#WHICH IS WELL ESTABLISHED TO HAVE GIGANTIC MONSTERS

[spooky-activity]

local warlock drinks legendary potion of gigantification to save friend from eldritch horrors who live in The Mists

[nectardaddy]

aftermath - higuruma hiromi

cw: blood, death, homicide, manga spoilers (I mean, if you know who tf he is you're fine tbh), language

notes: established relationship, gender neutral, inspired by if I killed someone for you by alec benjamin (was gonna put the song in but I refuse to put the gigantic eyesore that tumblr auto gives me and idk how to fix it)

synopsis: how should one react when their lover shows up on their doorstep covered in blood?

part two

You didn't mean for your breath to hitch in your throat so violently, creating an audible gasp from the air that lodged itself. Your fingers gripping the edge of your opened door with a grasp so desperate your hand already began to ache. Nails digging into the hard wood as you tried to decipher the pressing image before you.

"Hiromi-" you choked out. Voice wavering as his presence alone was enough to make your knees buckle. Dark, unwavering eyes boring into you. Seemingly nothing within them but a glimmer of something primal, macabre, and- desperate. You weren't a stranger to the unyielding looks, always transfixed on something well beyond his reach, but this was different. A look of a monster, and his attire following suit.

He was usually a well dressed, dapper man. But as he stood upon your doorstep, your opinion flipped instantaneously. A ruffled, crumbled suit jacket littered with dark blotches around the cuff, his white shirt underneath being the tell tale sign of what the mysterious blots were. A stark contrast, red on white, staining the previously ironed shirt right down to the threads. Cheeks splattered with the same red, a large spill just under his eye, like he had tried, unsuccessfully, to wipe his face. "What have you done?" You whispered, speaking softly as if it would untangle you from seeing him so heinous.

"Can I come in?" A gruff, almost uncaring, voice in comparison to your own. You didn't know why you hurriedly nodded, why you shifted out of the way for him to enter your home, why you thought letting this man back into your home was a good idea. It was against your better judgment, but you wracked your brain about the thought of 'there has to be a good reason.' This was the man you loved after all, not a cold hearted killer, or so you came to believe.

Hearing the door click shut and the lock engage, his eyes scanned his surroundings before returning to you. Tired eyes once again looking into you, almost trying to see through you with the intensity of it. "I killed them," he said bluntly, without regard and without further context. His words made your shoulders slump, your body creating shivers as his words hit you so profoundly.

"Who?" Was all you managed to ask, the word escaping your lips so quietly you hoped he would be able to hear it at all. Not asking why, not asking where or when. Who.

"The retrial was today," he said simply. It was all you needed, an impactful statement to which your eyes widened and your mouth opened. Quickly shutting it as no words were found on the tip of your tongue, your throat suddenly dry at the revelation, you could only stare. Looking over him to find any sort of answer, your eyes stopping at the collar of his suit jacket. There once was a small sunflower pin on the lapel, one you had gifted him years ago to replace the former. It was gone. It came off. Could the man you love really be so violent? So much so his beloved pin was ripped from him in the heat of the moment?

You couldn't say what had possessed you to step closer to the man, your lover, the murderer. Each step becoming easier as you neared him, stopping just before him and looking up. So close you could smell the gruesome, irony twinge mingling with the scent of his cologne. It made you nauseous, wanting nothing more than to spill your guts right then and there. But you swallowed hard and forced yourself to look upon the man who had sworn he'd love you to the end of his days. "Are you alright?"

A man of his situation might have said no, should have said no. "I've never felt better," he answered honestly. Looking down at you with a ghost of a smile, a mind fraying image now engraved in your psyche. Your fingers reached for his shoulders, letting out a shaky breath as your hands came in contact with him. It was damp.

"Oh my god," you spoke, forcing yourself to close your eyes at the sensation. You feared to lift your hands to what you would see on your palms, subconsciously pushing down the thoughts to the deepest part of your mind. "Oh my fucking god," you repeated, unable to form a single coherent thought as you couldn't stop yourself from circling back to the feeling.

But the hand, drenched in the same crimson, that gently touched your cheek made your eyes snap open and you inhaled sharply. There was blood on his hands, staining his fingers in sin so much so it was under his nails. That blood was now on you, ripping your stomach right out of your body as you wanted to heave. Desperately searching his features for any sort of answer, but only coming to the same conclusion.

The man you loved killed two people - and liked it.

oh I'm definitely making a part 2 are you kidding??? I wrote this shit in an hour that's a new fucking record for me

[eldritch-spouse]

Going out for ice cream with Obie and having him feed you the ice cream knowing FULLY WELL this is going to end with you cleaning the mess off his fingers with your mouth (of course there is intense eye contact, that's a given). I need to bother this man so he's steaming in public but unable to do anything about it ‼️ raaaaugh!!!

[Reader is implied fem, but can be read as neutral.]

TW: Semi-public; Foodplay; Unsanitary.

You've always been a bit nervous about taking Obie out to eat anywhere.

Meals are important for gluttons, which means that, to many of them, which restaurant you choose to have your dates in and what you order can be the decisive blow to a newly blossoming romance. Even if the mid-ranker who has his eyes on you doesn't exactly seem to be the snobbish type, you can't help chewing your nails in dread that you somehow fuck up and take Obie to the worst lunch date of his entire life- Getting brutally dumped in the process.

He laughed when you brought these concerns up, straight up telling you he'd eat off the floor if you wanted him to -Something that honestly made you worry for his sanity back then- That the mere act of trying to feed him meant everything to the glutton.

And for as much as you want to believe him, you always hesitate to make a decision, constantly fearing the worst no matter how unlikely it is that your choices would be that disastrous.

Seeing this, Obie often decides to take pressure off your shoulders by suggesting your next meal-date locations himself. And it does kind of make sense that a demon of his type would know all the best places. You just wish he'd stop recommending establishments in the Gluttony ring.

You're very scared of visiting Hell in general, it's not a place for humans, you don't care how many of them like to gloat that they set foot there and came back unharmed- You don't buy it! There's always a price to pay for dwelling in the sins. And even with a mid-ranker who was born and lived in the Rings for a good portion of his life to protect you, you're just not ready.

Obie laments this, though the demon has admitted it's clever of you to want to stay away. You're too soft, whatever he meant with that. Still, since you can't visit his favorite ice cream establishment in the Hells -That so fabled Sorbet Sabbath he's mentioned more than a few times- He's finally taken you to a surface alternative he deems decent enough.

It's nothing special, he said, as he handed you the most massive ice cream cone you've ever seen in your entire life. Three fat scoops of absolute sugary goodness staring at you with different toppings and syrups, appetizing enough to have you swallowing your own drool back up. Obie spotted that hunger immediately, beaming with that bear trap of a mouth, proud of nailing your tastes once more.

" What do you mean, nothing special?! " You nearly shout as the two of you pick a more secluded table to enjoy your treats. " This is gigantic! "

The demon wheezes, brows raised at you as if waiting for the other shoe to drop. " Dude please, this is a robbery, in Gluttony I'd pay basically the same and the scoops are double this size. "

" Fuck off. " He's joking. He has to be.

" No, for real! "

When you're both seated, you finally glance at your boyfriend's choice of treat. Your eyeballs nearly fall off their sockets. He's got like five scoops poorly balanced on that thing, there's so much syrup and sprinkles on it, you have no idea how the cone he clutches isn't disintegrating. He's going to make a mess, for sure. There's no way any person can eat that without making a fool of themselves, that little plastic spoon sticking out of the mountain of sweetness is borderline hilarious.

The yellow monster notices the staring, broken tail wagging. " Want some of mine? "

" Ah- No, no thanks. " You're pretty sure you'd have a heart attack.

Perhaps because he knows letting the thing sit for too long will end in disaster, Obie is quick to forgo conversation and focus on his ice cream. And by that, you mean he unhinges his jaw to python-like proportions, glittering rows upon rows of teeth connected by strands of hungry drool right in front of you.

An equally wet tongue slips out from its cavern to wrap all too easily along the length of the frozen delicacy, clutching it with a dexterity you've both coveted and lusted for several times, before it reaches the cone and swiftly sucks it into Obie's maw. Like a vacuum cleaner on steroids. If you blinked, you would have missed it. When the two of you started hanging out, you'd see the glutton eat this fast and you wondered if he even tasted anything he put in his mouth- You know better now.

Because after his throat bulges obscenely with the size of his meal, he licks his lips and lets out that content rumble you've grown ever so fond of. He tasted it alright, licking his lips and choppers for any trace of goodness he didn't miss.

It's an embarrassing amount of time until you tear your gaze away from him, eyes busy scrolling his form from top to bottom with an intensity that might make the hellfire creature burn alive. You could watch him for days.

You could watch him eat for days.

Damn you and your stupid fucking oral fixation.

" Hey uh- Bonbon, that's melting. "

Snapping into attention, you follow the direction of that lazily pointing claw to find that, indeed, part of your ice cream is already losing shape, dripping onto itself and nearly coating your fingers.

In the panicked pause you take to decide how to prevent the inevitable, Obie has already taken action. Bigger fingers than yours reach out to collect the stray trails, collecting the more melted sections too so that they don't start dripping immediately afterwards. You relax slightly, a ghost of a smile on your features as you expect him to shove them into his mouth and be done with it.

And yet, the demon hesitates, gaze veering from his hand to you in the sliver of a second.

" Hey now, that's my ice cream. Not fair. " You jest softly, far from expecting him to crack a toothy grin in reply.

" Oh? Yeah sure, don't let me stop you then. "

And, much to your chagrin, the glutton presents his sweetened hand your way, resting his chin on the other as he silently dares you to follow through.

Fortunately for him, you're stubborn sometimes.

There isn't a single thought resembling common decency in your mind when you lean forward and steal a quick lick of his finger tips, darting back into your seat as soon as you realize what a gross act that was to do in public.

Obie's perpetually squinted gaze widens the smallest amount, he exhales in amusement at your five seconds of bravery and his grin quickly acquires a tone befitting of his nature as a spawn of Hell.

" That's it? " He tilts his head.

" Obie, we- "

" You barely even tasted it. " That hand edges forward more.

" We're not alone! " You whisper-shout.

The demon laughs openly, clean hand gesturing to the surroundings. " Yeah? You sure? "

Your own curiosity betrays you, hues flickering all across the place and spotting only vacant tables, save for two other people seated a considerable distance away, not even facing the two of you. For all intents and purposes, you could get away with a lot. But like Hell you're saying that to his smarmy face.

" Fine. "

If his grin got any wider, it would escape his face.

The next time those fingers wiggle in your direction, you catch two between your lips, smiling as you thoroughly begin cleaning them. At the first rush of your tongue working, Obie appears to visibly shiver hard, a hint of color to the glutton's cheeks causing his shit-eating smirk to grow crooked.

Very satisfied with yourself, you leisurely pop off his digits.

" Is it any good? " Obie teases.

" Mmm. But I think you might just taste better. "

Oh.

Oh that got him revved up alright.

You gloat inwardly at knowing how to properly bother your glutton.

" Why not test that theory? "

He has the nerve to reach for your cone again, collecting more recently melted stray trails and making more of a mess than before.

After some paranoid glancing around, you decide to start with his palm, a flat and honestly less impressive muscle flattening itself against the soft creases of his skin. The quiet gasp that erupts from him only serves to further stroke your ego while you isolate one digit and thoroughly suck it clean.

" Hhn fuck. "

Your muffled giggle is almost mean-spirited.

Perhaps against your better judgement, you don't release Obie's hand, moving to the pinkie and offering it the same hungry treatment, going as far as to lick between digits before swallowing his ring finger and moaning around it.

Obie has been increasingly quiet and still throughout all of this. And even if it's always been very hard to kind of guess how much attention he's paying to something or where he might be staring, you know for a fact his attention blazes on you, rapt and unfiltered. Something that might be sweat condenses on the left side of his forehead and a faint sheen of drool coats his bottom lip. You only wish you could look beneath the table and check if there's anything going on. The possibility of Obie having popped a boner from this alone thrills you immensely.

The moment you start pulling back, the glutton jolts into movement, suddenly shoving his pointer and index into your mouth, your eyes widening like dinner plates.

" You're not done. "

That wasn't a tease anymore.

It's your turn to shudder, an almost violently quick outbreak of goosebumps raising your hairs when the very tips of his claws sit placidly on your tongue. Your shocked stillness doesn't halt Obie, whose breathing comes out in hot, barely muffled pants.

Without an inkling of shame, his digits glide on the flat of your tongue, a slow back and forth, coating themselves in your drool as he casually plays with your mouth. Your cheeks are catching up with his in terms of heat.

" Suck. "

You nearly choke.

You can't really turn your head to check anymore, so you simply pray that no one is looking when you do just that, enjoying the way he gulps and straightens. Obie's legs part the slightest amount, and you know exactly what he's trying to accommodate, the flames of your aroused confidence stoked to brand new levels.

The mid-ranker is an iota of carelessness away from cutting into his own lip while he essentially finger-fucks your mouth, humming every time you have to swallow the excess saliva or try to use your tiny tongue to lap around his digits. You know there's a myriad of nasty things going on inside that head, because you yourself are getting a few less than innocent ones. Lords know he's the kind of guy that would coat his dick in syrup in try to get you to suck him off the same way you're treating his fingers.

And the worst part is that you'd probably agree.

Maybe on purpose, or perhaps because he's getting too into it, Obie slips his digits too far down your mouth and triggers a gag from you, the sound and look of it making him growl loud enough to have you sliding down in your seat a bit from sheer embarrassment.

You're released from that lewd torment however, searching for a napkin to wipe the spittle from your lips, wondering just how much of a show an onlooker could have gotten just now. Obie feels no such pressure, playing with the strands of drool connecting his fingers while his clean hand dips to squeeze at something out of view briefly.

" I can't wait to put that little throat to use. "

He leers, grin sloppy and heated, chuckling when you lightly kick his leg.

" I guess... W- We should go home then? " Because really, he's not the only one left surprisingly turned on by this.

The glutton raises a hand. " Finish yours. Can't leave yet... "

When the demon makes a vague gesture towards his lower body, you can only snicker, nodding.

It's a bit hard to eat properly when you're aware Obie is lazily studying every lap and bite. And, at this rate, you just hope he has enough restraint not to push you against the closest conveniently placed wall...

[ranticore]

Hi has anyone ever told you Ice Storm Over Kosa has impeccable vibes and feels incredibly innovative and fresh!

In terms of the towns and communities, what types of infrastructure connects them? What kinds of technologies are common vs cutting edge in the setting���s different time periods?

hehe thank you.. i really like how the setting tag is just one of the character's names so it looks like you're saying He has impeccable vibes

<3

So there is a huge huge almost insurmountable limiting factor when it comes to the growth of towns and communities, which is that large aggregations of living creatures will attract the crawly beasts and they pollute the earth, make crops wither and die away, kill livestock, kill people, etc, and humans can't even touch them with protective gloves on since the crawlers' fluids eat through leather

humanity (and monsters) were forced to spread out over a larger surface area. villages and settlements are small and have to be actively defended almost nightly. there has been a slight stagnation of the march of progress, as just fighting off this threat takes up so much of everyone's resources, and forbids institutes of learning and the like from forming. so most of the technological advancements we see, they are in the field of long-range communication, weaponry (falconry too), and material technology that might repel crawling beasts

in prehistory, the land now called "the Ama plains" hosted a gigantic city with a hundred thousand people living in it, called Amphora. it was very advanced for its time period, with working plumbing, hot and cold water even, mass production of cloth and food, etc (not to mention the magic). Amphora no longer exists and most of its innovations were lost.

in the early time period after the arrival of the crawling beasts, humanity and monsterkind are scattered. the only established settlements are those guarded by wyrms, but it took many centuries to reach that point. human towns are ruled by small feudal lords who may form loose alliances with one another but typically rule their land as if it's a lone island in the middle of a vast sea. this is the time of Revelation's march. the most established settlement is the city of Onozar in the far west of Ama, which is ruled by a king who has a hold over many of the neighbouring towns and lords, by virtue of Onozar's size and relative safety. technology levels are low; no firearms, trebuchets and crossbows are cutting edge.

in the time of Twist and Flicker, there is an age of unprecedented cooperation with monsters (Revelation's march might have had something to do with this change). This means that towns and villages are now usually protected by something other than a wyrm - this ranges from willing cooperation to cruel self-styled 'monster tamers' who force monsters to do their bidding. This is the dawning age of harpy falconry as described in the lil story i wrote about Ice Storm of Kosa himself, though back then the old method was to make a contract with an adult harpy and cooperate that way. The infrastructure is still not very advanced; they're still struggling with plumbing and sewage systems, because crawlies come out of the ground and their poison can seep into aquifers. Anyway communication between towns is usually done by pigeon (or pigeon harpy). The ground is not a safe place to be, so houses are typically built on short stilts, or at the very least, residential rooms are upstairs. Water supply is often provided by elevated aqueducts; wells are a last resort, but often the only choice for impoverished villages. There is a culture of fear surrounding large gatherings and groups - sometimes it's unavoidable, and human/monster nature, but that anxiety is always there.

With this increased cooperation between humans and monsters, people are able to gather in larger groups. this enables more learning, more apprenticeships, more farmlands, and a more rapid development of technology. It also means a more centralised ruling system begins to form; it takes a lot of resources to supply a pack of wolfmen or a harpy flock to defend a town, so small towns must make petitions to their more prosperous neighbours, and this develops into a Government of the entire region. firearms develop in this time as a means to kill crawling beasts; they are not that successful, and it takes a while before people realise you can use firearms to kill other things, too.

A century later, developments are progressing well enough. Firearms are still rare but starting to spread. Harpy falconers have developed a new, effective technique for their art, it's called "kidnapping"; steal an egg, and raise the chick to imprint on its human parents. that way it won't want to leave. There is a sense of teetering on an edge; humanity leaning more into forcing monsters to help, instead of cooperating. But this is not the progression; the success of the Kosa flock helps convince many falconers that the kidnapping method isn't the best after all. technology is still uh bad, but this is an era where writing materials are finally becoming more mainstream, literacy rates are slowly rising. the printing press is the hot new thing. they have water towers now to provide the plumbing at a safe elevation. communication between villages is still very dove-based, since flight is the safest method of travel.

fire is the only thing that both kills and neutralises the poison of a crawling beast. by this time, progress has been made to develop "automatic fire machines". so all the R&D people put into guns in the real world was put into flamethrowers instead. it's easy enough to rig up a system that pumps out burning oil, but these devices are usually stationary, heavy, and fixed at the gates of the various more prosperous town walls.

[serpentface]

So how does magic, gods, and other supernatural nonsense work in the new blightseed?

The biggest material difference between this world and our own is an objectively existing parallel plane that leaks into the material plane at certain points and makes the 'laws' of the material plane more malleable where they cross (rift zones). It has many names but 'the Ether' and 'the Dreamlands' is what's used most commonly in my writing.

The Ether has both sentient and non-sentient 'fauna' that frequently cross into the material plane. Most come and go unnoticed, but those that are noticed are highly susceptible to influence by an observer- frequent observation will shape Etheric fauna into fixed forms and ascribe qualities to the fauna that the witness believes it to have. It's sort of an unknowing dream-dreamer relationship.

An Etheric lifeform that is repeatedly observed and becomes culturally established may gradually be shaped into what we would describe as a spirit, supernatural entity, or even a god, and develop some of the reality-altering abilities ascribed to them. (note that this relationship is not even CLOSE to well-known or understood, and tends to be only theorized by devoted scholarly groups or the knowledge of peoples historically living close to rifts).

THAT BEING SAID.....

GODS/RELIGION/THE SUPERNATURAL:

Assume it functions basically the same as real life (with some additional nuances). There is no more of what most would consider 'definitive'/'material' proof of creator deities/the afterlife/etc than there is in real life. Cultural/religious groups see evidence of their gods and other religious elements in the world, but it's nothing ''''solid'''' per-se. (IE you could be an atheist in this setting without anything directly contradicting your beliefs)

However there is the aforementioned etheric fauna that are have functionally been shaped into gods/supernatural entities via observation and belief. Some folkloric entities are material Etheric fauna, but just as many legendary monsters are in the realm of mythology and belief. I'll mostly call deified Etheric fauna 'living gods' which is an in-universe scholarly term in the Great Gate region.

FOR EXAMPLE: the Nekh demigod Hai-Taihe materially exists as an unkillable talking dog with a sword that is physically encountered by travellers, she was once Etheric fauna who has been shaped into a living god through over a thousand years of belief and veneration. The Nekh 'river queen' spirits said to haunt fishermen, (depicted as gigantic river kings with female elowey attributes) are widely believed in and encounters are claimed, but there is not necessarily a physical entity running around with those characteristics (who knows, though?).

Magic:

Magic DOES materially exist, but it's incredibly subtle and there is no clear and objective line between folk belief/witchcraft and 'actual magic', no single in-universe word to describe the phenomena, and no one in-universe can make definitive factual statements on how exactly it works, what powers it, where it comes from, etc.

Observations made through rigorous magical scholarship tends to connect magic with the Ether (as its effects are strengthened in rift zones) and identify magic as will made material, influencing possible physical outcomes by concentrated willpower. A person can influence a moving ball to roll off a table more easily than to influence a motionless ball into rolling. It's effects can be strengthened through practices affecting consciousness such as psychoactive substance usage, meditation, oxygen deprivation, heightened emotional states, dreaming, etc.

Any sophont is capable of magic, but the degree of practice and mental control required to generate practical results makes its usage relatively insignificant in the grand cultural schema, and has had fairly minimal impact on the technologies of this setting. And as in real life, forms of magic/witchcraft/rituals etc are practiced without necessarily generating any unambiguous material effects (while still being believed effective).

There is absolutely nothing inherent to sophonts that allows for their magic usage, it's just that animals who do not have abstract cognitive abilities typically cannot work magic by the nature of it needing abstract cognition to work. (there are a few exceptions with non-sentient animals who have, via natural selection, developed highly specific forms of magic (usually used for predator evasion))

[ren-rambles-often]

Hi...Do you know what anime you'll watch this season?

My top 3 fav this season are :

- Tadaima, Okaeri (wholesome BL, also one of my comfort read)

-Black Butler : Public School Arc (yes the ship is problematic but you cannot deny the shipper when you watch it. I'm not shipping SebasCiel but I'm not anti too. Their canon relationship is complicated but great story)

-Wind Breaker (bucchigiri but way better and loveable mc)

Hope you'll like them.....

Hey hey ( ◜‿◝ )♡, Literally following all of these already.

Black Butler was definitely a must, since the announcement dropped sometime last year I've been unable to keep it out of my mind. It's understandable not everyone will ship them but I personally have missed Sebaciel shenanigans so much and seeing favorite characters like Soma (although with less melanin than I remember lol what =_=) in the recent episode just made me so happy.

As for Tadaima Okaeri, I was looking forward to it for a long time, so far I'm not disappointed and it's definitely so fucking cute. All I'm saying is...if any country needs to push baby making propaganda they should go for this instead of the trashy het stuff, I don't make the rules.

I have almost no thoughts on Wind Breaker. It's definitely an upgrade but after the disappointment that was Bucchigiri, I've began to keep my expectations for Delinquent shows low (Tokyo revengers and IWGP are yet to be topped for me). It's not bad but do feel like it's lacking substance in some areas and trying too hard. The main character isn't a bitch tho so I know there's hope for it yet.

To me this year's winter season had way more exciting stuff but there are a number of other anime I'd love to recommend for this spring.

Karasu wa aruji wa Erabanai (The Raven does not choose it's Master) Is almost like the apothecary diaries, but with magic, and without the herbs and medicine...but it has the court politics so yay (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧ taking place in a world where people can turn into three legged ravens called Yatagurasu, Yukiya after causing some trouble for his family is taken to serve the most special of specials crown prince who is to become the next Kin'u after picking a bride from the four daughters of the clan heads sent to him. So basically every gay historical romance Wattpad story lol. Unfortunately this isn't a bl and though you can probably tell the prince will get married in future episodes, from these three eps, I think it establishes the focus will be on him and Yukiya, which, I couldn't ask for more.

Another Recommendation is Kaijuu no. 8, I have no words (in a good way). Just spacial forces slaying gigantic monsters while the main character suddenly becomes one of those monsters and has to still join the special force that at some point will kill him if they find out, or if they have found out they realize he's different from other monsters and can help them win the war for humanity *aot flashbacks ಥ‿ಥ* What I'm trying to say is that... it's good. I think it's funny with characters that have to potential to reel you in. I've been told the manga is pretty average tho but we'll see.

Touken Ranbu Kai is...something, I don't watch anime just for pretty boys but even if I didn't like the plot of this one I'd stick with it just for the guys. Beautiful character designs, the lore feels very fresh and intriguing and as well. There's a lot of philosophical topics I think the show has potential to dive into and I'm excited to see where we go moving forward from the three eps out currently.

Last but not least, there's Sentai Daishikkaku (Go Go Loser Ranger) I really don't want to spoil anything but let me just say, it's a brilliant subversion of the Power Rangers narrative. The sound track is fun while also hitting hard, and the characters definitely leave you wanting to know more about them and the world they're in. Definitely give it a try, I don't think you'll regret it.

Got a bit carried away with this one hahah, welp that's all my recs for now. Aside from my shipping stuff I'll probably talk about any of these every now and then, my top three right now tho are definitely Black Butler, Sentai Daishikkaku and Karasu wa aruji wa Erabanai. Anon has amazing taste but I'm a very big action and supernatural fan at heart so I'm based.

Depending on how disappointing or exciting things get along the line this list might change but unfortunately my feelings don't help the state of my FAL ranking so yeah wish me luck (〒﹏〒)

Feel free to leave YOUR current top 3 for this season in the comments, or if you joined FAL like me or just what you think of any of these of you're already watching them (◍•ᴗ•◍)❤

[sinosauropteryx--prima]

Life in the Carboniferous

(first row: Diplocaulus, Lepidodendron, Arthropleura; second row: Meganeura, Hylonomus, Walchia, Pulmonoscorpius; third row: Tullimonstrum, Calamites, Edestus; fourth row: Pederpes, Eryops, Stethacanthus)

Art by:

Pederpes - Ntvtiko

Lepidodendron - Richard Bizley

Calamites - Jonathan Hughes

Walchia - Dinoraul

Arthropleura - Vladislav Egorov

Meganeura - Walking with Monsters

Pulmonoscorpius - Plioart

Hylonomus - John Sibbeck

Diplocaulus - Sergey Krasovskiy

Eryops - mmuyano

Tullimonstrum - Nobu Tamura

Edestus - Julio Lacerda

Stethacanthus - Ja Chirinos

It‘s the age of giant bugs!

But before I get to talk about giant bugs, we have to take a moment and appreciate the real stars of the Carboniferous: The plants! The whole reason it is called Carboniferous (“coal-bearing“) is because of them. The forests of the time got flooded repeatedly, decayed, rotted and over the ages have turned into coal deposits that we use today. So whenever you hear people talk about fossil fuels coming from dinosaurs you can “well-actually“ them and talk about ancient plants instead.

During the Carboniferous earth was a warm, humid place with lots of tropical swamp forests. Some of the plants you would have seen there are roughly familiar to us today, like ferns. Similar looking were the seed ferns, which are extinct today. They reproduced by making seeds (shocking, I know), unlike “regular“ ferns, that reproduce via spores.

In some cases the plant groups are still around today, but they look nothing like their Carboniferous counterparts. Calamites for example was a horsetail that grew into more than 30 m high tree-like structures. Closely related to the small modern clubmosses were the Lepidodendrales (“scale trees“, named after their bark, which looked like scaly reptile skin). Lepidodendron could grow up to 50 m tall and would have spend most of its life as a single unbranched stem, which definitely added to the weird alien feel of Carboniferous forests. A more familiar sight were the earliest conifers, like Walchia, which lived during the late Carboniferous. Many other modern plants including grasses, flowers or hardwood trees, like maples or oaks, weren‘t around yet and wouldn‘t be for many millions of years.

Now that we have established that the forests of the time were strange and alien filled with plants of all kinds of weird shapes and unusual sizes, let‘s look at the bugs, which were also having all the wrong sizes:

Among many others there was the dragonfly cousin Meganeura with a wingspan of more than 70 cm, Pulmonoscorpius, an about 70 cm long scorpion and Arthropleura, a truly gigantic millipede, more than 2 m long. It was comparable in size to the biggest sea scorpions and one of the biggest arthropods that ever lived.

The questions is of course, why were insects and other arthropods this big? The main answer is oxygen. Insects have a very different breathing system than we do and it doesn‘t scale well with size. Because of that they have a size limit. At some point, they just can‘t get enough oxygen into their bodies (thankfully, because I don‘t need giant spiders or mosquitos or whatever). During the Carboniferous however, there was a lot more oxygen in the atmosphere than there is today, so the arthropods could grow much bigger than they do today.

Another reason for the giant bugs might be, that they didn‘t really have a lot of competition. There was nothing to keep them in check, so evolution just went wild with them. You have to remember that, while insects were already taking to the skies, the proudest accomplishment of our tetrapod ancestors was crawling from one puddle to another. To say that arthropods had a head start would be an understatement. So for future references, remember that every time I mention a cool thing any vertebrate does, there probably was an insect that did the same thing millions of years earlier.

But speaking of the tetrapods: They were getting better at crawling between puddles. We get the first true amphibians like boomerang-headed Diplocaulus and the giant Eryops, one of the biggest land animals of the time (you know, roughly milliped-sized). Maybe even more exciting was that during this time we see the first amniots! That‘s right, there are animals that lay eggs now. Real, actual eggs, that can survive without water. These lizard-like creatures (they aren‘t actual lizards, those will take a lot longer to evolve) can finally leave the puddles and rivers their amphibian cousins have been bound to.

It‘s probably a good thing, that they can leave the water behind, because there was some very weird shit going on in the oceans. After the placoderms went extinct during the late Devonian mass extinction (rip), a lot of bizarre shark relatives showed up, like Stethacanthus with its anvil shaped dorsal fin or the absolute horror that is Edestus.

But the weirdest thing of the Carboniferous (maybe one of the weirdest things ever) has to be the Tully monster (btw, not really a monster, only about 35 cm long). I mean, just look at it. It has a mouth that is separated from the rest of its body by a proboscis. It has stalked eyes. It is weird as fuck. We also have absolutely no idea what it is. Science agrees that it is an animal, and that‘s about it. There are arguments for it being a vertebrate, an arthropod, a mollusc, a worm and pretty much anything else you could think of. Honestly I just love it because of how strange and fake it looks.

[paperanddice]

Gigantic snakes over 60 feet long with iridescent black scales, the andrenjinyi are a select few children of one of the spirits present at the start of the world. Born from scales cast off of the great Rainbow Serpent, these lesser nature spirits hold sway over the land in several ways. They represent the sky, rain, and quite often have an interest in birth and fertility.

They might as well be gods to many regular people, with their power over nature and weather in particular. One that establishes itself in a region can influence those who live nearby in immense ways, and often nearby people wind up offering it ritual and obedience in exchange for benevolent use of its power. As a guardian the andrenjinyi can assure the safety of the community, as few creatures will dare challenge it, but it sets specific edicts with harsh punishment for failure, a hanging blade that could fall upon the people depending on it.

One particularly interesting feature of the andrenjinyi is its gullet. Creatures it swallows are transformed into beasts, which the andrenjinyi then releases to populate the area surrounding its home. A lake with a menagerie of unusual creatures (often in mixed gender pairs) may mark the presence of one of these great serpents, and approaching closer without the proper rites and offerings could be quite dangerous.

With their low numbers, each lost andrenjinyi is irreplaceable. As such, they have become more cautious with this new world, only living in isolated regions beyond the reach of the major powers, and if severely injured by an actual threat they will attempt to use their rainbow arch to escape to safety rather than fight to the death.

Originally from the Tome of Beasts 1. This post came out a week ago on my Patreon. If you want to get access to all my monster conversions early, as well as access to my premade adventures and other material I’m working on, consider backing me there!

Pathfinder 2e

Andrenjinyi Creature 15 N Gargantuan Monitor Amphibious Perception +28; darkvision, tremorsense (imprecise) 120 feet Languages Common, Celestial, Jotun, Sylvan Skills Arcana +26, Diplomacy +27, Intimidation +29, Nature +26, Religion +30 Str +9, Dex +4, Con +8, Int +5, Wis +7, Cha +8 AC 39; Fort +29, Ref +23, Will+26; +1 status to all saves vs. magic HP 282; Immunities mental; Resistances acid 20, electricity 20, fire 20 Speed 60 feet, burrow 20 feet, climb 20 feet, swim 60 feet Melee bite +30 (magical, reach 15 feet), Damage 3d12+15 piercing plus Improved Grab Melee body +29 (magical, reach 15 feet), Damage 3d6+13 bludgeoning Divine Innate Spells DC 33 ; 8th dispel magic (×3), hydraulic torrent, sudden blight; 6th flesh to stone; 4th shape stone (at will); 2nd speak with animals (at will); 1st create water (at will); cantrips (8th) spout Divine Rituals Spells DC 33 , 8th control weather, reincarnate; 6th commune; 4th plant growth; Rainbow Arch (2 actions) (divine, teleportation); Requirement The andrenjinyi is touching a pool of fresh water large enough to hold its entire body. Effect The andrenjinyi can teleport up to 1 mile to another body of fresh water it knows of. For 1 minute after it uses this ability, a ranbow manifests between the origin and destination point. Swallow Whole (one action) Huge, 3d8+9 bludgeoning, Rupture 25 Thrash (2 actions) The andrenjinyi makes a Strike against each creature within its reach. It can Strike up to once with its bite, and any number of times with its body. Each attack counts toward the andrenjinyi's multiple attack penalty, but the multiple attack penalty doesn't increase until after it makes all the attacks. Transmuting Gullet (free action) (divine, polymorph) When a creature ends its turn swallowed by the andrenjinyi, the andrenjinyi casts baleful polymorph on that creature (save DC 33).

13th Age

Andrenjinyi  Huge 8th level spoiler [beast]  Initiative: +11 Great Maw +13 vs. PD - 50 damage Natural Even Hit: The target is swallowed if it’s smaller than the andrenjinyi (see below). Miss: 25 damage. C: Thrash +13 vs. AC (1d3 random nearby enemies) - 30 damage. Miss: 15 damage. Limited Use: The andrenjinyi can make this attack as a free action if it has no enemies swallowed after using its standard action during its turn. Swallow Whole: While a creature is swallowed, it is stuck, hampered, and unable to attack or affect anything outside the andrenjinyi’s stomach (and vice-versa). The andrenjinyi makes a transmuting gullet attack against any creature that ends its turn swallowed. There are two ways to escape. Cut Yourself Free: If a creature inside the andrenjinyi makes a single attack that deals 40 or more damage, it can climb free. All weapons are reduced to d6 damage dice if they were higher. Crawl Out: When the andrenjinyi is staggered, you can try to climb up the andrenjinyi’s throat as a standard action. Roll a hard save (16+), on a success, you crawl into its mouth and it spits you out somewhere nearby. When the andrenjinyi is reduced to 0 hit points, all creatures it’s swallowed can climb out of its stomach as a move action. [Special Trigger] Transmuting Gullet +13 vs. MD - The target transforms into a tiny animal until the end of its next turn. While in this form, the target is weakened, hampered, cannot cast spells or use powers, and deals half damage with all its attacks. Natural 18+: The transformation is permanent, until removed by a ritual or other powerful magic. Burrow, swim, and climb walls. Rainbow Arch: As a standard action, the andrenjinyi can teleport to a nearby or far away source of fresh water. It may attempt to teleport to a similar spot up to a mile away, leaving the battle entirely. It rolls a hard save (16+). On a success, it immediately leaves the battle, carrying any creatures in its gullet with it. AC 24 PD 21 MD 19 HP 410

[aeoki]

SHINSEKAI - Magicians of ES: Chapter 1

Location: SHINSEKAI Control Room Characters: Sora, Natsume & Tsumugi

< One week later. In the ���SHINSEKAI” control room in the Tohoku region. >

Tsumugi: I suppose this would be their limit.

Natsume: YeAH. It’s possible to sustain them for this long due to the latest equipmeNT, but there is a limIT. Their bodily functions will be badly affected if they were to be logged in for a long period of tiME.

It’s the same as a trip to spaCE. If the human body is in an environment different to where it’s normally supposed to live in for a long tiME, it’ll start to break doWN.

So we’ll log out the players as plannED. And we’ll let them rest for a few days in the real worLD.

By doing that, we should be able to relieve any issues the body hAS. That’s the sort of experimental data we’re seemingly gettiNG.

Tsumugi: Well, it’s the latest technology that we’re unfamiliar with, so we should be careful. Our contract with ES does state that they will take full responsibility, though.

But if victims do arise, we wouldn’t be able to sleep very well at night.

Natsume: Speaking of victiMS, “Valkyrie” are just victims who got dragged into thIS.

We’re doing this because we received orders from the higher-up to do sO, but I felt sorry for them in the beginniNG.

Tsumugi: Ahaha. I’m sorry, it’s all because I’ve been ordered to not go against what they tell us to do…

But if things take a turn for the worse, I’d ignore the “order” and save them, though.

Natsume: YeAH, I have no objection to thAT.

Sora: Sora, too! That’s because Sora and the others in “Switch” are not “evil magicians” ♪

Natsume: YeAH. Ultimately, not having the liberty to do whatever they please within a great government or religion is what magicians aRE.

Unlike “Trickstar” and “Crazy:B”, we have no intentions of recklessly going against the higher-ups, thouGH.

We bear different positions – different identitiES. We’ll use our methods to etch our ideals in ink and to take hold of our dreAM. …I won’t let anyone make complainTS.

Tsumugi: Fufu. Everything is going smoothly right now, so we can breathe a sigh of relief. I hope things will continue this way, though.

Sora: HaHa~♪ Sora is also doing his best alongside Senpai and Master~ to ensure a happy ending!

Natsume: YeAH. Compared to “Valkyrie” who are struggling against heavy odds in-gaME, it’s rather easy for us as all we have to do is simply watch over thEM.

Sora: Actually, Sora wanted to play inside “SHINSEKAI”~ It’s a bit boring just watching.

Tsumugi: I’ve said this a few times before, but we’ll take care of what needs to be done, so it’ll be fine for you to play in “SHINSEKAI”, Sora-kun.

Sora: No, no! Sora isn’t a child who will push his work onto the adults and play around innocently!

Tsumugi: Right. We’re counting on you to do your part too, Sora-kun ♪

Natsume: In reality, after Sora became the focus of our activitiES, “Switch’s” reputation has skyrocketED.

We only achieved that because you held our hands and pulled us aloNG.

But at this point in tiME, we’re lacking in achievements to our naME. We can’t say it’s better compared to before and leave things theRE.

We need power in order to change the worLD and in this industry, ES single-handedly shoulders thAT.

They lay low after they were established for a little whiLE, but ever since “SS” began, ES started genuinely baring their fangs as the gigantic monster they aRE.

We “Switch” will smoothly manoeuvre around that and create even a fraction of a world where unhappiness and sadness do not exiST.

The testing conducted in this “SHINSEKAI” which utilises “SSVRS” is that very first stEP.

“SSVRS” is a device which allows unparalleled dreams in the world to turn into a reality and its profits are immeasurabLE.

We’ll make it an exclusive patent from our agency and it’ll be a huge commercial produCT.

We’ll change the world with new technoloGY. Just like how the internet and smartphones dID.

Tsumugi: Ahaha, Our agency never has the money nor the power, so it’s nice that we’re able to attain a large source of income like this.

It’ll be a great help in terms of managing the agency in the future.

Natsume: YeAH. Within the four great agencies, apart from the huge RhyLin, StarPro and CosPro have millionaires supporting thEM.

I say the four great agenciES, but there is a clear disparity between our economic power and theiRS.

Tsumugi: It would have been great if Suou-kun could support us, though.

Compared to Eichi-kun and his group, they almost seem poor and it seems they’ve run into some trouble at home as well…

Sora: Yes… Sora often chats with Tsuka-chan on “Hallhands”, but it looks like things are really bad right now?

Natsume: YeAH. In reality, we can’t continue to keep relying on “Knights” even though they’re a unit with steady populariTY.

But with this “SSVRS”, we can shrink the gap between us and the other agenciES.

Even without assistance from other agencies or “Double Face” having to come in to keep things in cheCK, we should be able to boldly and freely hold our activities in the futuRE.

Tsumugi: Yes. Justice without power is powerless and power without justice is violence. Let’s work hard to use the power we’ve gained righteously and act appropriately.

So we no longer bear any regrets.

Natsume: YeAH. We don’t know what will happen in the futuRE, but let’s stop watching on the sidelines without doing a thiNG.

Complaining from the inside won’t change a thiNG. Let’s get ourselves involved in the stoRY.

This time, truly, to reach a happy endiNG.

Sora: …………

Natsume: ? What’s wroNG, Sora? Sorry, we ended up talking between ourselves agaIN…

Sora: HiHi~♪ Sora loves watching that more than playing video games ♪

Oh, not that, Sora felt something weird when Sora looked at the in-game data…

Natsume: Felt something weiRD?

Sora: Sora can’t explain it very well but it feels like someone else is trying to overwrite the story we’re trying to write out…?

← Previous Chapter ᠂ ⚘ ˚⊹˚ ⚘ ᠂  Next Chapter →

[red9]

/leans in and taps the mic/ i would love to hear what you think might have happened storywise and onward had luis survived in resi4 instead of the fate he has in the game. would he continued to work towards atoning for his sins or even a happy ending to his own story? i have a feeling you have a lot of thoughts on the matter.

              This question took me a while to get to simply because I have so many different thoughts and possibilities for what could have come postgame for Luis. Some of these of course will be the basic what Capcom would have done versus fun things in terms of AU's I would enjoy to explore. So forgive me for all the rambling I’m about to do.

              In terms of gameplay and story wise, I feel like if by some means where was a way of keeping him alive, realistically Capcom would have pulled what they do with any side companions in these kind of games. Like Sheva, or Carlos for instance, that stereotypical thing the company does. Maybe he got what he wanted, in a perfect world he somehow got to drop off the radar. If we kind of follow the end game post credit scene with Ada having that discussion with Wesker, she changes course with the amber and what would be Luis. Maybe she keeps their side of the deal, maybe she just drops him off somewhere and says see ya, giving him a chance to get away from that life. Because I have no doubt in my mind if she went back to Wesker there would be no way in hell they’d just let him go. 

              The more they’ve elaborated and changed Luis’ lore it’s very clear he is a powerful, knowledgeable person. We all know by now he worked for Umbrella, helped create Nemesis, assisted Saddler in the study of Las Plagas, after the incident in Raccoon City he was literally being hunted by the government to be taken in as a bioterrorist. He is very educated on the genetic research and modification of Plaga, capable of injecting and removing it from the host, etc. So a man who can make Nemesis, El Gigante, Regenerators- you name it- I don’t see Wesker as someone who would just let him walk. Be it by force or offer, I don’t think Luis could ever fully run from his past and get off scot free. By this point in the timeline it’s established that Wesker is working alongside Excella, who as we all know is the CEO of Tricell and the chief of bioweapons development. And you know who would work very well with her? Luis. This is where I can go into a whole alternate universe bad timeline for Luis where he ends up being a part of the plot of Resi 5, even if it’s against his will. This man knows so much about Plaga research he could have been recruited into their B.O.W. trade ring with Ricardo, a man who is capable of creating all these horrendous monsters that get shipped out around the world. He could have easily been a hand in the Uroboros Project, even met Jill and been forced by Wesker to create her chest device, she also has the T-virus in her which makes for interesting research- would he feel good about any of this- no, but if he had no other choice he’d do what he had to in order to survive and find means of escape all over again. Anyway we all know what happens in 5 and that’s a rant for another time so I’ll backtrack to other possibilities. 

              There are lighter happier endings that are so far fetched but I feel like I want to include them anyway because it’s what he deserves. If he was wounded, or didn’t give the sample over to Ada and escape with her I imagine if he wasn’t critically wounded, there’s that chance that he’d be able to escape with Leon and Ashley. Things are about to get real cozy on that jet ski but they make it work. There’s the ‘yay he got to escape with his friends’ factor, but in all reality if Leon didn’t drop him off somewhere before they were picked up from the extraction point he’d be sent back to America with him. Realistically, he’d be taken in by the government since he’s a wanted man. They wouldn’t let him go after being on a hunt for so long. And with Leon’s reports on what happened during his mission, they’d probably just lock him up and we’d never see him again. 

              However this is where fun little AU’s come into play for me so while you’re still reading this bear with me. Leon makes some deal with the government, in some magical world they listen to him and take his word. Luis once recovered, being forced to become some kind of field agent and get training. He’s the brains, Leon is the brawn, whenever Leon is sent out on a mission he takes Luis with him. He can clearly hold his own, even more so with training, and encountering any sort of B.O.W’s he’d be able to take samples there on the field and give direct feedback to whatever HQ. Would be a fun little thing to consider, he and Leon still get to see Ashley from time to time, he lives a life on a ball and chain but at least he’s not dead or in a jail cell for life. 

              I’ll stop here for now but as you can see I have many different thoughts, possibilities, and AU’s to cater and cope with the fact that he’s dead. In a perfect world he’d be able to run off and live his quiet life, but we just know that in this universe no one is ever truly able to have a happy ending. Thanks for the question!!

[ultrajaphunter]

Cape Town -

A popular Bellville eatery has again set the bar for their record-breaking attempts at meal creation.

Based in Stikland,

Annies Ladies Bar

was the talk of the town when they showed off their unique

4-metre long Gatsby,

Weighing in at a Whopping 65.2kg

and prepared under the watchful eye of in-house chef Michael Steyn.

Owners Joe, 63, and Annie Redelinghuys, 64, also made the news in 2019 when they made and served a Gigantic 79.5kg burger, which crushed the Guinness World Record of 74.6kg. The Burger went on sale at the eatery for R13 950.

On Saturday, the couple from Penhill invited 100 witnesses for the occasion when they laid out four specially made buns measuring 1-metre each, creating the 4-metre base.

This was then layered with

fried egg,

calamari strips,

slap chips,

sauces,

chicken fillets,

masala steak,

Annie’s Patties,

russians,

vienna,

polony,

onion,

tomato

and lettuce –

cut in four.

Annie put out an invite to the public to join in and eat for free.

"The idea of the Gatsby came from bar talk, we just spoke about it randomly and we also wanted to do this to make people aware that we are now serving Gatsbies on our menu,” said Annie.

We were three people who prepared the Gatsby.

“We started preparation at 2pm on Saturday and ended at 6pm, ready to eat.”

Joe said:

“Wow, what an experience, we got to feed 140 people on Saturday after creating this monster of a Gatsby.

“We can’t say for sure that it is a world record, but we can confidently say it’s the biggest Gatsby made in South Africa.”

Ingredients used to make the Gatsby cost R2 750, added Joe.

“This attempt was made possible by our brilliant Chef Michael.

We did this for fun and it proved to be a great success.

Above all we enjoyed putting this monster together,” he said.

Staff helped to line up the buns on a long Table Counter.

Owner and operator of Cut-in-2, an established Gatsby eatery in Bergvliet, Bradley Isaacs, added that the Gatsby looked tasty, but ingredients did not belong on it. “My opinion on the ‘record Gatsby’ that was made... well, kudos to them for attempting it but they are definitely hurting my feelings.

“A Gatsby can be gourmet but not sturvy (stuck up) or too posh.

“There's mix between cooked meats and cold processed meats, the lettuce is also a no-no, the incorrect one was used.

“If I were to constructively criticize it, also raw onions (red onions on top of it, the flavor and taste is too potent) coupled with deep fried coated onions.

“It definitely looks tasty and well done to the Annies team,

they might have just started a trend,

but my stomach would need at least a two-day recovery after attempting this.

I’d gladly challenge that record with a slight twist on a classic Gatsby,” he said.

venecia.valentine@inl.co.za

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"GIGANTIC DRIVE TO CREATE WORK," Kingston Whig-Standard. May 14, 1934. Page 15. --- Re-establishment of Credit and Stability Helps Government ---- WINNIPEG - Papers are being shuffled in relief department pigeon- holes and preliminary plans checked in preparation for monster drive by the governments of western Canada. Work schemes, carefully fyled away during a period of financial stringency are receiving fresh attention in the face of a better budgetary outlook.

Proposals are being re-examined that will bring workers back to the land, encourage home crafts and local industries, revive building activity and encourage agricultural development. Special attention will be paid to waterworks projects in rural areas in view of the disastrous effect of the recent drought.

Approval of the government's relief bill which ear-marked $50,000,000 for a public works program across Canada provided the spark which set provincial machinery humming for the benefit of thousands of unemployed.

Proposals for housing schemes are being studied by a score of cities. Winnipeg has under consideration several plans including the construction of a community centre, to cost $1,700,000. Other preliminary projects in Manitoba include work at the International Peace Garden and Riding Mountain National park, extensive river works to prevent floods and develop the northern mining industry, government and small public buildings at various points..

Public works in 'Saskatchewan include construction of government buildings at Regina to cost $750,000 and a number of post-offices throughout the province. Construction of airports in the north and a general program to stimulate industry is also planned.

Several cities have indicated a willingness to launch their own recovery program and pay the full cost of labor involved in return for inter- est-free loans. It is believed the Dominion government will encourage such schemes which are well thought out, and justified on their merits. Lethbridge in Alberta, seeks a loan of 500,000 on these terms for an extensive building and paving program.

The proposed British Columbia program includes innumerable public buildings, sewer, water and road works, post-office and bridge construction. Erection of a huge stadium, grandstand and auditorium at Kitsilano Indian reserve would cost $2,000,000 and employ 600 men for one year.

In addition federal machinery is being set up to secure rellef for agricultural communities. Powers of the Federal Farm Loan Board will be enlarged to permit of debt adjustment. Arrangements will be made to loan money to wipe off existing debts up to two-thirds of the value of land and equipment.

[acerealty1]

Advantages Of A Gated People group

Benefits Of Living In A Gated People groupWith regards to purchasing a house, individuals consider various elements from area to financial plan prior to pursuing a decision. One significant convenience to consider is regardless of whether your private condo is gated. While this might appear as though a little detail, it has various advantages. Land monsters, for example, Pro Realty guarantee occupant wellbeing in all real estate projects in Thane with the assistance of different security measures, one of which is building a gated local area.

Here, we investigate the advantages this proposals to all occupants.Top-Class SecuritySecurity is a gigantic worry for everybody nowadays. With an expansion in robbery and different exercises, guaranteeing the security of your home and friends and family is a first concern. Gated people group, for example, Pro Feeling, Mulund or Pro Anthurium, Thane offer first rate security that boosts the wellbeing of everybody inside the limit walls. These people group keep a reasonable record of everybody entering and leaving the reason, screen all passages, as well as have watches set up to safeguard the inhabitants and property from any inappropriate episodes.Safe Recess For YoungstersWith computer games supplanting actual games and tremendous security concerns making guardians delay prior to sending their kids outside, recess for youngsters has incredibly reduced. With gated networks, guardians can have a good sense of reassurance in sending their kids out to play empowering actual work while likewise making a feeling of local area.Confined TrafficIn Mumbai, traffic is a steady concern. Indeed, even top luxury homes in Thane are dependent upon steady vehicle development outside their home. In a gated local area, nonetheless, traffic development inside the property is limited exclusively to occupants. This makes it less boisterous as well as makes it more secure for kids and occupants out for a walk. Further, it confines the availability to pariahs upgrading the security for inhabitants.Higher Property EstimationFrom a affordable 2 BHK in Thane to an luxury 3 BHK in Mulund, property is an extraordinary speculation. An extra benefit of a gated local area is that it offers a higher property estimation than non-gated lofts. Consequently, whether you are purchasing property to live in or as a speculation, picking a gated local area offers definitely a greater number of advantages than one which isn't.Available ConveniencesGated people group take care of different occupant necessities going from a supermarket to a play region or even a senior resident sporting facility. This large number of variables make it simple to improve one's general personal satisfaction without voyaging significant distances. Whether it is last-minute food or a spot to loosen up following a monotonous day, a gated local area offers everything in one spot.Stylishly SatisfyingGated people group effectively work to keep up with the encompassing scene and vegetation improving the tasteful allure of the condo. Besides the fact that this establishes a peaceful and satisfying climate yet in addition adds to the general property estimation of the loft.EndGated people group offer a few advantages to occupants be it with regards to security or vibe. Whether you are a solitary individual living in a 1 BHK property in Thane or a family hoping to buy an luxury 3 BHK apartment in Mulund, gated networks offer you a heap of benefits for a portion of the expense.

[eldritch-spouse]

Pinnie - or, if you're truly fine with it, Mommy cause you radiate that energy tbf - does Zizz like getting spanked?? Cause one thing that sounds really fantastic is tying a big monster boy up, head down ass up and spanking him until he's begging me to fuck him stupid X)

[I thought it'd be a little obvious I enjoy that title. FUCK YES THOUGH, I love the sound of that for Zizz. Fem reader.]

TW: Spanking (reader has to use a flogger this man is huge).

Being the wife of an Icon of Hell isn't always as bleak as you thought it'd be.

Sure, you didn't come into this willingly, and the first months you spent with Zizz certainly can't be called a walk in the park by any stretch of the imagination, but you count your lucky stars that it wasn't worse. That your initial expectations weren't met.

That he doesn't hurt you. That the demonlord actually made, and continues to make, efforts to turn this into an acceptable arrangement for you. You're not excusing any of his actions, but you've allowed yourself to feel glad for the way things have turned out, with a more or less loving dynamic established. You're not sure you'll ever match his frankly intimidating intensity, but... You're fond of Zizz.

And he's been happy with that so far, which means you've been steadily introduced to a lot of Zizz's duties as King of Sloth. It's actually quite surprising, the amount of work he gets done during the brief episodes wherein he's fully awake. Zizz is a bright demon, in spite of initial appearances. He's organized Sloth in a way where his trusted servants can pick up work perfectly when he inevitably falls onto a dead sleep at his desk. He's got alarms set up for very specific hours and manages to schedule things in a way where, almost magically, Sloth still functions. It's impressive.

He says having you around has been very helpful as well, since you apparently prove to be a very effective source of motivation for the demonlord to remain awake and complete tasks, so he can spend more time with you. You recall the way he purrs whenever you bring him a cup of coffee. Not that it does anything to him physically, you're sure it must be nothing more than a placebo effect paired with joy that you bother to do such for him in the first place.

Nonetheless, one of the facets of Zizz's professional life you've been involved in occasionally are the so-fabled "Icon meetings". It's... Well, they're shitshows more often than not, you kind of understand why Zizz dozes off early on. Usually, there's bickering going on, and it hardly ever involves the Sloth lord himself, so being awake is a waste of time as far as he's concerned. Clever thinking. Though it does make you feel slightly unsafe that he's willingly going unconscious while you're surrounded by other huge demons, who sometimes give you strange looks.

You're sure the gigantic snake woman is going to eat you one of these days, Livius is constantly glaring at you two, Cero has a disgusted look on his face whenever you meet his eyes and Rinx glances over everytime some gold trinket in your outfit jingles. You won't even get started on the Wrath lord's dreadful volume. Vesper is apparently one of the friendlier ones, it seems. He still gives you and Zizz lecherous glances, having blatantly propositioned the demonlord to let him sleep with you two at several points. While it scandalized you at first, you soon realized it was just in his nature to behave that way. Still, when he's not actively trying to get you horny, he's not bad company, and you've had quite a few pleasant conversations so far.

One such is what planted an idea in your mind.

If you recall correctly, it was at a meeting a couple of days ago, nothing too eventful was taking place, the Pride lord and the Greed lord were arguing heatedly about the state of cross-ring resource importation and some manner of "unreasonable inflation", it didn't matter. Vesper was sitting next to Zizz, who was predictably in a dead sleep in spite of the commotion. He had you trapped in his arms, which were crossed over his chest. You had been about ready to take a nap yourself when someone tapped your shoulder.

" Don't snooze just yet, darling, I'm terribly bored. " It was the Lust King, of course, flicking his lashes and pouting.

" Mmn, whaddya want? "

Vesper snickers. " Oh, humor me just this once? "

" 'M not going to have sex with you. " A muscle memory response by then.

" Yes, a shame. " He paused. " But, I actually want to know about your sex life with Zizz. "

You had popped an eye open there, not exactly amused.

" See, I spoke with Zizz when he was still single, and I know for a fact he's into a number of things... " Those sharpened teeth took on a perverted, pleased grin. " Have you two been exploring that? "

Had you? It was odd, aside from somnophilia and lazy sex, maybe a couple of slightly risky escapades, things hadn't really gotten spiced up. But then, you had only recently began getting sexually comfortable with Zizz, maybe he didn't want to jeopardize everything by introducing something hard into the bedroom. Vesper took that silence as an answer by itself, tutting softly.

" W- Why do you care?! " Why wouldn't he care? He's a huge whore, it's what he does.

" I just hate seeing potential go to waste, dear. " The Icon then murmured. " I can give you some hints, hm? "

The suggestion had given you pause. Indulging in Zizz's kinks... In your captor turned oddly-lovable demon's kinks. What had your life come to... But then, it'd be a lie to say you disliked the idea. The morality of it is frivolous, you're here now. There's no way out, you thought maybe you should lean into what amount of happiness you could reap from this situation. And maybe, just maybe, getting Zizz hot and bothered made you happy.

" U- Uhm. Okay... "

Vesper perked up, head tendril curling. " Perfect! I'll send you a little something something. You're a smart girl, you'll get the idea. " And he winked, letting the conversation die there.

A day later, one of the head imp servants approached you specifically with a delivery from Lust. A mysterious black box with a stupidly fancy bow on top. You opened it in your shared bedroom, coming face to face with a long silicone... Flogger? Paddle? One end featuring a pretty pastel pink heart shape while the other had feathers of the same hue. It clicked then. Spanking. Zizz was into spanking. How innocuous, you expected something a little more menacing. Included in the box was also a pair of handcuffs. The symbols on its sleek padded purple design made it obvious that it was enchanted with something. Though it was the size of the item that gave you pause. It was far too big for a human. For you. These cuffs were made for demons the size of Zizz.

Meaning you will not be the one getting spanked. The Icon of Sloth is.

That alone had taken you by surprise, though a knowing smirk quickly crawled up your cheeks while you pondered. It made sense. Zizz is a lazy demon, for sure. Sex with him usually has you doing most of the work, though he has proved to be an efficient pleaser when challenged before. Point being, Zizz's lack of energy makes him come off as submissive... It was no wonder that he'd enjoy taking the role of a spankee.

You liked that idea. A whole lot actually. A plan began formulating in your mind...

Which leads you to today!

Tonight actually.

You can't sleep. How could you?! You're going to spank your big goof of a boyfriend. King, actually. You're going to spank a King. Oh ho ho, if this isn't some power trip.

The room is dark, aptly dark for someone as light-sensitive as your partner, only some dim LED lights scattered around. You're once more trapped between a mountain of plushies and the demon's annoyingly tight grip as he lays on his side, chin plopped on top of your head. Zizz has recently taken to sleeping without his veil, perhaps because he trusts you not to peel the curtains open in the morning and blind him. Eitherway, that leaves the big lad in nothing but plain black underwear, overly hot body glued to yours. It's unpleasant to always wake up vaguely sweaty, but you've resigned yourself to it by now, it's part of this new life.

Alright. Step one is wiggling out of your prison.

Kicking and shoving stuffed animals aside sounds easy, and it really is, unless you're drowning in them, in which case you might as well be doing jack shit. Because everytime you push a shape out of the way, another fluffy thing will take its place, like quicksand. Eventually, with enough effort, you manage to create some vacant space in the bed. Good. Now comes the hard part.

Getting Zizz to let go of you.

You've been practicing. After all, he's done this since day one, and many were the times where you woke up in the middle of the night on emergency mode with a full bladder. Calling his name is fruitless, the demon will grunt or mumble at most, maybe whine. Taps and straight up slaps to his bare skin won't do anything either, he just shakes like jelly and snores. You've learned, through experience, that gentle attention is usually what gets Zizz to move.

Squirming to at least face the huge demon, you look up and frame his dark face. Soft, so weirdly soft. This part of him is as odd as it gets. He's like... A matchstick, featuring this charred-black head bleeding darkness into his neck. You'd figure such a part of him would be rough, but it's almost like a cloud. Grabbing those smooth cheeks, you place gentle kisses all over his face and exposed teeth, making sure to nuzzle your nose on him. Zizz faintly starts purring and readjusts his neck to be closer to you, but his arms remain firmly locked around your torso and waist, not even twitching. Tsk.

With a huff, you resort to more insistent tricks, tickling at his neck and trying to do the same to the parts of his tummy you can reach. That gets him to groan something nonsensical out, limbs jerking and tail swatting at the sheets. Yet still not enough. Fine then. Far from deterred, not only do you hasten the pace of your digits, you blow air onto his face periodically.

Finally, that appears to bother Zizz enough to slacken his hold, one arm raising to rub his features.

Knowing a golden opportunity when you see one, it's a matter wiggling insistently and tapping at his loose arm to finally, finally- Break free! Victory. Aha!

The demonlord very clearly notices the lack of heat and pressure on him, growing distressed ad grumbling amidst a deep slumber. It's almost cute, the way his tail thrashes in indignation.

That's step one. Step 2 is breaking out the nice stuff, conveniently hidden inside the closet you share with your King. It's not like he looks at it anyway, his servants basically do everything for him. And you. But it's okay to be a little pampered, right? The contents of the box are removed and tossed onto the bed after you clear it of excess pillows and plushies.

Step 3, the most difficult of them all. Rolling this fucker onto his stomach.

But how?

Hm...

Impact. You need to throw yourself. Though it could backfire and make him fall on you. Here goes nothing! With some momentum, you roll onto the bed and slam against a hard grayish body, mostly not achieving much beyond stunting yourself. But hey, you did wake him up slightly.

" Mmmr, whas' dat? "

Zizz rumbles out, a deep, slurred sleepy tone that always makes you shiver. " Hey... Roll onto your stomach? " Worth a try.

He sighs, and after a couple of seconds, basically flops onto his front like dead weight. Hah! You're not sure how awake the demonlord is right now, but it won't stop you.

" Zizz? " You try after getting back up, receiving no response from the static monster. Yep, he's out again. Truly remarkable.

No time to waste! Grabbing the cuffs, and securing the key somewhere of course, you drag his hands together, looping the toy around one of the top columns of this ridiculously large bed. The cuffs glow a slightly pink hue once locked. He didn't twitch a muscle through this... Sometimes you worry for Zizz's safety.

There! Now, onto the good part.

Having the large demon rolled over, you giggle to yourself in pure satisfaction and eye his plain boxers. It's funny, you have more than confirmed he doesn't use underwear with his typical garbs, but he puts it on to sleep. How odd. Climbing behind the large monster, you take a moment to appreciate his behind. Zizz is huge, and what's more, he's also on the curvier side, you're sure he's the softest demon out there. By virtue of the former, he also has a pretty fat ass, if you do say so yourself.

A cute, round, perfect ass.

Lips curled up, you drag bare palms up the Icon's legs, making sure to cup the fat of his heavy thighs before resting them on those fine globes. For someone who likes to call you "pillow" so much, you sure as Hell just found a perfect headrest right here. Your attention is caught by a periodically swaying tail, that pretty thin thing with a tip very similar to his horns. It looks like a half-moon. Your arm extends, grabbing the length of it much like a cat after a thread of yarn. It bats aimlessly in your grasp, until you peel it out of that special band in his boxers.

You're no angel, you're purposely giving yourself a titillating show when you grasp the hem of his underwear, dragging the fabric down slowly and biting your lip the moment it rests on his thighs. Perfect ass indeed. You could just bite him.

Instead, you pick up the long flogger Vesper generously gifted to you, choosing the feathered end to start your torture. Sitting cross-legged between the massive demon's legs, you start feathering at his limbs.

" Ziiizz... "

Nothing, predictably. The ministrations move higher, zigzagging playfully, resting over the crux between those thighs. " Zizzy. " No response.

Your notions become insistent, tickling at the expanse of skin between pucker and slit, occasionally rising to tease the root of his tail before dipping back down. Laughter rings out when the demonlord does move, shifting his ass and twitching his legs. The most you get out of him is another caveman grunt.

Tut tut.

Alright. No more playing around then.

Readjusting the toy, you quickly swat it against the meat of his left cheek.

Finally, the Sloth King jolts, making a much more sober sound. You can hear the rustling of those fancy cuffs against the bed post while Zizz gradually processes the situation.

" Mmn did... Did you just hit me? " He slurs, bright white eyes staring back at you from the relative darkness.

" Me? " You start innocently. " With these little hands? " As if to emphasize the point, you splay said feelers against his rump, groping to your heart's content, drumming on his rump a bit. He shudders when you lean in to plant a kiss on the spot you just swatted. " You wouldn't even feel it, right? "

Before the demon can answer, you grasp the cute flogger again and swipe it across his right cheek. Zizz instantly shudders, muscles tensing. Hm, Vesper wasn't kidding, this does work. Good.

" M-Marshmallow? What is that? " His tone is breathy, that doesn't sound like a complaint to you.

" Don't worry about it too much. " And just because you like seeing his buffer jiggle, you lash it again, a little lower, a more tender spot if your research is correct.

Zizz chuffs something incomprehensible. The sleepiness apparently leaving him steadily at this turn of events. " Am... 'M I being punished? " He murmurs, legs spreading ever so slightly.

You take the time to think about it while you remove his underwear fully. Are you punishing your King? You could, by all means, you're still essentially a captive, even if you've decided to make the most out of it. Why not spin this in a different direction?

" I don't know Zizz, do you want to be punished? " The question hangs thick in the air while you play with the rubber tip of the toy, waiting.

His brain might not be fully back online, because the demonlord makes a confused sort of "Hhrn?" noise. The next swat has some heft behind it, actually making him arch!

" Words. "

" No... " He finally squeezes out.

You laugh. Yeah right, like he hasn't been pushing his ass up this entire time. You're willing to bet his slit is already wet. " Then what do you want? "

Zizz makes a drawn-out purr, trying to look back at you from his awkward position while his tail dances. " Mm, I want you to suck me off- "

CRACK

" Selfish! Mutt! " Each word punctuated with much harder swats. " Unbelievable... " Zizz pants now, actually pants. " Get on your knees. "

When he takes too long to obey, he's rewarded with yet another lash smack dab on the same side. " We don't have all day! "

" Owww f-fuck- " Doing as told, a clear string of viscous precum connects his slit to the silken sheets beneath him, making you just about steam alive. " You're so mean. "

Rolling your eyes yet smiling wide, you point the feathered side to his dripping entrance and tease it thoroughly, laughing when Zizz squirms in frustration, never getting decent stimulation no matter which way he leans. It only succeeds in making him wetter. " And you're hopeless, my lord. " Switching ends, you allow him direct contact with the pink silicone heart, something the horny monster greedily accepts, rocking against it like an animal, trying to hump the thing.

It's a lecherous show, a sight that just about has you salivating, your pussy seeming to jolt awake as you consider getting beneath the cuffed demon and letting him rut at you. No, not so fast, not this time. The more he huffs and rolls his hips, the less mental fortitude you retain, so you cut the scene short by harshly and suddenly slapping the tip against his slit. A bit cruel, admittedly.

Zizz jerks forward, a loud pained whimper followed by horny little gasps as he buries his whining face in pillows and instinctively bucks against nothing, tingles of pain and pleasure working their way through his body. In a matter of seconds, that gorgeous purple cock is slipping out to play, more than teased and ready. You lick your lips, considering doing just what he wanted for a sliver of a second.

Instead, you snicker and brush his length with the same fluffy feathers. Zizz actually tugs at the cuffs this time, head rising. " Please! "

" Already? " Your brows rise, but it's not much of a surprise at all. It's not hard to make the demonlord beg, he gives in easily, because it takes less effort. You suspect a part of him enjoys feeling powerless anyway. " Tsk, come on, at least try. "

Zizz groans. " Mmh please please please please- "

Figures. Slut.

Your response is to crack that flogger several times across both sides of his ass, hard enough that it does start leaving heart-shaped imprints. And... Aw, it's adorable! You just have to see more of those pretty deep blue hearts on his ass. So pretty...

In a lustful stupor, enamored by those lovely hearts, you keep lashing the thing on several spots, ignoring the way the demonlord howls and trembles, even going for his thighs. He's a big boy, and strong at that. He can deal with a bit of thigh flogging. By the time you've calmed down, breathing heavily, his lower half is peppered in cute little hearts, sore, some spots starting to bruise in even prettier colors. But most importantly, Zizz is sobbing.

You hadn't even heard him.

Whimpering and moaning softly like some sort of overwhelmed animal. You wonder if maybe you've gone too far until you see his cock throbbing repeatedly. Then again, if he really wanted to stop this, he could have by now, you don't believe the cuffs would be an issue given what you've seen Zizz do before.

" Do you think you can come just from this? I think you can. " You half-mock.

The King of Sloth makes a pathetic little noise betraying some great exasperation. " No! No no nn- Please- Please, I'll take anything jus' make me come please- " You wonder what it says about yourself that his sobbing voice makes you heat up like a furnace, shuddering.

The next thing that connects to Zizz's ass is neither the paddle nor the feathers, but your small human hands. He twitches regardless, more than sensitive enough to wince from something as simple as a gust of wind. " Alright, but only because you took it all like a champ. "

Gentle lips peck and smooch around the places you thoroughly abused, a spare hand snaking to his front so you can grab his weeping girth and treat him to generous strokes, not enough to let him orgasm yet. No, you want to take your sweet time, swiping your tongue from the bottom of his slit, all the way up and over his hole. The other moans out, audibly splintering something in the bed post so he can press harder against your flat tongue.

Your chuckle vibrates against his skin, and as fun as eating him out could be, your goal is that appendage thrashing and thumping around. A brilliantly devious idea has you catching the thing with your teeth, nipping at it at the same time your pumps increase in pressure.

Zizz somehow manages to melt more into the sheets, trembling like a leaf. " Hhrn- Don't stop don't stop donn- Ah! " And you don't. Offering the massive monster one last, thunderous clap to his ass the very moment he starts coming.

It's a spectacular show. He comes hard, whining out like a needy harlot, grinding deep into your hand, shooting thick ropes all across it and the bed. Enough in quantity to make you titer. Cooing and swooning, you make sure to milk everything out of Zizz, hearing him huff out in complete euphoria. You only stop when his trembling becomes pained hissing, quickly moving to remove those cuffs while he sags onto the mattress like an emptying balloon. Atop a small pool of his own seed, ew... It's funny, he didn't even pull that hard at the cuffs. Sure, the bed post is visibly damaged, but he behaved fairly well, all things considered!

This was a great test run.

It's not too long before you hop into bed, on top of Zizz's spent body and blowing raspberries on his back. The Icon chuckles tiredly.

" You should see your ass right now. " You smirk.

" You ruined it. " He laments, sighing.

Laughing, you give him a soft kiss and massage his sore wrists. " You did very well, my King. Maybe you should tell me more about your tastes in the future, hm? "

Zizz snorts after a couple of puzzled seconds. " It was Vesper, wasn't it? "

" We're gonna thank him tomorrow. "

Although Zizz makes a disgruntled noise, you catch the very same tail you bit on wagging.

[gomamonday]

Gomamon Day is THIS FRIDAY! GET HYPED!!1!

I originally established Gomamon Day back in 2017, I wrote a small FAQ about it back then: https://tumblr.com/gomamonday/168174866156/gomamon-day-2017, here's an updated version:

Why a digimon?

I’ve seen a few days for celebrating other digimon (Flamedramon, Renamon), as well as days to celebrate pokemon (such as 7/28 as Popplio Day), and figured it would be nice to celebrate a specific digimon species; not necessarily “Jo’s Gomamon”, although that is the one that most digimon fans are familiar with.

Why Gomamon?

Many years ago, along with Patamon and countless virus types, he was established as one of my favourite digimon. I quickly got tired of the Adventure anime and am mostly familiar with them through the old PS1 games. Over a decade ago I decided to begin collecting digimon merchandise, with a main focus on Gomamon and Patamon. Over the years more recently, they appear to me as a sort of embodiment of positivity and happiness, and have helped me get through a lot of negative or otherwise not-so-great times in my life. So for me personally I think having one day to celebrate them would be great to show others how awesome this underappreciated digimon is!

Why December 9th?

December 9th is the day I got a special Gomamon custom-made plushie of my own; in fact, he’ll be 9 years old this year! His name is Natticus, and you can follow his cohost once he decides which username to use (Natticus or NatticusTheGomamon on cohost) or check out his old tumblr archive @natticusthegomamon​. He was made by magnastorm on DeviantArt and is one of the most popular “Gomamon” art submissions there! The date also correlates to the same month Gomamon was first revealed in the Digimon Pendulum Version 2 (Deep Savers) in December 1998.

How do I celebrate?

You can draw or write about them, take some photos if you have a collection (no matter whether it’s gigantic or just one plushie), make a photo story of your own Gomamon’s adventures, livestream a digimon game (Gomamon is obtainable in Digimon Survive, Cyber Sleuth, Hacker's Memory and Next Order!) or just reblog some relevant posts~ Make a Gomamon OC (or ask an OC owner to draw theirs!) You’re free to @ or submit posts to this account anytime from now until then, or you can make your own post(s) and tag them with at least one of these hashtags below so I can find them to reblog here!

#gomamonday #gomamon day

Any rules?

No negative/hateful posts about anyone or mon; we can all love Gomamon without being mean to other monsters right? While I'd like the day's celebrations to stay SFW, if you do make other content (NSFW or "SFW fetish" content) please do not directly tag it under #GomamonDay, use something different like #GomamonDayNSFW instead. Late posts are okay, I’ll likely be celebrating at least all weekend long!

Feel free to ask/message me if you have any other questions, ideas or suggestions! Thanks!

[jimilter]

riptide (m) | k.sj. | (1/2)

one | two

pairing:  kim seokjin x reader

rating:  m (18+)

genre:  angst | smut | established relationship!au

summary:  It takes a foolishly trivial incident to unravel how astonishingly little you and Seokjin actually understand each other. It has you questioning your relationship, and him? Well, he’s questioning his whole life.

warnings:  swearing + implied alcohol consumption + realistic relationship problems + mentions of insecurities, jealousy, complicated mental dispositions + emotional distress + sexual situations (unprotected penetrative sex, dirty talking, a bit of manhandling, fingering) + mentions of masturbation + a ton of miscommunication (refer to the summary smh)

word count: 12.3 k

note:  it’s FINALLY done, y’all! came up to be a monster of 25k words, so i decided to split it into two. i’ll drop the other part next week. this took a lot more time, energy and re-writing than i’d thought it would. i began writing this in january - it’s been five excruciating months! 😩 i really hope y'all will like this one~ 🥺💜

💟 YOUTH – 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

— masterlist

— feedback is always appreciated!

riptide (n) – a dangerous area of strongly moving water in the sea, where two or more currents meet.

Lady, running down to the riptide - Taken away to the dark side - I wanna be your left hand man.

The turn of events has been so fucking hilariously impossible that Seokjin has literally been rendered speechless. Which doesn't happen often, mind you. What can he do, he is just extremely witty—he always has something to say about everything, usually and preferably with impeccable comic timing. Especially when it comes to you. 

This, though. This completely baffling scenario, right in front of him, has him gaping like a goldfish with no words to say.

"Final call, Jin. Gawk at me for five more seconds and I walk out of here," you threaten, an elegant arm poised at your waist and gorgeously plump lips pressed into a thin line. "Say something?"

And Seokjin still cannot formulate a single word, because what the actual fuck? How can you even think that he could ever— 

"Alright." You catwalk out of his bedroom, leaving him blinking into space.

He jumps the next second, leaping after you. "Honey! How would—what—I can never—why do I even have to say—will you wait? You’re being so ridiculous, right now, I hope you know that!"

If he wasn't in such a fix, Seokjin would physically cringe at his speech. It was better when he was just gaping.

“Honey! Stop being so overdramatic, you’ve known me and you’ve known Jimin! For years! Stop acting like you seriously don’t know what happened, here!”

You don't stop, though, gliding down the stairs and hopping over the haphazardly tossed items in the living room as you exit out of the house.

And then you're gone. You're really gone, over something so fucking ridiculous, that Seokjin still has no words to say.

All he knows is that his girlfriend of five years has finally gone crazy enough to jump to conclusions of such high magnitude of stupidity.

And, that Park Jimin is a dead man.

It all begins on an unsuspecting Sunday morning, when the entire house is smelling of weed, stale booze and some worse fluids. 

Last night, Seokjin vacated his own bedroom for the boys to smoke up in at Jimin's request, because that is the only well ventilated room of the house. He spent the night in Yoongi's room with earplugs in, dead to all the chaos in the house—as he often does on party nights—to catch up on his beauty sleep. He cannot afford any unbecoming dark circles or, God forbid, breakouts.

And no, that's not a comedic moment, he really does need his face looking perfect this week for reasons outside of personal gratification too, because he has a shoot on Tuesday. He especially took a leave from his part-time job at the Mexican restaurant downtown where his girlfriend, you, work full-time, on a Tuesday—saying goodbye to all the amazing tips always forwarded to the cooks on Taco Tuesday—for this. Nothing would mess up his face.

Not to mention that one very important audition for a very gigantic project he's been looking forward to. They're yet to announce the date, but it would be this very month. He hasn't really told you much about it, planning a huge surprise for later when—if, actually, but he prefers to be unrealistically optimistic in every situation possible—he bags the coveted position, at the end. He hasn't really decided upon much, other than a long drive and a picnic date to one of those grasslands on the city's outskirts that you love so much. Oh, and bringing up the prospect of moving in together in an apartment with just the two of you. 

He's pretty certain you must not remember him raving about the opportunity, because it has been months since he did that. He then proceeded to be covert about all the mini auditions and trainings he underwent to prepare for the final audition, and he is confident you have not connected the dots.

But that is all a discussion for later — he doesn't even know when he would be auditioning. 

The crux of the whole matter is that he needs to keep looking as flawless as he can until that audition happens.

So he has slept like a baby, last night, while the rest of his friends have partied, including two out of three of his housemates—Hoseok and Jimin—along with Taehyung and Taehyung's girl. Namjoon had foregone attendance in lieu of the Halloween party, next weekend, that he knows he would definitely be forced to attend because Hoseok is hosting. Yoongi, his third and final housemate, escaped the house altogether to spend a night of music-making with Jungkook in his dorm.

So, in the morning, when Seokjin is moving around his kitchen that seems to have been hit by a tornado, checking the fridge and mentally praying that his baggie of smoothie ingredients is still in good shape—a scream echoes around the house.

Seokjin freezes. That sounded a lot like…you.

Immediately alert, he runs out of the kitchen and into the drawing room. Hoseok is hanging upside down on one of the couches, something that looks a lot like undigested white sauce pasta puddles on the ground, inches from his new, fiery red hair. Seokjin grimaces.

"Kim Seokjin!" your screech tears the silence.

Seokjin twists on his heels, looking up in the direction of his bedroom. It really is you. And you're in his bedroom—the room he did not occupy last night.

God only knows what kind of a scene you have walked in on. He hopes these idiots didn’t have an orgy up there, although he really can’t put it past them.

Not waiting another second, Seokjin rushes up the stairs and pushes through the doors to his bedroom. His mouth falls open on an audible gasp.

You stand next to his bed, dressed up elegantly in a navy dress that ends above your knees—which makes him wonder if you are here for an impromptu breakfast date—with one hand clutching his duvet that has uncovered what looks like…

…a head of long, dirty blonde hair.

Who the fuck?

In his bed?

"Hey, Honey!" Seokjin's voice is a squeak. "You… you here for a date?" he manages out of a suddenly parched throat.

You roll your eyes. "Uh huh. A fact you would've known if you looked at the texts I sent you last night." Your eyes are narrow at him. "This explains why you didn't, though. Busy night, Jin?" 

He balks at your words, at a loss. How could you even think it was him, when you know all about Park Jimin and his escapades?! 

Seokjin's blood boils. Fucking Jimin. There is going to be blood on Seokjin’s hands. 

In the midst of it, the blonde head shifts. 

Soon after, as you two watch, a pair of brown eyes with smudged makeup emerge from inside Seokjin's bed—and the audacity?! There’s makeup all over his covers! Jimin will pay for the dry cleaning. The face is followed by a whole, tiny woman of five-something feet who is, thankfully, covered in a shirt.

Seokjin is almost not breathing when the blonde starts to give him a dreamy smile, his gaze switching between her and you. And it’s extremely stupid, because he hasn’t seen this woman before, ever, in his entire life. But he catches the way your arms fall to your sides and those elegant, dainty fingers of yours ball up into fists as you look at the blondie’s face.

Fortunately, the girl recognises him at last before her grin could turn fully dopey, and with a squeak, jumps out of the bed. “You’re not—um. Hi. Sorry, I, uh. I’ll get going.”

And surprisingly, she does exactly that in less than a minute, leaving you to stare down at Seokjin.

“You know, it’s really unbecoming for a girlfriend to keep finding girls in her boyfriend’s bed every other week and not be given an explanation, ever.” Your tone is teasing, but your eyes are taunting. “You shouldn’t always be so dismissive, you know? What if I start getting ideas? I don’t think you even remember how to make up with your girlfriend, at this point, because I never fight.”

That is when Seokjin starts gawking. And literally doesn’t stop until you’ve left the house.

“I don’t get it,” Jackson says, stuffing cold noodles into his mouth and chewing on them without closing it. “Do you think he cheated on you, or do you not think he cheated on you?”

You look at your best friend with your face twisted up in disgust. You swear to God you would never have agreed to make friends with this guy on your mother’s insistence when the Wang family moved in next doors to you, had you known he’d turn out to be such a barbarian a decade later. Twelve-year-old Jackson had been such a decent kid—studious, elegant, well-mannered. What went wrong, along the way?

You exhale, shifting on your chair, very wary of any dried up fluids that you might come in contact with. “I know he did not cheat on me, Jax, the very notion is completely ridiculous.”

Jackson stops chewing and looks away from the WWE match playing on the TV to squint at you. “I’m…confused? Wait. What is the problem, then? What are you mad at him for?”

To be completely honest, you aren’t quite certain yourself.

But you do know that you don’t feel good. And that this feeling has been building up over a couple months, but you have only really acknowledged it head-on, today, in all five-something years of your relationship. Five years, seven months and eight days, to be exact, but that’s kinda besides the point.

You’ve had at least a few months’ worth of buildup that has gotten you to this point, you would admit. Especially after Seokjin had to cancel that visit to your hometown at the end of June, for your parents’ thirty-fifth wedding anniversary celebration because he had an important audition for a big-brand ad film. The cancellation was acceptable, but his offhand comment that, “thirty-five isn’t even that special, we’ll get them a huge gift for their fiftieth,” stayed with you longer than it should’ve. Things got okay-ish when you reminded yourself how Seokjin never really thought too hard about things he said, always being a humorous, unattached clown in every situation. But this morning's dismissal has pushed you over that edge. You straightaway goaded him, claiming he doesn’t remember how to make it up to you, and all you got in response was his shock and being called “ridiculous” and “overdramatic.” Fun.

You were most certainly joking, if a bit caustically, when you said what you did. He could have taken it as a joke and laughed it off. He could have taken it as a threat and comforted you, said it was Jimin that used his room, and maybe kissed you. You already knew what had happened when you saw the girl, anyway. But this was probably the third time this situation had happened, this month. 

Sure, you are understanding and really do know Jimin and what all he gets up to, but is that really supposed to be such a given? Asking your boyfriend to hug you close and kiss your forehead when you discover a girl in his bed just as you were about to cuddle the lump of sheets thinking it was him, is not too much to expect, is it?

Granted, Seokjin has never been extremely expressive, but still. It feels like he’s consciously trying to keep you at a distance, these past few months.

You don’t have the complete grasp of the storm of thoughts in your head yet, but you want to try and explain it to Jackson the best you can. 

“It was about respect, in a way, I guess,” you quietly mumble, and Jackson turns the TV off, now sitting cross legged on the couch to face your chair. He puts away his takeout container to frown at you, probably gleaning how serious this is for you. “He stood there, without saying a single word, expecting me to stop being mad. Almost willing me to stop being mad by making these big, incredulous eyes at me. Like it was that horrible of his girlfriend to demand for an explanation when she found a girl in his bedroom. It was just the two of us, I wasn’t making a scene in front of anybody. He just—ugh! He could’ve simply asked me to not be mad, said it was Jimin who spent the night in the room and maybe even laughed about it, or plotted Jimin’s murder—I would’ve joined in—but no. He acted like I was being stupid, told me not be ridiculous and dramatic. And that made me feel really stupid.”

Jackson winces. “And why do you think you were not being stupid?”

You exhale. “I wasn’t. Because I wasn’t actually accusing him of anything, and five years down the lane, he should know that now. I just wanted him to say it and not scold me when I tease-taunted him. He always expects me to know everything. And even though I always do, it gets tiring sometimes. These weird thoughts get to you — that maybe you’re being too understanding and he’s using that to his advantage, you know?” You look down at your lap, playing with your nails. “It’s just…um. I wanted him to coddle me, I guess. To treat this as something big because I was throwing a tantrum about it and, just, I don’t know—try to cajole me? Assuage me with his words, maybe? But he didn’t. Because he hasn’t done that in forever. Because I never need him to, because I always freaking understand everything!” A sob leaves you.

Jackson pats the place next to him. “C’mere, you dumdum, and stop hyperventilating,” he mumbles, hugging you to his side when you move to sit on the couch. “I don’t exactly understand how the relationship dynamics work, but from what you told me, I get that you wanted attention? Some loving? And instead you got disappointed looks because Jin expected you to be mature and rational about it — the way you always are — and that too with his fucking eyes and some low-key insult words? Is it something like that?”

Wow, Jackson really paraphrased all that amazingly. “Yes, actually. It’s exactly that.”

Jackson sighs. “Y’all have been together a long time, babe, so I guess it’s kind of a given that you’d get to a no-bullshit point. Which is why he hasn’t done that in forever, because y’all probably don’t need that kinda stuff between you anymore.”

“I get that, it’s how a relationship matures. But I’m pretty certain that it’s not supposed to make me feel like this,” you sound slightly muffled, having stuffed your face into Jackson’s hoodie-covered chest. “I feel—I feel like we got too comfortable and now he’s just started to take me for granted. And I also feel like I’m being too needy. Am I being needy and annoying? He’d hate me if I told him all this, won’t he? Half of the reason we’ve worked out so well is because we’re both career oriented and don’t waste time overthinking stupid shit.” You gasp. “Oh, no—would he leave me? He’s used to his girlfriend being mature, not needy—”

You are cut off when Jackson pulls you away by your shoulders, giving you a serious look. “Wait, wait, stop. What did you say? Not the needy part, you’re allowed to be needy once in all the damn three-sixty-five days y’all stay busy for. The…taking you for granted part. Pretty big of a thing to say, babe.”

You sigh. “We haven’t been on an actual date in months. Seokjin thinks there’s no need for that extra effort when we spend lunch breaks at work together, everyday. Outside of the restaurant, our meetings involve our entire flock of friends by default. It’s been three months since we slept together.” You sniff, hating having to impart such a private detail of your life. “So no, I don’t think it’s that big of a thing to say, at all.”

“Wow.” Jackson gives a slow whistle. “You’ve really been bottling up a lot in there, huh?”

You shrug. “I guess. It never made me feel underappreciated, though. Sure, I was irritated at some occasions and disappointed at others, but… Today I feel horrible, Jax.”

“Did you share anything with Byulyi?” he asks, referring to your flatmate and good friend since college.

You shake your head. “She already has a lot on her plate, right now. She got rejected by the photographer she wanted to intern with, so it’s back to freelancing for her.”

“Yeah, that must suck.” Jackson grimaces. Then he looks at you. “You need to take a break, hun. Sit back, today, and have tacos and beer with me. Reset your inner thoughts. Talk to Jin tomorrow. Although, I must say, it’s kinda depressing that you have to actually tell your boyfriend that he’s being a bad boyfriend. Isn’t that kind of shit supposed to be realized on your own?”

You purse your lips. “I guess, yeah. But…don’t say that he’s being a bad boyfriend, Jax. I don’t think he even realizes something is wrong.”

“And that…doesn’t make it worse?” At your raised eyebrows, he concedes with a roll of his eyes. “Fine, fine, in any case — maybe try to hint at it before you dive straight in with the kill? See if he reacts?”

“I don’t know, Jax. What if he doesn’t? He’s really not the best at taking hints and reading signs, or that kind of subtle stuff.”

“Then you can just say your shit. All I’m saying is, give him a chance to figure it out on his own. He’s probably really clueless why you reacted so big on something so small, this morning. If you drop hints, maybe he’ll feel it out.”

You nod, somewhat amazed at how sound Jackson’s advice seems. “How are you doing this, Jax? Being a love guru all of a sudden?”

Jackson scoffs. “I’m just tryna put myself in Seokjin’s shoes. If I was in the situation he’s in, this is what I’d like to happen — be given a window to figure out what’s wrong. You’ve been together a long time, hun. It really shouldn’t be that difficult for him.”

You shrug a shoulder. “I won’t be too sure about that. Why does it even matter if he can or cannot, though?”

Jackson seems to be mulling over something before he drops his chin to his chest. “Because you’re supposed to be partners, hun. If you can tell what’s up with him with a single glance, why can't he? Not being good at taking signs is not a good enough excuse. My gut says that he’d be able to, though. And that knowledge will make you feel infinitely better, trust me. It’ll be reassuring to learn that he really knows and understands you well, won’t it?”

You nod, slowly, but you still have your suspicions. Seokjin has just been the kind of guy whose emotional depth goes to a certain extent and then just — well, stops. There are things that he feels and realizes and sees, and there are things that he doesn’t. It isn’t even something he does, you believe. It’s just how he is. Certain feelings just don’t fall in his orbit. And you’ve never found there to be anything wrong with it when he’s been an immaculately amazing boyfriend and tended to every single one of your needs, always. Well, you have never actually needed emotional consoling, too, so you haven’t had the chance to audition him for that. You keep yourself too busy for all that unnecessary mental pressure. It comes as a surprise, but you have never cried on Seokjin’s shoulder in all these years of your togetherness. You’ve kept your head straight and chin up, even during your college exams. And so has Seokjin, because you’ve never seen him cry, either.

Lately, though, things have been kind of weird. The gradual transformation into your professional lives that began after college, has been drastic in the past few months. Seokjin has been constantly prioritizing his career over you, and you have been understanding about it because you agree with it — to an extent. Seokjin believes it all the way through, though, and you have known for a while that you would hit your limit at some point, and would try to bring him back to yourself. Today morning, it seems, you hit that limit. 

You felt dispensable. 

You hate this feeling.

To be very honest, you know you can get over this. You can give it some time, remind yourself of how much your Jin loves you, believe that he is eventually going to come back to you once he settles, and be understanding about the entire thing. 

You can — but you really don’t want to.

Something tells you that this feeling of getting too comfortable will only fester and take a worse form as time goes by. You can wait it out, sure, and hope you aren’t being a pushover as he works on building his career. You are building your career, too, after all, and at least some of it has been for each other. 

The thing is, your plans with Seokjin are long-term—marriage, kids, white-picket fence, and all that. And you believe that if you are sensing a problem now, you better deal with it now before it has the chance to change its form and affect you both when you are at a more responsible point in your life.

Mind made up, you look up at Jackson, immediately grimacing when he forwards a greasy hand to pick up a taco for you. “I don’t…I don’t like tacos. And may I exchange the beer for scotch?”

“You work at a Mexican restaurant, and you don’t like tacos,” Jackson deadpans.

“They mess up my skincare.”

“Oh, fuck off! Have a spinach smoothie with a drink, why don’t you?”

You purse your lips to hold back your laughter at his ire, your own worries forgotten in the moment as Jackson gets up to get you a glass of scotch and some healthier snacking alternative.

“You're a dead man.”

Jimin stops dead in his tracks, arms frozen in the act of putting a t-shirt on. He blinks at Seokjin with big round eyes. “Hyung?” he mumbles, a picture of unblemished innocence, especially when he covers his toned torso with the oversized t-shirt he was in the process of getting into. “What—what’d I do?”

Someone who doesn’t know better would never believe that this young, innocent, frazzled haired fairy-boy could ever do any wrong. But Seokjin knows better. “You chaotic womanizer,” Seokjin nearly hisses, "you've gotta learn to clean after yourself. Honey found a girl in my bed. A girl—in my bed.”

Jimin had the decency to drop the innocent act. “Oh. Oh.”

Seokjin raises a brow. “Oh? That’s it?”

"Yeah, well, I clarified to her that it was a one time thing when we got to it. She was obviously expecting something more if she didn't leave when I told her to. Disappointed but not surprised." Jimin is frowning when he comes to sit down on the couch next to Seokjin. “Sorry you two had to see that. You clarified to Honey noona that I’d been the occupant of the room, though, right?” 

“I—what?” Seokjin scoffs. “Why would I even need to do that? She knows that already, obviously. She’s been seeing you for over five years, or have you forgotten?”

Jimin squints. “I mean…okay, fair point, I guess. Why’re you so worked up, then? Did something else happen, too? Where’s she, now?” Jimin looks around the living room as if looking for you.

Seokjin sighs. “Well, I couldn't really get much out before she was storming out of the damn house, altogether.”

Jimin blinks. “Storming out? Why? She… um, was she mad?"

Seokjin opens his mouth – and then shuts it. Was she mad, indeed. "I don't know. She looked kinda mad, yes. But maybe she was in a hurry?" 

"Why would she be mad? Did you try to call her? Text her? It's unlike her to react so big on something so small." Jimin bites down on his lip, looking lost in thought. 

Seokjin shakes his head. "She didn't pick up or text back."

“There’s definitely got to be an underlying reason for her being like this. Are you sure you guys haven’t been fighting, hyung?” 

Seokjin sighs. “Yes, Jimin, I’m absolutely certain that there hasn’t been any fighting of any sorts between the two of us before today.” He pauses. “Well, she was slightly irritated that I didn’t check her texts last night, but she knows I go to bed at eleven on days leading up to a shoot, so that one’s on her.”

Jimin looks genuinely concerned, which, in turn, makes Seokjin concerned. Jimin isn't the type to stress over stuff if he can help it. Sure, he cares about the boys and would always be down to do whatever he can for them, but his throwing-caution-to-the-wind way of life causes him to not take most of the things in life seriously.

You’ve been like an older sister to the boys ever since Seokjin started dating you and introduced you to them. They all have their ways of showing their respect and affection to you. Well, maybe not Jungkook because he can’t get over getting unnecessarily intimidated by Seokjin enough to relax around you. 

Jimin, especially, always seems to be affected by any tension in Seokjin’s relationship. Everyone can see how it upsets his entire life when you two are fighting, although he’d never admit to it. He doesn’t need to, because it’s pretty obvious when he becomes a cranky six-year-old who hates the world. 

Right now, he has a guilty frown on his face. "I should've seen to it that Suzette left before I went to shower," he mumbles as if talking to himself. “Shouldn’t have trusted her to leave just because I told her to.” He looks up at Seokjin with troubled eyes. "I'm sorry, hyung."

Seokjin can not believe himself when he shakes his head at Jimin's apology—this little demon causes so much chaos in all their lives that any apology coming from him should be justified and welcome. But this one isn't really on him. "It's not entirely your fault."

Jimin's demeanor changes a bit and the attitude Seokjin is used to witnessing makes an appearance. "Right? That's what I was thinking, too!" Jimin exclaims, some of the concern on his face lifting. "You have to talk to Honey noona and make things right, though, hyung. She’s the only womanly touch in our man cave. We’d all be barbarians without her.” Jimin looks very wary and kind of nervous.

“It’s funny you would crave her ‘womanly’ presence when she’s rushed off because of a woman that you brought home.” Seokjin scrunches his nose. "And I said it isn't entirely on you, because it is partially on you, Park Jimin. You borrowed my room to smoke up in. Why couldn't you take your Suzy back to your own room?"

"Suzette," Jimin corrects under his breath while shaking his head. "Yeah, I should've, but… your room just felt like a better choice during the high," he finishes in a mumble, dragging a hand down his face. “Hyung,” Jimin says with a pout on his lips, “the last time you two fought was two years ago, remember? On your birthday? When Hobi hyung dumped cake in noona’s hair and she had her first shoot for that bigshot magazine, the next day?”

Seokjin nods with a sigh. “She yelled at me for having stupid friends, and I yelled at her for caring more about the shoot that having a good time on my birthday. Yes, I remember.”

“And then she didn’t visit us for a whole week. Please don’t let that happen, again.” Jimin looks up at Seokjin with big, round eyes. “I can’t take that kind of unrest in my life."

Seokjin briefly wonders, if Jimin’s nightly conquests were to see this side of him, would they run in the opposite direction or be more attracted to him? Jimin definitely needs someone in his life that would bring out this side in him and stay to provide him the emotional comfort he requires when he gets like this. 

“I will try not to, Jiminie, but…” Seokjin shuts his eyes. “I seriously do not understand her actions from the morning,” he finishes in a mumble.

“Maybe she’s—maybe she’s worried about something else? Some other aspect of her life?” Jimin suggests with wide eyes. “And she’s just projecting onto you.”

“As sound as the explanation is, I am literally involved in ninety percent of the aspects in her life,” Seokjin says with a twist to his lips. “I would know if something was wrong anywhere.”

“That’s cocky of you to say,” Jimin snarkily comments with narrowed eyes. At Seokjin’s raised eyebrows, he amends, “That’s cocky of you to say, hyung-nim.”

Seokjin scoffs, but then he shrugs his shoulders. “It’s true. We work at the same restaurant, we’re scouted by the same agency. Even her agent is best friends with mine—she gossips a ton about how Honey passes up so many opportunities and pisses her agent off. Her friends are, well—” Seokjin stops short when it hits him. “Wang. Wang could know something!”

Jimin is looking at him skeptically when Seokjin meets the younger’s eyes. “I just think you should have a simple talk with noona first before digging around.”

That is sensible advice. Seokjin nods as he pulls his phone out.

“Just find out what’s been troubling her, hyung. You two are rational people, I’m sure you’ll work it out.” Jimin pauses to scratch the back of his head. “Just please don’t let this be another fight like that one?”

“Don’t worry,” Seokjin finally says with a pat on Jimin’s shoulder as he finishes sending off another text to you, “this one is nothing like that fight.”

Turns out, this fight really is not like that one. Or any other fights Seokjin has ever had with you, in fact, because you’re giving him the silent treatment. 

You’ve never given him the silent treatment. 

Not even when you were students and didn’t have a load of time on your hands and used to waste precious sleep hours arguing over stupid shit that would probably resolve itself if you just slept on it and looked back at it with a fresh state of mind. Not even then did you forego talking.

Needless to say, Seokjin is distressed.

You drive to the house to pick him up at your usual time, the next morning, after not having responded to any of his calls or texts for the entire day. Seokjin is aghast as he gets into the car.

“Honey! What is going on? Why didn’t you—where have you been?”

You simply start the engine and take off. “Busy,” you murmur after a while.

Soekjin’s head is close to exploding. “Busy? Doing what?”

Your face remains stoic as you weave through the morning traffic. Seokjin looks at you. You’re dressed up in your waitressing outfit that consists of a shirt, skirt and tights, and being who you are, Seokjin can proudly say that you would stand out to be the most well dressed server in the field. You’re always pristine and tidy — no accidents happen to you at the job ever. No spillage of drinks or ketchups, no soiled hands being wiped down on your skirt. Nothing even ruins your manicure. 

It is something that Seokjin has always tried to keep up with, this cleanliness streak of yours. Because he has always assumed you would expect it out of him, too. You were attracted to the cover model version of him, after all. It is quite natural that you would have those kinds of expectations. And Seokjin has always been more than happy to deliver. It has become a part of him, in fact. He doesn't even chew with his mouth open even when he's among the boys, anymore.

It has, somewhat, made him practical and less emotional in life, too, but he doesn't really think of it as a bad thing. You have always been practical in life – the most ambitious girl he has ever met, someone that has always prioritized her career and goals over everything else. Seokjin has admired that since college, and has tried to show you that he has similar priorities even if he has had to work on thinking from his mind more than his heart.

But when you are already by his side, what does he even need his heart for, anymore, when it's already yours?

Now, looking at you sitting with a morose expression on your face as you give him the cold shoulder, Seokjin is just as much in love with you as he was when he first met you.

“Stuff,” you say with a shrug, after some extended silence. “You should know about that, right? Your schedule’s always busier than mine and I never complain.”

Your sharp words have him reeling. Whatever do you even mean by that? “Uhm, okay. Fair enough. But… did you really not have the time to respond to a single text?”

“It gets impossible sometimes, Jin, you know how it is.”

Seokjin frowns. He does know that, but he doesn’t feel okay. Something is very off with you. It is as if you’re saying something else and expecting him to discern a different meaning out of it. 

He doesn’t understand why, though. You, of all people, should know how terrible he is at decoding signs.

He sighs.

Seokjin, after his conversation with Jimin yesterday, had decided to ask you about the morning’s incident, head on, whenever you called him back. But you didn’t, and this is the first opportunity he’s had to talk to you, so he decides to bring it up, now. “What—what happened yesterday morning, babe? You got really mad and stormed off, and… I mean, you’ve got to know the girl had been Jimin’s companion for the night, right? You know him, how he is!”

You say nothing, hands tightening a bit on the steering wheel. Seokjin looks down at his own hands.

“You know I was only surprised at your words because we really do not have the time to be discussing silly things." He shuts his heart down when it tries to tell him to go soft. He knows it isn't something you would appreciate. "After five years, you know what I’m capable of right? You can never start getting ideas, because that would be insane and stupid. I’m already so supremely occupied as it is between two jobs, when would I even have the time to cheat, right?” he jokes, snorting to himself.

You’re still quiet, but your tongue comes out to moisten your lips. It is a nervous tick of yours which Seokjin recognizes very well, because with your skincare and scheduled regular application of lip balms, your lips never need the extra moisture.

He frowns. Was he too straightforward? But this is exactly how you communicate with him! “Hey, is everything okay, babe?”

You exhale, noisily. “Everything’s fine, Jin,” you finally say with a roll of your eyes. “And you’re right. I know you wouldn’t cheat. You don’t have the time to chat me up, how are you gonna pick someone new to impress, huh?” 

Your snort sounds lacking in humor, but Seokjin still gives a couple of stilted chuckles. Even so, he's still somewhat relieved. “Right. Just so we’re certain, that was a joke, right? I mean, it would be really ridiculous of you to think that I would—”

“Yes, Jin!” you cut him off with a deep frown. “If I wanted to talk to you about something, or accuse you, or confront you — I’d do that without you having to prompt me. Stop obsessing over yesterday and stop trying to explain yourself. I know it was Jimin’s doing.”

Seokjin feels immensely relaxed at the conviction with which you say the last sentence, certainly, but something is still off. “Why were you ignoring me, then?”

“I just didn’t have anything to say to you.” You stop at a red light, the last one before you reach the restaurant, and turn to look at Seokjin with really vacant eyes. He doesn’t like your stare one bit. “We’ve been together five years, babe. If neither of us have got anything of significance to say, I’d rather not text too much, if that’s okay with you? I’ve got a busy schedule to work around, too, you know?”

Seokjin wants to remind you that both of you had something of significance to say after you left his place in anger, but chooses to just roll with whatever you’re playing at. Maybe he's thinking too much. He nods. “Sounds alright to me.”

“Great,” you breathe out, somehow looking disappointed along with the preexisting sorrowful expression you had on your face.

You really do not have a concrete explanation for why you acted the way you did with Seokjin, this morning. 

You were supposed to hint at being mad, not blatantly try to give him a taste of his own medicine. It could turn out to be a good thing if he eventually starts to miss you and reaches out, sure, but playing mind games never feels right to you. But when he started to joke about not having time to cheat, and something just turned off in you. He really could’ve seriously reassured you of his love. That would’ve been actually comforting. But no. He chose to joke about that, too. You didn’t feel like putting in all that energy anymore, after that.

Now, you sit down in the break room to check your phone during your ten minutes’ rest break. A text message floats at the top of your notifications.

Jax 🚽 Hey How’d it go?

With an exhale, you decide to call him back. Your fingers are too tired to type, and Jackson is sure to launch off into a rampage of texts the moment you tell him you’ve tried to turn the tables on Seokjin.

Seokjin is in the kitchen, his usual rest break not being for another hour, so you don’t have to worry about him walking in.

“Hey!” Jackson jovially greets you as soon as he picks the phone. “Did you get my text?”

“I did, yes,” you respond in a calm voice. “I’ve been looping milkshake mugs through my fingers since eight am, they needed some rest, so I decided to call.”

“Yeah, no, it’s cool. I was in a really boring class, anyway. So. How'd it go?"

You pull in your lip between your teeth. "I… I kinda ended up telling him I am a busy person too and that we shouldn’t text that much."

You hear silence instead of the outburst you'd expected. 

"Jax?"

"Are you actually gonna try to play a mind game with the dumbest human being you know on earth?" Jackson so very eloquently asks, his interpretation making you pinch the bridge of your nose. “He’s never even gonna figure it out!”

“I know how it sounds, okay?” You exhale. “I honestly don’t know what came over me.”

“Okay, alright, one thing at a time. So, no coddling?"

"Not a single soft word. Just more expectations of me understanding, and claiming that anything but that would be stupid of me. He acts like I'm supposed to know everything about him and everyone in his group of friends," you mutter in irritation. “As if those dumbasses know the first thing about themselves.”

You realize you're being a bit harsh, because his friends – basically your younger brothers, at this point – are a bunch of clueless idiots that love, adore and respect you. You shouldn't be badmouthing them, Seokjin’s growing callousness towards you isn't their doing. It's his own. 

You sigh. You really miss how things used to be when you were in college.

“Uh, I think we need to rewind a bit. What happened? What triggered this?”

It makes you smile a little when Jackson asks that. At least your best knows you’re not wholly clinically insane. “Well… I drove him to work. He…" your brows lower at the recollection, "he was the first to bring up yesterday morning. And yet again, he gave me the same you've got to know this and that crap, and then he tried to assure me in the dumbest possible way. Do you know what he said, Jax, do you?”

“Um, do I wanna know?”

“He said, and I quote, he doesn’t have the time to cheat. Jackson Wang, are you hearing this? He really straight up said he was too busy to cheat on me and so I should rest assured! Who says that?!”

“He must’ve meant it as a joke—”

“Yeah, he said that, too, and then very immaculately added that it’d be ridiculous of me to think otherwise. I have lost count of how many times the words ridiculous and stupid came up.”

“Goddammit.”

“Goddammit is right,” you mumble, morosely resting your head on your palm.

“What did he say, by the way? When you told him to text less?”

You give a wry chuckle. "Well, he said it sounded alright to him."

"Son of a bitch. You – you two are messed up, man. Messed up bad. Why the hell can you not just say shit you really mean and actually want to instead of saying shit you don't? You don't wanna text less because you're busy, you want him to dote on you because you miss him!" Jackson sounds beyond frustrated. "And it doesn't fucking sound alright to him! It sounds scary, it sounds confusing, it sounds like something you would never say to him!" He groans. "But none of you would say that shit to each other! You’re choosing to be evasive and fucking plastic instead of honest, and falling deeper into your mess."

You reel from the onslaught of his harsh words, eyes widened and breath stuttering. Jackson isn't usually the type to pay so much attention to your relationship problems. But this time, you guess, he has garnered the depth of your unhappiness and thus has gotten so involved.

You realize he is right. Nothing good can come out of any turned tables, because Seokjin is, anyways, not even going to be able to work out the problem by himself. He may even go around talking to his friends about how you were being cold with him and not giving him any time, and still not realize he has been doing the same to you. He is thick like that. 

When his friends tell you tales of his compassion, you're unable to relate. You've never seen that side of him. He has probably grown up from that emotionally overwhelmed high school graduate who had made friends on a whim, the night of his graduation.

You certainly don't appreciate the emotional abstinence, though, and would very much rather prefer if he would open up a bit more. It would help you be more open with him, without fearing him calling you "stupid" in response.

But it’s still alright, you accept him with that thick brain of his, because he’s still only ever going to be the only one for you.

"How are you two gonna get around to having a proper chat if you just keep building more walls between you both?" Jackson asks after the long pause from your end, this time softer. “I’m sorry, babe, I was wrong. Giving him signs and making him realize shit won’t work. It was stupid of me to suggest that. It’s probably why you ended up being so caustic with him.

“No, no, it was all me, Jax. I could’ve chosen to not listen to you, but my ego got in the way, I guess. It’s not exactly easy, telling your boyfriend you’re feeling neglected. I mean, what if he laughs in my face and tells me I’m being paranoid? What if he thinks I have no regard for his career — or mine — because my priorities don’t align with his?” You bite your lip, shutting your eyes as your insecurities attack you.

“Hey, no. None of that is gonna happen if you really share with him what you’ve been feeling. No hints, no sarcasm, you’re gonna have to tell him point blank. Allow yourself to be raw. He’s the love of your life. You don’t have to protect yourself from him, right?”

You sigh. “Yeah, I know. You’re absolutely right, Jax. But I really have no idea how to even approach him, at this point. He’s either too busy with shoots, or with the guys, or some meeting. I cannot do this on call, because that always leads to misunderstandings.” You bite down on your lower lip, contemplating. “But I’ll figure something out.”

"Yes, you will. You always do. So, that’s good then. In the meanwhile, can you at least clean up this latest pile of poop? The talking less thingy is gonna make you two more distant, hun."

You scrunch your nose at his metaphor, but then your shoulders slump. "I don't know, Jackson. The way he so impassively agreed to it would make me sound really stupid if I take it back. And given what he keeps saying, he really doesn’t want me to sound stupid."

Jackson gives a snort at that. “Hah, funny. But listen. At the end of the day, he’s your boyfriend. You're gonna have to really decide if you're trying to get your boyfriend to give you more love, or if you're fighting a battle of egos and would like to bend him to you."

You bite your lip. “You make me sound manipulative.”

“You yourself confessed you let your ego come into this, one time. Don’t let that happen again. I’m trying to make you realize that complicated problems can have simple solutions, too. If only you’d communicate. Just talk to him soon, please, and make him understand why you’re hurt. Don’t carry on with this stupid cold war, okay? You gotta figure out exactly what you want, first.”

“You know what I want, Jax. You’re literally the only person that does, actually,” you remind him with a sigh.

“Oh, he is, isn’t he?”

You freeze, eyes bulging at the familiar voice. “I’ll… I’ll call you back,” you mumble before you disconnect the call and turn to look over your shoulder at Seokjin’s unreadable face. He stands with his arms crossed, still in his uniform but without the apron. “Jin… what—uh…”

“What am I doing here?” he scoffs, lips curling in distaste as he stares you down. “Well, I was going to the loo when I saw you sitting here. You looked upset, so I thought I’d check in on you on my way back.” He clicks his tongue, a dry chuckle tumbling out. “But apparently, you’ve got other people doing it for you, already.”

You wince, shutting your eyes. The one time he was finally going to give you some much needed attention — you sent a bad message his way. 

“So. Good to know there actually is someone who knows what you want. Would’ve been easier if it were me, though, given how I stand to be the one that is to deliver.” Seokjin sounds pissed off, and despite your irritation, you really want to make him understand.

You rub at your forehead. “Stop talking like that, Jin, it was just Jackson.”

“Wang?” He seems to seethe more, for some reason. “Of course, it’s fucking Wang!”

You frown, standing up. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Seokjin looks at you incredulously. “You—do you not see how this looks? You have problems with me, Honey, but you choose to discuss them with him? Who’s he, your therapist?”

“He’s my best friend, Jin, someone I trust,” you grit out.

Seokjin seems to take it the wrong way, his agitated expressions slowly fading into a blank stare. “Oh. You trust him, as opposed to…” He trails off with a shrug, but the implication is as obvious as it can be.

“Jin—”

He raises a hand up, palm facing you as he looks away. “If you need some time apart, you should tell me in plain words. You know I’m not good at reading signs.”

Seokjin gives you a blank stare before turning around to leave the area. You stand rooted to your place, jaw dropped and eyes wide.

Some time apart? Has he lost his mind? 

He really is a huge freaking idiot who cannot pause to think what implications his words have. He seriously doesn’t recognize what all his “don’t be ridiculous/overdramatic/stupid” speeches do to you. You realize you should really make him understand. This has gone on for way too long.

But maybe you should take some time to yourself to cool off before that. You don’t want to say the wrong thing in your rage and complicate things further.

You sigh to yourself as you slump back into the bench you were sat on before.

You’d set out to tell your boyfriend you were feeling neglected, but you ended up making him think you want to be apart. How the heck did you get here?

You belatedly recall Jackson's words.

Why the hell can you not just say shit you really mean and actually want to instead of saying shit you don't?

You’re choosing to be evasive and fucking plastic instead of honest, and falling deeper into your mess.

Your usually dumbheaded best friend was right on this one, you realize. You should’ve just talked like a normal human being instead of letting Seokjin’s words get to you and get pissy in retaliation.

You give a weary sigh. 

Seokjin is grateful for the sudden busyness he’s got on his schedule, or he would explode from all the pent up frustration you have been causing him. 

He realized he wasn’t as upset with you as he was irritated, right after he walked away from you on Monday. He dropped you a text with some excuse of needing to stay back so that he wasn’t forced to ride with you in the car again, and later took the bus home. 

You had told Jackson Wang about what was troubling you, but not him. It made Seokjin feel upset, incompetent and more than a little insecure. Seokjin absolutely hates feeling insecure. Especially about you. You’re the singular most precious entity in his life — not that you are an entity, per se — and anything that seeks to threaten your position in his life or his position in yours, makes him lose his shit.

So it was understandable that he jumped to unfairly disproportionate magnitudes of conclusions that day. When he thought about it, later, he could easily tell that you are just mad at him and not actually contemplating leaving him, not even for a little while. Not that he’d just sit back and have you do that so easily.

Seokjin also hates overthinking, but that is all he did for the entirety of his Monday. 

Monday, though, was the last time he had time to overthink. Life got exponentially busier after that.

Immediately after his shoot on Tuesday, he received his agent’s call and was informed of his jam packed schedule for the remainder of the week. He was pulled into two separate magazine ad shoots on Wednesday, a perfume ad film drank up all of his Thursday, and today, a hair product ad film needed him to report to a sunrise point in the city at the ass-crack of dawn. The sky was still dark when he rode across the city with his agent at nearly four in the morning. 

And now, the afternoon sun beats down on his car as he drives back alone, his agent staying back to tend to some business. Stopping at a red light, he reaches for his spinach smoothie with one hand and his phone with the other. Ugh, he feels beyond tired.

Blearily, he looks down at the device around a yawn, fingers habitually reaching for your chat.

He took a week off from the restaurant and dropped you a text, late Tuesday evening, informing you of the same.

Honey✨❤👸 Hm, kay. Good luck x

Unsurprisingly, that stands to be your last message in his inbox. It’s been four days.

Sighing, he swipes a hand down his tired face and exits out of the message app. He went to bed at nine o’clock, last night, and owing to the way he has trained his body to sleep on command, he did manage to get a sleep of nearly six hours, too. But it was fitful and plagued with nightmares featuring you. 

Knowing he doesn't have to be at the restaurant until Monday and that his next gig isn’t until Wednesday, he cannot wait to get back home and drink his weight in alcohol before he sleeps his way through the weekend.

Just as he has moved past the intersection, his phone rings. 

Honey✨❤👸 calling...

He nearly spits the smoothie he just sipped at.

Coughing, he roughly jostles the plastic cup back in the holder and pulls up to a side of the road to pick up the call. “Hey,” he breathes into the phone, embarrassed at his desperation.

“Jin. Um, hi.” You sound awkward, as if you…have been compelled to call him due to some reason.

He is immediately worried. “Honey? Is everything okay, do you need something?”

He hates himself for being so concerned when you have been neglecting him for so many days – yet again, despite your spat at the restaurant – instead of finally talking to him about what’s bothering you, but he can’t help it. At the end of the day, you are the love of his life. 

“Yes, yes, I’m okay. It’s just, um. Can you pick me up from the restaurant?” you sound nervous.

But, Seokjin realizes, I was right. You do need something. He clears his throat. “Uh, okay, I guess,” he agrees before stopping short when he realizes the time. “Wait, it’s barely even two. Why are you leaving?” he asks, confused and a little concerned. You work your shift till five every day and till eight on weekends.

“Tomorrow is Halloween, Jin. We’re closing for the weekend, remember?”

Seokjin’s mouth falls open on a gasp. He really had forgotten. “Oh. Oh, okay. Yeah, I’ll be there in five, wait up.”

He swerves the car into the lane and takes off in the direction of the restaurant. 

He laughs at himself. He has been so caught up in work that he literally forgot Halloween. He wonders if this is what actual adulting is.

He is stopping before the restaurant within three minutes of your phone call, eyes immediately spotting your delicate figure standing on the sidewalk with your hands crossed against your chest.

You step down from the curb when you spot his car, and walk towards him. He watches your elegant legs as they beautifully fall in a straight line. Even when exiting your job as a waitress, you’re every bit the elegant model he met in college. Your hips sway tantalizingly, and something akin to longing swirls in his chest.

He composes himself quickly when you cross the car to get into the passenger’s seat. You awkwardly clear your throat as Seokjin busies himself with starting the vehicle, unsure if he should initiate conversation.

“Um, sorry about this. You were probably getting ready for shoot,” you finally say. “Byulyi dropped me off today. She wasn’t picking her phone up. I was trying to get a cab for half an hour. And the bus stop’s really far—”

“Hey, stop. It’s okay. You should’ve called me sooner.” Seokjin catches your apprehensive gaze on his oversized hoodie when he chances a glance at you. He sighs. “I was returning home from shoot, actually.”

He feels you stiffen, and he feels even more mentally drained at this. You used to be updated with his schedule to the tee — just short of having an actual copy of the calendar his agent carries on him. And the same goes for him with your schedule. This feels so wrong.

You are quiet for a while, your hands fidgeting in his peripheral vision.

“How—how was it?” you finally say, voice coming out like a croak.

Seokjin shrugs his shoulders. “The usual. Blinding, tiring, exhaustive. I did okay, I guess.”

He feels your gaze snap up to drill holes into his skull. Your eyes are wide when he checks. “Okay? Since when do you do anything less than amazing at shoots, babe?”

He feels endeared at your casual use of a pet name. “I had to get up at three in the morning and go through a skincare routine. Then drive across the entire city to get to the location, because they wanted to capture actual sunrise. I was more tired than excited by the time they rolled cameras, so.” He shrugs. “Can’t really say I gave my best today.”

You nod at his admission. 

Seokjin almost jumps when his phone rings, again.

Jiminie calling...

He feels you shift in your seat. His mouth sours at the reminder of that Sue girl that started off this entire tussle between you and him. Fucking Jimin and his conquests. What happened to the shy and more than a little glum looking freshman he let into his living space, three years ago?

Your hand suddenly reaches forth to accept the call, putting it on loudspeaker, immediately. Seokjin gapes at you, momentarily looking away from the road. 

“Uh…hyung?” Jimin’s confused voice echoes in the car. 

Seokjin snaps out of his daze when you gesture towards the device. “Wh—Jimin, hi, what’s — what’s up?” he stumbles his way through a haphazard greeting.

“Hyung, I needed a favor. Are you on your way back from the shoot, right now?” Jimin asks, and Seokjin sees you freeze in your seat.

He feels a perverse sense of satisfaction. Yes, take that! Park Jmin knows of my schedule better than you do! This is what you get for ghosting me! “I was, yeah. What is it?”

“Oh, great! I kinda need your help, hyung. My tire gave out. Could you pick me up from the Kappa hall?”

Seokjin scowls. “Yah! Who am I, your butler? Hop on a damn bus!”

He notices you pursing your lips, no doubt finding his agitation humorous — you always do. 

“Hyu~ng,” Jimin whines. “I would take the bus, but the next one leaves in forty-five minutes and I need to be back within an hour!”

“What? Why?”

“I started on my sem project really late, hyung, and now I gotta spend any time I can spare at the rehearsal hall. I’m meeting a choreographer here in an hour. Please help me out!” Jimin is still whining, and maybe his reasoning is kind of alright, but—

Seokjin is tired to his bones. He literally cannot drive all the way down to your apartment and then drive back to the university campus to pick Jimin up.

He sighs, wearily. “Jimin… I’m really tired.” 

“And I’m really desperate, hyung! Dancing is tough! And the subject I've chosen, tougher. I haven't done ballet since first semester, Freshman year! I have to work my butt off and be done in under two months."

Seokjin exhales, feeling beyond exhausted. But then your finger is tapping on the screen and the call has been muted. Seokjin’s surprised eyes fly up to meet yours. You look conflicted, biting down on your lower lip as you shake your head with a frown.

“You should go home and rest, Jin. Leave the car with me, I’ll pick him up.”

“Hyung? Say something?”

Seokjin blinks. “You…”

You roll your eyes. “I’ll pick him up, yeah. He’ll drop me off and drive back to your place.”

“Hyung?! Did you put me on mute, or what? I can't hear a thing!”

“Tell him you’ll be there in ten!” you say, unmuting the call.

“I’m in the car, the network must have glitched. I’ll, uh… be there in ten?” Seokjin nervously finishes off, looking at you in question. You give him a nod, blinking slowly. “Wait up, okay?”

“Oh my God, thank you so much, hyung!” Jimin practically squeals through the phone. “I’ll be in the ice cream shop across the building. I love you, hyung-nim!”

Seokjin rolls his eyes and disconnects the call. He looks at you from the corner of his eyes as he takes a right, now moving in the direction of his apartment instead of yours. “You sure about this? Jimin, um, knows. About our…” Seokjin doesn’t want to call it the f-word, because he would like to believe that you two aren’t actually fighting. “You being upset, I mean,” he settles for the easier alternative. “He might ask questions.”

You give a small huff of wry laugh. “I can handle it, Seokjin. I’ve known Jimin for almost three years now.”

Seokjin doesn’t like it when you address him by his full name. And so, his lips remain pursed for the remainder of the ride, only parting to tell you to “drive safe and text me when you finally get home,” and then he walks inside his apartment without looking back.

He hears his car come to life and then speed away. He shuts his eyes, leaning against the kitchen counter. Gathering his emotional as well as physical bearings, he opens the refrigerator to rummage through some leftovers to munch on while he breaks out a six pack of Budweiser. 

Before his fried rice has even reheated, Seokjin groans at the sight of an all too jovial Hoseok entering the kitchen with a glint in his eyes. “No, Hobi. Not now.”

“What? I didn’t say a word, hyung!”

Seokjin winces, shutting his eyes just as the microwave beeps. “I don’t have enough energy to deal with your general aura, right now,” he mumbles, extracting the piping hot glass bowl. He leans down to open one of the compartments beneath the kitchen table to get to the beer that he’s been dreaming of for nearly an hour, now. “I’m dead on my feet and—woah!” Seokjin gasps, cutting himself off.

Hoseok hops into the kitchen, coming around to stand behind Seokjin. “So you found ’em,” he says around a chuckle.

“Found ’em? This is you?” Seokjin whips his head around to glare at Hoseok up from his crouch. “Why is my liquor closet resembling a liquor shop, Hobi? Why do we have all this—” he turns around to read the labels, cursing under his breath. “Why do we have,” he pauses to count, “five bottles of Tequila and eight bottles of Vodka?”

Hoseok frowns in concern. “Eight? There should be ten, hyung, check again.”

Seokjin actually gasps, this time. “What the hell, Jung Hoseok? Explain yourself before I start throwing hands!”

Hoseok smacks a palm against his forehead, taking Seokjin by surprise, yet again. “Tonight’s the Halloween party, hyung! Did you actually forget?”

Seokjin screws his eyes shut, letting his head roll back with a frustrated whine. “No~o, don’t tell me it's tonight. Halloween’s tomorrow, right? Why is the party tonight?”

“Yes, hyung, Halloween in tomorrow, which is why it would be stupid to hold the party when Halloween is ending.”

Seokjin finds the logic to be very severely flawed, but his energy is draining out fast and he cannot keep up with this quarrel. There’s no point, anyway. He’s known about this party for nearly a month. And Hoseok isn’t going to postpone a whole party just because Seokjin is tired.

“You look tired, hyung. You should rest. Recharge yourself before the party, okay? There’s plenty of time.” Hoseok pats Seokjin on the shoulder with a kind smile.

“I’m not even in the mood to party, Hobi,” Seokjin mutters, reaching behind all the glass bottles to extract his pack of cans. 

Hoseok scowls at Seokjin. “Because you’re upset about your fight, I realize that. All the more reason to party, hyung! Take your mind off it for some time, why don’t you? You don’t even have to dress up, come as yourself.”

“I’d rather just drink myself to sleep and not wake up for the next twenty four hours.”

Hoseok blocks his path as Seokjin moves to exit the kitchen. “Is Honey coming?”

Seokjin sighs, shrugging his shoulders. “I don’t know, Hobi. Did you invite her?”

“No, hyung, because you said you would.”

Seokjin clicks his tongue. He completely forgot. “Then she isn’t coming.”

Without listening to his protests, Seokjin trudges upstairs with his food and beer. He will be forced to come down for at least a couple shots, he is certain, so he better make as much of the time he has on his hands as he can.

These days, it seems to be becoming a pattern for you to do things without really understanding why you do them. 

You nibble at your bottom lip as you recall how gaunt and pale Seokjin had looked when you sat in the car. You had been really self-centered as it is, not really keeping in touch with him for four days, and then reaching out when you needed help. You couldn’t bear to think, on top of everything, that he had driven you home despite his extreme exhaustion while you sat back selfishly and let him drive around the city to pick Jimin up when he looked like a ghost.

You shake your head at yourself as Jimin jogs down the road to enter the car, ten seconds after you texted him. 

His gaze is slightly hesitant when he meets your eyes, even though his smile is nothing but genuine. “Hello, noona. How come you are…” he trails off, gesturing around the two of you.

You start the car, shrugging one shoulder. “Seokjin came to pick me up. Now you’re gonna drop me off.”

Jimin gives you a huge smile, before his eyebrows suddenly lower. You look away, veering onto the road. “Wait. Were you in the car with him when I called?”

You chuckle. “Yes.”

“Oh,” Jimin mumbles around a small laugh.

You hum to yourself as you drive, distracting yourself from the thoughts that keep encircling your head. Seokjin is your boyfriend, no matter how mad you might be at him — you love him and care about him. Which is why you have tried to help him out. Not to mention, you felt slightly guilty, as it is, about calling him to pick you up. Why is your gesture of goodwill bothering you, then?

This is what you do for people you care about. Seokjin would do the same.

Your train of thoughts suddenly comes to a screeching halt.

Would he? Would he, really?

“You okay, noona?”

You jolt back from your thoughts, wide eyes turning to look at Jimin. “Wha—yes, yeah, I'm fine.”

He cocks an eyebrow at you. “You’re gripping the wheel really hard.”

You look at your tightly clenched fists, and immediately ease them. “Oh, uh. Sorry. A lot on my mind, I guess.”

“Understandably,” Jimin mutters, looking out of the side window when you turn to look at him.

You purse your lips and press down on the accelerator. 

A few beats of silence pass between you two before Jimin clears his throat. “Can I say something?” he asks you in a soft voice, looking nothing like the seductive persona he puts forth to get ladies falling in his bed. 

You exhale. “Sure.”

“You, um. You are not just hyung’s girlfriend, you know?” he says slowly.

You scoff. “Of course, I do. I am also the very best server my restaurant has ever seen and the best struggling model you’ll ever meet, on the side.”

Jimin snorts, before giggling with his eyes closed. “You know that’s not what I meant.”

You do. But you do not want to face it. You want to be selfish, for once. You do absolutely know that you have been ignoring all the boys in your anger at Seokjin, but you absolutely do not wish to do anything about it. Not until you’ve resolved this tense air between you and Seokjin.

“You are also a part of our little family,” Jimin quietly finishes.

You suck your lips in at that. The word “family'' really gets to you. 

He’s right, isn’t he? 

All eight of you — well, nine, now, with the addition of Taehyung’s girlfriend — have been a family since the day you met these guys.

You smile as the memories start to filter in.

You had had a giant crush on Seokjin since the very first time you saw him in your Freshman year. Well, having a crush on the guy wasn’t that unheard of given how handsome he was. It also helped matters that he modelled for the cover page of your university’s journal within his first month in college. What surprised you was his reciprocated interest when you both finally got to know each other, thanks to Byulyi. Your current roommate was majoring in photography back then, and somehow roped the two of you into modelling for her portfolio. Seokjin asked you out during the sixth month of your Freshman year.

You recall being introduced to Yoongi in your Sophomore year, when he entered your college as a Music major. You found him laid back, calm but really sassy, and fun to be around. The three of you often hung out together, and you took immense pleasure in singling Seokjin out with the two of your sarcastic back and forths.

In your senior year, Hoseok transferred to your college as a Sophomore, and Taehyung and Jimin entered as Freshmen. 

Hoseok was literally the most lively person you’d ever met in your life. There wasn’t a single moment of boredom next to him. He was easily given the responsibility of planning all your outings and parties, henceforth — a position he still holds with full competence.

Taehyung was usually found to be lost in his head more often than not in his initial college days. He was confused about his major for two entire semesters. With inputs from the group, when he eventually picked Art, he eased into college life. After that, he came out to be one of the weirdest and unwittingly funny guys in the group. You still don’t get how he was the first amongst all the boys to find him a girl.

Jimin was a really quiet and reserved individual, at first. He very rarely interacted with you all, choosing to stay holed up in his dorm room, instead, that Taehyung had forced him to share with him. You suspected he was recovering from a recent heartbreak. It became evident when he started dating someone within a week of getting into college, only to confess it was a rebound when he got dumped. The whoring around that began after the whole debacle is yet to cease, though. Obviously. 

Hoseok comes from a really well-off family, and had brought along with him the four-bedroom apartment he currently resides in with Yoongi, Jimin and your boyfriend. His uncle gave it away to him, rent-free of course, and he proposed to share it with the rest of the guys. Seokjin and Yoongi were immediately on board, more than eager to leave the chaotic dorm life behind. Taehyung, contrarily, decided he wanted to get the whole college experience and refused to quit the dorms. Jimin, then, left the dorm he shared with Taehyung to move in with the elders.

You met Jungkook immediately after your graduation on the boy’s eighteenth birthday. He instantly struck you as a smart kid, really good at singing as well as art. Yoongi disclosed he wanted to be a music major in your college, and you tried to encourage Jungkook about it, but the guy could hardly even look at you. It was cute but also hilarious how much he was scared of Seokjin, and by principle, you.

You believe that is still true. Now that you think about it, you're pretty sure you haven’t seen Jungkook ever actually relax around the two of you.

“Noona?”

You blink, coming back to the present as Jimin calls out to you. You take a deep breath, the memories hitting you with tender emotions. All these people are really precious to you, aren’t they? The bunch of you really are a family, aren’t you?

A sad smile swims up to your face. You miss the boys.

When he calls again, you turn to look at Jimin, questioningly. 

“Please don’t be mad at hyung,” he slowly says, looking down at his lap. In this moment, he looks quite unlike the Jimin you are used to and reminds you of, instead, the one you’d first met. “He might lack tact, sometimes, but he really loves you a lot. You’re his whole world. Whatever it is that you are angry about, you should tell him about it. I don’t think he would be able to figure it out by himself.”

This, you agree with. “I’ll try, Jiminie.”

“We all miss you. Especially Hobi hyung and I,” he says with a lopsided excuse of a smile. 

You resist the urge to fluff his hair. Jimin and Hoseok have been like the younger brothers you never had. You miss them, too. 

He suddenly chuckles. "And Yoongi hyung hides it well, but I think he's the one that misses you the most. No one helps him roast Jin hyung quite like you do."

You roll your eyes. "Of course not. It's a waste for Yoongi to even try to find a better partner at roasting Jin."

You spot your apartment building and pull up to it. 

“I’ll try to talk to Jin as soon as I can, Jimin, I promise. Don't worry so much about it,” you say as you step out, patting the boy once on his head. "I miss you all, too."

You give a small wave and faint smile to him as he drives away.

tagging: @shrimpmsg​

note: so! a lil bit of backstory and the infamous halloween party - how we feelin’ so far? the next part is ~12k words, too, and i’ll post it next wednesday, wait around~ 😘💕

SECOND PART OUT NOW: read here!

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