#and everyone else is so happy and on vacation 👍

[dreamy7777]

how to tell my parents that having a job is making me wanna kill myself without them coming at me like but you have to start working out etc. how to tell them part of the reason is bc i have no energy to spend time with them and it breaks my heart. i want to die so bad, i don’t know what to do

[sugar-omi]

Hi Naeomi 👋

Thank you for replying to my inquiry so diligently (omg, me trying to sound like Baxter XD dead)!

For my Baxter request, I want to understand his character more, so I wanna pick ur brain for some ideas 😄

He is a very considerate person as his approach to the MC's comfort level changes between nervous, relaxed, and direct (i think 🤔😅). I just want to know how he reacts with an MC (on crush/love) who is only anxious around him but relaxed with everyone else. MC would be trying to fluster the crap out of Cove and talking excitedly about nerdy stuff (anime/manga, video games, books, random facts on their interests, a tv series, etc.), but when Baxter comes around they simmer down and smile all giddy his way and talk about stuff they he may like or be interested in.

Honestly, my MC would feel a bit unsure how to act around Baxter at first, but eventually, they become more comfortable over time as he is revealed to be easygoing and welcoming to MC's quirky side. Makes my heart flutter just thinking about it, so cute~ 🥰☺️

hii !!! omg your mc sounds so cute n honestly like me when I was younger lol, so sweet<33 excuse to the format I'm on mobile rn and I'll fix text color n format n stuff once I'm on my computer😎👍👍👍👍honestly i had fun writing this, two darlings taking their time to open up n love each other, embracing each others quirks... its so sweet, pls i feel like i could write another lil drabble abt how happy n cute baxter would be w a playful reader like this, mmm many thoughts

tags : fluff, nervous crush/love status w baxter, multiple choice text, headcanons/drabbles

*edited for format

this man is too cocky for his own good, baxter can easily tell how someone feels about him.

but I think that excludes people he has a crush on, as you couldn't possibly like/love him back.

he has some shame! although it's only enough to not assume everyone is in love with him or likes him in any capacity...

anyway, we'll get to that later~

at first he thinks it's because you want to impress him or maybe you don't want to bore him with what you think is brain rot to someone so mature and elegant as him.

(+ a "small" but darker part of him thinks you might hate him, that you don't want to show a piece of yourself to this weird stranger on your block. he squishes the thought)

so he finds out your interest through terri/terry and by spying on snippets of your conversations with your family or with cove.

and even though he will only admit it if you threaten him with something terrifying, like angry dragons, early mornings, or worse- color. then and only then will he admit he wants you to tease him the same way you do with cove.

you're so close with him, snuggling up to cove's side, and you smirk so tantalizingly as you lean i. close to whisper it in his ear, and you say something dirty or perhaps its something cove finds especially scandalous but now cove is blushing and he's pushing you away with a chastising "y/n!"

and baxter wishes it was him...

he wants you to curl up behind him and blow on his ear the way you do cove. he wants you to pinch his butt as he walks by and he wants you to flirt with him.

and he wants you to show up on his temporary doorstep to show him your favorite volume of a manga that you finally got your hands on.

and when baxter is a hopeless romantic because he's so vulnerable under the blanket of night, he imagines you laying next to him in this big bed and he imagines the music is blending in with your voice as you babble on about something before it drifts off into your soft breath when you fall asleep due to the late hour.

but time goes on and his vacation nears the quarter mark and whenever you two talk he notices that you are getting into some of the things he likes, like rock music, and when you see him walking lazily back to his condo you come rushing off the steps of your porch, abandoning your snickering moms, and showing baxter the new song you found that he had not listened to before.

you light up at the praise in a way that makes him wish he could capture it forever...

finally baxter comes to the conclusion that he should speak to you about the things you like, and the first time he mentions something about your hobby you clam up a bit.

you don't want to bore him or scare him off with your excitement but in the end you're showing him your craft/collection and telling him every shiny detail and he's so happy to watch the light in your eyes as you speak.

eventually though you two get to the point where you try to fluster him.

it's not often, baxter makes you far too nervous and he can see anything coming from a mile away. he's so cool and you love him for it but God is his smirking face irritating when you just want him to blush, giggle and kick his feet like a love sicken school girl.

but you finally get him to flush. it takes more than half his vacation for it to happen but you're standing behind him as he works away at plating the dinner you two cooked up together.

it's simple, both of you combined have the cooking skills of a sea turtle but it's good enough for one night and it's edible.

it's good enough, you know your way around a stove well enough not to burn the house down and with baxter as your assistant you're more focused on how fun it was than anything.

it's perfect, you know how to whip up something delicious and baxter did more chopping and passing of the seasonings than anything.

he doesn't process it at first but then it hits him like a ton of bricks.

you just... said something flirty?

he's short circuting and his ears are red, and baxter pretends that his blush isn't spread down to his neck.

it's such a reward for you, you can't help but gape for a moment because baxter alexander ward is walking away from you with a blush from his ears to below the collar of his shirt and he definitely squealed a bit when he beckoned you to the living room.

it takes a whole summer of talking to you about things you like that he has little or no knowledge in, doing an activity that caters to/is apart of your interest, and soothing you when you cut yourself off when talking (it's okay, he does want to hear whatever you're looking to ramble about, be it something exciting, something that happened when practicing your hobby, or venting about something you thought was terrible or sad in a show/comic you saw earlier that week.)

and he finally gets to a point where you're teasing him a bit more often, even if you don't get the flustered reaction you want, and you're taking a page out of cove's book and the two of you spent a secret night in baxter's condo, talking about everything and nothing all at the same time.

but then he leaves, and he let's you down gently but his rejection stabs like a knife anyway.

so when you meet again, half a decade later, baxter feels his heart fall out his stomach so bad he sucks it in to try and make up for the way his heart clocks out and air leaves his lungs...

you look sad. this wasn't what you either of you were expecting to be faced with and having no time to prepare yourself to face the man who ended your relationship that summer has your eyes glassed over and your fingers dig into your skin to ground yourself.

you look indifferent. somehow that hurts more than if you were sad or angry at him, not that he'd prefer it but the smaller part of him thinks that your empty gaze shows he's lost any part in your life and you stare through him like you can see the rawness of his heart...

your face is schooled into a stony expression and you've folded your arms to match the rest of tour cold posture. he can't tell what you're thinking even though he's searching your eyes and this time baxter can't tell if you want to cry, scream at him, or if you're looking past him to the scenic view. but he sees your fingers twitch, like you want to either grab him by his tie or run.

you look angry. you try to mask it, not wanting to display the unadulterated rage you feel but your lip quirks up and your eyes are sharp and the words that escape your lips lick at baxter's ears like fire. if your thunderous glare could kill a man he'd be a goner..

he knows he's fucked up either way.

and the whole time you're working together, you're distant. although sometimes you snap back, you confront him and you joke with him sometimes.

you're both too nostalgic, you're both too in love.

somehow, you let him start over.

perhaps its the nostalgia and sentiment that came from making the groom cake together, or how beautiful scott and jude's wedding went, or perhaps its the way the other person laughs and smiles that has you drunk.

but now you two are sitting on baxter's couch and you're letting him start over.

he messed up, it's something hard to move past. something you did, for better or for worse but now it's for the better and you're moving on together.

and you're almost as nervous as you were when you first met but this time it's more that you're reserved than anything else.

sometimes he thinks he's fucked up too much, that when you cut yourself short while rambling and when you take more interest in his hobbies than your own, baxter puts a stop to it quickly.

it takes while. you both try too much to insert yourself into the other person's likes, as if that will make the comfortable relationship you had once come back quicker.

but finally, you and baxter are sharing a bed in the middle of your new apartment, and you're laughing about something funny Miranda sent you earlier that day and in the morning you two are spinning around your new kitchen in a guideless dance with your hands intertwined and you're laughing...

and baxter loves both versions of you.

the version of you that's so in love with him you quiet down, letting him take up all the space in the world and the other version of you that rants about something stupid in an anime and pinches his pale thigh when he's searching through his messy pile of clothes for that one specific shirt.

and he's so happy you opened up to him and you still open up to him everyday, loving him the same no matter how shy you are that day <333

[beecreeper]

For the Tav ask game: 4, 12, and 91 😊

~ @bardic-perdita 💜

Answering for my durges as well because why not!

Long answers under the cut

4. Is there a reason why your Tav starts out as Level 1?

Briar and Ferox both got a hard reset from Orin's attack and getting dissected by Kressa.

Molli just genuinely is level one. She never got the chance to be a proper bard before she got confined, having only basic bard skills. Gortash only let her play an instrument as a very occasionally metered out reward, so she wasn't able to develop past where she was before. Though, she often sang or hummed to herself and practiced the fingerings for notes in the air to pass time/dissociate, so that was enough to keep her skills *at* level one. Her warlock powers she got while on the nautiloid so those are brand new.

12. How does your Tav feel about Us? Did they free them, maim them or leave them behind?

Briar crushed Us immediately lol very much a tone setter for her run.

Molli's state of mind upon waking up was very much "there is so much happening right now that I am just. Not going to process any of it on a conscious level right now." Making her way around the ship in a confused haze and so disconnected from reality that she hardly registered just how terrifying everything was until after the fact. All this to say that, yes she helped Us out. She was honestly just grateful to have any direction at all. "Help us" and "Go to the helm" are much more concrete and digestible ideas than... everything else. When she meets Us again at Moonrise she gets attached to it immediately because it's *like them* 🥺

Ferox also freed Us, more out of idle curiosity than anything. Kinda compromised with his urge which really really wanted him to mutilate that corpse. Like, his urge was telling him to stick his hands in there and the front of his mind kinda backdoor justified that as "I guess I want to help take this brain thing out. Why else would I want to stick my hands in a corpse? That's the only logical reason here good job Ferox 👍" Once Us was out and started talking, he a) was kinda weirded out ngl and b) decided to follow it anyway because it was his best lead on what was going on. I haven't gotten him to Moonrise yet so I'm not 100% sure what his reaction will be to meeting it again.

91. Does you Tav get a happily ever after?

I really love to write both good and bad endings for my characters (thank you Arcana fandom for burning the concept of upright and reversed endings into me). So, yes!

Molli is the one with the clearest happy ending. In her good timeline, she defeats the brain and goes to Avernus with Karlach, where I INSIST that they find a way to fix her heart. They also have to chop off her warlock arm to break her pact but don't worry about that. 😊 Anyway, after that, they come back to Baldur's Gate, get rich selling all the rare hell stuff they've accumulated, get married and retire together. They buy a tavern, but they don't, like, run it. They hire someone else to actually do the managing part and they just hang out with patrons whenever they aren't off having eccentric retired lesbian vacations. They name their tavern "The Mockingbird and Goat."

Ferox will ALSO be getting a good ending but it's not as solidly planned in my head. The part I know for sure for sure is that he rejects Bhaal and then takes up a new Oath of Devoation and dedicates himself to actually being the paladin he's always wanted to be. Probably gonna join Lae'zel in her war against Vlaakith but there's a chance I could be swayed to something different when I actually play through it.

And then Briar's endings are... well okay they're both bad. On one hand she gets everything she wants and takes over the world in Bhaal's name, which *she* likes but is pretty bad for everyone else (and also it ultimately makes her feel hollow in the end but she doesn't know why and she would never admit it even to herself). On the other hand, she gets talked into rejecting Bhaal (thanks Sunflower!) but just feels so so so *empty* afterwards. She feels *nothing*. She has *NOTHING*. She just peaces out to be a weird reclusive mushroom hermit and never talk to anyone ever again. She also resurrects Gortash's body as a mushroom zombie and takes it with her, though she doesn't really know why. It just FEELS right.

[astraykidz]

aww i'm sorry the past few days haven't been too great but also!! so happy that you got to do something that cheered you up💖 (also i totally get what you mean😩 i hope san's signed album can power you through this year) i hope the upcoming days treat you kinder! i've been okay~ currently on vacation so any break from work is good😭👍i'm curious to know what kpop groups you're into? and who your biases are🧚‍♀️-🎄

Oh i hope you're having a nice vacation!

stray kids is definitely my ultimate fav group, and chan is definitely my ult bias lol my second favorite group is ateez, and for them my main 2 biases are hongjoong and wooyoung, but san and mingi are definitely major bias wreckers. third is txt, and my bias is yeonjun. If you go by my youtube recap top 5, fourth is seventeen and enhypen is fifth, which is nuts because i definitely know twice and have listened to more of twice's discography than either of those groups, but I listened to fml a LOT as well as cheers and rock with you, rock with you was my third most listened song and the other 4 were all stray kids lmao. Enhypen probably got up there because i listened to bite me, chaconne and scarifice a LOT this year LMAO i really like some other songs by them, but those ones probably did most of the heavy lifting lol. I like seventeen and enhypen, but i feel like i don't know them or their music all that well, i can maaaaybe identify all of the seventeen member (i think i can confidently identify at least 10 lol) and i haven't really listened to a whole lot of their music. enhypen i'm pretty sure i know all of them, i think i might get sunoo and sungwon and jungwon mixed up sometimes, it's just because their names are similar lol versus like. twice i definitely know everybody and have listened to more of their songs, but i guess i didn't have some of their songs on repeat as much as some enhypen and seventeen songs this year? and my biases for twice are jihyo and momo. I'm also surprised xdinary heroes weren't in my top 5, i've listened to them quite a bit this year, i thought it would've been them and twice instead of seventeen and enhypen. i've had a hard time choosing my xdinary heroes bias but i think it's between jooyeon and o.de.

I also really like (G)I-DLE and my bias for them is yuqi, as well as p1harmony, and my biases for them are Keeho and Soul, though i'm not as good at keeping up with them... honestly, i mostly just actually keep up with stray kids and ateez, everyone else like i listen to knew music when it comes out and that's mostly it lol it takes so much time and energy to keep up anymore than that, i can't do it for more than 2 groups at a time, and even then, i still don't keep up with anyone as thoroughly as i do skz. Oh i really like xiker's too, i've listened to everything they've put out so far and really liked it, but i don't know literally any of the members so i don't have a bias atm lol

What are your favorite groups and biases?