#and it feels so unfair when people decide to boil his character down something he's clearly not

[momotonescreaming]

Your posts and fics about Steve not being a pushover are some of my favorite in this fandom! I was wondering if you had any thoughts or headcanons about how Steve would deal with other members of the older party, instead of the younger party? This is more so in fanon than canon, but people mocking his intelligence or being surprised he's not a douche? Thanks!

Oh!! Thank you so much!!! That really means a lot! I'm always a little nervous when I make another post about Steve's boundaries and how fanon sometimes treats him, so it's a relief to hear people like them haha. 

You raise an interesting question! And one I will admit I haven't thought about too much, actually. Most of my posts have been about Steve and Dustin, as that's what I've been thinking about lately, but you're so right that the older teens do it too. LOTS to think about. So fair disclaimer that I'm thinking and writing by the seat of my pants here. 

I do just want to start off by saying that fanon is fun! Taking canon apart and disecting it, taking out its parts and figuring out how it works is fun! Diving deep and analysing and comparing what the writers intended vs what they ended up portraying vs what the fans thought. Media analysis baby! But fanon (like canon), can't cater to everyone. I'm just a Steve girlie with a lot of feelings. Not to say canon's exempt, of course. These ideas had to have come from somewhere. And I swear that each season gets a little bit worse at turning Steve into a verbal punching bag. A joke. He was supposed to be Nancy's jerk boyfriend who died, but everyone loved Joe Keery so much they kept him alive. And now they thank him by boiling his character down to a dumb jock who was an asshole. It's tiring. 

I remember ages ago there was a post (that I cannot find for the life of me) that pointed out that in season 1 Steve says the word connoisseurs (in the scene with the camera smashing) but if they made him say that in season 4 they would have made Dustin make a comment how he didn't know Steve knew a word with that many syllables or something.

All this insulting Steve, all the canon jokes and fanon characterisation shitting on his interests and his personality and the fact that he decided to be a better person 3 years ago by the time S4 rolls around? Just feels like an excuse to shit on the jock. Revenge of the nerds. But it just makes the nerds look like bullies. Like the Duffers got bullied by jocks when they were kids and now they're making it everyone else's problem.

But to the actual point of this ask! The older party! Below the cut because this got long.

First up is Eddie! With canon Eddie a part of me doesn't think he would make fun of Steve's intelligence or call him a douche post season 4. A big part of Eddie's journey was him getting his whole world turned upside down (pun not intended). With the whole monsters thing, but also with his worldview! He thought he was confident and tough, but realised that he panicked when things got real (which I mean, fair, but that's not what we're talking about). And that he was making assumptions about people based on his own unfair biases! He canonically admits to Steve that he couldn't accept the fact that Steve is a Good Dude and the only reasons he thought he was a douche was that he has rich parents, was popular, and chicks love him. Nothing based on Steve's actions. Him turning around after all that to comment about Steve's intelligence, or bringing up his non existent assholery again just feels like a huge backslide. Doing both their characters a real disservice.

But you mentioned fanon more than canon, and there are absolutely fanon Eddie's out there who would insult Steve like that. And I gotta be honest - I don't think that Steve would take that lying down. Steve absolutely has an angry knee jerk reaction to things during this show. Back in S1, but also in S4 - when he says to Dustin that he was going to punch him so hard his teeth would fall back out. If Eddie, the new dude, decided he was going to be a jerk and insult Steve's intelligence? Steve would absolutely retort that it was fucking rich coming from the guy who failed senior year twice. Which is harsh, but I'd be angry too if I saved this guy's life and he turns around and calls me stupid for it. He'd call Eddie a hypocrite.

One thing I like about Steddie (both platonically, and romantically) is how they're on equal footing. The get along. They respect each other. Stop making Eddie a jerk to Steve for no good reason.

Eddie bringing up he thought Steve was a douche feels better than the other instances because he admits he was wrong!! Willingly! To Steve's face! But any times after? Steve would drop Eddie like a hot potato. He's not going to hang around with someone who's a dick to him for no reason. The fact that they went through the Upside Down together isn't going to make him suffer through it. Like, there's no way Steve hung out with Nancy and Jon after the breakup. No Upside Down monsters could make that less awkward.

Speaking of other instances - Robin. Stobin, my beloved. Sometimes I wonder if people actually like Steve, or if they just put up with him because him and Robin are a special deal. My thoughts on her are a little more all over the place, so bare with.

Is she a jerk to him in Season 3? Yes. But she's also a lonely, angry, teen, holding a grudge against him for no good reason. The only 2 things she says she hated him for were - he ate bagels messily in class, and that he didn't pay attention to the girl she had a crush on. Once again, nothing substantial.

But then they get tortured together, they become best friends. They get a job together again and he drives her to school. Robin canonically is the one to bring up what if they could combine into one person. She cares about Steve! She loves him so much she wants to merge with him!! And yet so much fanon has her acting like Steve is a bad rash she can't get rid of. Insulting him at every chance she gets. I get that friendships have gentle ribbing, teasing and jokes, because you know them and you know where their line in the sand is. But a lot of fanon feels like Robin rubbing salt into the wound. Taking it too far.

How many times does Steve have to apologise for being an asshole when he really wasn't that bad in the first place?

Steve reinforcing his boundaries with aggressive fanon Robin would be more chill than Eddie, I think. More like a conversation. Like, hey, you're my best friend and what you're saying is actually really hurting me? Could you please stop because it really doesn't feel like you want to be my friend since you won't stop insulting my intelligence? Robin isn't just an angry teen on her own anymore, she has a friend and the things she says has an effect. I can see him being more conservative with it than him telling Tommy & Carol that they're assholes. If he loses Robin, he goes back to his only friend being Dustin. But he'd still bring it up. He wouldn't just roll over and take it.

If she didn't listen when he talked to her like an adult? That's when he'd call her out like he did Tommy and Carol. If he can call out his best friends before, he'd do it again. It'd suck, but he needs to put himself first.

Nancy and Jon I'm still thinking about.

Jon doesn't like Steve, doesn't respect him, and canonically says mean things about Steve still, after Steve's done so much to atone, to save and help everyone. That mean joke he makes at the end of S4 about Steve being in charge? Oof.

A part of me can see Steve being like 'who cares what that guy thinks, I know myself'. But I'm afraid I just don't have a lot more on Jon. He's just not a character I'm a big fan of so I'm not as confident with his characterisation.

Nancy however? Nancy would hurt. Steve loved her, cared for her, she was there when he was trying to be better, when he was atoning. (I know that Steve says that Nancy was the bump on the head he needed, but he's wrong. He did it himself. But that's besides the point.). He went with her to the Hollands, he saved her little brother's life, him and all the party. With Billy and then in the tunnels. He opened up to her, she helped him with his college essays. She broke his heart and for her to turn around and comment on his intelligence? to call him a douche? would fucking hurt. Not at the same level as the S2 drunk bathroom bullshit convo, but it would hurt.

A part of me can see Steve doing the whole - pinch the bridge of your nose to hold back the tears and leave - thing like in S2 after the party. But a part of me could see Steve having had the time away from her to say something. But IDK. I'm not too sure on this. If she wasn't going to be mature about their breakup, about the things he told her, wasn't going to respect him and not insult him after all the things she's done? I'd say leave her behind, but I don't know if Steve would. He has a big heart. It might just be easier to take the bittersweet option and quietly let her go. Don't interact.

ANYWAY. OOF. Sorry this got so long, I was thinking and then my brain kind of ran away with me. Hopefully this was the sort of thing you were thinking? It was a fun thought experiment either way!!

[janvizr]

closed starter ✼ @bellstrom where ✼ ruby's diner when ✼ late night

The night was off to a rough start. Eyes low and exhausted from an all-nighter turned all-day, Louis wanted nothing more than to relax. The man was certainly no stranger to bursts of inspiration that led to these awful sleeping habits, but those often ended well. This time, however, what kept him up was a phone call from his father from who knows where. The comforting rumble of his voice brought on a wave of elation to the artist, but just like one of destructive nature, left him washed up in its wake. The call was short and awkward. Henri simply asked how and where he was, then upon hearing the answer, hung up abruptly. Who was he to decide when and how long contact should be made? It was unfair.

Feeling a slow boil of anger rising, Louis discards the feeling and makes his way to Ruby's Diner. According to a few folks around town (and Artie), someone named Benny had baked something interesting. Despite being a complete stranger, Louis had no issue making deals with people professionally or under the table. He himself was considered an unusual character, so why not expand on the idea? A welcoming jingle of whatever tune on the radio greets him as he enters. He's surprised to find a few patrons still inhabiting a few of the booths, indulging in late-night cravings or intimate conversation. He wasn't sure who exactly he was looking for, so instead he takes a seat in one of the stools and flags down a waitress.

"Is Benny still here?" He asks, shifting in his seat to get comfortable. "He has something a client of mine wants picked up." A lie, but not a damnable one. "I was told to meet him at the end of his shift."

[agentpenguinmann]

i'm not sure how people can read twilight as a manipulator with how much worrying he does about his mission with the forgers. like him putting on that one outfit in the cruise ship arc, just to be a cool dad for anya, and then his reaction when it is a decisive failure?

and even aside from that, twilight cares so god damn much, he's so incredibly empathetic, but he hides from it with the "it's for the mission" lie, because GOD knows this man is afraid of intimacy / close connections. that's why we get so many instances of twilight looking at a situation and relating it to his past experiences in westalis and the war (and why we get so many instances of the "it's for the mission" lie, because this man is desperately trying to hide from the reality that he cares about this family.)

Right?!?!!! He just can't allow himself to follow and admit his emotions. He comes up with "logical" explanations for his feelings (like when he said to himself he's just tired after he acknowledged he's jealous of the Briar siblings) and once it slips out of his control, he goes into denial i.e. "for the mission" mode - he convinces himself he's doing everything for the mission. He reminds himself time and time again that at some point he wouldn't be able to be with Anya and Yor anymore.

From his past experiences, he knows he's gonna loose whatever he's built with someone sooner or later (either they part ways or they die) so he doesn't allow himself to acknowledge he's close with someone.

Speaking of empathy, I think that among many others, one of the best pieces of evidence for it is how he treats dogs - creatures over which he has the upper hand.

He apologized to one dog three times in the span of a couple of minutes. A dog that was hostile towards him.

Also this:

This is probably one of the most genuine and "unedited" Twilight's facial expressions we've seen so far. At that moment there was absolutely no need for him to put on a mask or control his expression, there was no one else around except Bond.

Speaking of Bond, in the "saving doggy from the fire" chapter, when the crisis was averted, Twilight got on Bond's eye level to tell him that he's gotta be careful because Anya would be heartbroken if something happened to him.

This is something parents do to their kids to help children feel safer, to show them they're giving the kid their full attention.

And then he goes right into the "for the mission" mode at the slightest sign of affection from a dog. (Good thing Bond doesn't buy any of hit, judging by his annoyed "borf borf" XD)

I think this also ties back to your original post about Twilight not being used to receiving any kind of gratitude for his actions. He just kinda doesn't know what to do with it, because literally moments later he gives Bond the Proud Dad look that speaks for itself.

If all of this is not Twilight being a big softie at his core then I'm an alien from Mars.

[yandere-sins]

Past and Future

Horrortober Day 2: Decision  |  “It’s your decision. Choose wisely.”

Day 2 woop! Got a chance to work on my Kazuha a bit more. I hope to write for him more in the future!

Warnings: Yandere, Manipulation, Possessiveness, Stalking Mention Characters: Kadehara Kazuha x Reader

Kazuha couldn’t not notice the yearning in your gaze as you looked across the plaza at your old friends. These scumbags. Wannabe goody-two-shoes. Oh, how much he despised them. And yet, you longed for their laughter in your ears, the wrinkles in their eyes as they grinned and smiled at each other cheerfully. They were celebrating something Kazuha didn’t know about. But undoubtedly, you remembered after having been close to them since early childhood. 

And yet, you didn’t belong to their circle anymore. You hadn’t been invited to wine and laughter, food and celebration. Instead, you absentmindedly squeezed his hand tighter, and Kazuha took that as a sign. “Come on,” he mumbled, watching how sadness overcame you with every passing second. Frustration and anger, but mostly disappointment, snaked their way into your expression. You had been so excited for today, going out with him, exploring Liyue Harbor with your boyfriend, but the mood was ruined now. 

When you didn’t react, Kazuha used his free arm to lay it around you, pushing you forward despite your feet being unwilling to move. Part of you wanted to go to your friends, to join them in their festivity. But without being invited, you were way too hesitant to approach, and it hurt you even more. Your head hung low as you two finally disappeared in the crowd of people working and shopping, the night market making for a great scene. Still, you couldn’t take it in anymore after remembering your past heartbreak now.

Kazuha wasn’t the type to leave you alone, never wishing to be separated from the warmth and comfort you gave him by being by his side, but in your depressed state, it was hard to do anything with you. Placing you on a bench, Kazuha left to get you something to drink. His mind was wrecking itself of how to help you as he bought your favorite, seasonal beverage, still hot and steaming in its cup, and brought it back to you. 

Unfortunately, no one heard the clattering sound as he dropped it, watching you talk with some of your old friends. When did they come over to talk? Why were they here? How did they notice you? Why now of all times? This was his evening. His time with you. And yet, you hadn’t been as happy with him all night as you were when you talked to them. Kazuha’s expression changed from worried to upset as he had to watch you laugh with them, even though the mood seemed awkward from afar. Maybe they were apologizing, or perhaps just trying to replicate the good old times with you, but you seemed very receptive to their presence, smiling in a way that you never did when you were with Kazuha. 

It had taken a lot to break you guys apart. Not willingly, but they weren’t a good influence for you. He had never done anything to them, but one day they had decided they didn’t like the way he looked at you. That Kazuha was too ‘possessive’ and that the ‘took up all your time’. They told you to stay away from the outsider, to ignore the soft, wonderful feelings you two had for each other—the strong bond you were forming with your boyfriend. Your friends decided he wasn’t good for you but were they really your friends when they made you choose between them and your love? Gods, he hated what they did to you. Hated how miserable they could make you. You had been so nervous and anxious after they started harassing you to leave him, crying at night and into his shoulder when you didn’t know what to do. The first time you said you loved him was while you were assuring him that you still had feelings for him; that being the reason why it was so hard on you to be forced to make this decision. It wasn’t a romantic moment, but one filled with tears. Kazuha would never forgive them for robbing him of his amazing confession from your lips.

However, in the end? You chose him—naturally. You chose him for this very reason. Because you love him. Kazuha never made you decide. Sure, he didn’t like your friends, but he didn’t go out of his way to engage with them. He only ever had eyes for you, following you whenever you met with your so-called friends and making sure you’d be safe from them. However, he was better than them, and even if they made you cry on your way home, he never once went back to hurt them just as much as they hurt you, even if his blood was boiling. Kazuha would rather spend his time comforting you, asserting his place in your heart, than stick to the ones who were desperately trying to tear him out of said place. 

But maybe he should have.

Maybe he should have demanded that you decide on one side. After all, you were already distancing yourself from these people that kept hurting you in the name of ‘only wanting the best for you’. He was the best for you. There was nothing that could be better for you than Kazuha. He was strong; he was safe for you. No one else tended to you as gently and lovingly as he did. Comforted you when you were down. You had to wear the burden of everyone around you, but Kazuha only committed to you and your worries. He was the saving grace and the helping hand you needed in your desperation. The person your friends should have been if you had actually mattered to them. 

In return, you were the same for him. You gave his life a meaning that he had long searched for. A new friend and a love to wake his lonely heart again. No one could ever stir him like you did, and he was thankful. Thankful for the opportunity to be by your side, to warm you on cold nights, and to tell you about the past he never shared with anyone else. You were the listener he wanted; gave him the attention he needed. And Kazuha...

Kazuha wouldn’t lose you now. He couldn’t lose someone again. Not you.

Marching up to you and your friends gathering around, he listened to the meaningless conversation you had. “We’re sorry for saying such harsh things,” and “We were worried about you.” Loads of empty words, in his opinion. But seeing your eyes tear up at them made his heart sting and his blood boil all over again. It made him furious. Furious for you. You deserved so much better than these lies. They didn’t care about you!

Pushing through them without roughly, Kazuha only looked at you, finding your eyes instantly. You were surprised by his appearance but quickly wiped the tears from your eyes and returning to the silly, little smile you usually graced him with. One that was as empty as your friend’s words. One you adapted just to please him and not worry him further, but once he’d put an end to this, Kazuha knew you’d be able to smile at him properly again with a sincere one. 

“Choose,” he prompted, and you raised an eyebrow in confusion while your friends began to grow tense and murmur between themselves. 

“These people-” he made a vague gesture between the few gathered around, “-aren’t good for you, and you know it. They dropped you when you needed them the most while I’ve been with you all this time.”

“You can’t be serious,” you breathed, but Kazuha didn’t confirm your wish. He was serious, even if that meant upsetting you. This was for the best. “It’s your decision. Them or me. Choose wisely.”

“That’s unfair!” one of your friends cried out, upset about his intention, and Kazuha looked at them sharply from the corner of his eye, silencing them effectively. “It’s not unfair,” he shut their argument down, looking only at you as he spoke. “They made you choose first and broke your heart. I never have and never will hurt you. But I am not so sure about the people who already did it once.”

Kazuha’s words had impact; he could see it in your eyes. You, too, remembered the bad times that felt like your heart was ripped into pieces by the people you put so much trust in. And instead, it had been him who was there, making sure you ate and drank in your troubled times, and got rest when you needed it. Even if there was no luxury in his life, he still had been a better friend than any of them. Kazuha completely missed that he suggested dropping you the same way your friends had when he made you choose. He didn’t want to believe you would choose anyone over him after all he did for you. You belonged to him, and he belonged to you. That’s how love worked. 

“I love you.” 

A dirty trick. One that your friends couldn’t use. Kazuha directly pulled at your heartstrings, making you miss a breath as you grew even more blindsided. “I don’t want to lose you, again,” he didn’t hesitate to add, noticing how your friends’ faces grew worried and upset at his words. He was hinting at the bad time you two had gone through. The one that made a part of you die. But you only looked down, hands balling into fists as you felt conflicted. There was no need for you to wreck your pretty head over these nobodies, Kazuha decided, holding out his hand. You only needed him—as much as he needed you. 

Timidly, you reached for his hand, and he gripped yours tightly, pulling you up from your seat and after him, away from these fake friends and their fake worry without another word to them. “It’s better like this,” he assured you, dragging you through the crowd so you wouldn’t be able to look back at your past. He was before you, your future, and he wouldn’t let anyone take you from him and ruin this for you. 

But when you were unresponsive, he threw a glance back over his shoulder, noticing the tears streaming down your eyes. You two came to a stop as he turned around, cupping your face and pulling you into a kiss. Even though your hands came to rest against his chest, pushing, you never managed to escape his grip, forced to kiss him until neither of you could hold your breath anymore. Leaning his forehead against yours, you were left speechless, but not Kazuha.

“I love you. I love you so much. Promise me you’ll never go back to them.” It was hard to commit to that, but his hands grew tighter around your face, desperate to hear it. “You chose me,” he insisted, pain swinging in his voice. “You’re not leaving me.”

There was no way of saying where those emotions came from, but he didn’t give you time to think them over. This was the future he chose, by your side. And that night, you chose it too, even if you ended up not liking it once you found out that your friends had been right all along.

[unohanadaydreams]

How would the captains react to catching their partner cheating on them? I’m feeling angst tonight

Finally some good fucking food. Angst; it’s what’s for dinner and I’m chowing down with you, anon.

Features: angst. Some violence and torture with Gin and Mayuri.

How The Original Captains React To Being Cheated On:

Genryusai Yamamoto:

There’s little to no reaction. You wouldn’t be the first and won’t be the last to use him for status or money or petty bragging rights. Just another day.

Quietly, behind closed doors, he does mourn. Not for the loss of you, but for the prospect of starting again. He caresses the pretty things he’s bought you, each touch a vote for or against bothering.

If you come to him, apologetic and willing to repent, he’ll look past the transgression. Less work for him to undertake, in the end, and the power of demanding this is that in the name of forgiveness suits him.

Shunsui Kyoraku:

He can’t help but laugh. All those years chasing girls and washing his hands of the consequences come to catch him now that he’s standing still with just one hand holding his.

Business goes on as usual, but he’s sloppier around the edges—spilling sake on paper work, falling asleep against Jushiro’s grave, and forsaking the frequent partying he’s known for in lieu of furiously scribbling down the perfect love story he didn’t get.

Honestly, he’s willing to forgive if it wasn’t done out of love for the other person and there’s a willingness to work on the relationship. Shunsui has played the unfaithful lover more times than he can remember; being black out drunk more often than sober will do that to you.

Soi Fon:

She can’t speak and doesn’t bother. Throat closed with anger, she lets her body tell you where your relationship lies—thrown off the bed and kicked outside.

There’s nothing but hatred for you and humiliation for herself. Not just personally, but professionally; a leader of the 2nd division being caught unawares is irony at the cost of her reputation.

People are always leaving her behind once she trusts them. After weeks, she’ll ask you why. Because that’s always the question burning in her chest. Why can’t she be a person someone stays for.

Gin Ichimaru:

Cute, how you think you can shuffle off and away from him after getting caught. He doesn’t flinch, talking with conversational tones. Hey, sweetie, who’s your little friend? Aww, they don’t talk or some thin’?

There’s two options; submit to grueling public humiliation or die. Gin loves to have fun, after all. And, isn’t it fun having to watch the person you cheated with get toyed with like a mouse under kitty claws? Aren’t you having fun kissing the corpse? Wasn’t your silly mistake worth it?

Gin has never forgiven, forgotten, or turned down an opportunity to make someone who cares about him regret feeling so. Your life is hell and the jailor can’t decide whether to keep your head under boiling water or kill you. Fun!

Retsu Unohana:

The impulse to leave as the only one alive is temptation incarnate. She is firm, restrained, and digs into her cheeks until her teeth pop through.

She keeps waiting to calm, for the situation to become objective instead of the turmoil in her gut. Retsu is especially brusque with everyone while working, making every stitch job a painful one. Why is there always something. Why can’t all the change finally stick; why is she still glad to feel the pain so she can inflict it back?

The betrayal was the end and there’s years of coping methods that keep you from spilling your guts on a sword, but it feels like a very near thing to her. Professionally, she’s less kind, and your next set of wounds healed by the 4th get infected. Poor thing.

Sosuke Aizen:

As far as you know, he’s stricken with heartbreak and disappointment. His voice is a touch too loud when telling you off—others hear. And disapprove greatly. He asks any bystanders for their discretion towards his privacy, adding a tear or two for effect.

Your relationship being over matters little; dime a dozen are the people who’ll fall over themselves to be his. The audacity of treating him, your better, with such unfairness? Affects him like an itch under skin.

Of course, he forgives you. He makes a show of it and the number of people out for your unhappiness grows. How could you cheat on such a gracious, loving man? You are punished with little action from himself, the many shinigami who view him with starry-eyes doing their work without needing explicit instruction.

Byakuya Kuchiki:

There’s little to say or do outside of making it clear he wants you gone in a permanent way. Reaction is the thief of dignity, so he saves any emotion for when he’s alone.

Self flagellation is his favorite dessert and he is convinced the bitter taste reflects his character somehow. In a way, it speaks to his lack of care and dignity as a clan leader; what fully aware man could let this happen?

For you, there aren’t any chances let alone forgiveness. You’ve stung his pride in multiple ways and only social norms keep you from dying in a duel over it. But as a shinigami—as a captain—he has avenues to vent his vindication until he feels the crime has been payed for. Too bad for you that pride is worth it’s weight in gold for a Kuchiki.

Sajin Komamura:

He runs away from the situation as soon as possible. Of course you cheated on him; how foolish to think anyone would not. At least he knows now and can get back to his normal.

Being alone isn’t all bad. There’s more time for his pets, his company, and his training. Comforting, familiar, he can pretend this is how it always was. Just him, alone.

His lack of self-esteem outweighs his want for justice. It was unfair to subject anyone to…himself, anyway. He can’t blame you for wanting someone untouched by the curse of the beast.

Kaname Tosen:

There’s more anger than even you expect. Injustice in anything, especially something so personal, enrages him. But he has the self control and sense to only send you packing.

Still, it’s all he can think about. Better to be consumed by this than the glacial pace his better world is taking. You’re one of the people holding that goal back, he’s sure. He insists on a talk that’s really just a long, painful lecture.

People like you, who disregard what’s right, don’t deserve forgiveness and the upset within him darkens. Maybe there is a way you can make things right. They’re so close to perfecting the Arrancar and he’d like to see how you’ve contributed once his eyes open, finally able to see.

Toshiro Hitsugaya:

There aren’t any dramatics or punishments or even words to give you other than ‘goodbye’. He sees the break and he cuts it cleanly. There’s no need for anything else.

Largely he copes by doing what he always does—working, training, meditating. There are a few sips of alcohol and punches to his pillow, but you’re no longer someone he cares about. The ice has holed over the spot you took just fine.

You don’t exist to him anymore. If you try to apologize, his eyes will pass over you and he’ll remind you once before ignoring you again: He’s a captain and he’s closed the conversation and now he’s getting back to work. Goodbye.

Kenpachi Zaraki:

So you’re fucking somebody. Is that a big deal or something? Should he be hurt? Because all he can muster is annoyance.

And then he thinks about it. He lets it sink in that somebody was touching you while you’re his. Kenpachi understands the want to play, but isn’t love when someone is the best in your heart and only them? Like, strength but more fucking confusing.

He’s still undecided if there’s anything to forgive. He tells you to give it another go with him in the mix and likes the feeling better than walking in uninvited. So maybe it was just play…and maybe he’s more rough with you two than intended. But he leaves more content than he came, so he figures everything’s fine. He can always kill somebody later, once he’s figured it out for good.

Mayuri Kurotsuchi:

You’re knocked unconscious and so is the person you were in bed with. That’s the last you see of them or the world beyond one lab room.

Congratulations, you are now confined to a pill that is swallowed by gigai after gigai designed in your likeness. Isn’t he generous, letting you take part in his research still? Don’t you feel honored to still feel any part of his touch as he takes you apart somehow more painfully than the time before?

Because it is just research. He didn’t care about you enough to still feel enraged about it. This is purely out of principle, a logical response to your base actions. Don’t worry, it’s just forever.

Jushiro Ukitake:

The discovery is emotional and he struggles keep his dignity, especially when a coughing fit starts soon after. He can’t even tell you off without sickness leaking into the moment.

The spiral begins. You’re awful one moment and justified the next. He’s the victim, then the one who should’ve known. There was no good reason and then he coughs again and there’s one.

He could forgive you if you’re genuine and forthright with a reason that isn’t the weight which holds him under blankets or pushes blood past his lips. As long as the illness isn’t what poisoned the relationship, he could forgive you.

[1025cherrystreet]

funeral

y/n attends a funeral and feels hopeless after losing her best friend until she meets her late bsf's cousin Harry.

a/n: this is for @harrystylescherry​ Playlist Fic Challenge!!! this is inspired by the song Funeral by Phoebe Bridgers. i used the name Phoebe in the story but i wasn't picturing Phoebe Bridgers when I was writing that character, i just liked the name and decided to go with it! but, y'all can picture her however y'all like lol. i went from loving this story to hating it, but i hope y'all like it! any feedback is appreciated!! <3

**despite it being surrounded by depressing matters, it's actually a cute and fluffy story lol! just wanted to point that out because i, myself, kinda avoid reading sad stories

warnings: a LOT of talk about death and dying and funerals, mentions depression/depressive episode?, mentions drugs and alcohol, swearing. i'm ceo of rushing the ending, soz <3 (also, gave up on proofreading lmao)

word count: 8k+ (this is the longest piece i've ever written lol)

Y/N has this dream. Where she's screaming underwater while her friends are waving at her from the shore. She's desperately calling for them, hoping and waiting for them to help, but, seemingly, her friends can't hear... and can't help. Submerged beneath the thrashing waters, her wails fall silent; her familiars deaf to her pleads. The more she struggles to get to the surface for air, the deeper she sinks. Her friends just waving at her as she drifts to the bottom. Every time she jolts awake from these dreams in a sweat stained bed and sticky clothes, she decides to brush it off. Not wanting to think about the problems she needs to face or what she needs to work on. Always concluding that she doesn't need anyone to tell her what it means or overanalyze her life through misplaced visions. Deciding to not believe assumptions made from vague, painful pictures.

As the familiar sinking feeling in her chest starts yet again, Y/N snaps her eyes up at the casket as the sound of her best friend's mother releasing a heart wrenching sob catches her focus.

The contrast of the white roses that lay on top of Phoebe's mahogany stained casket almost glow in the evening light, seeming like a mock to such a somber evening. The way the living looks so effervescent and bright, casting shadows on the less fortunate. The dead never celebrated in such light but rather mourned in dim grief and sadness.

Y/N doesn't like funerals, and not just because her best friend of 10 years is the recipient of this one. She's never cared for them. Believing they're just an excuse to get over the one they are to be honoring, they carry a stigma that everyone in attendance has to cry or you're seen as heartless, while the people who were never close to the deceased are presumed fake for showing emotion. Y/N thinks they're a big joke... with a cruel, cruel punchline.

The sound of despondent music playing and cries ring throughout the cemetery as Phoebe's casket is lowered six feet into the ground. The unchecked emotions start to boil inside of Y/N. Anger boiling deep inside of her quickly reaching its point, anger that stems from betrayal, that stems from hurt, that stems from...loss. She quietly scoffs, shaking her head with a stone cold look, before quickly getting up and walking away from the ceremony as her late friend's uncle, Bill, wraps up his poor excuse of a eulogy.

Phoebe wouldn't have wanted this. She wouldn't have wanted people to cry over her casket, stuck laying in a padded box while people who don't even know the real her, speak of her existence like they were the best of friends. They weren't. She was. Y/N was her best friend. These people don't... didn't know her like Y/N does. It's all bullshit.

In Y/N's quick pace away from the tent around the damp open ground, she spots a bigger gravestone with a stone bench built into it and takes a seat.

She inhales deeply, taking a moment to herself to look up at the sky. The clouds that overcast part of the blue sky drifting farther away from the graveyard as the sun starts making its way to set. She breathes in, the delightful scent of honeysuckle and dewy grass filling her nose before it's tainted by fumes of petrol from the road just on the other side of the cemetery gates behind her. It's so unfair; why of all people did Phoebe have to-

"It's all a joke," A deep accent says to her left.

She almost jumps out of her seat when she turns to the man who took the empty spot next to her. Jesus Christ, where the fuck did he come from? she thinks to herself. He had brown curly hair and green eyes (well, thinking green from what she can gather staring at the side of his face), wearing a black suit with a black button up shirt underneath. Rings clad his fingers and the sunset gleam shines off his cross necklace. She stares wide-eyed at him for a few moments before shaking her head to get out of her daze.

"Huh?" She says when she realizes he had spoken before.

"It's all a big joke," He repeats himself, the British accent more noticeable this time around. His head faced towards the funeral, having not spared a glance at her once this whole time.

She settles back into her seat, shifting her gaze to match his with the group of mourning people in the distance.

"Yeah." Y/N sighs in agreement.

The two of them sit in silence for a moment before Y/N decides to speak. Thinking to herself that if anyone would listen to her thoughts, a man who's also ditching the shitty eulogy would be her best bet.

"They all talk about her as if she was God." She chuckles humorlessly.

He scoffs with a small smirk, "Far from it."

Another wave of silence crashes over them, before Y/N breaks it once again.

"She would've hated this," She whispers, "People she barely even knows crying over her like they had any significance in her life. She probably only talked to five people here. She didn't even like her uncle." She laughs, referencing the man who gave the half-assed eulogy about how Phoebe being such an innocent, bright young girl.

"They're grieving her loss instead of celebrating her life, it's all fucked," He clears his throat before continuing, "Funerals are for the living."

"I hate funerals..." She says in reply.

Glancing at the boy beside her when she hears him digging through his jacket pocket, pulling out a flask.  He takes a sip, and another, before gesturing it to her. Not overthinking it too much, she takes the cool metal bottle and takes a big gulp. Tasting the burn of vodka in her throat and mint from what she supposes is the mysterious strangers mouth.

Handing the flask back she says, "She would've wanted a party. Something where everyone was having fun in her honor, not some substandard funeral full of random people and careless words."

This time he's the one who chuckles humorlessly, "Yeah, she would've wanted everyone t'take shots and dress up in fancy clothes n' wreak havoc on this fucking town,"

Y/N smiles at this because Phoebe really would. Phoebe was the type of person who everyone wanted to be friends with, but also who everyone was scared of. She was mysterious and intimidating (a bit like the man next to her, Y/N thinks). Phoebe was a master at persuasion and could get almost anyone to go on crazy fucking adventures with her. One of Y/N's favorite memories with Phoebe was when they dressed up in wedding dresses they had gotten from a second-hand store and walked down the street yelling random things at strangers, taking turns drinking tequila from a metal water bottle.

"She really was something else, huh?" Y/N says a bit somberly, reminiscing on her late best friend.

"Definitely, a know-it-all," He laughs, bringing the flask up to his mouth.

"Oh, of course, she always thought she was right." She smirks.

"I mean, most of the time she was." He shrugs.  

"Yeah, how did she always know everything?" The two of you laugh, taking turns drinking from the flask.

He shakes his head in disbelief, silence settling over the pair again.

"How did you know her?" He asks, still staring at the gathering of people in the distance.

"...She was my best friend," Y/N responds quietly, still staring out at the sunset.

He hums in return, "You?" She asks as she hands the flask over.

"Her cousin." His rough voice speaks out.

"You're Harry?" She says, less as a question and more in disbelief. Phoebe always mentioned her cousin Harry from England, always telling Y/N of stories they had together getting into reckless shit.

She turns her head to look at him just as he does, "And you're Y/N."

He offers a soft, knowing smile, both having heard countless stories of one another from Phoebe. He leans back and extends his arm on the top of the bench behind her, feeling the warmth of his body radiate off of him.

"I wonder what she'd say to me now. Sitting on a random gravestone in our hometown, drinking out of her cousin's flask, ditching what's supposed to be her remembrance." Y/N says, leaning back on the bench too.

"She would've said, 'quit y'crying, it's a sign of the times' and then would drag your arse t'the nearest pub." He laughs.

She joins in on the soft laughter, shaking her head because she knows that's exactly what she would've said. Phoebe was such a joy to be around, her presence unmatched.

"You know, she always talked about wanting to leave a legacy behind. Most of the time, I just laughed at her, thinking it was just another bizarre thing to come out of her mouth. But, she was always saying she wanted to be remembered as some enigma when she dies..." Y/N recalls the many memories of her and Phoebe staying up til 4am talking. Chills suddenly covering her body, not only from the cool Winter air but because of how Phoebe had talked about her death and now she's actually...dead.

She turns her head to look at Harry and he has a bittersweet smile on his face.

"I think she's accomplished that quite well, hasn't she?" He replies.

"How?" She questions softly with furrowed brows.

"Well, f'starters, her funeral is full of people who never even knew her, or frankly even cared about her, while two emotionless people just got up and stormed away from it t'drink vodka out of a flask on some random person's gravestone." He laughs before tacking on, "Trust me, the people over there are wondering who the hell she was and who she knew, right about now."

She turns her head from the (quite pretty, she thinks) boy to her left, looking at the wake, only to be met with a few people staring back at them.

"Well, I'll be damned," She scoffs. "Of course, the bitch did it." A smile bright on her face, probably the only real grin she's pulled since Phoebe's passing. Her best friends wishes coming true makes her heart warm just a tad, a relief to how cold losing her best friend made it.

"Always able t'make her life seem like an episode of Pretty Little Liars." He says shaking his head with a knowing smirk.

This comment makes Y/N laugh quite loudly, drawing a few — what she could only think were glares — back at her. Wiping a stray tear from her face that fell due to her laughing. The sweet sound coming from her lips only tacking on Harry to join her.

"Oh my god, she practically lived in an indie movie, always the role of the mysterious main character!" She chuckled out, creases forming at the corners of her eyes that Harry has taken a liking to.

As both of their laughter slowly dies out, another silence comes over them; only this time it's almost deafening. It's like the weight of the matter finally settled in.

Harry lets out a deep sigh, staring out at the never ending field of stone. Flowers accompany very few of the many graves; some wilted, some looking fresh, some long gone by now. Name placards littering the ground, all of these lost and forgotten people just decomposing underneath them. People coming and going to visit, only to be forgotten as time goes by, memories fading from their loved ones' mind. He wonders if he could ever forget Phoebe. No, I could never, he thinks to himself. He could never forget the only person that ever truly believed in him and embraced him for being himself.

Deciding he doesn't want to give anymore thought to the painful insight that one day he might forget Phoebe, he asks Y/N something instead.

"Y'wanna get out of here? M'starvin'."

The quiet girl next to him looks his way, his green eyes meeting her's that shine in the last few minutes of orange sunlight. Her eyes are so pretty, he tries to mentally shake that thought out of his head. He can't be hitting on his late cousin's best friend at her funeral, for fuck's sake.

Y/N only nods in response, gathering her bag and phone before standing from the bench. Harry towers over her when he gets up and the observation of how tall her his makes Y/N feel all giddy inside for some reason. Placing the flask back in his suit jacket pocket, he leads the way to a small restaurant nearby. She walks beside him the whole way there, the two of them just quietly observing everything around them.

***

The crisp, cool air passes through, goosebumps creeping up their arms as they sit in the outside seating of a small restaurant. Comfortable silence wraps them up and spits them out as their minds explore all the vast depths of their troubled minds, giving them time for their treacherous thoughts to eat at their sanity bit by bit.

"Phoebe told me once," Y/N cleared her throat, trying to get rid of the scratchy feeling from not using it. Harry's green eyes moved to her from his observance of the lonely street they're next to as she spoke softly. "She told me the only time she truly felt alive was when she made decisions that were reckless and spontaneous. She said living her life precariously was the only reason for her happiness, claiming that the perfect life is just an illusion. That dreaming of labor should not be the goal, but instead becoming your authentic self and living with no regrets..."

Harry stays quiet, reflection in his eyes as he stares at her from across the table, chewing the food in his mouth. Y/N plays around with the food on her plate with her fork and waits for his acknowledgment (although, she doesn't even know if he would say or do anything -- she doesn't know why she decided to tell him that)

"I mean, she's right, righ'? I never understood when people would ask what your 'dream job' is from a young age. No one's dream is t'work everyday 'til they die. They have to, t'make a living and survive, but what's the point in living if you aren't enjoyin' it. But, if y'workin' all the time, how do you make the time to really live?" He says, furrowing his brows as he talks.

Y/N takes in his words. The moonlight and street lamps casting a soft glow on his face, his carved features looking even more beautiful at night.

"Yeah... I guess, I guess I just envy how she viewed life, ya know?" She states, looking at the cars drive by as she tries to explain how she feels. "Always saying things to make you rethink your existence and purpose..." She looks back at Harry and whispers, "...She talked about life so much like she knew she was going to die."

"Well, we're all gonna die eventually." Harry rests his arms on the table with a quiet sigh, his features passive, but his mind is thinking of how he just wants to hug her and tell her everything is going to be alright.

"Yeah, but she just...she talked about it like she knew all the answers. She knew exactly what to say, when to say it. Sometimes, I feel like she was telling everyone around her how to live in complete happiness because she knew she didn't have much of her own, despite convincing everyone she was carefree and unbothered." Y/N shrugs and watches as they fall into a short silence.

"...I miss her." Harry breathes out after a moment, reaching his hand across the table to hold hers. Her skin is soft against his as he rubs his thumb against her hand in an attempt to comfort both of them.

Her eyes soaking in his softened expression, her cherry tinted lips whispering, "Me too."

They eat the rest of their dinner in silence, the only sounds reverberating from the road with the occasional car or pedestrian. Harry pays for the food, but not without many protests from Y/N.

As the two walk side by side down the street, back to the cemetery to pick up their cars, Y/N suddenly falls anxious. She doesn't want to be alone tonight, scared of being alone with her thoughts when she goes back to stay in her childhood home. Her parents, still living in the house they lived in since her youth, had to drive up to another town for a few nights to stay with her cousins because they planned to go there before the news broke about Phoebe. Leaving Y/N alone in the empty house since there wasn't room for her at her cousins.

The black cemetery gates coming into view, eeriness and gloom becoming more apparent when the sun is down, Y/N and Harry can see their two cars sitting idly on the side of the road. Y/N fidgets with her fingers as they grow close to departure.

"D-do you, maybe, wanna hang out for a little while longer?" She turns to face him, looking up at him nervously. "I just don't want to be alone right now." She rushes out when he doesn't respond.

"Yeah, I didn't really want t'go home alone right now either." He offers a sliver of a smile before unlocking his car, grabbing two brown paper bags that look to hold bottles, and gesturing his head, "C'mon, we'll pick up my car later. Let's go celebrate Pheebz, yeah?" He grins.

She smiles at him, unlocking her own car and waiting for him to get in, putting on a playlist full of Phoebe's favorite songs. She drives through her hometown, memories stirring up of her and her best friend smoking weed in the park the summer before graduation and jumping in the lake naked in the middle of winter. The two end up at her house sitting in her abandoned driveway, both unbuckling but neither making the move to get out of the parked car, the engine still running as they sit listening to the melodies playing from the speaker.

Harry suddenly pulls out two bottles from the brown paper bags at his feet, one of vodka and the other tequila.

"Pick y'poison." He says with a smirk.

She picks the vodka and Harry mutters, "Good choice, tequila is more m'speed."

"Weren't you drinking vodka at the funeral?" She laughs, unscrewing the cap.

"Yeah, figured I'd drink Phoebe's favorite since it was her party." He chuckles.

"To Phoebe." Y/N says, sorrow lacing her voice as she turns in her seat to face Harry.

"To living your life precariously." He says before the two of them take a big gulp of the sharp liquid, starting what will only be the beginning of a long night.

***

Light shines through the white curtains, the room glowing bright in the soft, yellow sunlight. The white comforter tangled up in bodies as birds chirp in the morning tranquility. Y/N's eyes flutter open, immediately feeling sweaty and clammy. The headache that sets in reminds her of the amount of alcohol she consumed last night. Waking up in her childhood bed after blacking out in the backseat of her car the night before doing very little for her sanity.

As she lays in bed, groggy, she needs to pee. She moves to get up and walk to the bathroom connected to her room, only to freeze when an arm wraps around her and pulls her closer. Warm breathes pant at the back of her neck, unintelligible murmurs coming from the person behind her. Her eyes widen, realizing Harry is the one she is snuggling with in the early morning (afternoon?) light. Despite needing to pee really badly, she finds herself only melting into his touch. She can't remember the last time someone held her like this, can't remember the last time she felt this content. In fact, she thinks the last time she cuddled with someone was with Phoebe when she slept over in her room at their apartment... Well, just Y/N's apartment now.

Y/N and Phoebe would have movie nights in Y/N's room and in the midst of the fun, they would grow tired. Phoebe would never want to leave the comfort of Y/N's warm bed, so she always asked, sleepover?, with a wide grin. To which Y/N never refused and the two would put on The Notebook and fall asleep spooning one another. The first time it happened, when they were children having sleepovers, she tensed a bit; thinking it weird for her friend to cuddle her because no one had ever done that. But, as the years went by and their friendship grew stronger, knowing that despite both of them being bisexual it wasn't an act of intimacy, but one of platonic comfort.

So, Y/N figured (in her touch deprived mind) that this was just an act of friendly, platonic intimacy...nothing else. After coming to that conclusion, she let herself relax into his touch, his warm embrace nodding her off to sleep once again.

What wakes her up the second time is the sound of a gravelly voice groaning. The arm around her waist squeezes tightly before the body it's attached to tenses up. Harry tries to take in the position they're in -- his arm snuggling her close to his bare chest and legs intertwined with hers -- but his hangover headache clouds his mind too much to think about it. Only registering that he's never felt this comfortable with someone before, never felt someone so warm and cozy. He's cuddled lots of girls (and guys), has spent many mornings waking up in someones hold or holding someone in his, but they've never been as addicting as her. Never being so relaxing, so soft. He's about to just say, fuck it, and fall back asleep as to spend as much time with her in his clutch, but Y/N had stirred awake from his groaning and she really has to pee!

She slowly turns in his arms, their legs shifting apart, and is met with probably the cutest sight she's ever seen. His eyes are glassy and the green of his irises shine in the soft light. His lips pink and his face holding a hesitant look, like he thinks she might yell at him for accidentally ending up in his arms throughout the night, but she can also sense the underlying feeling of content reading on his face. The way his eyes soften when they meet hers and the way his hand involuntarily squeezes at her side. The serene feeling almost tangible as her childhood room becomes their own little world. All the responsibilities and pain of the outside fall ceased at the door decorated with heights of a growing Y/N.

"G'morning," His gravelly voice going straight to her heart, melting it at the beautiful sound.

"Good morning," She says in a raspy whisper, her throat dry from the alcohol and singing at the top of her lungs the night before.

She takes the quiet moment to look at his body, her gaze drifting from tattoo to tattoo, not realizing how many he has. She knew he had some from the ones on his hands yesterday, but she didn't know he had so many. His long sleeve button up had covered the view of the ones adorning his arms, but she looks at them now in awe, thinking how pretty they are.

She's about to tell him how much she likes the butterfly tattoo on his chest, when her bladder has other plans.

"I'm sorry, but I really have to pee," She bashfully smiles as she looks at him.

"Oh, m'sorry. Probably should've told ya' I'm a cuddler." He gives a small smile with embarrassment soaking his words, thinking he's made her uncomfortable.

"No need to apologize," Her eyes light up at his out of character shyness, "I am too, I just really have to go to the bathroom." The harmonious sound of her giggles soothing every worry in Harry's body.

He playfully sighs, "Fine, I guess I'll let y'go piss."

A smirk pulls at his lips as she rolls her eyes and gets up, but he can see the corners of her lips turn up.

She goes to the bathroom, doing her business and washing her hands. She takes the time to brush her teeth and wash her face, cringing when she looks in the mirror. She feels gross that she looked like this when Harry woke up with the resemblance of an angel.

When she's finished, she walks out back into her room, excited to get back into the warm bed (and hopefully cuddle with Harry some more, but she would never admit that out loud), but she's met with abandoned sheets and panic consumes her. Did he leave? Did I make him uncomfortable by waking up in his arms? He was the one to cuddle me and he joked about it! But maybe he was just trying to be nice so he could escape? Her mind starts to race a mile a minute of anxious thoughts before they're all suddenly wiped away at the smell of coffee wafting in from the open doorway.

She throws on a sweatshirt and socks and makes her way down the stairs of the familiar, yet foreign after spending so long away from home, house. Her sock clad feet pad on the hardwood floors as she walks into the kitchen, spotting Harry silently staring at a spot on the wall with a cup of coffee in his hand (he's using the same pink and green mug with a little ceramic pig sitting on the top of the handle that Phoebe would use every time she'd sleepover in high school).

She walks in quietly, coming up behind him and grabbing a cup of coffee for herself, noticing the two pain killers next to the pot (which made her heart swell if she's honest). He had heard her coming down the stairs, but despite her presence his focus is still on the spot on the wall. Taking a sip of her pick-me-up and swallowing the pills, she takes up space next to Harry, following his eyes that stare intently at a picture frame hanging up and her eyes immediately soften.

"That was freshman year," Y/N spoke delicately, staring at the picture herself, "We had both been asked to prom by these senior guys. I was ecstatic because no one had ever shown any liking to me, but Phoebe had played it cool, of course." Harry lets out a quiet breathy laugh because of course Phoebe didn't care.

"We spent weeks planning out how prom night would be. Imagining how the senior parties would be like and if the boys would kiss us by the end of the night or not. She came over at 9am the morning of the dance and we spent all day getting ready and laughing with each other. She had even done my makeup all pretty and I helped her get into her dress. I remember I laughed when she decided she was going to wear converse under her dress, and she almost convinced me to do it too because she said 'you're not gonna be the one laughing when we're at all the after parties and your feet are killing you'." A genuine smile forms on Y/N's face as she reminisces on the cherished moment.

"But, two hours before the dance, our dates cancelled on us and told us they were going with these senior girls." Harry scoffs bitterly, understanding how cruel teenage boys are.

"I remember I was so upset because the one time I thought someone actually liked me or thought I was pretty enough to go to prom with, had just made me a second choice..." She recalls to Harry, who is now looking at the side of her face as she looks at the picture of Phoebe carrying Y/N on her back, piggy-back style, in long prom dresses, dirty white converse peaking out from under both girls' dresses.

"So, she grabbed me by the arms and looked me in the eyes and said 'Y/N L/N, we are deserving of the love we wish for. No senior boys are going to make us doubt that. We are not little freshmen girls who can be seen as cheap thrills and easy hookups. We are women, who demand respect and complete infatuation.' Then she took the tickets that the boys had pre-purchased for us, took my hand, and dragged me to that dance. We had been each other's date and made prom our bitch. She even got us into a party afterward...And we had one hell of a night."

She smiles fondly at the sweet memory. Harry's eyes flutter between the picture and the beautiful girl next to him. How could she ever think of herself as a second choice?, is all he can wonder to himself.

Letting his gaze fall to the picture one last time, he mumbles, "Well, those boys missed out on the best thing t'ever happen t'them."

He doesn't catch Y/N's blush that creeps up on her cheeks as he turns around, taking a sip from his little pig mug.

She shakes her head as to get out of the crushing haze she falls into, turning and walking to the countertop, leaning against it as Harry stands in front of her on the other side.

"Thank you. F'letting me stay the night, last night." He speaks up.

Y/N notices how he's still lacking a shirt, making her mouth dry up just a little at the sight of how fit he is. The tattoos stretching across his tan skin so perfectly, the black ink creating such a beautiful contrast on his body. He catches onto the not-so-subtle gawking and smirks.

"Uh, yeah. It's really no problem. There's no way I'd have let you drive home intoxicated and it was the least I could do after I made you practically spend the day with me." She blushes.

"Y'didn't make me," He shakes his head gently with a smile.

Y/N doesn't know to feel about how her cheeks heat up at his remark, shyly looking away as the teasing gleam in his eyes might make her combust.

"O-okay. Good to know." She squeaks out, the action only fueling Harry's ego and playful mood.

"I should go get m'car from the cemetery before it gets towed," He says almost disappointedly, like he doesn't want to leave yet. If she's being honest, she doesn't want him to leave yet either.

"Yeah, that wouldn't be good. I'll give you a ride." She says, shaking off the saddened feeling of his departure.

"Oh, you don't have t'do tha'." He shakes his head but Y/N quickly shoots him down.

"Nonsense, I'll take you. It's no big deal."

He smiles at her objection, nodding, and going upstairs to grab the rest of his clothes, feeling uncomfortable in his dress pants from the funeral that he had put back on when he got up this morning, not wanting to make Y/N feel weird by staying in only his boxers.

***

Vodka Lover: hey... are you up?

She chews on the skin around her thumb, a nervous habit that Phoebe had always teased her about, as she sends the text to Harry (having exchanged numbers when she had dropped him off at his car at the cemetery). Phoebe had always said, 'You're not gonna have any thumb left to chew, babes, if you keep at it'. To which Y/N just rolled her eyes, but in the deafening silence of 4am, she wishes she cherished those moments with her best friend more. Wishing she didn't take for granted in those little encounters of Phoebe's care and concern with her well-being. Y/N would give anything to be able to spend one more minute with her.

Butterfly Boy: yeah, everything okay?

Vodka Lover: um, can i call you?

Suddenly, breaking the bitter quiet with a ringtone, her phone she holds in her palm lights up with Harry's contact. A tear falls from her face onto the screen and she has to wipe it away before she presses accept.

"Y/N?" Harry's deep voice rings out, laced in worry, from the other line.

She chokes out a sob, not being able to hold it back anymore. The floodgate of her emotions she has been trying to keep at bay suddenly burst. Salty tears fall onto the blue fluffy blanket from her senior year she's wrapped up in.

"Hey, hey, s'everythin' okay? What's wrong?" Harry says, more alert now that he hears her in such a fragile and frantic state.

Y/N just cries harder, desperately trying to catch her breath, she feels like she's suffocating.

"Hey, love, just breathe. Just breathe, Y/N." He tries to coax her down in a soothing voice.

A raggedy breath is heard on Harry's side, making the worry dissipate just a little now that he knows she's breathing. Harry sits up in his bed, calling out to Y/N, repeatedly telling her to just keep breathing. He can't get to what's wrong if she hyperventilates.

He was laying restless in his bed when she had texted, lost in thoughts of life and replaying memories with his cousin. Trying to grasp everything she's ever told him before, hoping that by watching the moments he spent with her like a film reel in his mind would help him not forget them.

"Love, can y'tell me what's got you so upset? Please," He asks softly when she calms down enough where her breathing is regular and not sporadic inhales gasping for air.

"I-I-I miss her," She cries out into the phone, the thought of embarrassing herself by breaking down to Harry not on her mind; the only thought she has is how empty she feels.

"I know, I know, love. I miss her, too," He sighs out sadly, wishing he could take away her pain, hating the way her voice quivers with every word. "Do you want t'talk about it?"

She wipes the tears that sting her eyes and cascade down her face with the sleeve of her sweatshirt. The one she wore when Harry slept over, smelling a little like him still from the car ride to his car that day, three days ago.

They had been texting each other and talking every day since then, usually about light topics like asking how their day's were or what they were doing. However, tonight (or early morning), everything felt like it was crashing down on her. Y/N's strong front she had put up since the funeral for Phoebe's family finally collapsed, and she's found herself stuck under the rubble. She was trying so hard to keep it in because she shouldn't be feeling sorry for herself when someone's kid is dead.

She had bored herself to tears, not knowing what to do. The only thing that seemed right was to call Harry.

"Talk to me, babe." He begs her, running a hand through his disheveled curls.

"I-" She sniffles, "I feel like I'm fucking drowning,"

He hates how defeated her voice sounds and he wishes he could just be there to hug her and tell her everything's going to be okay, eventually.

"It-it feels like my whole life is in ruins. Harry, I miss her." Her face scrunches up again as she starts to sob, "Sh-She was my best friend, I d-did everything with her. How am I s-supposed to do this without her? How am I supposed t-to live without her?"

"Oh, darling. I know, but you will..and you can." He frowns, racking his brain for the right thing to tell her, "You got t'live so you can experience all those ways of life she always talked about. Y'haven't experienced all those feelings Pheebz would mention when she would live her life precariously. Don't y'want to know how she felt when she would talk of such a beautiful life she lived, yeah?"

He hears a hiccup and a quiet, albeit breathy, yeah, from the other side of the call.

"You are so strong, Y/N. I don't know how y'made it this far without breaking down..." He tells her whole-heartedly.

"D-don't know how you haven't either," She gets out, realizing how selfish she's probably being, bothering Harry with her grief when he has his own to deal with.

"Honestly," He breathes out through a somber smile, "The only reason I haven't is because I have you, love."

Y/N's heart swells tenfold, she thinks. She didn't realize Harry needed her just as much as she needed him.

"...I'm sorry for calling you, I know it's late." She says through sniffles when she notices the time.

"There's no reason to apologize. It's okay, love. It's okay to hurt or be angry or upset. No one expects you to be perfect all the time." He pauses, listening to her breathing.

"Ya know, one day, it won't hurt this much. One day, you'll be able t'look back at this moment and it won't break y'heart as much as it does now. You're just in the thick of it right now, pretty girl. But, the light's coming soon, I promise." He continues and Y/N feels her heart beat faster at the pet name.

"You promise?" Her voice barely above a whisper and Harry thinks his heart just broke at the sound.

"Promise." He says, wiping the stray tears rolling down his cheeks, "Phoebe wouldn't want y'to be this upset. She would want you to keep living your life and find out the ways to how she was so in love with it. If not for yourself, love, then for her...F'me."

She nods, despite knowing he can't see. Silence falls over the pair, only the sound of bated breaths assuring the other one is there.

"One summer," He speaks up, "One summer, my family had come t'visit them, partly because of the lake near her house. It was after we had moved t'the States from Cheshire, and Phoebe and I would go walk to the little pond near the park,"

"The one near Hope?" She asks quietly if they had gone to the park she had always played at as a little girl.

"Mhm. We would walk there in the blistering sun and when we got there she tried to convince me how fairies were real." He said in a calm voice.

He hears an airy puff of breath escape her mouth, which he takes as a small giggle -- making him want to continue his story as it's helping her cheer up, and because he'd probably do anything to hear her that sound from her.

"Yeah, fairies. She told me that they live at the pond and t'see them, I would have to find a pretty flower and then jump in the water with it in only m'underwear." He breathes out a laugh.

Y/N gasps, trying to keep quiet but fails when she lets out a loud laugh.

"Oh my, did you do it?" She asks bewildered, laying down so her head rests against the pillow.

"So, I told Phoebe 'no way', yeah? But, then she said she can't just tell me about them and not follow through with seeing them. Convinced me that it would bring bad luck." He scoffs, remembering the memory vividly.

"Bad luck, indeed." She giggles and it brings the dimple out on Harry's face.

"Yeah, so of course, me being like 8 or sum', I stripped down to m'pants in the middle of the day and jumped in the water." He smiles when he hears her laughing, even if it's at his expense. "Y'laughing, but I think I got ringworm after tha'!"

"I can't believe she got you to do that! I wish I'd been there." Y/N says, out of breath from laughing.

"Scarred me of ponds for the rest of m'life." He chuckles and a pause takes them both over as they settle back down. 

"...Thank you, H." She whispers into the phone, adoration taking up all her features.

“F’what?”

“For being you, for being here. Just...Thank you.” She sighs. 

They get lost in recalling stories of their loved one for the rest of the night, repainting her memories in gold. They laugh with each other until all the pain seems to disappear. The weight, of what felt like the world, lifting off of both their shoulders. Finally being able to breathe after days of endless battles of trying to stay strong for Phoebe's sake.

***

Days pass since the lonely 4am phone call and Y/N and Harry are still talking everyday.

She finds out he lives in her city, only a few blocks from her apartment she shared with Phoebe! She didn't believe him when he first told her, but he said he was always busy with college whenever Phoebe tried to meet up. Y/N's not going to lie, her heart picked up when she found out he'd be so close to her, wondering if he'd want to hang out with her when they leave her hometown.

Almost everyday of the last few days they have visiting, they've spent at Y/N's empty childhood home. Harry asking her to explain pictures and what she was like in high school, whenever he gets the chance. In turn, she's been picking his mind on what Holmes Chapel was like and how his family was growing up. She found out that he lived with his sister, Gemma, and his mom, Anne. They talked about everything, from their favorite things to every pet they've ever had (Y/N, particularly, falling in love with the pictures of his cat, Evie).

Just as the last few days have been spent, they are spending Y/N's last day in her hometown together before she goes back. Harry told her he had to stay a couple more nights with his family before he could leave, assuring her he would've gone back with her if he could've. That comment made her blush and she had to pray the butterflies growing in her tummy to relax.

That's another thing. Y/N had stopped lying to herself and denying the ache in her chest that would form when she was away from Harry, growing very fond of him since their first encounter at the headstone bench.

Harry, also, couldn't deny any longer the way his heart would flutter at every little thing she did. Just wondering to himself how everything about her was just so pretty. He loved the way her eyes would light up every time she saw him and how he would catch her checking him out whenever he took off his shirt.

He especially loved the way she let him sleepover a few times and how they would end up cuddling into the late hours of the morning. Both parties not minding one bit, the comfort and warmth actually preferred than sending Harry home to sleep in his own bed.

"Bet I can reach that branch right there," Harry shouts with a gleeful tone, a bit out of breath as he tries to stretch his legs far enough so his shoe brushes against the leaf on the end of the tree branch.

The two of them decided to go to Hope park, where they both held fond childhood memories at. They settled at the swingset, calm swaying in the seats quickly turning into a competition of who could swing the highest. Harry won of course, his legs being much longer than hers giving him the advantage. Playful giggles and sweet conversations of things occurring in that moment help distract them from both Phoebe and the fact that Y/N is leaving.

Y/N is distracting herself from worrying about if Harry will reach out to her when they get back to the city, if he even wants to talk to her again after this weekend or if this was all just out of politeness.

Harry, on the other hand, is distracting himself from wondering if she fancies him. He wonders if the cuddles and small touches meant as much to her as they did him, if after this weekend she would want to hang out again or if she was just being nice because he knows what she's going through.

"Bet I can reach it before you!" She giggles as her hair whips around in the wind she's created. Pumping her legs back and forth, desperately trying to get higher so she can beat Harry in her made up competition.

"Now, love, not everything has to be a competition," He huffs, really reaching out this time, "But, I wanna win, if we're playing a game, I wanna win." He grins, the cute dimple that Y/N has fallen for making an appearance on his face.

The two try their hardest to be the first ones to touch the tree branch hanging not too far from their swinging feet at their highest point. Harry, however, attempts a little too hard and flies off the swing when he lifted up his leg to make the two inch gap he was short of.

Tumbling to the woodchip covered ground, he ends up laying on his back. Groans spill out of his mouth and Y/N's eyes go wide with concern. She slows herself down just enough to safely jump off the swingset, rushing to Harry's side.

"Oh my god, are you okay?" She asks worriedly, trying to hold back the laugh that's trying to bust out. Crouching down to him, she runs her hand over his arm that's grabbing his leg.

He rubs his knee with a pained smile, "Yeah, just peachy, pet."

"Is anything hurting? Bruised?" She questions with a loving smile.

"Just my ego," He chuckles, looking up at her and admiring her caring nature.

She can't hold it in anymore, she laughs loudly at his comment, her carefree happiness making Harry's ears perk up and his heart warm.

"Yeah, love, just laugh at the crippled man." He jokes, smiling up at her happy face, wishing it could stay that way forever.

She lets out another laugh at his comment, delicately grabbing his arm to help him up, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry. It wasn't funny," She attempts to calm herself but fails, "Okay, it was a little bit funny!"

Giggles fall out of her mouth as Harry brushes off the mulch from his jeans, "See how much you're laughing when I push you out of the swing."

"I'm soo scared." She mocks fear.

"Oh, just wait, pet. You'll never be safe on another swing set again." He playfully grabs her sides to tickle her, but her fighting his tries just ends up bringing her closer in his hold.

Their laughs quickly die out when they realize he's holding her in his clutch, his hands at her waist, hers around his neck. Harry stares into her eyes as she stares back into his. The empty park is serene, no other noises besides the chirping of birds and the sounds of other animals sprawling about. The sweet moment causes Y/N's breath to hitch and her palms to sweat. They've only been this close when cuddling, she's never been this close to his face before. His features glow in the sunlight, his green irises complimenting the bounce of his skin and dark eyelashes. Her skin is soft and warm against his, and he just wants to lean in and-

Y/N's eyes flutter close as Harry's face comes closer, his lips meet hers in a gentle caress. With the sweet kiss, he takes note of how soft her lips are, how warm and fuzzy her intimate touch is making his head. While one hand is squeezing at her side, the other is brought up to cradle her face and she leans into his touch. Harry sucks on her bottom lip before peeling away so they can catch their breath.

Y/N lets out a whine at the loss of contact, her bottom lip jutting out as he pulls away.

"What are y'pouting for, pet? W-was that not okay? Should I not have done tha'?" The blood almost drains from his face at the pouty look on her beautiful face.

She shakes her head at him, "No, I liked it. I want more," She pants, pulling him by the collar of his shirt to bring him back to her lips.

He chuckles at her cute antics (and in relief of not fucking up his shot with her). He smiles against her lips as he melts back into her, her hand around his neck reaching up to tangle in his curly hair. He groans when her nimble fingers pull tenderly at the curls at the base of his neck, causing him to squeeze her side gently.

She breathlessly kissed him, slotting her lips between his and immediately opening her mouth in acceptance when he brushes his tongue against her bottom lip in a silent ask to take it further. As the kiss deepens, the need for air increases. They naturally separate, Harry sucking her bottom lip as he goes until it pops back.

Taking in her reddened swollen lips and her pretty flushed face, he presses one last chaste kiss on her lips, and one to her cheek and her nose.

A big, genuine grin adorns Y/N's face as she stares up at the man in front of her.

"Thank you f'letting me do tha'." He says with a gravelly voice.

"I've been thinking about you doing that since the first night you stayed at my house." She tells him bashfully.

"Me too, love. And it was better than I ever expected," He says whole-heartedly, leaning in to press one more quick kiss to her lips again.

"So, does this mean we're gonna hang out when we both go back home? Because I really want to do that again." Her glassy eyes blink at him with hope awaiting his answer.

He smiles and shakes his head, bewildered at how she could ever think that he could just ghost her after that, "I think Phoebe would come back just to slap me upside the head if I ever kissed her best friend and just never saw her again."

She chuckles at his comment, shyly looking down to her hand on his chest when he doesn't say anything else.

"Of course, I want to hang out when we get back. I want to take y'out on a real date, if you'd let me."  He looks at her all starry eyed, squeezing her waist.

"I think Phoebe would come back and slap me upside the head if I ever kissed her cousin and just never saw him again," This time he's the one that laughs.

"I'd love that very much, Harry." She beams up at him.

Going back home couldn't come sooner to the both of them.

******************

ahhh i hope y’all liked that, i’d love feedback :) i’m thinking of making a series out of it, but only if that’s something y’all would like! so, pls let me know if you enjoyed it or if i should make a part 2 ?? 

anyways, stay safe and much love <3

[hxhhasmysoul]

Read ur answer to an ask abt Gon's "selfishness", & ur rb of a post of Ging not "abandoning" Gon; both were interesting reads. Liked what u said abt Gon, Mtio, Killua, & Ging. "& to get to what Gon really is & what's Killua’s interpretation of Gon takes a lot of work & honestly is very hard. it’s really hard to filter out Killua’s pov & i don’t think I’ve managed.." Yeah, we get a lot KilluaPOV; interestingly. How much of Gon do u think is really him & what do u think is Killua's interpretation?

Thank you for the ask <3 I’m really hesitant to answer this question without rereading the manga and taking notes XD but that’d mean i could answer it only after a month or more XD maybe i’ll do the reread in February and make a more detailed post on the topic. So here I’ll just give the broad strokes. I’m sorry for that. I hope it won't feel too chaotic. And I do find Gon more complex than what I'll outline here.

I’m not sure if it’s exactly Killua’s interpretation per se. What I mean is that probably a lot of the stuff we read/hear Killua think or say about Gon is pretty accurate. Like the conclusions Killua comes to when he outright analyses Gon’s character and skills. What Killua is less good at figuring out, if I remember canon correctly, is Gon’s attitude to him. And I think he also fails when it comes to Gon’s motivations and the scope of Gon’s mental breakdown in the chimaera ant arc. It’s a mixed bag so this is the first pitfall that sometimes we can rely on Killua and sometimes we can’t.

And that comes from the fact that Killua isn’t neutral towards Gon. He can’t detach his analysis of Gon from how Gon affects him. And that’s a really human feature of Killua’s, truly analysing people we’re emotionally attached to might be impossible. And this is where I think the reader comes in with their own interpretation.

It’s true that the reader can make the mistake of overly relying on Killua’s analysis of Gon, or Wing’s, Bisky’s, Ging’s etc. But I think the bigger pitfall is analysing Gon through Killua’s emotions or the opposite by deciding that taking into account how Gon affects the people around him, including Killua, is unfair to Gon.

And this boils down to which character they like more or resonates with them more.

There are more people who prefer Killua and it’s easy to see why. Killua’s emotions and thoughts become more and more open to us as the story progresses. While Gon’s, on the other hand, become more and more closed off. It’s just easier to align yourself with the character who seems easy to understand than with the character who becomes more and more distant.

Idk how intentional it is on Togashi’s part, but I’d venture a guess that it is pretty intentional. In the exam arc Gon’s pov is the main one and we get good insight into the way he thinks. We see him figure out tricky situations, like the test with the candles. We see him analyse how Pokkele gets the badge he needs. Then figure out the getting Hisoka’s badge issue, how he approaches the problem, how he analyses what he’s doing and progressively eliminates the flaws in his approach until he comes to the exact right way to get the badge. This part also shows us three other things.

One: focusing on a task can leave Gon blind to the rest of the world, which results in him losing his own badge and Hisoka getting an opportunity to manipulate Gon.

Two: not achieving something on his own merits really fucks Gon up.

Three: that he doesn’t know how to handle situations where his goals conflict with his loyalties - Togashi shows him mercy here and Gon isn’t forced to choose between Kurapika and Leorio’s well-being and getting the badge.

Point 2 is actually reinforced here because it already shows up in the game with Netero on the ship and comes back again really damn fast when Gon gets brutalised by Hanzo. We see more of it in Gon’s fights in Heaven’s Arena. He doesn’t mind the losses that much, as long as his victories are earned. He doesn’t seem that bothered by his loss to Hisoka because he achieves in that fight almost as much as he could. What disappoints him is that the referee quite openly and Hisoka sneakily make the fight shorter so Gon’s time to learn from Hisoka is cut a bit short. It also comes back when Gon chooses to play Greed Island alone, without using shortcuts.

And that part of Gon’s personality is tainted from the start. He doesn’t mind getting hurt, being downright brutalised if the win at the end feels earned. He lets himself get hurt by Hanzo, the arena guy, Hisoka, Genthru and Knuckle. All to become more capable and earn the victories that he hopes to have after the brutalisation. And this peaks in his nen contract where this character trait/flaw meets his mental breakdown.

This part of Gon’s personality I think can be pretty fairly blamed on the Freecess and the hunters. On the Freecess because the condition Mito chooses to hinge Gon’s participation in the exam on is Gon catching an elusive and hard to catch fish. Aka Gon needed to hone several skills to achieve that: strength, reflexes, patience, angling and probably several others. Ging decided that any contact with him will depend on Gon getting the hunter’s licence. Kite, when he meets Gon on whale island, chastises him for his lack of knowledge and skill. And then as the story progresses Gon needs to get better at stuff constantly.

The approval of a lot of people in Gon’s life hinges on him being capable, and more often than not these expectations of capability are beyond what anyone could expect from a child but that’s classic shonen shit. The twist in hxh is that these constant expectations break Gon in the end.

The fact that so much of Gon’s relationships is dependent on him proving himself he really doesn’t seem to know how to foster those relationships that don’t require that from him. Mito, while she did give Gon that skill based ultimatum, actually loves him regardless of what he can and can’t do. The ultimatum taints their relationship a bit but it doesn’t determine whether Gon is worthy of Mito’s attention. And I suspect Gon knows that. Him calling Mito his mum and rejecting whoever Ging would talk about on the tape shows that Gon feels pretty certain of her.

And that’s actually a double edged sword. Because when Gon starts feeling secure within a relationship with someone he starts to take it for granted. I don’t think it’s a conscious decision, it’s more of an automatic subconscious mechanism. He does that with Killua, too.

In the beginning Killua gets interested in Gon because Killua sees someone his age who’s also very capable. And actually throughout the exam arc it’s Killua who follows Gon around, makes sure he doesn’t lose sight of Gon. At that point Gon’s just generally making friends and Killua is the last one he meets. It’s clear that he’s not more attached to Killua than he’s to Kurapika or Leorio.

What fosters a stronger attachment is first of the injustice that happens to Killua by Illumi’s hands and the forced separation afterwards. Because Gon has a very strong sense of whats just and what isn't, though it gets challenged and more shaky as the story progresses.

The Zoldycks are really stupid abusers because if Illumi didn’t do his thing in public, if he let Killua pass the exam and scared him into going home after Gon probably wouldn’t go after Klliua. They would all be parting ways, it’d stand to reason that Killua’s going to do his own thing. If Illumi played his cards right no one would’ve suspected that something was amiss. But Gon going after Killua really cements their friendship.

After their friendship is cemented and they decide to travel together Killua jumps into his big brother mode. Seeing that Gon has no clue what to do next, Killua takes the reins and starts to control the logistics of finding Ging, usually for the better but sometimes for the worse - like when Killua gets them to lose almost all their money XD.

And because Killua starts playing this facilitating role, previously played by Mito, Gon, while cherishing their relationship, starts to also overly rely on it. And before Gon starts to break it’s all kind of harmless, though it does feel a bit ominous. Like this might become a problem and then it does.

It’s not to say that Gon never caters to Killua’s emotional needs. The whole saving Killua thing is Gon taking into consideration Killua’s emotions. He does it again on Whale Island by saying the exact thing Killua needs to hear, or again when they are Nobunaga’s captives.

He also does that kind of stuff for Kurapika in York New.

Gon generally really cares about the well-being of the people he likes. He gets angry when they get hurt, when injustice happens to them. He wants to protect them, also protect them from being bothered by his needs or his problems. Where his emotional intelligence doesn’t work so well is understanding how his actions may affect others. Especially when theoretically they aren’t involved at all. We can first see it with Zebro at the testing gate. Zebro needs to clearly alert Gon to the fact that his actions may mean trouble for Zebro. And that is something Killua never does, he bottles stuff up.

And when this comes back with a vengeance is when Togashi starts limiting our direct, unbiased insight into Gon. Because we have it very clearly spelt out how Gon’s behaviour negatively affects Killua but it requires effort to piece together what Gon’s going through, what he may be thinking.

And here when some fan interpretations go so aggressively into two opposing directions.

1. Gon’s selfish because he’s not thinking about Killua at all. He’s only focused on his goals blah blah.

2. Gon’s a kid going through a mental breakdown and Killua is actually facilitating it and projecting too much onto Gon and expecting too much of him.

And because how this concludes is so visceral so shocking and possibly traumatising for the reader it’s very easy to get lost in the emotions of it all. And a lot of fandom is very quick in trying to assign blame and moral judgement to something like this. Their minds subconsciously decide whether Gon’s only the victim in the chimaera ant arc and completely not responsible for Killua’s feelings, or if he’s guilty of making Killua feel bad. And once the decision is made many just double down it. And it goes into full on “sweet innocent baby” Gon or “selfish, uncaring and stupid” Gon.

[kraviolis]

sorting the owl house characters into hogwarts houses, because im cringe

luz - ravenclaw

she’s creative and clever and is always searching to learn new things and loves learning just for the sake of learning. shes incredibly witty and quick thinking and open-minded. she’s constantly finding clever, creative, and original ways to solve her problems. she hardly blinked when given the opportunity to learn magic, and only continued to show an intense amount of intelligence and appreciation for academics. shes very resourceful as a human learning magic, finding a entirely new form of magic when it was apparent that she couldnt do it the traditional way. she’s very aspiring, wanting to be a witch and an author since she was very young. she’s very logical about a lot of things, like how it doesnt make sense to not allow witches to study multiple tracks or that people were imprisoned just for being themselves. she’s highly encouraging of individuality which is a lesser known trait of ravenclaw but very important. she can be a perfectionist at times and tended to avoid social interaction so she could persue her creativity. she’s outspoken, an overthinker, and very competitive. i think a lot of people might say she’s a hufflepuff, as she’s loyal and kind and hardworking, but luz values learning and creativity above any of those other things— this is evident, when she makes the decision to stay in the boiling isles to learn magic rather than go home to her mom, thus putting knowledge and creativity over her own family.

eda - gryffindor

she’s not afraid to stand up for herself and others and will never back down from a challenge. she would rather die as herself than live unauthentically. she’s very passionate and empathetic. she’s rebellious against rules that dont make sense to her and cares intensely for her friends and family. she has a strong internal moral code that she sticks to intensely, never straying from it. in the very first episode, she breaks into the conformatorium just to get a paper crown thats important to king. she let raine break up with her because she didnt want to burden them with her curse. she forfeited the match with lily because she knew her sister wanted to be in the emperor’s coven more than she ever did. she’s sacrifices herself for luz & king over and over again because she cares so deeply for her.

king - slytherin

he’s self-centered, smart, arrogant, and highly ambitious. he would do anything to achieve his goals— which was at first reclaiming his throne as the king of demons, and then turned into finding out where he came from. he tried to use luz as a means to reach his goals when he became an author, nearly sacrificing their friendship. he became incredibly loyal to luz after that in the same way he’s loyal to eda, the one who raised him.

(other characters under the cut)

lily - slytherin

it was between this and ravenclaw, because she’s incredibly intelligent and does seem to enjoy learning and has a great mind, she’s also incredibly ambitious and prideful. the deciding factor was that she cursed eda just to reach her own goals. she’s still loyal to eda even when working for belos, which says a lot to how she’s loyal to only a select few people. to her, the ends justify the means (making amity cheat to appear like the better teacher, cursing eda to win the duel, kidnapping luz to get belos to cure eda, losing her magic to help eda)

amity - gryffindor

this one was hard, i swapped between slytherin and gryffindor a lot for her. she’s ambitious and intelligent, but also not afraid to do whats right even if means breaking the rules. she’s self-sacrificing and empathetic and prideful. she ended her friendship with boscha to help luz and willow win. she didnt like luz at first because luz kept cheating and messing up her life, which means she has a strong moral code against cheating and bullies. she’s rebellious in small ways at first but once she started realizing how terrible her parents and belos really were, she pulled away extremely quickly.

willow - slytherin

not surprising, if you take into her account of self-preservation and bending of the rules to suit her ambitions. in the first episode she agrees to cheating just to get ahead in school because she wants to make her parents proud, and in the end she switches to the plants track so to her the ends justify the means. she pulled out of the grudgby game when luz pushed her & gus too far, a perfect example of that self preservation. she has a sense of loyalty that extends to very specific people but she always makes sure those people are taken care of. her parents, luz, gus, and eventually king, eda, and amity, too. she wouldn’t die for them, but she would kill for them.

gus - hufflepuff

sure, he has the ravenclaw curiousity and thirst for knowledge, but he’s very kind, hard working, has a strong inner sense of justice and fairness, and is tolerant of others. he helps mattholomule even if he’d been a jerk before because it was unfair if he didnt. he helps luz break into belos’s castle to find a cure for eda, lets luz borrow his library card to see amity, and hated it when mattholomule tried to lie about the human objects. he knows what it feels like to be left behind and underestimated, so he makes an effort to be kind to others who seem to be in the same boat. he’s very young but already so accomplished which is a testament to how hard he works.

hunter - hufflepuff

this one was HARD. it was either slytherin or this, and a deciding factor for this is the fact that he is self-sacrificing. he sacrifices a lot for other people, even if it doesnt seem like it. in the palisman episode, he sacrifices the palismen getting away despite knowing he would be punished for returning empty-handed. in eclipse lake, he leaves to find the titans blood for belos when he simply could have stayed in the castle and been safe. he’s viciously hard-working, dedicated, and loyal to his family. he lets people’s actions speak for them. he doesn’t immediately judge luz for using wild magic and actually seems interested in it before remembering to be loyal to belos. he’s patient, too, as seen by his interactions with luz. he gets frustrated, sure, but he still works with her. he’s modest about his rank and title, preferring to not flaunt it more than needed. but he does take pride in it. he’s kind in his own way, specifically to belos and lil rascal, but you can see it in his interactions with amity & luz, too. with amity, he empathizes with her and gives her advice that he thinks is true, and offers to dig a grave for her too when its apparent that neither of them are getting any titans blood. with luz, he gives up the palismen and protects her from kikimora. that boy is a hufflepuff for sure.

raine - gryffindor

oh buddy theyre the biggest gryffindor ever. they extremely, extremely brave. they have terrible stage fright and anxiety but they still became head bard, and they still ran an underground resistance group, and they still gave everything up just to help eda. they have a strong sense of whats right and whats wrong and incredible amount of passion, empathy, and integrity. they have a great sense of pride— “How did someone with stage fright end up as Head Witch?” “I’m just that good.”— and are very selfless. they stopped eda from sacrificing herself because they knew her kids needed her more, they sacrificed themselves in eda’s place and gave up everything they had just so eda wouldnt have to.

camila - hufflepuff

she’s extraordinarily kind, even when she’s terrified. she’s accepting and open-minded and hardworking, making sure to show luz that she loves her creativity but still wants to make sure luz can do well in school and can make friends. sometimes you can do something you think is kind but isnt really. she’s also a single mother doing her best to give her daughter a good life, which is a credit to how hard she works and how dedicated she is to her daughter. she even took the day off of work to drive luz to camp because she knew luz was anxious and wanted to reassure her. she’s patient with luz, and even when faced with the scariest moment of her life, she’s still thinking of how luz feels rather than her own fears and anger. she’s very much a hufflepuff in the way that she’s quiet and unassuming but fiercely protective of her family.

vee - slytherin

she’s opportunistic and has a sense of self-preservation. she’d rather save her own skin than do that right thing. she’s cunning, having pretended to be camila’s daughter just to have a place for herself. this isnt a bad thing at all, though. she’s also loyal to camila, who she sees as her family, and even got into a fight with luz over how she treated camila. she still listened to luz and let luz help her so that vee could remain living as luz. she doesnt feel guilty about valuing herself ahead of luz.

belos - ravenclaw

honestly? not a hard decision. he’s smart, sure, but he’s not people-smart. he didnt think lilith would betray him after he admitted to lying about healing eda. he doesnt understand loyalty, not even to those close to him. he’s rational and logical rather than emotional. if the theory that he is philip wittebane is to be believed, then its obvious he has an appreciation for learning and knowledge. belos distinctly reminds me of lockhart, or even quirrell, who were also in ravenclaw. he’s got an arrogance to him that blinds him, believing himself to be the smartest and strongest witch on the isles and thus underestimating others, which will only lead him to ruin.

[itsclydebitches]

I'm sorry, but as someone who can't stand how Yang acted for 80% of Atlas, saying "her feeling like she had to help raise Ruby is demeaning and unempathetic to Tai" is a HORRIBLE take. If Yang held it against Tai that'd be one thing, but she doesn't, least not as far as we've seen.

And "she decided he's an unfit parent"? That's literally just headcanon. Where is this stated or supported in any way? Literally everything, from the show to the comics to the manga, shows she absolutely values her father and his guidance. Her providing similar guidance to Ruby at some point doesn't change that, she's stated to be Ruby's mother figure, a woman in her life she could seek advice on in regards to things as well.

Like anon I get you're frustrated by how empathy and morality are handled in this show, I am too, but this just ain't it.

I have simillar feelings on the Weiss scene too but that's another story, you already kind of covered it.

Agreed, though I don't want to rag on the other anon. As said, I can very easily see how someone would come to that conclusion, especially given how often we discuss parts of the show without actually re-watching those scenes, leading to iffy interpretations down the line. A fandom pretty heavily focused on a "Tai is a bad dad" reading + Yang's unfair criticisms of others from Volumes 5-8 (notably her most recent characterization. The one fresh in everyone's mind) = an easy opportunity to mistakenly slam the two together. It happens. That's why I try, whenever possible, to re-watch moments, or at the very least re-read transcripts. I'm well aware of how easy it is to get sucked into how the fandom discusses scenes and take that interpretation at face value, when in fact what's canonical has gotten pretty warped across, in this case, six years of content and discussions.

But let's talk about Weiss a bit more! I think it's worth re-emphasizing that, yes, I'm well aware that she was the victim of that dinner party. My own criticism lies less in that specific moment and more the conceptualizing of our heroes as a whole, which leads to some missed opportunities in that moment, some quite important. For example, most classically heroic characters would be horrified at nearly hurting/killing someone, regardless of whether that was intentional or not. That's a crucial part of what makes them heroic: cherishing life and shouldering responsibility for others' safety, even when it's clear from the audience's more objective perspective that they weren't at fault. There's a happy middle ground here between acknowledging Weiss' horrific panic attack and acknowledging Weiss' responsibility moving forward to ensure that her trauma doesn't endanger others—given that her trauma is drawing on literal, combat techniques—highlighting her desire to do right by the people of Remnant, even when they're snobbish, rich assholes. Any reading that boils things down simply to "Weiss is the only victim in this situation and besides, why do we care if a racist Atlesian bites the dust 😒?" is a small representation of the much larger writing problems of Volumes 7 and 8: acting like Mantle is full of only good victims, Atlas only evil perpetrators, and a defense of the latter isn't worth anyone's time—certainly not the heroes who never, ever make mistakes with massive consequences. Weiss' near attack also carries with it the beginnings of a lot of themes that RWBY never capitalized on, but pretended were an important part of the story by the end of that Atlas arc, like Ironwood's supposed propaganda, or Whitley's question of whether power should be solely in the hands of a few, individual huntsmen. Weiss' situation might have been reframed into something that looks intentional: Here's not just a girl, but a Schnee girl, attacking a poor, defenseless civilian with her scary powers. Are we really going to leave the safety of our kingdom—the world—in the hands of people like her? You should be backing the army, people who have your real interests in mind, led by the man who saved that woman's life—General Ironwood! And the audience would rightly be going, Hey now wait a fucking minute. That's not what happened! It was an accident born of trauma and abuse. How can you manipulate the people into thinking otherwise? Into thinking Weiss is the enemy here? Like, if you're going to write Ironwood/Atlas as the awful, propaganda spewing antagonists... actually write that story.

So the party scene could have been the launching point for a lot of important work, both in terms of Weiss' characterization (a hero learning to balance flaws with her people's safety; taking responsibility for her mistakes, no matter the initial intention) and the world building (what does it mean for a Schnee to (mistakenly) attack a civilian when tensions are this high and faith in huntsmen is beginning to fail?) But for the purposes of what we actually got, that lack of reflection on Weiss' part, as said, reads badly when pit against her actions in Volumes 6-8. Because my brain is super focused on Star Wars atm, I think Anakin is a decent comparison to all this. Meaning, we know where he ends up—super scary Sith Lord who is going to do All The Bad Things Ever—and that will, naturally, color our reading of everything that happens in prequal material. When Anakin gets pissed and cuts the limbs off a Separatist, it produces a "Yikes" reaction in the audience because we know that anger, grief, frustration, and fear are going to lead him down an awful path. In contrast, when Obi-Wan is challenged about his no killing unarmed men policy and cheekily looks to Rex to kill him instead, we don't really go "Yikes" because we know Obi-Wan remains true to the Light for his entire run. All their actions have the primary reading of "They were justified that time/they made a mistake/they're allowed to be human/etc." But only Anakin has the secondary reading of, "That action is REALLY BAD—more bad than Obi-Wan's—because we know where it leads. It reads as setup for his inevitable fall." That's basically where the RWBY group is at the moment, provided you're unhappy with their lack of empathy in the later volumes. If the group had remained more compassionate then yeah, we'd continue to shrug off past moments that sorta imply otherwise because we know that's not who they really are. Weiss never grappled with nearly hurting someone only because, hell, RWBY doesn't let her grapple with anything! She didn't even get to respond to getting speared through the gut. But knowing where they end up—knowing that Weiss will be party to Ozpin's treatment, will help betray Ironwood, will accuse Marrow of abandoning her city only to do nothing for it in turn, will threaten her brother, will give the wish to destroy her entire kingdom and displace all its people, etc.—creates that "Yikes" response whenever we see something earlier that even somewhat aligns with her current characterization. It doesn't erase the 100% correct reading that Weiss was the victim and made a totally unintentional mistake in that moment. It doesn't erase the knowledge that RWBY rarely capitalizes on the implications of scenes like this anyway. It only adds another reading in the form of, "Well, knowing where she ends up... I can kinda see that future version in her here too."

[keyofjetwolf]

We’re All Just Guys

Well it took the entire fucking season, but I FINALLY get the purpose for Henry Fondle: Sex Robot. And while the entire episode (and season, honestly) has been tremendous, that this ridiculous fucking punchline was the vehicle to deliver the overarching point with a solid knockout punch of meaning AND pathos? Absolutely floored. That BoJack Horseman can be (and often is) brilliant isn’t a surprise, but the ways is keeps proving it often are.

So “The Stopped Show”, a tale of accountability and responsibility and how we’re all just guys.

Each of our main characters closes out this season alone (sort of), in assorted stages of realizing the main themes, or completely failing to. I find Diane’s arc the hardest for me to make a decision on, which isn’t surprising, as I think in many ways, Diane’s the most complicated character in the show. She delivers, directly and succinctly, one of the major points of not just this season but the entire show, but how does it relate to her? I’M NOT COMPLETELY SURE. I think part of the problem with (and for) Diane is that she knows better. She’s the most insightful character, she has a fantastic head on her shoulders, but only for everyone else. She’s this fucked up little disaster prophet, her vision clear and her message concise, unable to ever apply her gifts to fix herself.

Diane is just as trapped as BoJack, but in a fun twist, is now lagging behind him in trying to do something about it. Nearly every single scene with Diane this season has been in this sad little room of her sad little apartment with all her sad little unpacked boxes, and no matter how much truth and wisdom she spits out, HERE SHE STILL IS, failing to correctly assemble IKEA furniture with names like Bȧcksleid. She already feels like shit for sleeping with Mr. Peanutbutter, so what does she do? THE SAME FUCKING THING. To which I groan and roll my eyes, while simultaneously being proud of her for directly and immediately setting him straight about not getting back together. Diane rides this constant line where she gets it but also doesn’t, which is so interesting to me in the level of additional frustration this makes me feel. BoJack is so self-absorbed you don’t really expect any better of him, which has the flip side of your expectations being so low that even the whiff of progress feels exceptional. Diane doesn’t come with any of that though, she knows better, you KNOW she knows better, and the consequence of this for the audience is that she winds up being more unlikeable than the guy who literally last episode nearly strangled his girlfriend and co-star in the middle of a paranoid drug-induced frenzy.

Which is fucked up! It’s intensely fucked up! And also, I think, the point! We expect more of Diane, and so feel more disappointed when she doesn’t deliver. Is that fair of us?

But there’s more here, as we pivot to the accountability portion of this episode/season. From the beginning of the show, it’s been incredibly upfront about how everything is unfair. We come back to this time and again. Privilege rules the day in the world of Hollywoo. Fame, money, charisma, gender, power. BoJack has been an asshole from pretty much the moment he set foot in the spotlight (possibly before?), and the only thing ever even attempting to hold him back has been the moments his guilt manages to scream loud enough to be heard over his internal narrative. Whatever he does, however he fucks up, he always stumbles back to his feet, and NEVER with any (broad scale) consequences. Meanwhile, here’s Diane, in her sad shitty apartment. Consequences haunt Diane, even if she’s the one doing the haunting. The crap things she’s done and the shitty choices she’s made cling to her.

There’s no fairness in that either, no justice. But Hollywoo (and the entire world around it) (and our world too oh yes) has that privilege carved into its bones, and Diane bears none of its marks. Her situation is very different from but parallel to Gina, who is just so fucked over, it keeps legitimately making me angry for her.

Gina, of course, brought none of this on herself. She made the mistake of caring about BoJack and trying to help him. OOPS YOU WERE A GENEROUS PERSON WITH AN OPEN HEART FUCK YOU LADY. For her trouble, Gina has been assaulted and traumatized, AND she is in very real danger of her career being over when it’s only just finally beginning. And she KNOWS THIS. That’s the part that I keep coming back to. All this should be an aberration, an anomaly, and while that may be true of the specifics, conceptually, it’s so commonplace that Gina already knows how it’s going to play. She’ll stop being Gina and become The Woman Nearly Strangled To Death By BoJack Horseman. Even if she’s able to keep working, this is what she’ll be asked about in every interview forever. Even if she convinced people to genuinely listen to her, BoJack would, at worst, get a slap on the wrist as he stumbles back to his feet. We know that, WE ALL KNOW THAT, because it happens all. the. fucking. time. Gina did nothing wrong, but this would still define her for the rest of her life, while for BoJack, it would maybe become a footnote on his Wikipedia page.

Nothing about that is FAIR. Nothing about it is JUST. Gina’s choices shouldn’t have to be “this becomes my entire life” or “swallow this down and pretend it never happened”. But it is, as it has been in perpetuity for the victims of the privileged.

So then what can we do about it? Well that’s really the question, isn’t it? This episode answers it in an assortment of ways (I think the entire SHOW is very much about this, really, but this episode is for sure coming with guns blazing), while also showing us why none of those answers can work. It’s funny and sad and awful and true, but also, ultimately, the most hopeful answer because it’s the only one you can actually affect: It’s you. It’s me. It’s each and every one of us, individually, making a choice to be better.

And believe it or not, we embody this with Henry Fondle: Sex Robot.

I thought the whole thing was so unbelievably stupid. Half the season, we’ve had this goddamn multi-dildo’d juvenile frat boy joke running around with its stupid ass Speak-and-Say voice, doing the same shtick over and over, and I’m like, “okay this is just the shit I have to put up with to get the clever stuff, I guess.” BUT THAT’S EXACTLY THE POINT I’M SITTING THERE LIVING THE ENTIRE GODDAMN POINT AND MISSING IT. Henry Fondle: Sex Robot is seventeen shades of overt horribleness, AND WE ALL JUST GIVE IT A PASS. It’s just the way it is, the way the world works, the price of doing business. When the whole time -- THE ENTIRE FUCKING TIME -- all it took was one person to say no. One person who could see the game we all are playing and was willing to give up everything to stop it.

Hilariously, Henry Fondle IS a metaphor, sort of, but of the saddest kind. He is literally a robot, he can’t possibly change. What’s more, media fervor will never affect him, fallout will never touch him, and the powerful will always rally around themselves to retain their power. It takes Todd, the head of the company, the creator of Henry Fondle, and the one person who would benefit most from the unending efforts of the rest of the world bending over backwards to avoid the truth, to put a stop to it. In doing so, he immediately returns to his old, homeless, destitute self, but doesn’t once hesitate or look back.

It’s Todd, and only Todd, that stops that madness, because while individual people are a problem, the world at large is too. Stefani makes a great point that Diane holds herself and everyone else to impossible standards and a little forgiveness and grace wouldn’t go amiss, but when Diane suggests they apply that philosophy to their clickbait gossipy shit on their website, it’s just

Which again, is beautifully cynical and depressing, but not untrue. Fostering a more forgiving culture isn’t in stopping websites from posting clickbaity takedown articles, it’s each person deciding not to take the clickbait. We can absolutely have a conversation about the people creating their world or the world creating its people, but when you boil it down, only one of those things can you yourself absolutely and directly change, and it’s not the entire world.

A THING DIANE GETS BUT SIMULTANEOUSLY ABSOLUTELY DOES NOT.

I can’t take myself away from this Diane thing, I know, but only because she’s the fucking CORE of each and every one of us struggling with this idea. She’s the simplicity of it and the complication all in one. Not BoJack, which is NOT where I thought we’d be when we started this journey. BoJack is more an action on the people around him at this point in the story, he IS the world you cannot change. He’s pointed to rehab, and off he goes -- or doesn’t! I don’t think it’s coincidence that we stay with Diane and watch her watching him.

Oh, Diane, indeed. As she tells her story of her friend Abby, who threw her over for the cool kids, who turned every confidence into a scar. Who Diane still helped anyway, because Abby needed her. Did Abby learn from that, did she get better? We don’t know; we stay with Diane and watch her watching Abby. Diane, who can so completely understand about personal responsibility while failing to recognize her own enabling for the shitty things that keep happening to her.

You can control yourself. That’s it. That’s the only playground with a guarantee.

Will BoJack go off to learn that? Will Diane stay and figure it out?

THAT’S WHAT NEXT SEASON IS FOR

Something I was toying with including in this, but ultimately decided against for a variety of reasons, was the contrast between BoJack’s take on personal responsibility independent of external response, and The Good Place’s argument that people need external support for personal growth. An idea I may not have even considered contrasting save that Doc’s talked before about these two Jewish creators with what are clearly very different philosophies, and basically, if she were ever able to manage a discussion between them on this, I’d love to be in the room. I’ll be very quiet and not get in the way, I promise.

[bedlamsbard]

Some new concept writing! There’s backstory for this one, but I’m not sure how much will get written because it’s relatively different from most of my extant concept writing and/or canon.  The short version is that the Clone Wars ended, but not with Order 66; the Purge and fall of the Republic happened about 8-10 years later than in canon.  (Caleb and Hera would have been in their light teens/early 20s at the time, so about the same time as AND in canon.)  My worldbuilding brain is clicking over the differences and repercussions, but, uh, we’ll see if there’s more. (If I went forward, there would be some characters I haven’t written in five or six years turning up.)

About 3K below the break.  Please note that I don’t warn.

***

Parasites, Hera Syndulla thought, but kept her face pleasantly bland.  The description was unfair to only a small handful of her fellow senators, but as far as she was concerned was more than accurate in regards to the remainder. She sipped her wine and tilted her head a little to make it look like she was listening to Senator An’s description of the opera he had attended two nights previous, wondering if it was too early in the evening for her to go back to her apartment and scream into a pillow.

The occasion was a gathering to welcome freshman senators who might be inclined to the opposition party, which meant that a number of loyalist senators were here just to find out which of the freshmen were actually considering it.  In Hera’s experience the opposition mostly just made noise before agreeing to whatever legislation the Emperor wanted to pass, but the numbers mattered and a show of disapproval was better than nothing.  She wasn’t a freshman anymore, but her absence at the party would have been noticed by both sides; Ryloth didn’t hold much political sway but it was well-known.

A break in Senator An’s storytelling let her step away, gesturing vaguely at her now-empty wineglass as an excuse.  There were serving droids roaming the room so she was able to deposit it with one of them; she was trying to decide whether to stay longer or leave when she noticed an eddy in the crowd, people stepping aside and trying not to seem like they were doing so.  Riyo Chuchi was suddenly at her side, the older woman’s face drawn.

“What is it?” Hera asked her, low-voiced.

“The Emperor’s Inquisitor is making his rounds,” Riyo said, equally soft. She snagged two glasses from a passing serving droids and handed one to Hera.

She took it, tasted it, and then looked sharply at Riyo. “His?”

For the past two years, as long as Hera had been serving in the Senate, the Inquisitor assigned to Coruscant had been a woman, a huge Dowutin who delighted in terrifying the senators of both parties, as well as anyone else she came in contact with.

“I saw him in the other room,” Riyo said; the party spilled through half a dozen rented rooms and onto the balconies of each.  “He’s human, young.  I think I’ve seen him before, but I can’t think where.”

Hera raised her gaze as the movement in the room reached them.  She felt Riyo draw back, but Hera stood frozen, her heart in her throat.

The Inquisitor was a tall human male, amber-skinned and dark-haired, with a fading bruise visible on his face.  Despite that, and the scars that cut across his cheek, he was handsome; if he hadn’t been an Inquisitor Hera knew a dozen senators, female and otherwise, who would have been throwing themselves at him.  His pale gaze moved across the crowd without seeming to see anyone in it, as if he did so only to make sure they knew he was there.  If he saw Hera, he didn’t show it, just kept walking with steadied patience toward the balcony.

Hera put the glass back into Riyo’s hand and followed him before the Pantoran had a chance to protest her departure.

By the time she had reached the balcony, most of its occupants had fled back inside, though there were a dozen senators and their aides still standing by the refreshment cart there, trying not to watch the Inquisitor.  He had retreated to the far end of the balcony and was standing with his gaze fixed on the cityscape beyond.

He must have sensed her approach, but he didn’t show any sign of acknowledgment until she stepped up beside him and said quietly, “Caleb?”

He turned towards her, his eyes widening.

He had, Hera knew immediately, been very badly hurt.  There was something mad in his gaze, something more like a wounded animal than a sentient being; the scars that cut across his face had the look of something done deliberately rather than being incidental to combat injuries.  For an instant his mouth worked silently, then he looked over her shoulder at the other guests still on the balcony.  Hera turned in time to see all of them flee back into the room, leaving the two of them alone.

Hera had intended to be more circumspect about it, but since now everyone inside knew they were out here alone together she reached out and put her hand over his.  He looked at it as if he had never seen anything like it before, but didn’t pull away.

“What are you doing here?”

His voice was rougher than it had been five years ago, something that sounded like an injury rather than a reaction to her presence.

“I’m the senator for Ryloth,” Hera told him.  She wanted to take him into her arms, but didn’t dare, not when they were somewhere as public as this, not even with everyone else inside.  Instead, she squeezed his fingers and asked, “Can you come home with me?  I’ve got an apartment twenty stories down in the connecting building.”

He nodded.  She could feel him starting to shake, the shock from her unexpected appearance beginning to set in. “You go first,” he said, low-voiced. “I’ll follow.”

Hera nodded, hesitating briefly before she released his hand.  She wanted to kiss him, but couldn’t, not here, and not when she didn’t know how he would react to that.  She licked her lips and told him her apartment number, then stepped away and went inside without looking back at him.

People stepped away from her as she came in, as though she had been contaminated by her interaction with the Inquisitor.  Only Bail Organa and Riyo Chuchi came up to her, with Mon Mothma following them.

“Are you all right?” Bail asked her immediately. “Are you hurt?”

“I’m fine,” Hera assured them. “I know him.”

“How?” Mon Mothma asked, startled.

Hera hesitated, then said, “I need to talk to him first, somewhere that isn’t here.  Alone,” she added, seeing Bail open his mouth. “He won’t hurt me.”

From their expressions, she suspected that they guessed “I know him” meant “I had an affair with him before the Republic fell and everything went to blazes in a handbasket,” but none of them said anything along those lines, for which Hera was profoundly grateful. Instead, she said, “I have to go.”

None of them tried to stop her.  Bail said, “Be careful,” and Riyo squeezed her arm, her expression worried.

Hera smiled at them, then started to make her way out of the suite of rooms.  As crowded as they were, it took her some time until she could get her cloak and leave; most of the guests hadn’t heard about her tête-à-tête with the Inquisitor and get out of her way as a result, the way people had done with anyone who encountered the previous Inquisitor assigned to Coruscant.  By the time she had finally managed to leave, Hera was out of breath and irritated, and the effects of the wine she had been drinking earlier had worn off.  The walk back to her own junior senator’s apartments gave her time to calm down and think over what Caleb Dume’s appearance might mean.

He had been a Jedi. He had been a Jedi, and he had believed in it so profoundly that it had sometimes made Hera feel a little ashamed of herself.  Not for sleeping with him, which she knew his master had been aware of and somewhat amused by, but because she had never believed in anything that much in her life. She couldn’t believe that he had fallen in with the Emperor after the near-genocide of the Jedi, not willingly.

The look in his eyes hadn’t been entirely sane.

Hera went into the kitchen to start water boiling for tea, then into her bedroom to change out of her evening gown for something more comfortable.  She was just pouring hot water into the teapot when her door chime sounded.

She set the pot down on the kitchen table and went to get the door.  Caleb didn’t say anything as he came in, just waited for her to shut and lock the door behind him.  Hera opened her mouth, but he put a hand up to stop her, then went prowling nervously through the apartment.  Hera guessed that he was looking for listening devices and went back to the kitchen to finish making tea.

He came in a few minutes later.  Hera went over to him, hesitated, then took him in her arms.  For an instant he was stiff, then he returned her embrace.  He was shaking badly, his skin fever-hot when Hera reached up touch his scarred face.  He flinched when her fingers accidentally brushed the bruise around his left eye, but didn’t pull away.

“Can I kiss you?” Hera asked him.

Caleb nodded, bending his head to hers.  Hera kissed him slowly and carefully; he kissed her back with desperation.  When they stopped, breathing hard, he tipped his forehead against hers, his eyes closed.

“Tell me,” Hera whispered.

“He killed her,” Caleb said, his voice so soft that the words were almost a thought rather than spoken. “He killed Depa.  Then he – he – he’d bargained with the Emperor for me.  He killed her, and he – he –”  He was shaking again, so badly that his teeth were rattling together. “It took a long time, what he did to me,” he said eventually.  “Then he had me, and so did the Inquisition.”

“Come and sit down,” Hera said.  She got him into a chair and a cup of tea into his hand, then pulled another chair over so that she could sit next to him, close enough to touch.

He drank his tea slowly, his eyes narrowed in concentration as if it was the only thing he was capable of focusing on.  This close to him, Hera could see the scars barely hidden under the high collar of his black tunic, the same kinds of scars she had seen on freed slaves – left behind by a metal collar worn for too long.

Hera remembered the day the Purge had started.  It was burned into her memory, coming down to join her family at dinner and finding them all watching the HoloNews coverage of the Jedi Temple burning.  It had been barely a month after Depa Billaba and Caleb Dume had left, after Caleb had kissed her goodbye and promised that he would return after he had his knighthood, which he expected to attain within the year.  She had stood there, sick to her stomach, and known that he was dead.  He had been in her bed recently enough that she still had blankets that smelled like him and he was dead.

Except he hadn’t been dead.

“Who is he?” she asked him once he had finished the tea.  Hera poured more, but he just played with the cut-glass cup, running his gloved fingers over the silver holder. “The person who hurt you?”

“My master.”  His voice was utterly without inflection, but Hera could guess he wasn’t talking about Depa Billaba.  He pushed the cup away as his hands started to shake. “He’s – he was a Jedi, a Temple Guard.  He’d wanted me for a padawan years ago, but I didn’t know, and Master Billaba didn’t – but he was angry about it.  When the Emperor – he bargained with him for me.  We were still at the Temple.  He killed Depa, and he – he hurt me.”  He looked down at his hands as if he had never seen them before.  “I heard them killing the others,” he added eventually. “He and the others who betrayed the Order.  The other Inquisitors.”

“They’re Jedi?” Hera said, stunned. “They’re all Jedi?”

He nodded.  “After he did – what he did – it was a – a stopgap, almost, you could call it – he left me in that room with Master Billaba while he went to the rest of the…of the killing.  And when the others were all dead, he came back and did it again, to make sure it had taken, before he took me to the Inquisition headquarters on Mustafar to finish it.  The Emperor had been planning this for a long time,” he added, his voice very soft.

Hera swallowed back nausea. She didn’t think Caleb meant by that what anyone else would have meant, but she wasn’t entirely certain that he didn’t, either.  She was trying to decide how to ask when he said, very quietly, “There’s a way to force a master-apprentice bond, if the apprentice’s first master is dead.  The Jedi won’t do it unless there’s no other choice because it’s so dangerous; it’s better to let the bond develop naturally, even if it’s weak.  But – he –”

“It sounds like psychic rape,” Hera said hesitantly when he didn’t go on.  She couldn’t shake the mental image of Caleb locked in some room with Master Billaba’s body, probably injured himself, as the rest of the Jedi fought and died outside the door.

He nodded without looking at her.

“Is he here?”

Caleb shook his head. “Five years is long enough that he can let me out of his sight without worrying that I’m going to run away.  Or fall on my lightsaber,” he added, his voice a little distant.  He licked his lips, a nervous gesture, then raised his gaze to her. “I’m glad to see you.”

Hera leaned forward, slowly enough that he could pull away if he needed to, and kissed him gently. He put one hand up to curve the backs of his knuckles against her face, kissing her back. “You can stay with me as long as you’re here, if you like,” she said. “I have a spare room.”

He nodded a little, kissed her again, and then sat back in his chair.  After a moment of silence, he admitted, “That might not be a good idea. If anyone finds out, it won’t be safe for you –”

“Will anyone in the Empire challenge an Inquisitor if he wants to keep a mistress?” Hera asked. When he blinked, she said, “I don’t mean – you don’t have to sleep with me.  But it’s what people in the Senate and the HoloNews will think.”

“My master would,” Caleb said quietly. “And he’s the only one I can’t beat in a fight, if it comes to it.”

“I have friends too,” Hera told him. “I know the Senate is pretty useless in the Empire, but it isn’t without meaning, even now.”  She hesitated, on the verge of telling him that there were other Jedi who had survived, people who might be able to help him, but finally held back.  Even if he had been forced into it, he was still an Inquisitor, and Hera didn’t know him well enough anymore to be able to gamble anyone else’s life on what would he would do.

“What happened to your face?” she asked instead.

He touched a finger to his scarred cheek. “I tried to run away and my master caught me.  I’ve got others.”

“I meant the bruise,” Hera said, feeling a little sick.

“Oh.  I was in a fight.”  He hesitated, then reached out to take one of her hands, running his thumb over her knuckles. “How long have you been a senator?”

“Two years,” Hera said. “I ran against Orn Free Taa in the last election.”

“You’re smarter,” he said. “And prettier.”

“Right on both counts,” Hera said. “And I don’t take bribes.  And my father’s a war hero.  That helped.” She winced a little, but Cham Syndulla’s record was still better than Orn Free Taa’s, especially since Palpatine had removed his backing from the previous senator.  She suspected that the Emperor thought that a pretty young female senator, especially a nonhuman one, would be more or less harmless; Orn Free Taa’s decades in the Senate had given him allies in both main parties and most of the smaller ones, even if he himself was mostly ineffectual.  Hera had connections, but not the kind that would make her a serious threat, inasmuch as any single senator could be these days.  “How long are you here for?”

He shrugged. “Until I get reassigned.  They wanted someone as different as possible from the Hammer – the Inquisitor assigned here before me – as they could get, and I guess that was me.”

“Did you want to be assigned here?” Hera asked cautiously.  She wanted to ask how he felt about the Inquisition, if he was a true believer – from what he had said she suspected not – but couldn’t come out and ask it, not yet.

Caleb shrugged again. “I didn’t have a choice.  But my master’s not here, and that’s always a relief.”  He smiled shyly at her. “I’m glad you’re here.”

She leaned forward and kissed him again.  He had relaxed as they talked, and he kissed her back with less desperation now than he had before.

“Do you want to go to bed with me?” she asked him.

Caleb raised his eyes to hers. “Yes,” he said. “If you want to.”

Hera smiled and kissed him again, then got to her feet, drawing him with her.  She could have and probably should have waited until she knew how firmly he believed in the Inquisition and the Empire, if he had, as the Jedi she knew put it, gone over to the dark side, but he was here now, and she had been so certain he was dead.  For all the brevity of their affair, she had loved him very much, and she had known he had loved her – enough to know that even though they had never talked about it, the idea of leaving the Jedi Order had crossed his mind.

“Come on,” she told him. “If everyone’s going to think we’re having an affair anyway, we might as well have one.”

[soukokuwu]

Ohhhh cool!! if you can could you do some hcs with nikolai and sigma having a crush on the same girl who happens to be another member of DOA, please? i really don’t know how to make requests, but thank you anyway 🥺

➤ aww omg don’t worry you did great <3 this is my first go at both of them so i hope you like these, my sweet anony ^.^

➤ characters: nikolai, sigma

having a crush on the same doa girl

when he first realises he likes you, he tries to pry himself away from you. he doesn’t want to be tied down by anything, the worst of all being an attachment to someone — it’s known to be ruthless and unforgiving at times. or at least, that’s what he hears. so he’d rather keep his status as a free man, bound by nothing, especially not a woman.

oh, but everything changes once he realises that sigma actually likes you too. it’s one thing for nikolai to choose not to have you, but to envision you being with someone else, let alone another member of the doa? to have to possibly see you with your arms around sigma everyday? to watch as you give affections to someone that’s not him? no. nikolai’s blood is boiling just at the mere thought of it.

occasionally initiates squabbles with sigma because he keeps asking him to back away and sigma just never relents.

so he fights for your affection. and nikolai isn’t one to be bound by rules or boundaries either. as long as he sees it can help in his end goal, he’ll do it. basically, he won’t play fair. he’s the type to drag out your afternoon date knowing you have a dinner date with sigma. or purposely feed sigma soemthing bad or spicy just to make sure he comes down with a stomachache so terrible that he ends up cancelling on you.

you’re not stupid, obviously. if not why’d you be in the doa? you know nikolai is playing dirty tricks to ruin sigma’s time with you, so you get a one-up on him by initiating to spend time with sigma while he recovers. you’d hate for it to be unfair to one of them after all. and nikolai absolutely hates it when you do this, because you end up being all sweet to sigma. so he stops with his pranks. you’ve such a brilliant mind, they’ll backfire no matter how good they are.

tries to charm you with so many theatrics but it never turns out well. and he should’ve known. you’re so observant, you know his exaggerations are always a facade. and you don’t appreciate ingenuity. so nikolai slowly learns to break his walls down around you and only you, letting you in, albeit very slowly. but this you see, and this you are grateful for.

once he finds that that is what it takes to curry your favour, he keeps at it. besides, he has sigma’s charm to compete with and no matter how he hates admitting it, it’s no small feat to beat.

he doesn’t know what it is exactly, but there’s an attraction he feels toward you. and he’s heard a lot about ‘love’ and how it makes people feel alive. maybe, just maybe, if he can be in love with you, would that give him a reason to live?

when he finds out that nikolai has the hots for you too? eye roll. it’s going to be troublesome. but sigma thinks you have to be worth it. he feels a desire that he cannot find in anything — anyone — else. even if nikolai declares war, sigma would go for it. besides, he knows how to appease people. perhaps you’d be more drawn toward him.

unlike nikolai, sigma knows the importance of appealing to the audience. gogol may have the theatrics but sigma has a genuine side that just comes out easier. he knows you, and doesn’t let his feelings consume him. even when he is envious as all hell when he sees nikolai putting his arms around you, he controls himself. he doesn’t lash out or say a thing. besides, what he does know is that if you really fall for nikolai, then he’d want you to be happy with him.

occasionally entertains nikolai’s gibberish about asking him to back off because he needs to let out some steam at the man from all the pda he has had to endure seeing.

you see that sigma’s giving you a fair chance to decide who you actually see a future with, and you appreciate it immensely. and so sigma will always put your feelings first, even if that meant giving in to nikolai sometimes. he knows how much you hate seeing them bicker for days on end. he just waves the white flag, for you.

but even with his people and social skills, he can’t get one past you. you’re insightful, and you know his confidence is just a bravado. something that he and nikolai have in common, a mask. though sigma’s is more metaphorical. you hate how doesn’t share his real feelings and you confess to feeling a distance from him that is more apparent than that with gogol.

so sigma works on it, works on letting you inside his head, where all the ugly words lie and consume him from the inside out. he grows to love your comforting words, of course. nobody else can have that effect on him after all. and he’ll continue to keep pursuing you, because he believes fully now that a desire to live exists within you.

[smilindesperado]

New chapter of (My Heart) Still Beats for You is (finally) up!

Aang has some news for Sokka, and Sokka finds himself wanting to spend more time with Suki.

Another update on the shorter side, but we’re moving the story along.  

Originally, I had only planned on telling this story from Mai’s POV, but as I started fleshing it out more, I realized that there were some things that I wanted from Sokka’s POV.  Eventually I made the decision to dedicate an equal amount of chapters to each character.  BUT because of that, in editing Sokka’s chapters end up having a lot more changes to them, whereas the edits to Mai’s chapters are mostly just tightening up her story and cleaning up some prose.

There are some changes to Sokka’s story that were made during edits, including the flashback from chapter 4 (a last minute addition) and changing the flashback in this chapter.  Originally, I had Sokka and Yue’s first meeting here, but as I was editing it felt like it was just padding for the chapter instead of actually moving it along.  So, ultimately, I took it out and stole a flashback from Chapter 10 because it fit much better here (and I have some different plans for chapter 10, now).

Even still...I really liked some parts of the flashback that I ended up removing, so I’m going to post it here for anyone that’s interested!  And if you see me reuse some of the ideas from this excerpt, no you didn’t.

(Also, apart from a quick skim of the text before, I didn’t do much editing on it, so apologies for any typos/awkward grammar.)

“Are you alright?”

Yue’s pretty blue eyes glossed over with worry as she held an ice-stuffed bar rag against Sokka’s shoulder.

“Oh yeah, I’m great,” Sokka replied, punctuated with an eye roll.  Yue bit her lip and looked to the side, guilty, and he quickly backtracked.  “Yeah...I’m alright.  Don’t worry about me.”

The night had decidedly not been going Sokka’s way.  He found himself at some schmoozy dinner club uptown for a university alumni event.  He usually avoided those kinds of things, but he didn’t really have anything else to do.  He had just moved into his new spot, away from old friends, so his Friday night plans usually involved his roommate Aang and/or his sister.  Recently, however, that had turned into Sokka hanging out with Aang and Katara, and he felt like it was time for a change of scenery.

So, in an effort to switch up his nights and not get stuck spending another evening as third wheel to his sister and best friend, he decided to give one of these stupid alumni events a go.

And it was stupid. The bar was a little stuffy for his tastes, filled with suits and kids on trust funds if the price of drinks was anything to go by.  He recognized a couple of people from his engineering program, but no one he really shared many interests with besides engineering itself.

But the music at the bar was another story.

That was where he met Yue.  She was like something out of a dream, really.  Or like a movie; a silver screen moment where the lights dimmed and the spotlight illuminated her, erasing the crowd as if the whole universe began and ended with Yue.  She tapped her foot along to the beat while a guitarist strummed along in her shadow, singing a lovely melody about the moon and stars to her audience of one.

Sokka never returned to the reserved area for his party, because he had the perfect view at the bar.

Well, it was the perfect view.  Until some douchebag saddled up next to him and started hitting on the bartender.  The woman was clearly uncomfortable and the guy just couldn’t take a hint.  Even worse, once the bartender quickly extracted herself from the conversation, the guy had found another poor girl to harass.  This one was unfortunately more comfortable with the situation and Sokka ended up hearing their whole gross flirtations while they exchanged numbers.

But still, it had been worth enduring all of that to catch the last of the siren’s songs.

Sokka cashed out once Yue’s set ended and scanned the room hoping to spot her.  He thought she should at least know how incredible she was-er...sounded.

He caught her eye and she began floating towards him, smiling wide.  Sokka wondered if he actually hadn’t imagined that she was singing directly to him before the illusion was shattered when she locked her eyes onto someone behind him instead.

Needless to say, when Yue swept up to the guy who had been flirting with everything in sight just a few minutes ago, Sokka boiled over.  Perhaps it had been the drinks, or maybe he was just so offended on her behalf, but the accusations spilled out of his mouth before his mind could catch up.

“Wait.  You’re with him?”

The guy glared at Sokka, sweeping his hair out of his eyes before slinging an arm around Yue.  “Yeah, what of it?”

Sokka knew he should have kept his big mouth shut, because really, it was none of his business.  He knew nothing about the woman, but the liquid courage gave him the boost he needed to defend her honor.

After calling him out on his behavior and hurling a few insults at one another, the incident quickly devolved and the guy shoved Sokka, his back hitting the ledge of the bar roughly, which spurred Sokka to tackle him to the ground.  Security wrestled them apart and threw the guy and his friends out.  The reassurance from the bartender that the other guy instigated the whole thing allowed Sokka to stay behind and make sure Yue was okay.

Or more accurately, allowed Yue to make sure Sokka was okay.  Though he wished he could have caught her attention with a different method, Sokka couldn’t help but feel a little thrilled to find himself with an excuse to spend time with this otherworldly beauty.

“I’m sorry about Hahn.” Yue kept her gaze down at the ground, her voice sounding so small.  Sokka thought how unfair it was that she was the one feeling guilty in this mess.

“Oh, that guy?  He barely touched me.  The guy’s probably never been in a fight in his life.”

“Oh?” She looked back up at Sokka again, and he tried his best to not get lost in her eyes.  “Do you get into a lot of fights?”

Sokka rolled his neck, feigning a coolness he definitely wasn’t feeling.  “Psh, people don’t usually try to get into fights with me.”

Yue got up from her spot to reach for the bag behind her and Sokka realized how that may have sounded.  She just (hopefully) dumped her short-tempered boyfriend and probably wasn’t looking for another one.

“I mean, not that I look for fights or anything,” he added quickly.  “I’m a lover, not a fighter, you know?”

Was that a weird thing to say?

But Yue giggled and a faint blush rose to her cheeks, and Sokka knew he would do anything to pull that reaction out of her again.

“Well, thank you, Sokka.”  Yue slung her purse over her shoulder and gave Sokka a small, pretty smile.

“Uh, what are you up to now?  Do you wanna get out of here?” Sokka asked, causing Yue to still, looking him over.  His eyes grew wide when he realized how that may have sounded.  “Not, like in a creepy way,” he rectified quickly.  “I mean, like maybe we could go for a walk and grab some food or...do an activity?”

She raised a delicate eyebrow curiously and her lips pressed together in an attempt to hold back her laughter.  “Do an activity?”

“Uh…” Sokka rubbed at the back of his neck before squeaking out a hesitant “...yes?” in confirmation.

A lovely smile graced her lips, and Sokka couldn’t believe his luck.  “Okay.”

Maybe Aang and Katara’s oogies would be a little more tolerable if he had a love of his own.

[drariellevalentine]

Medically Inevitable

Chapter 13- Surprising Scenerio

Characters:- Arielle Valentine, Ethan Ramsey, Liam Mercado, Ava Day, Sienna Trinh, Elijah Greene, Bryce Lahela, Danny Cardinal

Pairing:- Ethan Ramsey x Arielle Valentine

Warnings:- Slight angst, PTSD

Arielle’s PoV:-

You’re woke up by a loud thud sound. “Huh!” You sit up and rub your eyes until they adjust to the very little sunlight streaming from the windows.

“Well look who’s up!” You would know this voice anywhere. Looking around, memories of last night slowly recollect in your head when you spot her.

“Ava!” You’re one step away from engulfing her in a bear hug when you remember she’s pregnant.

“So I see Liam’s let the cat out of the bag, huh?”, she laughs as she wraps you carefully in a hug. “You of all people should know it’s safe to hug pregnant women.”

You snort out of laughter. “Says the woman who has an MD in gynaecology.”, you retort. Both of you giggle. “Oh, it’s sooo good to see you Ava! It’s been so long! Way too long that you didn’t tell me one, you’re engaged and two, you’re pregnant!”

“I see the two of you have gotten acquainted already.” Both of you give him a look.

“Need I remind you that Arielle was the one who introduced us? We were best friends way back.”, Ava says.

“Ok, I get the point. It’s obviously not a fight I’m going to win with my fiancée and my childhood best friend against me!”, he says raising his hand in mock surrender as he heads inside.

“We need to catch up sometime! I would love to right now but I have work in about…”, you scan the room for a clock, “...an hour. Shit, an hour! I have to go!”, you say.

“Residency’s kicking your ass, isn’t it? Don’t worry, it’s kicking mine too!”, she replies.

“Anyways, what are you doing here in Boston? I asked Liam but he was all”- You gesture your hands wildly.

She laughs. “I’ll tell you, on one condition.”

“What?”

“Brunch.”

“I have work.” You give her a look as she rolls her eyes. “I see pregnancy hasn’t changed your personality one bit.”, you joke.

“I meant later this week, what do you say?”

You smirk, “I’ll have to check my schedule.”

“You’re not the only one who’s an intern, you know that right?”

“I know! I’ll call you, I promise!”, you say as you gather your things.

“In one month or two?”, she pokes.

“Okay, that’s just unfair. It was one time!”, you retort as you slip on your shoes.

“Where are you going already?” You turn around to see Liam dressed in work attire.

“She has work in an hour. Don’t worry, I made her promise to meet us for brunch later.”, Ava says.

“In a year or two?”, Mark asks sarcastically.

“Ughhh…. not you too!” All three of you laugh.

“Did you even eat anything?”, Liam asks.

“Nope, I’ll get something on the way.”, you reply.

“Nuh uh, sit your ass down. I’ll make you a breakfast bagel.”, Liam says.

“But”-

“Nope, you’re eating or else I’m not giving you your car keys.” You turn around to see your rose gold car keys dangling from Ava’s finger.

“Hey! I’m late for work and my boss is going to kill me!”, you say as a certain someone crosses your mind.

“Ooh! Who’s your boss?! ….is he hot?”, Ava asks with a smirk. You feel a slight blush settling on your cheeks.

“Ava! I’m right here!”

“Oh please, we’ve already established that you’re the only man in my life. Well maybe one of two…”, Ava says as she gestures to her stomach.

“Okay, now sit down, Arielle. I know you can’t resist my breakfast bagels. And I’m sure you need an aspirin for that hangover….”

One delicious bagel later, you’re in the locker room at Edenbrook with Sienna, Bryce and Elijah.

“So where’d you run off to yesterday?”, Elijah asks.

“Wait, she didn’t go back with you guys?”, Bryce asks.

“Nope!”, Sienna replies.

“I stayed at Liam’s house last night, and no Bryce.”, you respond as you grab your towel and shower gel.

“No to what? I didn’t even ask a question!”, Bryce asks.

“Exactly, keep your mouth shut.”, you reply while slipping into the shower. After pulling on a pair of scrubs, you head towards the nurses’ station.

“Hey Arielle, here for the PITA’s tests?”, Danny asks.

“Huh? Who’s PITA?”, you ask.

“PITA is a name the nurses gave Mr. Platt. It stands for pain in the ass.”, he says as she laughs.

You groan. “Ugh, you’re right about that. That man just loves to call my credentials in question! If he wasn’t a patient, I would just”-

“Woah, woah, woah. Take a chill pill. Heard that Dr. Ramsey assigned you this case, wouldn’t want to blow it if I were you.”, he says as he hands you the tests.

“God, nurses are like spies these days. They seem to know everything!”

You look through the test results as you walk up to Mr. Platt’s room.

“Damnit! These are negative too! Ughhhh…”

You take a deep breath before entering Nigel's room. You fake a smile as you enter.

"Good morning Mr.Pl-" you start to say as nicely as possible before he interrupts.

"Know what's wrong with me?" He asks angrily.

"No, not yet," you say sympathetically, " You recent tests came back negative as well."

"This is absurd," he burps, " I’m calling consumer affairs. I'll have you demoted before you can blink!”, he rudely barks at you. Your anger is starting to flare.

“Keep your cool, Arielle. He’s still a patient.”, you say to yourself.

"Why don't you get some rest while I figure out how to help you, Mr. Platt?" You reply as nicely as you can.

"Why don't you send someone worth listening to?", he says. The utter disrespect in his voice makes you want to sock him in the jaw. But instead, gritting your teeth you walk out of the room.

"Turn the A/C down while you are at it, will you?" He calls out from behind but you decide not to shout back, your hands curling into fists.

You make your way towards Dr. Ramsey's office. Your steps are slow and unsure as you question your abilities.

“Maybe father was right? After all, he always believed I wouldn’t be able to help people, at least in this way.”

You shake your head, as a futile attempt to throw the self-doubts outside your head. Bad memories surface, past fights and conversations arise. Words repeat again and again until you find it hard to breathe.

“Damn it!” Taking a few deep breaths to center yourself, you continue to his office.

“Come on, Arielle. You are capable of anything. You’ve come this far. What’s one patient?”, you try and convince yourself. That's when you spot Ethan. Anger boils up inside you, seeing his nonchalant face look over charts, assigning you this case for “a reason”? And when you ask, “figure it out”! What the hell does that mean?! You need answers, everything else can wait.

So you run up to him. "Dr. Ramsey, we need to talk!”, you voice louder than you expected.

“Yes?”, he asks with a questioning look, surprisingly ignoring your raised voice.

You steel yourself. “Mr. Platt is rude, belligerent and always questioning my credits. I would like to be taken off of this case.”

He looks at you for a second, straight in your eyes and says, “No.”

You’re taken aback, completely forgetting that you’re talking to your boss. “What?!”, you gawk.

“No. What part of that did you not understand?” Without waiting for your reply, he swiftly steps into his office and closes the door in your face. The anger gets to you, and against all common sense you pull open the the door and storm into his office. Ethan’s face betrays him, portraying his imminent shock.

“What do you think you’re doing?!”

“I’m trying to know why you’ve assigned me this case!”, you say a little loudly.

“I already told you to figure it out.”, he says coldly.

“Well I tried but the only reason I came up with is that it’s a joke.”, you say completely burnt out.

His face turns deadly serious. “Do I look like someone who uses patients as a joke?”

“Well I don’t know! It feels like you’re punishing me!”

His face is slightly red as he suddenly gets up, his chair tumbling down to the floor. “And why would I punish you, for God’s sake?”, he asks as he takes long strides towards you.

“I don’t know, maybe because you enjoy it!!”, you shout completely out of your mind.

"You need to keep your personal feelings sperate from your professional life, Dr. Valentine." He shouts, hurting you more.

He doesn't even let you say anything, " I'd think very carefully before you say something to embarrass yourself even more." He slams his hand on his desk.

You can feel tears welling in your eyes, you close your eyes for a second in a attempt to make them stay there.

"Would I be saying anything that wasn't true?" Anger can be still hinted in your voice. "You told me you have me that awful patient for a reason! But you won't tell me what the reason is! You won't even take me off the case! Why?"

"Because I assigned you to the case to challenge you! To push you!" His voice bellows.

"To push me?" You let out a humorless laugh. " To push me to what?" You shout.

"To be the best doctor you can be."

"I selected you for a reason. I selected you because I saw something special in your application."

All the wind is knocked out of you. Shock and embarrassment taking your anger‘s place." Wait… you selected me?"

"Yes. It was my evaluation that got you matched here. I believed I saw someone who could be truly great," he says his voice filled with disappoinment.

"It's very rare that I am wrong, Rookie. But I'm willing to admit when I am," he paused," And I was wrong about you.”

“I was wrong about you…”, the phrase triggers something in your mind, it being played on a loop inside your head.

The words are like acid poured on you, making memories surface, memories which you buried deep inside you a long time ago.

Your father’s voice takes over your mind. “I thought you were mature, and understood the importance of what I’m talking about! Turns out, you are just a disgrace to this family. I had such high hopes for you, but I was wrong about you. Don’t ever tell anybody that you’re apart of this family, you’ll bring nothing but shame and bad luck to this family. After all, ever since you were born everything went downhill…” The words your father spoke, each feeling like a knife embedded deep inside your heart, are playing in your head again and again. You shout, not being able to take it anymore.

Ethan’s PoV:-

Seething, you look to your side seeing the young resident gasp as she takes in the shocking information you just relayed. You’re about to shout again when instead you turn around, pinching the bridge of your nose and sigh. You turn around, ready to reprimand her when you notice her pale face. She’s on her knees, hands around herself in a protective way and having a difficult time to breathe.

“Fuck!” You bound towards her calling her name but she doesn’t hear you. Her small whispers turn into agonised shouts.

“No, no, no, no! Stop! Please, no!”

You sink down to your knees and try to calm her down. “Arielle, look at me…Arielle!” She finally looks up, violet eyes wide and breath ragged.

“Listen to me. To my voice. I want you to take a deep breath, five times.” She nods and tries to take a breath.

“That’s it. In and out, five times.” Her breathing and heart rate start to normalise when you notice your pulse racing. As she collects herself, your mind puts the pieces together. You lead her to the small loveseat in your office and hand her a bottle of water.

“...you’re suffering from PTSD, aren’t you?”, you ask.

“I was. My last attack was 4 years back.”, she replies softly, the usual melodic tone of her voice completely gone without a trace.

“4 years? Then why”-

“My last attack was when I had gotten a really bad score on one of my midterms because I was sick. Luckily, my professor allowed me to retake the test though. The attacks started after the big fight with my father. Sometimes I would feel like whatever my father said was right or sometimes events would instigate it but they haven’t happened for a while.”

“So why suddenly now?”, you ask.

”I’ve just been feeling a little unsure of myself, with the fellowship competition and Naveen… All the tension probably just built up…”

You nod. “Residency can be stressful, especially the first year.” Suddenly she looks around and abruptly gets up. You realise you’ve been holding her.

“Uh, I should get going. My lunch break is almost over.”

“You should.” You walk towards your desk to pick up another one of Naveen’s tests when suddenly Arielle swivels around, almost colliding with you.

“Sorry! I didn’t know you were behind me…” She stutters. “Um…uh I just wanted to uh.. thank you. So, thank you, Dr. Ramsey.” You look down, her violet irises cauciously peering into yours. Her face slightly tilts upward as her perfectly pink lips slighly apart. You stare at her eyes, like inevitable magnets, attracting you even closer when her pager suddenly beeps, pulling both of you back into reality.

Her eyes widen as her cheeks turn a shade of pink. She says something extremely rapid which you can’t make out as she rushes out the door. You slump down in your desk chair, raking a hand through your hair.

“Damn it…”

———————————————————————————

Authors’ Note:- Hey everyone! So, you guys are going to hate us even more cause guess what?! We’re going on a two-week break! Aurora has exams and I just finished mine (well, I when I post this I would have) and we found it convenient cause it’s a cliffhanger...of a sort. But don’t worry, we will be posting Character Moodboards and Aesthetics for all the characters and pairings instead for the next two weeks so stay tuned for that!

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Love,

@drariellevalentine 😘

[shoujolover-666]

A fae’s love

Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27197677

Characters: Yandere!Lilia, Reader

Summary:  Lilia could feel that they were being watched.

A frustrated sound filled the oh so silent room as they threw their phone against their bed, a look of anger was on their face as they ran a hand through soft strands of hair. It was the Halloween Event in Twisted Wonderland, and they saved up quite a lot of summons just for that. They didn’t manage to get any of the cards they wanted though.

Not a single Jade, Vil or even Azul was in sight. No, the only one they got was Lilia.

Over and over again.

Even when they maxed him out, the gacha didn’t stop throwing the young looking ancient being at them.

Really, at first they didn’t mind it at all. Lilia was one of their favourite characters because of how fun, interesting and mysterious he was, but that didn’t mean that he wanted to get him. All. The. Time.

They lied down next to the phone he just threw a few seconds ago, grabbing it before rolling around in a lazy manner. For now… he would probably level him up and put him in his team. His attack stats weren’t bad after all, and the element combination was decent enough.

Still, they had no intention of keeping him there permanently.

While they were trying to calm themself down, they didn’t notice the pair of red eyes following him through the screen.

~ 🦇

Lilia was watching them from the homescreen. It was the only time he had the chance to watch them, for usually, he was busy doing other things usually.

Being with his dorm mates, watching some of the other students or doing whatever task he had been given by the teachers who were like little children in comparison to himself.

But when he was summoned by that strange entity, he was able to take a glimpse at a person who seemed to be the one who was watching over all of them, influencing the child of man in the way they wanted him to act to a certain extent. Something that was quite fascinating to him.

A person who was watching over them from time to time, almost as if they were some kind of god… he wished to know more about them. He wanted to see what they would think of all of them, and he wanted to know in what way they would tick.

That was how he started to watch them from the background, hidden in places in which he guessed that the entity was not able to see him. Lilia was able to feel when he was being watched, which he used to his advantage. The ancient fae started to be around the other students more as he observed Yuu. In a way, he acted way too passive for it to be natural. Almost as if he was simply a vessel for the being who was watching all of the things at the school unfold.

There were times when he was stuck at a strange place, in which he couldn’t do much, he had the opportunity to take a close look at them.

It was fascinating. They were neither unbelievable beautiful nor ugly, but there was something so fascinating, that he couldn’t help but be in slight awe.

A pair of eyes that were shining with excitement. Locks of soft looking hair that he wanted to touch and maybe do something with. Rosy cheeks and a bright smile on cute lips.

“Isn’t it interesting how mysterious I am?”

“Hehe, did you notice? Today I was able to tie my necktie into a prettier butterfly knot than usual.”

He loved talking to them, and sometimes, they even answered with an adorable laugh of theirs. It always made his heart beat in excitement, and he couldn’t help but look forward to those meetings more and more, no matter how sudden they were. With time though, he noticed that they spent less and less time with him, until at one point he wasn’t being summoned anymore. At that, he became annoyed, which he hid behind his usual smile. Certainly they will summon him again, won’t they?

He was wrong. They did not summon him, and he got angrier and angrier each time. They paid more and more attention to the other students than him, and he could feel his blood boil.

How were they worthy when they did not even notice their presence? How were they more deserving of their love than him. At one point, he snapped and decided to take matters in his own hands.

Each time he could feel the pull, he would get in the other students way, so they would only have him in their mind. When it was time for Halloween, he made sure that they won’t get anyone but him.

Like that, they would have to notice him again. To love him again and to pay attention to him.

Lilia could feel the anger, even see it sometimes, but he didn’t care and kept on smiling. As long as they looked at them, he was happy.

That was what he thought at first at least. The longer that went on, the longer he desired to be able to interact with that deity, with that god.

With that goal in mind, he started to research. Day and night, he spent his time in libraries while using his connections to all kinds of people that he built up over the years he has lived to get more magical texts and scrolls.

There had to be something that would let him do the thing he wanted, right?

Time passed, and he got more and more frustrated. His obsession only grew with each day.

Until it finally happened.

A magic spell that required a few living sacrifices to summon a being into his world, into his arms. It was not guaranteed that it would work, or that it would bring him the person he wanted to meet so badly, but he didn’t care.

Sacrificing a few was worth it, as long as he could get to touch them, to talk to them, to take them.

Maybe there were a few people who wouldn’t be missed? The headmaster might be willing to part from a few of his students if he offered him a few favours.

Lilia was numb to killing and death because of the things he did in the past.

War was taxing on the mind, even if it had been such a long time ago. Now though, it helped him with having an easier time to get the things he wanted.

To his surprise, Crowley was not willing to offer students, but he was willing to use contacts of his own.

Well, as long as he got what he needed, he didn’t care.

Like that, he started to prepare the ritual. He was careful, everything had to be perfect. When he had the time, he was preparing the room he would keep them in.

Soft, pillows. Silken sheets. Comfortable beds. A wardrobe with the finest clothes.

Anything less could not be accepted. A chuckle crawled up his throat, which he hid behind his hand before he continued to prepare everything.

Soon.

~ 🦇

They were playing the main story of Twisted Wonderland. Chapter five to be more exact. Their fingers were resting over the screen as they read the text, chuckling over the funny moments while getting angry over moments that they saw as unfair. Every time they played this game, they couldn’t help but feel with the characters and get invested in what they are doing and how they felt.

Still, in the end, they were just fictional characters. And soon, they were sure of it, they would find another fandom to get into and start obsessing over that. It was simply a cycle, and they didn’t mind as long as it brought them joy.

“Finally.”

A surprised look was on their face and they looked around, searching for the source of the voice. It was Lilias voice, they knew it all too well by now, having heard it almost every time they visited the game.

But how? He was nowhere to be seen on the screen, the only characters visible were Vil and Epel!

Screeching was echoing from the walls as their hand suddenly went through the phone, a force seemed to suck them in. They tried to fight against it, but to no avail. Laughing was the last thing they heard, before they lost consciousness.

~ 🦇

Lilia looked at the summoning circle that appeared on the ceiling he was in and grinned from ear to ear, holding out his arms so he would be able to catch them. They landed safely in his arms, and he could feel their sweet scent enveloping him.

It was difficult to describe because of how intoxicating it was to him. The body he held close to himself was warm, and full of life.

They were perfect. So much more than he expected.

With the person still in his arms, he turned around and left the place that was prepared for him. He didn’t care about the mess that he left behind. Crowley would surely clean it himself anyway. Even if he didn’t, there was no time to worry about trivial matters like these, for he had to take care of someone way more important than that little bit of dirt.

The ancient fae walked with them through the halls of Diasomnia to bring them to the room he especially prepared for them, a place where no one else but him and Malleus were allowed to go. Maybe even Silver and Sebek if he was in an especially good mood. None of the fellow students dared to look at them or even dared to ask him who the person in his arms was, for they were way too afraid of him.

Not without reason.

When they finally arrived, he gently placed them on the bed before he traced their lips with his pale, thin fingers, feeling the body heat that radiated from them. Without a second thought, he placed his own lips against the others, one hand was placed on a cheek. Lilia tugged on their bottom lip with his teeth before he bit down, letting the metallic but also sweet taste of their warm blood fill his mouth.

A moan escaped him, it was better than any wine he had tasted, better than even the freshest bottle of tomato juice.

It was addicting, and he never wanted to live without it again.

And he wouldn’t. He would make sure that this being, this entity would stay here in that safe, comfortable place forever. There will definitely be resistance at first, but it was nothing a little curse or spell couldn’t salvage.

He lied down next to them now, pulling them into his arms and caressing their hair. This… finally he had what he wanted. In the past, he felt that something was missing, but he could never tell what it was.

Now that he had them with him, he knew. Finally he was complete.

Anyone who would try to take this happiness away from him would not be spared.

[spelledb-a-r-e]

I saw a post by @hearmyvoicee pointing out that in a typical teen musical, Matt would have been the main character, so I wrote out the plot from Matt's POV so I could see it for myself. Turns out it was spot on! (Also 100% credit to @hearmyvoicee for this idea, please read their full post on this because it's so insightful.) Enjoy:

The show opens with Matt going through the halls of his school, awkwardly trying to get other people's attention, especially Ivy, but she mostly ignores him. We see that Jason, on the other hand, is Mr. Popular getting fawned over by all the other guys and girls.

Matt goes to audition for the school play as Romeo, and even Sister Chantelle notices how hard he worked to prepare for it. But he doesn't get the part he worked so hard for. Of course, it's Jason who gets the part instead, and when Matt tries to do the right thing and congratulate him, Jason arrogantly comments that he hadn't even prepared for the audition at all.

When Matt hangs out with some of his classmates, he reveals that he wants to impress his popular crush, Ivy, with a surprise party. They start talking about going to a rave, and Matt is nervous, because he's never rebelled or done drugs before. But when Ivy flirtatiously asks him to go, he sees this as his chance to get her attention and fit in better, so he accepts.

At the rave, Matt sees Ivy pass out. Like a gentleman, he tries to help her by taking her outside. On his way back, he notices that Jason is kissing one of their other male classmates named Peter. He's shocked that Mr. Popular would have such a big secret, but he doesn't say anything because he's a nice guy.

He does struggle with whether he should out Jason in confession, but he decides not to because, again, he's a nice guy who keeps other people's secrets.

The party he planned for Ivy becomes a total disaster at the hands of the other kids, and to his dismay Ivy comes in drunk. She thanks him for the party, but when he asks her to dance, she ignores him and flirts with Jason instead. Now that Matt knows Jason's secret, this is too much to take and he storms out.

He sees Peter drinking outside and commiserates with him. Eventually Peter tells him about his secret relationship with Jason, and Matt, not knowing how to react, just says good night and leaves.

At rehearsal, Matt's frustration with the unfairness of this situation boils over, and he lets a homophobic slur slip out when he's rehearsing a fight with Jason. Jason immediately turns it into a real fight until Sister Chantelle separates them. Matt is ashamed of his outburst, but he sees Jason go over to talk to Peter, and he can't bring himself to face either of them.

Then everyone goes on spring break!

When Matt comes back, he approaches Ivy, asking why she hadn't returned any of his calls over the break. She starts to make some excuses, but she's cut off by the arrival of the class ranks. Matt is second. Jason is first. (Also his sister might be dead?? We'll never know that one I guess.) Ivy, surprise surprise, goes off to talk to Jason.

At the next rehearsal, Ivy isn't there, and it's revealed that she's missed several rehearsals in a row. When Juliet's understudy doesn't know the lines, Peter comes in and has a romantic moment with Jason in front of everyone, who don't suspect that it goes beyond the acting. But Jason immediately snaps out of it when Ivy comes in, leaving her in the dark once again. Everyone is kinda mean to Ivy and she's upset that Jason would be so careless as to replace her like that.

The cast meets to rehearse later. Matt is the third one there and witnesses Jason yelling at Ivy as she tearfully tries to tell him something. She finally shouts that she's pregnant, and Matt watches in horror as she and Jason nervously try to reconcile. Unable to see Ivy unhappy, he bursts in and declares his love for her, and tells her that Jason would never be able to love her, because he already has a boyfriend. His boyfriend conveniently comes in, and Matt tells Ivy all about Jason and Peter's relationship. As the other students come in, the scene dissolves into chaos and shouting. Ivy doesn't respond like Matt hoped. Instead of being grateful, she's angry with him. Jason breaks down crying, and Matt feels guilty, but he knows he can't do anything more.

The night of the play arrives. Matt tries to make amends with Peter, who is still cold to him. He doesn't get a chance to apologize to Jason before the show. In the middle of one of the scenes, Jason collapses. Matt finds out soon afterwards that Jason has died from a drug overdose.

Matt becomes the valedictorian in Jason's absence, but he can't find the words to say in his speech that would make things better. Poor Matt has not only lost the girl of his dreams, but now he has to feel guilty about contributing to someone's suicide.

By the end, Matt has learned the valuable lesson that sometimes getting popular comes at a cost! :)