#and I put this one in drafts because it was so long

[thepolyamorouspolymath]

What kind of damage are you willing to accept to avoid that then?

To be clear, I'm not disagreeing, I'm not generally a fan of the glorious violent revolution as it tends to neverever in the history of the fucking world have been glorious if you lived in it.

Just that there's another side to consider -- the one in which how many people are being held in horrific conditions that are going to die in "detention camps" for the sin because a corrupt government decided their paperwork was canceled because they disagreed with a US policy publicly, the one in which violence against women skyrockets, the one in which women are denied life saving care for "moral" reasons, the one in which we see the already high suicide rates among gay and trans kids rising faster and higher because they are put through conversion camps and denied their gender, the one in which the economics mean children are starving, the one where vaccines are banned because some nut job decided they were political...

How many of those deaths are you willing to accept?

There sometimes comes a point where it's not a matter of whether deaths are going to result but which deaths and what horrifying number you will accept.

Sometimes there is no good choice. I don't know if we're there yet, but that point does exist.

Radiation poisoning is horrifying. So is the absolute carnage of a beachfront invasion, time after time after time, by people drafted into a war whether they wanted to be or not. So were the conditions of prisoners in the Pacific -- not just combatants, ask the Chinese who were just living their lives when invaded.

Which one do you choose -- the nuclear weapon use that killed hundreds of thousands many in horrifying ways and affected God knows how many more long term with radiation side effects? The prolonged island by island fight that would have cost millions of lives? Or just ignoring the problem and letting civilians in invaded areas be enslaved, starved, tortured by not acting at all?

I think a lot about how, if the glorious violent revolution happens, every kid with significant medical needs in a hospital where power gets cut will die.

You can decide you're willing to sacrifice your own life, but you don't get to tell everybody else on the planet that they're acceptable collateral damage.

[lighting-and-shadow]

Ikigai, Part 1

I previously posted a blurb/preview of a soulmate AU with Sylus and a Non MC Reader. Here is the full length fic. Hope you all enjoy because there's more fics to come with this man from me (he has me in a goddamn chokehold; I already have so many drafts 😭).

Length: 2.2k words

Not completely proofread.

🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹

You sit on Sylus' bed, restless despite the exhaustion that clings to your body. It’s like a noose with every second that goes by. Yet, you know rest will never come to you. Not for some time at least. So, you pass the time with tapping.

Tap. Tap. Tap. Broken nails tap uselessly and frequently against the expensive sheets. No amount of this makes the ire in your blood burn any less.

"Sylus," you call out to the man in question, who merely hums your name in response. "Have I ever told you that you're the biggest fool I've met?"

Sylus stands in his bathroom, door wide open as always. He stopped showering or tending to his wounds with it closed long ago. You can't quite remember how long. It's just how it is. Has it made for some embarrassing moments where he teases you with a towel barely around his waist as you struggle to keep your eyes solely on his (and not his chest that you want to run your hands on or his neck you want to bury your face in as you drift to sleep)? Yes.

Would you want it any other way? No.

"Is that so, sweetie? I must've gone deaf the last few hours, and missed it. Mind repeating yourself so I can etch it into my mind for future reference?"

"You're the biggest fool I've ever met."

He chuckles. The rich laughter makes your heart flutter and you almost immediately march over to help him.

"May I remind you that you work for this fool? What does that make you?"

"What indeed…"

The pair of you sit in silence except for the sounds of Sylus digging into his own skin to remove a bullet that seems to be giving him particular trouble.

"Be a dear and help your boss out, sweetie."

Part of you wants to give in, as you've done so many times. Sylus' tone gives away that he knows that too. Even without seeing his face, you can imagine the smug smirk it has. Oh how you want to kiss that smirk away so badly.

And that's exactly why you can't comply with his request. You need to put your foot down. Maybe being belligerent will help quell these annoying feelings. Sylus isn't meant to be yours, after all.

"No thanks."

You stare at his thread of fate. It shimmers the same red that everyone else's does. That red used to alarm you as a child. Now, all you see is him. Him and his beautiful red you wish to burrow yourself in forever.

Now that red helps not give into him. Helps you remember that if you want him to meet his soulmate in one piece, you couldn't keep letting him do this.

"Seriously?"

"Yep. My foolish boss did this to himself, so he should pay the price."

"And what price is that?"

"The price of spending who knows how long digging bullets out of his skin."

"Of course. Whatever you say sweetie. A far better price than what… hmmm… what was his name? George? Jarold?"

He's teasing you again. The drawl in his voice told you as much. He didn't even bother to hide the slight chuckles he let out at your tired sigh.

"James," you reply.

"Yes, Jake," now he was just fucking with you. "The price he was demanding for such mediocre business was… appalling. I much prefer this."

You snort at your boss, "Just keep telling yourself that bossman."

"I will, sweetie."

Silence engulfs the pair of you. For you, it sits on your chest, swims in your blood, and chews on your skin. The quiet gnaws at you, a steady and annoying and repetitive peaking reminiscent of Mephisto.

You hate it. But you must maintain it. Even when Sylus glances over his shoulder at you. You're sure to avoid eye contact with him. One look is all it would take for you to storm over to him and tenderly take the bullets out of his skin.

Not this time. This time, you had to be firm.

Your mind drifts back to the meeting. There wasn't anything special about this particular one. Hell, it wasn't even a weapons deal. Rather, James was apparently an old friend of Sherman's with a vinyl collection. The stupid man had gone off the rails recently.

Was it surprising that he did? Not in the least bit. It did make for a good laugh over diner one day though. About how this man thought he could take you two down. Sylus and his faithful companion with a silver tongue, one that seemed to speak to very depths of your soul.

Taking down Sherman wouldn't be difficult. Nothing ever was with you two being the well-oiled machine you are together. But, you never liked being unprepared. You're cautious to a fault. And Sylus wanted to easy your worrying, or nagging as he called it.

Enter James: a connection to Sherman you dug up. One with a pension for vintage music and antique jewelry. It should've been an easy deal. Especially once you saw his thread.

James' thread was a dim red. A red you hadn't seen for quite sometime. A red you didn't expect from someone like him.

A dead soulmate. You could hear the deceased man's faint screams. You could see their final hours together as illness wracked the poor boy. God, they must've been about 16; James had to be at least in his mid 30's now. He still clings to his soulmate all these years later, a simple tattoo over his heart to symbolize the love that was lost too early.

You pitied the man. He wasn't a good man, with countless lives lost at his hands and many loves cut too short because of his actions, but the loss of a soulmate is something no one recovers from. It's one of those things that immutable in this world.

So you used that to crack through his icy exterior. Peeled it back layer by layer until his soul danced in the palm of your hand. James was at your command. Until your boss shattered that.

"Why are you so mad at me, my sweet Gamayun?"

You can't help it: you look up and are immediately greeted by your boss' smug face. And you're angry at falling for his trick. For a moment.

Then you lock eyes. Deep, deep, crimson, so similar yet so unlike the threads of fate you see so often. His red is a good red. His red is the red of your love rather than everyone else's. Sometimes you wonder if his red eyes are your thread of fate, that they're your soulmate connection.

Any other day, you'd soak in the attention of that red. You can't right now. Because in a fraction of a second, you see it. You see the hurt he's trying to cover. You see in his soul how his wounds ache and how he wants your forgiveness, how he wants to make you smile (for some reason).

It's all you need to move from his bed and approach his back. He still looks at you, smirk gone and expression soft with something you can't place. You ignore it. He turns around so that his bare chest faces you. You struggle to not let yourself be flustered.

”It's nothing you haven't seen before. It's no big deal. You're just business partners and companions. Nothing else.”

"Gimme your gauze."

Your tone is sharp. Maybe because you hope to cover how weirdly intimate this feels: your boss basically naked and unguarded as you try to tend to his wounds.

You focus your eyes onto his hands. He holds his bandages in them. You reach for them, but he moves his hand away. You reach again, and Sylus raises his hand above his head, and raises an eyebrow at you.

You can't even be mad at him when he does.

"Why, Gamayun?"

There’s that nickname again. It carries so much. His trust, his affection, and his heart. Just not in the way you hope.

Gamayun carries false dreams, fantasies that haunt you as you sleep at night. Gamayun is a fake promise of a love you'll never have. But it was yours, so you gladly take ownership of it.

"You're pathetic…"

"Because my foolish Morana apparently can't clean up his own messes."

"Ah, but that's why I have you, my sweet, beautiful, and kind Gamayun."

Your hands tremble as you pull back on the roll of gauze. You think Sylus laughs at you, but you can't hear it over the pounding of your heart.

"Stop it," you want to tell him. "Stop giving me hope."

It doesn't take long for you to finish. You help Sylus dress, despite knowing he doesn't in any way, shape, or form need you help. He stopped you when you tried to leave after finishing his bandages, so you figure you wouldn't even bother for now.

"Sylus, what're you—"

"Sylus? Who's Sylus? Since when did you know a Sylus?"

You roll your eyes at him.

“Have you suddenly become a decrepit old man with my noticing?”

"No," he then lifts you into your arms and forces you to meet his eyes.

He stares into your eyes; you stare right back, praying that you give nothing away. He walks towards his bed, still looking at you.

"You must be really mad at me if you're calling me by my name right now."

"Don't be so dramatic you big baby. I called you by name earlier.”

Sylus pays no heed to words. In fact, he takes them in stride, placing you slowly onto his bed. His movements are slow, precise. Almost as if he's afraid to hurt you. But that’s ridiculous; he could never hurt you.

"Are his injuries still causing him problems?"

You keep that thought in mind in order to not trick yourself. In order to not gaslight yourself into believing that there's something more behind his actions. Sylus and you have always had an intimate relationship. Closer than most ever will be. Best friends. Partners in crime.

"This means nothing."

You try to get out of bed, to run away to wallow in your sorrows, but Sylus plops down next you and wraps an arm around you.

"Sleep. We'll discuss this later."

A protest builds up in your throat. It’s pushed back down when his arms tightens around you and his breathing evens out into soft puffs. He’s not asleep; you know that, and he knows you know that. But you play along anyway.

Turning in his arms to play with his hair, you think more about what happened earlier. At how Sylus kept trying to get between you and James when you guys got closer. At how Sylus seemed more passive aggressive with the man the more you two talked, forgetting that there was even someone else in the room. At how Sylus would subtly move you away from James when a crack in the man’s facade would appear at your words.

He got worse when you reciprocated. Of course, you always did on these missions; it’s a great way to build rapport. Today was different. Today was real. You really felt for James. You really wanted to reach him. As someone who also understands of the pain of being without a soulmate—soulless, as society would call you.

But you were different. You didn’t lose your soulmate. You never had one. All you could do was watch as others loved and lost, doomed to never experience the same.

Things exploded when James asked if he could see you again. A normal request from clients and prospective/current business partners alike. But you never quite clicked with them the same way you had with James, a man whose heart was so hurt, much like your own. You hope the poor man is still alive.

Sleep begins to creep up on you as you remember the vigor in Sylus protest. Honestly, it was kind of hot; you rarely get to see him lose composure. Even less so during business exchanges. You burrow into his embrace at the thought. Of the way his face contorted with rage. At the way his Evol thrashed out at those around you.

You use that to cover what you truly remember: the gentle way that same power carried you to safety (he was always weirdly protective of you because of your lack of Evol; strange, considering what you’re capable of). The worried way he asked if you were alright. The kind way he treated you despite your anger.

But, why were you angry? Why are you still angry? Because he once again used violence when it wasn’t needed? Because he didn’t listen when you told him to back off? Because he got himself hurting protecting you? Because this showed that deep down he doesn’t trust you?

No. Never.

Sylus trusts you with everything. And you, in turn, trust him with everything. Well, except one thing: your heart. Maybe that was why you were mad at him. Because when he does things like that, it makes it so hard to let him go.

🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹 🥀 🌹

Taglist: @eolivy, @rafayelridesfisheatsfish, @animegamerfox, @jasperjokester, @schrodingerskimdokja, @just--crys, @snowdynasty, @shi-thats-kiera, @mansonofmadness, @dwuclvr, @ameilli, @katiedoesstuff101, @everythingistaken00, @napa-the-yappa, @hanaluxx, @lovesick-sylus, @madam8, @tenaciouszombiewombat, @ladyparamount, @applepi405, @midnight-reverie, @69-gojos-wife-69, @bellagrayson-wayne, @phisen, @idkmanimjusthorny, @munchychuusy, @autumn2534, @poptrim, @sillyfreakfanparty, @zaynesfirefly, @flamedancer13, @thissmartdumbass, @mrsllawliet, @jeondyy, @ssetsuka, @dels-page, @that-lost-one, @johnnysactualgf, @mariquitas-en-verano @toelady, @sinnamon-bunn, @yesbiaswrecked, @doggyteam2028, @little-rays-of-darkness, @albatrossblue, @vyntheria, @silverianni, @browneyedgirl22, @tiklestar, @beaconsxd, @pepperushia

[pineconepie]

yandere english prof?

Sorry this took so long, its been sitting in my drafts forever LOL. Here you go! I actually really like this one haha.

TW: Violence, blood (not detailed), injuries, bullying, light forced infantilization, parental yandere, manipulative yandere, implied extortion

Everyone hated your English professor, Ellis, but you never understood the hate he received. Practically day one, everyone was complaining about how mean he could be or how unfair or harsh his grading was.

At first, you believed them, not really knowing the professor well enough to come to his defense. He seemed to have a no-nonsense attitude with you just as much as everyone else.

It wasn't really until one day, when some guys of a nasty fraternity came in and began harassing you.

You had always ignored it, but it became more impossible to ignore when one of them tripped you on your way into the class.

"Jerk," you grumble under your breath, watching him saunter off with a laugh. You feel blood dripping down your nose.

You grab your phone to see if it looks bad, and sure enough, it does. If the pain in your face weren't indicating you landed straight on it, then the blood trailing down your nose and forming bruise on your eye were.

After wiping your face clean as best as you can, you continue your trek back to class.

Sure, it'd probably be a better idea to email your professor and explain to him what happened, but knowing how harshly he can treat students, you'd rather get the attendance than email him about something he might not even believe is true.

And so, you stumble through the halls with blood dried at the corners of your nostrils, one eye looking swollen with the other's vision blurred from crying earlier.

A black eye must already be forming. A few people give you odd looks, but almost everyone else minds their own business. Soon enough, you finally enter your classroom.

"You're three minutes late," Ellis coldly says as soon as you step through the door.

He isn't even looking at you, probably just figures its you, because his eyes are on a few papers.

"I-I'm sorry." Your voice cracks. You wince from the sound of it.

Ellis's gaze immediately shoots up at you. He looks baffled and furious at first. "What on earth happened to you?"

He makes a hand gesture for you not to answer that, and looks back at the several rows of students, some of which are paying attention to the situation, but most are talking to their friends or on their phones. He puts his head down and begins writing something on a small piece of paper, then walks to you and hands it to you.

As you grab the note, his hand squeezes over yours. He lets go after you look at him. "Take it. Go. Come back when you get something for that."

You nod quickly, then glance down at the paper to see that there's a pass.

 Medical office, Room 305

He even went as far as to write the room number in case you forgot.

Thankful for that and everything else, you smile a little and make your way out the door, making sure not to get harassed again by some bully on your way.

Now that you really think about it, he's been having more of a soft spot for you recently, though maybe that's all in your head, too.

Like when you offered to help him clean up the room, and once you even stayed after class to ask him for help regarding what he was teaching.

Even though he could be intimidating sometimes, and downright frightening at others, you didn't find yourself scared around him. Only when he raises his voice, which he never does towards you.

Once you make it to the medical office and have the nurse inspect the damage, she determines that nothing is broken, just badly bruised.

You don't want to tell her that this incident was caused by bullies, so you just awkwardly tell her you fell down some stairs. She likely doesn't get paid enough to snuff out your lie.

She hands you an ice pack. "There," she smiles. "Not so bad. Try to watch where you're going next time, okay?"

Her condescending tone makes you feel worse. "Yes, ma'am. Thank you."

You apply pressure to your black eye as instructed, then head back to your English class.

When you get back inside the room, no one is there except Ellis. You check your phone, to see barely thirty minutes has passed. Maybe he sent them home early.

"Hi. I'm here." Your voice cracks again and you can't help but cringe. It sounds horrible, even to your own ears.

He looks up at you, brows pinching together in concern as soon as his eyes meet yours. He doesn't speak; he only pats the seat nearest to him on the front row of desks, gesturing for you to take a seat beside him.

Once you do, his cold fingers brush under your bruised eye. It should hurt, but they are so gentle against your skin that you barely flinch away from them.

"Who did this?" Ellis's gaze becomes narrow behind his round glasses.

You shake your head, suddenly feeling sick at your stomach. You hate how these kinds of things happen to you, especially since everyone else thinks they're harmless pranks.

They don't feel harmless. Especially when it feels like they leave physical and mental wounds everywhere on you.

"Nobody. I'm sorry."

He tuts in disapproval. "I know someone did this. Either you tell me, or I find out myself."

"Why do you care?" It sounds much more rude than you intended, so you try to soften your tone. "I'm sorry, its just... why would it matter if someone did?"

Ellis pinches the bridge of his nose. "Because you're too sweet. Too kind. It isn't fair that people treat you this way." He gives you another look over. "I dismissed my class today because of you, you know. I wouldn't do that for any of my other students, because they don't like me. And honestly, I don't really like them. But you..." he trails off.

"...but me?" you echo.

He scrubs a hand over his face. "You're like my child, (Y/n). It's my job as a professor to treat my students fairly, equally, but when it comes to you..." he sighs deeply, "...I worry about you every day. I wonder if you ate breakfast. If you've had anything to drink recently. How you slept. If anyone hurts you. None of my other students I let help me after class. Because if you're in front of my own two eyes, it's easier to just stop worrying. And I like being around you."

The information almost overwhelms you. "I had no clue."

"Well, now you do. So could you please tell me who did this? I'll have a heart attack if you worry me any more than I need to," he jokes with a weak smile, a very rare one.

"Just some guy from Delta Psi Lambda," you answer quickly. "I think his name was Brock, or something."

"I'll take care of him. Now, how's your eye?" As soon as you pull away the ice pack, he sucks in a harsh breath. "(Y/n). Oh, honey. It must be painful."

The term of endearment almost goes right past your head.

Almost.

"I mean, yeah. A little," you chuckle, trying to play it off. Really, it feels awful. "It doesn't feel too great, but it looks worse."

"It's bruising. Poor thing," he coos, taking your chin into his long, bony fingers and turning your head left and right, analyzing all of the damage. "This is unacceptable. Does anywhere else hurt?"

"No, this is all." You try to shrug again, but it comes out weird-looking. You can tell he catches it, too. "My nose was bleeding a lot earlier, but it stopped. Other than that, I guess everything else feels okay."

Ellis grabs a tissue and wipes off the leftover drying blood. His movements are careful yet firm, as if you would shatter to pieces if he wasn't gentle enough. "What am I going to do with you?" he sighs. "Can't trust you for even a moment before you're already coming back to me hurt." He presses a soft kiss on the crown of your head. "Do you need me to drive you back home?"

"I live on campus," you murmur. "I can just walk there."

He raises a brow at you. "That means they could just get you again if I let you go alone," he chastises. "Come on, follow me." He stands up, putting the papers into his work bag, then swinging it over his shoulder. He holds his free hand out and waits patiently for you to grab onto it, then he helps hoist you up.

As he does, your backpack slides down one arm. You watch as he puts it over his shoulder with his workbag, too.

...

A week passes, and Ellis is much softer towards you. He isn't as fatherly to you in front of people, but its pretty obvious that you've become the favorite.

He keeps asking if you have any food or drinks, and when you don't, he pulls out his lunchbox and offers whatever you need. You're not complaining. Free lunches are always good to accept.

"I don't need to eat lunch in here all the time now," you mumble, chewing on your favorite fruit that he offered. Weird that he knew that, but surely a coincidence.

Ellis pauses from what he's doing, which is erasing the whiteboard, and peers at you from the corner of his eye. "Why? Do you dislike spending time with me?"

You shake your head. "No, it's not that. I just... I think the bullies will leave me alone now. I haven't even seen any of the fraternity's faces since the incident."

"That doesn't mean I still can't worry about you," Ellis replies coolly. "You even forgot your lunch several times now. It worries me. I need to make sure you eat properly." The marker squeaks against the board as he writes reminders for next class's essay. Once he finishes that task, he sets everything down and heads to sit down at his desk. "I always pack extra for you now, because you're so forgetful. And thank goodness I do."

"Okay, Professor Dad," you sarcastically laugh.

He shakes his head at you while looking amused, making your words die in your throat.

That was clearly meant to be a joke, so why is he smiling like that?

Well, you know the answer, but it's still hard to believe. Even though Ellis seems to really care about you, he hasn't known you for very long at all.

So, why would he start acting so... so dad-like towards you? What exactly happened to turn him from the stern and rigid teacher persona into an almost doting father-figure towards one of his students?

"I-I didn't really mean—"

"I know. I get it," he says softly. "Just humor me. Let me keep fussing over you." After that, he falls quiet, working on grading some papers from earlier classes that day.

...

"You didn't bring a jacket?" Ellis asks exasperatedly. He's walking you to your dorm again after class ended, since it snowed.

Normally, you would've gone yourself, but due to the cold weather and Ellis's demands for you to stay in his classroom until he finished getting ready to walk you himself, you couldn't exactly refuse.

You look over at him, finding that his brows are pinched together in concern. "Oh, uh, no. I guess I forgot."

"For Pete's sake," he mutters, tugging the scarf from his neck and wrapping it snugly around yours instead. "I swear, you'll be the death of me one day, (Y/n). Can't even remember a simple thing like bringing a jacket." Despite sounding mad, there's also a tone of fondness mixed in with it.

You decide not to mention it, feeling embarrassed just thinking about it.

"Thanks," you hum.

"I don't mind doing things for you, you know," he adds after a moment. "I wanted to have kids of my own, but found out romance wasn't really my thing. And adoption costs way more money than what I have." He lets out a huff through his nostrils. "But it seems like you require the same doting as a toddler."

It doesn't even sound like its meant to be a jab at you; if anything, his voice takes on an affectionate edge.

"Is that bad?" you ask sheepishly.

"Not to me." He squeezes your hand, pulling you along beside him to cross the street. As soon as you reach your dorm and go inside, he dusts snowflakes off the top of your head. "That's better." You try to unwrap the scarf, but he stops you. "Keep it. I have several others like it. Besides, I don't want you catching a cold from being under-dressed."

You smile awkwardly. "Oh, okay. Thank you."

...

A month passes, and your friends had begun to avoid you. Even the bullies act scared to show their faces around you.

You wonder if its just Ellis's mere presence, but it's hard to tell. You decide a few days avoiding Ellis and trying to spend time with your friends again wouldn't hurt. You figure Ellis won't even notice too much, busy with papers and classes.

You notice Ellis giving you strange looks during class, but other than that, he acts normal. It's nice to feel like things are going back to the way they used to be again.

Barely a week after avoiding him, you hear someone yell your name.

But it isn't Ellis. It's Brock, and three of his other friends.

"Haven't forgotten what you did to me yet, did you? Because of you, I was nearly expelled!" he screams. Then, Brock runs towards you, fist flying directly towards your stomach and hitting you hard. You groan, then fall forward when one of his friends pushes you. "Hope you had fun trying to get rid of me, because you're gonna regret it!"

They get a few more punches in, and you can't even do anything about it because there's so many of them. You desperately look for anyone to be around, but there's no one.

"Stop!" someone yells.

You open your eyes from their previous screwed shut state, peering over at the man in glasses running towards you. Its Ellis.

He helps pull you away from all the frat guys, glaring down at each of them.

They must have some common sense, because they all freeze at the sight of Ellis. He barks something at them, but you can't pay attention over the ringing in your ears.

As soon as they begin sprinting off in the other direction, Ellis scoops you up bridal style and carries you somewhere.

You try opening your eyes to see where, but as soon as you manage to pry one open, he brushes his fingertips over your forehead.

"Don't stress yourself, love. Just rest." You close your eyes, and fade out from exhaustion.

...

You wake up in Ellis's apartment. It smells so clean, like it's never been lived in. Everything is so neatly organized, and nothing is out of place.

Not even a speck of dust lays on the windowsills or countertops. It seems like something straight out of a catalog.

You push yourself up into a sitting position, wincing from the pain in your arms and abdomen. Your lower back aches and twinges, too.

"Oh! Kiddo, please be careful!" You turn your head slowly towards Ellis's voice. He's holding some ice packs, water bottles, and bandages. His sweater vest has been changed for a plain gray shirt. "I'm glad you're finally awake. Let me take a look at you."

"What happened? Why am I here?"

He gives you a strange look. "You got beat up. Again," he emphasizes, clearly frustrated. "And you were so banged up that I brought you back to my place. I thought maybe I shouldn't take you back to your dorm, because you have no one who could take care of you." He clicks his tongue. "And besides that, you haven't come to me lately, and you're avoiding me. Now, you just got attacked again because I wasn't around to protect you."

You sniffle and in a sudden motion, wrap your arms around his neck. It surprises both you and him, but he's quick to embrace you twice as tightly.

His fingers curl into your hair, his other hand rubbing your back comfortingly.

"Hey, hey, shh..." He squeezes you. "Sweetie, calm down for me. You're going to hyperventilate if you breathe any quicker."

"I-I'm sorry... I d-didn't think th-they'd ever b-bother me again...!"

"Shh, breathe for me. Follow my rhythm." He takes deep breaths, waiting each time for you to follow. "That's right. You're such a good listener." Ellis cups your cheek and rubs away a few stray tears from it. He notices your breathing returned back to normal, so he smiles, placing a tender kiss to the crown of your head. "I've missed having you around."

"I'm sorry."

"That's alright. Now that I have you again, you're safe." He gets up, then walks to the kitchen. "Let me fix you something warm. You need it after today, poor baby."

As he cooks, you drift in and out of consciousness yet again. He chuckles when he notices you're basically passed out once again.

His phone rings. He scoffs, but answers it.

"What do you want? Yes, yes... you'll no longer need to worry about getting expelled for what you did... no, I'm not thanking you. Now please delete this number and never talk to them again. If I catch you even looking at them, I really will make sure you're suspended."

[jeizet]

Fracción Orihime AU (The lost princess of Hueco Mundo)

An AU where Orihime ends up stranded in Hueco Mundo during and after the fight against Aizen, leading her to "survive" by eating hollows... which ended up making her a hollow herself.

(Orihime it's a Fraction because she, kind of jokingly, becomes Grimmjow's fracción, they are constantly together)

About the AU and Orihime's Resurrection (Written by my discord buddy Budget, he is amazing)

Draft Story

The idea came to me because I just started wondering where the fuck that black box that Grimmjow used Against Ulquiorra led and I imagined it just lead to fuck nowhere inside of Hueco Mundo.

So basically how this goes is that during the fight of Ichigo Vs Ulquiorra in the tower where Loly and Melony attack Orihime. Ulquiorra gets tired and to piss off Ichigo, grabs Orihime and makes her eat the teleportation box and she ends up so fucking far away that her presence it's unreachable, suddenly the whole Karakura gang feels it, she is GONE.

Ulquiorra starts talking big and Ichigo goes fucking nuclear on his ass because sure Orihime was traumatized but she was alive... WAS. Because who the fuck knows what that box was truly.

After the fight with Ulquiorra Ichigo was going to search for Hime but is stopped, he is told that Uryuu and the rest are going to search for her, that Unohana currently needs Him to fight, so he trusts his friends to find her while he fights Aizen.

And then he fought Aizen, and he was relieved and his group of friends went to check on him… And there's still no Hime, there's no cute scene of her being relieved and making a comment on how he looks different and there's no soft smiles. He sees the guys, he smiles and then realizes... Orihime is not there and a simple "Where is Inoue?" changes the face of everyone 

"We are still searching, all of the Seireitei is searching for her on Hueco Mundo"

And then he passes out from pain

…

The Caja Negación puts the victim in a pocket dimension for a bit, So Hime is stranded in nothingness for a while before reappearing, lost in Hueco Mundo, very far away. Time goes on and she grows hungrier; she goes to the point that she tries to reject her own hunger, but of course, that’s not really fenomena and trying to find a way to leave the pocket dimension left her drained of energy.

But, even though she is a place made of bone dust, she remembers that hollows bleed, but in a cruel twist, if she kills them, they become dust. She has to eat hollows alive, small or big. She still feels hungry and at some point, she notices a hole opening where her belly button was…

Listen, she has a hole in her tummy now, and who else has it? Grimmjow! Where is he? Close by!

After some time, no one knows how long she has been lost, so she finds Aizen castle and inside the castle, it's Grimmjow, who starts to bully her... Well try to…

It's the first familiar face other than her rikkas who were always by her side. Sure, he is not nice, but it's a face she knows, in a place she knows and it feels grounding enough to break her and allow her to cry.

She collapses and when she wakes up she is on the couch of her old room, Grimmjow on the other side of the room just looking at her. They start chatting, She notices how he is still damaged so she heals him without even asking. He guesses it's not the best time to complain, she is just healing him at the end of the day.

He wonders how she is still alive? Ori admits that she has been eating hollows and they go hunting together. He makes it a competition and for the first time what Orihime was doing felt somehow typical, like she wasn't fighting to survive it's just surviving.

Grimmjow jokes how Orihime it's now his fracción because they have the hole in the same place and she is following him around and Ori can't be happier with finally having guidance.

Time goes on, Grimmjow finally feels better and he opens a Garganta for Orihime to go to the human world, but he goes with her because if she it's caught by a shinigami she will get hunted because she definitely smells/feels like a hollow now. Orihime accepts and goes back to the human world, she imagines the gang think she is dead so she at least wants to clarify that.

She sees that the human world it's intact, so they definitely won which makes her so happy and decides to go to the school since it's a weekday. When she goes to the school the first person that sees her it's Tatsuki, who calls the whole gang to meet her.

Ori discovers that she has been missing for nearly a year, she is informed that the boys go to hueco mundo every weekend to search for her. Uryuu does mention that her spiritual pressure it's extremely strong and that she feels different. They don't realise she is a hollow until Ichigo finally talks…

"Why can't I see Inoue?" He asks, and everyone grows quiet…

This was a confirmation. Orihime is indeed dead, Ichigo can't feel her, or see her, he even tries to reach for her and there's NOTHING

Orihime explains how the months went, she is now friends with Grimmjow, she has seen Nel, she became great at hunting, she has met Haribel and the tres bestias and they get along pretty nice... How she has been eating hollows and at some point she simply couldn’t reject her becoming a hollow.

And with that she shows the gang the hole that was growing on her stomach.

They don't take it well, Ichigo doesn't know what 's going on so he has to explain that now Orihime was dead, that she was a hollow, she had short hair with different clothes and she was completely different, but she didn't look completely sad.

Orihime couldn't bear watching Ichigo getting explained in front of her what she went through, she wanted to talk to him, so as a test she asked for pen and paper to see if he could see her writing, and he could! This in some weird way made Ichigo feel a little better.

She goes back with Tatsuki, she cooks with her, she takes a bath, Orihime begs to do homework together for some sense of normality but... It just doesn't feel like it's normal…

She enjoys the commodities for a week, she takes her long deserved bath, she catches up with her mangas, she reads some stories to Nel and Grimmjow who don't know how to read... And she goes back to Hueco Mundo.

She comes back to the human world very often, she trains with the boys, she jokes around Uryu how they are now sworn enemies, and tells Chad and Tatsuki how she is going to eat them! And she exchanges letters with Ichigo, which has to be her favourite part. She goes to Ichigo's home, talks with Karin, helps Isshin with cleaning, eats and helps Yuzu although she can't see her and goes to Ichigo's room. He bought a whiteboard in order for her to write more comfortably and quicker. At first she just had a stack of papers but she admitted she felt bad making him buy so much paper.

They would talk like this for HOURS. She would write about her day and he'll talk about his. Sometimes she would go to his home thinking he is there and he isn't so he leaves her a message on the whiteboard, she erases what he wrote and writes down a long message of whatever she wants to.

…

17 months after Aizen's death. Let's change perspectives.

…

Ichigo misses Rukia, he misses Orihime, he misses the soul society and how he felt at home there.

He always felt like something wasn't clicking in the human world for him, and he somehow felt at home after becoming a shinigami, and he couldn't admit it to anyone… Anyone other than Orihime, the friend he failed his promise to, he owed her his honesty at least, she has long forgiven him, she always says "there's nothing you and I could have done, it was my decision to go to Hueco Mundo and it was my decision to stop being human too" she will always say.

Inoue would feel like an imaginary friend if it wasn't for his Dad always talking about missing Orihime and how he wants to talk to her, "she the only one to respect me!" He would cry, and Ichigo would remind him that Orihime describes him as " a little silly" not as a grown man.

He told Inoue everything that was going on in his life, she was pretty much his diary, maybe it was easier because he could just write it on the whiteboard and disappear afterwards. He also could guess that it was the same for her, sometimes her messages would be on the sadder side, how she missed them, how she was worried. They kept it light hearted where they were together tho...until one time.

Uryu was attacked and didn't want to tell who and Ichigo was too pissed to even hide it to Hime who was coincidentally in his home that day. She had told him days prior about Uryuu being worried about Ichigo being targeted by bad people and Ichigo chose to ignore it.

Ichigo spoke about how he was powerless, about how he misses his powers and Rukia and her… More than everything else. She is his failed promise, she is the person he failed to protect and somehow she was still here, and every time she came he was happy they weren't apart but it was a constant reminder on how useless he was.

Usually when speaking Ichigo would give her time to reply, but this time he went on and on, and when he realised that he's been speaking for minutes without stopping he looked at the board.

It was empty, but after some minutes Orihime started writing back… 

"I miss you too.

Please get your powers back.

We never really hugged or anything like that, I don't know how I can miss something we never really did, but I do.

I miss you looking at me and not a place where you think I'm at.

I'm taller now but you don't know it, I look different but you don't know it.

After everything somehow I'm fine and I can't show it to you.

Please, I know it's selfish for me to ask, but get your powers back, I miss your eyes on me" 

Ichigo ran through the door to Xcution that day.

The day he saw a hollow for the first time was the happiest he was in a while.

The day he saw Rukia again was a disaster, but after everything went through it was great, they spoke for hours after getting scolded for "being a pussy" and "crying like a baby".

And one day, a Garganta opened up, the first one to come out of it was Grimmjow. 

Ichigo looks at him like he didn't miss him, because he didn't! But he was happy to see him in some wicked way, this was the guy that protected Orihime for 18 months when he couldn't so he was at least thankful.

And then Inoue comes through the Garganta happily like a puppy.

"GRIMM I OPENED IT MYSELF CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT OMG I-...."

She was taller indeed, she had shorter hair than the last time he saw her, but longer than the last time she was described to him.

She looked thin and fragile, but she walked with the confidence of a warrior.

He could see the hole on her stomach slightly through the white of her tank top.

Her hair clips were no longer hairclips but they were part of her, and branches grew out of them like horns.

She was fine, she somehow was alive, she didn't look sad or like she had given up.

Her eyes didn't shine as much now. But they shined like they did before when she realised HE was looking.

Looking AT her.

Listening TO her.

"You can see me." Ichigo nodded. "You can hear me" She started crying 

"I can hear you," he replied.

They hugged.

Resurrección

Culebre (the name's closest direct meaning is 'Snake' or 'Cobra', but it specifically refers to a Cantabrian dragon renowned for kidnapping fairies).

Culebre possesses four separate release commands, which will have separate entries.

Release Command: Hoard.

Appearance: Upon release, the three fairies normally used for Santen Kesshun glow and writhe, white clay covering their bodies as they melt into Orihime's flesh, becoming scaled armor that stretches down Orihime's legs to end in clawed, reptilian feet, as well as armor that covers her torso, with enormous, leathery wings emerging from her back.

Ability: With this release of Culebre, Orihime's speed is greatly increased, as she can cross vast distances on foot or by flight without even needing Sonido. When she does make use of Sonido, she can make use of the tremendous speed granted to her to turn herself into a living weapon, slamming into enemies at such high velocities that the impact alone can shatter their bones and pulp their organs. Beyond her base stat increase, Orihime is also capable of creating the Escamas de Dragón (Dragon Scales), massive walls of physical rejection that dwarf the shields she was capable of before becoming a Hollow. These walls are so large and heavy, they can be used as a weapon in their own right, as Orihime drops them from high in the air or simply wraps them around her opponent in order to crush them into paste. However, despite using the most fairies, this is actually the weakest of Culebre's releases, as it has more value in helping Orihime escape or defend herself than in outright destroying her enemies.

Release Command: Gorge Yourself

Appearance: Once released, the two fairies normally used for Soten Kisshun melt into Orihime's body, becoming massive gauntlets that stretch all the way up to her shoulders. These gauntlets have the same scales as her other released forms, and end in enormous clawed hands, so large just a single one can wrap all the way around an adult human without even trying.

Ability: With this aspect of Culebre, Orihime perverts the healing nature of Soten Kisshun, transforming it into a vessel for the insatiable hunger of a Hollow. Her claws, already massively powerful and capable of devastating blows, can scrape into the Reishi around her, rejecting its existence to allow her to bypass armor and shields and strike right at her enemy's heart. But, when something is rejected from existence entirely, it doesn't just vanish, but instead leaves behind a unique energy, as the universe attempts to compensate for a clear violation of the Law of Conservation of Matter. Orihime can then consume this energy, healing her own wounds and making herself stronger and larger, to the point where she towers over her foes in a similar fashion to Yammy. However, this power comes at a price. The more energy Orihime consumes, the hungrier she becomes, the gnawing sense of starvation in her stomach leading her to devour more and more, driving her into a frenzy of feral need until either everything around her is dead or she has collapsed from the exhausting ache in her Soul.

Release Command: Kill Them All

Appearance: With the command given, and her intent filled with the murderous desires of a Hollow, Tsubaki sinks into Orihime's flesh, transforming into a draconic helmet with towering horns and gnashing jaws, which covers Orihime's head entirely save for her left eye.

Ability: The most powerful and the most limited of Orihime's first three releases, this form only allows for a single attack, concentrated on Orihime's head. By using the rejecting powers of Tsubaki, which normally splits anything in half, Orihime can cause the Reishi around her body to become dangerously unstable, in a similar manner to fissile nuclear material. She can then draw this unstable Reishi towards her head, concentrating and channeling it until it can't take anymore, and then launch it forwards with a Cero. The resulting attack is a beam of unstable, cascading Reishi, breaking down and releasing ridiculous amounts of force as it hurtles at high speed into the enemy's body, reducing them to nothing with enough force to crack a tectonic plate. Orihime refers to this as her Aliento de Muerte (Breath of Death), and uses it only when an enemy can't be defeated otherwise, as it is incredibly draining on her Reiatsu to perform more than once or twice successively.

Release Command: Devastate

Appearance: The pinnacle of Culebre's power, which melds all of Orihime's fairies with her body. However, that much power forcibly being added to her system causes her to warp and mutate, the refined armor of her previous releases breaking apart and becoming true flesh and blood. The end result is that Orihime ends up as a massive, monstrous dragon, her legs replaced with a writhing snake's tail as she drags herself forward with clawed hands and massive, canopy-like wings. Even her one eye that was normally visible under her helmet has vanished, leaving little to no trace of anything that could ever identify Orihime as 'human'.

Ability: By using all six of her fairies at once, Orihime has access to all of her prior powers, now at a considerably greater scale, allowing her to surround herself with nigh-impenetrable shields, tear the landscape apart for fuel, and fire beams of pure destruction at anything that lives long enough to be a bother. However, the true power of Culebre in this form is that it isn't quite Orihime. The massive dragon others can see is actually a shell of flesh, similar to a biological mech suit, with Orihime somewhere inside it. Because of this, there's no way to kill Culebre unless you can guarantee hitting Orihime inside it, which is practically impossible given its size. And whenever you land a blow that doesn't end the fight, Culebre simply regenerates, sealing up its flesh and reinforcing its scales as it preps another breath attack to vaporize you. That said, though targeting Orihime herself is impractical (as she could be anywhere in the dragon at any time, and even a single chunk can regrow the whole thing if she isn't removed or killed), Culebre is not without weak spots. The six fairies form points of Reiatsu that those with astute spiritual senses can detect. By targeting these points, a coordinated team can pull the fairies out of Culebre, weakening the dragon as a whole until eventually it loses all its special powers, becoming nothing more than a regular large, scary Hollow. From here, the team could then destroy the weakened Culebre, but this in turn carries a separate risk. So long as Orihime is still driven by rage, hunger, and despair, her considerable power will continue reinforcing Culebre's physical form, to the point where removing the fairies might prompt an evolution of all new attacks and strategies. Thus, in order to truly defeat Culebre, someone needs to break Orihime out of the negative emotions that fill her mind and Soul, preventing Culebre from growing stronger as it is taken apart, and she can finally be saved from her own power and grief.

[whatdoyouwanttocallmefor]

But She Chose to Use Me - Hwang Hyunjin x Fem!Reader

This is the time, guys! MUAGAHAHA. I think this gonna be in my draft for a long time, but i write this because i got the inspiration from the tiktok I watched. I'll put it here later if I find it again. Anyways, enjoy!!!!

WARNING: Toxic reader, playgirl behaviour, downbad hyunjin ( he's down so bad your honour ), etc....

----

Everyone at school knew Y/N. She was the kind of girl who could make hearts race with just a glance, the kind who played love like a game and always won. Boys would fall for her, one after another, and she would entertain them just long enough to keep them hoping—only to leave them behind when she got bored. It was never personal. It was just how she was.

So when she set her sights on Hyunjin, the warning bells rang almost instantly.

“She’s just going to break your heart,” Changbin had said, arms crossed as he leaned against the lockers, watching Y/N as she walked past with that signature smirk on her lips.

“She gets bored easily. You’re just the next phase,” Seungmin added, adjusting his bag strap.

“She’s dangerous,” Felix muttered, quieter but just as firm. “You should know better, Hyunjin.”

The rest of his friends had their own warnings, each trying to talk some sense into him, but none of it mattered. Because Hyunjin had already made up his mind.

“She could’ve picked anyone,” he said, his voice soft but unwavering. “But she chose to use me.”

There was no bitterness in his tone, no resentment. Just a quiet sort of acceptance, as if the idea of being used by Y/N was still something special. And that was how it started.

---

Y/N played her usual game, pulling Hyunjin close just to push him away. She’d call him late at night just to hear his voice, only to ignore his texts the next morning. She’d let him walk her home, teasing him with playful smiles, but never let things go further. He was just another boy caught in her web—except, he never fought against it.

If anything, Hyunjin enjoyed it.

Because he was down bad.

Ridiculously, pathetically, hopelessly down bad for her.

Every time she was so much as she glanced his way, he felt like his heart was about to burst. He went out of his way to buy her little gifts, her favourite snacks, cute plushies, and even a custom bracelet with her initials on it. He never expected anything in return. He just wanted to see her smile.

One time, she casually mentioned that she liked a certain perfume, and the next day, Hyunjin had it in his bag, waiting for the perfect moment to give it to her.

“I just thought you’d like it,” he had said, rubbing the back of his neck shyly as he handed it over.

Y/N had stared at the expensive glass bottle in disbelief before laughing. “You’re really too easy, Hyunjin.”

But that didn’t stop her from using it. And it definitely didn’t stop him from noticing how she smelled like him now.

He let her do whatever she wanted, never questioning when she left him on read, never demanding more. When she ignored him in school, he didn’t push. He just waited. When she disappeared for days, he still sent her good morning texts, knowing she wouldn’t reply. And when she asked him to meet up, no matter what time it was, he always showed up.

---

One night, as they sat together on the rooftop of an abandoned building—one of her favorite hideouts—Hyunjin turned to her with a thoughtful expression. The city lights flickered below, and the cool night air carried a sense of stillness that made everything feel more real.

“Do you ever get tired?” he asked, his voice gentle.

Y/N raised a brow. “Of what?”

“Of pretending you don’t care.”

She scoffed, leaning back on her palms. “Who says I’m pretending?”

Hyunjin didn’t argue. He simply stared up at the stars, his long fingers tracing invisible patterns on his knee. “You could’ve picked anyone,” he murmured. “But you chose to use me.”

Y/N froze, caught off guard by the way he said it. There was no accusation, no anger. Just quiet acceptance. He wasn’t asking for more. He wasn’t trying to change her. He was simply stating a fact.

For the first time, something inside her stirred, something uncomfortable, something unfamiliar. Guilt.

Hyunjin was different. Every other boy had tried to chase her, to make her stay, to demand more than she was willing to give. But Hyunjin never asked for anything. He let her come and go as she pleased, and somehow, that made it worse. Because he deserved better, and yet, he stayed anyway.

---

Over the next few weeks, Y/N found herself changing in ways she couldn’t explain. She stopped flirting with other guys, stopped playing games with Hyunjin. She started waiting for him after school, asking him about his day, genuinely listening to what he had to say. She let herself care, just a little.

But caring was dangerous.

It meant she could get hurt.

One afternoon, she found herself walking towards the soccer field, where Hyunjin sat alone, sketchbook resting on his lap. His hair fell in soft waves over his forehead, and the late afternoon sunlight made him look almost ethereal.

She hesitated for a moment before taking a deep breath and stepping closer. “Hey.”

Hyunjin looked up, his eyes immediately softening. “Hey.”

Y/N swallowed, suddenly feeling nervous, something that never happened to her. She shoved her hands into her jacket pockets, trying to gather her thoughts. “I think I’ve been using you as an excuse.”

Hyunjin tilted his head slightly, his expression unreadable. “An excuse for what?”

“For not letting myself care,” she admitted, staring down at the grass. “Because if I let myself care, it means I can get hurt. And I don’t—” She took a shaky breath. “I don’t want to get hurt, Hyunjin.”

He was silent for a long moment before setting his sketchbook aside and standing up. He stepped closer, close enough that she could see the way his eyes searched hers, trying to understand what she was saying.

“I’d wait for you, you know,” he said quietly. “Even if you’re scared.”

Her heart clenched at the sincerity in his voice. He meant it. He always meant what he said.

She let out a shaky laugh, rubbing the back of her neck. “I don’t want you to wait anymore.”

Hyunjin’s brows furrowed, and for a second, she saw the briefest flicker of hurt cross his face. But before he could misunderstand, she stepped forward and took his hand in hers.

“I don’t want you to wait,” she repeated, squeezing his fingers gently. “Because I want to try. With you.”

His breath hitched, and for the first time, he was the one caught off guard. His free hand came up to cup her cheek, his thumb brushing softly against her skin as if trying to make sure this was real.

“You’re serious?” he whispered.

Y/N nodded. “I am.”

A slow, disbelieving smile spread across his lips before he let out a breathless chuckle. “You’re going to be the death of me,” he muttered, shaking his head.

She smirked, tilting her head playfully. “Yeah, but at least you’ll die happy, right?”

Hyunjin rolled his eyes, but he was still smiling as he pulled her closer, resting his forehead against hers. “You’re impossible.”

Y/N closed her eyes, letting herself fall into the warmth of his touch. “But you still chose me.”

His fingers tightened around hers. “Yeah,” he murmured. “And I always will.”

For the first time, Y/N wasn’t playing a game. She wasn’t running.

She was falling.

And this time, she was okay with it.

---

Look at that!! Im not gonna lie. The moment this idea pops up in my head, I'm giggling hard. Ouh, and I'm planning to make it as a series for all members. Do tell me if you guys are interested in reading other members' parts too. Love yall!

[swaps55]

Hi! I'm actually obsessed with Opus rn (like I'm daydreaming about it at work. You broke me). Anyways, I was wondering about your writing process for it! When did you first get the idea for it, and when did you start writing it? What does your revision process look like? Did you plan for it to be a full trilogy + more retelling or did it spiral out of Sonata? It's so amazing and I'm so happy that you're writing it :)

Talk about a dream question!!! I could go on about this for days.

Opus was directly inspired by @urrone, who back in 2019 had the lovely idea of creating a playlist and writing a short fic for each song. I'd been itching to get back into writing fanfic after a long hiatus, but hadn't found the right story to write. A songfic playlist suddenly gave me some direction. In the past I'd written a lot of short stories about a generic mshenko Shepard, and I knew certain things about how I saw that romance unfolding (such as them serving together before the Normandy), but I had never written anything consistent with a particular Shepard. So I figured I would try my hand at a short story collection tracing an mshenko relationship across the trilogy.

ONE work. Maybe 15 or so chapters, each one its own self-contained short. I still have the outline somewhere.

Now, let's be clear, this was never going to be how it actually worked in practice. This was a pipe dream. XD

As soon as I wrote the story that became the first chapter of Cantata I realized how much context I would need to set up their relationship before we ever got to the Normandy. I continued on in my delusion, however. ONE story. All 3 games plus the pre-trilogy roots. ONE.

Then I got stuck at Sharjila, and that's how Sonata, which was intended to be a silly one-shot diversion, happened. And once Sonata was written, it wasn't silly, and it wasn't a one-shot. But to fit it into my 'canon' relationship timeline, I'd have to change how I envisioned what I was doing. Sonata was a novel. So the other stories in it would have to be, too.

Each one has had a slightly different writing process. Sonata was chaos to write. I wrote an entire 30k word draft that I threw in the trash. (I was so rusty and had let some bad habits and lazy storytelling get in my way.) I wrote it out of order. I had no idea where the story was going or what I was doing. I figuratively closed my eyes and just let it come out on the page. It was a possession, from start to finish. It was 100% pantsed.

Instead of going back to what was now Cantata (which was also a mess, thanks to all the aforementioned rust), I rode my momentum into Fugue. But it was so brutal, and I knew I was eventually going to hit a point where everything that had happened on the 'Yang was going to become very important to Kaidan. At this point in time NO one but me knew who Pendergrass, Aslany, Beaudoin, and Captain Oseguera were, aside from a couple of references in Sonata. But for Fugue to work, people needed to care about what had happened before ME1, and miss those characters. So I put Fugue on the shelf to let myself recover, and went back to Cantata.

Cantata is closer to my original idea than the rest of Opus - it is a series of interconnected short stories. Each one tells a pretty complete story that stands on its own, but together they all create a bigger whole. While I had a rough idea of what I wanted to achieve with each story/chapter, I had no idea how I was going to do it until I started writing it. My 'outline' for Fall From Your Ladder says, "N5 training is a bitch. Fuck Benning," with no further notes.

Cantata was a joy to write. I miss writing it more than any other story. Even when it was hard (looking at YOU, scene transitions in Facing Giants), it was fun.

I think once Cantata was finished I was still scared of Fugue, so I did a quick detour to Concerto, which was a wholly different writing experience because I was adapting something I had already written, an ME1 novelization called Exordium, to tailor it for Sam. I only took on the Virmire piece of it, because it felt important. I have had no interest in writing a different take on ME1 from what I'd already done, because I love what I did. Someday I might do the rest of it, and make Concerto a larger story. But the bite-sized challenge of identifying what worked for Sam, what didn't, what needed to be added and what needed to be dropped or modified was a lot of fun.

Fugue was work. The first half before I took the break was still mostly pantsing: having a vague idea of what I wanted to accomplish and figuring out how as I went. The second half was...whew. In addition to managing Kaidan's grief and making his journey through it feel authentic, I had to start setting a chess board for a re-wired ME3 ending that I've been pondering for over a decade. I had to get more organized than I usually do when I write. I didn't do detailed outlines, but I did write thought dumps so I could think my way through all the different threads and how they needed to connect. Fugue was emotionally and technically VERY complex, and I did a lot of agonizing over each piece of it. The Weight of Everything and Remember We Flew were two of the most complicated and difficult chapters I have ever pieced together.

And now we're at Mezzo. Mezzo has been a different kind of hard for personal reasons. I'm burned out on a lot of fronts, so writing just isn't the sanctuary I can retreat to like it has been. My commitment to it is unwavering, but it just hasn't gone as smoothly or quickly as I would like. It doesn't help that ME2 is a disaster of a narrative - it's like a 24 episode TV season with monster of the week episodes peppered with the occasional overarching plot, which is great for a TV series but terrible for a novel format. Too many characters, too many disconnected plot lines, and a thin central narrative that ultimately has little impact on the overall trilogy. It's a great game, but it's a nightmare to turn into a conventional narrative.

It's also a very different experience writing through on-screen game events. I don't like regurgitating what readers already know, so when I need to do it, I try to find a different angle or perspective that gives you something new to chew on. My main approach has been to more or less let the plot and game events happen in the background wherever I can. If I don't have anything meaningful to add or change, there's no reason to put them in present action, so they happen off screen (like Freedom's Progress). The beauty of fanfic is that I can do that, because I know the reader already has the information I am leaving out.

Another tricky thing about Mezzo is telling a story that centers on someone's downward trauma spiral without access to their POV. Every time the story has gotten stuck, it's been because I have forced the POV character to fixate on Sam rather than let them be the hero of their own story. When I go back and instead let the POV character put themselves first, Sam does what the story needs him to do in the periphery, and the writing imitates what's happening to Sam: he is spiraling out of control and people aren't seeing it. But the reader does. :)

I could say so much more, but this is SO long and you deserve a cookie if you have read this far. Thank you so much for asking!!

[nkjemisin]

Hey there. I'm writing a story set in New York City and am not American. I have few characters, but most of them are arab or white. I can't help but feel a bit wrong about it, given that America is much more diverse than that, and NYC being an emblem of that. Do you think I should force myself to include more representation or should I just tell my story, and leave that more diverse cast to some other story I could write? I know this is a neverending debate and there are many opinions about it, but I've always agreed with everything you've said in matters of representation in fiction, and so I'd be curious to know your personal answer on it.

I'm a little confused by how you're using "representation," here. It sounds like you think representation = "randomly sticking BIPOC everywhere." I think when most people use that word, it means something more like "create an accurate or at least plausible depiction of a group or place." In actual New York, there are plenty of Middle Easterners and white people who live in relatively homogeneous small communities where they might only see someone of a different ethnicity on the subway. If your story is set in one of those communities -- and you do stick some random BIPOC in that subway scene, because that's plausible -- then it sounds like your characters might be an example of good representation.

(Note: if you're not writing something set in the real world, but it features human beings, it needs to represent humanity as a whole, unless there's a good in-world reason not to. But if it's our world? You can get specific.)

Here's the catch, tho: plausibility is relative. If you've absorbed some biases and haven't done enough research, then you might end up writing something that feels plausible to you, but which isn't actually representative or plausible to anyone else. The way to avoid this is to do the research and check (to the best of your ability) your biases. For example, you aren't American, I assume you've at least visited NYC? If not, you should. You can visit some of the communities I mentioned! You can eat in restaurants, visit mosques, have conversations with actual real people who are living the life you're writing about! If you don't have the time, money, or spoons to do that, there are other ways to do good research -- films and YT/Tiktok videos made by people from the communities in question, for example. But you'd need to watch a lot of them to get a good representative sample.

I recommend this book to all the writing students I've taught at Clarion, and other writer workshops: Writing the Other, by Nisi Shawl and Cynthia Ward. There's a particular part of it that seems relevant here, which is a kind of hierarchy of "appropriate" appropriation, I think first mentioned by Diantha Day Sprouse but included in Writing the Other. Basically it says that if you want to write about a culture that isn't your own, you can learn about that culture in one of several ways: a) You can be an Invader, and just go take whatever intellectual and artistic tidbits from that culture that you want, regardless of how damaging this might be to members of that group. Example: non-Indigenous people who write about actual secret practices, or who encourage the desecration of sacred places. b) You can be a Tourist, in which you're still mooching from that culture, but at least you're figuratively paying someone for it and accepting tidbits that the culture has chosen to sell. Example: getting a sensitivity reader. Or c) you can be an Invited Guest, who brings in as much as they take out, and who has formed relationships that are beneficial to all involved. Example: being part of an exchange program, both as a student and later as a host, and maintaining those friendships outside of the program.

The goal is to be an IG, but that isn't always possible. Tourist is still better than being an Invader. (...I feel like I'm leaving out a category. It's been a while since I read the book; any more recent readers want to check me here?) But the closer you can get to actually participating in that culture, the more your work will be informed by reality instead of biases or misinformation, and the more likely your work will read as plausible not just to you, but to your widest possible audience -- people familiar with the culture and people who aren't.

(I'm a little concerned about your phrasing of "force myself to include more representation," note. Why would that need to be a forced thing? A writer's goal should be to write something that feels lived-in and authentic to [if it's a real place] most people's experience -- not to meet some arbitrary standard, but because that's how you master immersion and characterization. If good immersion and characterization feel forced to you right now, that suggests you need more practice. I recommend writing short stories!)

[mossy-paws]

I miss clementine. I miss vinestaff's adopted creature. Could we see some new clementine. I just want to give the cuty a second hug.

(Bias towards the past? what's that :) )

funny enough! Guess what I’ve been forgetting to post for quite some time now :)

[phonification]

something something about worth

[crossbackpoke-check]

blessed be (lorscher bienensegen) | telling the bees (wiþ ymbe)

"Bees" [remixed, abridged], Claudia Emerson // "Letter to Someone Living Fifty Years from Now" [remixed. abridged], Matthew Olzmann // "Letter to my Great, Great Grandchild" [remixed, abridged], J.P. Grasser | Len Redkole, Nina Weiss, Brian Babineau, Christian Peterson, Mitchell Leff, Dave Isaac, Megan DeRuchie

[mammomlette]

People don’t talk about MC needing to wear a magical ring to not accidentally yk cause NATURAL DISASTERS with their powers??? Not only accidentally but without realising???

Diavolo or smthn is asking too much of MC or being a bit too annoying and their other hand slowly drifts towards the ring and they hold onto it while maintaining dead eye contact. Like continue to piss me off hoe I’ll blink and blow a hole in your castle idk

Obv they never do it (or do they?) but the threat is there and it’s a risk dia (or whoever but I’m using dia) can’t take

[sevensinswithin]

Okay so to everyone who was here for the original post, here’s basically how Alicent and Laenor get married in my lavender marriage au:

The entire thing starts because Alicent catches Laenor and Joffrey fucking in a secluded part of the castle a few weeks before Aemma dies. The boys only realize they’ve been caught because Alicent runs away from them like her ass is on fire. That girl had no idea gay male sex was an option in life and now needs to reevaluate everything in her life after catching them.

Laenor then spends the next few weeks trying to find a way to get her alone because guess what. Fucking in a secluded but also public area is not a good strategy if you want to keep your gay love affair a secret. So now Laenor is hoping to convince Alicent to stay quiet about what she saw because his dad seems to think he'll grow out of it (do not attack me, this literally happens in canon) and he doesn’t want anyone to know yet since it might impact who he’ll get married to eventually. Meanwhile Alicent is desperately trying to forget that she ever saw anything and doesn’t tell Otto about seeing Laenor and Joffrey because let's be real. This man said “childhood companions” like it was a slur in that one scene, so she knows that her father would do something with this information. Alicent does not want to be the reason Joffrey and Laenor are in trouble for their relationship. Nevermind that she’s suddenly having the realization that women liking women isn’t that far of a stretch after all.

Unfortunately, to everyone else in the world, it looks like Laenor is trying to court her and that Alicent is just trying to be very polite about his interest in her since she never wants to be alone in a room with him unless they’re around other people. Which is something that is totally normal and not weird at all. Why would you say otherwise?

Then Aemma dies and Otto sends her to see Viserys in his room and Alicent is now very stressed about something else in her life because she wants to do what her father says, but she also doesn’t want to betray Rhaenyra.

So during those six months after Aemma dies - which is apparently how much times passes between Aemma’s death and when Viserys decides to marry Alicent according to a HOTD article I read - Alicent, like in canon, is sent by her father to Viserys’ chambers and desperately hopes that her father’s ambitions won’t happen and that Viserys will simply see her as person that is supporting him in his grief.

(Life Hack: If you ever want to read an article and it says you have to make an account to read the rest of it, just go back to the google page you found it on, right click the link, and save the link as an HTML document. That lets you read the article without having to make an account. I found this out from someone on the internet and damn did it help when I wanted to access any account restricted article. Anyways, back to the plot.)

So to counteract that and make it so she’s less appealing to Viserys, Alicent always mentions Laenor and how fond of him she is during their talks. She also mentions how worried she is about Rhaenyra and her position as heir because there seems to be so many people that seem to be under the impression that they can replace her by having Viserys marry one of their daughters and convince him change his heir to one of the possible children he might have with those daughters.

Meanwhile, Laenor is absolutely losing his mind because all of a sudden Alicent is always around him and receptive to interacting with him, even though literally weeks before she avoided being around him like the plague. During this she also manages to wring out of him the fact that his parents (mainly Corlys, let's be real) are talking about potentially marrying Laena to Viserys and that he hates that idea as she’s way too young in his eyes for that. Eventually Alicent manages to find a way to be alone with Laenor and make him swear to secrecy about what she'll tell him because telling anyone might mean that his sister will actually have to marry Viserys. He does and she fills him in on what her father wants and what she’s attempting to do, and that she needs his cooperation to get him to at least appear like they’re courting.

So Alicent and Laenor put up the appearance that they’re at least attracted to each other to get people talking, which totally doesn’t ignite jealousy in Rhaenyra at the idea of Alicent being in love with her cousin. Cue Rhaenyra absolutely doing everything in her power to make Laenor appear like a loser to Alicent and the rest of the court. Alicent makes sure to get her to stop that shit real quick and tells Rhaenyra that she and Laenor are only pretending to be in love in order to avoid having to marry someone that would disrespect Laenor’s preference for men and disregard Alicent’s autonomy. Alicent also mentions that possibly marrying Laenor means that Alicent and Rhaenyra will be allowed to see each other very frequently as she will be Laenor’s wife and the Velaryons are often at court since they are related to the royal family. So now they have Rhaenyra on board.

Eventually the night before that one small council meeting where in canon Viserys announces that he’ll marry Alicent, Alicent “confesses” to Viserys that she’s in love with Laenor and that she wants to marry him, but that her father would never allow Alicent to marry Laenor because he and Lord Corlys dislike each other. She also lets it “slip” that Otto is very adamant that Viserys must have a male heir despite the fact that Rhaenyra has already been made heir, and that he sees Alicent as a potential bride for Viserys despite her unwillingness to marry her best friend’s father. She also sprinkles in the fact that Rhaenyra would be devastated at the idea of her father remarrying, especially if the bride in question were her best friend or even her little cousin (Yeah fuck you Corlys, you’re on thin ice for that and the grow out of it comment), and the fact that surely his wife would want him to defend his daughter’s claim to the Iron Throne from potential usurpers, which is something that would definitely happen if he had a son.

This causes Viserys to absolutely lose his shit, but Alicent calms him down and he sends her away from his chambers. However, not before Viserys hints that he would not dissolve a marriage between a highborn lady and lord if they eloped and consummated the marriage. So instead of heading straight to her rooms, Alicent instead books it to Laenor’s chambers. The two of them run off to a sept and convince a septon to marry them with a few commoners as their witnesses because they can’t take any nobles in fear of being stopped (and to also have the commoners spread the fact that Alicent and Laenor eloped). Then she and Laenor head off to Laenor’s chambers to consummate the marriage with the help of Joffrey, who they had stay in Laenor’s chambers so that no one would get him in trouble or notice that he was in the room with them during the consummation, and to have Alicent stay over so that people could catch them together in the morning and spread the news of her “ruined reputation”.

The next morning Laena bursts into Laenor’s chambers like she always does and “catches” them before running off to tell Rhaenys the way all little siblings do. So then Rhaenys and Corlys show up, as does Otto; he caught wind of the situation through a servant he paid off to spy on the Velaryons. Once there Otto starts shaming Alicent about her ruined reputation and Laenor retorts that she didn’t ruin anything as he married her before he bedded her. Otto then explodes at the pair when Laenor says that and Corlys rushes to defend his son against all the stuff Otto is saying and threatening him with.

Eventually their argument gets so loud that a servant rushes to get Viserys and a few guards since they’re afraid that the two lords will resort to violence. Trailing after them is Rhaenyra and the Small Council, as the meeting was supposed to start half an hour ago but certain people were missing and needed to be found. So now the entire Small Council, Rhaneyra, and Viserys are at the doorway of Laenor’s room while a furious Otto and Corlys trade insults. Meanwhile Rhaenys sees how afraid Alicent and Laenor are and rushes to the pair’s defense (because they need someone in their corner that isn’t shaming the other party), saying that perhaps the two wouldn’t have resorted to eloping if Otto and Corlys weren't always at odds. Seeing the King, Otto rushes to demand that he have the septon reverse the marriage, but Viserys reveals that he knows about Otto’s plan to make Alicent marry him and how he knows that she wished to marry Laenor instead. He then fires Otto from being Hand and sends him packing to Oldtown, approving of Laenor and Alicent’s marriage as a final insult to Otto. He also firmly informs the small council that he will not be getting remarried, that Rhaenyra will remain his heir, and that anyone who objects otherwise is speaking of treason.

So there you go, the outline for a story that I’m most likely going to write in non-linear bits. In this world Alicent is Lady of Driftmark, Laenor and Joffrey get to be happy, and Viserys prioritizes making sure that Rhaenyra’s claim to the throne is secure. Also somewhere down the line in this universe Rhaenyra and Alicent get their shit together and realize they’re in love with each other, and Rhaenyra gets to marry Harwin because Daemon never takes her to the brothel and so she gets to pick her husband and be the polyamorous bi queen we all love.

[homoeroticchess]

yall are gonna hate to hear it but falsettos, ride the cyclone, six, and epic the musical are just the second gen of dear evan hansen, be more chill, hamilton, & heathers when it comes to tumblr musical fandom

[lovesickeros]

lord its so dark in here the sahara desert of tsaritsa content you are like a shining oasis. your characterisation of her compels me & mihoyo would be hard pressed to top it imo.!! caaaaan i humbly request yr thoughts on her first meeting w a reader of any kind, or maybe even multiple kinds (sagau, sagau god au, isekai, etc) if you so desire...

it really is like a desert here. being the fan of a character we aren't getting until the last damn nation is driving me up a wall but i will persevere bc if nothing else i support morally bankrupt women in media. we r in a severe drought over here but i do my best. unfortunately nothing i say is ever coherent so pull out your translation notes its abt 2 be messy

also this got out of hand but thats bc first meetings w the tsaritsa are tricky to write + a LOT of her characterization lies in deeper exploration then just surface level yknow...NOT A DIG AT YOU this is just my excuse for rambling. gently pats the tsaritsa she can hold so much complexity i do not have the word count to delve into it completely :]

gonna talk cult au for a bit here though because that's 99% of my content. and honestly? she thrives in sub au's of the cult au like villain au + imposter au. it's basically made for her. i mean, early days, the imposter au had been going around for a little while but one of the first few ideas was the Fatui taking reader in so like. it kinda technically actually was. pretty sure cult au Tsaritsa popped up because of the imposter au. a lot of it's writers kinda left though which. man am i getting old or.

anyway.

there isn't much of a chance her first impression is all that positive. at best it's usually neutral, imo, but rarely if ever positive. specifically because i view the Tsaritsa as someone who isn't as fanatical as most of the acolytes typically are towards the creator. she's not exactly going to worship the ground you walk on unlike a certain geo lizard. which is partially why i think she thrives in the sub au's i mentioned.

imposter au, for example. she meets you at your lowest. there's no gaudy extravagance or pampering from the acolytes waiting for you because your own acolytes have turned on you. for all intents and purposes you aren't a "god" at all. which is why i don't think she meshes well with normal cult au reader. the Fatui are made up of outcasts, basically, and imposter au slots right in just perfectly. you're weak, at your lowest, when you meet the Fatui in the imposter au. and the Fatui can help you, too.

a mutual exchange, really. the Tsaritsa sees a tool she can use to one up the rest of the nations and especially Archons, and she has no qualms about you using her and the Fatui in turn. you both want something out of it, after all. whether you just want to be safe from the rest of the acolytes, or you want revenge, or whatever else..she'll give you the power to fulfill it, and she gains the strongest piece on the chessboard when all is said and done.

the best way i can describe the first meeting is "practical", i suppose. she sees an opportunity in you. the ultimate gamble. because if she "saves" you, and you dont trust anyone else because they tried to kill you, well..she holds all the cards, doesn't she?

but the Tsaritsa, imo, is just as capable of being just as fanatical towards you as anyone else. she just won't worship you as the creator. but as yourself? clawing your way back to your divine power and taking back what belongs to you? the Tsaritsa is, to me, a character who's character flourishes in long-term fics more because she changes a LOT between "just met reader" and after having been with reader for some time. she's practically apathetic at the beginning but a lot of her character, in my characterization, shines through LONG after the first meeting.

[crossbackpoke-check]

Substance, Shadow, and Spirit [remixed, abridged] by Tao Yuanming

[arsenicflame]

so, this ones technically not a fix it because its still major character death but this is how i would tweak the canon story to give Izzy's death meaning and weight.

First of all, Izzy doesn't get shot by Ricky. The crew of the revenge may still be absolute rookies by Izzy's standards but even they know to take all the weapons off a hostage and unload any guns. Ricky still escapes and alerts the Navy, and our crew are running through the woods, down to the beach and Izzy is still falling back. For all his new prosthetic has helped his mobility immensely, its no good for running. Its clunky and dragging behind him and Ed and Frenchie and Jim and everyone keeps slowing down to make sure he's keeping up with them, but in doing that the navy are quickly catching up to all of them, they're being swarmed.

They break through the trees onto the beach, with more and more men coming up behind them. Izzy's struggling even more across the beach than he was in the woods, the hoof sinking in and sand shifting as he tries to run, and he stumbles. All the while Navy men continue to appear from all directions- and it hits him. That this is it. There's no way they will all make it out alive.

But he's Izzy Fucking Hands and even if he cant run anymore, he can still fight. He can fight for this crew, this family, these people who have given him so much, who have opened their arms to him when he was at his lowest, who have allowed him to feel free. He can still fight. He can buy them time.

So he turns, and draws his sword.

There was never any way he could win, of course. Even when he truly was the best swordfighter in all the Caribbean, fighting dozens of navy men at once would have been beyond him- but he can distract them, hold them off long enough the revenge sets sail. Its a glorious sight, one man against dozens, bodies falling around him as he holds them back. Its impressive to watch, and maybe, for a second, the crew allows themselves to hope. But then, he takes a cut to his sword arm, and another to his side.

And then he goes down.

But he goes down fighting.

Izzy Hands, who spent his whole life fighting dies that way too, fighting for the safety he spent his whole life searching for.