#I’m doing a craft trade with a friend

[rosesncarnations]

Got all the info back and nothing is torn 🥳

[shatterthefragments]

I SWEAR TO FUCK IF HE DOESNT FUCKING RESPOND THOUGH

[motorsportbarbie13]

Forbidden - Part 1

In which you reconnect with an old friend, much to the dismay of your brother.

Warnings: None. This is mostly background and will be several parts.

Pairing: Max Verstappen x LeClercSister!Reader Word Count: 2.6k words Masterlist Here

It started slowly, this thing between your brother's best friend and biggest rival and you. So slowly that you hadn't been directly involved, you probably wouldn't have even noticed the clandestine brushing of fingers to skin in the paddock or the flickering looks that lingered just a bit too long. Even the way Max managed to stare at you from his garage went unnoticed by everyone but you. But what started slowly over one summer quickly snowballed into something that nearly destroyed you both.

You'd known Max since you were young, of course, so maybe that was why the pair of you managed to keep things hidden for so long. You two being friendly wasn't all that out of the ordinary so maybe that was why it took people longer to connect the dots. You two had always been friends, but it was a quiet friendship so not many people picked up on it, even back then. But he had always been firmly in the ‘my brother’s best friend and track rival’ category for as long as you could remember.

Did it drive you crazy that they were much quicker to involve your younger brother, Arthur, in their antics instead of you? Yes. But Charlie and his friends were like the untouchable super hero's you watched in movies: larger than life and totally invincible so you always lapped up any ounce of attention they gave you.

As you got older though, your trips to the track became less and less frequent with you picking up your own interests. You traded weekends at the track for weekends spent with friends your own age who didn't worship the ground your brother and his friends walked on. Before long, you were headed off to university in New York City, wanting a bit of space from your famous brother and his aura. You loved Charlie and Arthur to death, they were your favorite people in the world after all, but it was difficult being the 'normal' sister to such talented men and the space had allowed you to thrive on your own, in your own way. 

You went home to Monaco infrequently, the trip from New York to the small principality being just long enough to be annoying to do regularly and traveled to races even less. It wasn’t that you didn’t support Charlie. You always made sure to be at his home race in Monaco and the race in Monza of course, but your life was in New York. First it was your rigorous coursework for your degree in economics from NYU that kept you away and then you continued on with a Master’s degree in economics and international business, the intensity of both programs serving you well crafted excuses for years. 

“You’re really going to come travel with us?” Charlie was unable to hide his surprise and excitement this morning when you called to tell him your post-graduation plans. 

“It’s been the hardest year of my life, between my thesis, interning at the investment firm in Manhattan, and finishing up grad school, I’ve barely had a chance to breathe for years. I need a break Charlie.” You sigh, settling into your couch that faces the floor to ceiling windows in your New York apartment that was currently full of packing boxes. 

“I know you do. You’re the hardest working person in this family.” 

You chuckle, knowing that this wasn’t true. Your two brothers worked just as hard, if not harder, at their careers in motorsport. There was no way Charlie would have reached F1 if he hadn’t been a hard worker. You might be the smartest LeClerc though, although you knew Arthur would never admit to that even if Charlie would. 

“What happened to that job in London?” 

You pick at an invisible piece of lint, wanting to avoid the question, as you shrug even though your brother couldn’t see you. “I told them I wasn’t interested. They wanted too much from me and I’m just so close to being burnt out. I’m taking on a consulting gig with the Bank of London. They’ve agreed to allow me to work remotely so I can live in Monaco and travel. I’ve missed so much of your career Charlie, I hate that I’ve been so absent from everyone for so long.” 

Charlie’s voice goes soft at the sound of regret in your voice, “Oh, petit papillon.” My little butterfly. You can’t help but smile at the nickname, despite the melancholy mood that had settled over you. “We know you did what you had to do to make you happy, we don’t blame you for being gone for so long. All that matters now is that your studies are done and we get to see you more.” 

Your heart warms in your chest. Of course Charlie hadn’t held your distance against you, it wasn’t in his nature to hold grudges against you, even when you fought the hardest. “I’m so excited to come home, Charlie.” 

*Six Weeks Later*

A faint tapping on the front door catches your attention from where you sat in Charlie’s living room, staring at the same spreadsheet you had been working on for the last hour. “Saved by the knock.” You mutter, getting up from your spot on you’re brother’s couch. You’ve spent so much time on the plush piece of furniture over the last few days, busy with work, that you’re surprised there’s not a permanent indent of your backside on the cushion. 

Finding an apartment in Monaco was proving harder than you had thought. Every flat you looked at in the city was either so far out of your price range or was missing something you deemed essential to have in your living space so for the time being you were staying with Charlie and Alexandra in their guest bedroom until the right place came around. 

“Coming!” You call out, hoping to alert the person knocking on the front door to your approach. Although you couldn’t fathom who would be at the door in the middle of the day on a Tuesday afternoon. You quickly run through an inventory of where the important people in your life were: Charlie was at a sponsor event while Alex was at doing some content creation in Paris for the gallery that she worked for. Your mother was at work of course and Arthur was off somewhere with his girlfriend Jade today. Everyone accounted for and busy. 

Without checking the peephole, you swing the door open wide, relieved for an excuse to take a break from the project that had found its way to your inbox early this morning. 

“Maxie!” You gasp, launching yourself into the unprepared arms of the Dutchman who you hadn’t seen in years. 

Max was thankful for his quick reflexes that were required of a world championship winning F1 driver because without them, the two of you would have found yourselves in a heap of limbs on the floor. “Beestje! You nearly took me out.” Max sets you down carefully but not before you have a chance to swat at his arm. 

“You know I hate when you call me that.” You pout, nipping at his finger when he teasingly swipes at your lip. Max had called you ‘little beast’ for as long as you could remember, always delighting in your cries of protest when he did. If there was one thing Max loved, it was teasing Charlie’s sister.  

He grins down at you, dimples winking out at the corner of his mouth. “That’s why I do it.” 

Rolling your eyes, you open the door wide enough to allow the both of you to enter the empty apartment. Max follows you into the living room, where your computer sits discarded. 

“I didn’t know you were visiting.” Max says, trying to remain calm as you settle down on the couch opposite of him. 

You had always been gorgeous, those good looking LeClerc genes that Charles was so famous for had obviously been passed on to you as well, but now? You were hands down the most stunning woman Max had ever seen in his entire life. Your social media presence was sparse, at best, so while he followed you, it was rare for you to post much of anything. He couldn’t remember the last time he saw you in person either, knowing that you much preferred to avoid the harsh light of fame that came with being a LeClerc. 

“Charlie didn’t tell you? I moved back!” You wave a hand towards your laptop, “I got a job with the Bank of London doing consulting work, fully remote.” 

“No, Charles didn’t tell me.” Max says, narrowing his eyes. He had just played padel with Charles and Carlos the other day and he hadn’t made a single mention of you being back. “Where is he, anyway? I came by to see if he wanted to go for a run tonight.” 

You shrug, trying to force your heart rate to slow to a pace that couldn’t potentially be heard by people playing the slots at the famous Monte Carlo Casino down the street. You had always had a juvenile crush on Max. Honestly, who wouldn’t? His demeanor on the track and in the paddock was completely opposite of who he was in private. You may have not spent much, if any, time with him the past decade but you knew that the Max that had been your brother’s childhood best friend and rival was the same Max sitting next to you right now. Nothing had changed.

“He’s at some event for Ferrari. I’ll never understand why people want to pay thousands of dollars to get to talk to the likes of you chuckle heads. How would those donors feel knowing they invested so much in a person that once got so drunk on their birthday they thought the Uber driver was trying to kidnap them because they, and I quote, ‘could totally make a killing with the ransom Christian would pay to get me back.’” 

“That was ONE time!” He croaks, blinking at you in surprise. “And how the fuck did you know about that? Charles swore he’d never tell anyone about that.” 

You can’t help the laughter that bubbles out and Max momentarily forgets how embarrassed he is that you know that story. It’s light and airy, the notes dragging their fingers down Max’s skin. “I’m not ‘anyone’, Maxie darling. You know that.” 

And boy did he. Just the way you wink at him while calling him ‘Maxie darling’ is enough to send his mind into overdrive, wondering how it would feel if more of your attention was turned his way. 

Max just smirks back, fighting to keep up the cool facade he’s usually got so carefully constructed in place. He expertly steers the conversation away from anymore potentially embarrassing stories and towards you. How you’ve been. The near year you spent writing your thesis paper for your Master’s degree. The life you’ve built so far away from Max. It makes his heart squeeze something fierce knowing that you two have drifted so far apart.

Before you know it, the sun is sinking low in the sky, casting a glittering glow over the water just outside the apartment. The sunlight filters in through the half-drawn curtains, bathing you in a golden light. Max had never understood why everyone raves about the beauty of ‘golden hour’ until he saw the setting sun reflected in your eyes. 

He was in so much trouble. 

You two are so lost in your conversation you don’t notice the front door swing open or Charles bustling through the door hours later. Charles pauses when he sees the two of you sat on the couch together. Somewhere between the first and second glass of wine that you had poured when it became evident neither of you wanted the afternoon to end, you had ended up quite close to Max. His hand sat outstretched over the back of the couch, hovering just out of reach of your shoulder. You were leaning into him ever so slightly, laughing at something Max had said moments before. The obvious intimacy between the two of you set off alarm bells for Charles, not liking how Max was looking at you over the rim of his wine glass. 

The thing was, Charles is quite protective of you. It was one of the reasons you always tried to leave the details about your love life out of any conversation you had with either of your brothers. Arthur was bad enough, but your twin? Charles was of the opinion that no one was ever good enough for you. Especially someone like Max. While he wasn’t as bad as some of the guys on the grid (lookin at you Lando Norris), Max still liked to party and take advantage of how often pretty girls threw themselves at him. He did not want someone like that interested in his sister. He knew how much you valued your privacy and that was not something someone like Max could offer you. 

“What’s going on here?” Charles fought to keep the hostility out of his voice, crossing his arms over his chest. 

Max jumped off the couch like it had suddenly burst into flames. He knew how protective Charles was over you and judging by the stormy look on your brother’s face, he wasn’t happy to find him there tonight. 

You, on the other hand, found it amusing how quickly your brother’s protective side reared it’s ugly head. There was nothing to be ashamed of, you knew that. You were just two friends catching up after being apart for so long. Totally innocent. Right? Right. 

“Max stopped by to see if you wanted to go on a run and we just got lost in conversation is all, Charlie.” You sooth, knowing your brother has a short fuse when it comes to you. 

Charles narrows his eyes at Max as if he doesn’t believe your words and to be honest, he probably shouldn’t. If he had known the thoughts racing through Max’s head over the last few hours, Max would have probably found himself in the gravel pit of whatever race was next on the calendar. 

“I was just leaving.” Max stutters, glancing down at where you still sit on the couch, amused grin playing at the corner of your lips. 

“It was nice to see you Maxie.” 

Max doesn’t miss the way Charles clenches his fists when you say his name like that. 

“Always a pleasure, Beestje.” He teases, hoping that Charles doesn’t pick up on the nervous waver in his voice. 

You tip your wine glass towards him in a mock salute before picking up your laptop where it’s sat discarded for the last few hours while Max makes a beeline for the front door. Charles follows him out, eyes trained on the back of his friends head, trying to calm the storm of anger that is swirling around his gut. 

“I don’t think it needs to be said but stay away from my sister.” Charles practically growls when Max’s hand closes over the doorknob. 

“We’re just friends Charles. I haven’t seen her in ages, we were just catching up.” 

“I don’t look at my friends the way you were just looking at her.” Charles grouses. “Just don’t, okay? I don’t want to give her any reason to leave again. If you hurt her, she’ll go running. Leave her alone.” 

Max nods, unable to find the words he wants to use because he has a feeling ‘fuck you, I’ll do whatever I want with your sister’ seems like a bad way to end the conversation. But as he waits for the elevator in the quiet hall, he knows that staying away from you is going to be near impossible. 

[razorblade180]

A Splendid Day

Furina:*packing groceries* That’s everything. Thank you very much.

Merchant:The pleasure is all mine! You’re one of my best customers.

Furina:The price is still 500 mora for everything?

Merchant:On the house.

Furina:P-Pardon?

Merchant:Your birthday. It’s on the house, and I will accept nothing less!

Furina:But-

Merchant:It may not be a national holiday anymore and you may not be our Archon, but a little free macaroni and beverages is the least I’d like to offer. A birthday is still a birthday.

Furina:…*smiles* Thank you for the gift.

xxxxxx

A little later, the national celebrity walks down the streets of her nation only to be stopped by the sight of a top hat floating down into her hands. She looks up to see Lyney, Lynette, and even Freminet sitting on the railing of bridge covered in the nation’s flowers in a pattern that spelled her name.

Lyney:HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Lynnette:*clapping*

Freminet:T-Ta Da….

Lyney:C’mon you two. A little more energy.

Furina:Hahaha! My, my, this is quite the shock. *red* How long have you been planning this?

Lynette:Your birthday is no secret. We had ample time.

Freminet:The hardest part was keeping them alive long enough to do this.

Lyney:Just our little way of showing our gratitude. We wouldve baked a cake, but I fear our skills our outmatched in that department.

Furina:All cake is good cake if it’s sweet enough. Who is outmatching your-

???:Haaaapppy Birthday!

Furina didn’t get the chance to turn around before Navia swooped her up into a bear hug, spinning her around lovingly while Clorinde and Sigewinne held a small present patiently.

Furina:Never mind Lyney!

Navia:*puts her down.* How’s the birthday girl!?

Furina:Startled, but pleasantly surprised.

Sigewinne:Perfect! Exactly how a birthday should be!

Clorinde:Happy Birthday, Lady Furina.

Furina:Hehe, wow. Everyone take the day off or something? I was expecting a little get together or gift. Honestly I’m a tad embarrassed.

Chiori:*struts in* Since when does the wonderful Furina de Fontaine prefer a “little” get together?

Furina:How long have I been retired from leadership?

Chiori:Pfft, please. In or out of power, you’re still the same person who demanded dozens of retakes for a film in the name of “producing a diamond among diamonds in the craft.”

Furina:And we won! I will never forsake the arts!

Sigewinne:And we will never forsake your wonderful efforts.

Her and Clorinde walked up and presented the box. Furina only had to undo the ribbon to reveal it to be a makeup box containing an array of colors and tools to use.

Sigewinne:I made every color!

Clorinde:I made the box.

Chiori:Now we stop by my store so you can feast on Navia’s pastries in style.

Furina:How many pastries?

Navia:Yes.

Furina:Fantastic.

xxxxxx

More than 500 birthdays, and this might be the first one filled with true joy. Eating cheesecake while wearing a lovely pale blue sundress with dark blue water droplets on the skirt and cuffs that matched the sun hat she was given. Her nails matched perfectly and her lipstick was admittedly a little ruined now because of danishes, but she didn’t care! Furina even smelled like fresh rain thanks to Emilie’s lovely new perfume she made with the help of resource gathering/testing from Chevreuse and Neuvillette.

Charlotte took a photo of the girl’s pure joy as she dined with friends.

Furina:!? Please tell me you didn’t take that mid bite?

Charlotte:Of course I did. You need moments to smile at.

Furina:Myself!?

Wriothesley:*pouring more tea* Gotta admit, I’m a little jealous I didn’t get this brand on my birthday.

Clorinde:You didn’t like the “gift” I gave you?

Wriothesley:Oh I loved it. Wouldn’t trade it for anything.

Navia:Don’t spoil good food with certain topics you too. This is a sweet gathering. Not saucy.

Furina:You all really outdid yourselves. I don’t know what to say aside from thank you.

Lynette: “You can have the last slice” is a second option.

Freminet:Ummm-

Lynette:It was a joke. I would never rob someone of that honor. The last of any dessert is always the best.

Furina:Would you like to split the-

Lynette:If you insist.

Furina cuts the last danish is half and shares, giggling alongside her friends at Lynette’s perky ears as she ate. The girl was swept in the laughter she hadn’t realized Neuvillette had finally joined them.

Neuvillette:Today seems like a wonderful day to be out.

Furina:Huh? Neuvillette!? You took off too!?

Neuvillette:Is that so strange. Half the day has gone by. I used it do enough work to give the rest of today to properly wish you a wonderful birthday. I’m happy to see others make that possible.

Furina:Yes, it’s really more than I ever hoped her. I’m serious when I say I don’t really know what to say. Frankly I-

Navia:Now don’t go saying “I don’t deserve it.”

Chevreuse:She’s right. Thank you is more than enough. Besides, everyone here would easily agree that you deserve nice things ten fold.

Furina:Sniffles You guys… don’t make me cry today!

Neuvillette:So*reveals jewelry box* this might be a bad time.

Furina:You have another gift for me!?

Neuvillette:I wouldn’t count pointing out a good source of water for your perfume as a my gift. I could do that any day of the week. This however, took quite a bit more time and a trip to the bottom of several bodies water.

Knowing Furina best, Neuvillette wrapped the gift in a way that allowed her to still open it with ruining the design. The young lady choked on her own breath when her eyes saw shining white pearls in the form of a necklace. Neuvillette took the jewelry and put it around her neck while everyone was stunned into silence.

Freminet:Those are- how did you find so many perfect pearls?

Neuvillette:I am no stranger to sea life or waiting.

Navia:And here I thought I gave the best present without a doubt.

Clorinde:It wasn’t a contest.

Lyney, Lynette, Chiori: No it kinda was. We went all out.

Furina:I’m just- these are so expensive looking! And beautiful! I might have to start revising my entire wardrobe to wear these more often.

Neuvillette:Hehe, I don’t mind if you limit their use to a special occasion like today or a grand opening of a play. I simply wanted to give you something only I could manage, like everyone else.

Wriothesley:All I did was supply a big enough kitchen for Navia. Now I’m starting to think I should’ve fought some ancient monster for gems alongside Clorinde.

Chevreuse:Umm, Clorinde? When you said you made the makeup box….

Clorinde:I used only the finest of materials. It just so happened the finest things may involve interacting with less than fine creatures.

Furina:You could buy a box! All of you are so…wonderfully ridiculous. Neuvillette, thank you for this. I love it. Today has truly been splendid. I couldn’t ask for anything more.

Charlotte:You’re welcome!

Emilie:Charlotte, what was your gift.

Charlotte:Who do you think made all the invites, planned the timing and picked the location? It’s a little past midday, the space isn’t crowded, and more importantly, Furina still hasn’t eaten a proper birthday cake!

Furina:Ooooo I still get one? Wonderful! Although…I’m admittedly a bit on the fence. *crosses arms* I can’t believe Aether bragged about his baking skills just to go off to Natlan before ever letting me get my own personal cake! Not to mention not a single birthday letter! He’s probably off breaking some law right about now or fighting an ancient evil he stumbled into.

???:That sounds more like you, than me. I’m actually careful.

???:Yeah! How else would be able to carry a packaged cake through the desert!?

Furina froze up, her heart skipping a beat after hearing two familiar voices call behind her. She slowly looked over her shoulder and saw familiar faces that made her ignore any on lookers as her body took off out of her seat without thinking; the girl was full on sprinting towards Aether so quickly that he had no choice but to hand over the three layered cake to Paimon before catching Furina, who jumped right into his arms. Thankfully Clorinde zipped over to help Paimon balance the final dessert, but frankly, everyone doubted Furina cared about the cake as her embrace around Aether grew tighter while he spun her.

Furina couldn’t care less about any pictures getting taken or the giggles from her friends at the moment. She was just happy to be held again, resting her face in the crook of his neck.

Aether:H-Hello. You look lovely. I take it you missed me?

Furina:Yes. Don’t you dare let go until I say so.

Aether:*red* O-Oh. I thought you were going to deny it.

Furina:Later, but for now…

She raised her head to see his dumb smile before giving Aether a heartfelt kiss. Clorinde leaned over awkwardly and pulled down Furina’s sun hat over the two in order to create any semblance of privacy.

Neuvillette:I think she forgot she’s in company.

Sigewinne:Well, I think Aether won.

Navia:If I had to lose, it’s an honor to go out like this.

Chiori:You actually lost to Charlotte. If she planned the spot alongside the timing with the invites…

The reporter held up a photo of birthday girl with a tearful smile getting spun around in the arms of her happiness smiling back at her as the warm light of the afternoon barely broke through around the vast colors of flower petals.

Charlotte:Like I said, you need moments to smile at.

[spinningalbinoturtle]

Social Media headcanons

Aragorn

Has an official Instagram and Facebook accounts as a head of state. He also has a private account that his friends follow him on: strideranger alternatively strangerranger or rangerdanger on tiktok. His insta consists solely of pictures of his horse, Arwen and occasionally videos of cool plants or wildlife. He captions thing like an old man. His Tiktok is tracking tutorials and again nature videos. He hates twitter and isn’t on it.

Legolas

All the social medias his names include princeofmirkwood, andmybow, and legolocks. Has over a million followers in insta, tiktok and twitter. He posts lots of glammy photos of himself in the woods and tutorials of how to keep your hair and makeup intact in the battlefield. He also edits slow mows of himself shooting orcs. Doesn’t have Facebook because he claims its “for old people” despite being the second oldest member of the fellowship Posts his random thoughts in twitter and gets like thousands of retweets every time

Gimli

anmyaxe, lordofglitteringcaves, gimlet, are some of his names. Posts angry rants on twitter and faceboo. Regularly gets into internet fights with trolls. Posts videos on tiktok of his various stone projects and his workout routine (the latter gets a lot of views) Everyone loses it when he and Legolas team up for a “elf braid vs dwarf braid” youtube video. Oh yes he also has a very popular youtube channel where he explains how to of various craft trades.

Pippin

Has made foolofatook his name for everything and also a hashtag. Huge on twitter and twitch, he also has insta and tiktok and a youtube channel with Merry. Said Youtube is very popular and involves pranks, media reviews, and him and Merry doing stupid shit

Merry

Does a lot of work on the channel with Pippin. Also has a twitch and twitter. Insta king people think he’s really cool. He is the kind of person who shares his progress on candy crush and duolingo. Tried to make merrychristmas his username but it was taken and so went with theweedprofessor. His tiktok is more popular than Pippin’s but Pippin’s twitter is more popular

Sam

Not huge on social media mostly got it because his friends peer pressured him into it. Has facebook and always says happy birthday to people on it but gets annoyed by all the politics. His instagram is samnotsowise alternatively gardeningamgee. Its super wholesome, lots of pictures of his plants and pets and him and Frodo. Sometimes he’ll post a poem

Frodo

Frodo would be on tumblr tho. Username is bagginit on insta and frodoninefingers on twitter which he never uses. His tumblr is ringringhello. He also has insta but rarely posts anything except occasionally a picture of Sam. He has a linguistics Youtube channel where he talks about elvish history and language. Actually the most political on social media this is because Frodo has a very strong moral compass and wants to get the word out about important issues.

Boromir

He’s a twitch streamer I’m sorry. He also has twitter at hornofgondor. Likes everyone of Merry and Pippin’s videos and posts and reposts them with captions like “love these guys!!!” Mostly shares memes on twitter and facebook very much dad vibes

Gandalf

Posts weird shit that no one understands on facebook and instagram at thegreywizard

Bilbo

He has facebook and likes to tag his relatives in things that he knows will annoy them. Other than that he just posts memories of Frodo like the proud parent he is Like every birthday he’ll post something really sweet and sappy like “so proud of the young man he’s become”

Elrond

He gets in trouble on twitter sometimes but not nearly as much as Thranduil

Faramir

Insta and tiktok at stewardstew. Mostly posts pics of his cats. Reposts everything Eowyn posts. Likes to uplift his friends. Answers citizen questions on official gondor accounts very warmly. Also shares memes

Eowyn

She has a podcast and everyone has been a guest at some point. She highlights inequalities in middle earth. Lots of reposts of feminist events and programs. Badass pics of her with her sword on her insta and tiktok. She does lots of tiktok challenges. Her username is iamnoman on tiktok and eowinner on instagram

Arwen

Like legolas is all over insta posts lots of glammy photos in the woods as well. But she also shares a lot of Eowyn’s posts. Posts lots of inspirational quotes and stuff. Is really into yoga and posts about that as well. Her name on all social medias is evenstarwen

[corpsebasil]

The Prince’s Whore Part 2 18+

Part 1 ——-> here

You sipped from your vodka soda, watching as Nikolai approached you from across the tavern, making his way to your side. He either didn’t notice or didn’t care—most likely the latter—when several people openly stared in surprise to see the prince being so casually in attendance. You raised a brow when he made it to your side, squeezing a lime wedge into your drink before dropping it in.

“Thank you.” You told him, glancing away as he leaned against the wall to your right. You didn’t want to address the fact that he knew exactly how you liked your drinks, or why that made something in you feel a bit soft. “How are you?”

“Perfect, now that I’m with you.” He muttered, scanning the crowd. “Found anyone to tangle with tonight?” His voice dropped lower. “Someone to tear that dress off?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know.”

“I would.” He grinned and bumped your arm with his, jostling you into looking over at him. “Speaking of that dress. Did someone pour you into it? Saints.”

You glanced down.

It was true, the tight black fabric that ended mid-thigh was sinfully draped over your body, exposing every dip and curve of your hips and waist. Nikolai wasn’t the first to have noticed—you saw a man eyeing you as he and his friend walked past, your stare turning purposely sultry, but his words he whispered none too softly made your face turn red.

“The Prince’s Whore.” He muttered, giving you an up-down that wasn’t anything close to admiring. “Pretty brave of them to show up together in public. Makes a mockery of the crown.”

You opened your mouth, ready to tear into him, but Nikolai had already peeled off the wall and stepped forward. The man had a brief second to look apologetic before the Prince’s fist slammed into his head, knocking him backwards and onto the ground. The man’s friend backed up, sputtering apologies, and Nikolai shook his hand out with a wince before walking back to you.

You could only stare, taking a lofty sip of your drink, as those fierce blue eyes met yours and he cast one more glare over his shoulders. You didn’t want to admit it, but…that was incredibly sexy. You cursed yourself for thinking it, but your eyes still strayed to his hands, remembering how recently they’d—

“Bastards,” he grumbled, rubbing his knuckles as he interrupted your filthy thoughts. “you’d think they’d have more decorum when I’m standing right here.”

“You—” you swallowed, still staring as your skin warmed. “what the hell did you do that for? I can defend myself.”

“But it’s so much more fun when you let me do it, darling.”

“Oh god.” You groaned, rolling your eyes.

“I love it when you make that sound.”

You shot the prince an annoyed look as he grinned down at you, reaching out to play with the strap of your dress. He looked at you like he always did, admiringly, but something softer in his gaze made your guard go right up. You didn’t like this—didn’t like the rush of warmth that had spread through you when he hit the man who called you a whore. Didn’t like the way he was gazing as you now, eyes scanning your face like you were the prettiest thing he’d ever seen.

“I’m doing a customer scan.” You informed him, looking away from that maddeningly handsome face. “Try not to punch anyone else.”

“My lady, where your honor is concerned, I make no promises.”

“Saints save me.” You grumbled under your breath, shoving your empty drink into his hand and ignoring his dark laugh as you pushed your way into the crowd.

You swayed your hips invitingly, eyes roving around the press of people, searching for a willing customer. It was always the same—approach or be approached, then the inevitable venturing into someone’s bed. For the past few months you’d been low on customers, preferring, to your chagrin, the press of a certain someone’s hands to your body instead of a stranger’s. But this was your trade, your craft, and you soon saw a boy in the distance who’s sparkling smile caught your attention.

He laughed at something the person he was talking to said, then looked over, his eyes meeting yours as if by chance. His approving up-down was quick and his face flushed with color, looking away then back as you approached him. He whispered something to his friend and moved towards you, cutting through the crowd.

“Hi,” you greeted him, holding a hand out for him to take. “I’m Y/N. I couldn’t help but notice your smile.”

“Hard not to notice pretty much everything about you.” He laughed, and damn you if he wasn’t cute as hell. He seemed like the kind of guy you might’ve dated back before you took up your current lifestyle. “Ethan. Nice to meet you.” He dropped a kiss onto the back of your hand and you blushed involuntarily.

“Where are you from E—” you stopped, watching as his eyes widened, gaze locked on something behind you. And when you turned, you saw Nikolai ordering a fresh drink at the bar, laughing over something the bartender was saying. “Ethan?”

“Sorry, I um—” he glanced at the floor, then back up. “You’re absolutely lovely, Y/N. But I’d love to leave this place with my head on my shoulders, so I’m gonna…” he pointed awkwardly back at his friends and you scowled.

“What does that mean?” When he paused, you pushed. “Ethan?”

“It’s um…pretty much guaranteed that if I hit on you or even try going home with you, the prince will kill me.”

“What?” Your head whipped around as your eyes shot daggers at the prince. He was still chatting away, and somehow you knew that he was completely aware of the current exchange and was unworried. “Did he say something to anyone?”

“Yeah uh, he pretty much spread word that if someone tries to touch you they’re dead.” Then he shrugged, face softening. “You’re gorgeous. And dating a prince seems like exactly what someone as pretty as you deserves.”

“We’re not dating—I’m—“ you closed your eyes and then smiled tightly. “Thank you. For being so nice. Have a good night.”

“You too.”

You turned on your heel and walked slowly back through the crowd, suddenly realizing how many men and women were eyeing you and then looking away like you were a walking death sentence. When you made it to Nikolai’s side you slid an arm around his waist, under his jacket, so that your hand that was now out of sight from onlookers could dig sharp nails into his ribs.

He grunted and then coughed, turning a pleasant little smile towards you.

“Y/N, darling.” He said, eyes gleaming with both pain and amusement. “Did you make a friend? Braid each other’s hair?”

You used your free hand to pick up his glass of whiskey and knock it back, then reached for the vodka soda he’d ordered for you. The sight of the lime already inside annoyed you more than warmed you, and you sucked half the drink down in one go before speaking.

“If you ever,” you started, voice dripping with honey and venom. “interfere with my work again, I’ll kill you.”

“And I’ll kill every man who has the audacity to look at you in that dress for more than five seconds.” He shot a look at someone behind you, proving his point, and you dug your nails in harder. Gods above, he was pure muscle. It was like squeezing a boulder. “Careful, love, if you want to kiss me later don’t injure me first.”

“I don’t want anything to do with you.” You hissed, voice low and serious. His smile faltered and you pushed on, pulling away from him. “Nothing. Leave. Me. Alone.” You finished your drink and whirled, headed towards the door. And to your surprise, though you’d asked, he didn’t follow.

—

You took the long way home, walking slowly, letting the night air soothe your anger. You felt guilty every time you thought of Nikolai. For months now, months, you hadn’t had anyone in your bed but him. You’d settled for inns and homes, even the occasional alleyway, to your disgust, but no one in your own apartment. No one in your shower. No one sleeping beside you.

And so you walked, rubbing your arms, and when you turned the corner onto your street you stopped dead in your tracks. Nikolai sat on the front step of your apartment building, chin propped on a hand as he stared dully out at something in the distance. At the sound of your resuming footsteps he looked up, apology written all over his face.

“I’m sorry, Y/N. I had no right to—” He paused when you held up a hand, brushing past him to unlock the door and move to the stairway.

He trailed after you quietly, his shallow breaths the only other sound besides your footsteps, and watched somberly as you unlocked your apartment and moved inside. When he stood there, unmoving, you let out a sigh.

“Are you coming inside, Nik?”

Something like hope crossed his face as he followed you, watching again as you shut the door behind him and locked up. Your heels clicked as you walked to the bathroom, washing your hands and undoing the pins in your hair, letting it fall around your shoulders.

“Make me a drink, will you?” You called out to him, then smeared your favorite lip-balm over your mouth. You’d been biting your lip during your walk, stressing over what you’d said to him and what it meant for the two of you.

He poured, and you walked out to find him with his jacket off, the top few buttons of his shirt undone. He’d pushed his sleeves up over his elbows and—Saints have mercy. His arms. You blinked once and looked away quickly, unwilling to be distracted.

“I didn’t mean what I said.” You admitted, swallowing as a sense of awkwardness washed over you. He wasn’t your friend; what did it matter if you’d hurt his feelings? “I just didn’t appreciate you stopping me from doing my job.”

“I understand.” He said, tone flat and void of any sort of emotion. He handed you a glass tumbler of whiskey and took a sip from his own, leaning against the wall to look at you. “I’ll leave you alone, after tonight. If that’s what you want.”

“It’s not—” you felt frustrated all of a sudden, a feeling of odd desperation crawling through you. “it’s not what I want.”

“Then what do you want, Y/N?” He asked, still looking at you in that insufferably calm way. You set your drink down after a long sip, your fingers trembling a bit as he moved forward. “Because I know what I want.”

“And what’s that?” Your voice was practically inaudible, your breath catching when he took your face in a hand, fingers sliding behind your neck and into your hair.

“I want you.” He said, completely serious, and the laugh that bubbled out of you was hardly a laugh at all. Especially when he bent his head and kissed you, pulling you into him, his mouth soft and gentle and absolutely perfect.

Your heart dropped so abruptly into your stomach you gasped, reaching out to clutch at his shirt. The feel of him—and then smell of his cologne—your head was spinning, and you weren’t sure if it was the alcohol or him or both.

“Let me get you out of that dress.” He whispered, moving to kiss your jaw, then neck, your head tipping backwards. You were practically panting, feeling so hot you thought you’d faint, when his hand slipped behind you and slid the zipper of your dress down.

He tugged it up slowly, hands sliding under the hem and bringing it with him, his hands grazing your skin as he went. Over your hips, then your stomach, then—

When it was over your head he dropped it onto the floor, kissing your mouth again once as he stared down reverently at your body. You’d gone braless out of necessity and his eyes drank you in, his stare so heated you felt the impact like a brand.

“Sit.” He told you and, like a godsdammned dog, you did. And when Nikolai knelt between your legs, you had a flashback of the shower so intense that an ache began between your thighs. “You’re so beautiful.” He sighed, tugging off one heel, then the other. His lips kissed your calf, his mouth moving up your leg. “I want you to be mine, Y/N.”

“That’s insane.” You managed to say, and the sharp nip he gave to your inner thigh made you gasp.

“Why?” He questioned against your skin, his fingers tugging your underwear down and over your hips.

“You’re a prince.” You closed your eyes, trying not to let out a ridiculous moan when his teeth grazed, then he kissed, your hip. “You can’t be with me.”

“I can be with whoever I wish. My title doesn’t matter.”

“Of course it does.” You opened your eyes, and the sight of his mouth so close to—you shut them again, unable to have this conversation with him when he looked so damn needy. “Even if you could, we aren’t friends, Nik. We’ve never been friends, so what makes you think I want a relationship with you?”

“You always insist on that.” He sighed, breath warm against your inner thighs. “And yet I cannot stop loving you anyways.”

Your heart stopped.

When he looked up at you, blue eyes soft and filled with—oh gods. He couldn’t be serious.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” You spat, shifting and crawling farther up the bed away from him. You grabbed a blanket and covered yourself, glaring as he stood and sat on the edge of the bed.

“I’ve never been more serious.” His voice was so calm, so gentle, you—no. No. “How can I prove it to you?”

“You’re insane Nik. You’ve lost your damn mind.”

“I will beg for you, if you wish it.”

“Nikolai, stop. You’re absolutely insane and I do not love you.”

“Please Y/N.” His breath caught as his brows furrowed, an injured look on his face. “I will humble myself at your feet if it will satisfy you. I have cared for you for so long and—and if you truly do not love me, even a bit, I will go.” His eyes left yours, scanning the apartment as if memorizing it, then moved back to your face. “If even the possibility of loving me is…insane to you, then I will leave. But I cannot keep loving you and sharing your bed when you don’t feel the same. It’s killing me.”

Your mouth was dry, something cleaving in your chest as you looked at him. You looked at your prince, at the only man you’d allowed in your bed, the man you’d brushed your damn teeth with, the man who squeezed lime into your drinks and defended you when you were insulted. And something tightened in you further when he nodded once and stood, headed for his coat.

“Nikolai, wait.” You could hardly breathe as he turned his head, something like pain written across his features. “I do—I—” Saints, where were your words? “I want you. To stay. Please.”

A soft laugh left him, a sound of pure relief, and you watched with a strangely warm, desperate feeling inside you as he made his way to the bed, moving beside you. He tugged the blanket off you and bent his head to kiss the curve of your knee, watching as you propped yourself on your elbows and stared at him.

“You look a bit like you want to attack me, right now.” He informed you, using his grip on your legs to pull you closer.

You kind of did want to attack him. Especially when he unbuttoned the rest of his shirt and removed it, every inch of his chest and—gods those abs—on display.

“Saints.” You muttered, then let out a sigh when he bent his head, his mouth kissing your stomach and naval.

“They’re not here, love.” He chuckled, sarcastic bastard that he was, and you opened your mouth to sass him when he licked you long and appreciatively.

A moan left your mouth as he kissed and sucked at your center, your hands gripping his hair like a lifeline. When he lifted your hips higher for him and slid two fingers in deep, you could’ve swore the only word left in your vocabulary was his name as you gasped it over and over.

But when he stopped you lifted your head, turned on and annoyed and absolutely burning for him.

“Why’d you—” you stopped when he took off his pants, then reached for you, lifting you and laying you down against your pillows. “Nikolai.” You sighed against him when he kissed you, his tongue brushing into your mouth, and the feel of him made you writhe beneath his body.

“Say you’re mine.” He whispered, then licked into your mouth again, and you keened his name, his hands a bruising force against your hips. “Y/N.”

“Yours.” You gasped, feeling the first brush of him against your center. Gods you were about to explode. “Yours, Nik.”

And when he pushed inside, slowly, letting you feel every godsdammned inch of him as he pressed in deeper, your heart dropped into your stomach and your eyes squeezed shut. His hand brushed your face as he kissed your forehead softly, arms settling to frame your head.

You gripped his back, running your hands down it and scratching lightly when he moved, so agonizingly slow, the inside of you aching where your bodies met. He let out a ragged laugh near your ear and the sound wound you up even tighter.

“Don’t squeeze me so hard or this will be over embarrassingly fast, my love.” He murmured, kissing your nose, then your mouth. And you forced yourself to relax.

My love. You didn’t think you’d ever been so warm in your life, not when he pulled out and then pushed back in, shallow, slow thrusts he made as he lazily rolled his hips against yours. He felt so—oh. Oh.

“You feel so good, sweetheart.” He whispered, his voice strained. You pushed your hips into his, needing more.

“Please, Nik.” You gasped, taking his face in your hands as you pressed a desperate kiss against his mouth.

And so he picked up his pace, and soon he was fucking you so hard into the mattress that you can hardly breathe—could hardly think—especially when his fingers slipped between you and began to rub the sensitive bud right above where he thrust into you.

“Nik. Nik.” You moaned, gripping him as tightly as you could, and cried out when he bit and then kissed your neck carefully.

“I love it when you say my name.” He told you, licking the offending area he’d just nipped, and you came. Hard.

A choked gasp left your mouth as a jolt ran through you, your face turning to press against the pillows as he came with you, a low moan against your shoulder bringing you so quickly back to arousal it startled you. He continued to move lazily as he slowed, you still fighting for breath, when he cradled your face in his hands and brushed a piece of hair away from your eyes.

“I’m going to make love to you so many times you’ll forget there was ever another man inside you.” He said, as simply as if he was telling you the weather, as his eyes studied the bruise appearing on your neck. He smirked and leaned down to kiss it, making your body arch involuntarily into him.

“I want that.” You breathed, still gripping him hard, and he bent his head lower, moving down your body, his mouth closing over a sensitive breast.

“Whatever you want,” he murmured against your skin. “I’ll give you. The world. A crown.”

You tried not to think about everything his words implied, not when his mouth reached your naval, then lower, and he started working his mouth against you, again.

Helloooo good lord ladies I have truly mastered the nasty

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[adragonsfriend]

Supreme Chancellor Grandpa and his Spectacular Vibes

"'Busy as always, I’m afraid. But very glad of this evening’s reprieve.' He says, smiling warmly, because Chancellor Palpatine is the picture of a harried but caring and active leader."

This is going to be part commentary on canon, part my response to the fairly common supposition that Palpatine acts openly rude or prejudiced as Chancellor, part thought experiment.

(quotes from Biting his own Tale (mostly The Supreme Chancellor's Diary) in purple because if I don't do breakdowns of my own writing, who will?)

I pose the question, what is it actually like to be in Palpatine’s presence?

At the heart of it, it's incredibly reassuring:

He is always solving problems for people—often by taking on extra responsibility! It is genuinely difficult to come out of a meeting with Chancellor Palpatine feeling as though some weight has not been taken off your shoulders. Be it emotional (he has lent a sympathetic ear: gained personal information about you), logistical (he’s offered to mention your problem to someone: gained a tacit, informal favour in return), personal (he’s given you advice: shaped your decisions), or logical (he’s always up for a challenging puzzle: he’s always looking for opportunities to take advantage of).

He's a good public speaker, and his speeches gesture at large goals, out of the individual person's reach (I went to a school that had students give these speeches to the whole school twice a week about what ever (school-approved) topic they wanted and trust me, the fastest way to alienate a general audience is to ask them to do something achievable. depressing i know). People—even senators who are aware of his rhetorical tricks—consistently leave his public appearances with a vague but incredibly strong sense that big problems will all be resolved naturally, or by someone else. "She starts reading over one of Palpatine’s oldest speeches, from nearly twenty years ago. …Our Sector is made strong by its partnerships with our neighbors…Naboo will always maintain those relationships bring Prosperity to young and old…The new trade bill will ensure Peace and Security for decades to come…  It has a familiar, empty quality that makes the speaker sound full of ideas, but really only rouses emotion."

He’s no comedian—his jokes are typically chuckle-worthy at best, indeed they are often a little awkward—but he takes such clear delight in causing joy in the people around him that it is hard to resist smiling even when a joke is stilted or slightly out of touch. "'Knight Skywalker didn’t stir at all, I’m afraid,' Sidious inserts a little self-deprecation into Palpatine’s tone, “But it’s reassuring to know he’s in the most capable hands here, Master healer.' / 'We certainly do our best, Chancellor.' Master Che’s expression is polite, but she doesn’t smile. / Not taken in by flattery for a moment. Palpatine approves, 'And I’d best let you get back to it.' He sighs just audibly, and squares his shoulders, 'And get back to it myself.' He crafts a smaller smile, and this time he catches the faintest hint of amusement in the twitch of her lips."

You are a corrupt politician who has gotten in some trouble, but don't worry—your friend Palpatine is there to take care of it. He'll ask a few favors on your behalf, only because he knows you deserve a second chance, and besides he says, what you did wasn't really all that bad in the first pace. He's not doing anything bad by helping out a friend. "'But I'm not! Ventress is getting stronger and I'm still too weak. I should’ve killed her when I had the chance—' [Anakin] cuts himself off, glancing nervously at Palpatine—Sidious arranges Palpatine’s face like a deck of cards so it shows only dedicated interest. Anakin continues, reassured that Palpatine sees no problem with killing his enemies."

You are a leader of your people, worried about how you are going to help them. Palpatine is also a leader, and of even more people than you—but he sympathises, he's made time for you, he worries about his own home planet even as he puts that worry aside to care for the whole galaxy. He suggests someone you might speak with.

You are a clone in the coruscant guard, whom many citizens and senators dislike either for enforcing the law or simply for being clones, but Chancellor Palpatine is always polite to his guards. He confuses you for your brothers sometimes, but he always apologizes and clarifies your name. Sometimes you catch him muttering names and ranks under his breath, trying to remember all of them—he is always faintly embarrassed when this happens, but he keeps doing it.

You are a Jedi, reporting that one of your people has died in tragic, violent circumstances. Out of the many-faced mass of the Senate comes Palpatine to lead the condolences. He maintains a steady sympathy, but beneath it, you can see that he truly feels the loss. Even the seemingly apathetic Senators around him have been moved to nod their heads in true sympathy—in a galaxy that grows cold to your people you more and more, he makes your loss felt to others when you cannot. "[Padme]'s hardly ever irritated by Palpatine when she’s in his presence, only after she leaves, when she’s picked through all the pleasantries and misdirection. Just this week, she’d watched him frown upon hearing about the death of Knight Wu Mengxiang, and caught herself nodding along with his condolences to the Jedi who’d come to inform them."

You are the queen of a planet in danger, and here is someone who is willing to do something drastic to help you. He will take power, and help you fix all the injustice if you will only ask him for help. Yes it may take a few days, but he is doing all he can—it is not his fault the incumbent Chancellor is too attached to his position to realize another could do better in his place. "He’d used them, encouraged them to attack Naboo, and then used the crisis to force a vote of no confidence against Valorum. Only force isn’t the right word is it? He’d made a suggestion, and Padme had jumped at the chance to spare her people."

Body language and charisma are incredibly powerful (random statistics like 'oh 80% of all human communication is through body language' are not sufficient to communicate the extent of this power), and one of Palpatine’s most extraordinary traits is is ability to keep up and act—probably to an unrealistic extent.

Lots of real life advice on how to discover manipulative people is simply to wait and observe their actions over a longer period—eventually, they will slip up and reveal who they truly are. This certainly happens with Palpatine in ROTS, but it takes a very long time, not months or even years, but decades.

And his suspicions behavior in ROTS is a deliberate ploy! He uses it three fold:

To incite cognitive dissonance and uncertainty in the senate—most of whom have regarded him as trustworthy and in accord with their specific interests up to this point—so that he can push through his most obviously suspicious empire-making pieces of legislation.

To cause the Jedi to be suspicious of him in general, so that they investigate and eventually attempt to arrest him, allowing him to label them traitors and usurpers.

To cause the Jedi to be suspicious of him specifically to put Anakin, who either does not register or does not acknowledge any change in behavior, at odds with the other Jedi.

"'The upside,' Padmé counters, 'Is that it means even Palpatine is limited in what he can push through without sacrificing his [public] image—' / Ekkreth cuts her off, 'If you ever do find him obviously suspicious, it is too late. That is his endgame for the Republic.'"

The only point where he compromises his act to his own detriment is in Return of the Jedi with Luke, who has the twin advantages of knowing exactly who Sidious is and only having been in the same room as him for all of ten minutes.

People like the Jedi on the Council and the leaders of the Delegation of 2000 (potentially including) Padmé Amidala who manage to partly pierce the veil and form actual distrust of Chancellor Palpatine as an individual are the exception, not the rule. They are extraordinary in being able to both know the man and even semi-accurately analyze his actions.

I say potentially about Padmé because it is very much the last days when she remarks upon anything, and the delegation of 2000 deleted scene reads to me as though she is being read in on a plan others have already made—ergo she is not one of the initiators.

People who are aware of him only as a public figure are not at any great advantage either. His speeches give much the same air of worn but steady reassurance, and it is difficult to trace any particular wrong doing back to him—he took over of a paralyzed, unpopular leader, he was in favor of unity and so opposed the war, he has a great origin story going from troubled youth to orphan to responsible leader, his greatest scandal is a slightly expensive taste easily excused by his role.

Sidious has a distinct advantage in that any obviously violent or cruel end he wishes to pursue can be achieved through Dooku and the Separatist military (want to kill a Jedi who knows too much? Dooku can have Ventress do that. Want Anakin to suffer extra this week? Dooku can arrange that. Want this or that artifact/weapon stolen or destroyed? Dooku can assign a general to do that. Want a clone army? Dooku can get Syfo Dyas to do that. et cetera), and there is no paper trail of any of it. The only way in which Chancellor Palpatine has to get his hands dirty is making the pragmatic decisions necessary to the Republic. "No matter how much more obscure the methods for obtaining those records has become since the Government Information Acts—which she recalls Palpatine calling a deeply unfortunate necessity of these troubled times—were passed, they are still legal."

Long story short, Anakin is special only in the individual attention he receives—he is the microcosm of what Palpatine does to almost everyone he comes into contact with. Invoke trust, take on responsibility, absolve guilt, corrupt. Palpatine's greatest strength is not in his long-term schemes—many of those are set up for him, or mainly managed by Dooku—it is in his opportunism, and that includes in his ability to become the right person for every given moment.

Long story even shorter, Darth Plagueis did not name his apprentice Darth Sneeky McSneekface so people could try and convince me Chancellor Palpatine is randomly rude to people.

Edit: changed some phrasing--nothing substantive

[cyn-write]

The Little Cecelia - Chapter 3: A Change in Tides

Summary - Every 100 years, the spirits of the Great Seven and their Rivals return. Sometimes, they attempt to right the wrongs of the past, get revenge, or relive the same story, but it all is the same - only one spirit gets their Happily Ever After. Azul has always been fascinated with the human world, which only intensified once he met a human girl, Grace Trien. He desires to become a Great Mage of both Land and Sea and to explore the human world and all its wonders with the Tweels and Grace by his side, but Prince Rielle is willing to do whatever it takes to stop the little Cecelia from getting his Happy Ending.

Chapter 3- After Seven years, a lot of things have changed. Azul has become the "Merchant of the Deep" and Grace has become a Lady of High Society, and their feelings have grown as well. Upon Grace's return, Azul is determined to confess his feelings but his plans change when Grace shares troubling news with the trio.

Prev - Master List

Pairing - Azul Ashengrotto x F!Oc (Grace Trein)

Tags/Warning - Pinning, Scheming, and Childhood Friends to Lovers!

Notes - After a long (unplanned) break, I've finally returned! Thank you everyone for your patience! This chapter took a long time to write but I hope you enjoy it as things start to heat up. Just an FYI: Grace Trein is based on my Oc Grace Wilde so if you want to learn more about her click the link, but you can replace her name when reading if you want to read it as Yuu or another name. This is only the third chapter of 11, so if you enjoy this and want to be tagged or have questions, please let me know! This is also on Ao3 if you want to follow it over there. Comments, likes, and Reblogs are appreciated!

Seven summers come and go like the shifting tides.

Azul spent his days and nights perfecting himself and his magic. He swore to become a powerful Mage and that he did. Every waking moment was spent studying every book in the grotto. From potions to spells, he had mastered his craft. In the midst of the magic books were books on business and trade which he poured over every night. In a few short summers, Azul had become a master merchant, selling potions and restored treasures.

The twins became Azul’s partners in crime and aided in growing his business. They helped him gather information and ingredients to use to his advantage. They found mermaids, mermen, and some truly desperate humans who had no one else to turn to and led them to his doors. In seven years, Azul had gone from being a whimpering no one to the mysterious and powerful “Merchant of the Deep.”

Despite his growing business, he still set aside time each night to talk to Grace. It was the part of his day he treasured most as he would put down his work and simply talk to the person he treasured most. Her voice would take him out of his business guise and remind him why he was doing all of this. She also became a business asset as she had a good understanding of finance and trade due to her schooling and training under her father. Azul often found himself running his plans by Grace and she would provide honest feedback or return the next day with information that would aid him.

Beyond business, the two would talk about anything under the sea. From books they read to random musings, these simple moments brought both out of their heads and let them just be. For a few moments they were not “The Merchant of the Deep” or “Lady Trein of High Society,” they could simply be Azul and Grace, two teens dreaming of a better future.  

One conversation that would often lull them to sleep was the conversation of “what if…”

“I wish you could be here Azul,” Grace mused, “You would have loved it…”

“The more we talk the more I wish I was born human.” He would hum.

“Being human isn’t all its cracked up to be,” She would say, “If you’re born into the right station and gender, your fine. Honestly, I feel more like a bird than a person at times. All I’m supposed to do is sit pretty, speak when I’m spoken too… smile and nod as people talk about my worth... To be honest I wish I could have been born a mermaid, then I could swim away with you and the tweels.” She sounded like she was dreaming again, but they did that often.

“If you are born the right mer maybe… the sea is a dangerous place, and if you’re not the right kind of mer or swim into the wrong places… you could end up shark bait.” Azul had a dark tone to his voice, as much as he enjoyed picturing Grace as a Mer, he didn’t want her to face the monsters larking in the sea. “Besides, I think we can do better… We could run things. Create something that last centuries after we’re gone.”

“And what would that be? A potions business? Trade business?” Grace pondered, “I would love to create something, but sadly women of my status are not usually able to… We usually have to marry for wealth or diplomatic reasons and run our husband’s estate, birth heirs, and raise them to do the same… But I’m hoping to be different. Mama and Papa promised me when I was little that I would have a say in my hand and my future. They even promised that I would get the villa and part of the estate once he retires.”

“I hope so to…” Azul looked at the bracelet on his wrist and dream that the hand she would choose was his. “Do you ever wish you could just... run away from everything? Start somewhere new where no one knew who you were and could just…be?”

Grace was quiet for a moment. Azul thought he scared her away, but when she spoke again, it sent all three heart a flutter, “I would, if you would go with me.”

Ever since that conversation, Azul made it his mission to become human and be with her as more than a friend, but a partner.

Grace kept her promise and returned to the grotto each summer. The three short months she spent with them each year were filled with joy and fun. She showed them everything she learned at school and brought them a variety of land treasures (much to Floyd’s delight). She also taught them everything she could about life on land from human etiquette to fashion to food. By the time she left for her final year of schooling, the trio had a good grasp on the ins and outs of high land culture.

When the day came for Grace to finally return to the grotto, the three were anxious for her return for different reasons and Jade found it entertaining.

Floyd was impatiently waiting for Grace as he anticipated the gifts she promised to bring. How did he cope with the impatience and boredom? He messed with Azul who was a nervous wreck.

Azul was always a nervous wreck when Grace returned from boarding school, but this year it was amplified for a singular reason. Azul (after relentless Bullying from the Tweels) made a bet with the twins that was finally going to confess his feelings to Grace and present her with the human transformation potion he made. This “bet” amplified his nerves and the tweels found it entertaining to tease him about it.

By the time mid-day came around, Azul was pacing in the water and Floyd was trying to catch his tentacles as he passed. “Why isn’t she here yet?” Azul muttered, “She said she would be here by high noon. What if shes- AK! FLOYD!”

“hehehe~ I got Zuuul!” Floyd waved Azul’s captured tentacle around until Azul used that tentacle to slap him in the back of the head. “Owwie!”

“Azul you’re overthinking this, her Father is probably just keeping her.” Jade sat in the back corner of the cave re-reading one of the books Grace had given him years ago.

“I know. I know.” Azul muttered and returned to pacing, “But what if-“

“What if, What if, that’s all you’ve been saying for WEEKS.” Floyd dramatically flopped over Jade’s rock, “She’s a strong Shrimpy and any fish with eyes can see she’s liked you for YEARS!”

Jade nodded as he pushed his brother off his rock, “Besides, if you don’t tell her. We will. That’s the deal~”

Azul shook his head at the brothers’ antics. He knew they were right, but his hearts were still beating rapidly. Before Floyd could launch himself at Jade, the three heard the fast shifting of sand, shifting of fabric, and the signal whistle of their dear human.

Floyd shifted his launch towards the caves shore and bolted towards the entrance. Azul tried to calm his beating hearts as Grace entered the cave.

She certainly has grown over the years, but she has changed a lot over the last nine months. Her features had refined, her hair darkened to a golden hue, and her figure was no longer “boyish” (a term her brothers used to torment her) but full. She was even dressed differently from last summer. Instead of the flowing dresses and bows in her hair, she entered the cave in a structured summer dress, gloves, and woven sun hat.

“SHRIMPY!” Floyd launched himself onto the beach and into Grace’s outstretched arms.

“Floyd!” Grace kneeled so Floyd could give her his signature hug properly. “Oh, I’ve missed your squeezes!”

As she welcomed Floyd, Jade took his time crawling up the beach and was more gentlemanly in his greeting… until he pulled Floyd’s tail.

“Floyd, it’s rude to hog attention.” He reprimanded his brother with a teasing smile.

“Hey!” Floyd lost his balance and fell back, loosening his grip on Grace just in time for Jade to steal her.

“Ahh! Jade!” Grace laughed as she fell into his embrace. “I’ve missed you too!”

“Welcome Home, Grace,” Jade said, helping Grace steady herself as she stood up.

Azul never felt more self-conscious then when he made his way onto the shore to greet Grace. His arms felt weighted, his stomach felt bloated, he could feel all his imperfections highlighted on his body. The guppies in his stomach swam rapidly as she finally stood and looked his way. She set down her basket and walked over to Azul with arms open and bright smile.

Azul felt his lips turn up as he wrapped his arms around her and she returned his embrace, “I’ve missed you.”

“I’ve missed you too,” She gave him a quick squeeze before stepping back, hands in his. Her bright eyes scanned his figure and she looked at him in awe, “You’ve certainly changed though! Look at you!” She smiled so brightly. “You look wonderful, Azul, truly you hard work has paid off!”

Azul felt the guppies settle and his cheeks warm, “You’ve changed a lot yourself. This is certainly a new look.”

“Thank you,” Grace smiled. He lifted a hand for her to spin and she did with a laugh, “Ever since my birthday, Father has insisted I dress ‘properly.’ Honestly, I never thought I would say this but father has been exhausting.” She shook her head. “Actually, that’s why I’m late.”

Azul’s worry resurfaced and he squeezed her hand still in his. “What’s going on?”

“It’s a long story,” Grace’s smile returned, and she said, “We should get settled first before I get into that mess. Why don’t I give you your gifts first before Floyd tares my basket?”

“Too late,” Azul nodded over to Floyd and Jade already shuffling through her discarded basket. Her blanket, snacks, and some books were already spread around them with Jade placing the objects to the side before Floyd threw them in his search for the gifts.

Grace just shook her head at the two and chuckled, “What am I going to do with you two?”

Floyd’s head shot up from his search and said, “Hand over the shinnies!”

Azul let himself genuinely laugh for the first time in what felt like years. He followed Grace as she spread out her picnic blanket and settled on it. Floyd had all of her attention as she reached into her skirt pockets and brought out three wrapped items. “I guess, I guess.” Floyd reached for them but Grace quickly moved them out of reach. “Na-ah-ah! Patience Floyd! You’d think you would’ve learned after last year!”

“How many times do I have say sorry!” Floyd whined as Jade held his brother back.

“Once more as always.” Jade gave Floyd the stink eye. Last year Grace got Jade a terrarium with small figurines of woodland creatures and Floyd ended up breaking it in his search for his gift. She got Jade another and Floyd felt terrible, but Jade still holds it over his head whenever he can.

Grace handed the objects to them one at a time starting with Jade. She gave him a small jar shaped object which he delicately unwrapped to Floyd’s dismay, “There was a small shop in town that finds these, I described your fascinations to him and the shopkeep assured me you would like this!” Inside the package was a clear glass jar terrarium with rotting wood inside dotted with small white umbrellas, “He said since they are already growing, as long as you keep them in dark, moist places they should keep growing.”

Jade’s eyes sparkled as he looked at the jar. He looked like a child given a seabunny during Winterfest. He gingerly placed the jar down before giving Grace a hug. “Thank you.” He said softly, letting a few happy trills slip through. “It’s perfect.”

“Ya, ya, you got plants gimmie mine!!” Floyd pouted and his tail twitched in annoyance. Grace giggled at his childlike annoyance.

“Alright, hold your horses,” Grace said as she picked up a small rectangular object. The moment it grazed Floyd’s skin, he snatched it and shredded the wrapping paper. “I saw this in a traveling shop and had to get it for you!” The rectangular object was a case and inside the case was a small instrument, “It’s called a harmonica! You blow into this side and it makes music!”

Floyd picked up the instrument and smiled wide, “A LAND SNARFLUCS!” He put it to his lips and blew a few notes, rolling his tail in glee. After sliding it across his lip a few times, Floyd put the harmonica down and wrapped Grace in a big squeeze. “THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU! Mom never let me keep these!”

“Ya. Thanks a lot.” Azul sighed knowing he will never know peace again.

“Don’t worry, I got you and Jade earplugs too.” Grace said, patting Floyds back as she returned the squeeze.

Once Floyd let Grace go so he could admire his new shiny, she finally turned to Azul. Azul way always the last to receive his gift, and he was fine with it. He liked to think it was because she was saving the best for last. Grace took out a slim case and handed it to him.

“I know you don’t need these, but when I saw them I couldn’t help but think of you.” Grace said as Azul took the wrapped case. He unwrapped it and felt the smooth leather of the case on his fingers, tracing the Bell logo imprinted lid. When he opened the case and saw a pair of round spectacles. The golden frames were decorated simply with a white chain connecting the two ends so the seer my put them down for a moment without losing them. They were a simple, sleek, ordinary pair of frames, but the fact that she thought of him when she saw them made his hearts beat faster.

“Go ahead, put them on! I want to see how you look!” Grace said as she reached into her pocket for her hand mirror.

Azul did as she asked and put on the spectacles. There were clear lenses so he could see his image in the mirror clearly. He looked… older, more sophisticated, like the merchants in stories. It felt odd to look at the reflection, his reflection. The person staring back looked like him, but with confidence and charm.

He looked up to ask her thoughts and Grace was blushing. Her mouth was slightly ajar and she was flush. When their eyes met, she held his gaze. That is one thing Azul always admired, she always looked him in the eyes.

“S-see. I knew they would look good on you,” She said softly as she put the mirror away.

Azul smirked at her remark, “You’ve always had impeccable taste.”

“I’m glad you think so,” Grace chuckled and shook her head, “that’s a rare opinion according to my brothers and their wives. They’ve criticized my every move since I’ve returned.”

“Speaking of, why don’t we return to the subject of your tardiness?” Azul said, settling beside Grace, spectacles still on. “What happened?”

She sighed and picked at her gloves, removing them as she spoke, “The short explanation is… a lot happened while I was gone leading to father pushing my debut.” Azul felt his hearts stop. Her Debut? Doesn’t that mean… no. Grace continued as she picked at her dress. “The Long of it is… complicated.”

Azul’s tentacle moved its way to her mid-back and his hand covered hers, “I can take complicated.”

Grace sighed and the tweels turned their attentions away from their gifts as she spoke. “While I was at school, apparently my brothers and their wives decided to squander their portion of the family fortune and their dowries. Against my advisement, Father has housebound them and limited their spending ability, but by that point they had already made a sizable dent in the coffers. He doesn’t want to strain our people more than he has to so Father has turned to other methods of regaining funds.” She squeezed Azul’s hand for reassurance as she continued, “He is holding my debut ball the Friday. The invitations were sent out already, and this morning while I was getting my gown tailored, Father gave me the rundown of the ‘most suitable candidates’ attending.  Apparently, I must choose a husband at this ball or else.”  She laced her fingers through his, holding it close as tears threatened her eyes, “When I reminded him of the promise, he said I did have a choice, but it must be made by the end of the ball or else its moot…” She started shaking.

There was a thick silence between the four. Azul’s tentacle wrapped around her midsection in a comforting hug. “So, you’ll be engaged by Saturday?”

She placed her free hand on top of the tentacle and rubbed her thumb along his skin, “According to father I should be… but it is still my choice. A-and who knows, I could meet the one. A plethora of fairytale romances happen that way…” She looked him in the eyes as she said this. She was looking for reassurance, to convince herself that everything will be okay. “Maybe… my Prince Charming will come sweep me off my feet.”

That’s when it hit him. A plan. A glorious, beautiful plan. His tentacles slithered as it formed and Grace caught on to him.

“What?” She asked, “I know that twinkle in your eye, you’re scheming.”

“I certainly am,” Azul ran the rudimentary plan in his mind and there were some kinks, but it should work. “It’s risky, but it just might work.”

“Ooooo! This is gonna be fun,” Floyd said chuckling.

“Mind sharing?” Jade asked slithering to the water.

Azul’s tentacle’s started drawing out a plan in the sand, “Your Father said you just had to chose a suitor correct? He never said it had to be from his list, correct?”

“Technically, yes. Where are you going with this?” Grace asked, curiosity twinkling in her eyes.

“Well, if you already had a suitor with wealth. You could hold off your father for a while until you decide to marry.” Azul offered up.

“That would be wonderful, except father would want to meet the mysterious suitor and know why it is being delayed.” Grace said.

Azul had to take a deep breath before he said the next part, “Didn’t you say you wanted us to meet him one day?”

“You mean-”

“Around 11 o���clock on the night of the party. You will introduce your father to me as your…Chosen Fiancé. I have enough gold and treasure to appease him for a long time. The excuse will be we are waiting till I finish a human transformation potion so I can be with you on land. If your father is the man you say he is, then that should hold him for at least a season. Enough time for you to truly chose someone to marry.” He took both her hands in his and squeezed them, “As I said, its risky, but it just might work. But I won’t do anything without your approval.”

Grace returned the squeeze and looked at him with those lovely green eyes, “Are you sure? This could put you and the tweels in so much danger. And I-”

“I-we care about you and your happiness. There is no need to worry about us. We can handle the danger.” Azul’s tentacle came up and caressed her cheek, “You mean the world to us, and we will do anything for your happiness.” Azul felt his face heat up and he turned away to look at the tweels smirking at him, “isn’t that right?”

Thankfully, the tweels played along. “Ya! We’d do anything for our shrimpy!”

“We are happy to help a dear friend~”

Grace looked at the tweels then turned back to Azul, “Promise me you’ll keep me in the loop, and stay safe?”

Azul nodded, “I promise.”

She sighed and a sly smile grew on her face, “Well then, I guess we should flesh out this plan then, shouldn’t we?”

The rest of the evening, Grace, Azul, Jade, and Floyd developed the plan down to the minute. Every move was plotted out and obstacles considered. By the time the sun touched the sea, they had a foolproof plan prepared for the ball.

After Grace left, Jade approached Azul whispered, “What are you truly planning Azul? I’ve never seen you make a one-sided deal like this before.”

“Oh, that’s where your wrong, Jade.” Azul smirked as one tentacle brought up a golden glowing potion to his eyes, “Once this deal is done, not only will I have won our bet, but I will have everything I’ve ever wanted in my grasp.” He turned to Floyd trying out his harmonica, “Floyd, I think its time we pay Sam a visit. I’m going to need a suit for Friday’s ball.”

“Hehehe, I knew this was gonna be fun~” Floyd’s eyes sparkled with excitement.

“It certainly will,” Azul peaked around the cave and gazed at the manor lights. There his dearest pearl was having dinner with her family, unbeknownst to her that her Prince Charming would sweep her off her feet at the ball, and right into his tentacles.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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[laniuchiha7]

The Baker and The Farmer

During the weekly farmers market Naruto rushes over to the Uchiha Farms display clutching a bouquet of lilies in one hand and two pieces of honey cake in the other.

“A new bakery opened up in the town square!” Naruto informs Sasuke while eating one of the cakes. “The woman who owns it is at Ino’s stand handing out free samples to everyone who buys a flower arrangement.”

“Ok?” Sasuke isn’t sure why this matters since he’s not a fan of sweets nor does he have a reason for buying flowers.

“Here.” Naruto shoves the remaining confection at him. “Try it! I bet you’ll like it more than you think!”

Reluctantly, he takes a bite. Not bad, actually Sasuke thinks it’s really good. Still too sweet for his personal tastes, but he can tell someone who really cares about their craft made this. “It’s fine.”

“I’m gonna give these flowers to Hinata,” Naruto says. “The cute baker girl, Sakura I think her name is, mentioned coming around later and introducing herself to the other vendors later. She’s hard to miss so be nice to her, alright?” With that the blonde runs off, leaving Sasuke to finish the honey cake without complaint.

At first Sasuke wonders what his friend means by she being hard to miss until he spots someone with blossom pink hair speaking with his brother by the wooden containers of cherries and strawberries.

“Sasuke,” Itachi waves him over. “This is Sakura, the owner of the new bakery in town.”

“Hi!” Her singsong voice pleasantly says. “Nice to meet you!”

“Likewise. I had one of your honey cakes earlier, it was good.”

“That’s high praise coming from him,” Itachi adds.

“I’m glad you enjoyed them,” she’s smiling from ear to ear, a tinge if blush spreading across her cheeks. Must be from the sun, he thinks, just like the burst of warmth climbing up the back of his neck.

“What were you talking about before I came over?”

“I’m interested in having produce from Uchiha Farms delivered to my shop, maybe two or three times a week.”

“Shouldn’t be a problem,” Itachi assures. “I can add you to my route. Just let me know what you want and how much.”

Before she can answer, Ino calls her back to their stand for a moment. “I’ll be right back!”

Sasuke turns to his brother as soon as she’s far enough away. “I can do it. Handle her order,” he clarifies.

“Are you sure? I already have a few deliveries in that area.”

“Hn. I don’t mind. If you want you can take my stop at the schoolhouse near the edge of town.” Bait Sasuke hopes his brother takes since the teacher who runs the place is Izumi, the girl Itachi has been eyeing for weeks.

The corner of his lips curve into a smirk. “Ah, I guess that’s a fair trade.”

Over the course of the next few weeks, Sasuke gradually learns more about Sakura when he delivers her order and when she stops by his stall at the farmers market — her parents own a bakery back in her hometown and she wanted to start her own, she and Ino attended the same school as children and continued to keep in touch, she loves strawberry mochi, and is very single.

Whenever he stops by she gives him an extra piece of cake or fruit pie she made, although she soon learns he isn’t a big fan of sweets. “I noticed your nose scrunches up before taking a bite. It’s cute,” she says to him one day, “I’ll cut back on the sugar when you’re here again.”

Next time he stops by she gave him a delicious cheese tart instead, causing something to bloom in his chest. Something he doesn’t want to name just yet.

“Why haven’t you asked Sakura out??” Naruto is loitering around the Uchiha Farms stand during the weekly market. “She’s popular, ya know.”

“Hn. None of my business,” Sasuke mutters under his breath, throwing a glance across the road at her set up only to see Idate chatting her up. Of course he’s aware of Sakura’s reputation around Konoha of being the sweet baker with even sweeter goods. Yet he doesn’t believe she treats him any different than a customer or their friends, she’s just naturally friendly to everyone.

“Do you really think she’s giving the rest of us free food?” Naruto brings up. “She only started adding savory options at her shop after learning you prefer them over her usual stuff. Trust me, she likes you.”

From the other end, once Idate finally leaves, Sakura meets his gaze with a bright expression.

Perhaps Naruto has a point and he needs to get out of his own head. He can try a more subtle approach, buying her a pink and yellow dahlias should convey his sentiments, even if it means having to withstand Ino’s prying questions.

“What are those for?” Sakura asks as she’s packing up her table for the day.

“I got them for you.” The tips of his ears begin to burn.

“They’re beautiful Sasuke!” She takes them thankfully. “They smell wonderful too.”

He takes her basket so she can hold the flowers as they walk back to the bakery.

“I-um-had something I wanted to ask you too,” Sakura goes on. “I heard from Itachi that you really like tomatoes. I found this recipe for a tomato and goat cheese tart. If you’re not too busy tomorrow, I was thinking we could make it together and have it for dinner….as a date? Unless you’d rather do something else?”

“That sounds perfect,” Sasuke says. “I’ll look forward to it.”

[the-travelling-witch]

so i can’t work on my twst x pokémon au (fittingly named a twisted pokémon au) atm since i’m absolutely overwhelmed with irl stuff but i want to share this little headcanon with the attentive ones of you that catch this post

I still haven’t finalised giving each character a team but every now and then I think about it and I know a lot of people give Azul a tentacruel or octillery as a signature pokémon, and I definitely have them written down too, don’t get me wrong, but I had this stupid idea out of nowhere

Picture this: you’re fighting this super tough battle against this cunning opponent and he has all these intimidating water pokemon and you somehow get him down to his last but strongest pokémon. As you wait with bated breath for what kind of ace he will send out next, he throws his pokéball to release… quagsire, arguably one of the least nefarious water types there is (at least visually)

And basically the backstory is that Azul’s had the whooper since he was still a chubby little octopus and it was basically his first real friend who’d stick by his side and wouldn’t bully him, even trying to ‘protect’ Azul from his bullies despite being so small itself (the twins would totally find it hilarious yet strangely adorable), so Azul being the softie he is just can’t not have quagsire on his team, even if it ruins his whole reputation

Tl;dr emotional support quagsire for the business octopus

I mean quagsire isn’t a bad pokemon if you don’t put it in front of a plant (or the opponent has freeze dry), it just ruins the image Azul is trying to establish here. But I think Azul is low-key a softie and I want to believe that quagsire could be the worst mon ever and he’d find some kind of excuse to keep bringing it along (Jade and Floyd just trade knowing smirks as Azul clears his throat and pushes up his glasses)

Speaking of Jade and Floyd, they get to make fun of Azul/ quagsire but if anyone else does it, they’d better start praying to all higher powers they can think of

Imagine quagsire wearing Azul’s dorm uniform hat, being all happy and proud about it ㅠㅠ

(Also quagsire going from this stick thin little guy to a chubby bigger guy kind of parallels Azul’s insecurities if you want to read more into it than I initially considered)

Azul: Should we order dark purple or lilac decorations for Mostro Lounge… What do you think?

Quagsire: :]

Azul: You are so right, a deeper purple would compliment the tableware nicely

or maybe I’ll just give him a tentacruel anyway… though quagsire is also working his way into my heart

© the-travelling-witch 2024 - do not repost, translate, copy or edit; do not feed my writing to an ai

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[cuckoo-on-a-string]

The Moon's Lies

Summary: Kylo Ren x named!Reader. It was never going to be black or white, Light or Dark, friend or foe. Who wouldn't let the galaxy burn to keep their loved ones safe?

Warnings: 18+, Murder/"execution," graphic violence, unspoken threat of bodily harm, twisted morals, Kylo Ren being himself

Masterlist

Canon Divergence Notes: There is no Rey. Finn is the destined Jedi, and he leaves the scar on Ren’s face during the climactic fight on Starkiller Base. The only original canon kept after TFA is the destined Jedi (Finn) leaving to find Luke and Snoke pushing Kylo Ren to the breaking point, continuing the student-kills-the-master cycle. Summary: No Rey. Finn is training to be a Jedi. Kylo Ren takes the throne from Snoke.

This chapter is the only pre-TFA part of the story. Everything after that is in the AU as described.

A/N: Holy shit, I'm having so much fun with this. You all have no idea (but you will soon). Out here crafting whole-ass mythologies and cultures for this shit. Literally forgot to post this first chapter because I'm neck-deep in the next. Please, please, please do comment! I post for interactions with friends new and old. Otherwise I'd hoard all my embarrassing stories like the grouchy old dragon I really am.

1.

He needed to maul something.

His lightsaber practically vibrated on his belt, answering the pull of itching hands as Kylo Ren stormed into the planet-side depot. Civilians scattered from their orderly lines in front of the First Order’s regional bureaucratic office, startled like so many kaadus. The system had so little to offer, the Order couldn’t even justify a separate complex for the port authority and notary.

A shabby little base on a barren little world. If he could, he’d sink his saber to the planet’s core and kill it all in one, fell stroke.

What a waste of his time.

The rebel insurgent had nothing. They hunted him to the edge of the First Order’s territory only to discover a dead end whose handful of contacts met the heat of Kylo’s blade long ago. They’d missed something. He’d missed something. Instead of fresh leads into the Resistance’s plans, he would leave empty handed. This detour took weeks, and he couldn’t shake the feeling that their enemies were planning something. But in the end, the only thing the dead Rodian had been good at was hiding. Any trooper could’ve shot the scum and been done with it. No need for the Knights of Ren.

He looked like a fool.

Rage tipped over the edge of reason, flooding logic, and plans, and anything but the dark urge to destroy.

He marched through the door, well ahead of his knights. The stormtroopers were nearly as eager to avoid his wrath as the civilians, and he burst into an empty hall. The faintest conversation reached him, a hum of living Force further inside. He followed it. Down the hall. Around the corner. Gathering fuel to further spark his hate for this place and all the people in it as he approached.

A crisp, core world accent he had no doubt belonged to an officer carried farthest.

“I’m afraid it just won’t do. If you want clearance to leave for Gan Moradir, I’ll need those credits in my hand. Today.”

“You already have them.”

The second voice almost surprised Ren. He could barely feel the speaker’s signature, and he rested his hand on his saber, ready for a battle. No one unskilled in the Force could veil themselves like that.

From the sound of things, he had two valid targets to suffer for his humiliation. With new focus, he prepared to take the last corner, the heat in his blood ready to burn through the traitors and fools ahead.

Just out of sight, the officer tsked. “Not enough, I’m afraid.”

“Do you plan on demanding more every time we visit your system?”

“I could.”

“I’m afraid that will be very bad for trade.”

Ren saw the pair before they saw him. A First Order corporal with his hands clasped behind his back and a sneer on his face stood opposite a civilian girl, both oblivious to their approaching doom.

“Corporal.”

The man practically jumped out of his uniform, eyes bugging wide. The girl barely even flinched, following the officer’s panicked gaze with guarded curiosity. Ren would deal with her after he thinned the ranks. It was important to cut out rot before it spread, after all.

“Lord Ren!” The officer’s voice wavered, nearly breaking like a teenager’s as he took two steps away from the civilian and bowed to his superior. “My apologies. We’d heard your knights may be in the system, but we had no idea you’d actually –”

“What is the First Order’s standing on bribery?” He asked like he didn’t know simply so the criminal would recite his own conviction. Let him know how he’d failed. Let the fear string out his last moment.

The corporal’s mind couldn’t keep pace with his spiking adrenaline. He shifted, eyes darting for an escape, an excuse, as he tried to drag an explanation through his dry mouth.

“Well, I…”

Ren had no mercy. And no patience. His hand clenched over his blade’s hilt, and he imagined he could already feel the subtle vibration as it came to life to end another’s.

“Well?”

The corporal swallowed, and Ren watched the confidence roll away down the man’s throat.

“Soliciting or accepting bribes in any form, be it credits or goods, is a class three offense, sir.” He spoke clearly. Responding to a clear order with clear rules he would’ve learned by rote in training. He knew the consequences for disguising this theft behind the First Order’s banner, and now Ren would reveal a new part of the corporal. Blood. Bone. The messy things he wrapped out of sight beneath his skin.

Ren hummed. A mockery of consideration as he swayed nearer, forcing the smaller man to stare up at a painful angle. Decapitation was too neat for such a selfish little traitor. Maybe he’d sheer away half the man’s chest. Or leave him in a dozen pieces for his command to discover.

“I see.” He stalked forward another step, savoring the building dread like a cool wind beneath his mask. “And what is the punishment for class three offenses?”

The officer’s lingering hopes to put off his superior with a lie – Blame the girl, his mind screamed – finally crumbled. The dread Force-wielder had caught him. He knew enough to damn him. He’d been judged. He’d been sentenced. Only one step remained. Kylo Ren loomed, a Loth cat playing with vermin caught raiding the larder, and his uniform was an invitation to deal justice, not the shield the corporal once believed. He backpedaled, nearly foaming at the mouth as he spluttered a final plea for mercy.

“Lord Ren, please! I merely –!”

Red light and a crackling hum cut him off.

Ren speared the traitor through the belly, letting the fool totter backwards, wheezing for a breath that would never come. The corrupt officer groped over his exposed diaphragm as he tumbled to the floor, and his head met the polished floor with a crack as he continued pointlessly gasping.

It wouldn’t be a quick death.

Satisfied, Ren looked at the second actor in this little scene. She’d barely flinched when he struck down the corporal, but her attention remained fixed on the dying criminal. Ren waited for the inevitable wave of panic, ready to toy with a fresh target, but the life ending at her feet held her gaze. Something about her blunted his senses, and he struggled to pry into her mind beyond what she projected: caution and studied calm.

Maybe it was shock. Or maybe she needed reminding of her own mortality.

Ren cut off the corporal’s death rattle with a stroke of his saber, and as the head rolled across the hall, the girl finally looked up to meet his gaze. He glowered back through his visor, itching for her reaction.

She bowed. Maintaining the poise of a diplomat who hadn’t just witnessed a brutal execution, she dipped at the knees, dropping her eyes in polite deference before rising to meet him all over again. Still as a lake.

His lightsaber hissed, twisting in his grip. He pointed it under her chin, demanding she answer every question he hadn’t asked.

“You.” He didn’t bother with the show he’d put on for the corporal. Her careful placidity irritated him, and it felt like her very presence muted his senses when he hunted for her fear.

He looked again, noting the grey stone pendant and loops of beads she wore. A memory teased the edge of his lingering rage, dragging his focus away from his quest for bloodshed. He’d seen that material before. He recognized the numbing sensation in the Force from a failed project to build better restraints for Force sensitive prisoners. “What is that?”

Her fingers rose to the pendant, brushing over an unfamiliar pattern of engraved stars.

“It’s Selenubis, sir.” She paused, flicking her gaze over his mask like she might find a clue to his expression. When he didn’t answer, she pushed ahead. “A traditional protection charm from Lethe. If it’s offensive to the First Order I can come again with out it…?”

Behind his mask, he ground his teeth, clawing against the foggy wall so few of her thoughts penetrated. Selenubis proved useless to the First Order when it became clear the stone did as much to shield a prisoner from other Force users as it did to shackle the target.

She wanted to return without her shield? She wouldn’t leave with it. He’d hack it off her neck, and if he didn’t like what he found in her head, she wouldn’t leave with that, either.

His flickering saber reflected in her eyes as he angled it up, forcing her to expose her throat as red lightning reflected in bottomless reservoirs of control. He didn’t believe for a second she was ignorant of the power in her little trinkets and beads.

Just as he prepared to cleave through her jewelry – and likely leave a deep burn to remember him by – one of his knights burst into the hall.

“Commander. The Supreme Leader requests your presence. Immediately, sir.”

His foiled rage rebounded, arcing like a current through his bones and burning him with his own intent as he growled in frustration. The sound hissed through his modulator.

This would have to wait.

Deactivating his saber, he stepped back, pivoted on his heel, and marched back the way he came. He would have to relive his humiliation at his master’s feet, and there was no time to vent his frustrations.

He left no orders in his rush to answer his master’s summons. No one held the girl or even took special note of her name and business as he knelt before Snoke’s projected image, and by the time he returned to the hall, she was gone.

The documentation the dead corporal had been withholding, a pile on the floor by his headless corpse, had gone with her.

[theminecraftbee]

OMG i got a better pc recently and i JUST realized i can play vault hunters now!!! :000 any advice for absolute newbies? (kinda scared of it)

YAY! you’ll enjoy it I have trouble playing normal minecraft now that I know there’s a Minecraft I can be playing that has Goals and Objectives and also Storage Systems.

and then yes I absolutely have newbie advice! don’t take any of this as gospel I’m hardly a top player these are just things I find handy:

make sure you’ve allocated at least 8 GB to the game before playing to save yourself some headache. 6 GB can work if you’re pushing it, but not much less.

vault hunters discord can be a useful place to join to find various advice and also things like community documents on everything in the game as you need.

you don’t need better armor than iron; since all vanilla armor was nerfed, diamond armor has the same protective strength as iron armor, just with more durability. save your diamonds for other crafts, like a vault enchanter, a diamond pickaxe, and the altar itself!

you do not need a librarian setup because the vault enchanter exists, but you will need some kind of emerald income. I normally use a classic sticks to fletcher in the early game, but more efficient trading halls aren’t terrible to have (farmers, for example, are also good). you can pick up a villager from the overworld as an item with shift+right click, just don’t do that with a villager that currently has a workstation, because that can cause pretty bad lag!

animal jars and animal pens exist! use them! an animal jar works by shift+right click while holding the jar on adult animals. place a jar with at least two animals into an animal pen to be able to breed them; hit shift to see how many animals is in the pen and the cooldown. you can use a bucket to get eggs from a chicken pen or a turtle pen. you can shear a sheep pen to get all the wool from the sheep, a bee pen to get honeycomb. to kill animals in a pen and get drops from them, just kill them with your sword. later, using some combination of modular routers and bee pens is helpful for automation.

JEI is your friend, but doesn’t show you a few vault hunters recipes (namely, any tool station or vault forge recipes). you can view those recipes in their respective workbench. however, JEI does have lists of what loot is found in each vault chest. that’s handy for pouch filtering!

a pouch with a pickup upgrade is your friend; multiple pouches is even more your friend. the sooner you can graduate to using a magnet to pick up items into pouches without using your shulker boxes, the faster you’ll get at running vaults, I promise! so as expensive as pouches seem early on, it’s really, really worth it to start using them. the filter is also handy to prevent picking up junk items.

similarly, breaking chests with vault tools will seem slow to you at first; it’s not it’s faster than manually grabbing the items from chests. you will get a quest about making vault tools, and a chest breaker should be one of your first tools when you do!

anything you find inside a chest in the vault you should keep; any vanilla items you find you should keep. however, any modded item that isn’t inside a chest in the vault can’t be an altar item, so if you’re short on storage space, you can throw those out.

early skill points should include at least one in heal and at least one in vein miner. strength is very good early game, especially all the way up to strength four. speed is really good but expensive so save getting speed until you’re ready. you only need two levels in un-specialized stonefall to negate fall damage altogether when you use the skill, which, if you’re like me and can’t mlg, is a lifesaver. I also recommend early points in dash and javelin. don’t be precious with skill points, though, they’re easy to change later! also unless you take the intelligence talent, early game you’ll NORMALLY have better strength than you do ability power for the skills that require AP. however, you can re-spec this easily later.

expertises, however, CANNOT easily be reset—you’ll get a free neuralyzer (check spelling haha) at level 50, but beyond that you need an omega pog, which is… expensive to say the least. so you SHOULD maybe be precious with these! experienced is the only one I’d say is definitively BAD. personally I recommend maxing out fortune and bounty hunter with your first 25 levels, but not everyone likes having the double bounties so that’s a “I prefer it” thing. late game, infuser and mystic are really good, but early game you won’t use those. angel is SUPER FUN and always really convenient to have but angel blocks aren’t cheap, so I never unlock it until I actually have the materials to make an angel block. jeweler is definitely actually good but I kind of hate perfecting jewels so I don’t take it, but most people who like maxing out tools do want that one.

I had a whole post about knowledge unlocks but basically, do the ones you want most as you need them, but drawers, the vault compass, double pouches, or stack upgrades are normally my first choices.

level matters more for gear than rarity, especially early game when you level through new tiers of gear quickly. if you get new gear with better implicit stats in a new, higher-level tier, replace your old gear, even if your new gear is common and your old gear was omega. later game is when having higher rarity gear will actually start to matter.

unless you’re very good at the game don’t try to be iskall, use a chestplate, not an elytra, in the vault. so you know, you don’t die.

keep up with the quest book! it’s handy like that! you can go back and read old quests too!

don’t be afraid to change your difficulty settings to whatever you have the most fun with—I basically always play in vaultMode casual and I like it that way!

watching other vault hunters like the hermits can help a lot!

and most of all: HAVE FUN!!!

[danime25]

Last Christmas

ao3 // normal masterlist // christmas masterlist

*Summary: Colt happened to overhear that there was a gift exchange. What will he do to get involved when he hears a member of the lighting crew shit talking someone else on staff?

*Rating: E for Everyone

*Content/Tags: Bittersweet Ending, Secret Santa

*Status: Oneshot?/Complete

“Ah damn.” Colt’s ears perked up as he overheard one of the lighting guys. He was in between scenes right now and he had another two hours of sitting on set before they’d actually need him for the day. So he did what came naturally to him, snoop.

“What?” The other guy asked, not looking up from the lights he was tweaking

“You know that one PA?”

“There’s a lot of them on set.” The other man rolled his eyes

“The one that hardly talks to anyone, and if she does she covers her mouth with that stupid clipboard she has?”

“Oh that frigid bitch.” His friend laughed. Colt raised an eyebrow. He knew the production assistant that they were talking about. He’d never had a problem with her in the past, and honestly she was probably the nicest member to him. She’d always make sure that he had enough time in between scenes to run to the craft table when he needed some coffee. 

“Yeah, her. So I got her for the stupid secret santa. Wanna trade?”

“Hell no. You think I want that bitch who sucked a cock to get her job?”

“Well I don’t want her either, and no one else in lighting fucking wants her.”

“Did you ask the prop department? Someone in there might be desperate enough…”

“I’ll take her.” Colt, who up until then had been silently listening made a couple strides across the way, “I’ll take her for the gift exchange or… whatever.”

“Okay.” The first guy looked him up and down, “Who are you anyway?”

“I’m the stunt guy.” Colt nodded

“Fine. Here. Give me your sheet.” The guy held his hand out

“What sheet?”

“The secret santa sheet.” He rolled his eyes, “Did you even sign up?’ “Yeah. It’s just… in my car.” Colt slid away for a second and pulled a sheet of paper out of a script someone left around. He copied the general format, and wrote down a bullshit name. He strided back in and handed it off to the guy, “There.”

“Thanks.” He looked over it for a second before a runner came and started screaming about how the director needed everyone in lighting over at the other lot. Colt took a look at the sheet that he had tucked in his pocket so as not to get the two confused. He frowned a little bit as he saw how little she wrote. A woman of few words, he guessed. If he was going to get her something she’d like as a thank you for all the coffee breaks on set, he’d have to continue snooping. He looked down at his watch and hurried to the set where his next scene was. She was probably setting up there.

---

Sure enough, he found her pointing directions out to other members of the crew. He could hardly hear her and he was only about 10 feet away. Maybe his eardrums were just shot to hell being next to explosions? He shook his head and walked over to her. He gave her a quick nod. Without missing a beat she quietly said,

“You’re early. You’re never on set early.”

“Yeah. But I’m on time.”

“Last time you were two minutes late.” She looks down at her phone. He sees the music banner on her screen and asked,

“What are you listening to?” He was fishing, but maybe that would give him some ideas about what to get her

“Nothing.” She looked at him, a bit confused. “I was listening to something on my commute.”

“Oh yeah?” He leaned against a cart, only for it to move out from under him. He tipped over slightly before catching his balance and giving her a thumbs up. “That could’ve been bad.”

“Don’t get injured.” She replied. That was nice of her. “Our insurance won’t cover it.”

“Ouch.” He laughed, “I mean you’re probably right.”

“Not probably. I am right.” She sighed, “I appreciate your company, but I really need to finish setting up for the scene… Mark will be mad if I don’t.”

“First name basis with the director?’

She sighed again, even more exhausted, “Listen if those… guys from VFX sent you to spy on me. I swear I’ve never done anything immoral to keep my job… I just come to set, do my job and go home.”

“No that’s not why I’m here…” He tried to explain, but how could he without giving away that he was trying to get her something? “I’ll just… sit over there.”

“Thank you.” Her shoulders loosened up as he sat quietly in the corner of the studio. Other members of the crew filtered in, then the actors paraded in. She started talking with the star about some rewrites the writers had come up with and guided them through it. He crept closer to listen in, given that it might change his performance too. She raised an eyebrow as she saw him move into her line of sight, but decided to not do anything about it until one of the actors piped up about the intrusion. Surprisingly, no one said anything and they got to work filming. The director guided both Colt and the man he was doubling for on how to perform the stunt correctly, the angle and distance the camera would be to ensure no one saw the switch between the two. Colt nodded along as if he were paying attention and his eyes darted back to the PA. She looked to be underlining the script with due diligence.

“And action!”

Colt watched the scene until it was his time to step in. It was a basic fight scene with a fall, easy enough. He landed on the mat perfectly and rested on it for a moment, waiting for his back to crack as he pushed into the plush pad. When he got up he walked back over to behind the camera, seeing her with her teeth pressed down into her lips.

“You okay?” He asked her

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“You want some coffee?” He asked in a way that wasn’t really a suggestion. She nodded and he guided her outside the studio. When she knew no one was looking at her she started to sob. Something in Colt’s heart broke seeing her completely shatter that he took her into his arms and held her. She seemed a bit confused by the gesture but wrapped her arms around his and cried. After a couple heaves and a tear stained shirt, he asked, “You want to talk about it?”

“I… sorry this shoot’s been a lot. Doesn’t help that Mark is fucking asshole.”

“Yeah.” He never noticed it, but the director was kind of a raging asshole when he thought about it. “The shoot’s done for the day, right?”

“Yeah.” She sighed, trying to regain her composure

“Why don’t I take you home?’

“Okay,” she said with a little grin. It wasn’t a date, per say. Colt considered it a mission to find out more about her when no one else on set seemed to care. He just knew when he saw something in her house it would click like that.

---

At the Christmas party, Colt was eager to give her her present. He’d grown to really like her and he noticed her more on set. There was some kind of change in her that he couldn’t quite put his finger on. People talked behind her back still, but it was less about her being cold and her being ‘bossy’. Colt shrugged it all off because at the end of the day it really didn’t matter to him. His head kept turning instinctively towards the door every time someone came in, but she was nowhere to be seen. He almost decided to go home when he saw her walk in. Her hair was styled, but the curls were mostly deflated as she played with the ends at her shoulder. He waved at her and she caught his gaze, practically running over to him.

“Hi! So sorry I’m late,” she started to apologize to him, “I know I said I’d be on time…”

“It’s okay.” He smiled

“I just had to make sure my boyfriend, Nick… well he texted me that he had a flat tire…” She explained. Colt’s smile faded. He tried to pretend to be happy for her sake, but he hid the box behind his back.

“Is he okay?” He asked. It was polite, if a bit disinterested

“Yeah, he’s fine. He’s parking my car now.” She replied, looking over her shoulder

“That’s good. Glad you’re alright.”

“Thanks.” She smiled back at him. “Oh there he is.”

“I should let you go then…” He hesitated

“No, you two should meet, I think you’d really like him!” She pulled him over. “Hey hon.”

“There you are.” The other man pressed his lips onto her cheek once, then again on the other side. She hugged him tightly. It wasn’t personal, but Colt couldn’t help but see it as a reminder that she wasn’t his. From the looks of it, she’d never be his. After she pulled out of his reach, she turned to face Colt. She gestured towards her friend on set,

“Hon, this is Colt.”

“Nice to meet you.” Her boyfriend smiled back at him. He looked like he was in another world… Colt really couldn’t blame him. He held his hand out and Colt shook it loosely

“You as well,” He replied. He didn’t have much else to say to her boyfriend but he tried his best to keep a conversation going between the two of them while she went to grab a drink. She managed to find the person on the crew who she was Santa for and gave her her gift. They shared a quick hug and she came back to the two.

“I guess I should tell you, I was your Santa.” Colt rubbed at the back of his neck with his free hand

“Oh!” She smiled, “Thank you. I’m sure whatever you got me is nice. You don’t have to give it to me right now if you don’t want to.”

“Yeah, I seemed to misplace it…” He acted like he dropped it when he went to get a drink, but really he left it on the table everyone had discarded their presents on. “I was just gonna head out then. I’m all partied out.”

“Oh. Okay.” She nodded, “I get that… Let me see if I can find my present before you go though. I’ll just hold onto it.”

“Okay.” He smiled at her as she went to find his present. Sure enough, she found the little box and she brought it back with her

“I can’t wait to open it later.” She smiled as she held it between the palms of her hands

“Yeah, I hope you like it.” His words seemed to deflate as they left his lips. He turned around and left the party. He sat in his truck for a moment before riding home alone.

---

The next day that they needed him on set, production had promised it would be his last. He came in with thoughts running through his head. Would she be mad at him? Would she scream ‘how could you give me this’? He wasn’t sure how she’d react. Maybe he didn’t really know her enough to have wanted to ask her for a kiss. He walked into the studio and it felt like nothing had changed. He followed her directions, the scene was shot and it was time to go home. Before he could though, he felt a tug on his shirt sleeve from behind him.

“Hey.” She said

“Hi.” He replied

“I…”

“Listen. I’m sorry about my gift. I just thought that we were getting really close. And I was gonna ask you that night for a kiss.”

“I’m sorry.” She bit her lip, “We’d just gotten together a couple days before the party.”

“Oh.” His heart broke even more. “He seemed really nice though. I hope you’re happy.”

“I am now.” She nodded, “I… don’t think I would have been able to talk to him if we hadn’t met.”

“Oh.”

“That’s to say… I feel like I owe you something.”

“Whatever it is, let’s just call it even,” he took her hand off of him

“No I mean… Colt.”

“Yeah?”

“Maybe… maybe it could have worked out.” She said after a moment of silence lingered in between them. She leaned in and pressed her lips onto his. He pulled away from her and looked at her. He had to walk away otherwise he’d never be able to live with the feeling in his chest of tearing her away from her happy ending. He dryly laughed and said,

“Well at least we weren’t under the mistleto…” She pulled the gift box from out of her pocket and held it out for him to see. He turned his back on her and walked away. She didn’t try to chase after him. Maybe they were better off this way after all.

[qwertycake]

more qpr fluffy squishy platonic writing prompts! wahoo!! part two!!! :)

Same disclaimer applies as my first post - these are aro- and ace-spec centric, may only work for shortform fiction, and feel free to tweak them to be less specific/more specific to specific characters.

Specific is a weird word lol

Anyways…

“We both get caught out in the rain and wait out the weather under the same shelter, and either we’re meeting for the first time or we have a nice excuse to hang out together” AU

“You annotate a book for me and I annotate it right back for you, and we keep passing the book back and forth until its a mess of affectionate scribbles that we keep on the coffee table” AU

"It's hot outside and you love the heat but I hate it and you're being stupidly nice and sweet to me while I'm a grouchy mess" AU

"I can teach you how to play this instrument if you stop DISTRACTING ME by looking so ENDEARING AND INFATUATED" AU

"Keep Talking And Nobody Explodes" AU

"We're both too tired to take care of ourselves because of sickness/work/school/whatever but we immediately find the energy to take care of one another via making tea and grabbing blankets" AU

"We trade clothes for Halloween and do terrible impersonations of one another" AU

"We have a bunch of unfinished craft projects between the two of us and decide to just... finish them all in one day... 24 itty-bitty hours... oh boy..." AU

"We recreate a terrible low-budget movie together" AU

"On Valentine's Day, we decide to make a bunch of garlic bread and cake, and buy each other flowers in the colours of our respective aro-/ace-spec flags... and then the day after, we buy all the chocolate that's finally gone on sale" AU

“I teach you how to do make-up because for one reason or another you’re unfamiliar with it” AU

“Fake dating and having dramatic break ups over silly things in public for shits and giggles” AU

“So, the world might have just ended… so guess who has two thumbs and a bunker that desperately could use a roommate?” AU

“We’re made to play seven minutes in heaven at a party and after a few awkward minutes of silence we both decide to just order a pizza or something while we wait out the seven minutes” AU

“Hey, you can dance, and I can’t, teach me— no, I don’t care that I’ve got two left feet, teach me!” AU

“We’re both artists, maybe of different skill levels, and we decide to draw/paint/make art of each other” AU

“I’m a night owl and you’re more of a day person, so whenever we stop texting because you have to go to bed, I’m stuck laying awake thinking about you Please Enjoy Waking Up To A Bunch Of Messages” AU

“I’m a day person and you’re more of a night owl but I struggle to fall asleep because I’m stuck thinking about how lucky I am to be your friend Hey I Think I Could Stay Up For An Extra Ten Minutes” AU

“We’re both nervous about going to the gym alone so we try going together… but neither of us have the guts to get out of the car so we just go for a walk or something instead” AU

“You’re super into sports and exercise and I’m just getting into it but you hype me up so I’m less nervous about getting started” AU

“I bake a whole bunch, you cook big meals… at the same time of day - our kitchen is chaos” AU

“It’s New Year’s Eve and we’re hanging out at a party and everyone’s speculating that we’re gonna have our New Year’s Kiss together but the New Year comes and we just do a weird handshake” AU

“Non-Fatal Hanahaki Disease AU where we’re some of the few people who don’t experience it because we’re content with whatever non-romantic thing we have together… but we both have hay fever and are very annoyed by the constant barrage of flower petals around us and have to tell our friends to Please Stop Crushing On The Random Barista At Starbucks It’s The Third Time This Week You Are KILLING US” AU

“We’re both alien test subjects who’ve never met before and have to try and plan our escape - bonus points if the aliens are specifically testing for something like amatonormative like All Humans Fall In Love and we’re the black swans of the research since they apparently abducted Only Romantic Allosexuals Aside From Us Somehow” AU

“It’s midnight and you show up on my doorstep unannounced after a long while of us drifting apart, what on earth happened?” AU

“We’re both capable of granting wishes - you’re the monkey’s paw and I’m the guy who’s stuck remedying all the messed up things you have happen to people What Is Wrong With You” AU

And finally…

“I’m laying on the couch at a party drunk/high/exhausted/whatever and you’re looking after me, having only met me that night - I proceed to ramble about how embarrassed I’ll be when I’m older and think back to how I made a fool of myself in front of someone I wanted to be friends with really badly… but luckily for me, you’re flattered that I think you’re super cool” AU

[ofstoriesandstardust]

the one with the friendship bracelets (b.r.b.)

note: sunshine will forever be immortalized in the friendship bracelet i made her and i love their love so here is this. :)

warnings: a wee bit of jealous Bradley if you squint, future Bradley and Sunshine, swearing, kissing, i got a wee bit carried away

Snow crunched under your boots as you hurried across campus, tucking your chin tighter into your jacket. 

Despite the sunny skies and decent temperature, the wind went right through you, settling in your bones as you rushed towards the dining hall. Someone calls out your name as you arrive at the doors of the building. You turn, looking behind you to spot Blake rushing towards you. 

You offer him a smile as he climbs up the steps. “Hey Blake, it’s been a minute.” 

He nods, a bit breathless. “Yeah, well, you know how it is. Busy.” 

You nod, pushing the door open for him as he walks in behind you. The warm air hits you as the door shuts, something you welcome. “Yeah, totally get that. We should hang sometime if you aren’t too busy though. I miss seeing you.” 

He gives you a small smile. “Yeah, that’d be fun.” 

Someone calls your name and you both turn, spotting your friends waving you over. He follows you, if a bit hesitantly, as you look at them. “What are you doing?” 

In one of the open areas for students to hang out in the dining hall, SGA had set up tables with what appeared to be different crafts. Madison smiles, holding up a bracelet. “We’re making friendship bracelets. It’s for Valentine’s Day.” 

You nod, eyes scanning over the table at your friends bracelets. “Hey Sunshine, give me your wrist.” Bradley picks up your hand before you can even offer it to him, making a blush immediately crawl up your neck. Blake’s hand lands on your shoulder before you can address what Bradley is doing.

“Hey, I’m gonna go, but uh, we should catch up sometime, yeah?” 

You nod, giving him a smile. “Yeah, okay. Anytime, you just let me know!” 

Bradley tugs your arm, nodding his head down to your wrist. You glance down, missing the look Bailey and Tommy share across the table. “What- Oh my God.” 

On your wrist is a bracelet with blue and yellow beads, a charm that says sunshine in the middle. 

“I made you a friendship bracelet.” He says with a smile. “You were in class and I wanted to make sure you got one.” 

“Bradley, I-” Your throat closes up with how earnest he looked, with how happy he looked. 

You were not about to cry over a thread with some beads, god damn it. 

“Do you like it?” He asks softly, his smile turning a little nervous. 

“Bradley, I love it. This is so me, I- Thank you.” You say, blinking at how much the little craft meant to you. “Can I make you one?” He shrugs. 

“Sure. I gotta go to class though.” 

You nod, slipping your backpack off as the two of you trade seats. “Hey, what’re you doing for Valentine’s Day tonight?” 

You freeze, looking up to him. “Um, nothing. Why?” 

“Do you wanna come over to the house and get pizza or something? I think Tommy and Madison are coming. Eli has a date so I think Bailey will be gracing us with her presence too.” 

Bailey tosses him a look as your brain comes back online, trying to swallow the bitter disappointment lingering in the back of your throat that he hadn’t wanted to do something with you.

Just you. 

“Yeah, sounds fun.” 

He grabs his backpack from the floor and begins walk towards the door. You examine the beads, wondering which ones should go best for Bradley when you release the table has gone quiet.

“What?” You ask, looking up at them all. 

Tommy has a knowing smile of his face, shaking his head. “Nothing.” 

-

“That’s a cute bracelet.” 

You hum, looking down to the beads on your wrist. “Thank you Amelia. Bradley made it for me.” 

Penny smiles as she wipes down the countertop. “Tell us the story behind it?” 

You shrug, adjusting the bracelet on your wrist. 

You and Bradley were going out to dinner for Valentine’s Day tonight, and in a moment of panic about your outfit, had fled to the Hard Deck for Penny and Amelia’s opinion on your dress. 

“When we were at UVA together, he made it for me as part of a Valentine’s crafts thing our student government put on. I thought I had lost it just in moving so much, but I actually found it tucked in between some boxes of books when I moved out here. I must’ve thrown it in there and then forgotten about it. Are you sure I look nice?” 

Penny gives a soft laugh, shaking her head. “Yes, you look wonderful. Where’s Brad taking you?” 

You shrug again, fiddling with the jewelry on your wrist. “I don’t know. He won’t tell me.” 

“Well, you look lovely. Always do. He’ll love you no matter what.” 

“Yeah, I mean he liked you enough to marry you. Why are you nervous?” Amelia asks, doodling in the margins of her notebook. 

“It’s our first Valentine’s Day together and I want it to go well, I guess? I don’t know.” You groan, head resting in the palm of your hand. Penny takes your hands from over the bar, squeezing them. 

“You’re nervous because it’s still the first for you guys, even if you’ve been together for a while on paper. But he loves you, and you love him. And he loves you so much.” 

The bell at the door jingles, signaling a new arrival as she squeezes your hands once more before letting them go. “Thank you Penny.” You whisper, as a comfortable and familiar weight slides across your shoulders. 

“Hey sweetheart.” His voice rumbles in your ear as you look up to him. He’d changed at work before coming to the Hard Deck to pick you up, dressed in a nice pair of pants and dark blue polo. “You look pretty.” He comments, eyes traveling down your body as he takes in the dress you’re wearing. 

“Speak for yourself, handsome.” You respond, hands finding his belt loops as you pull him between your knees. 

He smiles, leaning down for a kiss when someone behind you gags. “Y’all are gross. Get a room.” 

Bradley’s eyes peak up from over your shoulder. “Hangman, you’re just mad because the only date you’ll be going on tonight is with your hand.” 

Even without turning around, you’re certain Hangman is offering Bradley a look that could kill as his—no, yours both now—friends laugh. Bradley smirks, his eyes travel back down to you when he catches sight of the bracelet on your wrist. 

“You’re wearing the bracelet I made you.” He whisper, sounding a bit breathless as his face softens. 

“Yeah well, you made it for me on Valentine’s Day and I don’t know- thought it was a nice touch.” 

“Guess we were on the same page.” He comments, causing you to look down to his wrist. 

There’s the red and black bracelet you had made for him, the wooden B in the middle. 

“B for Bradley.” You say, recalling what you had told him when you’d given the bracelet to over pizza. “You still have it?”

“Course I do.” He says, hazel eyes holding nothing but love. “And anyways, are we sure it’s not B for Blake?” He jokes, smirking.

You pause as you take a moment to realize who he’s referring to. “Why would it have been B for Blake?” 

He shrugs. “I don’t know, was pretty sure the two of you had a thing going for a while there.” 

You snort. “You’re being ridiculous. Blake and I never had a thing.” 

“Well, he had a thing for you.” 

“No, he didn’t?”

“Oh c’mon Sunshine, he so did.” 

You gape at him, confused by his words. “We were just friends.” 

“And we said the same thing for how many years?” 

“So true.” Fanboy mumbles from somewhere behind you, causing you to turn sharply. 

“Don’t encourage him.” 

Fanboy throws his hands up in defense, slinking to the other side of the bar. 

“He and I were actually just friends.” 

He nods, a skeptical look on his face. “Sure Sunshine. Whatever you need to tell yourself.” 

You huff, tugging at his arm as you slide off the barstool you’re sitting on. “Even if he had, what would it have mattered? You were the only one I had eyes for. You’re the only one I’ll ever have eyes for.” 

He smiles softly, moving some of your hair to adjust your necklace before leaning down to finally press a soft kiss to your lips. 

Although Bradley had kissed you countless times since the two of you had gotten together, you never stopped treasuring the ones that felt like how he had the first time. 

He’s kissed you silly, he’d kissed you while sleepy, he’d kissed you in the shower and while dancing around the kitchen, he’d kiss your cheek (and neck for that matter) any time he got the chance. 

But the times when he kissed you, full of passion and love, where everything went quiet and jstt felt safe and warm, were your favorite. 

You hoped they never stopped being your favorite. 

“I know, Sunshine.” He whispers as he pulls away. “I know.” 

[leopardom]

✨ sappy post incoming ✨

(and a little trigger warrning for the vague mention of suicide)

i’m not gonna do any gig reports for now because last week still feels like a fever dream and i can’t really put my thoughts in an order that makes sense. but i just wanted to stop by to say how much i love the vibes and creativity of this fandom and how happy everyone was when it came to meeting and trading/giving out their creations while queueing for the gigs or even when they were over

in Munich, Milan and Padova i got to meet so many people from here. with some of them i chatted more and with some others less. but in any case it absolutely warmed my heart to finally see all those people i see on tumblr but like, in real life! i got to trade my stickers for bracelets/stickers/art/fan stuff, got to see everyone have a good laugh because of my stuff and also got to complement people for their crafts. and i'm telling you i really meant every single word because as i already mentioned, i love the creativity of this fandom 💕

last weekend i began my trip with pretty much nothing on me and now i'm back home with a bag full of bracelets, a folder full of art and a heart so full i wanna cry. i mean look at that:

1) idek where to begin with the tags of the artists, i’m still confusion but i’ll try to come back to this post again later with a clearer mind

2) “big juicy” bracelet you will always be famous @greensolsikke <3

this last week was a tiring experience with many ups and downs but at the same time it was probably the best week of my life so far

i'm getting especially emotional about it all because this whole frenzy concided with my birthday (on the 29th of March). this may sound cringe or what, but on the actual day of my birthday and when everything was over, i was sitting alone on my hotel bed in Milan and was thinking how this last year of my life started in the worst way possible and how it was only escallating towards the worst every single day. during my 26 i reached a new level of low, a bottom lower than the one i had reached when i was 20-21 (and that was a bad bad time). and yes, there were a few times when i was close to ending it all because it was too much. my 26 was pretty much like hell

but now i'm glad i didn't give up and pushed through all the struggles. because if i hadn't, i wouldn't be able to experience last week. i wouldn't be able to see some of my dearest friends again, to meet all the amazing people from here and from twitter, to see one of my favourite bands perform for three nights in-a-row and to listen to all my fave songs of theirs live and even cry my eyes out to some of them (Barve Oceana in Munich, Padam in Milan and Metulji in Padova really were an Experience). can safely say that my 26 ended with a bang and it was a very good one 😌

i'm feeling sad that this is over but at the same time i'm so warm inside and so happy that it happened. and i would do it all over again, especially if it meant meeting you all again or meeting even more of you from in here. i have never felt so welcome by people who technically only knew me as a tumblr user and i never thought this would happen, considering how awkward i am when it comes to interacting with people online and in real life

anyway i think i've talked too much and i'm slowly loosing my train of thought because the thoughts and emotions are so many right now. i just wanna thank each and every single one of you for making the past week so special and one of the best weeks of my life. i'm beyond gratefull 💖

sincerely, the curly head with the meme stickers 🫶