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dilfdoctordoom · 3 years ago

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On Tom Taylor, the Current Nightwing Run & Ableism

I did mention I was gonna do a post about it, so here we are. There are some things I want to make clear before we begin: the issue exploded on Twitter on the very first day of disabled Pride month; disabled people have been discussing the ableism in Taylor’s Nightwing run since it began; nobody has blamed Taylor for what happened to Barbara in 2011. We are, however, blaming him for the way she is written in his series during 2021.

I am also going to be discussing the ableism in the fandom in this post. The reactions I have seen, from here to Twitter to TikTok, are showing not only a great misunderstanding of the situation, but a purposeful misunderstanding. The very real reasons disabled people are angry right now have been twisted to make us seem ridiculous and overly sensitive and I cannot help but feel that is very intentional.

Another quick addition: disabled people are not a monolith. Barbara Gordon spent over 20 years as a paralyzed wheelchair user. Stating (and I would like to note, never truly showing) that she is a part time cane user now is still erasing her disability. These things are not interchangeable.

So, with that out of the way, let’s begin.

Tom Taylor’s run is ableist. That is a fact of this situation. He made the active choice to include a version of Barbara Gordon that is ableist caricature. Story wise, the role that Barbara plays could have easily been filled by anyone else. There is no real season, within the narrative and outside of it, for Taylor to include this version of Barbara Gordon, who has received a decade of criticism from disabled people. It’s very well known that this iteration is problematic, to put it kindly, and Taylor is aware of that.

He made the active decision to include her, anyway, showing, at the very least, that he is passively, if not actively, ableist. Passive ableism is still ableism and disabled people are allowed to take issue with that.

That alone is reason enough for disabled people to be angry. But that’s not why things exploded on Twitter.

On July 1st, the very first day of disabled pride month, the new design for Barbara was dropped. After months of teasing Barbara’s return to a wheelchair using Oracle (see: Last Days of The DC Universe, Batgirl (2016), etc), they debuted... a new Batgirl costume that the artist has openly said draws inspiration from the Burnside suit.

There’s a lot of issues to unpack here, so let’s start small: the issue with consciously calling back to Burnside. The Burnside era of Batgirl stories was... beyond awful. The villain of the series’ first arc, was an AI based on Barbara’s brain patterns when she was disabled. It was evil because of all the rage and pain Barbara felt. The actual Barbara, on the other hand, was good -- because she was able bodied. Because her PTSD had been tossed aside. It was a horrifically ableist era that drove the idea that Barbara’s life was terrible when she was disabled; that it was some horrible, twisted secret.

Comics have kept that narrative going. Barbara is seen hiding books on chronic pain; she reacts aggressively to the mere idea that she could be in a wheelchair again, acting like it would be weakness. Whereas Barbara had once been Oracle not because of, but in spite of, her disability, who was fantastic representation for the disabled community, she now acts like it is the most shameful thing in her life.

To call back to Burnside is to call back to that ableism and make no critique of it. If anything, it’s to embrace the ideas of that era.

There is also the design itself to consider. Many people have pointed out the inclusion of a back brace, as if that saves it from ableism -- it does not. Any person who has ever worn a back brace can take one look at this design and know that they did not consult a disabled person. Hell, by how impractical that thing is, I doubt they even Googled a picture of a back brace.

It’s a superficial acknowledgement that Barbara is supposed to be disabled. Something that was apparently thrown in to appease the numerous complaints of Barbara being able bodied; something that no one working on it put any effort into.

When it comes to aids, this is not a new thing for Barbara in Infinite Frontier. She’s said to be using a cane occasionally, that we got a better look at in Batman: Urban Legends, and as any cane user can tell you... that is not a cane that could feasibly be used. It’s another pathetic attempt to acknowledge that Barbara is supposed to be disabled, without actually doing anything of importance.

[IMAGE ID: A segmented cane with a tri-pointed handle with a wrist strap. There is a stripe across the sections to connection them, labelled “solar battery charger buttons”. The text reads: “telescoping antenna doubles as cane or weapon if needed”. END ID]

Dropping this design (which we have now established to be problematic) on the very first day of disabled pride month is a sickening move. The very first day, and DC has doubled down on their disability erasure, thrown in superficial things like a back brace to act like it’s fine.

Tom Taylor is definitely involved in this, whether you like it not. No, he is not in anyway responsible for the events of the New 52 and what they did to Barbara Gordon, but that does not absolve him of blame for what is currently being done to her in his run.

When the design dropped, it started trending due to disabled fans reactions. To be clear: we were directly calling out the ableism in this design. This was Tom Taylor’s response:

[IMAGE ID: A tweet from TomTaylorMade that says: “Hey, @Bruna_Redono_F I think our new Batgirl suit is getting some attention.” He then adds a winky face emoji and tags @jesswchen and @drinkpinkkink. Attached are a screenshot showing that Batgirl is trending in the United States and a picture of the design itself. END ID]

This is him, bragging about how the disabled community reacted. Perhaps before this tweet, you could’ve made an argument that he was not ableist, but after he flaunted the fact that disabled people were rightly furious over this, like it was something to be proud of? No. If you are defending him, you are a part of the problem.

Taylor has included ableist writing in his Nightwing run, beyond the inherent ableism that comes with the current iteration of Barbara Gordon (whose inclusion, yet again, is his decision).

[IMAGE ID: A panel from Nightwing #79. Barbara and Dick are standing in his apartment. Barbara is saying: “I have some pretty new technology holding my spine together. I’m happy to do most things -- eat pizza in the park, take down low-level thugs -- but leaping from rooftops seems... unwise.” END ID]

What Barbara says in the panel above has bothered a lot of disabled people. The implication that she couldn’t “eat pizza in the park’ and “take down low-level thugs” without a spinal implant that conveniently erases her disability is... fucked up, to put it mildly. Those are both things that Barbara has done in a wheelchair. The first one is something wheelchair users can do and the implication that it’s not is beyond offensive.

But, let’s leave Barbara behind for a moment. I have previously mentioned that disabled people have been discussing the ableism present in this run long before July -- and that ableism is not only centred on Barbara. Dick is also a player in all this.

Dick Grayson was shot in the head. I don’t believe I need to retread the story, but just in case: Dick was shot in the head by KGBeast, developed amnesia from the event, and went by Ric Grayson for a long enough period in comics. If you have been active within the DC fandom for the past year or so, you know all about this controversial storyline and its fallout.

The Ric Grayson arc concluded itself the issue before Taylor became the writer for the series and ever since his tenure has begun, Taylor has completely ignored the reality of Dick being a disabled man. We understand this is comics, that things do not function the way they do in our world, but still -- it is clear that this gunshot wound to the head has affected Dick massively. We had an entire arc dedicated to how he struggled to find himself in the aftermath.

Taylor is choosing to write Dick as an able-bodied man, despite his canonical injuries and how they would impact his life.

This man is choosing to give empty gestures towards Barbara being a disabled woman (as discussed above, the completely dysfunctional back brace, etc) whilst writing her as able-bodied as possible. He writes both Dick and Barbara as able bodied as humanly possible. That is ableist. He is ableist. This is the same man that said he made a dog disabled ‘in honour of Barbara’. I do not think I need to elaborate on why that is bad.

The least he could’ve done, was get a sensitivity reader. We know that Taylor is not beyond getting people from marginalized communities to consult on his work (see: Suicide Squad), so why, when writing two characters that should be disabled, one that the disabled community have been criticising for a decade, does he not reach out to a single disabled person? A mere Google search could’ve improved the situation massively. In both the new design and the current writing, it is beyond clear that this is not just an able-bodied person writing it -- it’s an ableist person.

He could have listened to the numerous disabled fans that spoke out. Instead, he chose not only to refuse to do that, but to describe justifiable anger as ‘raging’. He treated us like we were crazy for daring to speak out about blatant ableism being parading around of us in our pride month.

Tom Taylor has failed to do the bare minimum and in doing so, he is, at very, very least, guilty of complicity. Again: passive ableism is still ableism.

The argument at hand is not just about Barbara Gordon and the continuing ableism that shines out from her current writing. The argument is about the treatment of disabled characters in his run. It has also become about the way he treats physically disabled people.

We also can’t have this conversation without acknowledging the fandom’s role in it all. I waited a day to write this up, to allow all the reactions to flood in... and I am sickened.

We have everything across the board. Able-bodied people that have actually listened to disabled people, who have supported us (which is deeply appreciated). Able-bodied people who may have had good intentions, but a skewed sense of the situation and perpetuating some of the more insidious lies being spread around (IE. that this is only about the new costume).

There are, obviously, the ableist reactions, though, that we will be discussing here. People deeming the current issues as ‘crazy’, calling disabled people ‘overly sensitive’ and ‘delusional’. Many people have completely glossed over the examples given for why Taylor, specifically, is ableist, and instead have resorted to telling disabled people that we are wrong and should be mad at DC instead.

It’s important to note that Tom Taylor is an adult man. He doesn’t need a fandom to attack disabled people for daring to call him out. He is not the victim in this situation; he has, for quite a few disabled people, been the aggressor.

I have seen claims that Infinite Frontier is a ‘slow burn’, implying that disabled people need to patient... as if we have not waited a decade for less ableist writing. There is a complete refusal from able-bodied fans to actually listen to what disabled people are saying. They would much rather rush to the defence of the (honestly rather mediocre) current Nightwing run.

Disabled fans know that comic book spaces are ableist. We know that both DC and Marvel and many of their writers are ableist. We are still allowed to be pissed as hell about it and acting like the current reaction being had right now is disabled people being ‘overdramatic’ is yet another example of how the able-bodied side of the fandom both refuses to listen to and undermine disabled people when we call out ableism.

We know it when we see it. We always do and we always will and we will always be able to recognize it far faster than an able-bodied person. If this many disabled fans are coming out and talking about an issue, calling it ableism, then it’s time for you shut up and listen.

Stop being a part of the problem and start supporting disabled fans for once.

#barbara gordon #dick grayson #nightwing #batgirl #tom taylor #tw ableism #okay to rb

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whiteqnn · 4 years ago

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PURE [3] - Corpse Husband x Fem! Reader

A/N: Over 1 thousand notes. You guys are insane. I can’t see any other explanation.

Thank you so much for all the love and support under the previous parts, all those comments just absolutely made my day! I would never expect this story to receive such a positive feedback, which I’m extremely grateful for!

Anyway, I decided to add some additional plot to this story - mainly, the sudden criticism and hate directed on Y/N after the last Among Us stream. I thought it would make things more interesting.

That being said, I hope you enjoy the third part ^^

part 1

part 2

part 4

part 5

PURE [3]

Y/N stared at her phone screen, reading through the latest tweets of her friends inviting their fans to watch their streams. It was Thursday evening and just as it was planned, everyone was getting ready for another game of Among Us. Just as she would do if it wasn’t for all those comments...

The last stream caused sudden, unexpected amounts of attention on her social media. She probably shouldn’t be that surprised by it, given the fact that by appearing in Sean’s and Felix’s videos she wasn’t all that strange to their fans. But people who watched Rae, Toast, or Corpse’s streams didn’t know her. And apparently, some of them weren’t that happy to see a new face among the group of well-known gamers.

She always tried to avoid the unnecessary spotlight as much as she could, preferring to stay hidden somewhere behind other, much more popular streamers. And it never bothered her. She was never one to enjoy too much attention anyway.

That’s why when she discovered how upset, or even angry, some people were when she played with all those famous streamers, she was quite shocked, to say the least.

Like all those comments under Poki’s tweet, in which she mentioned who’s gonna be playing this time...

“Duh, why’s that Y/N chick supposed to play with them again? There are at least hundreds of other, much more popular streamers I can think of who would be better than her.”

“Who the fuck is she anyway? Why’s she there?”

“lmao, some random girl who got lucky enough to know jacksepticeye. Don’t get why she’s playing with them though.”

“NOT HER AGAIN. I SWEAR TO GOD SHE WAS SO FUCKING ANNOYING LAST TIME”

Sure, she wasn’t as famous as Felix, or Sean, or Rae, or anyone else for that matter. Her audience wasn’t very small, but it was nothing compared to the number of fans other YouTubers had. It was understandable that most people didn’t know who she was, and didn’t understand why she was there in the first place.

She was, in fact, just some random girl who was lucky to have Sean as her friend. But in a group of such great and well-known streamers, she definitely stood out like a sore thumb.

Y/N almost jumped in her seat when her phone beeped with a new message, Sean’s nickname showing up at the top of her screen.

Jackaboy: We’re starting in a few kiddo

Jackaboy: But join the call now so we can both make fun of Felix

After the last game, she was so excited and couldn’t wait for this evening. She looked forward to cooperating with Sykkuno again, to arguing with Toast, to laughing with Sean and Felix, to murdering other people with Corpse... Yet now, all this excitement seemed to vanish just like the mood to play, let alone talk with other people. They would surely see right through her and try to make her spill the beans, which would ruin the stream. And the last thing she wanted was to ruin their game.

Jackaboy: You there Y/N??

She sighed, thinking of some believable excuse that wouldn’t arouse suspicion, but her mind was flooded with all those comments and DMs she received over those past days, which expressed nothing but hatred towards her.

Y/N: I’m really sorry Sean, but I don’t think I will be joining you today... I don’t feel very well.

She waited for Sean’s reply impatiently, expecting him to send her some angry emoji or tell her to move her ass and join the discord call. What she didn’t expect though, was that he would facetime her.

Her first instinct was to throw her phone across the room as if it would make Sean stop calling. He wouldn’t stop unless she’d tell him the truth.

So she cleared her throat and plastered the widest smile on her face, before answering his call.

“Alright, what is going on?” Sean asked right away, staring at her with his brows furrowed. He wasn’t in his recording room, but in his kitchen, which meant that he left his stream to call her. “And please don’t tell me you’re sick cause I won’t believe it anyway. And neither will Pewds.”

“I’m tired, Sean... I was working late again and I really need to rest.” she lied, trying to keep her voice steady and calm. She really didn’t want Sean to interrogate her now, not when his fans were waiting for him. “I’m sure you’ll find someone else though. Please tell the guys that I’m sorry”

“Y/N, c’mon, cut this bullshit. What’s wrong?” he asked softly, moving his phone closer to his face. “You know you’re a terrible liar, just tell me what happened. If you don’t wanna play then neither do I.”

“Sean, please don’t do it” she shook her head with a sigh. “Your fans are waiting for you, I’ll be fine.”

“Well they’re waiting for you too you dummy, I already promised them you’ll be playing with us tonight” he stated matter of factly, rolling his eyes. Y/N remained silent for a moment, and Sean suddenly furrowed his brows, narrowing his eyes at her in a suspicious look. “Did someone tell you something rude last time we played? Who and what?”

“What? No, Sean, oh my God. Everyone was super nice, it has nothing to do with the last stream... not with you guys, at least.” she mumbled under her breath, dropping her eyes from Sean’s confused face.

“What do you mean not with you guys? Y/N, what the hell happened?” he demanded, slowly getting more and more worried. She wouldn’t tell him though, too scared that Sean would just laugh it off, even though he also sometimes had problems with dealing with hate. And just as if he was reading her mind, Sean sighed, his face softening in a sad smile. “You’ve read the comments, didn’t you?”

She felt so stupid for being so easily offended by comments of some random people on the Internet, that she just nodded her head meekly, still looking anywhere but at the man.

“Look kiddo... I’m not gonna tell you to get yourself together and just ignore them, cause it won’t help, and I know cause I’ve been there. Hell, I’m still there.” he chuckled to himself and continued “Anyway, you really shouldn’t be worrying yourself about people who don’t even know you. They don’t know you, Y/N, why would some complete stranger’s opinion matter to you?”

“They said I shouldn’t be playing with you guys... that I’m nothing but a burden and you should be playing with someone who’s at least recognizable.”

“Well excuse me Miss, last time I checked I could choose who the fuck I want to play with.” Sean scoffed, clearly irritated by such comments “You’re one of my best friends Y/N and I don’t give a fuck what some haters say. And neither should you.”

“Maybe you should just invite someone else... It would make everyone happy.” she muttered almost inaudibly, but Sean almost barked at her when he heard her words.

“I told you to cut that bullshit, Y/N! Everyone couldn’t wait for this game and now you wanna back out? C’mon, kid. Do you have any idea how heartbroken Sykkuno’s gonna be? When you left so quickly last time, he kept complaining that he has no one to team up with.” she couldn’t help but smile at that, letting out a tiny giggle. “And Corpse? Have you even seen his last tweet?”

“What? No, I- I don’t follow him...” she said, wondering what Sean was talking about. She quickly searched for Corpse on Twitter, still being on facetime with Sean, and her heart almost dropped when she saw the last tweet.

@.Corpse_Husband Really excited for tonight’s Among Us stream, 8PM PST.

Jacksepticeye

Valkyrae

Pewdiepie

Pokimane

Sykkuno

Disguised Toast

Logic

Mr Beast

and, hopefully, my partner in crime - Little Y/N

She stared at the screen with her eyes widened, and her lips corners curling up in a small, bashful smile. It was so nice of Corpse to mention her as well, especially with the nickname that he seemed to like so much since their last game.

“God, if you could see yourself right now. How’s it that my pep talk didn’t do shit, but Corpse’s tweet magically made you smile, ugh.” Sean reminded her of his presence, and she quickly returned to the call, trying to somehow control her burning cheeks.

“It’s not like that, Sean, I really appreciate that you’re trying to cheer me up... I just didn’t expect your friends to like me...” she admitted quietly, and if Sean could, he would probably strangle her at that moment.

“I JUST TOLD YOU THAT SYKKUNO KEPT BUGGING ME ABOUT YOU FOR TWO FUCKING HOURS. YOU THINK HE WOULD TALK ABOUT YOU IF HE DIDN’T LIKE YOU?!”

“I just... what if they’re just being nice, but they don’t actually want me to play with them?”

“I’m done.” Sean groaned, shaking his head furiously. “Alright, here’s what you’re gonna do. You stay away from your phone, join the discord call, say hi to everyone, and we’re all gonna have fun, okay? If not, Pewds is gonna murder you, cause he was already growing impatient even before I called you.”

“I’m still not sure if that’s a good idea, Sean...”

“But I am sure, Y/N! Now come on, we’re playing in five. I’m telling everyone you’re joining as well.”

And before she could even reply, he hung up. Y/N groaned, rushing to her computer to turn it on. Now it would just be plain rude not to join the game, especially after Sean wasted his time talking with her, while he should be talking to his fans. Just as he suggested, she kept her phone far away from her desk, deciding to stay away from Twitter and all those comments for a bit. Maybe it would help her clear her mind and at least try to have some fun.

An invite to the group call was already waiting for her, along with a message from Sean with a code to the game. Y/N put her headphones on before joining the call and quickly typing in the code.

“... so let me repeat myself. I ALWAYS sound guilty, no matter what. Please, guys, don’t vote me out!”

Y/N shook her head with a smile on her lips when the first thing she heard after joining the call was Felix’s pleading voice. Clearly, he was already trying to save his own ass even before the game began.

Y/N could hear Sean’s loud voice as he commented on Felix’s plea with some snarky remark, later also catching the sounds of Rae’s laughter. Everyone was already there, they’ve been clearly waiting for her to join.

“Hey, look who’s finally here! Hi Y/N!” Poki noticed her presence first.

“Hello everyone” Y/N said, as shy and quiet as usual.

“Oh, Y/N! It’s so great to see you again, I was worried you weren’t joining us tonight” Sykkuno said, a pout clear in his voice.

“WELL ABOUT DAMN TIME” Felix all but yelled, making her roll her eyes with a smile. “What did I tell you about being late?!”

“Give her a break Felix, her mic wasn’t working again... Luckily, I was there to save the damsel in distress” Sean said, and even though she couldn’t see him, Y/N was almost certain that he was smirking.

“Yeah, I’m really sorry guys to have kept you waiting so long...” Y/N said, feeling genuinely bad. Maybe Sean was right after all? They could have just invited someone else, and yet they decided to wait for her.

“It’s okay, you’re here now and it’s all that matters” a deep voice sounded out, and whether she liked it or not, Y/N grinned like an idiot with a blush rising up her cheeks.

“Shit, here we go again...” Felix sighed, making everyone else laugh. Y/N bit at her lower lip, feeling her heart thump in her chest as she felt a sudden wave of courage, deciding to speak up despite her initial shyness:

“Well... I couldn’t just leave my partner in crime alone, right?” she asked, and she could swear she heard Corpse stutter as if he completely didn’t expect her to say that.

“Ah yes, after all, killing wouldn’t be the same without her, right Corpse?” Toast teased, repeating Corpse’s words from the last stream. Everyone in the call laughed, Y/N included. She couldn’t stop herself from smiling, even though just mere minutes ago she was on the verge of crying. “It’s good to have you here, Y/N/N. Maybe I’ll actually get a chance to finally kill you this time.”

“Jesus Christ, Toast. You sound like a psychopath. Hey, I’m happy you’re here, lemme stab you in the back, please?” someone whose nickname was MrBeast spoke up with a chuckle, before directing his next words to Y/N “I believe we haven’t played together before, I’m Mr Beast, it’s really nice to meet you Y/N”

“Yeah, pleased to meet you!” another player, Logic, spoke up “I also didn’t have a chance to play with you yet, but I’ve seen Sean’s last stream... Let me just say, that Toast murder was absolutely perfect!”

“Wow. And here I almost managed to block it out. I’m fucking traumatized Y/N, you should be ashamed of yourself” Toast scoffed over Felix’s laughter.

“You should be proud of yourself!” Sean interfered “Just so you know lads, Y/N may seem like a little angel, but she’s a little demon. You’ve been warned.”

“Yeah, she’ll charm you with her voice only to snap your neck next second.” Felix scoffed.

“Just like she did with Corpse!”

“Charm?!” Y/N gasped, her cheeks burning.

“I don’t recall Y/N killing me...” Corpse said in his low voice.

“I love how that’s the only thing he denied” Poki pointed out in a teasing voice, which only made Y/N sink further into her chair.

“Can we please start the game now?” she asked in a pleading voice, hoping that everyone would stop making fun of Corpse and her. She could only imagine how uncomfortable he felt, for some reason being the target of their jokes... They must’ve made him feel awkward, right?

“Jack, did you tell Y/N how we’re playing tonight?” Sykkuno asked, and she sighed in relief that they dropped the jokes.

“Oh, right! So there’s this mod called proximity chat, where we’re able to hear each other as we pass by another person, and it seems quite fun so that’s what we decided to try out tonight.” Sean explained to Y/N, and before she could ask another question, he added “I’ve just sent you the link, it’ll take a minute to install it.”

“Oh, okay. Thank you Sean” Y/N said, before downloading the mod and quickly installing it. When everything was set and ready, she pulled up Among Us again and typed in the code, and the game finally began.

“Woah”

“Holy shit!”

“Guys this is so cool!” Sykkuno exclaimed, his voice so happy and excited that Y/N couldn’t help but giggle.

“Okay, I’m scared now. I feel like encounters with Imposter are just gonna be perfectly cut screams” Felix chuckled, as they left the dropship and moved down the map. That’s when Y/N gasped in surprise, upon seeing the locations completely different than those she was used to.

“Wait- is that a different map?” she asked through her mic, hearing Toast’s distanced, devilish laugh. There was only Rae and Sykkuno beside her, as everyone else have already split up to do their tasks.

“Oh yeah, that’s Polus, it’s much more fun than the one we were playing in last time.” Rae explained happily and Y/N groaned. She didn’t know that map.

“Great. I don’t even know how am I supposed to do tasks in here...”

“Oh, it’s not that hard. They’re in most cases similar to those you already know, they only look a little bit different.” Sykkuno said in his kind voice, before asking “Do you want to team up again, Y/N?”

“I thought you would never ask Sykkuno” Rae chuckled under her breath.

“Yeah, that would be great! I need someone to show me around” she smiled. The trio finally moved from their spot beside the dropship and went to the left where, as Y/N later realized, was electrical. She quickly did her task in there, being under the watchful eyes of both Sykkuno and Rae.

Before the latter could do his own task, the first body was reported.

“The body is in the lab” Felix said, and Y/N couldn’t help but smirk as she saw that it was Toast who was murdered first. One less person to accuse her or try to frame her, if he was the Imposter.

“I just ran towards the lab from the left side, I only saw Poki on my way there” Corpse said right away, and the accused girl was quick to try and defend herself:

“Okay, I wasn’t in the lab, I was doing that engines task which is next to the lab.”

“Did you see someone else there?” Jack questioned.

“Nope, just me and the engines.”

“Okay. Sykkuno, where are you?” the lime astronaut was next on Jack’s list of suspects, which made Sykkuno groan.

“Why do you sound so suspicious right away?” he asked in disbelief, causing the rest to giggle “I was with Y/N and Rae all this time, we were all doing our tasks in electrical.”

“Is that true Y/N?”

“Yes Sean, that is true” she rolled her eyes with a laugh “I don’t even know this map, I have to stick with someone so I don’t end up like Toast.”

“Alright, what about rest? Logic? I think I saw you in admin but then you disappeared somewhere.” Felix said.

“Yeah I’m with Mr Beast in the office”

“That’s right” Mr Beast confirmed, which didn’t bring anything new to the investigation, so everyone decided to skip.

“Wo- Okay where are we now?” Y/N asked in surprise, when the new round began in some completely new place Sykkuno didn’t manage to show her yet. She could hear as Corpse laughed at her shocked voice, which made her smile widely.

“Yeah, I’m also not used to this new map yet” he admitted, his black astronaut walking up to her white one “Hey, wanna see something cool?”

“Sure!”

*Meanwhile Sykkuno*

“Okay this is bad guys, we lost Y/N” Sykkuno said to his mic, running around the map to find the girl he was earlier teamed up with. “I thought she followed us when the new round began, but she must’ve gone the other way... What if she’s dead already? Not good, not good...”

"Woah! This looks amazing! Is there some task here as well?”

“Yes, there’s temperature recording right here” Corpse said, standing by the lava pit, watching as Y/N’s character ran back and forth over the pool of lava.

“I wonder if you could jump into it. What do you think, Corpse?” she asked curiously, standing close to the edge.

“Not that I’m aware of it...” he mumbled coming closer to the edge as well “Why would you jump into it?” he asked with a half-smile on his face.

“So Felix can’t stab me in the back.” she whispered, even though there was no one around them.

“You think it’s him?” Corpse mirrored her voice, and she hummed in response “Why?”

“He’s constantly suspicious of everyone, last time we played he also kept interrogating us all, without even telling his own location.” she stated as if it was very obvious. Corpse couldn’t help but let out a laugh “What? Why are you laughing at me?”

“Not at you, Y/N. I’m just impressed by your investigation skills” he admitted “In that case, we better both jump in. Felix likes to frame other people.”

“You wanna jump into the lava with me?”

“Sure I do.”

“There you are!” Sykkuno’s lime astronaut came out of nowhere, followed by Mr Beast. Two of them walked up to Y/N and Corpse, and before the latter could even say anything, Mr Beast snapped Y/N’s neck.

“WAIT, NO-”

“OH GOD, OH GOD” Sykkuno yelled in panic.

“KILL HIM CORPSE” Mr Beast screamed, frantically running around.

“What the heck?” Y/N stared at her screen in shock, her dead body laying over the lava pit. Mr Beast had already fled to the left, leaving her, Sykkuno and Corpse standing between two of them. None of them said anything for a moment before the black astronaut finally spoke up.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m so fucking sorry, Y/N” he kept repeating, regret clear in his voice. “And Sykkuno, I- I can’t even express how-”

He was cut off by Felix’s scream, who reported the bodies before Corpse could kill him as well.

“IT’S CORPSE ALRIGHT” Felix yelled right away “HE’S STANDING OVER Y/N AND SYKKUNO, HE HAS THEIR BLOOD ON HIS HANDS”

“That is- I did not kill them” Corpse replied, calm as ever, as opposed to his frantic apologies.

“Then why were you standing there?! Without reporting the bodies?!”

“I was... mourning their death.” he replied, which caused the whole group to burst out laughing. “Seriously guys, you think I would murder Sykkuno? And Y/N? I would never even think of hurting them.”

“The simp is strong, we get it, but it doesn’t really save your situation” Rae laughed.

“Let’s kick him out guys, he can’t even defend himself” Sean chuckled, and everyone else didn’t need to be told twice. Soon enough, Y/N watched as Corpse’s black astronaut was thrown into the lava pit... Oh, the irony...

The game continued with her wandering around the map, doing the rest of her tasks to at least support somehow her fellow crewmates. She stumbled upon Corpse’s ghost at some point and laughed wholeheartedly when he started circling her little character in something she read as an attempt to apologize.

A little while later another body was reported, this time it was Felix who lost his life. Y/N didn’t really focus on the conversation this time, glancing at her phone instead. There was this urge to reach for it and check how people reacted to her joining the game, but she kept repeating Sean’s words in her head. There was no point in worrying about the opinion of somebody who doesn’t even know her... or at least that’s what she tried to convince herself to think.

Her attention was brought back to the game when she heard the sound of a new message from someone who was also dead. She clicked on the chat, seeing that it was one of the Impostors.

Corpse: :(

Corpse: I’m sorry

Y/N thought it was sweet of him to apologize for it, even though it was his main goal to murder everyone after all. She believed he was genuinely sorry for it, just like she was each time she was an Impostor and had to kill somebody.

Sykkuno: Welcome to the afterlife, Corpse!

She laughed at Sykkuno’s constant happiness, which was evident even in his messages, before typing one as well:

Y/N: We’re all corpse here

Sykkuno: Oh, so it means we’re all really cool then ^^

Y/N: Fair point

Corpse: See Y/N

Corpse: I told you I would jump into the lava for you

Y/N: You didn’t exactly jump...

Corpse: :(

Y/N: But let’s say it counts as well :)

Corpse: :)

Before they knew, the voting ended. Mr Beast was thrown into the lava, which ultimately lead to the victory of crewmates. Y/N cheered happily, when the blue sign appeared on her screen, right above everyone else who was innocent.

“Yaaay, the first time I wasn’t killed in the first game!” Sean announced enthusiastically, his astronaut running around the dropship.

“Yeah, and the first time it went so fast...”

“Right? Corpse, I’m disappointed in you. What happened to the King of Impostors?” Rae asked.

“Well.. no matter how good you are, you can’t always win, right?” Corpse replied calmly.

“Hmm, you seemed kinda absent-minded during the game, though...” Poki suggested with a smirk hiding in her voice, and Rae was very quick to pick on it.

“Oh, you’ve noticed that too? Almost as if he was distracted by something”

“I don’t know what are you talking about” he chuckled nervously, and Y/N just sat in her chair confused about what was going on. “Anyway, who’s up for another round?”

“Yeah, I have an idea” Sean said, effectively shutting everyone up “What if we play something along the lines of hide and seek? Let’s have one impostor, and everyone else needs to get their tasks done before he finds them.”

“That is...” Felix took in a dramatic breath “THE BEST THING I’VE EVER HEARD ABOUT”

“Yeah, I think it will be fun” Sykkuno replied.

“It sounds really cool, but let’s maybe tell who’s the impostor? I think it would be more fair” Rae suggested.

“I think it’s a good idea” Sean concluded, before changing the settings for one impostor only. Y/N waited patiently for the game to begin, and when she saw that she was a crewmate again, she sighed in relief. Only to gasp in a panic a second later...

“It’s me.”

Everyone stumbled out of the dropship as Corpse admitted that he’s the impostor. It seemed that knowing exactly who can murder everyone made the whole game a little bit terrifying...

“I don’t know where the heck I’m going” Y/N mumbled to herself with a nervous laugh when instead of doing her tasks, she searched for the perfect place to hide. When she entered security, she spotted Mr Beast fixing the wires, so she decided to join him.

“OH SHIT- god damn it, you scared me to death!” he all but yelled when she appeared next to him, doing her tasks.

“Sorry” she giggled, quickly finishing the wires, before speeding out of the room. On her way to weapons, she stumbled across Felix’s dead body, and could hear some screaming in the background... but didn’t recognize who was murdered next.

Y/N managed to do most of her tasks without meeting Corpse, whom she hoped not to see probably for the first time since they played together. She was just leaving decontamination when she heard Sean’s panicked laughter:

“...tee, bitches love me?”

“Wrong.” Corpse’s voice almost made her squeak in surprise, only to really scream when he suddenly snapped Sean’s neck.

“Retreat, retreat!” Y/N laughed as she sped past oblivious Rae and Logic, Corpse hot on her tail. She quickly returned to the decontamination room, hoping to flee from her inevitable death, when Corpse’s black astronaut walked in, and the door closed.

“Please don’t kill me” she chuckled, even though there was no hope for her.

“Finish my lyrics, and I’ll let you live...” he began, and Y/N furrowed her brows in confusion “ I spilt wine...”

“Wait- what lyrics? You sing?” she asked, completely dumbfounded. Corpse was silent for a moment as if he didn’t understand her, before bursting out laughing “What’s so funny again? Corpse, come on!”

“Yes, Y/N, I do sing, I was actually hoping you’ve heard some of my songs...” he admitted, still chuckling to himself. She felt a blush rising up her cheeks.

“Oh- I- I didn’t, I-... but I will, okay? I’ll do it right away!” she promised, quickly jumping up to grab her phone and listen to Corpse’s song. She was genuinely shocked, she would never expect him to sing!

She unlocked her phone with a wide, somehow nervous smile on her face, which, however, dropped the moment she saw her notifications. Hundreds of notifications.

“You there, Y/N?” Corpse’s voice reached her after a moment, when she still didn’t say anything, just kept looking at her screen. “I hope my music isn’t so bad that you passed out from listening to it...”

She could feel the tears welling up in her eyes, her phone gripped tightly in her shaking hands.

“Um, Y/N?” his voice became more worried now “Is everything okay?”

Y/N cleared her throat and quickly wiped her eyes, closing them for a moment to steady her breathing.

“Yeah, all good Corpse” she forced herself to smile, so her voice wouldn’t sound weird. “Look, um, I need to leave, can you tell the others bye from me?”

“Is something wrong?” Corpse asked confused.

“No, of course not!” she laughed through her tears “Something just came up and I really need to leave.”

“You sure you’re-”

“Bye Corpse. It was nice playing with you.”

A/N: I hope you guys are not too disappointed in me... It didn’t turn out as I initially thought it would. Isn’t it too dramatic? And is this hate plot fine? Or is it not? What do guys you think?

TAG LIST IS CLOSED!

@slytherin-chan @pillowjj @afuckingunicornn @love-and-virtues @ignooynim @crapimahuman @hannahjsworld @laugh-like-the-moon @fallengoddess772 @kingric03 @dolphinpink310 @paigeyisme @bunnychano3o @dxrtygxrl28 @z-nyx @baby-iyania @trashygeek

#corpse husband #corpse x reader #corpse husband x reader #fanfiction #youtubers #corpse husband imagine #writing #imagine

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balkanradfem · 3 years ago

Text

The basics of growing food

So, growing food sounds very intimidating, and in reality, it's something people knew how to do thru all history, and it's made even easier by new methods of 'no till' and 'no dig' garden. I didn't know almost anything about it until 3 years ago, when I got a plot in a community garden and started growing food with no experience. Still it went good! Here's what I learned:

The basics are as simple as 'if you put a seed underground and keep it wet, it's going to come out.' If you start off from that, even if you know nothing else, eventually you will succeed. The additional stuff is done to ensure success. The biggest actual issue of gardening isn't how, but when. When are you supposed to put all the seeds underground to get good harvest? For most of the plants, it can be as simple as 'Spring'. For others, it's very important just when in the spring you plant it.

Let's say you want to start your first garden, you want to plant some onions, lettuce, peas, green beans, tomatoes, peppers and zucchini. All of these can be planted in the spring! But these plants are sorted in 2 categories: Those who can survive a frost, and those who cannot. We call these 'frost hardy' (those who survive the frost) and frost-tender (those plants will die if they're exposed to lower than 0 temperatures). From the ones I listed, onions, lettuce and peas are frost hardy! It means you can plant them very early in spring, such as February and March, and they can be hit with snow and ice and be just fine. They can also be planted in autumn, and they only really start growing in the spring.

Green beans, tomatoes, peppers, and zucchini are frost-tender, meaning you absolutely can't grow them before the chance of freezing temperatures is gone. This is known in gardening as 'the last frost date'. Every area has a different last-frost date, so it's good to google yours to be sure you're planting these when it's safe to do so. For me it's mid-April.

Now, since it's a long time to wait for your plants to grow if you've only planted the seeds in mid April, people have found a way around it by planting the seeds in little containers inside of their house, or in a greenhouse, so they grow in a nice warm place on a windowsill, and are moved out in the ground when it's warm and safe. This is a very fun thing to do as you will have bunch of little plants growing in your home. Important thing to know about it is to use really light and airy soil, not garden soil, (you can use forest soil!) and to make sure you're not over-watering them and you give them as much light as possible.

Soil is another big thing in gardening, the grass grows so easily from it, but you can't exactly plant your seeds into the grass; they will get suffocated. For a long time people have tilled the ground to make it empty of all the weeds and easy to handle; however this isn't healthy for the soil, because it ruins the quality of top-soil, exposes it to sun and wind erosion, and it dries up very easily. Here are some beneficial methods of gardening: mulching and no-dig. Mulching means adding stuff like hay, straw, tree leaves, woodchips, pine needles on top of the soil. You're protecting your soil from sun, wind, erosion, drying out, and if your mulch is thick and dark enough, no weeds will grow in your garden. You are gardening by science.

So what does this mean for you, when you're standing before a patch of grass, thinking of turning it into a garden? You need to do this months before the actual planting, using time to your benefit is the smartest thing a gardener can do. You pick a patch of land and bring in everything you can on top: cut grass, hay, tree leaves you raked or found, straw if you have any, woodchips, anything that will stop the grass from growing. If you really want to build up your soil you can bring in compost too! All that organic material will eventually turn into compost and fertilize your garden as it degrades to soil. It's important to not mix it with the soil, and to only keep it on top of the plants. Mixing it will deplete the soil of nitrogen, and you need nitrogen to grow anything green. If you keep bringing in organic material for years of gardening, and on top of that put some compost as well, in 3-5 years your soil will become so rich and soft you will no longer have to use tools to plant in it.

But, hey, if it's your first time, you don't need to aim for perfection. If you didn't prepare your soil in the fall, whatever! You can still pull the weeds, dig around a little to make some clear soil, and plant your stuff! I've done this last-minute planting and it works just fine. Mulching and adding organic material is only the easiest, most scienc-y way to garden.

The next big thing in gardening is spacing and depth: how far apart should your plants be? And how deep to plant them? For depth, the rule of the thumb is 'twice as deep as the seed is tall'. But I've seen people pull various shit in this area and succeed so do what you want. As of spacing, I would also say, try out what fits for you. It takes a year of gardening to get a sense of just how big the plants get, and what would be ideal spacing for each of them. I decided only on my third year to plant tomatoes VERY far apart, because I realized in this case, one plant will give me more than 8kg tomatoes and it's much less work than planting 3 times as many plants that are close together. Peas seem to like to grow close tho, for some reason. Sometimes you can decide you want a bunch of tiny plants because you'll eat them young, so you don't space them on purpose, people do that with lettuce, leeks, spinach. If you want your plants as big as possible with as much yield as possible, give them half a meter and see what happens.

Fertilization is another big thing in gardening; if you add a lot of compost and mulch your garden consistently, you won't need a lot more; however there's a cool free trick you can do (if you're not currently sick): you can mix your urine with 10x water, and water your plants with that. And I really mean mix it with 10x water! Plants can get very fried by it and start to wilt if they're bombed with too much fertilizer at once! There are rules for this: use it when you want your plants to grow a lot of greenery, not if you want them to flower or produce fruit. This fertilizer is rich in nitrogen, and nitrogen inspires plants to grow more leaves! If you wanna fertilize them later in their growth, put a lot of nettle plants in a big container with water, leave it in the sun for 10 days; when it starts to smell real bad, it's ready. (you can also do this with comfrey). Also dilute it with 10x water! Don't use these fertilizers on bean or pea plants, or any legume, they don't like it.

Now I've given you so much info at once, you're probably struggling to take it all in, so here's a good youtube channel where I learned all I know: Roots and Refuge. If you watch this lady garden for long enough, she will tell you all of the secrets.

I remember being a first time gardener overwhelmed with worry; what if I fail, what if nothing grows, what if I kill all the plants, what if I have a black thumb, what if the plants die because I am stupid, what if I put all of this work in and get nothing, what if people make fun of me, what if I run into problems I won't be able to solve. Here are some of the answers to these!

A part of what you grow will DEFINITELY DIE. I can guarantee it, it happens to everyone, every single garden in the world has had plants die, sometimes for no reason at all, but in no case will EVERYTHING die. We all count on a part of our plants dying, becoming slug food, not doing well in general, and we always plant 30% more than we absolutely need. Even if you are personally responsible for killing the plants, the plants will not hold it against you! Plants appreciate you spreading their seed regardless of success, they understand that by trying multiple times you will eventually succeed and they absolutely want you to learn thru occasional failure. The answer is again to plant a lot, and it never ever happened that nothing came out of it. Most often, it's not going to be your fault at all. Sometimes the year will be good for tomatoes and carrots, and bad for peas. It's all okay! Because you just planted extra peas, and you'll get more tomatoes than you expected to have.

If you have the desire to plant food, you do not have a black thumb; the green thumb is in the heart that yearns to grow. You're not stupid if your plants die, plants die for everyone. And people are likely to come at you with million advice; listen to no one, try everything yourself. If they make fun of you, they're gonna look real stupid when you have home-grown food. Any problem you might run into while gardening is google-able! Or you can join a page of gardeners and they'll be happy to identify the issue.

The real main issue with gardening are slugs and bug-type pests, and that is a problem for another day because all I know to do is to yeet those away by hand and shake my finger very sternly at them. Hope this helps!

#growing food #food growing basics #gardening #diy #planting food #plants #home grown food #garden

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mittensmorgul · 3 years ago

Text

For anyone interested in long-term residence in the supernatural fandom, please have some observations I’ve made over the decade I’ve been here. Take it or leave it as you will, but I’ve found all of this info useful over the years I’ve been here.

I wrote this yesterday, and it achieved its mission of identifying the sort of folks who would react negatively to it (i.e. a lot of block lists have been updated), so now that it’s been edited for content, it’s going under a cut (because that is how we do things on tumblr in general, unless we have a deliberate purpose for annoying readers with excessively long text posts) for the sake of people who actually do care about the fandom and its history. If that’s not you or your reason for being here, then keep on keeping on with your own thing, I guess. For those who are interested, there’s a lot of fandom resources some of us have been building for years that you might enjoy knowing about.

First off, I’ve been informed by a few friends who’ve read through this for coherency’s sake that it sort of reads like a *shakes cane from porch* fandom grandma complaint, but honestly... I earned this rocking chair and goshdangit imma rock now. So apologies for any “back in my day” vibes or faint aroma of tiger balm this post might give off. Then again, it’s loosely based on a similar post from 2012 so like... time is a flat circle anyway I guess.

1. There is no such thing as “tumblr famous,” unless you’re referring to the hilarious and delightful fic of the same name (please go read it, you will cackle). Posting Hot Takes for imaginary Clout™ on this site is kind of pointless in the long run. Sure you can post solely for the sake of stirring shit and getting notes, but the majority of the folks who do aren’t long term residents of the fandom. They’re just tourists moving through our little beach town for spring break. If you’re actually intent on moving to this corner of the fandom for an extended stay, please bother to really feel out the permanent residents and understand the culture and general mood of the neighborhood. It bears no resemblance to whatever’s going on across town where all the bars and beach parities are happening, and those loud, drunken revelers are, again, gonna disappear back to their regular lives or on to the next party eventually. That doesn’t mean the fandom is dying, it’s just evolving.

(funny how I had several comments implying that I’m just trying to keep the fandom from evolving with this post, because I sincerely do want the fandom to continue on for years to come, and that is impossible without evolution. We can evolve without self-immolating, though. mostly i included point 1 for an excuse to push ancient but hilarious fanfic on you.)

2. Once you post something here, it’s been unleashed to the fandom winds. You never know where it will end up, or who will comment on it or add to it. Remember that time Misha tweeted the link to the Epic Cockles Love Story post? No? It was wild. That was 2012. They all know we’re here, and how to find us if they want to. Please don’t take it to their doorsteps.

Obviously if someone is being a dick on your posts, please feel free to block them, but the whole entire point of this site is to engage people with your posts. Being big mad that someone reblogged your post with comments or supporting evidence, or happy headcanons or “HECK THIS IS GREAT BECAUSE (insert personal story about their experience or whatever else made them Feel Things about your post)” is frankly ridiculous. If your goal is to avoid any sort of engagement with your posts, then maybe try instagram instead. From what I understand, there is a SPN fandom presence there, and nobody can tarnish your original posts with unwanted commentary. But the ability to reblog with additional commentary is a FEATURE of tumblr that builds community through conversation. Otherwise we’re all just talking to ourselves in a vacuum, and that’s what actually kills fandoms.

(and for the folks who just want to blog how they want to blog and don’t want people to engage on their posts at all, please feel free to block anyone you want, as well... nobody wants to step on your toes, but most of us also don’t want to walk on eggshells wondering if this post is one of the “do not add comments for any reason” sorts of posts, either. This is a huge fandom and most people can’t even begin to keep track of every creator and their url du jour, and what their personal rules might be regarding interaction with their content. Including a “please don’t add comments” note at the bottom of your posts-- and not in your tags that won’t even show up on reblogs, but in the actual body of the post-- would sincerely help avoid any awkward or unwanted interactions, too. At the end of the day, you are in control of your own fandom experience and the block button exists.

For the record, I block zero fandom blogs (which is why I posted this, I wanted it to reach a wide scope... refer to the opening paragraphs as to why).

3. Since this post was partly inspired by a tag I left on that post going around about how “previous tags” mean fuckall on this site (which you can read here), just a reminder that if you like someone’s tags or feel they add value to the post, part of the Peer Review structure of tumblr encourages you to PASTE THEM INTO A REBLOG. If you do this, then at least credit the person who actually wrote the tags! Don’t just copy someone else’s tags into your tags on your reblog of the post without credit either. They were not YOUR tags. (I have had this happen to tag rambles I wrote and someone else got credited with them on a subsequent reblog and it is FRUSTRATING). Just... don’t even bother to write “previous tags” because WHAT PREVIOUS TAGS?! Nobody is gonna bother to chase back the chain of reblogs trying to find where the mystery tags came from, friendos. That way lies madness.

(for the record, since some folks seemed to focus on this point solely, writing “previous tags” on a post isn’t inherently a BAD thing, but for anyone who actually is here for more than one-off shitposting, then it’s sort of a pointless thing in the long run. This wasn’t intended to suggest people who ARE here for one-off shitposting are bad or “doing it wrong,” but for people who might actually want to preserve that hilarious joke or insightful comment. People delete posts and entire blogs all the time around here. Links break. I get that the upcoming generation just shrugs at that and moves on with their lives, but heck... you don’t have to accept that all entertainment is disposable if you don’t want to. There’s a bizarre sort of nihilism plaguing us all about the impermanence of pretty much everything that feels like something we should be fighting against rather than buying into wholesale, even in our escapist entertainment. I’m just exhausted by the complete loss of joy in community.

*shouts from the peanut gallery* IT AIN’T THAT DEEP, JUST GET SOME FRESH AIR AND LOOK AT A PUPPY OR SOMETHING

Yes... yes it isn’t really that deep, but bigger picture in the state of reality we’re all entirely disillusioned with, are we supposed to just give up on everything, including the things we cling to because they bring us a tiny spark of hope that we’re not all just trapped in this dystopian nightmare and things might actually be worth living for?

*peanut gallery clinging to burnt husks of peanuts in a barren peanut field* but this is how we have chosen to cope

Okay... you do you... I feel bad for you but if that’s the case then this post is NOT FOR YOU. AND THAT’S FINE. I honestly do not care if you don’t care! I mean, I’m sorry anyone has to live in a world that drives them to that mindset, but I understand. This post is for anyone who might look at their lives and their choices and think “no wait, I unironically enjoy this and want more from the experience of that enjoyment than I’m currently feeling.” Everyone else can continue with their lives as usual.)

4. CONTENT THEFT IS NEVER OKAY. PERIOD. Things like “credit to the artist” or tagging gifs or images you found on pinterest as “not mine” isn’t actually credit. If you can’t source an image or gif set, DO NOT POST IT! We don’t REPOST (i.e. save an image and then create a new post with it as if it was our own creation). We REBLOG (click the little square arrows and reblog from the actual creator). That goes for gif sets, fanvids, screencaps, meta, fic... everything.

(hopefully everyone here already understands this one, but I felt compelled to include some “these are stupidly obvious” reminders anyway, since this is ostensibly some sort of advice column. This is the equivalent of the warning label on your toaster reminding you not to use it in the bath. Like... duh...)

5. Close kin of item 4 is SOURCE YOUR SHIT.

(for 100% disclosure purposes, I specifically discussed this one in this specific way because of an influx of anon ask messages I received in the wake of the finale. Literally the inciting incident for creating this entire post was what I can only assume was a joking ask about a comment Misha made at a con years ago. Someone actually bothered to take the time to type out those sentences to me. I have no idea what they were expecting in reply, or what could possibly motivate them to send this comment about something so entirely random from, again, several years ago. Just a joke? No idea, but whatever... it got me thinking that there might actually be people who are new to the fandom who MIGHT actually care about the fandom history, and maybe they just don’t know where to go for that info, or how to even begin searching through 16 years of history for things they might actually find enjoyment in, rather than just hauling random out of context garbage out on main and pointing and laughing about it now. People are actually allowed to care about things. It’s not cringeworthy to actually care about things, and you are not alone in actually caring, and there’s this whole big room over here full of people who are thrilled to share in that with you. This post is intended FOR THOSE PEOPLE SPECIFICALLY, so if that is not you, please just continue walking by.)

Yes, I know lots of y’all are new around here right now, but dredging up stuff from years ago that fandom has completely debunked and presenting it as TRU FAX again is just exhausting. We’re not trying to be party poopers, but seriously, we have seen it all and are mostly done with extinguishing bags of flaming dog poop on our front porches for the umpteenth year in a row. I’ve seen a lot of posts that have the same tone as “I saw Goody Proctor dancing with the devil” or “I heard kylo ren has an eight pack” and just... the information is there for anyone who cares enough to find it.

This goes double for “why is nobody talking about this thing I just discovered while watching the show for the first time?!” And, oh hon, we have talked it all into the ground over the last fifteen years. We’re happy you’re discovering it again, but I promise we talked about it plenty when the episodes originally aired. We have such a rich meta history that lots of us have worked really hard to preserve. I encourage you to seek it out, if nothing else than as historical artifacts. The way we have discussed the show has been a 16-year evolution. People have written literal doctoral dissertations on this show. Your shitposts are fun! We love reliving our own experience through fresh eyes, and seeing your wonder at experiencing it all again for the first time! But y’all didn’t invent this fandom in the last six months, either.

Meta Sources and Minerals provided by our friendly neighborhood fandom archivist, @lets-steal-an-archive

Academic books and articles about SPN

A collection of Meta Essays going back to s1 and organized by topic (all of this has happened before, all of it will happen again)

SPN Heavy Meta Archive (s1-3)

Mel’s Dreamwidth archive of meta (s1-12)

Oranges8hands Dreamwidth archive of meta (s1-15, with many similar entries to Mel’s... though ymmv on viewpoint in a lot of these too)

Anyone remember Fandom Wank? Not the concept but the actual LJ... No? Okay have a link to SPN topics that ended up there. Through 2013. We have seen so much... including several fandom containment breaches.

for all your art sourcing needs, please see @theroadsofararchive, the repository for so much fandom art.

need to find a gif of something? canonspngifs is a vast repository of gifsets of the entire series. If the gif you want to use in your post happens to be the first gif in the gifset, in the tumblr gif finder thingy just paste the permalink to that post from canonspngifs (which is easily searchable by episode, character, location, situation, quotes, and sometimes even color and clothing items the actors are wearing... it’s really well organized, especially for tumblr >.>) and the first gif will be automatically linked with credit to the gif creator attached. It makes life easy that way. It’s also convenient when trying to remember something specific but can’t remember what episode it’s from. I’ve used the site to jog my memory before going to the superwiki armed with more specific search results to find episode quotes and references. Or sometimes I just scroll through all the nice gifs for fun, too.

Need a screencap of something and know exactly which episode it’s from? Try Home of the Nutty. You might not find the exact screencap you’re looking for, but they have a complete set of caps of every episode, and it’s an incredibly useful resource for quick reference checks and the like. Just give pages a chance to fully load before clicking on the next one. The site is easily overloaded, but it’s still free to use (and again, with credit... Pretty much every screencap on my entire blog is from HotN unless otherwise credited).

As you can see, this is a fandom built on preserving our history. You absolutely are not required to engage with any of this if that’s not of interest to you, but I can only assume that there are people who would be interested in it if only they knew it existed and how to find it. Well, now they do.

6. A few more notes on tags, and how they work on tumblr. The first 20 tags on your ORIGINAL posts are searchable sitewide, so if you want to be able to find something again, tag that thing first before going on general tag rambles. The only place tags on reblogs are searchable is on your own blog. So you don’t have to put 50 tags trying to get a post seen if it’s a reblog. You’re just spitting into the wind at that point. If you have a filing system for finding things again, then by all means add those tags (again, in the first 20, so they’re searchable), but you don’t need to tag a reblog “destiel” and “deancas” and “dean” and “cas” and “dean x cas” or whatever. Pick one for your personal blog’s filing system, that’s all you need.

(this was only added because tagging and searching on this site is so very broken... I get that a lot of folks don’t care about ever searching their own blogs again for anything, so this one only really applies if you do often find yourself trying to find old posts. If not, then it’s not really relevant. It took me years to work out a decent tagging system, and at the beginning of my time here I never thought I’d end up camping out here for a decade and falling this deep into the fandom, and I regretted my lack of consistent tags only years later when I realized I actually wanted to be able to go back and find specific old posts again. So... for anyone who wants to err on the side of caution, working out a sensible tagging system really helps if you’re here for the long term. I personally tag content by episode, because some of my other general tags are so large as to be practically useless as a search term. But whatever system you choose to file stuff on your own blog, it really only has to make sense to you. And again, if this is pointless advice for someone who has no intention of settling here for the long term. Please feel free to ignore it. I just wish someone had explained it this way to me ten years ago and saved me the hassle of retroactively tagging something like 30k posts... especially now that using the mass tag replacer is the fastest way to get your entire blog deleted... oops? so yeah, don’t use the mass tag replacer either >.>)

7. Tags on Tumblr DO NOT WORK LIKE TAGS ON TWITTER. If you @ someone in the body of the post, it will show up in their notifications (if they’re the sort of person who even checks their notifications... not all of us do. For the record, I generally don’t...), but putting actor or ship names in the tags on a tumblr post does absolutely nothing. It’s not the same as tagging the actor’s twitter account in a tweet. Nobody’s getting notifications about you tagging a post about Jensen here as “Jensen Ackles.” There is a difference. Please learn it. (and don’t take headcanons and ESPECIALLY RPF or otherwise explicit art or fic from tumblr to twitter and tag the actors in it. That’s just... not okay.)

(I have seen the pearl clutchers getting all in a huff about the mere existence of RPF or even explicit content of fictional characters if it doesn’t meet their purity standards, but tagging those things allows people who don’t want to see it to actively avoid that content here. Nobody has a right to tell people their fictional content shouldn’t exist at all, or that creators of that fictional content somehow deserve harassment or threats for having dared to create such “immoral” content, won’t somebody PLEASE think of the children... and no... you do not do that here. Don’t be the problematic behavior you wish to ban from the world. Learn to use tags to protect yourself from, as i have attempted to emphasize here, fictional content you are personally upset by. That’s a you problem, not a problem for the creators of potentially upsetting content that they tag appropriately for.)

8. General formatting stuff: If you’re writing long text posts, visually break them up so people aren’t faced with one long wall of text. The enter key is your friend. Also, if you put long text posts under a Read More break and send people to your blog to finish reading, please ensure that your blog is actually visually accessible (tiny text, or light grey text on a dark grey background, or a visually busy background might be aesthetically pleasing to you but nobody can actually read it. Loads of folks won’t even try. Which is great if you don’t actually care whether people are able to appreciate your content or not, but something to at least consider if you *do* actively want to encourage engagement with your work. Confirm how your blog looks on both mobile and desktop and make sure it’s actually functional in both, too).

And since I mentioned that most of my experience on fandom tumblr has been in the SPN fandom, here’s a bit of a reminder for folks who are new around here. With the reminder that I have been here more than a decade and still feel like a newbie myself sometimes...

This is an OLD FANDOM. There are many, many people who have been at this longer than some of you have been alive. The average age for creators in this fandom is older than you think (I think of my friends in their 30′s as young’ins okay? okay). With that understood, you are responsible for the content you consume and are exposed to. Curate your experience. Ship and let ship. YKINMKATOK. Don’t deliberately expose yourself to content you find upsetting for whatever reason. Tags and warnings are your friends, not targets for you to attack in some sort of purity war. People will ship things you do not like (or in specific ways you do not like), will say things you do not agree with, and will find their happiness in things you abhor. That is not your concern. Find what you do like, and support and engage with it, and ignore (or block, or unfollow) the rest. Tumblr has a feature that lets you blacklist tags so the content you’re trying to avoid won’t appear on your dash.

Remember the paradox of tolerance.

It is not your job in fandom to police how other people enjoy the fandom. It’s not *my* job to police how *you* enjoy the fandom, UNLESS your enjoyment is in actively harming other real human beings in the fandom. If you don’t like their take on the character or the show or the plotlines or their ships or anything else, you don’t need to engage with their posts at all! The necessary corollary to this is that clarifying misunderstandings or correcting factual misinformation is not “policing.”

(this is where the peanut gallery reminds me it ain’t that deep, and I plead with them to put down the social media and find just one (1) thing to actually believe in in this godforsaken life, find something other than disdain and cynicism and spite to live for. If those things motivate you to find a larger cause for yourself, then great, use them to your advantage, but use them to find something that makes you a better person or brings you a modicum of joy and connection to your fellow human beings despite living in a dystopian hellscape of a world)

I have seen a lot of posts lately that are founded on the sort of authority that comes with “I watched through tumblr for a few months and then watched the last three episodes of the series” and as such are just... missing the larger context of the entire show, and are unfounded entirely in canon. I 100% appreciate the new enthusiasm for the fandom that we’ve been living in here for years, and it’s wonderful to see new people enjoying the thing we love. Your headcanons are valid, you are valid, but recognize that your headcanons aren’t canon. All of us finale denialists have accepted this in some measure, so we feel you. We truly, truly feel you. But regarding actual canon, we have a resource for that: the Superwiki. Learn it, live it, love it, as Metatron would say.

(which you could discover he said in 10.17 Inside Man, thanks to the superwiki! accept no substitutes!)

(and again, there have been people who have been involved in fandom for years who haven’t engaged with canon in years, either! You can play in this universe however you choose, BUT FOR PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY CARE ABOUT CANON AT ALL, WHICH I AM AGAIN POINTEDLY SAYING MIGHT NOT BE YOU, READER, AND I’M NOT SUGGESTING YOU ARE WRONG FOR NOT WANTING TO ACTUALLY ENGAGE WITH CANON, but if you DO want to engage with canon, please have some useful resources. Why do people feel personally attacked by being presented a list of helpful resources? Absolutely baffling.)

(also: words have definitions. “Canon” is a specific thing, meaning in this case “the finished media product that aired on television.” Anything beyond those limits is secondary canon (think: john’s journal, which is not canon but canon adjacent at best...), word of god (i.e stuff said by the writers and showrunners), or headcanon (which includes actor commentary-- they may have helped create the show with their acting choices and whatever, but they are not in control of the story overall). If there’s something you dislike about actual canon, you can reject it and supplement it with your own theories or preferred outcomes-- that’s basically what fanfic is-- but that doesn’t make your theories canon (much to all our dismay, that’s just not how any of this works. This is not to invalidate how anyone engages with the show or the fandom, just trying to clarify what seems to have been a source of unintentional misunderstandings. Your theories do not have to be “canon” to be legitimate interpretations.)

***I am setting this section apart, and did make a separate post of just this following information, because this is where we go from being relatively chill about different parts of fandom choosing to interact in different ways and you do you and blog however you want, to “hey can everybody please understand that the way you are interacting with this specific material might be harmful for specific legal reasons, and stating that you do not care about the consequences of your actions does actively make you the asshole here...” Okay, now that we have that understood:

The spnscripthunt collective has been steadily acquiring new scripts (which are posted in full on the superwiki for everyone to enjoy, for free). The language around how some folks are talking about these scripts is... concerning. For very real legal reasons, actually, and not because we’re feeling precious about the collection and don’t wike it when meanies use them in shitposts.

-First off, these scripts are not “leaks.” They are all verified and legally purchased (or gifted, in some cases, but still acquired entirely above board. we didn’t whack anyone over the head in a back alley for these scripts, or swipe them out of someone’s trailer on set).

(in case anyone was unaware, these scripts are the copywritten protected property of Warner Brothers. So yes, how we use them and share them with the fandom could have legal repercussions. We present them as a collected resource of fandom history which SHOULD fall under Fair Use doctrine, but this is untested legal water. Insinuating that the scripts are somehow not entirely legally obtained, or that posting them for public access involved less than 100% transparent and entirely legal transactions is incredibly concerning.

Once again for the peanut gallery, if you don’t care about any of that and are just having a good time with it, at least be mindful of the work and expense a large group of people have gone through to acquire and present the content you’re all too eager to exploit for cheap thrills. Some of us do actually care and are not exactly comfortable with the fact that others don’t seem to care about burning it all to the ground. We can’t force you to listen or behave as we’d hope you might, but at least be aware of the potential consequences of your actions. All we’re asking is for you to not be the douchebag who sets the whole neighborhood on fire with your illegal fireworks display. Is that too much to ask for? more on that in a second, first... a psa)

-If you see a script for sale and are unsure if it’s legit (or believe it might already be freely available in our collection), please feel free to ask us for advice. Our goal is to make as much of our fandom history available to the entire fandom, and we absolutely do not want anyone shelling out money for stuff you can already find for free.

(seriously, we’ve seen a bunch of resellers cropping up selling printed versions of the scripts we bought and uploaded for everyone to enjoy free of charge, or scripts that are otherwise of dubious origin. We’ve been at this for years now and know what’s actually out there. We don’t want anyone to fall for a scam if we can help it)

-Also, the usual reminder that the scripts we acquire ARE NOT NECESSARILY THE FINAL SHOOTING DRAFTS. In fact, the majority of scripts in our collection are NOT. Changes are made daily to scripts, even during filming. Comparing a Production Draft (white pages, effectively the first “final draft” of what usually becomes a series of drafts before filming wraps) to a much later revision (say... green or goldenrod revisions, several of which we DO have in our collection for comparison) and how those earlier drafts often differ wildly from the aired version versus how similar a much later green draft is to the aired version, for example, can teach you a lot about the television writing process. The link above to the superwiki scripts page has a nice little explainer about how this process works.

Differences between our posted scripts (many of which are white drafts, aka FIRST complete drafts, which will likely go through multiple rounds of revisions before filming even begins) and the aired version of the show are not all “acting choices” or a director or editor just cutting whole scenes on a whim. It’s insulting to everyone involved in production to suggest that’s the case.

(and yeah, fine... whatever, make any sort of posts you like regarding how those changes came about, but at the very least understand that it’s not actually the truth about how any of this works. Don’t care that that’s not the truth and want to make the posts anyway because shitposting is fun and that’s the extent of your sense of humor? FINE! You’re entitled to do that! But at least you DO know the truth now, and hopefully so do the people who engage with your posts. Deliberate ignorance isn’t cute, smooth lions notwithstanding)

There’s probably a whole other post to be made on fandom tagging etiquette, but again I don’t really use the tags enough to know what’s going on with that whole situation. I’ve also probably left a lot of stuff out, so please feel free to add things I’ve overlooked.

Thanks also to @trisscar368 and @thayerkerbasy for help compiling this, too. They were kind enough to escort me through the park to feed these pigeons. Now I need to take them out for ice cream. :’D

So I guess welcome to the neighborhood. Make yourself at home, but like... try not to trash the place while you’re here. Some of us live here by choice, lol.

#this blue hellsite (affectionate)#fandom problems #kinda wish i'd made this post six months ago but here we are i guess lol #long post #now edited for the people who are actually personally invested in the fandom #thanks for participating in this little experiment and I hope this version is actually informative to those who are interested #meaning there's a lot more links to stuff and explainers and whatnot...#and one last reminder that for folks just swinging through for laughs absolutely none of this applies to you #if you are legit interested in fandom history and preservation as we move to the post-canon world then hopefully this is useful to you

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nanatsumu · 4 years ago

Text

TEENAGE FEVER

pairing: iwaizumi hajime x f!reader, oikawa tooru x f!reader

synopsis: iwaizumi has strung you on long enough and you’re finally at the end of your rope.

genre: heavy angst... like make your heart wrench in pain heavy, one sided pining

warnings: manga spoilers, bad grammar (didn’t know it was that bad until i used grammarly), MATURE themes, drinking, smoking, alcohol, iwaizumi being an asshole (he’s also a frat boy because surprise! frat boys should never be trusted), subtle hints at sex, bittersweet ending

word count: 6.7K

series masterlist

part one | part two | part three | part four

“y/n we know you’re in there, someone told me they saw you run in here.”

great!

you slowly sit up from the toilet, dragging your feet across the bathroom tiles until you make it to the door and begin unlocking the lock at a snail’s pace. but before you can even get a chance to twist the doorknob, somebody is already doing so on the other side of the door and the next thing you know, reina’s screaming ‘HURRY UP’ and you’re assaulted by the bathroom door.

“REINA!” you scream as the result of the door flying into your face has you clutching your head.

“SHIT! SORRY Y/N!”

“geez, why are you so fucking slow,” oikawa complains as he sucks his teeth, pushing the door in a little wider so that you can see standing him behind reina as well. “did iwa-chan’s kiss mess you up that bad?”

“your friend is a prick, oikawa!” reina jabs him in the side, eliciting a grunt from the poor man. “it was supposed to be a quick smooch but that guy had to be extra and start using tongue!”

“what kind of guy kisses a girl who he’s only met once like that?!” your female friend cries.

“only someone as ballsy as him would even try and do that,” oikawa stops scratching his head, his eyes widening like saucers as if he’s just realized something. “and don’t put all the blame on iwaizumi! y/n, you literally moaned! and i even saw you kissing back!”

“don’t make me feel shittier than i already do oikawa!” you jeer.

“he...” you sigh and you can feel the tears start to prickle your eyes. “i feel so humiliated, and embarrassed.”

“and i-i felt so... so exposed.”

oikawa’s playful expression falters as he hears the hurt in your voice and manages to squeeze his way past a protesting reina before kneeling down so that he could meet your glossy eyes.

“listen, i’ll apologize on his behalf for now and i’ll take him about it later, alright?” he awkwardly pats your shoulder, not sure what to do as he’s never been in a situation where he’s had to comfort a girl bawling her eyes out.

“y-you... don’t have— t-to do that,” you whimper. “i’m just being a big crybaby, it’s just a silly kiss.”

“no it’s not!” reina blurts out a little louder than she intended to. “that prick completely disrespected you and embarrassed you in front of everyone! it wasn’t even a matter of him kissing you, it was a part of a game, but that dude took it too far and crossed the line!”

“listen, this is why i told you to stay away from him in the first place,” your roommate shuffles closer to you and pulls you in for a hug. “let’s go home alright?”

“let me walk you guys home, it’s getting late outside and even though you two are together, you never know what’ll happen.” oikawa offers, and while you are quick to accept, reina wavers momentarily.

“how do you know you’re not gonna take advantage of us, hm?”

“please, if i wanted to i already would’ve given the circumstances but i haven’t because i. do. not. want. to!” he smiles patronizingly which irks reina.

“whatever, but if you even think about trying anything then i’ll cut your dick off and feed it to my lizard.” she threatens but oikawa doesn’t take it to heart.

you finally get the last of your sniffles out as you stand up to your feet and exit the bathroom with oikawa and reina trailing along right behind you, similar to an assembly line of ducks— a very... tall duck, a crying duck, and an angry duck.

the walk home was rowdier than you had expected it to be. while you were quieter than usual and still in a bad mood from earlier events, that didn’t stop oikawa and reina though from causing a ruckus on the way back to the dorms.

“you’re telling me, that THAT’S hajime? like hajime iwaizumi? the notorious playboy of irvine?” reina gapes as she stares at the photo of iwaizumi back in high school that oikawa had saved in his phone.

even you were surprised to see what iwaizumi looked back then when reina practically shoved oikawa’s phone in your face, the brightness radiating from his phone screen only further irritating your bloodshot eyes.

while he still had a bit of muscle on him back then, he looked a lot lankier in comparison to his university counterpart who had grown twice in size. his once pale skin had become almost a sun-kissed tan color that complimented his features. but what shocked you the most was that the iwaizumi shown to you in the photos was free from any blemishes on his arms and his ears weren’t dressed in dangly silvers or studs.

“that’s iwaizumi?” your jaw dropped and oikawa was quick to make a teasing remark about how your mouth was wide open enough for flies to fly in.

“what happened to him?!” reina cries.

“sometimes i wonder why he hasn’t visited japan in the past 4 years but when i look back at this photo and then compare it to present him, i would piss my pants too if i were him and had to go back home to my mom.”

“does his mom not like tattoos or piercings?” reina questions as you and oikawa give each other a look before turning back to the girl.

“i don’t know about iwaizumi, but my mom is pretty strict about tattoos and piercings,” you start to explain. “she’s the ‘girls shouldn’t get tattoos!’ and ‘guys shouldn’t get piercings!’ type of mom, so she’s not completely against it, but if i came home with a huge ass tattoo like iwaizumi then she’d sure as hell chop my arm off.”

“japan’s pretty strict about piercings and tattoos, especially when it comes to students because tattoos are kind of a sign of the yakuza in japan,” oikawa adds in addition. “piercings aren’t as frowned upon as tattoos but it’s usually the younger kids who have ‘em.”

“yakuza?”

“like a gang basically? or a mafia i guess.” you answer reina to the best of your abilities.

you start kicking a pebble around and breathe in the crisp california air, watching as a puff of smoke escapes your lips with every exhale.

“you alright?” oikawa asks as he begins growing worried since you haven’t said anything in the past few minutes.

“yeah, just thinking,” you stuff your hands into your pockets and continue kicking the pebble beneath your feet. “california is a lot hotter than japan.”

“you think california is hot? just wait ‘till you spend a day in the summer heat in argentina.” he counters.

“maybe one day,” you say in consideration. “maybe when i graduate university i’ll consider traveling somewhere before my life completely revolves around paying taxes and bills.”

“if you do come to argentina one day then just give me a call and i’ll be more than happy to give you a tour around.” he beams.

“my cousin is playing volleyball in brazil, i think?” you say, remembering your mother telling you that hinata had gone to play beach volleyball in brazil. “he’s blood-related but he lived in miyagi while i lived in aomori so we never really got to see each other that much.”

“miyagi? i used to live in miyagi too!”

“huh? really? do you know a hinata shoyo then?” you ask, intrigued at the newfound information. “i heard from my mom that he started playing volleyball in high school so he’s probably played you once in a game if you played volleyball in high school too.”

“i did actually, his team beat mine during the qualifiers for spring nationals my last year of high school and man, i think i probably broke the record for most bowls of ramen eaten in one sitting that day.” he chuckles but it comes out sounding more half-heartedly in your ears, almost like he’s recalling an unpleasant memory from the past.

“so what made you go to argentina?” you ask and oikawa answers like he’s been asked this countless of times (which he has.)

“when i was a kid, there was this volleyball player i really looked up to,” oikawa starts. “his name was jose blanco and there was a tournament happening in sendai that i went to where he played against japan, and at the time there was a young ace on the team who was a fledgling star,”

“he made a big impression during the first half of the tournament but he started getting worse as things progressed. he was kind of off for the rest of the game and i thought that he was gonna be subbed out but it wasn’t until they switched setters that i noticed the ace was getting back into his groove. jose was a veteran setter, 38 years old i think? and if you were to be asked who the star of the game was then you’d probably say the ace since he was the one who scored most of the points right? but if you ask me, i think the setter was the star of the game!”

“he was so cool too! like he was so calm the entire time and he inconspicuously helped the ace get back on to his feet and just simply left the court,” oikawa continues to ramble. “i even got an autograph but that dumbass iwaizumi took the paper that i bought and got the autograph of some dude on the japan team so i had to give jose the jersey i bought earlier that day instead. although it did end up getting washed though....”

“hah! desperate much?” you laugh as you bump shoulders with him.

“desperate time for desperate measures! no way was i gonna leave without getting the jose blanco’s autograph!” he emphasizes.

unbeknownst to you and oikawa, a cheeky smile creeps upon reina’s face as she watches you and oikawa converse with each other like you two were long-time friends catching up for the first time in forever.

you, on the other hand, were starstruck by the man that is oikawa tooru.

the story he told you left you feeling heart-warmed because you noticed how his eyes sparkled and his lips curved into a genuine smile as he talked about his idol and the sport he is so passionate about. oikawa was many things: a flirt, a smooth talker, a sly fox, and he could get a little handsy sometimes— but you could tell the love he had for volleyball was like no other and you respected how committed he was to the sport, even going as far as to going to argentina in order to follow his long-time idol.

“i think it’s really cool that you’re so passionate about volleyball,” you smile as you peer up at the night sky. “in my opinion, i think being committed to one thing your entire life is a bit hard depending on who you are, but at least there are guys like you who are one-in-a-million.”

your words strike a chord in oikawa and reina is quick to notice the way his lips part as he holds his gaze on you.

“oh would you two quit flirting!” reina lets out an inhumane noise that startles you and oikawa.

“you scared me!” you take a deep breath and frantically clutch your heart.

“just say you forgot that i was here because you were too busy getting chummy with oikawa!” she groans while pulling her face.

“you’re just jealous i’m stealing your roommate away,” oikawa sticks his tongue out at your roommate before stopping in his tracks and pulling you into a hug. “but don’t worry! i’ll take extremely good care of her.”

“no way buddy,” reina takes a hold of your arm and uses all of her strength in order to pull you away from oikawa. “she was my roommate before she was your friend!”

“wow i feel so popular,” you say sarcastically, accompanied with a roll of your eyes. “it’s 1 now and i think i would very much rather be at home right now in my jammies instead of listening to you two bicker back and forth.”

“you don’t mean me do you, y/n?!” reina wails as she clings onto you.

“oh look! it’s a bear!” you point out to the other side of the street and reina snaps her head in the direction you’re pointing in.

“where?!”

with her attention off of you, you take this chance to slip away from her and run towards your dorm building along with oikawa who’s right on your tail.

“you’re... really... fast!” oikawa pants as he speaks in-between breaths. “like a lo— WOAH!”

he trips over a slab of concrete that was out of place and out of reflex, he latches onto the nearest object— and unfortunately, you were the closest thing he could grab onto.

“H-HEY!” you screech when you feel yourself being pulled down onto the ground.

with the split second that he had of clarity, oikawa took advantage of the opportunity and moved his hand under your head so that it wouldn’t make contact with the concrete and his hand, would instead, cushion your fall.

you hit the concrete with an ‘oof!’ and while you were awaiting the sharp pain in the back of your head to come, it never came. instead, you open your eyes only to see oikawa’s brown ones staring right back at you with an astounded expression that mirrored yours.

“so, how are you doing this fine night?” he grins.

“pretty good, up until your dumbass tripped and pulled me down with you,” you snort.

reina gasps dramatically when she catches up to you guys and sees the position you two are in.

“you deny your chumminess with him and then you run off to get all handsy with him!”

“this idiot tripped and then thought it would be a good idea to pull me down with him,” you stand up after oikawa offers to pull you up. “what kind of thought process do you even have to think that i could catch your fall?”

reina squeezes his bicep, triggering him to let out a yelp.

“oh it’s hard alright.” reina smirks as oikawa yanks his arm away.

“do you work out a lot?” you sneak up behind oikawa and put your hands on his broad shoulders.

“yup!” he flexes his arm and gives you both a cheeky smile. “i gained 10 kilograms of muscle mass!”

“1-10?! isn’t that like 20 pounds?!” reina gawks at the volleyball player.

“yeah and guess what, i only grew one centimeter so it was all me baby!” he laughs almost mockingly.

the rest of the walk home was full of laughter and heartwarming bantering between the three of you and you were happy that you were able to meet reina, an amazing roommate, and oikawa, who was a cocky shit but still managed to squeeze a laugh out of you.

it was going to be a long 4 years away from home, but just as long as you were surrounded by the right people, you were sure that these 4 years would fly by in a jiffy.

when you guys finally arrived at your dorm building, you notified reina that you would stay outside and chat with oikawa for a bit and so she gave you the okay and headed up to your room first so that she could get ready for bed since she was about ready to knock out right then and there.

“thanks for walking me home, oikawa,” you pull him in for friendly hug that he didn’t expect, but nevertheless, he hugs back anyway because who is he to decline a hug from you? “i feel bad for having you walk me home even though you probably want to hang out with iwaizumi.

oikawa feels his stomach churn at the mention of his best friend and guilt creeps upon him like bile rising in the back of your throat.

oikawa had turned a blind eye to iwaizumi’s bad habit of playing around with girls and leaving them after he’s had his fair share of fun because iwaizumi was his best friend and despite the drastic transformation he had gone through within the 4 years that they’ve been away from each other, oikawa knew deep down that he was still the iwaizumi he knew and loved— the iwaizumi who had stuck with him through thick and thin during his adolescent years.

however, now that he’s taken the time to familiarize himself with you personally and grow to learn what type of person you were— someone with a good heart but isn’t afraid to voice their own opinions and stand their ground when people try to walk all over them— he can’t help but be greedy and want you all for himself.

“say, y/n,” you give him a soft hum in response which prompts him to continue taking. “you wanna grab some milk bread with me tomorrow at the cafe you were talking about?”

“are you asking me out on a date right now?” you wheeze. “you’re pretty bold for asking out someone you’ve only met twice your entire life.”

“it’s not a date unless you want it to be.” he wiggles his eyebrows.

“a platonic date sounds good to me, don’t you think?”

“there’s no such thing as a platonic date, y/n.”

“maybe not to you since you’re probably used to girls flocking around you all the time,” you say and he’s visibly upset at the fact that you think he’s a casanova or something when in reality he still hasn’t had his first girlfriend yet. “so you in? i’ll even call it a date if you’d like.”

“yeah i’m in,” he puts his fist out for a fist bump, which you are content with returning, and he beams at you with the biggest smile you’ve seen him give you. “does the afternoon work for you?”

you pull your phone out of your jacket pocket and open up the contacts app before handing it to the male.

“just give me your number and we can go over the specifics over text tonight.”

he punches in his number, saving the contact as “tooru👽” before handing the device back to you.

“an alien emoji?” you laugh as you read his contact name displayed on your phone. “you’re a dork.”

“like you’re any less of a dork than me.” he playfully rolls his eyes as he pulls his phone out and gives it for you to return the favor.

you clumsily put your number into his phone, accidentally pressing some random digit one too many times, and save your name as “y/n :3” before handing his phone back to him.

“a bunny face?” he threw his head back and let out a humorous laugh.

“shut up!” you give his shoulder a gentle push. “as if an alien emoji is any better, at least my emoticon is cute!”

“yeah yeah, whatever you say.” he slips his phone back into his pocket before giving you one last final hug that feels a bit warmer than the ones he’s given you before.

“get home safe, oikawa.”

his eyes linger on your face for a bit longer than he would’ve liked.

your eyes were crinkled and your smile lines were more prominent up close, but it didn’t stop oikawa’s heart from skipping a beat.

“sweet dreams y/n.”

you awaken the next morning to the sound of your phone ringing and reina’s abnormally loud snoring (you’re surprised that the girls in the next room over haven’t come knocking at your door telling your roommate to snore a little quieter.)

with the sleep still present in your eyes, the brightness of your phone screen causes you to squint before your vision clears up and you’re able to make out the numbers ‘7:30 A.M’ displayed across your screen.

when the haziness finally leaves your system, you take a look outside your window and realize that the only speck of sunlight present at all is the sunlight that’s provided by the rising sun, peeking out from across the horizon.

you mentally curse oikawa out in your head as your fingers dance across your keyboard to type out a brief response to oikawa’s suspiciously ominous text message.

you reluctantly get up from your bed and slip on your fuzzy bunny slippers before treading over to your door, unlocking it, and then swinging it open, revealing your tall, brown-haired friend standing right where he said he would be.

“nice jammies,” he lets loose an unrestrained, boisterous laugh as he reaches out to fix the strap of your tank top which slipped off your shoulder. “i dig the bunny slippers by the way.”

you haphazardly shuffle your feet, gaining a smile from oikawa as he chuckles softly.

“can i come in?” he peers into the room by leaning over a bit where he sees reina sprawled out in a weird position on her bed, snoring loudly.

“uh, reina’s actually asleep,” you sheepishly scratch the back of your head. “the dorms don’t have separate bedrooms, everyone just sleeps in the same room with their respective roommates.”

“so movie night’s no longer in question?”

“i guess if you don’t mind reina being a plus one,” you shrug as you gesture for him to come in, letting him enter the room first so that you can close the door on your way in. “she’s a heavy sleeper so don’t worry about waking her up.”

oikawa throws himself onto your bed, even going as far as to slipping under your covers and making himself right at home, which, you don’t hesitate to scold him for doing so.

“what’s the point of coming all the way over here just to go back to sleep?” you cross your arms as you walk over to your bed, your knees hitting the edge of the mattress.

“the bakery opens at 8:30 so i wanted to pick you up since the walk there is 25 minutes from here,” oikawa pulls his phone out and checks the time. “it’s 7:37 now so hurry and get ready!”

you shuffle over to the worn-out dresser that has been with you since the day you moved into the dorms and pull out the drawers that contain a majority of your most worn pieces. taking into account the outfit that oikawa was currently sporting— an oversized hoodie, a loose pair of sweatpants, and some sneakers that looked to be on the pricier side— you decided that wearing something similar to that would suffice.

“can you turn around?” you ask as you grab a pair of black sweatpants, not bothering to check the design since they looked all the same anyways, and an oversized hoodie that you forgot you even had in your possession.

“hm? why?”

“i’m gonna change?” you shrug. “unless you don’t mind staying here by yourself? or you can just step outside for a minute if you want to.”

“oh yeah, sure.”

you watch as he heeds your request and begins to turn around to face the wall before proceeding to take off your pajamas, making sure to keep a close eye on him just in case he decides to be a peeping tom.

“you know, you’re pretty credulous trusting a guy you’ve only met last week.” he says as he rocks side to side, head still turned facing the wall.

“well i don’t have to worry about you peeping because i’m already done changing,” you pull down the rest of the bunched up fabric of your hoodie that’s around your waist before slipping on a random baseball cap you saw laying around. “even if you did turn around, i have a 5-pound textbook and i’m not afraid to use it.”

oikawa’s about to make a snarky remark in return to your futile threat when suddenly a loud snore escapes reina’s mouth, encouraging the two of you to give each other a flabbergasted look that leads to you both erupting into a fit of hushed laughter.

“let’s go before reina wakes up and gets a heart attack after seeing you in here.”

“no way!”

after exiting the dorm building and beginning your journey with oikawa to the designated cafe, you two arguing about whether or not milk or cereal should go first after oikawa mentioned to you that he was a firm believer of “milk first, cereal last.”

“if you put milk in first then you’re just gonna get less cereal and who the fuck eats cereal just to drink the cereal milk?” you shoot him a grimace.

“when you pour in the cereal after the milk, then it’s just gonna float there and who takes satisfaction in seeing that shit?” you add. “that’s why cereal first is way better because you get a bowl full of cereal and it’s just... perfect!”

“but your cereal is gonna be soggy by the time you put the milk back in the refrigerator!” oikawa retorts.

“then just wait until after you’re done to put it away? how long do you even take to put the milk back in the refrigerator that when you come back your cereal gets all soggy?!”

“and aren’t you supposed to be an athlete? i’m seriously concerned if it takes you at least over 15 seconds just to put back a carton of milk.” you take a jab at him.

“i will not allow this oikawa slander from you!” he stops in his tracks before abruptly picking you up and throwing you over his shoulder.

“h-hey! put me down! i’m heavy, oikawa!” you squirm around in protest, but oikawa shows no sign of letting you go anytime soon as he starts to pick up his pace.

“i didn’t gain all of that muscle for nothin’ baby!” he laughs maniacally as he’s practically full-on sprinting down the street now.

luckily enough, the cafe was just around the corner of the street that oikawa started running down from which meant there was finally a reason for the male to let you down, despite the fact that you had been punching his back for the last minute or so but you couldn’t seem to crack him, his arms, nor those broad shoulders of his.

you let out a huff of feigned annoyance once you’re down on your feet while oikawa is still laughing his ass off as you two walk into the establishment.

“not funny! i almost dropped my hat when you pulled that stunt!” you complain as you’re frantically trying to fix your hair: when oikawa abruptly picked you up and threw you over his shoulder, the baseball cap on your head was about to fall off but thankfully with your reflexes, you were able to catch it in the nick of time— however, at the price of your own hair.

“here, i got you,” oikawa extends his hand out to your head and starts to brush away at your mess of a hair. “if it makes you feel better, it’s on the house.”

“i was gonna make you pay anyways.” you stick your tongue out at him playfully, feigning annoyance.

“pft, and you brought your wallet anyways?” he grabs your wrist and pulls it up so that you could see the object in your hands.

“it has my id in it you doofus,” you roll your eyes but there’s a hint of blush on your face as you realize he’s practically holding your hand. “and what if you forgot your wallet, hm?”

he lets go of your wrist before slipping his hand into his sweatpants pocket and pulling out a black wallet.

“i never forget my wallet sweetheart,” he winks and you laugh. “especially if i know i’m gonna be going out with a pretty lady— don’t wanna leave a bad impression y’know”

“i think you’ve already left quite the impression on me from your stunt earlier.” you bump shoulders with him.

“so see anything you like on the menu?” he puts his hand on the small of your back and guides you over to where the menu is so that you could get a closer look at all of the options the cafe had to offer its customers.

“we’ll... we did come here originally for milk bread,” oikawa notices how deep in thought you are over something as trivial as baked goods and he can’t help but smile a bit when he notices the little pout on your face or the crease that forms on your forehead when you scrunch your face a little bit. “but i wanna try their matcha bread! and their boba looks good, or is it a little bit too early to be drinking boba?”

oikawa’s so lost in thought (*correction: staring at you) that he doesn’t even realize that you’ve been trying to grab his attention by calling his name 5 times— and it’s only when you physically have to shake him a bit that he snaps out of his little daydream.

“oh, sorry!” he gives you an apologetic smile. “what’s up?”

“i was asking if you wanted to share one of their drinks with me but you were too busy staring at me to hear.” you sneer. “do you have a crush on me or something? heh.”

“pshhh, no way!” he has a sheepish look on his face that you can’t stop yourself from laughing at.

“you better not go falling for me anytime soon, you playboy.” you jest while nudging him with your elbow.

“i’m pretty sure i should be the one telling you that,” he rolls his eyes playfully. “i’m surprised you haven’t confessed your undying love for me yet.”

“i don’t fall in love that easily, pretty boy, and i certainly do not fall in love with someone i’ve only recently met.” you snort at his comment.

“hi there! are you two ready to order?” a voice startles you and oikawa as you both turn your heads towards a woman standing behind the counter.

“oh i’m so sorry about that! i’m sure you didn’t come to work just to see the two of us play around.” you giggle as the woman mirrors your action.

“it’s nothing new to me, it seems like this place is a hotspot for couples to come and hang out so it’s kind of the norm for me now.” she reassures you.

“are you a college student?” you ask the cashier, taking note on how she looked to be around your age.

“i actually graduated from culinary school about 2 years ago,” she starts off. “my parents supported me throughout my 4 years of culinary school, but when it came down to actually opening this cafe, my boyfriend— well, fiancé now— helped me look for a good place to rent out and it was history from there!”

“it was a bit hard at first since i was still fresh out of culinary school and i could barely start this business with the funds i had saved up, but thankfully my boyfriend was able to pitch in and help make my dreams come true,” she continues and you feel your heart grow fuzzy at how whenever she mentioned her boyfriend, her face would soften and a small smile would make its way onto her face. “i honestly cannot imagine a life without him, he’s been with me since high school so he’s always known about my longtime dream of owning my own cafe. he’s always been my rock during my hardest times and— oh my! i started rambling didn’t i?”

she starts to apologize for burdening you with her life story, but you dismiss her worries by waving your hands in front of you, oikawa laughing and copying your motions.

“i think he’d be really happy to hear that you think so lovingly of him.” your lips curve into a gentle smile, which the woman reciprocates.

“what’s your name?” she asks.

“i’m y/n! and this big guy is tooru.” oikawa waves at the woman, her following suit.

“ah i see! well y/n and tooru, my name is maia and it’s so nice to meet you two!” she brings her hand out for a handshake, which you and oikawa return. “are you two college students?”

“yeah! i’m actually a student at the university of irvine!” you answer enthusiastically. “tooru is just visiting from argentina at the moment so i wanted to take him around the area before he left.”

“argentina, really?” her mouth forms an ‘o’ shape. “it must be hard doing long distance, huh? i couldn’t even imagine if my fiancé and i had to live that far away from each other.”

you and oikawa turn to look at each other in confusion before an invisible lightbulb goes off in both of your heads and you bring your attention back onto maia, who’s now equally as confused as you two are.

“we’re actually not dating!” the pink hue from earlier creeps back onto your cheeks and from the corner of your eye you can see oikawa fiddling with the sleeves of his hoodie. “i met him at one of the frat parties i went to last week and we kind of just clicked.”

“i’m so sorry for assuming!” she has a distraught look on her face and you’re quick to tell her that it was just a misunderstanding. “you two just look really cute together, plus i’m also really used to a lot of couples coming here that i was quick to assume that you two were dating!”

“i mean, we’d be a cute couple right, y/n-chan?” gone was the nervous oikawa you saw just a second ago, and back was the cocky oikawa you all know and love.

“you wish!” you scoff, not bothering to shrug off the arm he slung around your shoulder.

“anyways, is it alright if we can get two of your milk breads as well as a matcha bread and a oolong milk tea with boba?” you order and maia quickly input the order into the tablet in front of her.

“will that be all for you today?”

“anything else you want, oikawa?” you ask him but he shakes his head in response. “i think that’ll be all for us today then, maia.”

you’re about to insert your card into the chip holder when suddenly oikawa grabs your arm and plucks the card out of your hand.

“h-hey! what are you doing? give me my card back!”

“didn’t i tell you that it was on the house earlier?” he looks at you with a teasing smirk on his face and before you could protest again, a pleasant sound comes out of the machine, signaling that the transaction was successful.

“such a gentleman! you should snatch him up before someone else does, y/n!” maia coos.

“i think it’d be best for someone else to snatch him up, i don’t think i could handle all of... this.” you motion to his entire body.

“are you flirting with me?” oikawa had a shit-eating grin on his face that you were so tempted to wipe off, but his actions from less than a minute ago still caught you off guard and you had to admit, you were glad he wasn’t a cheapskate and offered to pay in your stead— well, more forced you out of paying.

“thanks, oikawa,” you didn’t know what you had the other day to make you act so bold, but you stood on your tiptoes and planted a chaste kiss on his cheek out of gratitude. “for being the only gentleman on campus, even though you’re technically not a student here.”

out of instinct, oikawa’s hand immediately flys up to the spot where your lips touched his skin and starts to graze it.

“heh, i like your spunk, y/n.” he shows you a cheeky smile.

“don’t let it get to your head, it was just a complimentary kiss.” you laugh and it sounds more melodious than usual to oikawa’s ears for some reason.

“so...” he starts and you let out a small ‘hm?’ which prompts him to continue. “do you have any plans for the rest of the day?”

“i don’t think so? i have the dorm all to myself from when reina goes to her blind date and up until she comes back, so if you wanna do something then i don’t mind squeezing you into my schedule!” you reply, but a thought suddenly resurfaces in your mind. “no frat parties though, i heard one of iwaizumi’s friends are hosting one tonight but i don’t think i can think about another frat party without having to gouge my eyeballs out.”

“got it, no frat parties,” oikawa chuckles. “if it makes you feel any better, i never liked those frat parties anyways and i only went because iwaizumi is the only person i know here which meant i was obligated to follow him around everywhere but now that i know you, it changes the whole game!”

“i’m just as new to california as you are oikawa, don’t get your hopes up too high.”

“but that’s the fun part about it, right? we get to explore california together! it really feels like we’re a couple don’t you think?” he blurts out in the heat of the moment but quickly comes to realize the weight of his words. “oh shit— sorry... i hope you’re not uncomfortable hearing me say that out loud.”

“not at all!” you look down at your shoes for a fleeting moment before looking back up at oikawa. “it’s quite... endearing? i’ve never really had a lot of ‘guy friends’ and mostly hung around with girls so this is the first time i’ve ever really had a guy show any interest in me— platonically of course!”

“and you’ve never ever had a boyfriend before?” oikawa lifts an eyebrow.

“nope, never even had my first kiss,” you say but you think back to the events that took place last night. “well, up until yesterday...”

you tried to hide the grimace on your face as the memory of you and iwaizumi kissing kept playing on repeat in your mind, but oikawa was able to see right through your mask and clenched his fists as he recalled the distressed look on your face when he and reina found you crying in the bathroom.

oikawa believed that you should have deserved to have your first kiss taken by someone who truly loved you, but instead, it was taken away by his scum of a best friend, who, he was currently disappointed in for treating you the way he did last night.

oikawa is about to open his mouth up to say something, but he’s interrupted before he even gets a chance to say anything when maia announces that your order is ready.

“it smells so good, maia!” you say after you skip over to the other side of the counter and take a whiff of the freshly baked pastries.

“oh you’re making me blush, y/n!” maia cups her cheeks bashfully while you laugh at her antics.

you shake up the cup of boba so that the pearls were evenly distributed throughout the drink before taking a straw and puncturing a hole through the film on top of the cup, taking a small sip after you mix the drink around one last time with the straw.

“mhm! so good!” you lean back, not realizing that oikawa had moved to stand right behind you, resulting in you crashing into his chest.

“shit, you scared me oikawa!” you laugh as you slap his chest. “want some?”

you hold the straw up to his lips, and you notice the way his eyes widen by a fraction.

“you wanna share?”

“well yeah? unless you’re scared of getting cooties or something, what are you? 12?” you tease. “or are you worried that it’s an indirect kiss? i can always get another—”

your rambling is cut off when his lips wrap around the straw and he takes a long sip of the drink in your hand.

“there, we just indirectly kissed!” he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand before shooting you a goofy grin.

“pft, how childish do you have to be to be freaked out over an indirect kiss.” you mumble, but it doesn’t cover up the blood that rushes up to your face, painting your cheeks in a pinkish hue which oikawa finds endearing.

part one | part two | part three | part four

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philipkindreddickhead · 4 years ago

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I often seen critiques of make up from an existential/philosophical perspective, but I rarely see criticism of cosmetics from a stand point of the very physical bodily harm it does. I think this is because the number of dangerous ingredients is so massive, and overlapping its an absolutely daunting task. So I've compiled the information I've found and bear with me its a lot. (This is from an American perspective. Sorry, thats what I know. However I would love it if people from other countries had things to add.)

First I want to get the "simple" stuff out of the way. I think almost everyone has heard about bacteria and fungi in makeup and that makeup causes acne from clogging pores. Makeup has a pretty strict shelf life, yet consumers are entirely supposed to self-police as Ive never seen a single expiration date on any cosmetic packaging. (I guess consumers are meant to pull this knowledge out of the ether or something. I only found out about it in a tumblr PSA. I did read that expirys are on products in Europe.) Beauty blenders are the worst offender because theyre almost always moist. When I was taught makeup I was told to wet my sponge so it would soak up less product. If you apply makeup daily your sponge is likely constantly damp. USA Today had an article which said that 96% of sponges had fungi and over 60% had E. Coli in them. But I think what people talk about less is the complication of problems from using other products in conjunction with dirty beauty blenders. USA Today warns its especially dangerous to use beauty blenders if you have damage to your skin like acne, cuts, or dry skin. However the most popular beauty products for washing your face contain walnut pieces for literally scrubbing your skin and creating microabrasions. If youre a frequent makeup user you probably know about the cyclical nature of applying foundation, breaking out, and then applying more foundation to cover the breakout. You may even be using scrubbing cleansers more frequently to combat the acne creating more tears. This can lead to "blood poisoning" and, though neither USA today or Forbes mentions this, blood poisoning (not a medical term btw. Its sepsis.) according to numerous medical sites has the potential to be extremely lethal. The symptoms are so similar to a regular flu its nearly impossible to self-diagnose.

The very first thing I was told when a friend handed me a jar of finishing powder- popular with many beauty gurus for the "baking" technique and considered a must have- was a joke about "clown lung." This was a reference to the main ingredient talc. Talc causes lung problems including cancer and respiratory illness. If anyone remembers the large Johnson and Johnson lawsuit from 2019 it was because theyd been putting talc into baby powder. Talc is dangerous because it's impossible to mine and seperate from ASBESTOS. Some high-end finishing powders will try to sell you on safe talc-free formulas but all the products I looked into contained mica instead which causes pneumoconiosis, colloquially known as "black lung disease." Like fucking coal miners get. Its not just present in finishing powder either. In my research it turned out that talc/asbestos are also present in many eyeshadows and other powder products. [Googleable, evidenced in J&J lawsuit]

Another industry to examine is nail salons. Toluene, Formaldehyde, Dibutyl Phthalate, and Methacrylate compounds are all dangerous ingredients and present in various salon products. These ingredients cause a range of problems from dizziness, drowsiness, birth defects, slow fetal growth, future intellectual disabilities in the fetus, eye skin and throat irritation, coughing, allergic reactions, asthma-like attacks, short-term memory loss, nausea, dermatitis, cancer, and misscarriage. Some nail products advertise that they are 3-free meaning that toluene, formaldehyde, and DP should be absent but often the labels are found to be completely inaccurate. It should be noted that the risk is mainly to salon workers and not patrons but ask yourself if it is right to place other people at serious risk for your aesthetic. OSHA does make an attempt to mitigate these risks however not once in my years of makeup queen did I see a salon following these directives which include constant air monitoring, half mask respirators with chemical cartridges, gloves, long sleeves, and safety glasses. (And Im not even going to touch issues of human trafficking/slave labour out of nail salons one case of which occured 5 days ago two hours away from me) It should also be noted that formaldehyde can also be found in hair relaxers and hair dyes. [Found articles in Scientific American and NYT]

I also found on the FDAs website that many cosmetics include heavy metals like arsenic, mercury, and lead. (Usually accompainied by a picture of lipstick so I assume that is the product most likely to contain it, however campaign for safe cosmetics lists foundation as containing heavy metals, and The Guardian has an article about skin lighteners from Asia and Africa containing mercury.) The website stated that the amount of these heavy metals in cosmetics is "safe" if used as intended. (and I'm going to come back to the concept of "intended use" later because thats a can of worms too) However, when searching for info on heavy metal safety I found this quote in regards to metals in food:

"Certain metals, such as arsenic, lead and mercury, have no established health benefit, and have been shown to lead to illness, impairment, and in high doses, death. Understanding the risk that harmful metals pose in our food supply is complicated by the fact that no single food source accounts for most people’s exposure to metals in foods. People’s exposure comes from many different foods containing these metals. Combining all of the foods we eat, even low levels of harmful metals from individual food sources, can sometimes add up to a level of concern"

So like, which is it? Is it a "safe amount" or is no amount of metal safe? I understand that in the case of certain foods like fish some amount of mercury poisoning is always expected but fish is also something you feed yourself and nourish your body with while cosmetics are completely unecessary to your survival. The mercury problem in fish is also mitigated by health warnings when mercury levels are particularly high but cosmetics have no such warning. Another warning on the site indicated that children should ingest NO amount of lead AT ALL because it is particularly harmful for kids yet theres no effort to stop children from using lead-containing cosmetics. I worked next to a Five Below where I was shocked to find they sold Jeffree Star and Anastasia eyeshadow dupes for five dollars which amounts to fucking pocket change for a lot of kids and kids do buy that stuff. I also think its ironic the FDA would have anything to say regarding cosmetics because in the very same article about heavy metals in cosmetics the FDA says that they DO NOT REGULATE cosmetics beyond the color additives.

Mascara, eyeliner, lipstick, and brow tint often contain carbon black. This is a color additive that is an incomplete combustion of carbon-based products. It can cause lung disease, cancer, and organ system toxicity, and eye, nose, throat irritation. The effects are mainly studied in rats and those at biggest risk are industrial workers but why do other workers have to endure lung problems for something so unecessary? [Easily googleable, NIH, CDC, WHO Europe]

This next bit I only want to mention briefly because I didnt find any particularly reputable sources about it, but its a claim that cropped up repeatedly and I think its an interesting one. Parabens, estrogen, phthalates (again), and pesticides in cosmetics are apparently linked to endocrine disorders and hormone dysregulation. Im not entirely sure what is meant by this accusation. Endocrine disorders include female diseases like PCOS and possibly endometriosis. None of these diseases is very well studied and the female endocrine system itself is not well studied either. Im not saying "cosmetics cause PCOS" because we dont know if PCOS or these other endocrine/hormonal disorders are genetic or environmental or both (it appears that PCOS is largely genetic and Endometriosis is likely autoimmune related) AND we dont appear to know for sure that cosmetic ingredients cause endocrine disorder. But I include anyway for a number of reasons:

If you happen to struggle with hormonal problems you may want to know cosmetics is a potential environment factor.

These conditions are incredibly painful. It will be a battle getting your doctor to even acknowledge that pain for diagnosis. PCOS is linked to diabetes, and heart disease. [Thanks @mother-of-pearl ] There is no cure and the treatments are often throwing hormonal birth control at it and hoping for the best.

I dont anticipate the link between cosmetics and endocrine disorders being studied any time soon or any endocrine disorders studied at all because the medical/scientific field is sexist. I dont want women to suffer in the mean time.

Now again, take this with a grain of salt because I couldnt find scientific or news sources for it. Dont fucking come for me. Im not gonna respond to you. [Most reputable source was a paper from the library of medicine at the national institutes of health but it was behind a paywall and I dont have 39 dollars to be right on tumblrdotcom]

Avoiding these ingredients is not as simple as scanning the label for them. As many beautubers and the community are no doubt aware considering multiple scandals over veganism. Products advertised as vegan or cruelty free but contain non-vegan carmine or are sold in China which legally requires the products to be animal tested. Cosmetic companies will hide ingredients claiming they are "trade secrets" or they will be placed under "fragrance." Many ingredients will be known by six or seven different names and asking consumers to be aware of seven different names for multiple ingredients requires consumers to be aware of innumerable different, often complicated ingredient names. I shouldnt have to point out that's a ridiculous burden to place on women. The EU banned 1,300 hazardous ingredients that the US did not. Cosmetic companies rely on women being unwilling/unable to bring in a list of 1,300 ingredients- with multiple names- every time they pop in to the drug store, sephora, or wherever. Buying "natural" products will not help you either. Theres no established criteria for natural/organic in costmetics, the FDA doesnt test these products, and "natural"=/= safe anyway. Plenty of plants and minerals are poisonous. One good example is traditional kohl products which advertise their natural status but also naturally contain lead and reiterating that natural powders contain mica. US courts are rarely on the side of consumers either. I found an interesting lawsuit against St. Ives for their apricot scrub taken to court for their "dermatologist tested" label despite it causing breakouts and cuts to the skin. The courts ruled that this label was fine because it only indicated that the product was TESTED not APPROVED by dermatologists. However I think any rational consumer would look at this label and assume the tests concluded it was safe for use or else why put the label on there?

[Googlable XMONDO drama, googlable laws wrt china and eu, already stated about FDA, FDA website about Kohl. Googled St. Ives lawsuit.]

I want to return to the idea of "intended use." This is sort of a fucky concept a lot of companies have ways of getting around. My "last straw" with makeup had to do with a run-in I had with Anastasia over their "Riviera" eyeshadow palette. In this pallette they had two colors that were the real feature of the palette, an electric neon purple and a radioactive pink I mean every photo, every promotion has these two colors swirled together around the eye. Because again, its an eyeshadow palette. When I buy the eyeshadow palette of course there's a little insert warning in the package that says these two shades are not intended on the eye area. In an eyeshadow palette. Contacting their customer service they told me that these two shades were meant to be used as a blush. neon purple blush. Not only that, but their website and instagram featured NO models wearing the shades as blush while EVERY model one or more of the shades as eyeshadow. When asked about this discrepancy ABH stopped responding. What I find egregious about this is the amount of people who dont know, and then more staggeringly; dont care. The sephora clerks didnt know, the in store abh representative didnt know, their customers didnt know, and when I told them they would respond with "oh, [brand] did the same thing with their [shade]." Sure enough, when I demanded that store clerks open the packaging to look for warnings nearly every product had an "eyeshadow" that was not intended for use on the eyes. Relegating dark, red-toned teal to "contour" and neon grean to "highlighter" US-based cosmetic junkies will say that these pigments have been approved for use by the EU however I found absolutely NO evidence of that. I googled it a thousand ways but all I ever found were blog posts, reddit comments, and one quote from an apparently nonEuropean layman in an Insider article. I even changed my location to France on ABH's website and the Norvina palette still contains the same warnings (not to harp on ABH in particular. I just know which shades in particular are the problem there). The Insider article noted that brands who were selling pressed pigments declined to comment. If the pressed pigments were EU friendly, I would think companies would be clamouring to say so. It also still makes their market as eyeshadow colors illegal in the US. (If any Europeans would like to chime in I'd love that.) Another problem I find with cosmetics companies and their reps is the claim that the worst thing that could happen is eye irritation for those with sensitive eyes and staining. How could they possibly know? The FDA doesnt test, or approve these cosmetics in the eye area, so ostensibly no one should be using it that way.

The next one is a bit of a "duh" but I'm going to talk about it anyway. Counterfeit cosmetics are a booming market full of untold dangers. Untold primarily because these products could contain literally anything. Ive read about glue, arsenic, lead, feces, staph, and horse urine to name a few. The labels and ingredient list on these products are fake. Legitimate brands often unintentionally play into the counterfeit market. They create artificial scarcity by making less of the product than is actually needed for consumer demand to create an even higher demand. If consumers miss out often their only chance at getting the product is to turn to counterfeits. I found examples of women who had their lips superglued, lips "turned to goo" and burned to blistering, throat closures, women with stys, contact dermatitis, eye infections. I think we as a society turn a blind eye to this problem because we think "hey, if youre buying counterfeits for a discount and you get hurt you deserve it." We imagine idiots buying products for 4 dollars from ebay or perusing Canal street for FEИTY beauty. But these counterfeits can be really convincing. I myself received a gift of a huda palette that I only recognized something was weird about it because I'd swatched it at sephora about five times earlier that month. The person who bought it for me actually paid MORE than the usual cost for the palette because it was advertised as a newer, better edition. The websites can be disturbingly similar. For instance Kylie Jenner's legitimate website is KylieCosmetics.com but you can find fakes at kyliecosmeticsshop.co.uk. These fakes can buy ad space and be one of the first sites that populate when you google the products instead of typing the legitimate site into the address bar. Counterfeits can also be bought and sold through third parties on websites like ebay, wish, and amazon. (My gift actually came from Amazon.)

[Netflix doc "Broken" ep "Makeup Mayhem" Corroborated by personal experience and google]

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becausethathappens · 3 years ago

Text

Spare Change

4k - college - Link is furious, so Rhett tries to calm him down.

For @peachworthy and anyone else who thinks swearing is hot.

Link is mad.

Link is pacing.

Rhett tries to help.

“Why don’t you just scream into a pillow, like you always do?” Rhett offers.

“I did that!” Link cries. He makes a show of going over and doing it again. Rhett can’t help his instinct to recoil at seeing his friend yell like that.

Link’s car has been towed. Link can’t go on a date with the girl he’s been trying to court all week.

On top of that: Link doesn’t have a credit card (all he’s got is cash) and it says right on the tow sign they don’t deal in it. Somehow Link missed the whole thing, the first time around, when he parked wrong or whatever. But now going to have to borrow his Mama’s card just to get the truck out of impound.

All this and he still has to cancel on his date tonight.

“I didn’t even see a line!” he yells again, recounting the events that have unfolded. “How am I supposed to take their word for it without a picture, either! And like I said, if you can’t see the line, how are you gonna know when you’ve crossed it?!” he decries.

They’ve towed his car because he parked outside the student residential boundary lines on the main street. Everyone knows this is how the city of Raleigh makes most it’s coin. Shoving parking tickets on unsuspecting co-eds.

Link never thought they’d tow his freaking car, though.

Well, his truck. To be specific.

He feels stifled, cornered, and hot. Very hot. His skin is boiling, red and he wants to punch the pillow he’s just released after screaming into it.

His only permanent means of escape.

At least, unless he borrows Rhett's car.

“I can’t believe they wouldn’t even give me a warning! Or wait five minutes! I was only in rec center for ten minutes picking up freakin’ — these freakin’ things,” Link spits the words as he picks up and tosses the flowers back down on his desk.

They’re rumpled, now, with his tense hold and actions. Rhett gets up and fidgets with them, trying to smooth the foliage back into the nice shape it started in.

“Link, it’s okay, Lindsey is gonna understand,” Rhett explains.

“It’s not — it’s — there’s — why’s it always — I’M SO MAD!” Link ends with, apoplectic and beyond any other way to articulate it.

“That’s okay!” Rhett tells him, since he has every right to be upset.

“I...! Ughhhh!” He walks over and bangs his right Reebok heel against the closet door once for good measure.

It makes a noisy sound as it bends at the overhead slide hinge that keeps it on track. Link kicks it again, seeming pleased with the audible response from the wood bending and cracking loudly in the room, like a smack to the face.

“Link!” Rhett reprimands, sure that they’ll be in trouble with their resident advisor for damaging property if Link keeps it up.

“I’m sorry, I just! I just wanna — ‘s just been one thing after another, this year!” Link growls, continuing his pacing and returning to the wooden door again. “I’m just so — so — ARRGH!” Link fumes and before Rhett can jump up to intervene, he watches his friend punch the door.

“FFF—reak! Dang it!” Link screams.

Rhett watches, eyes wide.

“Shit!” Link yells as it hits. It gives with a loud, snap-crack and Rhett’s mouth makes a perfect “o” in reaction.

Link’s hand goes to his mouth catching his own language. “Shit!” he cries again like he can’t stop, muffled by his hand.

Afterwards, he’s panting and Rhett is left standing to the side staring in a bit of awe. He didn’t know Link had that in him, to be honest. “Shit, there’s a hole!” Link exclaims.

Their eyes both guiltily dart to the half-filled swear jar on Link’s desk. Usually he’s the one keeping after Rhett for saying “Hell!” or “Damn!”

Although Rhett’s said all the bad words, at some point or another, it is unlike either of them to spew out a ton of foul language in a string as Link has.

“Swear jar?” Rhett says, mostly in question. He can tell Link’s much madder than the other times they’ve punished each other for cursing. His willingness to let it go is rife in his tone, but Link shakes his head, madder at himself for having swore and willing to pay the price.

He saunters over to his backpack and finds his wallet. “No, no, I earned it.” He tsks himself as he pulls out a few singles and strides over to the jar, tipping them in.

“You overpaid, there, bo,” Rhett advises, watching the bills settle. It was a quarter a word and Link put in three dollars.

“‘S for the door,” Links says, shrugging. “I don’t know what the Hell I ‘s thinkin’!”

He closes his eyes. “And for that Hell, too,” he adds. “And that one!” He throws his hands up. “ARRgh!”

“Link!” Rhett yells as he slots another single dollar bill, adding to the overpayment, but cushioning the extra curses all the same. “Link, it’s — you — it’s fine!”

“It’s not fine!” Link yells. “I’m screwed. And now I’m cursing like a sailor watchin’ my favorite football team lose the playoffs!”

Rhett makes a face. “What, we talkin’ the Army-Navy game, or what?”

“Damn it, Rhett!” Link snarls. Then he closes his eyes and makes a face at his own words. “Damn it, Rhett!” He paces around, throwing his hands back around, gesticulating. “I feel like I’m trapped in some sick dirty mouth loop!”

“That sounds… why does that sound worse than the cursing?” Rhett says, joking. “Maybe you should add another dollar?”

Link sighs, dramatically, and does so.

“Link, I was — you don’t have to actually — Link, it’s okay!” Rhett stammers out, eyes bright. He comes at Link with his hand out, like he’s asking to be heard out. “You had a horrible day, you should be allowed to vent a little!”

“Vent a little?!” Link shoots back. “I put a hole in the door!”

“Yeah, okay, maybe that wasn’t your finest moment, but you’re pissed!” Rhett explains. “I get it!”

Link throws his hands up as if to say, at least there’s that and not much else.

“You should get a pass.”

“A pass?” Link questions.

“Yeah, just for tonight.” Rhett puts his hands on his hips. “You already paid for a week’s worth of curses with my exchange rate,” Rhett jokes.

Rhett didn’t curse much, but all the other money in the jar was his. Link’s never so much as taken the Lord’s name in vain before.

Link spares a sidelong glance and hustles back over to his backpack to return his wallet.

“Go ahead, man, you’ve earned it. Blow off some steam!” Rhett advises.

“So, you just want me to start cursing?” Link asks, joking with a touch of condescension. “Like some — some degenerate?”

“Degenerate?” Rhett asks, laughing. “Who said anything about being a degenerate?”

“That’s who curses, Rhett!”

Rhett looks Link over and decides to try and get his mind off what’s eating him by messing with him. His favorite pastime.

“You should say the ‘F’ word, Link,” Rhett urges, suddenly, overcome with the desire to corrupt Link. He’s a bit ashamed of it, but another side of him insists that it would be hilarious to see Link snap and start saying filthy things, even for just one night.

Hearing him say Shit! is enough to get Rhett interested in hearing more.

Link frowns. “Fornicate?”

Rhett smirks. “Yeah, but the bad version.”

Link’s eyes go wide. “Rhett!” he puts a hand to his chest, finally settling on a posture that indicates he’s nearly at his wit’s end. Rhett beams at him.

This is as much about teasing Link to take a night off being Mr. Perfect as it is about Rhett noticing that Link screaming Shit! also did a lot to calm him down. If he curses more, maybe he’ll feel better altogether. Plus, as established, Rhett found it hilarious to watch unfold.

In his opinion, it’s certainly worth a shot.

“C’mon, Link — let one rip!” Rhett teases and Link’s brows furrow.

Unfortunately, Rhett’s efforts to cheer him up are doing the opposite for his mood in the meantime. Link looks actively annoyed at the supposition.

“Will you please — ? We’ve established I’m having a terrible enough night as it is and I don’t need your added bull —” Link stops, then goes silent off at Rhett’s delighted expression.

“My what?” Rhett teases more. “My bullshit?”

Link’s eyes flick to the jar. Rhett makes a show of grabbing a quarter from his laundry money holder on his own desk and walking over to put it in the jar.

“Yeah, that,” Link bullies.

“Well, too dang bad, Link,” Rhett says, splaying his arms wide and taking in that Link is at least partly distracted from his terrible night, even while he spoke of it. “Rules are that so long as I pay up, I’m fine.”

Link huffs.

“This is —” Link starts, voice rising again in agitation.

“Uh, huh,” Rhett encourages.

“You’re such a —” Link begins and ends. Rhett’s eyebrows and eyes both dart up then turn crooked, waiting for any addition to that comment, but it never arrives.

Link starts pacing again, faster, back and forth between the dorm beds and their door.

Rhett merely nods, waiting for more.

Finally, something in Link stops him in his tracks. Whether it’s the constant grinning nods from Rhett to egg him on, the long itinerary of Bad Things that keep on Happening, or just that Link is filled with an urge to punch the closet door again and he knows he can’t do that.

So, he snaps, “IT IS BULLSHIT!” full volume at Rhett.

Rhett’s head nods even more swiftly, taking a deeper path up and down, like he’s bobbing over steady waves to stay afloat.

“IT’S ALL BULLSHIT!” Link repeats at the same charged decibel.

Rhett still nods more, as if to tell him to elaborate further, but Link’s anger stagnates his thinking. He just wants to keep screaming that, so he does. “IT’S ALL SUCH BULLSHIT!”

“Yeah, it is!” Rhett calls back at him, like he’s cheering him on in the stands.

“And you?!” Rhett puts a hand on his own chest as if to answer silently who me? Link’s, fired up again and pointing in Rhett’s direction. “You don’t get to have fun with this, you’re — you’re just as bad!”

“YEAH! I AM!” Rhett calls out, uncaring about being thrown into the mix as well.

“When you drove us to the rec center last weekend, we double-parked with our hazards on and took twice as long!”

Rhett exclaims, “We did!” in agreement.

“ASSHOLE!” Link yells at him.

Rhett nods.

Link tears his fingers through his hair, overwhelmed at how out of hand his words have gotten, so quickly. His eyes stray back to the swear jar where he knows he has at least a few words to go. Disturbing though the thought, he considers also that he has more money in his wallet.

He knows how far he’s strayed, already, from that change in priorities alone. When he looks back at Rhett, who is still giddy, waiting for him to say more, he gives up.

“Fuck,” he mutters, in absolution.

Rhett gasps.

He’s been waiting for Link to say that, most of all, and is shocked by how quickly they’ve arrived there. Hearing it spoken so casually, on top of it all.

“Fuck,” Link repeats again, in surprise that the word actually tumbled out of his mouth so smoothly.

“I don’t even think I’ve ever hardly thought that word before, let alone said it, now I can’t f — fuck, now I can’t stop!” Link growls at Rhett, furious at his role in what feels like a downfall.

Rhett is still aghast. His mind racing.

He’s been waiting for the delivery and is amazed to hear Link actually do it. His mind has been picturing this as a funny joke, but Link is just standing there, mad, yelling fuck, again and again, accusatory. Rightly so.

Rhett knows he drove Link to this, in part for his own amusement, but it doesn’t feel funny at all anymore. His cheeks feel warm.

Link’s face reddens further at Rhett’s lack of response.

He gets up in Rhett’s face and Rhett feels himself start to back up so quickly he nearly stumbles to sit on the bed. He needs to concede this fight because it’s clear there’s a lot more pent up anger than he’s realized inside Link.

He thinks back to the door and looks around. That did calm him briefly, but surely he can’t just punch the door again. “You should yell,” Rhett ekes out the next best thing. What Link shouted after the punch. “Yell it.”

He means the f-word, still. The way Link is saying it, it feels immoral to be saying it, too.

“FUCK!” Link yells, at his continued badgering, whether it’s in fulfillment of his request or not, Rhett couldn’t say. His body shudders in fear at how loud and direct an outburst that was.

Now, he’s worried their dorm mates are going to think they’re in an all-out fight. Rhett’s eyes scan the bed and he grabs a pillow. “Yell into this,” he offers, handing the pillow over.

Link, still looking annoyed, takes the pillow. He shoves his face against it and screams, “FUCK!” at what must be the very top of his lungs.

Rhett has to brace himself against the top bunk. He’s waiting for the punchline.

It still hasn’t come.

Link, meanwhile, has pulled his bright red face from the pillow and takes in air in pants, looking over at Rhett. Rhett is sure he’s never looked so tough, so masculine, so — Rhett’s stomach lurches.

He knows that can’t be healthy. To consider any of those traits as a burly or cool, but he’s too concerned with why they’re making his insides tingle to interrogate it much for himself.

He offers to take the pillow back and Link hands it to him. Instead of putting it on the bed, Rhett holds it in his hands. He’s speechless, he thinks, but his head is pounding too hard to know why his mind directs him to his next request. Muscle memory, perhaps.

Normally, Rhett would wrestle with Link until he got the anger out, but that feels absolutely impossible to initiate right now. With Link this mad, somehow Rhett worries that even being bigger and heavier, Link would find a way to win that match, looking as livid as he does.

“Um,” Rhett starts, unable to figure out what more to say, now that Link’s gone through all that. He holds up the pillow. “Punch this,” Rhett says, not thinking about the fact that said pillow is still in his grip. He’s more focused on the mental image of sweaty, angry Link punching things again.

It’s what helped him relieve tension before, after all.

So, he pushes the pillow forward again, centering it where Link can take an easy swing in the middle and miss Rhett’s hands entirely, and waits for Link to make a move.

Soon, Link does swing, deftly, landing a soft punch on the object with a huff. Rhett can see some of the tension lock up and release from his shoulders. It’s not gone, but it must be helping. Rhett knows shooting hoops when he’s pissed always did the trick.

Link then punches again, firmer, this time, shouting, “Fuck!” along with his movements.

Then again, then a third and fourth time, until the pillow gives way and flies back towards the chair behind where Rhett stands. “Shit!” Link calls, watching it settle on the desk chair to their right.

Rhett considers that is likely to keep happening, once Link builds back to that momentum, so he turns back and squares up. He holds a palm out behind another palm. He doesn’t ask, but Link can tell he’s being told to punch into Rhett’s open hand like it’s a boxing or pitching warm-up.

Link pulls back and slams his fist into Rhett’s palm. The taller of the two staggers back, but doesn't flinch. He puts his hand back in the same spot waiting for another. Link gives just as hard again.

On the third hit, Rhett finally falters. The sting of the punch is too much for him to let on as harmless, when he waves his hands around the air to ease the throb. He grabs a throw blanket and drapes it two or three times around his upper chest, then motions for Link to aim there instead.

Link gets a good hit in and Rhett is sure this way is going to last even less than his naked hand did, but he has to try to keep at it. Link is so angry, but he looks so good hitting like this, like he could star in a cologne ad or work at Abercrombie & Fitch at the mall. Rhett has to let him get the tension out.

That’s Rhett’s job as his best friend.

Eventually, the pain is too much and he needs a break. Rhett puts a hand up in pause and sits himself on the bottom bunk and waits for Link to say something. They’re both panting with the same amount of exertion they use when they wrestle, but they still have all their clothes on.

For some reason, Rhett’s mind takes note of that.

He realizes he’s been staring at Link when Link starts to return the gaze. “Why’re you looking at me like that?” Link asks.

Rhett blushes. “Like what?” He can’t see his face to know.

“Like I’m a sideshow exhibit,” Link tells him, throwing his hands back up in derision. “Or — or, I don’t know a piece of undercooked meat, almost.”

“What?” Rhett asks, blanching.

“Like you’re sizing me up to fight,” Link clarifies.

Fight — Rhett considers. Quite the opposite. His mind thought Link meant piece of meat — to bite. Which sent a chill up his spine. “I-I wasn’t…”

“You were!” Link says, still crackling with tension. Rhett doesn’t have any part of his body to absorb it, any longer, he feels useless to help.

“Link…” Rhett starts to say, looking up at Link. Link still has an arm on the top bunk but now he’s leaning down a little, friendly but threatening, and Rhett’s insides start to turn over in knots.

“You want to pound me, admit it!” Link says, impatiently.

“What?!” Rhett replies, stunned.

“You,” Link says, pointing at Rhett. “Want to pound me,” he starts only to stop and point at himself. “It’s clear as day on your face.”

“What?!” Rhett yells at him.

“You want to pound me, Rhett. You’re so predictable,” Link elaborates, plainly. “Go ahead!”

Rhett’s eyes nearly bug out of his head. “Link, I-I…” Rhett trails off, his face blotchy and drawn.

“C’mon,” Link begs, leaning forward down at Rhett, taunting him. “Hit me!”

Rhett registers his words, understanding finally that he means to physically fight him, not to pound him as in fuck him. In Rhett’s defense, that word has been thrown around pretty casually for the first time ever and he’s racing to keep up with everything Link is doing.

Unfortunately, Rhett comes to this conclusion after he’s already leaned upwards and started kissing Link on the mouth.

Once he’s there, realizing the grave error he’s made, he breaths a huff of air in humility as he feels Link’s mouth open in turn. Then Link’s tongue darts out to push into his.

As the wet tip bursts in and out, rapidly, and Rhett contemplates that it’s like Link is still hitting him, in this tiny only-in-his-mouth kind of way. So, maybe Link was right and he did want to pound him but only via the mouth. Since it also felt so good, Rhett starts returning the kiss, rapid pace, and pulling Link closer.

Link groans under his guidance, but it’s a good groan. Link rests a thigh over each of Rhett’s and sinks back on his knees, sitting over Rhett, as they continue to twist tongues. Rhett doesn’t know what to do with his hands, so he moves them around to Link’s back and they naturally drift towards gripping his ass while he holds him.

Link moans into his mouth at the feeling.

Eventually, Link pulls back, leaning so there’s enough space to speak his shock.

“Fuck, Rhett,” Link mutters. Rhett feels his dick throb and thrust up towards Link’s lap as he shifts. Rhett’s not sure when he got this hard, but it suddenly feels like he has a steel rod stuffed down his sweats. “What are we doing?” Link breathes out. “Was that — were we just kissin’? What the Hell is going on?” Link questions, desperate and aroused.

Rhett humps up another time and Link keens at the sensation.

“I think my body just wanted to help relieve the tension of, uh, you know, all that anger and — " Rhett starts to explain, but he’s helpless to the feeling of Link rolling around in his lap and generating even more friction between their overlapping arousal. “Guess it preferred the idea of this over punching you.”

Link rocks his hips and giggles through his own enjoyment as he watches Rhett squirm. “I’m a little biased, but yeah,” Link says, grinding down more. “This does beat a punch in the face, I’ll give you that.”

They’re both panting and rubbing on each other more before Rhett reaches down to touch Link. “Honestly, I think I could —” Link says, grinding with extra effort in a way that makes Rhett feel Link’s erection evidently as it presses against his midsection. He grinds back into that area specifically.

“Yeah, same,” Rhett agrees, circling his hips in time with Link’s.

Nothin’ like some good old dry humping, for what ails ‘ya, he figures.

Link leans down and either forgetting his initial shock or abandoning it, he captures Rhett’s mouth in another kiss.

Before long, they start gasping for air from one another’s open mouths while their faces stay pressed together but not kissing, as they grind harder and harder where they sit.

Rhett reaches a hand down and fondles them both at once, rubbing his sweats against Link’s khakis. Link throws his head back in pleasure. “Feel better?” he asks, hoping this has been as erotic and pleasurable for Link as it has been for him.

“Oh, shit, Rhett, yeah,” Link moans, waist canting in time with Rhett’s motions. While gripping Link’s ass, Rhett’s moved his right hand up his back to steady him with how harsh the kisses are, each time. The hand that moved to Link’s back has stayed under his tank and drifts to his front. Rhett feels around for a nipple and squeezes once when it finds purchase.

“Oh, fuck, yeah, just like that, oh my God, fuck, FUCK!” Link bellows out, suddenly aware that Rhett is sucking kisses into his jaw and throat as his other hand, the one not on the nipple, still squeezes his ass.

“I’m gonna — I can’t stop — I’m about to,” Link begins several attempts to warn Rhett, but comes before he can finish or Rhett can respond.

Rhett’s eyes go fully wide again, in amazement, feeling Link’s dick throb and spurt laid against his own. It’s enough added heat and friction that he feels his own orgasm begin to crest unexpectedly. He hasn’t come that quick in years. Maybe ever.

Link pants through his come down, but doesn’t move to get off Rhett right away. They both remain still, clutching each other as they sit tangled limb over limb.

“D-Did we just have sex?” Link asks, mortified, but still draped over Rhett.

“Technically,” Rhett confirms. “But it was non-penetrative, so we’re still good, I think.”

“Oh, okay, yeah,” Link says back, his eyes far off.

“You sure that’s okay?” Rhett asks, looking for Link to meet his gaze and assure him that is.

He does, but he speaks his mind, to clarify anything not given away by his crooked grin. “No, I was askin’ ‘cause I wanna do it again.”

Rhett’s eyes light up.

“A lot,” Link explains.

“Fuck,” Rhett moans, softly, brushing a thumb to Link’s lower lip.

He joins their mouths again.

Link cuts the kiss short, with a hand between them, however, and gives Rhett a stern look. Rhett knows in that moment and any proceeding it, he’ll do anything Link asks of him.

Rhett’s glazed eyes spin focus to Link’s face again to figure out what that will be this time. Link nods his head towards the half-empty jar on his desk.

“Pay up.”

#why is mean link always so hot #things i wrote #🍋#@peachworthy

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doyelikehaggis · 3 years ago

Note

Okay sorry to bother you about this but you know a lot about the tvdu lore!, do you remember what the initial reasoning/rationale for doppelgängers was? I know it changed in later seasons when it turned out Stefan was one too and the whole Amara-Silas-Quetisyah(?) situation but what was the reasoning for why Elena was Katherine’s doppelgänger/Klaus knew Katherine was what he needed to break his curse initially or was that never exactly explained.

That's weirdly flattering?? Thank you for bringing your tvdu question to me!

So, I totally spent like an hour and a half researching this question just to be absolutely positive that I wasn't missing a line that disputed anything I'm about to say, and honestly, I'm still not entirely sure that this is 100% right but I'm gonna give you the best answer I can, and if anyone has any additional details that I've missed, they can feel free to add to this post!

So, here we have something Katherine said to Elena in 2x09:

Katherine: "The curse was bound by the sacrifice of Petrova blood. Witches are crafty with their spells. The doppelgänger was created as a way to be able to undo the spell. Once the doppelgänger reappeared, the curse can be broken."

According to her, the doppelgangers were solely created by the one who cursed Klaus so that it could be undone at some point. That person being Esther, as we well know. So, going on this, the initial reasoning for the Petrova Doppelgangers was that by binding Klaus’ werewolf side using Tatia’s blood, natura had to find a balance and thus created doppelgangers in her bloodline every few decades/centuries in order to let Klaus be able to undo the curse. And lining up with this, according to the earlier seasons, this bloodline begins specifically with Tatia:

From 3x13:

Klaus: It's just the allure of the Petrova doppelgänger, still so strong. What do you say, brother? Should we tell them about Tatia?

Elijah: Now why should we discuss matters long since resolved?

Klaus: Well, given their shared affection for both Elena and Katerina, I think our guests might be curious to learn about the originator of the Petrova line.

And at one point, during 3x05, when Rebekah meets Elena:

Rebekah: So this is the latest doppelgänger. The original one was much prettier.

If Tatia was the originator of the Petrova Doppelganger bloodline, it would make perfect sense and fit into the plot. After Amara is brought in, it's made more clear that Esther specifically chose Tatia because she knew her doppelganger blood had mystical properties, which makes a bit more sense. However, there is always the possibility that Tatia could have merely been a traveller, which would still give her blood mystical properties, and was potentially the easiest target for Esther. Or it’s simply because she was already using her blood to turn them into vampires, as a human that was close to the family and whom she trusted, so when Elijah killed her, she figured she might as well just use her blood for the curse as well.

Of course, just because Klaus, Elijah, and Rebekah believed Tatia to be "the first" of the doppelgangers doesn't necessarily squash all wiggle room for the writers to expand the bloodline. After all, when Rose kidnapped Elena in 2x08, this exchange happened:

Elena: Katherine.

Rose: The one and only, the first Petrova Doppelgänger.

So, Rose believed that Katherine was actually the first Petrova Doppelganger, which we definitely know is not the case. Maybe Klaus, Elijah, and Rebekah simply believed Tatia to be the first because they had never met Amara, or heard of her before, just as Rose had seemingly never heard of Tatia.

The reason that Elena was also a doppelganger is really as simple as the bloodline and chance, I suppose. Tatia had a child, who probably grew up, had kids of their own, so on and so on. Perhaps there was even another Doppelganger or two in the period between Tatia and Katherine. Now, I have to assume when it comes to Katherine that the Petrova bloodline was actually carried on through siblings rather than her own child, because as far as we are aware, Nadia never had children. So, one of Katherine's siblings has children, and again we may gain an extra doppelganger or five in there, then Isobel Fleming is born, and she then has Elena, our next known doppelganger. It really was just more about chance and sharing a bloodline.

Now, to answer the third (?) question, which is surprisingly simpler but also is a touch more this-is-what's-implied-but-we-can't-be-totally-sure: Klaus knew that he needed Katherine/a Petrova doppelganger because Mikael forced Esther to perform the ritual to bind his werewolf side while he was conscious, therefore, he saw everything she did. It can then be assumed that he only needed to repeat what she did in order to reverse it, or even just had to reverse her order of the ritual itself. It could be that Esther told him what he'd have to do in order to break it because she assumed he'd never be able to do it.

Something that is said in 3x08 by Rebekah to Elena about Esther:

Rebekah: She tried to make it right. She put the hybrid curse on Nik to suppress his werewolf side, and then she turned her back on him.

I feel like it's not too far fetched to assume then that they were all aware of what had to be done in order to perform the ritual. Again, though, that's never explicitly said as far as I'm aware, but I could be wrong! But if we go along with this, then we can probably assume that the initial implication here was that they either all saw Esther use Tatia's blood for the ritual or, as I suggested earlier, she may even have told Klaus that he would need a doppelganger's blood, knowing that Tatia was already dead and therefore unable to be used by Klaus, leaving his werewolf side bound for at least another few decades until the next doppelganger came along.

A lot of the answer about the ritual is more speculation based on the very few details I could actually find on Klaus' curse from before they introduced Amara and the change to the doppelganger plotline. I could've just said that they didn't really discuss it in depth enough for us to know at the time, but I thought I'd throw in some theories as well, in case you're interested!

So, shorter answer: The Petrova doppelganger bloodline was initially meant to start with Tatia when Esther used her blood for the ritual to bind Klaus' werewolf side and nature wanted to ensure there was a way to break it, which meant making sure that there would be more doppelgangers. Klaus more than likely knew about this because 1) he saw the things Esther used for the ritual and only needed to repeat what she did and/or 2) Esther told him the things he would need if he ever wanted to break it.

Again, if I missed any details, please feel free to let me know! I literally scoured for so long through the transcripts to every episode up until season 4 using every important keyword I could think of, so I'm hoping I didn't miss anything, but there's always a possibility! Hope this... kind of helped? And thank you again, Anon!

#oh look a wild anonymoose #ask away earthling!#the vampire diaries #klaus mikaelson #elena gilbert #katherine pierce #tatia petrova #long post #kinda wish the writers had stuck with this plot instead not gonna lie #I just think that the doppelgangers being created by esther for the sake of the curse made more sense

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mediocre--writing · 4 years ago

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i know we always talk about billy easily submitting to his dad but imagine this:

neil is charismatic, that must be where billy gets it, because he has the whole town fooled. nobody sees the demonic beast hiding under human flesh.

neil knows all the neighbors by name. he treats the custodian as he treats his boss. he offers help to old ladies with groceries and helps them cross the street.

people wonder why billy seems to glare at his father and disobey him so often; for how good a man neil is, it’s astonishing how resentful billy is of him.

billy will snark back in public, blatantly roll his eyes, flip him the bird when he’s not looking (and leave it up long enough for him to see when he turns).

the party thinks he’s an asshole who hates everyone. steve can’t believe the amount of disrespect he gives his dad. nancy and jonathan are floored at the vulgar words he speaks about him with, how he talks about him to his face.

max is more sympathetic than ever. how neil is so well known and widely liked by the people of hawkins and how nobody would ever even begin to believe a word of the truth billy could tell.

it’s almost like there’s nothing to be done. because as awful as neil is, there’s some days when billy won’t shut his mouth. and it gets him into trouble.

he’s spiteful and vindictive and vulgar when they shout at each other, but once billy is shoved against the wall, it’s a 50/50 chance he’s gonna fight back.

some days he can’t be bothered. is sick and tired of his own life, he lets the one ‘warning’ hit be enough.

other days he shoves back. he always gets shoved harder after. he’ll rile neil up to the point of maximum damage, but it’s so easy to get him angry it’s almost funny.

billy wishes, every time he gets hit, that some random townsperson would just walk into their living room. or kitchen. or billy’s bedroom. or, on one occasion, their back yard.

nobody sees billy hargrove: victim of abuse. they see billy hargrove: hates the nicest man in town. it’s ridiculous and billy can’t stand it.

he’s almost 18 now. he’s sick of hawkins and ready to leave and go anywhere but where his dad is.

but he wants one last joyride on the anger express. maybe ruin a reputation in the process.

so he acts out one day, while they’re walking down the sidewalk from a store max and susan had wanted to look at before grocery shopping.

billy knows how to get under neil’s skin. it’s one of the things he prides himself in knowing well.

he makes an off handed comment about how shitty it is that he’s being dragged into family outings. “we aren’t even a family,” he’ll say.

neil will give him a look. one that says he’s gonna get it when they’re home. where nobody can see who neil really is.

then billy brings up his mother, how she was so much better than neil could ever be. “she made the right decision to leave you,” he snickers as he watches neil’s fists clench.

a myriad of comments follow. ones about how neil is gonna lose another wife. ones about how he still can’t get billy into place. ones about how awful it must be to enjoy hating children.

there’s one more thing that he’s depending on to be the final fuse to make neil explode, right in broad daylight. bringing in the one thing neil hates most in life: “it’s too bad you’ve got a faggot for a son, huh?” billy says, just loud enough to be almost heard by the old lady walking a few steps in front of them.

when neil’s mustache curls into a pained grimace, billy knows he’s won. knows that he’s got the upper hand of the situation, even if he’s gonna get hit for it.

knows, right when the name “william,” comes out, threatening as ever, that he has won.

so he adds fuel to the fire. “do you think red or pink lipstick would look better with my complexion?” just to see the extra line that forms above neil’s eyebrows.

neil stops walking. turns to look at billy. they’re still in the middle of the sidewalk, max and susan a few feet away, stopped as well. max looks like she wants the floor to swallow her whole.

“well, you know, when i become a drag queen, i’ll have to look good, right?” billy asks his father, and it’s like he’s lost control over his own mouth. “so what’ll it be, dad? pink or red?”

and maybe the alarm bells and flashing red lights in billy’s head should have stopped him from talking. maybe he should have let this grocery trip be about getting weekly groceries.

but something about how he could see his fathers breathing speed up and his face turn so pink it’s almost purple, it’s fun.

with the added addition of seeing some of max’s little friends leaving the theatre at that moment.

right when the boys notice max, neil lunges for billy.

the old lady that had been steps in front of them has turned to see what the thud behind her was, only to see neil holding billy by his collar and his neck, shoved against a brick wall, billy’s toes barely touching the floor.

for being in such a compromising position, billy shouldn’t look as smug as he does when the old lady drops her purse with a gasp or when he sees max’s friends’ faces contort with fear. or when he sees harrington exit the movie theatre as well.

it happens quickly, the fight. billy thinks his brain went black and acted on instinct, he doesn’t remember a thing.

but the bystanders see it all. how close neil leans in to sneer something in billy’s face. how billy laughs, then lifts a knee to hit neil where it hurts.

how he stumbles enough for billy to get on his own two feet.

there’s a quick moment where neither moves, then neil rams into billy, but billy keeps his balance well, planted feet and all, and shoved neil back.

within the next minute, they’re both on the floor and alternating who’s got the upper hand. they’re decently matched as opponents, but neil has the upper hand. he’s taken billy down so many times he knows just how to bring him down physically, like how billy can destroy neil with words.

max and susan are backed up another few yards, susan holding max behind her, but not saying a thing. both are too shocked. this has never happened in public.

the party are watching from across the road, and steve feels like he should do something, because neil just slammed billys head into the cement. and he can’t really tell from how far they are, but billy’s nose is sure to be broken.

“call hopper,” steve instructs the party as he moves to walk across the street.

dustin grabs his arm before he can move far. “billy beat you once before, and now there’s like two of him, steve!”

steve walks over anyway. billy had been straddling neil prior, pushing a finger into his shoulder, before being slammed back to the ground.

there’s many different slurs being spewed from neil’s mouth, many of which change steve’s perception of billy entirely, but that’s not important now.

steve gets to where susan and max are when neil gets a grip on billy’s dangly dagger earring and pulls until it rips out of billy’s ear.

susan is staring, horrified at the scene, and max has shoved her face into the pink cardigan her mother wore, peeking out every moment or so.

when she spots steve, she doesn’t feel relived like she hoped she might, she just feels worse. more people don’t need to be involved.

“max, the party’s over there if you wanna...” steve suggests, motioning over his shoulder where the boys are crowded around a pay phone.

max pulls susan along with her across the road, glancing back at steve, who doesn’t seem to know what to do either.

what is he supposed to do? it’s not like dustin was wrong, steve’s never won a fight on his own.

luckily, right as he sees neil stand up and literally stomp as hard as he could on billy’s elbow, backwards, he hears a siren.

sees hopper’s cruiser pull around the corner and feels like a weight is both equally being lifted off his chest and being pushed down heavier.

neil is standing above billy, a few scrapes and forming bruises, ruffled clothes and a tear in the polo he was wearing, but nothing more damaged than his ego.

billy, on the other hand, is laying face down on the concrete, elbow bending in a way that is not natural and half his face covered in blood from both his nose and his ear.

neil looks only mildly frightened by hoppers appearance, and something about it rests uneasy with steve.

steve feels like he’s having an out of body experience as things happen. like he’s only there to observe, which he kinda is, but it’s hazy.

susan comes back, along with the boys following a shaken up max.

another cop, steve thinks it’s callahan, tries to wake billy up, because at some point neil had rendered him unconscious.

neil looks calm while this happens. he has an almost proud air about him as he watches a man try to wake up his son that he’d beaten so bad, he’d passed out.

it makes steve sick.

it also makes steve wonder if this were a semi common occurrence.

billy is driven to the hospital, mostly because his nose is crooked, his ear is still bleeding, and his elbow is most definitely facing the wrong direction, but they also think he may have cracked a rib or two.

neil is driven off in a cop car, callahan’s, while hopper stays to take stories.

it’s news to steve when susan and max share that this has happened multiple times, just never to such a detrimental state.

max recalls the first time that she’d met billy, he’d been wearing a cast on his arm and refused to tell her how he broke it.

steve sees billy in his head. sees the bruises on billy’s back when they’d play shirts and skins and how he’d chalked it up to a childish fight or a fun night with a girl.

sees how billy would favor his left leg for two weeks during basketball, and only wear sweats, but steve had noticed bruising around his right ankle when he’d change his shoes.

sees how billy seems to have insanely good intuition to when people are behind him or when he’s in a crowded place, always on the lookout.

sees, not justification, but a reason behind the way billy acts.

steve can’t imagine, even if his dad was like neil hargrove, having enough nerve to hit him back. even speak rudely towards him.

he recalls all the times he’d seen billy talk shit about his dad or snark at him in public. now he sees them as acts of bravery and defiance from an abuser rather than impolite and hateful towards a parent.

billy’s been fighting this whole time. and he’s been on the right side of the fight.

#stranger things #billy hargrove #neil hargrove #steve harrington #kinda but not really harringrove but imma tag it anyway #harringrove #mw harringrove #mediocre—writing #lol none of this is proof read so good luck #tw abuse #tw domestic violence #tw neil hargrove #tw gore #kinda??

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s-creations · 3 years ago

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Oh, That Imagination

Kids will always have active imaginations. But how the adult handles it depends on what the child is afraid of.

Fandom: DuckTales 2017 / The Three Caballeros Rating: General Audience Relationships/Pairings: José Carioca/Donald Duck/Panchito Pistoles Additional Tags: Growing up, Uncles with their Nephews, Facing Fears, Worries, hunting a creature, Krampus (character), giving a speech, watching a scary movie, protecting the boys, the passing of time, names OCs.

Part of a Series Called: We’re the Three- Sorry, Six Caballeros!

Author Note: I finished Student Teaching and passed my Content Test, so I’m getting back into writing! I do have a new job lined up for the school year. We’ll see how consistent I stay with uploading. XD

“Unca Donald, Unca Donald, Unca Donald!”

Even with the loud warning call, Donald still staggers when something blue collides against his leg. “Dishes! I’m doing dishes. Go and sit on the counter please.”

6-year-old Dewey gave a quick nod before clamoring up. The older duck impressed by how quickly the duckling could climb.

“Now, what can I help you with?”

“Benny said there’s a-a monster living in the sewage of Duckberg! I wanna go catch it!”

Donald let out a low hum as he washed the soap from the glass. This was twice in two weeks that neighbor Benny had told some story about some ‘creature’ they had seen. Dewey, always on the lookout for new adventures, ate each story up with determination and gusto.

“I see, very interesting. What does this monster look like?”

“Like...Like an alligator. Only bigger!”

“Ooooh, that sounds scary. And you’re going to catch them all by yourself?”

“Yep!”

“Well, aren’t you brave. Are you going to bring them back to be studied for science?”

“I’m gonna do it to rub it in Huey’s face. Cuz he says the creature isn’t real. But I’m gonna prove him wrong!”

“It sounds like your afternoon is full.”

“It sure is! Oh, wait, I wanted to ask you if we have a large net that I could use?”

“I don’t think we have a ‘large’ net. You’ll have your bug catching net.”

Dewey let out a contemplative hum. Hand resting on his cheek while his pointer finger tapped out some unknown tempo. A habit he picked up from José. “That’s not great. But I suppose it’ll have to do.”

“Look at you compromising. What are you going to use as bait?”

“Do we have any old lunch meat?”

“No and you’re not using what we have in the fridge.”

“You’re ruining the search Unca Donald! I need bait.”

“How about you take Tio Panchito with you? He had to help his grandpa search for farm animals when they got out of their pens. Didn’t have to use bait to get those animals back.”

“Tio worked on a farm?” Dewey’s eyes lit up hearing this new piece of information.

“Spent a few childhood Summers there.”

“What did he do?”

“Why don’t you go and ask him? I’m sure he would be more than happy to share stories with you and your brothers.”

“Okay, bye Unca Donald! I’m gonna learn about cows!”

Donald silently laughed as Dewey raced out of the kitchen. Childhood stories continued during dinner and only ended when the triplets were put to bed.

“So...should I question why Dewey furiously ran at me this afternoon? All while screaming his demands for me to tell stories?” The rooster asked as Donald joined him and José on the living room couch.

“Apparently, Benny had seen some ‘creature’ in the sewer system. Dewey determined that he was going to hunt said being down. I told him you would help in the search because you’ve helped with finding lost farm animals. That caught his attention and now you know the outcome.” Donald sighed as he leaned against the other, relaxing.

“Do you think the thrill of the hunt will call out to Dewey tomorrow?”

“We’ll see.” Donald replied back simply.

The hunt did not call out the next day. Dewey focused on creating a backyard zoo, he didn’t have time to worry about some creature. A few days later, a pet iguana was rescued from the neighborhood sewers. It appears Benny had actually seen something. It just wasn’t the towering creature he’d claimed before.

________________

The holidays were busy for all the adults in the household. Donald focused on getting the shopping done and holding down the fort while the ducklings raced around during their school break. Gleefully talking about Santa and what present they’re excited most about. José would be gone for weeks on end leading up to December 25, helping with numerous flights to make sure he had that day off. Starting from October through December, this time saw Panchito with booked weekends of different performances to help get other families into the festive feeling.

Even with having busy and exhausting schedules, they made sure to make time for the triplets. Baking, decorating the house, helping them pick out gifts for the other family members. Every year it was the goal to keep the ducklings as happy as possible.

Which is why Panchito became worried when 7-year-old Louie started acting...strange. Almost what the rooster would call ‘stressed’.

The duckling had started being overly helpful around the house. Doing more tasks than what would be required. Going out of his way to ask if he could help. And, most worriedly, he’d become quiet. Not in his normal way of just relaxing in front of the television. But almost fearful that he was being listened to by some unseen stranger. Eyes even darting around as he moved through the apartment.

Unfortunately, Panchito wasn’t able to approach this possible problem until a weekend late into the duckling’s break.

The rooster let out a sigh as he collapsed onto the couch. Thankful that he was done until the New Year’s celebrations he had the coming weekend. But he was able to relax for the rest of the week to celebrate Christmas. Cautious footsteps drawing closer caused Panchito to open his eyes. Finding Louis standing nervously in the middle of the room.

“Hola Louie, what can I do for you?”

“Um, do you need me to get you anything?”

Panchito raised a brow. “No, I’m fine. Why don’t you join me until dinner’s ready?”

“Oh, um, that’s okay. Maybe I should see if Uncle Donald needs any help.”

“You’re on break. Why don’t you just sit for a while?” The duckling frowned, eyes darting around before settling onto the couch. Still tense. “So, how has school been? I haven’t heard you and your brothers talk about it for a while.”

“Uh...good.”

“Just good? ...Try out any new schemes lately? I know Uncle Donald isn’t so thrilled when you do that. But you always have such clever ideas, makes me laugh.”

“Nope, I’ve been good! No crazy plans from me!”

Panchito sat up a little more when Louie started shouting at the ceiling. “Okay Louie, what’s going on. Are you feeling okay? Did something happen at school?”

The duckling dressed in green wrung his hands as he peered around.

“...Abby told me about the Krampus…” Louie eventually whispered.

“The who?”

“The Krampus! He’s the opposite of Santa Claus! A big creature with long horns and wears a cloak! And he comes after bad boys and girls! He takes them away in his large, greasy bag and they’re never seen again and-”

“Okay, Louie, come here. You’re getting yourself worked up.” Panchito easily and quickly moved the duckling onto his lap. Wrapping arms around the smaller form to help keep Louie grounded. “Breath with me. We’re going to take a few deep breaths, okay?”

Louie gave two quick nods. They remained this way for a few minutes, Panchito holding the duckling close and controlling his breathing for Louie to follow. The rooster only pulled away when Louie had calmed down enough to talk. “Okay, so, you were told a scary story. Why are you worried?”

“Because he goes after bad kids and I know I’m...not good.”

“Why would you say that? You’re a wonderful kid!”

“But I get the most detentions and I’m lazy and I know I don’t do my homework when I need to and-”

‘Louie… Yes, we would like you to work a little harder than what you do now. But you’re not bad. You...take risks. You have a point of view that I’ve never seen before. You’re a clever kid. And, well, between you and me.”

Panchito leaned closer. Louie’s eyes widened with curiosity. “You fight the system and you don’t let them beat you down.”

“...Does that mean I don’t have to wash the dishes?”

“Don’t push your luck. What I’m trying to say is that you’re not bad. You just think differently than others. Plus, if you’re this worried, this might be a sign you should help out more. But I doubt any Krampus will come after you.”

“Really?”

“Really… Also, you know your uncles and I would beat up any creature who dares try to hurt you.”

Louie laughed. Beaming and squirming as Panchito placed a kiss on his cheek. Christmas Day arrived with no mysterious creatures knocking in their front door. Louie was still safely tucked away in his bed. Joining his brothers with running out to the living room and unwrapping presents. Curling next to Panchito as all enjoyed the afternoon glow while watching a marathon of movies.

________________

Huey took to the Junior Woodchucks like a duck to water.

From day one it became a large part of his identity. He carried his handbook around with him everywhere. Writing his own notes and entries to add to the already thick volume. Gleefully patting his knees as he patiently waited for whatever uncle was going to take him to the weekly meetings. Even learning how to iron his uniform to keep it in tip top shape.

Dewey may complain that the eagerness was annoying. But nothing seemed to damper Huey’s spirit.

Until Huey was tasked to write a speech. As he was top ranked among the troop, he was given the honor of addressing the new member that would be joining that year. A banquet being held with the duckling presenting a speech of his own at the beginning of the event. The duckling was absolutely thrilled at first. Telling everyone he could about the great honor bestowed onto him.

All in the family thought he would triumph over this just like many other things in his life.

José was humming softly one evening, making his way to the kitchen when he heard sniffing coming from the bathroom. The door opened a crack and, taking a risk, José peered in. He found 8-year-old Huey, curled up by the tub and far away from the door. A stack of paper was at the duckling’s feet. Red rimmed eyes glaring at said stack.

“Huey?”

Said duckling’s head snapped up hearing José. Wiping his eyes frantically. “T-Tio José…”

“Criança doce, what is wrong?” José entered, leaving the door open in case Huey wanted out.

The duckling sniffed weakly. “...I’m scared.”

“Of what?”

“My speech…”

José frowned, knowing how excited Huey had been only a few days ago. “Can you tell me what you are scared about?”

Huey let out another sniff. His hand starting to hit the side of the tub as time went on. Which José put a stop to by reaching out to take the duckling’s hand. “I’m scared...that people are going to laugh at me. I keep practicing my speech to make it perfect and I read a bunch of tips but… All I can think about is messing up and people mocking me. Then my scout leader will see me as a failure and strip me of my badges and-”

The parrot pulled the duckling closer, humming a lullaby softly. Huey instantly clung to José, burying himself away in his guardian’s chest. It took a few minutes before the duckling finally relaxed, slumped against the older, hand still keeping a good grip on José's shirt.

“Huey, I would like for you to listen to me. Can you do that for me?” José received a nod, “I will help you with your speech. But you have nothing to worry about. Your scout leader seems to be nothing of the kind who would take away what you’ve achieved. And no one will laugh. We all know you will be doing your best.”

“...But what if my best isn’t enough?”

“It always will be Huey. Never doubt that.” José peered up hearing the floorboards creek. Finding Donald standing in the doorway wearing a look of worry. The parrot gave a quick shake of his head. A silent message that he had a handle on the situation. Donald gave a nod of his own before sneaking off. “Feeling better?”

“...A little. I’m still scared.”

“That is fine. How about we make some cookies? I think I saw your Uncle Donald heading that way before. And while we are doing that, you can show me your speech.”

Huey sniffed weakly. Pulling back slightly to look up at José. “Chocolate chip?”

“Of course.”

The duckling smiled weakly and nodded. Donald greeted the two with wide arms and a smile when they walked in. Huey beamed as he was picked up and given a sturdy hug from his other uncle as José started the process. But uncles gave Huey their undivided attention when he gave his speech. The other members of the family joined them as the cookies started to bake. Dewey and Louie keeping their ‘helpful’ comments to themselves and clapping along when Huey finished.

At the night of the banquet, Huey beamed as he gave a flawless speech. His family cheered the loudest.

________________

“This is such a bad idea.”

9-year-old Louie huffed, rolling his eyes as Huey bemoaned at his flawless plan. “If you’re going to be a stick in the mud, then don’t watch.”

“But I want to see it.”

“Then what’s the issue?”

“The movie is PG-13! We need parental guidance to watch.”

“You know they won’t let us watch.” Dewey added.

“But-”

“You get two options here Hubert,” Louie interrupted. One hand holding up a finger to keep Huey quiet. The other holding the latest zombie movie that had just recently been release to DVD, “You either watch with your mouth shut. Or you leave and keep your mouth shut in the bed while you listen to the amazingness that is this movie from the closed doors. What’s it going to be?”

Huey frowned. But he ‘zipped’ his bill closed and crossed his arms. Which the green-hoodied triplet took as keeping his mouth shut. With a nod, Louie popped the movie in and sat next to his brothers. All three were huddled together in the closet. Eyes glued to the small t.v. screen that was crammed in with them as well. The movie menu soon appeared and Dewey pressed play.

Donald let out a content sigh as he relaxed further between his partners. Panchito clinging to him as Donald’s head was tucked under the rooster’s chin. While José was curled up at Donald’s side, using the duck’s chest as a pillow. That night was quiet and calm. There was a weekend ahead of them that was just filled with nothing. A relaxing time with his partners and kids. It was going to be great…

A chorus of screams sounded from the triplet’s room. All adults were up and racing out in only a few seconds. Even hard to wake José was on full alert. Donald reached the door first, flinging it open. Fully expecting to see an intruder standing in the middle of the bedroom. Only to find Huey and Louie, sobbing as they clung to each other on the younger triplet’s bed. Dewey was waving his plastic sword at the open closet. His entire being was shaking as wide, fearful eyes were on the open space.

“What is going on here?” Donald called out over the noise.

“There’s a zombie in the closet!” Louis answered.

“It touched me!” Huey added.

“I’m fighting it off!” Dewey finished.

“What- okay- Dewey stop swinging that around!” Panchito walked over and pulled the sword from the duckling. Collecting the blue cladded triplet as he continued to shake.

Donald gathers the other two. Both of them desperately slings to the protection that was their uncle. José took to the closet, making sure it was empty. The parrot raised a brow, finding the t.v. that was still on and playing a movie.

He reached in to eject the movie and brought it out for the other two to see. “Donald.”

The duck looked it over. Frowning, seeing the topic, letting out a slow breath. It was clear the triplets were in no condition to have a stern talking to. Plus, he was honestly too tired to worry about it at the moment. “Okay...let’s go back to our room.”

The other two adults nodded. José turned off the lights as he was the last to leave the boy’s room. Donald rested himself back into the middle of the bed, only with more bodies pressed around him. Panchito cleverly left the bedside light on before he laid down on the bed, Dewey resting on his chest. The triplets flinched when José walked in.

“It is just me.” The parrot assured.

Donald let out a sigh as he gently preened the top of each head. “You’re safe here. Nothing’s going to get you.”

The bed was pressed further down as José laid down. Huey clamoring over into the parrot’s hold. Donald was free to wrap both arms around Louie. Three voices began to hum a familiar lullaby in hope of calming the triplets further. Even with their comforting presence, it took awhile for the three to fall asleep. It was not the way Donald wanted to start his weekend. But he should have known nothing he plans ever goes his way. Even with this hiccup, he was happy to have his family close. Falling asleep with a smile on his face.

Donald was able to take his pent up frustration on the idiot who had allowed children to rent a horror movie. Panchito coming as back up to make sure the duck didn’t kill anyone.

#donald duck #Jose Carioca #panchito pistoles #jose carioca/donald duck/panchito pistoles #The Three Caballeros #the three gay caballeros #s-creations

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baconpal · 4 years ago

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pokemon rant time

this one’s about the 2 new things, and is at least slightly intended for people actually excited/interested in them, click keep reading or perish

Gonna try and keep stuff short cus there's a lot of topics this time and I've already gone off about how pokemon Isn't meant for me or meant to be a good video game anymore, but gamefreak is right back on their bullshit, so I feel I need to at least point it out.

I'd like to preface all this with, if you are a fan of pokemon still, please realize you can ask for more out of this series. Expect perfection, even if you don't think you'll get it anytime soon. Pokemon won't go anywhere, the old games won't go anywhere, and gaming is a hobby, not a necessity; don't accept low quality products from a company just because you feel like you're supposed to.

With this next wave of pokemon games, gamefreak is clearly testing how little they can put in to a $60 game while still keeping the 2 major audiences they've cultivated. By responding to the most obvious and vocal complaints from the community, gamefreak is aiming to make games that seems like what most players want, without having to put in the work on quality products.

GEN 4 REMAKES Pokemon BS (I am not calling this shit BDSP) is intended for the audience that put up with let's go and RS remakes. The most vocal and obvious complaints for these games is their failure as definitive versions of the games they are remakes of, such as missing features/content, or drastically changed story/dialogue/style. In a way, the recent remakes are inferior versions of incredibly old games, which shows a lack of improvement in pokemon as a whole.

To address these issues, BS is very, very, VERY clearly aiming for a more 1-to-1 recreation of the DS games, but with fully 3d graphics. Clearly the map layout has been transferred exactly, and gen 4 already had mostly 3d environments to begin with, and everyone knows about the future-proof pokemon models at this point, so the amount of effort required to create something like this is absolutely minimal. Assuming dialogue, trainer teams, move lists, etc. are also lifted directly from DP, then this game could be developed in basically no time at all, leaving the team time to ensure the product is of decent quality and includes ALL of the content of the originals, if not more, like the earlier pokemon remakes did to ensure they were truly definitive versions of the games. That being said, it is unlikely the team behind BS has been making use of this saved time to improve the game.

One failing already clear is that the quality is not very good, at least graphical quality. The footage we have shows environments lacking in color compared to the original, with messy, unpleasant textures that contrast poorly with the simplistic environments. The characters especially do not work. As cute and fun the fanart of tiny dawn has been, BS dawn and all other characters look awful. They have gorilla arms that reach down to the floor and lifeless faces, as well as incredibly stiff/simplistic animations. As it stands, BS is a visually inferior game to DP, though most consumers will simply see it as 3D>2D without any understanding of what an artstyle is, so this might not be a problem for many, but that doesn't mean you should accept it.

What remains to be seen is what content will be added/missing from pokemon BS. It is very possible that massive parts of the game, such as the underground, variety of online modes, postgame areas, and content from platinum could be missing entirely. We also do not know if pokemon from after gen 4 will be worked into the region, or even supported. Gen 8 still currently does not support a large number of pokemon, and the remakes may continue this limited dex trend.

Even assuming the remake includes everything from the DS games and doesn't add anything that slows down the story or harms the experience, it will still only be an exercise in forced obsolescence. The main reason people can't really play DP still is that the online isn't supported anymore. If BS turns out to be exactly the same as DP, then you're buying the same game for at a higher price, only to play it until the online service goes away again, or the next game comes out, if both don't happen at the same time.

Don't let yourself buy a 13 year old game at twice the original price.

GEN 4 NOT-REMAKE KIND OF NEW THING On to legends now, gamefreak is targeting the people who put up with sun/moon and sword/shield. The obvious problem with those games to most people was simply a lack of change from the standard pokemon formula. Even when changing the gyms to trials or stadiums, most people still understand that the format and story structures are mostly unchanged. Of course, this problem has seemingly been addressed by changing the game structure a fair bit, but almost entirely by removal.

Trainer battles, and by extension, gyms and tournaments/elite 4 have been confirmed to be absent, meaning all battles are only vs single pokemon, in spite of the player likely having a team of 6 pokemon. Even if battle difficulty is increased to compensate (doubtful), this will still drastically increase the simplicity of combat and make it even less likely for the game to include any meaningful challenge. Exploring towns and meeting NPCs is also seemingly missing, as the game is confirmed to have only a single village, which frankly looks incredibly boring and we've yet to see a single NPC inhabiting the village.

Battles now use an ATB format instead of a turn-based format (for those of you who don't know what that means, it basically means nothing, it's still turn based, it just means the speed state determines who gets more turns instead of who goes first, that's it), but beyond that there seems to be no noteworthy changes, pokemon learn 4 moves with limited PP, type advantage will still definitely be the most important aspect to battle, and the player being able to walk around during battle provides no meaningful impact. While the little dash the pokemon do to approach each other is cool, it is already a sign that gamefreak will not be addressing the issue of lacking animations for pokemon battles, as they can't even be assed to animate and program pokemon walking around the environment during combat, and lucario doing 1 kick for a move described as a series of punches isn't a great sign either.

On the topic of lacking animations, the new "pet simulator feature" for legends seems to be an advancement on the ride system from sun/moon, which presumably people missed from sword/shield. Being able to ride on your pokemon to do stuff sounds cool, but in all likelihood, this system will be limited to only a select few pokemon who will each do a select few actions, and is not a reasonable replacement for all the other pet raising features that have been removed in the past. Similar to BS, the total number of pokemon included may also be limited arbitrarily, in spite of the fact that no new pokemon need to be added, as these games are not claiming to be a new generation.

The largest issues I personally have with this new game is the horrible technical quality and gameplay quality shown in the initial trailer. Unfortunately, these types of problems seem to be difficult to explain to the average consumer, even though the issues seem incredibly obvious and inexcusable to people like me. Most people were able to understand the problem with the berry trees in gen 8, because it was easy to explain, "this tree doesn't look like the other trees, and it sticks out, isn't that weird?", and so gamefreak has eliminated any immediately obvious issues like that, sticking with a very consistent artstyle for legends, making it almost impossible to easily explain its faults to the average pokemon fan.

People have been really quick to compare legends to BoTW; the game that invented grass, trees, and mountains. In spite of these comparisons, nobody seems to point out that legends looks dramatically worse than that almost 5 year old game from the previous generation. Plants are stiff and lacking in energy, draw distances are poor, colors are drab, and textures are messy. Many parts of legends seems to ape BoTW on just the surface, essentially just following market trends. Even the controls seem to follow after modern 3rd person shooters/stealth games, including a seemingly pointless roll and a clunky looking ball lobbing arc that feels unfun before even getting to play it myself.

The largest issue, painfully obvious to some, and impossible to explain to others, is the framerate. The trailer clearly was ran on actual switch hardware, and not prerendered, which would be a good mark for gamefreak if it didn't result in a trailer that never once hit 30fps. Even with empty fields, with only 1 or 2 characters on screen, the game was incapable of meeting the target speed, and had to resort to optimizations like reducing the frame rate of pokemon only inches away from the player to stop-motion levels of choppy. If situations with almost nothing going on result in slow-down, how will the game perform during actual gameplay? Even though slow-down is something everyone can feel, many people aren't capable of identifying it.

The major things to wait and see for legends is if the removed aspects of the series are made up for by some additional systems or content, and definitely wait to see if the performance improves. As with BS, preordering a game like this only shows that gamefreak only has to market the game by saying it's different, not improved, like they've been doing for years now.

TL;DR FUCK GAMEFREAK One major thing of note is that gamefreak is releasing 2 games based on gen 4 at the nearly the same time, meaning they have no obligation to design new pokemon or even include pokemon not from sinnoh, and also that the sales of each game can be used as an indicator for which of their 2 audiences is more loyal to them. Both BS and Legends are in a position to be pushes aside if they fail, but if either succeeds, gamefreak can continue in the direction of the more successful game and reap the benefits, without any need to innovate, improve, or adapt to criticism.

The last thing I feel I have to remind people about is that gamefreak is a company; you don't need to be "grateful" to them. I've seen that word thrown around far too much by people who seem to buy pokemon games like its a tax, and not something they want to do. You don't have to suck up to a company that made games you liked as a kid if the games aren't what you want anymore. Pokemon is so wildly successful that it can't possible die, so don't buy the games out of pity, or out of some feeling of obligation. Buy the video games you want to play and nothing more.

Basically, if you are considering getting any of these new games, please wait until the games are out before purchasing them, and decide for yourself if they are worth your money, and more importantly, your time. Preordering these games only lets gamefreak know their audience will buy and put up with anything. They have no real competition at the moment, so the only thing the audience can do to encourage improvement is show some of restraint.

#juvenile rant #pokemon #if you read all that then good job cus jesus that got long #please just respect yourself #you deserve better games #you arent weird for wanting things to be good #anyway have a good night

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fandomgodmother420 · 4 years ago

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Okay so I saw

This post ^^

And I was like

Wait wait wait okay okay hang on wait a damn minute-

Because this is cursed rite we all know this is cursed but somethin about it got me thinkin it got me thinking quite a lot and it’s the idea of Callahans character being deaf and like obviously the way it’s done here is bad but it got me thinking okay well what if you did it well? What if it wasn’t garbage? What if it became a super important part of the show?

I think I have a new favorite au now?

Okay listen listen let me explain right-Callahan would still be a side character to the side characters but first things first he’d talk using sign language and literally the first thing that he signs when people try and talk to him is that he’s deaf. He also wouldn’t be able to understand people who talk to him, they’d have to either sign, write something down, or be super expressive. (Ik a lot of deaf people read lips but I feel like in media with deaf people almost all the time they like fully rely on lip reading and their almost superhumanly good at it and idk I think it would be cool for a deaf character to just not lip read-hardly ever) so now the fact that he’s deaf isn’t just something that you can drop in interviews for brownie points. Still, he’s hardly ever there and he’s not really a part of the story and that’s just kind of annoying and for a while it seems like that’s just how it’s gonna be, just one background background deaf character who’s pretty cool but who we almost never get to see...

But the explosions that went off during the pogtopia manburg war where pretty fuckin loud

And Quackity was right on top of them. He might’ve lost a cannon life to them-it’s kinda up for debate but for the purpose of the au we’re gonna say he did, because losing a cannon life affects your body. Your body changes to suit how you died-you get scars from losing a cannon life.

Here’s where it gets good

One of the next episodes post war is 100% Quackity focused and he wakes up in a bed and he’s like welp lets just hope I’m not as bad off as Tubbo was. There’s no rustling noise when he moves the sheets and blankets to look at himself, at this point the viewer might realize there’s no music in the background either, there’s no ambient noises from outside. Quackity sees he doesn’t have visible scaring anywhere and he’s like that’s weird but good for me? I guess? He walks outside and his footsteps don’t make any noise. Tubbo runs up to him and starts talking-except he’s not making any noise either. His mouth is moving but there’s no sound coming out of it. Both quackity and the viewer are currently experiencing what’s going on in 100% silence and Quackity starts to panic. A scar would’ve been fine, a limb he can live without, but this??? He can’t hear! He can’t hear anything! Fuck is he supposed to do now?

He runs to Sapnap and Karl, they’re not dating yet but they make him feel safe and he doesn’t know where else to go or what to do and Sapnaps like “I know a guy” but neither the audience nor Quackity hears him say it. His mouth moves but again, no sound. Nothing. Still he makes it clear that he has an idea and that he’ll be right back. Mans fuckin books it to Callahan and after a bit of frantic gestures and sloppy sign language because ya know of course Sapnap did try to learn sign to talk to Callahan at some point he just doesn’t practice nearly enough, Callahan comes over to Quackity and starts teaching him and Karl ASL and gives Sapnap a much needed review course.

That’s it. That’s the episode. An entire episode that’s 100% silent with no subtitles, that’s just Quackity learning how to function without being able to hear. In the places where Callahan can’t help Sapnap and Karl come in. Tubbo gets in on it too since he’s deaf in one ear ever since the festival. (Quackitys like damn cheif I didn’t even kno that and Tubbo admits to thinking it was just him being in shock for a long time until a bee flew around his ear for 20 minutes straight a week after the festival had happened and he didn’t know it was there until Tommy asked if he was gonna name it.) Quackity learns how to talk when he can’t hear himself speaking, how to read lips, what music is like when you can’t hear it, how to speak sign language, all that jazz.

One of the things about being deaf that scares the shit out of Quackity is not being able to hear people sneaking up on him and Tubbos like “oh you need a spotter” and Quackity makes it clear that he has no idea what the fuck that means. So Tubbo explains “a spotter, I don’t know if they actually have a different name but I call them that cuz they cover your blind spot. They’re like your eyes and ears where you don’t have any. That way nobody can sneak up on you.” If the audience is particularly observant they’ll realize that ever since the festival Tommy has always stood on Tubbos right, witch is where Tubbo had gotten scarred. (Later on after Tommy’s exiled Quackity and sometimes Fundy become the ones to cover Tubbos right, but Tubbo is more clearly on constant high alert than he used to be. On a few days like the one before the capturing techno and the one before the second festival he’s straight up jumpy and he hates it) So Quackity of course has a lot of questions is this is pretty important. “well how do I know who I should get to be my spotter? Do they need like training or something? Should I just get a service dog? ???” And Tubbos like “No. Well-maybe that’s the proper way to do it but I’d just go with someone I trust my life with-whoever makes you feel safest, go with that” and Sapnap and Karl start laughing like idiots because Quackity IMMEDIATELY grabs them-like Tubbos barley finished his sentence and Quackitys like ah yes

The hardest part is preserving Quackitys ability to speak Spanish, because he’s the only one who knows it so Karl Sapnap and Tubbo can’t tell him weather he’s pronouncing it right or not and none of them know Spanish sign language. Hell Karl and Tubbo didn’t even know Spanish sign language existed until that day. After a bit of panicking Sapnap is like “wait I know a guy” and Quackity can actually tell what he’s saying this time. (Woo parallels) So sapnap and Co. go to George who’s king now and has access to all of Erets king stuff. Turns out Erets castle has a whole shelf of translation guides for different languages and their sign language counterparts. She kept them for diplomacy reasons. It’s much harder to learn without Callahan teaching it, but progress is made and the gang decides they’ll keep working on learning it together. There’s still the problem of Quackity not being able to speak Spanish though, they end up going with does Quackity sound like how he normally does rn? for figuring out if he’s pronouncing things right. Karl and Sapnap are surprisingly good at being able to tell.

But here’s the best part rite:

So after this episode Quackity, Karl, Sapnap, Tubbo, and obvs Callahan all know sign language-they don’t all know it perfectly nobody’s gonna master it in a day but they’re working on it. And so now in later episodes in addition to the gang talking in sign language a lot when they’re the focus of a scene, you can make them talk to eachother in sign language while other stuff is going on!! No subtitles to translate or draw attention to it, some people might not even notice its happening, but if you watch them you can see them signing to eachother. You could add so many convos and lore and secrets and the best part is if the audience wants in on it they also have to learn sign language!!

Literally just-oh my god it would be the coolest thing okay like immagine:

Ranboos doing his dramatic speech to everyone. Y’all know the one-the one before doomsday after Tommy gets out of exhile. So like Ranboos doing his bit and Fundy and Nikki are arguing with him and :0! what’s this? Look in the background and Tubbo and Quackity are signing to eachother, Quackitys angry and Tubbo is somehow angrier and you watch them more closely to see what the hell is going on and realize (with your sign language knowledge)-they’re fighting about executing Ranboo.

LIKE HOW FUCKING COOL WOULD THAT BE HOLY SHIT

Anyways I have so many headcannons for this now I think it’s the coolest thing if there’s like a tag? Or something? For this thatd be so fuckin cool if there isn’t I feel like I should make one but idk what to call it ion know man I just think this is poggers as hell. To think it all sprung from someone making a DreamSMP as a garbage riverdale show joke

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romance-geek · 4 years ago

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sleep my long, unbroken sleep (niragi x oc)

warnings: violence, blood

author’s note: heyy guys! so this chapter is mostly about chiyori's parents and how they came to the borderlands. like the summary says, she was born in the borderlands so she's like a native of this "country" - i wanted to explore such a concept. the next chapter will be more chiyori-centric. let me know what you guys think! (also the tech from her parents' era are a bit diff so instead of smartphones and such, i had to change it a little)

summary: Kuroba Chiyori may be born in the Borderlands, but no way in hell does she want to die in it.

AO3 LINK

20 YEARS AGO ; SEASIDE PARADISE RESORT

I just want to stay like this forever, without the boring routine of life.

The sun begins its slow descent towards the horizon, painting the sky in oranges and pinks and purples. Children screaming in delight, splashing each other with pool water. Couples lathering each other up with sunscreen. Lifeguards diligently looking over everyone.

All her life, everyone praises her wit and loads her with expectations. So, so many expectations that weigh heavily on her shoulders.

Expectations that she wants to meet.

But you can’t exactly please everyone, can you? Or maybe you can, but at the expense of your health.

Being with Kuroba Asuma is a breath of fresh air. He never expects anything too much from her, content with what she has and who she is. She first met him at a crime scene, which isn’t exactly how most love stories go but she didn’t mind because after he took her witness statement he stopped by at the library everyday for lunch. He courted her for almost a year before he asked - quite nervously, might I add - if she could be his girlfriend.

(Of course she said yes. In fact, what she said was: “Wasn’t I already your girlfriend?”)

Fast forward through the happiest years of her life and now she’s here at the Seaside Paradise Resort, a thoughtful surprise from Asuma. It’s the week of their first wedding anniversary, can you believe that? How time flies when you’re with the person you love.

A smile forms on Kuroba Kaname’s face as her husband helps her rise from the pool. Her hand automatically rests on her bulging stomach while Asuma wraps a towel around her.

Like her, he can’t help but caress her stomach, knowing that in just about a month there would be a new addition to their little family. A daughter…

“Let’s get you dried off now, dear.” He brushes off the water droplets on her face, sneaking in a quick kiss.

Kaname presses her fingers together, batting her eyelashes. He immediately catches on to what she wants and rolls his eyes. “What’s the little one craving for now?”

“Congee, some mango, aaand,” she hums for a second, “a chicken sandwich with lots of mayo!”

Asuma sighs resignedly. “I’ll order room service while you wash off.”

They walk into the elevator - or in Kaname’s case, she waddles - and press the button for the third floor. The elevator lifts up smoothly, but Kaname sways in her spot. “Woah!” She presses a hand to her head. “I feel a bit li-ligh—um, what was that word?”

“Light-headed?” Asuma asks softly, putting one of his wife’s arms over his shoulder so that he could carry her weight lest she fall down and potentially harm the baby. “I think you’ve had enough fun for today.”

The elevator dings open and they step out, Asuma nearly bumping into a man who seems almost like he’s sleepwalking. Kaname keeps her gaze on him out of curiosity even as her husband leads them to their room.

“Doesn’t that guy seem strange to you?”

Asuma throws a nonchalant glance over his shoulder. He shrugs and unlocks their room. “Probably had too much to drink. It is Paradise, after all.” Wagging his eyebrows as he says that last sentence, he gathers a giggling Kaname into his arms and closes the door behind them.

“I wish we can stay here forever,” Kaname says.

“Me too, dear.” Asuma kisses her forehead softly. “Now, let me prepare a bath for y—”

Darkness.

Drenched in heavy, silent darkness.

Silence except for the thudding of their heart, their heavy breathing as they try to understand what the hell is going on.

“D-dear, what’s going on?” Kaname trembles against him. He could see the whites of her eyes even in the dim room, eyes searching for an answer.

Asuma runs to the window and peeks behind the curtains. He freezes, then pulls them apart completely. Kaname trails after him in confusion, asking again, “What’s happening?”

“Gone,” Asuma whispers.

“What?!” Kaname gasps. “Wh-But—How can that be?”

He turns to her with a serious look on his face, repeating, “Everyone’s gone.”

Kaname’s brows crease in a mixture of worry and trepidation, biting her lip as she rubs her belly. “That’s impossible. How can everybody disappear in a blink of an eye? Did we miss a fire alarm or something? An earthquake drill?”

“I don’t think so.” Asume grabs his phone from the nightstand and flips it open. He presses the home button to turn it on, but the screen doesn’t light up. “That’s weird.”

Again, he presses it, this time longer.

The black screen stares at him, almost mockingly.

“I was just charging this,” he says to Kaname, scratching his head. “Let me see your phone.”

Kaname’s phone yields the same results.

“Maybe our phones overheated?” Asuma suggests.

Kaname shakes her head. “It’s barely hot out. Let’s just put some clothes on and ask around. If we take too long, we might not be able to catch up to everyone.”

They dress up in a hurry, question after question popping up in their heads. (Asuma discretely takes out a gun from his bags as well as its holster.) They take the stairs when it seems evident that the electricity is out in the whole resort. Their trip is longer than it should have been, mainly due to Kaname’s state.

“You’d think a resort would have backup generators,” Asuma mumbles to her. It didn’t feel right to talk louder than a whisper, like someone may be watching them. The thought unsettles him.

Finally, they exit the resort building.

They are greeted by even more silence and darkness, with only the pale moon as their source of light.

Asuma pulls his wife close to him. “You know, I pride myself in being completely unflappable at whatever the world throws at me, but this is a little too much. The only reason I’m not freaking out right now is because you’re here with me and I don’t want to seem like a wimp.”

This prompts a giggle out of Kaname. “My goofy knight in shining cargo pants.”

“It’s so creepy,” she says after a beat. “Did we black out or something during an evacuation?”

“We’re the picture of health, dear, I don’t think we’d black out. Especially not at the same time.”

She nods. “Yeah, you’re right. Let’s just walk until we see someone or something that could tell us what is going on.”

“Don’t worry, babe.” Asuma flexes his biceps, shooting her a charming smile. “I didn’t get a job at the police force because of my exceedingly handsome good looks, you know. I’ll protect you.”

Kaname rolls her eyes, placing a hand on his still-flexing bicep. “Whatever you say, dear.”

They continue walking in a vaguely uncomfortable silence further out of the resort’s grounds. It takes them almost an hour before something bright pops up in the distance.

“Hey, there’s some light over there!”

They quicken their feet, eager to get out of the darkness. What greets them is a LED TV inside an otherwise dark electronic store that says…

𝐖 𝐄 𝐋 𝐂 𝐎 𝐌 𝐄、 𝐏 𝐋 𝐀 𝐘 𝐄 𝐑 𝐒

𝐓 𝐇 𝐄

【 𝙶 𝙰 𝙼 𝙴 】

𝐖 𝐈 𝐋 𝐋 𝐂 𝐎 𝐌 𝐌 𝐄 𝐍 𝐂 𝐄

𝐈 𝐍 𝐀 𝐌 𝐎 𝐌 𝐄 𝐍 𝐓

“Game?” Kaname whispers. “What the hell?”

“Is this some kind of government experiment type of deal?” Asuma asks rhetorically.

The text on the screen changes.

𝐓 𝐇 𝐈 𝐒 𝐖 𝐀 𝐘 𝐓 𝐎

𝐓 𝐇 𝐄 𝐆 𝐀 𝐌 𝐄 𝐀 𝐑 𝐄 𝐍 𝐀

⬅

“Should we go? I mean, there might be people there?” She rubs her belly, as if to comfort her daughter even though it looks like she’s the one who needs comforting.

He thinks for a moment, then nods. “Well, it’s not like there’s anything else to do or anywhere else to go.”

Asuma leads the way, hand clasped tight on Kaname’s as they near what looks like a karaoke bar complete with a blinking GAME sign in neon pink and the background instrumentals of a pop song. When they cross the threshold, what feels like the sense of imminent danger falls over them. Inside is a small group of people, the majority of which glance at the husband and wife pair. All of their eyes trail down to Kaname’s protruding stomach. They give her looks that are a mixture of a grimace and a pitying look.

“Are we playing a singing game?” Kaname chirps into the awkward silence. Asuma now has his arm around her shoulder protectively. “I’m not a bad singer, but if we’re going based on scores I’m definitely gonna fail.”

Silence.

“Tough crowd,” Asuma remarks. He notices a small sign that says 𝐒 𝐂 𝐀 𝐍 𝐇 𝐄 𝐑 𝐄 and below it what looks like a fingerprint scanner. Above those two is a TV screen. “Are we supposed to scan ourselves?”

“Yes.” Surprisingly, one blank-faced man with sleeves rolled up to his elbow replies.

Asuma waits for an explanation, but the man doesn’t say anything else. “Ooookay, then.” He pulls Kaname closer as he presses his thumb to the biometric device.

𝐅 𝐈 𝐍 𝐆 𝐄 𝐑 𝐏 𝐑 𝐈 𝐍 𝐓 𝐑 𝐄 𝐂 𝐎 𝐆 𝐍 𝐈 𝐓 𝐈 𝐎 𝐍 𝐈 𝐍 𝐏 𝐑 𝐎 𝐂 𝐄 𝐒 𝐒

𝐏 𝐋 𝐄 𝐀 𝐒 𝐄 𝐖 𝐀 𝐈 𝐓 𝐀 𝐌 𝐎 𝐌 𝐄 𝐍 𝐓

“Please wait for the game to commence.” A robotic feminine voice says, the TV suddenly turning on. A timer appears on the screen. 00:59… 58… 57… “One minute until registration closes. There are currently eleven participants.”

They wait another minute through the stifling silence, but no one else seems to come. Finally, the speakers emit a tone. “Registration has closed. The game will now commence. Game: ‘Singing Contest.’ Difficulty: Ace of Hearts.” At the announcement of the difficulty level, most of the group seems to sag in relief although some still seem tense. Kaname feels a bemused smile slide over her face. So it really is a singing game? And yet, everyone looks so serious.

“Rule: Each player has thirty seconds of singing time. After each player, everyone else has to vote whether that person is a good singer or a bad singer. Condition: Guess the majority vote correctly within one minute.”

A door to one of the karaoke rooms creaks open.

Asuma and Kaname exchange a look as they follow everyone into the room. All this fuss for a simple singing game?

Someone, a young college student, clears her throat to gain the attention of everyone. “How should we decide the order?”

“Whoever wants to go, goes,” replies a gruff voice. It comes from a man whose biceps are nearly as big as his head, with eyes that scrutinize every person in the room. Asuma doesn’t feel as intimidated as he is probably expected to be because he knows that he has a trump card hidden under his jacket. He hopes he doesn’t have to resort to using it.

Everyone stands there in silence for a moment, eyeing each other with suspicion and anxiety. Asuma can feel his patience beginning to wear thin, so he lets go of Kaname’s hand and grabs the microphone in the room. “I’ll go,” he says, flipping through the songbook and inputting the numbers for the song he wants.

When the music starts up, Kaname cheers him on. Everyone else remains silent as he sings for the required thirty seconds, even incorporating silly dance moves that make the rest of the group look at him weirdly. When he finishes, the TV flashes again, text appearing on the screen as the voice dictates. “The voting period has begun. Singer, next to the songbook is a notepad and two pens - take one piece of paper and one pen. You may place your guess inside or outside, but it is required for you to wait outside while the audience submits their votes. Audience, write down your vote and fold it. You may not discuss your vote, nor can you persuade others. Once everyone has voted within one minute, the singer can return to the room. The audience will one by one reveal their votes, and afterward the singer will reveal their guess.”

“Fun.” Asuma tears out one page and takes a pen. It didn’t matter whether he actually sang well, because no one in the room is obligated to write down their actual opinion. He sweeps a quick glance around the others, but he isn’t a mind reader. What he can gather is that they are too solemn for what seems to be a trivial game, therefore there is more than meets the eye. There is also still the question of the city-wide blackout, as well as the disappearance of hundreds-maybe thousands-of people almost in a blink of an eye. So you can’t blame him for feeling nervous as he writes down his guess.

He leaves the room, flashing a smile to his wife as he does so.

“We only have one minute to vote, so let’s vote now,” Kaname says once the door shuts. One by one, they each tear out a piece of paper and write down their votes. When Kaname’s turn comes, she keeps a poker face on while tearing at the notepad.

She bends to write down ‘GOOD.’

Soon enough, the voting period has ended and Asuma returns to the room.

“Audience, you may now reveal your votes.”

Kaname feels her heart pounding as the votes are being said, her hand holding tightly onto Asuma’s. It’s neck to neck. Tears gather at the corners of her eyes ( Why is she being so emotional? It’s just a stupid game. Stupid hormones! ) when she is the last to reveal her vote. “Good,” she croaks out. But it doesn’t matter.

Because there are 6 votes for BAD and 4 votes for GOOD.

Asuma pats her hand reassuringly as he holds up his paper, which says BAD. “Lucky guess, huh?”

She feels the tension in her body leave and a slightly teary giggle erupts from her throat.

"I think I'll wait a while before my turn," she says.

The next two singers successfully guess correctly, and it's during the fourth round when something happens. The guy with muscles drops down like a sack of potatoes as a red laser comes for him, prompting shocked gasps all around.

Asuma immediately kneels down and takes his pulse, but… Nothing. "He's dead," he announces, but it looks like everyone except his wife already knew that. "Alright, can anybody tell us what the fuck is going on?!"

"He didn't follow the rules," says the man with rolled-up sleeves. He was the second singer. His glasses glint in the neon light as he points with his chin to the muscled guy's hand, which clutches two pieces of paper. "The rules stipulate that singers may only take one piece of paper."

Kaname gapes at this.

Almost as if setting the tone for the rest of the game, nearly every singer up next guesses incorrectly and meets the same fate as the muscled guy. Not before long, she is the only singer left. Aside from the first three singers, only one other person had guessed correctly, so four people would be voting.

She starts to move, but Asuma holds her back by the wrist and pulls her in to kiss her, hoping it wasn’t their last. Not wanting to prolong it any more than it has to be, she quickly takes a piece of paper and brings it outside.

Asuma stares at his paper for a while before he scribbles down 'BAD.' He didn't know how he could cement her guess as the majority vote. Eyes burning, he kicks himself inwardly for not fulfilling his promise of protecting her.

Kaname returns with two clenched fists, a determined look in her eyes.

"Audience, you may now reveal your votes."

"Good.”

"Bad.”

"Good.”

What?

Asuma stares at his folded vote, then slowly opens it to show everyone. “Bad.”

The young college girl, who survived, reels back in surprise. “It’s a tie? Does that mean whatever her answer is, she’ll live?”

“No,” interrupts the man with rolled-up sleeves. “The rules say—”

“Enough with your fucking rules, man!” Asuma barks.

The other survivor is quiet. She almost looks like she could blend in the shadows with all the dark colors she’s wearing as well as the shades she has on.

Asuma wraps his arm around Kaname to comfort her when her shoulders start shaking. “Don’t cry, dear,” he says, but his assumption is wrong when she suddenly bursts out laughing.

Kaname holds up not one, but two pieces of paper.

GOOD.

BAD.

“I guessed correctly after all.”

9 YEARS AGO ; TOKYO METROPOLITAN CENTRAL LIBRARY

Eleven-year-old Kuroba Chiyori strikes a match and a tiny little flame appears.

She guides this flame to a tall candle on her favorite bronze candle holder. In the Borderlands, electricity is reserved for the game arenas, which her parents forbid her from entering until she is at least 18 years of age. She hasn’t been able to witness a single game yet, but she knows it’s only a matter of time before her parents let her.

Because if she doesn’t know what to expect, how can she emerge a victor?

Chiyori shifts her focus back to the book on the table. Her mother, Kuroba Kaname, said that she used to work as a librarian in this very library, before she and Chiyori’s father, Kuroba Asuma, became citizens of the Borderlands. It’s her goal to read every single book in the library before she turns 18, but Kaname says that she needs to be realistic. Her mother is right, of course. The Tokyo Metropolitan Central Library has literally thousands of books, so how could Chiyori possibly read every book?

Nice to have a goal though, she muses as she flips to another page. It’s not like there’s anything else to do in here, not while her parents are gone probably watching over tonight’s games.

It wasn’t always like this. When she was younger, her parents weren’t the Queen of Diamonds or the King of Spades yet. But then two years ago, the face card representatives were finally killed off by that cycle’s players, and the positions were up for grabs. There were only a handful of citizens in the Borderlands, victors from certain cycles that chose to stay after conquering all the cards from Ace to King. Her parents decided just that almost eight years ago.

It mustn’t have been easy for them, her mother especially. She was due to give birth to Chiyori in a mere two months when they became players. Perhaps this was a good thing though, as it gave them the drive to not die. For her. For Chiyori.

As far as Chiyori knows, she’s the only person to have ever been born in the Borderlands. But there isn’t really anyone to ask, or to give her answers.

Her first memory is of her father returning home, looking as if he took a quick swim in a pool of blood. Chiyori’s fingers clutching at her mother’s clothes as she drank her milk, eyes wide as her father dropped down on one knee to ruffle her then-short hair.

Now that she’s a bit older, her parents started leaving her alone at night, in this quiet library. These books are her only friends as she wasn’t yet allowed to make her presence known to the players.

Sometimes there are game arenas close by and she watches through the windows as numbers of players enter and only a few come back out. None of the players she has seen are anywhere near her age.

Maybe that’s why she wants to join the games when she turns 18. Loneliness.

The books she’s read tell her of companionship, adventure, friendship… love. What interesting concepts. Would she ever experience such a thing?

She startles when the light from her candle burns out. Pouting, she places a bookmark on her book and closes it. That’s her last candle.

As if on cue, flashes of red catch her eye. Outside the window, lasers from the sky come down, and some people scream when they do.

There’s someone standing outside the library.

He looks young, almost as young as Chiyori. Maybe a highschooler? He locks eyes with Chiyori just as a laser comes for him.

She doesn’t move as his body sprawls on the pavement.

Books tell her that she should feel sad when people die. How can she feel sad for this stranger? At least he has experienced life before death. At least he’s out there, while she’s in here almost longing to exchange places with him.

… Well, she may be young, but so is the night.

Chiyori sprints to her closet, which is really a display cabinet that used to house heavy encyclopedias. She tugs off her pajamas in a rush and grabs a clean teal t-shirt along with cream-colored cargo shorts. Her feet are already clad in socks, so she just pushes them into her ratty sneakers.

Most games usually last until midnight, there are some that last until sunrise, and a select few can last for days. It usually depends on the difficulty of the game itself, not just the game levels.

The gamemasters and dealers use the Takebashi Station in Chiyoda City, Tokyo as their headquarters, so the distance from there to here would be… She visualizes a map of Tokyo for a moment. Around 8 to 9 kilometers! It’s far enough to watch one game and get back before midnight.

She giggles when she realizes it’s almost like that Cinderella fairy tale she read as a child.

TWO HOURS LATER

She comes home drenched in blood.

#alice in borderland #niragi x reader #niragi x oc #niragi suguru #niragi

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