#all the asks about my fics and characters

[hellokittykookies]

Pose for me - J.JK -

──── sypnosis ✮⋆˙ After years of running from the life you never wanted, you thought you had finally succeeded. erasing y/n, becoming ji-ha, and leaving your past behind. But then came him. A model you accidentally brought to a cotillion, a man effortlessly loved by the woman who had become family to you. And it just so happens He was connected to the one person you abandoned nine years ago. You were supposed to avoid him. To walk away. So why did you keep finding yourself right next to him?

──── pairings ✮⋆˙ Model! jk x Photographer! reader (y/n also ji ah)

──── genre ✮⋆˙ slow burn, fake dating, forced proximity, angst, romance, mutual pining, emotional hurt/comfort, smut, hidden identity, jealousy, high fashion industry setting

──── contents ✮⋆˙ simp!jungkook, creative director!reader, reader works at dior, model!jungkook, jealousy, secret lingering touches, soft but intense sexual tension, rich! reader, rich! jungkook, domestic moments, unresolved tension, slow trust-building, implied sex (not detailed) unprotected sex (it's not detailed. just implied), family issues, abandonment themes, identity struggles, missing person case mentions, emotional breakdowns, trust issues, georgina is inspired by georgina sparks, inspired by gossip girl and devil wears prada, brother! taehyung, assistant! georgina, calvin klein jungkook, jungkook is like the main main model or the face of calvin klein, part time photographer! reader (it's her side quest pls), petty fights, bickering, push and pull?, nepo baby! jk (mentioned), make outs, kissing, teasing, curse words.

──── notes ✮⋆˙ this was last year. i haven't written anything in a while. i was looking or browsing my works on wattpad and saw this fic that i completely forgot about. i posted a poll and yall voted for me to post it so here it is! your wish is my command. haha. i'm still not sure if i wanna come back to writing but this fic is making me want to. the problem? no motivations and my words aren't still wording like before. i made my friend read the whole fic and helped me fix it and edit it so here it iss! most of the fics that were posted here in my acc will be reposted in ao3 or wattpad. reading this fic was mind blowing to me honestly. i feel proud about this.... i'm sorry if it doesn't feel rght or not omg i am not an expert at these things. i searched and researched stuff about devil wears prada outfits to change her outfits cuz it was sooo bad in the draft. like... tf you mean you're THAT rich and you're wearing forever 21 skinny jeans with fucking fitted top?? omg... my friend and i was cringing sooo baaddd. the amount of times i wrote "your breath hitched" "then" "smirk" what the fuck honestly... wrote this like actually july 2024 or something. i tried my best making this better so pls bare with me. the contents are there and the notes is here. if you don't like it feel free to give feedbacks but pls make it a little nicer maybe? also this was the time i was soo obsessed with devil wears prada. me and my friend changed the names, characters and some of the character traits cuz we thought it'd be fun if we added georgina sparks inspired character here (minus the part where she always want drama or trouble ofc), again i am not an expert at these stuff. had to literally ask my mom shit about her bags and designer stuff when i was re editing this. also i looovveee calvin klein jk omg... i can NEVER get over that era. we made ocs character a little bit moree pushy and stuff like pushing jk away and more in denial lmao. don't even know if this is slow burn or not but whatever.

──── WC ✮⋆˙ 34k

tumblr won't let me post all of it all at once so i'll post each of it part by part. atleast like 5k words per chapt next week as i have a flight tommorow lolll. also fly high michelle trachtenberg:(((

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[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

Doing Time 3

No tag lists. Do not send asks or DMs about updates. Review my pinned post for guidelines, masterlist, etc.

Warnings: this fic will include dark content such as noncon/dubcon, threats, age gap, and possible untagged elements. My warnings are not exhaustive, enter at your own risk.

This is a dark!fic and explicit. 18+ only. Your media consumption is your own responsibility. Warnings have been given. DO NOT PROCEED if these matters upset you.

Summary: you try to keep your brother safe in jail but put yourself in danger along the way.

Characters: con/ex-con!Steve Rogers

Note: I need the weekend to come so I can cum

As per usual, I humbly request your thoughts! Reblogs are always appreciated and welcomed, not only do I see them easier but it lets other people see my work. I will do my best to answer all I can. I’m trying to get better at keeping up so thanks everyone for staying with me.

Your feedback will help in this and future works (and WiPs, I haven’t forgotten those!) Please do not just put ‘more’. I will block you.

I love you all immensely. Take care. 💖

"Things aren't too bad. Not since I got my ass kicked," Vaughn chortles. "Mighta knocked some sense into this thick skull at last."

"Hopefully," you agree. "Mom said--"

"I tried calling. She didn't pick up."

"Oh..."

"Why-- Why should I even bother?" His humour fades to hostility, "and why are you acting like you're my mother? When she does answer, she just calls me a fuck up. Like I don't fucking know."

"Vaughn," you hum, "please, I'm not trying to piss you off."

"But you are," he snarls. "Always gotta ruin a good time, don't ya?"

You frown. This is the Vaughn you don't know. The one with the anger like a grenade pin. One tug and it's over. You sit back and wait. Arguing only fuels the flames.

"You're the one person who's s'posed to believe in me and you're nagging me about mom," he snarls.

You look away guiltily. You wonder how he'd react if you told him about Steve. If you mentioned that the reason things 'aren't too bad' is because you did something just as stupid as him. Somehow, you don't think that him knowing you do dumb stuff too will help.

He tugs at his cuffs. The guards come forward. You say his name again.

"Vaughn, please--"

"Piss off! Yeah, you meat head, get me outta here," he turns his wrath on the guard. "Waste of my time."

"Please, I didn't-- I just--"

"I told you not to talk about it no more," he barks. He did. You didn't listen.

Your eyes well. You don't know what happened to him. Where did all this anger come from? As you watch the guards unhook him and he stomps away, you can only think you may have made a good decision talking to Steve. At least there's someone in there who can help. Or try to.

You wiggle your nose and dab your eyes with your knuckle. That was embarrassing as much as it was scary. The guard on the other side returns.

"We'll bring the next early, miss."

"Thanks," you nod. You recognise him. You realise most of the guards must know your face too. It's so strange to think this is a normal part of your life now. That this has become your social life as late.

It isn't long before Steve appears. He sits calmly lets himself be leashed. He leans forward and takes the receiver. You still have yours in hand but it's against the table. You lift it.

"Couldn't wait to see me, huh?" He purrs.

Your cheeks draw tight, "how are you?"

"Mm," he narrows his eyes as he looks you over. "What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing, Steve," you swallow the dregs of your tears. "Really. It was an early morning."

He stares a little longer, the lines deepening in his forehead. His eyes meet yours. His aquamarine irises are speckled with gold and silver. He takes a breath and tuts.

"You were crying."

"No, Steve, it's nothing."

"That brat brother of yours," he nods as his expression turns dangerous.

"Please, Steve, not you too. Okay? It's... a sibling spat. That's all," you assure him. You wish you were as transparent as the window between you.

"I don't like that. I had family coming to see me, I'd be nice," he snarls.

"It's not your problem."

"That's where you're wrong, sweetheart. You made it my problem when you started coming around." He insists.

You chew your lip, "I know..."

"I'm not complaining, so you know," he leans back. "Kinda used to ya now."

"Thanks," you utter grimly and stare at the desk.

"Hey," he says and your eyes flick back up. "I didn't drag myself out here to see you mope."

You swallow and push away the rest of your chagrin, "sorry, I... better?"

"How can that face get any better?" He winks. You squirm.

He's been more forward lately. You assure yourself that it's just him playing with you. He's bored and you're the only person he talks to that isn't a guard or an inmate.

"That's... Right. Um, I guess it was dumb to ask how it's going," you scoff at yourself.

"It's going good, now I'm here," he runs his hand over his mouth, feeling his cheeks, "fresh shave this morning. Looking good, huh?"

You let your eyes focus. You can tell. His chiseled jaw is bare, not one speck of stubble. And his blond hair is parted and combed back. It's getting a bit long.

"You look refreshed."

"Well, I got something coming up later today."

"Another visitor?" You wonder.

"Lawyer," he shrugs. "No big thing. I got business on the outside still. Power of attorney or whatever."

"Mm," you hum.

"Boring stuff. What about you? Besides that idiot you call a brother, how's life?"

"It's life," you say. "Go to work, come home, sleep, it's all the same."

"Huh, sounds like being in here," he snorts. "Lonely?"

You don't realise at first, he's asking.

"I guess. Thought about getting a cat."

"Ah, you're young. Probably wait a few years before that," he chirps.

You tilt your head wryly, "no harm starting early."

"You're funny, sweetheart."

"Am I?" You wonder dryly.

"Well, the things they think are funny in here..." he makes a face. "You know, I wouldn't tell a lady all that, but it's low brow."

"Right."

"I'm still trying to figure you out, you know? Your brother, well, not to pile on top but he's not exactly a model citizen, but you, you're practical, considerate, you make stuffed chicken and pesto. I can't help but wonder how you're not adopted," he snickers.

"Life is strange."

"Isn't it? Never saw some girl knocking on my cell door but here we are," he drawls.

"Here we are," you agree. He smiles and bites his thumb. You shift as his eyes sparkle.

"I might never get outta of this place, but at least I can see a pretty face now and again," he growls.

Yep, at least he'll never get out. You just need to hope Vaughn doesn't get any time added and it will all be over soon. 

⛓️‍💥

It's the first night Steve doesn't call. You're a bit disturbed by how it seems to throw the whole evening off. It's not like you're friends. He's an obligation. You should be happy to have one less thing on your plate.

You take a long bath, your phone on the back of the toilet, the ringer set to chirp. But it doesn't. The soak isn't enough to ease your nerves.

If something happened to him, what about Vaughn? It's a selfish worry but you can't help it. How could that even happen? Steve has this invincibility about him. You just can't believe it.

You get out and dry yourself off slowly. You're achy from sitting on your ass all day. Admin work isn't very thrilling. You stretch and rub the cushion of your bottom, the muscles easing beneath the layer of padding. You've always had a bit extra. It never bothered you as much as it bothers men. Your brother used to beat up any guy he heard hurling insults at you.

It's not your biggest care in the world. You tend to eat those away. Your sweet tooth hardly helps.

You put on a night shirt and lay awake for a while. Even when you do sleep, it's not peaceful. You dream of iron bars and blood on the floor. You wake with a thumping in your temples.

You dress for work. Your stretch-waist grey pants and the silk blouse with roses on the collar. You pack your lunch and brew your coffee, honey and a dash of almond milk splashed in. You leave with your bag and thermos.

The traffic around the clinic is always clogged. You get in with two minutes to spare. You sit behind the window and the phone rings as soon as opening hour strikes. You're swept up in the demands of patients and doctors alike. One thing you can't complain for how quickly the days fly.

You eat your lunch in your car. You cherish the moments you're not surrounded by sniffling, coughing, and complaining. You head back in and finish the last half, yawning at the monitor.

It's even busier when you pull out into the street. You let the music flow into your ears and distract you. You tap the pedal as you slog along. Finally, you get to a side street and cut a zig zag across town. You pull up to your building and linger in your car.

You have this eerie feeling. You glance over at the unfamiliar car parked facing the brick. The sleek white muscle car is vintage and polished to a shine. Someone loves that thing.

You get out of your dusty Honda and snatch your bag from the passenger's seat. You tap your fob and enter through the side. You stop before the elevator and turn back. You should at least try to get a few steps in. You take the stairs.

You stare at your pointed flats as you drag your soles over the carpet. You smother a yawn behind your hand. A throat clears. You move over, thinking someone's coming your way. You stir in your bag for your keys. Your name brings your chin up.

You gasp and drop your keys. You teeter as you nearly spin and sprint away. Your bag slips and you barely catch the strap. You gape at Steve as he stands beside your door.

Silence wafts around you with the smell of cooking and laundry. He holds a bouquet of classic red roses. He sports a tailored suit in black that puts his prison uniform to shame. The collar is crisp and the tie perfectly knotted. His jawline is shaved and his hair is styled down to the strand.

"Hey, sweetheart," he greets with a smirk.

You wordlessly bend to pick up your keys then stand and fix your bag on your shoulder. Your eyes glaze in disbelief and horror. A million questions flurry to a storm of terror.

"How..."

"Appeal went through. They turned over my conviction," he struts away from the wall. "These are for you, sweetheart."

You look at the petals then at him as he comes close. Your shoulders sag as you shrink down at the breadth of his shadow. He's even bigger like that. You shudder, the lack of barrier unsettling.

"I got you speechless," he intones and grabs the strap of your bag. "Look like you had a long day, let me take a load off."

He takes your bag then guides your hand to the bouquet. You close your mouth and gulp. He sweeps away your keys and hooks his arm through yours. You let him lead you to the door of your apartment. He swings it open and you flinch.

"Wait, Steve, how did you-- how do you know where I live?" You quaver.

"Told you, I got friends on the outside. You don't think I'd leave you unprotected--"

"Wait, wait," you plead as you face him, untangling your arm from his. "How is this real? How are you here? How- Why-- You don't think--"

"I think I spent months talking to you and you spent the same time coming to me. It's not what I think, it's what I know," he insists. You choke.

If his conviction was flipped, maybe that means he isn't so bad. No, no, you heard of what he did in there. He's dangerous. Whether he did what the court said he didn't or not.

He waves you in, "come on, we can take it slow. We'll talk, like old times."

You shake your head but enter. You see no other choice. You're too stunned to think of any.

He follows and pulls the key free of the door before shutting it. He hangs them on the little hook beside the frame. He faces you as you focus on slipping off your flats. He puts your bag on the top of the small shelf where you store your mitts and whatnot.

He whistles, "you look... good. I mean, I never got the full angle." He steps back and you feel him raking you with his eyes. "Got a nice shape..."

"Steve," you snap and face him. "I... I never..." you pace yourself and take a breath. "The flowers are lovely, thank you. And I appreciate you coming by but I think there's a bit of a miscommunication." You turn and slowly inch away. You spin around as he watches you, his expression betraying nothing. "I only talked to you to keep Vaughn safe."

He sighs and his eyes narrow. His brows tilt slightly and his jaw squares. He nods and smooths the front of his jacket.

"Well, sweetheart, I went and got a new suit for you."

"I'm sorry--"

"No, get this," he strides forward and stops before you. "Whether it was for me, for you, or for that scum you call a brother, it happened and it's not over. You got me? I might be out but I got men inside. Men who are willing to do a lot worse than me," he snarls.

You shudder and he grabs your chin. You whimper. "I wanna be nice to you, sweetheart. That's all I've been dreaming of. I went out, got all dressed up, got you flowers, now you do me a favour, go put a dress on so I can take you out for dinner." He sniffs and squeezes just until your jaw throbs, "see, I'm still doing stuff for you. I'm not asking much except you to come out and look pretty."

He lets go and you stagger back. You sniffle and quickly hide your face. Your voice comes out hoarse, "I'll put these in water first."

Your heart races and you go into the kitchen. You find a vase and focus on filling it. You put the flowers in and toss the paper cone. He looms in the doorway.

"I'll find something to put on, okay?" Your voice cracks.

You cross the kitchen and he stays firmly in your path. He brings his knuckle up under your chin and forces your face up.

"Smile, sweetheart," he growls. "We're together. At last."

[isaisliterallyhim]

heyyyy love your fics <333

can you do sugar daddy Kaiser who's always been rude and rough with reader but one day when he realises he's falling in love with them he's really gentle, asking how they feel and praising them? if possible can you do fluff along with nsfw???

ahh hii anon!! thank uu i appreciate ur words <33 anywayss i love the plot ohh gosh ygs r so creative omg

"And all I wanna do is stay with HER"

ft. michael kaiser . sugar daddy! kaiser . ooc! kaiser lol... . ness is in the story omg! . is ness ooc! too... . yes ness is ooc asw . character development.? . eventual smut . sex gulp... . piv ! . afab! reader . mistreated! reader ... . fluff asw . unreliable narrator

wc: 1.0k

"she's annoying." kaiser grumbled, taking a sip of wine. ness looked at him, "[name] cares about you that's why." the magician tried to lighten the mood. clearly, it didn't work.

"she just wants fucking money." he retorted. ness frowned, "can't you look at it in a positive way.? at least she's trying. take a look at all the others you've had."

that sentence had kaiser reflecting for a bit. "huh. i suppose you have a point for once, ness." the prodigy felt himself get a little flushed. "you're treating her so rough, how often does she even ask for money.?" ness continued. "don't be so harsh man! she's trying..."

the emperor tsked. "if she's so 'perfect' you take her then." he grumbled. jeez this guy is really helpless man... ness looked at kaiser disgusted for the first time.

"keep acting like that and she's bound to become who you think she really is." ness thought as he picked himself up and left kaiser to his thoughts.

later within the night, kaiser found himself scrolling through your photos after sending you some money (oh need that.) it hit him you were gorgeous. pretty face with a kind heart.. he was going to go insane.

the more he scrolled the more he admired your beauty. you radiated an aura that he just couldn't place his finger on. perfection was a word too vague to describe it.

shaking his head, he set his phone down. hands on his head, he was wondering. what the literal hell was he doing.? all he's ever done was treat you like shit because he had such horrendous experiences with others.

i mean, you were like the others. you were just there for the money... and attention i guess. but there was something more to it. he was just to blind to see it. (tf r ur glasses for mihya bro.)

it was late — hella late. 2:32 A.M.? there's no way you'd come over right? so what the heck were you doing at his door in a matter of moments?

kaiser opened his door, surprised. "you — you actually came?" he asked, somewhat in disbelief. "i'm right here aren't i, dumbass.. plus you called." you shrugged.

the satin on the bed somewhat wrinkled as the both of you sat down. "um, so why'd you want me to come ove-" you were quickly interrupted by an apology. "[name], liebling. i'm sorry. i'm sorry for my behaviour, how i treated you. scheiße, i'm so fuckin' sorry."

he held your visibly smaller and softer hands. his hands feeling quite the opposite. you were kinda a dumbass, "wha — michael huh...?" you shook your head giggling, "what are you apologizing for?"

his gorgeous blue eyes stared into yours. "don't act coy with me, [name]. you don't need to forgive me. i'll do whatever for your forgiveness. please. do you want more money? gifts.? flowers..? wha.. god. what do you want?!" kaiser asked desperately.

you looked at him with a deadpan expression. god, has this man ever been treated alright.? "mihya, i don't really want anything. yea i mean i love money i mean — who doesn't love money. but i'm not here solely because of money." you sighed.

"yes, you have money is definitely a positive trait but, you have more to it. money isn't the only thing that makes you lovable." you continued to ramble. his hands released yours. you were caught in his embrace.

"mihya.?" you whispered. kaiser knew how scary it was to love someone. the amount of devotion you must give. the time and effort. one wrong move? it could all crumble.

his embrace got tighter, you were tensing a little bit up. was he gonna beat you like what the heck is goin' on?! he knew you were always running away from love, 'cause your daddy never gave you enough :((

hey, same for him as well, no? "meine liebe." kaiser breathed, "let's try again together. i'm done with the 'you deserve better' bullshit. i have the choice to be better and i'm taking it."

he loosened his embrace on you, hands on your shoulders. you met his gaze. all it could scream was blue of desperation. not going to even lie, most dedication you've seen in your whole life.

you were still skeptical — hell, i can't blame you! you've been mistreated all the time by partners, getting taken advantage of... what change is this rich and attractive man going to do? he has the money, the women ugh... thinking about it made your head hurt.

"what do you say, liebling. let me show you.?" he leaned in, mumbling into your ear. hah! as if you'd believe what he said and give him a chance.

kaiser would be lying if he said he didn't regret making up with you earlier. he'd be lying if he said he didn't miss you. hell! every bit of fiber within him missed you! his lips on yours, oh gosh. he's going crazy. :c

a little while after what was supposed to be a sweet make out, he found himself aligning his tip to your slit. you had glossy eyes as you stared back up at him. he had you pinned onto the bed...

"are you sure?" he asked stroking your stomach, his hands then tracing your curves. "fuu-uck. you're perfect." he mumbled. you nodded in response.

as he buried his length into your warmth he swore he got sent to heaven. "sh-shit.. scheißescheißescheiße...! please you're made for me..." he continued, his lips once more pressed onto yours.

nah, at this point his cock was stretching your opening... it hurt. kaiser broke off the kiss as he groaned, "you take me so damn well.. i'm sorry for being so horrid to you."

you were practically crying, was it cause the sex was good? cause of kaiser? you didn't know! "m-hya.." you sobbed out so sweetly. it was kaiser's last straw.

your walls were sucking his member in man..! how could he not..? your noises could kill him oh gosh! one last thrust and his length was kissing your womb :c "i'm sorry meine liebe, i-" the emperor didn't even get to finish his sentence as he finished in you <3

he pulled out just to push his fingers back in. admiring your form and expression. maaaan, kaiser couldn't ask for a better girl >< dawn came, so did kaiser, 'cept he n you came multiple times :3 kaiser could make it better. all he needed was just one more day with ya.

— ©isaisliterallyhim, 2025

tags !! : @twijaxx ♡, @kyvkc

a/n: hey guys.. hey anon.. guess who's finally back heh... my writers block actually fried me so bad its diabolical man.. yes i lost motivation half way along w the plot tbf i had this in my drafts for 2 weeks or smth... i'm so sorry if this wasn't what y'all wanted ill cook for the future ones ;-; not proofread btw good GAWDDDD if kaiser was my sugar daddy man.. money and hes hot YES PLSS (no im nawt shallow but tuition fees are booty bro yall cant blame me.) yes this is all yap ALL MY NOTES ARE YAP OK </3 but um.. yay ilygs a lot mwa mwa <3

[mariasont]

maria's fic recs

i have realized how most of these are smut & idk what that says about me but alas this are some super super amazing talented people who write crazy cool stories!!!! check them out!!!!! make sure to follow, reblog & comment on these fics if you like them!!! these incredible fic writers deserve it! i will also probably be adding more as i read follow my fic rec page for more @mariasficrecs if anyone mentioned in this post wants to be removed let me know <3

spencer reid

cedar - @parfaitblogs summary: in which compatible bodies does not always mean compatible minds, but spencer reid is all too kind when you're like this, so perhaps you're allowed to forget that for a night. 

this is the fic for the girlies who have loved someone more than they should, more than they loved you back and more than was every healthy. this is the kind of fic that makes you reread certain lines just to punch yourself in the chest a second time. masterpiece in pining, delusion, and tragic devotion. the most gorgeous piece of writing truthfully

in my dream im fixing your crutch - @notlongtolove summary: most nights, spencer wakes to the sound of your sniffles—unlike most nights, he doesn’t have to ask why. the reason is visceral, tangible—staining the sheets when the wound dressing wasn’t tight enough, seeping and pooling right between the both of you where an ocean of your guilt already lies.

this and everythingggg p writes is so incredibly SHATTERING in the best way possible. i truly need everyone to follow rn! and reader everything written by them! but this one specifically wasn't just a fic it was an experience. it's so painful and beautiful and so unfairly written. the duality of intimacy and violence is insaneeeeee like shakespearean level.

into the rose garden; for evermore - @notlongtolove summary: months of hope, weeks of ache. you’ve stayed. you’ve waited. you’ve stayed in the waiting. more pathetic than poetic if you’re being honest. but now, with him standing here with his heart in his hands, it doesn’t feel simple.

might be my favorite fic ive ever read if im being honest. everything about it had me sobbing like a baby. it's not even angst at this point it's a biblical reckoning. p has made heartbreak into a single character, personified pain and i felt every freaking piece of it actually! every single line was freaking perfection & you get to choose your ending!!!!!!! because user notlongtolove is so cool and so creative.

i can do a lot with fifteen minutes - @reidrum summary: in which you and spencer don't make it out the door on date night

i love a sabrina reference (clearly) and this was just the perfect smut fic literally like poetry disguised as desire. i have read a lot of smut (u got me). but nothing compares to a good intimate zipper scene. i will eat it up everytime!!!!!!! and a mirror scene!!!!! double whammy. fantastic 10000/10

hypothalamus - @reidrum summary: in which spencer gets creative on helping you study for your exam

godddddds to have spencer reid talk nerdy to me in bed. so in character. essentially the anatomy lesson of the gods actually. so amazing

sobriquet - @siriuslylantsov summary: spencer reacts to you calling him a nickname for the first time.

so sweet, so fluffy, a love letter to everything good in the world, essentially love seeping into mundane which is my favorite genre!!!! waking up with spencer!! being in love!! angel!!!! i love spencer calling the reader angel girl!!!!! <3

sweeter - @siriuslylantsov summary: in which, you and spencer try out foodplay, through use of whipped cream.

whipped cream!!!!!!!!! i dont have many words other than that! must read

white noise - @brattyspence summary: spencer x reader -- a situationship defined by white noise; a metaphor for how we pacify ourselves and make stupid decisions to experience comfort, even when it hurts

visceral, soul-shattering, gut wrenching agony. that's about it. slow burn destruction that will have you crying. no doubt. this fic literally lulls you into a false sense of security and then u realize that spencer is white noise and that you'd rather have whatever this is than nothing at all. LOL! definitely did not almost kill me while reading. most accurate portrayal of a situationship

chateau lobby #4 - @burymagdalene summary: Whilst trying to navigate romantic relationships after prison, Spencer finds himself in love and caught in an all-too-serious non-relationship with reader. Wanting to break this streak, he asks to spend Valentine's Day properly with a real date. Afterward, they find themselves desperate with trying to express their love for each other.

so as you might be able to tell i have a pattern of reading situationship spence! call me a masochist! but this one had a happy ending okay!!!!!!!! and a reference to father john misty? yes. immediately. i also just love post prison reid because he's so complicated and different but still him and he doesnt think he deserves soft things and soft love and it's so devastating. reading the date literally felt like falling in love in real time. so good.

a closed mouth doesn't get fed - @burymagdalene summary: When reader notices Spencers dark circles and glossy eyes, they store away their pressing need for him in bed. This desire locked away forms into a wet dream that escalates their prior expectations substantially.

one of the best portrayals of sleep-deprived, love-drunk, desperate sex. that's it. that's the tweet. also when he switches the reader's straw like why was that so sweet to me im crying

xoxo - @pathologicalreid summary: in which your daughter goes to the BAU to hand out her extra Valentines

peak domesticity. i love girl dad spence so much it's not even funny. it's everything he deserves. like i can only hope in some alternate au this is the ending reid got <3

to talk is to bare - @esote-rika summary: three times you've never felt enough for Spencer Reid—and the three times he rectified it immediately

one of the most painfully real depiction of navigating self worth in a relationship with spencer. like exactly what i feel like it would be like to be with someone so brilliant and like so unattainable-seeming, while feeling ordinary and yet spencer makes the reader feel so special ugh

in infinite universes - @nereidprinc3ss summary: in which spencer reid picks up uni!reader from a party. you're drunk, and he's in love with you

there is not a single thing (cannot emphasize this enough) that i won't read from nereidprinc3ss okay? everything she writes is actually literary gold. but this one was so beautiful it almost hurts to reid because it's literally a love letter to inevitability!!!!! and the dialogue is so funny and flirty and so spencer and ugh it's so raw and real.

spencer reid & aaron hotchner

unknown territory - @minswriting Spencer walks in on Aaron going down on you. So he watches the two of you have sex.

had to take multiple breathers after reading this! everyone knows i love hotch and reid and even more so i loveeeee a why choose. also everything min writes is so hot, 10/10 recommend checking out her account. "reid, if you're going to stand there and watch, you can at least come in and close the door" hello????????? immediately yes.

aaron hotchner

crazy - @kimstills summary: after one heated and spontaneous night together, aaron can’t seem to get his pretty subordinate (or her pussy) out of his head.

i did in fact read this bad boy like three times because it's that good. it perfectly mirrors hotch's mental state which i love love love. and i just love a smutty fic that has the best escalation of tension, like it builds until hotch physically cannot take it anymore and shewwwww so hot. exactly what i want in a hotch smut fic

savor - @kimstills summary: after being compromised to working a case the next day, aaron decides on savoring your current moment together for when he’s gone.

maddie is just always going to make the hottest aaron hotchner smut. the fact that this idea comes to aaron mid fuck is wild and i love it LOL.

morphine - @luveline summary: you get a good dose, confess your affections, and leave poor, oblivious hotch to fix things up neatly. 

so if you follow my fic rec blog you know i literally reblog absolutely everything jade writes because it is just that fantastic. and this one is just soooo tender and so perfectly in character with hotch. if you are looking for truly amazing characterizations of hotch and reid !!!!! right here besties !!!!

filthy flat-pack thoughts - @alinathinkstoomuch summary: you had taken the day off to get yourself settled into your new apartment, not expecting hotch to show up at your door and offer a hand.

hey so firstly im just obsessed with the title, idk why it scratches something in my brain. and i feel like this fic should be illegal because it's not just smut-adjacent, it's foreplay with no touching, sexual frustration in furniture assembly and poor decisions lolol and again everyone who knows me knows i eat upppppp sexual tension and this fic was just that. there is literally no kisses no sex nothing and it's still one of the hottest fics i've ever read (there is also a smutty part two so go check that out as well)

can't lose when i'm with you - @aureatelys summary: You work as a beverage cart girl at your local country club and your dad ropes you in to make him look good during a business meeting with his new best friend.

dbf hotch is my weakness. the slow burn!!!!!! possessive hotch!!! daddy hotch!!!! this is the gold standard for dbf hotch truly. felt like i needed a cigarette after and i don't even smoke

red light kiss - @aureatelys summary: You haven't had sex in a week, you're stuck in the car with your new boyfriend/boss, and he's wearing that damn Kevlar vest. How could you resist?

hey yeah so i was positively feral after reading this actually. that damn kevlar vest is right. idk how you managed to make a blowjob in a government vehicle feel romantic but you did so bravo

tyrant - @solardrop summary: Hotch lets you take some anger out on him after he disrespects you on a case.

my favorite genre !!!!!!! making hotch shut up by sitting on his face! mhm mhm mhm. absolutely amazing use of free will was you writing this because i've read it at least 5 times minimum. i was forever changed after this

salt & pepper - @dudeitiskarev summary: dad bod and insecure Hotch. That’s it.

everything cat writes is just so crazy good but everyone knows i have such a weakness for dad bod hotch & this is the absolute perfect fic for it.

we can't be friends (wait for your love) - @cerisereids summary: down on your luck after a huge betrayal, you return to live at your father's house with your tail between your legs. you're humiliated, thoroughly convinced nothing good could come from returning home. then you meet aaron hotchner.

there are three parts to this masterpiece and i need everyone to read them all okay? because it's just so good. hotch flustered is my roman empire and grrrrrr this man was literally on his knees for the reader internally through out the whole thing & once again dbf!hotch!!!!! arghhh obsessed

[nick-writes-stuff]

Various Squid Game Characters x reader, A Chance Meeting After the Games

Includes: Thanos, Nam-gyu, Dae-ho, In-ho, and Gyeong-seok (Player 246)

!warnings: drug use (Thanos and Nam-gyu), canon-typical violence (All), implied fem!reader [reader called señorita] (Nam-gyu), Gyeong-seok is probably ooc, use of y/n (In-ho, Gyeong-seok), ~1k words each

a/n: hey guys! i've been cooking this one for a while but it's here now! i think i probably could have done these more justice by making them individual and fully fleshed-out fics, but i still like the way these turned out. hope you enjoy!

Player 230, Thanos:

The two of you never formally agreed to meet up anywhere. You hadn't thought about it because you had been so scared that you wouldn't make it out of there alive. He didn't consider it because he was high for a considerable amount of time.

But you both realized it the second you got back to your routine. Well, as routine as things could be after experiencing something like the games.

You found yourself missing the cheesy flirting and the pet names. But it was the quiet moments in between his rambunctious highs that truly stole your heart. Beneath the chaotic exterior, there was a man who cared about you more than he liked others to think.

He missed your flustered reactions and genuine interest in him. You didn't throw yourself at him because he was a celebrity. You didn't just like Thanos, but you saw him for Su-bong, a person he hadn't felt like for a long time.

It was a good thing Thanos was never hard to find. He was an up-and-coming celebrity after all, so it was very easy to find a show near you and buy tickets. You added the meet and greet package as well so you could talk to him. Normally, this would have been out of your price range, but that wasn't an issue anymore.

You had never heard of Thanos before the games, so you didn't really know what to expect. There was a part of you that assumed he had been exaggerating his influence in the games to appear cooler, but he clearly wasn't.

There were a few moments during the show where he thought he saw you in the crowd, but he disregarded it. Between the lights in his eyes, the sheer amount of people before him, and the drugs in his system, he didn't trust his own perception right now.

He was probably just seeing what his subconscious wanted him to. Because he really, really wanted to see you.

As the VIP ticket holders were being escorted to the designated meet and greet location, you listened to the fans talking highly of Thanos. It was oddly comforting to hear people praise him like you would. You got so used to the players in the game shit-talking him. You were glad that you weren't the only one who saw something good in him.

While you were in line, you eventually caught the gaze of Nam-gyu. He opened his mouth to say something, but you stopped him with a finger to your lips. He gave you a knowing look and a smirk, keeping quiet.

As you neared the front of the line, you looked down to your phone, trying to avoid looking at him so as to not spoil the surprise. You did hear a fan behind you give a distasteful comment about your demeanor, but you didn't care.

“Next.” Nam-gyu said, signaling you to step forward. You slid a CD case toward him. He didn't look up. You could see that he was getting a little burnt out from the sustained interaction with fans. Either that or the drugs were wearing off. Maybe both. “Who should I make it out to?” He asked, holding a marker in his hands.

You smirked slightly. "Player 438.” You said.

He started to sign it, getting his signature written and pausing as he realized what you said your name was. You could see his eyebrows furrow as he thought about it for a moment before looking up at you.

He gave a gasp of shock before laughing. “Oh my god, no way you're here!” He said loudly. He got up from his seat, walking around the table to pull you into a tight hug.

You laughed as well, hugging him back as you heard some of the fans who were still waiting murmur about you. “Of course I am, I missed you.” You said, soft enough that only he could hear it.

When he pulled away from the hug, you could see the goofy smile on his face and you couldn't quell the fluttery feeling in your stomach. “Bro, how did you know that I would be here?” He asked.

You were the one being confused now. You blinked a few times, trying to process what was going on. Did he just-

You stopped your train of thought when you noticed just how large his pupils were. He definitely wasn't sober right now.

You laughed. “Thanos, it's literally your show.” You said. He let out a soft “oh” when he realized his mistake.

He told you to stick around while he finished his obligations and you obviously agreed.

You, Thanos, and Nam-gyu spent the rest of the evening in Thanos's trailer. You all ordered an embarrassing amount of fast food to share between you three.

You all just sat on the floor and talked. There was a lot of catching up to do regarding what had happened since the games ended. It had been a month or two since you all had seen each other.

It felt like you talked for hours. You could notice the drugs leaving Thanos's system. His voice slowly got softer and his demeanor was becoming less chaotic.

Eventually you leaned your head on Thanos's shoulder, an action that actually made him blush slightly.

“I really missed you, you know?” He said quietly.

You smiled up at him. “I did, too.”

You were telling him and Nam-gyu about something your landlord had said to you, but his mind was elsewhere, trying to figure out how to ask you to go on the tour with him. He didn't want to be apart from you anymore.

----

Player 124, Nam-gyu:

“Do you think we'll ever see each other again after this?” You had asked before the vote. A few more games had taken place, and the player numbers had decreased enough that most players were satisfied with the amount they would be taking home. It seemed that you guys were really going to make it out of here.

His face remained blank. “Would you even want to?” He asked, sounding uninterested. But he was actually ecstatic that you even considered seeing him after this. He was just afraid you wouldn't be okay with his… hobbies.

You seemed confused. “Why else would I ask?” You responded.

He shrugged. “I don't know. I just didn't think clubs and drugs were your thing.” That wasn't something that was going away after this. Honestly, he knew himself and Thanos, some of this money was going to be used to go on a bender.

You sighed. “They aren’t. But I think I could tolerate it if I got to see you.” You said.

He rolled his eyes, trying to remain unaffected but you could see the faintest dusting of pink on his face. “You are so cringe.” He said with a scoff.

You gasped in mock offense. “Wow.” You said, crossing your arms. “I should have let you die during Mingle.” You spat with false venom.

He laughed, shaking his head. Your look of annoyance softened, smiling at your success in making him laugh.

When he spoke again, his tone was much more genuine. “Well, you'll know where to find me.” He said before nodding toward Thanos. The purple-haired man was tormenting Myung-gi again. “Wherever that dumbass is, I'm usually there babysitting him.” You both laughed.

When you got out, you had some things you had to deal with before you could think about seeking out Nam-gyu. You needed to find a new place and get things back into working order in your life. You had been kicked out of your apartment right before you had met the Salesman, so you needed to find a place to stay and replace most of your belongings.

Every day that passed after the games had ended felt like a weight on Nam-gyu's shoulders. At first, he tried to get rid of the feeling with drugs, but that was only a short-term solution.

Were you ever going to seek him out? Maybe you had just been trying to be nice to him. Did you ever actually intend on coming, or were you trying to let him down easy? Why did he think this would be any different? His brain couldn't shut off the rumination, and he hated it.

You did try to find him eventually. It had been a few weeks until you got back on your feet, but you couldn't stop thinking about how much you wanted to see him again. So when you heard Thanos would be doing a set at a local nightclub, you jumped at the chance to go.

You found your way across the dance floor, pushing your way through the crowd to get closer to the stage. You could hear members of the crowd talking about how excited they were to see Thanos perform, but that was the farthest thing from your mind.

When you got to the entrance of the backstage area, you looked around for any sign of him. You didn't see him, and it seemed like the bouncer had left the area for a moment. You entered the backstage, trying to seem as nonchalant as possible. People don't ask questions unless you don't seem like you are supposed to be there.

“Hey, what do you think you're doing?” You heard a deep voice call out from behind you. You winced, thinking of ignoring him but you ultimately turned around. “This is a restricted area. You can't be here.”

Before you could say anything, you heard a different voice. “Back off, they're with me.” You turned to see Nam-gyu with his arms crossed, giving the bouncer a glare until he backed down and left you alone.

You sighed in relief. “Thank you.” You said softly, taking a step toward him.

Before you could say anything else, Thanos emerged from what you assumed to be his dressing room. Upon seeing you, he laughed loudly. “Hey, I was wondering when you'd finally show up. Did you miss me, señorita?” He asked, a flirtatious glint in his eyes. From his demeanor, you could tell he was definitely high.

“Dude, what the hell?” Nam-gyu said with annoyance.

You chuckled awkwardly to try to clear some tension. “It's nice to see you too, but that's not why I'm here.” You said.

Thanos seemed puzzled, his brain taking longer to piece together the situation due to the substances. He scoffed and rolled his eyes. “Don't tell me you came here to see Nam-su and not-” You both corrected him in unison.

“Yeah. Nam-gyu, whatever. I-” Thanos said dismissively, but he was interrupted by someone calling for him. He sighed and went to see what they needed.

You looked back over to him. “I was starting to think you weren't going to come.” He said, trying to keep his voice level despite his excitement.

You chuckled. “I had to find a new place. I got kicked out of my old one.” You said. He nodded slightly, but you could see that there was a part of him that wasn't satisfied with your response. You smirked slightly. “Aww, did someone miss me?” You teased.

He rolled his eyes. “Oh, go to hell.” He said. He was thankful the room was dark so you couldn't see him blushing.

You laughed lightly. “If it helps, I missed you too.” You knew he missed you. He just had a different way of showing it.

----

Player 388, Dae-ho:

Ironically, you and Dae-ho had actually met multiple times before the games. You worked as a barista in the coffee shop he frequented.

You had never spoken very much outside of the typical pleasantries expected in the situation. The conversation had never gone much past small talk about the weather if his drink was taking longer than usual.

You both were caught up in your own struggles. You both had debts hanging over you, keeping your minds too busy to socialize. You helped your parents manage the shop, and the business was struggling to stay afloat. He had his own problems in his life, some demons he couldn't put to rest.

You both ended up in the games due to your debts. Neither of you recognized the other, but you both thought the other looked vaguely familiar. There were more important things to focus on at that time. Your fight or flight response took precedence over trying to figure out if you had seen each other before.

The two of you were very close, near inseparable, during the games. You both found comfort in the other's presence. You would talk about anything and everything under the pretense that these conversations may be some of the last. From embarrassing stories to your deepest fears, you both poured your hearts out to each other.

Before the last vote, he asked you a question. “Do you think we'll see each other again? Out there, I mean.”

You looked up at him. “I hope so.” You said softly.

His smile grew. “You'll miss me too much.” He said teasingly. It felt easier to joke with you than admit that he didn't know what he would do without you.

You feigned offense. “Oh, so you're saying you won't miss me then?” You asked.

He started to apologize but your smile betrayed you and he realized you were messing with him. He laughed, but he made sure to add, “I will miss you though. A lot.”

From talking further, you found that you lived in the same area, so maybe you would see each other after all. You hadn't thought about the fact you may have already met before.

About a week after you had been released, you were back at work at the shop. You were still working there even though you had enough money to live comfortably. You put most of it into the business and into your parents’ retirement fund.

You were making a drink as your co-worker was taking orders. It was quiet, so you were able to overhear their interaction with the customer.

“What's the name for the order?” They asked politely. “Kang Dae-ho.”

You were so shocked you almost dropped the cup in your hand. You set it down a bit too quickly, causing it to clatter against the counter and getting both of their attention. “Dae-ho?” You asked.

You met his eyes, and his lips curled into a smile. “Hey. It's so nice to see you.” He said softly. He seemed considerably less tense than how you were used to seeing him in the games. Happiness was a good look on him.

Your coworker looked back at you. “Oh, how do you two know each other?” They asked. Your eyes widened, looking over to Dae-ho realizing there was no good way to explain it.

“It's uhh... It's a long story.” He trailed. You agreed quickly. They seemed confused but eventually continued taking his order.

The shop was busy, so you didn't have time to talk in depth, to Dae-ho's dismay.

He left the building a little bummed out, but it was short-lived. He noticed on the side of his cup there was something else written aside from his name.

You wrote your phone number on the side of the cup, along with a note saying “Call me. I miss you.” You added a small smiley face with it.

He laughed. He couldn't wipe the smile off his face. He had been afraid he would never see you again, so meeting you like that was a relief.

He only wished he'd been paying attention to his surroundings more. He had gone to the coffee shop for years, and once he saw you behind the counter this time, he realized why you had seemed somewhat familiar to him.

You had been hiding from him in plain sight. You meant the world to him now, and maybe if he had taken the initiative to talk with you before, who knows how your lives would have been different. You could have been great friends right now, maybe more than friends.

He sent you a quick text, telling you that this was his number and when he would be free to chat. He soon sent another message telling you that his drink you made him was amazing.

Once again, he smiled like an idiot as he stared at his phone, realizing you weren't going to be the one that got away. He wasted no time putting your number in his contacts.

Just ignore the heart next to your name.

----

Player 1/The Front Man, In-ho:

You had tried your best not to give up on your hopes of survival after the failed coup of the games. Your closest ally, your friend, died and you hadn't even been able to say goodbye. He was doing something so heroic just to be killed and disposed of unceremoniously.

You didn't give yourself time to grieve. Grief would only distract you. It didn't hit you until the night before what would be the last vote. You weren't sure what the outcome of the vote would be, but you were just so overwhelmed and sad and angry. So fucking angry.

Angry at the people who run the games, angry at the other players who have been keeping you here, angry at Gi-hun for even suggesting the attempted uprising, and angry at Young-il for going to play the hero and getting himself killed.

You finally broke down in the dead of night after a few hours of failing to fall asleep. Hyun-ju tried her best to comfort you to no avail.

In-ho watched from the control room. He felt his heart wrench hearing you sob. While the mask made him seem cold and collected, this affected him more than he wanted to admit. He hated that he had to do this to you. He had to leave you and it wasn't fair to you.

It wasn't fair to himself either. He finally made a strong, genuine connection with someone and his job had to ruin it. Neither of you deserved the cards you were dealt in this situation, but it didn't have to stay this way.

While you were getting back into your normal life, In-ho was thinking of a way to reintroduce himself to you. He had a few people doing surveillance on you. Nothing major, just trying to see what your routine was. The places you frequented, your schedule, things of the like.

He waited a bit less than a year to make a move. He needed to make sure your memory of him had faded slightly. This would never work if you recognized him as Young-il. Waiting was excruciating. He just wanted to talk to you. To hear your voice. To see you smile.

You hadn't been the same since the games. You felt like you were in a haze. You were only alive because of the deaths of hundreds of people. You lived, and Young-il didn't. There was a voice in the back of your mind that told you it should have been you instead. You hardly slept anymore. Nightmares plagued you any time you closed your eyes.

After a few months, you finally decided to seek out a therapist. It was hard to describe the situation to him, seeing as you couldn't explain much about the death game aspect. You simply told him that someone close to you died in a violent manner, and you had survivor's guilt.

He advised trying to reintegrate yourself into the world. Social interaction could help to pull yourself out of the depressive episode. Which is how you ended up becoming a regular customer at a cafe near your apartment. You didn't talk to anyone very often, but existing in the presence of others and having basic interactions with the staff was helpful to you.

You noticed someone who you had never seen before come in while the cafe was somewhat busy. He bore a striking resemblance to Young-il, but you brushed it off as his image haunting your mind.

He was dressed up like he was straight out of a business meeting, dark hair slicked back. You tried not to stare, and while he didn't make it obvious, he did notice. You eventually tore your eyes away from him, focusing on the book you were reading.

You hadn't noticed him coming toward you until he spoke. “Is this seat taken?” He asked, hand resting on the chair across from yours. You looked up at him, and he could have sworn he felt his heart skip a beat.

You were a bit confused. The cafe was busy, but there were certainly other places available. You shook your head while returning to your book.

He took a sip of his drink before speaking again. “How do you like it?” He asked. You looked up at him, eyebrows drawn together in confusion. He chuckled, realizing his vague question. “The book, I mean.”

“Oh, it's really good. One of my favorites, actually.” You said. He already knew the answer to his question. One of the nights when you were bordering on a panic attack, he asked you questions about it to distract you. You rambled for a while, and he was entranced by your passion. After the games ended, the first thing he did was find a copy of it.

“What's it about?” He asked. You started talking in a rather closed-off manner, as if you were trying to distance yourself from him. You found it hard to get close to anyone since Young-il. But the more you spoke, the more he saw the old you peeking through.

You both spoke for over an hour, first about the book and then about other things. You both talked about where you were from, what you did for work, and the like. although you were both withholding some of the truth

You didn't even notice time passing by until you saw one of the workers starting to sweep the floor. You had talked until the cafe was about to close. You laughed awkwardly at that fact. “We should probably go. I don't want to hold them up.”

You said your goodbyes and parted ways. It wasn't until you got home that you noticed the slip of paper in your bag. It was a phone number with a small note: We should do this again sometime. - In-ho

Your eyes widened slightly in surprise, but then you just smiled. Your cheeks hurt at the motion, and you realized how much you had been smiling that evening. Your fear of getting close to people was forgotten at that moment.

You typed out a single message: Hey, it's Y/N. Same time next week?

----

Player 246, Gyeong-seok:

You were trying to get back into the swing of things after being put through the horrible games. You had tried to close yourself off from the other players. After seeing the brutality of Red Light Green Light, you didn't want to get attached to anyone. You just wanted to get out of there.

But Gyeong-seok managed to break down the walls you had made. Your number was right after his, so you stood next to each other on the X side of the room. You noticed him glancing over at him but you didn't react.

He struck up a conversation with you afterward while eating dinner. You tried to ignore him, but he was stubborn. You eventually relented, and you both talked for a bit. It was all fine until he told you about his daughter at home, Na-yeon, and how she was sick.

You sympathized with him, and it scared you. You had no intentions of betraying him. Quite the opposite, actually. You were afraid of being attached because it would make the inevitable hurt even worse. A death game was no place to make friends. But that's exactly what you did. Maybe even more than friends.

When he decided to help Gi-hun and the others during the raid, you felt an intense feeling of dread, and the blood in your veins ran cold. You were already grieving him, silently lamenting for the daughter whose father would never return. That was until he came stumbling into the room with a gunshot wound.

You tried to treat the wound the best you could, but the lack of supplies and the incessant trembling of your hands hindered you. Luckily, your makeshift bandage wouldn't see too much use, as the Xs had a majority in the next vote.

Before anything else happened, he pulled you aside. “Hey, thanks for everything. I couldn't have asked for a better friend here.” He said.

You tried to ignore the fluttery feeling in your stomach after his praise. “Thank you, too. I think you kept me sane.” You said softly with a slight chuckle.

He smiled before pulling you into a hug. You tensed up slightly, the movement catching you off guard at first. You hesitantly reciprocated his embrace. “I hope we get to see each other again.” He said.

“In better circumstances, I hope.” You quipped, earning a chuckle from him.

And you would see him again. It was about a month or so later, but fate moved you toward each other. It started with a light tug on your jacket while you were shopping in a department store. You looked down to see a little girl, barely tall enough to reach your waist.

Before you could speak, the girl did. “I can't find my dad. Can you help me?” She definitely was a bit shaken up and nervous to talk to you.

Your eyes softened when they met hers. You crouched down to talk to her on her level. “Of course I can. My name is Y/N. What's yours?” You asked her.

You smiled. “That's a pretty name.” You said, causing her to become bashful. “Hey, I have an idea. I can carry you on my shoulders so you can see over the clothing racks. Is that okay with you?” You offered. It would let her be able to see more of the store. She nodded.

That seemed to calm her nerves a bit. “Na-yeon.” She said softly. Her name didn't immediately trigger your memory since it was a fairly popular name.

She giggled when you picked her up. You grabbed her hands to help keep her stable. You intended to find your way to the cashier so they could make an announcement over the speakers.

You didn't make it that far before she called out to someone. “Na-yeon, what did I say about running-” His words caught in his throat when you turned toward him. It was Gyeong-seok

You smiled as you put the girl back on the ground. She moved to wrap her arms around his legs, and he put his hand on her shoulder. “Fancy seeing you here.” He said with a grin.

She looked back at you. “How do you know my dad?” She asked you.

You locked eyes with him, hesitating on how to explain it. “They're a friend from work.” He offered. You agreed. It was better to lie than try to explain anything further. “What do you say, Na-yeon?” He asked, prompting her to use her manners. The girl let go of her father, saying a word of thanks with a bow.

You smiled. “It was no trouble. She was very brave.” You said, causing her to beam with pride.

While he was talking to his daughter, you pulled out your phone. You started to make a new contact. When he was done talking, you passed your phone to him. He smiled when he realized what you were doing. He put his number in.

“It was nice meeting you, Na-yeon. Don't be strangers, okay?” You said. You said goodbye and made your way to the checkout. As much as you would have loved to stay and chat, you had a pressing matter to attend to.

The girl heard the ring tone. “Is that Y/N?” She asked.

As the two were getting into their car, he received a text message. It was nice seeing you both. Glad to see that Na-yeon is doing well.

He chuckled as he was buckling her seat belt. “Yes, it is.” He confirmed.

“They were nice. When can we see them again?” She asked, very eagerly.

He smiled. “Soon, kiddo.” He said. Before he started driving, he answered you. I'm glad to see you too. Na-yeon is already asking to see you again. Do you want to grab lunch with us sometime?

You smiled at your phone, answering almost immediately. How could I say no?

[pyract0]

Random thoughts with MHA men!

☁︎Lowkey just a heap of stupid ideas I had for different characters I thought were funny/ cute. Might extend on a few of these into longer fics if I find the time :) ☁︎Going back to finishing some requests after this! Sometimes read and can't process what I just read so might take a while to finish them all! Feel free to request but might be a bit slow at the moment, but I'll get through them when I can! ☁︎Not really any warnings other than swearing (Tried to keep it to a minimum but habit when I can't think of a fitting word)! Gn/ unspecified reader :))

╰┈➤ Katsuki Bakugo who follows a strict routine he set for himself to get the most out of the day, in bed by exactly 8:30. Yet he coincidently always happens to be awake when you try to sneak in and cuddle under the covers with him. Gets annoyed at you for "interfering" with his schedule, but he never lets himself fall asleep if he knows your planning to visit, even if at ridiculous hours of the night. ╰┈➤ Shoto Todoroki who lacks certain aspects of understanding when it comes to social cues, specifically the idea of personal space after you start dating. Will stand behind you breathing down your neck just wanting to be near you, not realising how odd it appears to anyone passing by. Similarly, will practically sit ON you instead of beside you, squeezing between you and anyone/anything so he can sit right beside you.

╰┈➤ Izuku Midoriya who often forgets or simply doesn't realise when his habit of rambling starts, sometimes scaring the shit out of you when he suddenly breaks the silence. Will need you to sometimes cover his mouth when out in public before he says something that would accidently make any sane person uncomfortable. Talked about murder out of context at least a few times and got y'all kicked out of somewhere </3

╰┈➤ Tenya Iida who understands the concept of money and it's overall value, but frankly doesn't care when it comes to you. Buys you awfully expensive items that reminds him of you/ thinks you'll like, hiding just how much he actually spent so you don't reject it (you know, you just don't have the heart to tell him.) Will gift you like it's only something small and beat himself up for not getting you something better (It cost more than what you make in 3 months). Prides himself on responsibility but it all falls out the window when about his decisions around you.

╰┈➤ Eijiro Kirishima who shows you off like some sort of deity, constantly praising anything and everything you do. Accidently degrades himself while praising you, saying how he doesn't deserve you (he's literally an angel :(( ). Will do anything for you, if you ask him or not, choosing to show just how much he loves you through his actions not just words. Tells you he loves you at least 5 times a day <3

╰┈➤ Neito Monoma who respects you even if you're in class 1a, never speaking poorly of you even when shitting on your class. Stops whenever you're nearby and starts acting all sweet like he wasn't badmouthing each of your classmates to their faces minutes prior. Another one who worships your every movement and the ground you walk on, but instead of degrading himself puts everyone else but the both of you down. (My favourite little menace)

╰┈➤ Hitoshi Shinsou who without fail whenever you're alone hands you some random ass cat inspired thing that reminded him of you. First it was a small succulent pot, next some really doped out looking cat plushie, then a little keychain of a black cat with a witches hat.. it just kept going. Gets you wondering how he manages to keep finding these objects, and how he always manages to have one when you see each other unplanned (He has a little hidden pocket where he stores the little strange trinkets) ╰┈➤ Rody Soul who sometimes activates his quirk, summoning Pino, at the most random hours of night. Will get woken up by your sudden screams, thinking you had a nightmare only for it to have been Pino scaring the shit out of you by sitting on your chest in the middle of the night and scrutinizing your very being (lovingly). Has been forced as a result to spend the next day begging for forgiveness for Pino's actions (He had a dream of you and she was just admiring you with the same level of affection as him, just hers a bit more creepy..)

╰┈➤ Mirio togata who even after years of practice with his quirk, happens to forget what activating it in normal clothes does. Has tried to phase through the ground to surprise you with his sudden appearance just to end up flashing you, both of you now sitting in embarrassment while your struggling to breathe through your laughter. Apologises before joining you in going along with your everyday life (It will happen again)

╰┈➤ Tamaki Amajiki who uses you as a form of protection, not from physical danger but from people trying to communicate with you both. Will hold your hand in his and stand right against your back, head often against yours or on your shoulder while he lets you talk for him as well as yourself. As soon as you finish, will drag you away to a more secluded area and embrace you with more confidence as a way of showing his appreciation for never complaining about his shying away from socialising.

╰┈➤ Giulio Gandini who chooses to not wear his eyepatch when you're both alone, trusting you in his most vulnerable form. Who is able to use his robotic eye as a camera, recording your interactions to preserve the memory. Often pulls up these moments on the screen of his prosthetic arm when you're apart, watching through them when he misses you. Moves certain ones to a USB and prints out photos to give you (some in lockets, some just as a copy to frame) leaving you confused on how he managed to get them. (I love him so much :(( lowkey the main reason I liked the 4th movie sm)

╰┈➤ Touya Todoroki/ Dabi who will only let you help when it comes to dyeing his hair (aka forces you when the black is washing out to help fix it up). Will sit on a random chair he dragged in or the edge of the bathtub while you touch up his roots, probably moves constantly unless you hold his head in place. Gets you to join him in the shower to help wash through it, being a little shit about it and smudging the dye on you so it'll stain.

╰┈➤ Tomura Shigaraki who refuses to touch you with all 5 of his fingers, even after he's confident in his abilities to control his quirk. Will always have a finger lifted from your body while he holds you in his embrace, wearing artist gloves when sleeping beside you just to be safe. Holds your hand constantly when alone like the touch starved person he is but never has a proper grasp, loosely intertwining your fingers while he leaves his pinkie away from your hand.

╰┈➤ Shota Aizawa who similar to his son has a habit of handing you random stuff when he returns home, though his are more concerning. If you had a nickel for every time he came home to hand you a kitten he found in an alley, you would have two but it was very strange it happened twice. Came home after his long shift one night and handed you a cat like it was just another causal Wednesday. So anyways you guys have 2 cats now :))

╰┈➤ Keigo Takami who likes to use his feathers to tickle you at the least expected times, often resulting in a fresh bruise the next day. Will each and every time forget you like to swing when his feathers are tickling at your sides, with your first or leg accidently colliding with some part of his body. One time was his face, another his calf, or the time you accidently hit him where the sun don't shine. He learnt to move back after that one..

[aspenmissing]

Hi! Love your arcane posts and headcannons! Could you write a comfort fic with arcane characters with a reader who doesn’t like to celebrate their birthday. I have negative feelings regarding mine and had a bad depressive episode on my last birthday. The reader’s reason can be up to you.

ᴜɴᴡᴀɴᴛᴇᴅ ʀᴇᴍɪɴᴅᴇʀꜱ

ᴊᴀʏᴄᴇ | ᴠɪᴋᴛᴏʀ | ᴊᴀʏᴠɪᴋ | ᴠᴀɴᴅᴇʀ | ꜱɪʟᴄᴏ | ᴊɪɴx || ᴄᴏᴍꜰᴏʀᴛ/ᴀɴɢꜱᴛ/ꜰʟᴜꜰꜰ? || 7228 ᴡᴏʀᴅꜱ || ᴡᴀʀɴɪɴɢꜱ: ᴘᴀʀᴇɴᴛᴀʟ ᴅᴇᴀᴛʜ, ꜰᴇᴇʟɪɴɢ ᴏꜰ ʟᴏɴᴇʟɪɴᴇꜱꜱ, ᴀʙꜱᴇɴᴛ ꜰʀɪᴇɴᴅꜱ/ꜰᴀᴍɪʟʏ

ʀᴇQᴜᴇꜱᴛ ᴀɴꜱᴡᴇʀ: ʜᴇʟʟᴏ ᴍʏ ᴅᴇᴀʀ! ᴛʜᴀɴᴋ ʏᴏᴜ ꜰᴏʀ ʀᴇᴀᴅɪɴɢ ᴀʟʟ ᴍʏ ᴀʀᴄᴀɴᴇ ᴘᴏꜱᴛꜱ!! ɪ'ᴍ ɢʟᴀᴅ ʏᴏᴜ ᴀʀᴇ ᴇɴᴊᴏʏɪɴɢ ᴛʜᴇᴍ! ᴀɴᴅ ɪ'ᴍ ꜱᴏʀʀʏ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ʏᴏᴜ ꜰᴇᴇʟ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ᴡᴀʏ, ʙᴜᴛ ᴊᴜꜱᴛ ᴋɴᴏᴡ ᴛʜᴇʀᴇ ɪꜱ ɴᴏ ꜱʜᴀᴍᴇ ɪɴ ꜰᴇᴇʟɪɴɢ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ᴡᴀʏ! <3

ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ | ᴊᴀʏᴄᴇ | ᴠɪᴋᴛᴏʀ | ᴠᴀɴᴅᴇʀ | ꜱɪʟᴄᴏ | ᴊɪɴx

JAYCE

Jayce had always been the kind of person who loved celebrating. Achievements, milestones, even the little things—he believed life was meant to be enjoyed to the fullest. So when he found out Y/N’s birthday was coming up, he took it upon himself to make it special.

They hadn’t been together for long—just under a year—but in that time, Jayce had come to care about her in a way that made her feel like home. They shared an apartment in Piltover, and while it wasn’t the grandest place in the city, it was theirs. The walls were filled with little moments that spoke of their growing connection: a pair of mismatched mugs in the kitchen, a collection of books they both loved to read, and the way their shoes always seemed to end up scattered in the same corner. It was a place where both of them could just be—no need for pretence.

And now, Jayce wanted to show Y/N just how much he appreciated her. It had become clear over the last few months that she didn’t often let people get too close, that she was careful with how much of herself she shared. Jayce didn’t know much about her past—she kept that to herself—but he could see the occasional flash of sadness in her eyes, as if something, or someone, had left a mark on her.

So, when he realized her birthday was coming up, he decided to make the day about her. He went all out—decorating their living room with soft golden lights, scattering delicate rose petals across the table, and, most importantly, cooking a homemade meal. Jayce wasn’t just decent in the kitchen—he was skilled. He had grown up learning from his mother, and over the years, cooking had become second nature to him. He spent the entire afternoon preparing a carefully crafted meal: roasted herb chicken, buttered vegetables, and a rich, velvety sauce to tie it all together. The aroma filled the apartment, warm and inviting.

A beautifully wrapped gift sat waiting on the coffee table, next to a cake he’d carefully ordered from the best bakery in town. He couldn’t wait to see the smile on her face when she walked in.

Everything was set. The only thing missing was Y/N.

=

When she finally walked through the door that evening, looking exhausted from a long day at work, Jayce’s excitement was palpable. “Surprise!” he beamed, stepping aside to reveal the cozy, intimate celebration he had prepared.

But instead of the joyful reaction he expected—maybe a laugh, a hug, something—her face fell. Her body seemed to freeze, her shoulders tensing up like she’d just been hit with a wave of cold. It was subtle, but Jayce knew her well enough by now to notice the shift.

“Y/N?” he asked, his smile faltering as concern replaced his earlier excitement. “What’s wrong?”

She swallowed hard, not meeting his eyes. “You did all this… for me?” Her voice was quiet, distant.

Jayce felt a pang of confusion. “Of course! It’s your birthday. I wanted to make it special. Don’t you like it?”

She looked around, her gaze skimming over the soft glow of the lights, the perfectly arranged table, the thoughtful little touches he’d put together. It was clear she wasn’t upset about the effort. But there was something behind her eyes—a reluctance, a hesitation.

“I—” She let out a long sigh and crossed her arms in front of her, as though she was trying to shield herself from everything around her. “Jayce, I don’t really celebrate my birthday.”

The words hit him harder than he expected. His brow furrowed, and he took a small step toward her. “You… don’t?”

“No,” she whispered, shaking her head. “I never really have.”

His confusion deepened. “But… why?”

She paused for a moment, her expression shifting as she searched for the right words, then finally spoke in a voice barely above a whisper, “Because it just reminds me of everything I lost.”

Jayce’s heart sank at the weight of her words. The smile he had been wearing slipped away as he took in her expression—one that was tinged with grief and something else, something much older than their relationship. The excitement of the evening suddenly seemed small, almost irrelevant.

Her birthday had never been a day of celebration for her. It was a reminder of the people she no longer had in her life, the family that had fallen apart, the friends who had moved on, the empty spaces in her past that no amount of time could ever fill. It wasn’t a day to celebrate; it was a day to mourn what was gone, what had never been.

Jayce exhaled softly, stepping closer but keeping a respectful distance. He could feel the tension in her shoulders, the way she was closing herself off. “Y/N, I… I didn’t know. I’m so sorry.” His voice was soft, sincere.

Her eyes met his at last, and there was something fragile in her gaze. She shook her head slightly. “I know you meant well, Jayce. And… this is beautiful. Really. But I just—” She faltered, her voice wavering. “I don’t know how to enjoy it. I don’t know how to make myself believe I’m supposed to.”

The vulnerability in her words made his chest tighten. Jayce wasn’t one to give up easily, but this time, instead of pushing her to celebrate, he did something he hadn’t expected himself to do. He reached out slowly, brushing his fingers against one of the candles on the table. He blew it out gently, the small flame flickering for a moment before dying completely.

“There,” he said quietly, offering a small, understanding smile. “We don’t have to celebrate if you don’t want to. We can just… be here. Together. Just us. No expectations.”

Y/N blinked at him, the surprise evident in her expression. She hadn’t expected that. Maybe she thought he would insist, maybe even pressure her to smile, to make a wish, to “enjoy her day.” But Jayce had never been about forcing things—he just wanted her to feel safe. And, for the first time, he wasn’t trying to fix anything. He was just trying to give her space.

Slowly, Y/N’s posture relaxed, and a soft, tentative smile tugged at the corners of her lips. “You don’t have to take everything down, though,” she murmured. “The place looks nice. And it does smell really good.”

Jayce chuckled, relieved by the small shift in her tone. “Well, I’ll have you know that I slaved away in the kitchen for hours to make sure it was perfect.” He grinned, playfully nudging her. “So, how about this? No birthday expectations. Just dinner, just us.”

Y/N hesitated for a moment, then finally, she gave him a real, small smile. “I think I can do that.”

Jayce grinned and pulled out her chair for her. “Perfect. Let’s eat.”

They sat together at the table, the warm glow of the lights making the space feel intimate and safe. As they ate, Y/N found herself relaxing more and more, letting Jayce’s presence soothe the lingering ache inside her. And maybe—just maybe—this wasn’t so bad. Maybe it wasn’t about celebrating a birthday.

Maybe it was just about being with him.

And that was enough.

VIKTOR

The morning light streamed through the windows of Viktor’s lab, casting long, delicate beams through the dust-speckled air. Shadows stretched over the cluttered workbenches, where blueprints, half-assembled inventions, and the lingering scent of metal and parchment created a world entirely their own. The rhythmic clink of metal against the wooden floor broke the stillness, a quiet but familiar sound that heralded his arrival before he had even spoken.

Viktor paused in the doorway, leaning on his cane, his sharp, knowing eyes settling on Y/N. She was hunched over her work, utterly absorbed, as she always was. The soft glow of a lamp cast golden light over her features, highlighting the slight furrow in her brow, the way her fingers delicately adjusted the components of whatever intricate project had captured her attention today.

A familiar fondness tugged at his chest.

It was February 25th.

He knew what that meant.

Most people would have arrived with an eager grin, a cake in hand, candles at the ready, eager to celebrate another year of life. But Viktor wasn’t most people. And Y/N… Y/N didn’t celebrate her birthday.

He had learned this in passing, the way one might stumble upon an old, forgotten book wedged between the shelves. A casual conversation, a date mentioned in some offhand way. When he had pressed, even gently, she had tensed—just for a moment—before brushing it off.

"I don’t like it. Just another day."

That should have been enough of an answer, but Viktor was a scientist, and scientists were not satisfied with vague explanations. He had watched, observed, until eventually, the truth had slipped through the cracks.

Her birthdays had never been warm, never filled with the kind of joy that people spoke of when they reminisced about childhood celebrations. They had been reminders of loneliness, of expectations never met. A day where she had once allowed herself to hope—only to be left with nothing but silence, an empty room, and the realization that no one was coming. No one had remembered. No one had cared.

So, she had stopped expecting anything. Stopped wanting it.

And so, Viktor did not say happy birthday.

He did not drape streamers across the lab or offer her some grand, well-intentioned gift. He did not try to convince her that this year could be different, that this day could be redeemed. That wasn’t what she wanted.

=

Instead, he walked over to her desk, cane tapping softly against the floor, and set down a cup of tea—freshly brewed, still steaming, made just how she liked it.

She blinked up at him, her expression shifting from focus to something softer, something warm. A ghost of a smile tugged at her lips before she reached for the tea, fingers brushing his for just a second.

“Did you sleep at all last night?” His voice was teasing, but there was an unmistakable intimacy beneath it, a quiet concern wrapped in familiarity.

Y/N exhaled a short laugh, shaking her head. “Did you?”

Viktor chuckled, settling into the chair across from her with the slow, careful movements that his leg required. He sighed as he leaned back slightly, cane resting against the side of the desk. “A scientist never sleeps, můj drahý. You know this.” (My Dear)

She rolled her eyes but took the tea anyway, holding the cup close, letting the warmth seep into her fingertips. It wasn’t extravagant, but it was thoughtful—him.

And that meant something.

=

The world outside was moving, rushing, celebrating and forgetting, just as it always did. But here, in the quiet sanctuary of the lab, time moved differently.

Eventually, Viktor broke the silence. “I made some adjustments to the schematics for your stabilizer design,” he murmured, sliding a few papers her way with his free hand. His thumb traced slow, absent-minded circles against the back of her hand. “Thought we might test them later.”

Y/N reached for them, scanning over his precise, detailed notes. Her fingers brushed his once more as she took them, gaze softening.

He always did this—always found ways to show he cared without making it feel like pity, without making it feel forced.

For the first time that day, a genuine smile tugged at her lips.

She knew what he was doing.

No grand gestures, no forced celebrations—just quiet companionship. Just another day, but one where he made sure she wasn’t alone.

And for that, she was grateful.

Viktor, who had always been so consumed by his work, who had spent so much of his life surrounded by brilliance but little warmth, had learned to understand her in ways no one else had. He had learned when to push and when to simply be there.

He lifted her hand to his lips, pressing a kiss to her knuckles. It was soft, barely there, but it sent warmth curling through her chest.

"Would it be terribly forward of me," he murmured, "if I said I was quite glad you exist?"

Y/N inhaled slowly, watching him, her heart catching in her throat. She could say a thousand things. Make a joke, tease him, brush it off like she always had before.

But not with him.

Not today.

Instead, she leaned forward, pressing a slow, lingering kiss to his lips. Viktor sighed into it, fingers tightening around hers, his other hand reaching up to cradle her face as if she were something fragile.

When they parted, her forehead rested against his, her breath mingling with his own.

"You could say it," she murmured, "or you could just keep kissing me."

Viktor chuckled, shaking his head fondly. "Ah, můj drahý, you truly do have the best ideas."

And for the rest of the day, no one spoke of birthdays. No candles, no gifts, no reminders of the past. Just quiet love, warm hands, stolen kisses, and a man who had never needed a reason to cherish her.

And for Y/N, that meant more than any celebration ever could.

JAYVIK

You never liked celebrating your birthday.

It wasn’t because you feared aging or found parties annoying—no, it was because the day itself held nothing but bittersweet memories. The kind that lingered in the back of your mind, creeping in like an unshakable shadow no matter how hard you tried to ignore them.

It was the day your mother died.

She passed on the very day she had brought you into the world, a cruel twist of fate that turned every birthday into a mourning period rather than a celebration. You were too young to remember the first few years, but as you grew older, you learned to recognize the sadness in your father’s eyes, the way he would sit at the table in silence while neighbors offered pitying smiles.

The house was always too quiet on that day. Too empty.

Even as a child, you never wanted cakes or candles, never wanted people to sing or toast in your name. Other children at school had balloons and parties, but every time someone asked you, “What are you doing for your birthday?” you would shrug and change the subject.

As an adult, that habit remained.

Working in the bustling halls of Piltover’s Academy meant you had plenty of colleagues, many of whom thrived on gossip and social events. The first year you were there, someone had tried to throw you a small get-together, completely unaware of your distaste for the occasion. You had left early, stomach tight, heart heavy. The forced joy made you feel even more isolated.

Jayce and Viktor were the only ones who truly understood.

Which was why, when the morning of your birthday arrived, they were already on high alert.

=

Jayce, ever the charismatic golden boy of the Academy, was the first line of defence. He intercepted professors, engineers, and assistants with a charming smile and a firm “Don’t even think about it.”

He knew how these people worked—how they’d see an excuse to celebrate and turn it into a grand affair, no matter how personal it was. But this wasn’t about them. This was about you.

When the first person casually brought up your birthday, Jayce cut them off mid-sentence.

“She doesn’t celebrate,” he stated plainly, rolling up his sleeves. “Respect that.”

Most people backed off quickly. Jayce’s reputation made him difficult to argue with, especially when his normally easygoing demeanor shifted into something more serious.

Viktor, meanwhile, played his own part. He loitered near your usual workspace, leaning on his cane, golden eyes sharp as he redirected any well-meaning colleagues before they could get too close.

“She does not want this,” he reminded them, his voice carrying the kind of finality that made people think twice.

If Jayce was the first line of defence, Viktor was the last.

And yet, people were persistent.

By midday, Sky tried sneaking in a small wrapped box, her expression hesitant yet hopeful.

Jayce sighed, arms crossed over his broad chest. “Sky,” he said, his tone somewhere between patient and exasperated. “We talked about this.”

“I know, I know! But it’s just something small—”

Viktor exhaled through his nose, unimpressed. “You know she will not accept it.”

Sky hesitated, looking between the two of them. “But… doesn’t she deserve something nice?”

That was the thing. You did deserve something nice. But not a forced celebration. Not something that made the weight on your heart feel heavier.

And so, with careful words, Jayce and Viktor turned every well-meaning colleague away, ensuring that by the time you arrived in the lab that afternoon, there wasn’t a single hint of birthday cheer in sight. No decorations, no cake, no whispered happy birthday from a passing researcher. Just another ordinary day.

Just how you wanted it.

=

The only difference came when the three of you finally made it home that evening.

The exhaustion from the day lingered in your bones, sinking deep into the spaces between muscle and marrow. You weren’t sure if it was from the weight of the date itself or from the constant effort it took to suppress it. Keeping up the mask. Pretending not to notice the hushed whispers from colleagues who meant well. The tension of dodging sympathetic glances. It all piled onto you, a quiet but relentless pressure.

The moment the door shut behind you, the tension cracked just a little.

Jayce didn’t hesitate. Strong arms wrapped around you from behind, his warmth pressing into your back, solid and steady. His chin found its way to the crook of your shoulder, his breath warm against your skin as he exhaled slowly, deliberately, as if trying to breathe some of his ease into you.

Viktor, already making his way to the couch, watched with quiet understanding. His amber eyes, sharp with intelligence yet endlessly soft when it came to you, traced over your face, noting the tired slump of your shoulders. He didn’t speak right away—he never did when words weren’t needed.

Instead, he set his cane aside and shifted to one end of the couch, making room. One hand reached toward you, fingers curling slightly in silent invitation.

You let Jayce guide you forward, your movements slow and heavy, as if wading through thick fog. The moment you sank onto the couch beside Viktor, his hand found yours, fingers cool but firm. He ran his thumb in slow, deliberate circles over your knuckles—soothing, grounding. Jayce followed close behind, settling in on your other side, draping an arm around both you and Viktor with ease.

The room was dim, illuminated only by the golden glow of the city filtering through the windows. Outside, Piltover was still alive with its usual hum—distant chatter, the occasional clang of machinery, the faint whistle of a steam-powered transport. But here, in this small sanctuary of an apartment, it was quiet.

No one said happy birthday.

No one tried to make it a special day.

Instead, Viktor leaned his head against yours, his voice barely above a whisper. “Long day?”

You let out a slow, steady breath. It wasn’t quite a sigh, more like an unspoken admission. “Yeah.”

Jayce tightened his grip around your waist, his palm pressing against your ribs in a steadying warmth. He pressed a lingering kiss to your temple before murmuring, “Do you want to talk about it?”

You swallowed, shaking your head. Your throat felt tight, the kind of tightness that came from holding too much in for too long. “Just… stay like this.”

And they did. The three of you sat there, tangled together in the quiet.

Viktor’s fingers never stopped their slow, soothing circles against your skin, while Jayce’s thumb brushed absentmindedly along your side, a silent promise that he was there. No words needed. No grand gestures. Just warmth. Comfort. The kind of love that wasn’t flashy or loud but strong in the way it simply existed—constant, unwavering.

The weight in your chest didn’t vanish entirely, but it loosened, just a little. The kind of looseness that let you breathe a little easier. That reminded you that, even on a day you’d rather forget, you weren’t alone.

VANDER

The air in The Last Drop buzzed with quiet anticipation. Vander had made it abundantly clear to the kids that Y/N didn’t like celebrating her birthday. He respected that, understood that some wounds weren’t meant to be reopened, even by well-intentioned hands.

For Y/N, birthdays weren’t something to celebrate. Not anymore. The memories attached to them were too heavy—ghosts of the past lurking in every candle’s flicker. She had once celebrated, long ago, before she lost everything. Before she learned that birthdays only marked another year of surviving, not truly living.

So when Vander had told the kids to leave it alone, he had truly believed they would listen.

But when had they ever?

=

So here they were, barely containing their excitement, whispering and snickering in hurried voices as they scrambled to put the finishing touches on their secret little plan.

Powder had drawn a picture of all of them together—crayon strokes slightly smudged from how many times she had reworked Vander’s beard and added extra details to Y/N’s smile. She clutched the paper close to her chest like it was the most important thing in the world, her fingers twitching as if eager to hand it over already.

Milo had stolen a few extra rations of sweets, stuffing them in his pockets with a cocky smirk, convinced that the slightly stale biscuits and hardened chocolate were a necessary sacrifice for the occasion. He had even swiped a handful of sugar cubes from behind the bar, arguing that they’d make the cake taste better—though no one was entirely sure how.

Claggor, ever resourceful, had somehow acquired a half-melted candle that leaned dangerously to one side when stuck into the lopsided mess of a cake they had put together. "It’s still good!" he insisted, rotating it to try and find an angle where it didn’t look like it was about to fall over entirely.

Vi, of course, had taken charge.

She stood in the middle of it all, hands on her hips, directing them with the confidence of someone who had no plan B if this whole thing went sideways. "Alright, Powder, you stand by the lights. Claggor, make sure Milo doesn’t eat half the cake before Y/N even sees it. And for the love of everything, act natural. We don’t want Vander sniffing this out before she even gets here."

Milo scoffed. "You act like the old man’s got some kinda sixth sense."

Vi shot him a look. "He does."

And sure enough, Vander was already suspicious.

From behind the bar, his sharp gaze flickered toward them every so often, narrowing slightly when he caught them huddled too close together, whispering like little criminals. He let out a low sigh, rubbing a hand down his face. He didn’t know what they were planning—yet—but he could tell it was trouble.

And knowing them?

It was a disaster waiting to happen.

=

Y/N walked through the door, rolling her shoulders from a long day of work, already looking forward to a quiet evening with Vander. The familiar scent of ale and warm spices from The Last Drop wrapped around her like a well-worn cloak—comforting, familiar.

She had been looking forward to him.

A drink in hand, his gruff voice teasing her about taking on too much, and later, the weight of his arms draped over her shoulders as they sat together in silence. That was all she needed.

But the moment she stepped inside—

“SURPRISE!”

The word hit her like a sudden wave, the air crackling with the energy of young excitement. The dim lights of the bar flickered to life, revealing a scene she had not been expecting.

Powder practically bounced on her heels, blue eyes wide with joy. Vi stood at the centre, arms crossed in smug satisfaction, chin lifted as if to say, I told you we’d pull it off. Claggor grinned, clearly proud of whatever part he had played, and Milo—well, he looked impatient, like he was waiting for her to collapse into gratitude at their grand effort.

Y/N froze.

The room had been hastily decorated, mismatched scraps of fabric strung together in an attempt at banners. A small cake—lopsided and definitely not store-bought—sat on the table. And in the centre of it all, carefully propped up, was Powder’s drawing.

A picture of all of them. Together.

Her stomach twisted.

From beside her, Vander’s reaction was immediate. His broad shoulders tensed, his brows pulled into a deep frown, and his large hands planted firmly on his hips as he took in the sight before him.

The decorations. The makeshift cake. The eager, hopeful expressions of the kids who had clearly gone behind his back.

His voice was low, sharp, unmistakably displeased.

“Oi.” His gruff tone cut through the moment like a blade. “What the hell is this?”

The kids flinched—just barely. Even Vi, the most defiant of them all, hesitated under the weight of his stare. But she recovered quickly, lifting her chin again.

“A party. For Y/N.”

Her words hung in the air like a challenge.

Vander exhaled slowly, nostrils flaring as he ran a hand through his graying hair. His gaze flickered toward Y/N, searching, already prepared to shut this whole thing down at the first sign of distress.

And Y/N—

She should have been angry.

She wanted to be angry.

They had no idea what birthdays meant to her. How every year, the weight of those she lost pressed down on her like an iron chain. How she had once celebrated before everything fell apart, before the world had taught her that growing older wasn’t a gift—it was survival.

But the kids—

They were beaming.

They weren’t doing this to hurt her. They weren’t trying to dredge up old wounds or make her feel obligated. They had done this because, in their eyes, she was someone worth celebrating.

And damn it all—how could she be mad at that?

Y/N swallowed hard, forcing down the tightness in her throat. She glanced at Powder first, the girl nearly vibrating with anticipation. Then Vi, still trying to act like she didn’t care about Y/N’s reaction, even though she clearly did. Claggor, hopeful. Milo, already looking like he wanted to roll his eyes if she didn’t react fast enough.

They had done this for her.

So, she did the only thing she could.

She forced a smile—small, but genuine enough.

“You little brats,” she muttered, shaking her head as she stepped forward.

Powder gasped, practically bouncing in place. “Do you like it? We worked really hard!”

Vi nudged her, grinning. “Told you we should celebrate. You’re part of this family, Y/N. You don’t get to just ignore your birthday when you’ve got us around.”

A chuckle slipped past her lips.

This wasn’t about a date on a calendar. It was about them. About the people in front of her, the ones who—despite everything—wanted her to know she mattered. But even as warmth settled in her chest, something in her remained guarded.

She turned her gaze back toward Vander.

He was still watching her, his frown lingering, the tension in his stance refusing to ease. He didn’t like this. Not one bit. His protective nature warred against the situation, his first instinct to keep her from something that might hurt.

But she wasn’t breaking.

Not tonight.

She brushed her fingers against his arm, a silent reassurance.

His jaw tightened, his lips pressing into a firm line. His shoulders remained stiff for a moment longer before he finally exhaled, long and slow, the fight draining from him.

He sighed again, running a large hand down his face before his voice dropped, low and meant only for her.

“You don’t have to do this, love.”

Y/N met his gaze, her expression softer now, a quiet acceptance in her eyes.

“Just this once.” Her voice was steady, but there was a finality to it. A warning that this was an exception, not a change.

Vander studied her for a long moment, weighing her words. Then, after a beat, the smallest, most reluctant smirk tugged at the corner of his lips.

“You’re stronger than me.”

She huffed out a quiet laugh, shaking her head. “Damn right.”

And for the first time in years— Just this once—

She let them celebrate her.

SILCO

The Undercity was a cruel place to be born, filled with smoke-choked streets, back-alley dealings, and the ever-present reminder that survival was never guaranteed. Crueler still was being reminded of it every year, as if the simple passage of time was something to be celebrated rather than endured.

Y/N never saw the point in marking the day she entered this world—not when all it had ever done was take, take, take.

She had learned young that birthdays were little more than a cruel joke, an arbitrary measurement of time that only served to remind her that each passing year did not bring change, did not bring hope, did not bring anything but more of the same struggle. In Zaun, surviving another year was less of an achievement and more of an inevitability, a slow march toward an end that came for everyone eventually. And yet, people insisted on celebrating as if it meant something.

She could still remember the last time she had indulged in the notion.

She had been a child then, still foolish enough to believe that love and effort could outweigh the weight of the world pressing down on them. Her parents had done their best with what little they had, scraping together a meager but heartfelt attempt at a celebration—scavenged sweets wrapped in old paper, a candle stuck into a piece of stale bread, and a broken music box that had once belonged to someone else, given to her as though it was something new. She had loved it anyway. She had cherished it, wound it up every night just to hear its fragile, warbled tune, a melody that trembled on the edge of silence like a secret too delicate to hold.

But that was the last time she had both of them.

=

By the time the next year rolled around, they were gone, swallowed up by the Undercity’s insatiable hunger, lost to violence or sickness or some other inevitable fate. She never learned exactly how they had died. Perhaps it had been Piltover’s enforcers, another brutal culling of those who dared to scrape too close to the surface. Perhaps it had been the Chem Barons, ruthless in their control, never hesitating to snuff out lives that no longer served a purpose. Or perhaps it had been the city itself, bleeding them dry in the way it always did, with slow, grinding inevitability, until there was nothing left.

Either way, they were gone. And the day that had once been hers became something else entirely.

A reminder.

A grave marker.

Since then, Y/N had avoided birthdays altogether. No counting down the days, no laughter, no candles, no meaningless words of well-wishing from people who had no idea what they were actually celebrating. Just another day lost to the endless churn of time, another twenty-four hours of survival in a city that did not care whether she lived or died.

She never spoke of it to anyone.

But Silco was not just anyone.

He knew.

He always knew.

And so when the day arrived, he did not acknowledge it, did not force a smile or offer some insincere platitude, did not drape the moment in pretence. He treated it the way she wanted it to be treated—like any other day. A kindness, though neither of them would ever call it that.

But Silco was not a man to do nothing.

=

The air inside The Last Drop was thick with the familiar scent of smoke, sweat, and spilled liquor, the murmur of voices blending seamlessly into the pulse of low, vibrating bass that thrummed through the floorboards. Even this late at night, the bar was still alive, though the energy had settled into something slower, something heavier—the way all things did when exhaustion began to set in, when the night grew long and patience ran thin.

By the time Y/N climbed the stairs to Silco’s office, the weight of the day had already settled deep into her bones. She had spent the past few hours dealing with the kind of people who made survival in Zaun all the more exhausting—smugglers trying to squeeze extra coin from their dealings, desperate men willing to sell out their own for another taste of shimmer, debtors who thought they could outrun the inevitable. It was nothing she wasn’t used to, nothing she hadn’t done before, but today, it felt heavier. Today, it felt like the air was pressing against her ribs just a little too tightly, like the exhaustion ran deeper than just her body.

Pushing the door open, she expected to find Silco exactly as he always was—seated at his desk, a cigar burning lazily between his fingers, his mind already several moves ahead in whatever endless game he was playing.

Instead, she found something different.

The usual stacks of paperwork, half-finished letters, and bloodstained reports had been pushed aside, leaving his desk almost uncharacteristically clear. And waiting at the center, as though it had been placed there deliberately, were two glasses of her favorite drink, the liquid catching the dim candlelight as it reflected off the glass.

The invitation was silent but unmistakable.

She hesitated for only a moment before stepping inside and shutting the door behind her.

"You look tired," Silco murmured, his voice smooth as ever, measured and precise, though his mismatched eyes studied her with the same quiet intensity they always did, searching for something unspoken, something unsaid.

"Long day," she replied, moving toward the chair he had left open for her, dropping into it with a sigh that she didn’t bother to suppress.

"Mm. As they often are."

The silence that settled between them was not uncomfortable, nor was it unfamiliar. It was something steady, something known. A thing that had long since lost the need for words.

For a while, they sat like that, drinking in the silence the same way they drank the liquor in their glasses—slowly, without urgency, without expectation.

Then, after a long moment, Silco reached for something and pushed it across the desk toward her.

Y/N frowned slightly, her fingers pausing over the rim of her glass before reaching out.

A silver pocket watch.

She had expected something sleek, something expensive, something that bore the telltale touch of his wealth and power. But this—this was old, worn but well-kept, the casing smooth from years of use, the chain aged but still strong. A relic, not an ornament. When she flipped it open, she found an inscription carved into the inside, the letters delicate, almost too fine to read in the dim light.

Time owes you nothing—take what you will.

Her breath caught.

"It belonged to someone who never waited for time to give her anything," Silco said, his voice softer now, as though speaking too loudly might break whatever unspoken thing had settled between them. "I suspect you share that sentiment."

Her fingers traced the inscription, lingering on the words, feeling their weight settle into something deep, something heavy.

She swallowed.

This was not just a gift. This was a message, a statement, an acknowledgment of something neither of them had ever put into words.

"You didn’t have to," she said finally, her voice quieter than before.

"I know," Silco replied simply, taking another slow sip of his drink.

The clock inside the watch still ticked, faint but steady. A reminder that time did not stop, did not slow, did not wait for anyone.

A reminder that it belonged to her now.

Y/N exhaled, closing the pocket watch with a soft click and tucking it away.

For once, she didn’t mind that today wasn’t just any other day.

At least, not with him.

JINX

Zaun never really slept.

It never had, never would.

Its streets pulsed with a restless, feverish energy that never truly died down, not even in the dead of night. Machines whirred and clanked somewhere in the distance, metal on metal grinding in an endless, mechanical heartbeat. The occasional burst of shouting—sometimes laughter, sometimes anger—echoed through the narrow alleys, bouncing off corroded walls. A loud crash rang out, a telltale sign that someone had knocked over a crate they probably weren’t supposed to be touching.

And then there was the air—thick, heavy, pressing against her skin like an invisible weight. It carried the scent of smoke, scorched metal, and something sharper, the acrid tang of chemicals that settled deep in the lungs and never quite left. It clung to everything, just like the grime that covered Zaun’s bones, woven into its very foundation.

Sometimes, Zaun was deafening. The kind of loud that made your head throb and your ears ring, a never-ending buzz of industry and life.

But some nights felt quieter than others.

The kind of quiet that wasn’t really quiet at all—the kind that made every little sound stand out, the faintest creak of metal groaning under shifting weight, the rhythmic drip of water leaking from old pipes, the soft hum of distant neon signs flickering like tired eyes struggling to stay awake.

The kind of quiet that made your thoughts louder.

The kind that pressed against your ribs, curling in the hollow spaces between your bones, filling your chest with something heavy and unwelcome.

The kind that left you with nothing but yourself.

Y/N sat on the edge of a rusted metal platform, legs dangling over the side, watching the city below with an expression caught somewhere between longing and detachment.

The glow of chem-lamps burned low in the distance, their eerie green light casting long, shifting shadows across the streets, stretching them until they seemed to dance and twist. Zaun’s underbelly was always moving, shifting, breathing. Alive.

Most nights, she liked the view.

Most nights, it reminded her that there was still life here, that the world hadn’t stopped turning, that time hadn’t frozen the way it sometimes felt like it had.

But tonight, she wasn’t looking to be distracted.

Tonight, she was thinking.

She let out a slow breath, curling her fingers into the worn fabric of her sleeves, gripping them so tightly that her knuckles turned white.

Because tonight was different.

It was her birthday.

Not that it mattered. Not that it had mattered in a long time.

Once, a lifetime ago, birthdays had meant something. They had been warm, familiar, filled with soft voices and flickering candlelight, with cakes that always came out a little lopsided but never tasted any less sweet, with laughter that filled the air like music.

Once, birthdays had been something to look forward to.

Something to cherish.

But that was before.

Before she lost people. Before she realized that marking another year alive only reminded her of the ones who never got to. Before she learned that time didn’t care who it took and who it left behind.

Before she stopped wanting to count.

So she didn’t.

She stopped celebrating. Stopped acknowledging it. Stopped pretending that it was anything more than another number she didn’t need to keep track of.

Jinx knew that.

She had told her—sat her down once, forced the words out, made her listen. And, in a rare moment of stillness, Jinx had actually been quiet.

For a whole three minutes.

Which had to be some kind of record.

And, for the most part, Jinx had respected it.

But Jinx was… well, Jinx.

=

The unmistakable sound of rapid, uneven footsteps against hollow pipes reached her before the voice did.

“HEEEEEEY, FIRECRACKER!”

Y/N barely had time to groan before something crashed into her back, nearly sending her lurching forward off the platform. A pair of wiry arms locked around her shoulders in a half-hug, half-tackle, squeezing her so tight she almost lost her breath. The familiar scent of gunpowder, metal, and motor oil filled her nose, accompanied by the weight of a body practically draped over her like a human-sized ragdoll.

Jinx clung to her like a koala, her legs swinging freely in the air, her chin resting on Y/N’s head as if she belonged there.

“Whatcha doin’ up here all alone, huh?” Jinx chirped, voice muffled slightly by Y/N’s hair. “Broodin’? Starin’ dramatically into the abyss? Pfft—that’s my thing.”

Y/N sighed, shaking her head but making no effort to push her off. “Just thinking.”

Jinx hummed. “Uh-oh. Dangerous game, thinkin’.”

She swung herself around, flopping down beside Y/N with a clang of metal against metal, her boots tapping an impatient rhythm against the platform. She was practically vibrating with energy, fingers twitching at her sides, electric-blue eyes darting between Y/N and something hidden behind her back.

Y/N shot her a sideways glance. Something was up. Jinx was many things—reckless, unpredictable, explosively chaotic—but she wasn’t subtle. The silence stretched.

Y/N narrowed her eyes. “…What did you do?”

Jinx gasped, pressing a hand to her chest like she was offended.

“Pshh, what? Me? Do? Something?” She scoffed, throwing her hands up in an exaggerated motion. “Pffft—ha! As if!”

Y/N raised an eyebrow.

Jinx grinned, wide and impish, the kind of grin that said ‘I absolutely did something, but I want you to guess first.’

“Jinx.”

The grin wavered slightly.

“Okay, okay! So, uh—funny story!”

Y/N exhaled, already regretting this conversation.

“I may or may not have kinda-sorta-totally forgotten that you don’t like birthdays.” Jinx gave a sheepish laugh, rubbing the back of her neck. “Buuuut—before ya get all grumpy-pants on me, I didn’t do much! Like, really, barely anything!”

Y/N stared, unimpressed.

“No giant banners! No confetti bombs! No fireworks! I reeeaaally dialed it down!”

As if on cue, a small explosion rattled somewhere in the distance. Jinx winced.

“Okay, but that one wasn’t for you. Probably.”

Y/N groaned, dragging a hand down her face. Jinx perked up, grinning. Too wide. Too forced.

“Well! Lucky for you, this isn’t a birthday celebration!”

Y/N blinked. “What?”

Jinx beamed and pulled something from behind her back—a small, slightly crumpled, suspiciously warm package wrapped in mismatched scraps of fabric.

“This, my dear friend,” Jinx declared, waving it in front of Y/N’s face, “is an ‘I-Know-You-Don’t-Like-Birthdays-But-I-Still-Wanted-To-Do-Something-Nice-For-You’ gift!”

Y/N hesitated.

Inside was a small metal pendant, crudely shaped into a star. Uneven. Jagged. One point longer than the others, the edges rough where they had been cut by hand. It wasn’t perfect.

But it was hers. And for the first time in years, she didn’t hate the day quite as much. Not because it was her birthday.

But because she had someone like Jinx.

[gffa]

I love your blog but I can't remember whether or not you're an author BUT I do remember that you know how characters are Supposed To Be.

So-

Do you have any tips on how to write Mace Windu?

Hi! I've written a few Star Wars fics, but probably not ones you've read. 😂 But here is what I would say about writing Mace Windu (or even just if you want to have fun discussing him, I'd love to know what others would say are the best ways to write him!): Mace is someone who is severe with an undercurrent of deep care, this is someone who is serious but whole-heartedly believes in helping others and doing the right thing as best he can. He is a Jedi to his core, which means he holds compassion as the highest value and there's a subtle warmth to him if you care to look. He will place his life on the line to help people, if others have done their best, he will acknowledge it, if they have something of value to add, he will turn to them and ask them to say what they have to say, he will make sure his clones get through a battle if there's any way he can help them, he will gently touch the Zillo beast's face to comfort it, he will jump down into a ravine and smile at a child who needs help, he will stop to ask baby Anakin if his chip removal scar is healing, he will patiently explain Jedi beliefs to him if he's not quite getting it, he will grump at Yoda that their campaign isn't going the way he'd like, but will still easily sit down and meditate with him and find comfort in that. He's not someone who is a big ray of sunshine, he's too serious for that, he has far too much responsibility on his shoulders and holds them with gravitas, he'll tell someone to take a seat if they're getting out of line (he has more patience with children, but adults he'll treat as adults), he's not going to coddle someone who isn't trying their best, but at the heart of him, he is someone who genuinely wants the best for people, who will wrestle with his anger over injustice and win over it because he has spent a lifetime wrangling his anger into compassion, because he truly believes in the Jedi path, and always do what he believes is right. He takes administrative politics seriously, because he knows that he can't just defy them without consequences that would hurt people in the long run, which may appear cold to others who don't really know him but fundamentally, Mace Windu is a deeply caring man who is trying to help as many people as he can, he has dedicated his life to helping all people, even those who would spit on him, he still does his best to understand their circumstances and find sympathy for them. (Like when Prosset Dibs fell to the dark side, tried to kill Mace and said that he would dance on the Jedi's graves, Mace's response was to say that it was their duty to help him back to the light and put him on archive duty, rather than any serious punishment.) Mace can occasionally crack a very dry joke, he does have a sense of humor, but it's fairly rare. He'll be curt if he's having a bad day, especially if someone is getting out of their lane at him, but not unfairly and never with cruelty. He's a phenomenal athlete even among the Jedi, he's brilliant at what he does, there's a reason he helps lead the Jedi, this is someone who embodies the very best of them. Admittedly, I'm biased because Mace is one of my favorite characters, so I'm less aware of his flaws (even if I'll defend why he's sometimes short with people, it's true that he can sometimes come off as abrasive and not as patient as he might in better times, but I think Mace should be allowed to have frayed nerves sometimes, too), but I do genuinely believe that Mace should be written as someone who is a very serious faced person but loves the galaxy so deeply that it's woven into his bones, who loves his culture and his people, who loves the people of the galaxy, who would give all of himself to help them.

[saintsenara]

Hi, do you have an analysis for why you prefer bottom Tom? Most fics have him as a top, but I'm very interested in your perspective ma'am.

well, the short answer is because i want to and because i can.

the longer answer is that i just don't find any of the arguments for why voldemort would never bottom under any circumstances to be as convincing and definitive as their proponents claim them to be.

my issue - to be clear - isn't with people having a preference for reading or writing about him being a top. it's with the fact that him only being a top - and not only that, but him being repulsed or humiliated by the idea of bottoming - is typically presented as such an objective fact that preferring to read or write about him being a bottom provokes responses which range from the simply annoying - "this is out of character!" [any fic in which he consensually shags his prophesied child-enemy is out of character, be serious] - to the genuinely troubling - "it's disgusting! voldemort is a real man and real men don't want anything up their arses!".

obviously - let's be real - a lot of the arguments about why bottom!voldemort is impossible are just typical "slash fandom reinvents gender roles" shit - they essentially boil down to "omg no harry would bottom because he's the girl".

but others do come with more weight behind them. and two of these are:

that the gender norms voldemort was raised with would inculcate in him a big lump of internalised homophobia which would make him see bottoming as feminine, and - in seeing it as feminine - see it as weak, humiliating, dependent, and incompatible with his understanding of control and power. that voldemort would be horrified by the idea of being penetrated, because he would see it as something which polluted or profaned the body he considers to be sacred.

i do think it's possible to argue both of these points robustly, using actual readings of the text rather than just vibes. i've just never found any of these readings compelling.

and the reason why all comes down to this:

"I knew I was different," he whispered to his own quivering fingers. "I knew I was special. Always, I knew there was something." [HBP 13]

he's talking about something specific - how he's always known that he's a wizard - here, of course. but we can also take this statement and use it to think more generally about how he views being perceived as deviant, strange, or wrong by the norms of the society in which he lives.

by which i mean... he's somebody who believes that being different makes him special and that people who try to punish or shame him for his difference are idiots who simply haven't yet worked out that he's superior to them in literally everything he does. he's not someone who perceives being different in a self-flagellating way - he doesn't think there's something wrong with him, he doesn't think that his difference makes him a pathetic or unimpressive person. and he's also not somebody who views being criticised or punished for his difference as something which causes him sorrow or anxiety. it causes him rage - because it inconveniences him [it creates obstacles he has to overcome, although he entirely believes he can overcome them] and because it doesn't recognise his self-conception as the protagonist of reality:

Riddle's reaction to this was most surprising. He leapt from the bed and backed away from Dumbledore, looking furious. "You can't kid me! The asylum, that's where you're from, isn't it? 'Professor,' yes, of course - well, I'm not going, see? That old cat's the one who should be in the asylum. I never did anything to little Amy Benson or Dennis Bishop, and you can ask them, they'll tell you!"   "I am not from the asylum," said Dumbledore patiently. "I am a teacher and, if you will sit down calmly, I shall tell you about Hogwarts. Of course, if you would rather not come to the school, nobody will force you -" "I'd like to see them try," sneered Riddle. "Hogwarts," Dumbledore went on, as though he had not heard Riddle's last words, "is a school for people with special abilities -"   "I'm not mad!" [HBP 13]

you can entertain a very dark reading of this scene - in fact, i have - but it's also possible to entertain a liberating one, and see the child voldemort as someone who has always been proud of his difference and prepared to defend that pride in the face of censure, and who is absolutely delighted to be given the language to define and describe his difference and to be given access to a community of people who are similarly - in his words - special.

all of which is to say... the standard interpretation in fandom seems to be that a queer voldemort would fall somewhere on a spectrum from indifferent to his sexuality to actively ashamed of it.

but i think it's much, much more plausible that he'd actually be proud of it, and for his statement - "i knew i was different... i knew i was special" - to be used as the starting point for how we might imagine him realising that he's queer.

and this is why the "he'd have so much internalised homophobia he'd never bottom" argument always falls flat for me - it rests on an assumption that queer men having to grow past a childhood/teenage fear that there's something wrong with them is the default position. it overlooks the fact that there are many ways for somebody to come to understand their own sexuality.

and that two of those ways are "defiantly" and "spitefully". aka the lord voldemort special.

something which always stands out to me about the canonical voldemort, both when he's a good-looking teenager/young man and a monstrous, serpentine adult, is that - even with all the phallic symbolism which surrounds him [enormous snakes and ultra-powerful wands and so on] - the text presents him as somebody who comes across as fairly effeminate:

he's typically described - as we can see from this excellent analysis from @said-snape-softly - as speaking "softly" or "quietly". when he isn't, he's often "shrill", "shrieking", "screeching", or "screaming".

he has a hair-trigger temper and he's extremely emotionally volatile.

he's typically described as moving in ways which have similarly feminine connotations - he "drifts" and "glides". while the primary doylist reason for this is clearly so the reader associates him with snakes, ghosts, and dementors, it ends up giving him a quality of movement which is fey, rather than powerful and purposeful. indeed, we only ever see him do one thing which requires physical, as well as magical, prowess - duelling. but, like fencing - which is its real-world equivalent - good duellists aren't people who are physically strong or imposing, they're people who are cunning and nimble [and the other men the text emphasises are good at it are snape, flitwick, and harry - with harry's quick reflexes being explicitly given as a reason why [i.e. GoF 34] ]. his ability to fly is a demonstration of his magical power alone, since it allows him to circumvent the need to use a broom, which does appear to require physical strength [hence why the only main characters who aren't fond of using brooms are either women or fat, cowardly little boys like neville...]

building on this, he's often described in ways which make him sound quite physically fragile - he's very thin, he's very pale, he's always cold, every time his heartbeat is described it seems to be irregular and so on.

his reputation in his teens and young adulthood is as a "polite [and] quiet" goody-two-shoes who "showed no sign of outward arrogance or aggression at all" [HBP 17]. i think that point about aggression is really important - it builds on what mrs cole tells dumbledore about it being "very hard to catch him" bullying other orphans [HBP 13]. he's not dudley - or james and sirius - using his physical talents to subdue and control people. he's sneakier... more insidious... indeed, in chamber of secrets, ron explicitly compares him to percy - somebody else the text presents as fairly effete - in order to complain about him "squealing" - aka, running to tell a teacher, like a girl, instead of settling things like a man - on hagrid [CoS 14].

when he's a young man, living alone for the first time, the text thinks it's very important to tell us that he has "slightly longer hair" than he does at school [HBP 20]. "slightly" is obviously the operative word here - i don't think he's strutting into hepzibah smith's house in a twenty-four inch lace-front - but we can certainly imagine him with the sort of greaser or pompadour haircut which was understood in the 1950s as being a bit counter-cultural...

of the five horcruxes which are objects - rather than harry and nagini [who is, of course, female] - three [cup, diadem, locket] originally belonged to a woman and are acquired from a woman, two [cup, locket] are acquired by killing a woman using a stereotypically female murder method [poison], two are connected to voldemort's rage at his mother being disparaged [locket - he's furious to hear hepzibah say that merope must have stolen it, ring - he attacks morfin immediately after morfin calls his mother a "slut"]. and all five of these horcruxes also depend on women to introduce them into the narrative in a way that facilitates their destruction: the diary is given to ginny; dumbledore puts on the ring in order to speak to his sister; the locket is associated both with walburga's grief [it's literally moved from the cave - voldemort's grave for his mother - to the house which is walburga's own tomb!] and with umbridge's performance of femininity; the cup is given to bellatrix [and the text is very clear that both she and voldemort understand it as having only been given to her, rather than to her and rodolphus] and is then destroyed - albeit off-stage - by hermione; and harry is given the tools to acquire the diadem by cho, luna, and mcgonagall, although he has to overcome the obstacles of alecto carrow and helena ravenclaw to get hold of it. harry - of course - also only becomes a horcrux because of a woman - lily's - sacrifice.

his favourite death eaters are a woman and a very feminine-coded man. but - more interestingly - what the text finds unimpressive isn't that he likes bellatrix and snape... it's that he leaves a lot of his dirty work to male minions who are characterised by their brutish strength - people like greyback, hagrid [who he makes carry harry up to hogwarts], rowle, gibbon, amycus carrow and so on. there's the heavy implication in the text that voldemort's preference for leaving the violence to others - as i'm always pointing out, his canonical kill count is really low; most of the murders in the series are done by other death eaters acting on his orders - is something we should see as weak.

the text associates him with this effeminacy - i think it's really important to note, given who jkr is - as a criticism. it's something - much like the text's presentation of him as aromantic, and the fact that the degradation of his looks via the creation of the horcruxes makes him look sexless/eunuch-like - being used to underscore his villainy. he's feminine-coded in a toxic way.

but let's take this in another direction [and let's also return to the actual question you asked me...] and read him as someone who has always had to deal with being perceived as queer by other people, and having that perception be associated with negative assumptions.

he's very easy to imagine as a child/teenager who's the target of ridicule from his fellow orphans/fellow students [for not being sporty, for liking to sit in the library for hours on end coming up with anagrams of his own name, for the way he walks and speaks] which hinges on the idea that his failure to conform to the expected conventions of "proper" masculinity mean that he's not a proper man... and that if he's not a proper man then... he's not straight.

but then we have to come back to the "i knew i was special" point, don't we?

voldemort's belief in his own superiority can - in my view - be used to read him as somebody who would embrace being camp or effeminate or whatever term we want to use, in order both to express his contempt for people who criticise him ["think i'm a messed up little deviant, do you, mrs cole? well, you don't know the half of it!"] and who conform to social norms he thinks are reprehensible ["oh, do purebloods frown upon bottoming, abraxas? well - guess what - so do muggles. do you agree with what muggles think?"] and to humiliate, subjugate, and control them ["you think i'm a faggot, do you...? well, you're right... i'm a faggot who's defeated you in battle and now i'm about to kill you... still feel like a man?"].

while - obviously - appearance/gender presentation has nothing to do with preferred sexual roles - the manliest men on earth can be bottoms! being femme doesn't prevent you topping! - i really do think that voldemort is someone who can be written entirely canon-coherently as thinking that the homophobic perception of bottoming as weak, powerless, or humiliating is complete nonsense, and who would actively flaunt his rejection of this perception as a way to mock people who subscribe to it.

after all, we see him do something similar in canon when it comes to his blood-status and social class. the death eaters - lots of whom are posh pureblood men who conceive of themselves as the most important people in the universe - are made to kneel at the feet of and kiss the robes of and be branded like cattle by and be at the beck and call of someone who's neither pureblood nor posh. there are - as lupin tells us - no wizarding princes... and yet the closest things the wizarding world has to an aristocracy are rolling around on the ground debasing themselves and calling a half-blood orphan "my lord".

voldemort does this to humiliate them. but he also does this to amuse himself - à la logan roy making men who've displeased him play "boar on the floor".

[wormtail being forced to care for him when he's in his half-form at the start of goblet of fire, for example. he's not humiliated in the slightest by his dependence on wormtail... wormtail is humiliated by it, and voldemort finds it hilarious.]

and so i think we can plausibly imagine him also deeply enjoying making his straight, married, "i would die before i let anything near my arse", "i'm not getting changed for quidditch with so-and-so there, he's queer", "i'd disown my son if i found out he let other men fuck him" death eaters grovel for the favour of someone who loves getting railed...

this deeply aligns with how voldemort understands things like power and control - and it's why the argument that he'd only top because he would regard it as the only way of being powerful and controlling never hits for me.

because this also rests on an assumption - that the bottom always understands themselves as the passive partner. i do think the fandom is broadly getting better at recognising that bottoms and submissives are different things [although the bar was on the floor...], but i think there's still a tendency to default to the idea that the two people involved in sex are an active partner and a passive partner, and that the passive partner is - for want of a better term - the receptacle.

the language used around bottoming reinforces this assumption. its voice is passive - the bottom is penetrated, is bred, is fucked, is taken - its verbs are passive too - the top does, the bottom receives.

but the thing is... this is just semantics. and it's a semantic argument directly rooted in misogyny, and the homophobia which stems from and connects to it.

and - since it's just semantics - we can change the language we use at any time to completely reconfigure the assumed power dynamic.

the bottom grants access. the bottom consumes. the bottom takes. the bottom absorbs. the bottom uses. the bottom captures. the bottom detains. the bottom grips. the bottom devours. the bottom permits. the bottom destroys.

the top is the person who's passive - who receives permission, who is granted access, who is consumed, who is absorbed, who is captured. the top is the person having their life-force leached from them. they're just a toy, just a piece of meat. they literally don't matter.

and the text already uses this sort of language - the language of consumption and capture and permission to cross thresholds and so on - to talk about voldemort's attitude to power, magic, and the body.

he drains the blood of unicorns; he uses up the life-force of the people and animals he possesses; he grows stronger by consuming ginny's secrets; he is restored to his body by taking from his father, wormtail, and harry; he takes the money dumbledore offers without feeling the need to thank him or regard it as a gift; he offers up gifts to people he wants to use for his own gain; he "doesn't march up to people's houses and bang on their front doors" [OotP 6]; he hoards and conceals precious things; his soul is kept safe by being encased by the horcruxes; his locket is guarded by something which has to be drunk, which destroys anyone who assumes they can simply take it without his permission; he "would be glad to see anything miss hepzibah shows me" [HBP 20] and then seizes her secrets and uses them to bring about her doom; his descent from slytherin is proven by his control of the threshold of the chamber of secrets; he places himself and his talents at dumbledore's disposal, "i am yours to command" [HBP 20]; he controls snakes and they do his bidding; he drains the ministry of its secrets; he controls the dementors, who devour joy; augustus rookwood "has lord voldemort's gratitude... i shall need all the information you can give me" [OotP 26]; he is the greatest legilimens - that is to say, he is excellent at pulling other people's secrets into his own mind and using them as he wishes - the world has ever seen; he has seen ron's heart and it is his; his followers live to serve him...

his followers are called death eaters, not death fuckers.

and so it's inarguable, really, that he'd have a legion of service tops under his command...

[hyukascampfire]

THE TERRIBLE HALF-TRUTHS OF THE UNDEAD ҜING

⠀(🍂 ) 𝓡EVENANT in folklore, a revenant is a spirit or animated corpse that is believed to have been revived from death to haunt the living ... ( 𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑦𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡 )

1︎5.5k revenant!yeonjun · ƒ ! r ft. soobin ⸺ ✴︎ 𝖿𝖺𝗇𝗍𝖺𝗌𝗒 ... smut, violence, angst, death, animal death & vivid descriptions of animal death, major character death, unprotected sex, cumming inside, dry humping (because bring it back), biting, dom yeonjun sub reader, mentions of death in childbirth, reincarnation, teasing, breast worship, yj calls reader ‘my love’, def some typos

🪶 ⦂ how fun is this collab? :,) this fic was so fun to write. i personally believe that tsfawc enjoyers will love this one,, but you'll have to read it to confirm that, right? hehe. and of course, go read everybody else's if you love this one! they're all set in the same world, and everybody worked so hard on these fics. send some love their way!

rꫀׁׅܻblogs & asks arꫀׁׅܻ always apprꫀׁׅܻciatꫀׁׅܻd!

𝒪𝑁𝐶𝐸 𝒰𝑃𝑂𝑁 𝒶 𝒯𝐼𝑀𝐸, in a land far, far away, where the treetops touched the soft clouds of the sky and the water sparkled under the glowing sun, where mountains rose high, and long, deep caves ran through them, where the sea met shore in collisions of swirling, foamy punches, where the undead walked among the living, where the winged flew above the finned, there was a land where things beyond reason and rhyme existed perfectly true. Among those strange beings and within the veils of Aethera, there was a girl loved by death. 

He sits on your shoulder, a dark, boding shadow and glared at those around you with promise in his eyes.

That’s how it seems, anyway. That’s how everybody looks at you. They dodge you, whisper about you, evade your gaze as if he might reach his claws for them next if they linger for too long.

Crows with dead eyes arrive at your doorstep like some lover’s cheeky gift, other poor creatures like fat grey mice are left to rot in the wheatfields, and yarrow stocks wilt outside the wall of your room. If Death thinks that you are flattered, he misunderstands you. You are terrified of nothing more than dying. The first time, it was a sly joke. Then it happened again, and you watched their eyes change. And it happened again and again, and your people are a suspicious type. Something can only be a coincidence so many times.

When you began to sneak into a little shack with a village boy, you thought that maybe, somehow, this would all pass. He died too. There’s really no coming back from that, is there? You don’t blame them. You’re not the freak that they all believe you to be—none of them get close enough anymore to know that, though.

The wickerbasket’s handle creaks under your fist. You usually only forage along the shallow line of the forest; you pluck from bramble bushes topped with plump berries that crawl between trees during the summer, and when the crab apple tree’s branches hang heavy with the fruit, you snatch those up too. You’re more useful to your family out here, in the woods that they deem just as cursed as you. Where you won’t be their burden.

Crisp autumn leaves crunch under your boots. You scan between them—more grey and rotted this late in the season than fresh and orangey—for the edible mushrooms and roots that you usually forage at this time of year. The basket’s already pretty heavy with a variety, black morels and sorrel and burdock, as you bend down to pull a truffle from the dirt against a tree.

You drop it down with the rest of your finds. The basket smells like earth, no doubt your hands do too. You dust your palms off on your skirts and go to rise back from your squat.

A deep, billowing horn pierces the forest’s silence. It’s both far away, wiggling between the whispers of rustling leaves, and much too close. It draws out. Long. Bone-chilling. You freeze, scanning between each tree trunk and praying that you won’t find what you fear you might.

You are much deeper into the woods than you usually are. Than you ought to be. And you know what that horn means—you know that it means something far worse than what you’d been afraid of, coming into these woods. Much more primordial than the hide-behinds you were scared you might find this deep, much less avoidable than the faerie rings you stepped around.

Why would The Wild Hunt be here? A shudder runs down your spine, and you curl your fingers into your skirts and lift them as if to prepare to run, but you don’t. Your feet find root in the forest floor and all you can do is stand terribly still in catatonia. Their horn sounds again, and a procession of wicked whoops and howls follow. Wild hoofbeat rumbles under it all—the hunt and their rides. You hope that they’re just passing through, and you won’t so much as see one of those wild riders. There were plenty of folktales that the matrons of your village would bolster to terrify you as children, but you knew even then that their stories of the riders, with their flesh falling away from them and their pale or beady eyes and their gnarled maws and frightening figures as they rode on the backs of equally terrible steeds, were not fabricated. They are not a bogeyman or a wailing banshee; they are death made in the flesh, and they are here. In your forest. 

Your legs won’t work. You curl your clammy fingers tighter around your basket and lean into the tree beside you. How deep had you wandered into the forest? Hopefully not too far; when you gain the courage to run, you hope that they do not send their hounds to snap their foul breath on your heels. Maybe just standing here and blending into the trees is best. The Hunt would love a chase, and you don’t want to become their next.

The next call comes and you throw that all to the wind. Your heart pounds against your ribcage as you let your basket clatter to the leaves and you take off. You fly over roots and shrubbery and between the trees, your blood roaring in your ears faster. You’d oblige if you could.

Above the loudness of your frantic mind, the harrowing whinnies and The Hunt’s ruckus dulls until it’s faraway again, and then it’s gone. Well, you don’t stop to check if they’ve really passed through the forest. You just run.

“There you are, love.”

His voice cuts through your frantic escape and stops you dead in your path. You almost go crashing down over the ground with the force that you dig your heels into it. Though the voice is non-threatening, you don’t turn to face the source.

He speaks again. You already know who it is. He, old as the earth you stand on itself, leads that band of wild riders. Is the king of the undead, collects souls for reaping.

And he’s the one who’s plagued you with his attention. Death.

“Why do you keep your back turned to me?” he says. “I frighten you. That hurts.” His voice lilts with amusement and sharpness. “I wish that you would face me.”

You’re not fond of the way that he speaks to you with a familiarity. But then again, you’re not fond of dying, either. Your legs are boneless beneath you. Turning, you slowly indulge him, though it takes a great amount of willpower to not run again like your jittering jaw and trembling hands ask you to.

The King of Death stands tall and utterly preternatural, leaned against a crooked tree in the woods behind you. His smile cracks across his face in a jagged way that suggests he finds you amusing, but none of that meets his eyes. They’re the color of the greyish, rotted leaves beneath you. The dark shadows beneath his eyes are the only thing belying the weight that his infinite life might have on him. That, and the hollowness that rings from him.

And though he sounded entirely playful, you are shaken by the sorrow that you find in him now that you’ve turned. Even more so, you’re not sure why you feel it echoed somewhere in the hollows of your bones. “I’m sorry,” you say. It trembles terribly. You want to say that you’re sorry you caught his attention, but it seems you’ve always had his attention. It’s more that you are petrified down to your marrow that the time’s come that you face this… strange infatuation. Here he stands: the one who leaves hollowed out husks of creatures at your doorstep. Should you run or thank him? Is Death as prideful a creature as the other kinds that inhabit Aethera? “I don’t mean to…”

He pushes off his tree, fixing his cape that cascades over only one of his shoulders. It’s tattered and falling apart like the rest of his clothing, though you think that the bronze stitching and swirling oakleaf patterns in the black say that they might have been immaculate at some point. Or maybe they weren’t, and they had started that way. He is Death, anyway. “You’re sorry?” he says. “Why are you apologizing to me? You’ve hardly done a thing to warrant it.”

Faltering, you wet your chapped lips. You’re not really sure. Holding back another apology for fear that you’ve offended him and he’ll now strike you down for it, you say, “I thought that, maybe the hunt was…” Wow, you sound stupid. You can see in the sly smile his lips form that it amuses him. That’s almost worse than angering him: intriguing him. What you really should be doing is boring him so that he’ll find you a waste of his time. Then, maybe, he’d give up haunting you.

“After you?” he finishes. Shaking his head, he says, “My hunters only answer to me.”

“Oh,” you say plainly. Part of you wants to ask why that should comfort you, especially when you’re the one that he sends little bits of death to, but rationality keeps those words in the back of your throat. You don’t really want to know. “Why are you passing by here?”

Something akin to old longing passes through those witty eyes, and then he eats up the distance between you with languid steps of his long legs until he’s nothing more than one last step in front of you. The closeness consumes the air in your lungs, leaving nothing for you but short and shallow drags. The forest has gone dead silent aside from the sound of it. His voice is even more magnetic now that he’s so close.

You recoil when he brings a hand up to brush the pad of his thumb over your cheek and then cup your jaw, as if afraid that he might snuff you out here and now. His fingers are softer than you thought they might be, and the lines of his face sharpen into what you think is hurt. Hurt that you flinched?

“We go here and there,” he says, “but it’s been a very long time since we came here.” There’s a certain thickness to his words; a certain tension coiled over them from something that you’re not privy to. And yet, there’s a farawayness, too. You bet he’s full of a lifetime of secrets. Lifetimes of secrets. “But I think I’ve found myself a reason to finally return.”

Breathy and still struggling to flatten out your breathing, you ask him, “Why?”

The Undead King’s smile turns wicked once more, and he doesn’t answer you. It’s awfully eerie.

“Do you have… business here?” you try again. It’s a roundabout way of asking, do you have someone to take away?

“I have business wherever the living go,” he says, letting your face go but not giving you any more room. You narrow your eyes. He’s quite good at non-answers. “Nothing is more certain than that I will greet every living thing eventually. I’ll come to take you, too, when the time comes.”

Your mouth dries up. The entirety of your home, all the people you’ve ever known, fear you for all the death you bring. Not one of them fears it more than you do. You’ve seen it enough to fear its frightening finality.

The drop of your face must’ve told him how much that scared you. “Dying is not such an awful thing, love. Living pales in comparison.” Searching your eyes, he adds, “But I’ve not come to take you.”

That’s easy for him to say: that death isn’t something to fear. His words don’t calm your thundering heart, but you offer him a, “Thank you…” It trails off toward the end when you realize that you don’t have his name. If he has one, anyway.

“Yeonjun.” He tilts his head, strands of sparrow hair brushing over his watching eyes. “Most don’t know it, but you’re not most people, are you?”

Your breathing had just begun evening out. It’s a shame, the way that it kicks back up at the way he looks at you. “What do you mean?” you say, but of course you know. Nobody else is given dead things like you. It’s not like you yourself are very strange; you like pretty dresses and sharing gossip with friends just as much as any other girl your age.

Giving you another one of those knowing smiles that he uses just like words, he steps back. “I’m sorry that I scare you how I do.”

You don’t answer him. What could you say to that? That he doesn’t? That would be a lie, and he would know it.

Yeonjun’s eyes flit over your face, over your cheeks made pink by the autumn cold, lingering on your lips for a few unexplainable beats, and then landing on your eyes where he searches and finds something that sends his throat bobbing with a thick swallow. “I don’t mean to be your monster. It’s only that…” He steps back again. “You remind me a terrible amount of someone I once knew.”

“Who?” Though your shoulders relax a bit with some distance between the two of you, you do your best to not let your guard down. All the stories that you recall being told, all those cautionary tales passed down through word of mouth around a fire, end with some stupid girl thinking that the monster could be changed or tricked. You’re willing to bet that the man in front of you, no matter how human he looks or how enchanting his words are, could be neither.

That doesn’t explain the ache in your chest when he holds your eyes for too long. But you shove that feeling way, way down. It’s nonsensical.

His voice takes on a parting tilt when he says, “It doesn’t matter anymore. Death takes us all.” Yeonjun dips his head at you. His smile wavers. You’d think that crooked smile on his mouth was indelible had you not seen it twitch down at the corners only for a moment. If you’d have blinked, you’d have missed it. “You think I’ll hurt you,” he says, “well, don’t let me stop you. Go ahead, run. I apologize for your basket.”

Death takes us all. You’re not sure what that’s supposed to mean, coming from him, but it sends a cold wind up your spine and goosebumps crawling over your skin.

He watches you go. You don’t look back when you do, but his gaze sits on your back until you’re sure you’re out of his sight. When you return to your home, your mother asks where the basket full of ingredients for supper went.

You imagine what her face might look like if you told her the truth. But that was impossible, so instead you tell her some stupid story about a wolf that startled you so bad that you ran home paying no mind to where your basket was. It’s close enough to the truth.

༺ ꘏ ༻

It doesn’t matter what you do; you can’t get his face out of your head. While you cut butter into flour and then roll out dough, simmer fruits over flame and you slice cheese off blocks, you replay that meeting in the forest. The memory spins and turns over no matter how hard you try to put it away from your thoughts.

It’s not every day that somebody meets the likes of him. You can’t blame yourself; he had such captivating eyes. Dark, playful, and endless. There they are again. You sigh and dust your hands off. Maybe you are just as strange as they all think that you are. Morbid curiosity is like that, though. Taking the most normal of us and making you wonder what you absolutely should not wonder about.

And you absolutely should not wonder about him.

The sun has begun to hang high in the sky, but the breeze that crawls through the window you pulled open before you got to work is a crisp one. Autumn’s really come, now. Outside the window, a huddle of children play around in the leaves that you’d raked up. You’ll have to rake those back up, but you hardly have the heart to tell them to take their playing elsewhere. Their giggles and small voices waft in with the breeze, and a traitorous part of you yearns for a family that you know you’ll never have. No man would risk that fate, not after what happened to the last man who paid you any attention. You grit your teeth at the memory.

Having a face for the thing that’s made your life the way it is is strange. Seeing him in the flesh, with handsome eyes and a taunting mouth, looking something near human, you think you’ve come to resent him for it. How dare he ruin your life? He, more than anybody, should know how fleeting life is. What is in it for him to deface what little time you have? You keep going back to that thought: why did he ever even appear to you in that forest? There is not one story in which you remember Yeonjun showing his face to those he hasn’t come to claim. Death makes his visits swift and purposeful.

Moreover, why on earth would he even look your way? You wish there was a plain way to ask him why, or even to plead with him to stop. Whatever it is he’d ask of you, you think you might give him. To get back to living, you would.

A deep, familiar voice from behind you gives you pause. “Want some help with that?” Soobin says. He stands  in the doorway, his head nearly brushing the top of the frame. It’s made too small for him. Most things in your tiny village were made too small for Soobin. There had been a time where you’d been taller than him, that had hardly lasted long enough.

“As if,” you dismiss and gesture at his dirty hands. He’d no doubt been out working his family’s field, his tunic sleeves rolled up to his elbows.  “Cow shit isn’t an ingredient.”

Anybody else might’ve scoffed or taken offense, but he just laughs and invites himself in anyway. It never fazes Soobin. He doesn’t let you push him away.

It’d be better if he did. How long before he ends up dead, too? Alive one moment, and then a husk without a soul next. You don’t think you could handle seeing cold, dead eyes where the annoying, warm shine should be. Of course it would be better if he stayed away, if he had half the mind to. Even most of the children have heard enough from their mothers to stay a healthy distance. He’s not too much better than a child, though.

“Isn’t it?” he says. His cheek is smudged with whatever sort of dirt he’s got on his hands and under his nails. “I’m done with work for the day. Want to go out to the field?”

You two have always ran off and avoided your life in between willowy, flaxen wheat stocks. They were just tall enough at this time of year to hide you away. But, for some reason, your stomach does a quick flip at the thought of being outside. It’s silly; couldn’t he find you here, too? “I’m busy,” you say. You’d already kneaded this roll of dough plenty, but you dig your fingers into it and begin again.

“Busy?” he scoffs, “Since when are you too busy to get away from work?”

Gritting your teeth, you let the sounds of your kneading answer. Now, more than ever, he should keep his distance. You know one thing that you’re sure nobody else does: Death’s come to visit. 

His brows shoot up in your peripherals. “I don’t get answers today?”

“I’m sorry,” you say, giving up working the over-kneaded dough only because your arms ache. “Why don’t you go talk off the ear of some other poor village girl? I’ve heard as much as I can handle today. And then when that one’s tired, you can bother the next, I’m sure.”  You soften the words with a quick smile his way. No matter how many times you say something sour in hopes that it’ll send him away, as soon as you glance up at his face, you reel it in.

His company is all you’ve ever had. The least you can do for him is make sure he doesn’t end up like carrion, even if he chooses to take that risk himself. You don’t know why he does.

Voice playful, he says, “I’m glad to hear that you believe I’ve got ladies falling at my feet, but I’d rather not annoy a pretty girl, so you’re my only option.” He pokes at the sleeve of your simple cotton dress. “Should I drag you out of here? Don’t your arms hurt doing all that?”

“Oh, you are a refined man, aren’t you?” you say, shuffling out of his reach. Damn him, he makes it difficult. “Well, I am a pretty girl, so you should take yourself elsewhere.”

Soobin smiles easy. “I’m bored out of my mind. You’re just going to let me suffer?”

“That’s not my issue.”

“I’d argue that it is,” he says. “Come on. Why are you giving me a cold shoulder?” Leaning, he tries to get a look at your face. “Did I upset you? I wasn’t aware that you cared much about what I thought.” When you spare him a sharp glance, he says, “I think you are very, very beautiful. Would you stop ignoring me, now?”

You wish you could fall into the easy banter that comes with being around Soobin, but you can’t. You can’t let him be around you. “Soobin, stop it,” you say, draining your voice. You don’t look at him while you say it.

Going quiet, he seems to notice that today’s different. His gaze is heavy as he stares at you for a few long moments. Crossing his arms over his chest, he asks, “What happened?”

You swallow. “Nothing. I’m just doing something.”

“Oh, alright,” he says, tone inflicting in a way that says he doesn’t believe you one bit. He pushes off the counter. “I’ve put up with you pushing me away for years. You think I don’t know what you’re doing?”

“Soobin,” you warn. If you look at him, you fear you’ll be forced to watch the only one who never cared much what a risk it was being around you leaving. So you don’t.

Your friend raises his hands in the air defensively. “Okay, then.” He makes for the doorway with languid, lingering steps. As if he doesn’t want to leave. “Tomorrow..”

That’s both a threat and a promise, knowing him. Sighing and watching the rowan tree out your window sway, you bid him a curt goodbye.

If only that jerk took offense to things. It would make things an awful lot easier for you.

༺ ꘏ ༻

Being out in the wheat fields brings you peace when you’re alone, but you find it to be terribly lonely. The earthy, sweet scent of it wraps around you, and the stalks whisper against each other in a soothing way.

When you look beside you, the patch of wheat imprinted with the shape of your bodies is empty on his side. You are quite weak; it makes you want to go knocking at his door for his company. But that would be the selfish thing to do, so you card your fingers between the golden straw instead.

A chill trickles down your spine. You feel his presence before you even see him; it’s a feeling that you used to get fleetingly, as if something far away was tugging at you. But then he became real, a living thing in front of you that can touch, and that is much different.

“Why is it that I always find you out in the wilderness?” Yeonjun says. His voice comes from behind you.

Has he been watching you? You stand and dust your bottom off, heart kicking to life. “It’s nice out here,” you say. In truth, you haven’t come outside since that day. You’ve dodged Soobin and made a million excuses as to why you won’t go anywhere past the fences of your home. “I like to… watch people go about their days. It’s interesting.” It’s true—you always watch from afar how the village folk interact. How groups of girls your age link arms and whisper to each other, how neighbors come together to fix up a shoddy fence. You watch them be a community that you are not a part of. Watching it tastes bitter sometimes, but mostly you take pleasure in imagining yourself there with them. You’re not sure why you try making small talk with him, but what else? Should you go running again? If you were to listen to your pattering heart, maybe that’s what you’d do. He’s hardly shown you any bad will, though, and he’s the one that’s come to you. Maybe it’s silly to wait until something bad happens to be cautious.

A thousand pounds in stones sit at the center of your chest, though, and his voice makes them feel lighter. Why on earth that is, you’re not sure. It’s a nice relief regardless.

He smiles. It's different from the ones he showed you before. It’s knowing; more sweet than cracking over his face like the smile you would expect from the likes of him. What use might he have in being sweet? “Could I join you?”

Blinking dumbly at him for a second, you nod. “Oh, uh… Yeah.” Settling back down into your spot, you spare him a few curious sideways glances.

The breeze billows over the gold stems, moving them like gentle waves over the ocean and blowing your hair in it too. The flattened bits rustle under his weight. He doesn’t even turn his face toward the village; instantly, his gravitational eyes are on you.

“Do you come here often?”

“I do,” you answer. Mostly when you and Soobin have too much to do and not enough will to do it. “It’s nice. The village doesn’t like me much, so it’s easier out here.” You don’t mention that mostly you don’t come here alone.

Yeonjun’s face becomes far away. It looks strikingly like somebody forced into an old, unpleasant memory. “Don’t like you?” he asks, “What reason would they have for that?”

“They fear me. Things go wrong around me, that’s all.” You pluck at the hay absentmindedly. “Things die. They’re smart to stay away.”

The hay whispers much louder for the long moment he remains quiet, digesting what you’ve said. Maybe deciding what to say, considering that it’s his fault.

“Die?” he asks, voice inflected with surprise.

Turning to him, your brow creases. Shouldn’t he know? He’s the one that’s done it to you. “Everything that gets too close ends up dead. Everything,” you say, resting your temple on your knee. “So, I guess, I just keep it all at arm’s length.” You look back at your tiny village, a collection of familiar, un-familiar thatch-roof homes. 

Continuing to blink at you, his eyes narrowed in a strange grimace, Yeonjun says, “Death follows me, too.”

What? A laugh of disbelief bubbles up in your chest. Of course, death follows him. You cover your mouth with a hand to obscure your laugh, but you just giggle at him harder.

A laugh twitches at the corners of his mouth, too. “I mean it,” he says. The lines of his face become distant again, eyes both trained on your face and melancholic as if the sight reminds him of something.

It ignites a question in your mind about something he said in the forest. “You said that I reminded you of somebody,” you say, testing the waters. “Who?”

A muscle feathers in his jaw. He looks away, as if he can’t look at you while he says it. “I loved a girl from this village once. When I was human, no less than you.”

You falter, mouth falling open to ask all the questions that flurry through your thoughts. You settle on one. “You were human?”

“I was,” he says ruefully. “And I had everything. I had the love of my life. I think that even the most bitter of creatures on this island had envy for our love. She would braid dandelions into my hair, and then I’d braid them into hers.” He swallows thickly and pauses, as if the wound was still festering and fresh. “And then she died. She died starting our family. She died because of me, in my arms.”

You don’t know what to say, so you just look into his shining eyes as if that’ll help. You’re not very useful with people, much less comforting them.

“I couldn’t accept that. I wouldn’t. So I went where I shouldn’t have gone, and angered something much bigger than myself. They thought it would be a fitting punishment for me to live an eternity, the King of Death who could not bring back his dead lover.” The harrowed look that he gives you, only briefly, has your chest heavy all over again. “They have a sense of humor, the forces.”

You imagine what it would’ve been like for him to lose his lover in that way. How far he’d gone to try and have her back, but death does not give back. Where had he gone to have been turned into this? An immortal thing, forced to roam the world and scoop up the souls of the living for an eternity? To be bound in ancient bones and made to remember forever how you had lost your lover?

The grandness of what you want to say is too big, but all those words feel pitying and patronizing in a way that you don’t think will actually bring him any comfort. Rather, you doubt anything you say will be able to patch up a wound older than you could imagine. Simply, you offer him a raw, “I’m so sorry.”

Yeonjun lets a crooked smile replace the trembling at his lips. “As long as I live, so too will she,” he says, placing his palm over his heart. “Death doesn’t so much happen when we leave behind our bodies, but when we’ve left the minds of the living.” Narrowing his eyes at you, he brushes hair behind your ear with his knuckles. “I know she lives on, somewhere out there. Somewhere. I’ll find her.”

That intrigues you. “Is there some way that you could bring her back?”

The grim light in his eyes tells you his answer. “My curse is to take life,” he says, “not to give it. But the one who made me this, he is cruel in a twisted way. If I were to find her, as a human or an animal or a blade of grass in the forest, only then could I rest.”

It is cruel. “You’ve been searching, then,” you conclude. “When you find her, you’ll both be able to rest.” But how could he find her, if as he says, she could be any living thing? Where would he even begin?

Slowly, he shakes his head, throat bobbing. “Death needs a farrier.”

She would become what he is. You swallow thickly. Was it not him who caused the deaths that follow you? Or, at least, it was not on purpose?

Opening your mouth, you go to tell him that you’ll help him look. You’re sure you’ll be of no help. He’s spent an immortal lifetime searching, and he still hasn’t found his dead lover. Nobody would know better than him where to look.

The ground shakes beneath your palms with impact, and something cuts through the wheat. The noise of its bleating becomes nearer until the both of you scramble up to find out what’s in such distress.

A deer stumbles around wildly. It looks lame, but you don’t see anything wrong with its legs. Your throat tightens at the awful sound, piercing and sad. Frozen, you watch it try to stay upright before it finally collapses down, legs still kicking as though it still wants to run but its body has begun weakening on it. “Oh my god,” you say, stumbling back. The sounds; its sounds are awful, echoing in your bones and constricting your thoughts until they’re a pinched panic.

There’s an arrow lodged into its ribcage, deep and at a terrible angle. You already know that it’s pierced some vital organs, if not its heart. It continues to writhe on the ground, not ready to give up. You’re not sure if you should approach it—you don’t want to scare it, and you can tell by the look in its wet eyes that it already wants to be away from you.

Or, maybe it had come to you. How else had it found the two of you in the middle of this field?

Yeonjun’s already on it. He puts his knees into the dirt and dried wheat to kneel by it, running his hand over the beast's pelt in long strokes. The small buck flinches at first but relaxes once he learns that his touches are gentle, not the gnashing of hungry teeth ready to make him a meal.

Blood runs like lead through your veins. You say, “Can we help it?”

He shakes his head. “He’ll die.”

Whip-lashed, you swallow thickly. He says it so unphased, and you’re sure he is. You can hardly make yourself mirror that serenity that he exudes as he runs his hand over its flank, but you get on the ground beside him anyway.

The buck’s breaths slow to desperate drags for breath. For a few long minutes, the two of you sit in silence and stay with him until he no longer fights, until his breaths are ragged. You feel his side, still warm and alive, but you see the life going from his eyes. You sit here, talking to each other about nothing just so it hears gentle voices as it goes, for a while.

Eventually, he’s gone. Quiet and at peace, no longer hurting. This time, when you look over to Yeonjun who still smooths over the deer’s skin even as he goes, guiding him delicately into whatever greets us when we go, you see death as a gentle thing.

༺ ꘏ ༻

Though you never seek him out, Yeonjun always finds you. In hidden places, away from prying eyes, he appears behind you and makes himself known. Well, you have a feeling that he watches you for a while before saying anything. It’s hard not to feel the strange tingling of his gaze over your form. It’s akin to the sixth sense that’s supposed to keep you safe out in the dark hearts of forests, an innate feeling that tells you some beast with a rotten, pale maw watches you between the trees.

Yeonjun doesn’t feel rotten, though, preternatural and eerie as he is. As you shirk your duties and talk with him for hours, you stare into ancient eyes and watch his crooked mouth move around his words and you feel an odd comfort. As if he’s the only one who’s ever understood you, or maybe that your strangeness pales beside him and for once you’re nothing but who you are. So many nights, the sun fell on your talking until the night insects buzzed from the grasses and your eyes were heavy.

Sometimes, as you dozed off with your back to a hay bale or a hardwood wall of the abandoned home beside yours with its sagging thatched roof, you caught such festering longing in his his eyes that you’d let your lashes fall and pretend to sleep so that you could imagine what it was that he longed for. No doubt his lost lover. When you imagine him, bound in bones and coming back to haunt the living for an eternity as he mourns her infinitely, searching for her in impossible places, your chest aches with a gnawing intensity.

It’s a terrible, cursed existence. Even the nothingness of death becomes a paradise beside it.

“Is it scary?” you ask into the air, sat criss-crossed on the thick duvet of the bed. He sits across from you, looking perfectly lazy. Moonlight pools in like sterling mist through the shutters.

“What?” He watches you, sitting in your plain dress, as though you’re the only thing in the world.

You’ve begun to wonder. Wonder about those looks he gives you.

Shifting, you fix the shoulder of your soft chemise where it’s slipped down when you catch his eyes lingering on it. His throat bobs. “Dying,” you elaborate. “Is it really nothing? After we go, all of it was for nothing?”

A slow smile tugs his full lips, made a bit red in the middle where he likes to worry it. It’s such a human habit to see on something so far from human. “Hardly,” he says. “It’s like going home, right where your soul is supposed to be. Who do you think rides with me?”

Furrowing your brows, you tilt your head toward one shoulder and let your hair pool there. “The riders are dead?” You had thought they were undead in some way like Yeonjun, other sorts of revenants come back to life with their own purposes. Then, are their creepy horses dead, too? A chill goes down your arms. Sometimes, sitting here with him when his face is made soft by the orange glow of the fire he puts on, you forget what he is.

“They are.” He nods, leaned back onto his elbows, his eyes alight with a hunger that makes your insides feel funny. “It doesn’t stop once we’ve died. You don’t need to be scared, my love. So many things end, but then so many things begin. The earth no longer holds you down, the weight of being is gone. You don’t know anything like it; you don’t know leaving behind the pleasures of earth to know the ones that only the afterlife can show you.”

His eyes laced with something entirely else, he adds, “And it’s not the end. Not for everything. For some it’s only the beginning, and for others, those who have not yet fulfilled their purpose, they come back to the flesh. They return.”

You can’t tell if he means himself, or something else. The weight in his eyes, dark, endlessly swirling pools, makes you wonder again why it is that he’s lingering here: the place that he had not visited once since the death of his lover, for the fact that it still hurts too much. Why his shadow of death, his fault or not, was tangled in your soul enough to brush its fingers over the things around you.

“It’s scary,” you say, breathy. The thought of eternity.

Soft hairs brush over his eyes as he tilts his head at you. “Do I scare you?”

“No.”

“No?” he echos, pushing himself up so that he leans back onto his palms. “Isn’t that strange? Pretty little thing says she’s not afraid of death, but her heart races when I’m near. Her sweet heart jumps at just the brush of my leg. Are you sure you’re telling me the truth, love?”

Your blood roars in your veins, inflaming your cheeks and making your head dizzy. Nobody’s ever looked at you like that before. Hair prickles on your skin. “Yes,” you breathe.

Feral delight sparks in his eyes, black as pitch. His smile turns up all feline at the crooked corners. “Crawl to me, then.”

Like how fire licks up oxygen in any room it is in, his words steal the breath right from your lungs. What does he think you are? You blink at him wide-eyed and dumb for a moment.

How can he say that as though it were nothing? Moreover, how does the ravenous flare in his eyes, his head tilted back as he watches you down his nose expectantly, do that to your belly?

Your mind glazes over with something thick and heady, and you damn the nerves in your belly and begin to crawl from your end of the bed to his. His tongue darts out to wet his lips, making sure you feel every inch of the taunt in his eyes as he trains them on you. When you’ve gotten to him through the thickness in the air, you settle into his lap and bracket his waist with your thighs.

Yeonjun takes the soft fat of your hips in his fingers. “Fuck,” he says. It sounds like he’s barely holding the gates on something endlessly consuming. Something that might break loose on the two of you, and leave you changed forever with its hungry, gnashing teeth. His head hits your collarbone. “Tell me to stop. Please, tell me to go. Because I don’t know how.”

“Don’t,” you say. “Don’t stop. I want it, Yeonjun. I want this.”

He straightens, pupils blown and eyes as tense as his set jaw. “No, you don’t understand what you’re asking for. All I’ve ever done is ruin. All I’ll ever do is ruin. I won’t ruin you; not again.”

That rings bells somewhere outside the heavy fog that’s infiltrated your mind, but they don’t sound too alarming when he looks as though he wants to drag his teeth over your heart to taste its beating. It doesn’t touch the ground, when you want him to, so badly. So badly that you taste it on your tongue and it tinges your words as you tell him, “I do know what I’m asking for. I want you. Yeonjun. Don’t you want me too?” Voice and confidence wavering, you pull back. Maybe you’ve read this all wrong. A tickling shame crawls over your skull. “Do you not want me?”

“You think I don’t want you?” he says, straightening up and meeting your gaze. His breath is hot on your mouth. “I want you so fucking bad. You are in the marrow of my bones. Fuck, I have done nothing but want you, but I am foul. I will only hurt you.”

He takes your hand and places it over his chest, where a heart should be. Beneath your palm, you do not feel the thumping of an alive thing. Yeonjun has no heart. You knit your brows and examine the strain of his features. Does he think that you’ll be disgusted? Maybe the girl you were in that forest might’ve been, but being near Yeonjun has changed you in ways you couldn’t start to put your finger on. “I’m asking you to,” you say. “Show me what you want to do to me. What you’ve wanted to do to me.”

Searing silence burns between you as he drinks that in, and then he shoves you onto your back. Supporting himself with an arm beside your head, he curls his fingers into your hip and nudges your thighs wider. He doesn’t lift the hem of your chemise like you expect him to. No—Yeonjun begins to grind himself into your cunt through all the layers of your clothes. Though your dress is bunched up and his pants lay between any real contact, Yeonjun’s hard and that friction tastes fleetingly sweet.

“I want you to beg me for it,” he says, grinning down at you with cruel intention. “Beg me, and make it so pretty.”

You let little sounds linger in that back of your throat and become hungrier each time he grinds against you. It’s so much, mind swimming and sparks spraying up your spine, and yet each time it is not near enough. Damn that foxish smile on his face; you beg for him anyway. “Yeonjun,” you breathe, curling your fingers around the wrist of that hand with which he pins your hip. “P…lease, will you help me? It feels so good; I want more, please.”

He raises his eyebrows at you and an eager grind comes right over your throbbing clit. 

You know he wants more than that, but mortification already is making your voice unsteady and your cheeks burn. “Yeonjun,” you huff, hips wiggling.

The king of the undead delights fully in your shame and rewards you with more of those pointed, dry grinds. Your legs tremble; he’s giving you so little, and yet your need takes it and magnifies it into something grand.

Though he pretends he’s on some high ground, you hear his shuddering breaths each time his fucks his hips against you. He feels that roiling, liquid need in his belly just as vehemently as you do. The room fills with your breathy pants and grinding bodies. You catch your lip in your teeth and begin to meet him half-way. Your moans are low and sweet, and each one sends his jaw tighter. 

You twist and grind against each other like fumbling teens until you’re coiled up so tight that he has to pull himself away. Your throbbing cunt protests, but you know he doesn’t want you cumming like this.

“You want me to show you what I’ve wanted to do to you?” he says, working at his pants. His eyes are so drunk on you, and his cheeks betray his state. “Open your legs, my love. Let me show you a little death.”

Throat gone dry, you slowly let your thighs fall open. The dull throbbing between your thighs roars to life. He slides your skirt up your leg, stopping when he frees your knee to pepper a few hot kisses into it. Once he’s got it bunched up at your ribcage, he runs his tongue over his dry lips to wet them. “Fuck. Such a pretty pussy. I want to fucking eat you up.”

“Yeonjun,” you whine. His name is all you can muster out, anticipation sharpened to a knife point.

Flashing his teeth, he purrs, “You like that, you filthy thing. I bet you’d like for me to fuck you till your brain’s gone and all that’s left is my name. Isn’t that right? Is that what you want?”

Your thoughts stall and you nod, making your mouth into a filthy pout. God, how you want that. Maybe he’s right about you being filthy. Coming from him, it sounds like a delicious thing to be.

The pretty, leaking tip of his cock brushes your clit as he slides it up and down your slit to collect the mess there. Your thighs jump to close before your mind gets the better of it. He does this a few times—up and down, letting you feel and get used to the size and length of him all the way till his cockhead kisses your clit and you squeak.

“Are you comfortable, love?” he asks, shifting your hips with strong hands. “Do you need anything from me?”

It’s so at odds with his other, nastier words. Your head spins, the moonlight blurring. “I’m okay,” you tell him. “I… just want you. Want you to put it in, want to feel you.”

His cock catches on your hole, and he begins to push forward with promising pressure. But then he pulls back, smiling downturned. You whine; why can’t he save his capriciousness for later? You’d almost had it…

“I could give it to you, or I could not…” He hums. “Wouldn’t that be so cruel of me? To leave you wanting?”

You flutter around nothing. Every inch of your body buzzes. Alive. You are more alive now, at the promise of Death’s touch, than ever before. The irony might be something to wonder about if you weren’t dribbling down onto the bed sheets with crude need. “Stop it,” you say. Your voice is whiny. You’re glad you can hardly hear yourself past the pounding in your bloodstream.

That delights the King of Death. He wrinkles his nose at you, burning you alive with his eyes as he presses his palm to your belly and guides himself into you with his free hand. You wrap around each inch of him slowly. The air between you bows under the weight of your gazes; he holds your eyes the whole way, inch by inch until he’s seated fully into you with his groin flush to your body. He stretches you to fit, and yet it’s just right. You could ask for no more or no less; you might even think your body was made for him, were you not too busy circling your hips to feel him.

“Good?” he says, squeezing your hip. “Do you need a moment?”

Pursing your lips, you test out the shape of him with another wiggle. “Maybe… Maybe a second.” Truth be told, you need a moment to grapple with the sparks sprinkling over your mind more than you need a moment to adjust to his stretch. You let out a shuddering breath.

He traces circles into your belly, just beneath your navel. The pad of his thumb goes round and round, warm on your flesh. “As long as you need,” he says, but it’s more like a triumphant, playful coo. There’s that lopsided smirk. One day, you’d like to kiss it off him. Taking that hypnotizing finger, Yeonjun trails it up your stomach, over your ribcage. He hooks it beneath your dress and drags it higher, revealing the soft swells of your breasts to the air. You shudder, body so, so hot that your nipples peak and tighten against the cool air.

“Such pretty tits,” he says, brushing his knuckle up the underside of one. “Everything about you. Such a pretty, pretty body. God, I don’t know if I want to worship it or ruin it.” His breaths fan over your skin as he bends down and pops an eager nipple into his mouth, lavishing it before releasing it with a lewd pop and letting his mouth fall all over your breast. Lick here, nip there, until you’re squirming adequately and squeezing him like a virgin. Then he blows cool air over it and watches with eyes like a cat toying with its prey as you shudder harder, your chest jumping. “Fucking look at you,” he sneers.

“Junnie,” you say, lost for breath. You think you’ve walked yourself into the lion’s den.

His breathy laughs fall over your breast. Taking his teeth, he drags them over your skin, right over where your heart thunders a rhythm fully for him, and then he bites. Nothing more than a shallow mark, the shape of his teeth in your soft tit. He lingers there, admiring the sight before he straightens himself up again.

“Fine.” He pulls out of you slowly, but you know what comes after that, so you savor every second of it. “I suppose you’ve wanted after it long enough. Let me hear your sweet voice again, my love.”

Yeonjun fucks you just right. His cock nudges right up on your sweet spot as if he’s done this before. Like he knows where to find it. You gasp and whine—you’re just happy he’s finally giving you something. 

“Oh, fuck,” you mewl. His shoulders wear the red crescent marks of your nails. “That’s—so good right there.”

Ever egotistical and cocky, he croons, “Yeah?” Rolling himself back, he makes it his mission to hit it ruthlessly.

A sharp, pitchy sound comes tumbling past your lips. You bring your hand up over your mouth, letting your eyelids dust your burning cheeks so that you can brave the flipping in your spine and deep in your belly. It’s nearly insufferable—the way pleasure licks up your spine, how it spreads out into your veins and takes control of you.

“No,” Yeonjun growls. “Don’t you dare close your eyes. Let me see that look in your eyes when you cum.”

Your eyes are heavier than they’ve ever been, but you open them. The sight that greets you is worth the effort. Yeonjun’s lip twitches and then he throws his head back, the column of his neck on display as his Adam's apple jumps around a thick swallow.

If that sight wasn’t enough to send you teetering down into whatever depths of lust and ecstasy that he crawled out from, then the angle he hits as he pushes one of your thighs to your chest is. The world frays, deep tremors starting at one small point in your cunt and then exploding up through your stomach and down the back of your thighs. Your chest arches off the bed and you mewl helplessly, fighting and embracing your orgasm in an intoxicating death.

“Oh, fuck,” Yeonjun growls, strained with something whinier as he watches you shake beneath him. “Fuck. I’m gonna—fuck, I’m gonna cum…” His voice chokes as his hips become stuttered more than pointed, the slick sounds of your own release tangling up with his grunts and pants until he shudders and stills, cumming into your puffy, fluttering cunt.

You both catch your breaths as if there’s no air in the room left for a while. His hair’s damp on his forehead, as is yours on your neck, and his eyes droop lazily. More lazy and content than you’ve ever seen him.

Collecting you to his chest, where only your heart thumps away frantically, he presses his mouth to your ear and says, “Do you think death is so scary now?”

With your limbs nothing more than boneless and liquid pleasure floating slowly through your thoughts, you smile.

A little death can be more visceral than living, you think.

༺ ꘏ ༻

The tree stump beneath you makes your tailbone ache. You sit criss-crossed, watching Soobin work away at the soil and tend to that section of the fence that’s begun to rot and sag. Your mouth moves endlessly, filling the space that would otherwise just be made up of his grunts of hard work.

“You know, you ought to help me if you’re just going to sit and watch,” he says, straightening to swipe at his forehead, sweaty despite the cold in the air.

“Totally improper,” you say, smiling at him cheekily. “Are you saying that you can’t handle yourself, strong man?”

He glares at you with the venom only somebody made to put up with hours of chatter could muster. “What’s got you so talkative?” he says.

You know he means why you’re suddenly not glaring him away. You can’t tell him that you’ve spoken with Death himself, so instead you say, “Nothing.” Letting your legs dangle down, you smile at him.

Yeonjun hadn’t done any of it. It’s a comfort, to some degrees, to know that. It’s not your fault that they died. Being around them, being around Soobin, won’t make them turn up dead. The rest of them still don’t know that—and they wouldn’t believe it, anyway—but the black shadow hanging over your shoulders dissipates.

For the first time in so, so long, you do not feel marked by death.

“Sure.” His smile tilts. “A week ago, you wouldn’t even look at me.”

Rolling your eyes, you decide to give him a hard time. “Not true. You just have a way of getting on my nerves.”

“I take pride in that.”

“Take pride in what? Being insufferable?”

Crinkling his nose, he says, “Knowing how to bother you best.”

“Get back to work, stupid.” Your heart soars. It’s good to have friends. To let yourself have friends is an ever better thing. Is this how it is? To be with others and not feel like their burden, or like they’re crossing their fingers behind their back to ward off whatever bad things you might bring onto them? He’s made it his mission to hover around you no matter what, but this feels different.

Maybe, for so long, part of it has been your own gloom that’s obscured it all. Maybe if you didn’t bare your teeth to anybody who got too close, it could’ve been like this always. You hate to think that your own isolation could be some part your own fault. But how were you not to show your teeth when someone tried to reach their hand out to you?

It doesn’t matter now. You shove that all down and let yourself feel the slight warmth of the sun’s glow on your skin where it peeks through the clouds. It’s a nice day, you shouldn’t ruin it with those thoughts.

The sun’s begun making its descent when Soobin’s done. He takes a long drink of water, hissing with relief and crumpling down to the ground with his back to your stump.

“Are you making any way with that girl you were talking to me about?” you prompt.

Giving you a long look over his shoulder, he says, “Don’t.”

“What?” You laugh a little, raising your brows down at him. “I’m not doing anything.”

“You know what you’re doing,” he says, voice flat as he picks stickers out of his fingers.

Soobin’s had a thousand different crushes. There was that daughter of the shepherd, and then the wealthy merchant’s daughter and her long pretty hair, and then the neighbor… Well, you could go on. None of them ever really came to fruition for the poor guy. He thinks that it’s because he’s a poor farmer’s son, but you always tell him that it’s because he’s got an insistent mouth, and that he should be more grateful that you deal with him. Your lips turn up at the corners a little thinking about it—he’ll find the one eventually, but you like the indignant look on his face when you say it.

“I mean it!” you say, nudging him with your leg. “Tell me. I want to know.”

“You won’t even tell me what’s happening with you. Until one of us quits keeping secrets,” he says, placing accusation heavy over the words, “I’ll keep my dealings to myself. What’s it to you, anyway?”

Feeling the weight of his head as he lets it loll lazily against your thigh, you decide that it couldn’t hurt to tell him. The itch to tell somebody crawls under your skin. Especially to tell him. “You know the other day? When I was… being awful?”

His body shakes with a vindicated laugh. “If you’re nothing else, at least you’re self-aware.”

You skirt around that with your own, more awkward, laugh. It’s nice that he thinks so, but you don’t feel it. “Stop,” you huff and nudge him again. “I was foraging out where I usually go. But I guess I wandered out farther than I thought I did. You remember when they used to tell us stories, right? Like the bogeyman. That he’d come snatch us up if we didn’t listen.” Your mom especially had loved that one, back when she cared what became of you. Would she care again, if you told her that everything was fine? “Well, I don’t know if you remember the one about The Wild Hunt, but… Anyway, I was picking some stuff, and…”

Sitting up from his exhausted slouch, Soobin looks like he’s suddenly come back to life. “What?” he interrupts. His voice is strangely serious.

“What?” you say, brow creasing. “They travel here and there… but they were here. In the woods. Like, I heard them.”

Tersely, he asks, “What were you doing that deep in the woods?”

“I mean, I just kept on finding nice stuff until I just… was deeper.” You survey him. You hadn’t thought that he’d react like this. “So I ran, and then there was this guy,” you say, watching realization fall over his face. He knew those stories as much as you do—knew where you were going with this. He is as starkly superstitious as the rest of your people, you forgot. Pushing past the grimace on his face, you say, “And I knew that he was the king. The one from the stories. It was so weird; it’s like you can feel it. And I spoke to him, and then…”

Stood up now, he cuts you off once more. “Are you kidding?”

“Why are you being like that?” you say, messing with your skirts to quell the defensive bite in your tone. “I didn’t do anything.”

“You didn’t do anything? Are you trying to get killed?” He throws up his hard-working hands. “We have rules for a reason. Don’t go out into the forest, don’t make deals with faeries, don’t follow a banshee scream. And then you go and talk to the king of death? How am I not supposed to be upset about that? You know that…” Soobin blinks a few times as if second-guessing what he’s about to say, but he says it anyway. “You know that he’s the reason that they treat you how they do. You know that he’s the one who ruined your life. Why would you ever mess with that?”

You push yourself up from the ground, eyes burning. That stings like a cut. “He didn’t do it. None of it is his fault,” you say, furrowing your brows. “What are you trying to say, Soobin? Just say what you want to say. Come on.”

“He didn’t do anything?” He scoffs, letting a heavy silence hang suspended in the air for a moment before saying, “Is that what he told you? And you just believed it? Listen to yourself, does that make any sense? He’s played with your life like it’s some fucking toy, and now he’s come to rub it in your face. Think about it: do animals just fly into anybody else’s windows and die? Do the trees that they pick from just end up dead? It’s his fault that they all treat you the way you do.”

Mouth opening and closing, you don’t know what to say. 

He sees the hurt in your burning eyes and tries to reel it back in. “What I’m trying to say is—”

“I know what you’re saying,” you say, grabbing up the lunch you’ve been nibbling on. “I know exactly what you’re saying. I just never thought you’d say it out loud.”

“Say what?” Soobin says, his voice raising behind you as you storm off.

That you think it’s my fault, you want to say. That they all die because I am a plague, and you are a charity worker for being my friend. Instead, you just leave and try to choke down the tightness in your throat.

༺ ꘏ ༻

You curl your arms around yourself, the night biting cold. Yeonjun had dragged you from bed, and who knows what hour of the night it is? If the heaviness beneath your eyes is to judge it by, it’s far too deep in the dead of night to be outside with your boots half-laced and nothing but your sleep chemise on.

You might’ve just stayed wrapped up in your blankets if you weren’t so lonely as you’ve been. Soobin’s been scarce. The most you see of him is in the fields from morning to afternoons. You hope that he’ll stop by your doorstep and knock so that you can groan about it but swing the door open anyway each time, but he doesn’t. He thinks that you won’t want to see him, and so he allows you your space.

That couldn’t be further from the truth. It’s hard to be the one to come back after a conversation like that, though. You watch him from the windows and hope he understands at some point instead. It’s an awful lot easier.

Other than preparing meals and window watching, you’ve been up to nothing much at all. You hadn’t realized how much you had, but you feel him in his absence. 

“It’s cold…” you say. The fog of breath that punctuates it makes your point. Whatever he’s brought you out here for, you have no doubt it’ll be something strange. The grin on his face tells you as much.

Leading the way, he heads for the Darkwood. “Only you would come rushing out without a cloak for your shoulders.”

“Well, only you would drag me from my nice, warm bed at this time of night. For what?”

“Can’t anything be a surprise with you?” he says, shooting you a cheeky glance over his shoulder. “Surprises are fun.”

“Surprises!” you say, working your legs to catch him. “Not surprises that involve you bringing me out into the woods. You know, it’s awfully suspicious. Somebody who sees this might think that I am the type to… sneak out with men.”

“Aren’t you now?”

Your lips tug down. “You know what I mean.”

He laughs in his airy way, a twig snapping under his foot. You’re well in the woods, now. Probably somewhere near where you’d first met him.

Lifting a brow, you look at him expectantly. Maybe a will-o’-the-wisp will come floating through with its light bouncing off the trees. That would be a nice surprise, you admit.

Yeonjun circles you. His presence behind you tingles in the way it always does, but true chills erupt when his breath puffs against your ear. “Close your eyes. I have something I want to show you.”

Your mind wanders back to what Soobin had gotten so twisted up about. It might be naive and reckless and against everything you ever learned, but you let your eyes fall shut to blackness. If he was going to hurt you, you imagine he’d have had that opportunity a mind-numbing amount of times before.

“Are they shut?” he asks, waiting for your nod. His voice comes from in front of you now. “I want you to keep them shut. You can’t open your eyes, or it will all go away. Okay?”

“Okay,” you breathe, mind full of a bounty of questions. You don’t even know where to begin to assume what he’s got going on, so you stand there shifting your antsy feet.

There’s a strange, rustling sound that catches you off guard with your eyes closed. It drags on for a long moment. Curiosity pries at your eyes; you want nothing more than to just crack an eye open to spy the source of the ruckus. 

It’ll be gone if you do, anyway.

You let out a surprised squeak as something rises up beneath you, as if risen from nothing more than the dirt and roots of the forest floor, bringing you up from the earth. You wobble and send your hands out to find a perch.

A horse. It’s a horse, its mane so tangled and windswept, but matted and clumped with leaves that crunch under your palm when you find them. It reeks of mud—everything around you begins to smell of earth and decomposition.

You know that if you open your eyes, you’ll find yourself sat upon the pale white steed of the Undead King, its eyes white and its knobby knees almost as famous as the leader of The Hunt himself. It chuffs beneath you.

“Are you ready?” Yeonjun says over your shoulder. You can hear the feral grin in his voice. It’s the leader of The Hunt, a creature of folklore, that sits behind you now. He curls an arm around your waist and tugs you closer to him, securing you against the wall of his chest. “Hold on tight, my love.”

The call of the wild, that horn, bellows again like it had the first time you heard it. Rather than coming from nearby as you thought it would, it dances between trees far off just like it had that time, too. Your heart jumps up into your throat.

Taking off with a howl, the Wild Hunt follows it.

You dig your fingers into Yeonjun’s at your waist. Weight melts away, and you know you’re in the air. Your belly swoops in tandem with the howls and hoots of the riders, heart palpitating to the hoofbeats. How there’s hoofbeats as you ride through the air, you’re not sure. The ghostly fleet manifests around you in vivid imagery, though you squeeze your eyes shut. They are wild enough to imagine just what they might look like: with their clothes and flesh in tatters, with their eyes beady or pale, with their hounds piercing the air with their calls and running alongside them, they are a perfect personification of freedom.

Whip-lash sends you reeling, body going rigid. You grit your teeth and squeeze your eyes harder, wishing that you’ll touch ground soon and that everything would become real again.

Yeonjun feels you go stiff. Bringing his head back to your shoulder from his own delight, he says, “It’s okay. You’re okay. Let it into your bones. Do you think I would let it hurt you?”

He is their leader. If it got too much, you know Yeonjun would be there to catch you. Curling your fingers into his, you release that tension and allow their drumbeat to echo through you.

And when it does, your blood begins to sing along. The wind whips your cheeks and your hair, and you begin to laugh with them. The Hunt twists and turns and dances through the air, an apparition in the night, but nothing more than that.

It comes to a slow, eventually, until the noise and even your steed crumbles back down into the dirt it appeared from. Your eyes pop open hoping to catch at least a glimpse of them, but only the dark forest and pale moonlight answer. Your legs threaten to give out on you, veins still thrumming, but, oh, do you feel alive.

You feel more alive than you ever have, more than you ever could have hoped to have known. Mind spinning, you stumble. Yeonjun catches and steadies you before you can go scraping your knees on a rock.

“Oh my fucking god,” you say.

The laugh that Yeonjun breaks into has you sending him a glare, but you break too. Everything about him is ironic; and how ironic indeed that Death himself should show you how to be alive, rather than to just live?

༺ ꘏ ༻

The air is so fresh in your lungs when you step outside that it nearly burns. You clutch your basket of warm fig tarts. Songbirds trill and fly between tree tops that slowly become more bare the deeper you fall into the season, singing their sweet songs that sound like new beginnings.

Raising your hem from the ground churned up into mud from the afternoon’s trickle, you prance into town with a lively pep in your step. You spent all last night making these—Yeonjun had kept you company, watching you how he always does as you pored over making them just right. His cruel snicker when the jam had simmered over flame for too long and became too thick bounces off your bones in a sweet melody. You’ve come to adore his wicked delight, the way his smile cracks over his face and the facetious raise of his brows, more than you fear it.

Sending small smiles to the people that you pass, you stop by a huddle of kids digging sticks into the mud. They look up at you with curious eyes, stopping to gawk.

“Hey, guys,” you say, pulling back the cloth laid over the sweets. “I’ve made some fig tarts. Do you like fig? I bet you’ll like them; they’re sweet.”

The kids stand up, eyes big as they share a look. They don’t let out so much as a peep before they scurry off home.

You blink. Well, you’re used to weird reactions, but that was… different. Picking up your deflated shoulders and hesitant limbs, you make a shoddy attempt at not letting it dampen your good morning. You were expecting wary looks, anyway.

You head down a little further toward the far side of your home village, the side that breaks off after a fenceline into a great, grassy field. There’s a bustle, mothers washing their clothes in pails and hanging them up to dry and a few others whispering at each other lowly as they go about their days.

An old woman so old her back curves and her fingers have gone knobby makes her way to wherever the day’s duty demands her to be. Your neighbor—an eccentric old lady bound in her times. You decide on her: the elderly are forgotten by the young. She might enjoy knowing that her neighbors still know she exists.

“Hello,” you say, showing her your basket with a hopeful, excited heart. “I have some treats that I was wanting to give out. I know they might not be much, but would you like one? I’m not the best baker, but I do it often enough.” A face like that, dragged down by her years on this earth and not long to death, has no doubt spent many years making meals for her family. You imagine your goods would be nothing beside hers, but it’s the gesture, no?

“Oh, girl,” she says, voice crackling as she clutches her shawl tighter around her shoulders. “I’m afraid it’s best if you found yourself missing from this place. Hurry yourself up and spare the drama.”

The incessant cawing of a crow from a clawed tree fades into the background as you furrow your brows and lower your basket to ask, “...Huh?” Your belly goes up in knots; terrible knots done up tight and fast. You haven’t got a clue what she’s talking about. Elders always did speak a bit strange, though. It could be nothing much; she’s a stern old lady.

But her eyes are not angry and glaring in the way that a harrowed old hag might turn her nose up at the youth. They drag down with a cold pity.

“Listen to me, girl.” She points at you with one of those worn, sun-spotted hands. “You had best leave. The boy’s gone, and they are already not fond of you. Who will they point their fingers to?” the woman says. “I hardly know you, but I would hate to see it.”

The rest of her words fade into the roaring in your ears, the feral drumbeat of your heart like a wardrum in the cage of your ribs as it beats against them as if to escape from you. You don’t feel the basket in your hands, don’t feel the solidity of the earth beneath your feet, and don’t feel a single one of your thoughts like tangible things. They flit as if liquidated into a rotten, sick mush.

Nothing. You can think of nothing. Nothing real; nothing holding you to the earth.

“What?” Your voice hardly reaches your ears, but what does is weak and broken and like a plea for her to tell you that it’s not really what you think it is.

And if you could see or hear anything beyond your fraying little rift in reality, you would’ve heard the man coming up to you. You would’ve heard the words coming from his angry, sneering mouth, and would’ve done something when he picked up a pail of water, and you would’ve been shaken by the nasty ice water that runs down your frozen body and plasters your hair and clothes down as he pours it over you. But none of it cuts through your stupor.

He yells some awful, stabbing things at you, and a few others join him. They tell you that you are nothing but a plague, tell you to leave and to not come back here.

But this is your home. Where else would you go?

With your sopping wet dress clutched in your shaking fists as though that might keep you grounded, you choke down the tightening of your throat and sift through their faces, searching for his face. Those brown eyes, brown and always shining with nagging playfulness, do not come up anywhere. Jaw trembling, you search harder. Out on the field where he should be at this time of day, at your doorstep demanding that you go spend the day doing nothing with him, in someone’s yard helping them fix up a broken fence, no matter where you look, neither his broad silhouette nor his cheeky, dimpled face is there. You continue to stand stricken dumb, looking for him even though you know by the churning in your belly that it’s true, and you’re just hurting yourself trying to find him right where he should be.

Fine. Alive. Untouched by your disgusting, destructive presence.

When you can no longer fight the strangling tightness in your lungs and your dress is as heavy as your heart, you take off. The hem of your dress drags in mud and sticker bushes and catches on stray twigs, and you don’t know where you’re going, but you just run. You’ll give them what they want. 

You stumble, probably like some lost, undead thing, until you find yourself at the edge of the forest. Only then do you let the wall of whittle-edged tears roll down your face. And you assume you sound like a choking, dying animal with how you choke and heave on them, but he was the one you might’ve dropped your head and cried to, so what’s the use of making it pretty? No; you let it all fall as it is.

Soobin’s dead. Soobin’s dead, and it’s nobody else’s but your own fault. You clutch your chest to staunch that old ache that’s grown teeth and tears at your heart; you have and will always be the end of everything that comes near. You are just as much the plague that you began to pretend, to believe, you weren’t. It was your stupid hope that maybe you could have something and not watch it become carrion that drove that pick. It was by your hope that he’s gone.

The hair on your arms begins to raise. You pick your head up and find Yeonjun standing in front of you.

There’s a few beats of long, dreadful quiet as he takes in the state of you. He drags his eyes down and they become liquid flame—something different from the impious delight that he is made of. He becomes the King of Death.

“What happened?” he says. The chills on your arms prickle furiously at the words, furling out distant and yet furious like the center of the fire.

You shake your head, wiping your soaked cheek.

“What the fuck happened?” he growls again, taking your face into his hand. “Who did this? Who did this to you, my love? I need you to tell me who the fuck did this to you.”

Letting the venom in your mouth out, you shove his chest and say, “Get away from me. Don’t fucking touch me.”

Yeonjun’s face twists up, looking scalded. Not surprised, though. “Don’t do this,” he says. “Let me hold you while it hurts. Don’t push me away. I can’t… I won’t lose you again.”

All the pieces that you had been putting into the corners of your mind snap together at that. As many suspicions as you had, though, it feels sour hearing it confirmed from his mouth. That you are his dead past lover, reincarnated or whatever you are. That it was his presence—because even though he stayed away for centuries, a part of him still lingered with you—that now has torn down everything you ever thought you could love. He, standing there in front of you like a kicked puppy, is the ruination of your life in the flesh. The flipping of your stomach is nauseating.

“I hate you,” you spit. “I hate you so much.” You repeat it a few more times, and you sob it into his chest as he takes you into his arms. “Is this what you wanted? You’ve been waiting for this forever, haven’t you? To find me again, so that you can die and fucking leave me here. So that you can make me exactly what you are, while you get your peace. You are a liar and a thief. All you’ve ever done is steal and take. How could you do it? Huh? Tell me…” Your voice trembles and staggers off. “Tell me how you made love to me, how you made me believe that you loved me, and all you ever wanted was to save yourself? You betrayed me.”

Pulling back, Yeonjun says, “No.”

“Yes,” you say, stumbling back away from him with a shaking, accusatory finger pointed at him. “Yes you did.”

Fingers itching to reach out to you, he holds them back by curling them into fists. “No. That’s not fair. I have spent an eternity loving you. I spent the entirety of my immortal, monstrous life searching for you, just so that I might find you in any form. I would have been glad to find you as a leaf in a tree, as long as I found you. But, then, I find you alive. Alive and back, as if… it never happened.” He steps toward you, aching to be near you. His voice wavers. “Please, don’t do this to me, love. Please, just let me have you again. I’ve waited… I’ve waited and I’ve waited, and I finally have you, and now you’re looking at me like I… Like I’d ever hurt you. Finding death—finally getting to die would be worth nothing if you weren’t there with me. It was never about that.”

“I could never love you,” you say, matching his steps forward with steps away from him. “I could never love a monster that does… Does nothing but kill. Take.”  You know your words are cruel, but you need them to be. You need him to hurt, you need him to go so far away from you that never again will you cause another living thing’s death. 

“You did.” Yeonjun’s mouth cracks into a pained smile, sharp at the corners. “You loved me just as much as I love you, once.”

“Just leave me. Leave me, and I wish to never see you again. If you love me, then you’ll give me that.” 

He looks at you, clever eyes intense and glassy, for a long time. And then he says, “Would that make you happy? Would it make it so that you could live a happy life, and find yourself something to live for?”

What’s left for you? A small village that won’t ever embrace you? No, it wouldn’t fix your life. But you open your mouth and tell him, “Yes.”

“Okay,” he says, brushing his knuckles over your cheeks reverently. He swallows in your features, running over them for what he knows is the last time he’ll be seeing you—the very last time he’ll see the face of his undying love. When he finally opens his mouth again, his voice is gentle. “I’ll leave you. If my being here hurts you, then I won’t be selfish. I love you, darling.”

Don’t go, you want to tell him. Please don’t leave. Please, hold me. But your mouth is dry, and you let the radiant hurt in your chest stop you. You let him go.

༺ ꘏ ༻

There’s only one place you can think of going to. It’s the only place your vagrant feet take you.

His spot still is held sacred by the flattened, gold wheat stalks. Your best friend, still living here on Earth in at least one way even if he’s not here to listen to your stupid rambling. And he would maybe complain, but he’d always listen.

The last thing you’d done was fight with him. What an awful thing—what an awful way to repay him for being the only one who ever dared to get close.

You sit in your spot, beside his, and rest your chin on your knees. If only the ground beneath you would open up and swallow you whole. You’d deserve it.

What’s left for you? Is there a place in the world that would keep you happily once they see what you do? No. There is not. You wish you knew what to do; you wish you had somebody to ask.

Releasing a long, tight breath, you just sit and wait for something to give you answers. A gentle breeze makes your hair dance, but it does not whisper anything to your ears. Something’s circling over head, but it doesn’t caw in the cadence of his laughter.

The day moves along without you. You’re not sure how long you sit, but it stretches somewhere between a few minutes and eternity. No matter how long you wait, there are no answers. No matter how long you mull over it.

Conceding, you begin to push yourself up from the ground. A rustle in between the foliage stops you before you stand.

A tawny hare leaps out in front of you. It sniffs around you, nose twitching. Then it stands back on its haunches. It stares straight at you, an intelligent light in its eyes that knits your brows. The wild thing stands there with a purpose that is uncharacteristic of a forest animal.

But entirely familiar in the face of your best friend. That shine in its eyes as it stands there, nose still twitching, makes your chest tighten up.

“Hey,” you say, as if it might answer you. Your eyes well up with hot tears again. Of course, it doesn’t. 

Maybe you’ve gone mad, but you know that it’s him. That idiot, coming to show you that he’s okay in the afterlife—to visit one last time and to let you know that you shouldn’t worry for him or cry for him. Look at him, full of life once again, he seems to say. The hare blinks its beady eyes. It lingers there for a long time, the ease of peace found in his gaze that Soobin hadn’t had in this life, saying that there is still something waiting out there for us once we go. You reach out a hand. He does not flinch as you scratch behind its ear.

“Okay,” you whisper. “I’m glad to know you’re alright. I know what I need to do, now.”

He blinks.

You laugh a hoarse, breathy laugh, familiar in only the way that Soobin could achieve. “You look stupid.”

Indignantly, the hare stops a bratty foot in a way reminiscent of one of Soobin’s huffs before it settles back down onto its forelegs and scurries off. He goes to live out this new form of life, because it’s true: life does not end in death. He’s shown you that.

Maybe, like this, he’ll find that pretty lady that loves him the way he deserves. That loser.

༺ ꘏ ༻

You spend only one night in your home and you know that what you’ve chosen is right. After spending your day out in the field, you sneak under night’s cover into your husk of a room and let yourself sleep there under the covers one last time. When morning breaks through the window, you gather your weary bones up and leave. 

You run into your mother on the way out. She doesn’t yell at you to leave, but her eyes have gone cold. Colder than you’re used to. You’ve killed again, in every way that counts. So you don’t bother with bidding her or any of them any grand goodbyes. You couldn’t handle the relief you might find falling over them, should you.

Plopping down to the floor, you take a few bites of the cheese and bread lathered in sweet jam that you’d swiped from the kitchen. The grass is long and willows in the wind, bending and dancing prettily. It’s so soft; you enjoy the feeling of it beneath your fingers in your quiet serenity. The scent of it, fresh over the baseness of dirt, you breathe into your lungs.

It would be the loveliest place to spend the rest of eternity.

For the first time, Yeonjun appears in front of you rather than behind you. He materializes from nothing, his elbow on his knee as casual as if he’d been sat there the whole time. The darkness beneath his eyes seems heavier, but then again you know that exact heaviness. It sits right in the very center of you.

You both are quiet for a bit. You let the tall grass whisper, instead.

“Bread?” you say and slant your lips into a smile. Bringing it up, you offer it to him.

His smile wrinkles his nose and curls at the edges. Entirely him. Yeonjun accepts the bread, ripping a bite out before throwing it away into the sea of green. Once he’s chewed, he leans in and captures your lips in a kiss that’s utterly at odds with his sharp mouth. Your lips move over each other gently, save for an indulgent nip or bite here and there.

He pushes you back into a bed of sweetgrass, never letting your lips go. Not to breathe, not to say something that’ll pale in comparison to the sweetness of your mouths on one another. He kisses you until he’s had enough to fulfill a lifetime without it, and then some more.

“My love,” he whispers into your skin, his breath hot on your collarbone. “Mine,” he says, pressing a kiss into the column of your neck, and then he says it again with a hot kiss to the place where your dress suggests your breasts. He says it a handful more times as he pushes your skirts up your thighs. “My love forever. I waited for you so long, and I would do it again.” Lowering his voice to a honeyed whisper, he adds, “I would find you no matter what.”

Laughing softly, you run your fingers through his raven hair to better see his eyes. You know he would.

Gently giving you one more of his lingering kisses that make your skin tingle, right into your bare shoulder, he presses into you. You loose a soft breath, wrapping your arms around his shoulders. The beating in your chest slows to a content purr as he begins languid thrusts in and out of you, rolling pointedly and unhurried.

Yeonjun makes love to you in a thousand dusted kisses and sweet words, your hands holding each other’s soft edges. Yeonjun traces the lines of you, taking the pads of his thumb down your cheeks and your lips and then his hand over the swell of your breasts and down your belly and over your thighs. Clamping down on him as your belly grows tight in the way it had the first time you had done this, your thighs begin to shake.

 Breathlessly, as you hurdle over the edge, all that you can say is, “I love you, ‘Junnie.” 

Yeonjun smiles at you and then presses his face into your neck. He doesn’t even brace himself against the grass to chase his own peak. Neither of you want this to end; you want to hold on to this moment and let it span forever. Slowly, Yeonjun rolls up into you until his hips finally stutter and he cums into you, his cheeks pink. The weight of him above you as he shakes with your shared ecstasy, and even as you both have come down and are nothing but lazy, is the only thing in this world. He is the only thing in this world.

Once you’ve both evened your breathing out, you roll apart and face each other, still just two forms bending the grass into your shapes. Blinking slowly and digesting his features one at a time—the angle of his eyes, softened but never tamed, the line of his nose, the line of his mouth always so proud and playful, and that pretty dot below his left eye—you let them solidify fully in your mind.

“Yeonjun,” you say, finally meeting his eyes across from you. “I want to go. I’m ready.”

The gentle, knowing look that he gives you soothes over the way your heart begins to race in your chest in rebellion. “I know,” he says.

Of course he had known. Yeonjun had been called here to ferry you into the afterlife. He had known the moment he appeared in front of you that his last soul to reap would be you; an ironic circle of karma that should be cruel, but you two make it something sweet. Chewing on your lip, you will your hands to not shake as you curl toward him. You’re no longer scared of going. You know that if you’ll be with him, it will be okay. It won’t be so scary. A hot tear rolls down your temple and then drops into your hair. “Will you be with me? I won’t be there alone?”

He tucks some hair behind your ear reverently and then leaves his hand there. “I don’t know,” he answers. “But I won’t leave you. I’ll stay right here with you.”

You lay there for a long time. Chatting and giggling and just looking into each other's eyes, until your heart becomes slow and all you feel is the wind singing in your blood. Yeonjun presses one final kiss to your forehead.

Maybe, in some years, somebody might dig up your bones and find you immortalized like this in your love. Your bones bowing toward each other, as if even death were not enough to stop you from reaching for each other. Or maybe they’ll just find yours, and Yeonjun still curling into them how you know he will for an eternity more.

Either way, the going is still slow and gentle, as death always is.

🪶 ⦂ tears. omfg i cried writing this which could totally be me being a bitch baby but it DAMN. omfg.

rꫀׁׅܻblogs & asks arꫀׁׅܻ always apprꫀׁׅܻciatꫀׁׅܻd!

�� tׁׅagᥣׁׅ֪ꪱׁׅstׁׅ @lvrs-street2mmorrow , @soohashits , @f4iryfever , @arcturus444 , @linqed , @serenityism00 , @immelissaaa , @luv4cheol , @lickingan0rchid , @20-cms , @hhoneylix , @beestvng , @hyucktapes , @bewitchless , @prince-jjae , @blankliving , @yaoizee , @stormy1408 , @missychief1404 , @izzyy-stuff , @miukuui , @lunesdesire , @sunoolver , @cherricola-star , @xylatox , @filmnings , @hearteyes4hobi , @hyunj00 , @kangtaehyunfan029 , @caratcakemoa, @wtevr-whocares, @usuallyunlikelyfox, @zi-vian, @brrytears, @stormy1408, @soobabby, @nshmrarki, @dontwannacry04. if your tag isn't working, check the mentions part of your settings!

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

Besotted 5

No tag lists. Do not send asks or DMs about updates. Review my pinned post for guidelines, masterlist, etc.

Warnings: this fic will include dark content such as noncon/dubcon, virginity loss, age gap, and possible untagged elements. My warnings are not exhaustive, enter at your own risk.

This is a dark!fic and explicit. 18+ only. Your media consumption is your own responsibility. Warnings have been given. DO NOT PROCEED if these matters upset you.

Summary: your new neighbour brings intrigue and a bit of danger.

Characters: ex-con!Bucky Barnes (silverfox)

Note: Friday at last and my house guest is away for a couple days.

As per usual, I humbly request your thoughts! Reblogs are always appreciated and welcomed, not only do I see them easier but it lets other people see my work. I will do my best to answer all I can. I’m trying to get better at keeping up so thanks everyone for staying with me.

Your feedback will help in this and future works (and WiPs, I haven’t forgotten those!) Please do not just put ‘more’. I will block you.

I love you all immensely. Take care. 💖

Bucky plants his feet as the bike comes to a stop. You look up at the duplex and your insides get all swirly. You're home and still giddy. You've made up your mind. It's now or never.

He shuts off the engine and waits for you to get off first. You hang onto his shoulder for balance as you hop down. He gets off without much effort and heaves a dark sigh. He hesitates and you do too.

"That was awesome, Bucky," you shimmy. 

"Mm," he drones and flinches, moving toward the saddle bag. He unbuckles it and takes out the cookies. "Don't forget these."

You take them reluctantly and he hauls out his bag of groceries. He wraps one arm around it and lets the flap fall open. He faces you as you clutch the box to your chest. Don't let him do it. He can't send you away now.

"Hey, you want... want to try some? I could make us some tea."

His eyes dart to the side then he looks down at the bag. He fidgets and shifts on his feet. He looks at you and his forehead lines. He deflates just a little as you watch him with rounded, hopeful eyes.

"Sure, I should get the yogurt in the fridge though so why don't you come in?" He relents.

You could fist pump and jump in glee. You don't. You're not that lame. You bounce and smile.

"Oh, yay," you grin, "so you got everything set up?"

"Hm, not much. Still got a few things to grab," he grits.

You walk up the steps beside him and stand aside, waiting for him to unlock the door. He keeps the screen door open with his elbow then pauses before he pushes open the inner one. He sniffs.

"Go on, girl," he waves inside.

Huh, what happened to doll?

You enter as if you've discovered some ancient crypt full of treasures meant for the after world. There's a couch and a coffee table, a floor lamp behind the former. The area rug is the only piece of decor to give it any warmth. You try not to be too obvious as you take account of the barren space.

"I might got some tea," he says as he gentle touches your back and slips by. You savour the tingle along your spine.

You take off your boots before you break the threshold of the front room. You tiptoe in as you hear him in the kitchen. He sighs as cupboards open and close.

"It doesn't have to be tea," you call to him. You near the table and examine the motorcycle magazine, a sheet of paper tucked under the cover.

"Good, all I got is beer," he says. 

"Mmm," you turn as he comes close with the bottles.

"Coasters," he says.

"Oh, uh, right," you set the box next to the magazine and take two of the cork coasters from the stack. You place them down and he swiftly clanks the bottles into place.

"I know it's not much but uh, get comfortable," he says.

You pluck up a bottle and sit on the couch. You taste the malty beer. It's not bad. He paces around and nears the window. You watch his back.

You lean forward to set down the bottle and tear the seal on the box. You flip the top and pick out two cookies. You get up and approach him. You stop beside him.

"Try one," you offer.

He exhales and accepts it with a thanks. You nibble and he crunches into his. It's a bit dry by sweet.

You're nervous. You've never been this close in your life. Now you have the prime opportunity. You're in his space. You finish the cookie and smack your lips.

"Dry," you chuckle, "need to wash it down."

"Me too," he says.

He follows you as you go to grab your beer. You drink and sit. He does the same, stiffly, as he takes his beer and swigs. Your eyes stick to him. You watch his throat and the way his chest stretches the fabric of his shirt. You set the beer back on the cork and sidle closer. You're fuzzy all over.

You put your hand on his knee. He flinches and lowers the bottle. He looks at your hand and reaches to set down the beer. His other hand covers yours and he peels it off.

"Look, doll," he squeezes and clears his throat, gently laying your hand in your own lap. "There's things you don't know about me. I think you better just finish and go."

"Bucky, I... it's okay. Whatever it is."

"I'm too old for ya," he puffs. "You're young. Don't do this."

His eyes bore into yours. You pout.

"I might be young but I can make my own choices. So why don't you tell me so I can?"

His cheek twitches, "girl--"

"Please. Don't I deserve to know?"

"I don't know what you're thinking, girl. Alright? Look at us. I'm... I gotta twice your age. And you're... you're too sweet for your own good."

"Tell me," you reach for him again, petting the denim on his thigh. "I won't go until you do. Or you can drag me out."

His eyes flicker and he looks at the window behind you. His jaw squares and he shakes his head. He slaps his hand over yours again but doesn't move it away.

"I'm a criminal. I just got out and I'm tryna rebuild, but I'm not changed. Alright? You understand me," he snarls. "I'm a bad man. I hurt people. Too late for me to change that."

You search his face, "but... you haven't hurt me. And you did your time."

"Girl, don't be foolish."

"No, Bucky, you told me and I don't care. I don't care what you are. I know that you feel this too," you move closer. "Don't you?"

He turns his head and stares at the wall. You squeeze his thigh and get up on your knees. You trail your touch up to his belt and he grunts, stopping you with his thick fingers around your wrist.

"Bucky, please," you beg. "It's just us. Nothing else."

"Girl--" he pleads.

"You're not too old, you're not too bad," you slip free of his grasp and tickle up his shirt, "you're perfect for me, baby."

You bring your hand to his jaw and flutter your fingers along his beard. He shudders and you raise yourself on your knees. You lean in and press your lips to his. He grabs your upper arm but doesn't push you away. He growls as you open your mouth and slide your tongue along his lips.

His hand slides away from your arm and to your back, crawling to the back of your neck. You brace his shoulder and swing your leg across him, straddling his lap as you deepen the kiss. He groans as you hook an arm around his neck and snare him. You rock him slightly as you breathe into him, tilting your pelvis against him. 

He grips your hip with his other hand and parts from your mouth. His eyes are cloudy as he gazes up at you. The tension is his cheek pulses.

"Doll," he shakes his head, "one last chance..."

"I got condoms," you say as you sit back and reach to your cross body bag, still resting against your side.

He shivers and slackens against the couch. "You're too much."

"I know what I want," you assure him.

He stares at you and his lashes flick, He grabs the strap of your cross body bag and unhooks it from around you. He puts it on the cushion and gulps. He frames your face with his hands, his thumbs rubbing your cheekbones. He sighs. 

You reach up to curl your fingers under the straps of your tanks top and drag them down your arms. You feel him beneath you. He's hard already. You're soaking through your panties, not that there's much to them.

You push down the sheath of your top to your waist. He inhales sharply and you reach back, your chest bulging as you tug at the band of your bra. You unhook it and quickly drop it down to your wrists. Your tits pop free and jiggle as you toss your bra.

He blinks at your chest. He just sits there, paralysed. You giggle and grab his hands, putting them on your tits, making him squeeze them. He purrs and rolls his hips.

"Doll, you're... you're..." He gropes you then slips his hands down to lift your tits. He leans forward and nuzzles your flesh, pushing your chest around his face as he snarls. You got him. There's no going back.

You arch your back and cling to his head, urging him on. He nips and teethes at you, tracing your nipple with his thumb before popping it between his lips. He hums and swirls his tongue around the hard bud. It must have been a while for him, having been in jail. That sends another thrill through you.

You twine your fingers into his hair and grazes his scalp with your nails. He snarls as he continues to bounce your tits, squeezing and pawing. You never cared much for the extra weight, but now that he's drowning in them, you can't complain.

You lip your hand down between your bodies and feel along the front of his jeans. He groans and wriggles against your touch. He's rock-hard. He hisses as he pulls away and drops back against the couch heavily.

"Doll," he tenses up.

You giggle and tug at the bottom of his shirt. You push it up his stomach and over his broad chest. You mess his hair as you swoop it past his head and drop it over the back of the couch.

Now it's your turn. You flatten your hands across his pecs and moan. He growls and you drag your nails lightly down his skin, the soft hair contrasting against hard muscle. His stomach is cushier but not in a bad way.

"Baby, you got me struggling," he groans and rubs your thighs, his pelvis tilting desperately.

"Me too," you breathe.

You linger at the top of his jeans then back off of him carefully. His eyes widen. You see fear in him. You grin and turn to wiggle your ass as him. You hook your fingers inside your leggings and bend as you push them down. Your thong rides up between your cheeks. He hums as the couch springs whine beneath him.

You shiver as your nerves flurry in your chest. This is it. So close. You're throbbing. You can see the slickness in your leggings as you step out of them.

"How... why do you want me, doll? You're... you're gorgeous," he rasps.

You stand and face him again. You shake your chest at him and he brings his fist up to bite his knuckle. You feel powerful.

You slink closer to him and touch the front of your bejeweled thong, a little heart on black. "Can I keep these on?"

"Yes," he croaks and clears his throat, "yes, doll."

You grin and grab your bag. You unzip the front pocket and slide free the strip of condoms. It unfurls and you laugh. "Oops... think we'll need them all?"

He startles you as he swipes up the end and tears one off, "we'll see."

You drop the rest beside your bag and blink at him. You sense something different. He tears open his pants and raises himself off the cushion as he shoves the denim down. His dick bobs above the elastic of his briefs, the head swollen and weeping. You get even wetter as you see the veins bulging under the skin.

He rips the wrapper with his teeth. He trembles as he presses the rubber to his tip and you near him, wavering as you weigh the moment. This is your last day a virgin. You take a silent breath and lean forward to grab his shoulders. He quakes and moans as he slides the condom down his length.

You bring yourself over his lap, hovering above him as he grips himself. He frames your hip and hisses, "doll, please, please, I need you on me. I need--"

You reach down and wrap your fingers above his. He lets go and gasps. You angle his tip along your cunt and push your panties aside. You stare down at him. Your eyes cling to his and you bite your lip.

You dip down carefully. As you open around him, you grunt. You sink your nails into his trap and your eyes speckle with tears. Oh, it hurts more than you expect.

He taps your hip, "stop," he snarls.

You bat your lashes but obey, "I can take it--"

"Come on," he feels along your side. He loops his arm around you and in an instant, he has your back to the cushion. He slips out of you. 

He fishes out your bag from beneath you and sweeps it onto the floor. He knees on the other end of the couch and urges you further up. You drag yourself until your head is against the armrest. 

He bends between your knees and kneads your thighs, his eyes on your cunt. He licks his lips before he plunges in. You yipe in surprise as he laps at you, his beard tickling your lips as he pushes your legs wider.

He flicks his tongue around and across your clit. You spasm and clasp onto his hair as the sensations stir within like flames. Your thighs clench and your spine stiffen. You pout and gulp loudly as he toys with you, suckling and swiping as you squirm.

He growls into you and traces a finger along your ass up to your entrance. He spreads the wetness there before he delves inside. He pushes his finger in bit by bit then draws it back out. He adds another and urges inside even deeper.

His tongue teases you to the edge as he pushes in and out of your cunt. He hums and drinks you up, spreading his tongue as wide as he can to taste all over you. He seals his lips once more around your clit and the pressure pinpoints, pulsing faster and faster until your muscles release.

There's a sudden surge and a hot flow coursing from you, dripping down his fingers. You convulse and whimper as you wash away with your orgasm.

He kisses your cunt before he sits up. You watch him, bleary-eyed, and he wipes the glisten from his beard with a hum. He inhales so his chest puffs out and he cracks his neck.

"If we're gonna do this, we're gonna do it right," he growls.

[junkdrawerthoughts]

You guys, I am down on my hands and knees begging you to please stop putting random things in the {character} x reader tags. 🙏🏻

I’m talking about things like answering asks that don’t have the fic actually written in the ask, random life updates, random story non-updates apologizing to the entire fandom for not updating or saying that you plan to update soon.

And please, can we stop tagging other characters x reader fics in another character’s x reader tag?

I’m really bad at gauging how things could come across over text, so I wanna clarify just incase that I don’t mean this in a hateful way at all. It’s just that it makes it so incredibly hard to find fics when the tags are filled up with a bunch of other stuff, you know what I mean?

Take Azriel for example—Azriel x Reader is incredibly popular, and that’s totally fine, but the Azriel girlies don’t have to spend a whole lot of time looking for Az fics, because he’s a fan fav and lots of writers enjoy writing for him. But then if you go and tag Az fics or other posts in the Rhysand or Cassian x Reader tags, it makes it difficult for Rhysand and Cassian girlies to find the fics they’re looking for. They don’t get as many fics written about them, so it pushes those fics down deep in the tags, and it kind of becomes a hunt to find them sometimes.

And once again using the Az tag as an example for posting random things, because Azriel gets so much attention, having a bunch of extra stuff in the fic tag pushes a lot of stuff down. So, if somebody were to take a little time off tumblr for say something as little as a week or two, it takes infinitely longer to catch up on all the wonderful fics that have been posted because you have to scroll through a ton of other stuff that either aren’t fics or aren’t Az fics.

I say all this because I’m a mood reader. The batboy that I’m fucking with today depends on how I’m feeling, so I bounce around a lot, and it can get frustrating sometimes trying to find fics—especially older fics for say Rhys or Cass once I’ve read everything current.

We all know Tumblr tagging sucks and the search function is kind of ass, but they don’t really seem to care about that lol, so we kind of have to help each other out by making sure we tag things properly and leave out things that don’t belong, you know?

P.S. I’ll probably get rid of this in a couple days so it doesn’t clog up the tags, but I really kind of needed to talk about it a little because it’s been bothering me for months.

[archiewantsheetmetal]

First Official Hello From Archie!

HELLO Layton Nation! Welcome to my Layton blog. My name is Archie, and I go by he/him. I am a minor!

DNI if you:

- Are a pedophile

- Ship any minors with any adult characters. This is also pedophilia

- Are a zoophile

- Are a strictly 18+ blog

- Are homophobic, transphobic, racist, or xenophobic I just post Layton stuff here and interact with the fandom. This is my only Tumblr blog. I really like Professor Layton. I don't tag triggers or spoilers unless it's something major, like if it's very mild blood or if it regards a Layton reveal, but if anyone has an issue, they can come to me through dms or asks! I am not a scary person. Like at all. I love interacting with the Layton fandom and to be honest I am probably just as scared of you as you are of me. So don't be afraid to be friends! I love getting questions and requests! I just won't respond to anything NSFW. I do not reblog NSFW content. On Archive of Our Own, my username is Archierot! You can find any fics I may post there. Currently, there are only three published works on my page, but there will be more to come. My askbox is almost always open! I just may be a little slower to get to some of them, or if you say something very nice or funny, I might just keep it in there so I can look at it when I need to.

Taglist and friends below!

LIST OF MY FRIENDS!! MY LOVELY FRIENDS THAT I LOVE FOREVER!!

@casualfr1days!! My best friend DREWWW!!!!! ! ! ! ! ^^ AMAZING person all around and very very pretty art. THEY ARE THE REASON. I am in the Professor Layton fandom. drew it is ALL your fault. Wonderful to be around and I feel like I can talk to you about my bugs forever.

@justkillingthyme MY LOVELY BEST FRIEND THYME!! ^^ FRIENDLY KIND FOREVER!! I love their art and their writing!! It's very distinct and has inspired several of my own creations. I'm very lucky to be friends with them. Very funny person and joy to be around.

@jesterday00 MY BEST FRIEND SKEETER!! HI SKEETER ^^ I LOVE this person, their art, and their writing. Very very kind and very funny. I'm glad to have met you! Gives you a BIG fist bump.

@hotsaucewmilk BEST FRIEND HOTSAUCE!! !HLELO ^^ FUNNY GUY ALERT!!! GREAT ARTIST ALERT!! And he's also british so maybe he knows layton. idk. were investigating the matter

@toonypow BEST FRIEND BEE!!! HI BEE HI BEE ^^ GREAT writer. Has made me cry on Bsky. Wonderful art that I've seen.

@mysterysnail APPEL. OLIVE. YOU. ^^ shares a similar sense of humor to me. thank you. SSHAKES your hand. VERY FUNNY PERSON AND I'VE SEEN SOME OF THEIR ART!! VERY GOOD!!

@speedygoreman speedy... ^^ I AM still scared of you KIND OF. a little bit. BUT I THINK YOU'RE COOL. AND I LOVE READING THE STUFF YOU POST. KLG. UGH. UURGH. @huevobuevo you/. i remember you. ^^ you're realy fuckin funny man. best first impression. i miss you heuevo............. @constantpan1c ^^ hi!! friend!! yay!! funny kind nice. not part of the layton fandom but i listed them here too. giggle If I didn't include you on here, I'm probably scared of you and I'm not sure if you consider us friends !!

TAGS!

#archiereblogs - what it sounds like !! these are just reblogged posts. #important - probably important ! #archiesfavs - MY MOST FAAAVORITE POSTS!! HIGHEST HONOR I CAN BESTOW!! They go here so i can look at them later. #phantom railway au - the 1930s-esque depression au i created for professor layton! #askarchie - just stuff from my askbox #archiesart - all of my art!! I'm trying to do more of it. #inbox thyme - all of or most of thyme's asks. because theyre in there a lot! #archiestupid - shitposts. this might be considered art too but if its too stupid it goes in there. #archierants - me talking. probably includes all analyses ive ever done. #pl creature au - my mythical creature/monster au i created for professor layton! #archierot - ALL of my fics and fic related content! #archiedoodles - doodle request answers! #pl/professor layton - professor laytong stuff! THAT'S ALL I CAN FIND!! Some tags may not have any posts in them! That's because, moving forward, I want to keep my account organized. That's what the empty tags are there for! So I can use them from now on. I'll try to edit existing posts to include these tags if I see them. I'll tag the taglist so you can use it to like. find stuff. if you need to.

I hope you guys like my stuff! -Archie!

[was-that-a-pun]

Fleshin out more background characters in my AU fic for later chapters like I have with Medic and Thomas and a recent cut content video gave me ideas for Scout the boogie bot and Izzy the bobby bearhug

Scout I've decided was an older kid in Playcare and was a close friend with Matthew before he was 'chosen'. They were similar ages, though Scout had been there longer and had lost her parents in a car accident she wasn't part of. It gave her a slightly better idea of what he was going through than most other kids did and tended to play backup to his leader role.

Neither ran into Kevin much just by chance, the little they did see of him he seemed fine to them although Matthew caught some other kids setting him up to get in trouble once and put a stop to it.

After Matthew was taken Izzy arrived, probably younger than Jack when she got there, and instantly clung to Scout as big sister. Scout returned in kind and goes out of her way to care for and dote on her.

Scout though was also 'chosen' a little more than a year after Matthew and Kevin were, Izzy had a hard time in Playcare for the few months before she was as 'chosen' as well because she couldn't connect with anyone else the same way.

Scout and Izzy are dumped into the workyard/general population at the same time and Izzy does not handle things well. Scout would know that sobbing anywhere and scrambles to comfort her and convince her of who she is and that Izzy isn't alone. Doey overhears and oh shit this is one of my friends.

They all end up in trouble/punished because Izzy can't calm down enough to work, Scout wont leave her side, and Doey wont let the guards touch either one of them. But afterwards it makes things a little easier because Matthew knows he can trust scout, which means Jack and Kevin learn to trust her and she becomes one of the main people he talk to about the whole confusing experience of being three kids turned into one.

Cut content lines under the readmore that inspired me

Scout: Izzy, have you done what I asked you to? Gathered all your things?

Izzy: Oh, yeah! I’ve got my journal and my crayons and my dollys and my-

Scout: Good. Good I just wanted to make sure

Izzy: You. Y-you sound sad -

Scout: No! No. Just thinking…

Izzy: Thinking about what?

Scout: About everything to come, about our part in it.

Izzy: Oh...okay. Are we still gonna play our game later? Y-you promised we would-

Scout: *chuckles* I remember kiddo, and a good scout knows to keep her promises.

Izzy: Yes!

Scout: But finish up your tasks first please! Then my time is all yours.

Izzy: Okay! I’ll get them done quick! Super quick! You wont even see me doing them!

Scout: That better mean they’re actually getting done though *sigh*

[amethxxt]

so... what do we think of the new D5 characters?

Look at me ranting again :)

I wanna start off by saying that this is no hate towards the actors. My problem is with the writers.

Am I excited for Red to have a younger sister? YES. My personal headcanon is that Red has 3 younger siblings (y'know, in a universe where the Queen of Hearts isn't an absolute tyrant), and now I can't wait to see what dynamic the two of them are going to have.

My problem with Pink, is that her name is Pink. WHY? WHAT WAS THE REASON?? It took me forever to get used to "Red" and now that's what they go for when Rosa/Rose was RIGHT THERE????

I seriously don't understand why Disney's so lazy when naming Descendants characters. Sometimes, we get absolute bangers like Calista Jane and others we get shit like Pink/Li'l Shang/Herkie/Hadie and I'm like… couldn't you have at least tried? Couldn't you go to a baby name website like every author in the world has done at least once and look for something better?

How do you expect us to care about the story of those characters when you couldn't be bothered to give them a decent name?

And speaking of Hook, we have a Hazel now :)

This one surprised me because I don't think I had ever expected them to come up with another child of Captain Hook. To me, Harriet, Harry and CJ are perfect and enough.

My problem isn't even that I think it's out of character for Hook to have four children. Actually, he seems like the type that adores the sex part but doesn't give a shit about his kids and is an abusive parent. My problem is that WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH HAZEL NOW????

I have such a perfect idea of how Harriet, Harry and CJ's dynamic is and now I have to worry about introducing a brand new sister. My second problem is that I love the idea of CJ being the baby of the family for more than one reasons.

Of course, I could just ignore her, but I'm actually curious about Hazel's character and love writing about the Hook family, so I've been trying to come up with my own headcanons for my version of Descendants in case Hazel lives and in case she doesn't and we're left with the original 3.

Max is... whatever. I hate that they're gonna have him be Red's love interest because she seemed so close to Maddox that it's weird to think she'd ever see him as anything other than a friend/brother figure. Also, I'm sure he only exists because they can't have Ace in the movies because it would contradict the book or something.

I just want glassheart to be canon, is that too much to ask????

Now (just let out the biggest sigh of my life), Luis Madrigal. He might actually be my new nemesis.

Again, no hate to the actor, but seriously?! They had to throw Encanto into the mix?? I would have no problems if their new character was like, Moana's son, for example, because I can see Moana existing in the Descendants universe.

Encanto, though? I love the movie, but no. Absolutely not.

It almost feels like those skits people post to make fun of Descendants with children of characters like Lightning McQueen and Buzz Lightyear.

Luis is not ever going to be a part of my fics but at the very least I hope Disney isn't so lazy as to make him have super strenght when that's not how gifts work in Encanto. It's not hereditary.

Honestly, I can't believe someone came up with his character and it got approved.

Everything points out to the new "core four" being Red, Chloe, Pink and Hazel, but since Rise of Red didn't do such a good job at developing Red and Chloe's friendship, I'm worried about how they're going to do that and introduce two new main characters and develop Red and Pink's dynamic because I'm sure Red isn't going to start off as the perfect older sister.

I think it'd be interesting if she felt resentment and jealousy towards Pink, because she didn't have a sister before the timeline change, but now not only does she have one, but Pink got to grow up with the good version of the Queen of Hearts and all the love Red never got.

Really nice room for angst, especially since Red and Chloe are the only ones who remember how things used to be and can't just go around talking about it.

Well, I don't know what else to say right now because I just needed to vent a little. At the end of the day, we can only hope that D5 turns out to be a good movie.

[newttxt]

20 questions for fic writers

thank you @strawhattery for @ing me, even though i do feel like it's a not-so-subtle urge to finish my current wips... (i need the kick)

for reference/those who only see my art, i used to be a fic writer who occasionally drew. that's obviously changed, but i am trying to write more, so you can find me at pseudoanalytics on ao3.

1) how many works do you have on ao3?

44, but only 35 are linked to me (9 are anonymous...)

2) what's your total ao3 word count?

347,773 😰

3) what are your top five fics by kudos?

while i nodded, nearly napping (suddenly there came a tapping) [haikyuu, ushiten]

redacted :/

the inherent romance of classical conditioning (or, the fine art of emotional recognition) [haikyuu, sakuatsu]

you're really pushing it (but you're going much too slowly) [haikyuu, ushiten]

redacted :/ (sequel to the first redacted...)

4) what fandoms do you write for?

most of my fics are so old i can't bear to look at them, but i'm trying to write more for one piece. then i've written a decent amount of haikyuu, pacific rim, and star wars.

5) do you respond to comments? why or why not?

initially? i absolutely do! but as any of my friends will tell you, i struggle to even reply to dms or texts. so alas. i drop off pretty quickly

i LOVE comments though, and i eagerly read and reread them frequently ;__;

6) what's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

oh sheesh. you may only ask once (so be prepared for the reply) which is a bad end for pacific rim 2. or i guess... a worse end. it's also a bit of a role swap au, if i remember correctly.

7) what's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

i... honestly don't know. i typically write happy endings. i like to write "missing scenes" and post-canon, so things tend to be rather open-ended or to just lead into the next part of canon. my memory is also not my prize-winning quality, so i can't really remember how my fics ended pre-2018ish.

8) do you get hate on fics?

i know i've gotten some ruder bookmarks, but not typically, no. i get more hate on art or in my ask box, but i honestly just delete it all, so it never sticks.

9) do you write smut?

yes, though its debatable if it's "smut" so much as "sex in such an irreverent context that it becomes humor." i cannot take sex seriously, so alas, i rarely write it seriously. i use it more as comedy and a tool for character studies. i do enjoy a stoic character's facade getting cracked open.

10) do you write crossovers?

i don't write legitimate crossovers, with characters from different medias intermingling, and frankly, i rarely do au's either.

but if i have one weakness, it's that i am ALWAYS a sucker for a pacific rim au. yes, i am rotating a one piece version in my head.

11) have you ever had a fic stolen?

i had a sakuatsu one reuploaded to wattpad under someone else's username. they deleted my author's notes and added their own, as if they'd written the fic, too. hilariously they even used my art for the cover.

it got taken down, but idk why. i never reached out about it.

12) have you ever had a fic translated?

yeah! i've had 5 translated, and i've had 2 turned into podfics, which is cool.

13) have you ever cowritten a fic before?

nope. i'd be terrible to work with, tbh. my writing process is a holdover from my journalism days, and the steps are a mystery even to me. i think i'll stick to drawing art for other ppl and their fics.

14) what's your all time favorite ship?

i will hold to the fact that it's asanoya from ao3. they were the first ship i got really invested in, and i see their impact on everything i ship to this day. they were my "blueprint," if you will. i still get smiley when i see art for them!

on the flip side... terezi/vriska was also a formative ship for me. but i won't discuss that.

15) what's the wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

rip go ahead and start talking (i'll pick up the slack). it's my 1-of-2-chapters ushiten fic that i should just mark as complete, since the first chapter can stand alone.

16) what are your writing strengths?

hard to determine your own strengths, but i think my dialogue/characterization are pretty strong, especially since i still regularly flex those muscles when writing comics. i also think i'm funny.

17) what are your writing weaknesses?

writing.

but seriously, i am so bad at sitting down and just hammering out a fic. don't get me started on outlines or longform works. i'd rather grab my pencil and start drawing, i'm afraid.

18) thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

i think there are ways to interweave words or terms in other languages, but overall, i'm a fan of just standardizing everything into one language. if your character understands it, i think all readers should be able to understand it. and i'm not a fan of when you're expected to scroll to the end for a translation; i think it interrupts the reading flow.

this is a generalized opinion though. i think there are ALWAYS storytelling exceptions, so if the other language usage is really important to your theme/intent, i can see why you would do this!

19) first fandom you wrote for?

please don't do this to me. it was maximum ride. yes, the james patterson books about the kids with bird wings. i wrote 4-5 fics, i was in middle school, and — as far as i know — they are still up on ff dot net. no, i won't elaborate.

20) favourite fic you've ever written?

hands down, it's the sakuatsu domesticity simulator. it's not necessarily my best work in terms of writing skill, but i also drew over 50 images for it and html coded it into an interactive story. i'm just proud that i started a big project by myself and i actually finished it!

it's my dream to someday make a whole visual fan novel. i feel like the domesticity sim was the first step.

oh boy i'm bad at tagging but if @syrupfog, @lawsbbygirl, @macabrekawaii , @bmouse, or @cooknumber3 want to go for it... :))