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blockgamepirate · 3 years ago

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So we were talking on Discord about a DSMP superpowers AU, specifically Syndicate as an anarchist superhero team who are perceived as villains by pretty much everybody. (There were a bunch of people involved in the brainstorming but I wanna particularly credit @macachee for the idea for Techno’s superpowers, even though I ended up using a slightly different version than theirs.)

Anyway I know I don't really write fanfic anymore and I'm extremely rusty but uh... my hand slipped?

(CW: nothing major but there are repeated mentions of fire and some pretty tame violence)

×××

"Professor Underscore, I presume?"

The distinctive deep voice of an infamous supervillain was really not something anyone wanted to hear after 14 hours of last minute bug-fixing on a prototype superweapon in a secret laboratory. Especially when all your assistants had already called it a day and gone home.

Without even looking around, Tubbo reached for the gun in his desk drawer but before he could pull it out, a blade smashed into the wood right next to his hand.

"Nope", said the voice, "you don't get to have weapons, I get to have weapons. And speaking of weapons..."

Tubbo carefully turned around on his chair to face his attacker. As expected, it was a huge, hulking pigman dressed in flashy red and a golden mask.

"You are Protesilaus, aren't you? From the Syndicate?"

Protesilaus blinked at him. "You're a LOT younger than I expected, professor."

"Yeah, I get that a lot."

"I mean it's very impressive though, good for you."

"Thanks."

"So anyway, I'm here for the weapons."

"The weapons are kinda reserved already. You know, for the military."

"Don't give a shit", said a voice from the door. "Gib."

Protesilaus sighed. "Zephyrus, you're supposed to be the secret back-up."

The man hiding by the door frame laughed. "We already took care of the guards. There's nobody here but him, it's fiiine."

"But what if HE has his own secret back-up? What then? Well, it's too late now so just keep a look-out, alright?"

Zephyrus laughed again. "Sure."

"Alright." Protesilaus pointed his sword at Tubbo. "Show us to the weapons."

×××

There wasn't much he could think of doing to stall except try and tap in the pin codes on the doors as slowly as humanly possible. To be fair he didn't even really know what he was stalling for exactly. Secret back-up would have been nice but if they’d really taken out all the guards then none was likely to come.

Protesilaus was following him, sword in hand, making random small talk on the way as if he didn't know how to deal with the silence. Tubbo had only caught a few glimpses of Zephyrus, the winged man, in the background or in reflections. He seemed to be tampering with the security systems on the way, meaning that Tubbo really might be completely alone on this if the sabotage was successful. Zephyrus was also pulling along a big wheeled container of some sort that was probably intended for the weapons.

The two of them were the known members of the Syndicate, a team of anarchist terrorists who gave nightmares to the local police forces, the national guard and occasionally the military, but it was also widely theorized to have a secret third member with fire powers. Nobody had ever managed to catch them in the act, the only evidence of the secret member's existence was the trail of smoking ruins following the pair, their targets always burned down in a blaze of extremely memorable pink flames.

Tubbo had a theory that there were actually two secret members in the Syndicate, because if you're going to have one secret member you might as well have two, right? Maybe even three! It just made sense.

His assistants hadn't seemed convinced by this logic.

They arrived at the large hall leading up to the main vault where the prototypes were hidden and Tubbo finally had a plan. Somebody (probably him, honestly) had left the remote control of his battle bots lying around on a sidetable. He took advantage of his captors checking the space for surprise guards and inched slowly towards the remote.

"Everything good up there?" Protesilaus called out to Zephyrus who had flown up to the rafters.

"All good."

"Alright, seems safe enough", said Protesilaus. "Now, open the vault."

Tubbo just needed to stall a little bit longer until he could grab the remote undetected. "Actually, maybe I just won't be able to live with the fact that I let you guys get your hands on superweapons? What if I'd rather die than let you have them?"

Protesilaus sighed. "Look, don't worry, it's for a good cause, I promise."

"I mean, you guys are supervillains."

"Oh yeah sure, you're literally making weapons for an imperialist government but we're the villains?"

"What about that orphanage you burned down?" Tubbo kept moving towards the sidetable, trying to make it look like he was just pacing nervously.

"I have NEVER burned down any orphanages, I do NOT have an irrational hatred of small children, in fact I LOVE orphans in particular, you can ask anyone."

"You did, though! That was like two years ago, back when you were part of the Sleepy Bois Inc!"

Tubbo actually knew quite a lot about the Sleepy Bois, the infamous villain team who were particularly known for conning people into taking part in some sort of strange experiments, like that time they somehow transported a hundred people to the moon and told them to terraform a random area. The group had broken up a while back and two of the four had since reformed. Well, more or less reformed anyway. Actually not really reformed, but they were at least sticking to smaller crimes these days.

Anyway Mr. Business was now one of Tubbo's best friends, although nobody was supposed to know that. And Dirty Crime Boy seemed like a surprisingly nice guy. He was out there running what seemed to be some kind of a drug van but Tubbo had chosen not to worry about it too much.

The other two members, however...

"Sleepy Boys? Doesn't ring a bell." Protesilaus' face was suspiciously blank.

"You know, back when you called yourself the Blood God."

"Nah nah nah, I'm Protesilaus, not the Blood God."

"Come on, you're OBVIOUSLY the Blood God."

"I've never even heard of that guy."

"You're LITERALLY a pigman with superhealing powers and a shiny magical sword, you wear a crown AND you're hanging out with a blond guy with wings who looks just like the Angel of Death."

"Wow, wild coincidence", said Protesilaus

“Not gonna lie, the Angel of Death is a really cool name“, said Zephyrus.

Tubbo ignored them. "And you sound exactly like the Blood God."

"I don't hear it", said Protesilaus.

"You said you don't even know who he is!"

"Exactly."

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN 'EXACTLY'??? THAT DOESN'T EVEN MAKE SENSE!!!"

"Well I can't hear it if I've never even heard him speak. That's just logic."

Up in the rafters Zephyrus was cackling like a madman.

"You annoy me so much", said Tubbo.

"Aaaanyways, just give us a little peek into the vault, alright? Just out of curiosity, you know."

Tubbo had made it to the remote, he just needed one more distraction to cover for him grabbing it. "Uh..." Then he had an idea: he just took a quick sudden glance at the exit, as if he'd seen something over there and sure enough both of the criminals immediately turned to check. It was just long enough. He got the remote. "Okay fine, you can see the vault."

"Nice, nice." Protesilaus was still glancing around suspiciously but he had no idea what he should have been suspicious of.

Tubbo was more than happy to open the vault now. It might be holding the prototypes but it was also filled with a small army of robots.

All of which came to life with the press of a button.

"Ah", said Protesilaus. "There's his secret back-up."

"Oh Jesus", said Zephyrus. "I think we fucked up."

"You could say that", said Tubbo. "If you just leave peacefully I might let you go", he added in a sudden fit of uncharacteristic levels of confidence.

Protesilaus raised his sword. "Well you see, I really want those weapons, though."

"I guess you'll just have to fight the robots for it then", said Tubbo, configuring the targetting system.

"Mate, they've got guns on them", Zephyrus called out from above.

"Take cover then", said Protesilaus, very much not taking any cover at all himself.

Tubbo, pretty sure the bots knew which people to fight, released them on the criminals.

Protesilaus immediately managed to dodge the first few lazer bolts from the bots, but the third hit him on the arm. He flinched a bit but didn't seem too bothered. "Ouch. Okay so they can actually aim."

Still dancing around the shots, he held his hand to the wound and once he took it off, only the singed hole on his sleeve remained. The Blood God had been known for some kind of healing powers and coincidentally Protesilaus of the Syndicate, who apparently definitely wasn't the Blood God, just happened to also have healing powers. This fight was going to be hard even for thirty robots.

The pigman finally took some cover, hiding behind a pillar. The robots would have to move closer and Tubbo could already tell that if he'd manage to single them out, Protesilaus would easily take them down one by one.

Even worse, Zephyrus had hidden behind a different pillar up near the ceiling and was sniping the bots from above. They were supposed to be bulletproof but the man was absolutely cracked and managed to keep hitting them in the joints and in the eyes.

But at least the bots had given Tubbo some room to work with. He bolted into the vault and headed straight for a very specific section.

"So I just wanna know, professor", Protesilaus called out from the hall, "how are you NOT the evil mastermind here? You have a LITERAL horde of robots in your control that you can just let loose on people!"

"What do you MEAN? They're for fighting people like you! In this exact kind of situation!" Tubbo found what he was looking for and quickly unbuckled the huge harnesses holding it in place. He had to get a stool to reach the highest ones and nearly tripped on it in his hurry.

"Oh and how many of these have you sold to the government? And what if they just decide that they'd be very convenient for taking care of dissenters?"

"Well if the dissenters are literal supervillains, that sounds great." He climbed the ladder on the wall up to the platform by the mech suit and jumped inside.

He couldn't hear what Protesilaus responded after he pulled down the dome of the suit over his body. The sounds of fighting and the bulletproof glass drowned it all out from this distance, and the sound system wasn’t turned on yet. Now the odds should be a lot more even, though. Let’s see how they deal with this, he thought. He settled in and launched the mech--

... and then maneuvered awkwardly through the mess of secret weapons and machines inside his vault. He was pretty sure he didn't break too many things on the way, it was fine. In the corner of his eye he thought he saw a flash of pink and for a second he worried that the pigman had followed him into the vault where it would be almost impossible for him to fight in the suit but luckily he could still hear the sound of sword clanging into metal from outside.

He moved over to the vault door as sneakily as he could while piloting a 12-foot-tall machine in a tight space and looked out into the hall. The floor was littered with broken robots, and there were several blinded ones aimlessly wandering around and getting in the way of the ones that still functioned properly. Protesilaus was towards the back of the hall, stabbing a bot in the armpit and tearing off its arm, Zephyrus on the other hand, still perching on the rafters, had moved around the pillar he had hidden behind, now aiming away from the vault. Neither of them were looking at Tubbo. He took aim and shot at one of the huge grey wings.

"Ah! Fuck!" Zephyrus spun around. "You little shit!"

"Zephyrus, are you okay??" Protesilaus immediately looked over to his ally and took another hit himself.

"I'm FINE, dude!" Zephyrus sounded exasperated but fond. "Look out yourself! Also the kid has a fucking mech."

"A what?"

Tubbo slammed the vault door shut. Good luck getting in there now, Syndicate. Then he tossed aside some robot carcasses to clear out the floor and threw one at Protesilaus who dodged it easily but in the process took another hit from a different robot. He was starting to look tired and he was obviously distracted by Zephyrus getting hurt. That was promising.

Tubbo started climbing the pillar up to the ceiling. Zephyrus cursed again and tried to hop around the pillar to run across to the other side but his hurt wing didn't open properly so he lost his balance, slipped up and fell. "Shit!"

"ZEPHYRUS!"

The man managed to open his wings and soften the fall but the injury made him veer dangerously to the left and crash into a pile of broken robots. Protesilaus leaped over to him, dropping his sword and laying his hands on his friend's wing and back. A faint red glow emitted from the touch points.

Tubbo jumped back down to the ground and stormed at them. He punched the pigman right in the chin, sending him flying across the room. He then tried to grab Zephyrus but the man had already slipped away and had apparently managed to pick up his friend's sword. "You motherfucker", the man said, "I'm going to take that fucking suit apart and then it's your turn."

"Zeph!" Protesilaus called from the side and Zephyrus tossed the sword to him without taking his eyes of off Tubbo. Then the man pulled up his sniper rifle again and Tubbo quickly covered his weak points with his armoured arms and jumped behind a pillar. He needed to disarm Zephyrus ASAP.

Behind them, Protesilaus was taking care of the last few robots. Tubbo didn't have much time, but he couldn't do anything until Zephyrus would have to reload, the guy was just too accurate...

"Oh fuck", said Zephyrus suddenly. "Prot, the door!"

They all turned to look at the exit.

There, at the door, was Ranboo, widened eyes flicking between Tubbo, the broken robots and the Syndicade. He was holding a bowl of biscuits and a cup of tea. "Uh... hello? Hi?"

Ranboo was actually NOT allowed in the vaults but how do you stop someone who can literally teleport anyway? Tubbo was glad to see him sneaking in, though.

"Ranboo! Help! They're trying to steal the weapons!"

"I..." Ranboo seemed frozen in place.

"Ranboo!" Tubbo was starting to get worried. His husband wasn't even taking any shelter. He drove the mech over to him to at least give him some protection.

"I just came to bring you cookies? Coz I thought maybe you were staying late to make the deadline and I thought--"

"Ranboo, I'm being attacked by supervillains right now!"

"Look, what if we just talked this through? I'm sure everybody here would rather not kill each other, right?" Ranboo was tall enough to lay a hand on Tubbo's shoulder even when he was wearing the mech suit which kind of pissed Tubbo off to be quite honest.

"Sure", said Protesilaus, "I love negotiating. Give us the weapons and their blueprints and we're more than happy to go."

"See? That's good, right? Tubbo, we can just let them have the weapons."

"Ranboo, sometimes you're a bit too quirky for my liking. Stop being quirky, help me fight them. You can use your... T-E-L-I-P-O-R-T-A-T-I-O-N powers."

Everybody just stared at him for a second.

"Shouldn't it be T-E-L-E?" said Protesilaus.

"Tubbo, you realise they can spell words too, you know, like most people who graduated elementary school?" said Ranboo.

"I'M SORRY! I'M TIRED, OKAY?"

“You could have just said ‘use your powers’, I mean, I know what my powers are.”

“IT'S BEEN A REALLY LONG DAY!“

"Zephyrus, I think this guy might be too much for us, I've never met such intimidating intellect", said Protesilaus. Zephyrus seemed to already be dying of laughter and his ally's words did not help.

"Now that's just rude," said Tubbo.

He'd barely finished his sentence when a horrible whistling sound hit them all like an invisible cargo train. After a second Tubbo managed to reassemble his braincells long enough to figure it out: "The fire alarm!"

Then he noticed the grin on his enemy's face. "Well, good job, everyone! Let's go home, Zephyrus", said Protesilaus cheerfully.

"Sure, mate."

The secret third member of the Syndicate, Tubbo suddenly remembered. The container they'd brought with them was gone too. Well, fuck. "This whole thing was a diversion??"

"Yep." The Protesilaus was already at the exit and Zephyrus was following right behind him. "See ya, losers!"

Something inside the vault exploded, making a muffled bang through the door, as if just to prove where exactly the fire had been lit.

"Oh man..." Tubbo flopped down on his seat. "I spent SO LONG building all those things!"

"Tubbo, we need to get out." Ranboo took him by the hand of his mech suit and pulled him along.

"No, we could still go in and save the--"

"No, Tubbo. Let's NOT run into the vault full of dangerous chemicals that's literally on fire, actually."

×××

By the time the fire department showed up, pink flames had enveloped the entire lab complex. The terrorists presumably had at least one of the prototypes now and all the remaining ones were a lost cause.

It's not like all the work was gone to waste, they'd made some backups at least, but it would be a pain to find a new lab and order all the extremely volatile chemicals again. So much paperwork. Tubbo was really not good at paperwork.

"Well, there goes my summer holidays I guess", he said.

"Yeah", said Ranboo. "There they go."

×××

"So... Lethe", said Techno at the next Syndicate meeting, "you never happened to mention you were friends with Professor Underscore."

Ranboo shifted nervously in his chair. "I mean... in my defence, you never said you were going to raid his lab?"

"True, true. It didn't seem like relevant information at the time I suppose. You know, because you're kinda more in the group just for the book club and Bake Off Fridays and not so much for the vigilante thing."

"How do you know Professor Underscore, Lethe?" asked Niki gently.

Ranboo looked around the table. He was fairly certain that the others wouldn't kill him for fraternizing with the enemy. He was pretty sure anyway. At least 70% sure.

Also they were all staring at him now.

"Uh... he's my... husband?"

The staring continued.

"Oh!" said Niki.

"Well", said Techno. "This is awkward."

"Uh huh?" Ranboo responded, his entire body tense and slightly wobbly.

"Techno", Phil said softly. Techno brushed him off.

"So uh, are you attached to him, Lethe?"

"Y-yes?" Ranboo straightened his back. "Yes." he said again, more firmly.

"Alright. I guess in the future we should try not to kill him then."

#dsmp fanfiction #technoblade fanfiction #im not tagging the others #i feel like im too much of a techno stan and it shows

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anestheticrage · 4 years ago

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Be me: Japanese honor student🎓, 15, with half a brain and even less of a plan. Hunting bitches by day and witches by night. Livin that dank only child✌️ life while mom n dad yeet all over the globe, leavin me plenty of time to forget not to make 2 lunches for myself #quirky 😜

no time for socialization or basic electronics skills ???📱??? when your best friends are an alien demon rabbit🐰👽 and the inexplicable Hole ™ in your brain. lmao, btw did i mention im ✨M✨A✨G✨I✨C✨A✨L✨

dreamin bout my 2D waifus again when familiar pink haired cancer patient dances through my brain passin out fliers: Kamihama Meguca Dating Service: Sponsored by Cult of the Magius. 250 stones per session 🤔

seems legit, Mr. Moneybags. wasn't spending my unwieldy sack of gemstones on anything else anyway. lets pull 💎💎💎

first up we have Redhead Radagast and her plethora of plants. 🌿☺️🦎

anndd, nearly dies immediately.

well not off to a great start but i guess shes pretty cute at lea- oh FUCK its her girlfriend, Tsundere Poseidon😒🔱💦, and their exasperated, straight and single Sword Mom 😔🗡️🔥. fml gonna have to save up for the next pull. might as well play a few rounds with what i got tho.

get in some good girl talk about things like school, color coded hair styles, body count, permanent soul damage, and our personal demon pacts. ya know, the usual 😚 . realize my dark backstory seems to be missing, so the girls take me to Ketchup Queen Sappho 🍅🥧 (wtf?) to molest my glowy egg stone. whatevs, more action than ive had since Kuroe 🖤 got added to the story anyway

the gang agrees it's time to hunt down the cutest rabbit pimp 🕶️🐇💵 in the city. >> say 🎵mukyuuu🎵 one more time and ill hug you so hard my backstory will pop right out, you adorable fluffy bastard. plz be my new best friend 💕

Form brand new friendship pact with Kyubae, and remember that my lil Sis 🐥 was always the best wingman for pickin up magic chicks, and kept her side of the room so spotless i forgot she existed. whoops 乁༼☯‿☯✿༽ㄏ Maybe if I find her i can stop paying these exorbitant pull fees.📵💎

speaking of which: hot damn this week's featured bachelorette is a 19 year old model and magical detective🔎 with massive levels of PTSD and self loathing 🥵💙💦 more likely to stab you or dramatically jump off a rooftoop than utter a single positive comment. wow, maybe i really COULD find true love…

... if i had MORE THAN A 1% FUCKING DRAW CHANCE. 😡 smh

hard to make much progress finding sis or winning the broken heart of a hard boiled detective amidst the never ending lover's quarrel of the Trident Vine Lesbians. 💔 Sword Mom tells them if they don't behave a monster will take them away. LOL classic mom 🤣

>>>HOLY FUCK IT DID

declare all-out war on urban legends, starting with staircases ⚔️ to reunite the dysfunctional trio, and hope that I net a way better lineup with the next 10x pull. at least sad sleuth lady came to help out. they say combat is the best way to bond wi- and there she goes off the rooftop again 🙄 fml

alright that got way off track, we need a fresh start, away from all the loli drama. how bout a little B&E🔓🔨🤷🏻‍♀️ at the local house of worship to clear my head. ahh nothing like the unanswered prayers of the masses to get you in the mood for another wasted pull, and the 🔥 MIGHTIEST 🔥 headache you could ask for with a side of Double Cooked Pork 🐖🍜 (meh 5/10🧾)

venture forth into the spiritual unknown with your new human flamethrower🔥🌻🧡 and ask your favorite private eye to please, for the love of Eve, trade Meguca accounts with me~~~ Head through the eastern spirit portal to meet up with hologram propaganda sis and detective crush's evil ex, who joined a dating-app cult (#fuck) and also turned into the moon?🌕?(that's rough buddy)

get ambushed by Acid Horse on Wheels 🌈🐴 and vomit up my soul so hard that its time for a crossover episode. T U R F F F W A R R R *que operatic harmonies* 💛 Blondie with the hair drills and enough attitude and guns to fill up a noble phantasm tries to ban my account permanently, but PI heartthrob denies her admin privileges. aww babe i didn't know you cared. 😭♥️

get kidnapped by my new true love and go back to her place 😏 defs enough empty rooms to house five emotionally traumatized girls and at least two ghosts hehehe👻 XD 💚🃏💜🎸 decide to form the anti-gossip brigade and recruit my blazing sunflower after getting ambushed by the witch living in my fruit loops🥣

❌outvoted 2:1 that cults are bad. mf. fiinneee one last pull to round out the team and then I'll delete the app. cmonnn Karin 🎃~

OH HELL YEAH TWO FOR ONE.

Always wanted a daughter 💜🔨🐄 with a penchant for pissing off the local Martial Arts & Books Club and drinking suspicious liquids offered by total strangers. Well if it's good enough for her AND the sexy mayadere with enough game to seduce a mermaid, might as well get in on that myself.

#curseddrank 🤢 0/24 would not recommend to a friend, 'cept maybe Ria

win alot of cash 🤑, blow up a fountain, meet the pied piper²🎶🖕, moon cult, monochrome feathers, something about liberation✊🏻; adopt temper tantrum cow girl. aces 💜🥩

Next up!!! skydiving with DJ Hammer! Jump to apparently-not-certain death after suicidal A.I. 💚💾🗼 tells you to rescue her hostage before they run out of Radiohead albums and have to move on to Thom Yorke's solo discography. save the invisible shield kitten 💚👑😿 from happiness and get chased through the internet by the sexiest homicidal Paint Pallette 💚🎨😈 since Caravaggio. (apparently green is the color of the digital apocalypse. i’m deleting Kako from my friend's list)

that’s it, fuck this app. 250 stones 💎 per-life-threatening-experience is more than i’m willing to deal with 😓 don’t wanna mess with the perfect nuclear family anyway. we've already got:

✔️the two emotionally traumatized moms with memory and commitment issues

✔️the adhd daughter with anger management problems and a giant hammer

✔️the psychologically abused scizophrenic cat

✔️and the eccentric aunt with crippling anxiety

#squadgoals

now that were done hoarding bitches, its time to hunt the witches. and the bitches makin the witches. btw did i mention the witches ARE the bitches! AND WERE ALL GOING TO DIE!? 📽️⁉️💀 wait fuck lets back up a second

This is Nemo📕 and Token🧪 and they have all the answers but prefer if you only ask vague questions in exchange for vague responses so they can fill in the rest by discussing their superior intellect 🧠 at length. not to mention they built that dating app, so of course everyone in my harem decides to be a FUCKING. TRAITOR.🤬

cept waifu prime ofc 🥰💙. [PTSD > brainwashing] 'yOu CaN bE tHe LeAdEr NoW'. i have been from the very beginning you traumatized Hinedere nightmare. maybe if you weren't so caught up collecting surrogate daughters you would've noticed IM👏THE👏ONLY👏 ONE👏PROGRESSING👏THE FUCKING👏PLOT✨

rescue the rest of dysfunctional found-family™ from selves before my adorable firebender burns down Disnihama🎡🔥😱 during her weekly anxiety attack. (love the makeover T B H)

CHAPTER 8: Magical Girl Massacre🩸🗡️

- everyone has like, the shittiest day ever

- the new Pope really needs to be extradited from the church

- make friends with a really pretty tree 🌺🌲✨

i swear, if i don't finish this god damn story in time to get that free pull im gonna beat the shit out of every mirror i find in that giant mansion that i haven't even had any time to even mention yet. 🖕🏚️ let alone EVERYTHING happening with the prequel [fuck you, I'm the star] girls 💗💜💙💛❤️️ and their multidimensional melodrama. We don't need that many repetitive af episodes to emphasize that Homo-ra is a shitty person. we've all seen Rebellion. 🙄

NO, I DONT CARE IF YOU WANT SAPPHO'S BACKSTORY, I ONLY HAVE 79 STONES LEFT AND IF YACHAN FINDS OUT I HAVEN'T DELETED THE APP YET IM GONNA HAVE TO GO SLEEP IN WITH SANA 😭💎💸😠

uhhhggggg where were we… Topple a cult and burn down Hotel Denoument only to realize that Sis was fused with the dating app servers this entire madokafuckin time (told ya she was the best wingman 😊).

Dilemma: Sis =🥚, Triumvirate of Trouble want 🐣. What do? vote now:

Help Hatch - IIIIIII

Not Do That - IIIII

What The Actual Fuck Is Going On - IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Lets just fight everyone until something good happens.

🔥🔫🔥🗡️🔥😱🔥🌆🔥😱🔥🛡️🔥💣🔥

Kill (???) the artist-in-chief of the italian reindeer murder police after teaching her the true meaning of Christmas 🎄 hatch 🐣lil Sis and realize she WAS your wingman all along🐰 MUKYUUUU! we're just gonna ignore how much trouble it would have saved if you'd just mentioned that. "yOu DiDnT aSk..."

FUCK YOU SPACE BITCH. ONCE AN INCUBATOR ALWAYS AN INCUBATOR 🖕🐇🔪

anywho, somewhere along the lines we of course summoned the Antichrist ⚙️ because why not raise the stakes to max and still not kill off a single character. Madofuckinkami, can we PLEASE wrap this up. 😩💤

feathers (not the culty kind, tfm) rain from the sky, and the power of friendship and not having the Urobutcher 🔪🩸as a lead writer saves our peacefully sectioned off alternate reality 😇

TL:DR fuck cults, real life waifus DO exist, don't sell your soul to space rabbits, or your stones to megacorporations. Enjoy arc 2 on the JP server with your shitty translation patch you filthy fuckin weebs

Yours Truly,

- Thirsty Weeb Eroha 💗💎😘

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charmingturkeysandwich · 5 years ago

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I Could Use a Love Song Ch. 3: don’t need no reason or happy hour

Chapter 3 of my Country Singer!Emma AU is here. I added a tag on AO3 for alcohol abuse, because while I don’t think we have true alcoholism here... Emma’s coping mechanisms are shit and the heavy drinking isn’t the healthiest. I wanted to make sure that I added that warning here as well. Please don’t use alcohol like Emma does here. I know from experience it’s hella bad news. Find a therapist! This is actual advice, not a joke. For reals. Emma should have just gone to a counselor instead of making appointments with Jose Cuervo and Jack Daniels. If anyone has treated you the way this iteration of Neal treated Emma, talk to someone. If you can’t afford a therapist, talk to me. Seriously, no lie, no joke, I’m only alive today because I eventually adopted a dog and sought counseling to cope with life’s many traumas.

Mmmmkkay enough babbling.

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Their next few gigs were some of the best in Emma’s (admittedly tequila-hazed) memory, and for once that glimmer of hope for that future of fame and fortune… well, it felt like a hell of a lot more than a glimmer.

The crowds had been rowdy, raucous, and ready to sing along to every song on their whole set. A few people even more some of the merch Killian had started selling at the door, nothing fancy of course, but it made her heart burst with pride nonetheless.

It had all gotten so real, so achievable, so close to everything she’s been dreaming about before she ever really knew that dreams were a thing that could come true.

So of course something was about to bring back the quasi-comfort of her life always reverting to being a waking nightmare.

That was a deeply melodramatic way of putting it – it’s not like she was being beaten or shamed or any of the daily torments her tiny town had ensured were burned into her brain. But that was the problem with the past, wasn’t it? It wasn’t over, even when it was. Those days were past but they would always somehow be present, replaying in her brain and aching in her heart no matter how far from Pennsylvania their little van puttered.

(Whoever said you can’t go home again neglected to mention how hard it was to leave it, even after you’d physically gone.)

It had been a Tuesday. In some chain grocery store outside Virginia Beach, the sun glowing through the big front windows and the icy chill of the air conditioning raising goosebumps on her bare arms. Emma had only echoes of a hangover, so Ruby’s constantly chatting wasn’t nearly as grating as it could be. They moved slowly through the aisles, tossing various food and supplies in their cart, more than fulfilling the list Graham and Mary Margaret had given them.

They were still struggling artists but some weeks the struggle was… less. This was one of them and if they decided to celebrate with Patron instead of Jose Cuervo and fresh, organic honeycrisp apples instead of Great Value brand dried apple chips, well, it’s because they damn well deserved it.

They couldn’t have been more than a few feet away from the checkout when the radio (a constant calming presence, most days, being the object of their ambition and all) caused her heart to drop to the deepest pits of her gut, twisting her insides until she was nearly dry-heaving to get the gross sensation of feelings out of her body and in the sewer system where it belonged.

They say scent is tied to memory, and it surely is, but there’s something, too, in sound. Music had a distinct way of tying itself to a moment, to a feeling. For some people that feeling was joy, was love, could be better than the best drug to intoxicate them with no risk of hangover. But for Emma, for this song in particular, it was all hangover, no high.

I’m set on cruise control

I’m slowly losing hold of everything I got

You’re looking so damn hot

The lyrics were innocuous enough. Sweet. Loving. There was certainly some couple out there – many, probably – who smiled fondly at each other when it came on. But for her, it was just a reminder of how pathetic she’d been, once upon a time, how deeply manipulated she’d been. And oh, the consequences she’d suffered for falling for a sweet voice and a pretty face and a moment that had felt like a country song.

And I don’t know what road we’re on

Or where we’ve been, from starin at you, girl

All I know is I don’t want this night to end

It had been a song she’d listened to in Neal’s truck, on a back road, the moon high and the stars bright and her heart hammering in her chest before he leaned over the center counsel parked in his daddy’s field and kissed her like she was precious, like she was, like he could love her through this life and the next.

And even today, half-hungover in a Piggly Wiggly or whatever the fuck this place was, she still felt the whisper of butterflies in her. She still remembered how much she’d believed the lies and even hoped the bad stuff wasn’t actually real, holding on to nights like that first one, her and Neal seemingly the only two people on Earth and all she’d ever need to feel whole again.

Emma Swan was a fighter, a survivor, a strong, badass woman that no man would ever hurt again.

But one Luke Bryan song on a clear Tuesday afternoon had her so torn up in shame, she almost forgot her best friend was standing beside her, her little “family” of a band and crew waiting for her back at the block of hotel rooms down the road.

She wasn’t in Pennsylvania. Neal wasn’t anywhere near her. But she could practically smell his cologne and the exhaust of his truck and the fact that there was a tiny part of her that truly still wished it had all worked out, that he’d been the happily ever after she’d wanted, and she wanted to slap herself silly for how stupid one smart girl could be.

“I think we can afford some Reese’s mix, right?” Ruby asked, already tossing two bags in the cart as they entered the self-checkout line.

“Yeah,” was all Emma could respond, her traitor brain still wavering between wishing for an alternate ending to her stupid, sad tale and coming totally clean to Ruby about what horrors she’d suffered and hitting the road with her on a revenge-fueled quest to keep that fucker from ever hurting another sweet, could-be-innocent girl ever again.

“Emma, you with me?” Ruby’s voice was hesitant, her eyes wide as she took in Emma’s likely ghost-pale complexion and battle-ready stance.

(She was always fighting those internal ghosts and damn could those things travel.)

But she didn’t want to think about Neal or the bruises long-healed or how she wishes she could time travel back and prevent the most painful part of what that monster had done to her, the part where for a pretty little minute she truly thought she’d loved him.

No. The past might be doing its damnedest to creep into today but she was not going to let it.

Fuck you, Luke Bryan, and all your pelvic sorcery.

“God, I hate this song,” Emma finally croaked out. “I think we should celebrate today.”

“Celebrate how much you hate a song that I’m fairly sure David would kill you for hating?”

“No, Rubes. Celebrate this,” Emma motioned all around them, somewhat erratically, only serving to further confuse Ruby. At least for a moment. “We’re really getting somewhere, aren’t we? I mean, three hotel rooms. That’s, like, a record. We’re getting somewhere. You and I, we came from some shit, right? And now we’re headed toward something good and I think we should celebrate.”

“And how exactly do you propose we celebrate this? Because if it’s by having a four-way with Graham and Killian I’m absolutely in, with just a couple ground rules – “

Emma cut off her teasing before her brain had enough time to make any visuals of that: “Ew. God, no. Why does your brain even go there? No. I just meant, you know, hitting some bars or the beach or something. Day drinking. It’s the ultimate in enjoyment and not giving a fuck.”

“So you’re suggesting we celebrate the good the same way we drown our sorrows in the bad?” Ruby mocked, tossing the groceries on the conveyor belt and a packet of mints at Emma’s head.

“No, you drink your sorrows in the dark. You drink your celebrations when the sun’s out,” Emma said like it was the most normal, accepted thing in the world, like she was reciting it from a code of conduct instead of having made it up on the spot to cover for the fact that she very much, one hundred percent was drowning her sorrows but just didn’t have the patience to wait for the sun to set.

“Sure, Ems. Let’s go with that.” Ruby clearly wasn’t buying her bullshit – she always did have an excellent bullshit detector – but she went along with it all the same.

Emma paid for the groceries and hefted as many bags to the car as she could possibly carry, the burn in her arms like the warmth of the sun as she flip-flopped her way to the awaiting van, a great day of drinking and forgettingahead of her.

The usual six of them turned into seven that day, Killian’s old buddy from the service having been stationed at the naval base in Norfolk and here for a visit. Will, that was his name, and he was a pain in the ass in the very best way. He had been matching her shot-for-shot in the hotel room before they hopped the Uber to The Cove, a beachside bar favored by locals and tourists alike. He would tease her and taunt her and buy her drinks, but with absolutely the energy of a brother and not a I’m looking to get into your pants kind of way.

David saw her as a sister, sure, but he tended toward the serious, the protective. He cared so much and knew too much, and it kept him from being totally lighthearted or even downright rude. And Graham, well he never paid Emma quite that much attention, always on his own quests and whatnot. She couldn’t blame the guy, and truly she didn’t usually want attention, but there was something about today, something about the casual nature of her exchanges with Will that allowed her to just be free.

Killian wasn’t quite on board, though. Ever since she and Ruby had floated the idea of some casual no-show-tonight fun, he’d been weirdly quiet. Mary Margaret and David were notably excited, seeming to view it as an opportunity for date night, even with the five other tagalongs. And Ruby was pretty much always up for a party.

But Killian seemed to be cranky at her and she couldn’t figure out why.

“Let loose, why don’t you, Jones!” Emma shouted across the bar, Killian nursing a rum and coke while Ruby, Will, and Emma had joined another group of probable-tourists in a limbo competition.

“Eh, let him sulk,” Will had suggested, stumbling a little after returning to the upright position. He was suspiciously good at the limbo. Maybe he’d been a gymnast in another life?

“I’ll get him, Em,” Ruby promised, having fallen flat on her ass after the last round (the responding ooooohhhhhhshaving more to do with her skirt riding up to her waist as she fell than it was about the fall itself).

Ruby had spent the next hour or so in the corner with Killian, both steadily drinking but never really coming to re-join the party. So Emma and Will kept socializing with strangers while Graham flirted hard with a pretty girl and Mary Margaret and David found another grossly into each other couple to apparently double date with, because of course they did.

After a few drinking games, a few messy dances, and definitely too much liquor for before 5pm, Emma finally took a break, she and Will sidling up to the bar and ordering some nachos.

“Y’know, you’re not nearly as pretty as Killian described you,” Will said after a few minutes of nacho-focused silence.

“Hey! I think you’re insulting me and I don’t appreciate it,” Emma responded, cheese dripping down the corner of her mouth.

“Way he talks, you’d think you were a bleeding fallen angel or something. I definitely didn’t expect a hot mess who talked with her mouth full.”

“Hah! You said hot. I still got it,” she joked, chomping down on another cheese and chili covered chip.

Emma had become pretty good at reading people – people tended to adapt after you suffering the consequences of falling for it – and Will definitely wasn’t flirting with her. At least not with actual intent. So why on earth had he brought up her looks?

She was happy to play along with whatever game he had going, was even feeling a little bolder and more confident than usual with his carefree attitude and his backward compliments.

But his next comment was the proverbial bucket of ice on any of those feelings.

“He’s a good man, Emma. I hope you don’t toy with him.”

“Excuse me?” What exactly was this fucker accusing her of? She hadn’t even talked to Killian since they’d been at the hotel and she certainly hadn’t been mean. No, even at her most prickly, she was never all-out mean to him. He was a good guy, the type to hold your hair when you puked and nearly the opposite of her initial assumptions about him. Of course she’d never ‘toy with him.’ The fucking nerve of this dude.

“I don’t think you know me enough to continue those thoughts, Scarlet,” she warned, shoving the nachos away and downing her fruity drink.

“Don’t get me wrong. I like you, Emma. You’d make a good mate. But I’m more like you than you realize, and I know how many people I hurt before I got myself straight. Just … keep that in mind, won’t ya?”

And then the bastard just… left.

He didn’t say goodbye to anyone – not even to Killian – and left Emma pissed as all hell and sitting alone at a tourist trap in the worst city in all of Virginia.

So much for that attempt at celebration.

But before her thoughts (and actions) could turn to the dark side, Graham and David were approaching her for a friendly tournament of darts and after a couple bulls eyes and a little light taunting, her carefree spirit had returned, just in time to kick Mary Margaret’s ass and move onto the championship game between her and Killian.

“So, that friend of yours is something,” Emma observed, tossing her first set of darts and landing them with soft thunks into the felt.

“Will? Aye. He’s… he’s been a friend for quite a long time. There for me for some pain. So I choose to keep his pain-in-the-ass existence around.” His tone was light and his words sincere, but there was a weight to his expression that Emma didn’t quite understand.

He took his turn, little glints in his eye and mini-fist pumps when he hit his intended target. It was adorable, to be honest. But there was definitely something wrong and despite Will’s seeming accusations about her and her abilities to be a good friend, she wanted nothing more than to take away whatever pain he was reliving at the moment.

So she lost – yes, intentionally – and dragged him to the bar, ordering him some straight whiskey to loosen him up and hopefully to help him forget like she already was.

“Why, Swan, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were trying to get me drunk,” he practically purred, breaking the flirty tone with a gentle boop to her nose. “Which is usually my tactic.”

“Easy, Captain,” she joked with him, fiddling with the prosthetic ‘hook’ contraption he wore when they went out (it’s a perfect beer holder, he’d said, to which she’d responded yeah, right, you just want to play pirate).

Despite the fog of the liquor, a few facts clicked into place. He’d suffered some bad shit in his past, shit Will apparently witnessed. Killian had also lost his hand, probably in the Navy. And this town, it wasn’t far from a navy base. Could that have been his navy base? Had they inadvertently brought Killian to the scene of the crime, so to speak?

The way she never wanted to go back to her ‘hometown,’ the place she’d lived the longest and suffered the most… what if that’s how he felt here? What if she’d suggested they celebrate over the grave of whatever and whoever he lost?

God, she was a hot mess and she was dangerous, the way she sank into her pain without looking into anyone else’s.

Before she could talk herself out of it, she wanted to apologize. Or something. “I’m sorry about this. Or, I guess, about whatever led to this. Or accompanied it. I’m just… I’m just sorry?”

“For the ungodly amount of liquor you’re pressuring me into drinking? Don’t worry, love, I’m a big boy.”

Ugh, the deflection. She knew that tactic well. “No, I mean this,” she said, gripping the elbow of his damaged arm. “I don’t know what happened and I’m not asking, but I just want you to know that I’m sorry. Not in the fault kind of way. Just the way where I wish it hadn’t happened and I know there’s pain and you didn’t deserve it. Or don’t. Currently. You know what I mean.”

“I think you’re drunk off your ass, darling.”

“Call me darling one more time and you’ll be the one on your ass.”

“So defensive, jeez,” he quipped, finishing another drink and slamming the glass back down on the table, his face melting into something a little more serious, if only for a moment. “Thank you, Swan,” he said finally, cupping her cheek with his right hand.

Her heart about stopped as his eyes bored into hers. It was much too much, the closeness, the feel of his hand, the heat of his body, the truth in his eyes, and all she wanted was to go back to teasing and laughing and strangers who didn’t have feelings or at least didn’t share them with her and why did she even bring it up, anyway? Just because Will had made her feel bad? Why shouldn’t they drink away their pain if it quieted the demons for one blessed day? Why should we have to suffer the same memories over and over when instead we could just fucking let go.

She should have just stuck to letting go.

But his intense sincerity washed away in a blink, his flirty near-pirate persona back with a vengeance. “Now, Swan, what game shall I best you at next?” His gentle caress on her cheek turned into a full grip, his fingers scrunching her face almost comically.

“Name it, Jones. You’re on.”

Turns out their little crew had signed them all up for a cornhole tournament out on the sand and Graham had called dibs on Emma as a partner, for which she was thankful. He was pretty boss at all bar games, and she had a competitive streak even without her BAC being higher than her high school GPA.

But get her drunk and she’d pretty much lie, cheat, and steal her way to bragging rights on whatever silly game they were playing.

So of course she and Graham had made it to the finals, their opponents two bikini-clad college girls who could trash talk like no other.

Which is why Emma was totally fine with the little plot she had brewing in her head.

“Graham, we need distractions here.”

“What do you mean, like have Mary Margaret set something on fire again?”

“Oh, come on. Pretty girls. Fun, happy, drunk, pretty girls. I saw them ogling you earlier so they’re probably straight. Take your shirt off. Now!”

“I always said I’d reject your advances when you inevitably tried to get me naked, Swan, but you drive a hard bargain.”

Emma rolled her eyes, but Graham did as instructed, stretching lazily and pantomiming sweat before pulling at the neck of his t-shirt and whisking it over his head.

The girls missed their next shots, and Graham had the chance to win it with this last toss and Emma was ready to bust out her victory dance just a tad prematurely.

Until the brunette untied her bikini top and let the fabric fall to her waist just as Graham was taking his shot.

He missed, of course.

Damn, these girls were good.

“Can I be of assistance?” a husky voice offered, his breath ticking her ear lobe.

Killian, of course.

“What exactly can you offer, Jones?” Graham swooped in to ask, clearly annoyed that his bare chest hadn’t yet won them the game.

“Well, Graham, Emma here assures me that you’re one ‘fine specimen of man’ but sadly to those girls you’re all talk and no action, across the beach from them, separated by this very game. I think they need something a little more… tactile.”

Killian was over-confident when he was drinking, but it’s not as if he were wrong. If she were one of those girls and Killian came up to her, with his sultry accent and his maddening smirk and the way he’d run his fingers through her long hair…

Yeah, it would work. Definitely. Yup.

“Go for it, Jones, but don’t come crying to us if they don’t take to your charms the way you want them to,” Emma warned, rolling her eyes and banishing all inappropriate thoughts of Killian Jones to the dark recesses of her mind with her knowledge of calculus and the memory of that time she walked in on Mary Margaret sucking David off in their shared kitchen back in Pittsburgh.

Killians voice alone proved distracting enough for the blonde girl to miss her shot and Graham, his ego now challenged, sank his with ease.

Emma cheered far too loud and leaped into Graham’s arms, her legs around his waist, Ruby rushing up to high five them and pass along a few more shots to keep the day rolling.

By the time the sun sank behind the bar, the ocean in front of them streaked with the deep blues and purples of twilight, Emma was well past drunk and definitely no longer thinking of any painful backstories or traumas or anything, really, but the cinnamon burn of the Fireball and the feel of Killian’s arm around her as they walked down a set of stairs to a fire pit so much like those that she’d built on the banks of the Allegheny and yet so different, the smell of the salt of the ocean and the leather of Killian’s jacket keeping her brain from connecting the present to the past.

“Jones, haven’t you ever heard you’re supposed to keep your hands to yourself in the presence of a lady?” she teased, wiggling her shoulders where he was grasping her.

“Aye, but I see no ladies here!” He chuckled and she elbowed him and he bowed his head to her ear as they stepped down the last stair. “Besides, love, what if you’d fallen and no one was there to save you?”

She rolled her eyes again, shrugging off his support now that there was no excuse for it, solid ground beneath their feet. “Oh, I’m a loud screamer. Someone would have come for me.”

“Oh, how I’d like to experience both of those things for myself…” Killian groaned, his mind of course solidly in the gutter.

Emma just laughed it off and stumbled toward the fire, joining Mary Margaret and David on a log clearly only meant for two.

Tomorrow was going to be hell, definitely more than just the echo of a hangover. But they had hotel rooms and each other and now and really those things alone made every minute of tomorrow’s inevitable headache more worth it than she could ever have fathomed in any stage of her life before this one.

#cs ff #cs au ff #cs fanfiction #keisha writes #i could use a love song #no luke bryans were harmed in the making of this chapter #yes they play cornhole wrong #i had a brain fart #so suspend your disbelief please #and seriously #i'm here for you if you need it #i drank my feelings for many years #it was not healthy #fun at times #but def not healthy #your trauma is not your fault #I LOVE YOU

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ladyhawk-s · 6 years ago

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“What a Halloween”

Summary: Tamaki Amajiki has always been a fearful person, even at the smallest of ages. However, making friends with Mirio has pushed him in ways that he maybe doesn’t want to know if he should be pushed in. Especially when it comes time for Halloween. Despite wanting to avoid all mentions of Halloween, Mirio decides that it’s time to celebrate his first Halloween and it’s one Tamaki won’t forget.

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A/N: Hello hello! So obviously, it's not Halloween, it's actually....28 days after that (29 depending on your time zone) and I really have no words to explain. Rather, I just want to apologize heavily for the....month delay on this. I actually have been going through a writing rut since I'm graduating this semester and doing a lot of things that have been stressing me out so, despite me wanting to write this, it almost turned into a stressor. It's been rough and I have another 3 weeks of it being rough but I'm so happy to have this done! It was for the @bnha-halloween-bb and Im sure I will be shot by the mods with how late I am but it's at least here! By no means am I proud of it but it's done and I'm so happy to be able to share it with you guys despite me not being the most pleased with it.

Rather, please support my LOVELY artist @nekosisterart who drew the piece for this fic:. They did such a phenomenal job with it and I'm literally shook. Not only are they amazingly talented but they are also super kind and sweet and just a wonderful bean and I was so honored to be working with them again. Really, go send all the love to them since they are super great <3 They put up with me during this whole thing and they are incredibly patient so I want to just WILL SMITH SHOW THEM OFF because they are wonderful !!! ----------------- Halloween was a strange time. In the past, it was a time where quirkless humans could pretend that they were beasts or have magical powers that sprouted from the palms of their hands. They were able to get candy by pretending to scare people with their fake powers and teeth and it was a day where the imaginable became reality.

But then quirks emerged and it threw off the balance that Halloween used to have. The fake accessories became real and people really developed features that originally were used for fear. Confusion swirled around people for a while on what to do for the holiday, wondering what to do next since there wasn’t much to fear anymore.

However, creativity burst in the people and Halloween was back in full swing, this time with an even higher intensity. People used their quirks to impress enough for candies and costumes became more elaborate. The horror cranked up to new levels and scary movies took on a different form that would have been eye wrenching in the past.

Even the little kids also took onto this new level. Before the age of four, they dressed up in whatever might have been cute or what their parents might have wanted them to wear. Then, when the quirks came in, that’s when the intensity started. Quirks shaped their halloween experiences and there was almost a competition on who could pull the scariest identities. School got involved in these activities and the school where Tamaki Amajiki and Mirio Togata went to was no different. The school encouraged students to go all out in their costumes provided that damages were kept to a fixable minimum.

But, while every classmate was discussing the plans of their costumes and how best to scare their parents day of, Tamaki wasn’t exactly in the same mood as them. Or rather, to put it into more simpler terms, he was absolutely terrified of Halloween and the horrors that came with it. Despite having the ability to transform his limbs into monstrous animals that he ingested earlier and possibly becoming more terrified than any recreations out there, something about the way tissue paper folded into itself and cheap fabric rippled on human skin just seemed to frighten Tamaki from where he was standing. Even though his mother constantly coaxed him through the day, he still ended up shivering at the mythical creatures that haunted his nightmares with their bloodsucking and howls at the moon. Sometimes he could feel little bit marks on the base of his neck that his mother said was from his imagination but Tamaki knew better.

So when the topic of the Halloween festival came up, Tamaki was on the top of the list on not attending. The teachers brought their hands and wiggled their fingers when discussing the horrors they would experience. There would be a haunted mansion maze that was made to send a soul out of the body and there would be enough candy to have a stomach ache for a week after. Everyone bounced in their seats the more was revealed but Tamaki could only ball up his fists and hide his head beneath the comfort of his arms. Images of fright conjured up in his mind, though they might have been more exaggerated to him than probably the other students. Not even his mother offering to volunteer or accompanying him to the event was enough to make Tamaki go.

But a certain blonde child had that effect on him.

In other schools, Tamaki never really had friends. His social anxiety made him quiver in front of other students and teachers usually went easier on him due to it, though others couldn’t understand the turmoil that went through his mind and usually left him alone, saying he could go play with the teachers. Friends were never something he had the chance to experience and there was always that little voice that desperately wailed for that chance.

And that chance happened this year.

This year he transferred to a new school and had to be immersed with new faces. While moving schools was already daunting enough, the fact that these would be new faces that would judge him the same way others did only made this more anxiety filled. He could remember walking down the halls, holding the strips of his backpack with tight hands that paled from the strong grip he had. His introduction didn’t even last that long because he couldn’t express the words he wanted to and ended up sitting down earlier than expected. Tears budded up on the water line of his eyes and he couldn’t focus for the rest of the class.

Until a boy called out to him and finished the sentence Tamaki couldn’t. “You want to be a hero, right?” the boy asked back, reading the mind of the scared one. Instantly, within a manner of 10 minutes, he found out that the blonde child was called Mirio Togata, he had a permutation quirk that could only work if he held his breath (which he was still having trouble perfecting and constantly hit walls and other foreign objects that left little scars on the top of his head), and that he was a curious kid that spammed Tamaki with questions about his quirk and what kind of animals he could recreate along with the feeling he got when his limbs were changed to chicken legs. Somehow Mirio ended up finding out more about Tamaki than anyone except his parents had in his entire life and Tamaki wasn’t so sure what to do with that. He knew he should have been cautious and wary and making sure that there was some distance but….Mirio had that cheerful smile that was infectious and Tamaki tunneled into it. Which turned out to be the right action since he began to be Tamaki’s first friend and he would never regret ever allowing Mirio to be open with him.

Until now. Now Tamaki was really beginning to question his friendship with Mirio.

Unlike Tamaki, Mirio happened to be the head of the excitement club for this school event. Everyday he would giddly explain the preparations his father making to his costume and he didn’t give anyone any hints as to what he was going to be (although Tamaki knew him well at this point and this year he was going to be a werewolf with fluffy ears and a bushed out tail. To be fair Mirio did invite him to his house and he saw those pieces laying around that Mirio would bashfully brush off whenever Tamaki asked him if those were parts of his costume). Many times throughout the day, he would go up to Tamaki’s desk and tell him how excited he was for it and that he was looking forward being able to go this year since last year was a year of flu but this time, he stocked up on his vitamins and enough of cold medicine to defeat the toughest of runny noses. And he would always check up on Tamaki to make sure he was still coming.

Yes, Tamaki told Mirio he would go. It wasn’t a very smart decision at all, it actually had a lot of flaws attached to it but seeing Mirio’s bright smile made him cave in and go to the festival. Besides it was a bit more complicated than that. Mirio was Tamaki’s first friend. Never did Tamaki have someone who would go out of their way to invite him to their house for dinner or to a party or even to spend just a bit of time with. While Tamaki knew in the bottom of his heart that Mirio wouldn’t judge him or leave him alone if he said no to coming, there was still this pressurized feeling that he had to go. At least to go for the sake of his friend. It was a weird sense of paying him back for all the kindness he’s given Tamaki. Possibly making it up to him might have had better connotations. Whatever it might have been, Tamaki was now stuck with date filled of events that were only going to be frightening and enough to haunt his dreams for the rest of the year.

Since Tamaki vowed to eliminate Halloween from his calendar, he never had to worry about making or even purchasing a costume. It was something that never crossed his mind and something that didn’t seem like it would be used anytime soon. Except for the fact that his initial plans to sit at home and watch cute shows were now tainted with going to a festival where the dress codes skewed to fit varieties of costumes. He initially tried to think of casual costumes that he could make using the items in his closet. However, when Tamaki brought these ideas up with Mirio, his friend cried nonsense and the next day came with an old vampire suit that was only worn once by its owner.

Every day, it was a reminder that Halloween was soon approaching and every day, Tamaki wished time would slow to prevent it from coming. But before anyone could stop it, it turned into the night of Halloween.

With a small bucket in the shape of a pumpkin, little Mirio Togata waddled through the sidewalk in his super secret and special costume of a werewolf. It was more uncomfortable than he had originally expected, especially with the tail bunching up near the gap between his legs, however he worked hard for this costume and nothing was going to stop him. He could endure it for a small bit.

After receiving looks and grins, he finally made it to Tamaki Amajiki’s house. In retrospect, they didn’t actually live too far from each other. They only lived a couple of blocks away and those blocks were covered with enough sidewalk and light that his father felt confident he could walk there by himself without being hurt. It also very much helped that Mirio had a quirk that allowed him to sink away in case so Mirio could only grin and be excited. His hands produced a small but mighty knock on the door, creating little pounds of noise that echoed within the house. At first nobody answered. But that didn’t stop Mirio from producing another round of knocks until the door opened to reveal a tired looking woman with bags ringing around her eyes.

“Oh hello, Togata. How are you?” She asked with a strain that was attempted to be covered in smiles but failing at every turn with that. Small wailes waved from behind her and the crinkles of her eyes pierced inwards. There was a tired and exhausted look seeped into her eyes that made Mirio feel bad for Tamaki’s mother.

“I’m doing well, Ms. Amajiki. Is Tamaki home?” Mirio asked, though he already knew the answer. Even at his young age, he still knew the fine motors of manners.

“Yes he is. Tamaki!” She called from the door. Silence. “Tamaki, your friend is here!” She yelled once more. Even more silence. Suddenly, the wails from earlier resurfaced and his mother’s eyes winced at the emergence. “It seems as if he’s huddled in his room, you can go in,” she said while giving room to the blonde boy. The second his body entered through the frame, she shut the door and quickly ran over to the screams, leaving Mirio by himself in the vast house.

With the layout of the house engraved in his mind from his countless visits, Mirio traversed through the halls to reach Tamaki’s room. It was hidden in a corner of the house that had shadows covering the darkness of the door, perfect for a person who couldn’t handle much of the sun beaming on them. Coming to the door, Mirio pressed his ear against the wood to hear any remnants of life. Silence. Tamaki sure knew when to be quiet when he wanted. Mirio’s hand went towards the knob and he cracked it open to find the room shrouded in darkness. “Amajiki? Are you here?” He asked softly, stepping onto the carpeted floor. There weren’t any visible signs of his friend but little whimpers came from the under the desk that stationed against the opposite wall. Mirio took careful steps before he crouched to see Tamaki’s directly. “Amajiki? What are you doing? Are you ok?”

Hearing Mirio’s voice snapped Tamaki out of the tunnel he found himself immersed in. Since putting on his costume, he found himself jumping at even the small sounds of wood shifting or the steps coming from his parents. He didn’t much remember how he exactly ended up in this position and what crossed his mind to end up underneath the desk but he wouldn’t lie, he didn’t exactly want to leave his spot. “It’s….nothing…..” Tamaki said softly as he crouched further into himself.

Until he felt his arm being pulled away from his hair so he could see the concern on Mirio’s face directly. “Then why are you under here?” His friend asked softly, his head slightly tilting to show his confusion.

Seeing that look made Tamaki’s eyes wander around as he thought of what to say next. It wasn’t necessarily that he was avoiding his look but rather, it was his way of trying to formulate all the thoughts that floated around in his mind. He didn’t want to go but he wanted to make Mirio happy but would this really make Mirio happy? So many thoughts ran through his brain and they could only come out as little stutters from the tip of his tongue. “I’m….I’m….sc-scar-re-d….” He managed to speak out, albeit in chopped syllables. His eyes closed once more to go back into that fantastical hole that he created in his mind.

“Why are you scared, Amajiki?” A tiny voice spoke out, making Tamaki reopen his eyes once more. Mirio’s beady eyes crinkled in worry and his mouth gave a small pout that contained a small frown in it.

Once more, Tamaki’s eyes diverted away from his and he could feel small tremors coursing through his body. He took a deep breath in. “I...don’t like the monsters...I don’t want to be hurt….There’s scary sounds and scary people and…I don’t...like those things…” he rambled on, trying to make sense of a situation that had no sense to it.

Tamaki then felt Mirio place his hands into his own and squeeze them tight in the darkness. It was hard to fully make out the emotion that was seen but it almost had a brotherly love attached to it. “There’s no reason to be scared Amajiki. All of it is fake. No one will hurt you.”

“B-but...how do you know?? They could jump out and...and….”

“Amajiki, I won’t let anyone or anything hurt you. I promise. Just trust me, ok?”

Tamaki wasn’t sure if it was that or the exchanges that happened back and forth but soon, having Mirio be someone to lean on, he managed to emerge from under the desk. Things turned into a blur and he didn’t exactly remember how things turned out. His mind went back and forth and switched off reality in moments. One minute, he remembered being in his house and the next, he was outside, walking alongside Mirio. He could hear Mirio speaking talking about different subjects but none of it truly registered in his head. The only thing that went through to him was the calling of his name and his cape fluttering around his feet. There wasn’t a measure on how long they were walking but the quiet winds of the streets gave a sign that they were heading to their destination but not quite there.

Unfortunately, soon enough, the sounds of goblins and ghouls began to mix itself into the winds. The duo reached the school that had been transformed from a clean, pristine building into one with cobwebs stringing from side to side and splotches of black smearing down the side. Animatronic screeches loomed from the interiors of bushes that came with cackles of lightning rotating in.

The closer they reached, the more Tamaki’s teeth chattered with little clicks that echoed from his mouth. His arm gripped tighter onto Mirio’s, holding onto him super tight in this special type of fear that came straight from horror films.

Yet, funnily enough, Mirio looked complete opposite from his friend. His beady black eyes shone with little stars twinkling in his pupils and his mouth formed a perfect amazed gap that was filled with wonder and excitement. If his tail had any form of reality behind it, it would have wagged ridiculously back and forth in this childish excitement that fit for his age. “Woah, that’s so awesome!” Mirio exclaimed, his feet bouncing up and down that made both him and Tamaki bob in unison. “C’mon, we gotta hurry!” And with that last push of pressure, Mirio took their still steps into a run that skidded through the dirt and landed them within the depths of the festival.

[They see a bunch of different costumes and there are some people trying to scare them which works for Tamaki but Mirio is chilling and such]

It was corny to say but it was something of another realm. The school was known to have proper clothing that seemed to be ironed onto skin with serious expressions that could make anyone be stiff. But this, this was something else. Baggy costumes of all kinds floated around with buckets in the shape of pumpkins being swung around. Teachers that only knew how to wear suits wore elaborate costumes with fancy trims and delicate lace that showed their own pleasure into the spirit of the holiday. Even parents took the occasion to wear outfits that uniformed themselves to their children and little cheers and claps came from them as their little monsters performed in excellent ways.

While Mirio took in all the sights and engaged himself at all the beauty surrounding him, Tamaki, on the other hand, began to tremble even harder. If it wasn’t for his ill formed pants, one could be able to easily see his knees buckling within themselves, his kneecaps bruising from the small bangs they were doing. His arms latched even harder to Mirio’s werewolf costume and, if no one knew who he was, they would think that he was actually the wimpiest vampire to ever exist, even more than the ones from the popular series, Twilight.

“Boo!” A voice ringed from behind, echoing within Tamaki’s ear. Fright surged up his spine and he collapsed into Mirio, sending them both soaring into the ground. Tamaki could hear some exchanges happening before a hand shook his clothed shoulder. “Hey are you alright??” Moving in whimpers, Tamaki took in the sights in front of him. The hand that shook him out belonged to Mirio while the adult removed the mask that covered his face to reveal a scared and worried face. Still in a form of shock, Tamaki could only manage a nod before having help from Mirio to stand up. “Oh goodness, I’m so sorry. I didn’t expect this type of reaction. Are you hurt? I can run to go get some stuff,” the adult said, his hands raised to offer any assistance that was needed.

Tamaki only could shake his head while Mirio grabbed onto the sides of his body to keep him steady. “Don’t worry sir, he seems alright!” Mirio responded for Tamaki, coaxing the situation to a calmer state. While Mirio and the man exchanged reassurances, Tamaki looked himself over. To his surprise, there was only a bit of dirt that caught onto his cape from the fall he made that easily was brushed off with a few swipes. When he focused back onto Mirio, the other two exchanged final words before Mirio looked back at his friend with upturned eyebrows. “Are you ok, Amajiki? You didn’t get hurt or anything?” Tamaki shook his head once more, leaving Mirio to check him more thoroughly. After a few swipes of his own, he focused back on his friend and smiled. “Well, why don’t we play some games for a bit? There’s a lot of activities that I am sure we can fun with. C’mon Amajiki,” and hand in hand, they walked into the fairgrounds.

Although it was covered in more halloween decorations and spooky accessories, the games all inherently had the same themes that were present in a regular festival. Ranging from shooting games to activities that involved heavy amounts of bobbing objects, there were children covering each inch of the booths. Little shouts came from the games that signaled activity and beckoned the two boys to join in.

At first, it was a bit difficult for the boys to get into the fun of the games. Costumed kids pushed each other to get to the front, even ignoring the cries from adults that tried to have a semblance of a line. Mirio managed to dodge the hits from the other kids but that didn’t exactly work out for the other boy. Bruises started to form on the top of his skin and multiple times he had to reach out for Mirio when he felt himself being separated from Mirio. At first, Mirio didn’t realize what was happening but when he almost got upset at Tamaki for bumping into him, then those same kids learned well to keep their distance.

After minutes of trying to find that perfect game to play, the boys managed to find space in a game that involved the test of aim. This was a game heavily seen in America that was brought to their festivals time to time and it involved throwing balls into moving vases that circled around in a spiral frenzy.

“Hey, you two! Come try out your aim! Get the ball in the white cup and get a prize!” The attender called out to them, beckoning them closer.

“You wanna try this, Amajiki? It looks like it would be pretty fun,” Mirio asked his friend with a soft yet encouraging tone. Tamaki gave a light nod and he pulled them up to the man. “We would like to try sir!”

“Excellent!” He then dipped lower to pick up a series of balls that balanced themselves on his palm. “Who’s up first?”

“I’ll go!” Mirio volunteered, raising his hand up really high to showcase his readiness. Exchanges happened between them and he bounced on the balls of his feet, gearing up to showcase his aim. “Alright, here I go!” And he began to aim at the moving cups.

If anyone separated the scene into two different parts, a person would believe that Mirio was winning due to the smile and determination that created creases on his forehead. However, the balls ended up nowhere the moving vases. Despite adjusting his strength in different conditions, the balls would roll around in the rims of the cups until they bounced off into the water. The last throw almost made it in, that is until a gust of wind blew it off.

“Sorry about that, young boy. You’ll do better next time,” The attender tried to encourage while collecting the fallen balls to dry them for the next game.

“Ahhh! I was so close!” Mirio grunted out, placing the bottoms of his palm into his eyes.

Tamaki didn’t say anything but he knew that Mirio’s light heartened frustration was actually bothering him much more than what he was letting on. Each time he threw the ball, Tamaki saw the small glint that would cross his eyes that came from the desire of wanting one of the plushies. It wasn’t clear which one attracted him and pushed him forward in determination but knowing his friend, he had a good idea behind.

“I….I would like to try….” Tamaki spoke up, raising his hand shyly. Eyes snapped towards his comment and he tried to hide within his cape until the balls of were thrust towards him. Smiles went around that pushed Tamaki out of the shell he was hiding under. Even Mirio gave a slight cheer and nudged him forward.

Pressure began to build up around Tamaki and his throat kept swallowing down the anxiety that formed lumps in his throat. This was exactly why he never put himself into any type of sports or performances and he almost brought back the balls until a glance at Mirio built in a push of confidence.

Nowhere around the stand or even in the neighboring areas were there mentions of the usage of quirks. There wasn’t anything stated outright that quirks were banned from the fairgrounds. Yet, Tamaki couldn’t help but feel a little guilty at the gasps that erupted when his arm transformed itself into a tentacle from the octopus he ate earlier in the day. The thin endpoint carefully wrapped around the first ball, suctioning it into itself the crevices. With immense precision, he brought his tentacle closer to rotating balls and focused in on the scarce white cups hidden within the sea of color. Their slow pace seemed to speed up within the energy of pressure but Tamaki focused in his senses and flicked it right at the moment his gut told him to do so. Time slowed into a blur that put Tamaki in a haze until Mirio’s shouts and screams pulled him out.

“Oh my gosh, Amajiki!!! That was awesome!!! You’re so freaking cool!!!” Mirio bounced around, going in and out of hugging his friend with a type of spastic energy. It took Tamaki for a second to be brought back to reality but when he returned, he saw the smiles on everyone’s face with the ball resting peacefully in the white cup. Little tugs pulled up on the corners of his mouth and he couldn’t help but feel a tad bit of pride in that. And each moment he managed to get the balls into the desired cups, he could have sworn he felt a little lighter and the shouts were a bit louder.

“My, my, my young lad! Even with the use of your quirk, you did a marvelous job! It’s a rare sight to see for sure!” The man complimented before jerking his thumb towards the prizes surrounding the back frame of the tent. “You can get whatever you want! You can get 4 small prizes, 1 big one with 2 other small ones, or even 2 big ones! Whatever you want!”

Immediately, his answer was met with Tamaki pointing at the big large plushies that were constricted by the large cords. “Are you sure you want those?” Which was met with a strong nod. “Well, alright, give me a second,” the man said as he climbed out of the stand and pulled out a small ladder. He struggled a bit with the tightness of the cords and even gave a small curse under his breath with his hands twisting them around. However, soon enough, he managed to get them down and presented them towards the small child. “Here you go! Enjoy!”

Tamaki brought the two plushies in and almost doubled over in the huge weight that it was creating against his fragile body. He had to set them down on top of a cleaner patch of the ground in order to figure out his bearings. With a small breath in and out, he reached for one of the plushies and hid his face behind it as he turned to Mirio and brought his arms forward. “This….this is for you…..” Tamaki said quietly, a small blush fired up in his cheeks.

He couldn’t see well behind the toy but he could definitely hear the gasp that came from his friend. “Really!? It’s for me!?” Mirio shouted back, forming an image of bouncing feet in Tamaki’s mind.

“...yes….” Tamaki responded softly, his head bobbing slightly in a nod. He pushed it towards Mirio even more, hoping he would take it soon since it was starting to be heavy in his arms.

That hope soon was answered when Mirio took it from his hands and hugged it within himself. “Thank you so much Amajiki! You’re such an amazing friend! It’s the best!” His friend spoke, though there was a small waver in his voice that threatened to release tears. However, once Tamaki picked up his own plush and a cough came from Mirio, the same excitement burst back in. “Let’s go Amajiki!! There’s still a lot to see,” and with that, the boys went off.

It was a bit silly to see two small kids with toys half their size but they somehow managed to traverse the grounds will small peeks of their toys’ shoulders and using the sounds of nearby footsteps. Fortunately, Tamaki recently ate an aquatic animal that had the ability of echolocation so he managed to traverse the grounds while making sure him and Mirio to submit to their sudden deaths. He could hear little sighs of protest coming from Mirio with his inability to see but Tamaki actually enjoyed the lack of sight. His plush kept him in a fuzzy darkness that was comforting. It almost made this experience fun and enjoyable.

“Hey Amajiki! Look! It’s a haunted house! We totally got to go to it!!” Or maybe not.

Tamaki pushed his face more into the back of his plush, smashing his face in enough that it was as if he completely disappeared from sight. “Do...do we have….to?” He asked softly, his tone carrying hesitation, though the indentations muddled within the soft core of the plush.

“Of course we do! This is the biggest thing here! I’ve been looking forward to that all week!” Mirio responded quickly before doubling back a bit and tilting his head towards his friend. “I mean, unless you don’t want to go. It’s fine if you don’t. I won’t make you,” he added, though there was a hint of sadness within it.

Tamaki heard that and peeked over at his friend. Selfishly, he wanted to take on that offer and walk away and never look at it again. Mirio did say that they didn’t have to do it so the lack of pressure dissipated. And yet, Tamaki couldn’t do it. Seeing the lack of glint in his eyes made his stomach turn in different directions. He had never seen a frown on the blonde boy and yet, there it was. And it wasn’t as if Mirio was doing it to make him feel guilty, rather he would do whatever Tamaki desired and needed and would always put his friendship first. Which is why Tamaki had to change his answer. “No it’s ok….we can go….” he muttered to his friend, his voice quiet but still present enough to hear.

“Really? Are you sure? We don’t have to if you don’t feel comfortable. I won’t pressure you,” Mirio responded back, his voice still sincere and worried, yet Tamaki could tell that there was a small little glint in the corner of his eyes. Already feeling regret bubbling inside of him, he nodded his head, affirming his previous words. Suddenly, the saddened face Mirio wore turned brighter, shining in the midst of the darkness looming around them. “Wow, you really are as bright as the sun Tamaki,” he said, though Tamaki couldn’t help but look at the irony in his statement. Then, he felt his hand being intertwined with his friend and he peeped up to see that Mirio beamed at him. “C’mon, let’s go. Don’t worry, it’ll be a lot of fun! I promise! And if you’re ever scared, you can always hold on to me.”

And with a little affirmative noise from Tamaki, the duo moved towards the haunted house.

Not surprisingly enough, there was a line of all ages shooting out from the door of the maze. Jitters and laughs came from the line while screams of those interior echoed against their excitement. Mirio kept bouncing on the balls of feet and moved around the sides that pulled Tamaki along with his movements. Having Mirio’s anxiety to get in only fueled Tamaki’s anxiety to go in, the screams and commotion only intensifying it even more. The shy boy even had to disappear once more into his plush until he heard a grunt. His dark eyes shifted to the owner and the first thing he saw was a teacher wrapped in bandages to a point where any recognizable features were gone. Dark patches of makeup covered any exposed areas of skin, looking as if they crawled out of a casket that buried them alive many years back. Only grunts came out of their mouth but they did hold a sign that stated, “Please leave all belongings in the cabinets to your right!”, to which Tamaki peered past them and saw kids cluttered around the lockers.

Tamaki was about to protest this rule when Mirio pulled on his arm to guide him along the way inside. “We gotta hurry Amajiki! We don’t want a bad spot!” Which was a reason that made Tamaki tilt his head in question but soon became clear when he saw Mirio shove other kids to have that cubby that was the right size for their plushies and bags and that wasn’t too high nor too low. Tamaki froze in the midst of the squandering children so there was a little bit of grace when Mirio took his stuff and placed it right next to his own. It took a bit for his friend to come over back to him but soon they were reunited and Tamaki’s arm began to pull out of his socket with Mirio dragging him along.

The mere second Tamaki laid eyes on the darkened door frame with pieces of stained fabric ruffling in the entrance, he could feel his soul seeping out of him, leaving his body into a frozen state. The only reason his feet kept moving was because of Mirio’s insistent pulls that drove him further into the tunnel. However, when the blood stained fabric brushed against his skin, the shock that froze his limbs shattered into millions of pieces and the adrenaline of fear zapped into him. Shakes covered his whole body and nails dug deep into his friends arms.

Eerie sounds echoed around them that contained jabs of snarls and henious jackal laughs. Hidden speakers scattered around the hallways, making the boys feel as if it was all happening right next to them. Splashes of red light illuminated parts of the hallway to help them find passage, though the first thought that came to Tamaki’s mind was that it was meant to help them lead the way to sudden death. Little ooo’s and aaaa’s came from Mirio and Tamaki questioned in his mind if his friend actually understood the negatives of this maze.

A dead end appeared at the end of the hallway with a window that had shadows dancing behind it. By force, the boys had to turn right with a darkened shadow peering off the left next to the ghostly window. With focus on getting through the new hallway in front of them, neither of them noticed a grotesque female in a tattered dress with zombie holes pushing herself out of the shadows, shouting monstrous noises while curling her clawed hands. Screams bubbled out of the boys and they scurried forward in fear she would be trailing behind them. In that scurry though, they didn’t notice a barn door slamming open and having a bloodied farmer popping out, reaching his arm for the boys to grab on help. However, before they could register the need, a horrific figure seeped behind the farmer and pulled him out of view that soon became replaced with sounds of hacking skin and blood bubbling screams. It felt like a scene from a horror film and Tamaki dug his face more into the crook of Mirio’s neck.

As they continued forward, the horrors turned more into sickening nightmare. The boys pushed through heavy black straps that greeted them with deafening chainsaw sounds. The scenery changed from a dark interior to a red lit farm. Glossy sheep and cows laid strewn on the turf, blood painted on the plastic surface. Bumpy paper mache trees stood tall, almost looking too calm in the scene of horror. They took more cautious steps, looking at the details and getting lost enough to distract the actions in their peripheral. Shooting behind the stationary tree was a younger male with a crumpled mask and plastic knife, charging after them with theatrical groans. Little screams erupted from the kids and they ran with adrenaline pumping in their system.

They pushed through to the next hallway and caught their breath in silence while listening to the whispers of halloween music in the background. Tamaki doubled over and placed his hands on his knees, wheezing from the creatures that popped out at him. He only paid attention to his breathing until the positive energy of Mirio snapped him out of it. “That….was awesome!” He heard Mirio say. Tamaki brought his eyes upwards and saw a gleaming smile on his face, completely serious on his comment. Mirio twisted to his friend and gave him a boost of encouragement. “Are you doing alright, Amajiki?” Tamaki wanted to give a big no along with running in maddening circles but he knew that the only way out was through the tunnel. He gave Mirio a nod and his friend stuck out his arm for him to grab. “Don’t worry, we’re almost there. Just a little bit more!” Mirio continued on, waiting until Tamaki grabbed his arm. “If anything, just close your eyes! Don’t worry, I won’t let anything to you. That’s a promise!”

Tamaki could only nuzzle into his shoulder and nod his head in response. Walking forward, he could steal hear the exaggerated halloween music playing in the background with screams and bangs hitting against the areas of the maze. He could also hear Mirio’s screams that were filled with more of a shock than any actual fear. Tamaki could occasionally feel slimy objects pressing against him or even the cold slivers of chill running up his spine when passing through a new hallway. However, no matter what ran through his mind and whatever colors flashed behind his eyelids, Tamaki made sure that they were kept shut as they traversed through the maze.

Then, a little glimmer of light seeped into his closed lids. He opened them to find a glowing hole, like the light at the end of the tunnel. True, there were hanging corpses and fragments of web shadowing over it but that went over Tamaki’s head. It meant his escape, the end to the horrors he had to endure the while he was stuck here, clutching onto Mirio’s arm and only having his laugh comfort his screams.

“C’mon! We’re almost there!” Mirio exclaimed loudly while pushing the hanged body out of the way. Their steps trudged through the wood flooring and the creepily placed tissue paper that stuck their feet into the ground, as if the maze was trying to keep them within the walls. However, with force, the boys pushed through. It wasn’t easy or fun or even comforting for Tamaki to have to push through hanging corpses that shared deceased eye contact with him with pieces of their toilet paper wrappings brushing against his skin. Nor was it easy or amazing to have to touch anything that had death and blood slime all over it. Yet, the light was getting closer and closer and the chills on his arms subsided and his eyes were screaming in adjustment and it kept going and going until….

They made it outside.

At first, it took Tamaki a small while to adjust to his surroundings. The fairgrounds had completely different vibes than what was shown in the maze. While the interior of the house was decked in horror and fright, the fairgrounds brought him back to the happier side of halloween with candy and costumes running around. Tamaki could feel his heartbeat calming down at the sights of comfort around him. Even his breath slowed down and the hyperextension of anxiety twirled down to a more easy rate, one that he was more used to.

“Congratulations for getting through the maze you guys!” A teacher in a witch costume encouraged. In her hands were little pumpkins buckets filled with all sorts of sweets brimming at the top. “Here, take this you guys. You earned it! Don’t forget to pick up your stuff!” She said with a sweet smile as she handed the buckets to the boys. Mirio gave a loud gasp while Tamaki matched it with wide eyes. Every candy that a sweet tooth desired found its way in the bucket and Tamaki couldn’t help but feel his mouth watering with anticipation to eating one of the candies in there.

Yet, before he could quickly pop one in his house, he grew distracted at the posture Mirio was doing. In his hand, Mirio held up a piece of chocolate with a grin slapped on his face. “Let’s do a toast to the night we already had so far and for the night to come!” And he brought the chocolate closer to Tamaki, hoping for a little bop back. It took a bit for Tamaki to get and Mirio had to give a small hint but he managed to scavenege a similar piece of chocolate and gave it a small boop into the one Mirio had in his hand while giving a small cheers in return. In unison, the boys ripped through the wrapper and chucked the chocolate in, savoring the sweet and melting flavor against their small tongues.

Silence passed between them when they tasted the goods but their swallows aligned at the right second and Mirio hooked his arm within Tamaki’s. “Alright, let’s get our stuff and do more stuff! There’s a lot to do and I’m sure we can get more candy!” He told Tamaki excitedly, making him walk toward the cabinets.

Tamaki didn’t say a word while Mirio went on and on about the different activities that were still left to do. However, it wasn’t exactly a terrified silence. Rather, and to his shock, Tamaki ended up smiling and nodding towards Mirio’s words, almost as if he was excited for the rest of the night. As if….this was going to end up being one of the best days within Tamaki’s life so far.

#bnha #mha #my hero academia #boku no hero academia #bnha halloween big bang #mirio togata #tamaki amajiki #miritama

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crystalized-dreams · 7 years ago

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So, if you frequent Twitter and/or Facebook, you’ll probably know I’ve been pretty sick. While I’m about halfway through my medicine (and hopefully feeling 100% once more), my focus is… very shake-y, at the moment, to say the least. As someone who normally multitasks a loot, it’s so… frustrating to essentially just be stuck staring at one thing and struggling to even accomplish that.

I don’t really like leaving things unfinished and right now, my unfinished pile feels kind of unbearable and there’s not much I can do about it. To make matters worse, because of the previous mentioned problem of not being able to focus, my mind is constantly thinking up ideas (whether drawings, stories, or something else entirely) that I just… do not have the time or talent to put into fruition and it’s pretty disheartening, honestly.

Meanwhile, I’ve been trying to write this entry since earlier this week and wanted to get it up before Pocket Camp came out because I was going to say how likely it’d be to come out the 21st/22nd because the Fortune Event ended then and it was also when the dailies ended for the current round instead of it being the usual 10–of course, I was right with that, but I never actually managed to… get that post done. On the bright side, I did manage to get all the wallpapers in the Fortune event:

As you can see, I apparently got Bitty: I don’t really think it’s that fitting, but I don’t really like to keep retaking these quizzes. I just wish they’d stop with the “shortened” quizzes–most people would prefer to answer all the questions to get a more accurate result and so it’s frustrating when it’s essentially powered by RNG to an extent because I don’t feel it’s entirely accurate.

As for the progress in the game, it’s mostly been slow… Ignoring server issues since the huge increase of people with the game releasing, as I’ve mentioned before, there’s just not much I can do right now. I did manage to get the level 5 Merry-go-Round completed: And currently have the level 5 Pool being built so I just have the Treehouse and Concert left to level up. I also have crafted everything I currently have unlocked at least once so the only things I have left are from getting villagers to level 15. I still have 21 villagers to go and I keep debating on if I should use my Request tickets to try and rush these or save them to rush being able to host when new villagers get added instead. Marshal is likely coming in the new batch of villagers due to being one of the options in the Fortune Event and it’s possible some of my own favorites could make their way in that batch too which would be nice as currently my only favorite villager in the game is Peanut.

As for the game itself, the trees and grass also changed shortly before the game opened for everyone and it’s quite nice: I’m looking forward to us getting snow. I am surprised we didn’t end up having a Harvest Festival ingame, but maybe they felt it was too soon after opening…

My struggles are still heavily with the resource mechanics though–especially with being sick, it makes it hard to keep my stock up since it’s hard to really play much and when I do have those short bursts where I feel up to more, I once again get hit by that item limit wall. Most of the limits and things, I can understand. The timers, the rotations, the crafting things… But the item limit is just such an issue. Especially because you get SO little from selling items, it doesn’t feel worth the effort to get them just to sell them so when your inventory is full, it’s like “Well, now what do I do?”. Prices are what you’d expect for clothing and furniture and to craft, but the prices for selling things from your inventory is just too small to cover that. 10 Bells for “common” stuff is just so disheartening. And it also gives me less of a reason to play when my requests are done honestly and removes a lot of the relaxing part of AC and playing how you like.

While my inventory management continues to be a nightmare, I’m doing pretty well catalog-wise. I currently have all market furniture available, everything from Labelle, and only need one thing from Kicks. I have about 13 things left from the Able Sisters, including one of the dresses (The Plum Coat) that I actually really want But the RNG with it all makes it… frustrating.

In the meantime, when I’ve needed a bit of a break from Pocket Camp due to just running out of things to do or just not having the energy for it, I’ve been having a lot of fun with Tiny Bird Garden which came out on November 15th. If you enjoy Neko Atsume and/or really like birds, you’ll probably enjoy Tiny Bird Garden. It is of the same nature as Neko Atsume (lay out toys and food for birds to come), but a bit more… immersive in a way with NPCs you can talk to and actually getting to talk to and befriend the birds in a way. You can give them treats and hats and it’s just a… very sweet game?

I mean, seriously, look at some of these birds:

I especially relate to Cherry:

And even the NPCs have sweet things to say:

Even the Credits as well:

I’ve managed to see all the birds at least once and give them all their favorite Treats so I just need to figure out all their favorite toys now. They all seem… a lot less picky than the cats in Neko Atsume though which both makes it a bit easier to see them all but also a bit harder if you’re specifically going for one.

Regardless, if you like cute birds and/or just need some kind of casual pick-me up, I really do recommend it–even if just for some positive reminders that you matter.

Right now, Super Mario Odyssey is a bit on hold which makes me… quite sad to be honest. I really love the game, but at the same time I just feel frustrated with it. I think a lot of the Moons are pretty fun, but at the same time it feels like way too much. It just feels packed just to be packed and I just don’t find that very fun. It makes them feel less special. That said, my least favorite ones have to be the high score ones I don’t mind doing the activities a certain amount of times, but there’s… not much fun in spending hours trying over and over to hit a score in the same monotonous activity. And you have to do this in two different ones.

The time trial ones are also fairly frustrating. I’ve long stopped enjoying the races and really just wish the only one was in the Mushroom Kingdom.

I’m sure we’ll get back to the game eventually and I really do want to hit the 999 Moons + get all the costumes, but right now I just feel discouraged and frustrated.

Finally, what I’ve been doing especially these last few months is getting myself a bit lost in visual novels. I love reading, but unfortunately our… living situation isn’t the best to really be situated *to* read books for long periods of time and still be comfortable. Let alone even… keep track of books 😦

I started playing My Candy Love aka Amour Sucré in March of last year and it’s been a… rollercoaster of feelings. I talk a lot about the game over on a Tumblr I have dedicated to it and other Beemoov games, but I wanted to bring it up here too for once because there’s a lot I really want to say about it.

I’m incredibly picky with Otome games. I don’t usually have the same tastes in guys as most people so it’s hard for me to find one appealing. Plus, when many games have you dating girls instead and you’re not particularly interested in girls, you’re usually playing more for story reasons then (Which is why I won’t play any… mature rated ones).

I think Otome games can be quite interesting though if they have a good focus on story and characters and that’s generally what I look for, though, I can be picky with art style. And while the art style in MCL can vary (especially with some of the older episodes’ illustrations), something about it still drew me in and I’m not entirely sure what. My one regret is mostly finding about it so late–the game started in 2011 and so I’ve… missed a lot Both onsite event-wise and merchandise-wise.

One thing that’s been especially frustrating to me is there was a short episode available for those who got a code from their booth at Japan Expo in 2013 that was only available for France and there is only video of one of the routes and I can’t find any transcripts of the other routes and this haunts me so much and is killing me slowly because of all kinds of problems. It’s rare, but hey, if you had unlocked the Japan Expo 2013 ring and now no longer can replay the episode, please report it so maybe someone can… finally upload the other routes and dialogue ._.

Moving to the game itself and despite some of my issues above and sadness of missing out, I wish I knew what captured me about the game. I found myself interested in all the characters and definitely found a favorite of the cast. The game takes place in a high school, towards the end of the school year (though, don’t actually try and figure out the timeline–it’s a complete and utter mess).

I think in a way, especially since my school life was absolute trash, it almost feels therapeutic for me. Even though the focus is the 5 main guys, you get two best friends and have a handful of other classmates as well. And even if on episode where you get completely screwed over, people are still there for you and sometimes a lot of it is just what I needed to hear and didn’t realize.

The game currently is at 37 episodes (with 38 coming out any day now honestly– a lot o people are expecting the trailer tomorrow) and you don’t even start dating the guy you want to go for until the end of Episode 28/start of Episode 29 so there’s a long build up (though, you may find the first 10 episodes kind of slow). There’s character arcs as well, some stronger than others, but honestly, I just have fun with it even if I genuinely think they could use a better translator, the censoring is awkward, and some lines are… a bit cringe-y, but it’s just… truly fun.

They have a Black Friday sale going on so I’m debating on buying a bunch of AP and $ and maybe doing a huge story replay to fix some decisions and things I’m not super happy with and also take opportunities to explore the school more so I’ll be less likely to miss dialogue and stuff too.

I would likely stream the big replay too so if someone is interested in the game, but doesn’t want to play, well, that could be an option!

I will say the game is a bit hard to get into–besides some of the older art style in illustrations, the game unfortunately uses an Action Point system. Once you’re caught up, you’ll usually manage to earn enough to play the next episode by the time it comes out, but until then, it’s a very slow grind trying to play each day and can be super demotivating honestly

Once thing I do wish Beemoov would do (besides an alternative to the AP system) is just… better jobs with merchandising to their other servers. There’s such a big focus on France as it’s the main server and where the company is located, but it really makes other servers feel left out. The manga, as an example, has only been published in French, Spanish, and German. It’s been years with no update on if we will ever see it outside those languages. The Artbooks have only been in French and English. And most merchandise hasn’t been outside France at all. It’s pretty discouraging (and also makes it all the harder to FIND older merchandise…).

Despite all this, the game’s taking place in France actually helped rejuvenate my love for France’s culture too. France was the first country I ever wanted to go to and the first language I wanted to learn when I was just 2-3 years old. It meant a lot to me and after some issues when I finally got to go to Paris, France, a piece of my heart got… incredibly hurt due to certain things that happened and it’s… really nice to have it mended and just between this and Miraculous Ladybug feel that love for France again (Also my French has gotten a lot better with all the things I’ve been looking up for character reasons so that’s pretty awesome).

Beemoov’s other visual novel is Eldarya which is much more fantasy-styled and more mature in general. It has the same kind of thing with a lot more characters besides just the love interest and the other servers are *nearly* caught up with France’s. It’s fun despite some… problematic decisions in plot, but I’m genuinely really excited to see where the story goes.

While I play MCL more for the characters as the story is mostly just… school with some character arcs, Eldarya’s overall story has me incredibly invested with where it’s going to go.

Of course, I don’t only play Otome game-Visual novels. One of Beemoov’s other visual novels is Henri’s Secret which is just a general romance story–you don’t have a character and you follow Lyla’s PoV for the most part (though, the game takes place mostly from a third person view). Even though the secret was super obvious from the get-go (and you learn it pretty quick in the story too–though Lyla and her friends have yet to…), I find myself still interested in the characters and story and really want to see their reactions when they learn Henri’s secret.

As for a non-Beemoov game, I’m actually super into SakeVisual’s Jisei series. I love mysteries and all the characters are super well-written. The fourth part is currently in production and I genuinely can’t wait. It’s such a good series, the art and voice acting is phenomenal and I haven’t played a game from SakeVisual that I haven’t enjoyed, honestly. I still have to finish Backstage Pass, but… stats and schedule stuff in games is hard for me x__x

But yes, this is what I’ve been up to recently! I’m still doing training in Miitopia, but it’s… very slow so that may be a while. I also do hope to get back to Lady Layton as SOON as I’m feeling better. I miss it, but I’m just… in no condition to do puzzles right now.

A bit of an update on things and games I’m currently playing~ So, if you frequent Twitter and/or Facebook, you'll probably know I've been pretty sick. While I'm about halfway through my medicine (and hopefully feeling 100% once more), my focus is...

#Opinion Piece #PC #Mobile Games #Visual Novels #Blog Related #Eldarya #Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp #Henri&039;s Secret #Jisei #Beemoov #My Candy Love #Nintendo Switch #Sakevisual #Super Mario Odyssey #Tiny Bird Garden

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jezfletcher · 6 years ago

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1000 Albums, 2018: The Top Ten

10. Skerryvore - Evo

(Celtic rock) Right in my wheelhouse is the confluence of Celtic folk, pop and rock, and Evo from Skerryvore really delivers exactly that. It’s has a kind of rousing stadium sound to it, but performed with some trad twists that always makes it sound fresher than your average kind of pop rock. Much like my #1 album of 2016, The Space Between from Jamie Smith’s Mabon, this is the kind of album which was always going to vault up the ratings. My pick of the tracks it Hold On.

9. Orbital - Monsters Exist

(techno) A pretty monumental album from Orbital, 90s beatmakers extrordinaire, which manages to wrangle all of their dark, thumping electronica, and their humour into one tight little package. My pick of the tracks is the sprawling Monsters Exist, but you could just as easily fall in love with tracks like Hoo Hoo Ha Ha or P.H.U.K.. This sounds a little bit like their 2001 album The Altogether, which is one of my favourite albums of all time. This won the week easily the week it came out; so easily that I didn’t necessarily think about it much. But when it came time to relisten, I appreciated anew just what a fine album this is.

8. Dudley Benson - Zealandia

(contemporary chamber music) This was something of a revelation to me. This was one of Sam’s picks, and something that I’d failed to find in my screening. But this is really quite wonderful music, akin to the Mercury-winning Benjamin Clementine we listened to last year. It’s music with a real sense of novelty to it—music that sounds like music will sound in the future. It’s based around chamber music ideals and baroque instrumentation (harpsichord features prominently), but it maintains a kind of pop structure that adds an accessibility to it. That might make it less academically complex as Clementine, for instance, but it also makes it the kind of music you can devour wholeheartedly. I have two particular picks: Birth of a Nation and It’s Otepoti’s Fault.

7. The Fratellis - In Your Own Sweet Time

(indie rock) I’ve actually never listened to the Fratellis before, although they’ve had a somewhat illustrious career before now. Coming into this album fresh though is quite an experience though. You feel a little bit as though they’ve completed everything they wanted to complete, and now, with an album like In Your Own Sweet Time (their fifth), they can just let rip and have fun. And this absolutely comes through in the music—it’s riproaring stuff, just full-throated and unapologetic about what a good time they’re having. It’s also daggy, but it’s done with such abandon and sincerity that I was dragged along with it, grinning every step of the way. There’s lots of pick on an album like this, but even amongst all the goodness, there’s a big standout in Starcrossed Losers.

6. Cosmo Sheldrake - The Much Much How How And I

(baroque pop, art pop) A wonderfully quirky album from a very talented musician, The Much Much How How And I is the debut album from Sheldrake, after a teaser of his style in his EP Pelicans We, which we also listened to this year. A multi-instrumentalist, Sheldrake must play around 100 instruments on this thing, ranging from plinky strings to oddly tuned percussion, to clarinet, all backed up by his affected vocals. It’s chamber pop in some sense, but it’s also mixed with the music you’d find in a turn-of-the-century circus, or the soundtrack to the inevitable approach of the clockwork army. It’s utterly unlike anything else we listened to this year, and that’s enough to propel it this high in my list. My top pick is Wriggle, but I also rate Birth a Basket, Hocking and Egg and Soldiers.

5. Jeremy Messersmith - Late Stage Capitalism

(orchestral pop) From the first moments I started this album, I could tell it was going to be a yearly standout. It’s a kind of effortless throwback pop rock, which both manages to sound evocative of 60s pop, while having the clean, crisp edge that makes it feel fresh and modern. On top of that, there’s just some really classic songwriting in here—tracks like Purple Hearts feel like the kind of track which could have been a hit in any era since the 1950s. While Purple Hearts is a big standout for me, I’m also very fond of the melancholy ambivalence of Monday (“Monday, you’re not so bad”, he croons), and the swooning All The Cool Girls. It’s a really quite wonderful album.

4. Moon Taxi - Let The Record Play

(indie pop) I’m pretty surprised to see this so high—it’s the highest album on this list which didn’t end up taking out an Album of the Week award the week it was released—but on relistening I was shocked at how bloody good it is. This is, absolutely, the kind of album which I have just devoured in the past. It’s pop rock with jazz and funk influences. It’s got a prominent horn section. I mean, even just look at that cover art. You know it’s going to be fun. But the even better part is the density of top tracks. Even many months after hearing it, I not only get my top track stuck in my head (Two High, which is awesome and you should go listen to it), but I find myself humming along to Let the Record Play, Good As Gold, Nothing Can Keep Us Apart and Trouble. This is the sort of thing that’s going to get me in just about any week of the music project. And yet it didn’t win the week when we listened to it. Funny about that.

3. Kyle Craft - Full Circle Nightmare

(glam folk) Kyle Craft had my #2 album of the year in 2016, with his debut Dolls of Highland, which was a revelation, and just a bloody good album. He’d released a couple of respectable, but somewhat underwhelming filler singles in 2017, so I was approaching his sophomore effort with some trepidation. But boy oh boy was I wrong to worry. This is every bit as good as his first effort, recapturing all of the energy and glam swagger, and putting it forward with his brassy bombast. Here we have tracks like Fever Dream Girl and Heartbreak Junky which run the gamut from melancholy introspection to punchy full-throated sass. This was absolutely the album I wanted from Craft to follow up on his exceptional debut: it’s more of the same, to show that he can pull out the same style and verve that made the first album so good. If there’s one reason that this is #3 of the year when the previous album was #2, it’s that it does lack that delineation from the first album. But that, as I said, is a strength as well. I feel like I’m expecting something new from album number three though, and given Craft’s talent, I can imagine a bunch of ways it could go where he really ratchets it up to the next level. I’ll be waiting.

2. Jukebox The Ghost - Off to the Races

(power pop) This is an amazing collection of music, and has a density of quality songs that beats just about anything on this list apart from my #1 album. Unsurprisingly, that’s why it’s in my #2 position of the year. You know you’re in safe hands from the very beginning, with the Queen-channelling, raucously complex opening track Jumpstarted (which will also be featuring prominently in my Top Tracks of the Year list). But the hits keep coming, with the power pop Fred Astaire, almost chamber-work like Time And I and plaintive Diane. There are more I could mention. This is just exactly the kind of music I’m here for—and for them to give me so many different flavours of it across the album is a real treat. A very worthy #2 of the year from me.

1. The Go! Team - Semicircle

(vaguely alterna-J-hip-poptronica) In the end though, I can’t go past this pretty awesome album from stylistic provocateurs The Go! Team. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed some of their previous work (although I’ve not done a proper deep dive into it), but even this album is pushing them somewhere different. Recorded with a youth choir and what sounds like a high school marching band, it manages to capture their same style but package it up in a different way and the results are fascinating. But beyond being academically interesting, it’s just great fun. We have tracks like the steel-drum infused If There’s One Thing You Should Know, the plunderphonic Mayday, which incorporates a Morse code beeping into its main driving rhythm, the tight jazz-rock stylings of All The Way Live, or title track The Semicircle Song, which climaxes with a bunch of the singers introducing themselves with their name and star sign (because why. the hell. not). This was a strong winner of Album of the Week the week it was release (and the reason why Moon Taxi didn’t get a look-in that week), and I think I’ve always been quietly considering it my Album of the Year from when it was first released. But there’s nothing like making it official, and it feels good to finally make an honest album out of Semicircle. There we have it for another year. There were genuinely some amazing albums this year, and I find it very, very satisfying to look over the best of them. It absolutely makes the effort and the time we spend on this project worth it. Tomorrow, I'm going to post my top tracks of the year, without commentary, and also post a public playlist of all of my top tracks, in case you want to give it a whirl. Believe me that 2018 (like 2017 and 2016 before it, and maybe even years before we did our 1000 Albums project) was an excellent year for music.

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