#I'm always willing to sacrifice to spend time with the people I love but it feels like others don't feel the same

[neverendingford]

.

[intuitively-her]

You've been through many trials and tribulations that have only made you stronger! I'm getting specifically that you don't look like the things you've been through. From the outside, you actually look perfect, or your lifestyle does. People would never know the sacrifices it took for you to get here though. Most people wouldn't have even made it through some of the obstacles that you've faced. I also get the vibe that you're very reserved with your energy. Kinda like you don't speak unless spoken to. Not in a bad way though. You could be an ambivert. ENTJ? INFJ? You don't have to do the most to get attention, it comes natural to you. You know how to stand alone. Never been a "follow the leader" type. Your balance and stability are surprising as well. It could be because of your age. Or maybe you used to live a reckless lifestyle but managed to pull yourself out of it. I feel like you have a tendency to go ghost for awhile, but then randomly pop out on some new sh*t. People can never keep up with you. You're an enigma. It kinda frustrates people tbh.😂 On the flip side, you are very loving to those closest to you. You always trust yourself and follow your heart to wherever it leads you. You are your top priority and will always make sure your cup is full before giving to someone else. If your love is not being reciprocated, then you will simply leave. Your love is intense.❤️‍🔥 You could be a gift-giver or you enjoy doing acts of kindness. You always know what to do/say at the right moment. Lastly, your star qualities are VERY attractive to others.🤩 You're so humble about it too. You could be an influencer or have an active presence on social media. You have a lot of copycats and people that try to emulate your energy. It never really sticks though.

Confirmations: Confident, Intellectual, 777, Sarcastic, Smart-ass, Mixed signals, Intimidating, 1010, Charming, Promiscuous, Friendly, Competitive, Creative

You always find a way to turn your pain into power! It doesn't matter how many hardships you face, you never let it keep you down. You're always onto the next best thing. Always looking towards the future. Someone here likes to take solo-trips often or you enjoy hiking/being in nature. You often come up creative ideas or new ways to make money. Always willing to learn something new. That trait of yours is highly admired by your bosses/higher-ups. You work very well with others. When people work with you, it quite literally increases their luck and money flow. So be mindful of who you share that energy with. You are such a kind and loving individual, even at your lowest. Give yourself more credit boo!❤️ You're very committed to your self-improvement and personal goals no matter what you go through. That's something to be proud of.

Confirmations: Famous, Sexy voice, 111, Friendly, Funny, Someone here has a cat that is very clingy, 444, Pretty skin, Hermoine from Harry Potter, Elusive, Life of the party, Genuine, Beautiful, Seeing 8's everywhere, Someone here owns an exotic animal or you want one

You know how to transmute any negative energy/situation that is sent your way. You are an alchemist. This is my witchy pile.🔮 You like to play fair and see both sides in situations. Very unbiased. However, you'll also put a b*tch in their place if needed. Cause I'm getting that people like to come into your energy to test/bully you for some reason. But you shut that sh*t down real quick.✅ You may be very introverted, or you have this innocent/naive vibe to you. A lot of people blindly trust you. They know you would never try to cross them. You're a big risk taker. You might do something unconventional for work. People love how you march to the beat of your drum always. You might spend a lot of time alone or you keep a close-knit group of friends. You're not afraid to stand alone whatsoever. Nobody can steal your happiness. That is what's most powerful about you.⭐

Confirmations: Genuine, 911, 818, Mysterious, Intoxicating, 717, Witch, Self-absorbed, Pretty eyes, 737, 777, Uptight, Predator, Intellectual, Elusive

You're more than what meets the eye. From the outside, you seem very shy or monotonous even. But you're a true gem baby.💎Your charisma and charm is one of a kind. You stand out without even realizing it. Your wit and sarcasm is very attractive. You have a very unbothered vibe to you. In your own lane, and outta the mix. It makes me think of "Daria". You might go ghost pretty often. You're very big on self-care and your alone time. On the go a lot. ✈️People feel like they can't get ahold of you anymore. You're very focused on self these days. Me vs. me kinda energy. You're a natural creator. Very artistic and out of the box. You might've been this way since childhood. You're often the topic of discussion to those around you. People really enjoy having you around, whether you know this or not. You're a sweetheart once you truly open up. People feel lucky that they took the time to get to know you. You're a true friend.🩷

Confirmations: Clingy, 111, Wife, Light skin tone, 222, One night stand, Player, 999, Mixed signals, Addict, Psychic, Lazy, Outgoing, Eccentric

💖Please do not copy, repost, or steal my work. Thanks!💖

I missed you guyss xx!!🩷🩷🩷

[koolades-world]

Hi, I love your writing - I was wondering if you could write about an MC who's sleep deprived? They're not an insomniac, they just lack sleep almost the the point of when RAD begins or even just awake up until then.

I see people keep talking about MC who have good sleep schedules.. But I'm not one of them, and I'm just curious as to how the brothers would react to them being up so late.

(Actually, it's 8 am for me rn and I still haven't slept..)

hi! sure thing :)

enjoy <3

Sleep Deprived Mc

Lucifer

if you think this man isn't sleep deprived himself, what are you doing

he's so dadcore. he himself could sleep more but scolds you for doing the same thing

however, his door is always open

if you just want to sit in his office while he does work, he wouldn't mind

Mammon

sometimes, he would occasionally stay up late (on accident)

but after you arrived in the devildom, his sleep schedule took a turn for the worse

basically, when you were awake, he was awake. when you were asleep, he was asleep

although, he'd often fall asleep on you while trying to stay awake with you. this is always your window to take tons of cute pictures <3

Levi

you're in it together bestie

whatever you're doing, even if it's just mindless scrolling

you can do it with him!

he won't try to stop you either lol. he's levi, not a hypocrite

Satan

he's another brother who doesn't want to admit he has poor sleep habits (like father like son)

often he accidently stays up reading

sometimes, a book is just too good to put down, and you just need to continue

he's got a potion somewhere that'll solve both of your lack of energy

Asmo

he's definitely the one who's always on you about your poor sleep schedule

beauty rest is important!

he's probably going to try everything until it's time for him to go to sleep

sorry, but he's not going to sacrifice his own rest. you're welcome to join him though, as long as you don't wake him up

Beel

he often wakes up in the middle of the night to snack

so, you might meet in the kitchen late in the night

he's more than willing to share with you if you want

he doesn't mind spending as much time as you want him to with you

Belphie

as the king of sleeping, he doesn't quite understand you

why would you choose to stay up like that?

no matter the case, he's dragging you to bed with him whether you like it or not

you can sleep, or don't. he just wants you as his pillow haha

[hollowingearth]

I'm sorry but the more I think about the Rebirth ending the more I love it actually like. The whole trilogy has been a meta commentary of sorts and, specially, Aerith's death is at the epicenter of it. She both dies and doesn't die exactly because us, as an audience, want both things to happen.

People have been clamoring to be able to save Aerith since 1997, there were fake hidden hacks, AU fictions, retellings, everything. Everyone has been at Squeenix's doorsteps begging them to let us save her. Like, it's at a point where the "Square will let us save Aerith if you pay for the DLC" joke is much more than a decade old.

On the other side, there's this very expressive unwant for any change whatsoever from the source material. It's not a feeling that is exclusive to FF7 either, there's this very clear pushback against any new remake/adaptation that deviates, even slightly, from it's original. People don't want new content, they want the old one they experienced when they were younger, but prettier, they want to both feel the nostalgia and experience everything as if for the first time again.

From that camp, I think the most prominent argument is that FF7 is about loss, right? And they're not wrong. Aerith's death is the crux of the story, it's the very thing that made FF7 as known as it is, there would be no actual weight to what it's trying to tell if the heroine doesn't die in the middle of it, an unexpected, hurtful, avoidable death. What's the point of a narrative about grief if you can just... avoid losing someone? Avoid having it be cruelly taken from you?

And yet, you see, if want someone to die, if you want something to be taken from you, are you really losing it? In the original, part of the impact was that no one could see it coming, it was a straight representation about how death is sudden and takes away opportunity from you. Aerith doesn't go into the sleeping forest willing to make a sacrifice for the greater good, she has barely started her adventure, she makes a promise to go on the highwind, the group is one location away from finding out more about her ancestry and her family.

That's not true for the remake, tho. Everyone knows about her fate, about what is going to happen to her. That's probably the most spoiled moment in video game history. I personally knew about her death before I truly understood what Final Fantasy even was. So now we have an audience that is extremely aware of what, when and how her death is going to happen. That's why the Confluence of Worlds is put at that moment, because it's the single most expected moment in the entire triology, it's the one moment that made the narrative resonate so well.

The impact is impossible to recreate now, even for newer fans of the series. People want a 1:1 retranslation but such a thing would always be a gimmicky shadow of it's original. It's why the focus shifts, now the most emotionally impactful scene is not the killing of her but of her goodbye, in the church after the dream date. "Thank you," Aerith echoes "It's been fun", a callback to her conclusion on Remake where she says "I'm grateful for all the words we shared. All the moments and the memories. You've made me more happy than you know."

So she dies and she doesn't, both at the same time. Effectively in limbo now, narratively explained by lifestream shenaningans. We put her there ourselves, by refusing to move on, refusing to accept her death but also refusing to change, allowing a different outcome. I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing, at least, Aerith's words sound like the very sincere feelings of the developers, who are grateful for all the love we all have powered into their work all these years.

I just love it so much, I could spend hours talking about it.

[amomentsescape]

Its me again! The Riddler and penguin simp >:] Can I request a Reader x Riddler/Oswald (they will be separate) where reader saves them from a dangerous situation. I was thinking hurt/comfort kind of thing but I will leave it to you

Reader Saving Oswald and Edward

Oswald Cobblepot x Reader, Edward Nygma x Reader (Separate)

Warnings: Mentions of blood, guns, bombs, violence, & foul language

A/N: Hopefully you're okay with these written as headcanons!

Oswald Cobblepot

Your safety had always been his number one priority

So he made you promise early on that if anything were to happen to him, you'd run far far away

He'd sacrifice his life for you, but he'd never want you to do the same

However, that promise was tested when you happened to be at the right place at the right time

You overheard some hushed voices around the corner

And although you would have normally ignored it, you heard your partner's name fall from their lips

They were discussing the next hit, and it happened to be the one person you weren't willing to risk

And so that fateful night, you ran towards Oswald's club, trying to get there to warn him before it was too late

But unfortunately, shots were already echoing throughout the air by the time you had arrived

You knew that if you ran in there, you'd be risking your life for his

You'd be breaking the vow you made

But as another shot rang out, the decision was made

You sprinted in the building and kept your head low

You searched everywhere until you saw a small trail of blood leading into a dark corner

On instinct, you followed it

And you immediately found Oswald propped up against the wall, a bloody wound in his shoulder

The moment his eyes found yours, his tired gaze became terrified

"No, no, no! Get out of here! Leave!" he yelled at you

You'd never seen him so angry with you before

"I'm getting you out of here!" you replied

You helped him up and despite his fear, he let you do so

You managed to lead him out the back, thankful for the first time ever that the GCPD were there to distract the gunmen

And the moment you had him outside, he was pulling away from you, staring at you with wide eyes

"What the hell were you thinking? You were supposed to be at home! You could have gotten yourself killed!"

You began to tear up at this

"You could have died, Oswald!" you shouted back

"Better me than you!"

Your sobs finally broke through the night

"I can't lose you! Please, please, don't be mad..." your voice cracked

And with that, his anger dropped

"I-I'm sorry, my dear," his voice quiet, "I just don't know what I would do if something happened to you"

You shook your head, "And that's how I feel towards you"

He finally pulled you into a warm embrace with his good arm, shushing you

"You've saved my life in every way. I'm sorry"

You kissed him at that, finally beginning to lead him out of the alley

Edward Nygma

As intelligent as The Riddler was, there was still a part of him that was just Ed

The Ed who loved you and wanted to protect you at all costs

So when the police showed up one night and threatened to take you away to Arkham for helping him, he gave in

He turned himself in to protect you

You remember the screams and tears you let out, the cursing towards the police as they took him away

His sad eyes just stared back at you

That pain truly didn't compare to anything you had experienced in the past

He had already been to the asylum before, and he refused to have you endure everyone and everything there

That is why you knew you had to save him

He'd likely spend the rest of his life in there if nothing was done

Would he be upset? Yes

Would he likely berate you for being so careless? Absolutely

But you knew he'd do it for you

It took weeks of planning and meetings with some not-so-great people

But you found a way

During one of the guard's rotations, you planted the bomb on the nearest wall

And the moment it went off, all hell broke loose

Inmates were laughing and yelling as they sprinted through the hole

Guards were already shouting and beginning to make their way to the sight

But you waited

And right before it seemed doomed, he stepped through

His eyes found yours instantly, and you could see his eyes flash between disbelief, worry, and anger

He immediately began running with you until you were far enough away

And the moment you stopped, he gripped his hands around your arms

"You must be insane! What were you thinking?!" he spat at you

"I couldn't just let you rot in there!"

"Well, now you certainly have a warrant out against you! It wasn't worth it!"

You hugged him in response, the tears making it impossible to respond any further

"Please, Ed. You would have done the same for me."

He slightly relaxed at this, knowing you were right

"Just- please don't do something like this again. Promise me"

You looked up at him and slowly shook your, causing him to furrow his brows

"I can only make promises I'll keep, Ed," you softly smiled

[yuri-is-online]

Can we hear your thoughts on Leona! Yutu?

Since Leona died fighting the Phantom, Yutu obviously wouldn't have met him, and I'm wondering about your ideas between what Leona became after NRC, how the loss of Yuu affected him, Leona's death, and Yutu's opinion of him before and after meeting him. I had an errant idea of Leona having Died a Hero's Death and then when Yutu meets him it's like, "THIS is the guy my parent was willing to spend the rest of their life with???"

Anyway yeah. As a Leona Simp, I would much appreciate anything you write.

Does he like cats... you know I have always sort of seen Leona has having a petty rivalry with Grim because he thinks he should be the King Cat, so the image of Leona! Yutu lying in a field with a bunch of cats is sort of a perfect contrast. I like it: Leona! Yutu absolutely loves cats and they love him.

notes: they/them used for Yuu, for context on the fyuuture kid au can be found here and here. You can find even more stuff for it on my masterlist under the series section.

Leona and and his position in the kingdom's line of succession... Based off my understanding of what we see in the Tashmina event I think the Savanna would prioritize protecting their royal family over a lot, something that pissed Leona off. He went to fight the King of Beast's phantom because he saw it as a problem he made and that he needed to take responsibility for sure, but also because he had no faith in his brother to do anything meaningful about it. I want to say that his brother wanted to enshrine Leona as a hero for his sacrifice, but that this decision was very unpopular with his advisors so he was buried in the Elephant Graveyard without much fanfare. He is an extremely popular figure with the hyenas, as is Ruggie. They see him as restoring the Kingdom's honor in a way by defeating the false king, something no other country in the apocalypse can claim, but things are still rough since they can't rely on tourism anymore and the blot has been making the weather really unpredictable, leading to bad harvests and starving people.

If Yuu was Leona's... losing them wouldn't have a noticeable affect on him but it was a massively crushing blow. We know he hates his unique magic because turning things to sand is a curse in the Savanna, but did it really have to be his own family this time? The family he got in spite of himself, the one fucking person who chose him no matter how much he snapped at them and tried to convince them to see him for what he was; a worthless dead end that would only hurt them. And what's worse is he knows that whoever took them had his brother's cooperation.

"Couldn't let me have this one fucking thing could you?" He's laughing as he says it and not even the irritation in his sister in law's eyes makes him back down. "Stuff it. I ain't stupid enough for whatever line you got fed and I don't care about your justifications. You're gonna have to live with this one on your own, Falena. Just like I have to."

He refuses to talk to his other family after that. No matter who is asking or making demands, taking Yuu and Yutu away from him is just one step too far. His brother probably thought that Yuu would be allowed to come home and that's why he let them go, but that's not exactly an excuse Leona would be willing to accept from anyone, let alone the supposed leader of a state. He almost feels relived when the blot phantoms start wreaking things, Leona might just want to sleep until you come to wake him up again but fighting things gives him an excuse to get his mind off things. Dying is a relief, he doesn't have to deal with Idia's whining or living without you any longer than he already has. His only regret is that he had to take Ruggie with him.

I really love this fanart and head cannon fima11 had of Leona's hair being light when he was born, and the color getting darker as he grows, so the idea of something similar happening with Leona! Yutu when he's born is really sweet. Leona's hair sort of resembles a mane, it'd be cute if Leona! Yutu's did the same. And genetics are already so weird I don't think any earth doctors would like too much of it.

Leona! Yutu is a sleepy boy. His hobby is napping and his favorite place in the whole wide world is his bed. He has a bad habit of laying face first in his pillows because he snores pretty loudly and he doesn't want to wake anyone up, which sort of makes him look like he has passed out as opposed to just settled down for a good snooze.

Because he is being raised by a single parent in the human world and not a bunch of gossipy servants hired by emotionally neglectful royalty, Yutu is significantly less entitled than Leona is. He has good sense with his money and can work hard, he just has a bit of a problem with resting bitch face that leaves people thinking he is rude. And to be fair? If someone is testing his patience then he really can be. Apple didn't fall far from the tree, Yutu is absolutely brutal when people test his patience.

Yuu's memories of Leona don't exactly help with his perceived behavior problems, they recall Leona's catty personality and how rude he could be, but that he was so remarkably clever and so very strong, that they were in awe of him sometimes. I think they would mention that he struggled with depression due to a difficult upbringing and feel a need to make sure Yutu felt appreciated and like he could do anything he set his mind to, no matter who he was born as. Yutu just takes that to mean that being a bitch runs in the family and he fully intends to ride that excuse to the bank.

It's a nice thought but Yutu feels a bit conflicted by it. He has no doubt that Yuu will always love and support him, but other people? Yuu might be able to ignore what their neighbors say about them but Yutu can hear them loud and clear. They think Yuu's amnesia is an act, and that he's a weirdo freak. Not to mention they don't have any money so even if he wanted to be a doctor or something like that going to school would be a bit of a pain, even with his grades. He finds school to be boring, and even when he gets bullied by one of the coaches in to taking up a sport because of how strong he is it doesn't help much.

I could see him being very into space and astronomy because he feels like he doesn't belong in your world. He knows a lot of downright stupid stuff about UFO sightings and aliens even though he doesn't believe in them. He is SO DISAPPOINTED when Twisted Wonderland turns out to have no conspiracy theories to talk about, can't think the moon landing was faked if you never had one after all. If the world wasn't literally ending he would be pushing for the Sunset Savanna to win the space race, c'mon guys it is in our name everything the light touches totally expands to the stars-

Like the other beastmen Yutus he maintains his instincts, even in your world. He is extremely territorial about his things and especially your home. Like Cater! Yutu, he has strong feelings of nostalgia for your world, but unlike him it has nothing to do with the monsters or hardships. Lions just tend to stay in the same place for a long time so moving to entirely different world and ecosystem makes him feel weird, even if he prefers his beastfolk body to his human one.

Gets put in Savanaclaw by the mirror. He might like space but his preferred type of argument is rearranging someone's dental work before asking them to explain themselves. He'd be terrible at defending a thesis.

Leona! Yutu's place in the Sunset Savanna hierarchy is tricky. I think, as Yutu is his brother's child, Falena would want some sort of relationship with him as he does clearly love his brother. What makes that hard is that as far as the government is concerned, Leona is dead and that's the end of his part of the family line. Acknowledging that he had a son could further destabilize the already tense political situation in the Savanna since Leona's sacrifice is already a point of conflict between the royal family and a portion of their people. While Crewel has no problem telling Yutu about his father since he has a right to know, the fact that he is technically a prince is completely hidden from him for a long time.

We haven't really played with this idea yet, but I sort of like Leona having a ghost that hangs around his grave sometimes. Idia arranges for Yutu to go there on a day he thinks he'll be hanging around and while Yutu doesn't get to talk to his father he does get to see him and the look of pride in his eyes when the grumpy lion realizes who he is. Leona gets to pass on and be with Yuu while Yutu gets a lesson from his cousin about the concept of the great Kings living on in the sky and how the past lives on in him. Because while Cheka understand his dad's concerns like hell is he not going to meet his favorite cousin. His enthusiasm is really exhausting to Yutu, he appreciates the fact that someone has nice things to say about his dad but he isn't too sure how much he trusts this guy.

Oh right one more thing, I don't want to say each of the Savanaclaw boys would pass their magic on to their Yutu's so if we ever get around to Jack he won't, but Leona should pass on King's Roar to his kid. Causing a drought might be considered a curse but I want to say Leona! Yutu wears it with pride. He loves his roar and that despite all the effort put in to erasing Leona from existence he still lives in him. His head is fit to wear the crown, no matter what anyone says.

Leona clocks what Yutu is the instant he steps out of the portal. It's all in the kid's scent and what runes he used to make the jump. He takes some time to think about what it could mean and comes to a few conclusions. Firstly, if he has a kid with you then he will always have some sort of relationship with you, no not in the yandere possessive way (mostly), he just knows enough about himself and his wants to know that having a kid would not be something he did by accident. If he did that at some point in the future it would be because you were going to stay with him forever and he actually believed that. Something that clearly did not get to happen because of how protective Yutu is of his parent.

Yutu was a bit confused if he should go about interacting with his dad or even ask about him so you can imagine his surprise when he stops by Ramshackle to see Leona half asleep on the couch.

"Oh sorry Yuu isn't here-"

"I know." Leona doesn't even open his eyes, and is he seriously wearing his shoes on the couch? Yuu would kill him for that it's so unsanitary.

"Um. Ok I'll just leave you be the-"

"Why'd you travel back in time?" Oh Leona's eyes are open now and there is something about that stare that's nailing Yutu to his spot and tempting his tail between his legs. His dad must notice because he laughs and shakes his head. "Seriously? If that's all it takes to scare you shitless we really are fucked."

Leona doesn't outright say he knows he's his dad, but Yutu gathers that's probably the case from the difference in his attitude around him compared to everyone else. There's a degree of coldness and severity to Leona when he's giving orders that really isn't present when he's talking to him about overblots or his theories about who is responsible for the bad future. He's almost playful about it, like he is messing with a cub. Which Yutu supposes that he is but still, he doesn't like being treated like a kid. Something he very much regrets telling Leona because holy shit his dad is strong just like Yuu said he was.

I think Leona would make him play chess against him a lot. You can learn a lot about a person by playing chess with them, and since it's something Leona really likes to do he would enjoy sharing it with his son. I think he would also get a kick out of seeing Yutu get really competitive with him about it. Maybe there is some lion in this kid after all.

Leona also makes a subtle effort to teach him about how the court of the Sunset Savanna works. I think Leona would sort of enjoy the fact that his kid didn't grow up as royalty just because it meant he was free of the pressures that he had, but hate everything else he learned about Yutu's childhood. It inspires him to think a bit deeper about how he is going to address this when Yutu is born in this timeline, though he is admittedly lacking on solutions beyond refusing to die this time. He must have been really far gone to even consider making a heroic sacrifice that's not like him at all.

He does get the appeal of his father sort of? Sure he's lazy, but he is extremely intelligent and clearly a lot more knowledgeable about literally everything than Yutu thought he was. When they're working together he sees a very impressive person and reliable leader. When he sees Leona interact with you he has questions. Why do you let him pick fights with you so often? Yutu can tell he's making heart eyes at how you fight back but that's because he's a beatman himself so he can read his body language. And he's not crazy about how he orders you around because if his father is a Prince... wouldn't that mean by marrying him you would also be royalty? He is so confused...

Meanwhile Leona isn't rushing things just because he knows you return his feelings at some point. He wants you to choose to be with him of your own free will, wants the feeling that comes with knowing you did that and he is willing to play the game to get that. Every milestone he reaches is so much sweeter for knowing that he got you on his efforts alone, crappy attitude and all.

The reveal to Yuu, much like the reveal to Yutu is extremely mundane. Leona invites you to spend the night with him sometime after you get together and he asks you while you're curled up on his chest and he's holding you just a bit too tight (not because he's afraid you'll run, not at all) how you would feel if you could never go home.

"A little upset." Because you had resigned yourself to the possibility a long time ago now. There's a chance you're only in Twisted Wonderland because you died in your world anyway, might as well be grateful you're still kicking. "And if you stayed and things went bad here, would you still be alright with that?" You don't hesitate at all to his surprise. "I think I'd be safe if I was with you." Well he really hates to prove you wrong but you still deserve to know.

Leona is weirdly quiet in his anger. He roars sure, but that's to exert control. When he's mad he just gets smug and says a lot of hurtful stuff. He leaves the screaming to Yuu, and I could see a Yuu that got with Leona only to learn they didn't get to spend the rest of their life with him doing a lot of screaming. Preventing the apocalypse is a team effort now but first Yutu and Leona are getting scolded for not letting Yuu in on the secret sooner. Leona is down bad horrendous and Yutu wants to die, he hates making you mad.

If I had to make a list of characters I would trust to find a solution to an apocalypse, Leona would actually be pretty close to the top. He is going to bitch about it the entire way, but if he were given the facts before things went too sideways, I think he would be able to make a good plan to set them straight. And there is no way anyone is going to tell him that he managed to have something as precious to him as Yuu taken away from him and not have him do something about it. He'll swallow his pride and take his licks when he has to, but not on this. Never on this, whoever thought he'd just roll over and die is going to shatter in his hands and be like dust on the wind. He really hopes they have enough sense to be prepared....

[redravenblogs]

I can't stop thinking about what an incredible episode "Children of Time" was in how it explored a number of the characters, and I might expound on them later, but I'm particularly transfixed with Odo's arc. For the entirety of the series up to this point, his two defining personality traits are his sense of justice and his profound loneliness, and the writers used both of those to deliver a precision gut punch to the audience.

That profound loneliness is magnified in this 200-years-older version of Odo. He has been waiting and hoping for so long for this brief chance to see Kira again. He probably couldn't even hold his form when she died in his timeline, so he never had the opportunity to tell her how much she mattered to him, or even to say goodbye. He's been living with that for two centuries.

In light of that, what does the staunchness of his past self matter? What did it ever get him? That's why he's so quick to tell her how much he loved her. Loves her.

They get to spend a precious day and a half together before she decides she must sacrifice herself, and he begins desperately and hopelessly trying to convince her not to. Then he asks her: would things have been different between us if you'd known I loved you all along?

When she says "maybe," you can see his heart fucking break all over again. Because he suddenly knows what was possible, even by the slimmest chance, but he's losing her all over again- she has to be thrown 200 years in the past to die so he and his society can continue existing.

And then she kisses him!

SHE is the one who leans in for it!!

And that's the turning point. Because he knows that if she and the rest of the crew make it back to DS9, his past self has a fighting chance to escape the loneliness that has always defined him. His other self has the possibility of something better, even if he is bound to lose her either way. That's why this other Odo is willing to eliminate himself and everyone else on the planet from existence in order for Kira to live. So when everyone else is planning on a noble self-sacrifice, he chooses to be selfish for once.

(Arguably, making it so that 8000 people never existed isn't the same as killing them - one of the big moral quandries of the episode, but I wonder if Odo wouldn't have burned that whole planet to ashes if that's what it took to save her.)

When our Odo is linked with by the alternate timeline Odo, he suddenly knows everything. He knows every single person that lived on that planet. He knows the pain of living for 200 years filled with a regret and loneliness unlike he'd ever experienced before. He knows the fate he narrowly escaped (and was utterly helpless to have any control over). And he suddenly knows what it's like to kiss the woman he's been in love with for ages! And he understands. Because now he also knows hope. A hope so wonderful and so terrible that the other Odo would go to such great lengths for it.

That's why even in the face of Kira's outrage at the great injustice of it all, he can't give her a straight answer when she asks if he thinks what the other Odo did was right. Two hundred years of XP has just downloaded into his brain and is exerting its gravitational pull on his sense of just and unjust... Not to mention he's had his deepest secret revealed to the person who he least wanted to know.

Until now, he's never even opened his mouth about his own feelings because his sense of lawfulness extended to not even creating ripples on the surface of the social status quo. But he's suddenly been blursed with the understanding of how the other Odo has benefitted him. (Wingman of all time?)

The tension between what he's always thought is right and what his gut is telling him he wants now is so delicious to me. His sense of justice is suddenly much more flexible than he ever thought because of the possibility of not being lonely anymore. Finally belonging. It's maybe the most humanizing experience the audience has seen him go through - even more so than being stuck as a solid for a while, I think.

[bookworm551]

Of Duty and Desire | Chapter 1 | Neteyam x Metkayina!reader

He glanced away for a moment and clenched his jaw. When he looked back at you, you could see the frustration burning in his face. "I just-" he paused, staring at you intensely. "I've never wanted anything as much as I want you."

—————

Summary: You are the tsakarem of the Metkayina, promised to Aonung, and you have settled into your role nicely. Everything is as it should be until a family of Omatikaya refugees arrives, and the eldest son causes you to reconsider everything

A/N: I have been working on this piece for a while, but I literally had to rewrite this like four times so whoops. I appreciate all the love on my last fic, so hopefully y’all enjoy this too :) also, after this part I’m aging up the characters lol. Part 1 of idk

Neteyam x fem Metkayina!readers

5.8k words

Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Epilogue

Freedom is oftentimes the sacrifice demanded by duty.

The privilege of choosing how to live one's life is swept away by the responsibilities one has to their family, their friends, or their people. You thought you understood the weight of duty when you became the tsakarem of the Metkayina, but you soon realized thereafter that the cost was higher than what you were willing to pay.

In the months following their arrival, you had gotten close to the forest children. You loved spending time with Tuk. She was bright and full of wonder, and she never failed to make you laugh with her occasional sassy remark. Lo'ak was determined and a fast learner, and you were constantly amused by his poorly-hidden attraction to your best friend, Tsireya. You became fast friends with Kiri due to her deep connection with Eywa and interest in healing.

But there was something about your relationship with Neteyam that was different from all the others. In the few short months you had known each other, your friendship had grown much faster than you had expected. He was kind and respectful, and he always knew how to make you laugh. He was as close to you as the friends you had known your whole life.

You had first met him one day rather unexpectedly after their arrival. You were under the cover of the healing tent when you heard someone approach from outside. You were surprised to find the oldest Sully waiting expectantly while gripping his wrist tightly. He dropped his grip in order to offer you the customary greeting of his hand to his forehead before immediately returning to hold his wrist again.

You offered the gesture back to him before asking, "Is everything alright?" He gave an embarrassed smile and said, "I touched a plant in the water with my hand, and now it burns. I was told to come here for a remedy." You knew immediately what it was, and you offered him a sympathetic look. Taking his hand, you inspected it to confirm your suspicion.

"We learn at a young age not to touch the sea nettle," you told him with a faint smile. "Think of it as a rite of passage." His lips turned upwards at your words. "Then I suppose I'm one step closer to becoming Metkayina," he joked. You chuckled as you searched for the treatment for nettle.

While he waited for you, he sat down on the floor and said, "I do not believe we have met before. I am Neteyam." You cast a brief glance over your shoulder with a smile. "I know who you are, Neteyam te Suli," you told him. "But you are right, we have not met. I suppose that is my fault, I have been very busy since you arrived." After finding the correct bowl, you sat down across from him and introduced yourself properly.

"You are the tsakarem, yes?" Neteyam clarified as you took his hand to inspect it for any remaining nettles. "I am," you confirmed, trying not to appear proud or arrogant in the title. "I spend much of my time here in the village. I have been able to become acquainted with your mother and sisters, though you and your brother seem rarely to leave the water."

Neteyam nodded with a small smile. "We have been learning so much," he told you. "It is all still so new to us." You hummed in understanding. "You seem to be adjusting well to the reef," you observed.

Before he could respond, you took the small bowl of oil and held it above his hand. "This will sting at first," you warned. He nodded, and you poured a small amount over his palm. As you had predicted, he tensed at the pain, and you could see the muscles in his arms flex reactively. He took a deep breath and relaxed as the pain ebbed away.

Carefully, you took your thumbs and rubbed them down his palm. "Let me know if I am hurting you," you told him quietly. He remained silent as you massaged the oil into his hand. You felt his eyes on your face, so you glanced up at him. He didn't look away, keeping his amber eyes fixed on your face, and he offered you a soft smile. You were only able to hold his gaze for a few seconds before becoming slightly embarrassed, and you quickly looked back down at your hands again.

"It feels much better," he said after a moment. "I'm glad," you replied earnestly. "I haven't touched sea nettle since I was very young, but I remember the sting of it very well." He nodded his head with an ironic grin. "I don't think I will forget this any time soon," he agreed.

You continued working the oil into his skin for a moment, and you still felt his eyes on your face, though you didn't look up at him again until you were finished. Dropping his hand, you said, "Try to avoid nettle in the future. We usually save the remedy for children, but I made an exception for you this time."

He grinned at you. "I am very grateful," he told you, placing his hand over his heart. "And I will take more care in the future." Smiling at him, you replied, "I hope so. I don't want to have to patch you up every day."

He looked at you in amusement. "I'm sure there are worse ways to spend the day," he teased. You shook your head with a small laugh. "Perhaps," you conceded. "But there are certainly more productive things to do as well."

"Thank you," he said as he moved to stand up. "I will see you later tonight?" You blinked in surprise. You saw him every night during the evening meal from afar, but since you had never spoken to him before, you were surprised at his forwardness.

"I suppose," you replied, then added with a smirk, "That is unless you hurt yourself again before then." He gave you a cheeky smile. "No promises," he responded playfully.

You saw the forest boy more often after that. Sometimes he would come in claiming to be searching for his mother and then stay and talk with you. Other times, he would come in with scrapes and cuts not severe enough to warrant Ronal's expertise, but deep enough to justify seeing you for help.

Sometimes, you wondered if he was getting hurt on purpose. You didn't mind though. He was sweet and enjoyable, and he always told you stories of himself and his siblings in the forest. You knew he missed it very much, but he hid his longing behind all the funny tales of his family.

One person who was wary of your friendship with Neteyam and his family was Aonung. He had his mother's distrusting nature as well as her pride, and as his intended mate, you knew he wasn't happy with how close you had become to them. He never said anything directly to you, but he would drop subtle comments about them when you were around. Whenever you were helping teach the forest children, he watched closely for how you interacted with them. You could feel the tension between him and the Sullys, and it all came to a head about two months after they had arrived at the reef.

You were sorting things when you heard a commotion outside. You looked out in confusion before Aonung pushed his way into the tent. You took in a sharp breath as you got a look at his face.

He looked awful. His eye was starting to swell, there was blood dripping from his nose, and dark purple bruises were beginning to form on his cheek. "What happened?!" You asked him sharply as some of his friends followed in behind him sporting similar injuries on their faces. Aonung didn't look at you, but one of his friends behind him chimed in, "It was the forest boys."

You scowled at Aonung. "What did you do?" You demanded to know. He shot you an irritated look. "You are accusing me?" he asked incredulously. Your scowl deepened as you glared up at him suspiciously. "Yes," you said. "I am." He scoffed at you. He wasn't afraid of your ire when he knew he had the privilege of being the son of the two clan leaders to protect him.

"They do not belong here," he told you. "I don't know why you are so fond of those freaks." His friends behind him muttered their approval at his statement. You turned your glare to them, and they immediately fell silent and looked away. Even if Aonung didn't fear you, at least they did.

"They are here under uturu," you said in a harsh whisper. "We must treat them with respect and dignity." Aonung rolled his eyes at your words. "Where is my mother?" he asked, ignoring your statement. You huffed an irritated breath. "Out," you responded crossly, walking over to where Ronal kept her store of medicines and other mending materials.

You pulled out a jar of ointment and handed it to Aonung. "For the cuts," you told him. "Now go." You pointed at the entrance of your tent resolutely, maintaining a level glare at him. He held your gaze for a moment before taking the bowl and walking away, his friends in tow.

You closed your eyes in exasperation. How could they all be so stuck up and stupid? You knew that Aonung took great pride in being the next in line for Olo'eyktan, but you had never seen him act so rude and self-absorbed. Honestly, it was embarrassing for you.

After a moment, you decided to go out to see if you could find one or both of the Omatikayan boys to apologize on behalf of Aonung. Stepping out, you headed over to where their family was residing. From a distance, you could see that Lo'ak was stepping out of the tent, his face downcast and irritated. He was still too far from you to try and call out to him, so you skipped briskly along the suspended walkways between you to try and catch up to him.

Despite your urgent pace, Lo'ak quickly moved in the opposite direction from you, but from their tent, Neteyam walked out into the light of the sun wearing a subtle smile on his face. Approaching his tent, you called out to him. He glanced up at you in mild surprise and offered a polite nod.

You studied his face for injuries, but besides a busted lip, he seemed relatively unharmed. "I know what happened with Aonung," you began. "Well, sort of. I am very sorry about him and his friends." He gave you a soft smile and shook his head casually. "It was not your fault," he said simply. "There is no need for you to apologize."

As he spoke, you noticed the fresh blood on his lip from his cut. "You are cut," you observed. "Come with me." You grabbed his arm to lead him back to the healing canopy, but he resisted, shaking his head again. "This is nothing," he told you gently. "I will be fine."

You didn't let go of his arm. "You have come to our home as guests," you said softly. "Aonung and his friends have treated you dishonorably. Please, let me make it right." You gazed up at his face imploringly, and after a moment, his face softened and he nodded. "Alright," he conceded and followed your pulling hand.

Entering under the cover of your canopy, you had Neteyam sit down while you took out a small cloth and a salve. Dampening the cloth with fresh water, you turned to where he was sitting patiently for you.

Taking his jaw in your hand gently, you turned his face so that you could inspect the cut better. Neteyam's eyes stayed on your face for a moment before glancing away to fixate on the tent walls. In addition to the cut on his lip, you also noticed some more purplish spots starting to form on his neck.

You traced your fingers over the forming bruises on his neck. Neteyam tensed at your touch, and his eyes quickly darted to your face. You pulled back your hand from his neck and said, "Sorry." He gave you a subtle smirk. "It doesn't hurt," he assured you. "Just sensitive."

"Ah," you said in a low voice, looking away from his eyes sheepishly. You started to clean away the blood on his lip. "What did he do to start the fight?" You asked him, changing the subject. He blinked slowly and shook his head. "It does not matter," he replied in a quiet voice, looking away from you.

Your grip on his jaw tightened slightly, and you turned his face back so he would look you in the eyes. "What did he do?" You asked again in a more insistent tone. You could see him contemplating, and you held his face and gaze in expectant silence.

"He was making fun of Kiri and Lo'ak," he relented. "He called them freaks." The grip of your hand holding his face tightened reflexively as anger burned in your chest. You closed your eyes for a second to regain your composure before turning his head back to continue attending to his cut.

"I am very sorry, Neteyam," you murmured earnestly. "He never should have said those things." In your peripheral vision, you could see that his eyes were fixated on your face, but you kept your focus on his lip. "You do not have to apologize," he repeated from earlier, trying to keep his mouth still as he spoke. "You have shown nothing but kindness to my family since we arrived."

You glanced up for a moment to meet his eyes. He was looking back at you with a soft gaze, and you became aware of how close you were to his face. You turned away from him as you felt your cheeks grow warm to pull out the salve you had. Taking a small swatch on your thumb, you brushed it gently over his lip. You could feel his eyes on you as you did, and despite your best efforts, you glanced up at them. A beat of tense silence passed as you looked at each other wordlessly, one of your hands holding his face while the other was tracing his mouth.

Worried that he may be able to hear your heart pounding, you thought desperately of something to say. "He is intimidated by you," you said finally as you dropped your hands from his face and looked down from his eyes. Neteyam cocked his head to the side. "Aonung?" He clarified. You nodded as you wiped the remaining salve off of your fingers.

"He is the son of Olo'eyktan," you explained, shifting to sit on the floor next to him. "There has never been anybody to challenge that status until now, but not only was your father Olo'eyktan as well, but he was Toruk Makto. We were raised hearing stories of him. Some sound too strange to be true."

Neteyam looked at you in curiosity. "Stories?" He repeated. "Like what?"

You smiled, somewhat embarrassed. "There are many," you said slowly. "He  was once a human, a warrior from the stars." Neteyam nodded his head slowly. "That is true," he confirmed. You thought back for more rumors. "They say he killed one of the Na'vi to possess his body," you mentioned.

Neteyam let out a small, surprised laugh. "That one is not true," he said, amused at the story. "The Sky People grew his body from the blood of his brother and Na'vi blood, and his spirit now resides in it." Your forehead scrunched in confusion. "The blood of his brother?" You echoed, perplexed.

He shrugged his shoulder nonchalantly. "I don't even fully understand it," he admitted. "But the important thing is that no, he didn't possess anybody else's body to become one of the People." You nodded faintly, still very confused about Neteyam's answer.

"What else have you heard?" He prompted. You thought back to the way you imagined Toruk Makto before he came here. You had thought he would be large and intimidating like Tonowari, but with an authoritarian attitude and little humor. It was almost comical how he really was just like any other Na'vi father aside from some small physical differences and his accent.

"I thought he couldn't speak in the Na'vi tongue," you added. "We all thought he spoke a strange language." Neteyam nodded again. "When he led the revolt against the Sky People," he explained, "he spoke very little Na'vi. His first language is called English."

You tilted your head at the funny word. "English," you repeated. He smiled at your accent and nodded. "He usually only speaks it with my family," he said. "Many of the Omatikaya can speak it a little, too." You smiled back before asking, "What does it sound like?"

Neteyam shrugged. "What do you want me to say?" He said in English. You couldn't help but giggle at the strange language. "What does that mean?" You asked. He smiled at you in amusement. "I simply asked what you wanted me to say," he clarified.

You hummed thoughtfully as you came up with a phrase for him to say. You looked out at the afternoon sun casting brilliant reflections on the water outside of your tent. "The sea is very beautiful," you said finally. He looked out at the water for a moment. "The sea is very beautiful," he replied before looking back at you and adding, "and so are you."

You tilted your head and eyed him suspiciously. The pause between his words sounded like he said something extra. "All of that means 'The sea is very beautiful?'" You questioned skeptically. He glanced away for a moment with a faint smile. "Not all of it," he admitted. He paused for a moment, and then he said, "I said 'The sea is very beautiful, but I miss the forest.'"

"Ah," you said, nodding in understanding. "It must be very hard for you to be away from it." He sighed, looking back out at the sea with a far-away stare. "It is," he agreed after a while. "It is so different there. The sounds, the smells, everything. I don't think I have ever spent so much time in the sun as I have here."

You laughed at his last statement. "What do you mean?" You asked. He pointed out to where a few large, craggy precipices jutted out over the water. "The trees where I am from are higher than those cliffs," he explained. "When you are in the forest, very little sunlight reaches the ground."

Looking out to where he pointed, you shook your head in amazement. "I cannot even imagine trees like that," you said in wonder. He turned to you with a soft smile. "I'll take you to see them someday," he promised.

You smiled up at him, but it quickly faded away. You shook your head and looked away from his face. "No," you sighed regretfully. "I am tsakarem. It would not be right for me to leave the reef." He hummed in understanding. "I imagine your intended would not be happy about it either," he commented, watching you for your reaction.

You shifted uncomfortably. "No," you conceded quietly, "probably not."

When he didn't respond, you glanced up at his face and saw he was gazing at you expectantly. "He is not entirely to blame," you defended gently. "He and I have a great responsibility to the clan. He has carried it his whole life, but I am still getting used to it." He gave a small nod in understanding. "I have carried it my whole life, too," he said, then added in English, "but it didn't make me into an ass."

You smiled at the strange words and shot him a quizzical look. "I said, 'It is a heavy burden to bear,'" he translated for you. You nodded in agreement, and you missed the wry grin on his face.

"It must be nice for you finally to be free of that burden," you reflected. He heaved a heavy sigh and shook his head. "Even though my father is no longer Olo'eyktan, he still holds the title of Toruk Makto," he countered. "It is one that will always follow him, and so it will always follow me."

He stared out at the water in contemplation. There was a pause, and Neteyam gave another sigh. You could see the weight of his family's legacy on his face, and you felt a sense of compassion for him. "A heavy burden," you repeated his words quietly. He didn't say anything, lost in his own internal musings.

Even though you knew that the expectations weren't quite the same, you felt that on some level, you understood the struggle of upholding the standard of greatness in life. Your parents were very proud of your status of tsakarem, and you felt the pressure of it from them as well as Ronal, whose expectations were higher than everyone else.

"I never understood how heavy it was until now," you commented. "But I accepted my role. You were born into yours." Neteyam looked at you carefully and tilted his head in curiosity. "You accepted it," he repeated, "but did you actually want it?"

His question caught you off guard. As you pondered it, you felt a strange mix of emotions stirring in your chest. Nobody had ever considered that you wouldn't want to be tsakarem. It was easy to get swept up in the honor and prestige and forget about the fact that you were surrendering many of the freedoms you had previously enjoyed in order to prepare yourself to help lead the clan.

Your throat tightened unexpectedly as you thought about his question. Neteyam must have noticed your reaction because he shook his head apologetically. "I'm sorry," he said. "I did not mean to upset you." His words snapped you out of your thoughts. You shook your head dismissively and gave a weak smile.

"It's okay," you assured him. "I just..." you trailed off, not sure of what to say. After a beat, he took your hand comfortingly. "You carry the title with great dignity," he told you reassuringly. "And you bring honor to your people."

Your chest warmed at his words, easing the strain of his earlier question. With a shy smile, you asked, "How do you say 'thank you' in English?" He chuckled at your question. "Thank you," he told you in English.

"Thank you," you repeated in his funny language. He gave you a warm smile. "You're welcome," he replied. "You're welcome," you echoed thoughtfully. He nodded in approval. "That was almost perfect," he complimented. You hummed at his praise. "You'll have to teach me to speak it perfectly," you told him. He smiled as he looked at you. "I will," he promised gently.

You felt your cheeks warm at his soft gaze. You had never seen eyes quite like his. They were a shade of yellow you had never seen before, almost greenish in the reflections from the water.  In the prolonged silence, you realized that he was still holding your hand, so you blinked and pulled it away gently while you desperately thought of something to say.

"Your cut will heal within the next couple of days," you said finally. He blinked as though pulled from deep thought and nodded gratefully. "You are very kind," he told you. "Thank you."

You smiled. "You're welcome," you told him, trying your best to accurately mimic the way he said the phrase.

He chuckled at your use of his language. "You're a fast learner," he praised and then sighed. "I should go find my brother," he added. You nodded in understanding, and you both stood up. Before he could leave, you said, "Please send my apologies to Lo'ak."

Neteyam shook his head with a reproachful smile. He brought his hand up to your face and tilted your chin upwards with his fingers to look him in the eye. "You need to stop apologizing for things you didn't do," he told you earnestly. Then, he dropped his hand and walked out of the tent before you could reply and before he could see the deep blush forming on your face.

Later that evening, you had taken Tuk out to feed the ilus. Waist deep in the water, you both giggled as the pod of ilus gathered around, swimming in eager circles around you. You and the young girl took turns feeding them one by one.

"I think this one likes me," Tuk giggled as one of the animals nudged her side affectionately. "Yes, well, that one is notorious for loving whoever has the food," you said with a laugh. Taking a fish from the basket, Tuk fed the cuddly ilu. "Then I'll feed him every day," she said with a bright smile.

From behind you, you could hear someone moving through the water. You turned and saw Neteyam wading out to where you and Tuk were standing. Noticing her older brother, Tuk called out, "Look, Neteyam! Come feed the ilus with us."

Neteyam offered his sister a quick smile before it melted into a more urgent look.

"Have either of you seen Lo'ak?" He asked. You glanced at Tuk, who looked back at you with the same confused look. "I haven't seen him since I saw you last," you told him. "Is everything alright?"

Neteyam glanced quickly at his younger sister before looking back at you. "It's probably nothing, I'm just looking for him." He started to walk back out of the water, and you could see the look of agitation on his face. You handed Tuk the basket of fish and said, "Here, you keep feeding them, I'll be right back."

You moved out of the water to follow after Neteyam. He must've heard you behind him because he slowed down and waited for you to catch up to him. Stepping behind him, you asked, "What's wrong?"

He shot you a worried glance. "I've looked everywhere. There is no sign of him, and nobody has seen him." Your forehead scrunched up at his words. "When did you last see him?" You asked. He gave a loose shrug and replied, "Earlier today, same as you."

"At your home?" You clarified questioningly. He nodded. "Yes, after my father told him to go..." he trailed off, and you could see that a thought had entered his mind. His worried face hardened into aggravation, his jaw clenched, and his head tilted as he fought to compose his anger.

"What is it?" You questioned in concern. Neteyam took a moment to close his eyes before muttering, "Aonung." Your stomach dropped a little bit at his name. Surely, he wouldn't have caused any more trouble than he already had.

Neteyam turned from you sharply and walked at a brisk pace towards the village. You struggled to keep pace behind him. "What about Aonung?" You asked, confused. Without breaking his stride, Neteyam said, "My father told Lo'ak to apologize to him earlier, and that was the last time I saw him."

A feeling of unease settled over you, and you prayed that Lo'ak was just off brooding somewhere instead of being in trouble. As you both quickly stepped across the beach, you caught Aonung's familiar form standing in the shallow water.

"You," Neteyam called out to him in a hard tone. Aonung had been staring out at the water towards the Sea Wall, but at the sound of Neteyam's voice, he whipped around. He was immediately defensive as Neteyam stepped up to him in the water.

"Where is my brother?" He demanded. Aonung scoffed. "He's your brother," he replied in a haughty voice. "Aren't you the one supposed to babysit him?" Neteyam shot the other boy a burning glare and took a step forward to get in his face, causing Aonung to take an uneasy step back. "I kicked your ass once already today," Neteyam stated. "I will do it again if I have to."

"Enough," you said firmly, not wanting a repeat of their earlier altercation. The boys didn't say anything, still holding each other's glare. "Aonung, do you know where Lo'ak is?" You asked. After a brief pause, Aonung's eyes glanced away from Neteyam over to you, and you saw the uneasy look he had.

Your stomach sank. "Where is he?" You pressed, feeling frustrated at his silence. You could see his hesitation before he finally relented, "I'm not sure. We...we left him at Three Brothers Rock."

You inhaled sharply. "Aonung," you whispered, horrified. He didn't look at you, the severity of his actions sinking in. Neteyam was a little lost. "Where is that?" He asked you, desperate to know where his brother was. You didn't answer him, still looking at Aonung in disbelief.

"How could you do that?" you asked quietly, and he averted his eyes. You glanced back at Neteyam. "It is way out past the reef," you said. "It is not close, and it is very dangerous for him to be alone."

At your words, Neteyam's face twisted in anger. He stepped towards Aongung again, but you had anticipated his reaction and moved quickly to stand between them and placed a hand on his chest. "No fighting," you told him sternly. "We need to gather a search party for Lo'ak, not waste time giving each other more injuries for me to tend to later on."

Both the boys stared at each other for a moment before Neteyam looked down at you and gave you a barely-perceptible nod. You let your hand drop from his chest and looked over at Aonung. "When did you leave?" You asked him.

He shook his head uncomfortably. "It's been a few hours," he admitted. You closed your eyes with a heavy sigh. Neteyam huffed a sharp breath and grabbed Aonung by the back of his neck. "I'm done with this," he muttered and marched him back to the village.

A search party was quickly organized. Several warriors and divers on skimwings and ilus assembled to search for Lo'ak. With the sun receding behind the planet, you and the rest of your friends were ordered to stay within the Sea Wall.

You saw Neteyam pacing anxiously on the beach, looking out for any sign of his brother's return. You walked up to him carefully. "I'm sure they will find him soon," you assured him, breaking him from his thoughts. He heaved a large sigh and looked out towards the water.

"I should have been with him," he murmured. "This wouldn't have happened if I had been with him." You looked at him with sympathy. "You can't blame yourself," you told him gently. "If anyone is to blame, it is Aonung." He didn't argue with you, and you both knew you were right.

You sat down on the sand with a sigh, and after a moment, Neteyam followed suit and sat down beside you. "I have known him almost my whole life," you said as you sifted some sand between your fingers. "He has always been proud and stubborn, but he has never been malicious." You couldn't deny that Aonung's behavior towards the Sullys before had made you uncomfortable and disappointed, but this was on a whole new level, and you felt as though you didn't even know him at all.

You sighed again and looked over at Neteyam. He was staring out at the water with a blank gaze. You weren't sure what else to say. You couldn't assure him of his brother's safe return because there was a very real chance he was not safe. So, you just sat in silence beside him.

As the evening turned into night, Lo'ak eventually returned unharmed, much to the relief of you and Neteyam. After taking the blame for Aonung, an uneasy but not unfriendly relationship started between him and Lo'ak, and Neteyam put aside his anger for his brother's sake.

The next day, Lo'ak recounted how a lone tulkun had saved him from the akula the day before. After describing the creature who saved his life, Tsireya quickly realized that the tulkun was the outcast Payakan.

"I'm telling you guys, he saved my life," Lo'ak explained insistently. "He is my friend."

Everyone had doubtful looks, but Neteyam stood up with a jaunty smile and grabbed his brother by the shoulders. "My baby bro," he said lightheartedly. "The mighty warrior who faced the killer tulkun and lived to tell about it."

Lo'ak was not amused and pushed his brother's hands off of him. "You guys aren't listening," he huffed and walked away. You all called out to him, but he continued away in irritation. Tsireya followed after him, and the others all disbursed to start the day.

You remained sitting there, perplexed at what you had heard. Everyone in the clan knew about the dangerous, young bull who had killed both Na'vi and other tulkun, and Lo'ak's assertions of Payakan's innocence unsettled you. Deep in thought, you hadn't even realized that Neteyam had stayed behind until he asked, "What are you thinking?"

You blinked, startled out of your thoughts. You gave a short sigh. "Tsireya is right," you told him. "If it was Payakan, then your brother is lucky to be alive. Payakan is very dangerous." Neteyam looked out for a moment to where Lo'ak had stormed off. "He seems to think differently," he commented.

You shifted uncomfortably. "I do believe your brother sees Payakan as a friend, but there is a reason for his exile." You looked out at the water and shook your head faintly. "The good thing is that Lo'ak is safe," you told him.

He smiled at you warmly. "That is true," he conceded. "And I appreciate your concern for my brother. It means a lot." You shrugged and replied, "You are my friend. What concerns you concerns me."

He offered his hand to help pull you up. You took it, and he pulled you up effortlessly. After you steadied yourself, you moved to walk off, but Neteyam didn't let go of your hand. You looked up at his face questioningly, and he was staring back at you with a soft smile.

"I'm serious," he told you earnestly. "Your friendship means a lot to me. Thank you." His face was so sincere and his voice so heartfelt that you didn't respond for a moment. "You're welcome," you replied finally. He held your gaze for a moment, the corner of his lips turned upwards, before dropping your hand and walking away to begin the day.

As you watched him disappear, you couldn't help but wonder why it was exactly that your heart was beating so quickly.

Chapter 2

[andreal831]

hi! i just discovered your blog! firstly i want to say i love your writing! the great war has me hooked! i’m a ghost reader (i must admit) but i love it sm 🫶🏽

anyway, my question for you is: do you think klaus dying in the season 5 finale was out of character for him? everyone i ever come in contact with always talks bout how dying for hope was his character development but it felt so simultaneously out of character for him. there’s no way klaus would leave hope alone in the world— he knew what that felt like. and she had just lost her mother like— *sigh*

i know joseph wanted to leave and killing klaus was the only way to make sure that the character couldn’t come back but it just. made. no. sense

what are your thoughts? (also sorry if you’ve already answered this some kind of way 😩)

Hi! First of all, thank you so much for reading my stories! That means so much to me! <3

I've talked about this a little before at the very end of my post about Klaus being a good father. I think him dying at the end of Season 5 was semi-in-character for Season 2 Klaus, but not where Klaus should have been in Season 5. People love to make it this great sacrifice, but in reality it was him running away from responsibility. A main character flaw for Klaus was that he wanted a lot of things without putting in the work. He wanted to be king of New Orleans, without having to do the political work necessary. He wanted the love of his siblings without being a good brother. He wanted the honor of being Hope's father without the responsibility of being her father.

We even see glimpses of this in Season 4. He spends all of his time spoiling Hope while Hayley does the work. I would have loved to see even one scene of Klaus doing Hope's hair or preparing her food (not compelling it) or disciplining her. Anything to show he was a father and not just a glorified babysitter.

We see the most improvement for Klaus when he takes the Hollow and separates from his family. I find it more impressive that he separated from Elijah and Rebekah more so than Hope. It seemed like every chance Klaus could "sacrifice" himself and be away from Hope, he did. I'm by no means saying he didn't love Hope. It's clear he did. But I think he allowed his fear of Hope seeing him for what he was to stop him from being a good father.

So in Season 5, when Hope has just lost her mother, he decided to orphan her rather than let Elijah die for her. Like you said, a lot of this was just due to JP setting up Legacies and Joseph not wanting to continue. They really couldn't set up Legacies with Klaus being alive without making Klaus look terrible. But honestly, at that point, he had already abandoned her for years, what's a few more? Him staying away is the same thing as him killing himself unnecessarily for her. She was still left alone. At least if he had been alive, he could check in with the family and keep pressure on them to raise his child.

But being dead was easier and Klaus tended to take the easy ways out.

As I said, this was a character regression. What would have actually been character development would be Klaus sticking around, without Elijah to clean up his mess or Hayley to raise his child or Cami to constantly set him on a better path. Hope needed Klaus to put her first and he didn't. He put his own fears above what Hope needed. Hope had to lose both parents in the span of a week because of him. Because there was another option. Elijah was willing and ready. When Elijah told him he had the Hollow too and would die by his side, Klaus should have let Elijah take it all and die alone. Elijah would have felt better leaving Klaus alive and Hope would have at least had one parent.

Klaus was good at showing up and doing the grand gestures for Hope. But he could never bring himself to do the day to day things that a child needs from her father. So, while I do think most of Klaus' behavior was OOC in Season 5, especially when the show was trying to pretend he had this great character development, it wasn't completely out of character for some of the earlier versions of Klaus.

Thanks for the ask!

[spyskater]

The quotes I believe are every characters' thesis statement in Willow (2022) and why. Elora: I believe that love is the most powerful force in the universe. Kit: You're afraid. So am I. But you know what? My fear, it doesn't get to decide. It doesn't get to, to define me. I'm not giving it the power. I'm giving it to you. I have never believed in anything my whole life. I believe in you. Jade: Yeah, and when you love someone and they need you, yes, you jump off the edge of the world to go and get to them. Graydon: One day you and I are gonna be in charge. And when that day comes, we don't have to do things the way our parents did. Boorman: I finally figured it out. This isn't my story. It's yours. You're the one. And all you gotta do is believe in yourself, and you'll be unstoppable. Willow: You know, it's taken me a long time to learn, it's okay to fall, to make mistakes. I've made lots... The trick is to embrace your defeats as well as your victories. You pay for both in the end. Be decent. Be fearless. And know this, wherever the adventure leads, I'm with you. Airk: You know, defend the realm and just be the best brother, and husband, and father, and son that I can possibly be. Because that is what you do when you have honor, right? Scorpia: All we have ever wanted is our freedom. That our children would not have to live in fear. They'd serve no master... We have no barrier to hide behind, no army to defend us. All we have is the fear our masks evoke, the determination to survive, and each other... Freedom, rebellion, passion, joy. To the break of dawn! Sorsha: Everything I've done, I've done to protect the people I love. It costs a lot. Madmartigan: It was the hardest thing I've ever done. But love is sacrifice. You've gotta be willing to give up what you want for what you believe in.

Elora's is extremely obvious. As the heroine and chosen one of our show, her quote not only represents who she is and what she believes, but the most important message that the show wants to leave us with. At the end of the day, love above all things. Let that be your guiding force. It's what all of our characters come away with. Jade lets go of her ideals of duty to follow her heart to Kit. Kit learns to love and gains courage through it. Airk is saved by Kit through the power of love. Graydon becomes who he's always dreamed of, partially due to his love of Elora. Elora is able to fully grasp her power through her love of Graydon. And Elora tells us throughout the season that love is the most powerful thing in the universe, at first taken as a joke by Airk, Kit, and the audience and evolving into the hopeful statement we're meant to latch onto.

This is Kit's big moment. She spends the entire season having everything she thought she knew stripped from her. When you have nothing left, it'll make you reevaluate what you truly want and what you believe. We know that all Kit has wanted is to be brave and loved and I would argue that quote is part one of the thesis of Kit. It's Jade's love that gives Kit the bravery to take the leap of faith. As she stares at the edge of the world, she's probably at her most fearful. But she's spent her whole life giving into fear, fear of loss, fear of rejection, fear of abandonment. She knows what it means to give fear power, so she chooses to give the power to Elora, to love, to hope, to finally believing in something greater than herself. And by choosing not to give into fear, she also inspires Elora to do the same. Fear no longer gets to control Kit and we shouldn't let it control us either.

Like Kit, Jade is completely stripped of everything she knows about herself. Her honor, her duty, her history, her beliefs, her identity, it all comes into question. But she had to lose all of the things that she thought made her Jade Claymore in order for her to truly follow her heart. You don't jump off the edge of the world out of duty. You do it out of love. Jade does it for Kit. Graydon does it for Elora. Elora and Kit do it for Airk. And while I don't think Jade fully knows what any of what she's learned means for her and her future, the one thing she does know for a fact at the end of the season, which was the only thing that she was uncertain of at the beginning, is that she is totally, ridiculously, desperately in love with Kit and that love is returned. It's like Elora said, love is the most power thing in the universe and Jade now knows that.

Graydon's quote, I find, is one of the most important quotes of the show. This is the story of the next generation learning from the previous one’s mistakes and trying to do better. All of our younger characters are forced to confront the mistakes of their elders, especially Willow, Sorsha, and Madmartigan’s. Kit as Elora’s protector and learning that love comes before dutiful sacrifice (her parents). Jade learning love before duty and honor (Ballantine). Boorman facing the mistakes he made with the older generation and making the better choice with the younger one. Going on this adventure with the others, Graydon is able to find his true self and make his own choices. Just because his father wants him to be one thing, doesn't mean that Gray has to be that. He gets to be his own man. You get to be who you want to be, not what your parents want.

Boorman desperately wants to be the hero of the story and that’s probably the source of a lot of his bravado. He feels shame for leaving Madmartigan for dead, for lying about his escape from Skellin, because it’s not a heroic tale. He was a teenager/young man when he went after the Cuirass with Mads. He was Jade once upon a time, a squire in service to Tir Asleen royalty. The problem is that Boorman thinks the cuirass is the only way he can be a hero and being a hero is the only way to make up for his mistakes. But the cuirass is not meant for him; it’s not his story. The way for him to come full circle and become whole is to make up for his sins against Mads by giving the cuirass to his daughter. He’s not the hero of this story, but I do believe he’s the hero of another.

Willow gives us another important message of the show that we've seen throughout the season. Our mentor's journey over the course of the season is to let go. Willow can't seem to accept the consequences of the past. The loss of his wife. The departure of his son. The loss of Elora. The fact that he never became the sorcerer he thought he was meant to be. All of this causes him to be incapable of training Elora with any sort of true openness or understanding. Where Elora needs freedom and a safe place to fail, Willow only provides restrictions and pressure. The world can't afford for Elora to fail. And if Elora fails, she dies. But in the end, it's only his ability to accept his failures and victories that allows him to help Elora grow to become the hero she needs to be. And it's an important lesson for us.

Airk is a character that could have easily played into his own trope of charming playboy prince without a care in the world, but this quote helps separate him from stereotype. In episode one, I'm sure we would all admit we all believed, like Kit, that Airk didn't know Elora's public name. But he did. And throughout his time resisting the Crone, Airk proved time and time again that he truly was honorable and that all he wanted was to be good. Madmartigan's departure and Kit's future ascension left Airk looking for his purpose and trying to prove to his family that he was everything his absentee father couldn't be. He does everything he can to be a good boyfriend, a good brother, a good son, a good diplomat, and, in episode seven, he does everything he can to be a good man.

Scorpia is an inspiration. She has lost so much, but still finds the strength to care deeply in the face of her grief. She's lost her mother, father, and several brothers and sisters, but finds it in herself to keep loving. She may be mostly concerned about her people, but it's their philosophy of life, of freedom and liberation (another analysis yet to be written) that sends her on a crusade to save all of those people in Skellin. Not just her people, but all people. And I think that will be important in the war to come. As much as Scorpia will want to avoid war, her belief in freedom for all and rebellion will convince her that it's necessary. The entire Wildwood episode shows us the joy and passion and freedom that's a stake, what's worth fighting for. There is no freedom under the Wyrm and Scorpia will not accept that.

I think it's important to discuss Sorsha and Madmartigan's quotes together, because they explain their mistakes as well as layer them with complexities. One of the things that kind of irritates me is when people paint Mads as saint and Sorsha as awful, because they're cut from the same cloth (Kit, I love you, but I blame you for this). At the end of the day, they were willing to make the hard sacrifices if it meant protecting their kids and saving the world. Neither one of them could have foreseen the harm that their choices would have, but they did what they thought was right. They are one and the same, united in their cause and parenthood. But every single choice also cost them so much sacrifice, the biggest one being their chance at parenting Elora, and I think a lot of people forget that, especially when it comes to Sorsha.

[bunnymermaidwrites]

pls tell me about odette and why you want to trap them in a snow globe and shake them until they’re concussed?

the fact that you compare hilbert to odette makes me already quite fearful

Hi!❤️❤️❤️

Okay, so Odette... Odette very much deserves to be trapped in a snow globe and a lot more if you ask me, but I'll let you be the judge.

While her crimes might not be as bad as Hilbert's (attempted murder of child and gaslighting vs genocide and I'm sure a lot of other stuff that I'm unaware of), the emotional wounds she causes are just horrible.

Let me give you a (hopefully) very quick rundown of what's going on here (if you have any questions here's my wip intro with links to all storts of things including characters or you can always ask):

The majestic country of Galla is floating in the sky, put there by the doves themselves to protect the humans from what lies beneath. The Black swamp, a place filled with monsters, fear, and madness.

Odette at 19 years old is a triarhist, one of three future rulers of Galla. They may be humans but their powers are devine, all powerful, that exist for one purpose alone: To protect people.

She is kind, clever and compassionate. She loves her people with everything she has and even as a young child she took her duties very seriously. She is also selflessness, always willing to help another.

She would do anything to keep her people safe like she's supposed to.

Odette, when she was little, was terrified of the Black swamp, of the stories about the place. Of having to be the one who stand been it and her beloved people if it comes to that. So she came up with an idea:

Build a machine and destroy the Black swamp for good.

However, her father disapproved, saying that what she wanted to do was way too extreme, that they were safe where they were. So Odette hid her plans, deciding to bide her time until she is officially crowned on her 20th birthday.

But someone found them... and Odette had to keep them quiet.

You see, Odette has a boyfriend, another triarhist, just like her. Endre. They love each other, understand one another better than anyone.

Endre has two younger siblings: Adél, the main character (15 yo) who idolizes Odette, she wants to be just like her, and Ákos (10 yo).

Sweet, little Ákos: smart, extremely curious, but unfortunately still naive. He was bound to find a secret drawer, with Odette's plans hidden deep within. He was bound to be confused and even frightened.

And Odette looked at him. The kid she helped teach how to read... and she pushed him off the edge of Galla and he fell...

All

The way

Down

Into the Black swamp below.

Anything for her people, right?

There are many reasons I hate Odette. Tiny things that just make everything worse.

Odette is selflessness, she doesn't care what happens to her as long as her people are safe.

Her selflessness stretched so far and so so thin that her sacrifice somehow became Ákos.

And she thinks she did the right thing.

😁Now let me just list a couple of my favorite (maybe petty) reasons to hate Odette:

Why I want to trap Odette in a snow globe:

Ákos for a long time blames himself for what happened partially because Odette was so perfect.

Ákos in general is just so confused about the whole thing. It's very hard for his young mind to wrap around the fact that someone that loved him could hurt him like this.

Like I said Adél wanted to be just like Odette. Now, she will spend the rest of her life fearing that she succeeded.

Endre lost the only person who could understand what he was going through as an heir!

Ákos was wearing a cat mask that Adél made when Odette pushed him. He looked adorable and innocent, and she still did it! Seriously, how can someone look at this and hurt him:

If put in the same situation, Odette wouldn't hesitate to do it again because she thought it was necessary.

I could go on, but for the sake of simplicity here, it is.

Tldr: She looked at a kid who saw her as a big sister and went: YEEET!

Thank you so so much for this ask! It made me really happy! I hope I answered your question well enough! ❤️

[aurerue3]

⭐️ Hsr :0

⭐️ Romantic

⭐️ Personality: I'm the type of person to love going out on some days; while on others I like to be on my own and just enjoy the silence. I can get along well with other people; however, I can get annoyed easily depending on what's said or done. I can be childish at times depending on my mood.

⭐️ Likes and dislikes: I like to cook and make new things. I like helping people as well. I'm always ready to sacrifice everything to help someone in need. I dislike baking (actually hate it) because of all the steps and precision needed to fulfill the requirements. I prefer to just go with the flow and cook how I want, which you kinda can't do with baking. I like comedies and romance films, as well as a good book.

⭐️ What you like and dislike in a person: I dislike people who are fake. Be straight with me and don't beat around the bush. I like people who I con confide in and relate to. They have to be someone trustworthy and not lie.

⭐️ Hobbies: Cooking, reading, music, learning, volunterring.

⭐️ Other facts about yourself: Idk what to put here tbh uhh I suck at history but am good in everything is surprisingly. Fav character is Sunday.

Hiii 🌼 thank you for submitting the first matchup for this blog~ 🌻

I match you with… 

Dan Heng 🍁

⭐️ He’s usually hanging around in the Astral Express especially when you want to enjoy some peace and quiet. He loves to enjoy his solitude with you whenever the rest of the crew is busy on their expedition. Whenever he goes out it's usually for data collecting and exploring the area so if you are looking to go outside on some days he would love to have you accompany him while he does his tasks. He’s not the type to admit it but he really wants you to go out with him since you two can take a stroll and enjoy the scenery after he finishes data collecting, if he’s not too busy or if the crew decides to stay on the planet for a while. He also chats with you about different planets, gives you a brief history about them, and his adventures with the crew. 

⭐️ His calm personality can help you the most whenever you’re having days whenever you feel out of the mood. He can also arrange to have the two of you watch films (and introduce you to some of Reca’s work), read novels in his room, and have a drink in the party car. (He is not leaving until you feel better-)

⭐️ He’d love to eat your cooking especially while he’s busy with data collecting and it would make his day better when you give him freshly made meals and snacks. He also likes the thought of being the first person to try out your new dishes. (It makes him feel special-) 

⭐️ He admires how much you sacrifice your time and effort to help someone but he would tell you not to push yourself too hard and to remind you to take care of yourself. To add, he’s very direct when it comes to giving advice or calling you out because he not only wants to make sure you understand him clearly but also cares about your well-being. He’s willing to sacrifice his own time to help you so you won’t have to carry the burden alone. 

⭐️ Dan Heng is someone who you can trust a lot when it comes to keeping secrets. He’s not the type to overly judge you and he will understand your reasons for keeping it. Rest assured your secrets are safe with him and in exchange you might hear his own~

⭐️ Dan Heng is not only a great romantic partner to have, he is also a great friend. He’s calm, caring, direct, and values his relationship with you as much as he values his friends. 

Honorable mention/s: Welt, Luka, Sunday

I also match you with… 

Himeko ☕️

⭐️ Like Dan Heng, Himeko usually spends a lot of her time in the Astral Express but she will be busy doing her responsibility as the navigator. Whenever she has spare time, you two would be spending it by reading books, chatting with a cup of coffee, and if she's not too busy she would love to watch movie films you like. (she’s flexible with any movie genre-)

⭐️ Himeko usually goes out either for an expedition or for formal events/meetings (usually from Herta’s space station-). If you were to go outside the express you’re either invited to go with her or you will be waiting somewhere within the venue until the meeting is finished. If she is in the middle of her expedition you would assist her in any way by collecting intel from suspicious individuals, gathering info about the stellaron, fighting off stronger mobs, and so on. Once the mission is complete you two would go shop for some trinkets and treats (especially for Pompom-). It's a bonus if you find some locally branded coffee beans to take back to the express. 

⭐️ Your casual chats come with Himeko’s black coffee with your cooking. Having a treat while drinking coffee will always be a pleasant treat for her and she gets the chance to try out what you come up with~ To her, that’s the best way to take a break from her responsibilities because she gets a chance to spend quality time with you. 

⭐️ Himeko is great at offering advice especially with her years of experience (repairing the express as an example-) she is bound to give you guidance when it comes to what annoys you. She appreciates how far you’re willing to sacrifice for your friends but she will persuade you to rest if you’re reaching your limit. 

⭐️ You can trust her to keep your secrets and if anyone asks she will either tease them for asking or pretend she doesn't know and won't budge no matter how many times they want to know~ 

⭐️ Himeko is a great romantic partner because will always make time for you and make sure that you take a proper break. She will also cherish every moment she gets to spend quality time with you.

Honorable mention/s: Robin, Natasha 

I hope you like it 💛

[melanieph321]

Ruben Dias - The Award Part 2/15

Prologue Part 1 Part 3 Part 4

Kiera Reed, upcoming superstar, the new it girl, multi Grammy Award winner…or so she wants to be. Realizing that the music industry has little to do with talent and a lot to do with status, Kiera is willing to do it all to give her music the recognition it deserves. Even if that means fake dating the stubborn, inconsiderate and undeniably arrogant football player, Ruben Dias. It is through lies, schemes and hurt that the "couple" comes to know each other. But through passion, love and sacrifice Kiera and Ruben go through lengths to help each other achieve their dreams.

Enjoy! ✨️

"Why does your face look like that?"

"Like what?"

"Like a clown."

Kids and their brutal honesty. Kiera did not sign up for a day surrounded by them and yet it was revealed that she would partake in a charity event full of them. It was hosted by Manchester City ahead of their fixture against Everton. Odell and Kiera's manager Irene, made Kiera arrive two hours before kick off just so she could spend time with the kids, play her music and inspire them to dream big just like she had. But after two hours of performing and chasing the gremlins around the bouncy house that was set up next to the stadium, Kiera did indeed end up looking like a clown.

"I can't go in there looking like this." She complained to her manager, who did everything for Kiera not to bail out of the event at the last minute. 

"We'll take you inside." Irene nodded. She was a spiky haired woman, with an even spikier demeanor about herself. "I'll have someone take us inside of the stadium and we'll redo your makeup."

"Where is Odell? Tell him that I'm going back to the hotel."

"I'm sorry honey, but Odell is already inside the stadium, holding a place for us in the VIP booths." Irene tugged Kiera along, anxious to get her into the stadium before more people caught a whiff of her runny makeup.

"I can't." Kiera fought back. "The charity arrangers told me that the kids are getting a chance to walk around the pitch before the game starts. I'm supposed to go with them."

"Right. You have to be there for the photos."

Kiera rolled her eyes in annoyance. It was ridiculous the way she was being shuffled around all the time, and for what, so she could appear like a good samaritan instead of actually being a good samaritan? 

"Okay, this is what we'll do." Irene dug through her purse in search of Keira's emergency makeup kit. "Let's wipe off the excess makeup and give you a more natural look for the photoshoot on the pitch. That will go great in the tabloids, Kiera Reed, spending her off time with the kids in Manchester, I can see the headlines before me."

Kiera could care less about the headlines, or the children for that matter. All she wanted was to go back to the hotel and spend more time with her cousin Angie, perhaps finally meet with her university friends.

"There, all done." 

The majority of Kiera's face was wiped free of makeup. She paused as she caught her own reflection in the glass windows surrounding the stadium. Somewhere down the road to fame someone had convinced Kiera that makeup was not only a necessity, but the elixir for eternal beauty. Turns out that beneath it all a beautiful young woman had always been hiding.

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

"Come on Ruben, time to get off the field. Don't think lingering on the pitch will convince Coach to let you play."

Ruben laughed at his teammate's taunting remark, passing him the match ball. It was tempting though, with the feel of the grass under his boots, damped and soft. It was safe to say that he was jealous of his teammates' who ran around the field, warming up ahead of the game. If not for his recent thigh injury Ruben would be warming up with them, instead of withdrawing to watch the game from the stands. Two months had passed since he last played and Ruben was definitely getting restless.

"Look, how about you come over to my place after the game. My wife is making Bacalhau, you're favorite."

"Thanks Bernardo, that's very generous of you and Ines, but I've got a meeting to attend after the game."

"Yeah, what meeting?"

Ruben shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know, some sponsor looking to invest. Paulo is the one setting it up."

"I see. Ruben Dias, the big investor. A businessman."

"Yeah right." 

"Don't laugh now." Berando pointed. "We've all seen you being interviewed for the big screen. A real celebrity. Don't think that will please coach though. You're supposed to be doing rehab not attending the red carpet to some award show."

"I am doing rehab, more of it than you've ever done with your agile little body."

"Hey, don't poke me in front of the kids. It's disrespectful." Bernardo tried to dodge Ruben's assaulting hands, but the size difference between them was truly comedic. While he ran for his life all Ruben had to do was stretch out his arms to catch him. They were like Tom and Jerry, their banter on the pitch certainly amusing a group of children nearby.

"Come on Ruben. Let me go." Bernardo pleaded. However, Ruben was not yet done having fun.

"Seriously, you're gonna injure me before the game even starts."

"Good, then you can keep me company on the bench."

"I'm serious Ruben, let me—"

Ruben did what he was told, letting his teammate go by shoving him down onto the grass.

"Great, now I've stained my shorts. Thank's a lot Ruben."

"You're welcome." He grinned and helped Bernardo backup on his feet. The two of them had been friends for many years, beyond football. Sharing the pitch for both club and country made Berandro the closest thing Ruben had to family here in Manchester. 

"I've got to go." Berando said, responding to the shouts from the assistant coaches, urging the players to return to the locker rooms before kick off.  Bernando turned to Ruben, guilty of having to leave him behind. "I'll see you around then. Not in training but…around."

"See you around." Ruben nodded, as the two of them went their separate ways. He raised his head towards the stands, the thought of spending another game as a spectator twisting his stomach. 

Ruben deliberately stalled on his way across the field. "Look, It's Ruben Dias!" The children gasped.  They most likely belong to the CItizens foundation, a charity that Ruben often took part in, now more than ever with all the free time on his hands. It wasn't until football was no longer an option that Ruben realized how much his life had revolved around the game. Without it he was nothing. 

"Ruben, Ruben, will you sign my jersey?"

"Fuck."  

Ruben had a choice to make, stop and sign the children's jersey's, or hurry across the pitch and take his seat in the stands. 

"Please, please!"

"Sure, I'll sign your jersey."

"Yay!"

He chose the latter because the game wasn't starting until another ten minutes, Ruben could never bear waiting the stands for that long, and so came a herd of children, rushing towards him like wild sheep.

"Alright, alright. One at a time, one at a time."

"Here, take my pen."

Ruben crouched down and began signing his name on the children's charity jersey's. They were beaming from ear to ear, almost exploding with joy just to see him vandalize a perfectly clean shirt. It made Ruben wonder, was he really as blissful and adoring when young? He highly doubted it.

"Ruben, will you sign my jersey too?"

"Of course I will sweetheart, do you have a—"

Ruben raised his head as two wheels rolled before him. It was a young girl in a wheelchair, a charity jersey in her lap. But what caught Ruben's tongue wasn't the girl in the chair, but the woman standing behind it.

"Hi." He said, once he found the words to speak again.

"Hi." The woman smiled.

Ruben barely recognized her, the woman from the award show. Her face looked different under the winter sun and her hair had grown significantly overnight.  And of course, she wasn't wearing the same dress that he had been fantasizing about for some time now. But no doubt that it was her, Kiera Reed.

"Will you sign her jersey?"

"Huh?" Ruben shook out of the momentary daze, shifting his attention to the girl in the wheelchair, stretching out her pen. "Of course!" He exclaimed, feeling how his heartbeat quickened in his chest. Even more so when her voice spoke above him.

"I'm so sorry to disturb you. The kids were just about to get off the field when they spotted you."

"It's all good." He muttered.

"No, really. She's the last one, I promise."

Ruben put the lid back on the pen and rose to his feet. By then he had regained his composure and made sure to display his most charming smile. "All good, it's a part of my job."

Kiera nodded her head, regarding him with curious eyes, a slight furrow between her brows. It seized however, the moment she realized who he was.

"Oh my god. It's you!" 

"So you remember me?" Ruben chuckled.

"How could I forget? You really saved me the other night."

"I did?" 

Ruben recalled the night of the award show a bit differently. Firstly he was forced to be there by yet another sponsor. A clothing brand, that needed him to be dressed up and seen in public a bit more, since the cameras seldom panned out to the players seated in the stands during a football game. And so Ruben's presence at the award show was an obligation, which left him quite bitter about it. That is, until he met Kiera. 

It was a last minute decision for Ruben to present the award for Best New Artist, an idea of his own making actually. Ruben figured that an appearance on a stage with the whole world watching, would certainly please his sponsor enough to let him leave the show early. And as expected they were very pleased with the idea, assuring that he'd looked good ahead of the appearance. Too bad someone had beaten him to it. As he made his way backstage time seemed to slow down for Ruben. The world was moving vigorously around him, but with his eyes locked on the silk dress ahead of him, draped over the body of shapeful woman, an aphrodite, with skin that glowed through the hollowed back of her dress, time was no more.

Kiera appeared so deep within herself when Ruben gathered enough courage to walk up to her. By then he already knew her by name, whispered to him by one of the producers backstage. Not only did he possess her name but he would possess a moment with her on stage as the two of them were expected to present the award for Best New artist. 

Not much else was remembered from that night. Ruben remembers presenting the award, of course, the stage lights painful in his eyes. He also remembers Keira, trembling like a kitten, although nothing about her was kitten-like. If anything she was a puma. An animal of the night that liked to linger in the dark where she wouldn't be seen. She was still, Ruben remembers, still against this chest where he had caged her in, but only because he couldn't see how else he would get her to stop trembling. Perhaps it was the hollowed back of her dress that left her with the shivers. And perhaps it was the animal in Ruben that jumped at the opportunity to have her skin against him, soft and warm.

"You really did." Kiera nodded and thanked Ruben for saving her that night. "Well, we better get going…back to the others." 

Before Ruben could fully extract himself from his fantasies Kiera was gone, wheeling the girl and her chair back to the other children. In that moment nothing could bring Ruben to leave the pitch and take his seat in the stands. He wanted more of whatever he was feeling inside. More of what she made him feel. Little did Ruben know that very soon he would come to feel more of Kiera Reed. Much much more. 

Prologue

Part 1

Part 3

Part 4

[shallowseeker]

hi shal!

re dean being willing to sacrifice jack... for me the throughline there is dean feeling powerless with things "above his paygrade." forgive that this is gonna be a bit long and rambling. but like as early as 1.04, we see dean being kind of overwhelmed by the more Cosmic nature of tackling a demon vs ghosts etc. and in season 4, he is so disbelieving that he is somehow equipped to stop the apocalypse. in 11.21 when he's desperately trying to get chuck's help with amara, he says, "Look, give me a – a vampire, and I'm good. But this – God's sister? That is way above my pay grade. I - It - Bottom line is i-it's you who has to take her out." this also ties a little bit into 2.18; he doesn't want to be in charge, he just wants to be part of a team.

it also reminds me of 15.06 - the episode dean spends in pajamas and reading off cereal boxes and acting kinda superficially silly. that episode always reminds me of the silly little jokes dean tries to crack in 1.20 after john comes back, while dean is trying to happily fall back into the good little soldier routine. and who do they find out isnt actually gone in 15.05? chuck. in both these instances, i think dean is dealing with feeling entirely powerless and hemmed in on all sides. so might as well crack a joke. dean is, i think, very very aware of his powerlessness in a world of supernatural creatures - e.g "i've never had powers" from 9.06.

15.05

DEAN: Without the gun? It’s God, Sam. And he’s coming for us. How the hell are we supposed to fight God?

5.17

DEAN: Angel world, angel rules, man.

so how does this tie back to jack? well the throughline there, i think, is billie. in s14 billie tells dean that there is only one way to stop michael and he believes her so firmly. even when jack kills michael, i dont think dean decides from that that billie was wrong. i think he sees all the consequences of jack's choice and it reaffirms for him that billie was right that any other choice about michael would result in a huge amount of damage. so when billie explains the plan about jack stopping chuck, i honestly think dean just believes that's the only way. and more than that, that he is just not equipped to change it. i mean its similar to his attitude in 14.20 when chuck tells him jack will destroy the world. and dean is devastated and also like... doesn't know what else to do but listen.

dean is resistant to authority figures and he is stubborn and gutsy... to a point. but there are times when shit gets so big and the powers at play feel so beyond him that he really doesn't know what else he can do. and though i think he would always, always rather sacrifice himself, that's not what's being offered to him.

idk sorry for the ramble and feel free to ignore but this is my understanding of his headspace.

Rambling always welcome. :-) Oh, yes, I agree with you. I think actually the 15x06 Golden Time *script goes out of i's way to describe Dean as fatalistic, overhwlemed, grief-stricken, and defeated. *My pet parallel is that season 15 Dean is in the same position as early-seasons Cas, losing faith in trusted foundations and, more importantly, in his self. He doesn't trust his own ability to change things!

And yes, Dean (and Cas and Sam) give up all the time! I think a nice way to look at is that, time and time again, it is the sharing of support that allows people to pick themselves up from their respective ashes.

Dean is wonderfully, honestly human. I personally think that the natural evolution of season 15 would be that it is Dean's previous grace towards others that "pays it forward" for his own recovery.

I.E. He's given grace and emotional support to others so often that his loved ones are finally going to return that grace ten-fold, understanding his psychological wound and helping him through it.

[cosmos-coma]

Hi! Can I request A, K, R, U, Z for Olgierd von Everec? 👉🏼👈🏼

Ooooooo! Of course! I've never done anything with Olgierd before so I'm Kind of excited!

A- Activities- What do they like to do with you? how do they spend their free time with you?

Having grown up as a noble he often spent his time learning to horseback ride, sword fight, and such. He likes to take some time to teach these things to you, especially sword fighting. He wants nothing more than to make sure that you’ll be safe. He knows he can’t always be right beside you, so he teaches you to sword fight- him using a wooden mock sword while he makes sure you get used to using the real thing (thank god he’s immortal right?). But he’s not all just training, he’s also a great lover of art and absolutely relishes in sharing it with you and hearing all of your thoughts.

K- Kiss- Are they a good kisser? what was the first kiss like?

He’s a pretty good kisser! He’s pretty damn suave but he’s not gonna be teaching a master class on kissing. After all the turmoil he went through, “living” life by just going through the motions, he’s still learning to have his heart properly in it again (though make no mistake, he is trying, but you can’t rush progress).

R- Romance - How romantic are they? what would they do to make you happy? Cliché or romantic?

Olgierd is very romantic and he would do quite literally anything to make you happy (except contact Gaunter O’Dimm again), but I wouldn’t call him cliché. When he and his band go out on their raids he always keeps a special eye out for something that will make you smile. Sometimes it’s a bit of jewelry, a fancy necklace no one will miss or a hair pin that’ll go with your eyes. But sometimes it’s a book you had been talking about weeks ago, or a jar of the best honey in town because he knows you’re running low. But that’s just simple little things to him. Every once in a while he’ll do something more grand- hiring a small orchestra and having someone make dinner for the two of you. Sometimes it’s all a little much for you, but you understand- after all, he’s already lost someone once, he doesn’t want to do it again…

U- Understanding - How good do they know their partner? are they empathetic?

“Empathy” and “Everec” are not often found in the same sentence. It’s well known that after he became immortal, the consequences of his wish also gradually stripped the emotion and empathy away from him. He had lived as a husk for many many years, alive but never living, emoting, but not really feeling. However… the day that you arrived in his life is the first day he felt his heart truly beat again. Something within him changed that day, strained that curse of his until just a touch of his old self was able to shine through and he hasn’t been the same since. Some people claim it’s a “true love thing” and Olgierd is in no place to deny it.

Z- Zeal - Are they willing to go to great lengths for the relationship? if so, what kind?

Olgierd would do anything for relationship relationships. It helps that he’s immortal, but he would put his life on the line for what you two have. Like I said above, Olgierd has already lost someone very dear to him, and for a long time he didn’t think he could ever have that again. So when you came into his life with that radiant smile and soft touch- gods, he knew what it meant to live again. And while he’s not perfect yet, it’s a far cry from what he once was. He would sacrifice anything to keep from loosing you.

[marley-manson]

For the character ask, Hawkeye and Leonard McCoy

Thank you! 💖

Hawkeye

Something I like:

Hmmm... I like that he's the heart. The emotional centre, the empathetic one who encourages everyone else to share their feelings, and incredibly open himself. He has multiple subplots where his goal is to get someone to talk about how they feel. He himself never represses his feelings (unless traumatic amnesia does it for him lol) and is always willing to share them/yell about them/start riots/etc. He's nearly shameless and almost never gets embarrassed about anything. He tells everyone when his dick stops working, his attempted solution when his (and bj's) prank goes wrong in Bottoms Up is to pants himself so they'll be even lol, he tells random people apropros of nothing that he was just sectioned in a psych ward in GFA, he shows up to morning assembly in a jockstrap to piss off a general once (not shown but mentioned), etc etc.

He's a very refreshing character that way, I love it. I'm used to being a fan of characters with a lot of hidden depths and interesting contradictory traits and big issues, but with Hawkeye what you see is what you get. He knows himself and he wants everyone else to know him too. And not in a shallow, simplistic two dimensional way - he's a complex and interesting guy - it's just his particular personality. He's overall a self-actualized, emotionally healthy, confident but self aware guy thrown into a hell that fucks with emotionally open people extra hard.

He's the sanest guy Sidney knows.

Something I dislike:

We're going niche with this because every other answer I can think of is something I've talked about at length. So in the occasional episode there are moments when he gets earnestly upset at someone and rather than eg making a caustic, mean joke, he'll respond in a humourless way, and honestly I think those moments are awkward lol. The examples I'm thinking of are Hey Doc, when he's upset about Frank not caring about a stolen microscope and just earnestly calls him heartless, and Preventative Medicine when he tells the xenophobic patient to shut up instead of eg cruelly mocking him. There are probably other examples occasionally.

I don't think it's ooc or anything, everyone has their off moments and Hawkeye can be an earnest emotional guy as I gushed about above lol, I just don't like them. I love when Hawkeye's wit gets mean when he's upset and it feels like a missed opportunity for that.

(And actually since I've talked about how much I love Hawkeye's openness before, I'll also add something v specific as an alternative answer for something I like:

I love that there are at least two lines indicating that he doesn't like John Wayne. (Disliking a John Wayne movie in LIP, "Who's John Wayne?" joke in Movie Tonight.) It makes perfect sense as a detail, John Wayne being the epitome of propagandic 50s manliness that the show spends a lot of time sending up, but it's just a great detail on a character level.)

McCoy

Something I like:

I love that he's open about his fears and discomforts and a bit of a worry-wort and not that into living on a spaceship having constant adventures lol while also being incredibly brave and badass. The moment that made him my TOS fave was when Khan was holding a knife to his throat and he told him exactly how to use it to kill him <3 And the moments he sacrifices himself for others - testing a medicine he just made on himself, volunteering for torture in The Empath, etc - are also badass af. But also he needs Spock to save him when he's thrown into a gladiator match because he doesn't know how to actually fight. Excellent combination.

Something I dislike:

There are the episodes that make him the bad guy in his arguments with Spock where he goes too far and that's always a little hard to watch. I kinda blame the writers for favouring Spock lol, but it's not exactly ooc and often it makes sense from Bones' pov, when Spock is behaving in a way that seems to him to be borderline sociopathic. And there are a couple eps where Spock comes across worse too at least. But yeah, sometimes McCoy needs to chill a little and remember that he knows Spock has feelings and viciously insulting him isn't a great way to bring out those feelings.

Send me a character and I’ll tell you something I like about them, as well as something I dislike about them