#Questions about them are also welcome though I do like this concept

[hrokkall]

Designed some V-Model Iterators to go with the Minos and Sisyphus slugcats I've been drawing

[winndycakes]

Winndy Rambles And Gushes About Chuck Tingle

Wanted to ramble a little about one of my favorite authors, creators and overall just super rad people; Chuck Tingle.

Like many people, when I first heard of Chuck, I took him as some sort of meme. A troll, a joke, someone not to be taken seriously. After all, the majority of his works are "silly short erotica stories around dinosaurs, cryptids and even living concepts and items". How COULD this be serious? It's a question I asked before, years ago, and one that many still do to this day.

One holiday season, a friend had made a post on FaceBook saying "first five people to comment I'll gift you a book". So I did. The book I got was a physical copy of the "Space Raptor Butt Invasion Trilogy" by Chuck Tingle. Since I had a book of Tingle's now, I really had no excuse to not read it for myself.

Erotica normally isn't my thing (I'm pretty ace and grey aro too), but very quickly, I was charmed by the prose. As you read Chuck's stories, there's a fact that becomes very apparent. Chuck Tingle is a great writer, a really great writer. How he writes, how the words flow together, one sentence going into the next. The characters, the plot, the little bits of lore, dialogue and all he puts in... You quickly begin to see; this is NOT a joke.

It is not a meme. He is not trolling you. It is art. Passionate, sincere, genuine art. And it's beautiful. The more you read, the more definitive it gets.

I will admit, I have read aloud many a Tingler for friends and others in Discord servers, both to share my joy of Tingle with others, but also, it is fun to look at how different his works are. It's fine to laugh along with them even.

The moment that really was like... angels singing, light shining down and there's bishi sparkles and a heavenly soft pink background appearing for me though was the summer Chuck Tingle released on of his first full novella's; "Trans Wizard Harriet Porber and the Bad Boy Parasaurolophus". Like many, I was crushed and gutted at JKR's extreme turn to committing to transphobia (and of course the hindsight of realizing... the HP books and universe were not as kind and welcoming as I remembered growing up). So when Chuck Tingle (in one weekend mind you) came out with a 50k novel affirming trans people and their belonging in not just queer spaces, but being on this Earth, as fellow human beings, it was... affirming. It was the welcoming feeling I had gotten with the original HP books all those years ago, but it was real. (Also please read both Trans Wizard Harriet Porber books. They're delightful, fun and the magic system Tingle creates is so, so cool and interesting).

The next thing that got me just mega hype for Tingle was his first foray into horror; "Straight". "Straight" is Tingle's answer to the ever popular trope and genre of zombies and the apocalypse that comes with them, and what a fun turn of tables he takes on them. Zombies in the Tingleverse are not undead beings, they're not humans afflicted by a virus, instead a strange cosmic event happens once a year, when one night, all cishet people on Earth get this animalistic, violent urge to brutally harm and even kill all queer people. I won't get too spoilery about it but it is a very fun romp, and as someone who has been fatigued by zombies, it is a welcome new perspective.

Not long after this, Chuck came out with two full, traditionally published horror novels; "Camp Damascus" and "Bury Your Gays". Both are very different experiences in horror, both a joyful celebration of being queer and your authentic self even in the face of those looking to silence you, permanently if they must. I had the pleasure of meeting Chuck (twice!) while he was on tour for both of these books, getting my copies signed (along with my copies of the Trans Wizard duology and my beloved copy of the Space Raptor trilogy) and was able to tell Tingle myself just how important he is to someone like me; another queer autistic creator. (I was also one of the few people to win the little mini games he gave, twice, but that's a different story).

Ultimately that is what I am trying to get at. Growing up, and even for all of my 20s, there wasn't really someone like Tingle. Someone unabashedly authentic, themselves, queer, open and imo most importantly, joyously so. One is often told "just be yourself" but that can be hard to do when it seems like the world is against you for one reason or another.

Seeing a creator like Chuck shows how important it is to have such a presence in the world, and I was glad I got to tell him myself. I've had a lot of hardships in life, a lot of losses, a lot of grief, but someone like Chuck is there to tell you to keep trotting and remind you; Love Is Real.

And that's truly the ending message:

Love Is Real.

[misshugs]

The elevator game || Colby Brock x Reader

[req by anon] You knew you were sensitive to the other side, but you didn't expect a silly little game from the internet to give you this much of an impact.

warnings: cursing, paranormal activity, reader getting (slightly) attacked by ghosts, sensitive/medium!reader, degrading, angst? still not sure what the meaning of it is tbh

a/n: this is my first request ever, i hope i didn't let you down dear anon. Concept based on this video

word count: 2.5k (not proofread)

[u n e d i t e d]

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"What's up guys, it's Sam and Colby!" Colby screamed towards the camera, as always.

"Today we are here at the Driskill Hotel, also known as the most haunted hotel here in Texas." Sam continues.

"We're here to figure out why this place is so haunted and what message the ghosts here wanna tell the people. And for this video guys, we have a very special someone!" Colby says, moving to the side so that you're visible to the camera.

Waving at it and smiling, you were greeted by Colby's hands wrapped around your shoulders. "Thank you, thank you. Hello, dear people. It is I." They laugh.

"How are you feeling about this? Are you excited?" Sam asks, putting the camera on the both of you.

"I am! The place is HUGE and honestly, just looks so good!"

"Right?? When we got in it was just like a burst of shock at how gorgeous this place is." Sam said and Colby nodded.

"If it weren't haunted I'd probably come here more often, but I can already feel all of these... energies walking around, I wouldn't last too long."

"Oh, right. For anybody that doesn't know, Y/n is actually a bit of medium?" Colby asks while looking at you, making you nod. "Yeah, so she's sensitive to like the energy of shadow figures and things like that, so maybe we'll get to experience something interesting tonight!"

"I'd say hopefully not but that wouldn't make it fun I guess." You laugh and so do they while you explain it is a pain in the ass to feel those things constantly. "It is almost as if you're constantly paranoid about someone looking at you, y'know what I mean?"

"Oh yeah, for sure." Colby noded.

"Yeah so that, but those stares are more physical than anything, there are times where I can feel people walking behind me and when I look back, there's no one."

"I can just imagine how creepy that must feel." Sam said and you chuckled.

"Oh yeah. You have no idea." You smiled.

"Well then, shall we begin the investigation?" Colby asked you, smiling. You quickly smiled back.

"Of course." You kissed him softly before Sam could even turn off the camera.

"Oh, gross man. I'll have to edit that out." He said jokingly and you laughed, rolling your eyes.

"But seriously though, let's keep it moving." You said and they agreed.

Walking around, there were a few pieces of lore they had to explain to you beforehand. About the one and only Driskill who created the hotel, about the little girl that broke her neck, so on and so forth.

There were times when you had this eerie feeling of constantly being followed, so you kept your arms interlocked with Colby's.

"You're doing okay so far?" He asked, cautiously caressing your hand. You nodded.

"Yeah, just feel like we're being followed." You replied, looking back where there was no one there.

"Really??" Sam asked, looking back as well but seeing nothing. "Do you think we caught a ghost's interest?"

"I mean, probably. There is a difference in between someone that's coming just for the hotel part and us, that are investigating and directly needing their intervention. We're making them curious."

"Well, for whatever spirit that might be following us, you're welcome to answer our questions later on tonight." Colby said loud enough for anything around to listen to it.

Honestly, even those small gestures made you so madly in love with him. The way he touches you softly just for you to make sure you're not alone and he's here for you is such a warming feeling.

Wilst looking around the current room, Colby walked up to a random closed door and tried to walk through.

"She said no closed doors!" Sam exclaimed, probably talking about the tour guide's rules of the place.

"Unless it's... unlocked." Colby responded, making Sam roll his eyes.

"Oop, it's Jim Hogg's room." You said, looking up.

"Who's that?" Sam asked.

"I dunno, it says its name on the top." You point up and they just laughed at the comment. I mean, what were they expecting? You had no idea about whatever story roams around these halls asides from the two main ones they've explained.

"Also I don't think you should be trying even more, like if it's hard to go in it's probably because you're not supposed to."

"We have a bad reputation of breaking into places." Sam admitted and you smiled.

"Yeah, I know. I remember that." You chuckle and hold Colby's hand to pull away from the door.

As they kept on chatting and making interesting comments here and there, you found the elevator and pointed it out. "Oh, is this the one?" Colby asked Sam and he just gave him a stare.

"This is the one what?" You ask and they look at eachother.

Sam sighed. "We were going to keep it until the time came, but we may have a little challenge for tonight that has to do with the elevator."

"Ooooh sounds fun. I wanna do it." You smile.

"You sure?? You have to be by yourself." Colby asked, worried but amused.

"Do you think I can't do this, Mr. Brock? That's offensive." You spat, crossing your hands around your chest.

"No! I meant-" He tried to explain, but you quickly interrupted.

"Cancelled, I tell you. Cancelled!" You look away with your eyes closed, trying not to laugh at the stupid situation unfolding.

"Great." You heard him sigh in defeat as Sam started laughing at the both of you. Looking back with a smile on your face, you hugged him.

"Alright, let's get going already." You giggled, gaining a kiss on the top of your head from your boyfriend.

Walking inside the elevator, it almost felt as if it quickly went down in an unnatural way.

"Did you guys feel like... the elevator dropping three inches?"

"Yeah, kinda of." Sam said.

"Three inches is a lot." Colby replied.

"Three inches is huge." Sam continued.

"I can vouch." You said.

"Mass..." Colby began talking but couldn't hold in the laugh after you said that.

Going back to the main lobby, you all reached out to a girl that was apparently the tourguide. She quickly explained the story of the place, how it ended up being the renouned hotel it came to be.

When she explained that the smell of cigar was one of the main ways Driskill manifested, your eyes went wide. "You're kidding."

"No, did you smell it before?" She asked.

"I did! But it was like, close to the entrance so I thought that maybe someone was smoking. I did find it rare because it was just a glimpse of it for like a solid second and then gone." You explained, making the girl smile.

"Well, that was him."

"No way." Colby said, smiling at you.

"Yup." She nodded, continuing to explain as you all started walking back to the elevator. Going inside, the door closed only to be opened again. "Oh?"

"Did we just pressed five and went to one? It's haunted!" Sam exclaimed.

"That was weird." Colby said, looking at the door.

"It was, that was so weird." The guide said, trying to close the door once again, only for it to open again.

"Does it do that often?" You asked and she shook her head.

"No! It doesn't." She walked back out and talked to someone from out side. "Are you fucking with us?"

"That's so strange- oh, I hit it." You whispered. The guide came back in.

"But you see it, right? I'm pressing five and it like start to go up but then it stops." The door closes once again, only for them to open.

"Oh my god." Sam said, whispering.

"And we're doing a challenge here?" You asked confused, making them laugh.

"Not here exactly." Colby smiled.

"Lemme- I'll go out." You said, walking out of the elevator, watching as the doors began to close, only for them to open once again. "Oh no, that's- that's a malfunction alright."

"And you said it, these malfuction all the time." Colby said to the guide as they walked out of the elevator.

When Sam did it by himself, it started working all over again.

"What the fuck??" Colby yelled.

"Are we like fat? Is it fat shaming us?" You whined, making everyone laugh.

And so, even though your night barely started, you were already having some activity to say the least.

And it kept being that way all night. Constant responses from spirits, intelligent ones at that. The little girl, the woman from the vortex room... all the way down to the challenge you've been anticipating the whole night round.

The elevator challenge.

"I think it might be just me but every single time we pass through this side of the hotel I feel like actually throwing up."

"Wait, really?" Colby asked, worried.

"Like an eerie feeling more than anything, almost like I'm kinda feeling a bit dizzy whenever we pass through here."

"Are you sure you want to do this? You can still back out, or I could go in with you." Colby tried to make you change your mind, but you were settled in it.

"No, I have to do it alone. What if it doesn't work because we're together? You're not gonna let me do this right?"

"I do! I'm just worried." Colby admitted, making you smile.

"You cutie. I love you so much." You said, smiling at him and cupping his face before giving him a quick peck on the lips.

"Y'all are gonna make me puke, another part I'm gonna have to cut out." Sam joked, making you giggle.

"Alright, alright. So, how does this work?" You ask, hugging yourself as you wait for instructions.

It was a simple game. Supposedly, you had to hit the buttons of the elevator in a specific order. In the last one, you had to invite in a lady. If the ritual worked, you were supposed to start going up into another world. If it didn't, well, nothing happened and it failed.

"So... I'm about to get isekai'd? We're going to an anime, brothers." You laughed at your own joke while they handed you your camera.

"I send you the order, just in case." Sam continued, and you nodded.

"Thank you, 'cause I already forgot." You turned on your phone as well as the camera and walked in.

"Any last words?" Colby asked cheekishly, making you smile.

"See you in the other side." You answered, before the door closed. You sighed, putting the camera up to your face. "Alright, so... I'm supposed to hit this one first." Switching the camera back to the buttons, you hit the number four.

It began moving. "Oh, good. It would've been a mess if it already fucked up. Alright..." You sighed. "I didn't told them this, but I do find the thought of getting stuck in an elevator horrifying. I just agreed because maybe it might help me out, but it doesn't work the fact that I can feel so many spirits around this area specifically every time we walk past it." You explain before getting on the next floor, touching the next button.

Back down on the lobby, Sam and Colby were talking.

"I didn't want her to do it, honestly. I was gonna do it myself." Sam said.

"Right? She's our guest too, what if something happens to her? That would be the death of me."

"Don't jinx it, brother. She'll be alright."

Boy they were wrong.

Halfway through, your vision started to get blurry, your legs were shaky and you couldn't brush off the feeling of pressure on your chest. It was starting to make you nervous, even more so the fact you were alone.

You started thinking to yourself. What if something really did happen? What if you summon something your body couldn't handle? What if it really did send you to another world?

It happened so quickly, that you have already reached the last floor before you knew it. Gulping down your dry throat, you began to speak. "Alright, if there's something... out... oh fuck." Your vision got blurry and you could feel an inmense ammout of power flushing through the elevator doors even before it opened up.

You couldn't hold it together, it was too much for you to handle as you were suspecting before. Although you tried to stay up, your legs couldn't hold your weight up anymore and you passed out, falling down to the floor, hitting your head strongly onto the hard floor of the elevator.

Luckily, the ritual didn't work. It began going down and the guys, mainly Colby, were anxiously waiting for the doors to open. When they did, their faces fell.

Colby screamed out your name, quickly rushing in and holding your head. "Love?? Sweetheart, what happened? Wake up, please. Oh God." He began shaking, carrying you outside of the elevator so that it was slightly more comfortable.

"What happened? Oh my fucking God." Sam whispered, grabbing your camera from the elevator's floor and walking out.

"She's not responding, Sam." Colby nervously said, making sure you were at least still alive.

You were.

"Should I call an ambulance or something?" Sam asked. "Oh, no. I have the keys with me."

"Let's take her to the hospital, quickly." He lifted you up from the floor and hurriedly got out of the building and to the hospital.

You were alright, luckily. It seemes you have just fainted, but you falling down to the floor and hitting your head so hard made it a bit more complicated than what it had to be.

Colby felt bad, horrible even to think that this could've happened to you.

He should've been more careful, he should've known you were too sensitive to all of these energies so that you would go alone and out to make something so nerve racking. He should've been more insisting, rather than going with the flow merely because of a video.

He let his love have that type of experience because of a mere video.

It devastared him. Made him feel absolutely awful about it. While waiting for you to wake up, he kept on downgrading himself thinking about how he's the worst possible boyfriend.

It all stops when you finally wake up. Looking around the white room, confused.

"What happened?"

"It looks like you fainted... I'm so sorry for letting you do that all by yourself, I should've stopped you, I should've at least gone with you, I'm so sorry that you had to go through that because-"

"Love. Love!" You held his cheeks softly, making him quietly stop ranting, you smiled. "You know I wanted to do it, I was the stupid one for forgetting that big energy rafts can affect me a lot, I'm so sorry baby." You kissed his nose, reassuring him everything was alright.

And honestly, he needed to hear it. From you, specifically. Sam was trying to make him calm down but it didn't really work. It had to be you, your voice, your smile.

The one thing that made him whole all over again.

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I MAY HAVE DONE TOO MUCH FILLER FOR NO GODDAMN REASON- also hoping that dear anon liked it-

thank you for reading, loves~! likes, comments and reblogs are appreciated <3

~nikkõ

[bakubonez]

mayhaps would you write as little or as much as you’d want of dan heng x reader and how they slowly work their way into his everyday life??? Perchance the fic generally begins with reader’s arrival on the express and extends into how either of them confessed and how they’re an inseparable part of dan heng’s life now （╹◡╹）I am so sorry for the long ass request lol

Dan Heng x GN! Reader || fluff

Summary: After inserting yourself into Dan Heng’s daily life, eventually he comes to enjoy your company—perhaps a bit too much.

A/N: HOORAY I was so excited to read this request, it was a lot of fun to do 🦭 I hope you like it, I wrote it while a little bit eepy so hopefully it isn’t too bad 🙏 also the trailblazer is considered as a separate entity from the reader so,, there is a wild Stelle/Caelus running around on the express

Your arrival on the express had sort of been anticipated, considering how much time you’d been spending with the Nameless since you met them—but that didn’t mean that Dan Heng was entirely happy with the concept. It wasn’t personal, he didn’t mind you as a person, he just wasn’t the most eager to discover someone new had joined the crew.

Unfortunately(or perhaps fortunately) for Dan Heng, you attached yourself to him. He has no clue why you took to him, but you did, and he didn’t have the heart to tell you to screw off. Besides, you weren’t too much of a nuisance. Your annoyingness levels were similar to that of March 7th and the trailblazer, so it wasn’t anything he was unfamiliar with.

Wherever he goes, you seem to follow. The majority of your free time was spent acting as his shadow, poking around in the databank, lounging in the parlor car with him, and so on.

Your company isn’t bad and he eventually grows to tolerate you easily. He’d answer your questions with patience and allow you to just, well, be around him, without complaint.

Mostly everyone else on the express notices.

At first its just the wise Himeko and Mr. Yang who notice Dan Heng warming up to you, but eventually while March 7th and the trailblazer are up to their usual nonsense, they have their eureka moment, and suddenly everyone—except for you and Dan Heng—is on the same page.

After a while, some conflicting feelings start to brew within Dan Heng. He wasn’t entirely sure what to do with them, but he knew that they were your fault. He hardly even realises it when he starts welcoming your presence in his life, and missing you dearly when you aren’t around.

You’d formed a habit of bringing him food to share, when he’d lock himself up in his room and work tirelessly on the databank. When you missed a meal with him, it left a feeling of disappointment in his chest. He’d started to look forward to your mealtimes with him.

Times when you leave, maybe to go out with March 7th and the trailblazer, or are on a separate part of the train doing chores, he tends to notice your absence—whether it be him having to eat breakfast alone or work in the databank without you, he always notices.

Dan Heng isn’t sure how to broach the topic. He considers asking Mr. Yang or perhaps Himeko for advice, but just thinking about it makes his skin burn a bit. And he’d rather clean the floors of the express with a toothbrush than have to tell March or the trailblazer about it. So, he’s left to deal with it alone until he gathers up the courage to tell you.

Every single time you’re around, he’s tempted to just come out with it. When you’re sitting next to him in his room, when you’re playing chess together, anything.

It’s excruciatingly painful for the rest of the Nameless to watch. They can all see how you fawn over Dan Heng, and how he dotes on your similarly, but they can’t do anything to speed up your hopeless pining and finally get you two to start a proper, committed relationship.

Much to their delight, though, Dan Heng does finally cough up his true feelings.

It wasn’t a particularly romantic setting. You two were just spending time together as you usually did, taking part in some mundane activity, but a slip of Dan Heng’s tongue changed it entirely.

He seemed almost as shocked as you were when he confessed to you, staring at you like a deer in headlights, like something had possessed him and made him tell you how he felt. He braced himself for some sort of rejection, but it… it never came.

In fact, rejection was the last thing on your mind—only giddy excitement.

After some mildly awkward back and forth, the pair of you discovered that hey, you two had been pining over each other for ages, and now the truth had finally come out. It was a relief.

Not much changed after you finally settled on a label for your relationship. The two of you were as close as ever. Of course, March was delighted—everyone was, really.

You became an inseparable couple, and neither of you could be happier.

[indieyuugure]

Hey there. I've been absent for some time (internet detoxing, finally reached my goal), and I'm so freaking excited about IndieTMNT. I love your designs for April, Karai and my man, Casey 😍. I was also looking at some of your "random" drawings and I came across the one where Raph proposes to Mona (Fangirl squeal!). One question though, are the first turtles Karai and Leo? Leo proposed to Karai? Is that canon? (Please say yes to all of them 🥺)

Hello! Welcome back! So glad you’re liking Indie TMNT so far!

Heavy Spoilers:

Yeah that’s canon. Here’s both pages

(Please note that this is concept art and so things may change to varying degrees)

Not sure what “first turtles” means, but Leo is the first of his brothers to propose to someone and it was Leo who proposed to Karai, not the other way.

Also, got an interesting ask the other day so I wanted to clear up any confusion, the turtles are over 18 by this point in the story, so like, they can do this kind of thing if they want to.

So I believe that’s a yes to all your questions??

Good question! :]

[refeverie]

CAN I REQUEST ANGST WITH WANDERER?? - reader is in love with a guy from the academy when the wanderer truly loves the reader and understands everything perfectly.. But soon it turns out that the guy the reader is in love with turns out to be.. not a good person and wanted to hurt the reader. I really ask you to make an angst with a good ending where the reader will be together with the wanderer. I will be glad if you accept my request

everything he did, he did for you.

slight hurt/comfort. gn!reader × wanderer. wc 660

note. nothing is specified, but i should say, that if you experienced anything like in the prompt, it by itself is a trigger warning for readers / it's also not entirely written like requested since i don't really know how to write it in my style (but i wanted to do it), so i tried not to stray from myself and wanderer.

(i don't take requests anymore, only ideas—i figured i can't write under pressure)

love is such a complicated concept. to some, it is a warm home; a safe place you return to at the end of the day. to others, an intense feeling of affection for a person you trust. for someone else, it is just a complex cycle of triggered hormones. … et cetera. 

and to wanderer? it is either a nonexistent idea for most days, or a specific name at times. yours, in particular. 

he is not one to confess, not one to possess, but one to suppress. wanderer is used to subdue the swirling hot emotions way easier than he should, or he would want to. he does not enjoy having certain feelings, yet, without them, he would not feel as human as he is. 

the thing is, you do not see him like that at all. well, that is what wanderer thinks anyway when he watches you take another’s hand. he notices the enamored look you give to that special someone, and it churns in his stomach. 

if his body had natural blood circulation, he would say he feels like all of his limbs are tied up firm—cutting the flow of oxygen to his brain; going all blue from pain and shortness of breath; said limbs being severed altogether with crimson red vital fluid drizzling into a pond underneath his trembling feet. 

the boy you like is sweet-talking. he gifts you expensive accessories, treats you to dinner, gives you flowers daily, always sneaks an arm around your waist, kisses your face, and never leaves your side. it is borderline perfect. 

he suffers this thing called ‘love’ like it is an incurable sickness. it eats him whole; gnaws at his heart. however, one fact is clear to him: he cares about you to an extent, so he understands your feelings well enough as well. letting you love someone else instead of him is one thing he can do for you beyond question. because you deserve to be your own person. 

wanderer ponders if it is what you like. he is the complete opposite of that guy—intimidating and teasing; all about give-and-take; not into intimacy nor gifting, but words and time; not around you every time yet always there for you when you do need him. and whatever you prefer. 

everything he did, he did for you.

despite all that agony, wanderer still lived, or rather, existed. 

it was not that long into your relationship before his ears perked up at the sound of your hushed name being mentioned when he strolled at the library of akademiya. he recognized the man you like. he is not alone and neither did he talk nice about you. some worm in his chest bit him hard.  

the house you are in is dark and unfamiliar; uncanny. it feels unpleasant. the guy you like mentioned he would be back soon, he just had to pick up something down the street. you assume it is flowers like every day. though, it has been quite a long time.

as you hear a bell ring, you go to welcome him back. in truth, after you open the doors, you are met with someone else instead—wanderer. he is not alone, his right hand is holding your boyfriend by the scruff of his neck, and the left grips another boy you saw once or twice before at the library. you are confused, but not for long. 

shortly, you are clutching wanderer’s chest, teary-eyed, and feeling so small in this huge scary world. if not for him, what would have happened to you? he holds you close, tracing soothing circles with the palm of his hand on your back. he found himself kissing the top of your head secretly, too.

you never appreciated wanderer that much before today. he earned your trust, your gratitude, and your love. he felt like he just sacrificed a lot of his energy, but it did not matter. 

because everything he did, he did for you.

[crinj-central]

Now that it is confirmed that Loki was framed for Harald's murder and in fact wasn't even present for the act itself, it does beg the question of who the traitor was. It'd only make sense if it's a character that was at the very least name-dropped during this arc, because there wouldn't be the same shocking impact otherwise. And while I do have Jarul on my sus radar now, there are too many factors that wouldn't make sense for him. Because why would Jarul make up a false prophecy about an unborn child?

Hajrudin's Mom (HM) would have plenty of reasons to detest not only Harald, but also Loki. *Especially* Loki, the very manifestation of HM's disgrace and living proof that Harald valued his citizens opinions above HM. The fact that the seeds of spite towards Loki were already planted before his birth is just too strange. Nobody else could possibly have any reason to hate his very conception than the woman who was shunned and replaced, whose lover didn't even stand up for her.

I believe that ever since Harald married Loki's Mom, HM managed to poison her while she was pregnant. She may wasn't allowed to *live* at the castle, but who is to say that she couldn't just keep on visiting, and in fact even pretend to be kind to Loki's Mom? Isn't it so strange how she died one year after his birth, which isn't a long time at all for a giant. And Loki has had his bandages on ever since he was child as well. Personally I believe that his eyes are just very sensitive to light instead of him being outright blind. His helmet is also rather unique because it's the only one that's shaped like a sun hat (trust me, I went back and looked at ALL the helmets in Elbaph). So while his strong genes might have prevented full blindness or worse, he was still born with a disability. He was already born a freak, fitting for the image of an accursed prince.

The following point was brought up by @wyvernslovecake : What the hell was Loki doing in the underworld when he was still a toddler? While it's true that little kids are notorious for going places they really shouldn't, it doesn't really make sense for Baby Loki to go all the way from the royal castle down to the underworld by himself. Did HM kidnap Loki and dump him in the underworld in the hopes that he would meet his end there? If HM really pretended to be friendly, then it would make sense that Baby Loki would trust her easily, even though HM's intentions were anything but pure. But instead of meeting his end there, Loki befriended all those wild beasts whom he still loves to this day, and because he was a small child he unknowingly unleashed them. Or perhaps the beasts were actually just carrying him back up to the sun realm where he belonged? So even though Loki managed to survive easily, it was a welcome puzzle piece for his growing terrible reputation.

Something that also caught my attention is how much emphasis Hajrudin puts on Loki insulting his mother as a child. Why exactly is he still this pressed about what a small child was parroting from his environment? It should be obvious to any adult that Loki was just repeating whatever he heard from his surroundings, so why didn't HM explain it to him that Loki most likely didn't even understand the weight of what he was saying? Unless of course, HM didn't want Hajrudin to form a bond with Loki either. The fact that he was already bullied was just too convenient, so it was just too easy to keep nurturing Hajrudin's hatred. It was so effective that even now as an adult, Hajrudin refuses to think rationally about his brother at all. In fact, this dialogue caught my attention:

Could it be that Loki actually did attempt to reconcile with Hajrudin and be nice to him, but HM managed to foil all of his efforts and make it seem as though Loki was a back-stabber instead? For example, what if Loki tried to make a nice gift for Hajrudin, but HM intercepted it and manipulated it into something awful, making it look like a terrible prank.... which would earn Loki the reputation of a malicious trickster.

Perhaps Loki started to internalise that he really was cursed, and no matter what he did or tried, he'd still get ostracised. It's not too far-fetched to assume that this was the origin of his villain persona or rather, him starting to embrace his reputation and lean into it instead. It'd be less painful to just roll with it and amp it up instead of opposing it and failing to prove his innocence every single time. If even his attempted acts of kindness ended up in disaster, then why should he even try anymore anyway?

So even though HM wasn't able to kill Loki, she sure was able to kill his reputation over time and make sure that he'd become an unacceptable heir to the throne. She made sure that the citizens of Elbaph began to shun the very thing that humiliated her in the first place. But the big question is, did she also cause Harald's death? That I am not 100% sure about or rather if she did, I dont think she was alone. But either way, I believe that she pinned the blame on Loki too. I assume that as Harald's former lover and almost-queen, she most likely knew the exact whereabouts of that legendary fruit. It could be the perfect setup of Loki finding that fruit in a way that made it *look* like he killed his father over it.

But what about the Mosa theory? I actually don't think that HM doing heinous things to Loki excludes the probability that she could be Mosa as well. There are two possibilities that I can see:

1) Over time, she started to feel guilty and regretful for her past actions and the weight of it all was eating away at her. Maybe she descended down to the underworld where Loki was tied up in order to relish in the sight, but instead she saw an incredibly broken person. Someone who didn't actually do anything wrong in his life, and yet he faced such a harsh and undeserved punishment. Perhaps she saw him actually cry for the first time; personally, I believe that he cried a lot in the underworld as a child, so this was nothing new to him. Nobody voluntarily set foot in the underworld anyway, so this was his little safe space where he could let out his real feelings. And maybe this pitiful sight finally snapped HM out of her spiteful vengeance. Maybe she wanted to make it up to him somehow, even though realistically speaking, no amount of acts of kindness could possibly make up for all the pain she inflicted onto Loki. But the very least she could do was place a snow-resistant den den mushi next to him. Of course she was nervous to call him for the first time, what if he'd recognise her voice? What if she'd slip up? But instead, she started to find these conversations calming as well.

2) would have similar beats, except she'd just stay comically evil and was only pretending to be Loki's friend in an act of sadism. While I do appreciate a good angsty drama, I much prefer scenario 1) instead. Because it would tie into the elephant of the room when it comes to the themes of the Elbaph arc: Forgiveness.

Loki forgiving HM, Hajrudin forgiving Loki but instead not forgiving his own mother for what she did. The citizens of Elbaph better ask for Loki's forgiveness too. Forgiveness can be messy and feel undeserved, but also get retracted. It's up to the individual person to decide.

[psilliguykai]

WELCOME TO WILLIAM’S WANTON WEARY WILES!

An impulsive, apathetic man’s misanthropic jams. An eclectic collection of futile dissensions, a pretentious pile of literary bile filled with self destructive theatrics and rectifying tactics and any other slew of showy words.

Welcome.

(Info under the cut)

*queue WTTH instrumental*

Hello boys, girls, neithers, boths, and in-betweens and welcome to William’s Wanton Weary Wiles, a Will Wood/WWATTW x CCCC AU! Consider this a masterpost. Note that this AU is still very much in development, and this post will be updated as things change/get added :] Also. being totally up front. I’ve never made an AU or attempted a story this complex before, so please bare with me if things get confusing! Feedback is appreciated ^^

Warning! WWWW tackles sensitive topics, but nothing foreign to Will Wood or Chonny Jash’s music. Appropriate warnings will be put in the tags of each post, but overall CW/TW for: alcoholism/addiction, mental health issues, suicidal ideation, manipulation, and (moderate) violence.

The WWWW AU story is very similar to the original CCCC album, but with slightly different themes and tone. It still follows HMSW after Whole splits, creating Heart, Mind, and Soul. However, each character and their dynamics + certain plot points (e.g the Juno incident) are altered.

Asks about this AU are extremely welcome! Could be genuine questions, thoughts, serious, silly - anything (so long as it’s SFW!) is great and will help me with making this a Better and Actual Thing :3

In WWWW each member of HMSW represents and is based off of a WW(ATTW) album. Each character’s songs are from their respective albums, and the story will be told in the form of a written series of covers of songs by WW/WWATTW (plus some visual pieces :]). These will be posted individually and linked here as they get released.

3/31/25 EDIT: The information above is somewhat outdated! The idea of having to write 20+ song covers has been kind of killing my motivation for this project, so I've decided I will only be writing the covers I'm confident and interested in. However, the full tracklist with notes on what happens in each song will be posted soon[ish] and hyperlinked here when it's finished so you all still get the full storyline :]

While HMSW still exist with the same vague concepts and color themes, they do diverge a decent bit from the original CCCC album and I would not consider them to be representations of canon HMSW (or of any real people, including Whole /srs). Ref sheets have been posted and are linked in each character's name.

Important overall info: 

- HMS exists in a sort of parallel reality I’m calling Marybell (as a reference to Suburbia Overture as well as The Prescription). It’s a town within Will’s psyche that reflects his reality. It can change depending on his state of mind/current situation, and pretty much only exists to provide a physical space for HMS.

- Time loop!! Soul remembers every loop and knows the vague events that happen when Will is whole (though the memories are less clear than when he’s split). Heart and Mind don’t remember previous loops and aren’t really aware of anything when HMS is combined. Physical changes caused to any of HMS remain, even when the timeloop resets.

- LI does exist in WWWW! She’s about as significant as she is in CCCC and will probably get at least an intro, if not her own ref sheet at some point. I also have a sort of Darrell-equivelant which will probably get his own thing at some point as well.

Meet the cast: 

All characters have multiple names which can/will be used interchangeably. I’ve included the pronouns I think the characters would use, but you all are welcome to use whatever you’d like for any of them. Run free :3 here are the posts with the ref sheets for each of them - info on its own is below:

William

Jimmy/Laplace/Cotard

Whole:

- Whole/Will/William Racheal McSprout

- In Case I Make It

- He/him (GNC Cis Guy)

- 23-24 years old across the album

- Works at a small grocery/general tourist store

- Makes music as a side hobby. Not that successful lol. He makes decent stuff though - within the AU, the ICIMI covers featured would be considered his original music. 

- Spends his extra money on video games, alcohol, music equipment (sorta, though he mostly borrows shit and uses free programs), and serving cunt (fashion/makeup stuff)

- Not aware of HMS, though they’re aware of him. Mostly just feels a general sense of dissonance during splits, rather than Knowing the presence of these Multiple Actual Guys. Can’t interact with Marybell, same as HMS can’t (directly) interact with the “Real World”.

Soul:

- The Soul/Mr. Capgras/Cotard/Atlas

- He/it

- SELF-iSH

- Whole’s “self” - who he is at his core. His identity and personality at its most raw form. 

- He’s the most in-tune with Will’s actual state of being (health, emotions, etc.) and considers himself to somewhat be William, just separated and with pieces of himself missing. 

- Ultimate goal is to become a Happy Healthy and Alive Whole. Unlike in CCCC, the self-destruction is left more to H/M in this one .

- Knows he needs to get Heart and Mind to work together if he wants to keep William good and well, but he’s growing incredibly tired throughout the loops. He primarily experiences Will’s worst moments and rarely gets a break. Spends most of him life trying to get these. Fuckers. to get along and he’s so incredibly done with both of them. Growing distant, but ultimately does care about H/M on a personal level and really wishes they could all be happy together.

Mind:

- The Mind/Laplace/Al/Marsha/Apollo

- He/she

- The Normal Album

- Whole’s logic, as well as his self-control and calculated decision making. Doing his best to keep Will stable and often doing so to the point of burnout.

- Primarily tries to keep Heart in check, to the point of excessively trying to control it and Soul. Wants to keep Whole productive and functional by any means necessary. 

- At the end of the day, he does want Whole to live a happy life, but (despite keeping up a facade of superiority and strength) fears Heart’s impulsiveness/ erratic nature and feels the need to over-compensate in order to keep Will safe. 

Heart:

- The Heart/Jimmy/Vestal/Artemis

- He/it

- Everything Is a Lot

- Whole’s emotions, as well as his impulsiveness and indulgence. Sometimes joy-seeking, sometimes self-destructive. Often those two go hand in hand.

- Focused on breaking free from Mind’s controlling nature, trying to get her and Soul to “live a little”. Wants to allow Whole unbridled indulgence (in every whim and emotion, including negative) often to the point of self-destruction. 

- Ultimately knows he’s wrecking Will, but finds it’s the only way he knows to soothe his suffering. He knows Mind is right about them needing to get their shit together, but finds him difficult to work with and listen to when he’s so excessively overbearing. 

Tags:

Everything about this AU will be listed under the tags #wwww au and #william’s wanton weary wiles. 

Additional tags (color-coded according to character): #William Racheal McSprout, #Jimmy wwww, #Al wwww, and #Mr. Capgras wwww

[cynnpng]

Helen Otis (Bloody Painter): Rewrite headcanons

Warnings: Mentions of murder and blood (not explicit though).

[!] • Requests (art or written) and questions about my rendition of Bloody painter are open.

The information below will be gathered with no particular order. And this will discuss all of the information given both in the wiki and the two story videos.

Remember that this is a rewrite and it's not meant to completely follow the original story (although I do mean to keep core parts from the original).

→ He was obsessed with art because he could express himself however he wanted, without having to think about what his parents preferred. And then it became a coping mechanism, one he basically became dependent of.

→ And to this day, Helen still views art the same way, and he still depends on art to control his emotions.

→ He is called Bloody painter because he uses blood for painting. Not only that, but he makes sculptures with his victims bodies.

→ These particular art methods don't come from murdering his classmates, it actually happened during his time in the mental hospital.

→ His mental health deteriorated heavily during his stay in the hospital, and to make it worse he couldn't use any harmful objects which meant that he couldn't paint.

→ It obviously made Helen slowly grow desperate, and it got so bad that one day he decided to make himself bleed and use the blood to paint.

→ Of course, he also used the blood of other patients for his paintings. Threatening them to not say anything about it to the nurses.

→ The two art movements that inspire Helen the most are: Pre-Raphaelism and the artistic trope of Memento Mori (Remember that you will die).

→ The Pre-Raphaelites were a brotherhood who opposed to the Royal Academy's tradition, and encouraged serious topics like love and death.

→ Memento Mori or Vanitas is a movement focused on the art of death, it reflects on the transient nature of earthly life.

→ Bloody painter doesn't have a pattern in his victims and never follows the same profile. He, as an artist, wants to experiment and would only follow a specific model if he were to be looking for a concrete concept.

→ He loves blood in an artistic way, not only as an art supply but as in the composition it creates in a crime scene (for reference you could compare that interest with Dexter Morgan's).

→ Helen would try different killing methods just to see what composition it would create, he would be aware of which methods might be harder to recreate with his victims and would only pursue the ones he knows won't risk his identity being revealed.

→ Unlike the original story, he would actually try to keep a low profile after the apartment incident. He would go to a different city, choose a different name for the public, develop a double life and make sure he is not suspected by the police.

→ He would either have a very average job (supermarket manager, attendant at a gas station, etc) or maybe try to make money out of art (using normal art supplies, he wouldn't be satisfied with the results but the public might like it).

→ As in the mental hospital, Helen would try to win the favour of others with charisma but will threaten those who try to catch him (or even kill them if he seizes the perfect opportunity to get away with it).

A/N: These are just general headcanons, if you want to know more specific things about him you are more than welcomed to leave questions in my inbox! I would also like to thank you guys for the love y'all have given to my concept art of him, I really appreciate it.

[thetrialsandtribulationsofeb]

do you think the writers have written buddie the way they are intentionally or not? ive been going crazy about this bc if its intentional it would feel mean for them to not go canon and if its unintentional then its just kind of an insanely unbelievable amount of "which could mean nothing" thats kind of hilarious. i would love to know your thoughts on this

i had to gather all my brain power to write the answer to your question, so buckle up

and i’m gonna mention all the previous seasons because i think it plays a huge role when you compare season 8 to them

i think they were definitely written as just best friends/comrades in seasons 2 and 3, and i’m including the “eddie begins” episode, because the way buck digs through dirt and screams eddie’s name - and the fact that buck is in a lot of eddie’s visions when he’s underwater - still felt platonic to the writers. and as much as we love to talk about how eddie kind of replaced his wife with buck as proof for buddie, it can still read as both platonic and romantic. like, you can see it as romantic, but it’s not the strongest argument

also, the weird tension in the gym in 2x01 was played as “rivalry” and “jealousy” from buck’s side and “amusement” from eddie’s side. i don’t think ryan and oliver were trying to make it sexual, but it came out that way anyway because of their chemistry. and this type of chemistry doesn’t mean the actors are dating or even attracted to each other irl. it just happens sometimes between two people, and it’s not their fault :D

“you wanna go for the title?” kitchen scene still confuses me though, because if the same exact thing - with the same angles, dialogue, and acting - happened between a male and female character, everyone with eyes would assume it was leading to them kissing and ending up in bed. so i still have no idea why it had to be so weirdly sexual if they didn’t want people to see it that way

but season 4 is where things get weird, because i consider it the buddiest season of all. despite ana and taylor being there, buck and eddie feel way more like a romantic couple with their interactions. like, they’re so weirdly flirty with each other. and i also only recently found out that apparently ryan and oliver were in some kind of fight and weren’t on speaking terms during s4, which puzzles me so much, because this season has the most heart eyes and tension between them. maybe it’s because they were like, “okay, we need to stay professional and continue playing these characters as besties,” and they kind of overdid it. but idk if those rumors are even true. the whole ana panic attack situation can be explained by eddie’s grief over shannon (which is silly on the writers’ part), but it still reads as gay-coded at the same time. so again - maybe it wasn’t intentional, but it leaves room for different interpretations

the way they parallel eddie’s NDE in the s4 finale with bathena’s talk about how losing someone you love is such an unimaginable concept, how they focus on buck and eddie’s faces when eddie wakes up in the hospital instead of ana, the will speech after bucktaylor’s kiss, the way they focus on buck’s smile at eddie’s “welcome home” party - it feels like they were kind of playing with their dynamic in a slightly different way. still, they probably didn’t think of them as romantic. but again, if the same things were written between opposite-sex characters, they’d totally understand why it does feel romantic. or maybe it was intentional, but they had to play by the network’s rules (and fox didn’t want buddie to happen)

then we move to seasons 5 and 6, where they went back to totally platonic again. even though they’re still very domestic, and eddie’s reaction to buck’s NDE was very similar to his reaction to shannon’s death, and the way eddie was looking at buck at poker night - which could be seen as not platonic - i just know the writers toned down the buddiness because they added lucy, natalia, and marisol, even though those relationships felt flat. and the whole eddie-trying-to-find-a-relationship arc was painful to watch. but since fox shut down buck’s bisexual arc and another writer that saw buddie as completely platonic was working on these seasons (i don’t remember her name), they just tried to stay away from buddie

and then came season 7, where everything shifted

the copy-paste parallels between 7x01 and 2x01 - it’s like they rewatched that episode and decided to recreate those scenes. and buck - the main character in his 30s - finally being allowed to be queer because the network approved it is what changes the game

another thing i found out recently is that tim not only wanted to make tommy eddie’s love interest at first, but also bring lucy back as buck’s love interest, because he “still couldn’t find a good romantic partner for buck” (meanwhile eddie is right there 🙄), so he was like, “maybe that’s it”

but some things didn’t work out with both of those ideas (lucy’s actress was unavailable and tim changed his mind about tommy and eddie), so they went a different route and made tommy buck’s love interest, and the queerness realization arc was given to buck instead

and i’m glad it happened that way, because buck finding out his bisexuality first makes more sense for his character, considering his background and personality. it’s easier for him

and i genuinely think the best way for eddie to discover his queerness is through his feelings for buck, ‘cause with his religious heteronormative upbringing, it fits him better

so s7 was supposed to be about exploring eddie’s sexuality, but i guess since tim changed his mind (which, again, i’m glad he did, ’cause it made sense for buck to discover his attraction to men first), he decided to throw in kim’s storyline to get rid of marisol and make eddie lose chris - which opened up his s8 arc. and because he loves “vertigo”

idk, just the fact that tim was considering making eddie attracted to men already means he wanted to make buddie canon. ’cause if he wanted to leave their relationship as platonic, he could’ve focused on eddie’s “straightness” and his relationships with women more. but instead, he brought up eddie’s catholic guilt and the bobby and eddie dialogue about commitment in s7. and then the whole priest talk about beards, disguises, failures, forgiveness, and joy. and that same episode had a throwback to “eddie begins” with the well emergency and bobby saying, “i don’t think you’re gonna fit this time,” and ended with buck coming to eddie right after eddie’s joy dance. which maybe could be coincidental, but idk how stupid you have to be as a writer to not realize how weird all those lines and scenes look together. and the episode is literally called “confessions” (“i’m not your last” is also a confession in its own way)

and the whole buck-tommy-eddie triangle is the biggest buddie proof for me, ’cause it was always about buck’s feelings for eddie and tommy knowing that as long as buck and eddie are together, he’s just a third wheel. otherwise the way he breaks up with buck doesn’t make any sense

also, tim admitted in interviews that buck and eddie’s characters don’t work without each other and that the show gets worse without their connection - and that they sound more like an old married couple going through a breakup than just best friends parting ways in 8x09-8x10

also, ryan guzman said in an interview that he watches buddie edits with oliver, understands why fans ship them, and is open to the idea - but if buddie were to happen, he still wants it to stay true to his character. which i get and agree with

but i also think this is exactly what they were doing

’cause again, the right way for eddie to discover his queerness is not through dating some random dude (which works in buck’s case), but through how he feels about buck

also, eddie’s reaction to buck coming out to him and saying he wants to date tommy - and also to buck and tommy’s hug at the bachelor’s party and their kiss at the hospital - is really weird. idk, it seemed like heartbreak and jealousy mixed with confusion to me (‘cause eddie doesn’t understand why he’s feeling so weird at this point, and some acting choices from ryan were definitely made)

and even though gay!eddie wasn’t planned until season 7, and the way he acted weird with women - including shannon - was supposedly because they had a difficult relationship due to her early pregnancy and chris’ CP, it still also reads as him being gay. so it is still true to his character. even if it weren’t intentional, it still would make sense for him to turn out to be gay

but i’m not sure how exactly the writers see eddie’s sexuality. they’re probably too stupid to go down the acknowledging eddie’s gayness and/or demisexuality lane

though i’d like for them to explore eddie’s view on his relationship with shannon - like, make him revisit it and see it in a new light now that he understands himself better

but it likely won’t happen, and he’s going to end up just bucksexual, which i’m okay with, i guess

then we have tim quite literally paralleling eddie to abby with him moving to el paso. and that he actually wanted to compare eddie to abby in buck and maddie’s dialogue in 8x11, but that line was scrapped ’cause the network thought it was too confusing and the audience wouldn’t get the reference

and the way they started to address buck’s feelings for eddie in 8b - these were very obvious signs. and if they don’t follow through on them, then it’s just really bad writing

which leads to the whole bobby’s death mess. ’cause it is a case of really bad writing from tim. before this, i was sure that season 8 would end with buddie canon - because eddie would come back to LA with chris after deciding to cut his parents off and choose himself and his joy once and for all. and it would lead to him finally choosing buck and making a move (love confession/a kiss). i didn’t think that buck would be the first to confess, because he still thinks eddie is straight and wouldn’t risk their friendship like that - he would just bury his feelings if he had to

but tim’s decision to kill bobby - that “had been lingering in the back of his mind for years” - threw me off so much, because literally no one saw it coming and no one thought that’s where the season was going, including the actors and the producers

so it leaves me with 3 options for how this all could go:

1) tim realizes he made a huge mistake and resurrects bobby. or maybe he wanted to fake-kill bobby from the very beginning and is just trying to sell the idea very hard so that no one will figure out bobby is actually alive. and buddie’s feelings realization will happen either during the grief period before they find out bobby’s alive, or after it

2) bobby is actually dead, but buddie will still become canon. which won’t save the show, because they’ve already lost a huge chunk of casual viewers, and even the buddie shippers are mad. ’cause without bobby, the show and its characters will be so different that it won’t even be enjoyable

3) not only is bobby actually dead, but buddie also won’t become canon, because tim decided to “raise the stakes.” so from now on, all the character development will be thrown in the trash, all the main characters will be ooc, they’ll focus on some random characters like gerard and brad, and the show will only be about big emergencies and the spectacle with no heart and soul

option 2 will be bad for the show because killing bobby is a really bad writing decision, and literally everyone on the show except tim thought that. so, again, buddie won’t save it, and it’s in poor taste to make such an important ship canon alongside ruining the show with this death

and option 3 will not only obviously destroy the show, but it will also be the worst and most infuriating and cruel case of queerbaiting in history - ’cause i’ve seen a lot of people who didn’t believe in buddie before start realizing buck and eddie are in love with each other during season 8. which means the writing is on the wall, and we’re not imagining or stretching things. so to not follow through is dumb af

so, in conclusion, i think it was partly intentional and partly unintentional in s2–s6, and all these coincidences are happening because the universe works in mysterious ways. and i think it was mostly intentional in seasons 7 and 8. but season 8 did everything to start addressing the way buck and eddie feel toward each other - and that it’s not just friendship from both sides

[annoyinglandmagazine]

You know that whole scene with Klaus reuniting with Punch and Judy/ Adam and Lilith? That already gives me so many emotions but I ended up accidentally making it worse with headcanons about their previous relationship that I hope at some point will make it into a fic:

Bill and Barry never really grasped the way constructs were treated outside of Mechanicsburg. They don’t really get the concept that something like that could matter so much to people, that they would actively view people as less than human for a few stitches or an extra limb. That the insanity of Mechanicsburg could actually be an improvement on the rest of the world that supposedly cared about morals in this one thing that they’d never even questioned before.

They try, they really do, they get righteously furious about it every other week, but they never really get it. They’re more confused than anything when Klaus and Judy tell them they should be the ones to ask for boarding while travelling anonymously because they’re less likely to be turned away.

They don’t notice that Punch and Judy take certain adventures more personally than the rest of them do, the way they went all still when hearing a monologue about constructs taken as ‘spare parts’ by Sparks that insist it doesn’t count because they’re not people anyway. Even worse the supposed ‘heroes’ they work with to take down rogue Sparks and then turn around and insist that the job isn’t finished until they purge the area of the Spark’s creations as well.

They’re complaining about their professors and Klaus explains why he dislikes one of them by casually bringing up that he had a pet theory of a ‘sliding scale of humanity’ and he once derailed a lecture by trying to place Klaus on it. They are horrified and murderous and Klaus becomes the first person to marvel at how sheltered someone was growing up in Mechanicsburg.

So there is always a certain connection between Punch, Judy and Klaus over this in particular because they know that Bill and Barry can’t possibly understand. Not like they do. And it’s important, to Punch and Judy entering an outside world for the first time and having it reject them even as it grows used to and even welcomes the Heterodynes but not them, never fully. Heterodynes can redeem themselves with enough determination but how can you redeem yourself when your only crime to begin with was existing?

It’s important to Klaus who knew relatives and friends who looked like they had to force themselves to say his name without flinching because they didn’t really believe it was him they were talking to. University was a fresh start but it took years for him to break the nervous habit of adjusting his cuffs and collar to cover his skin because it was just exhausting to watch the way people changed once they noticed.

Sometimes they talked about it but most of the time they’re just there for each other and that’s enough. Also they’re all way more willing to get into a fight on someone else’s behalf than their own so it gives them a nice opening to beat the shit out of bigots.

On an unrelated and slightly less angsty note I also think that Punch and Judy were sort of the mom friends of the Heterodyne adventures. They got into the habit of spending a considerable amount of their lives trying to make these insane twenty somethings get some rest every now again and the rest of it complaining (Punch naturally had a sign language that the Boys may have invented specifically for him but communicated perfectly adequately through Looks as well) the constant, stupid risks they took to their own lives.

When it became clear that they couldn’t have children Bill and Barry couldn’t feel more terrible about it, they spent ages trying to come up with a solution but couldn’t imagine one where there was an ironclad guarantee of no amnesia. Klaus suggested adoption since they were so good with the orphans they came across but, though it wasn’t ruled out, Judy half jokingly made comments about how she was busy enough with ‘her boys’ anyway so she didn’t need children for now.

Klaus finds it easiest to talk to Punch sometimes because he really listens and waits until he’s finished speaking to offer input when it’s wanted (it usually isn’t). He’s also exceptionally good at reading non verbal cues which is helpful because Klaus always had some kind of allergy to talking about anything personal.

Judy knows about Lucrezia and Klaus. She’s fairly certain Bill is the only one of them who doesn’t. She personally thinks both of them would be a lot better off with someone else, anyone else really. She distrusts something in Lucrezia’s eyes when she’s around them, calculating and almost predatory, but then both of them had unusual ideas of what constituted romance. She doesn’t like it but she doesn’t say anything. Years later she’ll wish she had.

When Punch and Judy hear that Klaus is back from the dead and annihilating all the warring nobility’s armies that cross his path they think ‘Well something else is clearly going on there but that does sound a little like what Klaus would do if he went off the deep end to be perfectly honest.’

They find out he’s conquering an empire and that sounds a lot less like Klaus. Then Barry returns in a complete panic, holding his niece like a lifeline and talking about how Klaus is working for the Other.

It’s a struggle to even contemplate it, the same Other that killed Bill’s infant son and most likely Bill as well, the Other that destroyed the Wulfenbach barony and massacred its people, including Klaus’ own parents, the Other that ravaged Europa sending it into a state of utter chaos. They know Klaus. They’ve known him since he was reckless eighteen year old who just wanted to make the world a better place. They know him.

But…… A few months ago they would have said the thought of subjugating the continent would never cross Klaus’ mind, that he’d never do something like that. He wasn’t that kind of Spark. On their bad days the boys used to talk about what would happen if either of them ever crossed ‘the line’ and though they’d all reassured them that they never would Klaus had promised in complete sincerity that he wouldn’t let them.

No one had ever thought that Klaus might need to have a line. He never even properly lost control of a fugue, he didn’t forget morals in the heat of the moment, every decision he made he’d stand by years later as the right one. He took things further than the boys sometimes but that was because he’d concluded it was for the best and he didn’t need a strict code the way they, still wrestling and redirecting those Heterodyne urges inside them, did.

They also knew Barry and he wouldn’t ever be able to believe something like that if there’d been any other explanation. Barry had known Klaus too.

Basically I’m never going to get over the tragedy that is this group of people because they were friends! They were probably the first real friends any of them had had! They were so young and optimistic and they decided they were going to start fixing things because no one else would. They thought the world could get better and people deserved second chances and for a while it actually worked and it meant something and then it blew up in their faces.

Everything falls apart worse than it was when they started, they lose everyone close to them and they wonder if the world was ever really going to change at all. When the era of the Heterodyne Boys comes to an end they don’t face it together the way they always thought they would if they failed. It ends with all of them are separated and so disillusioned that they’ll believe that even their closest friends would betray them and humanity in the worst way possible.

[poepoesstuff]

Satosugu x Reader Series - Part 1: Meeting Gojo & Geto

Notes: I’ve never written fanfiction before, so please don’t take it too seriously! I was just bored and thought about this idea because I love the concept of being in a poly relationship with Gojo and Geto—it seems like so much fun! I’m new to writing, so feedback, questions, or suggestions are totally welcome! I’m just having fun with it.

Tags:

#Satosugu #Gojo Satoru #Geto Suguru #Reader Insert #Jujutsu Kaisen #Satoru Gojo x Reader #Suguru Geto x Reader #Polyamory #Fanfiction #Jujutsu Kaisen Fanfic #Satoru Gojo x Suguru Geto #JJK Fanfiction #Gojo x Geto #Jujutsu High #Satosugu x Reader

-

You guys knew each other from high school. You came to Jujutsu High later but joined the same class as Gojo and Geto, though you were on a different team. The first person you noticed was Gojo Satoru from the Gojo Clan—a lineage you’d only heard of. His reputation and charm immediately intrigued you. However, it was Geto Suguru who ultimately stole your heart with his calm confidence.

You were introduced to the class about a year and a half before Geto’s path took a darker turn.

As Yaga steps into the class, he calls attention to you. You follow him in, and several surprised faces turn to look at you.

“This is Y/N. She’s a kunoichi from a remote village in Japan and will be attending as your classmate from now on. Y/N, introduce yourself.”

You take a breath, feeling the eyes on you, but stand confidently. “I am L/N Y/N, from the C/N Clan. As of today, I’m beginning my journey as a sorcerer at Jujutsu High. My family is known for preserving sorcery knowledge and secrets. As the new heir, I’ve come to study and hone my skills.”

You notice intrigued expressions, especially from a silver-haired boy with piercing blue eyes in the back. Shoko’s gaze also seems particularly curious. Once Yaga leaves, you take your seat and start your Jujutsu High journey. Quickly, you become friends with Shoko, who introduces you to both Gojo and Geto.

First Impressions

Gojo is thrilled to have you in class and wastes no time bringing you up with Geto.

“So,” Gojo nudges Geto with a grin, “what do you think of the new girl?”

Geto raises an eyebrow, already catching onto Gojo’s interest. “You mean Y/N? She has an interesting technique, definitely useful in a fight.”

Gojo laughs, shaking his head. “Come on, that’s not what I meant, and you know it.” He gives Geto a playful shove.

Geto smirks knowingly. “Well, if you’re asking… yes, she’s beautiful. Kinda reminds me of Erika Sawajiri.”

Gojo huffs, crossing his arms. “Right? I knew I had an eye for these things!”

Meanwhile, you feel lucky to be spending time with both of them. Missions become highlights of your training whenever you’re paired with Gojo, Geto, or both.

Gojo Satoru’s Approach to Win You Over

After Gojo admits he’s interested, he goes all out. Here’s how he tries to impress you:

1. Playful Teasing: Gojo loves to make you laugh. Expect playful remarks and witty comebacks whenever you’re around. His goal? To get you to blush.

2. Showing Off His Power: Gojo’s proud of his abilities, and he doesn’t hold back from showing off. From flashy demonstrations of his Limitless technique to skillful moves on missions, he always seems to be “casually” proving how powerful he is.

3. Grand Gestures: Gojo’s not one for small acts. If he learns about your favorite snack, he’ll buy a whole stash of it. If you’re stressed, he’ll invite you on a night adventure to see the city lights.

Continuing from where we left off with Gojo’s approach:

4. Constant Presence: Gojo wants to be around you as much as possible. He’ll always find a reason to sit next to you in class, join you on missions, or just “accidentally” bump into you between training sessions. He’s persistent and makes sure you notice him.

5. Playful Competition with Geto: Knowing Geto likes you too, Gojo can’t resist turning it into a friendly rivalry. He’ll challenge Geto to sparring matches, jokes, or even silly games to try and prove he’s the better choice for you, often with a smirk and a playful wink in your direction.

Geto Suguru’s Approach to Win You Over

Geto’s approach is more subtle, thoughtful, and grounded. Here’s how he tries to capture your heart:

1. Deep Conversations: Geto values getting to know you on a personal level. He’ll ask about your background, your clan, and your opinions on sorcery. These conversations make you feel like he genuinely cares about who you are beyond your technique.

2. Small, Thoughtful Gestures: Geto isn’t flashy but remembers the small details, like your favorite tea or if you’re having a hard day. He’ll quietly leave a comforting note or share a peaceful place he’s found on campus with you. His kindness is understated but leaves an impact.

3. Protective on Missions: Though both he and Gojo are strong, Geto takes a protective role. He’ll keep a watchful eye over you, subtly stepping in to ensure your safety without making it obvious. It’s his way of showing you’re important to him.

4. Respectful of Your Space: Unlike Gojo, Geto gives you space to make your own choices. He never pressures you to spend time with him, trusting that if you like him, you’ll come to him. This gives him a calm confidence, which contrasts with Gojo’s more in-your-face approach.

5. Gentle Rivalry with Gojo: Geto handles the “competition” in a reserved way, knowing Gojo’s personality. While Gojo’s approach is loud, Geto’s is quieter—he focuses on creating genuine moments with you that show his sincerity, confident that his authenticity will speak for itself.

Gojo and Geto were unbelievably close, and you helped them realize their feelings for each other and get together. They were six months into their relationship before they added you.

[actual-changeling]

Muriel isn't a child, they're not stupid or immature, and they CAN take care of themselves—with that, welcome to Alex's unhinged meta corner, hinged edition.

We need to talk about Muriel, so let's dive right in.

Despite the way many people depict them, they are the exact same age as every other angel, fallen or otherwise, and treating them as lesser because their mannerisms and expressions don't match up with what you think an 'adult' should look like doesn't mean they aren't one.

Not to speak of the ableism that's inherent to that kind of thinking, and actually, you know what? Before I keep talking, I want to ask you a question.

It is very common to talk about Muriel as a 'child of divorce', being 'adopted' by Crowley, someone 'precious' that needs protecting, and a lot of titles and concepts along those lines.

The question is: If, say, Uriel were in their place—sent down to earth after not being there for more than five minutes ever—would you still call him everything you call Muriel now? Would you treat him the same way you're treating them?

Would you see him the same way, and if not, why?

The question is, if any other angel were in Muriel's position, would you also infantilize them the way you currently do with Muriel?

Feel free to actually answer that question on my post or in your own, because I am genuinely curious about the reasoning, especially behind 'no' as an answer.

Heaven completely neglected them just like they did with everyone else, they were completely alone in a big, empty white room with nothing but a glass desk and presumably a chair for six thousand years—and probably even longer than that. Having someone ask them a job-related question every couple centuries doesn't even BEGIN to scratch the surface of their social needs.

When they came down to earth, it was the equivalent of one's first day at a new job, at university, at school, anywhere you had not been before but now plan on being for a while.

You come across others that have been there for twenty years and look like omniscient gods from your point of view; they run the game while you don't even know which game you're supposed to be playing. This is one of the reasons why they read as autistic to many, including myself, because that's exactly what every social situation feels like to me. That's for another post, though.

Of course they're socially awkward and easily overwhelmed! They were dropped off in a capital city after—and let me emphasise this once more—being completely alone for millennia.

The highest of the angels ordered them to do a specific job, like, fuck, I'd be having a nervous breakdown in the lift and curl up in a corner for a few hours because that thought is terrifying. Especially because failure is not something heaven accepts. Especially because they know what happens to those who disobey or disappoint in whatever shape or form.

When we see them, it is in that exact situation—talking to their bosses that they've likely never talked to before, arriving in a new world, being around new people, in a new environment, new everything. It always reminds me of this quote from Modern Family.

Muriel was assigned a rank and job just like everyone else, and they deserve the same respect and acknowledgement for it as the Guardian of the Eastern Gate or the Archangels themselves. Muriel is probably really fucking good at what they do, they've had millennia of practice, but we simply never see them in their everyday situations. Give them some time and support, and they'll be up to speed in no time.

They are not a child—don't treat them like one.

[dalishious]

Veilguard Companion First Impressions

So, I’ve finally recruited all the companions for the Veilguard! And as such, I thought I’d share my initial thoughts on them each.

Please keep in mind that as the title says, these are just my first impressions. I am nowhere near finishing the game yet. My thoughts very well may change after getting to know the characters more as the story progresses. Also, please do not take any opinions you do not share as a personal attack against you.

Bellara

Bellara might be my #1 favourite.

I’ve seen some people just say Bellara is “a Merrill rip-off” but I don’t think that’s fair at all. If all it took was a few similarities to say a character is a rip-off of another character, than I can think of so many boring white cishet male characters who would be guilty of that. But heaven forbid we get more than one elven woman who is passionate about her people’s culture and history!

Frankly, I think Bellara is a breath of fresh air in terms of Dalish characters specifically. Finally, a Dalish elf who isn’t punished for being proudly Dalish by the narrative.

I also really appreciate that so much of her can be easily understood by her backstory, too. Like, her feelings of never being good enough is reflective of the very realistic grief she is experiencing.

Lucanis

If Bellara isn’t my #1 favourite, then Lucanis is. They really both dominate that spot neck in neck. I can’t decide if I want to put him in a jar and shake it to see what happens, or wrap him up tight in a quilt and give him some good coffee.

I’m just a sucker for Lucanis’s character archetype, is the thing. I love taking him out simply because he’s so much fun to have around. And in terms of companion arcs, his is the one I am most intrigued to see where it goes.

Taash

(While I haven’t personally gotten to Taash’s non-binary plot yet, I am aware Taash switches to they/them pronouns, so that’s what I’ll be using.)

The moment I met Taash felt my heart skip a beat. The only thing hotter than their appearance is their voice. I know BioWare probably left Taash out of a lot of the advertising because they wanted to keep Taash’s gender stuff a surprise, but oh my god, because of this I was taken by quite the surprise. And so far Taash seems to be the type to keep a hard outer shell to protect a much softer side, and that is yet another character archetype I really love.

Davrin

My initial gripe about Davrin’s writing being so exclusively about Assan rather than Davrin himself is slowly peeling away, I hope. While I still think its bullshit that you can welcome Assan into the Veilgaurd but not Davrin, at least I’ve finally gotten a few bits of dialogue to get to know more about him finally. I just want to keep this momentum! Because Davrin as a concept has so much potential, in my opinion, and what little bits I have gotten from him have captivated me. But I can’t tell yet if it’s intentionally part of his character that maybe he’s just a closed off person who takes a while to trust others, (a little like Taash?) Or if the writer just cared more about griffons than the actual guy. I’m really, really holding out hope for the former.

Emmrich

Emmrich is so much more charming than I expected, and I found him instantly endearing the moment we met him. I also really like that we’re finally hearing some different stances and insight on death and necromancy than we ever had before from a companion! It makes him feel so fresh and completely new!

Harding

I’ll be real with you: I was not anticipating caring about Harding so much. She was who I was originally least interested in, when the companion line-up was announced. But the direction they’re taking her in has me questioning so much about bigger lore questions.

Unfortunately, I still don’t see much in her except being a vessel for those bigger lore questions, though. Like, Harding as a person has me mildly curious at best.

Neve

I’m really sorry Neve fans, but I just find her really boring so far, in comparison to everyone else. She doesn’t have a lot going on, and what she does have going on, doesn’t really captivate me much. Maybe I was just hoping she’d have stronger stances on things than she does? I don’t know.

It could be that I just really fucked up with Neve, and it won’t be until another playthrough that I’ll get to experience more that will change my mind. Because I will admit I am very good at picking choices she disapproves of, with my first Rook.

[rhonuscorner]

Hello! I love your work!

I have a question about the spin-off with our darling Eclipse. How would our crashing go if Y/n were pregnant? Previously you stated that human way of reproducing is very different and even kinda disturbing to our boys. So how would they react to Y/n carrying a child and being due in like 3/4 months?

How long would it take them to notice? Would Y/n needed to wait for a translator to be made to communicate about that - I mean you, can show an alien easy signs- like food, come etc. But trying to do this with 'hey! See this? Im pregnant!' would be a hassle lol.

I can see Sun's confused gaze as reader points at their belly clearly frustrated, while he holds a plate of food. Because what ca this little creature want? They are hungry right?

Later on with Y/n's relationship with the boys becoming better and friendlier how would they handle the birth? And their reaction to a little human baby! I mean they are so small!

Also my private opinion is women are awesome - I mean what do you mean you can build a whole another person and then automatically create the food to sustain them with ?? Goddesses

Love you!

Awww thank you so much! ❤️

I'm gonna put this answer under a cut for those who are uncomfortable with this topic, so here's your trigger warning!

Also I wanna add... while I don't mind the topic myself it's not something I'm gonna be putting a whole lot of effort or thought into. I personally don't really care for pregnancy themes involving humans, so while I don't mind answering asks about it and am fully okay with anyone imagining a pregnant Y/N with any of my boys - that's totally fine! - my answers might be disappointing. I dunno. Just wanna make that clear. ☺️

Yeah no nebuterran is gonna recognize it as a pregnancy with a few exceptions. It's not an entirely unfamiliar concept to them even though nothing on their homeworld reproduces like mammals (humans included obv) do. But it's not something that's unique to earth either.

There used to be a time, before Sun, Moon and Eclipse were born, when nebuterrans interacted with other species from other planets a lot more than they do nowadays. They used to welcome visitors, traded goods and knowledge and helped out when asked. There's only a few elderly nebuterrans left who remember those days and they're the only ones who might recognize Y/N's pregnant state for what it is because they'll have seen similar things before.

Yes, waiting for a translator of sorts would be a necessity either way so Y/N can let them know what it is they need. Unfortunately no medical center on this planet is gonna be equipped to help Y/N out with this, there's no way of knowing if any of their medicine - painkillers included - is gonna be safe to use on a human, what with our biological differences.

All they can do is offer support by being present and making Y/N as comfortable as possible... but ultimately Y/N will have to do this on their own.

Sun, Moon and Eclipse have never seen this before and yes, it's gonna be very disturbing for them. Nebuterrans hatch from a crystal, there's gonna be some fluids but it's just that... watery fluid. Very tame, very simple, no hassle and little to no risk of something going wrong. With humans... there's gonna be crying, screaming, tears, blood and pain. It's brutal compared to what they're used to.

I honestly don't think Sun and Moon will be able to stay in the same room when it's time, they won't be able to handle it. I'm sure they'll try if only because they'll want to do anything they can do to help Y/N through this, but they might have to flee the room if they don't faint first lol. Eclipse will stay, only because he's already seen his fair share of horror and violence, he can handle this too. Feel free to squeeze his hand until his bones pop lol.

However, once it's all said and done, that human baby is going to be doted on by all three of them like there's no tomorrow. Most spoiled baby in the galaxy.

[rozaceous]

tcba epilogue, hakumari snippet

i love sasuke but he's given no quarter here, i'm so sorry lmao

Sasuke comes to claim his daughter, rolls his eyes at them after reassuring them that the other two girls are kept busy and won’t be running out to bother them, and wanders back towards the house, leaving Haku with Mariko on the dock of the pond.

Haku has never disliked Sasuke, but the past several years have given him a distinct appreciation for the man, and they’ve become something like friends. Things like this just cement Haku’s judgment.

Even if he had been enjoying holding a sleeping Ayase.

Mariko notices, naturally.

“She’ll be awake again in a couple hours and screaming for food, and will be appropriately cuddly after,” she says, grinning.

Haku clears his throat. “I wouldn’t want to impose.”

“What impose?” Mariko returns with an unconcerned flap of her hand. She leans back against him until she’s fully reclined, one knee bent and her head rested on his thigh, looking up at him. “You’re welcome here, if that wasn’t clear, and Sasuke might like holding babies more than anyone else I’ve ever met, but it’s not like getting a break from doing so for a few days is a hardship.” Her eyes narrow, though her easy smile doesn’t fade. “Didn’t know you liked holding babies so much, though.”

Haku tucks a piece of hair behind her ear, huffing a laugh. “They have universal charm, I should think. Also, they’re yours, how could I dislike them?”

“Easier than you might think,” she says wryly. She looks at him more deeply, gaze gone assessing, but the moment is so utterly without tension that Haku doesn’t think anything of it until she continues, “Asking super bluntly and kinda out of nowhere, so feel free to take your time answering, but are children something you want?”

The hand he’d had resting on her ribs goes momentarily tense before he catches himself. He’s not sure how he’s meant to take such a question.

“Are you—Mariko? What are you saying?”

“Do you want kids? A kid. With me.”

“With—” Haku doesn’t know how to properly consider the concept. “You have a family, Mariko,” he says slowly, carefully. “You and Sasuke.”

“Sasuke is my family and we have children together,” she agrees. “But I love you and am probably going to keep loving you for the rest of my life, and we have a relationship together, and if you want that relationship to include children, it can. At least, as far as I’m concerned.”

From the way her eyes dart momentarily to the side, Haku interprets the ‘as far as I’m concerned’ as her personal insecurity regarding whatever reservations he might hypothetically have to having children together, rather than Sasuke taking issue. Still, to be clear—

“Is this something you’ve discussed with Sasuke?��

Mariko makes a half-scowl. “Sasuke gets to tell me what to do with my uterus approximately never. I do whatever I want and he can fucking bite me if he doesn’t like it.” But her sudden vitriol subsides immediately. “That’s to say, no, we haven’t talked about it, because I haven’t given it much serious thought before now, but I really don’t think he’d mind. We’re already so deviated from the norm, what’s one more thing? Plus, he’d get to hold more babies, I really don’t think he’d care if the baby was his? Or we wouldn’t have Yasumi.”

‘Deviated from the norm’ is correct; Haku hasn’t forgotten the apparently spontaneous adoption of Sasuke and Mariko’s first child, as at the time it’d felt like taking a lightning jutsu to his worldview, which had categorized the pair as deeply entwined but not at all romantic. Their subsequent genetic children of Kouka and Ayase was a further, though expected, blow to that view, but Haku had—resigned himself isn’t the right phrasing. His relationship with Mariko has always been fraught in some way or another; they were never going to be able to have a straightforward romance ending in marriage and a shared household. Haku has, thus, always been determined to make the most of what he does have with Mariko. He’s not interested in others; his interest is singular, and he can’t imagine anyone else commanding that interest to the same degree. His and Mariko’s circumstances and choices have simply precluded them from consistent closeness.

But this is—Haku has taken Sasuke as a particularly unjealous lover all this time. Yet surely no lover is so unjealous as to welcome another man’s children? But then why does Mariko seem so confident in her assessment?

Moreover, while Haku agrees that Mariko is the only person to determine her own actions and bodily autonomy—and woe betide the person who thought to tell her otherwise, indeed—it’s one thing to say that she does as she pleases, and another to willfully and incontrovertibly upset the dynamic of an established family and partnership.

And there are so many other considerations. Where would the child grow up? Haku has a hard time leaving Mist even for these few weeks, but the new, sudden thought of being estranged from his own child is less tolerable than even the distance between he and Mariko. But would he really have them raised in Mist, and become shinobi, part of the very system Mariko has worked to eradicate? And would he want to chance passing down his bloodline when he’s the last holder of the Ice Release? Could he put that burden on a child? Certainly, too, they wouldn’t have the Yuki name since he’d never taken it up himself, but it’s almost comically ridiculous to imagine a child of his bearing the name Uchiha. Yet how could they have a sense of ancestry and belonging without it?

Mariko presses a finger between his eyebrows; he realizes he’s started to frown.

“Not that you shouldn’t think hard about it,” she says gently, “but there’s no rush. Take your time. We’ll figure it out, however and whatever we want.”

The rush of affection he feels in response isn’t surprising, just an affirmation of his choices. Haku clasps her hand.

Mariko turns more humorous, her usual method of lightening a too-heavy mood. “I’m not doing another pregnancy for another year at earliest. Probably two or three years would be better, since I actually think I had Kouka and Ayase too close together. Like, between iryouninjutsu and basically turkey basting myself, physically I’ve done fantastic with such a short turnaround, but another baby too soon is too many babies being babies or toddlers at the same time and I do not have the stamina—”

She continues in this vein for another minute or so before Haku voices a lingering point of confusion.

“Turkey basted yourself?”

Mariko freezes. “Um. So like, I’m fine with you knowing, but maybe don’t say anything to anyone else, but, uh. Sasuke and I didn’t conceive Kouka and Ayase in the, uh, usual manner.”

Haku thinks forebodingly of her senpai’s history with human experimentation. “Mariko—”

“I just mean we didn’t have sex!” she blurts out in a panic, no doubt correctly reading whatever is in his expression. “It’s not anything freaky like I can tell you’re thinking! I worded that so bad, I’m sorry!”

Haku blinks. “You…didn’t have sex?”

Mariko gives him a put-upon look. He mercilessly waits for an answer.

“He ejaculated into a cup and I shoved the semen up my vag,” she says bluntly. “I knew I was ovulating so the egg fertilized both times, no need for a redo, but yeah. No sex.”

He tries to wrap his mind around this information. “Were you…having difficulty conceiving?”

He can’t really believe that’s the case. Mariko has enough skill as an iryouninja, and enough know-how, to facilitate a pregnancy without resorting to—this.

Mariko’s eyes narrow, then widen. “Haku,” she says, in the tone of someone who’s about to forcibly shift another’s paradigms, “Sasuke and I don’t have sex. At all. I’m sorry I let you assume otherwise, but it never seemed like it mattered to you? And everyone thinks we’re having sex, and we just never bother to correct them because it’s not anyone else’s business what we do or don’t do, and so I don’t even think to correct anyone. But I should’ve—” she clears her throat “—I should’ve told you. Explicitly. Before now. I’m really sorry. I honestly thought you didn’t care, but I guess that sounds like a poor excuse now that I’m saying it out loud.”

Haku looks down at their joined hands, which Mariko’s lightly squeezed. He thinks his entire brain has slowed. He feels rather like he did the time that he stayed awake for three days straight following a mudslide two years ago, too direly needed during the emergency to have time to sleep until he’d gotten so dazed that his sentences had ceased to cohere.

“You’ve never had sex with Sasuke?” he asks, slow, because even in interrogative form the words don’t seem right.

Mariko bites her lip. Haku stares.

“You can never tell,” she says finally, intensely. “Ever. You can’t even let on that you might suspect. But I haven’t said anything this whole time and now that I have the opportunity to tell someone, I think I’m going to explode if I don’t, holy shit. So.” Mariko’s eyes shift around, and Haku even feels the brush of jutsu as she ascertains that no one is within listening distance. “Look, in general, Sasuke’s feelings about sex can be summed up as ‘gross’ and ‘for other people,’ but it’s not like he doesn’t know that we’ve had sex. And if Sasuke was curious enough to give it a go, I was hardly going to say no, I love the guy and my eyes work, okay? So the one time Sasuke and I tried to have sex—well, I already used the word tried. Please understand what I’m saying.”