#I was taking some time to develop my art y’know

[maimebowz]

I’ve done a massive update w/ my ocs!!!

[sapphire-writes]

Beyond The Play

college!Art x college!Reader

summary: Tashi needs some time alone with her man, which leaves you without a room for the night.

word count: 3.8k

rating: mature/explicit/18+

warnings: alcohol, fingering, dry humping, p in v sex with a condom, light praise, titty sucking, there's only one bed oh no!!

a/n: thanks for all the love on my first Challengers fic! hope you enjoy this one!

“You are so fucked,” Art says, taking another sip of his beer.

“Shut up.”

“He’s right,” Tashi agrees, sighing heavily, glancing at her cards.

You’re all sitting on the floor of your and Tashi’s dorm room, half-empty beer bottles littering the floor between you. You’d been playing poker for the past hour or so, swindling more of Patrick and Art’s money. It’d become a Friday night habit of yours, card games and beer with Patrick and Art. Patrick was always a maybe, he only came to visit his girlfriend a couple times a semester. 

But you, Art, and Tashi were always a solid trio. Tashi and Art had met through tennis of course, and you had met Art through Tashi after rooming with her freshman year of college. You’d become fast friends, and roommates for the next several years. You got along with Patrick well enough, you had to once he and Tashi started dating.

You could tell that had been a sore spot for Art, at least for a while. You’d suspected he’d had a thing for Tashi, and fire and ice hadn’t been the same since. You’d once asked Tashi about it and she’d only shrugged. Even though she was with Patrick for now, you knew Tashi had only one true love. 

Whatever Art felt for Tashi was easily molded into friendship, and the three of you became nearly inseparable. Which was good, even if you may or may not have developed some feelings of your own for the blond tennis player. 

But your friendship was more important. Those feelings could be pushed aside.

“God damn it,” Patrick curses, “I fold.”

Tashi snickers, revealing her cards and Patrick swears once more. 

“I need a smoke,” Patrick says, standing and leaning across Tashi’s bed to the open window.

“Oh no you don’t,” Tashi says, standing at lightning speed, “Outside, we are not getting in trouble for this.”

She grabs Patrick by the shirt collar, dragging him off the bed. He dramatically chokes, but lets her drag him towards the door.

“Art come on,” Patrick insists, reaching for his best friend.

“What? No, I wanna stay,” Art says, sandy hair falling in front of his eyes, “You don’t need a babysitter—”

“Yes I do,” Patrick insists, “C’mon five minutes, I swear.”

The boys tumble into the hall and you can hear their voices fading as they make their way outside. You stand from the floor, gathering up some beer bottles, and folding up the empty pizza box.

“Hey, d’you think you could sleep somewhere else tonight?” Tashi asks, brown eyes wide, “It’s Patrick’s last night, and y’know we really haven’t had any alone time.”

Your chest constricts at the thought. You totally get where she’s coming from but, it’s your room too. The thought of sleeping in the common area is less enticing. 

“Or at least just for a couple of hours,” Tashi backtracks, seeing your expression, “Just so we can—”

“Yeah, Tash it’s fine,” you tell her, swallowing your annoyance. Tashi’s been nothing but thoughtful and kind as a roommate, and friend. It’s an inconvenient favor, but nothing crazy. “I’ll get out of your hair for a couple of hours.”

“You’re the best,” she says, kissing your cheek, “Seriously, I owe you one.”

“You sure do,” you tell her, “I expect full payment for this.”

“Do you mean a trip to the movies with slurpees and popcorn?” Tashi asks, raising her eyebrows. 

“With extra butter,” you clarify and point at her, “You’re not cheaping out on me.”

“I’d never,” she insists, feigning seriousness before breaking into a grin. 

You finish helping Tashi clean up and begin your excommunication from your room. Walking down the hallway you bump into Patrick and Art on their way back from Patrick’s smoke break.

“What’re you doing out here? You start smoking?” Art asks as Patrick keeps walking past you, picking up the pace, “Hey where…”

“Party’s over,” you tell him, as Patrick turns the corner, eager to return to Tashi now that she’s alone.

Art frowns, confused.

“But we were—”

“Art,” you cut him off and place your hands on his shoulders, shaking him slightly, “Party’s over. Unless you’re eager to be a third.”

Art’s cheeks flush and he glances away, forcing out a laugh. Something tugs at your heart watching his half-smile appear. 

“Uh yeah ... .no thanks,” he says and you pat his shoulders before releasing them, “Wait but where are you going to go?”

You shrug, “I haven’t thought that far ahead.”

“You can’t just wander around campus, it’s like 2 am,” Art says, beckoning you with his hand, “Come back to my room, at least till they’re done.”

“Really?” you ask, “Cause if you’re tired I can just—”

“Don’t be silly,” Art says, poking your shoulder, “C’mon.”

Art’s room is in a separate building on campus, about a five-minute walk from you and Tashi’s building. Art is lucky enough to have a single; you’d been there a handful of times before class or practice. He keeps his room neat, aside from some clothes scattered on the floor from quick changes before practice. You smile as he hurriedly picks them up, throwing them into a hamper in his closet.

His bed is unmade, navy sheets messy as though he’d just woken up. 

“Sorry bout the mess,” he says, awkwardly scratching the back of his neck.

“I’m not judging, you’re cleaner than most guys I’ve met,” you tell him and he laughs. 

Suddenly, it hits you how late it is, sleepiness hitting you like a train as you yawn. This triggers Art’s yawn and the pair of you stand awkwardly in front of each other. 

“Um,” Art says suddenly, “It’s late.”

“Yeah,” you agree, stomach sinking, “I can just—”

“You should stay.”

You’re silent at that. You stare at him, as he nervously plays with the hem of his t-shirt, waiting for your reaction. You’re not sure what to say. It’s fine, right? Just a friend, helping out another friend.

A friend whom you have a big fat annoying crush on.

“I mean….it’s just late and you’re tired and who knows when they’ll be done.”

“I don’t have anything with me,” you tell him, voice sounding softer, meeker than you’d like.

“Oh, here I got you,” he says, walking to his dresser. He shuffles through the drawer a moment before revealing a shirt and clean boxers, “Just did laundry today. You can….you can change in the bathroom. I even have an extra toothbrush.”

You roll your eyes at that, taking the clothes from him. 

“Okay,” you agree.

“Bathroom’s right there.”

You nod, quickly making your way across the room and into the bathroom. You close the door and quickly change, finding Art’s spare toothbrush unopened in a goodie bag from the dentist shoved into a spare drawer. You quickly wash your face, brush your teeth, and change into his clothes. The shirt is baggy, with Stanford Men’s Tennis written across the front. It smells like him, like his detergent and his cologne and you can’t help but greedily inhale.

When you exit the bathroom, Art dips in, leaving the door open as he brushes his teeth. You place your clothes in a pile on his desk, awkwardly waiting for him. When he emerges, he’s wearing only his boxers and a gray t-shirt.

“I’ll take the floor,” Art says, his face turning beet red, “You can have the bed.”

“Art no,” you insist, “It’s your room. I’ll take the floor, it’s only fair—”

“Yeah that is not happening,” he says, satisfied smirk on his face, “Tashi’d kill me if she found out I made you sleep on the floor.”

“We could…..” you wet your lips, struggling to get the words out, “We could share the bed?”

Art watches you, his eyes wide. You watch his Adam’s apple bobs as he contemplates your question. Suddenly your pulse quickens, and embarrassment floods your body, and your face flushes. You turn away from him, scooting onto the bed.

“I mean only—”

“—if you’re comfortable,” Art finishes and you shut your mouth. You both giggle at the overlapping sentences.

“Yeah, I’m comfortable, Art,” you tell him, patting the space beside you, “Come on.”

Art moves onto the bed and you push closer to the wall. He’s so close when he lies down beside you, stretching his arm above your head. You’ve grown accustomed to the moonlit room and at this distance, you can almost count each eyelash that frames his blue eyes. 

“Is this okay?” he whispers, minty breath wafting over your face, making your head spin.

“Mhmm,” is all you can manage as the heat of his body warms you under the covers.

He’s silent then and you lay there for a moment, watching each other, listening to your shared breathing. Art chuckles then.

“What?”

“It’s just…” he trails off, “Nothing, it’s silly.”

“What is it?”

“You’re the first girl I’ve shared a bed with,” he admits, shyly glancing away from your gaze.

“Art Donaldson,” your tone is teasing, “I find that rather hard to believe.”

“It’s true,” he insists, brows furrowing together, “I mean….I’m not saying—wait” he wets his lips nervously, “I’m not a virgin—”

Your eyebrows raise, a smile curling at the corner of your lips. No, you did not doubt that. 

“Not that anything’s wrong with that, I just—wait and not to imply—”

“Art!” you cut him off, reaching forward and pressing your fingers against his lips, “I’m kidding. Don’t freak out.”

“M’not,” he mumbles, lips moving against your fingers.

“I’m fucking with you, Donaldson,” you whisper, taking your hand back, “I know you’re a gentleman.”

“Thank Christ,” he says with an exaggerated exhale causing you to giggle once more. He watches you, a smile on his face, eyes flickering to your lips.

Your face heats up as he wets his lips. Suddenly, nervousness flutters in your belly, and your heart flutters in your chest.

“Goodnight,” you tell him, turning away from him to face the wall.

You wait for his response, hoping he’s not disappointed. Disappointed about what, you’re not sure. 

“Goodnight,” he says softly and you close your eyes.

You wake up early. Birds are chirping outside the window, golden sunlight is beginning to bleed into the room, and Art’s chest is smushed firmly against your back. His arm is curled around your middle, hand splayed under your shirt and on your tummy, face buried in the crook of your neck. He’s so warm, his presence so comforting, you just want to close your eyes and melt back into him. 

Art groans in his sleep, moving his hips slightly and your eyes snap open.

Oh, Art.

He’s pressed firmly against your backside, rock-hard, hips unconsciously grinding against you. Your mouth falls open slightly feeling him against you, the hard outline of his cock bullying against your ass. Art groans again, hand on your stomach pushing you closer to him.

A breathy sigh escapes you and your head falls back against him slightly. 

“Art,” you breathe, answered with another groan, this one edging on a whimper. His hips gyrate, cock pressing against you with need, “Oh God…”

You swallow, breathing becoming more shallow. Your pussy clenches, and you can feel the growing wetness in the boxers Art had lent you, thighs pressing together desperate to relieve some of the pressure.

“Art wake up!” 

Art wakes with a start, head pulled from your shoulder. You can’t see him, but you feel him tense, the warmth of his body ripped from yours as he lurches backward, right off the edge of the bed. He falls with a yelp, hitting the floor with a loud thud. You sit up turning toward him. 

“Fuck!” he says, scrambling to sit and hide his erection, “Shit, I’m so sorry!” His face is red and he grabs a pillow, placing it over his lap, “God–fuck, I’m so sorry I was asleep—” He keeps stuttering, unable to meet your eyes. 

“Art.”

“It’s just biological you know, just morning wood, I would never do anything without your explicit consent–enthusiastic consent!”

“Art…”

“And I would never want to ruin anything between us, ever–”

“Art!”

His head snaps toward you then, eyes meeting yours. His mouth hangs open, eyes watery as he looks up at you. He looks so sad, so embarrassed, and disappointed. And something else as well. Worried, perhaps. 

“Get back up here,” you tell him.

Art’s mouth remains open in shock as he glances at the bed.

“Now?”

“Yes, right now.”

Art scrambles to rejoin you on the bed, lying beside you. He faces you just as he did last night, sandy hair falling across his forehead. You smile softly at his disheveled appearance and his flushed cheeks.

“I’m sorry—”

“Stop talking,” you tell him, reaching forward and brushing some hair from his face. You let your hand trail around to the nape of his neck, fingers curling in his hair. “You have my consent.”

Art’s eyes widen, lips parting in shock.

“Yeah?”

“Mhmm,” you tell him, pulling yourself closer. His hand drifts to your hip, anchoring himself to it. “Explicit, enthusiastic, all yours.”

The last word has barely left your lips before he’s leaning forward, pressing his lips against your own. They’re warm and soft, he kisses you with innocent eagerness, the hand on your hip pulling you flush against him. You lift your leg, hitching it around his thigh, fingers tangling in his hair and tugging slightly, earning a moan against your mouth.

“Fuck,” he moans against your lips, “You don’t know how long I’ve thought about this.”

Something deep inside your belly warms at his admission. 

“Yeah?”

“Mhmm,” he answers, kissing you again, “Since freshman year.”

“Why didn’t you…..oh fuck..” your question trails off as Art mouths your neck, sucking and biting the tender skin.

“Didn’t want to ruin anything,” he mumbles, kissing your collarbone. 

You hum at his answer, tilting your head to give him better access. His hand moves from your hip bone, up under your shirt—his shirt. 

“Is this okay?” he asks, mouth returning to your lips.

“Yes,” you tell him, “Please touch me.”

You can feel his smile against your lips as he does what you ask, fingers grazing the underside of your breast. Pushing against him, his hand cups your breast, squeezing lightly. You pull away from his lips briefly, tugging your shirt over your head and tossing it to the end of the bed. Art’s eyes devour you and he kisses you desperately as he continues to play with your tits. 

“Fuck you’re beautiful,” he murmurs, kissing down your neck until he reaches the top of your chest. 

Art’s lips move across the tops of your breasts, as though he’s struggling with choosing which one to lavish with attention. Luckily for you, he decides rather quickly and latches his mouth to your right nipple, thumb, and forefinger, tweaking the opposite. Your back arches as he gently bites down, sucking the hardened peak harshly before releasing it with a pop. 

“Art.”

He simply moans, ignoring your cries as he brings his mouth to your opposite nipple, repeating his previous action. Pleasure winds a current in your lower belly, your thighs clench as he repeats his little torture, alternating back and forth between your breasts. You grab his hair, tugging him not too gently until he glances up at you, cheeks red, lips glossy and puckered. 

He’s too pretty.

You pull him back to your lips, kissing him feverishly while trying to rid yourself of the clothing you have left. Art feels you squirming and assists, hands moving the boxers down your legs until you’re able to kick them off at your ankles. Your hands move to him next, eager to even the playing field. 

You tear his shirt over his head revealing his toned stomach from countless hours on the court. Your mouth waters at the sight before Art is on you once more, lips capturing yours in another heated kiss. His hand returns to your hip, curling against it before he reaches further, squeezing your ass.

You smile against his mouth as he squeezes again. 

“You’re just fucking perfect, aren’t you?” he murmurs, returning your smile.

His hand grazes down the back of your thigh before venturing to the front where your legs meet. Your breathing becomes more labored the closer he gets to your hot center. 

“Can I?” he asks, so softly, you nearly drown out his question with your heavy breath.

“Yes,” you tell him, and that’s all he needs. 

Art slides a curious finger between your wet folds, gently circling your clit. Your mouth falls open as he continues.

“You’re so wet,” he remarks, dipping his finger lower, and finding your entrance. 

He lets his middle finger sink into you, met with little resistance. Your walls greedily accept him as he curls his finger upwards, beginning to pump it in and out. Stars explode behind your eyes and you moan, clutching onto his shoulder.

Art smirks, eyes aglow at the pleasured noises you emit.

“That feel good?”

“Yes—fuck,” you squeak as he presses another finger inside of you, “Oh god.”

“Yeah?” 

Art crooks his fingers against your velvety walls, pressing against that special spot inside of you that has your head lolling against him, moans spilling from your lips. His thumb joins, caressing your sensitive clit in time with the strokes of his fingers. 

“Feels so good,” you moan, “I’m so close.”

“Yeah? You're gonna come for me?” he asks, kissing your neck. Your fingers tangle themselves in his blonde hair, tugging harshly, your orgasm building deep in your belly, “Come on baby, come on my fingers, I wanna feel this pretty pussy come.”

His words send you over the edge and your pussy clenches around his digits as you come, thighs shaking from the intensity as warmth floods through you.

“That was so hot,” Art says, kissing you, still buried to the knuckles inside you, “You’re so hot. Let me fuck you, please.”

You hum against his lips as he carefully removes his fingers from your warmth. He pulls away, bringing his fingers to his lips, sucking them clean. You watch him awestruck as he moans, eyes closing at the taste of you.

“Get inside me,” you tell him, “Right now.”

Art doesn’t need to be told twice, sitting up and pulling his boxers off as you lay on your back. Your eyes drift down his stomach to his cock. It’s pretty, just like the rest of him. Long, girthy, a neat tuft of dark sandy colored hair at the base. The tip flushed red and weeping as he strokes himself. 

“Condom?” you ask, and he nods, walking to his desk and rummaging through the first drawer. 

He comes up successful, ripping the wrapper with his teeth and rolling the condom on his length before crawling on top of you. You spread your legs for him as he lines himself up, rubbing the tip along your soaked slit. 

“Art, please put it in,” you whine, hips lifting.

“Jesus, I’m not gonna last long if you keep that up,” he says, shaking his head.

Your responding giggle is short-lived as he slowly sinks inside of you, filling you to the brim.

“Oh god,” you whimper, as he rests his forehead against yours.

“You okay?”

“More than okay,” you answer, cupping his cheek. He mirrors your action and you smile, a sudden burst of tenderness exploding in your chest, tears welling in your eyes. 

Art rotates his hips, pulling back and sinking back into your inviting warmth. 

“You feel so fucking good,” he murmurs, kissing your lips, “I’ve dreamt of this for years.”

“Me too,” you admit, wrapping your legs around his waist, “God, Art, I’ve wanted this forever.”

This spurs him on, his thrusts becoming quicker, more eager at your confession. 

“Yeah?”

“Yes,” you whimper as he pounds into you, “Wanted this for so long—used to talk to….to Tashi about it—”

Art moves his hand along your side, reaching your thigh and hooking your leg over his shoulder.

“What’d you tell her?”

The new angle sends him deeper, the head of his cock rubbing perfectly against that spongy section of your walls that has your mouth dropping open in pleasure.

“Wanted you,” you manage as Art holds one of your hands above your head against the pillows, “Wanted this so bad.”

“I’ll give it to you,” Art says, his breath catching, “Fuck—oh god you’re so pretty like this, fuck.”

“Art!” you cry his name as your second orgasm builds, sneaking up on you as he slows his pace, “Why’d you—”

“Wanna savor this,” he says softly, kissing the tip of your nose. His thrusts have slowed, hips moving with leisure. 

The pressure in your belly continues to build as he smirks down at you. Tennis has done wonders to his stamina; he fucks you like he could keep this pace for hours, barely breaking a sweat. You whine, throwing your head back against the pillows as he kisses your neck, your hamstring burning deliciously with the stretch. 

“Please come for me,” he murmurs, right next to your ear, “I’ve got to feel that sweet little pussy come around my cock, please.”

You do as you’re told, spurred on by Art whispering praises and encouragement in your ear and you fall apart, clenching around his cock and milking him for all he’s worth. You feel his hips stutter, cock twitching inside your warmth as he follows your release with his own. Art’s lips find yours then, and you can taste yourself on his tongue as he kisses you like a drowning man coming up for air. 

You stay like that for several minutes, his cock softening as you kiss one another, before he slowly pulls out. He takes a moment to take off the condom, tying it off and tossing it in the trash before he rejoins you in bed.

“C’mere,” he says, pulling you across his chest. 

You lie with your cheek pressed against his pec, listening to the gentle beating of his heart. He strokes your arm with his fingers, pressing a kiss to the top of your head.

“Did you mean what you said?” he asks, face buried in your hair, “About wanting me? This?”

“Mhmm,” you answer, putting all your cards on the table, “I may have harbored a small crush on you.”

Art picks up your hand measuring it against his own before lacing your fingers together.

“I wish I knew that earlier,” he admits, still holding your hand, “I’ve been in love with you for ages.”

You glance up at him between your lashes and he grins.

“It’s true,” he says with a smile.

“And here I thought Patrick was the only one who owned your heart,” you tease, causing him to playfully bite your wrist, “Hey!”

“Not the only one,” he admits, rolling you over onto your back, “I’m glad you got kicked out of your room last night.”

You lean up, placing a kiss on the tip of his nose.

“Me too.”

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[chlorinecake]

Thoughts on stalker x stalker??

— 𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐞 | 𝐬.𝐣𝐲

▹ PAIRING: stalker ex bf ! jake x stalker ex gf ! reader

▹ SUMMARY: You and Jake, exes torn apart, developed a mutual obsession with each other overtime, the lingering romance coming to light with a simple flash of his camera…

▹ WARNINGS: BIG DICK JAKE who records a lil sextape of him fingering you because he's a helpless titty fixated perv, unprotected sex (cowgirl), some crying, a brief handjob and fingering session, kinda angsty

▹ WORD COUNT: 3.5k

“Do you really see better with those glasses on?”

Jake's chocolate brown eyes peeked at you through his specs, a gentle hum rumbling from his throat before answering.

“No. I mostly wear them for the art student aesthetic I’m going for… now don't smile, pretty.”

Snap.

You let the small smile on your face relax at his instructions. “And the other reason?” You pressed, watching as he angled the lens a little higher over you this time.

“Hm, dunno... maybe because cute girls always ask about them?”

You hated it whenever he talked about other girls—

Snap.

Another click of his camera sounded throughout the quiet studio, it’s white flashes lighting up the dim room.

“So you like the attention then?” You teased, watching as his facial expression remained nonchalant.

Focused.

“Your attention? Yes,” he admitted, narrowing his eyes behind the camera. “Might be one of my favorite things, actually…”

Snap.

Good answer Jakey, you thought to yourself, trying your best to keep a neutral facial expression before him.

“One of your favorites just like old cameras, apparently...” you went on… “How come you never use the new one I bought you for your birthday last year?”

“Because,” Jake answered while lining his eyes up with the camera lens, “this one is much easier for me to carry around... I like that it’s portable...”

Why would he need a camera on the go, you asked yourself silently… even though, the reality was that Jake had actually dropped the other camera while following you one night—

Snap.

“Jeez, how many more shots do you need, Peter Parker?”

“You'll know when I'm finished,” the dark eyed boy replied with a foreign rasp to his tone, index finger gently squeezing into the camera button as he continued. “Now stick your tongue out for me.”

“I'm sorry?”

Snap.

His unusual sentence really caught you off guard this time, a feeling of chills washing over you as he took his lower lip into his teeth.

“Beautiful,” he said almost breathlessly, “just try following my directions next time though, yeah?”

“Jake, I need a break...” You sighed, changing your position on the couch as his vision remained glued behind the camera.

“In a minute, ____…”

Snap.

He used your first name on purpose because you used his, and he knew you were the type of girl who didn’t like that very much.

“I said that’s enough, alright?”

You slightly raised your voice at him, his demeanor remaining just as calm as before once a prolonged sigh escaped his throat.

“I suppose five minutes of wasted time wouldn’t hurt,” he said sarcastically, placing his red camera on the stool beside him before extending a hand, helping you off the couch.

“Thanks,” you replied half-heartedly, grabbing the large white sheet from the couch arm and wrapping it around your naked body.

“I could never get tired of this honestly,” Jake confessed, watching you intently as you poured yourself a cup of water from the nearby cooler.

“Tired of what?” You asked in between your first sip, his eyes being all over you except your face as you spoke.

“Looking at you,” was all he said for you to roll your eyes at his words, making him chuckle at your reaction.

“I’m serious, y’know that?”

“Mhm… I can tell,” you smirked with a nod, taking the last sip of your water before making your way back over to plop on the couch. “How about you go over your pictures… you’ll never know if we caught the perfect one already if you don’t check…”

He didn’t verbally respond to your suggestion, only nodding in agreement as he reached for the camera, clicking through its film.

To no one’s surprise, Jake, who doubled as your pervy ex-boyfriend and personal neighborhood stalker, felt himself getting hot all over again just from looking at the pictures of you displayed on the grainy screen.

Today's excuse to photograph you? He needed a nude model for his chiaroscuro themed visual project at the fancy art university he attended.

You knew Jake would’ve a hard time finding any other female (or male) to willingly get naked for him, so you obliged… under the small condition that he wouldn’t try to fuck you afterwards.

Simply put, your infatuation with him always made it easier to agree to whatever stupid favors he needed you to do—

“God,” he groaned under his breath, taking a seat as an attempt to hide the boner slowly growing behind his pants.

“Damn, are they really that bad?” You asked with worried brows, misinterpreting his reaction.

“N-no, not at all,” he corrected, eyes still glued to the camera screen.

“Oh... well… okay then,” you sighed with relief, or maybe it was a yawn?

The studio AC was set to such a low temperature that you couldn't help but feel a little sleepy... especially with how mundane this whole model process was getting to be.

“Can I see the pictures?” You asked, making Jake's eyes widen slightly at your request. He knew it'd be suspicious to say no so he instead gave in, reluctantly handing you the camera.

Clicking the left arrow on the circular directional button, the gallery scrolled, picture after picture, with each slide shocking you with how good they came out.

“Lovely, aren't you?” Jake nearly whispered from behind you as he leaned over the couch, his hands pulling your hair out of the tussled bun he previously styled it in for the first part of the photoshoot.

For the next series of shots, he planned to go for a more natural look, taking your hair down to let it hang as the scent of your shampoo ignited him all over again.

Jake couldn’t stop himself from grinding his hard-on against the back of the couch, eager for any sort of friction that would ease the tension building up inside him.

You felt the teeth of the comb meet your scalp as he continued to comb, the simple act somehow making it even harder for him to control himself.

“You're really talented at this,” you said, just before your eyes glazed over the series of pictures following the one's he'd just taken of you.

Some were from recent trips you took to the supermarket, events you don't fully remember, and even a few scandalous shots of you through your apartment window, changing out of your work clothes—

“Thanks, but I prefer giving credit to the actual person I'm shooting,” he added, looking over your shoulder as you turned the camera off, just before he got a chance to see what you were looking at.

Though, from the almost immediate shift in the studio's aura, Jake had developed a pretty good inkling in his chest as to what you might've seen.

Your throat tensed up, chest expanding slightly with each exhale as a smile grew on Jake's face.

“Just let me know if I'm being too rough, alright?” He started, sectioning out your bangs as his hand slid around your neck, gently cradling your chin upward.

“Jake,” you choked out weakly, a shaky moan slipping past your lips as the comb got caught in a particular knot in your hair, “t-take your time, please...”

You stuttered, hoping in your heart that he wouldn't make a big deal about it.

In truth, you often watched Jake from afar yourself, not being able to get over your obsession with him, even months after you two first broke up…

Your eyes had a way of chasing stolen moments—the curve of his lips as he sipped coffee on his way to class, or the way his personal style slowly changed from denim coats and Timberland's to leather jackets and black boots.

You saw it all, seeking after it as often as you could… using it as a means to coax your own lonely desire for him.

Still, you couldn't quite shake how strange it was to see his gallery filled with images of you from every angle and emotion, even though it eventually delighted you to know that he wasn't as interested in other people as he let on—

“I'm in no rush, ____,” he said plainly, trying to redirect the energy in the room, “just relax for me... I'm not trying to hurt you...”

He chose his words wisely, releasing his hold from around your neck before making his way over to the wall where he dimmed the lights even more.

“I know, Jake,” you nearly whispered, wind flowing from the slightly opened windows as your voice flew with its gust…

“But how long have you been watching me?”

His wrists froze at your question, a mix of relief, guilt, and fear rising within every part of his body.

You turned your gaze towards him, eyes locking to reveal a mirror reflecting your similarly twisted desires, the tension screaming with ambivalence…

“Since we broke up...” He confessed, eerily loud footsteps sending shivers down your spine as he paced against the wooden floor, walking towards you, “does that bother you, love?”

You stammered at first, gentle grasp clinging to the white sheet around you. “It doesn't, Jake... not at all,” you finally mustered, watching as he licked his lips because God, he was such an anxious perv for you...

The way you looked before him in this moment, both fear and recognition present in your features as your body remained still as stone, every natural highlight of your skin looking even more gorgeous beneath the dim lights.

This entire moment was all too much for him… You were too much for him…

Slowly creeping towards you, his intense energy did nothing but make your arms sprout with tiny bumps all over.

“Good,” was all he said at first, trying to digest your body language while freeing himself from his jacket, “but I'm guessing there's something you might wanna come clean about, too, hm?”

“I… yes,” you admitted, somehow regaining your initial confidence, “since you wanna hear me say it so badly... I haven't exactly been able to get over you, either...”

He smirked at your honesty, “How bad has it gotten? The withdrawal, I mean... d'you ever think about me when you touch yourself?”

“Cute, but no...,” you scoffed, “I prefer hands-free fantasizing instead... less mess for me to clean up alone,” you smiled teasingly, tracing the arch of his jawline with your index finger.

It almost felt foreign when you did that just then...

You hadn't touched him like that in months... and even though the act was ordinary, it made you feel something intense—

“I need to take a few more shots of you like this,” he said randomly, reaching for his camera but not sitting on the opposite couch this time.

He stayed right in front of you, joining you on the couch and slightly caging you beneath his frame.

“Trying a new angle I see... these gonna be for your project or—”

“I'm gonna keep these for myself,” he interrupted, snaking his free hand beneath the sheet and lightly caressing the flesh of your thigh before kneading it, dangerously close to your core. “Just make sure you follow my instructions like I asked...”

You nodded at his words, letting your lower body relax as he gently guided your legs open, the sheet falling from over you boobs and exposing them to the air as he grazed your pussy lips with his fingers.

Jake nearly drooled at the sight of your hard nipples, clicking with his tongue to make you look back at the camera. “Start by squeezing your tits together for me,” he started in a low voice, “wanna see how well they’d suffocate my dick…”

The poor guy was still very much hard right now, and it didn't help him one bit with how wet you felt against his fingers, his skilled touch circling your clit as a feathery moan left your lips.

“C’mon pretty, do as I say…” Jake cooed, pointing the camera to you as you did just that, arching your back over the sofa arm while squeezing your tits together, his fingers quickening against your sensitive bud as he kept recording.

You're not sure what came over you just then, but you were starting to feel more than willing to do whatever Jake asked of you, especially when his fingers worked on teasing your initial tightness.

His digits curved against your g-spot, the pressure he applied only escalating as his stiff cock started leaking in his pants.

This entire moment felt strangely nostalgic, reminding you of the many times Jake would stand over while making you cream with just his fingers—

“Tell me when you're close, baby… beg for me to let you come,” he huffed, voice sounding somewhat labored as he intently watched your chest heave up and down, biting his lower lip to stop himself from kissing you.

Because as badly as he wanted to taste you, he had to capture your bliss on camera first, for the nights that memories become too vague... for the nights when fantasies don't compare to the real deal...

Your whole body was a mix of hot and cold, given the temperature of the room and the sexual energy meddling between your excited bodies.

“J-Jake…” you stuttered with a whine, clinging to the couch as your face flushed a ruddy hue, walls desperately clenching around his fingers, “please...l-let me come for you…”

The poor boy didn't know what to do with himself given how wet you were, his puppy-dog eyes looking almost in awe now that the realization had hit him:

He finally got you where he wanted you… and from your perspective, the likewise…

“You can let go now baby,” is all Jake manages to say before you're coming undone, the knot in you abdomen unraveling throughout every limb of your body as pure pleasure coursed through your starved out veins.

Jake kept the camera on your body the entire time, too, his digits only slowing down slightly to help you ride out your high.

He hadn't even fully slipped from your hole yet before a feeling of emptiness washed over you, lust-ridden eyes following Jake’s every move as his veiny hand retreated from your core.

He caught on to it, too... the way your eyes panned in on him like your own built in set of camera lenses... capturing every movement to store in your favorite mental file.

“Fuck,” Jake groaned around his own fingers suddenly, tasting the milky slick he gathered from your hole, “been missing the taste of you so bad, angel...”

“Then kiss me,” you whispered heavily, a clear sheen of Jake's saliva mixed with your sweet release painting the cupid's bow of his pouty lips.

He didn't hesitate to take heed to your words either, setting the camera down with haste before hovering back over you on the couch, not even guiding your face as he kissed your lips, humming into the contact.

The feeling of Jake's sloppy textured tongue against yours sent shivers down your spine, his hot breath doing nothing but heat up the warmth already present between your legs.

His heart pounded against his ribs as the kiss continued, his glasses eventually fogging up from how intense the contact was, compelling you to push him away for a seconds to remove his glasses, your own heart fluttering at his flushed demeanor.

“I need to touch you... r-right now,” you choked out breathlessly, not even bothering to cover your naked body now that the sheet was slipping to the floor.

It was a bit awkward at first, you'll admit, being completely naked while Jake was fully clothed. You grew tired of undressing him with your eyes and knew you had to do something about the issue throbbing behind his pants.

Before Jake could even respond, you were already pushing him back against the other side of the couch, his head plopping on the sofa arm with a gentle thud, fluffy brown locks framing his face.

The shadow of a smirk meddled over his handsome features as you eagerly yet patiently worked on unzipping his pants, the thick mound from his clothed hardness making your head spin.

There was really no point in taking things slow with him in this moment because its not like you two haven't already fucked each other before... only difference now was that it had been a while, so the nerves had built up—

“It's so red,” you remarked with a whisper, just having shimmed Jake's pants down enough for you to get his cock out, “does it hurt?”

“I'll let you know once you start touching it,” he let out with a relaxed breath, eyes once again focusing on the way you sat before him with your tits out on full display.

You took his comment as some sort of green light, gently taking his length in your grasp and pumping it in long, drawn out strokes.

His thighs were already trembling, hips grinding up into your first to gain a bit more friction.

“Fuck, stop teasing, ____,” he groaned with half-lidded eyes, wrapping his hand around yours to manually control the pace.

You let out a laugh at his neediness, swatting his hand away so you could take over again, “This is all apart of the foreplay, Jake... you know I'll be riding your cock properly before the night's out, anyways...”

Deep down, you were having just a little too much fun toying around with Jake right now, but given the sexually frustrated furrow of his eyebrows, you decided to be nice and just let him have you already.

Still pumping his shaft in your hand, you sat up on your knees to straddle him, lining up his tip with your entrance before letting your weight sink onto him, struggling to adjust to his size given how long its been since you took him.

A quiet curse fell from Jake's lips as he watched you wiggle past his mushroom tip, his veiny hands reaching forward to help you completely reach his pelvis.

You let out a shaky whimper at the sudden feeling of fullness, covering your mouth with the back of your hand to stop yourself from making any more pained sounds.

“There you go, pretty... nice and easy...” Jake cooed while still gripping the flesh of your hips, mostly because if he didn't, he would've started thrusting into you, “do you wanna stop?”

“N-no,” you practically blurted out, thighs still feeling tense despite how badly you wanted this with him, “I want you to make me cum again, Jakey... I can take it...”

Your words were like magic to his ears, his strong hand guiding your body against his as he left a tender kiss to your cheek before holding you in place, his dick moving in and out of you at a steady pace that escalated in a matter of seconds.

To be honest, you were shocked by Jake's adrenaline, your body already shaking beneath his arms as he held onto you tighter, grunting with each time your desperate walls clenched around him.

His balls bounced to the rhythm of his powerful thrusts, the sound of skin slapping against skin making you shut your eyes tightly in pleasure, whining frantically at the mix of sensations.

Your eyes started to sprout with tears, damping Jake's shoulder as he fucked against your g-spot, making it nearly impossible for you to hold in your delighted screams.

Pouring out a string of whiny moans, your body subconsciously moved with his hips, Jake catching on to your reactions rather quickly as he whispered a sultry “You like that, baby?” against your neck, your head nodding lazily as you looked into each other's eyes, right before your lips crashed into his. 

“I missed this so fucking badly, Jake... 'missed being this close to you,” you let out weakly, one of his thumbs going to wipe the tear of moisture sliding down your face as he kept rutting into you.

“I know, angel,” he panted, kissing you on the center of your lips before pulling back, his tip reaching the furthest its ever been inside your pussy as you rocked your hips against his, wobbly pleas of pleasure slipping past both your lips before you felt yourselves reach your peaks.

“Aww, f-f... shit,” you whined, Jake's hips still pivoting against you despite how strong the orgasm was, your thighs trembling as you felt your walls tighten around him.

“That's it, baby,” Jake cooed through heavy breaths, reeling out more of your pretty moans as he rode out your high for the last time, holding you close to him, “let it all out, angel...”

You let your legs relax, just as Jake sat himself up straight, delicate lips kissing along your jawline as he whispered against your skin, “Now you belong to me again…”

And there it was, two twisted souls basking in the very web of obsession the sewed together, a lost love blossoming yet again from a matter of stolen glances and a series of clandestine photographs bringing you back together again.

You internally yawned at the feeling of Jake's lips against you, his possessive words only making your heart sing as you reached down for the sheet, draping it over both your spent bodies...

“I've always been yours, Jake,” you smiled sincerely, ruffling the hair atop his head before falling back into his embrace, letting yourselves snuggle into the plush cushion of the couch, “even when you left me first...”

▹ Author's Note: This story is a work of fiction and does not intend to romanticize the harmfully obsessive behaviors described between the two characters. Real-life stalking is not okay my guys, so please, don’t be a sasaeng and instead seek healthy relationships !

▹ Perm Taglist ( 𝐨𝐩𝐞𝐧 ) : @squoxle @wonbinisbabygurl @ashgonedash @yourmomscuntis2tighy @addictedtohobi @ot7sevenlvr

[quinngefail]

Um. So

Wanted to do an inverse of that last drawing set, and the initial plan was for this one to also have an overall goofy tone. But I couldn't think of ways to spin humor into this one (save for the last image) given what I wanted to touch on, so...

I guess here's some divulgence of my post-bathroom-trap Lawrence characterization, but with a weird juxtaposition between Writing and Visuals because I still ended up using the Little Guy art style HRKGKG...

And same as Adam's post, if my writing is difficult to read, it's all in text form in the image descriptions! ^_^

I feel rather self-conscious about this one overall. But y’know, fuck it man. We're posting it regardless

More thoughts under the cut:

So basically... In my mind's eye, this is a man who has developed an extremely guilty conscious following the bathroom trap, and is now hyper aware of the consequences of his actions. He's been separated from his family, and is desperately determined not to fail anyone else; something that especially applies to Adam, and their relationship in general. And despite Adam having long forgiven him for what happened in the bathroom trap and making it very clear that 'I don't hate you, I could never hate you', Lawrence just cannot internalize this, and constantly has this 'it's the least I can do for you after everything I've done' sort of mentality towards far too many things in regards to Adam.

While also having serious bouts of that whole "You're just manipulating him so you can get your cheap validation and feel good about yourself-"

I'll elaborate more when I write my full thoughts out because there is SO MUCH MORE I could talk about but. FOR NOW THIS IS AN INTRODUCTION TO MY SICK AND TWISTED BRAINROT 🙌

Okay and like the overall tone on Adam's drawing set may have indeed been more goofy, but DON'T GET IT TWISTED that is not my perpetual approach to the way I think about + want to depict his struggles and all that. It was just certainly easier to throw comedy into his pieces lmao. And I've also got a whole lot more to elaborate on with him and his 20 million issues </3

And then lastly!! With the final image it's like I IMAGINE LAWRENCE DOESN'T GET AS CAUGHT UP IN BEING EMBARRASSED OVER BEING ROMANTICALLY CHEESY AND SHIT but y’know. Sometimes you're saying "what's cookin', good lookin'," to your boyfriend with no problem. But other times your brain crafts up "MI ADAM-ORE" and you just have to take a step back after actually going through with saying that one. And have your moment of regretting your every life choice. Y’know

Once they both realize + embrace how cringe + cheesy + corny they truly are. It'll be all over

That's all lol thank you for reading 👉👈

[wispscribbles]

Mw3 spoilers (just a long personal ramble)

Hiii. So

As soon as the pre-release came out on, I hunted down spoilers, because I know myself and knew that if someone died and I got that information out of the blue, I wouldn’t take it well. Jokes on me, because I still haven’t been taking it well lol

I won’t talk about how Soap’s death was handled or the quality of the game. Plenty of smarter people are doing so.

I try not to talk a lot about myself and irl stuff on here, but will just say: I am very unwell, mentally. (Cue silence because that’s not surprising at all) Something I am very aware that I do, is that I latch onto fiction with my whole being, usually one specific character. For some reason, I always latch onto the character that ends up dead, usually in a way that make them only exist to further the motivations of other characters. It sucks.

So my hope for Soap has never been great, but for some reason I was still so shocked?? I don’t know, I tricked myself into thinking this time was different. Such an iconic character with so much good setup for great character development. I knew someone would die, but ow. To me, he was the element that made 141 seem more like family than coworkers. Soap’s interactions with the rest just livened up the games so much and made them all shine. Especially Ghost. Their dynamic, man.

Soap was the character that intrigued me enough to jump into the cod rabbit hole. It feels very hollow without him.

I keep telling myself that it’s silly to be so hurt over something fictional, and that I can just treat it as a mcd fanfic and move on, but nope. Brain’s stuck in the bad stuff. It’s a bad habit of mine to let something like this affect me so much, but well. Logic vs feeling and all that.

I really did find so much comfort in Soap this last year, that I severely needed. It feels a little like losing someone I know, someone who helped me through a rough time. I related to something in him and felt inspired. I only started writing after getting into ghostsoap, I started working out and I got back into art after a very long burnout. It may be fiction, but the impact is not.

So that was pretty much the worst case scenario of what mw3 could be to me. I always knew the risk, but, once again, ow. But there also seems to be plenty of good stuff in the game that I enjoy. I’m happy with the Ghost and Soap dialogue, the whole team working together and seeing Laswell and Farah and Alex and Nik. I hope I can be inspired by some of the new content once I’m calmer.

And I was worried they would ignore Ghost and Soap’s relationship after their development in mw2, but they genuinely seem to have gotten real close. It’s nice. I thought the shipping might scare the game devs into never having them appear in a scene together again, so that’s a plus.

Bottom line to all this is: I probably need a little break to get my head sorted. The grief is surprisingly real, it’s triggered some old stuff for me (haven’t been sleeping or eating, been stuck in some old thoughts). I’ll need to calm down and become a bit more normal about this again. Part of the grief isn’t so much about Soap himself, but also just the safe space that this account has been. The very nature of how the fandom is going to interact with Soap and Ghostsoap is going to change now, and man… I liked how it was, y’know? Could’ve used a little longer in that bubble. There’s going to be plenty of new fics and art, lovely stuff as always, but many of them will be tinged with grief, and I’m not in a place where that won’t break me a little.

I will hopefully come back to posting and making stuff once my brain settles down. I have so many drafts for fics and ideas that I hope I can return to. I’ve gotten so used to drawing these lads that I doubt I can stop tbh

The version of Soap that we love is already evolved from the games due to all the time and care the community has put into the character. The games may have killed him, but luckily, he’s fictional. We can do what we want, same as before.

I’m not even saying that I wish they hadn’t killed him. The games are crafting a story that fits their audience. It makes sense.

But I will choose to live in one of the many universes we’ve created for Soap, where he is alive and cared for, with a found family and a spooky lieutenant with a soft spot for him. Good for him.

Hope you’re all taking care of yourselves. RIP canon Soap (again). Thanks to Neil for a wonderful portrayal. And no matter where we go from here, thanks for a wonderful year of creating with you lovely folks. Seriously, some of the kindest people I’ve met in fandom. <3

Lastly: fuck you Kevin O’Reilly, but more importantly, sincerely thank you. (CallMeKevin video about mw2 got me into this mess. Otherwise I was keeping cod at an arm’s length, but he’s my fav youtuber, so I watched it. And here we are!)

[evilcokito]

I have no idea if you’re still receiving asks for the Bleach Au but ok I have two thoughts

Y’know Kisuke Urahara, yeah? Everyone’s favourite hat and clogs man? Sam in his outfit….. look, I was rereading my bleach collection and was like- wait a minute. they both run a store, have that goofy saleman vibe that dips into something so much more mysterious from time to time…..

It’s an idea….. also chest out but let’s not focus on that….

And another idea would be KON. Who’s KON in the beach au? Technically Kon’s a doll with a piece of soul within it, right… so if you’re pissed with any of the soul reapers… could you technically put them in timeout in a plushie? I mean, Gigai work with that logic right….

What’s there to stop someone me from chucking an annoying boy into his respective nui plush…

Yes Ceru, yes you can. HOW???? with the art of "let's arrange this so it works in bleach".

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

[ Report No.665785543 ]

Division 12 - Shinigami Research and Development Institute.

Top Secret Project 6684. [Requested by Central 46].

- K.O.N -

Captain: XXXXXXX Shroud. Lieutenant: XXXXXXX Shroud.

Keywords: Control (suppression and storage) of Reiatsu, Gigai, prison, plushie.

K.O.N General information:

The aim is to create an artificial Gigai that contains the Shinigami in the human world. This Gigai is specially designed to go “unnoticed” by humans but not among Shinigami peers (shape similar to the aspect in question). Its a plushie whithout specific form, until it takes the form of the shinigami. It specifically seeks the creation of a material body capable of existing in the human world and prevent the shinigami from moving freely or use their powers. This Plushie Gigai dont need constant control or supervision, the Shinigami can only escape when the “captor” decides take out of it. In this way, it can be used in cases of rebellious Shinigami. Its main use is as a prison that will keep under control unil put the shinigami on trial in the Sereitei.

Project Status: Canceled

Reason:

The Gigai plushie is taken over by humans and is lost from sight. A number of XxXxxX shinigamis were lost in the human world, their whereabouts unknown.

It was also impossible to prevent Shinigamis with greater spiritual power from remaining immobile with the Gigai.

Although their use was discontinued, these Gigai continue circulate in the Sereitei. Some highly trusted Shinigami have been entrusted with this artifact:

- XXXXXXXX - XXXXXXXX - XXXXXXXX - Cerulean Marple. - XXXXXXXX

Cater moved and Ceru discovered him. Ceru left him in the Human World for 3 days. Trey was in favor of punishment. Even suggested Ceru abandon him in a house in a rural area without communications. Cater begged for mercy but no one takes away all that time that Ceru hugs him.

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

CERU - I LOVE URAHARA KISUKE.

How dare you suggest this to me??!!! do you want me to die??? Sam being a shinigami isn't enough??? GOING TO PUT THIS AT THE END ON THE CHANCE THAT NO ONE READS IT FROM THE AMOUNT OF TEXT ABOVE! GET BORED OF THE TEXT AND DON'T GET HERE! well let's get to that with two sketches.

5 / 10 -

THERE IS NO FAVORITISM BECAUSE IT'S SAM IN MY DEAR KISUKE'S CLOTHES chest out is not enough.

Ok, you got me here. The moment when they show their true selves and the bitch face got me.

1000 / 10

[alangdorf]

Welp, the ref lineup still isn’t done cause I haven’t drawn Shion yet, and the belated valentines I’ve been working on are gonna be like at least a month late cause I just planned three more, but what I did do these past couple weeks is start writing a fanfic and then immediately abandon it to go draw a bunch of only tangentially-related suzutsubas (except for that first pic; that’s a scene from it, albeit one I haven’t written yet), only half of which are fit for public posting (one of ‘em I could make a few edits and feel ok about posting sometime; it’s not that out there, it’s just, y’know. Hamal Cine Bad End Hyperbolic Torture Chamber. I’m usually very “whatever happens happens” about my art but if I don’t show some restraint I know I’ll end up stuck in there forever), but hey, since I’ve been teasing them for ages and finally have some finished stuff with them, take a couple Suzumii! Also gonna ramble abt headcanons under the cut (and it will be LONG)

To begin, a note abt my Len’en gender/pronoun headcanons: as a they/them preferrer myself, I’m thrilled that most people just stick with those for everyone, but I’ve developed some more detailed headcanons as I go through working on designs and I’ll generally be using those. Don’t worry though, most of them are still nonbinary and basically all of them are trans/gq. Relevant ones for this post are Tsubakura: they/them nonbinary (transmasc to some degree) and Suzumi: cis female, question mark?? (to be elaborated on); for clarity’s sake I usually use she/her for Arde and Hamal Cine individually and plural they for the system collectively (also I don’t usually use their nicknames, dunno why), but singular they for Benet (the wiki says Benny is probably short for Benetnasch so I’m assuming that’s their actual name) for reasons which will also be elaborated on (sort of).

Aaalso this clearly isn’t autobiographical or anything but I think I’m subconsciously putting a lot of myself into Suzumi because 1) we do look pretty similar (brown wavy bob + blue eyes) and 2) given their current status as both the main antagonist and the most well-known plural Len’en character (I get the impression that Hooaka also being plural isn’t super common knowledge; I mean it took me several read-throughs of their wiki page and their dialogue with BPoHC Secret Team to get what they were getting at lol) I am probably way too anxious about doing a bad stereotype. Just an observation and also probably partially why I’ve even ended up with so much headcanon for them in the first place

And before I get into the thick of it, notes on derivations from canon: I’m running with the assumption that Suzumi being a system is a relatively recent development tied to whatever incident it was that caused the falling-out, since Tsubakura is like the only person who seems at all familiar with Hamal (including Mitori/Chouki/Fumikado, but they’re more easily explained away as just having met with one of the other alters the few times they’ve interacted) even though she’s supposedly usually the one fronting. They don’t seem to know the mechanics of it though, judging by their confusion when Arde implied that she and Hamal are different people. So basically, I’ll be referring to pre-incident Suzumi as a different character from any of the other three. (Ngl I am very influenced by Dissociation Constant on that and just in general [when will my wife The One and Only Suzutsuba Fic return from the war…..]) I was also debating whether to have Suzumi have any history with the gang before starting to work at the lab/whether stuff would happen around high school or college age, cause they keep referring to everything happening “a long time ago” and I know I, a 24-year-old, feel like stuff that happened five years ago was like yesterday, but I do have the pandemic and not really doing much of anything for most of that time to reckon with so like, eh. College age makes more sense in my head and so does the dynamic of like, Suzumi was only introduced into the friend group (she was acquainted w Hoojiro and Yabu already though bc lab) because she was dating Tsubakura and since that ended, and badly (understatement of the century), they have extremely little reason to be civil with each other and also interacting at all is really awkward.

Ok now on with it! Either end of high school or beginning of college, Suzumi ends up interning at Tsubakura’s lab for college credit (Tsuba’s already practically a department head despite being like 17 or something because. Idk. Who even knows what’s up with them) and she’s like. Only wears t-shirts and jeans (bought a bunch of khakis for this job though), [reading] glasses from the men’s section, hates leaving her hair down (it’s lab safety anyways). Repressed queer in denial, you know the type. Starts interacting a lot with Mx. Tsubakura “wears short shorts that everybody thinks are actually a skirt and also uses ore and omae almost exclusively” Enraku who seems to have everything all figured out and is immediately starstruck (GIRL WHY?? they are such a mess). Lots of “do I want to date them or do I want to be them” confusion (this will be relevant later); eventually evolves into the “am I trans or just a lesbian” question (not that they would need to be attracted to women to be into Tsubakura but you get the picture), which never quite gets answered.

In any case, they do eventually start dating (Tsubakura thinks she’s cute and smart so they reciprocate), and they’re not like super great together cause Tsubakura is emotionally constipated at the best of times (Suzumi’s into that though) and neither of them are the most mentally/emotionally healthy people even back then and also Tsubakura is more or less Suzumi’s boss which is weird, but they’re kind of ok??? Tsubakura’s mom dies at some point, also they move in together (college housing is expensive), the rest of the crew at the very least tolerate Suzumi, etcetera.

And then…! [insert catastrophic event here]!! I don’t have a shot to call on this yet cause I have no idea what it could’ve been (and I’m sure it’ll get revealed at some point anyways); I’m just banking on it being something extremely not mundane and something where you could reasonably set the blame on either (or neither) party cause they sure both seem convinced the other is way worse, huh! In Tsubakura’s case at least, blaming Suzumi is partially a defense mechanism so their self-loathing doesn’t get the better of them over it (guess what the fic was supposed to be about, lol).

The worst part of all this business though is that they DON’T break up over it immediately and it just makes everything orders of magnitude worse for everyone involved. Tsubakura and Arde have hate sex MORE THAN ONCE………… they would both really rather forget about it. Hamal thinks it’s hilarious, ofc, but the less said about her, the better. And Benet… exists??? The only idea that I’m running off of for them atm is the observation that I think they’re the only character with flat black eyes other than Tsubakura/Tsurubami and the subsequent idle thought, “hey if someone malded so hard about a breakup that they ended up with an introject of their ex would that be messed up or what?” So make of that what you will. (Oh and it may have been obvious that this is what I was going for but Hamal is femme and Arde is butch and they’re constantly squabbling abt aesthetic presentation. Having Arde be straight-up male would’ve been too straightforward of an interpretation and I think it’s funnier this way)

The canonically mentioned murder attempts start taking place and I’m leaning towards Tsubakura eventually being convinced to move out even though it was originally their apartment, albeit mostly just because the wikipedia page for house sparrows mentions that they’re known to take over swallows’ nests, usually after they’ve been abandoned, but they will sometimes drive away or kill the current occupants, and that was a very fun fact to come across when specifically doing research for Len’en but idk how else to incorporate it lol. And so on and so forth up until the present time.

Uhhh is that all I have atm? I think so! Anyway, I think I finally shook out all my suzutsuba doodles (and rambling, though I do still have that fic to work on. idk whether I’ll be able to finish it though; I started strong with an extended metaphor in the middle but Iiiii’m not sure if I can successfully write my way up to it while making it make sense. Also I may draw pretty slow but I write even slower!! Eh I’m sure I’ll post some of it sometime) for the time being so I should theoretically be able to finish up my bigger projects now. Maybe I’ll have the valentines ready in time for white day? We’ll see!

[statisticallymorelikely]

AHHHH!!! Hello hi I’m back and I absolutely adore all of your Old guard x 00q crossover ideas!!! Thank you for indulging in my brainworms lol. Nicky calling Q bambino absolutely undoes me ahhhh 🥺🥺 and Q being the baby of the group is so funny!! When I was first thinking about it I headcannoned that Q was older than booker by a couple decades but honestly I think that just makes Q being solidly the kid of the group even funnier. Q, hasn’t been the newest member of the guard for 250+ years, dead eye staring as Booker (50 years younger than him) and Nile (literal 20-something-year-old), both skip mostly past baby treatment while Andy still calls him kiddo all the time.

Broooo and Bond seeing Q killed in front of him?? Maybe as a result of his actions??? Like. The guilt!! The angst!! The pain!! *chefs kiss* lovely absolutely lovely. And him being left alone to stew with the body?!?? Just him struggling to compartmentalize enough to do his job, kind of going into shock, wondering why the hell Q dying hurts as much as it does. Just Bond having his “oh” moment only after Q dies. Realizing he loved the snarky little bugger that kept him alive and guided him and helped him hide from medical and M. And then realizing that he can’t do anything about those feelings because Q is dead and it’s his fault. Only to have Q come back to life in front of his eyes.

I have this one scene in my head right now where MI6 has to work with the CIA for some reason and Copley is there as a favor for one of his former coworkers or smthn. And the entire time the man is completely unsubtle like. The opposite of subtlety, keeps glancing over at Q with wide eyes and Q’s dying inside. He’s developing an eye twitch and every time Copley looks at him M and R look at Q like “what’s going on rn” and Q’s like “I never should’ve okayed working with this man”. The two double O agents of your choice guarding the door are simultaneously staring a hole in the side of Q’s head and texting the double O groupchat about the situation.

Also you’re so right about Nile and Q bonding over art!! Ahhh I’m just imagining she takes a day trip to come visit him in London and they go to a bunch of museums and just chat. She calls him old man as a joke and he’s so used to being babied that he secretly loves it. And ik London is MI5 jurisdiction but I think it would be so funny if Nile, Q, and Bond get caught up in some kind of plot and have to save the day. Even better if this is Bond’s first time meeting any of the old guard members in person. Just Nile meeting Bond for the first time, giving him a once over and looking at Q and calling him a cradle robber. And Q is standing there having flashbacks to Bond saying that exact same thing while James is keeled over, laughing so hard he’s crying for the first time in decades. Nile just crosses her arms and is like “I said what I said”. NILE AND MONEYPENNY BONDING HDNDNDNDNDN. The two of them bonding 100 percent gives Q a headache.

And just. Q’s stuck in the UK because of his job, but he’s still part of the guard! Andy and him face timing to give updates, Joe and Nicky constantly texting him everyday, Nile calling him to tell him about whatever stupid shit is going on at the moment. When everything with Quynh gets sorted out I bet she and him constantly call too!! And him and Booker being tech bros!! And ofc they visit him pretty often, popping in and out of the country sometimes all together sometimes one at a time. Just being family y’know?

oop welcome back!

yesss it doesn't matter how old you headcanon Q as (personally i'm thinking after booker, think robert frobisher vibes), he is still baby. he used to scoff at it but he has to admit he misses it whenever he has to go back to london. eve's teasing makes up for it a little bit.

oh after bond finally finds out and they're Talking About It, he kind of feels relieved. at least he doesn't have to worry about Q dying anymore, right? but then bond learns about quynh, and then about merrick (Q deeply regrets not being able to fish them out of that one, he did clean up after them though), and about things worse than death

and then Q tells him oh so gently that no, he could still die. one day he will stop healing and it will be his time, and it's going to be okay, james, we all have to make peace with our mortality. and maybe the reminder of Q's mortality again is what finally kicks bond into Doing Something about this thing he has for Q

after the whole merrick debacle, Q not being in on the punishment to exclude booker offers him comfort and a place to stay. booker rejects the former but accepts the latter. Q always has a hand out and simply waits for booker to reach back.

Q maintaining a separate network of safehouses for his fam because he is still 50-50 on trusting copley. nile asks him if he has a stash similar to andy's cave. the next time they're in america, Q directs them to stay at his little townhouse in boston where she finds a couple of lost rembrandts and vermeers casually hanging in the bedrooms.

the second time bond witnesses Q die is when they're all drunk off their asses and joe dares him to jump into a pool from the third floor balcony. it's a large pool. Q misses. he revives laughing.

[archandshri]

8th March ‘24 - [arch] colour!!!! community!!!

Hey Shri! <3 

Wow!!!! I’ve seen the finished Brothers Lionheart cover already, but those thumbnails are just incredible. I know you plan to move away from the dark/horror vibes of those images but they’re so impactful!! For sure save those compositions for something else. You’ve put so so much thought into those compositions, it’s inspiring me to put that level of thought into my images too. It's nuts!!!

So y’know how the plan for this blog was to take it easy and do a little at a time? Maybe just pop in and update each other on what we’ve been working on, or even what’s been inspiring us? Well, we haven’t exactly been taking it easy have we :// At the beginning of writing this I thought it was gonna be a chill one but,,, it turned out not to be.

I was lucky enough to be back in Cardiff for a bit the other week, so I hit up the Riso studio. It was super lovely seeing everyone - really made me realise the value of having an artistic community. (for context, I have been travelling recently and it’s been weird, after uni, to not be surrounded by other illustrators)

About once a month, my shared print studio has an event called Open Haus, where we’re open to the public but also loads of members will come in, have a cuppa and a biscuit and talk about art stuff. I happened to be doing some riso printing and Gavin, who’s a right babe and an excellent riso artist, was once again giving me a hand. I love working with other people in the studio, bouncing ideas off them. It sometimes helps me get out of my head (though with practice, I’m also learning to do that by myself!)

Here’s a bit of development work for the print I did a few days before printing. It was actually a bit of development for my comfort characters’ home - but as you know i love building my skills through fun things like that! Trick yourself in to improving xD

This is the print I made!! It’s titled ‘Space Fyn’, named after a place I associate with home <3 

I ran into a bit of an issue with the blue, which I originally planned to use. Once I printed it, I hated it (blehhhhhh), so! We tried a mint out instead. I still didn’t like it. But thankfully, Gavin did this thing where he made me step back and view it from afar and then I liked it again (this has happened twice now I think I need to learn to step back without his help ://) Also, there were about 10 people in the studio, and they all voted on the mint, so I printed a run of 15! (ps. you can order them by dming me on Instagram)

Later, I was showing a friend the progress and she made some great points. The dark blue gives more of an evening vibe, while the mint gives more of a sunrise vibe, a bit brighter. But also, it totally changes the tone! This has led me to think more about how different colours can be used for particular vibes :0 and how can we bend that and make it more interesting than ‘red danger’ and ‘blue sad’. 

Some notes I took from our conversation

Looking at colours in particular genres (they are used differently in specific ways in different contexts) 

for example in Westerns, good guys wearing a white hat and bad guys wearing black hats - misc characters wearing brown.

Light sabres in Star Wars very clearly symbolising ideology

Characters attached to colour - she uses blue and red to symbolise characters that oppose each other in some way, for example.

Character designs, using colours that match well for more grounded characters, and colours that clash for more unstable characters

Power rangers!!

What colour is your ‘normal’ for the world? And how will specific characters break that or blend in?

All of these are just prompts and thinking points of course, it’ll take a lot of exploring to know how i want to apply these to my work.

I was lucky enough to attend Plymouth Comic and Zine fair!!!!! (this is me :0 !!)

It was very lovely, I really enjoyed seeing people from uni, the general Plymouth illustration scene, and those few illustrators you know but only really see at fairs. I also got the opportunity to have some awesome chats about illustration (shoutout to that one hermitcraft fan who let me ramble about Minecraft builds and setting design for a bit <3). I had a chat with the wonderful Ben Wright and Jess Holloway about colours, especially in narrative, and here are some ideas I took away from that!

They didn’t have any specific suggestions for books about colour and narrivite,  but again, film came up! Colours in film are discussed a lot, and vary a lot in genre, so i’ll have to do some looking into that.

In particular wes anderson might be good to look at 

Hero by Jet Li - haven’t looked at this yet

How to take colour that we may associate with a particular feeling and instead make it do something else. (eg. how to make blue happy)

Colour in context with shape and composition

I was very excited after PCZF and got hyperfixated on a little drawing. You and I were chatting about folds in clothes at the fair, so this image was to play with that a bit.

Yes this is an image of my favorite block lady. I love her. [Illustration of GeminiTay, along with her season 10 skin]

I decided to use the colour pick tool from my reference for accurate colours, which I don’t normally do. I do have a habit of going too light with my values, and a bit swampy and desaturated with my colours. When I started with her trousers, I thought it was wayyyy too dark, but I decided to stick with it till the end anyway. Even though it clearly worked in the reference image, I was still surprised it worked on mine. This has proved to me that it’s okay to push and use some darker colours - which is a bit scary but I’m going to give it a go.

'messing around with colors with imp and skizz' by @applestruda

I also saw this incredible image by @applestruda using wonderful colours! This led me to play around with some high-saturation images. I wanted to draw one of GeminiTay’s builds with the spooky vibes she’s been trying to capture. I downloaded applestruda’s image, colour shifted the hue to one that fits the energy I wanted to capture, and used it to create a high saturation colour pallet. This is a great starting point since I’ve never worked with this kind of colour palette before - it gives me a starting point rather than drowning in indecision and cluelessness XD

Here’s a timelapse of the study!

Once I’d finished, I hue-shifted them for some alt colours. I find this a helpful process for figuring out colour stuff that I would never consider normally. I think I like these more, actually. The one with the reddish wood and green accents feels like it has the vibes of the original image, but is exaggerated a bit. I think it pops. And the pink is cool. I think I could have pushed the values further again, but I'm pretty happy with the final images.

So those are my colour thoughts over for now - I’m hoping to keep playing but use of colour is for sure a lifelong skill. 

The past few weeks have been so awesome. I’ve just been so so moulded by conversations with my artistic community and it’s been so lovely!!! I’m really enjoying running around the country and visiting all my pals. It was so nice to see you at PCZF and I’m looking forward to more of it!!! :D

Ps. Here are some sketches I did at the fair

Can’t wait to see more lionheart lil guys :0

Archie <3 :)))))))))

[lizardtheartist]

I love your Max vices so so much and was wanting to know if I could draw some fan art for them (mostly Pride because he rocks) Also I would love to know more about your fan kids because they are AWESOME. Love your art!

OH MY GOSH OF COURSE YOU CANN!!! I would be so fucking happy if you drew my lil vices omgomg (and thank you!! I very much appreciate that you love my art :D)

And yes yes I have much information about the fankids

So originally, I made the fankids long ago when I first got into Sam and max, but I never bothered sharing them because i thought they weren’t that interesting, but I’ve developed their backstory a lot more since then:

Ace: So Ace is a fucked up cloning experiment conducted by Geek, she decided one day that she wanted to make a silly lil clone of Max to see how far her experiments could go, but that didn’t exactly go as planned. She ended up creating 507-B (B meaning that there WAS an A but y’know..A didn’t go as planned at all) whom she kept secret from everyone for a long while, that is until Max let his curiosity take over and snuck into the lab when everyone was sleeping. Max found little Ace in some sort of science-y pod thing (idk what those are called) and he immediately thought it was the cutest little guy he’d ever seen. Ace indeed did not look very adorable, he looked pretty freaky ngl. Max decided to wake Sam late at night and show him what he found, Sam was hesitant about thinking anything of the freaky little clone, but eventually Max convinced him it was also the cutest thing he’d ever seen. When Geek realized that Max discovered the experiment and told Sam all about it, she was pretty upset about it but at the same time, she was also relived that she didn’t have to overwork herself taking care of Ace anymore, Sam and Max would just take it from there. And so, experiment 507-B was eventually named Ace, like ace of spades. (kinda a Poker Night reference) Ace is just the definition of a skrunkly, he’s adorable and ugly at the same time. He loves to chew, scratch, bite, kick, throw, and attack almost anything he sees, it’s just in his nature.

Quinn: Sam and Max don’t feel like explaining how exactly Quinn came to be. She could either be biologically related, a clone, or had just poofed into existence. Whenever someone asks about it, they both just laugh and continuing talking about something else as if nothing happened. Quinn is a sabertooth dog creature who I had been drawing ever since I first got into Sam and Max, basically she’s kinda just a mini Sam. I like to imagine her and Sam hang out a lot because they have so much in common with each other, they probably go out for ice cream and leave Max with Ace at home, to which they’d probably play video games together or just have play fights with each other. (Lots of biting involved) Quinn is very serious about working as a freelance police officer when she’s older though, her and Ace end up taking over the business and they get commissioned more risky cases. Quinn’s favorite kind of cases are assassination cases, which she’ll always use her trusty sniper rifle for. (Don’t get on her bad side, that rifle is scary) Similar to Sam, Quinn has quite the appetite, but only for one specific food..desserts. Whenever any sort of sweet is involved in a case, she’ll always be tempted to take some for herself. Despite her overall serious tone about mostly everything, sweets are what really show her true self, a lovable little puppy dog who can’t resist any sort of treat.

General info about the two of them: They have quite the sibling relationship. They always pick on each other and argue, but they still really care for one another. Ace likes to support his sister in any way possible, often cheering for her whenever she takes charge in a case, which is literally every case. Quinn likes to show her support for her big brother through subtle affection, since it’s hard for her to show much affection at all. She tends to bonk him on the head, call him a harmless name (knucklehead, stupid, etc) or just give him a little head pat. Quinn also shows how much she cares for her brother by protecting him when he can’t protect himself in a dangerous situation. One can never be without the other, just like Sam and Max themselves, an Ace without a Quinn or vice versa will make both of them feel incomplete. I totally do not plan on purposely separating them for story purposes noooooooo/s

(Feel free to draw the fankids too if you’d like, that’d be so so cool)

[xaeyrnofnbe]

sandwings or seawings or both :) they are my favorite tribes

awesome, yes! i have multiple guys here

sandwings

unfortunately i only have the one mostly figured out sandwing, but she’s the greatest so it’s fine. her name is Queen Mirage and she wants nothing more than to Take Over The World, and her current plan involves her rogue rainwing gf Hummingbird (who’s whole thing is making Evil Deals and selling poisons + weapons,) manipulating other dragons into murdering all the current queens in order to destabilize things. these evil women are very special to me <3333

seawings

i’ve probably got the most developed story with my three main seawing characters, Urchin, Oyster, and Horizon. (important things to note: all my ocs exist in a hypothetical future about a generation and a half after the last wof book, borders are tense and the seawings have basically hidden in the sea the whole time and don’t leave often) (also Urchin and Oyster are pretty close, Oyster having repeatedly protected Urchin from their mom)

Urchin and Oyster are the two oldest children of Queen Otter, but the biggest issue here is her heir, Urchin, is transgender. and Doesn’t want to be queen. Oyster? is also transgender. she’s also always kept to herself, and has been pretty closeted her whole life. and Urchin only realizes himself when he meets Horizon (they/them,) a mysterious loner who dresses him up and helps him figure out his identity, Urchin regularly sneaking out of the palace to go hang out with his hot boygirlfriend who validates his gender identity.

but uh-oh, Urchin hasn’t seen Horizon in a while, he’s wondering where they are. they don’t have to worry too long, though, as pretty soon he finds them. killing his mom (due to orders from Hummingbird but he doesn’t know that yet.)

and now things are different. Horizon is gone, and the pressure is on Urchin to be the new queen. and like, his mom was hella transphobic and generally just unkind to him and his siblings, but it’s still a bummer, y’know? so he’s not doing great. so basically the day he’s supposed to become queen, he quickly shifts attention to Oyster and declares that she’s the rightful heir to the throne and also implies that he’s making her queen now, much to the confusion of just about everyone, and he just up and leaves. he leaves the palace, he leaves the city, he even leaves the seawing kingdom for the first time, with a couple goals in mind, mostly to find himself for real, but also to track down Horizon so he can yell at them for a while.

and yell at them he eventually does. as well as make some interesting friends along the way.

below the cut is all the art i’ve done for characters mentioned

Queen Mirage and Hummingbird

Urchin and Horizon

[fite-club]

Idk I mean no disrespect and I’m coming to you with this civilly because I do like a lot of your opinions but this one is a little harder for me to see eye to eye with you— I think it’s possible to think things are heading in the wrong direction in some ways and not act like saying so is trying to push some anti-tech amish narrative. Like, I don’t think smart phones are great for a lot of peoples mental health and I think tweens shouldn’t have unfiltered access to most social media but I’m also not unrealistic and realize that parents are still going to buy their kids smart phones and have no semblance of parental control and how to talk to kids about these things, y’know? Not really an ai example and more to do with ipads and smart phones, but we’re going to have multiple elsagates and things of the like too and it’s always going to be more useful for people to complain about it than ignore it. And no one has to understand how youtube algorithms work to complain about youtube. Like, you cannot like ai technology for what it’s currently doing now and when someone says “they are against ai” I don’t really take that in bad faith and know what they mean. Because even if it’s never going away, there could always be reformations and solutions ideally to address peoples concerns. I think that’s an okay thing to want even if it never happens. Things like deepfakes I see as very adjacent to this. Back in the day people would make a big deal about photoshop and it still hasn’t changed that people can use technology to be disrespectful to others or even do more horrendous things. The way I see it, since it’s been such a hot button topic lately, I think it’s good for people to voice their concerns and have some pushback towards what things we don’t want from this technology. I don’t think people are naive for that and I also don’t think one has to fully understand ai to have these concerns. Idk personally, I just see it as a pretty useless thing to argue about. Because at this rate, there is no “team pro-ai” — because as you said, the genie is already out of the bottle. But at the same time when people say they’re anti-ai, I know what they mean, even if people want to treat them as naive for not fully comprehending how the technology works. Like I understand WHAT they are worried about and I do still of course hope for the best in regard to its utilization and more and more people learning about it. I think a lot of people are disappointed too in how it’s become a feature on nearly everything and I can’t blame them. I find it personally just more annoying than anything. I’m an artist but not a good enough one to worry about people stealing my art so I can understand trying to tell people there’s no going back from this existing, I just think it’s also fair to let those people voice their concerns in the first place, whether they fully understand ai or not, and not make them feel like their opinion is useless because of how far the technology has come. Technology development will always be unwavering but it’s not out of left field to say that you want technology to be used for good instead of bad and I think that’s a basic concept anyone can get behind no matter how much they still have to learn.

well of course i believe that people are allowed to voice their concerns and criticism about ai, and i don’t defacto defend all uses of ai. my concern isn’t about people wanting precautions or talking about potential dangers, my concern is people flattening all nuance out of these conversations to the point that “anti-ai” becomes a stance. you bring up photoshop here which i like because photoshop is ai. social media algorithms use ai. medical diagnostic tools use ai. a calculator is ai. “artificial intelligence” is a buzzword more than an actual Thing. ai is not a sentient being, “it” isn’t doing anything besides math. it is what people do with it that determines whether or not it’s a “good” or “bad” thing. it should go without saying that corporations using ai image generators instead of paying human artists Is Bad and i’m not happy that’s happening— but the “using ai image generators” isn’t the immoral or evil part. and that’s all i want to make clear!

like i said i’ve had a personal interest in this exact topic for most of my life so i don’t blame people for not agreeing with me because i can see how what i’m saying sounds cruel and judgmental, but i’m coming from a place with less fear and confusion. people are allowed to have opinions on things they don’t understand, but i just want them to at least take into consideration that they don’t understand how it works. like, remember when everyone who was afraid of vaccines didn’t want to get the covid vaccine? a lot of the reactionary fear responses there came from a lack of understanding of how vaccines function, which is medical knowledge not everyone has. i’m not calling those people stupid, their fear has justification, but it’s their lack of understanding that lead to the fear.

ultimately we agree that it’s useless to argue about

[cheesesteakphil]

WHOO OK Big one this week! Both a mix of stuff from this week and forgotten doodles I only ever posted in one discord server.

In other news. I started BIG animatic no.3 today. I started it today and I am nearly half way through. Keep in mind my record is 3 days from start to finish. So uhhh. Y’know. Keep ur eyes peeled for that.

image explanations in the read more! :)

1) An matching cover for a short thing I wrote (maybe one day I’ll post it) about how Orlifa deals with the aftermath of the bugsnax truth reveal, and the guilt she feels for feeding so many of them to her friends. I couldn’t portray it too well with the art so I wrote it out instead

2) Funny sketches from ANOTHER thing I wrote (same again, neither drabbles are clean so they stay tucked in my google docs for now) about Floofty meeting Orlifa’s parents properly for the first time (I’m sure some folk remember the comic I did a while back, that was technically their first meeting) lmao.

3) I am gay. I drew this last week but I’m still obsessed with it

4-5) Did these last night, some good good juicy angst. But I’ve been taking a deeper look into the development of Orlifa and Floofty’s relationship, and how they originally did NOT get on well, and Floofty makes a careless remark about Orlifa not being a scientist (she is) which causes a HUGE rift early on which takes the majority of the games events to resolve. here’s some extra convo about that 

literally all the rest of them are various gift arts and doodles I’ve sent to @thegalleonsnest​ because I love drawing my friends OC/Canon ships and his funky bird too :)

[arvandus]

The Sound of Silence (18+ Aizawa x Fem!Reader)

Pairing: Aizawa x Fem!Reader

Synopsis: After once again being stood up for a date at your favorite jazz club, you decide to give up dating entirely in favor of watching and fantasizing about your favorite jazz musician, Aizawa Shouta.  You had assumed you’d never meet him face to face.  You had assumed that he didn’t even know you existed.  You’re about to learn that your assumptions are wrong.

Warnings: 18+ ONLY/NSFW; reader wears a sexy black dress (minimally described); minor sexual harassment; slow build; praise kink (if you squint); hand kink (probably); fingering; ‘baby’ petname.

Special Note:  A few days late, but here’s my contribution to the BNHarem January Collab ‘Making Beautiful Music’ posted by @kingexpl0sionmurder​​. It was supposed to be a oneshot, but this particular piece got a mind of its own and will at least have a sequel. If we’re all really lucky, it may become a multichapter series in the far and distant future, when my life is less crazy (I have ideas, ok??).  In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this fic!

Word Count: 9486

Recommended Song: No specific song at the moment, but this was what I listened to while writing this.

Lesson 1

It was crowded tonight, the air of the small club Midnight hot and heavy with the scent of cigar smoke and booze. The noise of conversations and laughing voices filled the air like the buzzing of a hive, as bodies mingled about like busy bees, each looking for their own bit of nectar.  Some looking to win romance.  Some looking to win money.  While others were simply winning by enjoying the company of friends.  Their movements were carried on the music that filled the space, upbeat jazz played by a three-person band.  It was comforting in its familiarity, developed over multiple visits – some with friends, some with coworkers, and some with potential love interests.

You sat at the bar, a drink held protectively in your hand as your eyes searched.  You checked your phone for messages but found none.  It’d been a full twenty minutes and you were pretty sure by this point that your date wasn’t going to show up.  It was supposed to be your first date in over a month, and you’d had high hopes for it - you’d clicked well with the person on your dating app (or so you thought), talking over the course of a couple of weeks before finally deciding to meet. So tonight, you’d put in a little extra effort into your appearance, donning a black dress that showed off your curves and putting careful attention into your makeup.

Damn. You were genuinely interested in this one.

You sent them a quick text in the hopes that you’d get a response.  Give them an extra ten minutes… You thought. Maybe they were caught in traffic or something.

But by the time you hit the 45-minute mark with no messages, you’d officially given up.  A half-hearted sigh fell past your painted lips. You weren’t really too surprised by this point.  You’d been having terrible luck in the dating scene for a while now.  Sometimes it was them.  Sometimes it was you.  But for whatever reason, each attempt ended in failure.

Oh well. It was likely for the best.  At least you would be able to enjoy the rest of your evening in solitude instead of enduring a potentially disastrous date.  And as for your attire, it certainly didn’t hurt to feel sexy, even if you had no one to share it with.

You loved this place. The atmosphere, the music… you’d even managed to make friends with the bartender Hizashi to the point that he’d walk you to your car on the nights that you stayed until closing.

Your eyes scanned around the room, observing.  Wooden tables littered the main floor, where small lit candles cast yellow light on observing faces, eyes trained on the musicians.  Booths lined along the far wall, filled mostly with men who puffed cigars over a game of cards, their raucous laughter carrying through the din.  Closer to the bar was an arrangement of tall, round tables with matching bar height chairs. A group of women, likely on a ladies’ night out, filled the table closest to you, taking shots and laughing, their heels perched on the rungs.  Waiters zigzagged their way through the crowd with expert precision, platters held high with drinks and snacks, while patrons milled about, waiting for an open table.

And, of course, there was the stage itself, where the jazz band finished their final piece before collecting their instruments and leaving the small stage.  All that was left from their departure was a black baby grand piano, property of the club.  Your pulse quickened as you checked your watch.  Was it that time already?

Not a moment later, there he was.  Long, black, wavy hair pulled back into a half ponytail, the hint of a 5 o’ clock shadow dusting his jawline and framing his lips.  He was dressed in simple clothes, as always… a black v-neck shirt with the sleeves pushed halfway up his forearms and dark jeans.  He entered the stage without so much a glance towards the busy room, instead making his way to the piano with his hands in his pockets. He sat down and from your position at the bar, you could barely see his long fingers arrange themselves at the keys, gently curled.

As soon as he began to play, the mood in the club shifted slightly from buzzing to relaxing.  The flow of his fingers across the keys drew a lazy melody reminiscent of rainy days and hot coffee; of snuggling under warm blankets, feet intertwined with a lover who danced their fingers across your skin, gently tickling your flesh the way his fingers tickled those keys.

Aizawa Shouta.

Of course you knew his name. The first time you’d heard him play, you’d felt weightless, your body going numb as every sensation coalesced into your chest like the forming of a star.  The question of his identity had fallen from your lips before you’d even realized it, and it had been Hizashi who’d answered you, a chuckle on his lips.

Fuck.  It felt like he was making love to you through the notes, each key meticulously selected like a carefully-worded love letter. It made your palms sweat against your glass, your breath hitching in your throat as that familiar sensation took you over, holding you hostage.

This.  This was probably why none of the people you dated ever seemed to work out.  You’d tried… God, you’d tried… some of them were nice, good people.  But you couldn’t help but search for that feeling – this feeling – each time you met someone new.  And every single time it fell short. It was an impossible standard, an invisible bar that no one was able to jump.  Deep down you knew this, yet you couldn’t figure out how to let it go. It was just music, right? Played by a handsome man who didn’t even know you existed.  But you didn’t want to let go of this feeling, to settle for someone that made you feel only an inkling of what he made you feel.  Or worse, to let it go and be left with emptiness.

You had no solutions. You were trapped in Aizawa’s maze of music, unwilling to find your way out as his notes weaved a cage around your heart.

You lost yourself to his melody, the club around you fading away.  Time lost its meaning as you watched his hands dance along the keys, his fingers nimble.  His half-lidded eyes were fixed on the instrument before him, his expression neutral.  To anyone else watching, he would look almost bored; but you’d seen him play often enough that you’d grown accustomed to reading the nuances of his body language, even across the smoky haze.  You knew his look of boredom was really a look of focus as he submerged himself in his art, his hands playing on instinct, a direct link between what he felt and what he expressed.

He loved what he did.

And you loved watching.

Hizashi’s voice interrupted your hypnosis.  “Another night solo, huh?”

You took a look at the bartender as he prepped some cocktails for some waiting patrons.  He had his wire-framed spectacles on again, the orange tinted ones, the color visible from the white backlight of the bar. His long blonde hair was pulled back into a low ponytail, and he wore a pinstriped shirt adorned with a black waistcoat.

You chuckled and took a sip of your drink. “It wasn’t supposed to be.”

“You got stood up again?” You shrugged and Hizashi shook his head slightly.  “If they ain’t willing to show up, then they ain’t worth your time.”

“Probably more like the other way around, don’t ya think?” you replied wryly.

Hizashi scoffed. “Don’t let them get to you. They don’t know what they’re missing.”

You grinned and set your glass down.  “Are you flirting with me, Hizashi?”

He grinned back and winked at you through his spectacles.  “Always, darlin’.”

You chuckled and returned your eyes to the stage. “It’s okay…” you said thoughtfully. “Maybe it’s time I stopped trying.”

“Mhm…” Hizashi watched you stare at Aizawa and he raised an eyebrow.  “Y’know, I can get you an introduction if you’d like…”

“What??”

“Don’t play coy with me, darlin’.  You know who I’m talking about.  If you want to meet him, I can introduce you to him. We’re good friends, he and I. Known each other for years.” He commented.

You weren’t surprised by this news… you’d seen Aizawa join Hizashi at the bar on rare occasions after his performance was done.  But you’d always been occupied at a table with company when it happened. 

Watching him from a distance was one thing.  But actually meeting him?  Up close? Where you couldn’t hide your girlish infatuation?

You felt your pulse quicken with dread, heat flooding your body.  “No, it’s okay.  I wouldn’t want to inconvenience him.”

Hizashi gave you a skeptical look over the rim of his glasses before he shrugged. “Suit yourself, darlin’.”

The blonde stepped away, a new group of customers hollering for his attention.  You took a large gulp of your drink hoping it would quell your nerves at the thought of meeting the man on stage.  No. You definitely didn’t want to meet him.  The last thing you needed was for your interaction with him to be a dud just like it was with all the others, destroying your own secret little fantasy. He was handsome to look at.  And you fantasized about his skilled hands when you were in the quiet of your bedroom. But that was all it was; just harmless daydreams over someone you didn’t really know or plan to get to know. Besides, if you’d ever thought you had a chance with him, you certainly wouldn’t be trying to meet people through a dating app.

Gradually the time ticked by as you enjoyed watching the dark-haired man play, Hizashi stopping in to check on you from time to time and place fresh drinks in front of you.  You were content for the time being, enjoying the steady buzz you were maintaining as you enjoyed the ambiance.  Occasionally you people watched or engaged in conversation with Hizashi when he wasn’t busy… but for the most part, you relaxed as you observed the raven-haired pianist, letting his music ease the tension in your shoulders as the alcohol warmed your bones.

A few hours later, as you were busy talking with Hizashi, the final note on the piano rang out, signaling the end of Aizawa’s shift.  The sudden silence hit you like a bucket of ice water, and your eyes darted towards the stage, your heart pumping panic through your veins.  You had planned to leave just before his shift ended, just to make sure you didn’t run into him.  Maybe it was the daydreaming, or the conversations with Hizashi, or the alcohol... but you’d lost track of time.  Now you could only watch and wait to see where he’d end up, hoping beyond hope that he’d disappear like he usually did.  Only rarely did he linger for a drink.  What were the odds, right?

Tonight was one of those rarities, and you held your breath, your posture going rigid, as he sat himself a mere two seats away from you.  He never once looked at you, instead, addressing Hizashi.

“Old Fashioned.” He requested, his voice deep.  It sent a shiver down your spine as the blood in your veins turned molten.  You knew instantly that that sound was now committed to memory.

“Do you even need to ask?” Hizashi replied with a grin as he slid the drink to him.

You disciplined your eyes to stare at your own drink as if it’d open up a portal for you to escape through. But as much as you struggled to control yourself, the simple gesture of Aizawa reaching for his drink made you break eye contact with your own. Your eyes caught how his fingers circled around his glass, long and surprisingly manicured.  You couldn’t help but watch as he brought the drink up to his lips to take a sip, and from there your gaze followed the curve of his mouth, the stubble that framed it, his jawline, his eyes…

Your eyes made contact with his briefly and you quickly looked back down at your drink, your heart pounding in your chest.

Shit.  He caught you staring.

You took a couple of deep swigs, forcing the alcohol down your tight throat, letting the burn of it act as a punishment for your violation. This. This was why you didn’t want to meet him.  No words had even been shared yet and you were already making a fool of yourself.

“Long night?” Hizashi asked him.  In the background, the next performer entered the stage and began to play, and you couldn’t help but strain your ears over the music to listen for Aizawa’s answer.

“I’ve had worse…” Aizawa replied.  “You?”

“Busy, but I’m in good company at least.” Hizashi replied.  Your heart pounded in your chest as your fingers tightened around your glass.  Your eyes darted up to lock with the bartender’s and you caught him smirking at you, his small, pointed mustache following the curve of his upper lip. 

He wouldn’t…

Suddenly another customer called for him from the other end of the bar.  “Duty calls, friend.  Be back in a sec.”

And just like that, you were left alone with him.  Aizawa. Your mind froze as it warred with itself between actually talking with him or grabbing your things and running away. Surely Hizashi would understand, right? And you could always pay back your tab later.   You took another deep gulp of alcohol in the hopes that it’d burn away some of your cowardice. 

Before you could so much as open your mouth, the unwelcome sensation of an unfamiliar hand on the curve of your back made your body go rigid, every muscle poised to fight.  A second later, the scent of hot breath laced in the stench of alcohol choked the air around you as an unfamiliar man slid into the open seat between you and the object of your affection.

“Hey there beautiful…” he slurred.  “You’ve been by yourself all night… you in need of some company?”

You covered your hand over your glass and shifted away from him slightly, your demeanor cold.  “No.”

“Aw, c’mon doll… don’t be like that…” he grinned.  “You don’t come here dressed like that for no good reason…”

The man’s hand was still on your back, its presence making your skin crawl.  It made the fog of your buzz lifting slightly, your senses suddenly heightened in the presence of a potential threat.  Your eyes searched frantically for Hizashi.  He had a way of handling drunken idiots.  But he was stuck at the other end of the bar still, a drunk woman trying desperately hard to flirt with him. 

You were on your own, and this creep clearly wasn’t taking no for an answer. Your brain started to fabricate worst-case scenarios and planning for them, a million options running through your mind.  Screaming. Throwing your drink in his face.  A well-placed kick to his shin.  Your pepper spray.

Your free hand slipped into your purse, fingers closing around you’re the plastic cylinder.  The feel of it gave you a sense of security, even if it might be a last resort.  You didn’t really want to use it, especially with Aizawa sitting behind him… you never had to use it before, and you couldn’t guarantee your accuracy, especially in such a tight space.

You watched from the corner of your eye as the man’s free hand reached forward to grasp your own that covered your drink, and your grip around the cylinder tightened, a warning beginning to fall from your lips.  But your words were cut short as the man’s hand was suddenly grabbed by familiar, long fingers and bent back at an uncomfortable angle that made the drunk cry out.

“Hey! What the hell?!” the man demanded.

Aizawa took a casual sip of his drink with his free hand while maintaining his grip on the offender, before pinning him with a dangerous glare.  “She said no.”

The man’s hand left your back as he struggled to free himself from Aizawa’s grip. “Let go!”

“First you will apologize to her.” Aizawa ordered.

The man sputtered.  “For what?!”

You watched in shock as Aizawa’s eyes narrowed.  His thumb positioned itself on a digit and began pushing it slowly backward.

“For touching her without permission.  For insinuating that her attire makes it acceptable for you to ignore her boundaries. For being a disgusting pig.”

With each statement, he pushed the finger back farther and farther, until the man was buckling to his knees under the pressure in an attempt to alleviate the pain and prevent the digit from breaking.

“Ow ow ow! Okay!  I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” The man begged.

Aizawa held him for a moment longer before finally releasing him. “Good.  Now get out.”

The man scurried away until he was out of reach before turning around to glare daggers at him.  “Hey, fuck you man!”  He shouted.  But for all of his drunken bravado, he stormed out of the club clutching his sore hand to his chest, as heads turned to watch him leave.

The hum of voices within the club fell silent for a moment, with only the band continuing their music. After the front door closed, the noise of people chattering slowly returned, countless sets of eyes turning back to their tables.  Aizawa turned his gaze back to you, the lethal look gone from his dark eyes.

“You okay?”

You nodded mutely, swallowing the dryness in your throat as your sweaty hand released the pepper spray in your purse.  Sensations warred within you, momentarily leaving you a confused mess.  The speed at which he came to your defense and his willingness to resort to violence on your behalf fueled a carnal need you didn’t even realize you had.  But even as hot arousal pooled deep in your gut, your heart still raced from the threat that had been quickly neutralized.

His eyes caught the movement of something over your shoulder and he cursed. “Shit.”

“SHOuTA!” Scolded a feminine voice.

He turned back to his drink, hunching his shoulders. “I told her not to call me that in public.” Aizawa muttered under his breath.

You spun on your stool to see the owner of the bar, Nemuri Kayama approaching, clad in a deep purple business suit with a dangerously low-cut black blouse. She was next to you in a matter of seconds, a cloud of strong perfume enveloping you as she snatched Aizawa’s drink from his hand as he began to raise it to his lips.

“What the hell was that?!” She demanded.  “What makes you think you can attack my customers like that?”

“Your customer was harassing this customer.” Aizawa pointed out.

Nemuri looked at you with her lavender eyes as if seeing you for this first time and paused in her verbal assault.

“Is this true?” She asked you.

She had a presence about her that instantly made you find your voice again.

“He was being handsy and wasn’t taking no for an answer.” You confirmed.

“Can I have my drink back now?” Aizawa asked.

She stared back and forth between the two of you for a moment before slamming the glass down in front of him, half of the contents spilling over the side. “Ugh. Fine.  But next time ask for one of my bouncers.  Or Hizashi.  Or me. Anyone but you.”

Aizawa’s mouth curled with a sly grin as he wiped at the spill with a napkin.  “And why is that?”

“Because you scare away customers.” She growled.

Aizawa stared into his drink, swirling its remaining contents.  “Well maybe you need better customers.” He took a sip.

“I’ll take whoever is willing to pay.  Unfortunately for you, this club doesn’t survive off of chivalry.”  She crossed her arms.  “Besides… it’s less about losing that drunken idiot and more about losing those who saw you almost break his hand.”

“I wasn’t going to break his hand.  I was going to break his finger.” Aizawa said.

You stifled a chuckle with a bite of your lip.

Nemuri rubbed the bridge of her nose in frustration.  “Don’t try to make it sound like that makes it any better.  And you!” She pointed at Hizashi, who had conveniently shown up not a minute before.  “You know better than to leave him alone like this!”

“I can either be a bartender or a babysitter, love.  I can’t do both.” Hizashi replied as he polished a glass.

 Nemuri grumbled under her breath before turning her gaze back to you. “I apologize for Aizawa’s violent behavior.” “Oh I didn’t mind…” you confessed with a small smile, and you could feel Aizawa’s eyes flicker to you briefly.

 “And I apologize for the inappropriate customer. Alcohol is no excuse for harassment.  I guarantee he won’t be returning to this club any time soon.” She looked at Hizashi.  “Get her a fresh drink.”  

 “Already on it…” He replied, sliding a new glass to you and removing your old one.

 She looked back at you. “And your drinks are on the house tonight.”

 “Thank you.” You replied.

 Nemuri gave a satisfied nod. “Now I need to go schmooze the rest of our frightened patrons, which is exactly how I didn’t want to spend my evening.” With a final glare at the two men, she stormed off, her pointed heels clicking on the hard floor.

 You stared at your new drink for a moment, the desire for it lost now.  “Hizashi, can I have a glass of water?”

 “Sure thing, darlin’.” Hizashi replied and placed a chilled glass in front of you.

You thanked him and took a sip followed by a long, deep breath.  Aizawa moved into the now-vacant seat next to you, and you welcomed the closeness. The gesture felt protective, a warning to anyone else who was dumb enough to try their luck with you after that display.  Noticing the closer proximity between the two of you, Hizashi quickly made himself scarce again.

“Thank you…” you said to Aizawa as your finger traced patterns into the condensation on the glass.

“It was nothing…” he replied.  There was a long silence before he spoke again.  “I hope I didn’t scare you.”

You looked at him with surprise then.  Scared? No. Aroused? Definitely.  The dampness of your panties were evidence enough of that, but he certainly didn’t need to know that.

“Not at all.” You confessed. “I actually really appreciate it.”

Aizawa’s shoulders relaxed slightly, as if a weight had been lifted.

“Where’d you learn to do that?” you asked.  “You were so fast…”

Aizawa gave a small grin. “Piano isn’t the only thing I’m good at…”

You had no difficulty believing that…

“Were you a bouncer or something at one point?” you asked curiously.

Aizawa chuckled. “Yeah, something like that…” he took a swig of his drink, the ice in it clinking.  The amber colored liquid was nearly gone now.

His response only gave you more questions, but you forced them down. There was a fine line between being curious and nosey, and you were too worried of crossing it, thus ending your conversation with him.

“You’re a regular here.” He commented.  

It wasn’t a question – it was a statement. He recognized you. You averted your eyes away in embarrassment, feeling suddenly exposed, your anonymity blown.  How long had he noticed you’d been coming here?  Did he know how closely you watched him?

“Yeah.” You confessed, as you took another sip of water. The alcohol next to it was calling to you, promising to ease your anxiety, but you refrained for the moment.  You wanted to keep your wits about you while you talked to him.

“No company tonight?” he asked.

Oh.  He watched you more closely than you ever realized. You weren’t sure whether you were feeling embarrassed or aroused.  Was it possible to feel both?

“Not this time.  I got stood up.” You replied.

“Sounds like you dodged a bullet there.” He said, looking into his empty glass.

You gave a dry laugh. “True.  I’ve dodged lots of bullets lately.”

Aizawa chuckled. “I believe it…”

Contrary to his outward aloof demeanor, he was nice.  You could feel the tension in your body start to dissipate as words came easier.

“If you ever think you want to try a dating app, don’t.” you commented. “It makes for good stories, but sometimes it really makes you want to give up on humanity.”

That earned an honest laugh as he looked at you with a grin.  “Well now you’ve piqued my curiosity.”

You couldn’t help but smile back.  This actually wasn’t so bad…

With amusement, you began to recount some of your more outlandish dating disasters with him, letting him in on the world of online dating from a woman’s perspective.  Aizawa listened with quiet interest, making the occasional wry joke or, for the more serious cases, wearing a deep frown of disapproval.  He was a good listener, and the conversation flowed easier than you had expected, words falling from your mouth without a second thought.  It felt natural.  Comfortable. And for the first time in a while, you felt like yourself.  After you ran out of stories, Aizawa offered a couple of his own, and you found yourself laughing at his own tales of dating woes. As Aizawa talked, Hizashi stopped by to quietly replace his empty drink before disappearing again, a pleased smile on his face.  His brief presence reminded you of your own glass pooling condensation on the paper coaster beneath it, and you returned to sipping its contents, once again finding the buzz you had been enjoying as you listened to Aizawa.

The time passed by as the two of you talked about the stress of dating and relationships. You’d learned that Aizawa rarely dated, but would occasionally have to endure awkward matchups thanks to Hizashi and Nemuri.  You learned how much of a private person he was, how he generally avoided dating culture entirely in favor of letting life play out on its own.  Everything about him exuded a man of experience and maturity, a man comfortable in his own skin and content with his life.  You couldn’t help but admire him as you soaked in every little detail that you’d wanted to know, committing every little bit of information he offered up to memory.  He was everything you’d imagined; kind, respectful, and serious with a sly sense of humor that he only shared once he was feeling comfortable.

Once the topic was exhausted, you sighed.  “I think I’m done with dating.” You confessed.  “I’ll just resign myself to my singlehood.”

Aizawa pinned you with a pensive look.  “Is that what you want?”

Something about the tone of his voice made your pulse race with excitement.

“Well… It’s better than being repeatedly disappointed.” You gave him a side glance as you took sip of your drink.  “But if the right guy comes along, I wouldn’t say no…”

“Hm… the right guy…” Aizawa muttered as he returned his gaze to his glass.

Your statement was a bold one, filled with invitation.  You hadn’t exactly planned for it to come out that way, but it was too late to take those words back now.  You quickly tried to turn the topic back to him.  “How about you?  Any special someone for you?”

He chuckled. “No.  No special someone.  Not yet, at least.”

The words fell from his mouth like breadcrumbs leading to a secret as he eyed you over the rim of his glass. You felt lightheaded and warm, the tips of your fingers buzzing with numbness. Maybe it was the half-finished drink in your hand.  Or maybe it was the look in Aizawa’s eyes that made you feel drunk, the Earth spinning under your feet as you mentally struggled to find some sort of purchase to keep from falling.  

Was he…?

Hope held you captive and you suddenly became acutely aware of how close you were to him.  Your eyes traced the scruff on his jawline, the stitching of his shirt, the slope of his neck as his Adam’s apple bobbed with a swallow. A stray strand of hair had come loose from his half-ponytail and was hanging over his forehead, begging to be touched. Your fingers twitched.  If you reached out to tuck it back into place, would he let you?

You couldn’t muster the courage and averted your eyes. You were filled with alcohol and infatuation, you reasoned.  Your defenses were down, your judgment potentially impaired… what if you were reading into something that wasn’t there?  What if you were wrong?  

You watched Hizashi close out a tab for an older couple as you took a sip of your water.

Warmth pressed against your forearm and looked down to see Aizawa’s arm resting against yours. All of your attention honed in on the softness of his shirtsleeve and the warmth of his skin as his hand fiddled with a paper coaster, flipping it over and over with each tap on the counter.  The contact was intentional, calculated in its subtle intimacy.  It was a silent question… a tentative invitation, absent of assumptions or expectations.  Your doubt evaporated like mist and you understood.  

He was interested.  In you.

Your heart did a somersault in your chest as you sat there, stunned.  Time froze as everything that’d transpired throughout the evening flitted through your mind.  It was a perfect amalgamation of circumstances, leading to this single moment, giving you the one thing you wanted most.  You held your breath as you stood on the precipice, uncertain if your next step would make you fall or let you fly.  

You stared at the contact and carefully… slowly… brushed your pinky along the back of his hand. It traced the vein that stood out there, following it to the knuckle. His own hand let go of the coaster his was holding, his own pinky linking with yours in affirmation.

You couldn’t help the elated smile that spread across your face in that moment and when you looked up at him with a shy glance, he had a smile of his own, small and secretive as he stared at your linked fingers.  Slowly the rest of his fingers followed, twining themselves into yours until he held your hand, his thumb brushing sensually against your skin.  That single action alone was enough to reignite the fire in your loins, your blood racing through your veins from the epicenter of his touch.

Hizashi’s voice crashed through your private, titillating moment.  “We’re closing up, lovebirds…”

Your hand pulled away from Aizawa’s on instinct as you looked around the now empty club.  Only staff remained, finalizing the last bit of cleanup and arranging the furniture for the next day.  How had it gotten so late so fast?

“You want me to walk you to your car?” Hizashi asked, a knowing grin on his face.

In all that had happened that evening, you’d forgotten about that little arrangement.  But you weren’t ready to leave just yet…

Aizawa’s voice answered before yours could.  “Leave me the keys to the place.  I’ll walk her tonight and lock up when we leave.”

“Suit yourself.” Hizashi replied with a shrug.  He placed a set of keys on the counter.  “Don’t tell Nemuri, though.  She’ll kill me.”

“Your secret’s safe with me, friend.” Aizawa replied.

With that, Hizashi gave a small salute, grabbed his coat, and left.  You watched, your heart pounding as the door closed behind him, leaving a deafening silence in its wake.

You were alone with Aizawa. Completely and utterly alone.

Your turned back to face him and froze.  Aizawa still sat on his stool, but he faced you now with an elbow propped against the counter, and that simple distinction made his presence fill your space.  He stared at you, the look in his eyes unfettered now, deep and hungry. “You really do look beautiful tonight.” He complimented.

With the way the words fell from his mouth and curled warmly into your chest like a cat, you believed him. You felt beautiful.

“Thank you.” You said with a soft smile.  “You look handsome yourself, Aizawa.”

He took your hand again and slowly began to lean forward, closing the small distance between you.  “Call me Shouta.”

You swallowed. “Shouta.” You whispered, feeling the name on your lips.

His dark pupils dilated and you felt his other hand on your jawline, warm, long fingers wrapping towards the back of your neck to pull you into a kiss.

His lips were warm and soft as his stubble tickled your skin, and you leaned into it fervently, your hands finding their home on his chest. You could feel his toned muscles beneath the black cotton and a purr found its way to the back of your throat. Shouta took it as an invitation, coming off of his barstool to stand between your now parted legs, his arm wrapping itself around your waist as his tongue slid along your lips.  You opened your mouth eagerly to taste the bourbon there, to feel the wet muscle dance and slide against your own.  Every touch, every taste, every smell enveloped you further and further in the essence that was Shouta until your entire body was singing, teetering on the edge.

Oh God… you were not going to let yourself cum just by kissing him.

You pulled out of the kiss slightly as your hands pressed gently against his chest, and he retreated from you just enough for his eyes to search your face, a silent question in them.

“I-I’m sorry, I just…” your words fell pitifully from your flushed, wet mouth, your voice shaky with pent-up arousal.

One second longer. One second longer is all it would have taken…

Shouta’s hand on your back began to rub soft, slow circles. “Would you like some water?” he asked, a small smile on his lips.

You nodded, and he kissed your forehead before handing you your glass.  You drank greedily before handing it back to him, half-empty.

“Have you ever been kissed like that?” he asked curiously, as he placed the glass back down onto the counter.

You gave a small laugh and shook your head.  “No… not like that.”

Your confession left you feeling embarrassed, even as your chest felt it would burst from this latest turn of events.

You kissed Aizawa Shouta.

Actually, he kissed you.

You needed a moment to collect yourself, to process everything you were feeling.

So, you completely changed the subject.

“How long have you been playing piano?” you asked.

Shouta didn’t miss a beat, returning to sit on his stool to give you the space you silently needed. But his hand still held yours, resting on the counter as his fingers twined with yours. It gave you a sense of reassurance, that everything was okay, despite your awkward hesitation.

“My grandpa had one when I was a kid.  Used to mess around on it.” He explained.  “He finally got me lessons from a guy he knew, and I’ve loved it ever since.”

You smiled as you watched his thumb trace across each of your fingernails.  You returned the gesture, tracing the details of his own hand. It was like living a dream, to see them up close and feel them, every fingernail, every vein, even the pads of his fingertips. The number of times you’d fantasized about these hands…

“I always wanted to learn how to play, but my family could never afford lessons.” You confessed. “But my mom used to have all of these old jazz albums, and I used to sit in my room and listen to them for hours.”

“I can teach you.”

Your fingers stopped their tracing.  “What?”

“I can teach you.” He repeated.

You shook your head.  “Um, no it’s okay… I’d probably be a terrible student anyway.”

“A student can only be as bad as the person teaching them.  Follow me.”

Before you could protest further, Shouta’s hand closed around yours and pulled you from your seat.  He led you up the steps of the stage and across it until you reached the black piano sitting forlornly in the empty space.

It felt strange being up on the stage, especially with the club being completely empty.  The stage light was bright and warm on your shoulders, and the silence sounded different there, affected by the difference in acoustics.

Shouta sat at one end of the black bench and pulled you down by your hand until you were sitting next to him.  The bench was small, meant for only one person, so you had to press yourself against him to be able to sit without feeling like you were going to fall off. Even then, it wasn’t the most comfortable arrangement, but you endured, if only to be close to him.

He released your hand and began his instruction.

“First thing you should know is how to find middle C.  Everything else will center around this.”  He pressed the white key with the thumb of his right hand, the note singing out into the empty space.  “Then, it’s D, E, F, G, A, B, which brings you back to C. That creates an octave, also known as a scale.” He played each note as he spoke.

“What about the black keys?” you asked curiously.

“Those are the half notes. Don’t worry about those right now.” He arranged his hand back how he initially had it, his thumb on the middle C key.

“Now,” he continued, “First, you must learn how to move your fingers along the keys.  Like this.”  Shouta demonstrated the motion again, his fingers playing each note slowly in a steady rhythm.  “The switch of the fingers is important. It will help you flow quickly and easily without having to watch where your hands are, which will be important for reading sheet music.”  He repeated the motion again, the sounds once again ringing out.  Then, he removed his hand.  “Your turn.”

You bit your lip and placed your hand how you’d seen his arranged and tried.  The notes were clumsy, lacking in rhythm and falling together as you forgot in your nervous haze where the switch of the fingers happened. Embarrassment flooded you and you withdrew your hand.

“Don’t expect to get it right on the first try.” He reassured.  “Let’s try it again.  Try to keep your fingers loose, curved like a bowl.”

Shouta modeled it again. You watched, but your focus was muddled with anxiety, attraction, and likely alcohol.  It was a poor recipe for learning, but you knew he was trying to make you feel comfortable, and you didn’t want to turn down his kindness.  You arranged your hand back on the keys again and tried again, with little improvement.

“I’m sorry, I…” you stuttered as you clutched your hand in your lap protectively.

His hand covered yours and you looked up at him to see him staring at you with warm patience.  “It’s okay.  If you don’t want to do this, we can stop.”

You stared at him, mouth slightly open as you thought about it.  You knew he wouldn’t hold it against you if you wanted to quit.  And sure, you felt silly being so poor at it when sitting next to someone who’s skills you idolized.

But did you really want to stop?  How often would you get an opportunity like this?

“No, it’s okay.  Keep going, I want to learn.” You replied.

Shouta watched you for a moment longer before he placed his hand back on the keys.  “Place your hand over mine.”

You followed his instructions, your hand looking small compared to his.  His skin was warm, and it calmed the shaking in your fingers.

“Watch where the fingers land.  Feel how they move.” He played the notes, and you could feel the tendons of his hand tense and shift, his fingers rising and falling like a wave.

“It’s like they’re dancing.” You said.  “You switch to your thumb on this key… E?”

“Yes.” Shouta replied in approval.  “Your turn.”

This time you focused, remembering the feel of how his hand had moved under yours as you played the keys, switching your fingers at the right time.  The improvement was noticeable.

He smiled.  “Good.  Now, for the other hand.  You’ll start one octave lower.  Can you find it?”

Your arm crossed Aizawa’s chest to press the white key, letting the sound ring out.

“Perfect.  Only this time, your pinky will sit on this key, with the others following after.”

You placed your fingers across the white keys.  “Like this?”

Shouta nodded.  “Now you’ll try the same progression with your left hand.  The middle finger will follow after the thumb plays the G note.”

You removed your hand so he could place his own and demonstrate it for you.  You followed after him, imitating his actions, but this time your attempt was worse than your first, your hand angled awkwardly due to limited space as you pressed yourself against him.

“That was terrible.” You laughed. “I can’t reach very easily.”

A small mischievous smile formed on Shouta’s lips and he slipped his hand around your waist.

“Come here.” He said.

You didn’t fight him as he pulled you into his lap.  His right hand settled itself against your stomach as his legs parted slightly to make room for yours, your knees drawn together between his.  The heat of his touch seeped through the fabric of your dress, weaving a tight knot of desire deep in your core that made your body go rigid as you tried to keep yourself from melting against him.

“Is this okay?” He asked, leaning slightly to see your face from his position behind you.

You licked your lips and swallowed, giving a nod.  “Y-Yes…” you answered shakily.  “Are you okay…? I’m not too heavy?”

Shouta gave a soft laugh. “No.  Not at all.” His breath was hot against your skin and you could feel the scratch of his stubble as he spoke, sending goosebumps over your body. “Let’s continue.”

He placed his left hand on the keys again with ease, regardless of how poor his view of the piano was with you in front of him.  He knew this instrument like the back of his hand; could probably play it with his eyes closed and never miss a note.

He played the simple notes again, C through B, fingers tip-toeing across the keys as he said their names out loud, helping you to remember them.  You watched carefully for where the shift in finger arrangement happened, the middle finger following after the thumb just as he’d described.

“You try.” He instructed, his right arm still wrapped around your waist, holding you close against him. You could feel the warmth of his chest against your back now, feel the strength of his body beneath you.

You loved this.  The lap-sitting, the lesson, the praise. Each time Shouta praised your improvements it sent a thrill through you from your head down to your toes.  To be complimented by him, even for something as simple as pressing a few keys… it only made you want to please him more.

You played the progression of notes with renewed motivation, once again showing improvement from your first attempt.

“Good.”

Your spine straightened against him slightly.  The thumb of his hand caressed your abdomen where he held you.

“Now you need to learn to do the same but in reverse, until you’re back where your fingers started.”

You moved your hand away to let him demonstrate and his right hand left your stomach, leaving an ache in its wake.  You watched both of his hands play the simple notes up and down, working together with ease. But you knew it was all a ruse… he made it look easy, but if you tried to do the same, you’d fumble clumsily.

“I don’t know about this…” you chuckled.

“It takes practice,” he replied, “until it becomes muscle memory.”

Shouta demonstrated it again, up and down.  And again.

You placed your hands over his, wanting to feel the touch of his hands under yours more than the actual pressing of the keys.  All you wanted was his arm around your waist again, his hand on your lower abdomen.  His touch was tantalizing, and you wanted more of it.  

He completed the simple scale progression two more times with your hands on top of his.

“Do you want to try?” he offered.

His hands left the keys to hold you again, his arms wrapped more tightly around you this time. You leaned against him, reveling in being held in his arms.

“I’m going to mess up.” You warned.

“Just take it slow.”

You shook your head a little and let out a small breath, shifting your position in his lap slightly as you leaned forward to focus on the keys.  His arms loosened around you, his hands shifting to your thighs.

It was likely an innocent action, intended to give you the freedom to move as you made yourself comfortable.  But as soon as the tips of his fingers touched the bare skin below the hem of your dress, that sharp zap of arousal tingled the ends of your nerves, causing you to suck in air and part your knees slightly, your walls throbbing in hopeful anticipation.

It wasn’t intentional. Your body just… reacted.  But Shouta noticed instantly.

There was silence at first, his hands still on your thighs, waiting.  Finally, he spoke.  “Y/N….” his voice was huskier now.  “How long has it been since you’ve been cared for?”

Embarrassment flooded through you.  Embarrassment at your sensitivity to his touch, embarrassment at the answer to his question... You hesitated a moment before words fell clumsily from your mouth. “I, um… a long time.”

A low hum rumbled from Shouta’s chest as his fingers brushing gently along the inside of your thighs until they dipped just beneath the black fabric. The action was experimental, a testing of the waters, and it brought immediate results.  Your thighs widened the slightest bit more as you failed to fight back a whimper, your hands grasping his arms in need.  Not a moment later you could feel the growing firmness of his cock begin to press against your backside, despite the restriction of Shouta’s jeans. Shouta’s hands halted again their movement, waiting. He was miraculously under control despite his obvious arousal, and you envied him.

“Do you want me to touch you?” he asked, his voice low.

Of course you did.  It was obvious you did.  Why else would your legs be parting like the red sea as if he were Moses?

But for some reason, your body language wasn’t enough for him.  He needed to hear it.  A sense of urgency filled you, desperate need driving you.  At this point, you’d give him whatever he wanted…

“Yes.” you begged. “Please, Shouta... Please touch me.” You leaned back against him, allowing the angle of your hips to tilt as your hands guided him further beneath the skirt of your dress.

With you draped onto him, your head tilted back, Shouta kissed the curve of your neck as his hands gently gripped the insides of your knees, pulling your legs apart until they were draped over his own.  You were open for him now, your skirt hiked halfway up by the spread of your legs.  

Your heart pounded in your chest with so much excitement that you could feel your own pulse in your neck and between your legs.  This was happening… This was really happening… How many times had you fantasized about this very thing?  How many times had you longed for this man, whispered his name on your tongue only to be met by the empty silence?  And now here he was, freeing you from the shackles of your loneliness in the best way possible.

Shouta’s hands pushed the fabric up the rest of the way until it was pooled around your hips, exposing your panties.  The thin cotton fabric did little to protect your aching cunt from the cold air, and you sucked air through your teeth at the sensation.  His fingers traced invisible lines up the inside of your thighs, leaving nothing but singing nerves in their wake that cascaded into a shiver that rolled over your flesh, leaving goosebumps.  Your body was already moving of its own volition, hips rolling, eager for Shouta’s fingers yet simultaneously attempting to grind down onto his restrained cock.  Your breaths were already coming in hot and ragged, every inch of you frantic for the release that it had been denied all evening.

Shouta gave a low growl, his left hand holding down your hip, halting your movements.  “You better stop that…” he warned.  

No doubt your girating was making things difficult for him on his end.  But you didn’t care.  You were an unfettered, horny mess now.

A whine escaped your lips at his restriction.  In response, Shouta’s left hand trailed up the length of your body, caressing over your breast before finding its home on your neck.  His palm was against your voice box now, his fingers long enough to wrap around your throat and reach your jaw.  There was no force in his hold, but it still held power over you, ushering your body into stillness while your chest heaved with heavy breaths.

“Patience.” He whispered. “Let me take care of you.”

Shouta followed up his words with more gentle kisses along your neck, your shoulder… wherever his lips could reach with you on his lap.  The feel of his hand on your throat was a reminder of who was in control.  But it was also a promise - a promise to ensure your needs would be met.

Once Shouta was sure he had your compliance, his right hand travelled the remaining distance of your inner thigh to arrive at your panties, where moist heat greeted him.

A low hum of approval rumbled in his chest, vibrating against your back.  “You’re so wet.”

A pitiful “yes” was all you could muster before the tips of his fingers brushed gently against your clothed sex, stealing your voice and replacing it with a gasp.

Slowly Shouta pet you, his fingers stroking gentle circles over the wet cotton, teasing the sensitive flesh beneath.  With his hand still on your neck, you kept your body torturously motionless as he gradually increased the pressure of his digits, reducing his speed as he passed over your clit to drag the pads of his fingers over the bundle of nerves.

You swallowed the pooling saliva in your mouth, the action causing your throat to press against his hand. “Please…” you begged. “I can’t…”

Shouta was strict, but not cruel.  He obliged, slipping his fingers beneath the cotton to swim his digits into your juices, never breaking his circular, rhythmic motion over your slick entrance.  The scent of your arousal surrounded both of you, thick and heavy.

“Fuck, Y/N…” he growled against your skin.

Two of his fingers dipped into you then, slow at first, allowing you to stretch around him as your walls quivered.  Your thighs tensed at the intrusion, welcoming the stinging pressure as your core burned with fire. He withdrew his fingers slowly and you lifted your head to watch in carnal fascination to see his fingers shining wet down to the knuckles. He pushed them into you again, curling his fingers towards the sensitive, spongey tissue along the top of your walls, his thumb pressing down on your wet clit.  A zap of stimulation fired from your core before fizzling away, a teasing warning of what was to come.

“Oh-Oh fuck…” you gasped as one hand reached back and grabbed a fistful of Shouta’s thick, dark hair.

He picked up his pace then, his thumb driving firm circles around your swollen pearl as the sounds of your wet hole being finger-fucked filled the silence of the empty stage.  With each pass of his thumb, with each curl of his fingers, the heat grew hotter, your cunt swollen and burning with the need for release.  Your thighs were tensed so tightly now that it made your legs lift and you had to brace your feet against the piano, discordant notes ringing out to join the sounds of your heavy pants and wet squelching in a lewd song. Shouta’s hand left your throat to hold you under your thigh to keep you steady as his other hand worked fast and hard to unravel you.  With the absence of his touch on your neck, you were free to move your hips, grinding hard into his hand, his lap, whatever part of him you were touching.  Your grip on his hair tightened, mirroring the tension building within you, clinging to him like the boughs of a tree knowing that any second the flood would come.

Shouta was your lifeline, your rock, your destroyer.  You were the waves and he was the shore, and your body tensed to prepare itself to crash against him.

“Come on, baby…” Shouta whispered gruffly.  “I’ve got you. Cum for me.”

You came with a cry, loud and frantic as your walls clamped down on his fingers.  The ball of heat that you had been carrying like a stone exploded within you, incinerating every nerve from the inside out, leaving nothing but sweet, sharp, euphoria in its wake.  Your walls spasmed repeatedly, sucking greedily on Shouta’s drenched fingers, as you cried and moaned, bucked and arched.  Shouta’s arm was around your waist, holding you against him to keep you from sliding off of his lap as you rode the high of your orgasm, tumbling like a waterfall over and over again to finally become a puddle in his strong arms.  

Shouta held you silently against him as your body twitched with aftershocks of pleasure.  Once your spasms subsided and he was sure you wouldn’t fall from your perch, Shouta released his hold around your waist to draw his fingers up and down your arm, creating goosebumps under his gentle touch.  His fingers were still in you, his hand cupped between your legs.  The warmth of his touch on your tired cunt was comforting, and it brought forth a content moan from your parted lips.  Shouta smiled as he planted another kiss on your shoulder.

You weren’t sure how long you stayed like that with him.  But you finally made yourself sit up when you felt sleep starting to drag you down into its murky depths, your limbs feeling heavy.

Finally, Shouta spoke. “Better?” he asked.

You gave a laugh.  “Much.”  You looked down at yourself in amusement. “You made a mess of me, though…”

Shouta gave a satisfied hum and stared at his hand that held you.  “I like you messy.” He stated.

“So, you’re just gonna leave me like this?” you teased.

He laughed and withdrew his fingers, wiping the slick coating them onto his jeans.  “As much as I like that idea, no.”  He adjusted your ruined underwear and the hem of your dress back into place before turning you around in his lap.  His hands were planted on your rear, keeping you securely and comfortably in place.  “It’s late. We should get you home.”

You wrapped your arms around his neck and kissed him.  “What about you?” you asked, your eyes glancing down to his lap. Your hands began to trail down his chest to reach the button of his pants, eager to reciprocate.

Shouta smiled at you and grabbed your hands, bringing them back up to plant kisses on your palms.  “Tonight was about you. There’ll be more opportunities for both of us later.”  You pouted and he chuckled. “Don’t give me that face.”

“It hardly seems fair…” you muttered.  You were looking forward to enjoying more of him… you didn’t want tonight to end.

He hummed as he began to trail kisses along your jawline and you arched your neck to allow him better access.  “We both… need sleep.”

Sleep? With his mouth on your skin, sleep was the last thing on your mind.  Shouta pulled his lips away to look into your eyes again and you could see the fatigue there, dark circles framing bloodshot eyes.  He really did look incredibly tired, and you couldn’t help but wonder how late it really was.  You brushed the errant strand of hair off of his forehead, tucking it behind his ear.

“Okay...” you softly agreed.

“You should come back tomorrow night.” He mused, the mischief back in his eyes. “We can continue our piano lessons.”

“I’d like that.” you smiled.

 You couldn’t wait.

[fatehbaz]

hi maybe you’ve written about this before but i’m working for someone who is part of the ecological landscape alliance and we’ve been having big talks about the concept of “invasive” species vs “native” plants and how the concept is rooted in xenophobia, and also talking about how maybe invasive plants aren’t that bad?? this goes against everything i’ve ever heard anyone talk about invasive species but i really don’t know all that much about it. sounds silly maybe coming from a farmer but i really don’t have a super firm ecological understanding, most of my plant knowledge is agricultural based and im really curious to learn more and was hoping you could point me in the right direction?

Yes, I definitely run into this disk horse all the time. Especially the “maybe invasive plants aren’t that bad” discussion. It seems the native/alien stuff is most often mentioned in disk horse about the Anthropocene. Basically, you’ll sometimes see statements like: “Is anything really natural in the Anthropocene?” I have also seen, and spent a lot of time contemplating, how belief in the categories of “natural” and “alien/invasive” in discussion of ecology might be rooted in or at least inadvertently support racism/xenophobia.

But I am still wary of the “native vs alien” and “no creature or landscape is really natural, not any more” disk horse, at least as explored by some white/settler-colonial academics, for exactly the same reasons: because it might be rooted in or support racism/xenophobia. Because the proposal that “nothing is native, nothing is invasive” itself can actually engage in a sort of “settler absolution” that obscures how there really is a contrast between imperial and Indigenous peoples, and the “nothing is natural, nothing is invasive” proposal could excuse the colonial/imperial introduction and expansion of monoculture by accepting the spread of industry/agriculture/non-native species as an inevitability. And these concepts can actually work to generalize conditions of ecological degradation and apocalypse, as if to say that “all humans now live in such a damaged world, we’re all victims” (even though many non-white, especially Indigenous, people actually bear most of the violence and burden of living in “post-apocalyptic” ecologies.)

But actually, I don’t think I can be too helpful here.

I still have a lot of contemplating to do, about how categories of natural/invasive in ecology might support the violence of categorizing people as natural/invasive. Don’t really know where I stand yet, y’know? So I don’t want to be too quick to come to a conclusion. I don’t even really want to offer opinions here. That said, I am very sensitive to language, and the language that I use. So I do appreciate that there is an effort to interrogate the negative consequences of describing things with words like “alien”. Also, the categorizing of lifeforms is and always has been a mess.

I don’t have many reading recommendations. The “native vs alien” and “nothing is really native, actually” proposals are concepts that I brush up against but don’t read too deeply into, even though this disk horse has been popular-ish in dark ecology and academic ecology/environmental studies circles for at least 10 years or more by now.

I guess, for my thoughts on native vs alien, what counts as “natural”, invasive species, and how the disk horse can excuse settler-colonial/imperial racism, I would point to this post I made about Pablo Escobar’s feral hippopotamuses in Colombia.

One introduction to the concept, which I think is an enjoyable read (though I don’t necessarily agree with all of his implications), is this essay by Hugo Reinert about the category of “natural” and the “purity” of a species: “Requiem for a Junk-Bird: Violence, Purity and the Wild.” Cultural Studies Review. 2019.

Anna Boswell’s very famous article about stoats and non-native species in Aotearoa kind of dances around this same issue of naturalness: “Settler Sanctuaries and the Stoat-Free State.” Animal Studies Journal. 2017.

-------

Generally, I agree with the implication that there is no “remote” or untouched corner of the planet where ecology has escaped human influence.

On that aspect, here’s a post I made about “planetary urbanization”.

But the native/alien disk horse can be extended to problematique degrees, with proposals that sometimes remind me of sci-fi goofiness, like fans of dark ecology or weird fiction or Mieville/Van der Meer got a little too excited about “the boundary between human and other-than-human has become so blurred that there may as well no longer be distinctions between native species and invasive species”, like they got a little too drunk on theory and just decided that “everything is in flux!”. Criticisms, then, of the “nothing is native” disk horse include how this oversimiplifies ecology and might enable/excuse settler-colonial invasion.

A lot of the “invasive plants are good, actually!” disk horse I’ve seen shows up in Australian literature written by settler scholars, which might be pretty telling.

Basically, it seems some scholars will take Alfred Crosby’s “neo-Europe” and “ecological imperialism” concepts, and then say something like “look, the damage is done, so much of Earth’s soils/landscapes are altered by introduced plants that we may as well accept it as the new baseline/normal ecology, and work from there.” As if to point at how North America has been entirely overrun by non-native earthworms and then to say “well, the worms are going to inevitably destroy hardwoods forests, soils of the Great Lakes region, the boreal-temperate transition zone, and maple trees which supply place-based maple syrup foodsheds, so we may as well accept that we live in a damaged world.”

I don’t know if I’m entirely satisfied with this.

-------

Other related concepts brought up in the same  discussion of “nothing is really native” might include “invasion biology” and “assisted migration.” I see these concepts brought up in academic writing from the University of California system, Australia, Aotearoa/New Zealand, and “environmental humanities” generally. Basically, these writers/scholars will point to the past ten thousand-ish years of the Holocene, and how humans have had such profound influence on global ecology that “introduction of non-native species” and “mass-scale anthropogenic climate/ecological change” are not just recent developments since Industrial Revolution or Indus/Yellow/Mesopotamian statecraft, but even older. For example, I’ve talked a lot about how, in the Late Pleistocene or early Holocene, the Asiatic steppes and parts of the Great Plains could have apparently been more like intermittent woodlands before humans engaged in deliberate fire-setting to better target megafauna herds, meaning that the human role in creation of vast “naturally-occurring” grassland regions may be underestimated. This dove-tails with the better-established fact that the forests of Central America and eastern North America in the early Holocene were/are actually more like cultivated food forests managed by Indigenous people.

The argument, then, may also point to yams, sweet potato, and coconut as examples of creatures with what now appear to be “old” and “established” widespread transoceanic distribution ranges which actually may have been introduced via assisted migration by humans.

The argument, basically, says: Well, let’s say hypothetically that humans didn’t play a role in spreading sweet potato or coconut. By chance, if ocean currents “naturally” introduced these species, if these plants “naturally” colonized whatever lands they were swept off towards, doesn’t this mean they could essentially be “natural” to anywhere they might arrive and successfully establish themselves? Therefore, does it really matter if humans helped them get there?

This seems to be related to the “no plants are actually invasive” proposal. As if to say: “If English pasture grasses have successfully reproduced themselves in Patagonia, Aotearoa, South Africa, the Canadian prairies, etc., what does it mean that their migration was assisted by humans?”

But this is where I have reservations: It wasn’t just any humans that “assisted the migration” of monoculture grasses from Europe to the prairies of Turtle Island. It was specific humans, with deliberate intent, upholding specific institutions, protecting their own well-being at the expense of other humans and lifeforms, enacting specific violence against specific victims.

-------

Another aspect of this which I see mentioned often is how early human/Polynesian settlement in Oceania and the South Pacific is an example of how mass anthropogenic ecological change doesn’t always involve statecraft, mass mono/agriculture, and imperialism. Aside from the famous decline of creatures like the moa, Polynesian islands were also home to relict species of large land turtles and ancient terrestrial/semi-arboreal crocodiles until human arrival in recent millennia. Writers will also point to human settlement in the Caribbean, where human arrival coincided with extinction of remnant populations of endemic Pleistocene ground sloths. (This also happened on Mediterranean islands, which hosted endemic species of hippopotamus and goats until recent millennia.)

Again, though, this is where white/settler-colonial academics advocating “nothing is natural” can kind of obscure settler-colonial violence, by pointing to history of anthropogenic environmental change and saying “see, all humans provoke extinction.”

Thus, you’ll see these scholars invoke Anna Tsing or Donna Harraway, referencing the “arts of living on a damaged planet” or “living in post-capitalist ruins.” Essentially, advocates of “nothing is native, any more” might say “we all live in a post-apocalyptic world now, so we should get used to it.”

This, coming from white/settler-colonial academics, sometimes rubs me the wrong way, as if it’s sort of like wish-fulfillment, or “an adventure” for comfortable white academics to engage in low-stakes thought experiments about extinction, naturalness, and apocalypse from which they’re actually largely insulated, at least compared to the poor, non-white, non-academic people who cope with the worst of environmental racism and ecological collapse.

This, again coming from white/settler-colonial academics, is also of course more than a little grating, since it kind of co-opts or culturally appropriates the “Indigenous/Native people actually live in a post-apocalyptic world” concept proposed by Indigenous scholars. It kind of takes from Indigenous/non-white people, and then generalizes the apocalypse as something that all humans now live with in seemingly equal measure, obscuring the fact that many people are actually forced to cope and/or live with more-serious-of-an-apocalypse than others.

-------

At the end of the day: Sure, kudzu or English pasture grasses or coconuts or European earthworms or domesticated cattle might be generalist species which can successfully inhabit landscapes across the planet. So whether humans introduce them via agriculture, or whether they "naturally" expand by some accident or by drifting across ocean currents, they might exist in this strange ontological space between "native" and "alien" which confounds human conceptions of what "belongs"? And this is worth considering! This is good to think about! But there are still, and always have been, those "small" landscapes, those isolated pockets, those relicts and remnants in shaded stream corridors, where small populations of endemic species teeter on the verge, with highly-specialized adaptations to highly-specific microhabitats. You're not going to "assist the migration" of or "accidentally introduce" a cave-obligate salamander from a limestone cavern or a temperate rainforest-dwelling land-slug to a desert biome.

But, again, I still think it is good to stop and ask ourselves whether categories of “natural” and “alien/invasive” in ecology make sense, are outdated, or if they reinforce racism/xenophobia. And, again, I haven’t read enough -- I haven’t grappled with these questions enough -- to have an opinion which I’m comfortable sharing, so I don’t want to discourage this disk horse too much.

Anyway, hope some of this is interesting. Sorry. Again, I don’t really have any good recommendations.

[hopeymchope]

From Michael Jackson to J.K. Rowling and Activision: Handling shitty creators and companies

This is going to be a long-winded bit of text considering how/whether I choose to stand up against problematic creators/content, how other people say it should be done, and basically providing warning that these issues aren’t so black and white as you might think. 

So, y’know. You can probably skip this if you’re just here to think about or see Danganronpa art and theories and fanfic and all that. :P 

Since Michael Jackson wound up inspiring this post, I’ll open with him.

I was hearing his music in my parents’ rotation long before I ever knew he was accused of some despicable shit, y’know? So I got hooked on that stuff before I had a reason to be (potentially?) disgusted. And when I got old enough to be aware of those accusations, I couldn’t get a good personal gauge on whether I believed him guilty of what he was accused. Pre-2019, I felt there were reasons to both believe and disbelieve the whole thing, so I just chose not to have any opinion on the matter. Which I guess is easier to do once you’ve already gotten attached to the music, right? Nobody wants to abandon something they’ve long enjoyed.

I specified “pre-2019″ because 2019 is when Leaving Neverland came around. I’ve admittedly never watched that documentary — the one that convinced many people of his guilt posthumously. And that’s probably chickenshit of me. It probably sounds like I’m just wimping out and burying my head in the sand. But shit, life is so full of despair and misery, and like I said: It’s hard to WANT to abandon something you’ve always taken pleasure from. I got old enough to where I decided to just... stop following every detail of every negative development around the things I enjoy. I’d rather hold onto some modicum of escapist pleasure than constantly have those works make me think about shitty, shitty people and their poor, forever-tormented victims. Is that selfish of me? ......... Uh, probably! If I’m going to keep on consuming that music, do I then owe it to society to fully immerse myself in every terrible thing that may be linked to it so I can be 100% informed of any implicit undercurrents? .... I’d say “obviously not,” but there are definitely those who’ve argued the opposite. 

In truth, so many people involved in so many creative works turn out to be sketch-ass fucks. I suppose that’s a natural consequence of how many people it takes to get a book published (tens), or to make an album (hundreds), or to complete a movie/video game (thousands). At a certain point, if you’re going to consume all your media responsibly so that you never watch or hear or see anything that was made by anybody problematic and so you never financially support bad behavior... well, fuck, you might as well give up the entire video game industry, then. And all movies. Because look at those corporations and their bullshit! Look at those thousands of people involved, which almost definitely includes some very bad individuals!

But I can still defy these things in small ways. If I know for a fact that there’s accusations/hard evidence out there against someone or something, I can at least avoid giving them my money directly. I no longer see movies at Cinemark theaters ever since the head of the company decided to start putting money towards supporting Trumpist and QAnon conspiracy theories. I haven’t given any money to Michael Jackson’s estate in a very long time; I can get that music through plenty of other channels than directly buying it. 

And if I know a game company is definitely being awful to its workers or has a culture of sexism and harassment? The bare minimum I can do is refuse to give them any direct money and just buy physical copies used so that they don’t get a cent of my cash trickled back to them. So, y’know — no direct purchases of anything published by UbiSoft or Activision. Clearly. 

All of the above applies to Harry Potter media at this point — I’m going to do what it takes to avoid giving it any more direct cash, but I’m not going to totally abandon the whole universe either. And to many people, that means I’m a bad member of the LGBTQ+ or a bad ally for trans rights or WHATEVER. But let’s not forget that virtually every talent involved with the series beyond Rowling has spoken out AGAINST her and FOR trans rights — all the actors from the films, the developers of the Hogwart’s Legacy game, and so on. So... do we boycott something that might give money to Rowling if it’ll ALSO give money to all these evident allies, then? Am I wrong to avoid giving money to this franchise if that means I’m denying money to all of THOSE people? For that matter: Is it bad that I’m going out of my way to NOT financially supporting the dev teams at Activision who are getting victimized by management? And... I don’t know. It’s tough.

Besides, You-Know-Who created a story that....... well, let’s just put this right here.

YEAH. The message is right there. It’s baked in. For fuck’s sake, Harry was even forced to live in a CLOSET. It’s too bad the author can’t even fucking see how perfectly her own stories apply to the trans experience. Fuck you, JKR. *sigh*

As I already referenced, LOADS of people would argue (and have argued) that all of the above people and companies should be 100% boycotted, and anything less makes you a person who is failing at promoting equality — a bad person. I don’t think it’s so black-and-white as all that, though. As I said: Who wants to give up things we enjoy in this miserable world? And for that matter, who wants to abandon all the innocent people in a company pipeline who are being diminished and/or abused by the powerful few? Ultimately, what’s the best way to deal with these kind of issues? Fuck if I know. 

We can all only do what’s right for us, and what feels like it’s the best/kindest thing overall.