#and I really wish that the media can actually follow through with the book and not the romance part

[thatsneakymedic]

// Ah I'm so excited! I bought the early tickets to watch the upcoming horror movie "The Last Voyage of the Demeter" and it's from a actually very scary chapter from the Dracula book and I loved reading that book so much! And for reals, that chapter is so underrated as people like to ignore the realistic horror that the chapter brought out.

And a lot of the media loves to focus on the beginning where Dracula is introduced and the castle and the parts where Dracula is in London and the plot to stop him, so for them to put that part of that underrated chapter in the spotlight and make it into a movie. You can see exactly why I'm so excited!

Not to mention that I am not a fan of the romantic popular media version of Dracula and I'm a fan of the actual manipulative, immoral monster that he is in the book. (though every now and then, some vampire romance books that are well-written are not that bad of a read.)

Oh and they made Dracula an ugly bat monster and not a stereotypical handsome bishi dude so that is a bonus for me too! I love my vampires when they're monsterous and evil! :D

[gloomwitchwrites]

secret baby trope with tf141? 😌😌

Anon! OH. MY. GOOOOOD. I love this. I love this. I love this. Secret baby? Yes, please. I adore this trope. I bow down to you for requesting this. I don't know who you are but I wish that I did. I can absolutely get behind a secret baby trope. I actually read a book recently that was a bit like that and I enjoyed it so so much.

I had an absolute blast putting this one together. Seriously. You totally indulged me here. Thank you!!

For the masterlist and how to submit your own request, click HERE

Task Force 141 x Female Reader

Content & Warnings (per the warnings MDNI): swearing, suggestive themes, stalking, possessive behavior, second chances, pregnancy / unplanned pregnancy, parenthood, reunions, light angst

Word Count: 2.3k

ao3 // taglist // main masterlist // imagines & what if masterlist

Kyle "Gaz" Garrick

Kyle relaxes further into the couch. The air around him is slightly smoky.

He brings his vape to his lips and takes a hit. The action is calming, and that’s exactly what he wants. Kyle is rotting, and it feels fucking good.

Between missions, Kyle is always somewhere, but right not there is no reason for him to do anything. He can relax. He can watch reality television, eat himself to sickness, and wank off until his wrist hurts.

It’s bloody fucking brilliant.

Kyle isn’t attached. He has no kids. The only responsibility required of him is the one he has to himself. Which is why he’s splayed out on the couch in nothing but grey sweatpants and his vape. The television is on, and the volume is low. It’s mostly for background noise. Kyle isn’t really paying attention to it.

With a vape in one hand and his phone in the other, Kyle scrolls through his contacts. There are all the usual people there, but there are also a slew of general acquaintances and a long list of people he’s had it off with but never took anything further.

He pauses at one name, and old memories resurface.

They just happen upon him. Kyle doesn’t drag them up from the depths. They linger there, and Kyle remembers all the fun he had with you.

You were just a small fling. A few lengthy but deliciously good fucks that tops most of the sex he’s ever had in his life. There have been times since he last saw you—over a year now—that Kyle has thought about what could have been.

You were sweet. A potential partner. But Kyle didn’t follow through. He would regret it, but things can’t be taken back. There is no turning back the clock to change what has already occurred.

Kyle’s thumb hovers above the screen.

He shouldn’t. He really fucking shouldn’t.

But he does. Because why not?

Switching over apps, Kyle starts scrolling social media. He doesn’t usually give a shit about what’s happening in people’s lives, but he is curious about you. What are you up to? What are you doing? If you’re not attached, maybe he could call you up, rekindle what was once there.

You don’t have him blocked on anything—thank fuck—and Kyle delves into your socials, exploring your life. At first, the small infant in your arms is nothing to him, but then the tiny human keeps reappearing, and Kyle pauses.

Kyle scrolls a bit more. And stops.

Just three—no—four months ago, there are a slew of friends and family congratulating you on the birth of your son.

Your…son.

Kyle thinks back. Does the math in his head.

“Fuck,” he mutters, sitting up, gaze glued on the screen.

He scrolls back, studying every photo where your son is featured. Kyle’s heart slams in his chest. The features Kyle sees are features he sees every time he looks in the mirror.

“Fucking hell,” groans Kyle, the phone nearly slipping from his hands as he slumps back against the couch.

Why didn’t you say anything? Why didn’t you contact him?

The very thought of you not reaching out doesn’t sit well with him. It sits heavy in his stomach.

“Fuck,” says Kyle, switching over to his contacts.

He finds Simon’s number and taps the call button.

It rings on the other end, and Kyle doesn’t think that he’ll answer. But he does.

“Kyle,” comes Simon’s gruff voice.

Kyle sighs. “I need you to track someone down for me.”

John Price

John doesn’t like cutting off contact with people.

He likes to keep in touch, even if it’s just an acquaintance. But things happen, like a fucked phone with no way to retrieve contacts, and the only people he’s able to retrieve are those he sees on a regular basis.

Your number is gone. And John has no way to get it back.

Legally that is. He could try and find you in the system. What information he has is minimal, but then again, the two of you only had a one-night stand. He’s prone to it since he’s never in one place. Always moving around.

John would like to settle down one day, but his work is his life, and it just doesn’t seem possible to have a family and be consistent with them when he’s constantly called away.

He chews it over while sitting in his office. It’s late, and there isn’t anyone else here but him. Late nights like this are calming to him—a time to process away from the events of the day. John has your first name, where you might live, and a general idea of what your number is. But he isn’t certain, and it’s hardly enough to go on.

Sighing, deciding he’d rather find you than not, John turns on his computer. It takes a while to get the classified systems he has access to. No one tracks what he does on here, and no one will think twice if they do happen to look. John runs lots of names and faces through this system.

John waits. Ponders. Enters in different spellings and every possible clue to try and seek you out. With every new search, John begins to lose hope. He might be completely fucked. Completely at a loss.

If this doesn’t work, he might not ever see you again. And for some goddamn reason, that bothers him.

He tries one last time, expecting nothing, only for his heart to drop into his stomach,

“There you are,” he murmurs, leaning forward, gaze sweeping over your passport photo.

Grabbing a piece of paper, John jots down your phone number and current address. He also notes your top place of employment. You might not be there anymore, but that isn’t an issue. He has enough.

John shuts off his computer and grabs his coat. He’ll try to reach out first by phone and go from there.

“You have the wrong number, bud.”

The man’s southern drawl irks John. “You sure?”

“Yeah I’m fucking sure. Quit calling.”

John frowns as the line goes dead. The number on file isn’t recent.

“Fuck,” mutters John, running his hand through his hair.

This is getting him nowhere. The only other option is showing up at your home or place of employment, but he can’t do that unless he’s on scheduled leave. That’s months away.

And each month is fucking agony.

When John finally makes it to your front door, nervousness sets in. This is completely fucking weird. Who the fuck shows up at someone’s door months after a one-night stand? Him apparently.

But fuck it. He’s here.

Either he does this and things go great, or things go to shit and he doesn’t need to worry about it anymore.

John takes a deep breath, and then pounds on the door. He takes a step back, hands in his pockets as he waits. There is a stretch of silence, and then he hears it—the turn of a deadbolt.

The door swings open, and there you are, just as beautiful from when he first saw you. At first, your brow scrunches in confusion, and then your eyes widen.

“John,” you breathe.

He smiles, and then his gaze drops as your hand moves away from the doorknob to land on your stomach. Your belly is round. Protruding. You’re—oh shit.

“Is that—”

“Yours?”

Fuck.

John glances up into your eyes and swallows.

You shift on your feet, one hand resting against the doorframe.

“It is,” you confirm.

Simon "Ghost" Riley

Simon shouldn’t. Really—it’s fucked up. Wrong.

But he does it anyway because there is no fucking way he’s letting you go even if he has to watch from afar.

He’s done a lot of things he isn’t proud of, and losing you is near the top of the list. Not that he blames you for breaking it off. You had every right. Simon is always gone. Always away. And he rarely thought of you when he came home.

Communication can be a difficult thing for him. He knows this, and yet he couldn’t make an effort to do better with you. It wounds him. It does. Like a sharp blade to the gut.

But that is secondary now. Simon has dismissed it.

Sure, you’re not truly his now, but you’ll come back to him. He’ll make sure of it.

In the dark, Simon watches. Before him is a slew of screens and all of them show different angles of your home. Simon also has your phone tapped, and in another window, he can lurk through your messages and emails.

It’s where he first learned you were pregnant.

You know, and haven’t told him. Haven’t reached out in the slightest. Simon has to see all the results and tests come back via your email. He has to log into your medical portal to access specific things which is goddamn frustrating but he needs to know.

You are fucking pregnant. With his child.

It’s growing in your belly.

Even through the camera feed, Simon can see the swell of your stomach. He wants to be there, to stand beside you, and rest his hand against it. He wants to feel his son kick. Because you are carrying his son in your belly. Simon saw the results.

It’s fucking painful watching you like this.

He’s stayed away for a bit. Not engaging.

But you’ve broken it off before, and came back eventually.

Simon just needs an in again. All he has to do is figure it out, and then he can put away these fucking screens and surveillance. He can be by your side and be there when you give birth.

Leaning back in his chair, Simon observes every screen, his palm rubbing against his thigh as he considered his options.

He has to play this right.

He has to.

John "Soap" MacTavish

“Do you think you’ll ever find your woman again?”

Johnny grins behind his pint glass. “If she’s here,” he replies.

The beer is perfectly cold and goes down easily. It’s refreshing since it’s so bloody hot outside.

Johnny didn’t think he’d ever come back to the little seaside town. He came between missions—a way to relax and get away for a bit. With only a few hundred residents, it seemed like the perfect place. What he didn’t expect was to meet a woman that upended his fatigue and made him glow a little brighter.

He learned your name while exploring a local pub. You were a pretty thing. Caught Johnny’s eye immediately. With several beers fueling him, Johnny struck up a conversation, and you were receptive to his charm—melting like butter over fresh toast.

That evening, the two of you jumped from pub to pub, having a bloody good time. It was fucking magical. Afterward, the two of you ventured back to Johnny’s hotel room. But the two of you didn’t have sex. It wasn’t until the next morning that Johnny actually fucked you.

Johnny had presented himself, you slid right into his arms. The hotel bed was well-used. There wasn’t a moment after that Johnny didn’t have his dick inside you. He kept you full and screaming his name for an entire fucking week.

But when that week was up, the two of you parted ways. You gave Johnny your number, and for a couple months, you were consistent in your texts and phone calls. Then it all changed, and you began to contact him less frequently.

Eventually, you didn’t talk to Johnny at all.

He was hurt at first. He tried to reach out. But Johnny didn’t hear a thing—and he left you to it. Maybe someone else arrived into your life. Johnny can respect that even if he doesn’t exactly like it.

It sucked then. And it still pains him a bit now. Johnny liked you when you left—and if he’s being entirely honest with himself—he still fucking likes you.

Maybe you’ll be here. Maybe you won’t.

Kyle is with him this time. A guy’s trip. Price isn’t one for vacations, and Simon has his own shit going on.

“We could try that pub again,” suggests Kyle. “See if she’s there.”

Johnny shrugs. “Maybe.”

“Did she live here?” asks Kyle.

Johnny nods. “Aye. Sure did.”

Kyle bobs his head. “We’ll find her.”

The two of them sit outside a small pub. The air is laced with salt from the ocean, and the sun is out, shining bright. It’s hot, but it’s a beautiful fucking day.

Johnny hums in agreement, bringing his pint glass back to his lips. For a moment, Johnny glances away from Kyle, looking out across the road where people walk along the pavement. He frowns.

Is that?

No. Can’t be.

His focus becomes a tunnel, and all he can see is the woman across the road. It’s you. There is no doubt. He knows that body, that hair and smile. You haven’t changed all that much. Not really.

There is another woman with you—a friend that Johnny met briefly before you and him went off on your own.

But that isn’t what has Johnny’s attention.

You’ve turned, and Johnny can see a swell to your stomach. Your hand cradles it affectionately.

“What is it?” asks Kyle, but his voice is distant.

“That’s her,” murmurs Johnny, his pint glass lowering back to the table.

You don’t see him. You’re chatting with your friend, features animated. The curve in your stomach is fairly large, and a deep twisting in his stomach arises, moving toward his throat.

“Oh fuck,” says Johnny as Kyle shifts to look in the direction Johnny is staring.

“Is that?”

“It fucking is.”

“She’s fucking pregnant.”

Johnny swallows. “Aye.”

He doesn’t want to admit it, but it’s likely the fucking truth. The baby is probably his. No wonder you stopped talking to him. Maybe you thought it best to cut off contact when you found out.

But that doesn’t sit right with him either. If you had told him, Johnny could have been there for you sooner—not finding out like this.

You throw your head back and laugh, playfully hitting your friend’s arm as she says something funny. When you wipe at your face, clearing tears, your gaze shifts, and all the humor leaves your face.

You’re staring right at Johnny.

And he’s staring back.

taglist:

@km-ffluv @glitterypirateduck @tiredmetalenthusiast @miaraei @cherryofdeath

@enarien @saoirse06 @ferns-fics @unhinged-reader-36 @miss-mistinguett

@ravenpoe67 @tulipsun-flower @sageyxbabey @mudisgranapat @ninman82

@lulurubberduckie @leed-bbg @yawning-grave81 @azkza @nishim

@haven-1307 @voids-universe @itsberrydreemurstuff @spicyspicyliving @keiva1000

@littlemisscriesherselftosleep @greeniegreengreen @umno-yeah @blackhawkfanatic @talooolaaloolla

@sadlonelybagel @kadeeesworld @iloveslasher @sammysinger04 @dakotakazansky

@suhmie @jaggersinclair @jackrabbitem @lxblm @beebeechaos

@no-oneelsebutnsu @kidd3ath @certainlygay @thewulf @lovely-ateez

@whisperwispxx @gingergirl06 @eternallyvenus @smileykiddie08 @arrozyfrijoles23

[ducktoo]

Syncing Dream [Aespa x M!Reader]

24. Level Up

Note: A prelude to the actual meat of the arc

Masterlist here

The anticipation for Aespa’s world tour was electric. Fans around the globe were buzzing with excitement, and each passing day brought the tour closer to reality. For Y/n, this meant endless planning, logistics, and coordination. After their successful comeback with Supernova, everything was moving fast. But this time, Y/n felt more prepared. He was no longer the nervous rookie manager who fumbled schedules during the Drama era. Sure, the pressure was still there, but now, there was something different about his approach.

He glanced at his laptop screen, dozens of tabs open with spreadsheets, calendars, and tour notes. His mind raced as he juggled rehearsals, soundchecks, interviews, and media appearances. There was still so much to do, but Y/n had learned from his past mistakes. This time, he was determined to avoid the fallout he’d experienced with Karina. That argument, followed by his short leave of absence, had been a wake-up call. He couldn’t afford to let things spiral like that again.

But just as he was about to close the last tab, something caught his eye.

“Wait, what the…?”

His eyes widened. He had accidentally double-booked their all-important soundcheck with a media appearance on the same day. A wave of deja vu hit him hard, and he couldn’t help but laugh under his breath. This was "exactly" the kind of stuff he’d made back during "Drama" and “Supernova”—and it had led to some serious fallout with Karina.

"Hah, sike. Too easy"

But instead of panicking this time, Y/n smirked to himself, already thinking of a solution. He knew how to handle it. He had this under control now. Still, it was fun to mess with the girls a little.

Feigning panic, Y/n rushed into the living room where Aespa was relaxing after a long day of rehearsals. He made sure to put on his most worried face, eyes wide and hands in the air.

“Uh, guys… I might have fcked it up,” he announced dramatically, trying to stifle the laughter bubbling up inside.

Karina, who was curled up on the couch, glanced up, her brow furrowing. “What now, Y/n? Did we lose a venue or something?”

Winter, lounging beside her, raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, what happened? You look like you just saw a ghost.”

"Yeah, you."

"Aish, this guy-"

Y/n paced back and forth, doing his best to keep the act going. “Ok, but I may have, uh... accidentally double-booked our soundcheck and media appearance on the same day.”

“Again?” Giselle piped up from the other side of the room, half-joking but slightly concerned. “Like you did during "Drama"?”

"…Maybe?"

Ningning gasped, holding a hand to her chest in mock horror. “Are we going to relive that disaster?”

For a moment, the room was tense. The girls exchanged glances, unsure if this was going to lead to another meltdown like the last time. But just as the panic started to set in, Y/n burst out laughing.

"You guys seriously should've seen yourself!" Y/n coughed. "Man, wished I recorded this whole thing!"

"Wait, so that means…" Ningning held her breath.

“I’m just messing with you,” he admitted through his laughter, holding up his hands. “Yeah, I double-booked, but I already deal with it.”

The girls stared at him, stunned. Karina blinked, completely thrown off. “You… you what?”

Y/n grinned, finally dropping the act. “It was a quick fix. I rescheduled the soundcheck earlier in the day, and the media event will be in the afternoon. Easy.”

Winter threw her hoodie at him. “Seriously, Y/n? You made us think the world was ending!”

He dodged the hoodie with a laugh, still reveling in their reactions. “What can I say? I couldn’t resist. It’s just... the deja vu, you know?”

Karina narrowed her eyes but couldn’t help the smile that crept onto her face. “You really had us for a second there.”

Ningning groaned, shaking her head. “And here I thought we’d have to take over as managers. You’re lucky you’ve learned to handle this stuff.”

“I mean, can you imagine Minjeong running the tour?” Y/n teased, raising an eyebrow at her. "Snack time for the whole concert and no song."

Winter rolled her eyes, crossing her arms. “I’d be a great manager, thank you very much. Probably better than you.”

Y/n snorted, grinning. “Sure, crybaby. Whatever you say.”

As the girls laughed and teased each other, the tension from earlier faded. Y/n leaned back against the wall, watching them bicker playfully. This was what he loved about working with them—the chaos, the camaraderie. Yeah, the job was stressful, and yeah, he still made mistakes, but now he knew how to handle them without everything blowing up. He wasn’t the rookie manager anymore.

Giselle gave him a playful shove. “Next time, maybe don’t give us all a heart attack.”

Y/n grinned. “Boohoo. Cry me a river.”

“Honestly,” Karina said, shaking her head but smiling. “I’m proud of you, though. You didn’t freak out this time.”

“Yeah, you’re actually handling things like a pro,” Winter added, her teasing tone softening.

Y/n smiled, feeling a warmth in their words. “Thanks, guys. I’m just trying to avoid another fallout like last time.”

Ningning gave him a thumbs up. “Well, you’re doing a good job. Just keep it up, and we might actually survive this tour.”

Y/n laughed, feeling lighter than he had in weeks. They still had a long way to go before the tour kicked off, but for the first time in a while, he felt confident. The hiccup had been small, easily fixed, and no disaster had followed. He knew there would be more challenges ahead, but now, he also knew they could face them together.

As the teasing died down, Y/n returned to his laptop, sending off the final confirmations for the schedule. He glanced around the room, watching the girls joke with each other, and felt a sense of pride. Things had come a long way since the Drama days, and so had he.

Still, the playful chaos of Aespa was something he’d never want to change.

Winter broke the silence, smirking at him. “But seriously, idiot… no more acting like the world is ending.”

Y/n chuckled. “Alright, alright. I’ll save that for when it actually happens.”

-

With the world tour rehearsals in full swing, it was time for Aespa’s final music show performance of the "Armaggedon" comeback. The entire team was feeling the pressure, but Y/n was calm, collected, and—most importantly—determined not to mess things up this time.

The last time they had a major show like this, Y/n had bungled backstage logistics, almost causing a nightmare with another group’s schedule. He still remembered the awkward encounter with Le Sserafim in the waiting room, where he accidentally swapped their rooms with Aespa's.

But not today.

This time, Y/n moved through the backstage area with confidence. He had already triple-checked the schedule, confirmed the setlist, and ensured Aespa’s dressing room was fully stocked with their favorite snacks. Everything was going smoothly. He wasn’t the same rookie manager anymore.

“Y/n, we’re heading to wardrobe,” Karina called, snapping him out of his thoughts.

He looked up from his clipboard, giving her a thumbs-up. “Got it. I’ll make sure everything’s ready when you guys are done.”

As Aespa headed off, Y/n glanced down at the small takeout bag in his hand. He had a little mission of his own to take care of before the show started. Inside the bag was some fried rice that Yunjin of Le Sserafim joked about during his first days. Today was the day for her delivery to arrive.

Heading down the hall, he spotted Le Sserafim’s waiting room and knocked lightly on the door. When it opened, Yunjin stood there, looking surprised but pleased to see him.

“Well, well, if it isn’t Y/n, the room-swapper,” she teased, crossing her arms with a grin. “What brings you here?”

Y/n chuckled, holding up the takeout bag. “Delivery for Yunjin? Huhhh?”

Yunjin’s eyes widened as she reached for the bag. “Wait actually? Bro, I thought I would never get my order delivered.”

“Hey, I always follow with the joke,” Y/n replied with a smirk. “It’s just… taken a while. But here’s to not messing up anymore.”

Yunjin laughed, taking the bag from him. “Well, I appreciate it. You’ve come a long way, you know. I remember when you were running around here like a headless chicken. Kept hearing Winter yelling idiot every time that it's kinda sad.”

Y/n smiled, feeling the truth of her words. “Yeah, well, I'm no longer that idiot… mostly.”

“Well, you’ve definitely got the manager game down now,” Yunjin said. “Thanks for the rice, by the way. And good luck today and for the world tour as well—though you guys don’t really need it. I’m betting on a win for Aespa.”

Y/n nodded, his heart swelling a little with pride. “Thanks, Yunjin. Good luck to you guys, too. I’ll see you around.”

With that, he left Le Sserafim’s waiting room and made his way back to Aespa, feeling good about how things were going. There was something satisfying about righting past mistakes—both big and small—and moving forward with confidence.

As he returned to Aespa’s waiting room, the girls were just finishing up their hair and makeup. Ningning spotted him first, giving him a wave. “Y/n-oppa! Did you deliver the fried rice?”

“Mission accomplished,” Y/n replied, leaning against the doorframe.

“Wow, look at you, handling everything without a hitch,” Giselle teased, a playful grin on her face. “Who are you, and what did you do with the old Y/n?”

Y/n rolled his eyes, though a smile tugged at his lips. “Still here, but not that often.”

Winter glanced at him, an amused expression on her face. “You sure? You still looked pretty panicked earlier when we teased you about the schedule.”

“Oh, that was just for show,” Y/n shot back, earning a few laughs. “I had it under control.”

The energy in the room was light, and everyone seemed relaxed despite the looming performance. But when it came time to head to the stage, the focus returned, and Aespa prepared for what would be their last Armageddon performance.

As the show progressed, the tension built. Y/n watched from the sidelines, clipboard in hand, managing every small detail without breaking a sweat. The girls were giving it their all, and he couldn’t help but feel a sense of pride watching them dominate the stage. When the performance ended, the crowd erupted in applause, and Y/n knew they had nailed it.

But the biggest (obvious) surprise of the night came during the awards segment.

The host’s voice echoed through the venue. “And the winner for today’s music show is… Aespa with Armageddon!”

The girls’ jaws dropped in unison, and they exchanged shocked looks before breaking into excited cheers. Y/n felt a wave of joy wash over him as he watched them rush to the stage to accept the trophy. This was the culmination of all their hard work, and the victory felt even sweeter knowing they had overcome so much to get here.

As Aespa gave their acceptance speech, Y/n stood in the shadows, beaming with pride. The girls thanked their fans, the staff, and each other, but when Karina spoke up, she made sure to throw a special shout-out.

“And, of course, we want to thank our manager, Y/n, for always keeping us on track—even when things get crazy!” Karina said, flashing a smile in his direction.

"Oh my god, why are they mentioning me…"

Y/n chuckled, shaking his head in disbelief. He couldn’t have imagined standing here a few years ago, especially not after all the chaos during the "Drama" era. But now, here they were—trophy in hand and stronger than ever.

As the night drew to a close, Y/n couldn’t help but feel a deep sense of satisfaction. He’d made it through the day without messing up, delivered on his promises, and Aespa had secured another win. It was a far cry from the days when he’d struggled to keep up, and now, he felt like he truly belonged.

Walking backstage with the girls, still riding the high of their victory, Y/n glanced at them, feeling grateful to be part of their journey. Things weren’t always easy, but moments like these made it all worth it.

“Well,” Y/n said, unable to resist one last tease. “I guess I didn’t mess up after all.”

Giselle elbowed him playfully. “Don’t get too cocky, bro. There’s still the world tour.”

Y/n grinned. “Bet.”

-

At the dorm, the atmosphere was a blend of excitement and calm, the perfect balance after a long day of rehearsals and celebrating their win. With the world tour concert kicking off tomorrow, the girls were looking forward to a quiet evening, but Y/n had one last treat in store for them.

“Alright, gather ’round,” Y/n called from the kitchen, waving a ladle like a conductor in front of an orchestra. The rich aroma of his signature cheesy ramen wafted through the air, filling the dorm with warmth.

Ningning poked her head around the corner, her eyes lighting up as she caught a whiff of the meal. “Are you serious? Cheesy ramen?! You’re really trying to spoil us before the tour, huh?”

Y/n grinned, stirring the pot. “Consider it a good luck charm, Ning. Besides, I know you guys are going to be too nervous and busy to eat anything decent tomorrow.”

Karina entered the kitchen, followed by Giselle and Winter, all of them eyeing the bubbling pot with a mix of hunger and anticipation.

“Didn’t you say last time that you’d never cook again after getting haunted by the ramen god?” Winter teased, leaning against the counter.

What she said was true, actually. After the dramatic ramen mess, Y/n ordered take out for the girls instead.

Y/n shot her a mock glare. “Ya, that was one time. And besides, I’ve perfected this ramen. No more getting haunted tonight.”

The girls laughed, settling around the small dining table as Y/n served each of them a steaming bowl of cheesy ramen. The rich, creamy broth mixed with the perfectly cooked noodles was an instant hit, and soon, the only sounds in the room were the slurps of noodles and the occasional hum of approval.

“You’ve really outdone yourself,” Giselle said between bites, pointing her chopsticks at Y/n. “This might be your best ramen yet.”

“I second that,” Karina added, nodding in agreement. “Please open a ramen shop after you finished managing.”

Y/n chuckled, shaking his head. “Ehhh… I'll just do managing, thanks. Cooking for you guys is tiring enough.”

As the dinner carried on, the mood was light, filled with laughter and warmth. The girls had already devoured their bowls of cheesy ramen, leaving them lounging comfortably at the table.

The conversation began to drift, as it always did, toward their solo songs for the tour, a favorite topic of the group these days.

“So, Y/n,” Karina said slyly, leaning forward with a grin that instantly put him on alert. “Now that you’ve seen heard all of our solo songs in full multiple time… Who’s your favorite?”

The question hung in the air, and Y/n groaned internally. After that whole chapter about the girls bickering about Y/n's choice for solo songs, they were still adamant to see who came out on top.

“Ah, come on,” Giselle chimed in, tapping her chopsticks against her empty bowl. “You know we need the finale. Spill it. Who’s the best?”

Ningning leaned in as well, her eyes gleaming with mischief. “I’m guessing it’s me, right? I mean, I did hear you humming my song in the kitchen yesterday.”

“Y/n humming?” Karina gasped dramatically, placing her hand over her chest. “That’s huge!”

Y/n chuckled, shaking his head as he wiped down the table. “You guys are annoying, you know that?”

“Oh, we know,” Giselle replied with a smirk. “But it’s time to face the music, literally.”

As the girls all leaned in closer, Y/n sighed. He was cornered. There was no way out of this one. He glanced over at Winter, who was sitting quietly, pretending not to care but clearly on edge. A small smile tugged at the corner of his lips.

“Okay, okay, fine,” Y/n finally said, holding up his hands in mock surrender. “If I had to choose…”

All eyes were on him. The room seemed to grow silent in anticipation.

“…Minjeong's solo is still my favorite.”

The room erupted in chaos.

Karina gasped dramatically, falling back against her chair. “Winter?! STILL!??” she exclaimed, half teasing, half genuinely shocked. “You traitor!”

Ningning clutched her chest in mock pain. “How could you do this to us, Y/n? After all we’ve been through!”

Giselle, however, grinned knowingly. “I knew it. I could tell from the way you looked all starstruck during her rehearsals.”

Winter, meanwhile, turned a shade of pink that could rival her stage outfit. She glanced at Y/n, clearly flustered but trying to play it cool.

“Really?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

Y/n nodded, flashing her a genuine smile. “Yeah, really. Your song’s got this energy… it just hits different.”

Winter’s expression shifted from embarrassment to pure joy, her eyes sparkling with happiness. “Thanks, Y/n,” she mumbled, but her shy smile said more than words could.

Before she could say anything else, Karina leaned across the table, nudging Winter with a smirk. “Of course because Minjeong is Y/n's favourite.”

Giselle clapped her hands together. “Better watch out, Winter. That means you’ve got to live up to his expectations.”

Ningning wasn’t letting this go easily either. “But Y/n, you were humming my song! What happened to that? You can’t just flip-flop like this!”

Y/n laughed, raising his hands in defense. “What can I say? Her song grew on me from back then.”

“You’re just saying that because she’s sitting right here!” Karina teased, though she was smiling.

“Technically, you are all sitting right here.” Y/n retorted.

Winter shot Karina a playful glare, clearly still basking in the praise. “Hey, don’t be jealous.”

“Oh, I’m jealous all right,” Karina retorted, crossing her arms but grinning all the same. "My song was his favourite until you lured him away."

"Blehh, what are you gonna do about it?" Winter teased.

“Just wait. My solo’s going to be the crowd favorite during the tour.”

“Sure, sure,” Y/n said with a laugh, already sensing the playful rivalry brewing. “But you’ll all kill it, and you know it.”

“Still doesn’t mean we’re letting you off the hook!” Ningning declared, shaking her head as if in mock disappointment. “This isn’t over, Y/n. You’ll see. I’ll win you over eventually.”

As they continue to bicker, the mood turned somber as it dawned on them that the concert started tomorrow. There was a mixture of excitement and nerves in the air, but Y/n could tell the girls were more than ready. They’d worked hard, and now, it was time to show the world what they were made of.

“So, how’s everyone feeling about tomorrow?” Y/n asked, leaning back in his chair and glancing around the table.

Karina was the first to speak. “Honestly? I’m a little nervous. It’s not our first tour, but the scale is huge. But I think we’re ready. We’ve put in the work.”

Ningning chimed in, her voice filled with excitement. “I can’t wait! I’ve been practicing my solo song every night. I’m going to blow everyone and you away.”

"Pff. You're not letting me the hook again…"Y/n sighed.

“Same,” Giselle added with a grin. “Though I might pass out from exhaustion halfway through.”

Winter, who had been unusually quiet, finally spoke up, a small smile playing on her lips. “I’m just excited to see the fans’ reactions. This tour is going to be so fun, I can feel it.”

Y/n watched them all, feeling a sense of pride wash over him. He had been there through every step of their journey, from the stressful rehearsals to the emotional wins. And now, they were about to embark on something even bigger—a world tour that would cement their place in history.

“Girls,” Y/n said, his voice softer now, “no matter what happens tomorrow, you’ve already proven yourselves. MYs love you, and this tour is going to be amazing because of all the hard work you’ve put in. I’ve seen it firsthand. You’ve grown so much.”

The girls smiled, the tension easing from their shoulders at his words. It was true—they had grown, and so had he. The struggles of the past seemed so distant now, replaced by a newfound confidence in their abilities.

"…well, for a year, since I started managing you from Drama, so I don't know-"

"Stop ruining the mood, oppa!!" Ningning groaned, earning a laugh from the manager.

“Well, if you’re saying it, we’ll take your word for it,” Karina said with a wink, raising her bowl as if to toast. “To our world tour!”

The others quickly followed suit, raising their bowls and clinking them together in a playful, noodle-filled cheer.

“To the world tour!” they echoed, laughter filling the room.

As they finished their meal, Y/n couldn’t help but feel a sense of calm settle over him. He was ready—ready for the tour, ready to support the girls, and ready to face whatever challenges came next. After all, if he could survive the chaos of the past few months, he could handle anything.

Before heading to bed, the girls lingered for a while longer, sharing stories and jokes, their bond stronger than ever. And as Y/n cleaned up the kitchen, he felt a warmth in his chest, knowing that, no matter what, they were in this together.

Tomorrow was the start of something incredible. But tonight? Tonight was just for them, a quiet moment before diving to the Synk Road.

[the-fiction-witch]

Young Love P1

Media The Artful Dodger

Character Jack Dawkins

Couple Jack X Reader

Rating Adorable

Requested

I have a request can you make one where y/n has been lying to her parents about dating a guy and her parents demand to meet this guy or she will have a arranged marriage with Sneed, so she turns to one of her good friend's Dr. Dawkins and after begging he agrees and the while they have a fake relationship he actually falls inlove with y/n? (Love your stories btw ❤ and could you add some smut?)

I sat in my room as usual in my small book nook, a small divot in the walls due to the strange renovation of our old house that I had lined with bookshelves and a small mattress to form a beautiful nook of books, My book in hand and my necklace pendent between my teeth as I read the alluring words. When my mother burst into my room so I returned my book to the self and sat up. She stood for a moment in her long blue dress fixing her hair a moment. 

"To what do I owe the pleasure?" 

"You're father wishes to speak with you princess." 

I rolled my eyes but hopped out of my nook and followed her through to father's study,  the room dark lit only by candlelight, his desk tidy and neat, his clothes lose where he had been frustrated in his thoughts, he sat at his desk as usual so I sat across from him as my mother perched herself on the corner. 

"Hello Princess," He smiled,

"Hello, Father." I nodded, "What uhh what brings me to the office today?"

"We have a very important matter to discuss."

"Alright," I sighed trying not to seem annoyed by all this,

"The subject of your social life troubles us." He began as he took my mother's hand,

Ohh no not this again!

"I assure you my social life is fine Father."

"Y/n, Princess, you have turned down the last seven ball invitations."

"I didn't know the ladies that well..."

"You barely wish to come on a walk with us, let alone with your sister."

"I find town too hot..."

"You have refused your last four suitors before even meeting them. All you've done this whole year is sit in your room reading your books."

Well... they had me there. And I do not really have an excuse for that.

"Princess we are worried, the last thing we would want is for you to be labelled a spinster or old maid, we want you to go out and enjoy the social life a young lady should have, you should be attending balls, walking in the town, meeting suitors, courting, falling in love a hundred times a day. as a young lady should." My mother chimed in,

I mean... I am falling in love a hundred times a day, they are just usually unreciprocal, and fictional. "I uhhh I..."

"We want you to fall in love, the sweetness of young love is something we wish to never deprive you of princess." He smiled, "Ohh to be young again my dearest?" He asked her,

"Oh it would be a dream," She smiled, "To once again feel the thrill of a sneak away,"

"The passion of a secret kiss,"

"The power of the vision of you outside my window,"

"The secret little snuggles and loving words in the dark"

for a moment I may as well have not been here, it's times like this I am so happy my parents are so utterly in love, even if it is a little weird to me. But they had always been this way and It was sweet, and I knew they had the best in mind for me.

"So, we are going to have to be... tough on you."

"How so?" I asked,

"If you do not start attending events, social functions, and other such things then... we will have to take our own action."

"Action?"

"You have one month to leave your bookworm cacoon and flutter forth as a social butterfly and show signs of at least attempting to look for a boyfriend or... we shall arrange you a marriage"

"WHAT!!" I got up from the chair, "A month! Father, mother, I am not a social butterfly I am not, I have never been, I never will be, and I do not want to be, Why would you do such a thing?"

"Becuase we want you to be happy, to find a sweet man and feel all the sweetness of love, if you will not at least try then we have no alternative." My mother explained,

"We do not do this out of cruelty Y/n, in fact, it pains us so to see you be shipped away with an arranged marriage, something we never wanted for you, your brother or your sisters, we wanted you to feel the thrill of young love but if you are unwilling we will have to marry you off," Father explained, 

"To whom!"

"Dr Rainsford Sneed has more than once offered over you,"

"SNEED!" I yelled, "I am not marrying snivelling slimy Sneed." 

"Well, we don't have a choice we can not deny him any longer,"

"What if I have a boyfriend!"

"What?" my mother asked,

"What if I... already have a boyfriend, a secret one."

"Ohh my, is it true princess?" My father asked, "Do you?"

"Uhhhhh Yes." I lied,

"Ohh this is joyous news! you know we had suspected that perhaps your lack of social willingness had been from your love for another."

"Yes. Yes. that is the reason yes I have a secret lover. That is why I have denied all others, that is why I do not socialize." 

"We have noticed your, exits."

Oh shit. "My- Yes, yes my secret exists to go and visit with my lover..." I lied, I have no lover, I have no man, and I have been sneaking out to play poker. 

"we have noticed you coming and going, secretly. Princess why did you feel the need to hide such things from us,"

"Well, I..."

"We are overjoyed."

"Of course, we couldn't be happier that our sweet girl is feeling the sweet thrill of young love," My mother smiled "Tell us have you two known one another long?"

"Yes, a fair while now" I lied,

"Ahh wonderful, you two are in love?" My father asked,

"Yes, yes deeply in love." 

"Ohh how sweet, and you sneak out together?"

"Yes,"

"You kiss in secret ways, and love each other intimately?"

"...Yes." I nodded, My parents are strange about this sort of thing always have been, they were utterly in love and were very open with their love and affection to one another and had always had an interest in... my siblings and I's... Sex lives. I assume part of it was them living through us to recall their own happy young love times. 

"Ohh this is such wonderful news." My mother smiled, 

"So I don't have to marry Sneed?"

"Of course not," My father smiled, "We shall have to meet this man."

"Uhh what?"

"We shall have to meet him! we must it is ever so exciting."

"Uhhh yes... yes you uhh you should meet him."

"well then it's settled, dinner on Thursday. you must bring him we insist." My father told me before he sent me back to my room, 

The moment my door was shut "Fuck! shit! why did I say that!" 

I sat in the cat and bagpipes having snuck out for poker as usual, the game going on as usual while my mind raced, I needed to find a man by tomorrow! to bring to family dinner! and pretend he's my boyfriend... 

I need a man. 

But where does one find a man?

A clean one. 

Ehhh he doesn't need to be that clean,

I pondered for a while, most men I know are from poker, and most of them are married. 

But I glanced up a moment as a coin entered the centre, and I looked at the man sat next to me on the table, He sat in his usual grey and half-bloody clothes from his work at the hospital, his jacket behind him and his sleeves pushed up as often due to his skill he was accused of cheating. His cards were on the table in front of him, his face unable to read, he added a coin to the pile and slipped his hand back, his other hand doing his usual trick, of dancing his lucky coin across his fingers. He saw me looking at him and smiled at me but with a questionable look. 

Jack and I knew each other well, as we both had a passion for poker, I'd... go so far as to call him my friend. Was I attracted to him? No. He's just a good poker player and often we'd team up against a cheating dick like Darius. 

And then it clicked... 

Jack is a man. 

Well... close enough. 

The guy gave in and Jack won so the man left the table leaving us alone as he took his winnings to his chest. And then he looked back at me. 

"Something bothering you y/n?"

"Can I ask you a weird question?"

".... Sure," he said a little concerned, 

"You're a man aren't you?"

"... what sort of question is that?" he glared, 

"My question. Answer."

"Yes. I'm a man."

"You have the... thingy right?"

He glared across the table "The what?"

"A dick?"

"... Yes! why are you asking!" He said very hushed, 

"... You wanna come to my house on Thursday,"

"Why?"

"Dinner."

"Uhhh... yeah sure." He shrugged, 

"Good, six. Be Prompt." 

"I will do." he nodded, "Are we playing again?"

"Sure," I smiled taking the cards to deal. 

I stood nervously, I know I should have told him but... he'd never agreed if I did. I got dressed into my little green and black dress sitting in my book nook as my sisters used my room.

"It's ever so exciting isn't it Melody?" My elder sister Magnolia asked from my dusty vanity as she was using my room to fix her hair, 

"It truly is! Ever so exciting!" Melody my younger sister smiled as she was still getting dressed as she couldn't pick what she wanted to wear more, 

"I don't know what everyone is so excited about." I sighed, 

"Y/n. This is a very exciting moment, we are to finally meet the man who has captured your heart." Magnolia smiled

"Well let's not go crazy with excitement, he's just a man Maggie," I said, 

"But he is your man! And that is so exciting!" Melody smiled, 

 "Do we get to know his name?" Magnolia asked 

"Jack."

"Jack, Awww he Sounds so perfect! What does he look like!" Melody giggled,

"Well, you're about to find out."

"I bet he's handsome," Melody smiled,

"Charming," Magnolia smiled,

"Stunning,"

"Sweet,"

"seductive,"

"Compassionate"

"You two are boy crazy," I sighed,

"I'm married! I am only Sam Crazy." Magnolia argued,

"I'm allowed to be boy crazy! I can't get married till you do y/n!" Melody complained, 

"I know, I know just... don't make a big thing out of this," I told them,

"Y/n. this is the first man you have ever brought home, mother is excited, Father is excited, Melody and I are excited." She explained, "We just want you to be happy."

"I know." I nodded, 

Once ready we headed down to the parlour where everyone sat having a drink and chatting, my father and my mother peaking out the window trying to see if they could see who was coming, Magnolia with her husband Sam whispering over a glass of wine, Melody stood by the fire playing with her dress excitedly, and my brother Peter drinking with his wife Lisa, I heard the door and my heart sunk. 

Welp... guess it's time. 

"Go on princess." My father smiled,

So I nodded and headed out the parlour and to the front door opening it up to see Jack with a typical smile,

"Hey,"

"Hi." I gulped letting him in, 

"Sorry, I'm a bit late hold up at the hospital," he said slipping off his hat and Jacket,

"You're fine."

"You alright? You look nice."

"Thank you uhh... Jack?"

"Yeah?"

"I am... really sorry." I whispered grabbing his hand and tugging him into the parlour he followed very confused and shocked as he was presented by to my family who all looked at him like he was a prize-winning pig at a fair judging his every inch but looking thrilled and excited, "Everyone, This is Dr Jack Dawkins." 

And of course, a million billion questions came jumping down his throat which he did his best to answer given he had no clue what was happening, I sat on the sofa and just drank to try and avoid this whole situation.

"Wonderful, now dinner won't be a moment you can all return to your rooms" My mother smiled, "Give you all some... alone time." She winked at me, 

and I very quickly ushered Jack to my room and shut everyone out before there could be any more questions. And as I locked the door understandably... he looked pissed.

"Okay! You wanna tell me what the bloody hell is going on!" 

"SHhhhh!" I told him, 

"No I will not shhh what is going on?"

"Jack... I can explain."

"Yeah please do."

"My parents... are weird."

"I noticed."

"They are unhappy about me not being... social."

"You are pretty anti-social."

"Hey!"

"what! you are?"

"And they have this weird thing about being involved in my life, well all our lives really. And they want me to be happy and in love, and active! and I really would rather not. But... they have gotten insistent."

"Insistent?"

"They said if I don't find a boyfriend in a month they'll marry me to Sneed."

"Sneed?" he laughed, "Awww Mrs. Y/n Sneed."

"Shut up Jack." I sighed, "Oddly enough I had to stop them so... I lied, and said I had a boyfriend."

"Okay... where do I? come into all this?"

"I lied and told them I had a boyfriend then they... called my bluff. Said they wanted to meet him and planned this whole dinner tonight to meet him. And I didn't know what else do to so... I Invited you, was gonna pretend you're my boyfriend." 

"Well, that's not cryptic and psychopathic at all..."

"Are you in?"

"Hell no!"

"What!"

"No way! I'm not pretending to be your boyfriend just to satisfy your parents."

"Jack, please! They'll marry me to sneed if you don't,"

"Not my problem." He said, "Maybe if you'd not been so antisocial you wouldn't be in this mess."

"I don't like people you know that,"

"You could have at least asked me? told me I was walking into a fucking meet-the-boyfriend dinner! I thought I was coming to just a simple dinner with you and we'd play poker tonight I was not prepared or warned!" 

"I know I know! I thought if I told you you'd say no."

"yes! I would have!"

"Well, you're here not it too late."

"No, it bloody well isn't. I am leaving." 

"No your not!"

"Try and stop me." He said trying to get past me and out the door,

"No! no no no Jack you're not leaving." I battled with him,

"You can't just kidnap me and pretend I'm your boyfriend!"

"Yes I can!"

"No, you can't! You leave now they'll marry me to Sneed! and I am not letting that happen!"

"You can't just keep me here!"

"Jack Please!" 

"...What?" his face softened and he moved back, 

"Please! Please! Please! I don't wanna marry Sneed, I don't wanna marry anyone this is the only way I can buy myself time, I can get out of this please!" I began to cry, "Please... Please just stay."

He sighed, "Alright, I'll stay." he wiped my tears away, "But I'm still angry with you."

"I know..." I nodded, "Thank you Jack." 

"I wanna be compensated for this."

"what?"

"I'm having to pretend to be your boyfriend... I want compensation."

"Fore, what?"

"My steller acting." 

I rolled my eyes, "Two beers."

"get lost. Beers for two months."

"That's extortionate!" 

"Need me or not?"

"... Ughh! you are infuriating, Beers for two days,"

"Two weeks."

"One week. and... three pounds."

"Ten."

"Five."

"Deal." He agreed, 

"Thank you," I sighed, 

"... Am I gonna have to... be nice to you?"

"Yes." I glared,

"Am I gonna have to kiss you?"

"Maybe."

"My rate is a pound a kiss."

"What! Jack that's insane!"

"My kisses are just that good."

"I am not paying a pound for a kiss!"

"I'm open to negotiations"

"Nothing Per kiss."

"A Pound and a shilling because you're pissing me off."

"Ughh! One cookie a kiss how about that?"

"...I can agree to that." He nods, "Homemade?"

"Yes."

"Alright, It's a deal. but you go back on this and I will tell them everything."

"Fine." I sighed, "But I want an acting performance the globe would be envious of Jack."

"Ohh it will be, just try and keep up with me," he smirked, 

"Dinners ready!" My sister Melody called as she opened my door, 

But the moment it clicked open Jack set his hands on my waist and pulled me close to him kissing my lips, I was shocked! but he was certainly not a bad kisser, I see why he'd be charging a pound for these, I kinda... feel like I'm a dick for lowballing him now. But he pulled back and left me rather breathless before he looked up at my sister, 

"Ohh Do Excuse us." he cooed, "We'll be right down. Won't we My darling?" He asked me,

"Uhhhhh yes, Yeah uhh Tell mother we'll be right down Melody," I nodded, 

So she happily scampered off, and we separated, "What?" he chuckled,

"Warning would have been nice." I gasped straightening myself up,

"Yeah well, I'd have liked a warning about being dropped into a family gathering as the new boyfriend."

"Fair enough, shall we go then..." I gulped heading to the door but he stopped me,

"Before we go."

"What?" 

"...You're gonna have to remind me who everyone is I really wasn't listening when they told me. and also who everyone is in relation to you and by extension me?" 

I rolled my eyes a little, "My parents, mother and father Eliza and Henry. Peter is my older brother, Lisa is his wife, Magnolia but everyone calls her Maggie is my older sister, Sam is her husband, Then there is me and by extension you, and then Melody she's the baby sister." 

"Right... Got it." He nodded 

"Let's get this over with," I sighed, 

"Ahhh young love" He cooed following along behind me,

"You're really gonna enjoy this aren't you?"

"Yes I am." 

[delulu-with-wandanat]

Objective: Teenage Dreams.

Pairings: Wanda Maximoff x Natasha Romanoff

Tags: Pride month, bisexual Wanda, mutual pining, canon divergence, lesbian Natasha.

A/n: My gift before pride ends lol, it a little rushed but uhh... I enjoyed writing it and I hope you enjoy reading it. It's kind of a crack fic honestly, just good vibe for ye gays :D (Ps. sorry if there are mistakes I kind rushed this andd it's been a while.)

Summary: It's pride month and Wanda still hasn't made her move. Being the self-proclaimed greatest ally, Y/n and two other decided to give them a push.

On lazy days like these, Wanda usually spends it by reading a book, maybe binge watching some shows. Other times she spends it with her brother, but ever since joining the Avengers, Pietro has made it his ultimate goal to have Steve Roger's physique. He trained almost day and night, honestly Wanda could enter the gym at 9 in the morning finding her brother in the middle of a workout, and by the time she was finished he was still there.

Often time he was also with her best friend, who is now his gym buddy, Y/n Romanoff. Who was just as much of a gym rat as Pietro. Honestly, the amount of time they stare at themselves in the mirror was concerning. She's almost sure she had passed a video on social media featuring them titled; 'How to train like an Avenger'

So nowadays she spends her free time alone, even though she wishes she could spend it with a certain beautiful redhead-

Although it wasn't all that bad. Wanda had found a new fixation to spend her time on. Which was Fanfictions.

Now how does one stumbles upon this... wonderful world you might ask? Well for Wanda it started when she was watching a new TV Show she had recently discovered called, The 100. It was fun until they killed off one of her favorite character, Lexa. Wanda naturally dropped the show in an instant. During one of her rants to one of the new recruits, Kate Bishop then sent her a link leading to a website followed a text that read; "The showrunners might break your heart, but fanfiction authors will be there to pick up the pieces."

And Wanda... Fell down the rabbit hole from there.

At first all she searched was merely about wlw couples on her favorite movies and shows, like that one Supergirl TV show she had been recently watching. Or that one cute show called 'Everything Sucks' that got canceled after one season. Basically any wlw couples she started to like, but couldn't be explored due to the showrunners being a pus-

It didn't matter, she founded the holy-site that held all the stories in the world. Then, when she found nothing else to read there, it lead her journey to... a site that shares the same name as drinking bottle; Tumblr. Minus the 'e'.

The site gave her access to a whole new world and whole lot more stories. It was on this website that she found out there was a whole fandom for the Avengers, and many stories was written about them in different scenarios. Sometimes it was cute, other times it was... questionable-

You can't really blame her, can't you? Her name and the word mommy was basically inseparable on this site.

This was where she learned that people have also been 'shipping' one Avenger and the other. Curiosity got the better of the witch when she started to search herself... and a certain former Russian spy. She was surprised to see how many stories were written about them here. Wanda... may have gotten a little out of hand.

This was her guilty pleasure. Reading stories about her crush and herself in a scenario instead of actually trying to talk to her. Can you blame her though? She was what the internet describes as a 'Loser Lesbian'.

The little voice in her head prefers the word 'Useless Lesbian', which wasn't even accurate as she mostly resonates more with Bisexuality-

"Happy gay month, cus you know you bi and stuff!" Ah there it is, the 'little voice' burst through her door unannounced, causing Wanda to yelp and quickly shut her laptop close to hide her 'shameful' activity.

Wanda glared at the young Romanoff who was carrying 3 different items in his hand and approaching her on the bed. "What the fuck is wrong with-"

"Here, I got you a gay balloon cus it got all the color because it's GAY."

"Y/n-" She reluctantly takes the balloon.

"And I gotchu a vinyl album with that Sweater Weather song cus you Bi." He handed her the vinyl, how thoughtful.

"Ok-"

Lastly, "And I baked you a cake that says, 'BeeEE who yoOOUUu aaRREEE, for YooUURE PRiiiDEEEEeeeEE'" He sang the word off tune.

"Ok- Thank you... Uhm-" She grabs all the items and looks at them with confusion. "This is..." Wanda furrowed her eyes at her friend. "Why- Why did you do this, why are you doing this??"

"You know... Cus you're Bi!"

"I'm well aware of that fact."

"Well my dearest Wanda, in this holy month of June I have a very important mission to accomplish." The young Romanoff suddenly jumps on her bed and dramatically opens his arms as if he was some kind of showman. "I'm gonna get you a woman!"

The youngest Maximoff cringes her face and with a flick of her wrist she knock the soldier off her bed, earning a high pitch scream from him. "First of all, you can't get a woman for yourself how do you expect to get me a girlfriend."

"I have plenty of girls!" He said rather defensively as he sat up on the floor.

"And second, why is this so important to you?"

"What you don't want a girlfriend?"

"I still like guys you know."

He rolled his eyes, "I know that, but you always told me you wanted to try dating girls."

"Not just girls... a girl-" She mumbles.

"What was that?" The man raised a teasing eyebrow.

"Nothing! Now shut up, you haven't answered my question." Wanda said while huffing and crossing her arms.

"Because my dearest friend being Bisexual is one thing, but being bi yourself is just sad-" That statement earned him a rightful pillow thrown at him at full speed. Which he thankfully manages to deflect this time with his reflex.

Wanda then groans and plops on her bed. "You're not going to stop, are you?"

"Nope." Y/n even popped the 'p' to emphasize his point. With a roll of her eyes, Wanda agrees with an exaggerated fine and he joined her on the bed with a grin. "Now, first thing on the list is we need to get you some new clothes."

Wanda hastily sat up looked down at her current outfit and glanced at the mirror in her room. She gave him a stinky eye. "What's wrong with my clothes??" This rude bitch-

"Nothing..." Y/n said rather sassily, "I just... think it might need a little spice is all." Without asking for her permission, Y/n grabs her laptop out of her reach and opens it. "I was thinking we could- WHOAAA..."

"What's- NO!" Her eyes widens in panic has her dirty little secret have been exposed. The witch lunges herself to him only for the young super soldier to hold out a hand to keep her at a distance while staring bewildered at the screen before him. "GIVE IT BACK."

"OH MY GOD???? YOu into this shit?!!" Oh the young Romanoff was having the time of his life. He grinned as he looked at what the story was about, "Natasha Romanoff x Reader? Ohhh ho HO, you really llike her huh-?"

"Y/n I swear to god, GIVE IT BACK." She yelled, Wanda was fucking furious. She already had an annoying brother to deal with, what was she thinking adding Y/n into the mix.

"I want to see your blog." It was like she was seeing red, blood thumping in her brain.

Wanda screeched like a maniac, suddenly overpowering the super soldier. She was practically sitting on top of him wrestling with the now closed laptop, Y/n hugged the laptop close. "Y/N I WILL KILL YOU!"

"I JUST WANT TO SEE!"

"NEVER!" Their screaming was probably heard all over the compound as they wrestle for Wanda's laptop. However, a stern voice stopped their childish fight.

"Enough, both of you!" The two whipped their head to the door to see Natasha crossing her arms and looking at them expectantly. The two scurry off of each other and Wanda made a final yank on her laptop out of his reach. The two stood up like guilty children caught in a fight.

"He took my laptop without permission." Wanda spoke up before Y/n could open his mouth. The look of betrayal on his face brings pleasure to Wanda as Natasha's anger was now directed to him.

"You-"

"Y/n, you know better than to take other people's personal things." Natasha glared at her little brother.

"You're just going to believe her right out of the gate?!" He retorted.

"It's the truth!" Wanda said while hugging her laptop tightly.

"You little snitch-" The super soldier turned to face her challengingly. Before the two were about to enter yet another screaming match, Natasha's stern voice puts them in their place once again.

"You two are acting like children. I have enough of this, Y/n if you don't stop this childish nonsense I'll have you grounded from any missions."

"You can't do that?!" His eyes practically bulge out of it's eye socket.

"I can, and I will." Natasha's death stare easily intimidates him as he quickly mumbles an apology to Wanda. The spy's gaze turned to the witch with soft and caring look, unlike the one she gave to her sibling. "Wanda, if he gives you anymore trouble you let me know ok?"

"Thank you, Natasha." Wanda said shyly, a faint blush visible on her cheek. The redhead smiled at her before giving one last glare to Y/n and left to god-knows-where.

It was so painfully obvious that the two liked each other. Except the only one that fail to realize that is themselves. Operation Scarlet Widow was going to be a lot more difficult than he anticipated, Y/n might need a little backup.

"I seriously don't get why you can't just ask her out instead of reading a bunch of stories-"

This annoying fuck- "DON'T talk to me about that!" She suddenly uses her powers to float him out of her room. "I don't wanna hear about it-" She practically throws him out, Y/n lies on the floor while looking at his friend bewildered. Wanda gave one last glare and shuts the door on his face.

"But-"

"And stay out!" Her voice yelled from inside the room.

Being the annoying friend that he is, he got onto his feet and proceeds to bug the shit out of the witch. Y/n started with those gentle knocks on the door. "Honeyyy-" He teased her.

"Ohmyfuckinggod. Don't call me that!" Wanda yells again. Y/n snickers at her response.

"Wanda, come on..." He knocks again, hearing no response the soldier knocks on the door harder. "You can't hide forever, come out!"

"Jokes on you, I already am!"

"Not what I meant, but ok!" He snickers again, clearly Wanda would not be opening the door anytime soon. He makes his way to the gym to recruit some people who shall help him in this mission.

------

Upon entering the training grounds, Y/n found Yelena and Pietro in the middle of a sparring session. Only these two would spend their Sundays training.

"Dearest Brother, nice of you to join us." Of course Yelena would know it was him, despite having her back facing Y/n.

"Let me know when you want to spar with someone who can actually throw a punch." The soldier said with a smirk.

"Fuck you, Romanoff!" The silver-haired speedster gave him the finger before focusing back on his opponent. "You're the one who's lacking, I thought super soldiers could do this all day?"

Y/n scoffed, "Oh please, I can take you down without breaking a sweat. You rely mostly on your powers."

"Barf, are you going to keep bothering us or join us?" Yelena said with a roll of her eyes, using the distraction Pietro surges forward in an attempt to tackle Yelena. Although she may not have powers, her skills were beyond his years. Using the techniques taught by none other than her own sister, Yelena manages to take down the speedster with ease.

"Hah!" She snorted seeing Pietro with his face on the ground and tapping the floor to announce his defeat. Yelena gets off of him with a smirk on her face.

"Oh come on! If this was a real fight you know you wouldn't stand a chance." The speedster grumbles.

"I'm not denying that, but take that power away and you're just another damsel in distress."

Pietro narrowed his eyes. In the midst of her overconfidence, he uses his powers to knock Yelena on the feet, causing her to fall backwards onto her ass. Normally, her instinct would've kicked in and she would prepare for the fall, but this time Pietro stands in triumph while crossing his arms with a smirk on his face.

"Bitch." Yelena mumbles in Russian before dusting herself off.

"Now if you're both finished, I would like to make an offering." Y/n said while putting his fingers together like some menace business man with bad intention.

"You want to steal Tony's car and do a high speed race on the highway? I call dibs on the Mclaren." Yelena spoke up.

"So long as I get the Ferrari-" Pietro chimes in.

"No, but we'll get back into that because I always wanted to try his Audi. What I have is, how would you feel on playing cupid for our dearest sisters?" Yelena only raises an eyebrow while Pietro squints his eyes.

"I am getting sick of seeing them practically eye-fucking each other at the gym." Yelena started.

"Hey, that's my little sister." Pietro said while puffing his chest out playing the overprotective big brother role.

Yelena rolled her eyes, "She's 27 dipshit, and you're only 12 minutes older."

"Still my little sister..."

"Look we can all agree that these two needs to sort out their feelings, and since the two are completely useless as one is an idiot who thinks staring will magically get her a date. And the other has deep traumatic issues where she struggles to have proper relationship due to her upbringing. I'd say, maybe they need a little third party help?" Y/n opens his arms as if to wait if any of the two objects.

"And how do you plan on pulling this off?" Yelena asked.

"I was hoping you might help me figure that out." Y/n threw back the question. Yelena rolled her eyes.

"So you came to us for help empty handed?"

"Well I would argue dedication and sheer will counts for something." Y/n puffed out his chest, he clearly has nothing.

"We don't even know if Natasha likes Wanda back." Pietro chimes in, which earns him a raised eyebrow from the two Russians.

"It's hard to miss."

"Yeah, I can see the oblivious genes runs in the Maximoff's."

Maybe it was less obvious to someone who was not close to Natasha, she was a trained spy overall. And these two were practically raised to be more observant than others. Or that could just be the oblivious Maximoff genes.

"All I know is, Wanda has had this crush ever since she stole Natasha's jacket."

Y/n furrowed his eyebrows at Pietro. "Wasn't that like... a year ago with Ultron?" Yelena barks out a laugh, "You mean to tell me she's been pinning on Natasha for a year??"

Pietro shrugs his shoulders and smirked, "Wanda has bigger pool, but I'm the one getting all the girls."

"Barf-" Yelena said while fake gagging, earning a jab on the rib by Pietro. "If we want a shot for our dearest love birds we have to be quick, cause I'm noticing a certain android having his eyes on Wanda."

"Who, the toaster?" Pietro said while cringing his face.

"Ok... I can see you don't seem so fond of the guy, and Vision's not so bad y'know-" Y/n said, it's not that he was close with Vision. But he didn't understand why Pietro would look so utterly disgusted.

"No, he's not bad. But if this works out, you and I would be brothers for real, y'know?"

Damn... This was true brotherhood. "Bro..."

"Bro..."

The two hugged like it was something out of a bromance movie. Yelena could only watch with her arms crossed, wondering what the fuck was going on. However, while the two gym rats were having their moment, a plan formed in her mind.

-------

The trio sprang into action in an instant, ordering a bunch of pizzas, heading to the city to grab some supplies, thankfully alcohols were already taken cared of.

"Ok! Now we just need everybody here." Y/n said with a satisfied grin whilst taking a shot to give himself a head start. Yelena mimicked his movement and so did Pietro.

"FRIDAY, assemble the team to the common room." The AI gave Pietro the acknowledgement, soon enough the team entered the common room with a confused look.

"What's going on?" Steve was first to spoke up as he looked around the decorated room with food and beverages.

Wanda glances to a certain redhead a few meters away from her, Natasha initially had a bored look on her face, arms crossed, and was probably mentally preparing herself to whatever the hell her siblings had in mind. And it was as if the spy felt a pair of eyes on her she looked to the side and locked eyes with Wanda, instantly, the corner of Natasha's mouth pulled into a tiny smile and a small shrug.

Wanda blushed instantly and turned her gaze to the floor, tucking a hair behind her ear. The trio, saw this and glances at one another.

"Well dearest teammates." Y/n started, taking a microphone and speaking to it as if he was an mc. "Tonight will be the night-"

"What's with the mic, Y/n?" Natasha asked with a roll of her eyes.

"I was getting there," He responded while putting his hand up, "Tonight Is the night we let loose!" He whooped, yet the only one cheered with him was Pietro.

"Seriously?" Natasha asked with a raised eyebrow.

Y/n scoffed at his teammates, looking at all the low faces and annoyed faces. "Sam! Come on, you're always game." He asked, needing ATLEAST someone to be in it.

Sam sighed, "Man, I would but honestly I was looking forward to sleep early tonight." Y/n looked at him as if his heart had been stabbed.

"Wanda??" He asked his best friend, and Wanda groaned at him. Oh this was a rough start.

"Honestly, I'm in the mood for some me time and not... whatever this is." She replied indicating to the alcohol bottles on the table.

"Sorry kid, looks like everyone is super tired." Steve added with a pity look, "Maybe next time plan things out."

"But that's boring!" Pietro exclaimed, and speeds to every single one handing out a shot glass filled with vodka.

"It's not just any normal drinking night, there's singing involved." Yelena finally chimed in while dunking another shot.

"Yelena, you can't possibly be part of this." Natasha asked her sister, and Yelena shrugged in respond.

"Any reason to grab Tony's alcohol is as good as any." The blonde replied.

Everyone glanced at one another, shot glass in hand, contemplating their decision. "Think of it like a team bonding." Y/n talked again, he cocked his head at Yelena who turns on a song and a familiar tune started playing, a song that would get anyone from any generation dancing (excluding Steve, perhaps). Dancing Queen by Abba.

Y/n had a goofy grin on his face, dancing into the tune, Pietro followed through while Yelena occasionally bopped her head. Sam was the first to grow a grin on his face. Steve, Natasha and Wanda looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "It's Abba!" The falcon said as a matter of factly, he then downed in shot.

"That's the spirit!" Y/n said excited as Sam danced to his direction.

Hesitantly, cap started to walk forward earning a disbelief gasp from Natasha. "Rogers, really...?"

"I mean, I really did enjoyed Mama Mia...." The American boy said with a sheepish smile.

As soon as the lyric's intro came in, Y/n puts an arm around Steve with a microphone in hand. "You can dance!"

"You can jive!" Sam pulled the microphone to himself.

"Having the time of your life!" Those who were already in the circle sang simultaneously, Natasha rolled her eyes but if you squint you could see a tiny smile there. Meanwhile Wanda shifted closer to Natasha watching the group in amusement.

"See that girl!" Y/n pointed at the two, and the other followed. "Watch that scene, digging the dancing queen." He sang, "Come on dancing queens get in here!"

Natasha shook her head fondly, holding back a smile.

"Wanda, Wanda, I know you want to join us girrlll..." Y/n said playfully to his best friend, the boys and Yelena were beckoning her to join. Natasha looked to her side and true enough, Wanda was biting her lips, contemplating whether or not she should join. "You like this song don't lie! Natasha, help me out." Wanda did in fact like this song.

The way her body swayed subtly to the rhythm, her eyes glinting with anticipation, the only thing that's holding Wanda back was herself. Fuck it, Natasha thought to herself. She then held Wanda's arms and dragged her into the group who cheered when they joined. "Wha- Nat, no I-"

"Come on, little witch." Natasha said, turning to face Wanda and raised her shot glass. "Loosen up a bit."

God, Wanda couldn't decline, especially when her crushed smirked like that. They clinked their shot glass and downed their drinks.

------

As the clock got closer to midnight, the more they drank, and the more they drank, the more chaotic it gets. The song they choose ranges to many different genres, in the beginning Pietro and Y/n mostly sang something boyish, like rap or rock. Then as the two gets progressively drunker they sang something what would be describe as 'Girly Pop'.

Steve sang some old 40s song, which was refreshing especially after hearing Y/n's off tune singing voice. Everybody except Natasha was surprised to hear Yelena singing American Pie wholeheartedly, Natasha even sat next to her and sang it with her briefly.

Although the highlight of the night was probably the time Yelena, Pietro and Y/n sang and dance to the song 'Wannabe' by Spice Girls. Natasha had to hid her face with her hand while Sam was laughing his ass off and leaning to Steve for support. Wanda was like a giggling maniac the whole time as she was secretly recording it for some black mailing material on her twin.

Mid-song, Yelena pulled her brother subtly and pushing a very drunk Pietro forward. "Take it for a spin, Maximoff!"

"So, here's a story from a to z-!" Pietro started rapping his part drunkenly.

"She's not drunk enough." Yelena said to Y/n who was trying to stable himself.

"Yep, the alcohol hasn't hit her yet, and Pietro's not going to be much help-" Y/n covered his mouth suddenly as he felt a vomit, he then answered after seeing Yelena's raised eyebrow. "Sorry- Don't worry I got this, hold a bottle."

"Slam your body down and wind it all around!" Pietro continued singing with Yelena twirling his ass in what this generation would describe as 'slay' manner, Y/n drunkenly sauntered over to Wanda who panicked when he started pulling her to the make shift stage.

"No- No, let me go, Y/n!" Wanda protested.

"Just take a shot and come with!" Y/n practically yanked her and they stumbled over to the middle of the living room. "Cheers!" He said while knocking his glass with hers and Wanda finally relents and knocked back her shot.

"-make it last forever, friendship never ends!" Y/n sang while putting an arm around his best friend, Wanda cringes at the bitter taste of the alcohol, she had a few drinks in already but she was never really fond at the taste of vodka.

"Wanda!" Yelena said, suddenly putting an arm around the her as well. "Oh, honey, you emptied your glass already."

"N-no, Yelena, I just dra-"

"Don't you worry, I got you." Yelena said while pouring her another shot, Wanda's eyes widens. She glances to the side and locked eyes with Natasha who raised a teasing eyebrow at her. "Yes, now we cling!" The blonde haired woman said while raising her glass.

Reluctantly, Wanda clinked their glass awkwardly and took a deep breath before taking another shot. She doesn't know how many shots she have taken from that moment, all she knew was that she felt like dancing.

Natasha watched as Wanda's dance move progressively become more fluid and at ease in contrast to her usual shy self. The spy smiled to herself, dance with her. Natasha shook her head at the impulsive thoughts. At some point during the song 'Teenage Dreams' by Katy Perry, Wanda was handed a mic by Yelena. Thankfully this time Wanda was drunk enough not to refuse, and instead grinned like a goof.

When Wanda sang the second verse, Natasha almost lost her breath because she sounded so... beautiful.

"We drove to Cali and got drunk on the beach. Got a motel and built a fort out of sheets."

Wanda sang with her eyes closed, smile on her face, swaying her body to the rhythm. "I finally found you, my missing puzzle piece, I'm complete." The witch opened her beautiful green eyes just to have a similar looking ones staring right back at her.

Wanda giddily approached Natasha and extend her hand, "Wanda-"

"Come onn, Tasha!" Wanda pleaded. Tasha, well that's new-

Natasha hesitantly looked around, the trio were holding onto each other while slurring to the song, Sam had passed out, and Steve... Well, he gave Natasha a knowing look before helping Sam up to his feet and gave Natasha a look that says 'Don't mess this up, Romanoff.' And walking off with a drunken Sam.

"We can dance, until we die. You and I..." Wanda sang waiting for Natasha to finally grab her hand, finally the spy relents and took the witch's offering hand. "-we'll be young forever!"

Wanda practically yanks Natasha into the middle of the living room.

"You make me feel like I'm livin' a teenage dream. The way you turn me on, I can't sleep. Let's run away and don't ever look back, don't ever look back!"

The younger woman puts a hand on Natasha's shoulder, swaying her hips while singing the lyrics. Natasha was unsure if she should put her hand on Wanda, keep it to the side, on Wanda's waist perhaps?

"My heart stops." The witch suddenly tilt Natasha's chin so their eyes meet. "When you look at me," Natasha's breath hitched in her throat, "just one touch...." And the rest of the lyrics seems to died on Natasha's ears as all she could see was a drunken state Wanda making her confession crystal clear.

Wanda turned and moved her body sensually against Natasha, without hesitation, the older woman puts a firm hand on Wanda's hips to guide her moves. Wanda shivered when she felt Natasha's hot breath on her ear. "Imma get your heart racing in my skin-tight jeans." She grabs Natasha's hand and trail it up her body, a silent plea to the older woman to touch her. "Be your teenage dream tonight..."

Fuck... if Natasha had no self-restraint, she would've taken Wanda here and there. "Let you put your hands on me in my skin-tight jeans" Wanda turns around to face Natasha again and this time the younger one guided Natasha's hand to rest on her thighs. "Be your teenage dream tonight...."

The song reached it's mini pause. Wanda, almost in desperation and system full of alcohol wrapped her arms around Natasha and leaned in til their nose was touching. "I want to kiss you so bad..." She whispered.

"I-" The redhead was at lost for words, her eyes looking deep into those beautiful green eyes, searching for any signs of hesitation. Blown pupils were looking right back at her, slowly it travels down to Natasha's lips. Fuck this.

As soon as the song started again, Natasha gently cup Wanda's face with one hand and pulled her into a soft kiss. Oh Wanda's heart could explode right about now, for a second her mind became stone-cold sober so it could remember this moment properly. Wanda drops the microphone she was holding and puts her hand on the older woman's cheeks, using her thumb to caress her soft delicate skin.

"You make me, Feel like I'm livin' a teenage dream The way you turn me on, I can't sleep Let's run away and don't ever look back, don't ever look back."

The two women were now lost in their own world, they failed to notice the cheers from their own respective (very drunk atm) siblings. Wanda was taller than Natasha, but she went on her tippy toes and wrapped her slender arms around the spy. Natasha craned her neck a little, smiling into the kiss, her arms securely on (her) the little witch's waist.

"My heart stops, when you look at me. Just one touch, now baby I believe this is real. So take a chance and don't ever look back."

Wanda felt like she was on cloud nine, feeling Natasha's soft lips on hers. Oh those sweet plump lips she's been day dreaming about for months, honestly, she felt like the main character in a movie. A teenager if you will in a coming off age movie, is this what Simon felt like from Love, Simon? The song was quite spot on, as Natasha made her feel like a teenager once again, or at least what she assumes a teenager would feel. She never really got to properly enjoyed her teenage years, but here she is. With the woman of her dreams.

"We're siblings for real!" They finally broke the kiss after hearing a drunken Y/n made the statement, arms on both Yelena and Pietro who were just as equally drunk as him. Pietro mimicked his sentence, and Yelena only nodded her head while occasionally raising her glass. Natasha and Wanda shared a look as they held each other, the spy snorted while her counterpart giggled at the scene.

It seems like the trio had put Katy Perry's song on shuffle, because the beat to 'Last Friday Night' started playing.

They started chanting "We did it!" matching their words to the tune of the song, the two couple shared a look.

"Do you wanna get out of here?" Natasha asked, a small smile on her face.

"Yes, please." Wanda replied shyly before being dragged out of the living room by Natasha.

-------

The witch woke up groggily on her bed, her eyes needed time to adjust to the light that were peaking into her room. She groaned and fell back onto the bed with a thud, shielding herself from the light like a vampire allergic to it. "Ugh... what did Yelena put in my drinks." She grumbles.

All of the sudden everything came rushing back into her memory like a tidal wave. I kissed Natasha...

She hastily sat on her bed and looked around. She remembered they kissed, but... how did they end up here. Wanda remembered Natasha asking her to move out of the living room, oh my god did we slept together? The witch's face started to match her battle suit as she thought of the possibility, wish I could've remembered.

Her throat felt dry so she decided to grab herself some drinks in the kitchen. And to her surprise, Natasha was already there. Humming to herself and cooking breakfast, Wanda let in a sharp breath at the sight. Of course, being the trained spy that she is, Natasha greeted Wanda without having to turn around.

"Good morning, Wanda. Slept well?" Natasha asked kindly.

"I don't know how you do that." Wanda muttered.

The spy chuckles to herself, "What I was trained for, little witch. I already put a glass of water for you by the table. Bacon and eggs alright?"

Wanda glanced at the table and surely enough Natasha already prepped a big jug of water and a glass for her. "Oh thank you, you're a godsent..." The younger woman took a seat and dawned her water, and then also her second glass of water.

Natasha walked by her and set a plate for both herself and Wanda. "What a night was it?" She said with a hint of tease.

The brunette only nodded her head while drinking her water like it was the last one on earth. She dropped her glass with a sigh of relief and glances at Natasha, a faint blush appeared on her cheek almost immediately. Wanda cleared her throat before answering, "It was, thank you for breakfast."

"You're welcome." She replied simply, her body still angled a little to the side, one arm propped on the head of the chair whilst staring intently at Wanda.

"Natasha, I..." Wanda started, oh god suddenly her throat feels dry again. The spy gave a small nod, urging her to continue. The younger woman started fidgeting with her finger. "I don't regret it," Wanda finally looks at her. "Kissing you, all of it, I don't regret any of it."

A smile tugged the corner of Natasha's lips, but before she could answer, Wanda started rambling on.

"B-but it's ok if you don't feel the same. Or that it was just a heat in the moment kind of thing."

"Wanda, relax." The older woman put a gentle hand on Wanda, she inhaled sharply at Natasha's action. "Listen... I'm no better at this. However, if your interested, I would like to take you out on a date." Natasha smiled at her, oh god, Wanda's heart was beating a mile minute. Wait, wait, she said date?

"I- Yes, I would love that." Wanda averted her gaze, the intensity of Natasha's green eyes was too much. The sheer intensity of the spy's gaze could turn her into a puddle of mess.

"Good, I've been dying to try this restaurant." Natasha said while turning her body now to face her breakfast, she took one bite of the bacon before continuing. "I hope Southeast Asian cuisine isn't too spicy for you." The spy said teasingly.

"Oh please, you underestimate me." Wanda responded with a slight bump of their shoulders, yet a question still lingers on her mind. "Hey uh... Sorry, I was just wondering. Did we uh... do anything?"

"What do you mean? We kissed." Natasha answered cluelessly.

"Yeah, but I remember you took me to my room. I couldn't remember anything from there, so... I was just wondering if we did anything." Wanda asked, her voice progressively gets more timid the more she explains.

"Hmmmm, like what? Watching a movie?" The spy said while looking up to the ceiling as if deep in thoughts, small smirk on her face.

"Tasha, stop messing around." Wanda said with a playful eyeroll.

"Tasha, huh? That's new." She continued to teased her little witch. Wanda playfully pouted her lips, of course Natasha couldn't help but give in to that. "Don't worry, little witch, nothing happened. I took you to your room, we made out for a little bit and before you finally fell a sleep in my arms. It was a adorable." Natasha added the last bit with a shrug and a smirk.

Wanda's face got increasingly red, "Ugh..." She groaned at hid her face in her hand. "I'm sorry."

"Don't hide that pretty face, as I said, it was adorable." Natasha pried away Wanda's hand, the witch relents and was greeting with a fond smile from Natasha. One she rarely saw, god she's so fucking beautiful.

And unfortunately for them, it had to be ruined by the trio... Again.

"Ughh.... my head-" Y/n groaned.

"I feel like skipping gym today." Pietro chimed in.

"Keep up." Yelena responded with a bored tone. She was sweating, probably went on a run.

Wanda and Natasha mentally cursed at themselves and returned to their own respective breakfast. The trio rummages through the kitchen, finding cereals and bowls, Yelena opted for an apple instead. They sat down across Natasha and Wanda, Y/n was first to point out the obvious of course.

"So...?" He asked them excitedly.

"So what?" Natasha raised an eyebrow at him.

Only for him to raised his eyebrow right back, "Did you guys shag?" Yelena piped in, Pietro groaned.

"No, don't answer that-" The older Maximoff covered his ears while Wanda shrunk in her seat.

"I'll take that as a yes!" Y/n yelled excitedly.

"First of all, we didn't." Natasha said firmly, "And second, I don't see how that's any of your business."

"Oh, but it is." The redhead narrowed her eyes at him, but it was too early to deal with her brother's antics.

"Look whatever you saw, zip it." Natasha stated, "I personally want to keep this under wrap, if this goes out to the press they're going to have a lot of questions and I don't want to deal with that."

"I'll second that." Wanda muttered, casting Natasha a grateful look to which the older woman smiled in response.

Y/n scoffed, "Whatever, I'm great at keeping secrets. Beside, I'm just glad the whole sexual tension can now be resolved-" He shuts up immediately upon seeing Natasha's glare.

After a few minutes of silence and eating their breakfast, Y/n's phone notification started going off like crazy. "Oh, Piet I think one of our videos got viral."

"Where let me see." Pietro leaned over to take a look, and upon opening the app, their eyes quickly widens. "Why would you upload that?!"

"I didn't! I must've- Fuck..." Y/n panicked, and by that, really panicked.

"What's going on?" Natasha asked.

"Nothing!" The two men said simultaneously, fuck... if Natasha finds out they're screwed. However, before they could delete the evidence, Natasha snatched the phone from her brother's hand. Wanda leaned closer to take a look and gasped. Yelena only snorted and excuse herself as she had an idea where this was going.

It was a footage of them, kissing, wrap up in each other's arms, lip tight in a passionate lock. Fuck, Katy Perry was right, Pictures of last night ended up online and they were screwed. "Y/n..." Natasha said warningly.

Without a second thought Y/n dashed away from the table with Pietro who zooms past him with his superspeed.

"I'll fucking kill you both!" Was Natasha's last word before hunting them down one by one.

[lavend-ler]

BORDERLANDS: DEBT OR ALIVE BOOK REVIEW

I have read the new Borderlands book Debt Or Alive. I did not like it. In fact, I hated it so much I needed to pour out my thoughts in this review. It’ll be very long, so bear this in mind while reading through it because it’s been a while since a piece of media has made me this angry.

There will be spoilers to ALL of the book so you’ve been warned. I am going to analyze this book very thoroughly so everything that can be spoiled will be spoiled.

TL;DR – I hated this book. I accept Borderlands 3, I think it’s fine and I really like aspects of it. I wasn’t enthusiastic about New Tales From The Borderlands but in the end, I thought it was fine. But Debt Or Alive? It’s probably the only piece of Borderlands media that I won’t consider canon from this point forward. Half-assed story with shallow characters and ham-fisted message which retroactively ruins the events of the game(s). Don’t buy it, don’t waste your time on this just to see the worst version of characters you love.

A more detailed review will be under the cut. It’s over 10k long.

1. Tales From The Borderlands made even worse

I have a complicated relationship with Tales From The Borderlands. I think my best friend had put it in the best way – Tales From The Borderlands is good when you don’t think about it for too long. For me, it’s a fun game to play once every 4 years, remember the story and move on. The more you think about it, the more apparent the cracks get and the worse it becomes.

Debt Or Alive REALLY makes you think about Tales From The Borderlands in the worst way possible.

I have always thought that Fiona’s part of the story is weaker than Rhys’. It’s told in a way that sort of meanders until it’s reached its conclusion. The first sin Debt Or Alive commits is that the ending of Tales is its beginning. What should be the conclusion, the nice ribbon to tie the story is now the jumping off point. In my opinion, it’s always a terrible narrative decision to make your sequel start where the story left off. It always implies the fact that your conclusion is meaningless and that your characters didn’t learn anything. To write a new story, you need more challenges which also means that characters need new struggles. In Debt Or Alive’s case, it means that everything that happened in Tales isn’t worth a thing.

To me, nothing was more apparent of it here than the Vault scene. The Vault of the Traveler grants a wish to everyone who steps there. The Vault should be the conclusion to what we know of the characters and sort of “off screen” this happens to Rhys. We see Fiona hear that Rhys wishes for Atlas and that’s the end of his story in Tales. Though I will touch upon why I didn’t like this later, it does make narrative sense, he was supposed to be more independent and choose his own path instead of following others. It’s a ribbon that ties to his character in Borderlands 3 and New Tales From The Borderlands.

Then it’s time for Fiona and… Oh, yeah. What would SHE wish for? Throughout Tales, we see Fiona evolve as a character from the ragged con-artist who wishes to just go by, to the independent and certain Vault Hunter. Or do we? Yes, there is a moment in which Sasha dies which would be traumatic for Fiona but she’s from Pandora. She should know the dangers of living and instead, she should be happy that she came back as the hero. In the ending of Tales, we can hear Fiona say “This [Vault hunting] life…suits me” so she already reconciled the danger and in fact, she welcomes it. But to make this half-assed story be a thing, we have to disregard this entirely.

So in the Vault, Fiona is given a chance to wish for anything she wants. What does she wish for? Nothing, actually. Presented with an opportunity of a lifetime, Fiona has no idea what to wish for. I can’t even begin to tell you how bad of either an opener or an ending this is for her character. For an opener, we have a protagonist who doesn’t know what she wants and where she needs to go. Sure, it’s a start for an arc but not for Fiona who already DID have it. It’s an arc she had earned, so why would she have a restart and go through this all over again? And as an ending, it’s a terrible reminder that Fiona probably didn’t learn a thing. The time in the Vault was for nothing, Athena didn’t teach her anything. Burch doesn’t know his character well enough to think of anything for her to wish for.

Hence the whole journey moving forward truly is just a bad rehash. If Fiona didn’t learn a thing about herself and needs to do it again but worse, what’s the point of this story? To see her come to the same conclusion as she did at the end of Tales but worse? The answer is yes. As this story suggests Fiona is a protagonist who doesn’t know what to do with her life and just wants to protect her sister and that’s all. Which is the exact same point her character was at, at the beginning of Tales.

Actually, why did the Vault have to grant wishes, anyway? It doesn’t make sense for neither Fiona nor Rhys and even later, Gaige cements that this didn’t have to be the case. Part of the charm which Tales From The Borderlands brought was the story of everyday people. This wasn’t a story of glorious Vault Hunters with great stamina and luck, who chose the adventure for the guns and glory. This was a story of a middle manager and a con artist, two unremarkable people who were basically forced onto this adventure from outside forces and because of their will became heroes of their own stories. It’s a story of normal people who have made their own self-made destiny.

Debt Or Alive, of course, scoffs at this idea. Rhys’ Vault wish for Atlas makes no sense as he already has Atlas and already probably works under this trademark. It doesn’t mean a thing that he wishes for the whole legal action thing, when his character progression to have Atlas from Jack would be so good. But no, it’s cosmic power that grants him that wish fully. Fiona too, she was supposed to be a self-made Vault Hunter but in the end (or the beginning), she rejects this and doesn’t know what to wish for. Just an absolutely horrible way of planning out her character. No one wants a passive character and this is what this story makes Fiona to be – a bystander, rather than an igniter.

I also want to point out that the events of Tales and characters she meets are truly nothing but cameos. A big part of Fiona’s story was gaining independence when her father figure Felix turned out to be a snake who sold them out. Within Tales, it’s very clear that Felix was abusive towards Fiona and Sasha, forcing them into roles they didn’t want, favoring Fiona and making them live such a strict life, they thought it was the best they could get. Of course, none of this is ever touched upon in Debt Or Alive. It’s never mentioned that Fiona is an abuse survivor and how it would shape her as a person with her protectiveness and willingness to give up greatness for simply “good enough”, and being held to impossible standards. There are also barely any mentions of Athena and their time together. At no point does Fiona use tactics she had learnt from Athena or recounts their time. Those are passive mentions which make Fiona look like she didn’t learn a thing.

My own ribbon that ties this section will be the funniest thing that for me exposes how much Tales is made worse. Tales From The Borderlands is a game in which choices DO NOT matter. There are no consequences and each choice will yield the same outcome. Again, it’s just meaningless and it’s so funny to me that this book wants to wink at the audience becoming a “choose your own adventure” book in two sections, which both lead to the same result. It truly does not mean a thing.

2. Anthony Burch cannot write women and Fiona’s character assassination

Anthony Burch cannot write women. This is a fact that I wanna point out every single time I can because it was never more apparent to me than in this book. Let’s start with women in Borderlands and the stories which he had written for them. Maya has a good theme but falls flat when she’s only an object for Kreig to lust over. Nisha is Burch’s sexual fantasies coming true in a gross way. Athena in Tales is made only stone cold, no-fun character who is a liar to someone who loves. Janey in Tales is made to be an overbearing girlfriend trope but it’s progressive because she’s a lesbian. Vallory is a collection of tropes. So on and so forth.

Hence right from the beginning, I was very skeptical of a book by Burch which will have the most female-driven cast in all of Borderlands. My skepticism was proved not only to be right but also that it was much worse than I had realized. Because I haven’t even shown you the issues of Fiona and Sasha and trust me, there are some even in Tales. However from Tales I could very easily tell you what character traits Fiona and Sasha have and what differentiated them.

Fiona, as described in Tales promotional material is a con-artist with a heart of gold. She has been raised on streets, she loves money and she has a silver tongue to get out of every situation she’s in. Fiona also cares about those she loves a lot, as an older sister she can get overbearing but her situation in life made her realize that it’s justifiable. She can also be a nerd, she’s curious and fun, likes to joke around. Sasha is a character who loves danger far more than Fiona. She likes guns and has great knowledge of them, she’s more a doer than a talker. Sasha doesn’t want the con life and longs for something tangible, rather than just be a prize in the books. She also has an inferiority complex, due to Felix��� abuse which she masks with her forwardness and action personality. She shines through when she can do things she loves, becoming headstrong, honest and independent.

Do you really think we’ll get any of this in this book?

The answer is no and it’s very easy to tell it right from the start. I know I keep getting back to the Vault scene but trust me, this is the culprit from which I knew this book will be a failure. In this scene, Fiona doesn’t know what to wish for, so she “wishes” that Sasha was there. This wish is granted and it’s now both sisters in the Vault. From this you can see the issue – this book does not treat Fiona and Sasha as separate characters. They ALWAYS have to be together, always mention each other, they’re basically never given a room to breathe because whenever a scene calls for just Fiona or just Sasha, their internal monologue will keep mentioning the other.

I can’t even really make a case for either of the characters individually because this book itself makes such a bad case with them. I’ll give it my best shot because when these moments occur they are, well, bad. I’ll start with Sasha because I have less to say since the book itself had less to say about her too. There is a certain moment in which Sasha, being tired of Fiona’s carefulness, goes Vault hunting with Gaige. I was very happy at this, since I have shipped Sasha and Gaige before and I thought their personalities would mesh well. Yet, in this particular instance, Sasha isn’t enjoying anything regarding Vault hunting and the danger, while constantly thinking of Fiona. Why is that, why wouldn’t she be thrilled for the adventure and getting to know another person like Gaige more? They could bond and start a friendship but in the end, they barely talk and Sasha isn’t into it. Even guns don’t excite her that much. What happened to her?

I think even her reflections towards life after death are very much shallow and omitted. We get a sense of it, we get that Sasha is terrified that there’s nothing when she dies but we’re not given anything of it. I figured this would be her turning point, that Sasha will realize that if there’s nothing afterwards, it’s best to live her life to the fullest, going on adventures, not wasting chances. But nothing like this has happened. Sasha doesn’t enjoy Vault hunting, she shrugs at guns, she can’t have her own fulfillments, her relationship with Rhys is wishy-washy. You’d think that with sudden realization of death, Sasha would have a breaking point and start thinking if it’s all worth it and how her life should now be like. But that would require interesting philosophical questions that Burch doesn’t want to answer. Not when they lose the life-giving crystal, nor when Sasha dies a second time when she chooses to. It’d be such an interesting discussion of the meaning of life, how Sasha approaches life and what it all means to her but no. Not given any thought to this. At the end it’s not even unique to her as Fiona dies and is brought to life too so again, no point.

Another faucet to her character is the on and off relationship with Rhys and just… I was never a fan of shipping Sasha and Rhys together and this book reminded me of it in the worst possible way. Sasha is disinterested with Rhys’ world and they never mesh well together, having such different goals in life. She doesn’t even want to acknowledge their relationship, leaving Rhys to look like a sad wet sock (more on that later). It’s described how she’s used to acting a certain way and that’s fair, that’s a huge roadblock in a relationship. But we never see this roadblock get pushed. Sasha at the end of the book is still terrified of the potential relationship and doesn’t want this. We only learn that one time she calls him her boyfriend off screen, which is just such a cop out I can’t begin to describe it. I’m so sorry, Sasha, you deserve an actual relationship not just Burch’s fantasies.

So I move to the main character of the story, Fiona. And oh god, how badly has Burch treated Fiona, words cannot describe it but they will try. From the beginning, we see one of Fiona’s traits be amped up to 11 – her protectiveness which turns into overbearingness. Constantly, we are reminded that Sasha died and Fiona can’t forgive herself. Which is fair but again… We saw her happy and fulfilled at the end of Tales. But since Tales doesn’t matter and probably it’s better if it didn’t exist, it gets shrugged off. May I remind you, this book starts right as Tales ended. Which is a year later from the start. Which means Fiona is 30 and Sasha is 25. Their actions do not portray two characters of this age, especially Fiona’s towards Sasha’s.

Look, I’m 24 and I have a sister who’s 33, so close-ish range to them. If my sister would do the things that Fiona did to Sasha I would be pissed off as all hell because guess what, my adult sister does consider me an adult woman. Unlike apparently Fiona and Sasha. Because for Sasha’s “safety” Fiona puts her into a fucking jail on a planet they do not know, just towards her “safety”. Yes, it’s regarded as dumb and wrong in the book and that Fiona knows that Sasha would pull through but it’s just mind boggling to me that Fiona would even do that. She should know her sister. But then throughout the book we see Fiona acting like know all be all authority to her, constantly second guessing her actions and opinions and being completely overbearing. I’m sorry but her apology at the end doesn’t make it remotely okay to be so controlling of Sasha.

I guess that’s the point. In my opinion, this book is a character assassination for Fiona. People will whine and moan over how Rhys got ruined in Borderlands 3 and New Tales but no, I had and will always disagree with this. But Fiona in Debt Or Alive? Burch truly showed how he has no clue how to write female characters because she is completely ruined here. None of her actions make sense, neither do her choices, the little character she has is so unlikeable and I just can’t believe he thought it was all good.

The best way to show you how Fiona got ruined is to have a little overview of Fiona as a character before and her background. She is a Pandoran, born and “raised” there, through the life of crime and bribery. Her biological parents died, she only has Sasha with her. Thus she feels responsible for her and their wellbeing. Fiona also had Felix, a man who brought her and Sasha with him and raised them in a very abusive manner. Fiona all her life had lived in poverty, struggling to get by with her cons, constantly having Felix make her think she’s responsible for the failures or successes of the group all on her own. She lived in a caravan, she barely had any money to her name. She’s no stranger to the climate and cruelty of Pandora, having lived there all her life, though she herself prefers the “word” combat.

Got it? Well, now forget it because that’s what Burch did in his book.

I know that wealth can change people, I really do and the sum of money Fiona and Sasha received is enormous. What I don’t understand is that they both did a complete 180 on their perspectives. I do realize that living in poverty all their life, Fiona would start spending money on dumb things but to hammer home this fact, Burch tries really hard to show us how dumb some of the purchases are. But would she really act like this in this setting? First, it’s hard for me to believe that she would willingly move to Eden-5, seeing the corrupted system and life in which it operates. It’s just Pandora but with chrome paint on it. Yet, Fiona doesn’t see red flags and just continues on living, buying dumb shit. We don’t learn anything new about her through this either, it’s just a dumb thing after dumb thing. Why couldn’t it start with things that she really wanted and then move on to unnecessary things? I think it’s because Burch couldn’t even establish what her wishes would be from Pandoran times.

What also made me just want to throw this book away was that it took Fiona around 200 pages to realize that people who work for her are also bound by debt. It’s such a nearsighted thing, I cannot believe that she would do it. Especially since I think we’re led to believe that this book happened in the span of 4-5 years. For Fiona to be this bound by greed and wealth doesn’t fit her character at all. How could she just not see that people who work for her have been tortured by poverty? Up until this point, Fiona lived in poverty herself, she should KNOW that this is a thing people struggle with. Not to mention, in the book there are talks about how people have multiple debt cuffs on them. It’s unacceptable that Fiona wouldn’t care about those who were beneath her. And if she really did, do you think this makes her character any more likable? And do you think that her turn around is a moment of triumph when we’re led to believe she ignored those people for YEARS?

I think the story itself just makes you shrivel at one moment in particular. Fiona purchases a sapphire kitten, which shatters. Classic Borderlands humor, right? This moment truly disturbed me but not in a way that Burch wanted but for the implications. Fiona spends money on bullshit she doesn’t want just to have it. Who else spent money on unneeded bullshit just to show wealth? Handsome Jack. And when you’re comparing your hero to the most vile villain from the series, I don’t think it’s a good sign. Especially since in canon Handsome Jack loved and cared for Butt Stallion. Unlike Fiona.

Even the breaking point moment of Fiona, the destruction of Rustville, felt shallow. Reading this, I couldn’t help but to go back to the moment of Helios’ destruction in Tales. It was such an incredible moment for Rhys, seeing the destruction of a place that was close to him, death of people who he knew and respected. And seeing this “reprise” of sorts with Fiona just felt shallow. At this point, Fiona was in Rustville around 3 times if I can recall? She met people but didn’t form any meaningful relationships (because Burch doesn’t want either of the sisters to have meaningful relationships besides each other) or got to know anyone better. These were all one off interactions with random people. Unlike Rhys, it wasn’t Fiona’s choice to destroy Rustville. It was only an act that she maybe sort of allowed to happen but it was an action of one rich woman. Fiona had no agency in her actions, there was nothing she could’ve done to neither prevent it nor cause it. Thirdly, Fiona is a Pandoran. She should know the carnage, death and destruction, as it is ingrained in Pandora’s system and society. For her to act so devastated and shocked, it simply doesn’t make sense.

Another thing is that this story really dumbs Fiona down, to the points that I couldn’t comprehend how dumb she was. She goes alone to Tetanus Wilds, even if with Sasha she’d have more chances. Especially since she was going to Gaige’s stash and let’s be real – Sasha knows guns, Fiona does not. Fiona goes to destroy Rustville without any weapons and without any protection which of course results in her basically getting killed. Fiona takes a leap of faith thinking she’d die in the ditch but forgets that Deathtrap can fly and catch her. How would she forget if she was tinkering with him before? The same way she’d forget her weapons it seems.

I also wanted to mention how it always made sense to me that Fiona and Sasha would have a falling out in some part of the story, so both of the sisters would become independent and chase their own destinies. It would require Burch to stop thinking of them as a singular character, which does not happen. This part in particular made me especially angry. A skilled writer would make Fiona’s overbearingness and constant promises to be a start of Sasha realizing she needs to live her own life, Fiona as well. Anthony Burch is not a skilled writer so nothing of such happens.

Within Debt Or Alive we don’t learn anything new regarding neither Fiona nor Sasha. We are spoon fed information that we already know, seeing characters we love either devolve to their pre-Tales state or make terrible, nonsensical decisions. There are no moments in which  either of the sisters can breathe on their own. They are thrown into situations where something just has to happen. Thus, we don’t learn anything about them as people.

I also want to point out that the writing of Gaige is fine. I’ll talk more about this later but she truly was fine and I didn’t see issues with how her character was carried. Granted, I think it’s very hard to screw up writing Gaige but it’s Burch, he can do it all. I’m still sad that she’s a lonely outcast like in Borderlands 3 but in general, I didn’t have issues with either her writing or the story.

3. There will never be another Handsome Jack and the death of a good villain

Some of you have already started to roll your eyes at the mention of Handsome Jack but trust me, I have a point here to make. Whenever you hear people talk about Handsome Jack a special kind of sentence emerges – a villain you love to hate. I think this sentence is a great guide to creating your villain so that they’re impactful, fit the story, be likable enough to want to be with them but you’re happy when you get to kill them. And nothing made me feel like it’s a craft long gone than reading Debt Or Alive.

Countess Holloway is a nothing villain. She truly doesn’t represent anything and I can’t tell you anything of what she is as a person. Actually, it can boil down to one sentence – she’s rich and she’s evil. That’s all there is to her character but I guess it goes to show that even then, Burch cannot write women.

Going a little deeper, we gotta discuss the parts that make a good villain. I’m sorry for the comparisons to Handsome Jack but we really need to talk about what makes him great and what makes Holloway shallow.

On the surface level, the points are there. A villain needs to be connected to your heroes in a specific way, having an impact on their lives. Holloway does meet that quota, as she’s not only the motor for this story but also is actually the reason why Fiona and Sasha got rich in the first place. She is a vain person, who loves to live for shallow things and doesn’t care about the rest. From this point of view, we could think that Holloway serves as a reminder to Fiona and Sasha of “be careful who you can become” but neither of them have this revelation. Throughout the story, Fiona and Sasha basically do turn into Holloway, yet nothing of it is neither stated nor explored. It’s not a revelation that characters have, it’s what we think when we connect the dots.

When we start to think more, it all begins to fall apart. The key thing that lacks here is motivation. Looking back at Handsome Jack, it was clear how his goals were stated – he was a nobody who became somebody by his charisma and cunning ways. Now he projects his awful world views on others and it’s your job to stop him. There’s also the fact that his daughter Angel works for him and killing her for Jack is the breaking point. You see him be cruel, vain and abusive but you see his more “human” side that does not excuse his actions (I am looking away from Tales) but makes you understand how much of a terrible person he is and how he deserves to die. It’s effective and fantastic storytelling and his personality makes you want to be around him, even if he’s an awful person who deserves to die.

Let’s go back to Holloway and examine her as I described the traits of a good villain via Jack. Holloway’s motivation is that 7 years ago Gaige murdered her daughter Marcie and now she wants revenge on her. This is already a problem, as this is a passive goal. Holloway is presented as an arrogant woman who doesn’t like to get her hands dirty, hence she can’t kill Gaige on her own. Understandable but also she doesn’t seem very interested in it anyway? She wants to kill Gaige but passively. There’s a bounty on Gaige but Holloway doesn’t have a squad to look after her. Wouldn’t it be more interesting if Holloway had people looking for Gaige and when they die she swiftly replaces them with another one? It would be active but instead we’re presented this information as “well, maybe Gaige dies or maybe she doesn’t, idk, it’s alright either way”.

Another point is that Holloway is a very shallow character. In general, yes but in her actions too. What do we really know about her? She is rich, vain, vengeful, powerful and likes to spend money on frivolous things. Sure but that’s so basic you could tell this about so many other villains it wouldn’t make a difference. There is nothing in her nor in her behavior that would be an indicator of any interesting persona or character. Holloway just exists and we’re told that she’s evil. Wonderful character writing, gotta say.

We’re introduced to Countess Holloway in a way that she is the potential buyer of the Typhon DeLeon Vaultlander figure. Why would she want this? We’re not told nor shown. Thinking of it logically, we could say that it’s supposed to show us that Holloway likes to spend money on whatever bullshit she wants, which is fair. But wouldn’t it make it more sense if after the death of her child, Holloway became obsessed with Vault Hunters, knowing the murderer of her child became one? How did she start researching stories of Vault Hunters and think about how much she hates them, which would lead to her gaining knowledge? This way, Holloway could’ve been prepared for the attacks of Vault Hunters and Vault Hunter wannabes, since she would predict it all. Or even set a lure with a promise of amazing loot. Nothing like this happens.

Even the death of Marcie isn’t exactly a driving point to Holloway. When Angel dies in Borderlands 2, you see the impact it has on Handsome Jack. You know he’s an abusive parent yet even within this, he still acts as sort of father of the year type and constantly manipulates you, saying this is your fault. For Holloway, it seemed that the death of her child just happened and yeah, she’s pissed but you know, things happen. She doesn’t mention who Marcie was, even in her shallow understanding of it. It could’ve made a very interesting character bit where she would tell lies about Marcie, as she was more of a commodity to and of Holloway than anything else. Instead, Marcie’s death isn’t really a drive for Holloway, it’s just a thing that happened and she’s kinda bummed about this.

Is Holloway an imposing force, a ticking clock of sorts? No, she is not. We’re told that during all their stay on Eden-5 (again, around 4 or 5 years), Fiona and Sasha are neighbors with Holloway and nothing is done with it. They’re not anxious that she could strike at any moment or that she could catch Gaige. They don’t care about Gaige actually. That’s why Holloway makes a very poor villain in the imposing sense. There’s no impact of hers and her power felt throughout the book, when Fiona and Sasha can happily live next to her and nothing happens.

The only interesting display of her power is during the gala at Fiona and Sasha’s place, where Holloway shows that she can very easily change the whole Elite’s perspectives regarding the sisters. Yes, it’s a good moment for Holloway but it also truly makes me think how shallow she is as a character. First, the fact that Fiona fell for the Claptrap Vaultlander is another testament of how dumbed down she was. Burch, you made a whole joke about how Claptrap sucks at the beginning and how Fiona hates him, the least you could do was to think that she’d immediately throw this away (especially since you’ve established that Fiona is frivolous with her possessions now).

Second, it’s such a bait and switch moment for Holloway and the whole Elite. I get what it was trying to accomplish, it was for us to see that the Elites are stupid and will follow anyone as it goes. But wouldn’t it be better that out of her hatred for Fiona and Sasha she would work behind the scenes, telling other Elites how they are just stupid Pandorans who can’t achieve anything? It could’ve been a carefully plotted plan with instances that the blackmail was happening hinted at throughout the story but that would require the time when Fiona and Sasha spent on Eden-5 to mean something (it does not) and Holloway to have an ounce of personality and planning skills (she does not).

Another thing that Holloway for me lacks is the backstory. To create a good villain you must make us believe that they had a reason to do all that so we can hate them even more. I think in general, Borderlands does a great job with this, with Knoxx, Handsome Jack, of course, Colonel Zarpedon and the twins. But Holloway? We do not know anything about Holloway’s life. It was probably done so the billionaire character is just a shallow representation of this world but it makes for a very boring and one note character. We don’t know how she got this money, if she lived all her life like this and hates outsiders who she thinks are unworthy of this. Or is it a thing she got later in life thus is so cutthroat about this because she doesn’t wanna go back to poverty. No, you just get a one note shallow villain with no motivation and nothing to play off of.

Even her death is such a nothing death too. Throughout the book we see everyone trying to get at her and eliminate her and not succeed. It’s why Gaige is here, it’s a whole moral dilemma for Fiona and Sasha to grasp upon. As much as Holloway is baiting them to do this but calling them cowards and the sisters just lamenting over how they should’ve done this, you’d think Holloway would get her way. Possibly being quite literally torn to shreds by the sisters, Gaige and the poor people of Eden-5. I mean, it’s Borderlands, deaths like these could happen! But no, she just falls to her death. Even Gaige didn’t deserve to get a shot at her, it seems.

4. The themes of why all billionaires deserve to die or lack therefore of

In a now deleted tweet, Anthony Burch describes Debt Or Alive as a book about how “all billionaires deserve to die”. Why he had deleted this, I have no idea and I’m not here to speculate. However, I did not forget this tweet and throughout reading Debt Or Alive I kept reminding myself of itt. It should be the credo of this book, right? Or at least it once was. That is why, I wanted to simply sit down and speculate, what does this tweet actually mean for the themes of this book.

(This screen isn’t mine, I didn’t get to screenshot it when it was up)

I am a leftist, my politics are very much so on the left. My expertise lies in environmental issues and I know less about socio-economics but it’s fine because it seems that Anthony Burch himself doesn’t know much about this. Hence while reading Debt Or Alive, I asked myself the same question over and over. Let’s say I’m a person who likes Borderlands, likes Fiona and Sasha, isn’t too involved in politics and now I read Debt Or Alive – will this book convince me to learn more of the theory or think that all billionaires should die? In a way yes but in none of the right meaning of such speculations.

On the planet of Eden-5, it seems that life is determined by money and social status. Even the smallest crimes (or rather inconveniences towards the wealthy) will result in you getting a debt cuff. The imagery is already very ham-fisted but let’s go forward with this idea. What are the debt cuffs? I can’t really tell you how they work. While reading I couldn’t have deduced how exactly they operate with that premise. 

First thing is that a person can have multiple debt cuffs but it is never specified if the cuffs ever reach their limit in amount of money on it. As we see Fiona and Sasha get their cuffs and then we learnt you can get multiple, it truly got me thinking – how is that possible? How is it possible to get another, if the screens are digital (and they are described to be digital) how can they reach the limit and be forced to get another? In a highly technological society like Borderlands, nonetheless? How are the body parts chosen for this process? Fiona gets one on her ankle (I think, either this or arm, I forgot) but Sasha gets one on her neck. There are people who have so many cuffs they can’t walk anymore. How can they have so many?

Truth be told, we won’t learn anything about the cuffs or how people operate with them. We simply know they are very common and every citizen of Rustville is described to wear one. Even children, in an incredibly not subtle way, are described to wear “debt cuffs 4 kidz!”. We’re told the cuffs are very heavy but people live with them. We won’t learn who manufactures them, who is in charge of the law to give them away. We’re not even told about the ones who have paid their debt without help from Fiona and Sasha.

The moment when the book takes us to debt prison and the guard says there are some prisoners who can’t even walk because of their cuffs, I realized what these truly were. The cuffs were nothing but the least subtle visualization for us for the statuses of Eden-5 citizens. A literal ball and chain to be exact. For me it just serves as a very ham-fisted metaphor for what could’ve been an interesting concept. We could’ve seen someone pay up their debt but the cuff stays on because the Elites don’t want anyone to be free. We could’ve seen Elites wearing some as a “fashion statement”, mocking the suffering of the lower class. We could’ve seen an Elite who has an actual debt cuff and can’t pay it away, resulting in them hiding it from others. We could’ve had anything but the complete disregard Fiona and Sasha had for their workers and not realizing all of them wear at least one.

For all it’s worth, the book has a very black and white approach towards wealth and money, one that is very unusual for Borderlands. Though we get the usual for Borderlands “everyone is an asshole”, we have such a divide between Rusters and the Elites, it’s hard to mistake it for anything else. Because of this, world building suffers with this incredibly. There are only the poorest people around or the richest people around. There is no nuance or a conversation, there is either this or that. Even Gaige doesn’t offer any insider information towards it, even if she was born and raised there. Nowhere does her very outspoken politics mention the structures and Elites of Eden-5 which she should be completely against. And the fact that she knew Marcie and that she doesn’t wear any debt cuffs that are omnipresent on Eden-5 and the fact that Elites don’t want anything to do with Rusters makes me wonder – is Gaige actually rich? Because everything shows this, and if so, great work, Burch on creating a character whose identity is all over the place.

That was my big issue with showing the problems of wealth and social structures it creates. With no middle class, the conversation lacks another point of view. There are either the wealthiest around or the completely poorest lowest class imaginable. With getting rid of the middle, Burch fails to show us how daily life operates and robs us of the potential conversation. Where are the people who chase wealth and fortune? Where are those who would betray their whole class just to have that taste of top dog life? The only thing we are offered in this conversation are Face and Pick (you don’t have to know anything about them), who want to give Fiona and Sasha away for Holloway, just for the money. But that’s treated as a plot twist, rather than an actual plot point and the siblings already paralleled Fiona and Sasha, so there’s no conversation, just a very shallow shock.

Another point is how the Elites are presented to us. The Elites are the villains, of course and just like billionaires in real life, they aren’t good people. It’s more of how they are presented to us or lack of such presentation. Debt Or Alive doesn’t show us insides to the minds of the Elites because frankly, they don’t have any. I do understand that Burch wanted to show that these are stupid, cruel people, I get it, but even in real life, billionaires are stupid but not necessarily unintelligent.

In the book, we don’t see much of Elites, actually. We see them on the gala Fiona constructed and on Holloway’s gala at the end. At first, they are mindless people who cannot think for themselves. They’re either doing what Fiona wants or what Holloway wants. Secondly, they are quite literally used as meat shields for our heroes to hide behind. So in all senses, they have no personalities, either as a group or individuals. I think the biggest crime is that even in their rich years, Fiona and Sasha don’t interact with the Elites. We could see them be cruel to the lower class citizens, purposefully making them do things that would rank up their debt. We could see them spending money on idiotic things which Fiona and Sasha would point out as dumb. We could even have descriptions of Holloway’s house that are garish and grotesque because she has so much money, she doesn’t know how to spend it anymore.

Truly, the only billionaires whose mind we can read are actually Fiona and Sasha. But for this kind of story, you need a strawman, which is absent. I genuinely thought that Gaige could become their strawman but their relationship is so shallow and so one note I quickly realized it’s impossible. In stories like this, usually when the protagonists become rich and get to make stupid, meaningless purchases, there are already signs that something like this is bad. And though there are plenty of moments in which the girls make stupid choices over their greed, it takes them so damn long to wake up from that dream.

There’s also no critique of overconsumption or consumerism in general. It should be an easy task, regarding how Fiona and Sasha spend their money but though we never see the effects on them, for example throwing away new things or we don’t see the workers (besides that one lady) in such conditions. It’s all a very interesting subject that is brushed away at rich ladies’ boredom. Though we are told that these purchases are stupid, we aren’t given an answer to what they should do instead. And the only point of activism Fiona and Sasha do is to finally free the workers from cuffs. Took them long enough.

I simply can’t understand why this plot even had to involve the sisters, since it truly makes them worse by association. All throughout Tales we hear that Fiona and Sasha hate Hyperion and don’t want anything to do with Rhys. It’s a fair assessment, they’re Pandoran and Hyperion destroyed Pandora as they knew it and is personification of greed. So… Why were they so eager to live a rich and boring life? Was their issue only with Hyperion? Even more so, why were they so hateful regarding Hyperions? For all we know, Rhys is just a simple white collar worker who also gets screwed over by the system, yet they hate him for being part of the system even when it’s to also get by. Reading this story, I had a feeling that Fiona and Sasha simply hated Rhys for being a white collar worker and they had no problems with greed and destruction of lives via riches.

The story also really doesn’t want to take sides in this whole debacle. Fiona and Sasha lose all their money and want to start a revolution, killing all the Elites. This thought isn’t given any time to sink in or develop. At some point, the sisters realize no, we shouldn’t kill the Elites because that is how we’re gonna liberate the people, with their money. But then Gaige tells them they’re wrong? It’s very all over the place and the story really doesn’t want to take sides in this. 

That does make me think, what kind of impact will this story even have on both Fiona and Sasha? All in all, it seemed that they didn’t learn anything. They have to be on the run because the Elites want them dead but also they’re still into the riches and spoils of the Vault. Since Rhys is rich now, wouldn’t they not want to associate with him? Or are we gonna play the “not all rich people” card? I love Rhys and I actually like fictional rich people. But while writing a story like this, you have to stick with your principals and make them call out Rhys’ practices, not side with him because he’s one of the good guys. You can’t lead a revolution and then make puppy eyes towards a rich capitalist.

I have left out the discussion of race, because I am white and I feel like this isn’t my place to be talking about this. Don’t listen to me regarding this, listen to people of color. I want to, however, point out that Burch stayed within the racial ambiguity of Fiona and Sasha and their racial identity is not spoken of, while we learn the ethnic identities of two white characters (Gaige and Felix). Not to mention that I can criticize that having two women of color be painted as rich assholes and drawing parallels between Fiona and Handsome Jack who is in canon called a fascist is incredibly insensitive. And within the revolution literally having them be called out on being “outsiders who want to lead revolution that isn’t theirs and they talk over the native people” is so bad I can’t believe Burch thought of this. 

All in all, would this book convince me that all billionaires should die? With its heavy-handed metaphors and subtlety equal to a trainwreck, I truly don’t think it would. It’s a mess of themes and missed chances on having actually said something regarding the fact that billionaires should not exist and that they are vapid people who can’t look out for others. The story is just complicated when those people you criticize are also your protagonists, like Fiona and Sasha here.

We could’ve had interesting stories of class struggle and differences. The Elites could’ve been destroying the land, long before that laser hit Rustville. Destruction of land and resources for people to live is one of the oppression strategies real life rich people do. And just like the environmental issues won’t be solved with only everyday people making a change, it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to make things better. Write better stories with better themes. Maybe it’s just a tie-in novel for a game from 10 years ago but it could’ve said something instead of giving us a caricature of a rich person who spends money on little whale serving dishes.

See how I mentioned my passion for environmental issues at the beginning and it came back here? Set up and pay off. Something this book lacks.

5. Writing not just a better story but A Story in general

I am a writer. Sure, I write fanfiction but that doesn’t disqualify what I’m about to say. Not everyone is a showrunner, you need screenwriters too. What is this book if not officially commissioned fanfiction regarding Fiona and Sasha? When I myself am writing a story to explore, I always ask myself what is my theme, what am I building towards. Every story is fundamentally about change, right? That was why, when I stopped asking myself if I think all billionaires should die, I started asking myself – what did I gain from reading this story? What did the characters gain from this story being told? The answer is actually nothing.

Some of you probably had thought “this is just a tie-in novel to the games, it’s not supposed to be high art” and I agree with this but it is supposed to be art, no matter what. You could’ve said the same thing about the original Tales From The Borderlands, it’s nothing but an addendum to the main stories within the Borderlands. Yet, it moved a lot of people, inspired them, wanted them to create and follow the stories of these characters. For years, I’ve seen people longing for a story of Fiona and Sasha post Tales and this is what we get. Maybe in this regard Debt Or Alive is a high art, since it’s been making me nothing but angry these past couple of days. Or maybe it truly is a nothing piece of art, since at the end of the day, the feelings are just of shallowness.

Coming back to the fact that every story needs change to be worthwhile, I mean it even in the smallest of sense. It doesn’t have to be a huge change, but there has to be one no matter what. After I read Debt Or Alive I realized there was completely no change involved in the process. We start this book with Fiona and Sasha not knowing where they are in life and at the end, they decide to be Vault Hunters. You can say it is a substantial change but think about it like this – it’s the same kind of character arc they’ve had in the original Tales From The Borderlands.

Nothing had changed, they’re still at the same point they were almost 10 years ago when we finished episode 5. What Burch does is a classic shitty storytelling technique of the sequel that is just forgetting everything that had happened before and rehashing the character arc from the first one, just worse. Fiona goes from a self-reassured con-artist to a confident Vault Hunter. Sasha goes from a closed off younger sister to someone with agency. Those are the same kinds of stories we’ve already been told but when there’s no one to bounce off of, you realize that the sisters didn’t need this journey to realize it, they just needed to think for 15 minutes.

There’s also no change to the dynamics between Fiona and Sasha, and every attempt at it is shallow and pointless. At the beginning, we see Fiona being anxious that Sasha literally died before her eyes. Fiona is basically patronizing, Sasha goes Vault hunting but dislikes this, goes back and they make up. There’s no sense of change between them or maturity. I’ve already discussed the sense that their “class consciousness” is meaningless when they at the beginning were lower class. But even between each other, it’s the same song and dance. Fiona is a little overprotective, Sasha wants to show that she’s not just the younger sister. I’ve seen this already, Burch, you’ve told me this in Tales.

It doesn’t help that Fiona and Sasha really are treated constantly as the same entity, so their “changes” just don’t appear. They’re bound by the hip, unable to grow because of their limitations of the relationship. It’s too bad that a story about siblings has to treat them like they can’t exist without each other, when it could be an interesting story about independence. What if Sasha decides that Vault hunting is for her and actually goes away with Gaige? What if Fiona realizes that she’s been too caught up in her sister’s life that she forgot how to live her own? Those are all interesting questions that get tossed off the window, when you realize you have to do Tales but worse.

Just like that, the sisters can’t form any meaningful relationship. Not with the cardboard cutouts of the supporting cast, not with Gaige, there really is nothing. Fiona and Sasha don’t interact with their environment in an interesting way, it’s just a ham-fisted need to show that rich people are bad. Yes, I know they’re bad, I just want to see them discover it on their own. But we get nothing.

You can also argue that Sasha’s story regarding Rhys is just a rehash. As I’ve said, I was never a fan of this couple but I can’t imagine being satisfied with a solution that Burch brings to the table. Through the story, we see Sasha denying her feelings, not being ready for a relationship until Fiona steps in and says “actually, you are or you’re not” and off-screen we see that Sasha decided on their relationship. It’s truly insulting to see the “will they, won’t they” scenario with adult people and solved not before us.

What you have to understand is that this period of life that we’re seeing, with Fiona and Sasha is not a brief period of time. Maybe Burch doesn’t want exact numbers but this is clear when you think about a certain fact – Rhys has a mustache. I’m bringing this up because in Borderlands 3, Lor is actually surprised to see him like this, which means that the Maliwan invasion is well on its way. Which Rhys doesn’t bring up, of course. But deducing from this single comment we can calculate that between the beginning of the book and the ending, 4 or 5 years had happened. That is a damn long time and the fact that during this Fiona and Sasha do not resolve anything, do not develop and only go forth with their very surface level resolution is just a slap in the face.

We finished when we had started – it’s just that Burch doesn’t want you to realize that we had started at the ending. And this itself has consequences that he doesn’t ever want to acknowledge.

6. Show me my silver lining

I think at this point it’s very clear to see that I very much so didn’t enjoy this book. It’s just that I can’t bring myself to give a fully negative review, when there is one thing that I have to actually compliment. That thing is the arc of Gaige and what she’s been through in this book.

How we see Gaige is an actual arc and change of the character. We start with her being petty and bitter, returning to her home planet of Eden-5 for revenge. She wants to kill Holloway for destroying her and especially for the fact that she had imprisoned her father. We see Gaige’s smarts play the role against Fiona and we actually see the unbeatable Vault Hunter lose. Her father died at the prison. She has to hide, plotting her revenge. At the opportunity to bring her father back with the life crystal, she takes it immediately. But when it fails, Gaige is avoidant and quiet. Not wanting to see that she had failed yet again.

What was a terrible point in Fiona’s characterization, the destruction of Rustville, is the moment where Gaige shines through. Being presented with a choice by Holloway, she actually altruistically chooses to get caught, so she won’t hurt anyone. Sure, Holloway doesn’t keep her promise but it’s what Gaige is doing what is important. Instead of her usual snarky demeanor, we see her give up, something she had never done on her own. And in prison we see her still fighting for her life, screaming at the top of her lungs, even if at that point both her father and Deathtrap are gone.

The one genuinely great moment was when at the gala, Gaige gets a chance to open up about her feelings to her ECHOtube (I think that was what it was called?) subscribers. She talks about her love for her dad and how much he meant to her. How she misses him but wants to avenge him and wants him to be proud of her. It’s a very powerful moment, in my opinion, the best in all of the book. Gaige, surrounding herself with cheap thrills and adventures, seeks something that is real and opens up. It’s a beautiful moment of humanity for her that is just lovely to see.

Why she decided to take up the job of a party planner, I have no idea. Even with her explanation it still didn’t mean much to me. Thinking of how sad and once more, avoidant and lonely she ends up in Borderlands 3 does make me feel regret but I wanna hold onto that moment. Of Gaige’s sass and positive spirit, the only thing that made me go through that book.

Also there was a moment in which Rhys admits that he had a voice surgery. Made me go “what the fuck” at first but then I kinda laughed. Nobody needed that but whatever. Also fuck Troy Baker, all my homies hate Troy Baker.

7. Lightning round of criticism

Having said all of that and more about this book, this little section is about criticisms I had but didn’t want to dedicate a whole section to them. It’s just a list of things that bothered me as hell there but that will be shorter to sum up:

-        The humor of this book was unbearable. After several of those “jokes” you could very easily predict how the next one would go. It’s one person making a statement, another person contradicting it and then the outcome is a contradiction or first person admitting to the contradiction. Imagine this dry explanation but repeated over and over again and you get at least 40% of the whole dialogue. I don’t think it’s a good thing when you can sum up your entire humor in a descriptions like this

-        The new side characters are so paper thin, I cannot tell you anything about them. I can guarantee that if you ask me who they are in a month or two, I simply won’t know. All of them were characterized by a gimmick and not given anything real to do. The sisters, too, don’t have interesting interactions with them. Side characters here exist for cheap scenes that sorta progress the bad plot. In the words of a streamer Oboeshoesgames “Katagawa Jr. What a crazy character. He’s almost as memorable as Chet Smith.”

-        The way this book handled Rhys is horrendous. Equated to the kicked puppy who desperately wants Sasha’s attention, constantly described as stupid and worthless and then acting like a teenager when he’s pushing 30. I don’t think Borderlands 3 ruined Rhys. I don’t think New Tales ruined Rhys. But this? This is the worst written Rhys I’ve seen in years

-        Speaking of, Burch trying his damn hardest to write as if he’s a gen z person throws out words that make him look like Steve Buscemi “how do you do fellow kids” moment. In one moment, he even calls Rhys a himbo. Burch, do you know what words even mean

-        The narration style suffers from “tell don’t show”. Look at this example, here. Not only is this just flat out bad writing, we don’t need to be told three different times how badly Holloway treats people. A good writer would just show it to us via her actions towards her staff and juxtapose it with how Fiona treats her staff but of course, none of this happens

-        Being a video game writer, Burch doesn’t know how to progress a story. For him, the more important things are side quests and instant gratifications, not real emotional bits. The story rushes to the next point and leaves no room for you to breathe. You can’t spend time with those characters, you can’t learn anything new because you have to do another thing

-        Maybe that’s just me but I hate the non descriptive narration style. The world of Eden-5 feels shallow and pointless because the sisters don’t explore it and we don’t get any descriptions of it. Those are just empty phrases of wealth and dirt and nothing else

-        Last but certainly not least, I gotta ask, what the hell was Burch thinking with making this healing watch be the same thing as the healing crystal from New Tales? I always hated the deus ex machina of the watch but here it just had gotten ridiculous. It makes no sense, it’s a contrived way to bring it together. How does it connect? We never know, it is never explored. Maybe in Borderlands 50 or something

8. Conclusion

I hated this book. I wish I could’ve said something more profound but sometimes being direct is better – I truly hated this book and I won’t consider this canon to the Borderlands storyline. You can take my word that the canon won’t acknowledge it either. It’s a shallow cash grab directed at people who love Fiona and Sasha, engineered to be as meaningless as it could be and not to say anything either about its themes or its characters. It’s not a character study. It’s not a jumping off point for meaningful class structures and struggles discussion. It’s not even a fun popcorn adventure for fans of the series. With huge letters stating that it was written by the writer of Borderlands 2, I think we gotta ask – maybe it’s time to stop relying on the past and have someone write a spectacular story on par and better than Borderlands 2? Just anyone but Anthony Burch. 

[justanotherfanfolks]

Guys saw this post and it set off the part of my brain where Cater Diamond lives rent free.

@krenenbaker you inspired this.

Gosh, I wanna throw Cater under a microscope.

Like he is such a fascinating character, it's so sad that people just see him as the "social media character." I remember a few months after I got the game I was reading through his vignettes and he was just setting off the gears in my head. Especially his Halloween vignette. I've talked about it before, but it gives us so much insight into Cater. How he doesn't like letting people in and keeps everyone at arms length, even Trey. When Trey was a Starsender, he wouldn't tell him his actual wish. And he was the same before when they got visited by a previous Starsender the year before. Trey knows there's something about him, but he is Trey "But That's None of My Business" Clover so he never pries. He's the closest to Cater, but maybe that's what makes Cater so wary. And how when his mandrake threatened to pull down the curtain, he shoved it back, he changed the subject. We also almost never get Cater by himself. He's always surrounded by people, always performing. And it's hard to tell what he's thinking because he's always brushing stuff aside with a smile on his face. But his Halloween vignette is one where we actually get to see some cracks in that, we actually get a peek into his brain. He's scared of getting too close to people because every time he lets someone in, he has to leave. He clearly cares about the people around him, but he has a track record that prevents him from showing too much of that. And by extension, we as an audience don't get to see too much of who he is behind closed doors. We know he puts on a show, he doesn't like showing when things get to him. When he mentions moving around a lot, he doesn't mention the struggle of it out loud. He says he likes Magicam for the casual connections and how it helps him keep in touch with old faces, but in his vignette when he actually gets messages from one of these faces he doesn't want to engage. In Silver's Halloween vignette he says his life has taught him to live in the moment. But it also taught him to not get comfortable, to keep walls up. He didn’t even tell his dorm something as simple as how he doesn't like sweets for years. Back on Halloween, he watches Diasomnia with something like envy. How they can be there for each other, be close. How they couldn't understand. Not knowing how someone there actually can understand.

Book 7 spoilers mentioned:

I also have a side tangent about him being multifaceted and always blending into what he expects people want. In Book 7, Cater is the only one we see truly struggling with the internships. Like, it is painfully relatable, I feel so called out. We go around the Juniors and see them feeling confident in their plans and here Cater is with his head on a desk feeling more confused and uncertain the more people he talks to. He's spent so much time following what other people want, putting on a show, he doesn't know where to go now. Let's not even mention how this is the moment he knew was coming for the past 3 years: that inevitable goodbye. I feel like Cater could be so interesting for the conflict going on in Diasomnia, but I'm not sure if they'll use him.

Tangent closing: I really like Cater. He's really well written and I don't think he gets enough respect on that front. He gets really good dialogue lines, but he also gets so much more. To me, he's one of the best characters in the game.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, the Cangst is real people.

[sout999]

adhd talk

the third truly unsung project alongside my film and dissertation was the weird amount of targeted effort i had to put into Completing Anything Big As A Neurodivergent Person Whose Brain Is A Crazy Off The Rails Train Staffed and Patronised Entirely By Multiple Exact Copies Of The Squirrel From Ice Age

which is a description like 99/100 people reading this can relate to, but i think a sentiment i see less often and therefore feel kind of stupid and stubborn and lonesome about is "adhd is innate but is also exasperated by hectic lifestyle/modern instant gratification machines so if i fix my habits around those i can cure myself forever". which is silly and wrong but also i feel abit disconnected from adhd social media culture and cant cope just relating to it (which is all it seems to be sometimes) but learning to harness or tame it to do the things that are really important to me

i felt really cringe tbh having to look up youtube videos of HARVARD STUDENT REVEALS PRO STUDY TRICK and then narrowing it down to specifically adhd-focused study videos and keeping a planner and setting aside specific time to study studying and practising anti-academic meltdown journaling techniques and reading fucking atomic habits but i really didn't want to contribute to my abhorrent academic record following me all through undergrad. in fact i wish i had done this sooner but i was not self aware enough to consider the fact

probably the best change i made was severely cutting down or being mindful of social media time, i don't backread my tl anymore and have more moments of awareness when i find myself dumbly scrolling and realize i dont want to be doing this, and then wondering what i actually Do want to be doing. i keep a book nearby to read, and have also swapped a lot of social media time to sketching-off-pinterest time. reading about the psychology behind social media apps is also super interesting, although i always feel like a paranoid wacko conspiracy theorist talking about it. stuff like how negativity and judgemental behaviour is good for engagement (and therefore ad revenue), and how if all posts on your tl were interesting you wouldn't be as addicted to social media as you are, therefore microblogging employs a slot machine/gacha system where you "roll" for posts by logging on and hope to get a good one. it's a little full on but the more i think of it as a revolting and evil machine the more incentive i have to do something else with my time ^q^

a harder thing to do was, in the late stages of the project, the real crunch time month, avoid everything that could become a huge hyperfixation, and then eventually even minor distractions or fixations. because i know if i got super obsessed with something i'd just be up posting about it or drawing fanart. i had to bar myself from persona 3 remake and elden ring dlc and all these other shiny new releases, and the mobile games i was playing... i look forward to catching up on them now. i took up reading books a lot more because unfortunately thats just not as exciting. in the last month of film work i stopped listening to music on my computer so i wouldnt get drawing or animation ideas to distract me from film work. as of writing this i havent listened to music in like 40 days guys 😱 at the same time i am the kind of person who needs background noise to work, so i have:

watched novum's four hour hereditary video essay three times

watched novum's seven hour midsomar video essay three times

watched that one five hour bojack horseman retrospective twice

listened to audiobooks of the Britney Spears biography, Jennette McCurdy biography, three Playboy Bunny biographies (i was on some sort of lady bopgraphy kick i guess), and a few fiction books

rewatched all of bojack horseman

started on House MD and got a few seasons in before i finished the project, amazingly the perfect show to look away from bc of all the medical stuff, how many lumbar punctures do you need to show like seriously

honorable mention to the learned skill of communication and being honest and picking your battles and killing your darlings which is a larger part of managing mental illness than i cared to admit but one of the hardest ones because it involved confronting things and making big painful drastic changes and then having to tell the faculty about them. sometimes i'd be stuck on a piece of animation work for weeks/months, then go back and change the underlying idea to one i'm actually passionate about, and do the animation work in one day using newly found magical hyperfocus passion power. it's crazy! but being able to be confident about taking those steps rather than keeping on with what you're "supposed" to do went a long way.

i very much look forward to listening to a music and playing some video games properly now and being pulverized like a small victorian child from the sheer amount of fun i'm having. i'd say it was all worth it and a fun experiment in channeling the magical humours of passion and boredom and i hope it will help me with future projects too. i Am super burnt out though x__ x thanks for reading and for all your support up until now!

[ndas-sraom]

Mirage, what's in a title. Here's some thoughts. Spoilers follow.

I haven't followed AC since Revelations but the introduction of Basim and Hytham in Valhalla interested me. I watched the cutscenes on YouTube and really enjoyed the character of Basim. I was happy to see Mirage announced soon after.

First off, the characters. The whole cast is fantastic, Basim and Roshan are obviously the standouts here. Their dynamic is a pure delight. Basim being the idealistic young man and Roshan being the tempered, disciplined older woman. To see the street thief with a heart of gold come into his own and find a wider purpose is a story old as time but beautifully done here. And to see Roshan with her cold as steel exterior soften around Basim at moments was touching. She is a battle hardened warrior but took Basim under her wing as her personal charge, and I hope in her upcoming book we get to see what drew her to Basim to take him as her apprentice when she knew how troubled he was.

The story. After watching the digest version of Valhalla I feel that I had a pretty decent understanding of who Basim is going into Mirage, but it turns out I knew nothing at all. Basim is idealistic to a fault, the perfect Hidden One, believing in the right to choose your own destiny. He loves his friends. He always tries to do what he believes is right. And all of these things play into this tragic, almost cruel irony as he finds out that his destiny is not his own, that his closest friend never existed, and he was deceived into being a pawn. I've compared it to the story of Anakin Skywalker, where the young man enters a new world with great ambition and the best intentions, and it ultimately leads them to a fate worse than death.

The last hour of the game is honestly devastating. To see Basim's fall in real time was hard to witness. To watch him betray his only real friends, his creed, to follow a shadow and a false promise, playing right into the hands of his sworn enemies... you wish you could do something to stop it. The final battle with Roshan is heartbreaking, you can hear the emotional strain in both of their voices as they refuse to give way to one another. When Roshan is defeated she opens her heart and shows how much she actually cares for Basim, begging him to leave the temptation of being "more than a man" and come back to his family as an equal. When he merges with Nehal I don't think he exists anymore as the character we came to know and love. What sealed it for me was the final scene with Enkidu where Basim earns the scar on his face. He ceases to be Basim and becomes the reincarnation of an Isu, where even his trusted companion for years is hostile towards him. He expresses a couple of times in the game how he is afraid of ending up alone, and he is utterly alone in the end.

Would love to discuss the game with any fellow fans, so many swirling feelings that haven't settled even days after finishing the walk-through. That's good media.

[vivicantstudy]

hi girly!! i need your help. i’ve been learning spanish for about a year now, but i feel like i’m not retaining anything. i can say most basic sentences and somewhat hold a conversation, but i struggle with words and the endings like the present tense, past tense, and stuff like that. I was wondering if you have any methods or apps that can help me retain and understand the language a little more?

Helloooo! That’s awesome that you’ve been learning Spanish for a year! It’s totally normal to feel a bit stuck sometimes, especially with verb tenses and endings. Here are some tips that might help:

First, I recommend using simple apps for spaced repetition, like Anki. They’re easy to use and really help with retention. For verb tenses, create charts for verbs (like hablar: hablo, hablas) and practice filling them in regularly. Writing simple sentences or reading aloud can also boost your confidence.

I truly believe that the easiest and fastest way to learn is through immersion. Listen to podcasts, watch shows with Spanish subtitles, and read children’s books or news apps like El País. The more you surround yourself with the language, the better.

HelloTalk is great for chatting with native speakers, so don’t be shy about that and try talking to people more often. Also, create an account on Twitter/X and follow Spanish accounts. Engaging with others by replying to tweets can really help you practice.

To really incorporate Spanish into your life, include it in your hobbies. Change your phone and social media language settings, and try to play games or watch movies in Spanish. This way, you’ll constantly be exposed to the language in different contexts.

Try talking to yourself. You can do this in the mirror or create scenarios in your head. I love Spanish dramas, so I often pretend I’m inside a novel and start talking to myself. It’s actually a lot of fun and helps you see exactly what you don’t know, allowing you to practice the specific words and sentences you need to improve.

Honestly, what might feel the silliest, like talking to yourself, keeping a diary, creating a chatting account, or even reading or watching kids’ books, can actually help you the most. If you’re struggling with the basics, you need to start with the simple stuff. Maybe your mind is too full, making it hard to keep going, so simplifying your approach can really help.

You might also try keeping a diary in Spanish or making collages and journals. Decorate your Spanish notebook (get a real one if you don’t have it; writing helps with absorption). This creative process can make learning feel more personal and engaging.

For more structured learning, try Lingvist or Clozemaster for grammar and vocab. Conjugato is great for practicing verb conjugations, and Busuu lets you interact with native speakers. SpanishDict is also super helpful for checking conjugations and grammar rules.

Start with the present tense, then move on to past tenses like preterite (for completed actions) and imperfect (for ongoing actions). When you feel comfortable, dive into the subjunctive, which is used for wishes and doubts.

I don’t know how you’re learning or the best way for you to do it since everyone is different. But if you haven’t tried immersion yet, I highly recommend it. I also got stuck with Spanish, but after I started immersing myself, I felt like things got better.

Good luck ( ˘ ³˘) ₊˚⊹ᡣ𐭩 I’m glad that my blog has made you comfortable enough to send me a message. If you want something more specific, don’t hesitate to ask me; I might be able to help! I’m not fluent, but as someone who has faced many difficulties, I’ve had to research learning methods that might be useful. ¡Que tengas un gran día, chiquita!

[missgoldberry]

It's not about being secret, it's about the way they say they want to be private and then play games with the fandom, posting hints that tehy're together (especially A and other Luke's friends). And are you really ok with these huge age gaps? I struggle to see what they have in common with these young people

Look I don't love huge age gaps when one person is very young. Luke and Antonia have less years between them but it seems like he was looking for a young/less successful girlfriend and that's icky to me. It seems like Nic and Jake were friends and then something developed which is more understandable to me but the gap between 37 and 24 is huge at that age (34 and 47 for example wouldn't be a big deal to me at all lmao). I wish they both were in more age appropriate relationships. But at the end of the day everyone involved is an adult. I do struggle to imagine the appeal, I'm 30 rn and I wouldn't want to date someone in their early 20s at all. But I do have some friends who are younger and they're not all the same, with some I genuinely feel we have an equal friendship and some younger people I know seem so so young and immature that I would struggle to spend any time one on one. And I kind of hate bringing up supposed maturity because "being mature for your age" is what every young person thinks about themselves, and the way every person dating much younger justifies it. But there is truth to that, not every young person is the same, just as not every older person is the same. You can be in a similar place in your life in your 20s and your 30s. To give an example from my own life, when I was about 25 I became really close friends with my coworker who is 21 years older than me. Now obviously there was nothing romantic about it at all (we're both in long term relationships AND he's gay) but we hung out all the time together and it truly didn't feel like there was 20+ years between us because we were in a similar life stage at the time? We worked at the same job, making a similar amount (I made more actually because I was working there longer), we both had long term relationships but weren't married and had no kids (and no plans for it), we both wanted to buy better places to live but had no money, we liked similar books and movies and had similar interests. Now I'm absolutely not denying that he had way more life experiences than me, and we obviously weren't dating or living together so that's also a very different dynamic. And if I saw a 25 and 46 year olds dating I would be side eyeing it hard. But I'm just saying that there doesn't always have to be a huge power imbalance between ages, you can legit connect with someone much older/younger and it doesn't have to be weird. The whole "what are they talking about" debate seems silly to me because you can connect with people of different ages than you. Btw me and that guy are not friends anymore because he turned out to be a raging transphobe.

Now when it comes to playing with fandom… I don't think there's nearly as much playing as people believe lmao. The truth is that fans will dig through backgrounds of pictures, look at windows and floors to draw their conclusions and you can't avoid it. And I know the argument is always "well they know fandoms are like this so they shouldn't post these things" but like?? That's kind of ridiculous. Imagine asking your partner to not post from vacations because people might analyze palm trees, or say they're not allowed to wear your hat (or a hat identical to yours), or forbid them from following who they want on socials, or avoid touching them when in public, especially once people already know you're together. Like that's an insane ask and not a good way to live. It's one thing to not blast your relationship on social media (which I think is a good idea if you're famous) but constantly living in fear of someone figuring out you're with your partner is fucking stupid imo. I do think, at least in the case of Luke and Antonia, that they did 'play' with fandom a bit because they wanted to make sure people knew they were together. Like the polaroids for example were very very intentional. And tbh it kind of makes sense, I'm sure it's very difficult to date an actor who has to go on a world tour for months when you just recently started dating, and he's being loved up with his costar, and everyone wants them to be together. It would be hard for many people, especially for a 23 year old who's probably in her first serious relationship. So yes I think they made some obvious moves on social media 🤷‍♀️ But that's not a crime and it doesn't contradict that they want their relationship to remain private. They just want it to be known that there is a serious relationship here. And Nicola and Jake I think are just living their life, not trying to hint at anything but also not hiding.

[disgracefulthings]

Hello..If you don't mind me asking, can I ask, what are your top 7 (or top 10) favorite media (can be books/ manga/ anime/movies/tv series/etc) and your top 10 favorite (fictional) characters from any media? Why do you love them all? Sorry if you've answered this questions before......

Thanks for asking! Be warned, long post

For media in no particular order:

Code Geass - Great male lead and phenomenal ending. Has that anime trope of too many love interests with little personality, but still has some really good female characters (Nunnally and Euphemia are amazing). The Lelouch and Suzaku relationship is just how I like it - filled with many complicated feelings

Scum Villain Self Saving System - As someone who loves fanfiction, I think Scum Villain is a must read. MXTX really shows her understanding of fandoms in the story. Shen Yuan is an amazing main character, his chaotic thoughts and his lack of understanding of everything makes him really funny, and I love learning more about the characters around him as they become more real to him

Puss in Boots: The Last Wish - Just a really great movie. Great characters and villains, you don't need me to tell you why it's amazing

Infinity Train - Gone too soon. Therapy train that forces you to get better or it kills you, a great idea for a kids TV show! It honestly was a really good show that showed people going through realistic issues, and have them try to be better, though the protagonists are never perfect and can and will fail. I will never forgive HBO for cancelling it

Gravity Falls - Being in the Gravity Falls fandom while this show was coming out was really fun. I loved all the theories and seeing which ones came true. Great characters and villains, and I can't wait to see what Alex Hirsch comes out with next

Hannibal (TV Series) - A great rom-com with some delicious looking food. Also Will has 7 dogs, 10/10 show

The Mandalorian (First 2 Seasons) - Got me into Star Wars. Tired gun dad and little gremlin baby carry the show, and I love watching Mando slowly learn Star Wars lore

Iron Man - Favorite Marvel movie. It does so many things right, I don't care if the main villain makes their own iron Man suite and fights Tony using his own power, that wasn't an annoying Marvel trope yet, and Iron Man does that trope the best. Stane actually has a personal relationship with the main character so we can feel Tony's betrayal when he learns what Stane has done. Also it has Phil Coulson, so 10/10

My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! - This show is just hilarious, I don't care if Catarina ends up with any of her love interests, I just love all of the characters (except Keith, I'm not a fan of 'I can't believe it's not incest' type ships)

Epithet Erased - Criminally underrated. The story takes place in a world where some people have specific words attached to their souls called epithets that give them power. The series has many amazing characters, but mostly follows Molly, a little girl whose epithet is 'dumb'. She is forced to grow up after losing her mother, and is made to do things 10 year olds shouldn't know how to do, like taxes. It's an amazing series that can be very heartwarming and funny, but also very tragic. Please watch!!!

And now my favorite characters, this time in order:

1. Shang Qinghua, Scum Villain Self Saving System - I love this pathetic hamster man. You can see parts of himself in the characters he wrote, and while his backstory isn't as tragic as most of the other characters, it is still very relatable and sad. He has really great chemistry with many of the characters, so he can be fun to write. He is my best friend and I would kill for him

2. Loki, Marvel - I'm a young adult woman on Tumblr, of course I love Loki. His characterization has kinda gone out the window since Thor Ragnarok, but he's still very charming and funny

3. Sesshomaru, Inuyasha (and only Inuyasha. Final Act made some questionable choices for the character, and I refuse to acknowledge Yasahime's existence, may it burn in hell) - I love the trope of redeeming a character by giving them a child. Sesshomaru's character growth throughout the story was fun to watch, and I love the fact that even though he has 1 arm, he doesn't hesitate to punch his brother in the face. The show ends without resolving anything, but at least it doesn't ruin the relationship he had with his father, gives his arm back in a stupid way, and changes his relationship with Rin in a creepy way. Nope, none of that happened

4. Yakushi Kabuto, Naruto - I loved this nerd since he was introduced, and the fact that he was given a tragic backstory near the end of Naruto just made me love him even more. He's a healer that uses his abilities to harm others, and I love that for him

5. Pythor P. Chumsworth, Ninjago - Best villain in the show. It doesn't always handle his character well, but his motivation for revenge is very tragic and I wished the show acknowledged it. His release with Lloyd was fun in ep. 4, and I wished they had a reconciliation. Still, he was fun throughout the show

6. Natural Harmonia Gropius, Pokemon - I love the idea of a character that can understand Pokemon, and he has a compelling arc in the games and anime. I love villains who do the wrong things for the right reasons, and also have good relationships with the people he's apposing

7. Mitth'raw'nuruodo, Star Wars (specifically when he's written by Timothy Zahn) - He's too smart for his own good and can be a little shit, but he also holds importance to the life around him, even though he's on the Empire's side. I love my morally grey characters

8. Discord, My Little Pony - I watched the entire show just because I liked one character, and it was worth it. I love my chaotic gods

9. Kumoko, So I'm a Spider, So What? - I love shows where we watch a protagonist get new abilities. Kumoko is very silly and chaotic, and while she seems nice, she wouldn't hesitate to commit atrocities

10. Lan Qiren, The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation - I just think he's funny

[spacexfucker]

I wish I'd had the wherewithal at the time to properly document in real-time the influx of new people into Fandom spaces online during the start of the pandemic.

There's a very interesting set of people who, because they were spending so much time indoors, decided to navigate online spaces for more content of their favorite media. And, in doing so, dipped their toes in the first few inches of Fandom space.

I've seen most of these types of people on tiktok where it's fairly easy to access introductory Fandom content like fan edits and what are essentially AMVs. Because of the nature of those searches, most of the results at first are very surface-level. Nothing too crazy, just screen grabs, scene breakdowns, thirst traps, etc.

But, as is the nature of getting into a tag on tiktok, eventually the algorithm starts pushing you deeper content the more you interact with a tag. And suddenly, you're getting in-depth breakdowns, shipping content, and then, slowly, content that starts slipping away from strict canon.

So these people, who likely didn't necessarily anticipate the depth of Fandom or understand its quirks and layers, are thrown off. You see "discourse" at this level by people who have never been in Fandom before getting really pissy about things like crack ships, aus, or anything that isn't very strictly canon/explicitly said. Purists who don't want to be associated with the other people who have been in Fandom spaces for longer.

Now, this happens all the time even before the pandemic but because of both the pandemic and the popularization of titkok, this particular fan is a much larger part of Fandom. There's a lot of them and new ones every day and none of them know how Fandom works, what the like general rules and etiquette are, and a good chunk are very resistant to critiques on how they interact with fandom spaces.

The biggest culprit are people who, through tiktok, have literally been influenced to find fanfic. But not based on what they actually would like to read, but what they hear that everyone else has read or is reading again. Unfortunately, the fic that has had the most traction and spread on tiktok is Manacled, a Harry Potter fic. Anyone familiar with ao3 can look this up if you don't already know about it. And if you'd read the tags, I'm sure you could piece together why exactly a fresh new Fandom recruit or even just a regular person who happened to enjoy HP years ago would come across something that is being passed around as good and enjoyable and a way to relieve their favorite series may have terrible consequences.

Then there was this frankly huge influx of people who had never read fic before and had no idea how to parse the system of tags on ao3 reading a book about their favorite characters in a very dark, riddled with triggers, extreme AU. A lot of these people were basically following a trend. And most of the videos I saw talk about Manacled did not really do it justice in terms of preparing their audience for exactly what this fic had in it, nor how to properly interact with the Fandom space and ao3.

People were reading Manacled but not paying attention to tags and then making videos basically slandering the author for the story, hate reading it to talk shit and make hate content. But, on the flip side, there are people who loved it and wanted physical copies.

Unfortunately, this is where a singular tiktok comes into play in which a friend videoed gifting her friend a bound copy she'd made herself of Manacled. And like on tumblr, when certain posts get a threshold of interactions, it breaks containment. This caused another small influx of people who had never been introduced to Fandom, let alone fic, to flock to ao3.

At this point, we start getting into you-all-are-going-to-get-sued territory.

A large number of people read Manacled and other, mostly very popular dramoine, fanfiction. An undetermined amount of those people then, after seeing the video of the binding, began searching for ways to purchase a physically bound copy for themselves. For whatever reason, most were not willing to do this themselves, and so this is where the etsy listings came in.

There was a small boom of etsy listings for bound copies of mostly Mancled. In fact, you can still find these up. This, obviously, is both very illegal and very fucking insulting. This is a very big legal issue. In response, at least at the time, several of the bigger, popular fics took down their work from ao3. Which unfortunately didn't do much because in response, people who had downloaded the first prior were sharing those downloads with heartbroken fans.

You'd think that after being told that selling fic is illegal that people would stop. But they don't. If you take a look at one of the etsy listings, some of these are being sold for over 100 dollars. There's been a small push by parts of Fandom that have been around for a while to go to etsy occasionally and mass report these listings, but it's not really stopped anyone yet.

Fic authors have made a ton of requests either on tiktok or through ao3 for people to not do this. But, because most of these people don't know Fandom etiquette or even care about actual law or respecting authors, these requests have been mostly ignored.

Over the years as an author and someone who has also just read a lot of fic, there is a ratio involved in fic metrics. Generally, you can usually expect about 10% of the hits value for kudos and anything from 1% to 5% of the hits value for comments.

Due to the influx of people with no understanding of fic Fandom etiquette, if you look at the metrics for Mancled, it has over 8,300,000 hits. But its kudos and comments do not reflect the usual ratio.

There is even a strange crossover with goodreads where you can literally find reviews for Manacled. Which is honestly probably one of the most interesting things Ive seen. There are actually several dramione fics you can review on goodreads.

I'm still trying to process how some people's first introduction to fic was Manacled. I'm not saying the story isn't good or isn't well written. But, you have to admit it's a very strong first foray into fanfiction.

All of this to say, when you run into someone starting fights in Fandom space about canon or shipping, I'd say there's a good chance that you're interacting with someone fresh into the space who's entire online experience has likely just been Facebook and fan edits on tiktok. Metaphorically, a group of people who only have ever used salt and pepper on tv dinners arguing about your wine pairings, seasonings, and why you deviated from Marie Callender's fettuccine Alfredo recipe.

As a disclaimer, not all new additions to Fandom are bad. It's great to grow. It is interesting to see how a lot of antis come into the space, though.

[crystalelemental]

Crystal Reads PokeSpe - RBY Arc

I have now spent money on this, even if it was for my wife's sake, so it was inevitable that I'd pick this up. I am starting to read the Pokemon manga. As of today, I have finished the RBY arc. This is the only arc I know I read once before, via fan translation, ages ago. I did not care for it at the time. But, it's a different time, and maybe I'll be more into it now. Who knows.

The Red and Blue segment (ie, the first three books), are kinda...whatever. I admit, I still don't like Red, even after he starts talking. This iteration of Red is more clear, but I also feel like he's less interesting. He's as standard shonen protagonist as you can get. Blue doesn't get a whole lot either, given that he's barely around as the rival figure. Green is more fun, because I vibe with her general personality type, but that's about as much as I can say. She doesn't get that much going for her, in truth.

I think the biggest aspect that throws off the first three manga is the general pacing. They absolutely blitz through the locations in the game, taking very little time to actually do much of anything. There are a few chapters that are just showing off a Pokemon, similar in style to the filler episodes of the anime. But more than that, things go so quickly it feels hard to keep up with sometimes. I couldn't remember who had what Pokemon most of the time. I still don't think I could tell you Red's actual team. It's not until the champion match between Red and Blue that things start to slow down a bit and you can more easily follow the action.

Fortunately, by the time the Yellow arc begins, they've realized this. The rest of the fights are actually pretty well paced, and I found the Elite Four a much more salient threat than anything Team Rocket does. Especially because it...well, it's novel. Team Rocket in the manga, despite being a bit more brutal and having Gym Leaders under their command, are kinda the same as they've ever been. Giovanni gets to be a little interesting as someone who's more directly interacted with Red, and their experiments are more complex, but their motivations and actions aren't really that different. The Elite Four's actions are significantly more interesting, mostly because it's such a new approach compared to other media formats.

I also wound up liking Yellow a lot more than the others? Like okay, Green is still the favorite because personality type vibes more, but Yellow's really interesting as someone who's pure pacifism and aims to win without hurting her opponent. They don't play with it quite as much as I wish they did, but it's an interesting approach and I like her a lot.

By other characters, I really like what they did with Erika and Blaine. They're definitely the most interesting Gym Leaders. Erika being a sort of leader figure for the justice side, while Blaine's connection to Mewtwo is really neat. I kinda love that Agatha is just kinda Like That about how Oak left under what should have been otherwise amicable circumstances, she's just that bitter. And I like that Lorelei's like this because of her literally watching her Seel friends die due to human pollution. It's got a lot of impact.

The rest of the gym leaders are kinda whatever. They don't really exude much to me. Same with Bruno and Lance, I don't really think they're all that interesting. If anything, I'm a little salty about Lance being from Viridian Forest apparently, but that's likely due to the manga setting that up before GSC released to establish Blackthorn.

As for general stuff...okay, I'm trying to calm down about "Everything should operate on the game logic," and let myself be taken by creativity in the anime and now manga when they operate on physics rather than strict move definition and numbers. Like, it's actually kinda cool for Giovanni to show off his threat level as the top Gym Leader by trying to throw Red into a pit he made in the ground, and breaking the release mechanisms on his Pokeballs to prevent switching them in. The idea of breaking the ball or incapacitating the trainer makes it more dynamic, and kinda gives more reason to the usual "I must train myself as well as my Pokemon" approach so common in Fighting specialists.

Now, this has all been relatively comparative. How it appears in contrast to the games, and I guess the anime a little bit. But on its own merits...how is it?

Again, I think the first three volumes are a bit too chaotic and hard to follow. They offer a bit of a story arc, but it doesn't have that much going on, so I don't respect it. The Yellow arc is...hmm.

I assume this is very much "product of its time," but the pollution angle for the Elite Four's motivation of eliminating humans feels kinda stock-standard. It's relatively harmless, but it feels like a background note that has very little impact on anything? We get a couple very brief glimpses at "Oh, these Mankey are rampaging because there's little food," and Lorelei's backstory involving a dying Seel population, but it all feels very distant. There's nothing that actually connects to our heroes, because as Blue expresses, Pallet Town is the only "pure" place left. None of them really feel the effects on the larger world.

What's kind of a bother is that neither do their Pokemon. Not one seems to be impacted by this alleged super-serious pollution issue across the region. The only one with an emotional connection to the evil of the world is Red's Eevee, who can shift between its evolutions almost at will due to Team Rocket's experiments, but nothing that connects to this deeper aspect. So when Lance and Co start going on about all humans being a problem, and all humanity being a problem, and everywhere being so corrupted...well, it falls a little flat.

I can't even use the "kid's media" excuse here, because again, part of the "more serious" tone is stuff like Arbok getting cut in half, and people kinda dying. Which...was missing here. I mentioned reading this before? Some scenes I remember aren't in the official translation. I assume it's the old 90's style American Censorship stuff, removing Lance blowing up a boat and actually killing people, and Green getting attacked across the chest to reveal she was hiding Pokeballs there, so like. I guess they were trying to align this more to kids, expecting them to pick this up after the games.

On the whole, I think the manga turned out alright. I will say I had a decent time. I am looking forward to where it goes from here, because my wife absolutely gushes about the Hoenn books. But up next is my beloved Johto, where I'm expecting to have a great time.

[wonderfuldeath]

Special Day - Taehyung

Disclaimer : The author doesn't think Taehyung is actually 'retarded' it's simply for the sake of the text ! Please do not interact if your only wish if to belittle or insult the artist (Kim Taehyung) or the author !

The snow, powdery, had a strange taste. It gave you a headache when you ate it and upset your stomach. Taehyung was almost thirty years old, yet he was a little… different. It wasn’t a mental illness or anything like that. He was just like that—different.

It wasn’t a problem for him; he didn’t really care what people said or thought. That’s how it was, and there was nothing he could do about it. It suited him. Others didn’t bother him, so he didn’t have to talk to them. It was a sort of give-and-take situation.

The young man had a well-ordered life: an apartment exactly 156 adult-sized steps away, or three child-sized steps—but not tiny preschooler steps, more like those of elementary school kids, though not quite middle school. Taehyung was a photographer. He had hired his one and only friend, Park Jimin, as a receptionist.

Taehyung liked Jimin. He was kind, cheerful, and even if he often acted like a slightly spoiled child, he was fun. They had met in middle school and had never parted since. Middle school had been one of those times when Taehyung wished he could be a little mouse, disappearing into a hole until he became an adult. It was crazy how mean people could be. Maybe that’s why Taehyung didn’t like people.

“— Still daydreaming? — I wish I could be on the moon instead. But it’s so far away… and probably freezing. — True. And you’re definitely not dressed for a lunar expedition. — That’s fair.”

Taehyung looked over his best friend’s shoulder. Jimin wasn’t very tall, just like his boyfriend. He hadn’t seen him often, but he knew Min Yoongi was a good person, even if his cold gaze and the smell of tobacco intimidated him. Jimin was dating an artist, a self-taught rapper and composer who had built his career on social media. For an entire year, Taehyung had been depressed at the thought of running his business alone, without Jimin. He probably would have shut the place down.

On the counter in front of Jimin sat the appointment book. Taehyung’s heart pounded in his temples as he followed each line, one by one, looking for a single name. Jimin chuckled softly and kindly pointed out the jackpot of the day.

“— Mr. Jeon booked an appointment, yes, like every Saturday, Tae. — Good. I like Mr. Jeon, you know? — I know, Tae.”

Jimin looked at him, his shoulders relaxing as Taehyung went back behind the heavy black curtain. He didn’t know why, but Yoongi had brought one of his friends during a shoot for his new album, which he had co-written with Jeon Jungkook. Since then, Jungkook had been coming to the shop every Saturday to get his photo taken—and nothing more.

“— It’s my birthday today. — Oh, really? Well, happy birthday, then. Here, for the big day. A birthday should be celebrated! — I agree. Thank you so much!”

Taehyung watched the old man drop a tip into the large pig-shaped jar. Jimin hated that hideous thing, but Taehyung found it adorable. So they used it for tips or anonymous donations. It helped the shop, and people seemed to give willingly.

The young man fidgeted. Taehyung paced, removing props and setting up new ones, only to take them down again. The time when Jungkook would walk through the door was approaching, and it felt like fireworks in his chest. Jimin knew Taehyung was head over heels for Jungkook, but he would never admit it. After all, he probably didn’t even understand what that kind of thing was. It was scary, anxiety-inducing, especially when you were peculiar like him—a little on the margins, a little on the side.

“— Hello. — Hello, Mr. Jeon. What will it be today? — I was thinking of a simple shoot. New Year’s is coming up. Can I get a form for the ad? — Of course.”

Jimin grabbed the big, glittery blue binder behind him, watching Jungkook’s doe eyes scan the room for the photographer. A mischievous smile appeared on his lips as he handed over the stapled sheets.

“— He’s in the back. Fill out the paperwork, and you can go see him. — I… Okay, thanks.”

Once the forms were done, Jungkook passed through the heavy black curtains into the photography studio. He was the last client of the day. Taehyung would probably have to work overtime, but he didn’t mind. Anything to keep Jungkook coming back.

He was blushing—or at least he thought he was. His hands were clammy, his gaze avoided Jungkook’s. He looked down at his feet a lot and stammered. Taehyung was a mess, unable to think about anything but the man in front of him.

“— You know, it’s my birthday today.”

It slipped out without him knowing why. At the end of the session, Jungkook turned pale. Maybe he didn’t like birthdays, or maybe he just didn’t care.

“— Oh, I didn’t know. I would’ve brought a gift. — Oh no! Gifts are silly. You never know what’s inside or how to say thank you. I don’t like gifts. — I don’t like them much either. But I think this one is perfect for the occasion.”

Jungkook leaned in and kissed Taehyung. It was warm, sweet, with a hint of raspberry and strawberry. It made his stomach flip and his eyes widen, but he didn’t move.

That day, Jungkook left feeling lighter, while Taehyung stood there watching him face the storm outside, his eyes lighting up only when Jimin closed the door behind them.

“— Oh no! I forgot to ask him to stay for cake!”

[askew-d]

Do you mind if I ask your top 10 favorite characters (can be male or female) from all of the media that you loved (can be anime/manga, books, movies or tv series)? And why do you love them? Sorry if you've answered this question before.....Thanks...

hello, there! thank you for following me, by the way. this ask’s a sweet surprise! i don’t mind at all, i’ve never answered this before :) i’ll make a list of all the characters i cherish. it’s not ranked over who i cherish more though (they’re all special for me). they’re all random nonetheless, but let’s see if you can catch a little bit of a ‘type’ here, haha.

1. kageyama tobio, from haikyuu!! — i first found him to be a very bothersome character in terms of background and personality. perhaps a little bit aggressive, unnecessarily so. however, i can see how much he’s changed after finding a team like karasuno and hinata especially, and over time we go unraveling his attitude to find an actually sweet person who probably only thinks about milk, cats, leaving his nails neat and other stupid things. he’s one of those tsundere characters and that’s nice. he’s overall a nice person who’s judged unfairly. and his awkwardness turns out to be adorable, so that’s a plus.

2. minato, from the film kaibutsu — this japanese show absolutely wrecked me. it seriously did. how the hell could they expect me to move on after it? i have no words for how much this story impacted me. this main character brings such a tender feeling of youth and fragile love towards another person that sweeps me off my feet. he’s got a repressed heart that slowly comes free and it made me feel very protective over him.

3. violet, from the anime violet evergarden — heartfelt letters aside, this anime felt to me like a coming of age show. or perhaps more like a coming of ‘human’. i love her because she’s truly intrigued about the world, the people, feelings as a whole and what it means to be a breathing creature. she’s just a child. she wants to see everything. to understand her heart. she’s a force of nature that beholds so much and doesn’t even know how to put into proper words, even if that’s her job.

4. lu guang, from shiguang daili ren —i just watched link click recently, but this boy surely made a way into my heart. i love how he’s ready to fight the world on behalf of cheng xiaoshi, and although he’s a hypocrite through and through, he’s real. he’s one of the realest people i’ve seen being portrayed. because who in heavens would choose someone unimportant to tou if you can choose someone you love? and how he hides his emotions? chef’s kiss. i love that he’s an ‘actions speak louder than words’ kind of guy; he’d call you an idiot in one moment, then burn the world for you in the following one.

5. the little prince, from the book the little prince — i cannot forget this book not even in a million years. changed me as a person. this vulnerable, free character makes me think he’s not just a hallucination from the author, he’s a magical shiny little person who’s discovering about life. i love him because he’d never change, you can’t change him, because he’ll always be a child at heart and mind. he’s everyone. he’s you, he’s me, he’s who we were. and that breaks me apart. he makes me cry, this one. he makes me remember that i’m a child too, regardless of how many time passes.

6. léon doré, from the film it’s not me, i swear! — i was a fifteen-year old watching this after having reconnected with my mother and that’s why it marvelled me. it’s a lot of what i’ve been through, of what i’ve been. i love him because i relate to him, and i wish i could’ve had that courage. i won’t spoil the story, but i really recommend it! my favorite film of all time. it has trigger warning for child abandonment, suicide attempts and child abuse though.

7. wei wuxian, from mo dao zu shi — oh, boy, i can’t relate to this one at all. i think he’s the only one from this list that doesn’t fall into the ‘introvert with hidden feelings and traumatised past’ type, not entirely. he only falls into the traumatised past. i think he’s the only extrovert character — besides hinata shouyou — that i actually like. i’m an introvert at heart, so at first he annoyed me too, lan wangji, i get you. but his strength? how he looks into the world that broke him and says ‘i’ll keep trying, i’ll keep smiling’? how he loves to the point of sacrifying himself? how he’s not attuned to his feelings because he’s more worried about being excited over little things? how he’s just overall so rebellious, but intelligent, sincere, witty, and does this all for the good, regardless if he’s being misjudged? how he’s been through hell but chooses to find reasons to keep going instead of looking back? oh, how i love him.

8. todoroki shouto, from my hero academia — i don’t enjoy boku no hero anymore, it has lost the entertaining bits for me. but i do expect the best for this boy right here, i love him for his cool nature, how he walks into life trying to let go of his resentment (after he befriends midoriya), and how he cares for his friends more than words can be let out to express. i wish the anime had grew to be better so i could watch more of him, but the feeling’s gone for me now. nevertheless, i still cherish him.

9. gin, from hotarubi no mori e — he’s a mystery, that’s for sure. he deserved so much more. he deserved life, he deserved a chance to live. i love the tenderness in him, and the sheer tenderness he showed our main character even if he didn’t even managed to be a real, normal boy! how can beings find the love in themselves and be so painfully alive even if they’re not in fact in the human spectrum? i love that he taught us this concept of love. i love this type of trope. i love and hate it at the same time.

10. dr. house, from house m.d — i had a hard time wondering if i should indeed add him here. because he’s an asshole. why do i like him? i don’t know. i see this flawed, asshole man and i see the pain in him and though it doesn’t justify anything at all, it’s what humans are all about. he judges everyone. he shames everyone. he shows people’s true intentions. he hides his true intentions. he’s repressed and lonely and he’s doomed. but he’s got this relationship with wilson, and women, and monster trucks games, and he lives. and he’s an awful man, but aren’t we all at core? i love to hate him.

bonus: nozomi fujisaki, from cherry magic, and nano, from girl from nowhere. they’re wonderful. they’re everything. love fujisaki’s view in life (it matches mine) and nano’s brilliance ✨

haha, well, this got longer than i thought, but wow, i enjoyed this a lot. thank you for asking me this, really! big hugs!!