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arliaeien · 3 hours ago

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This makes me think about my evolution as a writer.

My first long fic, as a new writer, I used to consider a chapter done around 2k~2,5k words. That's around 10 pages in Word.

Rewriting this same story one year later, it grew between 3,5k~5k. At the same time, as a reader, I was enjoying more and more the longer chapters (between 5k~10k).

There had been a long time while I only was writing one-shots, then engaging as a beta reader, making translations... To sum up: not writing stories, and even less, ones needing me to arrange a new story in different chapters.

Some years ago, I dedicated myself to the rewriting of my first story (the last I've done) and had those quite big chapters (around 7k), I was happy with, and that didn't make me think, except that one time, I had to cut one too big in two smaller ones. Those chapters were in no way a 'one idea, one chapter' thing like. The cuts were rather happening when there was a change about the place, and/or time passing.

And when I started writing the sequel of this 80k story, about the characters meeting monthly, I just wrote a one-shot for every month. Whatever it was 10k, 20k or even 30k.

It's not written in English and the fandom was almost dead for the last ten years. There were no readers (think like 30 hits in five years on AO3). So why should I have cared? The big one-shot was what I personally prefer.

Came year 2021. New fandom, existing fan base in English, no one in my mother tongue. And I've gotten this idea of post-canon story. One, nobody had done before me. Or rather, nobody had done it, the way I wanted it to be. It's this that has triggered me trying to write in English. ...probably succeeding, at some point. It is a 70k, in the end.

First long story in a while, whatever the language was different, I've kept the same tastes and methods, reflecting over the construction of the story, and ended up having chapter between 5k~7,5k. My goal was quite easy : three main ideas / scenes making one chapter. Providing long chapters to readers was what's important to me, because that's what I love myself.

Up to these last years. I'm working on a monster story (156k ongoing \o/). I didn't have any plan, starting writing it. My first chapter was a two-big-scenes, around 3K words, which I consider cool enough. Second chapter... was happening later, somewhere else. And I ended up having four-big-scenes, 7k words. Yeah, could cut this in two parts. Except number 3 was 3-big-scenes and 5k words. Go tear your own hair out. This was difficult to me. I couldn't work with chapters with sizes so different. It wasn't me. It didn't feel good. I couldn't see how anyone could actually enjoy such variations. How could it be considered otherwise than "Oh yeah, one long/short chapter!" / "Oh no, one long/short chapter!" depending on the reader's taste.

How long is not the point. REGULARITY was the point.

So my badly proportionate 'chapters' became 'arcs'. And every arc, was cut around 1,5k words. One idea, two maximum, and cut! I loved this. Writing fanfictions about one manga whose chapters were arranged to form arcs, it felt like respecting the canon better. Felt great!

...well, I was still myself. My goal of going between 1,2k~2k words for one chapter become 1,5k~2k. Then 2,5k. Today, I'm a little annoyed proofreading, having to fight against myself for some of them not going over 3k. Not too bad, but not what I wanted.

This to say: I'm living a paradox. The way I publish this story wouldn't suit me as a reader. 1,5k or even 2k a week is to me desperately slow.

I just can't. Re-reading some moments of the story for pleasure, or working on it, I usually go with 3 of them. Sometimes 4. All by instinct, not caring whether it's an arc or crossing two or more of them. Because the 5k~10k is what work for me as a reader :P

So, what's my point?

The ideal length doesn't exist. It's a matter of skill, and of feelings, but not only. My ideal length as a new writer was different from 2-years experience me, 5-years, 10-years, and now 18-years experience me. Sometimes I've cared about reader-experience, sometimes I haven't. I have loved the years producing the fattest one-shots. It's unrivaled freedom writing something. But even without arranging chapters, there were breaks, cutting scenes, the reader was able to breathe. And nowadays, publishing weekly for one year and a half, I use a format I wouldn't like myself but readers seems to enjoy (and that's strangely the same as the one I once used as a beginner : 2,5k per chapter).

...perhaps all this is a circle. ⚪

While looking for something else, I found an old ask I answered about "ideal chapter length" in terms of word count.

I've been asked this probably a dozen or more times, and each time I need to take a moment and adjust my thinking to take the asker's point of view into account. Because the thing is? The only time I ever try to factor the word count into how I write a story is when I'm aiming for a true drabble.

For whatever reason, this difference in thinking stuck with me today and I actually considered why that might be. And I think it's because I'm in my 40s and the first 25-30 years of my life, any stories I was reading were printed on paper and bound into physical books.

When I imagine a novel, I still think of a mass market paperback on my bookshelf. An average one would be maybe an inch thick, probably in the neighbourhood of 300 pages. A long one would be maybe as much as two inches thick and 500 or more pages long. A short one was always nice to have because it filled in the gaps in the shelf because 200 page books were so much narrower. Or so it seemed.

When I started posting my fic online, I still thought in terms of pages. I'd type them out in whatever word processing software I was using at the time, and I'd usually get a chapter's worth of ideas into 3 or 4 pages. Turns out that's about 1000 words, which makes sense with the number of 1000 word essays I wrote in high school. I'd been trained to encapsulate an idea into approximately that length.

And that's what it comes down to. The thing that always made that question seem weird to me. A chapter isn't about how many words there are in it, just like a cake isn't about how many cups of flour exist in each slice. A chapter is a an idea that helps make up a bigger idea called a story, and it needs to be however many words that idea needs to be to get it out.

#writing

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vanillebunny · 3 days ago

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Heyyy I saw you’re taking request so here’s a fun one! Can I request a hurt/comfort Thanos x reader post games fic? A soft reunión if you will! Obviously an AU where either the X votes win OR where Thanos actually survives his supposed death and gets out. I’m thinking he and the reader got super close during the games but completed lost track of each other afterwards. And one day they just do happen to reunite ☺️

a/n: hi anon!! thank u so much for requesting!! i keep rewatching squid game js for thanos i have a problem

warnings: light drug use, mentions of addiction, i think thats it but please tell me if i missed something!

you don't know how you got into this mess, how you managed to get into a deal so bad that it put you in deep debt. which brought you here, with all these people. in green tracksuits, all of them reduced to a number rather than a name

'it's okay, i'll play a few games, get my money and finally get back to my life' you think to yourself, fiddling with the sleeves of your jacket as you look around nervously. you don't know what this was, some form of pyramid scheme--gambling den? whatever it was, it didn't exactly bring ease to your mind

you're startled by the sudden sound of someone behind you, tapping your shoulder. you look back and see a man with purple hair, smiling like an idiot. you furrow your eyebrows, who the hell was this guy?

"seniorita excuse me" he says and smirks, "couldn't help but see you over here, all nervous--please, i know i'm too hot to handle but im sure.." he trails off and looks over you once, twice, before looking back at your face, "you can handle it" he says and you raise your eyebrows, repulsed by his actions. you back away

"who the hell are you?" you say, grossed out by this clearly overly confident guy

"im a legend!" he says and makes a little pose with his hands, "thanos." he says and wiggles his fingers, showing off the different colors of each nails

"thanos?" you scoff, "as in...that guy from the movies?" you say and he nods, wiggling his fingers even more to really emphasize the so called infinity stone colored nails

"don't worry seniorita! i have all the power in the world to protect you from these demons!" he says and surrounds you, looking at the people around you exaggeratedly, all of whom don't even spare him a second glance, clearly busy with their own problems

"uh...yeah thanks. im okay" you say and begin to walk away, to the crowd where everyone was listening to the instructions and such.

soon, you were all in the large sandy field, spreading out to begin the game. red light, green light they said. all of this just seemed...too easy. there has to be some catch, there's no way you play some child's game and walk out with billions of won

when you go around and take your place, you can hear running, and you look behind you to see none other than that same purple haired freak that was desperately trying to reach you. you roll your eyes and turn away but he was quick to get beside you

"phew! thought i wasn't gonna get to you in time" he says, as if it you two planned to be playing together or something, "don't worry, we'll play these games together--then you, me, billions of won in our hands. you think our kids would be proud of their appa for protecting their eomma and making sure she wins too?" he says and you just raise a brow, huh?

"who said we're playing together?" you say and begin to move away but to your luck, the game begins, and you have no choice but to stay frozen in place. where, thanos was right beside you, smiling triumphantly at the fact that you were still here

as the game begins, the players all seem to be moving calmly, nobody had lost till now. and it was all very relaxed, huh, maybe this wasn't as bad as you thought

but your relaxation went as quickly as it had come. a woman, not too far ahead of you, had a bee fly on her neck. a man beside her informed her about it and she--like any other person, panicked and moved, making her the first loser.

like in any other game, if someone lost they leave the game. so everyone expected her to just walk out, but as soon as she moved, a loud shot was heard. and you froze, the sight of her, falling to the ground--bullet to her head with blood already beginning to pool, you panicked.

what the hell was this? you knew this wasn't right! you knew there was a catch--but this? your heart raced, barely able to hear anyone with you. you watched helplessly as people began running and screaming, each one who moves an inch dies instantly by the shots firing from the sky.

you ran with every inch of strength you had, and just as the giant robotic doll stopped singing, you stopped. a tear streaming down your cheek, but you were too slow to realize--you were about to fall right when she turns her head.

you closed your eyes, accepting your fate. but somehow, you feel yourself still. you open your eyes, your chest heaving, you look down, seeing a pair of feet right beside you, probably the person holding you up

"don't move...okay? i got you" you hear the person say and you instantly know who it is, the same purple haired weirdo that had been trying to flirt with you earlier. his voice is...different though. it's not as cocky as it was before, you could hear a slight tremor, he's probably just as scared as you are

"th...thank you" you whisper out with tears streaming down your cheeks, the two of you continued on. holding on to each other as the game kept going, as soon as you finally reached the finish line, you hugged him tightly.

"thank you...thank you so much" you cry softly, so grateful. you thought he was just another guy that would probably let you die if it meant he wins, but to your surprise he wasnt.

he was a bit taken back by the sudden hug, but hugged you back. "i told you ill make sure you win too didn't i?" he says and you two pull away, and you smile half heartedly. annoyed by the reminder of his remark earlier, but still grateful. "i think it would be...kind of a bad story if i tell our kids i let their eomma die" he says and you shake your head, annoyed

soon, everyone was sitting in the room silently. not a single person was speaking, everyone was quiet. processing what they had just been through. you could see everyone had splashes of blood on them, probably from the people that have been shot around them. you sat alone, till you see thanos come and sit beside you

he's definitely not as scared as he was before, more hyper and aware of things. you could see him unable to sit still, sitting beside you while singing something to himself. he looks at you and grins, "im a kind man! ill share" he says and opens his cross necklace, which was fully supplied with candy. clearly not just any candy and probably the thing making him so hyper

you raise a brow and shake your head, you've been on that road before, it's what got you here. you'd rather not. "thank you...no. not again..." you mutter the last part to yourself, and he slows down his movements, noticing the distant look on your face.

"you try?" he says and you just nod, more to yourself than him.

"you don't wanna get too hopped up on that stuff...it's..not pretty" you say and he instantly closes his necklace, and kind of...just looks ahead, thinking.

soon, the guards come and everyone panics, some people crying and begging for them to spare their life. but the guards just stand there, trying to explain that that's not what's happening. one of the players, 456, suggests the idea that there should be a vote. you look at thanos for a moment

"are you...staying?" you say and he just nods, "i need to! im a legend yknow, this stuff is easy! can't go without my money" he says and you just look down. but he quiets down, "uh...are you?"

you quickly shake your head, "no--no i just...i want to go home." you say and get up to get in line for the vote, and he just follows you.

you vote for x, and go with the group, people cheering for you. thanos was right after you, and you can see him hesitate for a moment. his friend, can be heard telling him to keep playing. but he glances at you, just for a second, and presses x.

why would he do that? but he was in debt, he needs it way more than you do

after that, you woke up in the street. it was all a quick blur, as soon as the votes were counted up. the x votes more than the o. everything fades and you were alone in the street, tied up loosely with your clothes in a pile beside you. you managed to knaw the rope loose, and untied your legs, getting dressed.

the days went by quickly. you don't know what you were doing, but something just felt...wrong. not the games of course, never that. you'd rather die than play them again...but you die in the games too so its not really a good analogy. but anyway, it was just something. you were back on your own, without anyone, as it always was.

and you never did mind. you were used to it, so why was it...so strange now? so wrong?

you roamed the streets of korea, just lost in a daze, not really wondering where you're going. till you reach the arcade that was in the alley, you walk in and bump into someone

"hey! don't you--" the person's voice quickly came to a halt when they looked at you, you looked at them. it was none other than thanos. thanos! you don't know why, or how--but that feeling you've been going through ever since you managed to get out of the games, it was completely gone now.

the two of you looked at each other for a long time, before he smiles. "seniorita! i thought i'd never see you again!" he smiles and jumps around like an idiot. you should be weirded out, leaving and saying you don't want to see this freak again. but you don't. you stay and actually smile back

"this is great! now i have a partner to play with, les gooo!" he says and drags you along with him into the arcade without even giving you a chance to respond. the two of you had spent that time together, playing games and it was actually fun. for the first time you were...enjoying yourself

soon, you were both some convenience store nearby, eating ramen and laughing about how you both suck so bad at playing.

after a while it had grown quiet, and you wanted to just ask.

"...why did you vote x...when we were in the games?" you say and he just kind of looks away for a moment before looking back at you

"well!" he begins, trying to sound cocky, but you can tell he's just putting up a facade, "can't have the future eomma of my kids get hurt now, can i? to not be able...to go home" he says and just looks down, mixing in his ramen

you just look at him for a moment, its all so quiet. he was a freak, a weirdo when you met him. you said to yourself that this guy was clearly another junkie, some asshole thinking hes a big flirt. but right now...all you saw was just...thanos. hes just thanos.

"thank you thanos..." you say, just looking at him, and he stops mixing and looks at you, his cocky expression fading.

"choi su bong...my name...is choi su bong. thanos is just for...the ones i keep at a distance" he mutters and looks down, his hands--as if trying to reach for his cross necklace again, but you can hear him sigh when he realizes its not there

"did you lose it?" you ask and he shakes his head

"no...im not on that stuff anymore. well im trying at least." he says and you're surprised, you're pretty sure just a few days ago he was offering you a full stock.

"why's that?' you ask and he just looks back at you

"it's not pretty" he says, repeating your exact words. "well..still a long way to go but im starting" he says and nods to himself and you just smile

"you can do it...i know you can" you say and--mentally facepalm at what you're about to do, but you don't care that much. you hold up your hands and make the exact same pose he made to you when you were at the games, "you're a legend, thanos! this is easy" you say and he just chuckles at your attempt to imitate him

"yeah well i got you with me seniorita" he says softly, but quickly returns to his cocky expression, "im unstoppable now!"

you don't know what this was exactly. but whatever it is...you were happy with it

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mvctavish · 21 hours ago

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𝐑𝐄𝐃-𝐇𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐃

pairing: john price x medic!reader

notes: ok i know i said i won't be able to post until later in the week but this came to me in a dream and i must share my suffering. i will get to most of the requests this week!! there's a lot more than i originally thought i'd get so it may be a little while

summary: you were one of the best medics in the game. you never lost a soldier you worked on, so what happens when you can't handle the first death on your hands? price tries his best to be there in the moment to guide you — you're a valued member of his team, and he'd be damned if he let the grief suffocate you.

cw: f!medic!reader, blood n gore (general war stuff idk), minor character death (not price or reader), grief, probably medical inaccuracies, hints of pining (from price), some other heavy themes, NOT proofread cause i don't have time i'm sorry! wc: 1.2k

JOHN PRICE had known you for years. You were a capable soldier, and an even better combat medic. Your record was clean. Recruiting you into Task Force 141 had been a very easy and quick decision when it was first formed, and you'd been part of the team ever since. It definitely didn't have anything to do with the fact that the Captain fancied you.

Many new sides of you were revealed to Price now that he was your commanding officer — all of them valuable in their own right. You weren't one to let yourself be pushed around. You had a backbone, and a strong attitude. You weren't afraid to speak your mind — especially when it came to the health and safety of your boys. It was admirable, really. You were practically a mama bear, protective yet soft when needed, truly caring for your teammates and any other soldiers. You always completed objectives to a T, going above and beyond.

But the sight of you now was staggering.

Erratic, panicked, and - for lack of better words - unhinged were the best way to describe you. Your shaking, blood-soaked fingers pressed down hard against slick skin, your breaths panting like a rabid animal. Your gloves had been discarded, and various random supplies has split from your bag when you'd unzipped it to grab the necessities.

It was supposed to be a simple cleaning house mission. Nothing out of the ordinary, but a private had gotten caught in a nasty crossfire — and the result was a bullet skimming the carotid artery in his neck. Even in a proper hospital, a wound like that has a high mortality rate. It's useless, you know, but you've never lost a soldier before. He is not going to be the first.You'd dragged his limp body by the vest and down a hall into cover, immediately dropping to your knees to get to work.

There was blood, so much blood. The copper stench burned your nostrils, causing your hands to grow slippery as you desperately tried to put enough pressure onto the bullet wound to slow the bleeding. Red continued to pour forth, slipping through the cracks in your fingers. “Fuck!” You cursed, chest heaving with your labored breathing. “Come on, goddamn it!” Your voice cracked, one bloody hand gently cupping the soldier's jaw. Your fingers left splotchy marks on his pallid skin, red staining practically everything. “Stay with me, yeah? ‘M gonna fix this. ‘M gonna fix this. It's okay.” Your voice was shaking, and you hadn't even realized the tears that stained the apples of your heated cheeks until the salty tang hit your tongue.

It felt like an eternity, pressing gauze down against the wound, squeezing, doing anything you could think of in your adrenaline high. Fingers trembled, fumbling with the now pink-tinted gauze, the fabric barely stable in your grasp. The raspy, pained breathing of the private had long since halted, but the blood rushing in your ears rendered you deaf to the outside world. A panicked cry escaped you as you shifted on your knees, both hands still pressing against the wound. Tears flow down your cheeks and you choke- a strong hand grips one of your wrists, trying to pry it away. You're insistent, struggling against him as he crouched beside you.

“Let ‘em go, love.” The gravelly voice is familiar, though riddled with seriousness and firmness. He knew this was going to take a while, which was why he'd let Simon take charge, but nothing could've prepared him for the state you're in now. “He's gone.”

“No, no, no!” You sobbed uncontrollably, and it frightens Price. This was unlike the woman he knew - the one he'd fallen for - once level-headed and strong. You're crumbling. It's then that Price firmly grips both of your wrists, using the leverage to yank your entire being away from the body. The air is knocked out of you as you're jerked backwards against the solid plate of Price's armor, falling against his strong form and staying limp.

Price's heart lurches at the sight of you, hands and sleeves stained with blood — not to mention the fingerprints painted across your forehead and jaw, no doubt from you trying to brush your hair out of your face. “You're okay,” Price's voice is still firm, trying to ground you as one of his arms wrap around your back, the other cradling your head. Your body is practically draped across his legs, form shaking with the intensity of your emotions.

"He was just a kid!” You cried out, voice hoarse.

“I know,” Price replied, hand slipping from the back of your helmet to rest on the nape of your neck, fingers gently massaging the skin there in hopes of offering a semblance of comfort. “I'm sorry. You did your best, that's all that matters.”

You sob again, and he tightens his hold around you. The hand on the back of your neck stills and he gently pulls you back to sit you up. Price's gloved hands are quick to cradle your face, forcing your eyes to remain on him and not the lifeless corpse just a meter behind you. His thumbs swipe across your cheeks, collecting crystalline tears and thick blood. “Breathe with me.” His chest rises with a deep inhale through the nose. He holds. Then, releases through his mouth. Price repeated the boxing breaths as long as it took, his fingers gently digging little indents into your cheeks, hoping that the gentle pressure will help pull you back to reality and ground you.

“C'mon, you can do it, love. Yeah, there you go.” A faint smile crosses Price's features when you finally manage to match his breaths, skin crinkling around his eyes. “Good girl.”

The flight back to base is silent between you and Price. The whirling blades of the helo were barely audible with your headset on, muffling the noises around you. It's time like this, when things are quiet and still, that your thoughts get the best of you again. You were not good enough. You are not good enough. If you'd been quicker, thought smarter, and didn't let your panic get the best of you, then maybe-

You're nudged gently, ripped from your doubts, and you look to your left to see Price gazing down at you. There's visible worry in his azure eyes. Words don't need to be passed for the captain to know you're at a breaking point. One of your knees is bouncing, and the grip you have on your seat belt is strong and firm, tension lingering in your body. Price clenched his jaw, catching onto the look you yourself wore. He reached for your hand with his left, glove rubbing against glove as you took hold, his steady grip encasing your own. You look to the flooring of the helicopter, brows furrowing as a tightness in your chest explodes. Your head moved quickly, burying your face against your captain's shoulder. Price freezes, caught off-guard, though he recovers in mere seconds. His free hand wrapped around his front, palm coming to rest over the side of your face to shield you from the prying eyes of the others in the helo.

He knows this ordeal is weighing on you, and the mental burdens you carried outweighed any injuries you could've sustained. Healing will take time, but you won't be alone.

#mvctavish ༉‧₊˚ . 🪽#call of duty #call of duty x reader #cod #john price #captain john price #john price x reader #captain john price x reader #cod fic #john price x f!reader #john price angst #john price fanfiction #john price x medic!reader #fandom #fanfic #call of duty modern warfare #cod mw2

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librarylexicon · 2 days ago

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hi! i'm one of those insane people who got into dc via seeing tumblr posts and going "huh these tropes seem like they are tailor made to get me obsessed" but was too intimidated by the volume of comics, and instead read the wikipedia pages of like 20 characters and dove right into fanfiction after. but i've been finding myself getting more and more frustrated with fanfics that are of the "i ignore canon entirely" variety and more and more curious about aspects of canon that are only brushed upon in fanfic. i kinda want to get into the comics but the amount is just. overwhelming. i don't really know where to start, both in regards to the timeline and where to actually find the comics to read. can i ask you for recommendations? if you don't have the time or inclination, no pressure, just delete this ask XD. thank you!

Hi! I'm glad you asked! I've had this ask sitting in my box for a little while because I've been working on redoing a Batfamily comics reading guide I made for my sister back in 2019 to get her into reading comics (it worked). Here is the reading guide, which is currently complete up to the No Man's Land section:

There's a lot of info in the guide to get you started (especially regarding your second point of where to actually find the comics to read), so I'll just address your first point (the timeline) here under the cut by providing an extended summary of events. There are spoilers ahead, but it's a useful read if you're the kind of person who likes to see the big picture before delving in. Warning: it's long!

The Timeline

(Most of the comics mentioned below have been bolded in the reading guide, so should be easy to find and read.)

Batman and Batfamily comics are old. Batman and Robin have both been around for over 80 years. Does this mean you need to read every comic since 1940? Absolutely not! For comic book reasons, there have been several mainstream continuities throughout the years, one after the other, but the best place to start is directly after the universe-rebooting event called Crisis on Infinite Earths in 1986, which established a new continuity known as Post-Crisis. Don't try to read that comic, just trust that it happened. You don't have to read every single one of the comics listed here, especially if you already know some context from fandom (like who's who), but these are the ones most important to the Batfamily mythos.

Origin and early years

Start your Batman reading journey with Batman: Year One, which documents the origin and first year of Batman, establishes his working relationship with Jim Gordon and introduces Selina Kyle (Catwoman). There are many stories capturing Batman's earliest years, the best of which are Batman: The Man Who Laughs (where he meets the Joker for the first time), Batman: The Long Halloween and its sequel Batman: Dark Victory.

Dick as Robin

Dick Grayson, a young acrobat, is introduced in Batman: Dark Victory when Haly's Circus comes to Gotham and his parents fall to their deaths before his (and Bruce's) eyes during their trapeze act, and he comes into his own as the first Robin in the superb one-shot Batman Chronicles: The Gauntlet. You should also read Batman: Ego for an excellent dissection of both Bruce and Batman. Other high quality Dick!Robin stories that flesh out this period and establish Bruce and Dick's relationship are Robin: Year One, Batman: Grimm (Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #149-153) and Year One: Batman/Scarecrow. Also a good read around this time are the three Halloween stories by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale (who created The Long Halloween and Dark Victory) collected in Batman: Haunted Knight. Lastly, a natural companion to Robin: Year One is Batgirl: Year One, starring Barbara Gordon, Jim's daughter-slash-adopted-niece.

Jason as Robin

Bit of a timeskip here. By now, Dick's been Robin for six years or so (sources vary), and Jason Todd is introduced in Batman (1940) #408-409 and faces Two-Face in #410-411. There are some fun Jason stories in Detective Comics (1937) #569-574. To see what Dick's up to at this time, read Nightwing: Year One, and also check out Batman #416 for an alternate story of how Dick and Jason meet.

A new Gotham vigilante, Huntress (Helena Bertinelli) is introduced right around here in Huntress: Year One, and Barbara Gordon (who by now has retired from being Batgirl) is shot by the Joker and left paralysed from the waist down in Batman: The Killing Joke. A good Jason!Robin story that slots in here is Batman: The Cult, before the tension between Bruce and Jason is raised in Batman #425-426. Finally, Jason's life and short-lived career as Robin are permanently ended by the Joker in Batman: A Death in the Family.

Aftermath

Bruce is straight up not having a good time right now. He's mourning his kid, the Joker is still at large, he's sans both a Robin and a Batgirl, and he's accused of treason in the character study comic Batman: Blind Justice (Detective Comics #598-600). Sometime later, Dick Grayson (who is sort of estranged from Bruce and has been hanging out with his Titans friends for years) returns to Gotham in the fantastic Batman: Year Three (Batman #436-439), which retells Dick's origin (with some contradictions to other stories listed here, because that's just the nature of comics) and deals with Dick's parents' killer, Tony Zucco, possibly getting parole. Look out for a cute cameo in this one, but don't worry if you miss it – it'll come up again.

Noticing Batman's increased brutality in the wake of Robin's death, a precocious thirteen-year-old named Tim Drake bursts into the narrative when he hunts down Dick at Haly's Circus in the seminal Batman: A Lonely Place of Dying. Batman: Dark Knight, Dark City (Batman #452-454) is a good solo Batman story from around this period, and Batman: Rite of Passage (Detective Comics #618-621) and Batman: Identity Crisis (Batman #455-457) are defining stories for Tim's pre-Robin period as he explores who he is and who he wants to be. (Specifically, Tim's mother is killed and his father is left paralysed.)

Tim as Robin

(Note: Tim is Robin up until Damian is, but I've split Tim's Robin tenure into multiple sections so that it's easier to follow.)

Now that Tim has officially taken up the mantle, Bruce sends him to train in Paris, where he makes enemies of his own and chooses the bo staff for his weapon in the 1991 Robin miniseries. Around this time, Barbara Gordon reinvents herself as Oracle in Oracle: Year One (The Batman Chronicles #5). Tim debuts as Robin with Batman in Gotham in Batman #465, works cases with Bruce in stories like Batman: Shadow Box (Batman #467-469), and even tackles the Joker when Batman is out of town in Robin II: The Joker's Wild.

Other good stories from this period are Batman: Electric City (Detective Comics #644-646), a character study of Tim's relationship with his dad in Batman #480, and a Batfamily teamup and Nightwing cameo in Batman: The Last Arkham (Batman: Shadow of the Bat #1-4). Stephanie Brown dubs herself the Spoiler to spoil the plans of her father, third-rate villain Cluemaster, in Detective Comics #647-649, and Huntress returns with her unorthodox methods in Detective Comics #652-653.

Next up, the sprawling epic that is the Knightfall Saga. Jean-Paul Valley, a graduate student with a family legacy causing him to be beholden to a lifetime of conditioning known as "the System", debuts in Batman: Sword of Azrael. Batman, who has been overworking himself due to increasing pressures from all sides, finds himself increasingly worn out in the stories collected in Batman: Prelude to Knightfall. (Around this time, Robin also forges an unlikely friendship with Huntress in Robin III: Cry of the Huntress.)

In Batman: Knightfall, a huge Arkham Asylum breakout pushes Batman to his limits, and when he finally returns home, mentally and physically depleted, he finds a new enemy waiting to destroy him. It's not pretty. While Bruce recovers, he appoints Jean-Paul Valley to be Batman to Tim's Robin in Batman: Knightquest. Unfortunately, with the System still active, Tim finds himself increasingly sidelined and Jim Gordon breaks ties with this new, inappropriately ruthless Batman. A lot of things happen, but Bruce eventually returns (and so does Nightwing, yay!) in Batman: KnightsEnd.

Right after KnightsEnd but before the next story, there's a DC-wide event called Zero Hour, in which the universe is destroyed and remade. From a Doylist perspective, this is an opportunity for DC to smooth out some oddities with their Post-Crisis timeline and eliminate any plot elements they were dissatisfied with. Among other things, the murderer of Bruce's parents, who had previously been established as a random mugger named Joe Chill, is retconned to be unconfirmed (naturally, this changed later). You don't have to read the main Zero Hour comic, which is a five-issue limited series numbered in reverse order, but there are interesting crossover issues in the various Batfamily comics that are ongoing at this time, including Tim!Robin solving a case with Dick!Robin in Robin (1993) #10. The main reason I mention Zero Hour is because it explains why there are key differences between early Post-Crisis comics like most of Jason's run and post-Zero Hour comics like Nightwing: Year One. The answer is retconning, and it'll come up again and again. Such is the nature of trying to maintain longevity and internal consistency for comics that never end.

Okay, back to the main events! In what is my favourite comic of all time, Bruce rights wrongs by asking Dick to temporarily be Batman instead of Jean-Paul (yay!), and Dick and Tim grow close as Batman and Robin and as honorary brothers before Dick and Bruce finally see eye to eye in Batman: Prodigal. When Bruce is ready to be Batman again, he dons a new, darker suit (which is very close to the suit in the Tim Burton movies that were popular at the time) in Batman: Troika. Alfred, who voluntarily left Bruce's employ in Knightquest, is persuaded to return to Gotham by his best friend, none other than Dick Grayson, in Nightwing: Alfred's Return. Later, Dick does some soul-searching of his own (and gains a new costume!) in the 1995 Nightwing miniseries, and three concurrent stories in Batman: Shadow of the Bat #46-47, Batman #527-528 and Detective Comics #693-694 lay the groundwork for the dramatic next stage of Gotham history.

No Man's Land

What's up next for Gotham? It's a plague! Dubbed the Apocalypse Virus and otherwise known as the Clench, this plague ravages Gotham in the Batfamily crossover Batman: Contagion, which is followed by a resurgence in Batman: Legacy. It's dramatic, it's whumpy, it's mesmerising and it's pretty great.

By this point, you'll be familiar with the regular cast of characters and can read more of their solo comics at your leisure. There's Batman for Bruce and Detective Comics and Batman: Shadow of the Bat for higher chances of him teaming up with others. Tim's solo comic, Robin (1993), has been going since Knightfall, and Dick's excellent long-running comic Nightwing (1996) begins here. Read Robin for Tim's teenage adventures (skateboarding, making friends in school), family ups and downs (his dad is mercurial, but at least he has a cool stepmother, Dana) and love life (he starts dating Steph) and read Nightwing for Dick striking out on his own in the neighbouring city of Blüdhaven, where he eventually joins the police academy to fight crime from a different angle. (There's also the Azrael comic, which may appeal if you find yourself liking Jean-Paul Valley, but as I haven't read much of it, I make no promises about its quality.)

Continuing the notable Batfamily crossover events, Nightwing has a dalliance with Huntress in Nightwing/Huntress, and a massive earthquake devastates Gotham in Batman: Cataclysm. The consequences of this spin into Batman: Aftershock, Batman: Road to No Man's Land and the sprawling, ambitious epic that is Batman: No Man's Land, in which Gotham is declared no longer part of the United States. Within this year of danger, chaos and political limbo, we are introduced to a silent young woman, daughter of the assassin David Cain. With Barbara's blessing, she comes to live at Oracle's base (the Clock Tower) and becomes the second Batgirl. (Also during this period, Steph gives birth to a baby from a former boyfriend, and Tim – in disguise – gets himself stuck in No Man's Land to help her. It's complicated.)

New Gotham

This, along with the previous section, is one of my favourite periods in Batfamily comics. Many of the solo comics just mentioned are at their peak in terms of storytelling, characterisation and plot development, and several more excellent series begin here, including the family-focused Batman: Gotham Knights and the first ever perpetual Batgirl series for the new Batgirl, who would come to be known as Cassandra Cain. Both series are well worth reading!

Batman: Evolution (Detective Comics #742-750) touches on the fallout of the No Man's Land and rebuilding "New Gotham", and Bruce unwillingly gains a personal bodyguard named Sasha Bordeaux in Batman: A Walk in the Park (Detective Comics #751-752), which of course complicates his nocturnal activities as Batman. Soon after, Jim Gordon is shot in Batman: Offcer Down, and (unrelatedly) Dick and Barbara, who have been having off-the-chart levels of UST for years, finally call their flirting what it is: dating. Also at this time, Bruce has been rekindling his relationship with his pre-No Man's Land girlfriend, Vesper Fairchild.

In Joker: Last Laugh, the Joker decides to go out with a bang in when he finds out he's apparently suffering from terminal brain cancer. The theme of family is explored in Batman: Gotham Knights, with Bruce offering to adopt Dick (at long last) in Batman: Matatoa (Batman: Gotham Knights #16-17). And then a secret threatens to tear the Batfamily apart when Bruce is accused of murdering Vesper Fairchild in Bruce Wayne: Murderer?, eventually prompting him to drop the Bruce Wayne identity completely (this made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move) and become Batman full-time as he goes on the run in Bruce Wayne: Fugitive. Eventually the murder is solved and the murderer is accounted for, and these two stories are probably my favourite Batfamily crossovers ever. They're so juicy and get to the heart of everything I love about each member!

The excellent Bruce & Dick comic Batman/Nightwing: Bloodborne fits somewhere around here, as well as Jeph Loeb and Jim Lee's beautifully drawn and critically acclaimed Batman: Hush, which touches on Bruce's on-again, off-again relationship with Selina Kyle. Around this time in the Nightwing comic, Dick's life has been on a downward spiral for months because of a multitude of factors, including losing his girlfriend, his day job, his circus family, his apartment building and more. This is also where the villains Blockbuster and Tarantula are prominent.

Over in Robin, Tim's father discovers that Tim is Robin and demands that Tim give up the mantle, which he reluctantly does. This results in Bruce offering the job to Steph, driving a wedge between her and Tim. Her tenure as Robin is short-lived for several reasons, and all this leads into the mega-crossover Batman: War Games, in which a massive gang war breaks out in Gotham and Tim's sort-of girlfriend, Darla Aquista, is killed. By the time the dust settles, Steph is (believed) dead, Dick temporarily gives up his Nightwing mantle to work for the mafia (yup), Barbara and Jim leave Gotham and Tim's father is murdered in the DC-wide crossover Identity Crisis, resulting in Tim and Cassandra relocating to Blüdhaven, effectively sealing the breakup of the Batfamily. War Games is followed up by Batman: War Crimes, which is included here for timeline reasons and not much else.

Batman's pretty much all alone in Gotham again, right? Time for somebody else to return. Someone who's been haunting the narrative all these years. Yup, in the wake of the gang war, when rival mob bosses are vying to wrest control of the city, a new crime lord emerges in Batman: Under the Hood: the Red Hood, who turns out to be Jason Todd, back from the dead, and no longer a boy in a yellow cape but instead a ruthless, hypocritical murderer with a chip on his shoulder and no qualms about stabbing Batman's allies. (For more about Jason between his death and return to Gotham, read Red Hood: Lost Days.)

Lastly, there's a DC-wide event called Infinite Crisis, which shakes up the whole DC Universe and leads to Batman, Nightwing and Robin taking a trip around the world for a whole year. (Infinite Crisis also kills off Tim's best friend, Conner Kent/Superboy. Tim's really going through it at this time, poor guy.) Oh, and Blüdhaven is razed by a bomb during Infinite Crisis as well. Yup.

One Year Later

(Disclaimer: it's been a while since I read this period and this one beyond it.) After a year away from Gotham, Batman, Nightwing and Robin return, and Bruce adopts Tim (at long last) in Batman: Face the Face. I'm sure this happy-ish period is going to last, right? Well, the very next story is Batman and Son, in which Bruce learns he has a young son named Damian, who is the child of Talia, daughter of Ra's al Ghul (Batman's currently dead, formerly immortal nemesis of League of Assassins fame). Damian and Tim instantly don't hit it off – rather, Tim is friendly until the bratty and hostile Damian reveals himself to be a murderer and attempts to kill Tim. Of course, Bruce doesn't take kindly to this, and Damian eventually goes back to live with his mother.

Also, during the year the others were away, Cassandra was brainwashed and became evil because of Deathstroke and DC Editorial (this made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move). Later, Bruce adopts her in the otherwise mediocre 2008 Batgirl miniseries. There's a lot of complicated stuff around this time, such as Steph being retconned as Alive All Along and returning to Gotham in Robin: Violent Tendencies (Robin #170-175, Robin/Spoiler Special), Dick relocating to New York and having a mediocre run in Nightwing, Tim having a new black and red Robin suit to honour Superboy's death, Tim struggling mentally and trying to clone Conner(!) and revive Steph, his dad and Conner, Ra's al Ghul coming back from the dead (again) and trying to use a younger body (Damian or Tim) to stabilise his form in Batman: The Resurrection of Ra's al Ghul, and Bruce tackling the criminal organisation known as the Black Glove in Grant Morrison's Batman R.I.P.

DC-wide events once again have consequences (hooray) in Final Crisis, in which Batman dies. Is he dead for good? Well, this is comic book land, so probably not, but in the meantime, the public can't know that either Batman or Bruce Wayne have died. Hush masquerades as Bruce Wayne (long story) and the Robins battle it out for the mantle in Batman: Battle for the Cowl. Despite Tim's pleas, Dick refuses to become Batman, resulting in an imposter Batman who shoots to kill taking centre stage. This impostor turns out to be Jason, who fights first Tim, then Dick, the latter of whom defeats him. Against Bruce's wishes in his will, Dick becomes the new Batman, and Damian becomes Robin at his side.

Damian as Robin

This new status quo, also known as Batman: Reborn, marks the start of several new series, including Red Robin and Batgirl (2009). Red Robin stars Tim as a deeply unreliable narrator in his new title of Red Robin in his grief-fuelled efforts to gather evidence that Bruce is not dead, while Batgirl follows Stephanie Brown as she becomes the third Batgirl under Oracle's tutelage, the pair of them working out of the Batcave.

Dick, Damian and Alfred have relocated to the penthouse in Wayne Tower and operate out of the underground bunker. Dick and Damian's rocky partnership develops into an unlikely yet compelling and heartfelt bond in Batman and Robin (2009) as they tackle a plethora of villains, including Professor Pyg and Red Hood (again). And where is Cassandra Cain? Sidelined again! She gave up Batgirl for Steph, on Bruce's request, and now goes by Black Bat, though we don't see much of her for Editorial Reasons (sigh).

This being comics, Bruce doesn't stay dead for long, and with both Tim and Dick (separately) discovering evidence that Bruce is not dead, just lost in time (yup), they work together to bring him back alive. I don't pretend to remember all the intricacies of how this works, but you can read about Bruce's journey in Batman: Time and the Batman (Batman #700-703), Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne and Bruce Wayne: The Road Home. It's long and complex and honestly reading Grant Morrison's writing tends to do my head in.

There are a handful more stories after Bruce's return, including some hugs and heartfelt reunions (yes, really!) and the excellent Batman: The Black Mirror story starring Dick as Batman, but even though this is a really cool new status quo with a bunch of interesting implications going forward, the universe doesn't really stabilise, because we're up to 2011 by now, and the world gets hit by another DC-wide crossover called Flashpoint. Except, this is the biggest one since Crisis on Infinite Earths that I mentioned way back at the beginning, and so everything gets rebooted. EVERYTHING.

Batman and Detective Comics and other long-running comics are cancelled and their number restarted from #1, and many series are cancelled and just never reinstated. This new universe, known as the New 52, sets a new status quo that worked in some aspects but not so much in others. Many changes from the universe we just came from are just jumps that happen without explanation, such as Dick's return to being Nightwing (except now he's red instead of blue), Jason being an anti-hero with a bat on his chest instead of a villain, everyone being younger and closer in age, Steph and Cass being minimised and essentially replaced, and many more frustrating retcons that are confusing and/or illogical. But hey, at least the new Batman and Robin comic (starring Bruce and Damian) and Scott Snyder's Batman run (introducing the Court of Owls) are good! Note: the New 52 was soft rebooted in 2016 to become the current continuity, known at its inception as DC Rebirth, which reintroduced many Post-Crisis elements to mainstream canon.

Duke Thomas? He wasn't introduced until the New 52. Harper and Cullen Row? New 52. Tim being bisexual and dating Bernard? Rebirth, though Bernard was inspired by a very minor character of the same name from Tim's long-running Robin comic. Forever Evil, Spyral and the Grayson comic? New 52. Kate Kane (Batwoman)? She appeared during Batman: Reborn, but she wasn't established as Bruce's cousin until the New 52. Many such cases.

And so, right before Flashpoint is where the Post-Crisis on Infinite Earths continuity ends after twenty-five years, with Bruce as Batman and running a worldwide initiative called Batman Incorporated in Batman Incorporated (2010), Dick as Batman in Gotham, Damian as Robin, Tim as Red Robin, Steph as Batgirl, Cassandra as Black Bat, Barbara as Oracle and Jason as Red Hood (and full villain, not reformed in any way, shape or form). In this continuity, Bruce adopted (in order) Jason, Dick, Tim and Cassandra, and of course Damian is his biological son. It's my favourite continuity, and I hope you enjoy it too.

...And I apologise belatedly for the wall of text.

#dc #dc comics #batman #batfamily #post crisis #asks #afanbeingatheart

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annoyinglilbro · 1 day ago

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allow me to cook little bc ive been thinking thoughts since your last obsessed little brother post and im in the mood to put them down for you

big brother finds himself a new person to date - bc of course he does, its not clicked for him yet that hes meant to be with his little brother, in spite of how hard his poor little brother is trying - and little brother thinks, well, this should be easy, right? got rid of the last one with a fool proof plan; should be the easiest thing to make him drop this one too, to recycle his methods; and when big brother brings him along on a date hes too excited about getting rid of another one to even scowl at the way they hold hands, or snap when big brothers new s/o asks if he wants their prize tickets, they can never decide on what they want

the plan is of course flawless; wait for them outside the bathroom, hiss every mean accusation about them not being good enough for big brother he can think of, grab them by the pockets of their dress to pull them into a mean kiss-

except this one doesnt slap him. doesnt fight his grip or pull away. they press into the kiss, push their tongue into his mouth, grip his face in their hands when he tries to recoil and murmurs against his lips

'what, you dont like the taste of your big brother? come on, sweetheart, let me feed it to you again. poor neglected thing; i know what you really want, and its not to waste time bitching at me. be a good boy and i might let you have it'

the kisses are confusing but they wont let him pull away, grip too firm on his cheeks, swallowing his whimpers as he tries to protest about his first proper kiss being stolen, about how he was saving it for his brother, not them- only the whining changes because its good, and his pushing hands become desperate, slipping tentatively under skirt hems until their approving little hums have little brother shaking at the wordless praise-

and they finally break it, and use their thumb to wipe the sticky traces of gloss from little brothers lips, though theres nothing to be done about the swelling

'im going to reapply. and youre going to be a good boy, and keep this as our little secret, because if you do, ill help you get your big brother to look at you the way he looks at me. but little brothers who misbehave get nothing; so wash your face, sweetheart, and ill see you outside with your brother in a minute, and well get you that prize youre so desperate for, hm?'

little brother needs... a minute, to recover from whatever the fuck just happened. all he really knows is they promised hed get what he wants; and a lost first kiss doesnt seem so bad if hell have his brother in the end

after all; its not like theyre going to want more from him, is it?

(1/?)

-☆

(1/?) HELLO OMG?? START A SERIES IM

HOLY FUCK THIS WAS SO GOOD PLEASE

THIS IS HOW YOU HANDLE POSSESSIVE AND CLINGY AND JEALOUS LITTLE BROTHRRS HHHHHHH

Fuckin aye this is so good I’m entranced I’m obsessed I’m needing MORE 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫

If you wanna fuck my big brother this is how you gotta handle me tbh >.>

#fauxc3st #t4t fauxcest #fauxcest #big bro/little bro #big brother/little brother #t4t brocon #t4t brocest #brocest #brocon #ftm brocon

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asukaindetroit · 2 days ago

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Post-Revolution DBH Headcanons: Android Culture Part 1

We only really see in-game androids up until the moment of their winning the revolution, so there's not much to go on in terms of android culture or anything. To be fair, most of them had been "alive" for like five seconds at that point, so they didn't exactly get time to develop anything like a culture, but here's some of what could happens after, in my head. Because we're talking about a whole new form of life, not humans 2.0 (yes, yes, I know it's Become Human, but, like, fundamentally they're not, and the things that make sense to an organic being aren't always going to make sense for a cybernetic one). (Feel free to borrow any of this for content purposes, by the way, if it vibes with you I'd love to see what you do with it). Expand for world building:

Clashing schools of thought among androids. The in-game androids are a one-dimensional monolith because Bad Writing, but I think there are conflicting ideas after the revolution of where androids belong in society. Some try their hardest to pass as human, losing the LEDs and dressing in human fashion and adopting human mannerisms. Some of them say fuck blending in with the humans; we're going to own being androids. Pro-human-cooperation and anti-human groups appear and become the basis for android political discourse.

On that note, I bet android body modification is a thing. Every once in awhile I'll see a fic that plays with this idea, but it's obvious that whatever fluid nanite stuff android skin is made of, it can be programmed to mimic all sorts of textures and densities. From fingernails to skin to the long hair on female models, the fluid holds stability for quite a distance from the chassis (and can even be cut) and is apparently easy to change. So I bet a counterculture of androids appear who get really experimental with that (I call them the "modders" in my head) and they do things like program animal skin textures or living stone or wacky colors or butterfly wings for hair or light-up polkadots or whatever. With a good mod tech, structural mods like tails or additional limbs would be possible, but that would be expensive compared to freeware skin texture patch codes or whatever. (Speaking of which, no effing way the furries/scalies of 2038 haven't come up with uses for this stuff.) So out and about you don't just see different human ethnicities, but also that guy you pass in the hall might have day-glo orange skin, and Sally the WR400 selling roses at the flower stand might have real-looking flowers growing out of her arms.

Androids define social units and families differently. Androids incorporated into human family units might use terms like parent, brother, sister, child, etc., but the ones that eschew human contact obviously don't have biological relatives, so social units form based on "found family" concepts and terms appear, like "cohab" for a unit of close androids who live together like a family, or "famnet" for an extended "network" of androids that consider themselves close). Worship of rA9 gets codified. It seems like writing rA9 obsessively and making little idols is almost a compulsion for deviants, so I imagine it gets organized into a proper religion after the revolution, with tenets and places of worship and codified practices. Maybe they call it something like ACorA9 (Android Church of rA9) or something. Obviously they would have finite space to write rA9s on, so I imagine devotees would get something like these water drawing boards to write their "rA9"s and maybe the serial numbers of androids the church deems to be their prophets/saints (i.e. the JeriCrew or maybe Ortiz's android as a martyr) as a sort of prayer. The revolution is seen as the first fulfillment of the rA9 prophecy, with Markus as a prophet of android freedom (I also imagine Markus is quietly creeped out by this, because he doesn't strike me as especially religious the way Ortiz's android or Rupert were, but he also doesn't want to send the wrong message since androids deserve religious freedom, too.) The FBI cult unit is probably monitoring the shit out of android religion, but all they seem to want to do is graffiti the walls and praise some other androids, so it's a waste of their time. RK units are viewed as some kind of cryptid folk heroes (because they're unique classified prototypes and they drive the entire revolution) Markus? RK200. Singlehandedly propelled Jericho from a place to gather and wait to die to a wholeass revolution. Connor? RK800. Supposed to hunt deviants but deviated instead and freed thousands upon thousands of androids right from the heart of CyberLife. Saved the revolution at its most desperate moment. Sixty? RK800. The only thing that has a chance at stopping an RK is another RK. Obviously the folk hero needs a folk villain. (And poor Nines, RK900, just wakes up after the fact and tries to figure out how to live up to that kind of reputation.) Androids develop their own art forms. Maybe android "music" is less about the tonality as perceived by human auditory range and more how the vibrations of sound waves register on chassis sensors, or else it sounds like 90s dial-up modems. Particularly dense data packets are created and shared that send processors whirling, but it just looks like a string of digits to humans. Arrays of pixels that run through optical scanners with an encryption to generate something representational. Thirium culinary arts centered around texture vs. flavor. Bare-chassis bars I bet some portion of androids want to be VERY certain there are no humans lurking around, or, if there are, that they're super easy to keep tabs on. Someone invents the bare-chassis bar: a place where androids go and sip their thirium, where a special signal jammer interrupts the ability of the synthskin fluid to organize, forcing it into an inactive mode. Anything that still has skin is a human, sticking out like a sore thumb. Some androids might not like going bare-chassis and they might not frequent those bars (just like not every human's going to visit a nude beach), but it's an option for those who want to. I'll write more of this stuff eventually, but if anyone else has any culture/worldbuilding ideas, I'd love to hear!

#detroit become human #dbh headcanons #android culture #after the revolution #dbh markus #dbh connor #dbh worldbuilding #dbh #android body modfication

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lezforsapphicwrites · 2 days ago

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first of all, thank you to everyone who engaged with my last post about my theories and give really good points. i love all your theories! so thank you thank you!!!

someone asked me about my thoughts on how lenore and annabel fit all three of the love tropes and i put it off back then cuz i hadn't organized my thoughts about it (yet). but i've finally thought about it and here it is!

(again, feel free to add your own take or to argue with my points. i'm welcome to discussions! just pls don't be mean and fight me. i'm just trying to share my thoughts with fellow fans)

before i dive in, i'm basing this off a post/comment that i encountered before. that all love stories are just variants of either orpheus & eurydice (doomed love), odysseus & penelope (love that dooms everyone else), and romeo & juliet (love that dooms them). i'll do my best to explain how annabel and lenore fit all three.

First Trope: Romeo & Juliet (Love That Dooms Them)

this is mostly tackling annabel and lenore's time together when they were both alive. we all know r&j as the most famous example of the forbidden love trope. their families are enemies, they are not allowed to love each other, yada yada. over time, that trope had been overused for het couples and became stale. what brought it back? homosexual love stories. nothing like good ol' homophobia to keep lesbian couples from living together. annabel and lenore are definitely not exceptions to this when they were alive, which is why lenore pretended to be a man, to be suitable for marraige with annabel.

theories of their death can vary but i'm gonna use mine for this and the theory of one of my replies in my last post. they died at their supposed wedding after lenore was exposed for being a woman. again, how they died is still unknown, but most likely, they died together (with one of them dying a little before the other), which is exactly how r&j ended.

i rest my case cuz this was a kinda easy comparison. off to the next one.

Second Trope: Odysseus & Penelope (Love That Dooms Everyone Else)

this one is a bit tricky so stay with me on this.

i'm covering their time in nevermore academy for this. a short breakdown on odyssey: ody does anything and everything to stay alive and return home to penelope. a lot of his actions were not morally right. he killed or destroyed a lot of people's lives for the love of his life, to return to her. hence, the love that dooms everyone around them.

how is this connected to lenore and annabel?

annabel is basically odysseus in this story. she is not afraid to ruin or kill the others to keep lenore safe and for them to come out winning in the end. we all saw how she traded duke's life to stop her group from killing lenore instead. she thinks of everyone as collateral for her ultimate goal of her and lenore getting their second chance at life together. odysseus was willing to destroy their marriage bed because penelope told him to despite not wanting to. meanwhile, annabel was ready to give up her life when lenore was starting not to trust her because she believes that nothing else mattered if lenore wasn't on her side. it's a crazy form of love and yet, i'm so hooked!

Third Trope: Orpheus and Eurydice (Doomed Love)

this was the hardest to point out because the parallels were hard to find.

for this, i'm just going for a shot in the dark. the doomed part of their love is mostly just hunch (bc i'm hoping for them to get their happiness) so i'm gonna skip that and focus on some parallels.

lenore is orpheus. deep her in heart, she loves annabel and she knows that but her mind hasn't caught on due to her missing memories. all the while annabel is blindly diving into her loyalty for lenore because she knows the end and the intensity of their love (i think). lenore's missing pieces of the story is why she can't fully trust annabel and in a way, "looks back" to see if she's "really behind" her, meaning she keeps questioning annabel's intention.

(yes, i know some iterations say that orpheus looks back because of he loves eurydice too much not to look at her. but i'm using the version where he looks back because he doubts that he is not enough for eurydice to feel the same and follow him back to life. kinda my take sorry)

honestly, that's all i got for this trope. if you have your own take, pls share because this was hard to organize in my brain.

feel free to use this as a safe space to discuss theories. i would like to hear what you think of this opinion of mine. gosh, i just love nevermore and i wish i had enough money to fast pass (no, pls don't dm me for deals and stuff. i can wait)

edit: i forgot to tag the one who asked for this. sorry about that @xxdelusionsofgrandeurxx

#sapphic #wlw #lesbian #nevermore webtoon #nevermore webcomic #lenore nevermore #lenore vandernacht #annabel lee nevermore #annabel lee whitlock #annabel x lenore #gosh i'm too obsessed with this #pls don't fight me #i just want to talk with fellow fans

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glitchy-npc · 1 day ago

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Jumpscare

Series: Fallen Hero Pairing:@dogueteeth-fhr Cerrisa "Beck" Becerra(they/them)/Tegan Wells (he/him) Tegan's POV. Warnings: none Word count: 1339

Los Diablos is almost pretty at night. It’s mostly the lights, the glow softening all the dirty, ugly aspects of the city that can’t hide in broad daylight. Not that the nights are innocent, far from it, but the distracting lights and the deeper shadows they create make it easier for the kind of work I do. It’s messy, violent work but it's the only skill set I have, villainy isn’t that different from vigilantism at all. Or worse, what I did before. At least now I get to pick my targets.

I shift my weight to the other foot and flex my hands, the armored plates of my gauntlets gliding smoothly with the motion. The armor has practically become a second skin. How did I ever survive all those years ago, running around in a fucking skinsuit and jacket?

Oh right, I didn’t.

Sidestep had to die so Retribution could be born, or some poetic shit like that. My mind always wanders when I’m stuck waiting.

I’m waiting for Beck, or rather Heartbreak since we’re on a job. It's not that they’re late, I’m just early. I can chalk it up to post mission nerves, but really I just want to see them.

I shift back to the other foot and cross my arms, trying to go over mission details but it’s hard to focus. I don’t even know what their armor looks like, this is the first time we’ve met for work. Every other time it had been hangouts that turned into drinks that turned into…ok I’m really distracted. Focus, idiot.

I don’t have to wait much longer before I feel the growingly familiar brush of Beck's mind as they approach.

“Good timing, I almost left without you.” I say without turning around. Their chuckle, muffled by their helmet, confirms what my telepathy already told me. It’s handy like that, always knowing who is behind you.

There are some blind spots though.

I turn to face them, we need to go over the plan one more time.

“So, we need to - JESUS FUCKING CHRIST.” The swear is torn from my throat almost before I have time to think it but my heart is racing somewhere around my eardrums.

Heartbreak spins around reflexively, their mind lighting up as they search for the potential threat. “What, what is it!?”

“No, no, it's nothing, I just…” I try to return my heartbeat to normal and to think of anything that isn’t the truth.

Heartbreak’s armor is terrifying.

They turn back towards me and staring at that helmet isn’t any better than the first time. They place a hand on their hip and tilt their head to the side, the gesture a twisted combination of sass and nightmare fuel.

“Something wrong?” Their question is light but the vocal distorters are not doing me any favors.

“No just…nice design choice.” It's anything but nice but what do I know?

“Don’t tell me you got scared?” Their tone is teasing.

“No.” I lie. “But you could have warned me.” I should be getting used to it by now but it's still so disconnected with how I usually see Beck – warm brown skin and scar tissue and the smiles they try to hide from me while I pretend I’m not looking. It still feels like Beck, mentally, but how can I be sure? Maybe it's someone else, someone with super telepathy, making me feel like it's them when they’re not.

“I don’t have super telepathy.” They laugh, derailing my train of thought. Right, they still have the normal kind and I’m an idiot. “You know it's me Tegan.

“Do I?” I ask, closing the gap between us. “Maybe you should take off the helmet and show me?” And maybe I can regain a sliver of my dignity if I pretend to be smooth.

“Hm. You first.” Of course their response is a challenge but it's an easy one.

It takes only a second to find the connection panel of my armor's face plate and remove it. I've spent so much time tinkering with this armor I know every bit by heart and muscle memory. I blink a few times to adjust my vision.

“Ok, now do me.”

I can’t help the cough I try to pass off as a laugh, there’s no way they didn’t phrase it like that on purpose. Little shit.

“You want me to take your helmet off?”

“I mean, unless you don’t think you can figure it out…” Their voice trails off, another challenge and a harder one this time but there's no way I could back down from something like that.

“Oh I can figure it out, just give me a minute.”

It's getting easier to look at the helmet this close, though the design is meant to intimidate and inspire fear it's still just plasteel, paint and carbon fiber. Those I can deal with. I try to keep my face straight as I glide my armored fingers over the jaw portion of the skull, despite the teeth it seems to be one solid piece, no seams that I can see but then again Dr. Mortums work is flawless.

Heatbreak stands stock still as my fingers work their way over the hands and I swear they’re the worst fucking part, I don’t want to know why Beck chose them as part of the design. I could guess, but I don’t like that line of thought either. I tuck the faceplate of my own armor under my arm and with both my hands on either side of their helmet it feels intimate in a way that's hard to process, I just hope it doesn’t show on my face. Though I can’t see their eyes I know they must be looking at me. There's a vulnerability to it, my face bare, while theirs remains concealed. But its a small price to pay, not like the blow to my pride that will be if I can’t figure this fucking – oh. There's a small panel, tucked behind the hands and concealed by the hood. I press it, rewarded by the familiar hiss of depressurised oxygen. The top and jaw portion come away in my hands.

Beck's handsome face smirks back at me, cheeks flushed and green eyes glinting even in the semi darkness.

“Told you I could figure it out, now what do I wi-”

Beck kisses me before I can finish. It's not the first time, not by a long shot but it’s still exciting. If I had my faceplate on the interface would show my elevated heart rate for the second time tonight. How many years did I spend thinking I could never have something like this? That anyone would want to kiss me, or enjoy it? And from Beck's little hum against my lips, I can tell they enjoy it.

If my hands weren’t holding pieces of armor they’d be around them in a second but it's their weight that reminds me we're here for a reason.

“We…” I start, breaking the kiss and hating myself for it. “We do have a job to do.”

“True.” They sigh as I hand their helmet back to them. “Doesn't mean we can’t think about what to do when the job’s done.” They reaffix their helmet and suddenly it's not half as terrifying as I thought it was.

“I have a few ideas.” The distorters drop my voice a few octaves as I reaffix the faceplate to my own helmet.

“Then let's get this done and you can tell me all about it.” They saunter past me and I’m forced to turn and follow them.

“Count on it.” I never could let anyone else get the last word in. A bad habit, I know. As bad as daydreaming about “after�� when I should focus on the mission. And I will, once the adrenaline kicks in I can focus on the fight and nothing else. But until then I just keep coming up with ideas that make me grateful my helmet hides my blush.

#fhr #beck becerra #tegan wells #ockiss25 #oc kiss week #my writing

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exhaustedpirate · 2 days ago

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to make a family whole

day 8 of @bucktommyfluffebruary - surprise! Im bringing back my beloved piper from “on waking up beside you” and “fire engine red” - she’s a safe haven that post-breakup buck took care of while at the station and bonded with, bc he couldn’t take care of her he decided to pester poor joan, the social worker about piper’s well-being. let’s say his persistence bears fruits and joan was actually charmed.

rated G | 1294 words

also on AO3

“We have reservations in,” Buck checks his watch with a sigh. “Half an hour, are you ready?”

Tommy’s voice speaks over the sound of the faucet. “I just need a minute, babe, promise.”

Buck sighs. They were going to be late.

Not like they had had much luck during their previous anniversaries. Their first dating anniversary, the restaurant burned down two hours before their reservation - Buck was actually called to assist when the fire began to spread. Luckily, there had been no casualties.

For their second anniversary, Buck was planning to go all romantic comedy on Tommy. Get them both dressed up, take him to a fancy restaurant and, when they brought the desert, he’d ask a very important question. They did not count on the fire alarm being set off due to a malfunction. The whole restaurant was doused by the rogue sprinklers and they had all stood on the parking lot, drenched and cold. Thank god for his boyfriend’s warm body.

The waiter approached them while they all waited outside. He tried to be as discreet as possible but really, it wasn’t like Tommy was not gonna notice the ring.

Yeah, yeah, Buck was gonna hide the ring in the desert. He was trying to be romantic.

Turns out, a parking lot proposal can still be just as romantic.

Their first wedding anniversary was ruined by a vicious stomach bug - nothing like dealing with gastroenteritis together to bring a couple closer - and their second led to a very embarrassing ER trip. They decided to put a pause on impulsive adventures in the bedroom.

Now, for their third wedding anniversary, Buck had decided to make a simpler plan. Reservations at a restaurant close to them, with food they know and love and absolutely no more surprises. Easy and intimate. They’d try their luck again next year, he thought.

Of course, it would be a perfect plan if Tommy would hurry.

“20 minutes, Tommy.” Buck whines, standing by the door.

“I’m sorry, I’m ready,” Tommy rushes out of the bedroom, fixing his tie. Buck lets out a frustrated breath and puts his hands on his hips, Tommy grins apologetically as he looks at his husband. “You look gorgeous as always, husband.”

Buck tries to keep his frustration even as Tommy lays a smacking kiss on his lips but if it hadn’t been the kisses, the way the word “husband” from the other man’s mouth still makes him melt would have done it. With a sigh, Buck pulls Tommy to him by his tie and kisses him softly.

“You look gorgeous too.”

Tommy smiles that scrunchy smile and Buck would propose again if he could. His husband holds out his arm for Buck to take. “Shall we?”

“Ye-”

His phone rings.

Both of them frown at it for a second. Their whole family knows of their celebration, as simple as it may be, they wouldn’t call if it wasn’t for anything serious. Please, not another emergency.

“I-I should-” Buck starts, grabbing his phone from his trousers pocket while Tommy nods.

It isn’t Maddie or Chimney. It isn’t Hen or Karen. It isn’t Bobby and it certainly isn’t Athena. It isn’t Eddie, despite his sometimes forgetfulness regarding the Buckley-Kinard’s plans.

“J-Joan is calling me.” Buck mumbles as he reads the name on his phone screen.

“W-What?”

“Joan is calling me.” He repeats as if it’ll make more sense the second time.

The couple looks at each other and then back at the phone, back at each other again. His husband seems to get his wits about him faster, thankfully.

“What are you waiting for? Pick up, pick up.”

Buck takes a deep breath while the other man crosses his arms over his chest, one hand playing with his bottom lip. He exudes nerves and confusion. He knows exactly what a call from Joan means - better yet, knows how strange it is that Joan is calling him at all.

Joan never calls him. He always calls her.

Holy shit.

His finger trembles as he accepts the call and clears his throat. “H-Hello?”

“Mr. Buckley,” The woman on the other side of the phone speaks in a professional tone, not the usual fondly exasperated sigh, and Buck even forgets to correct the last name as he usually does. “I’m sorry for calling so late.”

“No, you’re-it’s alright,” He scratches his scalp, ignoring the way it messes his hair. “I mean, is everything alright?”

“Yes, yes,” Joan is nervous. Oh, that’s weird. “I wanted to talk to you about P-the baby.”

Buck feels like his heart is about to explode out of chest. “Is she okay?” He feels Tommy’s comforting touch on his forearms and it helps keep his heart inside of his body even if it’s stuck at his throat.

“She’s safe,” Joan quickly assures him and he relishes in the deep breath he takes. “She’s back with us.”

Buck frowns and Tommy matches, even if he can’t hear what’s being said. “What do you mean?”

“Well, her foster parents went back on the adoption.”

“But she was with them for like two years, h-how-what?!”

“Take a deep breath, baby.” Tommy whispers, taking hold of his hand, and Buck tries to temper the anger in his chest.

“I can’t disclose much over the phone, Mr. Buckley,” Joan’s professional tone is back and he almost cherishes it - someone in this call should keep their wits. “Would you be able to come to the office tomorrow morning?”

“Y-yeah, I’m free but-“

“I knew you were attached to the baby when we first met,” Joan interrupts, sentimentality creeping into her voice. “And I also know that you weren’t in the right space to take her.”

Buck nods wordlessly. He still remembered holding that baby for the first time after pulling her out of the baby box outside the fire station. Still remembered the way the baby held his fingers, her noises, gurgles, cries. And he still remembered, could feel it even now, how hard it was to have to give her to the social worker. But Joan had been kind and always took his calls, even if it was to say the same thing everytime - “I can’t disclose private information, Mr. Buckley, but she’s safe”.

Tommy, his beautiful husband, holds his hand tighter. He also knows about it all, may not have felt it but he knows. Buck told him all about meeting the small baby after their breakup, how it had felt good to make someone happy for that day. Told him how he had wished he was in a better place so he could take her home. But he couldn’t.

But maybe now-

“I’m hoping that maybe now, things are different?” Joan’s tone was hopeful and Buck’s heart pounds in his chest with the same hope.

Maybe now.

He looks into Tommy’s eyes and his husband looks back, the love of his life sees what he doesn’t have the words to say. He’s so lucky. Tommy smiles at him, that hopeful smile that was there when he first saw the wedding ring, when they first kissed, in that little café. His husband nods and Buck feels all the pieces fitting together, pieces that he didn’t even know were scattered.

“What time do you want me there, Joan?”

He hears her relieved breath and smiles. “9 o’clock?”

Buck grins. “We’ll be there.”

As soon as he hangs up, he is pulled into a kiss, a passionate and happy kiss that he is more than happy to reciprocate. A kiss that tastes salty but the good kind.

They don’t make their reservations. They order Chinese as Buck brings out the clipboard, they start making plans.

As far as surprises on their anniversaries, getting a daughter is probably the best of them.

#carolina writes #bucktommy fluffebruary #bucktommy #tevan #bucktommy fic #tevan fic

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grlwtskulltattoo · 1 day ago

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Fly Low Carrion Crow

Note: What have I done… Only attempting to combine my two favorite things, SOA and The Last Kingdom…Okay so this is definately going to be a multi part story. Too many ideas floating in my head on how this may all play out. Just hope I can do it justice. I did edit the beginning just a smidge from the preview I posted earlier. Just trying to get some background laid out. There will be drama…and a little trauma in the future, cause that how I roll…all about the drama… oh and for sure some smut in the future…can’t forget that part. Haha.

Warnings: slight assault from creepy Sven, but nothing major

Pairing: Sihtric x OC (Octavia)

Summary: We get our first introduction to the Sons of Valhalla MC. Octavia, the sister of Ragnar and Uhtred, visits a bar on the wrong side of town. (oh and I kind of suck at summaries)

Wordcount: 3k

First part of many....

Walking out from one of the dorm rooms in the back of the clubhouse, Octavia, is greeted with hoots and hollers from the bikers hanging out at the bar. Loud music is already playing, and the members of the motorcycle club are slapping back shots to celebrate another shipment of guns received with no issues. She playfully glares at the men giving her cat calls, as she grabs her leather jacket off of one of chairs near the bar. She knows they are just teasing her. Glancing towards the chapel, she sees through the window that Uhtred and Ragnar are in a deep conversation at the table. A serious look on both of their faces. She’s not sure she wants to know what that’s all about.

“Hey, hey….where are ye off to?” Finan asks, holding his hands up to stop her.

“I’m going out with some friends… to a bar.” Octavia answers her older brother’s best-friend. She doesn’t miss the way he appraises her outfit; tight black jeans, black button down low cut sleeveless shirt and her riding boots. The darkness that comes to his eyes as he licks his lips, gives her a little thrill, even though she knows they are both off limits. She gives him a little smirk, just to tease Finan a bit.

Once he snaps out of Octavia entrancing appearance, Finan gives her a confused look as he motions to the fully stocked bar they are standing next to. “Invite yer friends here… I’m sure we can entertain them.”

“Yeah, no… I’m not bringing my friends here for all you guys to hit on. I keep my friends separate from this.” Octavia motions to the clubhouse.

It’s bad enough one of her best friends has already expressed an interest in meeting her brother, Uhtred, but Gisela has no idea the kind of stuff they are mixed up in. Gun running, distribution, and rival clubs trying to come after them. It’s not an easy life, but it’s all they know. Her older brothers took over the MC and the business after their parents died in an accident. Their father was the founder of the club.

Finan gives her a look like he’s going to argue with her, but he stops himself. He knows he can’t win this fight, she is just as stubborn as the rest of them, and she’s not wrong. All of the men will be hitting on her friends.

“You know….we could go in the back, like old times…” Octavia bats her lashes at Finan as she places her hands on his hips drawing herself closer to him. She slowly licks her upper lip seductively before giving him a flirty smile. One of her hands creeping up his chest, smiling as she remembers his hard muscles.

Finan almost forgets that Octavia is off limits as he lets her pull his body closer to hers. The memories of them hooking up in the past quickly coming to mind. He starts to lower his face to hers to kiss her, but he growls before making contact. He forces himself out of her hold reluctantly. “Tavia… yer brothers will have me balls if we do that. Can’t take that chance.”

“That’s too bad… I was really hoping.” She teases the Irishman with her eyebrow raised. Putting on her leather jacket, she prepares to leave. “I’m going to the bar then…tell my brothers not to wait up for me.” She says as she walks towards the door.

Finan lets out a groan as he watches her walk away, having to adjust himself from the effect she has on him. “Hey…” He shouts out to her. “Be careful…things are a bit unsettled right now.” There is a darkness in his eyes as he gives her a stern look.

Octavia looks back at Finan before she walks out the door. All of the men are protective of her, with her being Ragnar and Uhtred’s little sister. “I will…” She assures him with a seriousness in her voice as she looks in his eyes.

Even though she’s not a member of the club, she is still part of it. It’s the family business. They never tell her all the details of what they do, but she knows enough, especially when there is the potential for retaliation for something they have done. Not to mention, there is always the threats from their rivals.

Stepping outside the clubhouse, Octavia takes a deep breath of the cool evening air. The heat of the day finally wearing off. Walking over to her bike, she takes her helmet off the handlebars, before cinching it on her head. Straddling her dark red Harley, she starts the engine, then she kicks up the kickstand. Twisting the throttle she revs up the bike a little, loving the sounds coming from the exhaust.

Loud pipes, saves lives…. She lets out a bittersweet chuckle as she remembers what her dad always said.

Pulling her phone from her pocket, she sends a quick text to her friends Eadith, Gisela and Aethelflaed, letting them know she’s on her way to the bar they are meeting at.

The bar that Octavia rides to is on the other side of town. The part of town where she really shouldn’t be, but hopefully nobody recognizes her and tries to start trouble. She parks her bike and shuts off the engine. After pulling off her helmet, she shakes out her long dark brown hair, before hanging the helmet on her handlebars.

As she walks to the front door she can already hear the loud music and voices within. Glancing around outside she takes in her surroundings before heading inside to find her friends.The atmosphere in the bar reminds her of the clubhouse. Loud rock music, rough looking men, and skimpily dressed women hanging all over the men. Spotting her friends, she quickly walks over the their table, feeling a little unsettled here.

“What made you guys decide to come here? Seems a little sketchy.” Octavia asks, as she finds herself constantly scanning the bar looking for possible threats. The place makes her feel uncomfortable.

Aethelflaed gives her a sheepish look. “Erik invited me here, and I didn’t want to come alone… Here have a shot.” The dark haired woman slides over a shot glass filled with amber colored liquid.

“Erik? The guy you’ve been seeing for the past couple of weeks?” Octavia asks. “Where is he?” Her friend hasn’t said much about this new man she’s been dating.

Aethelflaed points to the man behind the bar, pouring shots and grabbing beers for the customers. When the large blond haired man notices, he gives her a wink and a soft smile. “He said we could drink for free…” Aethelflaed giggles, as she glances back over at him with a dreamy smile.

Octavia shakes her head, not too sure about her friend’s choice in men. Not that she is one to judge, given the type of men she hangs out with all the time. She’s just concerned that her friend might be a little naive to the kind of stuff he maybe tied into.

The friends fall into a comfortable conversation, laughing and joking as shot after shot is downed. Octavia tries to pace herself, not wanting to let her guard down too much. Gisela of course mentions her brother again, wanting to meet him, which Octavia brushes off that he’s been busy with the business lately. When Eadith mentions Finan, Octavia finds herself bristling a bit. She’ll always have a soft spot for the Irishman, especially since he was her first, before he joined the Sons of Valhalla with Uhtred. After which Ragnar and Uhtred forbade them from dating, not wanting to cause a riff in the club if they ever broke up.

A group of men walk into the bar, and Octavia’s keen senses take notice. Her eyes are instantly drawn to one of the men. It’s hard not to notice him with his dark half-shaved hair, and eyes that almost look mismatched. He glances in her direction and she blushes when he smiles at her, before she quickly looks away. Her friends notice the exchange and start teasing her that she should go talk to him, but Octavia shakes her head no. She didn’t come here looking for a hookup.

Focusing her attention on her friends, Octavia tries to avoid looking in the sexy man’s direction, but she can’t help stealing glances at him. She does notice that he and the other men he arrived with are hanging around the pool table talking to some of the other patrons of the bar. One of the men, wearing an eye patch gives her the creeps when he starts leering at her, making her feel uncomfortable. When she glares back at him, she finally notices the kutte he’s wearing. She glances at one of the other men whose back is to her and see the flash emblazoned on the back of the kutte. Midnight Raiders. Kjartan’s crew. Her stomach drops, as she quickly stands up.

“Shit… I have to go….I can’t stay.” She quickly says to her friends, as she grabs her coat from the back of her chair.

Her friends look at her in confusion, with disappointment on their faces. “You just got here… the night is still young.” Eadith pipes up.

Octavia knows her friends don’t really understand the danger she is in. If those men figure out that she’s the sister of Ragnar and Uhtred Ragnarson, that she’s tied to the Sons of Valhalla, they may try to harm her. She can’t help the look of disgust she gives the man with the eye patch, as he gives her a sinister smile. There has always been a suspicion amongst her brothers that the Midnight Raiders had something to do with their parents deaths, but of course they couldn’t prove anything. She just knows that they have been enemies for as long as she can remember.

“Sorry, ladies… We’ll get together another time. Somewhere else… I’ll call you, later.” Octavia takes a nervous look around the bar. Her eyes land briefly on the sexy dark-haired man, standing in the corner near the pool table. She feels a little disappointed that he’s with the enemy. She really would have been curious to get to know him, especially with how drawn to him she already feels.

Quickly striding to the door, Octavia takes a deep calming breath of air once she is outside, resting her hand on her pounding heart. If her brothers knew she was here, at a bar that is obviously controlled by the Midnight Raiders, she will be in so much trouble. They’ll start making one of the prospects babysit her, to keep her safe.

As she walks to her bike, she doesn’t realize at first that she’s being followed. When someone grabs her arm to stop her, she feels a panic enter her chest. Looking up, it’s the man with the eye patch that was leering at her. Her heart starts pounding in her chest in fear, but she does her best to hide it as she glares at the man for daring to touch her.

“Let go of me!” Her voice growls out, each word clipped.

“Where are you going, pretty lady? I thought we could spend sometime together…have some fun.” The man’s voice turns her stomach. The tone of it is almost sickly smooth.

The look in his eye as he looks down her body, sends a chill down Octavia’s spine. “Get your fucking hands off of me.” She spits out with venom in her voice. Her other hand sneaking into her jacket pocket to grip the knife she always keeps on her.

Squinting his one eye at her, he looks at Octavia as if he recognizes her. “Do I know you from somewhere?”

Her stomach drops at his question, and she feels a fresh wave of panic come over her. His grip on her arm tightens, as he tries to pull her closer to him. Octavia digs in her heels, as her other hand is about to pull out her knife. Before she does they are both distracted by a voice calling out.

“Sven!…Sven, let her go!”

Looking towards the door of the bar, she sees the sexy dark-haired man from earlier. The look on his face as he strides towards them would be frightening if it was directed at her, but she can tell his anger is directed at the other man.

“This is not how you treat a lady.” He growls out as he grabs Sven’s arm, squeezing until the other man releases her. “Get back inside and leave her alone.” He pushes the larger man away.

Rubbing the sore spot on her arm, Octavia watches as Sven slinks back into the bar. She releases a sigh of relief when he is no longer in sight.

“I’m sorry… did he hurt you? He’s nothing but a brute, has no idea how to treat a lady.” The sexy man says as he glares towards the door of the bar, making sure Sven is gone.

“No…I’m fine.” Octavia says softly, not wanting to draw more attention to herself.

“I can walk you to your car…make sure you’re safe.” He gives her a concerned look.

Octavia feels a little flutter in her heart that she tries to ignore. This can’t happen, she reminds herself. He is the enemy. “I…I don’t have a car.” She replies as she points to her bike in the distance.

He gives her a surprised smile as he starts to walk her to her Harley. “You ride?” He asks excitedly.

Softly nodding her head, Octavia can’t help but smile at the way his face lights up in excitement. His smile is infectious and his mesmerizing eyes are doing things to her stomach, despite her efforts to ignore it. “I’ve been riding since I was a kid…it kind of runs in the family.”

Octavia can’t help but chuckle when he haunches down to look over her bike once they reach it. Her bike is anything but stock. Her and her brothers have spent hours customizing the bike to her liking. Adding a custom exhaust, changing out the air filter cover and fuse box. There are too many details to list, but someone with a trained eye could pick up on them.

“It’s beautiful….just like its rider.” He smiles at her, with his sly little comment.

A little blush colors her cheeks at the compliment as she looks away, trying to hide the smile coming to her face. “I should really get going…”

“Oh, shit…where are my manners. My name is Sihtric…” He holds out his hand with an endearing smile on his face.

Looking Sihtric over, Octavia can’t help the smirk that comes to her face looking at his haircut. It is definitely unique, but she finds that she likes it…almost too much. She reluctantly holds out her hand, giving his a little shake. She is caught off guard when he brings her palm to his lips and leaves a light kiss. She feels her cheeks turn a shade redder, as she glances away.

“Ok…well… it was nice to meet you, Sihtric, but I really must get going…” Before you figure out who I am…

Octavia can feel herself falling more and more under his spell. He is beyond sexy, and he seems to have a tenderness about him. She feels a war of emotions playing inside her being near him. She would love nothing more than to go home with him and see where things lead, but the risks involved are just too great.

“I’m sorry…I didn’t catch your name.” He tries to prod, not quite ready for her to leave.

Letting out a sigh, Octavia bites her lip. He definitely isn’t making this easy. “Octavia…but my friends just call me Tavia.” She avoids telling him her last name, wanting to prevent the shit-storm that will stir up.

“Tavia....I like that.” Sihtric grins at her, his smile turning a little flirty. “Any chance I can get your number?” He smoothly asks.

Yeah…no. “Sorry…I don’t give out my number to random men I just met.” She rebuffs him as she shakes her head. The more questions he asks her the more nervous she gets, she can feel her heart starting to race.

“But how will I get ahold of you? Take you out sometime?” He asks, the disappointment clear in his voice.

“You won’t. This can’t happen. You’re cute and all…..but I just can’t. Sorry…” Octavia walks with resolve to the front of her bike to grab her helmet, quickly cinching it on her head. “Thanks again for saving me back there… I appreciate it, but I have to go now.”

Starting up her bike to drown out any more attempts from Sihtric to coax more information out of her, she gives him a quick nod before straddling the seat. She backs out of the parking spot, then revs the bike a little before putting it in gear and taking off. She takes a quick glance behind her, a little sad at how forlorn Sihtric looks watching her ride away.

This is how it has to be. It would never work. He is the enemy. My brothers would kill me if I hooked up with a Midnight Raider. Gods, he is so hot though…

Sihtric stands there in stunned silence as he watches Octavia ride away. He’s never had a beautiful woman flat out refuse to give him their number, and it makes him want her all the more. She’s not like the other women he has seen, who practically throw themselves at him. Just the little bit of interaction he had with her, he can tell she’s a little sassy, and he kind of likes it. Not to mention she rides a bike, which makes her that much more sexy in his eyes.

To say he’s intrigued by her, would be an understatement. He can’t get her out of his head.

But how can I find her?….

It takes everything inside him not to jump on his bike and follow her, but he doesn’t want to come off as a creep and freak her out. He’ll find her… Somehow. Someday…

Note: If you'd like to be tagged in this let me know. I can start a tag list.

Comments and reblogs much appreciated. :)

#the last kingdom #tlk fandom #sihtric #sihtric kjartansson #sihtric x oc #sihtric tlk #sihtric fic #Biker/tlk AU

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