#We have all had a friendship triangle situation before. Right? You guys have also struggled to read people. Right?

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Average Drama Enjoyer observes some peak drama.

[hoodie-prince-kid]

Huey (rant invitation)

When Port Prisma got the paint stars stolen from the fountain, Huey was what emerged from the fountain's emergency system. He introduced himself by saying "let's get burgers, your treat" before letting Mario drain his color in order to fight off a stray shy guy in the town. At the ends of the game, after everything theyve been thru, Huey thanks Mario just before the final battle, and then in the battle turns himself into a card to become a solid object again, which made it go full circle. As the guardian of the paint fountain in Port Prisma, he realized his job wasnt to get the paint stars, but to get rid of the black paint that Bowser inadvertantly created. He told the others he would be right behind them as they escaped the castle, which was a lie, and proceeded to squeeze the paint out of the *entire castle*.

He's never seen the ocean before, but he loves it.

He's never been to a circus but he was so excited to go.

He's bad in front of crowds. (He tried a tin can impression and no one liked it [i liked it], said it would kill back at the recycling plant which?? Are there other living inanimate objects like Huey??? Hello?????)

He "speaks Draggadon" but he hasnt used it since college and his Draggadon speak is just SIMPLE SENTENCES IN ALL CAPS. (He also told the Draggadon "WE LOVE YOU.")

He's been to college, apparently.

He loves paint and values friendship.

He called shenanigans when the giant coin in the Mondo Woods was only worth one coin upon being picked up.

He was excited to see the fossil at the excavation site and told Mario to go ahead, he'd catch up.

He started a "if anything happens i will protect you" speech just before a chain chomp rolled in out of nowhere and interrupted him (i guess that was foreshadowing, looking back).

He steams and whistles like a tea kettle when he's mad.

He finds Toads adorable but also mumbled to Mario "Why can't we ever meet anyone normal?" upon meeting the lighthouse Toad.

His 3D model uses more triangles than the entirety of Super Mario 64.

He can smell paint stars (the green ones smell "minty fresh", apparently).

He wanted to fight at the coliseum but realized Mario would be the one doing the fighting and sounded it a bit disappointed. (Now thst i think abt it, they could very much have called it "The Colorseum". Missed opportunity.)

He makes bad paint puns and tries to use one to add levity to the situation after the battle with Kamek.

Mario had to whack him with a hammer several times (only once did he get truly upset abt it, in which case he was freaking out abt i mini goomba stuck on his back and Mario really had no choice ["You BETTER not have dented my can, fur face" will live rent free in my memory forever.])

His handles come apart which is something ive never seen a bucket or paint can be able to do but clearly it was solely so they could give him an equivalent to hands because he can clap and "dance".

He absorbed Bowser's black paint at Sunglow Ridge and told Mario to close his eyes and "never speak of this again" (i guess thst was foreshadowing too huh).

His little mask thing changes colors based on his emotions.

He sank into quicksand once and i panicked and when I finally got to him the game said "Huey's not breathing!" but we whacked him with the hammer and he was fine, just full of sand and stating that it's a good thing paint cans dont need to breathe.

Clearly has a sense of fairness, called out the scam at Bloo Bay Beach and got mad when the "legendary mountain sage" turned out to be a cardboard cutout.

Saved Mario from falling in lava and shouted "I got you, bud!"

If you lose a boss battle without the right Thing card he'll pop up on the game over screen and tell you.

He's so encouraging and cheerful, lots of times he cheered Mario on when he was struggling, including in the boss battle.

Apologized for forcing Mario to come with him to recover the paint stars which no, he didn't, Peach told Mario to go and Mario always listens to Peach because he loves her. Plus Mario's a hero and he'll always do what's right for the greater good but now that i think about it probably does need a break.

Thinks the Toad Rescue Squad scarves are "choice".

Wants to buy Birdo's album.

Thats all i got rn and already i know it's a lot so here ya go jdbsndbdb-

[life-rewritten]

TRUE BEAUTY; TRUE TRAUMAS AND UNSETTLING REGRESSIONS

The anger, the anguish, and upset I feel from the last moments of episode 10 are unspeakable. I can not believe how flawed and disgusting some of the parents are in this show. And I'm not particularly eager to write when I'm emotional and entirely overtaken by anger and sadness, but I also wanted to address immediately because this essay isn't about the love triangle. I couldn't give a hoot about the love triangle; I don't care what side people are on, because I think it's ridiculous that, that's what people came out of this week's episodes and focusing on. Like really, we're still doing this Suho vs Seojun nonsense, like make it make sense? Like no one is perfect, no one is a monster, all of them are just characters and yes Suho is problematic, Seojun also is, Jukyung this week was even more so, everybody likes to focus on their bias and forget that it's not that deep, it's okay to call out Suho on his mistakes but to sit there and fangirl about Seojun as the best hero boyfriend or whatever, when this episode had so much more depth to it, that's ridiculous. Anyway everyone is free to have their own opinions, but I can't believe that this tag is still full of Suho hate, absolutely absurd.  Back to the actual focus of this essay, what can I say True Beauty has always been about PTSD, trauma and the pain and suffering of our main characters, how that has shaped them, changed their mindsets on themselves, hindered them from growth, love and happiness. In Episode 9 and 10 all our characters with masks apart from Seojun who just kept growing regressed and fell apart because of past reminders of their traumas. Let me explain more as we get into it.

First of all, one of the most critical vital themes of this episode is about Secrets, especially how secrets can cause disconcert, miscommunication and chaos. All of the characters hold some kind of secret from their respective partners, family, friends, etc., and in hiding these secrets, they lose their positive attributes because of how stressed they are by the secrets, how ashamed they feel from the secrets and how afraid they are about what the reveal of the secrets would cause. Most importantly, we see Suho, Soojin and Ju Kyung spiral into regression because of the consequences of their masks and secrets.

Ju Kyung: A flashback to the past

Truthfully I was very peeved of by Ju Kyung these two episodes, but I mean it's evident that this was going to happen as mentioned before, Ju Kyung has severe PTSD from her past with bullying and suffering because the world made her feel inadequate and worthless because of what she lacks. Although Kyung ends up with someone who completely sees her for who she is, is supportive and by her side completely, Kyung can't help but question this blessing as a curse. This is what self hate, and self-deprecation does, immediately she receives something good for her, Kyung starts to withdraw in fear because some part of her can't believe she deserves to be happy and satisfied with Suho. Now, as I said, I was annoyed, but also I saw her reasons loud and clear and I understood them because I related to them as well. Let's first look at the situation that occurs to cause her to spiral.

Her secret is that she's dating Suho. Pause. Now at first she's hesistant because of the fear of bullying and being noticed and being pushed into the spotlight because of his reputation. However, because of him being him, taking care of her, making her feel brave and loving herself (he does so much to show her she's okay being her self), she decides she doesn't care if the secret is out. Unfortunately for Kyung, another secret is revealed; Soojin her new best friend someone, who she's so close to has feelings for Suho. In fact, she also has really fascinating and important reasons for why she believes Suho should be hers. Now, this is what truly causes Kyung's trauma to appear again, and she becomes a mess of emotions because she has spiralled back into self-hate and self-deprecation. Let me explain.

Losses and Fears

In order to understand why Kyung's trauma is actually more profound than it seems because it does feel quite dramatic and unimportant with the reveal of other people's secrets and situations, her crying about Suho not understanding her and why she's struggling seems really overdramatic and not needed. But let me take you back to episode 1, Kyung has been in this situation before, and this situation led her to want to take her life. Let's review

In episode 1,  Kyung was confident and happy in her self; she had a crush on a guy who made her smile, comfortable, and one of the people who paid attention to her and cared for her. Now this guy she had feelings for, as she confessed; she discovered he had feelings for another person, someone more prettier, popular and matched for him as people put it. This led to her confession with this guy bringing out the worst side of him; it led to her also losing her best friend who she relied on because she went to the popular girl out of fear, it led to her being taunted and broken by people making her feel like how dare she even think she could confess. You have to realise what they're saying to her, one she's not worth having a guy pay attention to her because of her looks, two she shouldn't try even to get someone's attention because the right person will find that person and they'll realise their mistake in associating with her, three, friendship and people are fickle, and she'll always be alone if she tries to do what she wants.

So back to our situation, Kyung has finally found a safe space. The beginning of episode 9 she reveals one of her secrets (part of her growth) to Soojin who completely protects and stays by her side. Soojin becomes the best friend she could ever have, she relies on her and is happy because of her. So she's regained a new best friend, but also she's found, love. A guy has thoroughly chosen to be with her despite her looks and whatnot (she thinks), this guy is a complete package, he's a prince, he's too good to be true, he protects, he's warm, and he makes her feel safe. (Just like the other guy did), lastly, she's also now found a place with her peers, she's no longer looked down on, and everyone likes her. There's a lot in her mind at stake if she chooses to reveal to Soojin the truth. It just makes her vulnerable, and it makes her more likely to lose everything, she finally regained by wearing her mask. It makes her return to that mindset in episode 1, where she felt she was worthless, and useless, a burden, and she should take her life. So her trauma is ingrained in her and causes her to spiral into self-doubt, fear, and hate just because she's gone through this before.

Lies and Masks

Now the past situation made her feel one thing; people are fickle. No matter how much Suho is here for her and says he wants her, his love is fickle. It can change, he just needs to find the right person, the smarter person, the prettier person, the more affluent person who matches him. Soojin is that. But even more from what Soojin is saying to her, Suho is just exactly like how he is with Kyung. He's protective, he's apparently warm, and he goes out of his way to make Soojin feel safe when he doesn't do that for anyone. In her head, he just hasn't realised he wants her the same way he wants Kyung cause she makes him care. And we all know what happened when someone else found another opportunity where the girl of his dreams wanted him, the cruel words he said, the way he pushed her away, Kyung feels like Suho has every right to do the same because she feels like she's not in his league. Because people; her mum, her bullies, her ex-friends, even strangers have made her feel like she's not meant to be perfect for him because she's dumb, ugly and has nothing to offer apart from makeup. And that's just painful and heartbreaking. What is she to do in this situation, losing Soojin is already painful because that's someone who she also holds in high regards in her life, someone who she depends on as a friend.

But it's not just that. As I said, she believes people's love and care for her is fickle. Actually, Soojin is proving her right without her knowing, Soojin isn't being a good friend. She's going behind the scenes to manipulate Kyung, making her feel listless knowing she's dating Suho. But the issue is Soojin also knows her without her mask, her deepest fears, her deepest secret, she has a weapon if Kyung tells her she's dating Suho. If Soojin switches, Kyung reverts back to her episode 1 self where the whole school sides with the popular girl, and she reveals the truth about how she looks without makeup. She loses not just her best friend but also her new safe space and she regresses back into the girl on the rooftop broken and exhausted of being alive.

Real vs Fake

And that's the painful thing because the reason why Kyung believes people are on her side is because of her mask of makeup and beauty, Suho thinks he likes her because she is pretty with her makeup at least, Soojin became her friend because she felt she was different and prettier, and people in the school rate her high because she's pretty. It's all about how much her mask has helped her be reborn as she said to Selena. But because she knows her mask isn't real, these people's feelings, and loyalty, friendship also isn't real, she has to keep up this facade to keep it accurate, and to stay in this lie she's created as long as she's safe, happy and able to walk around freely being her self. Something people refused her to do before because she had no right to be satisfied being ugly and dumb. So you see it's actually genuinely traumatic and painful what she's dealing with.

However, the painful thing about the fickleness of feelings is that Kyung has Suho and Suho has been in love with her and has been consistent with his care for her from the time he knew her without her mask. Since they were kids. Suho spent the whole episodes being grateful that he had her as his girlfriend, wanting to show her to the world, wanting to be with her, and Kyung's need to keep secrets was pushing his feelings, and his fears and his worries aside because she was more focused on prevention and protection. Now Suho doesn't care for other people or see other people the way he sees Kyung, for him Soojin is barging into his life without needing to be there, he told her this, but he doesn't see it as a big issue to tell Kyung she's there because she's not important. But Seojun is important, Seojun has already told him how he feels for Kyung, and Kyung seems pretty reliant and close to Seojun who keeps crossing the line sometimes (like coming to her house and staying when her boyfriend is there, competing and what not) this is what causes him to get agitated and tell her the way he knows how. 

He's had no parental care, no training, no nurturing to know what's wrong and right, he's been forced to deal with his issues on his own, and he isolated himself from people, we can see he struggles with relationships, and he's trying to navigate it. So it's not okay for him to act possessive and controlling over who she should be with, but it also makes sense with his character when he doesn't know how to show emotions appropriately, and he's jealous and worried because she's being happy and close with Seojun in one corner and avoiding his calls and him in the other. It doesn't make sense. This is what I was peeved off at her for. Both Kyung and Suho are in the wrong in this situation, not just Suho.

Speaking of Suho, let's talk about this episode, his secrets as Leo and the reveal of how Seoyeon got set up.

Suho; A memory of regrets

Now the frustrating thing about this situation is; I can't fathom humans that do this, I can't understand how cold and heartless someone can be that he drives someone to take their life, and he still acts nonchalant and cold about that person because he doesn't care about rookies. Suho's father is incredibly disgusting as a human, and I completely can't stand him. The reveal that Seoyeon's demise was because he wanted to cover up a dating scandal, his son's best friend, who his son is literally suffering PTSD because he believed he was the reason his friend jumped. It's so disgusting when you think about it. This episode does an excellent job in showing us how much Suho has struggled with emotions and life because of his father's reputation, personality, and upbringing. And that's why I don't understand how people can come into this episode and come out with hate for Suho. Make it make sense.

The first thing episode 9 shows about Suho, which was actually foreshadowing the final conflict in episode 10 is his lack of a fatherly figure despite the fact he had a father. We see him interact with his father when he goes to have dinner with Soojin's own disgusting family, and we realise this is all his father does for him. He makes little quips about why he and Suho can't spend time together, and we all know Suho holds resentment at his father for cheating and sleeping with women, but also the trauma he had from dealing with paparazzi because of his father's fame, and the fact his father was barely in his life to show him emotional support and care. This is even worse when you realise again why Seoyeon got set up because his father wanted to protect his reputation, to sleep with someone, and because he didn't care about people's emotions and wellbeing.

Warmth and Comfort

Now the only thing that helped him deal with his father at first was Seoyeon and Seojun; it's making me cry again. The thing that got him through his tough upbringing was his friends, they brought purpose through music (another secret he's Leo), they brought happiness and care through friendship, and they brought comfort through their presence. They were loyal, close, and ready to help each other no matter what. His father took that away from him. Not just took that away from him but broke his mindset about how he views himself, damaged his relationship and trust with people, and pulled him into a spiral of self hate and self deprecation and regrets because he set Seoyeon up. How messed up can someone be? It's even worse because he knows he's the reason why Suho lost his friend, and he still had the guts, the confidence, the heart to plagiarise the person he ruined's song. Even not knowing that his son is the one he's plagiarising from.  His father took it all from him. He made Suho think he's a burden, his reputation is a curse, and he's doomed to be alone to protect people away from him. It's funny because this is how Kyung also feels in her own regression. Both Suho and Kyung believe that they shouldn't be worth interacting with people because they're burdens and problematic for just being born. For Suho it's being born into his family, for Kyung it's being born with her looks and brains.  It's incredibly heartbreaking and frustrating.

That's why it's even more painful because episode 9, Suho gets to stay in a lie for a while with Kyung's father staying with him, showing him the warmth, care and support he didn't have with his father. That's why we got that scene; it was to make you compare how different Suho's father is to him, compared to a flawed father like Kyung who's a headache but is also a good source of comfort and love. Suho finally got to feel that care that he was lacking. But still, Suho's father's coldness and heartlessness also shadow to let us know why Suho is the way he is when he has a go at Kyung and tells her to stop hanging out with Seojun; when he is posessive and protective over her without listening to what she's saying. He hasn't had a significant role model/ influence to look up to. He also became like his father on the surface and withdrawn from emotions because he doesn't receive that. It's honestly upsetting. I am so angry at Suho's father.

Regrets and Resent

But let's talk about the regression. Suho finding out his father is the one who caused Seoyeon's demise. First of all, just think about how much Suho has suffered the past ten episodes because of this issue, he's had PTSD, actual PTSD, panic attacks, depression, anxiety, isolation, just because of this issue, because Seojun told him repeatedly he was the reason for why Seoyeon jumped. Because his reputation could not save Seoyeon, because he didn't answer the phone because of his callousness and also because he fought with the very reason for why this happened; his father.

Seojun made Suho feel like he was a monster, and he was never going to be any different because his father was his father. And the thing is, this has been going for a long time, Seojun kept showing up in Suho's life ensuring he never got to be happy (at the beginning not now), he never got to feel worthy of peace, love, friendship because of what he did to Seoyeon. In a way, if you actually think about Seojun's role in Suho's life for a while, he's been like the bullys who ensured Kyung didn't feel happy being her self the way she was because of how she looked. Now he's not as bad because he's not doing it purposely with that intention of psychological harm and breakdown, because he also doesn't think Suho feels any guilt or issue with Seoyeon's demise. But it's pretty messed up that the person everyone is hailing to be this perfect specimen was literally playing the same roles as the bullies you claim to hate in Suho's life.

Like I keep repeating all these characters are flawed, have made mistakes because they're human, but the hate and the bias towards some of them is insane and makes no sense to me.

But now Suho has entirely as Kyung went back to a flash to the past, he's spiralled again into self hate, self deprecation and trauma because he found out the truth. If he's already been struggling with not answering the phone to help Seoyeon; imagine how much of a monster he'll feel because it's his dad who set Seoyeon up to fail. Imagine the pain and suffering, the self-hate, the same things Seojun kept telling him will keep repeating in his head, his reputation hurts people, his dad hurts people, and his lifestyle hurts people. He shouldn't be loved, have friends, or have people around him because he doesn't deserve that when they can end up like Seoyeon. All of his bottled down secret; self-hate is now released because the reason is connected to him from the start, it was his father. So Kyung and Suho found themselves with their masks unveiled, broken and scared and terrified about the consequences of choosing to be happy and free. Now, both of them hold this burden and weight making them feel like they don't deserve to want to be happy, in love and confident in what they deserve because of what society has done to them. And that's insane.

Soojin- A journey of a villain 

Before I stop, we also need to speak about Soojin and her regression. Her regression is very fascinating and upsetting. I have been on edge about her character, and it was excruciating to see her become manipulative, sly and a full second lead this episode. But what can I say. It was going to happen. Soojin's secrets revealed this episode to Kyung is about the abuse she suffers, we also see a snippet again of her fathers sexist, heartless mindset about controlling her to ensure she makes the grades. We also see her regress back to hand washing and self-harm because of the news that Suho is dating Kyung. Now, her mindset in the last episodes have been noticing the warmth, and comfort Suho brings into her life. There's no one else who sees her, knows her, and can protect her without her mask. Suho has known her for ten years. They've been each other's support system to deal with their family, now for Suho, he cut the importance of her presence in his life because he pushed everyone away after, but for her, Suho has been a consistent person to rely on.

A safe space

Kyung showing up and making Suho open and caring made her feel fear and anxiety that the only source of happiness and warmth was being taken away from her. Suho is the only thing that makes her breath, everything else is a mask that makes her feel suffocated, even her friendships; she's not been her real self with them, she's been a perfectionist. Even her revealing her truth to Kyung this episode wasn't for friendship but for emotional manipulation, and it wasn't right. Like Kyung, Soojin regresses because she's afraid to go back to who she has to be without Suho's presence, which is protection, warmth and care compared to her actual home, cold, harsh and volatile. She had to latch onto something to stay sane and to stop breaking down. Suho, unfortunately, is what she latched onto. And it is a regression on her part because Kyung is her best friend, she's emotionally manipulating and hurting her best friend to make her self feel good and get what she wants.

Still, she's not even getting what she wants because Suho isn't going to pay attention to her apart from protecting her from her father as someone should do. Soojin has been a girls girl, supportive, protective, and kind to everyone she meets but now she's regressed to being petty, conniving and mean to her own friends because she can't lose her own safe space. Kyung regressed not to lose her safe space and for Soojin her safe space became Suho. Her regression is really unsettling because how far would she go to keep her safe space, and how far will she sacrifice Kyung's wellbeing and emotions for her own gain. She's dangerous because she knows Kyung's secret, she can unload the truth about Kyung pettily and get some kind of one up on her, which is sad because she's slowly regressing into those bullies that made Kyung's life hell.

Volatile Mindsets

In fact, she shadows like I said the popular girl in episode 1, she wants to get her way, and she feels slighted by Kyung taking it away from her. Also her self esteem, her ego is being bruised because she's meant to be the one for Suho as society keeps telling her, she's the prettiest, the smartest, his equal, why would he choose Kyung who is so far not that close to her level in any way. These are the kind of thoughts that happens when trauma makes you regress. Whilst Suho and Kyung are regressing into self-hate, and self deprecation Soojins regression is the opposite direction, it's regressing into self privilege and self-obsession, it's unfortunate.

There's so much more about this episode that we can discuss like I said everyone has a secret, but when it comes to these three, their secrets and unfortunate reveals causes them to spiral into a whirl of self-hate and pain, trauma and suffering. This has been building up for a while because their mindsets have been shaped and made this way because of all the hurts and attacks by society to them, not just society that affects them this way; with these three family affects them this way, Kyung's mum, Suho's dad, and Soojin's dad their nonchalant, and cold attitudes towards their children cause them to feel unstable and worthless, and also friends also causes them to spiral this way, For Kyung, Soojin has brought back a lot of fear and anxiety about where her life is going, and Seojun's past problematic actions have returned along with Suho's guilt to make him also spiral into self-hate and regret. Kyung, Soojin's best friend, has caused her to lose her safe space. These characters have been pushed into this by people they thought they could rely on, and that's what painful.

Anyway, if anyone wants to know my opinions on this love triangle,  I appreciate Seojun he's a great second lead. Still, he's not the one for Kyung or the right person as people keep trying to say, he and Suho are still equal on terms with who she should be with. The person she cares about is Suho; the person she loves/wants is Suho. She's not thought of Seojun in that way so respect it. There is so much more going on in this show than this love triangle, so much more to discuss and fight for, each character is human and makes their mistakes, but they're all so understandable and relatable, and the pain they suffer is just insane, the psychological trauma they all hold is too much to bare, and I really hope they find their way out of this. Because right now, Suho is not going to be okay, and Kyung is in danger of her past finding her.  I'm scared for them so much. This stuff may seem overdramatic and chaotic but with trauma and pain, and self-hate and psychological distress, it's not easy to overcome emotional abuse, trauma and mindsets that make you feel you're not meant to be alive, and all these characters are going through that. And it's so painful. Let's hope we find a way out of this: love triangle or no love triangle.

[poly-space-nerds]

ok i wanna talk about s2 of love victor

hi okay so just finished and lemme tell y’all. i am not happy. i’m gonna go through all my thoughts and you are all welcome to ignore this. i just have no one else to talk about it with.

Alright! Let’s get started with the things i did like, bc there is so few of them.

Armando!! His support was so surprising!

Isabel learning was grade A for me. I love that it showed her progress and how messy it is. like i very much disliked her at times but damn i was still rooting for her.

Armando and Isabel’s relationship is great. it made me so happy.

Felix’s story with his mom. It was complicated and so very messy but it was good.

Rahim! what a fun character!

The little brother was good too! “spongebob is gay”

Mia’s thing with her dad. (fuck him. weirdly i dislike him more than Isabel) I actually like Mia (and Lake) waaay more this season. They had good conflict.

Andrew was actually kinda nice this season.

There were so many cute venji scenes!!

okay now for the things i actually want to talk about: the bad.

can they actually talk about Felix’s alcoholism?? Please?? Instead of just making it a plot point for venji to fight about????? Literally any focus on felix thanks. (i love victor. and i know this show is literally called love victor. but wow it felt like their relationship was mostly about him all the time. Actually, its most of victor’s relationships. Felix will talk about something and they’ll talk but it’ll just come right back around to Victor’s problems. Like hun, did you even know about Felix’s mom before he moved in with you???)

Pilar. Damn girl what happened to you? Last season was about this anger she had for her mom and the situation. she had her own drama. but this season? She’s barely in it and is reduced to what? Felix’s next love interest? I miss S1 Pilar. Come back please.

ok. ok ok ok. Pilar and Felix. wow. also no. i have never seen real chemistry between them. i have always seen them as a big bro/ lil sis. so much so that i was uncomfortable watching either kisses. when the trailer came out, i was so excited to see them be friends! but now...ew. i am very much not excited to see them together next season. i’m grossed out even thinking about make out scenes.

i’m gonna miss Lake and Felix. a lot. Lake being bi is interesting! never saw her with those vibes but not against it. her and lucy is...something i wish was more developed. and not something that’s happening right after Felix broke up with her. (do these kids just constantly get into relationships??)

ALRIGHTY. time for this. the love triangle. just.. no thank you. I like Rahim! he’s great. i think him and victor have a good friendship. but thats it. just friendship. I felt so, so uncomfortable watching them in the last episode. so much so that i skipped most of it. i certainly skipped Rahim’s confession. my mind was going no no no no thank you no. it was just so unneeded. Victor and Benji are already having problems. why add in another guy. and really?? not all gay people date each other jesus christ. gay people can just be friends! they had good chemistry, but the directors really think that most of us would be happy with this development? Us? the same people who watched Simon and Bram get together and are delighted for their lil happily ever after? Nah. I’d be so disappointed to watch all of venji’s struggles to even just get together, just for them to break up and Victor get in a relationship thats been so poorly developed compared to Venji. (and I mean. i know that’s not gonna happen. victor’s known rahim for like a month. maybe less than that. of course he saw his future with Benji. of course he’s at Benji’s door. it’s a lil insulting they would even try to trick us like that.) I’m here for happily ever afters y’all. 

okay so are we never gonna get a Simon and Bram scene??? like come on! I’m still upset at s1 when they put them in the same room but they didnt interact! now we see Simon again but no Bram! (and why is his apartment so fancy?) I literally just said i’m in it for the happily ever after and they’re not even gonna show Simon and Bram being cute together in theirs??? blasphemy!! (no but seriously whats up with that?? do the actors not like each other or something??)

this season left me so disappointed. like i’m not very excited for the next season. I mean, of course I’ll watch it. maybe. as long as victor didn’t go to Rahim’s house tbh. i’m just brokenhearted and sad. maybe that was the purpose of this season? idk. i’m gonna go not think about pilar and felix.

[jeonqukie]

SOMEBODY ELSE / 02 ( ALT ).

SYNOPSIS / After years of working up the courage to confess his feelings for you, Min Yoongi decides to give up and move on from the unrequited position he has put himself in. However, when you discover his veiled attraction towards you, you dwell on what could have been. You find yourself ready to reciprocate the same sentiment for him, only you’re too late when he reveals he has already found someone else. Consequently, you’re lured into a series of meaningless and warped encounters from the one person you swore to avoid.

FEATURING / Min Yoongi; brief appearances by Kim Seokjin, Jung Hoseok, Park Jimin, and Jeon Jungkook.

GENRES / Angst, romance, mature, friends with benefits, and unrequited love.

WARNINGS / This chapter contains alcohol consumption, graphic language, mentions of sexual activity, mentions and acts of infidelity, and other mature themes.

WORD COUNT / 4.2k.

TABLE OF CONTENTS / To be redirected and get the latest on the story, click on the table of contents.

NOTES / Because part 3 of somebody else will take some time to write, I decided to post one of the original ideas I had thought of for part 2. I still really like this version a lot, but I feel like I wasn’t going to go the direction I wanted to. So please enjoy this alternate version while I still plot out part 3! In another world, this is what I had planned out for this love triangle. Feedback is always appreciate. Big reminder that I am forever grateful that you took your time to read this! Thank you very much for taking your time to read this. (つ≧▽≦)つ

© All rights reserved to jeonqukie. All or portions of my work may not be reproduced, distributed, modified, or used in any way whatsoever without my permission.

“Ladies, gentlemen, and our non-binary friends,” All it took was one step inside of Ernie’s newly renovated bar to hear the particularly flamboyant introduction from the opposite side of the room. “We are pleased to announce the arrival of the new division head of advertising, YN.”

Your cheeks ignited at Seokjin’s grandiose greeting. The rest of the gang was evidently hammered from the boisterous cheers and praises. Nevertheless, it was nearly impossible to avoid the incessant stares from other bar attendees when your feet hastily walk towards the other side of the room.

“Ernie, another round of shots over here, please!” Michelle’s request could be heard from a mile away. You began to strip out of the beige blazer that matched your skirt off of your body only to reveal your white button-up shirt with the sleeves rolled up all the way to your elbows.

“I told you guys to get started with the drinks - not to get fucking hammered.”

“Sweetheart, the moment you gave us the approval, we couldn’t help ourselves.” You were seated in between Hoseok and Michelle, trying to make yourself comfortable inside the semi-circular booth. On the other end was Jimin and Seokjin who were awaiting patiently for the new round of drinks to appear on the table.

“Plus, it’s your fault for being late.”

“It’s not really my fault that I had to stay an hour back at the office. There were just a couple of paperwork I needed to complete.”

Could you imagine what your boss would have said if you refused to stay back at the office after you recently earned your promotion? It would have led to her doubting her decision to promote you. So you had no choice but to go along with the flow.

Frankly, it didn’t take long for you to earn your position. It may sound immodest of you to assume that, but you’ve only been working for a year and a half and you were already the division head in advertising. It’s funny how a year and a half ago, you were merely just an intern, fighting for a permanent position in the company.

The glasses of spirits soon arrive at your table, Hoseok captures one and placed the minuscule glass across from where you sat. “Alright, everybody, grab a shot because I shall propose a toast -“ But at the corner of your eye, your main focal point happened to be at the front door where he stood; dark mane and pale face when he enters the vicinity with the now familiar, Tiffany.

“Oh, shit, Yoongi and Tiffany are here! Okay, now, it’s a real party!” The sputtering slurs began erupting out of Seokjin’s mouth and all eyes immediately dart towards you.

You weren’t just a mere intern, struggling to find her place in the company a year and a half ago. You were just as lost and confused when it came to your own personal life. You vividly remember the morning Yoongi confronted you of your feelings - how you interrogated him of his true emotions with the both of you coming to the conclusion that there was no happy ending for the both of you.

The circle was in an awkward position for a while, unsure of whether you and him can be in the same room. But for the sake of everyone’s sanity, you were forced to make up with him. Well, you didn’t want to say you were forced to make up with him.

Your friends were too fed up to deal with the cumbersome conversations, so Hoseok and Seokjin had unwillingly bring you together to resolve the predicament you both found yourselves in.

To be honest, you missed him a lot. Persistently trying to avoid him for a good two months was draining, especially when he would be with Tiffany. You were quite surprised she hadn’t caught onto the dynamics of the clique after nearly being with Yoongi for months. You felt an ache in your chest every time she seemed to tag along with him. You even remembered the gut-wrenching moment when you overheard from Jimin that Yoongi manage to convince Tiffany to move in with him.

Suddenly, you found yourself back with Taehyung - in your eyes, he was a saving grace. He was constantly there to numb and alleviate you from the pain. You were always frustrated, absolutely depressed and sought for the comfort you yearned for. For some reason, you were okay every time - as Michelle would say, he’d fuck the sorrow out of your poor soul.

You recovered from the pain and your naive mind believed that you were immune to it.

You thought that everything was fine; you focused on work, focused on rekindling the same friendship with Yoongi and you even ignited a new one with Tiffany herself. She was genuinely sweet, caring, and selfless when it came to Yoongi. Soon enough, you were getting comfortable with the idea that, perhaps, the universe was right - maybe you and Yoongi were better off as friends.

Of course, that wasn’t the case.

Oh, how you were so wrong.

Just a month ago, you remembered how everybody gathered over to their apartment for a movie night and Yoongi made the announcement that he’s asked for Tiffany’s hand in marriage and she inevitably said yes. 

Who wouldn’t say no to someone like him?

Living your life so normally, thinking that things have gotten better was just the naivety coming to slap you right across the face.

The pang of agony was unbearable. You weren’t so sure how you survived the two hours in their apartment with their radiating, saccharine faces.

Not even Taehyung could save you from this one.

You recalled the moment you and Michelle arrived home - how you stampeded over to the bathroom when you began to regurgitate all of the nauseating pain at the pits of your stomach. You were no where near drunk - just utterly miserable.

The sting of your eyes came crawling back to your eyes when the large diamond ring shone right across your face. With Yoongi and Tiffany at the end of the table, Seokjin looked at you straight in the eye, awaiting for you to raise your shot glass once more.

“Earth to YN, I need you to have your glass raised up.” You apologized hastily and raised the glass hesitantly, blushing in embarrassment when everyone had managed to catch you in a state of otherworldliness. “As I was saying, a big fucking congratulations to YN.” It was conspicuous that Seokjin was absolutely inebriated and you savored his demeanor; he was so carefree and loose. “And, also, to our Yoongi who, in a month, will no longer be a fucking bachelor.”

Everyone raised their glass yet you remained… paralyzed.

The clinks of the glass against each other notified you to take the shot into your lips and you swallowed it, feeling the stinging burn coating your throat.

With your eyes pinched closed, you open your eyes only to see Yoongi directly at you. For a split second, he saw the slightest unravel of your guard. He could feel his own chest swell when he notices the way Michelle’s arms slither around your shoulders, whispering words of comfort into your ear before your lips unwontedly twitch onto a discomforting grin. Your eyes glistened underneath what little lighting the bar possessed and when both your eyes lock onto each other, he can see the light in your eyes losing its spark ever so slowly.

You made the announcement that you will be using the restroom and that you should be back with another order of drinks. Scooting your way out of the booth, Yoongi’s eyes follow to where you hastily amble towards the women’s restroom. He tried his best to ignore the way you felt about the situation. He knew that if he factored you in to every decision he made, he wouldn’t be able to progress his relationship with her.

However, when the words came slipping out of somebody else’s mouth that he would no longer be an emotionally available man, it dawned on him how soon everything seemed and he tries his best not to dwell on the fact that there was a slim possibility that he was regretting the decisions he made himself.The night was still relatively young. It was close to midnight, but your feet was growing painfully exhausted from being at the dance floor all night. In order to avoid the newly engaged couple, Michelle and Jimin were trying their best to aid you in distracting yourself from your pain and, hopefully, avoiding you from a really bad mistake.

In this case, they feared that you would drunkenly dial your unofficial bootycall.

But Taehyung has made it clear that it’s best if he strayed away from you… because there was only so much he can do to help you forget Yoongi. Every time he had the chance to see you, it gave him more confirmation that you were anything but over Yoongi. Despite his efforts of making you forget him, he realizes that you were utterly in love with somebody else and he can’t change a thing about it.

Michelle held your phone so close to her while Jimin spun you in circles all night. You yearned to have the phone back to your safety, in case your boss called you for an emergency, but they knew it was wise of them to keep it as far away from you. But they had their limits, too.

“That’s the last song, I’m beat.” Jimin surrenders in defeat which is quite surprising for someone like him. He had so much energy and he was usually the last one off of the dance floor. But you can see from corner of your booth how Tiffany nuzzled ever so lovingly onto Yoongi’s neck when they whisper to each other and your eyes dart back to Jimin who was ambling over towards the bar along with Michelle and you were left stranded in the middle of the floor awkwardly.

It wasn’t until you feel the warmth of somebody else’s body against yours. You spun around to meet eyes with a much taller male; his hair slightly parted with the ends just ending at the top of his brows. His hooded doe eyes stare right down at you with his naturally pink lips curling onto a flirtatious grin.

“H - hi,” You were breathless and taken aback by his handsome face when the song switches over to a much slower rhythm, introducing a romantic guitar at the background. “I - uh, I’m sorry. You must have me mistaken for somebody else.” However, he shakes his head when his large palm envelopes your wrist gently, urging you to slither his arms around his shoulders.

“I saw your friends abandon you and you looked… lonely, so I decided to come and save the day.” He chuckles darkly when you oblige to his request. The romantic guitar playing in the background is not helping you establishing personal space with the newfound stranger. But you weren’t necessarily protesting against it; it was just a little too forward for your liking especially when you couldn’t see your friends in sight. “Plus, you have some serious dance moves."

“Saving me won’t do anything.” It was a depressing thought and you were already biting back the tears that shimmered your eyes when you looked onto the stranger’s eyes. “There’s really no point in saving damaged goods.” You concluded your self-deprecating statements with a dark chuckle, cocking your head to the side to see just how he would react. “Thank you though; I learned from both of my friends who abandoned me. I think you should be dancing with them instead of me." He swipes his tongue across his mouth when he guides you to the rhythm of the song; hips grinding and swaying together, bodies getting closer and closer to each other.

“What’s your name?” He whispers ever so softly into your ear when his large hand is placed right at the small of your back, right above your ass.

“YN.” You answer him breathlessly. Oddly enough, you find yourself being so responsive to his touch - to his voice and to his requests. “I think it’s fair you give me yours?”

“Jungkook.” He sighs before looking you straight into your eyes. “Whoever hurt you,” he begins before his the palm of his hand comes to cup your cheek, thumb circling over the cheek. “… is a real fucking idiot.”

Your laugh travels so far through the room and Yoongi reactively searches for your location. He watches you nuzzle onto the warmth of the stranger’s palm, feeling the world move around you. You were reminded just how out of tune you were out of your normal self. The buzzed brain clearly did not function well when it came to making smart decisions which is why you found yourself caressing his cheek as well, only to have your thumb swiping against his bottom lip. Instinctively, Yoongi’s digits grip around Tiffany’s waist and she squeals, reminding him just how ticklish she was. But his eyes remained fixated on your dancing body, how close you seemed to be against another man.

“I see what you’re trying to do.” You begin your comment before you slowly peel yourself out of the much taller male. “You see this… girl and it’s so obvious she’s broken and it’s so easy to get a good fuck.” You sigh before your digits run themselves through your tousled mane. “You put on this spiel that you can make her feel good, but you can’t. You try to get her hopes up and we all know how this ends.”

His eyes transform into more melancholic ones and he shakes his head before he takes a safe step closer to your body. At the corner of your eye, you can sense the presence of your friends. Suddenly, you can feel several eyes on you, observing how you stood your ground. “You’re wrong, but if that’s how you truly feel, I won’t convince you otherwise."

Your perfectly sculpted brows knit together in confusion when you see him take another step closer towards you, but you remain frozen to the floors. From the booth, Yoongi can see your mouth moving; they were poutier than ever - the bottom sticked out so much when you spoke to the stranger across you. He watches the other male tower over you, caressing your soft cheeks and he fists his hand momentarily before he watches you nod to his statement.

Suddenly, Yoongi observes the way you step closer onto the other male’s body; how his arm wrapped around your waist while you had yours propped over his shoulder. It’s been a while since he felt the nauseating boil at the pit of his stomach; he was envious of the man who had you all to himself at the dance floor. His eyes never missed a second of you swaying your hips to the pattern of the romantic guitar in the background, the way the male lured you to press your smaller physique onto his.

When the song ends, Jungkook whispers something into your ear before he barely brushes his petals right above yours. It ghosted over your dry ones and it took every ounce of self-resistance for Jungkook to step away from you and you both bid your goodbyes only to watch the lust driven look on your face direct itself towards where Yoongi sat uncomfortably. Tiffany and Hoseok were having a conversation about cleaning supplies and he could careless about which bleach did the best job of ridding of stains. However, Yoongi, a newly engaged man, found himself standing up from the booth only to examine you from head to toe. He observes the way your chest rose up and down heavily, frustrated and anxious to have what should be hers.

His eyes doesn’t disconnect from yours and you can’t help but swipe your tongue over to wet your petals, tasting the dried alcohol off of your lips and a hint of his strawberry chapstick. He wasn’t aware how hot the entire vicinity seemed to be. In addition to that, there was a minor strain over at his ripped, skinny jeans. When he mentally curses to himself, you begin your exit out of the bar, desperate to breathe in the cool air to relieve you off your non-fulfillments. When the night’s breeze attack your body, the muffled noises from the bar notifies you that you’re absolutely and utterly alone. The cruel reality of the thought finally edged you to your breaking point and you found yourself leaning against the wall, hugging yourself in the process of sobbing. When the doors open once more, revealing that Yoongi had followed you outside, clearly concerned for your well-being.

“What are you doing out here?” You inquire before you begin wiping every single tear that came streaming down your cheeks.

“I’d like to ask you the same question, to be honest.”

“I just needed some fresh air.” You quip bitterly before you sniffle to yourself, swallowing hard when he examines your current state. Hair disheveled from dancing for a decent hour yet your outfit seemed to be well in tact. The white dress shirt still tucked beautifully onto the waist of your beige skirt and some black tights to complement the outfit. But your eyes were too broken to comprehend; they were red and absolutely shattered, yet they shimmered in the night light. When he sees fresh tears staining your cheeks, he desperately seeks to wipe them off of you.

“A month, huh?”

Yoongi’s digits remain frozen midair when he attempt to wipe the tears off of your stained cheeks. He swallows hard, knowing very well where the conversation is leading to. All he could do is nod his head once and drop the hand to his side while takes a few step back, reminding himself that he cannot offer the same comfort to you anymore.

“Well, congratulations, Yoongs. I always thought Michelle would be the first one to get married - even Hoseok or something.” Yoongi was having a difficult time comprehending how you were still joking despite the pain he had put you through.

“Stop the bullshit, YN. I know you’re not okay with this.”

The uneasiness of his voice had your heart racing and your eyes disconnected from his; not wanting to read his mind - or try to read his mind. With pursed lips, the silence gave you a moment to remember everything - all of the pain he has put you through. Alcohol was running through both of your veins and you feel your hands ball into fists.

“But there’s nothing I can do about it.”

“From what I heard you’ve been fucking Taehyung.” He scoffs and, suddenly, you were no longer sad.

“So?”

“Well, how’s that working out for you, YN? How is fucking your ex-boyfriend going to make things any better between you and I?” You clenched your jaw and you swallowed hard, trying to understand why he was so frustrated with you. “And then you’re… just… sleeping with random strangers at the club now?”

“Excuse me?”

“Oh, c’mon, Hoseok tells me everything.”

“No - no! You have no right to discuss this with me. You have no right to judge me.” You seethed, stepping closer to his frame. “Just because you’re doing so much better at moving on from whatever the fuck we had, you have no right to judge the way I’m trying to cope with everything when this is all your fault.”

He scoffs bitterly and you pace yourself away from him, running your digits through your mane, wanting to rid of all frustrations out of your body immediately.

“I - I put my feelings to the side! I’ve withstand every single thing concerning you and Tiffany. For fuck’s sake, Yoongi, I even befriended her for your sake…. just to get back to the way things were.” The contrast of the cold breeze on your skin and the hot tears streaming down your cheeks earned an eruption of goosebumps through your skin. Your teeth shattered when you spoke and you swallowed the filter you once possessed. You were mindlessly speaking out loud at this point.

“And, for a while, I thought everything was okay. I’ve accepted that maybe this can work out - that i can move on from you because… I was so fucking happy to see you happy even if it wasn’t with me.”

You chuckled to yourself, reminiscing back to your naivety.

“Then you proposed and that’s when I knew I’m… not even fucking close to getting over you.” His eyes never leave yours and you can see how hard he was gritting his teeth because of how prominent his jaw was. He held his breath as he studies your tired features. The bags underneath your eyes stood out from your skin. Eyes blood shot from your tears and the alcohol - from the pain.

“I don’t know how you did it though. You’ve seen me with Taehyung all those months and you never said a single thing about it.” You started and he watches how your eyes are just searching for the right answer as if you were begging him to give you the answer. “You never did a single thing about it.”

It was his turn to get frustrated with your words. He opens his mouth expecting to raise his voice on you, but with the way you were sobbing, he chooses to calm himself further.

“There was nothing I can do, YN. You were with somebody else.”

“And look how the tables have turned.” You sighed, nibbling onto the bottom of your lip. Tears stopped trailing down your cheeks and you took deep breaths to calm your beating heart. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but… I’m not over you, Yoongi.” Your voice is small… so small that you feel yourself shrink in size when you amble yourself closer to him. “We both… had the chance to be together, but… we just - we didn’t happen.”

Silence over takes the conversation once more.

“Do you ever think of what could have happened?”

His query catches you off guard and your eyes meet his and you nod once. You inhale deeply, smelling his cologne and the alcohol exuding from his skin. “All the time it’s fucking unhealthy.” You were surprised to hear him chuckle softly to himself and you fold your arms, preventing yourself from doing something you may regret.

“I keep thinking what it would be like to hold your hand.” At the tip of your fingers, you feel the itch desperate to feel the searing heat of his skin against yours. “Every time you whisper something to her, I just… think what it would feel like to have your lips brush up against my ears.” Your cheeks burned when you confess your hidden emotions to him. “I see the way you kiss her; you have your hand caressing her cheek, fingers crawling to the back of her neck and you… sort of cradle her head while you just… kiss her and…”

All sorts of breathing stops when a hot palm frustratingly caresses your cheek, crawling gracelessly across the back of your neck to force your head to tilt towards the towering male. A pair of soft petals crash onto your own when he inevitably caves in and hungrily captures your bottom lip. You responded immediately to his actions, arms slithering around his neck when he firmly pushes you to cold wall, digits tugging at the roots of your hair when his tongue intrudes itself inside your mouth. You savored the heat of his tongue inside your mouth, so you feel your tongue collide against his. He tastes of mint and whiskey and you were addicted to the taste of his mouth.

When the sounds of exiting clientele leaves the bar, you are alerted that this was… wrong.

Yoongi was kissing you.

Yoongi is with Tiffany. You keep chanting it in your head and it took every ounce of willpower for your palms to unfold and push his strong physique off of yours, but you remain frozen underneath his touch.

Instead, he stops. He releases you slowly, lips leaving yourself gently. His hands, however, remain glued to your stained cheeks and he tucks a strand of your hair behind your ear. “You don’t know how long I’ve been waiting to do that.”

“We can’t do that anymore.”

You separate your heated bodies away from each other, experiencing a multitude of emotions all at once. There was a satisfaction deep within you at the realization that you were not the only one suffering from the struggle to get over somebody else.

Who knew one single kiss from him was all it took to realize that you wanted more?

“I — we should forget that ever happened.” You licked your lips once more, the guilt clearly painted across your visage and you tried your hardest not to break down when Yoongi exhales out slowly and realizes the immorality of your actions.

He stays absolutely quiet with his lips parted.

“Yoongi, say something. I’m doing this for your sake.” You try to shake him back to reality, worried he might make a choice he sincerely regrets. “Yoongi, you’re engaged… to Tiffany. You’re marrying Tiffany. Please go back inside and be with her.”

He nods his head once and shakes his head, realizing the repercussions of his actions. “We — we can’t say anything.”

“I won’t say anything.”

He purses his lips into a thin line, deciding to amble back to the entrance of the bar.

“YN,” He starts before he opens the door. “I — I’m sorry."

[kamenriderlogik27]

FINALLY BACK IN SABER!!!

PrFor the past... two months?.... I’ve been taking a break from watching Saber. Mostly due to personal reasons but also because I hate it when a very dumb and small misunderstanding (especially when the cause is from a new outsider character that totally has evil intentions. looking at you Sabela +-+) ruins such good friendships and bonds. Anyway, I decided to get back into it ‘cause I was SUPER curious at what was going on AND and kinda had a feeling that the misunderstanding situation was about to end soon. and omgosh I’m so glad I took a break! If I had gone through with watching each ep every week, I would have gone crazy with stress! There’s so much going on!!! yet I’m also glad that Toei FINALLY calmed us down with the pacing! I’m gonna try to talk about everything regarding episode 16 up to 25 so please bare with me. I think I might end up talking about the Zi-o VS Decade and Zenkaiger stuff too after this post~

1. When I say that I hate it when a stupid misunderstanding causes friends to turn on each other, I mean it. I absolutely hate it when a story goes down this path. especially after an episode that basically sealed a strong bond between all the characters. But... honestly, after watching it in Saber.... it has a sort of beauty to it, if that makes any sense. Kind of like Mono No Aware. I honestly feel like this situation really fit well with the plot and we got to see our swordsmen struggle with their own logic and feelings. Especially Rintaro. Poor baby didn’t know what to do, and yet still believed in Touma. Omgosh that rooftop scene with him and Mei! <3 That was probably one of the best scenes this series ever produced! I also loved how we got to see Touma personally struggle about the whole situation instead of just being mad at his friends for attacking him and not trusting him. Which is what I originally thought would happen tbh which is why I was scared to watch this batch of episodes. I’m so glad I was wrong!!! 

2. Yuri! I honestly believe that Yuri is such a great addition to the cast! He’s logical, curious, and yet has a good open mind about things. Instead of going with what he USED to know, he’s willing to listen and learn from Touma. Which I really like! Plus, the comic relief he adds is so awesome! Every episode so far I’m also looking forward to what Yuri will do just out of his own curiosity or blunt attitude. 

3. speaking of attitude, I feel like Touma is showing more personality now than compared to the first few episodes. Which is a huge relief! He was starting off as a kind of boring main rider and seemed flat. He’s still got ways to go, but I think his personality is getting better. Plus, I’m really interested in his past. If Luna is really the one that got him into reading, then is he really from Wonderworld like we’re told? Just who is he really? Is his last name really Kamiyama? What happened to him after he lost his memories? Did he get adopted? There has to be a reason why Rekka and the wonder ridebooks keep chosing him. ugh! I’m so curious!!!!! 

4. I can’t remember her name right now, so I’ll just call her Sabela. But omgosh I don’t know whether to hate her or pity her. I feel like she can work as an awesome villain, but just like other posts I’ve seen, it’d be such a shame if she ended up like Yaiba Yua. And, I honestly don’t want her to randomly become a hero like Amatsu Gai. Toei please just keep her as an awesome villain! 

5. Rintaro and Mei! omgosh Toei BETTER get them a kiss scene or something because they’re TOTALLY falling in love and I wanna see a proper kiss scene!! If Takamichi Cristalia can kiss a pink ranger, the the secondary rider can kiss the main rider girl!! No joke though, sometimes I can’t help but feel like Touma has feelings for Mei..... which I know probably is just me overthinking, but that’d be a really interesting addition to the plot. Has there ever been a love triangle between the main rider, secondary rider and main rider girl before? hmm.... 

6. Primitive Dragon!!!!!!! holy crap!!!!!!! I don’t know if I’ve ever said this before, but I FRICKIN’ LOVE BERSERK FORMS!!!!!!! I don’t know why, but the idea of the main character obtaining a power that choses him and yet he has no way of controlling said power, just interests the heck out of me! I feel like Touma REALLY needed one too! Like I said before, his character has been really flat from the start, so when he obtained this strange, ancient power that he can’t control at all, so much more is added to his character! Fear of the unknown, fear of being the one that hurts his friends, an intent to find out what’s behind the power, curiosity of why it chose him. Just so much can be added! I haven’t been this excited since Metal Cluster hopper was introduced! XD 

7. The master of logos... or master logos? is it? he kind of gives off final boss vibes. But he could also be the sort of ‘misunderstood guy that’s just trying to do good things in a very... seemingly evil way’. if that makes any sense. I’m really looking forward to his involvement with everything. Especially if he’s like, Touma’s long-lost-brother or uncle. Low-key hoping that he’s related to Touma. (like I said, I REALLY wanna know more about Touma’s past)

8. Ren like always is being a brat. But I did like how he’s actually giving what Ogami said to him some thought. Ever since watching his episode of the swordsmen biographies, I honestly thought that Ren might just end up going off with Dissast and betraying everyone. But now, especially with Kento’s return, I feel like Ren might learn and mature a bit. Heck, he might even start looking up to Touma for all we know. (that’s just a theory) 

9. Storious so far is my favorite of the three Megido. I don’t know if it’s because he’s played by Robin or what, but I’m always looking forward to his scenes. The Megido also make me curious about their backstories. Just why are they looking for more power? why do they want to rewrite the world? I’m so excited to learn more about them!    

10. And finally!!! Kento’s back!!!!!! I know that he must be under some kind of influence via Kurayami ( or not considering what he’s had to go through) and probably isn’t all THAT back. but still! he’s back! Now Toei, put him back in the opening and ending credits! I had already theorized that he’d be the new Caliber, but now that I see it, I just want him to be Espada again. Poor baby. Though, considering that Sabela is the one that took Kurayami, does this mean that he’s under her influence and working for her? hmmm.... This is gonna get interesting~ 

[soobiniebaby]

Angels & Devils Part IX : Magic Hour

Tomorrow x Together Fanfiction

~ p a r t s : main post || prologue || part 1 || part 2 || part 3 || part 4 || part 5 || part 6 || part 7 || part 8 || part 9 || part 10 || part 11 || part 12 || part 13 || part 14 || part 15 || part 16 || part 17 ~ p a i r i n g : love triangle involving choi soobin and choi yeonjun ~ g e n r e : high school au | some social media au | some fluff & angst | childhood friends | love triangle ~ l a n g u a g e : English ~ w a r n i n g : contains swearing, alcohol, kissing (?) and may contain mature themes (angst, etc.) ~ a / n : This will be my first fanfic (go easy on me pls) and i’m just writing this as I go along, so bear with me juseyo The setting (place/country) of the story is up to the reader’s interpretation ~ s u m m a r y : What should she choose? Han Baby: the new girl with a troubled past MO Academy: her new high school Choi Soobin: student council president, member of the Ecosave club, volunteer at the Humane Treatment of Animals, member of the Honor Society, a vocalist in the Jazzed club, the school’s all around golden boy Choi Yeonjun: leader of the Dance club, star of the Jazzed club, the school’s it boy with a bad rep 5 best friends, 1 new girl, 1 childhood friendship, 1 epic love triangle? What will this school year bring?

Yeonjun had been on cloud 9 the whole weekend.

Ever since he and Baby talked things out and she finally said yes to him that Friday, he hadn’t been able to stop himself from smiling. They had been texting ever since he had left her apartment.

Even the horrendously boring and rigid dinner he had with his parents that night became so much bearable since he had been texting her under the table nearly the whole time.

At the end of the day, he’d call her on FaceTime and they’d stay on video call until one of them would fall asleep.

On Saturday, he and the guys had hung out at Kai’s house. They all put together a care basket, each boy contributing a little gift or token along with a note, to wish B a speedy recovery. He had delivered it to B by the end of the day, stopping by her place for a quick visit as well.

“There’s a cute plushie from Hyuka, a novel highly recommended from Tyun, a collection of movies from Gyu, and handpicked snacks from Soobin. And there’s a get well soon card with a short message from each of us.” Yeonjun says, slowly laying out each boy’s gift in front of B. “Also, Soobin requests that you take a picture with his gift so you guys will have something to post for your project this week.” he adds.

“Alright, I’ll make sure to take a few pictures before devouring them.” B says, excitedly looking at the snacks. “Wow, these gifts are amazing. The boys are so sweet.” she says in awe, grabbing the plushie from Kai and holding it close to her chest.

“The boys? What about me? Aren’t I sweet?” Yeonjun asks.

“Well, I guess you are, but you didn’t get me a get-well-soon gift.” she says, pouting.

Yeonjun laughs. “Don’t worry, I’ve got your get-well gift right here.” he says. When she raises a brow at him in confusion, he simply puts a finger under her chin and tilts it upward as he gives her a kiss, keeping it tender and sweet. He feels her smile against his lips and he pulls away, smiling back at her. “See? Bet you feel better already.” he says.

“Much better.” B smiles, feeling tingles all over her body. “Still no gift, though.”

Yeonjun stepped back, shocked. “Was that not enough for you? What more do you want from me?” he says, exaggeratingly putting a fist over his chest.

B laughs. “You’re so dramatic! Don’t get me wrong, your kisses are great, but I want a gift that’ll keep me from getting bored or feeling lonely while I’m on lockdown for the week. The boys’ gifts are all spot on.” she explains. “If I’m gonna be stuck alone here for the next few days, I’m gonna get bored and lonely.”

“Don’t worry, I’ve got the perfect gift. You’ll see.” Yeonjun says mysteriously.

B raises a brow but raises no further questions. That night, she makes sure to take pictures and sends them to Soobin, each of them creating their own social media posts for their project.

When Sunday came, B decided to plan out her week of isolation, wanting to make it as productive as possible. First, she messaged the boys to thank them for their gift basket and to beg them to help her keep up with schoolwork and lessons, which they gamely accept. She also checks her other messages and sees a few from the girls.

She finally messages them, feeling guilty upon seeing how worried they were.

Meanwhile, Yeonjun starts to make plans of his own, wanting to make sure that the coming week would be perfect.

•°•

Monday

Wanting to start her first day of missing classes on the right foot, B had managed to convince at least one of her classmates in each class to secretly have her on call during the periods, so that she could listen in on the lectures on her phone, as if she were taking an online class. She had called Taehyun for first period Economics, Kai for second period History, Yuna for third period Biology, Beomgyu for after-lunch Maths, Taehyun again for Foreign Language class, and Soobin for Creative writing class.

“Why not me?” Yeonjun had asked her with a pout when she told him her plan.

B laughed at how adorable he was. “Because Soobin is one of my closest friends, plus he’s my partner in the class, so it would make more sense if I called him. Besides, it might seem too suspicious if I called you instead of him.” she reasoned.

The whole day, B had her phone by her side as she struggled to listen to the lectures and took down her own notes as well, making sure to catch any dates for assignment deadlines or quizzes. By the time last period was over, B had gotten showered and dressed, first for a quick visit from her family doctor to check on her condition and then for some time to hang out with Ryujin, who had promised to visit since she was immune to chicken pox.

Sure enough, the doctor came by and did a quick check up of her vital signs and assessed her rashes, simply advising her not to scratch them. He was there for a maximum of 20 minutes before leaving.

At a little past 5:30 PM, Ryujin came ringing on her front door holding a box of cinnamon rolls from Kang’s Kafe.

B excitedly hugs her as soon as she opens the door to let her friend in, squealing and thanking her for the cinnamon rolls.

As they step into the apartment, Ryujin observes “Wow B, you look so happy, you’re practically glowing, and I’m pretty sure it’s not the rashes.”

B blushes and waves her hand dismissively. “Oh, it’s probably just cause I’ve been getting a lot of sleep lately, but thanks.”

“A lot of sleep? More like a lot of Yeonjun.” Ryujin says, smiling devilishly. “Come on, tell me more about it! How are you feeling? What is it like to date him? Have you guys done anything yet?”

“Well if you must know, I feel really happy. So happy in fact that it keeps me too distracted to even think about how itchy these rashes are.” B says, rubbing her arms which had small specks of rashes. “And technically, we haven’t even gone on a date yet, but we’ve been talking a lot and he’s called me on Facetime the past 2 nights and he’s just really sweet. And no, we haven’t ‘done anything’ yet, we’ve just kissed a couple of times.”

Ryujin lets out a squeal. “Ah, it sounds so exciting! I’m so happy for you! Honestly, seeing how hard you were trying to avoid him for the past 2 weeks was hard. I wanted to shake you or something just to knock some sense into you. It was actually kinda funny seeing how stubborn you were about it, I mean he obviously liked you but anyone who knew your current situation could see that you definitely had feelings for him as well!” she laughs. “Speaking of, what have the other guys said about you 2 dating? I bet Gyu’s been teasing you 2 nonstop.” she asks, referring to the guys in the student council.

B laughs nervously. “Oh, uh, we haven’t really told anyone yet.” she admits. “I haven’t even told Ningni—I mean Hyuka, about Yeonjun asking me out at the party, so none of them have any clue about Yeonjun asking me out and me avoiding Yeonjun and everything. I’ve only told you and Yuna.”

Ryujin smacks B’s arm. “B! Why? You should’ve at least told Kai about it! Isn’t he your best friend?”

“He is, yes! It’s just hard, I mean I’ve told him about my past crushes and stuff back when we were younger, but it’s just that Yeonjun is his one of his closest friends, so it just feels kind of weird. Like it might make their friendship awkward, especially if things between me and Yeonjun don’t work out.” B says defensively.

“Please, those guys are thick as thieves, nothing could ever break their friendship apart. And stop saying that you and Yeonjun won’t work out, you’re worrying too much about something that hasn’t even happened yet or something that might not even ever happen. Instead of thinking the worst about the future, you should just try to make the most out of the present instead.” Ryujin says.

“Wow, that’s actually really good advice, Ryu.” B admits. “Fine, I promise I’ll try not to worry too much and stuff. But Yeonjun and I agreed that we’d wait until I’ve recovered enough to go back to school until we tell the guys anything about us dating.”

“Oh sweetie, he’s a guy. Heck, he’s not just a guy, he’s Choi Yeonjun. Guys like to talk about girls. And just like you’ve been talking to Yuna and I about Yeonjun, I’m pretty sure Yeonjun has been talking to at least 1 other guy about you too. The question is, which guy could he be talking to?” Ryujin wonders.

•°•

Tuesday

“So that’s what I’ve got planned out for the next few days. Well, while she’s still confined to her apartment, at least. I’ve got a whole week of stay-at-home dates and romantic stuff planned. I just want to make it as good as possible, even if she can’t leave her house.” Yeonjun says, finishing up explaining his plans in great detail. “It’s what she deserves, especially after hearing how much she struggled the past 2 weeks. I just want to make sure she won’t regret her decision to finally say yes.”

“Yeonjun, that sounds amazing.” Beomgyu says, looking at the blue-haired boy in awe. “I always knew you had your ways to woo a girl, but damn I’ve never seen you plan out something like this before. I especially like the part where you sort of kidnap her.” Beomgyu laughs. “Congrats on finally getting the ‘yes’ by the way. It was kinda killing me to see how hard the past 2 weeks have been on you too.”

“It’s what she deserves. It’s crazy cause I don’t think I’ve ever liked a girl this much before, especially since I’ve only known her for a few weeks.” Yeonjun gives him a bright smile, and Beomgyu could tell just how smitten he was.  “And thanks, Gyu. Thanks for being there for me these past couple of weeks, too. And thanks for keeping it between us.” he adds, remembering how Beomgyu had noticed how different Yeonjun had been acting, and how Yeonjun himself had finally told Beomgyu about everything.

From how Yeonjun had been watching B at the party to how Yeonjun had found himself smitten by B during their 7 minutes together to how Yeonjun had asked her out twice and even to how he had winked at her onstage. He didn’t mean to tell anyone about his feelings for their new friend so soon, but he couldn’t bear the weight of it any longer. Now he was happy to be telling Beomgyu about how he had taken care of B when she was sick and how they had finally been able to talk things out.

“Dude, you’ve got it bad.” Beomgyu says, laughing and clapping him on the back. “I have to admit, it’s a bit weird seeing you talk about a girl so much, but I can’t help but feel proud that you’ve finally found someone you genuinely seem to care for.”

Yeonjun nods. “Yes, I really do. And thanks Gyu, really. She just feels really different, I guess. And I’m hoping that the more I get to know her, the more I end up liking her, instead of the other way around. Usually with me, girls can make a strong first impression at the start but then when I try to get to know them more, they end up feeling just like everyone else. I don’t think it’ll be like that with her, though.”

“With all the things you’ve got planned for her, I highly doubt that’ll be the case.” Beomgyu says. “I’m sure she’ll love it. Go get her, Yeonjun!”

And he did.

That afternoon, he stood outside her apartment door feeling just a tiny bit nervous, his hands full, whispering and instructing the people behind him for the last time before he rang the doorbell.

“Coming!” Yeonjun could hear her yell from inside the apartment, and he smiled to himself.

He braces himself as she opens the door, and as soon as he sees her face, his heartbeat instantly speeds up.

“Hi, Baby.” he simply says as he stands in front of her with a bouquet of blue roses, the string quartet that he had hired for the afternoon starts to play a soft rendition of Euphoria by BTS.

She stands there for a moment, a hand covering her mouth as she stares in awe at the blue-haired boy before her and the blue roses he held, to the four string players holding their instruments and serenading her, until the chorus comes up and Yeonjun softly sings, “Take my hands now” as he takes one of her hands in his and squeezes it gently. “You are the cause of my euphoria.”

She unfreezes then, taking a step towards him and wrapping her arms around him to give him a hug, which was a bit of a challenge considering the dozen roses between them.

He laughs as she gives up on trying to hug him and settles on standing on her tiptoes to give him a quick peck instead. “You’re supposed to take the flowers first, silly.” he says.

“Yeonjun! This is just…wow.” she says, taking the flowers in her arms, they were heavier than they looked. “This is incredible. You’re incredible. This it too much, this is… just, thank you so much.” she says, flustered.

“Oh, Baby. This is nothing, don’t sweat it.” he says, savoring her reaction. If she was gonna smile this wide and get this flustered every time he made a romantic gesture like this, then the rest of the week was going to be fun.

•°•

Wednesday

B had been wondering why Yeonjun had made such a strange request that morning, but she was happy to oblige. It’s not like she had anything better to do in her apartment, and she spent most of her time listening to lectures through phone calls in her bedroom anyway. She had called the same people as she had for the past 2 days, glad that she had found a way to keep herself up to date on lectures.

She had almost forgotten about Yeonjun’s request until her last class for the day ended, and she heard sounds coming from inside her apartment. She kept her bedroom door closed the whole day, so the sound of some unknown person in her apartment was alarming.

She quickly dials up Yeonjun’s number, trying to keep herself calm and telling herself that it was probably not a dangerous intruder but rather something related to Yeonjun’s request.

“Hey Baby, what’s up?” he says, answering on the second ring.

“Hey Yeonjun, uh, I’m in my bedroom right now and I thought I heard something from inside the apartment so I was wondering if it’s something to do with what you texted me this morning or if there really is an intruder and I should call the police.” she says, trying to sound causal and calm.

Yeonjun laughs on the other end, which causes B to relax a bit. “You are adorable. Very smart and safe that you checked with me first though, everytime you hear strange noises in your apartment, call me right away okay?” he says. “For now, don’t worry though, I promise you’re safe. It’s part of the plan, I asked some people to help me set up for our date today. Sorry for making you panic, I should’ve given you a heads up.”

B scoffs. “Psh, I was not panicking. I’m just being very smart and safe, like you said.” she says. “What kind of date requires you to ask for help to set up though? What exactly do you have planned for today?”

“Now why would I tell you that? You’ll find out in about an hour anyway, but for now, promise me you’ll stay in your room until I tell you it’s safe okay? If not, you’ll spoil the surprise.” he says.

B nods. “Yeah sure, I can do that.” she says, even though the curiosity was killing her. What kind of date did Yeonjun have planned now?

Just then, B hears a voice from Yeonjun’s end of the call. “Hey YJ, you want me to ride with you to Kang’s? Or should I ride with Soobin?” Beomgyu asks.

“Hop right into the car, I’ll just finish up this call.” Yeonjun responds. “Hey Baby, gonna grab a quick snack at Kang’s with the boys before I head to your place. I’ll make it quick, so try not to miss me too much.” he says.

“Don’t worry, it’s the rest of the guys that I really miss anyway.” she says teasingly. “It’s only been a few days, but I haven’t seen them in forever.”

“Oh? So since you’ve been seeing me almost everyday now, you don’t miss me? Yeonjun says, and B could practically hear him pouting from the phone.

She laughs. “Don’t be silly, you know I miss you too.”

Yeonjun laughs too. “I miss you too. See you in about an hour, alright? And wear something nice.” he simply says before hanging up.

“Was that her? Was that B?” Beomgyu asks as Yeonjun gets into the car, joining him in the back seat before the car starts to move, taking them to Kang’s café.

Yeonjun nods. “Yeah, she was worried cause she heard a noise in her apartment but I told her it’s just the dinner people.”

Beomgyu raises a brow. “The dinner people? Wait, which date is this? The one where you hire people to set up the apartment in like a super romantic—”

“Yes yes, it’s that one.” Yeonjun said, amused at how excited Beomgyu was, remembering that he told Beomgyu about all his date plans for the week. “I’m a little worried that it might be a bit too much? What do you think?”

Beomgyu laughs. “Honestly, what you’ve got planned for today is…small compared to what you’ve got planned for Thursday or Friday. Considering she’s not supposed to leave her apartment, it’ll be a challenge to pull off too.”

“Oh, I asked her doctor about it and he said that as long as she’s very careful about who she comes in contact with and limits exposure as much as possible, then technically I can take her out. Just a matter of how and where I do it.” Yeonjun says confidently. “I’m sure it’ll be fine, I can pull it off.”

Beomgyu gives him a smile and a pat on the back. “I’m sure you can, Yeonjun. Don’t worry about sticking around at Kang’s either, you can leave as soon as you want, I’ll back you up. Try not to keep her waiting, you know?” he says supportively.

“Thanks, Gyu. I’ll just order something for takeout and I’ll go.”

•°•

B takes a deep breath and straightens out her dress one last time before finally opening her bedroom door and taking a step into her living area.

And she was immediately rendered speechless.

The place looked almost unrecognizable. The furniture had been moved around to make space in the middle of the room for her small round dining table and 2 chairs. The lights were all off, the apartment illuminated solely by candlelight, with tea candles and blue rose petals scattered all over the apartment, carefully sprawled all across the floor and sprinkled on the furniture. The table was set up for 2, with delicious-looking dishes already in place and a bottle of white wine along with a flower arrangement and 2 candles in the center.

She could hear the string quartet from yesterday from within the apartment, and after letting her eyes adjust to the dim light and looking around she could see that they were hidden away in the kitchen, softly playing their rendition of Home by Michael Buble.

Then Yeonjun reveals himself, he was waiting right outside her bedroom door, and he holds out a hand to her. “Han Baby, I know it’s a bit early, but would you do me the honour of having dinner with me?” he says grandly.

B lets out a laugh, looking at him in awe. “It would be my pleasure, Choi Yeonjun.” she says, taking his hand.

He smiles back at her and leads her to the dining table, pulling out her chair and letting her sit before joining her.

“I’m not sure what food you’d like, but I got garlic butter baked salmon, chicken kievs, Caesar salad, a bottle of Moscato and a serving of chocolate covered strawberries for dessert.” Yeonjun says, presenting the table on the food.

“Wow, they all look so good.” B says, feeling her mouth start to water. “How did you do all this? How did you put this all together?”

“Well, I had a bit of help, of course.” Yeonjun says, pouring the wine. “I asked my driver Hwall and some help from home to bring over the food, move the furniture and set up the candles and flowers. And the string quartet, whom you’ve met yesterday, are a few friends from my old school.” he says, giving a quick salute to the four string players in the kitchen, who warmly smiled back at him. “I hope you didn’t mind having strangers in your apartment, I’m sorry if you got scared. I should have been more considerate.”

B accepts the glass of champagne but shakes her head. “Yeonjun, it’s fine. I trust that you’re being careful and that you wouldn’t compromise my safety. This is all very lovely, thank you.” she says, reaching over the table to take his hand and gently squeezing it.

He smiles warmly at her. “Thank you for trusting me. I’m glad you like it.” he says, once again savouring the moment. The warmth in her eyes as she looked at him, her initial shock upon seeing the dinner set up, how good it felt to have her hand in his, and just everything about her in general.

Since he couldn’t be out too late on a school night without raising suspicion from his father, he wanted to make the most out of every minute. From sharing the most compelling yet laughably random conversations over dinner, to the sickeningly sweet banter over dessert, to the intimacy of slow dancing in her living room.

He made sure to bid his friends from the string quartet goodbye and help B with putting her furniture back in place before calling up Hwall and letting him know it was time for him to go.

As she walks him out of her apartment, lingering by the doorway for just a moment to say goodbye.

“You know, you never cease to amaze me, Choi Yeonjun. I’m starting to think there’s nothing you can’t do.” she says, as he stands outside her door. “Except fly, of course.”

Yeonjun smiles at her quizzically. “What makes you think I can’t fly?” he asks playfully, pulling her closer.

“Because you’re only human?” she says, laughing. “Besides, I don’t want a boy who can fly. I just want you.” she says, wrapping her arms around his neck.

“Aw, Baby, you’re so sweet.” Yeonjun says, planting a gentle kiss on her forehead. “Now, let’s say I could fly, would you still want me then?”

“And you’re so silly! Of course I would.” she laughs, stroking his hair. “But for now, I think you have to go.” she says, seeing his driver standing by from the corner of her eye.

“I’m afraid I do.” he says, giving a quick nod to Hwall before completely wrapping his arms around B’s waist and holding her tight, which causes her to squeal.

“See you tomorrow?” he says, finally letting go.

She nods. “See you tomorrow.” she says, waving him off and watching him walk away.

Right before he gets into his car, he takes one last look up at B’s apartment, and he’s pleasantly surprised to see her still standing outside, a hand on her chest as she smiled to herself, spinning in place a couple times before walking back into her apartment and closing the floor behind her.

He couldn’t wait to see how she’d react for what dates he had planned next.

•°•

Thursday

With Yeonjun’s simple request, once again, B didn’t really know what to expect.

She certainly wasn’t expecting to be ambushed at her front door with a bouquet or blue roses and to be serenaded by a string quartet on Tuesday, and she definitely wasn’t expecting her apartment to feel like a romantic 5 star restaurant yesterday, but his request for today’s date caught her so off guard that she couldn’t help but to overthink.

Wear something comfy?

What did he mean by that? What kind of date would entail such a simple request? Would it be something as simple as staying in and watching movies together? Knowing Yeonjun, it probably wasn’t.

While still keeping track of lectures through cellphone calls, she spent more of the overthinking about what kind of date Yeonjun could have possibly planned for the day, and what kind of outfit she’d be wearing.

At the end of the day, she decides to message her girl friends for help once again.

And right as she finishes fixing herself up, she hears the doorbell ring. She calls out “Just a second!” and quickly swipes on some blush to finish the look before running up to the front door and opening it.

“Hey, Baby.” Yeonjun says, smiling at her. “You look nice. You definitely found the perfect balance between cute and comfy.” he says, checking out her outfit.

“Hey Yeonjun! Thanks.” she says, smiling back. Just as she opens the door wider, ready to welcome him into the apartment, he takes her completely by surprise and says “Come on, let’s go.”

She blinks once, twice, still surprised. “Let’s go? Go, uh, where?”

“You’ll see. C’mon, put on some shoes and grab your things. Hwall’s waiting for us downstairs.” he says casually.

“Go? Where? And how? I mean, I’m still highly contagious, my doctor said I couldn’t leave—” B starts, still a bit dumfounded.

“I’ve cleared this with your doctor. Yes, you’re still possibly highly contagious, but where we’re going, there won’t be anyone for you to infect.” he says.

Confused, B decides to put on a pair of sneakers and grab a small sling bag before locking her apartment door behind her.

“Ah, before I forget.” Yeonjun says, rummaging through his bag before pulling out a surgical face mask wrapped in plastic. “You’ll have to put this on for now. Safety reasons.” he explains, handing it to her.

She obliges, and once the face mask is secured, he grabs her hand and leads her to the car.

•°•

“So…where are we going?” B asks for what feels like the hundredth time.

“You’ll see.” Yeonjun responds for what feels like the hundredth time.

“Are you kidnapping me? Should I be worried?” B asks. “Hey, Hwall, is he kidnapping me? Should I be worried?”

Yeonjun’s driver Hwall looks at her through the rear-view mirror as he drives. “I assure you, with sir Yeonjun, you’re in good hands.” he simply says.

B lets out a huff. “You didn’t answer either of my questions, but fine, I trust you.” she says, looking out the window and noticing how unfamiliar everything looked. They were now going uphill and had a fairly decent view of the town. “Wow, I am just now realizing just how little I know about this place. I mean, I just moved here, and all I know is how to get to school and back.”

Yeonjun laughs. “I don’t blame you, but it’s practically the opposite for me since I’ve lived here since I was a kid.” he says. “Don’t worry, I’ll show you around the whole town pretty soon.”

B gives him a curious look but doesn’t say anything. She continues to look out the window for the rest of the ride, noticing how high up they were going. Once they reach the top of the cliff, the car suddenly pulls over and stops, causing her to look around excitedly.

“Is this it? Are we here? Where are we?” she says excitedly, trying to look around for any clue as to what Yeonjun had planned for their date. All she could see, however, was the edge of the cliff and how high above the town they were.

“Huh, I guess we got here a bit early.” Yeonjun says, looking out the window. “Molang isn’t here yet.”

“Molang? Who’s Molang?” B asks, raising a brow.

Just then, she notices a low whirring noise, not knowing what it was or where it was coming from. She notices the sound getting louder and louder, until a helicopter comes into view.

As she spots the helicopter flying in and slowly approaching them, her jaw drops. “No way.”

Yeonjun laughs as he stares at her, amused by her reaction. “Yes way. Baby, this is Molang. My beautiful Airbus ACH175 helicopter.” he says, waving at the pilot through the window, who raised a hand back to acknowledge him. “And that’s Sunwoo, our pilot for today.”

“Yeonjun, I—” B starts, but she doesn’t really know what to say. “I—”

He laughs again. “Are you ready to fly?”

B simply nods, staring at the helicopter that was now landing in very close to proximity to where the car was parked. Once Yeonjun opens the door for her and she steps out, that’s when she notices that they were parked next to a helicopter pad situated right by the edge of the cliff.

“Okay, so, helicopter? How?” she manages to say, still struggling to put together coherent words. She could feel the end of her cropped sweater flapping around her torso as they came closer to the helicopter

“Let’s just say that there are a lot of perks that comes with being the sole heir to my father’s business.” he answers, almost yelling to be heard above the noise, taking her hand as they approach the helicopter.

They take the proper precautions and double check everything to make sure that they were securely strapped in, with Sunwoo the pilot briefing them on basic safety protocols and informing them of how they can communicate via the headsets provided.

Yeonjun buckles B into the backseat himself, making sure that she was strapped in tight and taking off her face mask, telling her “Don’t worry, I asked and made sure that Sunwoo is already immune to chickenpox beforehand, so you being contagious won’t be a problem.” before stealing a quick kiss and securing her headset. Next, Sunwoo helps him buckle up next to B, making all the necessary safety checks before they take off.

“Are you afraid of heights, Baby?” Yeonjun’s voice suddenly rings into B’s headset.

“No.” she replies, looking at him and squeezing his hand tight as she feels the vehicle lift off into the air. She wasn’t exactly scared, but she wasn’t expecting to leave the ground when she woke up that morning.

The view was simply breathtaking. She had flown in airplanes before, and as much as she enjoyed being at airports and taking the window seat, but nothing could compare to seeing the small town from a thousand feet in the air.

Below them, the world looked green and blue, the town highlighted by the abundantly green trees and the river that surrounded it.

Throughout the ride, Yeonjun had begun to point out the most random things to B. From the park where he won his first soccer match in when he was in the 5th grade, to the building that his father owned which he absolutely hated. He told her endless stories of the places he’d run away to when he felt like escaping, and stories of the places he’s learned to love the most after years of living in one place.

As the sun started to set, the city lights started to light up slowly, then all at once.

“Wow, this is amazing. It feels like magic.” B says, staring in awe at the town below them, now illuminated in hundreds of shining lights.

“Magic hour, when the sun sets and all the lights start to turn on.” Yeonjun agrees.

B could feel her neck start to ache from keeping it outstretched the whole time as she tried her best to look out the window, drinking in as much of the view as she could.

Meanwhile, Yeonjun had his eyes on her the whole time.

•°•

Friday

Just then, B hears her doorbell ringing.

She yells out “Coming! Just a minute!” before getting up and making sure she was appropriately dressed before making her way to the front door.

As bummed out as she was about their her supposed last stay-at-home date with Yeonjun being cancelled, she also couldn’t help but feel curious about what could have possible come up that Yeonjun had to cancel it.

She was so engrossed in her thoughts that she forgot to check through the peephole before opening her apartment door, and as soon as she saw the person standing on the other side, she felt her heart skip a beat.

“Baba!” Kai exclaims, throwing his hands in the air. “Surprise!” he says, before engulfing her in a hug.

She unfreezes then, her mind in scrambles, trying to comprehend what was happening.

“Ningning! What are you doing here? And why are you hugging me, step away from me, you might get chickenpox!” she exclaims, trying to pull away from his embrace.

“Actually, I’m here because I have chicken pox.” he admits, subtly rubbing his arms, which B suspected were covered in itchy red rashes. “A few people from school have started to show symptoms, actually, myself included.”

“Oh my god, you have chicken pox? Are you okay? Did any of the other guys get it?” she asks, concerned.

Kai shakes his head. “I’m fine, just a little itchy. And no, as far as I can tell, it’s just me so far. The school’s in chaos now, everyone’s starting to show up to school wearing face masks and spraying alcohol every 5 mintues. Everyone’s afraid of the chicken pox.” he says, shivering.

“That sounds disastrous.” she comments. “So what brings you here exactly?”

Kai grins. “Well, since I have chicken pox now, and you’ve had chicken pox now, and no one else in my family has had chicken pox so I’d be a major health threat to them, I was wondering if I could maybe…stay with you?” he asks sheepishly.

“Oh, like we could quarantine together?” B asks. “I was actually medically cleared by my doctor already so I can come back to school on Monday but I’d love to have you here! Why not?” she says, squealing excitedly as she hugs her bestfriend.

Kai laughs happily. “Oh thank god, Lea practically kicked me out of the house and sprayed me with alcohol the whole time when I got sent home from school. I was able to grab a few of my things before I was banished from my own home.” he says, relieved.

“Oh, you poor thing.” she says, ruffling his hair. “Come on in, I’ll make sure the guest bedroom is clean and ready for you.” she says, welcoming him into her apartment.

“Thanks, Baba! Oh, I’m so excited, I’ve missed you so much! I haven’t seen you in a whole week.” Kai says, whining. “I can’t wait to catch up with you. Honestly, MOA has felt so boring without you so there’s not much I have to say. But I can’t wait to hear all about how you spent your week!”

B laughs hesitantly. “Oh, psh, there’s not much to tell you either.” she says weakly.

“Don’t say that, I’m sure spending a week at home felt like a mini vacation! So tell me, what did you do the whole week?” Kai starts, as they enter the guest room.

I’ve been going on dates with our dear friend Yeonjun B thought to herself, though she knew she couldn’t bring herself to just tell her bestfriend about it.

So what could she tell him about her week?

[soulsdontbreaktheybeeend]

Night shift Part 3.1 | Joker x Reader

Quick summary Night shift in general: You’re working late, enjoying the almost peaceful night in Gotham. Well.. almost peaceful. Little did you know it’s also the night of Jokers escape of Arkham Asylum. I hope I’m not going to disappoint you guys with this one, since it’s not starting off where Part 2 ended. I thought about writing kind of a flashback, since you guys must be wondering where they know eachother from. Soo I’m getting into it and I’m actually going to write more to it, so this is Part 3.1. lol Night shift Part 1, Part 2 

Words: 2,243

gif originally posted by nuooage.tumblr.com

It was the 5th of November three years ago when you had decided to leave Gotham for good. It had been eating you up from the inside for too long. You had moved to Gotham City a few years ago. You weren’t feeling too well back at the town you were born and raised. Tried to leave everything behind with the decision to move to another city. Certainly, you had your hopes lifted up too high. With Gotham that didn’t change, after you moved into your new apartment. It made you forget a little of the problems and broken, sickening relationships you experienced in your hometown. They always felt heavy on your shoulders. Yet Gotham had its own dark diseased methods of throwing your mental health back to a state you couldn’t stand anymore.

You had been standing down the street, looking back up at the old run-down apartment, to the window on the 8th floor. Many memories rushed through your head. None of them happy ones, good or even worth to remember, worth to hold them dear. Taking your look back to the street you hailed a taxi.

„Good day sir, to the airport, please.“ You let the taxi driver know before he could ask where he should take you, taking your seat in the back of the car.

Please take me away from this shithole.

You had always liked watching the streets, buildings and landscapes while driving. But there wasn’t a thing in Gotham you could stand to see anymore. Not a single god damn thing. You decided to call the only person you managed to build up a friendship with in Gotham instead. And probably the only person that actually cared about you and what was happening at that time in your life. The other day you had been spending time with her, saying your goodbyes. She picked up the phone.

„Y/N, so today’s the day, huh?“ Your friend asked. „Hey, yeah… it is. I’m actually already on my way to the airport. Even when my flight won’t take off until tonight.“ You let her know. You had your elbow placed at the bottom of the window. Rubbing the back of your fingers along your forehead, you added, „I just had to. This place is poison and I feel like- „

BOOM!

 A loud crashing sound! The taxi stopped with a sudden halt. Your scream out of fear almost as loud as the crash itself, as you felt your arm being teared away from the window, along with your phone, dropping it down onto the floor. Your head bumped against the headrest of the seat in front of you, filling your ears with a buzzing sound. The impact had you immediately falling back into your seat, where your hand came up to cup your head. You grunted at the pain pulsing through your head.

What the hell was that?

The front windscreen of the car had been split into hundreds of little shards, still connected to each other, holding themselves in place. Yet now almost impossible to look through it. With wide eyes you could only notice something big and red rolling down the front windscreen. Not to your surprise, the cab driver hadn’t shown any reaction or slightest emotion to the accident he just had contributed.

What the fuck?? We just hit someone!

The silence of the taxi driver caused you to hear your name being screamed by someone. It sounded wide away, like from outside of the car and yet so near. You couldn’t quite sense the point of it. Again, you heard your name. „Y/N? Y/N!!!” That’s when you remembered your phone call. Your friend had been shocked as well, hearing that loud crashing sound and your screams over the phone. You bent down a little and started to search for your phone on the floor of the car. “Are you alright?? What the fuck happened over there?“ „Fuck… I’m sorry, I- I’m... I’ll call you back.“ You managed to stutter and hung up hastily.

 You quickly pushed the door open and rushed to the front of the taxi. Too quickly and rushed for the still shocked state of your body. As you focused on a man laying on the floor, whimpering and writhing, you had been stumbling all the way over to him. Your hands crashed on the cold, wet concrete near his head. Your knees stumbled over the rough street, ripping your jeans open slightly, surely leaving a graze.

Green hair.

 You mentally raised an eyebrow as you noticed his colored locks. „Sir- sir are you alright? Are you hurt?” He grunted painfully in response. As he lifted himself on his elbows, you could see something brown peaking out from under his upper body. It looked like some kind of notebook. You put your hand down carefully on his shoulder. “Can you move? Let me help you up.” He slowly turned his head to face the person who so kindly had offered to help him.

A clown?

 In that moment you soaked in every little detail you could spot in his face. Your heart still pounding so fast from the situation you had found yourself in. Painted big red smile, blue triangles under and above his piercing green eyes which seemed deep like an ocean. A beautiful ocean in which you felt yourself dive into right in this moment, even if you were swimming in it for just a second, and a scar just right above his upper lip. He looked devilishly handsome in that moment, his green wet locks slightly disheveled falling into his face. You could have sworn your heart had been pounding even heavier at this point.

 Little did you know his reaction to you was the absolute same. He noticed every little detail about it. Saving it in the back of his mind. The moment he laid his eyes on your face had calmed him down in a way he did not know how to process, when at the same time it had him feeling an excitement in his belly he had never felt before.

His eyes were running wildly over your facial features, eventually they stopped at meeting yours. You felt your cheeks burn up a little, as your eyes switched hastily between the both of his green ones. You could feel your breathing increase, as you shared this moment. Everything around you faded away.

  “ARTHUR!!” A loud desperate scream ripped you out of that little peaceful universe you had just went to. You looked over your shoulder, trying to find the owner of the voice, as you saw two detectives running directly in your direction. Again, they were shouting for an Arthur. You heard some movement right behind you. When you turned your head, you could only see the back of the man in the red suit. He ran, no, he fled from the detectives. He was almost out of your sight, when he took a quick glimpse back to estimate the distance between him and the detectives. When the detectives darted past you, his gaze fell back down on you. You whispered to yourself, “Arthur…”, as you looked back on the spot of wet concrete where he had just been laying only moments ago. It was right then, when you noticed something sticking to the wet concrete beneath you. It looked like some sort of paper. It must have been a page out of the brown notebook you had noticed earlier.

It must’ve gotten ripped out as he fell onto the floor.

You were still panting and felt dizzy, your view all blurred. You winced at a sudden noise taking you back to reality, your hand picked up the paper before you had a chance to take a good look at it, scooping it into the pocket of your coat. You got up on your feet and your view became clearer again, as you found yourself still standing in the middle of the street. Cars eager to start to drive again, honking wildly. Some of the drivers even yelled at you to get you out of their way. “Oh fuck off!” You yelled back them. This fucking city! ________

 You couldn’t tell exactly what it was that kept you from entering that taxi again. Something was holding you back for the moment. So instead of continuing your ride to the airport, you decided to take the subway, making your way to your friends’ apartment. While on the subway, you shoved your cold hands into the pockets of your coat.

The piece of paper!

You gently pulled it out of your pocket and took a closer look at it. You could hardly see anything on it. The water that had still lingered on the cold concrete, from the rain this morning, had almost smeared out half of it. You could put some words together-

 - However a lot of… they… just like I don’t exist

 - Today I feel fresh and ready for the day…

 And something that seemed to be about writing jokes.

 ________

“Oh Y/N, you know in Gotham no one really cares about the other guy. I’m actually kind of jealous you get to leave this shithole for that new job.” Your friend chuckled, handing you over a hot cup of coffee.

Your friend had invited you in, after she was more than surprised, seeing you standing in front of her. You told her everything that had happened, after you hung up on her on the phone call you two shared earlier. Before the car crashed. Before your big plan had been crushed. Crushed by a not assignable feeling, that lurked deep inside you.

“I know, I felt that once again today. Hey, do you mind if I stay for a little while? It’s just I-“, your friend interrupted you, as she saw you struggle to find the right words to express your scattered self.

“I won’t kick you out, Y/N. You can stay as long as you want. It’s my day off after all, so we can do what ever eases your mind. I’d love to watch the Murray Franklin Show later, though. I’m sure he’ll make you brighten up a bit, too.” You never really liked watching Murray. Making jokes on the costs of others just wasn’t your sense of humor. You weren’t even sure that it was an actual sense of humor in general.

 The opening song of the Murray Franklin Show started to fill the room. As your friend and you sat down on the couch in front of the tv, you had no idea what was about to happen.

For your friend almost glued to the tv, you on the contrary were still quite lost in your mind at that time. Sitting on the couch, cross-legged, drifting in and out of the conversation Murray had with a Dr. Sally. The doctors screen time was over and they showed some video tapes of a guy at a comedy club, it seemed to you. Murray was making fun him, the whole crowd laughed at the man and you remembered why you didn’t like that show at all. Murray welcomed “Joker”. You gasped loudly as you saw the curtain pulled aside for the entrance of the last guest of tonight’s show. 

Oh my god. It’s him.

 You sat straight up, placing your elbows on your knees and resting your head in your hands. Your attention now fixated at the tv surely as much as your friends’. The whole afternoon your body felt somewhat tense, stiff. Feeling like all the blood of your body had been stuck in one place. The moment Joker danced his way to greet Murray started something in you. You could feel your blood rushing through your veins fast, heating your body up in an unknown excitement. Murray kept making fun of him while the man sat right next him in front of a big crowd. It felt like a mental execution to you and you could see it was affecting the man in the red suit in no positive way. You could have sworn you saw tears in his eyes every other moment the camera zoomed in a bit on his painted face. He was told to show them some of his jokes, when he pulled something out from the back pocket of his red dress pants. “He’s got a book. A book of jokes.” Murray mocked him. You immediately had a flashback of the notebook laying on the street, while you wanted to help him up. Joker turned the pages, carefully picking out what he wanted to share with the crowd. He paused at one page and the expression on his face sent cold shivers down your spine. You remembered what you read on the page that got ripped out of his notebook.

Just like I don’t exist

You frowned in concern of what else he must have been writing down similar to this.

 A few minutes later you had witnessed a murder live on television. Your friend holding up her hand over her mouth in disbelief and shock. You didn’t move, you just sat there. Your heart was pounding heavy in your chest. The cause of your panting wasn’t the fact that you just had seen somebody’s head blown off, it was because of every word he said right before aiming a gun at Murrays head and pulling the trigger, you understood. You felt every single word of it.

________________

I can’t believe you two precious human beings asked me to tag you in this story, but here we go omgggg The night shift clowns: @jaylovesbats​ @arthurscarnival​

[xsecretblastsx]

1x13 - The thin line between Chuck and Nate

That’s a really long tittle for an episode. I wasn’t planning on doing this recap today, but I’m anxious and I needed some distraction, and so here we are.

This is quite the episode. I apologize in advance about the length of this recap. So here we go.

Thougths i had while watching the episode:

Not that it can be forgotten but the opening scene of this episode is such a reminder of how stalkerish the gossip girl site is

I had totally forgot about Jenny, like now that I think about it I didn’t even notice she wasn’t on the last couple of episodes, wow.

I actually laughed at Dan’s and Rufus stunned silence.

Somehow Dan I don’t believe you love Serena, I believe you think so, but that’s not the same as actually loving someone.

I’m not expert in the Queen bee and her clique hierarchy, but it’s says a lot about her that Jenny actually tries to stand up herself, like if you think about it she’s a freshman, and not even from the UES and she’s already really set on stating her place. 

Plot twist: the test was for Blair, dun dun dun

We have seen it before, but this is the first time we actually start to see the extent of Blair’s ability for going into denial mode, and Serena explains it masterfully, so much that “the movie playing in Blair’s head about her life” it’s something I’ve seen a lot since I first watched this show to describe some of Blair’s anticts through the show.

Maybe I’am a total bitch, have you thougth about that? It’s one my fave Blair’s lines.

Blair and Nate having a nice cute moment, while Chuck watches in the shadows, and Blair is just like sorry not sorry, auch.

I honestly don’t understand why Jenny is so surprised Blair is never going to really like her, like she said she has spend the last six months on it, being a minion, what did she expect, Blair is not nice, and that comes across, like two minutes after meeting her.

I love Serena’s gold coat, not that I blame her, but she gave up really fast.

Like even ignoring the fact that Jenny was eavesdropping, I’m not a fan of Serena telling Dan that, at least not the Blair part.

Jenny’s face is like “wow this is the gossip of the decade” hilarious.

Serena saying “he does have a this weird influence over her” is a very telling line about them. 

I’ve realized that while I like his characters, Rufus storylines are really boring when they are not related to Lily.

Chuck’s outfts in S1 were something else, not in a good way. 

Serena being all like damn, had I known that I wouldn’t have told you this. I feel bad or fher, because It’s one of those cases were having good intentios and helping your friends actually makes everything worse. 

“I command myself not to be pregnant” have I’ve mentioned I love Blair?

“I would have no idea what to wear to a paternity hearing” this line would never be hilarious, and Serena if it wasn’t for pre natal DNA tests, you probably would have picked that outif.

“So goodbye mistake, so far in my past I can hardly remember” that was harsh Blair, and I’m not justifying what Chuck does next, but I’ve always felt that for knowing him like she did, it was naive of her to believe he wouldn’t retaliate.

That scene of Blair waliking down the stairs while everyone gossips about her is so well done, the visuals, the voices around her, you really feel it, and feel for her.

Jenny spilling the beans to Nate, really steppingi in the game now.

That was a fight that was a long time coming since 1x07, and I love this scene, it’s interesting that Nate is mad, and probably hurt, and yet is Chuck the one that looks really hurt by it in the end of the scene.

Again, I understand why Nate is mad, but considering he actually cheated on Blair with Serena, he cames across as being a really hypocrite in his fight with Blair.

I love Serena, but she’s like immediately jumping on Dan and Jenny’s defence, without even really listening to Blair, not trying to understand why she’s upset. Of course Blair being Blair retaliates, but on this case she’s actually not wrong in what she says to Serena, it’s just brutally honest.

I loved the stand off’s between Blair and Jenny, they’re epic. As of now, Jenny 1, Blair 0.

I really love Serena’s outfit this episode.

No Dan! You don’t get to dictate when and if someone tells you they love you back, Like sorry, but putting that pressure on someone is not okay at all. Storming out in anger, is just... wrong.

That scene of Blair just wandering the streets, reminiscing about Nate and Chuck is so sad, and it’s probs also the first time since Cotillion, that she allows herselft to think on the fact that she has feelings for Chuck too. 

I like to mention that the Nate memory is a heartbreaking moment in their history, she’s crying. Her Chuck memory in the other hand is the moment that started it all, and exciting moment. The difference.  Great choice of music by the way.

One of my favorite aspects of S1 were the heart to heart convos between Serena and Eric. He’s such a wise kid.

What’s with Chuck’s outfits this episode. I hate that sweater. 

This scene is so hard to watch, Chuck’s words to Blair are horrible, so much that it’s hard to remember why he’s so mad and hurt, so one is like f*ck you Chuck,  and the way Blair reacts, and how hurt she is by his words, makes it easy to forget that she had dismissed his feelings, treated him like her dirty little secret and called him a mistake. 

Blari and her mom having a moment, always gets to me.

I love that scene between the girls of the steps and Jenny, you can really see her becoming a mean girl, and it gets even better when Penelope says “Blair trained you well”, cause this Jenny in many ways is indeed a Blair creation. 

“I love you because you make no apologies for being exactly who you are” Sorry Dan but I don’t believe you when you say that.

This is one of my favorite Serena and Blair moments ever,  No matter what they have each other, and have a lot of love between them, even if they forget about it from time to time.

So.. what an episode. People mostly remember it as the episode where the love triangle between Nate-Blair-Chuck explodes, but it’s also the episode that really puts Jenny in the road to Queen B, there’s also a lot about Blair and Serena’s friendship and it’s the episode where Dan and Serena say I love you to each other, quite the ride in plots. I’ll save my thougths on Jenny for the next episodes because if I remember correctly those focus a lot on her Blair and the road to queendom.

This is suposed to be a sweet episode for Dan and Serena, and for the most part it is, they’re there for each other, have cute dates, and Dan’s struggle to say I love you to Serana it’s almost endearing and then it comes to the moment Dan manages to sayI love you, and Serena doesn’t say it back. It’s obviously a distressing moment to say the words and not get them back, and I get it can be particularly difficult for Dan because he sees Serena as a girl that it’s so out of his league that really, why would she love him. And yet I hate his reaction. He storms out in anger, and tells her how is not okay for her to react that way. I guess I wouldn’t have much of an issue (i’m actually pretty sure I didn’t think much of it the first time I watched this) if I didn’t knew that he always reacts badly when Serena doesn’t act like he wants her to. 

I loved the fact that the show, makes a point to establish why Serena has a difficult time with the words I love you, her little talk with Eric was so nice because like the last episode references the way Lily’s chaotic love life damaged her children. I do wish we spend a bit more time on this issues, because I feel having Serena said I love you to Dan right back after his “this is why i love you speech” (which by the way sound hollow given what I’ve already know) it was a tad to soon and it cheapens a bit her difficulties, like if they were easy to get over, and not something that she has to work through, I would have prefered if her I love you came some episodes later, not necesarilly after dramatic struggling that’s not Serena, but rather after her realizing she can trust Dan and seeing for herself he loves her (I know, i know).

Now, the pregnancy scare, the way this episode flows is really good, it keeps you on your seat and starting out with the little plot twist about the pregnancy not being for Serena and instead is for Blair really sets the tone. I love how from the very beginning it shows how Serena is there for Blair, how she takes the bullet for her by gettingh photographed buying the test, it also shows how really well she know Blair, the line a about Blair living in the movie in her head is so good, we learn more about Blair and how it falls on Serena to help her deal with reality. When the shit hits the fan, Blair lashes against Serena, and this is the kind of situation where I can see where Blair’s coming from particularly when Serena defends Dan and Jenny, because to Blair she’s putting them above her, and the fact that Serena trusted in them and defends that trust hurts, Serena doesn’t seem to understand at first why Blair sees this scandal as the end of the world, and when Blair’s points out that she doesn’t get it because things are different for Serena and she already ruined her reputation, Serena gets offended, and I get it, Blair was recalling a part of Serena’s life she had left behind, and she doesn’t need the reminder, so she leaves. 

It does ironically proves Blair point, because at the start of the episode yes people talk about Serena, but when she says she’s not pregnant, everyone’s like ok whatever, the girls on the steps are like great let’s get drinks to celebrates, Blair on the other hand get’s dethroned for the same pregnancy scare and for sleeping with two guys... the consequences are not the same for the both of them, and Serena doesn’t understands it at first and reacts to Blair’s meltdown like Blair just being Blair, when she finally gets it she goes after her and convinces her to stay and not run away, giving us one of the nicest scenes of their friendship, their bond and their love for each other.

Another interesting bit about the episode is how we see Serena trying and tyring to help Blair one way or the other, she tries so hard that she makes questionable decisions that in the long run actually have undesirable consequences, however this only happens because Blair keeps being so obnoxious about it, and if  she hadn’t been in complete denial Serena wouldn’t have talked about with Dan and Chuck, which ends up with the whole affair exposed. This is a pattern that repeats during the whole episode having Blair  pushing and pushing people to the limits of their tolerance . We see Blair going over Jenny in full Queen B mode, whichs mades Jenny snap, tired about it and ends up with her telling Nate the whole truth. Same with Chuck,  this episode she actually refers to him as a mistake she doesn’t even remember, and since she has  been very dismissive of his feelings so far, so he snaps and sends the tip to gossip girl. So we have Blair suffering the consequences of her actions, and the fact that the show does this, it’s the reason that no matter how bitchy or mean she gets, she always ends up having to deal with the results of that, which helps her grow in the long run and us love her.

Finally, the love triangle. So Nate and Blair 2.0 end up being very short lived. Now I’m not a fan of Nate this episode, mostly his treatment of Blair. He was a shitty boyfriend, who cheated on her with her best friend, not only that but the way he reveals it to her and continues to pine after Serena long after it, not breaking up with her mainly to help his father, and they actually broke up because he didn’t love her, so he’s real a hypocrite when he says “Guess when we were talking about leaving the past behind we were talking about yours, not mine” and it’s not the same, you cheated she didn’t, and yet he drops her without a second thought, not considering how forgiving she was of him in the past. So in that sense, good riddance Nate.

On the other hand, Nate’s anger with Chuck is justified, because like I said about the Serna and Nate hook up in redgards to Blair, girlfriends come and go, but friends are forever and you expect loyalty of them, and sure Blair and Nate had already broke up, but it’s not like you expect your best friend to hook up with your ex the minute the relationship is over. So i get, I do find interesting that Nate seems more angry than hurt with Chuck, and I think he doesn’t feel as hurt because he doesn’t really love Blair, and so his anger comes from the fact that he believes Chuck sleeping with Blair was just Chuck being Chuck, and he can’t quite believe it when Chuck ends up pointing out that  Nate ignored Blair and how instead he was actually there for her, and I feel this is part of the reason Chuck’s look so hurt at the end of their fight, because not only did Nate ends their friendship but he’s very dismissive and quite can’t believe that Chuck may have cared from Blair somewhat. 

That’s the scenario Blair walks into when she goes to talk to Chuck. He’s really hurt, because he not only lost his best  friend, the one person that he had always openly cared for, and he lost him because of the relationship he had with Blair, who had been nothing but dissmisive of him for quite some time now, who at best treated him as her dirtly little secret, even when he admitted to feel something and had nice details with her, like the necklace he gave her, he put himself out there as much as his emotinal stunned self could at that time and it was all for nothing, she saw him as nothing but a mistake.It’s not that I’m taking his side per se, but Season one it’s the one I do tend to think Blair had a bigger part in how things got to that point, in many ways she was mean to him just because, he was mostly reacting to her actions, the thing about Chuck though is that whenever Blair does something bad to him, he ends up retaliating 100 times worst. 

I feel he does this to level the ground between and end ups going overboard because it’s the way he takes control back over the situation, particularly in the first two seasons, when hasn’t come to terms completely with what he feels for her, he doesn’t know how to handle it on a good day, even less so when he hurts because of her. So on this episode what he says to her is horrible, he basically slut shames her, the whole episode is a tale about that, and that’s just awful, honestly had Chuck not said that I would be totally on his corner on this one, as it is I can’t and I just sigh in frustration. He was hurt yes, but he ends up hurting Blair as badly if not more, for all her witty combacks and bitchiness she halts, not able to say anything back and she just looks so hurt, to the point that she ends up in her mother’s arm crying and wanting out, and sure it’s the combination of everything that want’s her to go away, but it’s Chuck’s words that put her over the edge because she wasn’t expecting that from him,before all of this they were partners in crime, friends in a weird way different from their friendship with Serena and Nate and also because she’s suprised it actually hurts her that much.

Here’s the thing, my own “theory” on this, when I did the recap for 1x07 I’ve mentioned this is the moment he realizes he’s in love with ther, he may not go as far as to called it that, but he know he feels something, being probably lowkey feeling it for quite sometime, and that to him is monumental. That’s Chuck’s moment. This episode to me is Blair’s moment. When I think of the moment she realizes she is in love with him is either this, or in that week before S2. But I’m way more inclined to believe it’s this one, when he breaks her heart. Especially because she breaks up again with Nate this same episode at a point when she believed the best of their relationship is yet to come, and she doesn’t seem as bad after talikng to him as she did after talking to Chuck. I also believe this because like I mentioned earlier in the scene when she thinks about both of them, she thinks of Nate in one of their saddest moment, when basically Nate says you either let go of the fact I cheated on you, or we end this, and when she thinks of Chuck she remembers their time in the limo, it’s an interesting contrast almost as if her subconcious was telling her, forget Nate that ended up a long time ago, what happened with Chuck however was amazing, do you really want to give it up? And it’s after that scene that she goes looking for him, only to find out, he doesn’t want her anymore. I also feels it paints a  kind of interesting contradiction, Chuck realizes he loves her on such a incredibly happy moment, she realizes she loves him in a really sad moment, like oh shit! I’m in love with Chuck Bass, and it fits with the star of the story, he’s after all the one that goes after her first, and truth is, since that day he never really let’s her go.

Random bits I’ve noticed:

This was filmed in december, that scene where Serena is telling Dan that she’s not pregnant, behind them you can see a lot of poinsettias.

Blair’s wearing Jeans for a bit during this episode, that’s like sighting the yeti.

The song they used throught this episode but most notably in the scene where the blast about Blair reaches everyone is called “The Dark side of Indoor Track Meets” by Captiva, and the full song is weirdly interesting, like the last part of the song is really creepy. 

I love the song they used when Blairs is thinking about Nate and Chuck. It’s called “The air we breathe” by the figurines.

[andtails]

A Prelude to Chaos Control - Chapter 4: In the City

Click here to start from the beginning. You can also read this story on FanFiction.Net or Archive of Our Own.

***** 

“I sure am beat.”

Sonic sat in Knuckles’ modest kitchen, resting his legs up on the table as he chugged a blueberry sports drink, sweat rolling down his fur.

“You said it,” Knuckles replied, entering the room with a training towel around his neck. “I haven’t had that much of a workout in a while.”

“Maybe I should come by more often then?”

“Just not too much.” The echidna and hedgehog chuckled while continuing their banter, relaxing after a few hours of sparring in the clearing surrounding Knuckles’ home.

“I wonder how Tails is doin’?” Sonic asked himself, standing up to get a good view of the Master Emerald shrine from the window. Sonic watched as Tails continued his work, typing away on his laptop, which he had wired to multiple points on the large gem.

“Do you think he’ll actually be able to pull it off?” Knuckles asked, peering out of the kitchen window alongside the blue hedgehog, taking a swig of his cherry sports beverage.

“Knowing my little bro, I have confidence that he’ll accomplish whatever he sets his mind to.”

“But still,” Knuckles interjected, “the thought that one can simply detect chaos energy with some machine seems a bit farfetched, don’t you think?”

Sonic turned his head toward the red echidna. “I don’t pretend to know much about all this science stuff. All I really know is that the emeralds can provide a significant power boost in combat, and finding a way to obtain them faster would place us at a great advantage. If anyone in this world can solve this puzzle, it’ll be my lil’ bro.”

“You sure seem to have a lot of confidence in him.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Sonic replied, his face tightening as he sat back down at the table. “Ever since we met, Tails has gotten me out of countless jams and helped thwart Eggman’s schemes time and time again. I don’t think I’d be here today without his genius mind…or his friendship.” Sonic placed his arms on the table, looking up at the red echidna. “Yet despite this, he still places a lot of pressure on himself to be perfect, and he takes any mistake as a personal failure.”

Sonic’s voice began to shake as a slight hint of moisture formed over his eyes. “If I had one wish in this world, it’d be to help my little bro, but I just don’t know how, ya know?”

Knuckles, not used to consoling a friend or having these sorts of interpersonal conversations, stood there and looked at the hedgehog. He observed as Sonic turned his attention back to the window, watching the orange kitsune working diligently on his experiment.

This is so unlike Sonic. He must really be stressing out if he came to me, of all people, to talk about his feelings.

“But, what am I sayin’?” Sonic said in a joyful manner, a smile appearing on his face as he got up from his seat. “I’m sure that Tails’ll get the detector working, and we’ll have all the emeralds back in no time.”

“Ahh, okay, then…” Knuckles wasn’t sure how to respond to Sonic’s rapid mood swing.

“Why don’t we go check on him?” Sonic offered as he began walking to the door, taking a last gulp of his drink before throwing the bottle in the trash can along the way.

“Hey, you know we recycle here, right?” Knuckles pointed to the recycling bin next to the garbage can. The recycling container was labeled with three arrows that formed a triangle.

“Oops, sorry man.” Sonic ran a hand through his quills in embarrassment before fishing the bottle out of the trash and placing it in the proper bin. As he headed to the exit, Knuckles placed a hand on his shoulder.

“I may not be the best at this sort of thing, but if you ever need to talk some more, I’m always here.” Sonic looked over his shoulder and gave the red echidna a thumbs up and a smile before leaving the cabin.

*****

Tails stared at his laptop, tinkering with a software application that he had programmed to help analyze the unique energy readings emitted by the emeralds. He carefully studied the monitor, double-checking the software parameters while munching on his box of Mobian Scout™ mint chocolate cookies, allowing dark crumbs to fall onto his keyboard.

“All right, here goes nothing.” Tails clicked a few remaining keys before wiping his face clean of cookie crumbs and following the trail of wires leading from his laptop to the Master Emerald, which stuck to the mystical gem with suction cup-like energy readers. The objective was for the emerald’s chaos energy to transmit through the cables and reach the laptop, where Tails’ application would convert the readings into digestible data for further analysis.

Tails watched as the Master Emerald began to glow with a green aura as streaks of static covered the large gem. Meanwhile, the laptop was beginning to hum louder than usual, its small fans spinning faster to prevent the computer from overheating. The program displayed lines upon lines of numerical data as points on a continuously expanding chart shot up and down.

“It’s working!” The orange kitsune waved a fist in the air in excitement before grounding himself back to the task at hand, anxiously dividing his attention between his laptop and the Master Emerald. It was at this time that Sonic and Knuckles arrived back to the shrine, climbing up the stairs to greet the young fox.

“Hey Tails, how’s it goin’?” the blue hedgehog asked, waving at his younger brother. Instead of waiting for an answer, though, he shifted his focus to the glowing emerald, taking a step back in surprise. Knuckles swiftly stepped sideways to avoid Sonic’s sudden movement before noticing the emerald himself.

“Tails, what’re you doing!” Knuckles yelled, approaching the mystical gem with anger in his eyes. “Can’t you see the Master Emerald is in pain?”

“Huh?” Tails looked at the red echidna in confusion. “What do you mean? I’m only gathering data on the emerald’s chaos energy.” As if not hearing Tails’ explanation, Knuckles approached the gem intending to remove the cables. Before he could, though, a bolt of static shocked his hand, causing the tough echidna to step back, his face tensing up as he growled in pain.

“Knuckles, are you hurt?” Tails asked, approaching him with an outstretched hand.

“No, I’m fine.” Knuckles turned away, tending to his bruised hands before shooting a glance back at the orange kitsune. “So, are you gonna stop this madness?”

“I really don’t know what you mean, I was just—” Tails’ explanation was cut short by the static growing in size around the Master Emerald, the gem’s glow now a piercing light that blinded the trio as the shrine began to shake under their feet.

“Tails,” Sonic said, balancing on one foot as he swung his arms to steady himself. “You gotta stop this!”

“Right.” Tails flew over to his laptop, as walking was now out of the question, and pressed a few keys. As the application closed, Tails looked in bewilderment as the Master Emerald continued to glow violently, the intensity of the static getting stronger. “No, this is impossible! The reaction should’ve subsided by now!”

In a desperate attempt to remedy the situation, Tails tried yanking the cables off the emerald, theorizing that the gem was still transmitting data to the computer, even with the program shut down. Despite his attempts, the suction cups remained in place, firmly rooted to the Master Emerald. Tails moved closer to the green gem, still yanking at the cables, with one in either hand, making no progress.

“Why did I have to fasten these so tight?” Tails struggled to say as he used as much force as his little body could muster to remove the cords. As he gave a final tug, a steady stream of static pulsed out of the Master Emerald, striking Tails on both hands, covering his body in a wave of light.

“Ahhhhh!”

To Sonic and Knuckles’ horror, the orange kitsune remained frozen in place for several seconds, glowing brightly to give them a view of the skeletal outline beneath his skin, before falling to his knees. Tails’ body tumbled sideways, facing the Master Emerald, as he fell out of consciousness.  

*****

Tails slowly opened his eyes, blinded by the mid-afternoon sun pouring through the bedroom window of Knuckles’ cabin, to find himself in bed. Sonic was staring intently into his eyes, shifting in his chair as he noticed his younger brother regaining consciousness.

“Tails!” Sonic grabbed his hand. The young fox winced at the pain in his palms. “Ohh, sorry little bro.”

The kitsune raised his head up and looked down at his hands, gloves replaced by white bandages. He attempted to make fists with his hands, but while he was able to successfully move his fingers, pain still shot up his hand, tears forming in his eyes as his lips trembled. Drying his eyes with his right arm, he looked at the concerned hedgehog sitting next to him on the side of the bed.

“How long was I out?”

“About two hours.” Sonic pointed at a clock on the wall, which read two in the afternoon.

“I see,” Tails replied, resting his eyes for a bit, allowing his hands to drop down to his belly, the position that seemed the most comfortable to his injured paws. “And the Master Emerald?”

“The giant rock is fine,” Sonic replied, a small smile returning to his face. “Knuckles is tending to it now. You should’ve seen the look on his face when you got shocked, though. He was so scared!”

“If he was frightened, I can’t imagine how you reacted!”

The two brothers laughed in unison.

“I’m just glad you’re okay, big guy.”

Sonic peered down at the injured fox as he rustled his hair. Tails looked up at the blue hedgehog, wondering if he was imagining the moisture that appeared to be forming in Sonic’s eyes, as if he were about to cry, or if it was merely an optical illusion from the sun’s reflection.

“I’m…sorry…” Tails said, looking down at his palms again, his fingers twitching as feeling returned to his hands.

“Hey, you’ve got nothin’ to apologize for,” Sonic replied, stroking the back of the fox’s head.

“Did I really cause pain to the Master Emerald?” Tails looked back up at the blue hedgehog, tears welling up in his eyes.

“I don’t know for sure,” Sonic replied, holding Tails’ hands, delicately enough to not cause pain, “but nobody believes that you did it on purpose.” The blue hedgehog’s calming voice and rational response helped cool his nerves, fresh tears no longer building up in his eyes. The young kitsune’s face loosened as he looked out the window.

“I’m sure Knuckles is upset with me, huh.” Tails watched as the red echidna shined the Master Emerald, as if attempting to restore the mystical gem after being sullied by his experimentation.

“He was much more concerned with your well-being than that stupid rock,” Sonic replied. “But if you think you’re up to it, we can get you out of bed and walk around, maybe go see ‘im too.”

Tails wiggled his toes to confirm his feet weren’t asleep before pulling himself out of bed. The hedgehog helped steady the orange fox as he placed his feet on the ground before letting him go. Tails wobbled a bit, grabbing onto Sonic’s shoulder before regaining his composure. After releasing him once more, waiting several seconds to make sure he could stand on his own, the young kitsune was able to keep his balance without anyone there to prop him up.

“Now let’s see if you can walk.” Sonic stepped out of the bedroom, beckoning Tails to follow him. Instead, he lost himself in thought, no longer in the company of his big brother.

I don’t understand…how did I survive such a shock with little more than burnt hands? Surely the intensity of the electricity should’ve paralyzed me, or worse…

The young kitsune stood there, pondering his miraculous recovery, his finger to his chin as he continued looking out the window, the sun warming his orange fur.

“Is something wrong?” Sonic asked, poking his head back into the bedroom to check on his little brother.

“No, I’m fine.” Wishing to delay no longer, Tails moved his legs, still wobbly as if his nervous system were still rebooting. Slowly taking a few more steps, however, the orange fox regained the ability to move normally, briskly following Sonic out of the cabin.

The bright sun, light wind, and refreshing aroma of the outdoor air seemed to calm Tails’ mind. He breathed deeply, allowing the air to escape his lungs slowly as he looked across the pristine clearing. He took it all in, forgetting about his injuries and scientific failures for a few moments before turning his eyes to the Master Emerald Shrine, where Knuckles was still shining the large gem with a white rag.

Not wanting to push his luck, but still eager to test his body’s limits after recovering from the electric shock, Tails jogged toward the shrine. Deciding that his legs were okay, and his balance unhindered, he began to spin his namesakes to increase his speed. Thankfully, his tails, or the rest of his body, didn’t seem to be drastically impacted by the accident, just another mystery that rivaled the age-old question of how he was able to rotate his appendages like helicopter propellers in the first place.

Sonic watched as Tails picked up speed.

Man, that little guy recovers fast!

Meeting each other at the foot of the shrine, the two brothers walked up the stone steps to greet Knuckles, who had since dropped his rag and sat down for a break.

“How are you doing, Knuckles?” Tails asked, his voice shaky. He was nervous to confront him after the incident with his Master Emerald.

“Not too bad,” the red echidna replied, looking up at the young kitsune from his seat on the ground. “I should be asking you the same thing.”

“Oh, I’m fine.” Tails smiled as he placed a hand behind his head before pulling it away, forgetting that his palms were more sensitive than usual.

“I’m sorry for yelling at you earlier,” Knuckles said, standing back on his feet. “I just hope you realize why I got so upset.”

“No, no, I should be the one apologizing for hurting the Master Emerald. I feel like I deserve the punishment I received.”

“That’s not true. I may be the guardian of the Master Emerald, sworn to protect it at all costs, but that doesn’t mean your pain was deserved. Besides, I’m sure the Master Emerald recognized you were not actually trying to cause harm.”

“Yeah, I guess.” Tails itched his muzzle. “Hey, Knuckles…does the Master Emerald have…sentience?”

“What does that mean?” Knuckles raised his hand to his chin, attempting to decipher this new word.

“You know…feelings…thoughts…like you and me.”

“Ohh, I see. Well…yes, the Master Emerald does have feelings, and I can use my connection to the emerald to sense these emotions, but it has never spoken to me in words. I felt the emerald’s pain during your experiment, but it didn’t say that you were causing it…it didn’t need to.”

The young fox approached the Master Emerald once more, the gem glistening in the mid-afternoon sun. “If you can understand me, I just want you to know that…I’m sorry...” He placed an injured paw on the large gem as he looked down at the base of the emerald. Surprisingly, his hand didn’t hurt from touching the mystical gem.

Knuckles and Tails stood there in silence. Only the rustling of the wind and the chirping of distant flickys could be heard as they lost themselves in thought. Sonic, who was on the other side of the Master Emerald, came back around and approached his younger brother.

“Hey Tails, you’re gonna wanna take a look at this.” The fox looked up and followed the blue hedgehog to the other side of the shrine, a charred laptop resting on the ground.

At first, the orange kitsune blankly stared at the damaged laptop, coming to the realization that all his hard work, not to mention his injuries, were for nothing, until he realized that not all hope was lost. The fox turned to his smartwatch, pressing a few buttons to reveal a projector-like display that floated over Tails’ wrist, allowing him to interface with its menu by swiping with his hands.

“Aha!” Tails raised a fist in the air and jumped for joy. “This is why I always run back-ups! My laptop saved all the Master Emerald readings to the cloud in real-time. I should be able to work with this.”

“That’s great news!” Sonic said, placing a hand on his shoulder. Tails looked up at his older brother with a smile, content that the work he undertook, and the inadvertent risks that he put the Master Emerald through, paid off in the end.

Their celebration, however, was cut short as the projector’s image of numerical chaos energy data shifted to the face of a small, serious-looking Mobian.

“Hello, come in, Tails,” said a gravely, deep voice from the other end of the call. “This is General Pitliff.” Sonic and company saw him talking into a headset covering his large, gray ears, a green hard hat and military fatigues blanketing his small, furry, puffy body. If not for his stern expression, the frown on his face, and his petrifying stare, the chinchilla would have almost looked cute.

“Listen up,” Pitliff continued, placing a small paw over his exposed ear. “Robotnik is up to his dirty schemes again.” He paused as a car exploded in the background. “We need you and Sonic here to defeat and, hopefully, apprehend the evil doctor.”

“We’re on it,” Tails replied, giving Pitliff a salute with his arm.

“I knew we could count on you.” Pitliff entered a few digits into his smartwatch. “All right, I just sent you the coordinates, the heart of Seaside City. We’ll fend him off until you get here, at which point we will divert our focus to assisting the injured while you take care of Robotnik.”

“Understood,” Tails said as the general ended the call. He turned his attention to Sonic and Knuckles. “Alright, let’s go and kick Eggman’s butt!”

“Hold on a second.” Sonic raised his arms, signaling the young fox to pause as he was about to fly down the stone steps of the shrine. “Is it such a good idea for you to go rushing into battle with your injuries?”

Tails stared at the bandages on his hands. He winced in pain as he attempted to form tight fists.

“I’m…I’m alright, Sonic…honest.”

“I dunno, little buddy. I’m not so sure you’re in a condition to fight.”

Tails stared at his older brother, a look of disbelief appearing on his face. “But I’m your pilot. We can defeat Eggman together, like we always do. And besides, now that Eggman is back, we don’t know what he is planning, or if he has any Chaos Emeralds.”

Sonic looked up at the blue sky while tapping a finger against his chin, pondering Tails’ plea to help.

I am concerned for the little guy, especially with his injuries, and I could just fly the Tornado 2 by myself, but that’d absolutely crush his self-confidence.

“As long as you stay in the plane, I’ll allow it.” The hedgehog folded his arms and lowered his head, closing his eyes as if in deep thought. “I care too much about you to put you in harm’s way.” Sonic’s voice cracked as he looked up at Tails, a smile returning to the blue blur’s face. “But if you promise to keep yourself safe, we could definitely use the air support.”

Tails could’ve sworn that the hedgehog’s eyes were starting to moisten.

He really is concerned for me, huh? Well, all the more reason to make him proud!

Sonic raised a gloved pinkie finger, and the young fox grabbed hold of it with his own bandaged pinkie finger.

“Pinkie swear!” they said in unison.

“Hey guys, not to interrupt your conversation here, but shouldn’t we be heading to Seaside City?”

“You’re right, Knuckles.” Sonic replied. “Let’s go!”

With that, Team Sonic dashed through the clearing and the wooded path, making their way back to the Tornado 2, untouched from their arrival earlier that day.

Tails hopped in the cockpit as Sonic and Knuckles planted their feet on the left and right wings, respectively.

“You sure you’re gonna be comfortable leaving the Master Emerald behind?” Sonic asked as Tails readied for takeoff.

“I don’t like being away from the shrine, yes, but a few hours should be okay. Eggman is the biggest threat to the Master Emerald after all, so I’m still defending the Master Emerald, even if I’m away from the island.”

“I guess,” Sonic replied, shrugging his shoulders. “Hey Tails, are we about ready yet?”

“Almost.” Tails’ fingers were still numb from his injuries, lightly burning as he twisted the knobs and pulled the levers on his control panel. “I know what should make it better!” He reached into his glove compartment to find a new pair of white gloves, replacing the ones destroyed during the incident. “These should provide some padding to help dull the pain.”

He slipped the gloves on gently, careful not to undo the bandages around his hands, before bringing the biplane to life. He spun it around, twisting it 180 degrees on the grassy runway, and rolled forward, picking up enough speed to take off and retract the aircraft’s wheels. The young kitsune looked down at his gloved hands, now lifting the plane as it brought the gang up to a higher elevation.

“Yeah, I think these gloves’ll do nicely.” He grinned to himself as he glanced at either wing, making sure that his two companions didn’t fall into the ocean below. Next, he clicked a few buttons on his smartwatch to transmit General Pitliff’s coordinates to the Tornado 2’s built-in GPS. “Alright!” Tails said to himself. “If we go a little bit faster, we should reach our destination in about 15 minutes.”

And with that, Tails cranked up the speed, the hedgehog and echidna wobbling a bit before regaining their composure, as Team Sonic soared through the sky, on their way to confront Eggman once more.

*****

Seaside Hill was a tropical paradise, sparsely populated by Mobians and primarily visited by tourists eager to enjoy the pleasant waters, warm sun, and ancient architecture the getaway had to offer. Over the years, a city formed nearby, although not close enough to disturb its natural wildlife or pollute its pristine waters. As time passed, the city expanded further away from the coastline that made the region famous. Eventually, a multi-lane interstate highway was constructed through the heart of the city. Tall buildings were developed to house various multi-national corporations that established their roots in the sprawling economically lush business district. New suburban communities seemed to sprout up like wildfire, eager to fill the residential needs of workers who wanted to live away from the hustle and bustle of city life. Indeed, the city was growing at a rapid rate.

The perfect target for Eggman’s nefarious schemes.

As Team Sonic neared the coordinates provided to them by General Pitliff, they spotted the sight and smell of smoke filling the air and a large figure hovering high above the city, higher than the tall buildings of downtown as if waiting for a new challenger to appear from the skies. As the biplane got closer, they got a better view of this entity: a large, silver, mechanical raptor with long talons, a wingspan the length of a semitruck, a razor-sharp beak, and menacing red eyes that glared at the party.

“Why hello there, you miserable pests!” The sound of Eggman’s bellowing voice echoed out of the raptor’s beak. Now approaching within striking distance of the creation, Tails began to circle it, hoping to learn of the evil doctor’s intentions while developing a plan for taking down the raptor.

“All right, Eggman,” Tails said, speaking into his headset, allowing his voice to be heard through external speakers. “What are you up to this time?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know, my furry little friend.” The robot hovered in place as the biplane made its second lap around. “All right, I’ll get right to the point. Hand over whatever Chaos Emeralds you may have in your possession or else I’ll continue terrorizing Seaside City with my Elemental Egg Eagle!” As if on cue, the mechanical eagle let out a deafening cry that sounded nearly identical to the real thing. The orange kitsune’s muscles tensed at the menacing sight before him, but Sonic didn’t seem too worried.

“Elemental whatchamacallit?” Sonic asked, placing his hands on his knees while laughing. “You need to build a robot to help you name these things because you’re lacking in the creativity department!”

“I’ll have you know that it took several days to come up with the perfect name!”

“Doesn’t sound like it to me,” Knuckles replied, pounding his fists together in anticipation for the battle ahead. Sonic followed suit, stretching his arms forward while still maintaining his balance on the unstable wing at his feet.

“Let’s say we show Eggman a thing or two.”

Not waiting for a response from the red echidna, Sonic leapt forward, rolling into a ball as he charged toward the robotic eagle. Knuckles did the same, gliding towards their foe, his arms outstretched in front of him. The two allies made contact, but they ricocheted off the mechanical beast, not even leaving a scratch. Tails expertly caught the two with his biplane, one on either wing, as he continued circling around the eagle.

“Now it’s my turn!” Tails declared, pressing a button on his steering wheel to release a torrent of bullets. Unfortunately, these also bounced off the robotic beast, seemingly having no impact on their foe.

“Wooahhooohoohooo.” Eggman’s jolly laughter was almost as deafening as the eagle’s cry. “Surely you didn’t think that such trivial attacks would stop the Elemental Egg Eagle!”

By this point, Sonic and Knuckles had recovered from their first attack against the raptor and tried again, both launching off the biplane’s wings simultaneously. This time, however, the eagle dodged the attack, soaring upward with a flap of its wings. The blue and red blurs collided, just hard enough to throw Sonic out of his spherical form, as they plummeted to the city below.

Once again, Tails jumped into action, putting his plane into a harrowing nosedive as he swooped down to capture the heroes on the leftmost wing.

“Aha! You fell right into my trap!” Eggman yelled from above.

Tails looked behind him to see what was, perhaps, his worst nightmare, the very thing that he feared most: lightning. The bright streak approached the biplane, originating from the eagle’s beak, hitting the tail of the plane. Electricity sparked along the back of the aircraft, but it didn’t reach the cockpit or the wings thanks to the weather-proofing shock absorbers installed throughout the Tornado 2.

“You’re gonna have to try harder than that, Eggman!” Tails yelled. Before the young fox could reverse his nosedive, however, an emergency alarm rang from the plane. He looked behind once more to discover the fire scorching the plane’s tail. “Damn it!”

“Woah, Tails. Language!” Sonic yelled as he and the red echidna clasped onto the wing, their legs dangling upward as the plane careened to the ground below. Tails ignored this comment, instead trying to steady the plane for an emergency landing.

“Bad news, guys. Looks like we’re gonna have to take this battle to the city.” As Tails announced his plan into his headset, he frantically looked around the cityscape for a suitable place to land his biplane. The tall buildings scattered throughout the downtown area directly below were, perhaps, suitable for a helicopter landing, but he needed a long strip of road to safely land his aircraft without any casualties.

The kitsune found an abandoned stretch of the interstate, a section just long enough for him to land the plane and allow it to roll to a safe stop. Wasting no time, the fox took the plane out of its nosedive, allowing the Tornado 2 to lose altitude as a steadier pace. He steered the plane, positioning it horizontally with the highway below.

“Brace yourselves!” Tails yelled, deploying the wheels as his friends regained their composure from the nosedive. They bent their knees and balanced on the biplane’s wing like a surfboard, using their hands to keep themselves from falling off as the aircraft’s wheels made contact with the cement surface below. As the plane slowly lost speed, the orange kitsune dodged a few burning police cars before the aircraft ground to a halt, almost colliding with a school bus that obstructed the entire stretch of the interstate.

“Great landing, Tails!” Sonic called out, giving the pilot a thumbs up, which Tails returned before opening the hatch protecting the cockpit.

“Woah, hold up there, cowboy.” Sonic looked up at the cockpit, his younger brother about to jump out. “Remember what you promised earlier.” It took a few moments for Tails to recall that he committed to staying in the plane.

“But I can fight, Sonic! You’re gonna need all the help y—”

“Pinkie…swear.” Sonic interrupted the fox’s argument with a stern voice, staring sharply at the pilot. “I’m sorry, but with your injuries, you’d only be a liability on the battlefield. Come on, Knuckles.”

The two jumped off the wing and ran down the interstate, approaching the mechanical raptor that had since descended and hovered in place a short distance away. Sonic dashed off too quickly to see the tears welling-up in Tails’ eyes. He tried to dry them with his gloved hands, but his emotional agony seemed to exacerbate his physical pain, causing him to groan in discomfort. He slumped in his chair, looking down at his feet as tears rolled down his muzzle, dripping to his legs.

“A liability, huh? Is that what you truly think?”

The young fox was too emotionally blinded to realize that Sonic’s comment was narrowly referencing the situation at hand – his injuries making him a more vulnerable target – instead of a poignant attack against his overall usefulness.

“No…” Tails’ voice was scratchy as he spoke through his tears. “I can do anything I set my mind to. I can help you defeat Eggman and prove that I’m no liability.” Drying his tears with his left arm, he jumped out of the aircraft. The fire on the plane’s tail extinguished itself naturally, so the young fox didn’t need to worry about further damage to his prized biplane.

“I’ll be back soon, okay?” Tails said to the Tornado 2, patting its metallic body as if to reassure the aircraft that he’d return safely.

He turned around and ran toward his friends, activating his namesakes for extra speed. The trip only took him a few minutes, even while dodging the debris scattered along the road. Hiding behind a destroyed car to remain undiscovered by Eggman, Tails peeked around the vehicle to find the evil doctor giving one of his famous, albeit annoying monologues.

“Isn’t my Elemental Egg Eagle an eggzzellent invention? It has the speed and agility of a raptor with an impenetrable body and the ability to produce not one…not two…but THREE elemental attacks. As you’ve already witnessed, electricity is one of them. Want to guess what else we have in store?” The eagle, resting its mechanical talons on the cement road, opened its beak while charging a new attack. “Get a load of this!”

The mechanical slave unleashed a stream of fire in Sonic and Knuckles’ direction. Sonic dodged with relative ease while Knuckles left little room for comfort. After jumping to the side, he noticed a warm feeling above his head. A few seconds later, he realized that his fur was on fire. He ducked and rolled around frantically to put out the miniature blaze, leaving a patchy burnt spot near his dreadlocks.

“Ahaha, Knuckles…you should look at yourself in the mirror!” The blue hedgehog laughed as he pointed at the red echidna, unable to control his emotions as Knuckles’ anger grew hotter than the flames he just extinguished. Suffice it to say: unlike Sonic, Knuckles didn’t chuckle.

“This is no laughing matter, you oaf!”

Little did Sonic know, Knuckles was correct. Eggman used this opportunity for the eagle to recharge, its beak gaping open as it gathered the energy necessary to release another flamethrower attack. Sonic quickly stopped laughing and braced himself for another dodge, Knuckles doing the same. Before the bird could launch its attack, however, an orange kitsune ran towards it, passing Sonic and Knuckles by as he held a dummy ring bomb in his outstretched hand.

“Get a load of this you fiend!”

Tails threw the ring directly at the eagle’s beak, landing in its mouth and falling down its throat. The machine’s eyes grew wide, realizing that a foreign object was obstructing the elemental weapons housed in its throat. It tried to gag it out, but it was no good; the bomb stuck itself to the first surface that it touched, making removal almost impossible in the short period of time before detonation. The eagle put its head down, as if conceding defeat, before the beak exploded, shooting shrapnel everywhere as the eagle collapsed to the ground, its wing twitching as if it were a real bird on its last legs.

“Noooooo! Curse that meddlesome fox! Get up, you worthless bucket of bolts!” Miraculously, the eagle obeyed; only its mouth and beak were damaged, so the rest of the mechanical raptor was still intact. The hole in the bird’s face left by the explosion revealed the three elemental cannons that deployed their respective attacks. The two on either side were too damaged to be of use, but the middle weapon was in working order.

“Freeze that fox back to the ice age, or else you’ll be joining your brothers in the junkyard.” Not needing to be threatened again, the eagle began charging the attack, a white mist forming around the hole in its face.

“Now fire!” At a speed even faster than its flame attack, the injured eagle released a stream of ice. The young fox had no time to dodge; the attack hit him directly in the chest, launching him back as the cold stream followed him, the green Chaos Emerald slipping from his utility belt and landing on the cement below.

“Not…the emerald…” Tails struggled to say as his body flew through the air, passing Sonic and Knuckles in the opposite direction before colliding with the side of a school bus. The ice continued its onslaught against his furry body, entombing him completely in a frozen chunk of ice against the bus, save for his head and a single arm.

“Ahhh, I’m…stuck…” Tails tried to wiggle himself free, but he lacked the energy and power to break the ice.

“Tails!” Sonic ran back to him, concern in his eyes as he approached his younger brother. “I’m gonna get you out of this.”

“No…Sonic…” Tails said between labored breaths, his body experiencing a tremendous amount of pain from the cold penetrating his fur and piercing the skin below. He used his head and eyes to turn Sonic’s attention to his free hand, a dummy ring bomb around his wrist. “Take…this bomb…and throw it into…its gullet. That…should weaken it…enough for you…and Knuckles to…bring it…do—”  

Tails spoke no more, dangling from the side of the truck.

“Tails…” Sonic placed a hand on his furry face, unresponsive to his gentle touch.

“Tails!”

*****

Click here to read chapter 5!

[clownsgobeepbeep]

014.

14.)Can’t get out of the building

With a break from the Mafia AU , we go back to our OG universe in the future...

I was going to add something else to this, but decided to keep it out for another fic

After having received a letter delivered by a small bird, Atlas was a little more relieved if he was being honest with himself. The letter was from Ula, handwritten as he recognized her writing and flowery scent coming off it, so things were finally looking better after their last conversation. In the letter, she requested that he meet her in the woods after she was done with her band practice, so that was where Atlas went once the time came.

The deer clown walked around as he heard leaves and twigs crunching beneath his shoes, scanning the area as birds were heard singing and there was a soft breeze all around. Atlas stretched his arms out as he was careful not to drop the latte in his hand before he lowered his hands once again, continuing on his way before stopping as he came across a large building.

It looked like an abandoned cottage alright, so that meant he just had to wait for Ula now. And then, a sweet flowery scent hit Atlas’ nose  meaning that she was already there, and Atlas playfully rolled his eyes as he walked towards it, making sure the letter was still in his pocket. However, it never left his mind that he had never seem this cottage before.

“Is anybody home?” he called into the empty home, only hearing the ancient planks creak beneath him with every step he took. Atlas continued walking deeper into the building, looking everywhere for Ula who he guessed must have been hiding from him. Trying to scare him as always.

“Does a Shortcake happen to be somewhere around here?”

That’s when he heard a giggle that was Ula’s so he sneaked over to a room close to him. He peeked inside the room, catching a quick glance of long blonde hair which made him smirk before he jumped into the room.

“I found you!”

“Oh, you sure did.” came Ula’s voice as Atlas now saw her, and she held a hand on her lips as she gave a giggle. “I thought that you wouldn’t end up coming, Bambi.~”

“Did you think I would get scared or something?”

“Maybe.~”Ula asked as she placed her hands onto Atlas’ chest, giggling once again while fluttering her eyelashes. “But I also thought that Basil would scare you on the way here.”

“What?”Atlas furrowed his eyebrows before feeling Ula pull herself away, giving a snap of her hands as Atlas heard something creak behind him. He turned and slightly flinched at the loud sound of the bedroom door shutting, this being due to a hand that slammed it shut.

“I thought we would be...”Atlas turned back to Ula who reached up to grab her hair that, starting from the top, turned into an orange color as her eyeshadow disappeared and blue markings under her eyes turned into purple curved-like triangles with a yellow circle. “...alone.”

“Good afternoon Atlas.~”spoke Ula with a giggle, though it was no longer her voice as she completely changed into a shorter figure, one Atlas recognized as being Flora, with Basil behind him and in front of the door.

“No...I, I gotta go-”

“There’s no leaving here Atlas.”Flora fluttered her eyelashes while fixing her gloves, then turning to look at Basil. “You can move from the door, you know.”

“After what you guys did last time, I don’t want to talk to either of you.”

“Oh don’t worry, Basil won’t talk.”

“Where’s Ula?”

“Oh please.”Flora looked over at Basil who continued staring at Atlas. “You really didn’t think Ula sent you a handwritten letter, did you? The last letter she wrote like that was to somebody else who actually sent letters to her.”

“I’m not hearing any of this.” Atlas shook his head before turning and heading towards the door, being slightly startled as one of Basil’s green claws slammed itself on it. “Let me through, I am not afraid of either of you.”

“Basil, let him go.” Flora smiled before Basil retrieved his hand, Atlas watching it slither behind him which made him even more nervous than he already was. He turned back to the door, turning the doorknob as he now opened it. However, his eyes widened at the sight of razor sharp teeth and a long, slithering tongue before he shut the door in a panic.

“What the hell was that thing!?”

“Excuse you, that was Twoey.”Flora rolled her eyes as she spoke in a matter-of-fact-y tone. “They’re there making sure you don’t leave of course.”

“A giant...whatever it is! That thing, you think nobody’s going to notice that!?”

“Oh posh Atlas, nobody ever really notices a pocket dimension that exists inside a little girl’s basket.”Flora giggled as Atlas’ eyes widened. “But the point here is, we brought you over because we want to talk. And talk only.”

“If I listen and am not treated like last time, will you let me go?”

“Of course.” Flora nodded before Basil snapped his fingers, chairs appearing behind him and his sister which they sat down on. At the same time, another appear behind Atlas before it moved behind him, making him fall back on it as he now sat in front of the siblings, divided by a table full with a tea set as Flora served.

“Tea?”

“No thanks.”

“Hm, your loss.”she shrugged before taking her teacup. “Mother makes the best teas ever, she’s practically a witch with what she adds to them.”

“What do you guys want with me?” Atlas interrupted as he glared at the siblings, though he knew he was no match against Basil’s expression that never ceased.

“Well, first of, we want to say that we no doubt started on the wrong foot. Especially with Basil being petty to you since the day you met those many years ago.” Flora started before taking a sip from her tea. “And we have been treating you rather badly.”

“Yeah, thanks for telling me. I never realized that.”

“Anyways. Our point here is that we wanted to...well, let me say this before anything. My brother and I have a certain goal that we hope to achieve, no matter what we must do.”

“Okay, and what does this have to do with me?”

“Now, that’s the thing. It doesn’t, but you’re in the way.” Flora stated before Atlas furrowed his eyebrows. “And don’t even try reading our minds, we’re so far past those funny party tricks.”

“What’s-”

“Our goal we will not share.”Flora interrupted Atlas who frowned a little deeper. “But, I can tell you that as we attempt to reach it, we don’t want anymore...conflicts.”

“Okay.”

“So, we want to apologize.”

Atlas’s eyes widened as he stared at Flora and then Basil, shaking his head as he tried to comprehend what was just said.

“Wait, what?”

“We want to apologize.”Flora repeated before Atlas checked the teacup he had been offered, realizing it was still full.

“You guys didn’t do anything weird to me, right? I mean, besides putting me in a pocket dimension with some creature making sure I don’t get out.”

“No, Atlas. We want to apologize to you, unless you don’t want it nor the truce we offer.”

“No, tell me.”

“Well as I’ve already said three times, we want to offer you an apology for all the trouble we have brought upon you. Mother nor father never taught us to act in such a way.”Flora served herself some more tea, taking a sniff of its sweet scent. “And so, we offer a truce. You stop being a jealous deer every time Ula talks to any other person that is not from your family or friend group. You especially refrain from feeling any sort of jealousy when she talks to Schrader who she wants a friendship from. And, you stop feeling like a damn rebound, you idiot.”

Atlas’ eyes widened at Flora’s words, raising a hand to speak before she lifted a finger to silence him.

“We know how you feel about the whole situation, and we find it hurtful that you blame Ula for this.”

“Blame her!?”

“Yes, Atlas, blame her! Maybe you don’t realize it but you think to yourself,” Flora cleared her throat before her voice changed into Atlas’. “Ula didn’t tell me that her ex-boyfriend was back, I had to learn from her friends! Ula didn’t accept my comfort when she needed it, she instead went to some kids I hate! Ula didn’t tell me that she was going to go talk to her ex-boyfriend before going to him! Sound familiar?”

“I...”

“Exactly Atlas.”Flora shook her head while taking a sip from her tea before hissing at him. “So selfish. Ula doesn’t have to tell you everything she does, and she doesn’t always have to rely on you for everything. She has other friends and family, yet you feel like the top priority for being her boyfriend. Was she your priority while you were on trips with your grandfather?”

“I, no...wait, I, I don’t-”

Flora waved a hand before Atlas’ mouth was closed shut, and he struggled to open it.

“I don’t want to hear it. I just want to know, if you accept this truce. In turn, we will respect your relationship with Ula and not interfere. Though, I can’t promise Basil won’t be all over her like a baby to its mother.” Flora waved her hand once again, letting Atlas open his mouth. “Now, what about it?”

Atlas stared in between the siblings who stared at him, both radiating disturbing vibes...if they were being honest...

“And what if you do continue on with this behavior?” he asked before the siblings turned to each other, then glancing back at him.

“We’ll be out of your lives. For good.” Flora spoke, whispering the last part before she nudged Basil, and he lifted a hand towards Atlas. “Now, let’s shake on it, yes?”

Atlas squinted his eyes at Basil’s hand, slowly lifting his own and bringing it towards Basil’s. He didn’t want last time to be repeated yet, it sounded like a pretty good deal. After what seemed like hours, Atlas’ hand finally grabbed Basil’s, feeling how it was rather rough. Soon, they shook hands as Atlas gave a quiet sigh of relief.

[andsmile]

varchie fanfiction masterlist

Hey people! I’ve been getting a lot of anons asking me for recommendations on Archie/Veronica fanfiction and I feel you, the struggle is real - our tag in AO3 is filled with Bughead!centric fanfics that have us as a background pairing. I’ve read some good ones and I’m happy to share, but I’ll also make a sort of… rant kind of thing in this post. Everything (links and rant) is under the cut.

Despite being a little less popular than other ships in the fandom, there are not so many ArchieRonnie fanfics out there because the readers don’t engage enough - myself included. You’ve been engaging with me when I post Lake Michigan and this is definitely fueling me to write more and faster, and I think it’s sad when I see some good fics out there with 1 or 2 comments, and we need to get better on commenting and reviewing them.

And I mean really commenting and reviewing, not only “pls update”, which is nice and all, but it doesn’t… I don’t know, it doesn’t excite us authors so much. When you read a fic, really comment on it, tell the author your favorite parts, ask them questions about the fic and the writer's process, engage (like you’ve been doing with me and LM) and I am sure more authors will pop and more fics will be written. I’m making a commitment to myself to engage more with the fics I’ve read and I hope you can do that too!

Of course, no one needs to feel obligated to review something if they’re not comfortable doing so, but it’s really good for us authors, it makes us produce more and it makes you have more material to read.

Now that I’ve said that, I’ll proceed to the links! 

MULTI-CHAPTER

The Nice Guy & The Spoiled Rich Girl by AlwaysSpeaksHerMind

A collection of random one-shots centered around my favorite Riverdale pairing OR it’s not really a multi-chapter but it’s a collection of canon compliant-ish and AU one shots that are very beautifully written, I really love this fic.

Devotion by vaarchie

Clearly the Lodges’ extracurriculars skew toward the illegal, but this is the first time Veronica is caught in the backdraft – the first time her life is truly in danger OR an amazing angst-filled fanfic that tells the story of Archie and Veronica trying to survive some real danger involving the Lodges. You will cry. You will love it.

Life has a weird way of getting to the happy ending by Agentbadass

She never planned to encounter Archie Andrews again. She never wanted to see him again. Of course, she runs into him in a club OR Archie is really famous and finds out he has a kid with Veronica, product of a one-night-stand! It's very fun and rom-com like!

an Affair To Remember by Browneyesparker

Archie Andrews meets Veronica Lodge on a cruise, even though they are both engaged to other people, they wind up falling in love OR a new fanfic that has a promising AU plot.

Don't Be Mean by theeternalblue

Veronica never thought meeting Betty's high school friend could change her life so much OR one of my favorite fanfics at the moment, a pregnancy AU and a very light, sweet read.

We've had this day with each other from the very beginning Archikins by BikerChick101

A day in the life and snapshots of my favorite couple on Riverdale, mostly fluff, canon-ish until 2x09 OR a collection of canon compliant-ish one shots, super sweet.

Finding our Way by BikerChick101

Our secret moments, in a crowded room, they've got no idea about me and you OR a secret-Vegas-wedding situation in the middle of a very real Betty/Archie/Veronica triangle. Worth the read.

standstill by Brenxalex

Archie feels as if his life had somehow come to a standstill ever since she had walked away OR sad-boy-Archie-Andrews strikes again and makes you sad with him. Recently discovered this fic, am loving it so far.

Collapsing Couches by temerarius

Seventeen year olds Veronica Lodge and Archie Andrews are facing the biggest challenge they've yet to overcome - Veronica is pregnant OR another pregnancy-AU (seems to be a popular trope in varchie fics) that it’s worth the read.

The Holiday by jinglejanglejones

After two terrible breakups, Betty and Veronica switches homes for the holidays and stumble upon unexpected romances. But what happens when Christmas is over? Can their new found love survive? OR this is both Varchie and Bughead centric, but I had the best time reading this fic, especially the Varchie scenes.

streetlight sun by singsongsung

He senses her before he sees her, feels the air shift in the gymnasium OR this is a two-chapter fic that has stolen my heart forever.

The Blood of Family by James Stryker

FBI agent Archie Andrews goes undercover to bring down a ruthless crime lord but ends up falling in love with his daughter OR nice slow-burn multi-chapter with an interesting plot (on FF.Net)

Make it back to me by explorerundecided

(no summary) OR a fanfic that is so sweet, picking up from 2x06 and slightly canon compliant-ish (on FF.Net)

It's A Mad World by COTT FAN

Just when Veronica thinks she can escape from her past and start a life with Archie, her life takes an unexpected turn when she is kidnapped by someone from her past OR yet anothjer pregnancy-AU with an interesting plot (on FF.net)

Every Minute by ForASecondThereWe'dWon

Expanding on the events of the season one finale, Veronica brings Archie back to her bedroom OR the longest, hottest, multi-chapter smut you’ll ever need (on FF.net)

your soul by vickliebold

Could be more complicated, but it really wasn’t. The girl he loved didn’t feel the same, so he wrote a song about it OR my first Varchie fanfic. Angst, sad times, and what happens when you have another chance with the love of your life.

lake michigan by vickliebold

it would be a tragedy of epic proportions if they had never met OR Archie moves to Chicago and everyone is crazy! My second Varchie fanfic.

Watch it Burn Down by weheartscorose

Archie was supposed to be more than this OR another sad-boy-Archie trying to win his girl back. This fic is a companion to another fic, a Bughead!Centric one, and both are really good. Sexy-times are a must.

Babes in the Woods by MotherMaple

When Archie and Jughead find themselves stranded in a campground, Betty and Veronica offer them a place to crash OR both VA and BH centric, this fic was very fun to read from the start and all the ArchieRonnie parts are... swoon.

bring the sin by sopaloma

three decades. seven people. seven sins OR a character-study fic that pairs a character with a deadly sin. Archie is lust (chapter 01) and Veronica is envy (chapter 05). The whole fic is great - but the Varchie parts are even greater, if that’s possible. It’s definitely one of my favorite Varchie fics ever.

In The Name Of Love by ffxo

Archie's waited four years for a girl to say the L word but she can't OR a fun, dramatic AU where the gang lives in LA and Veronica has deep-seated issues. Definitely worth it!

Extended Riverdale by ffxo

Extended moments of Varchie's journey, all through season 1 of Riverdale OR I really love this fic, it follows canon and explains a lot of it, ffxo does an amazing job portraying stolen VA’s moments! In FF.Net there are more chapters. 

The Greatest of All Time by Brenxalex

She takes his hand and as they glide along the ice OR a popular trope right now - the ice skating AU based on Scott Moir and Tessa Virtue’s story - but with Varchie instead. Definitely well-written and a full course if you’re into the trope!

ONE-SHOTS

will he hold your tiny face in his hands? by boos

Veronica has feelings about Betty, Archie has feelings about Jughead, and neither of them know how to deal with it. So they don't OR I don’t know if this counts as a varchie fanfiction since it’s Beronica/Jarchie as well, but I love their interactions in this, so...

slow dance by JollytheSad

A night of embraces OR smut one-shot without much plot, but we like reading sexy-times!

five times veronica almost had sex and one time she did by temerarius

veronica lodge’s past sexual experiences before archie have all been bad. these are all of them OR trigger-warning for rape and abuse, but it has a sweet outcome, and I loved reading it.

i will take care of you by camimendes

“have you been eating enough?” OR trigger-warning for eating disorders. A fanfic with a theme that is not explored enough.

crawl into my heart, take me apart by singsongsung

She finds him midday on a Wednesday, just after the bell for lunch OR my favorite Varchie one-shot, written by my love @singsongsung just after 2x08 aired. Sad times, cute times.

Basic Needs by ForASecondThereWe'dWon

A belated extension of Archie and Veronica's shower scene from S2E01 OR a detailed description of Varchie’s sexy times in the shower, swoon (on FF.Net)

hold me closer by anonymous_mystery95

All Archie wants is to take her out on a date, a perfect date. Their first date. OR Archie is a gentleman, Veronica wants to have sex, and oh-boy. The smut.

i see your true colours shining through (and that's why i love you) by anonymous_mystery95

Veronica never thought that a chance meeting on the corner of a busy New York street would change her life OR a soulmates!AU that probably is my soulmate, it’s so beautiful.

talk me down by beanie_betty

The one where Archie can’t sleep, Jughead just wants to sleep, and they both freak out about becoming dads OR it’s mostly a Jughead x Archie friendship with a side of ArchieRonnie, but very cute one shot.

Andrews, Party of Six by lodge_andrews 

Or the four times Veronica Andrews goes into labor OR this fic is very sweet and domestic, got me really emotional *-* worth the read for sure.

can't stop this breaking loose by vickliebold

Archie teaches Veronica how to drive OR I wrote this one-shot post-2x16 when Archie got that car and Veronica started driving it!

VARCHIE-CENTRIC AUTHORS

theeternalblue has written a lot of Varchie-centric one shots that are all very good and don’t get enough credit.

vaarchie writes one shots and fic requests on her tumblr and they’re all amazing as well.

raven-dale also writes one shots and fic requests on her tumblr and you should all read them or prompt her.

vcrchiedale writes one shots and fic requests on her tumblr and you should also read them and prompt her.

If you have other recommendations, let me know and I’ll update this post after I’ve read them! My inbox is always open for you guys (:

[random-thoughts-collection]

Shadowhunters | 3.07 Review

Shadowhunters - Salt in the Wound

written by Celeste Vasquez, directed by Joshua Butler

Lilith finishes her ritual and sends the Owl to get Valentine’s corpse from Alicante. Meanwhile, Clary, Alec, Izzy and Magnus try to find Jace while Simon, Maia, Jordan and Luke try to track down Lilith.

It will be grounds for a kill order

“All we have to do is find Jace.”

The episode opens up with Clary catching up with the Owl and a fight ensues. Despite Clary having made an impressive progress when it comes to her fighting abilities, the Owl overpowers her and – despite her declaration of love for Jace – throws her off the rooftops of a building. It’s a very moving scene when Clary calls Simon for help on the phone and he finds his best friend lying on a car, unable to move. Despite everything they’ve been through it is touching to see just how great their friendship really is.

Later on Clary reveals at the New York Institute that Jace had indeed been killed by Valentine and Raziel was the one to bring him back. They also now know that the demon controlling Jace is actually Lilith, and that she is even able to kill an angel. Clary is playing with completely open cards, and it’s a tense moment when she tells Alec that she understands if he wants to hand her over to the Clave and send her to the Gard. Alec however assures her that he would have done the same thing, much to the relief of Magnus, Izzy and Simon.

In order to get some necessary tools to trap the Owl Clary, Izzy and Alec want to go to Alicante. Before leaving, Alec makes up with Magnus and both express their commitment to try and help Jace. Magnus blames himself for what happened to Jace because he gave Lilith the elixir, while both Alec and Catarina try to convince him that he is not to blame.

At Alicante, they tell Imogen about Jace’s situation and convince her to help them by giving them the Malachi contraption without telling the Clave. Otherwise the Clave would surely hunt Jace down to kill him. While Clary and Izzy get the contraption and Alec distracts Consul Jia Penhallow, Jace enters Alicante and confronts Imogen. Imogen is suspicious from the start but the Owl manages to kill her anyway. Her last act is notifying Alec.

Alec, Clary and Izzy find Jace when he’s about to dig up Valentine’s corpse and they trap him with the Malachi contraption, but unfortunately the Clave shows up. Clary covers for them and sends Alec, Izzy and Jace back to Magnus but is captured by the Clave herself and locked up in the Gard.  

There are a lot of things happening in this part of the story, but the main protagonists are now all on the same page, which allows them to work together to try and resolve the problem. It also means that we get to see more mixed interactions again and I’m glad to see it – the relationships between most characters on Shadowhunters are really interesting and it’s great to see different characters interact with each other. In this episode the confrontation between Jace and Imogen comes to mind, but also the moments where Alec hugs Clary or covers for her in front of Imogen. We are also introduced to a new face: Jia Penhallow, who will most likely show up in the future again. In a way it feels like she steps in the place of Imogen as the Claves’ cold representative, who has become softer towards the Shadowhunters of the New York Institute because of her relationship to Jace.

The werewolf who turned me

“How do you tell the girl you love that you're an animal?”

Aside from the hunt for Jace the other main story of this episode is Maia’s and Jordan Kyle’s backstory.  When Maia surprisingly visits Simon at his apartment, she finds out that his new roommate is actually the werewolf that turned her. Naturally she’s upset and wants to be left alone for a while. Jordan feels bad about the situation himself and calls the Praetor Lupus and asks to be taken off the assignment.

In flashback from both characters we learn about their history. Maia and Jordan met at the beach, and it is a cute and innocent scene. We learn how Jordan dreams about getting away, going to Fiji, and while Maia likes the idea of it we soon learn that she thought of it as a fantasy, not a possible reality. When she gets a full scholarship in Marine Sciences Jordan reacts upset, and is harsher than Maia expected. This moment happened a few weeks after Jordan got attacked by a Werewolf, but Maia doesn’t know the extent of his wound and it’s hard to tell how much Jordan knows. The next flashback picks up weeks after Jordan’s and Maia’s relationship has ended, and Jordan wants to explain himself to Maia. In the end however he turns into a werewolf – most likely for the first time – and when he comes to his sense again he finds out that he has attacked Maia. Unable to deal with the situation he runs and leaves her lying bloody and alone in the street.

In the present, Jordan is about to leave when Maia stops him and explains him that his duty is to help Simon, to not abandon Simon as he abandoned her.

I have seen quite a few comments talking about the abusive aspect of the relationship of Maia and Jordan, but I think it is a bit more complicated than this. When we get the flashback about their first meeting, Jordan seems like a nice and friendly guy, and it is only after he’s been turned that he acts aggressively towards Maia. The show presents us a character who was struggling after he was scratched, and lost complete control once he turned. Ever since he has learned to control his werewolf nature he has been trying to make up for what he did by working for the Praetor Lupus. However, he doesn’t know how to face Maia after what he did to her.

For Maia, that is the worst thing about it – that he left her when she needed him most and never came back. Back when she was still human she had no explanation for his behavior, and him not trusting her and telling her the truth has hurt her, too. Maia is lucky to have meet Luke after she turned and for Luke to take her under his wings. Just as Simon had Raphael and sometimes Luke and Magnus as well for advice, it is important for a newly made vampire or werewolf to have someone to turn to for advice and help. That is why the situation for all three – Maia, Simona and Jordan – is so tragic. For Maia the most, for she has to face the man who turned her and left her bloody and helpless in the street, for Simon because he grew fond of Jordan before knowing who he really was and saw how it affected his girlfriend, and for Jordan who made mistakes when he wasn’t fully in control of himself – something he was unable to avoid and he can never make it right again. It makes for a complex story that is more than just a love triangle, and the chemistry works between all three characters and makes this plot really worth watching.    

In the meantime Luke is searching for Lilith in order to help Ollie and Jace. He finds out that Ollie already has killed her mother, and warns Sam who shows up at the office later on and learns the truth from Luke. Simon accompanies Luke in his search and when they reach Lilith’s hideout they also find Ollie there but can’t get a hold on her. Simon accidentally kills two of Lilith’s underlings with his Mark which greatly upsets Lilith. She learns from Ollie that it was Simon.

This episode has some great characters moments especially for Maia and Jordan while moving the main plot around Lilith and the Owl forward as well. There are some scenes with beautiful cinematography - especially the scenes at the beach have a nice atmosphere that stands out compared to the usual city background.

[renaroo]

Wednesday Roundup 11.7.2017

It’s DC week, fellow comic fans! and believe it or not, it was not planned. These things just… happen about once a month. It’s always a surprise to me, too, it’s weird.

Now there’s a lot of good comics out today but I do want to just take the time here to thank DC for memorializing two men I feel never got enough credit from the company for their vast contributions toward DC and its properties, those being the 100th birthday of Jack Kirby, and the passing of Adam West. I wish that more had been done during their lives to credit them the way they deserved rather than for DC to have spent the better part of the past forty years trying desperately to undermine those contributions, but it feels good knowing that the current atmosphere at the company is one of more gratefulness toward these men and what they meant for DC. And seeing the tributes toward them in all of my issues this week made me pretty emotional. I hope more and more exposure to these men’s legacies helps more fans look them up and expose themselves to how great their work was.

That all out of the way, let’s just get right into the comics this week.

DC’s Detective Comics, DC’s Gotham Academy: Second Semester, DC’s Superwoman, DC’s Titans, DC’s Wonder Woman

DC’s Detective Comics (2016-present) #960 James Tynion IV, Alvaro Martinez, Raul Fernandez, Brad Anderson

I have to take a star from this comic’s official score because it had an opportunity of Cass without ever delivering on the Cass, and as we all know from this blog that is considered an inconceivable sin. 

One of the reasons I’ve always been attracted to comics as a medium is because part of the fun of them is that you have this weird almost constant shift back and forth from what one creator considers canon to what another doesn’t, so I can say sentences like “I appreciate that this issue retconned back in the retcon that Bruce and Zatanna had a long history growing up together in the retcon that was brought about by the non-continuity animated series that was inspired by a writer’s love for their relationship back in the Bronze Age comics.”

And if you’re in the Know you understand that this is actually something that makes total sense. And if you don’t... hell, I have no idea. It’s been so long since I was ever a layperson in comic book terms that I can’t even accurately tell you whether or not Zatanna is a character known by non-comic fans or not. 

In any case I appreciate this issue a lot as a Zatanna fan because I’ve felt like, since the 2011 reboot and Zee’s reintroduction through Justice League Dark (which I was pretty famously not a fan of) there’s been a weird need to have Bruce and Zatanna more separate from each other and make Zee in particular younger and more... I don’t know. It’s been a weird couple of years for Zatanna fans, honestly.

I loved Kate and Luke throughout this comic, they both had a great chemistry with each other and I appreciate that we’re getting more different combinations of various members of the Belfry to sort of flesh out character and, more importantly, provide insight to how they work as a team from multiple angles. 

Just wish they’d give me more of Cass from this angle since the Belfry was originally designed to train younger members and she’s the only youth left c’mon.

Jean Paul’s stuff... I’ll have to wait for the story to wrap up fully because I have conflicted Catholic feelings and usually, for me, it’s just better to let that play out as it may. 

DC’s Gotham Academy: Second Semester (2016-2017) #11 Brenden Fletcher, Becky Cloonan, Karl Kerschl, Adam Archer, Sandra Hope, MASSYK

The relationship between Maps and Olive is truly the driving force of this series, so it is extremely fitting in a way that the driving force behind the plot to its ultimate story, and really its ultimate resolution, is challenging the foundations of that friendship to begin with.

Everything is coming together slowly but surely, and it’s interesting that Maps gets to live her dream -- to be Robin, a hero, and put on the mask -- but only really by confronting her own biases and misconceptions of her best friend and what mental illness really means for the situation they find themselves in. 

I love that Maps is allowed to be flawed and figure this out on her own -- she’s only a child, after all, while the world around her and the voices of reason from all the other children and adults constantly reminds her and us that these are not okay prejudices to have, and that her only way to save everything she’s shown to love in Gotham Academy will rely on her learning that. 

I remember two years ago when I was giving some pretty harsh criticisms of Batman and Robin Eternal and it’s pretty epically bad handling of disabilities and people were attempting to defend it with the idea that they were a bunch of teenagers being thoughtless, but issues like this -- really, series like this -- proves how these things should be done. It’s real to life without losing sight of the morally correct position.

I’m missing this series and the unique voice it provides to the DC Universe already.

DC’s Superwoman (2016-present) #12 K. Perkins, Stephen Segovia, Art Thibert, HI-FI

Remember how I used to be very very concerned about whether or not this comic was going to find its stride at the end of the day? Well, consider the concern taken care of because this issue absolutely helped me fee like Perkins knows exactly what Superwoman is doing and how to get us all there because this was tight, it was dramatic, and it was absolutely emotionally worthwhile the whole way through.

I love that the tension of this relationship and the tension of Lana never truly feeling as though she’s found her place even in a family she loves and respects as much as the Irons family comes through without necessitating that anyone is really the bad guy.

They are in a difficult situation involving loss, complicated dynamics, and just a general sense of losing touch with each other after the first arc really made them question how reliable each other’s abilities are. Especially Lana’s.

And I love that Nat can continue to be the good voice of reason and that the relationships between women overall are the most solid and most positive in the comic. Especially women in STEM positions.

I just loved this issue though I’m really hoping we get more Traci 13 sooner rather than later and that she and Nat’s relationship continues to bloom.

DC’s Titans (2016-present) #13 Dan Abnett, V. Ken Marion, Norm Rapmund, Andrew Dalhouse

While I wouldn’t exactly consider Abnett’s Titans a leading and daring change in the industry or anything, I’m kind of sad that we don’t see more of the Rebirth titles at DC attempting to do the very thing that has been so masterfully managed in the Titans comic. There’s this comfortable merger between what history of these characters and relationships we know and love from their extensive pasts with an honestly much needed upgrade and change up in the exact team components and their personal lives.

And yes I could totally do without stupid love triangles we’ve seen before on a team that’s had them for arguably far longer than can be excused, especially when it comes at the expense of either the very important plot of a black woman’s identity and growth or the interesting subplot being brought to the forefront of a traitor in the midst. But I feel, at least for this issue, that it’s not nearly as terrible as it could have been. Especially since most of the issue and its narration was handled through Wally’s perspective and he didn’t seem all that focused on his supposed romance with Donna.

I think it’s telling that in a few issues with far less focus, Lilith and Garth’s budding feelings for each other feels far more organic and interesting than what’s going on with the Obvious Breeding Pairs.

I also love how Dick is characterized in this series. It’s very much the Dick Grayson I remember and love and would like to see it in more current comics’ writing.

DC’s Wonder Woman (2016-present) #26 Shea Fontana, Mirka Andolfo, Romulo Fajardo Jr.

Anticipating this new run of Wonder Woman has had me both excited and utterly terrified all at once, but the thing that has concerned me the most is that we would be met with a run of Wonder Woman that would seemingly undo all the good will that was built up over the course of Greg Rucka’s amazing recent run. I was worried about the Amazons, I was worried about how Diana’s supporting cast would be adjusted, I was worried about her history, about her villains, about the freaking Bechdel Test of all things. I was just, like, a bottle full of worry until this issue came out.

And it came out and it… seems okay!

I know that doesn’t sound like a ringing endorsement but please believe me when I assure you that it is. I mean, the amount of hugs that are in this comic alone are deserving of remark. And I love that we’re diving right into the political statements with opening a brand new run with the defiant and important image of Diana defending Muslim refugees in a Greek camp. Like oh my gosh this is exactly the kind of empowerment and political statements we need from a Wonder Woman in the world right now.

I love that we’re going to concentrate more on Diana’s occupation outside of being Wonder Woman, getting to meet more of the military group she works with and seeing her interact with Etta even more than she does with Steve. And having Steve saving refugees alongside Diana! Diana dealing with her past! Diana struggling to put into words the things she sees on a daily basis! This is all good, humanizing stuff. And while I’m not the biggest fan of the art style, it does a good job of keeping the characters true to form and I love that Diana is still tall and towering over everyone.

I’m optimistic about this run and am hooping for the best to follow.  

So. There’s not really a clear victor here in my eyes this week. There’s just a lot of flavors of ice cream mixed together and I’m kinda overwhelmed because my go-to flavor to pick is chocolate and there’s not really a chocolate so it’s basically left to me tallying up nonsense points in my head arbitrarily and then playing a very festive game of eeny menny miny toe. but that didn’t seem scientific enough so I picked Superwoman. It felt like it moved the plot forward the most without being utterly weighed down by being either the new start of a storyline or the issue right before a big finale. It felt like a lot happened and yet it gave me a lot to look forward to. And also I think the art for it and Detective Comics were by far the most consistently good.

In any case that’s just my pick of the week and as you can probably tell I’m not entirely committed to the method by which I chose! So I’m curious to hear some other people’s opinions. Agree with me? Disagree? Think I should pick up something else this week that I missed? I’d love to hear from you.

Now, I’m going to take a moment to also ask something a little strange for those who maybe have been following me for a while. I’m a laboratory technician by day and a comic reviewer and aspiring writer/artist by night. And as a result, the pinch for creating content of any sort — but especially for these personal projects in regards to eventually building the time + materials for producing my own comic including being able to hire a line artist and colorist (who I already have in mind and a verbal agreement with), I will need additional funds to keep things up. I plan on keeping people tuned in as we build closer to more announcements, but I want to start the ball rolling now. So if you’re interested in my opinions on comics and would be interested in supporting what would come of me taking the opportunity to be behind the helm, please help me out by contributing to my Patreon! I’m still figuring out the kinks but I’m hoping that with some of your help I’ll be up and running sooner than expected!

Please become my patron on patreon for more alliterative begging like this!

[morrisondauthor]

Balancing Acts Q&A

This is the Q&A post I promised for Balancing Acts hope I answer most of your questions with this!

Warning: May contain possible spoilers

Q: What inspired you to write Balancing Acts?

A: Balancing Acts was inspired by me wanting to do at least one standalone story that wasn’t in any way connected to Demi’s Way. My upcoming stories The Summer Daze and Quentin’s Way are both connected to Demi’s Way and I was like, I need to have one story that’s set outside of the Demi’s Way universe. I also wanted to show a reality that I rarely write about, gay black men involved in long-term committed relationships.

Q: Why did you write the story from Julani’s perspective and not Brandon’s?

A: I wrote the story from Julani’s perspective because from the very beginning of my brainstorming for this story, I wanted the main character to be someone who would both literally and metaphorically represented balance throughout the story. I could have written it from any of the characters’ perspectives because most of the characters went through some sort of moment that required them to do a little give and take. However, because Julani had only ever been with two men in his whole life I figured I could only do a sort of counter-balance with his character that I couldn’t do with the others. It wasn’t about him being caught between his two loves, but about him striking a necessary balance with respect to his past with Tyree and his present with Brandon.

Q: How come you made Julani and Brandon’s relationship a typical top-bottom relationship instead of having them be a versatile couple?

A: This actually was a difficult decision, believe it or not. I actually could have extended the theme of balance into their sex life by making them a vers couple; however, there actually are many gay couples where you have a top and you have a bottom. I did explore the struggle with this topic with the whole Izzy, Myron and Lance triangle. The Myron character is vers and it causes a problem with him and Lance prior to where the story starts off, hence one of the reasons why Lance cheated with Izzy. These things really can get messy in relationships.

Q: What was the point of adding the Caiden and Marquell characters?

A: There were many reasons why I added the Caiden and Marquell characters to the story. One reason was because I didn’t want Julani to just have some assistant you only heard from every now and then without a real backstory. Another reason is because I wanted to show how natural teaching came to Julani, he often times helped Caiden with just a simple conversation or with small advice. The main reason why I added them was to show what possibly could have happened had Julani and Tyree stayed together after graduating high school. Caiden and Marquell are in many ways the reincarnation of the relationship between Julani and Tyree and they found a way to make it work whereas Julani and Tyree didn’t.

Q: Why did you make Brandon’s family the homophobic ones and not Julani’s?

A: It actually wasn’t because I think the South is more homophobic than other parts of the country, but actually because I’d already decided to set the story in Julani’s hometown and have him and Brandon settled there; therefore, there had to be a reason for that. The men in Brandon’s family represent the damage caused by hyper-masculinity passed down from generation to generation. It wasn’t until Brandon’s father was dying that his brothers finally allowed themselves to cry and be more loving towards one another, leading them to reach out to Brandon and finally accept him. They were raised to never show emotion except anger. Julani and his brothers were raised the exact opposite of that. They had a loving father and I made it that way to show not all black men are hyper-masculine and pass it down to their sons and grandsons.

Q: Brandon cheated but you didn’t balance it out with Julani cheating, why not?

A: The sole reason for not making Julani get even with Brandon by sleeping with Tyree was to show the growth of Tyree. Remember, he was selfish and didn’t want to compromise on anything when he and Julani were young. After the whole letter situation and being outed the way he was later, he was practically forced into changing who he was and how he looked at life. His growth is displayed the moment he tells Julani no he will not sleep with him and tells Julani to go to his husband, which ends up being the beginning of Julani and Brandon working out their issues.

Q: What’s next for Tyree?

A: That’s up for the reader to decide. Tyree’s journey in this story is told in parts and I did that to leave a little suspense in the story overall. We find out early on that he was outed after getting involved with a messy person and then we learn about the letter and how deeply his breakup from Julani affected him. We also see his strong compassionate side when he saves Izzy. While some readers may feel that Tyree wasn’t given enough backstory, my intention was to show his growth through his words and his actions as opposed to constantly having him in every single chapter. Due to his experiences, he knows what to do and what not to do now and when he does find the right person, he’ll have an advantage. He’ll be coming into a relationship as a whole person who knows what he wants and realizes what he has to offer.

Q: Why did you have to make Izzy so messy?

A: LOL! Izzy and Andre are both my favorite characters in the story. I loved writing their dialogues and acting it all out in my head because I have friends in my personal life that are like both of them. They are the two realest characters in the story because I’m sure we all know people like them. The reason why I made Izzy messy was because I wanted to show just how connected he and Julani were. It was like no matter how much Izzy fucked up, Julani had his back. He could’ve shot someone and Julani would’ve had his back in the trial! It wasn’t until the letter situation that Julani finally stepped back and got a good look at who his best friend truly was. The friendship was 100% toxic, no matter how real Izzy was with everyone. So he loses his friends and then he’s gay bashed, and who ends up saving his life? The same guy whose letter he ripped up all those years ago and caused a long time of emotional pain towards: Tyree. In that sense, Izzy’s messiness ties in with the backstory of Tyree’s personal growth and turns into a small redemption story. Tyree didn’t have to do what he did, but he saved Izzy because even though Izzy caused him pain by ripping up the letter, he still saw Izzy as a human being.

Q: Do you have any visual depictions of the characters?

A: I wasn’t going to provide any except for Brandon and Julani, but I decided to search for some pics that are close to the descriptions I gave in the story of some of the characters. Click the link to see the pics (remember links may not work in Tumblr app so use my morrisondauthor.tumblr.com url to see the pics if links don’t work in the app):

Brandon & Julani {LINK}

Myron {LINK}

Andre {LINK}

Izzy {LINK}

Tyree {LINK}

Caiden {LINK}

Marquell {LINK}

Lance {LINK}

Rayshun {LINK}

Omari {LINK}

Junior (Julani’s brother) {LINK}

Julissa (Julani’s sister and surrogate for Jeremiah) {LINK}

Lily (Brandon’s first-cousin and surrogate for Elijah) {LINK}

Q: Will there be a sequel or a spin-off to the story?

A: No. As stated before, I wanted to do this story so it would be a standalone from the Demi’s Way universe. I have another story planned that will also be outside of that universe. I was thinking about doing a prequel that showed Julani and Tyree’s relationship and then after their breakup doing the rest of the story from their individual POVs as Tyree goes off to college and into the pros and Julani meets Brandon at Howard. However, I have too many other projects planned and I do want to make my first novel, so that prequel will probably never come to fruition.

Q: What was your process for writing Balancing Acts?

A: Unlike with Demi’s Way, this story wasn’t already completed where all I had to do was some minor editing and then post. That’s why I was able to post chapters of Demi’s Way every night. With this story, I brainstormed what I wanted to do and did outlines. I used those outlines to write a first draft of each chapter. After reading and rereading each first draft, I made changes that were sometimes minor and sometimes I did a complete rewrite. As you could imagine, this took more time so I tried to stick to a Monday & Thursday posting schedule that worked most of the time but I had a few hiccups in scheduling due to personal issues. I had a lot of fun writing this story though and it did come to me naturally most of the time.

[gossipchii]

Taiorato, OoC and love triangles

I know Soshitsu came out more than a week ago and I know I’ve been wanting to write my thoughts in some better way than I already have, so here I am. Writing. 

I have to specify that the last time I watched Soshitsu was about one week ago so, somethings may not be on point, per se. Also, I am going to focus more on Sora, Taichi and Yamato because I suck and I just love these kids so much I could talk for hours about them.

LEGGO.

The beautiful thing about this fandom is how there’s barely two people who think the exact same way. These differences may be because one ships Taiyama and the other ships Takari. Some differences may be because some prefer the slices of life of the franchise and others prefer the big fights. And that’s okay!!! We all respect each other and everyone’s free to think whatever the hell they want.

Now, between the same group of people also are some huge differences. You see, I ship Sorato, I ship Sorato so hard and oh my God I adore Sorato. And some people who also ship Sorato hated the fact that Yamato was dumb and didn’t know how to treat Sora when she was upset.

Some Sorato fans wanted to see something similar to episode 26, I get it, it would’ve been nice. But you know, as much as episode 26 was incredible, this is a complete different situation, please don’t say Yamato acted OoC. Here we are seeing seventeen years old acting like seventeen years old.Reckless, stupid and full of hormones I remember perfectly fine how I acted when I was seventeen, it wasn’t that long ago for me.

And let me tell you, I identified with Sora in that forrest scene in so many levels. I know that sounds cliché but it’s true. When Sora starts running and she says 

You don’t even know why I am upset!

Then Yamato asks, as any seventeen year old - and any guy, really, would do.

Why are you upset?

And Sora simply answers that not even she knows why she is upset. Thing is, she does know, she just doesn’t want to admit it to herself let along to the rest of the gang or the two closest guys to her. She is selfless and never puts herself before others, so, seeing everyone bonding and being all happy-go-round with their Digimon while she was struggling really hard was something awful for Sora.

She doesn’t want to admiti it to herself because she’d feel selfish and that’s the complete opposite of who she is. She isn’t used to be jealous, she doesn’t feel her own self in this situation, you see? She’s upset at everyone for not realizing that something is wrong with her, and for caring about Meiko and Meicoomon more than caring about her. That is pretty obvious. But Sora is not only upset at everyone, but upset at herself for feeling that way.

This is why she says she doesn’t even know why she is upset. 

It’s super funny that Yamato suggests that they should’ve ased Takeru instead, because that’s a clear refference to episode 26, when Takeru was the perfect little comment that made Sora feel better. Right now, on the other hand, not even a sarcastic comment from Takeru would’ve helped. You can see that when he makes fun of Yamato minutes before. 

Sora needed to fix her problem and learn to accept her feelings on her own. And it’s wonderful to see Taichi and Yamato trying to help, because they really are trying their best. Taichi breaks his head when he tries to break the ice and Yamato is not the best one with words, so he was relying on Taichi to break the ice. But Yamato really was the first one to speak up.

Why are you worried?

He probably was the first one to notice something was wrong with Sora, and she always is worried about everyone, just this time, she was worried about herself. 

When she starts to run away from Taichi and Yamato, she spills some sentences, stating that Taichi and Yamato always fight with each other, being Sora the only one among the group who never stopped being worried about that. In fact, she obviously is still worried.

She then says something that really called my attention.

Eveyone only thinks about themselves.

And I think she really referred to everyone, not only Taichi and Yamato. This may be kinda crazy, but Sora may be feeling too lonely. And it breaks my heart. She doesn’t feel like anyone cares about what she says or feels, maybe she felt like Piyomon was the only one who understood her. And the Piyomon she’d known for 6 years had just died. Sora is mourning. 

Taichi finally says something not stupid and true, Sora simply cannot take care of herself, it’s something impossible for her. Taichi said so, Piyomon said so. Sora knows it’s true. That’s what Sora has to fight against (along with Mugendramon and Dark Gennai) during the rest of the film. And she totally nailed it.

About the so called love triagnle, if you still think it exists let me tell you that you’re damn stupid. Taiorato is real, this trio is real and has always been real. But it’s not real as a damn love triangle, is reeal as some fantastic friendship between what started as three kids and ended as three adults. Stop trying to polute it with some crazy ideas about a love triangle, please. 

Taiorato for life!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Also I wanted to originally talk about the whole movie but lolz, maybe later.