG 3 again. Studios like Dreamworks and Indie studios are taking risks, and it's paying off, because people are bored with the sanitization of Disney and Marvel. Everything has to have no true villain in Disney.

That's not to say I don't still enjoy Disney, I do, but Marvel as-of-late has put out more flops than fantastics. And I suspect some of it is studio and shareholder meddling. It's a miracle Gunn got to do what he wanted for GOTG3, and I'm glad he did. With Thor 3 I feel like Taika got raked over the coals because he had to follow whatever plan they wanted for his vision. I dunno. Marvel for me is so hit-and-miss these days.

As for Sherlock... I think part of it was BBC meddling and another was ego-tripping, because Mofftiss continually put out winner after winner of seasons, so they thought, because just the TWO of them got an Emmy for TAB, well, they're good enough to get it for a WHOLE SEASON! (which, for the record on my opinion, I think Mofftiss are better at ONE SHOT episodes, not an entire series on their own... they run out of ideas and then throw whatever their weird fanboy fantasies want, and without a third writer to reign them in, we get S4). So yeah, that's what I mean by bad writing as well. I BELIEVE Moffat or his wife owns Pinewood Studios that they film in, so like... it's literal studio meddling, LOL. But yeah sometimes a writer or director can also be too big in their britches, and whatever they say, goes.

So yeah, I dunno. It's honestly a mix of everything and fatigue with the unoriginality of content these days. I think that's why I don't really watch anything anymore unless a trailer REALLY grips me, or it's recommended to me by a Lovely. I stick mostly to old-faves because I know I won't be disappointed, or fandom-related content.

What do y'all think?

[undetectorist]

1, 40, and 54 for the fic ask meme :3c

do you know how you want the story to end when you start, or are you just stumbling through the figurative wilderness hoping to find a road?

in general i am stumbling....falling....collapsing my way to some kind of resolution. i usually start by imagining certain dialogue scenes and building out from there, but even when i know vaguely how i want the main beats of a story to go, i find it really difficult to actually draw things to a close in a way i find satisfactory.

40. best piece of feedback you’ve ever gotten.

it's so hard to isolate individual pieces of feedback because i am so touched and grateful any time anyone says anything about my writing! but i actually just remembered a recent ao3 comment i got that i loved so i'm going to talk about it:

in one of the mdzs fics i wrote, i put in a scene where yanli gives lwj a peace lily & he tells her that he never manages to keep plants alive & she's like, "it just needs a little nurturing". anyway the original ending of the fic after wangxian get together was lwj looking at the peace lily blooming, and i cut it because it felt too obvious and on the nose, but i left the earlier scene in bc i liked the moment between yanli and lwj. and then i completely forgot about all of this but the other day someone commented on that fic saying "i need to know whether the plant yanli gave lan zhan survived" and i was like... IT DID! and thank you for noticing that detail! and i love you!

54. what’s a common writing tip that you almost always follow?

writing a little every day! i have been bad at it recently but when i was writing fic regularly it was so helpful to make it a daily habit.

[bookwyrminspiration]

Quill I saw you have seen Across the Spiderverse and I need to know your thoughts on it.

Who’s your favorite character? What scene is your favorite? What did you think of the music in the movie? What did you believe the climax was?

And feel free to add anything else you want!

⚙️

I have! I'm going to be very typical here and say Hobie was my favorite--before I'd blocked the spiderverse spoiler tags I'd gotten a few glimpses of things before averting my eyes, and several were posts about him. About how he was animated, how people liked him, and so I had my eye out. I also had my eye-out for spider punk, because I find myself intrigued by punk ideology.

So imagine my delight when I realize they're the same person, and that that person is fucking cool as hell! Both in how he's animated and how he carries himself, how he interacts and his beliefs. He may not be super present, but all the little things--his whole intro speech, his saying "good" immediately after being told he isn't helping their system, his silently telling Miles how best to use his powers to break out, etc. I understand exactly why he's captured the attention he has and I'm right there with them. I just wish I'd had captions, because I struggled to hear some of his quips given his habit of quiet under the breath commentary

My favorite scene, I'm not sure I can pick one out just yet (it's all very fresh), but the two that stand out are the fight scene in Pav's universe and Miles' run from everyone. The perspectives in the first one really captured my attention, the fluidity with which everything moved and how they all worked together. I kinda lost track of the tension because I was just so wowed. And then the drama and intensity of Miles' run from all the other spidermans was excellent--loved his exploding the cage, and the realization he had had a plan all along. Plus learning more about the plot (him being the original anomaly, how canon events work) is a plus as well.

As for the climax, the way I'm understanding it, there isn't one in a sense? I'm using the definition of a climax as the moment of highest tension, which is frequently when the main conflict is finally resolved. It's the first of 2 parts, so the true climax will come in the second part with this movie being the inciting incident and rising action setting the stage for the big climax and subsequent parts. So on the scale of the bigger arc, there isn't a climax in this movie. The climax will be when Miles likely defies canon events successfully without breaking the world or something, righting all the anomalies--at least I assume that's generally where the story's heading.

But if we just look at this movie, I'd say its personal climax is either on that train-thing where Miles finally learns what's really going on with himself and the anomalies, which is a moment of high emotional tension that finally resolves the building secrecy apparent from others. Or that it's the ending scene, which is also incredibly tense and answers other introduced questions, such as what happened to universe 42 and what Miles has gotten himself into. The answer: a lot. It really sets up a lot for the next movie, so there's a lot going on--but it also doesn't have as much resolution I don't think? So I think it's climactic in the tension way, but is more between stories; the first is more isolated to the first movie's specific arc, and the ending scene goes beyond that, so I hesitate to say it's its personal climax.

Anyway, I only saw the movie today so my thoughts are rather scrambled and still organizing themselves, so perhaps I'll have better answers in the future! But I hope these are satisfactory for now!

[kpopfanfictrash]

hey shanna! i hope you're doing well. first, i want to say how much i enjoy reading your works - you're truly such a master of your craft. i really admire your captivating writing style, your complex characters and your intricate/gripping plots. i've been following lth ever since you posted the first chapter and even got my best friend to read it with me hehe idk if you remember me but i once told you that we held a bookclub for it and would read the chapters together.

anyways, i was wondering if you've ever struggled with the direction of a story? in my case, i'm struggling with where to go right after the conflict gets resolved. i apologize if this sounds too vague, i'm not really sure how to put it any better.

also thank you so much for always taking the time to respond and give out writing advice - i can't begin to tell you how much of a help they've been to me ^^

hi, anon! I do, in fact, remember you - that is still so unbelievably sweet to hear you and your friend read the chapters together. Thank you so much for following along with my fic!

Re: your question about struggling with the direction of a story -- of course. Always. I typically map out my story before writing, and one of the first things I do is write a high level summary of the plot. From there, I break things down and summarize (again, high level) what happens in each chapter. Until I'm satisfied, I don't put my metaphorical pen to paper. That's not say changes don't happen once I start writing. Sometimes, I think of a better plot twist. Sometimes, I realize a scene needs to be added or that one no longer makes sense. Having a rough outline of where I'm going though, has always been essential for me to start. This process can be long or shot... and when I'm struggling, it's much longer lol

Caveat: my planning approach isn't the same for all writers. There are authors I admire who don't plan at all. Then, there are others who insist on deciding each bit of lore/character connection before starting anything. My advice is to try different things and find what works best for you.

Another thing I'll say is usually, the point when conflict is resolved is the end of your story. Don't drag out your falling action. Ensure most of (if not all) of the plot points are wrapped up and the story resolution feels satisfactory. Then, end it. Don't overthink things and feel as though you need to answer every question a reader might have. The lives of your characters will continue, but you're writing a story about a specific conflict. Once that conflict is resolved, the story is usually over (for your purposes).

Best of luck on your writing, and hope you have a wonderful day/night!