#and it was just him being like ‘it’s really cool that they got to have you as their teacher’

[felassan]

David Gaider on Dorian, under a cut for length:

"Now this is a fun one. It's no big secret I have a lot of feelings about Dorian, not least of which because he was my first (and only) gay male companion. There's a lot more to him than that, of course (as there should be), and it was quite a trip. So let's go! Now, DAI is a story all its own, but I'm sticking to the characters. In this case, back at the beginning, the writers were going to try something new: we were going to let the artists take a more active role in the companion creation process. Why? Because not doing so had caused a lot of problems. See, here's the thing: writers and artists speak two different languages. When talking about characters, we talk about their story. Who they are. What they want. We'd write up these briefs, huge and full of information... but it was never the information the artists needed. They wanted visual cues. I don't mean describing their appearance. Sure, we'd usually provide that, especially if there was a story case to be made, but often the artists vetoed us on appearance stuff anyhow so meh. No, I mean they looked for visual language while we tended to only talk about who the characters *were*. What would happen is they'd hone in on something visual in our write-up not intended to be a focus. The first write-up for Anders in DA2, for instance, mentioned he was "haggard" after his journey... and the first concept we got was this pale, shriveled man. "What... is this?" "YOU SAID HAGGARD!" 😅"

"That was the other trick: sometimes when we DID try to be more descriptive, we had to be extra cautious because the words could be interpreted very differently. You encounter this recording VO, too. A VO note says "hysterical" and you *meant* "really upset" but the actor read "scream like a banshee" Thus this caused problems, like I said. The artists would struggle, sometimes conjuring details just to give the character *something* but which would change the character... and, to us, the character was created. Done. We were already invested, probably already writing them. Something had to give. So this time we wrote a bunch of character briefs - but short. One paragraph. We stuck to vibes and the *emotions* we wanted the concepts to evoke. And we didn't name them. They got titles like "Slick Con Man" or "Ice Queen", so we wouldn't get too attached. Then we handed these off to the artists. And it worked nicely. The ones that just weren't inspiring we'd discard, no problem. The others had juice... and the artists felt free to play and offer lots of variations because we weren't set on anything yet. A lot of times, what they produced ended up inspiring US. It was a neat back-and-forth."

"This is what led to Dorian, in fact. He came from a short write-up entitled "Rock Star Mage" and it really boiled down to "I'm cool and I know I'm cool, so take that you cretins". And just like that, the first sketches (by Casper Konefal, I think? I bet I'm wrong) were all amazing. Instant fire. Me: "He looks kind of like... Freddie Mercury?" Him: "Is that bad?" Me: "NO ARE YOU KIDDING THIS IS AMAZING" Plus there was a monkey. Sadly, we had to lose the monkey. There were iterations to come, but this was really where Dorian was born: Tevinter mage, noble, savant, and too cool for school."

"When did he become gay? Not right away. Like I said elsewhere, we didn't talk romance and sexuality until after the concepts were more in place. But as we were brainstorming about why this hot shot mage left Tevinter, the idea DID come up that maybe it was because he was gay. Not directly, however. Homophobia isn't really a thing in Thedas, after all, so at first blush I didn't think that could work. "Rich kid gets kicked out of the house for being gay" wasn't a trope I wanted to explore. But, then again, magister families in Tevinter are *obsessed* with the appearance of perfection, so...? Any deviation from the "norm" is considered scandal-worthy. It said weakness. It said you couldn't control your house. Now... THAT had real promise. The writing pit discussed it a lot. So I think it's fair to say that the gay fairy was already circling Dorian even before we got to the romance talk. I think it's also fair to say that the rest of the team realized I low-key wanted to write him, because when everyone started calling dibs, who was left standing for me? (I pick last, remember.) I gleefully snatched him up and got to work... ...about six months later. I was very busy at the time. 😅 That late start meant I had to design and write VERY quickly. And I did. Somehow, though, this one... it came easily. "Catty gay man" isn't digging very deep, no surprise to anyone who knows me, and it had an extra layer of being so fun because Dorian was confident. He sparred verbally. I loved it."

"There was more to it, however. The conflict between Dorian and his father... ugh, how do I say this? Let's be clear: Dorian's story is not MY story, but it's also not far off. I wrote the entire confrontation scene in one go. After I was done, I probably cried harder than I ever have in my life. 🫠 I was unsure whether it was any good, however. I just didn't feel objective. I passed it over to Cori May - my friend but also Dorian's editor - and asked her to please tell me and be honest. She read it. She walked into my office after, tears streaming down her face, and just nodded. "It's good." Here's the thing. Not everyone is going to agree with this, but: I don't think a writer NEEDS to be a minority in order to write a minority. Sometimes those characters should simply exist, and we want them to. But if that character's story is ABOUT their experience as a minority? That's different. Dorian's story didn't need to revolve around his sexuality - and, honestly, it only did so as a tangent to his family issue, but they're so bound together it's probably irrelevant to split them - but my writing him meant it could be. It allowed me to SAY something. That felt good. It felt right. Ramon Tikaram came on board after a lengthy casting process (so many British Indian accents, oh god). I sat in on a few recording sessions... the confrontation scene, though? Ramon: *says line* Me: (curled up on a nearby sofa in fetal position) *shaky thumbs up* Caroline: "Yep. Great work, Ramon!""

"Dorian's sexuality isn't all he's about, but that's certainly how some viewed it. When the character was announced in 2014, his being gay was mentioned as the last of a number of points, and the instant response from some gamers was to act as if we'd called a press conference just to say THAT. 🙄 It was annoying. Still is. Overall, however, the reaction to Dorian was very positive. The number of straight men who said they romanced him still pleases me. The number of fans who privately contacted me who'd been through conversion therapy, some who said Dorian helped them survive? Well. Gosh. 😭 I did write him for Trespasser - though I hear that a late scope cut meant every conversation had been chopped by 1/3rd or more, and that meant a lot of nuance lost. Which is sad, if true, because it sounds like the result of that left some Dorian romancers a bit cold. Such is how game dev rolls. 😔 If you need more proof of how it was hard for me to let go of him, a short story I wrote after Trespasser came out where Dorian has a bit of closure with his dead father: medium.com/@davidgaider... So yeah. He'll always be my boi. And I'll always be thankful Bio gave me this opportunity. ❤️"

[source thread]

User: "I'm not going to lie, it's hard to take my mind off Dorian almost having a monkey." David Gaider: "If by “almost” you mean there was a picture of a monkey that the concept artist put there as a whim, and which would almost certainly have taken more cinematics and modeling time to put in than we could ever afford… then yes. 😉" [source]

[demonic0angel]

Anger Management prompt where there is a car accident, except it's in space, between Team Phantom and The Outlaws.

(Lmaoooo this is so freaking funny bc my sister got into a car accident just a week ago. She’s fine tho, dw)

Part 2

“Fuck you!” The teenager immediately screamed. “Where the hell did you learn to drive?! Go back to school, fucking dumbass! You can’t even drive, you piece of sh—”

He was then pulled back by one of his friends, who grabbed him and dragged him back to their normal looking, definitely not broken spacecraft. A girl, dressed in a very distinctive style of goth, then made an awkward face, popped her gum, and said, “Sorry about him. He has really bad road rage.”

Jason’s eye twitched. “I can see that. So what’re we going to do now? You crashed into our spacecraft!”

“Well, you don’t have spaceship insurance, do you?” The girl drawled.

Jason was suddenly reminded of why he hated Tim Drake and Damian Wayne. They were goddamn insufferable, obnoxious, annoying, irresponsible teenagers.

Jason suddenly felt like he aged 20 years in an instant and wondered if this was what Dick felt like, being so old.

Roy patted him on the arm. “Want me to take care of this?”

Jason gestured for him to go ahead, already feeling a headache. Roy walked forward and smiled charmingly. “Hey, kiddo! So, it’s not a big deal that we got bumped into— happens all the time! But we just want to know where your parents are! And why you’re out in space! And how we’re going to get back to earth, since our shipped is now wrecked. You know what earth is, right? Earth is—”

“We know what earth is,” the same cursing teenager from earlier said with a snide tone, “We live there too.”

Roy and Jason blinked.

Then Jason spat, “Well, that doesn’t do us shit! We still have a wrecked spacecraft and we’re stuck here on this moon until you fix it! Don’t think you can just fly away! We’re stranded because of you brats!”

Kori then appeared out of the spacecraft and flew down to them all. The kids all immediately stopped, eyes wide in awe. She smiled and said, “Hello, children! Is there anyway you can help us? You did wreck our spacecraft after all.”

Immediately, in the most respectful tone Jason had ever heard, the two-faced brat from earlier then said, “I’m so sorry, miss. We didn’t think that anyone would be exploring this part of space out here, so we weren’t looking! We’re sorry. We don’t have the tools to fix it either.”

Jason’s entire face suddenly wanted to break out into the nastiest glare he could muster. So not only did this kid blatantly show favoritism to Kori (even if she was definitely super cool), he also couldn’t help at all despite the fact that he completely stranded them in space after being careless with a spaceship?

Kori frowned and they all shared a look. Now what? Jason could feel the migraine get more annoying and he almost wanted to pull out his gun just to kill some kids and feel better about his shitty fucking day, when the other teen, who had pulled away the feral brat, spoke up and said, “We can call Jazz!”

“Oh yeah! Jazz! Quick, Sam, call her up!”

Roy narrowed his eyes. “Who’s Jazz?”

“My big sister,” the brat said, “She’ll fix this.”

Great. Another annoying person who would only make his headache worse and possibly piss him off even further. However, just as he finished thinking this and sharing another annoyed look with Roy, a green portal opened up and a goddess stepped down.

She was tall, with a curvaceous figure wrapped in black and blue robes, as well as a fluffy cape around her shoulders. Her hair fell down over her back, colored red like fire and sunsets and tiger lilies, and her face was that of a statue, carefully designed, crafted, and admired by all. She was so beautiful and picturesque that the air around her seemed to glow like a halo.

Just looking at her made Jason’s sorrows disappear.

She blinked her fluttering eyelashes over her turquoise eyes and then asked, “What seems to be the problem?”

Her voice was so angelic that Jason didn’t even feel his headache anymore.

“Nothing now that you’re here,” Jason said dreamily.

“Oh my god,” Roy said, hand over his mouth as he stared at Jason in shock. Even Kori looked shocked and amused.

The boy with black hair shared a disgusted look with his friends. “I thought that would’ve been my line.”

[world-of-aus]

Hot Shot

Pairing: NHL!Photographer!Reader x Hockey Player!Bucky

Warnings: Bucky being a heartthrob.

A/N: I've been reading one to many hockey romances and well here we are scratching an itch. I know I would like to eventually come out with a bigger story for these two but for now this is just the start a taste if you will. I'd like to leave this open to suggestion of what y'all would like to see or know about these two if anything.. Hope you enjoy the first taste.

You barely had a chance to unlock your screen to reply to her message before her caller ID

was taking up your screen, a recent photo of her and Steve that she had made as her contact picture pulling a smile onto your lips.

“Tasha.” you answer.

“Y/n, listen I know you were just planning on watching the game from the comfort of your living room but I mean talk about an upgrade! From a television screen to being at the actual game on the floor behind the safety of the glass getting some wicked shots, and no one captures action shots like you do - I promise I wouldn’t have asked otherwise.” she tacks on her voice pleading.

You chuckle, you know had the circumstances been different she’d be one of the first ones at the arena, she hadn’t missed one of Steve’s games yet, not since you had been signed on. “Natasha relax, you know you don’t have to pull out the stops on me, I'll go - do you want me to send you the photos?”

The redhead turned blonde breathes a heavy sigh of relief, “oh god thank you! and if you don’t mind, but take your time, I’m sure a certain bruin's player is going to be demanding your attention after the game especially if they bag a win.” she teases seemingly mentioning the man in your DM’s.

Your cheeks warm, the unread notification from the player she speaks of appearing in your mind, “please Tasha,” you deflect, “it’s the game of the season he’ll have plenty of attention with all the puck bunnies sporting his name on their jersey throwing themselves at him for an inkling of his attention.” you murmur picking at an invisible speck of lint on your sweater as you stand from the couch, intent on getting your things packed to head out.

“And yet he only seems to want yours,” she sings, “you should totally wear the jersey I got you for your birthday.”

You roll your eyes smile pulling at your lips, “is your flight really delayed, do I have to text Steve?”

Your friend laughs, “unfortunately it is and hey thank you again for this, I owe you, love you, oh and send me a picture of Steve, one of you and Bucky too!”

You shake your head as your friend rushes out her farewell your screen now gone black as you look down at it “looks like pjs are out of the question for tonight” you murmur continuing on through your apartment to grab your things Bucky’s text still sitting in your messages unanswered.

He’d have his answer soon enough.

🏒🖤

The cool of the arena’s backstage floor seeps through your jeans, your tripod sitting off to the side, your camera nestled in your hands as you wait for the first few players of the bruins to make their arrival.

Your camera goes up; the first of the team to come through the backdoors is the Bruins coach Fury, he spots you smile on his face his hand coming up in a greeting as you get your first arrival shot of the day. Slowly players begin to trickle in, most of them spot you posing for you as they stride by, others walk by with a simple wave their heads already in the game.

Speaking of head in the game center Steve Rogers makes his way in, his suit pressed, duffle thrown over his shoulder as he owns the floor. “Looking good Rogers, say you wouldn’t have Natasha tucked away in that duffle by chance?” you tease grinning behind your camera. You laugh at the grin that breaks his lips, a shake of his head as he directs his gaze at you, “can assure you Natasha wouldn’t be packed in my bag, she’d be hanging on my arm.” You coo at the bearded blonde, “you think you can say that again I didn’t have my phone out.”

The two of you laugh as you capture a few more shots, “Come on Rogers leave some love for the rest of us, you already have your face glued on billboards!”

Left defenseman Sam Wilson is striding in next million dollar smile painted on his lips like the suit he wears on his skin. “But no one has their face printed on as many shirts like you do Wilson, now give me something new to look out for will ya, want to make sure these etsy sellers get only the best!” Wilson eats your words up, feeding the fans through your film. He comes closer kneeling to your level to pull you in for a hug, “it’s good to see you hot shot, thought you weren’t coming out tonight with how Barnes was moping.”

Your heart beats like a wild drum in your chest, “Tasha’s flight got delayed, cashed in her IOU, so here I am and surely your version of Barnes moping is different from mine.”

“Oh man you should of seen him, had to smack the phone out of his hands with how often he was checking it, you’re gonna join us tonight after the win right?”

“You Bruins are so sure about that win,” you laugh.

“That’s because it’s in the bag, hot shot.” It takes everything in you not to snap your eyes to the broad shoulder right defenseman sauntering into the building. “Here comes your boy.” Sam chuckles patting your shoulder as you find said man with your camera lens. You wanted to eat him up like he was eating at your film.

Like Sam Bucky strolls till he’s standing above you, grin pulling at his pink lips as he offers you his hand. You set your camera down gently against your chest before taking his offer, warmth seeping though you at your hand wrapped in his. “Thought you weren’t gonna show.” He murmurs watching you.

“Well as enticing as staying in my pjs on my couch with a glass of wine watching the game tonight sounded IOUs are a serious thing to cash in.” you say struggling to keep his gaze, you were certain you’d turn into a puddle of goo soon.

“More enticing then upgrading your lock screen?”

You let out a groan reaching out to smack his chest, but his hand captures yours instead keeping it there a teasing smile playing at his lips. “You’re never going to let that go are you?” you question recalling the night at the bar that he discovered himself as your lock screen. To be fair it was one of your favorite shots you had captured at the beginning of the seasons. It didn’t hurt that he was your favorite Bruin player to follow on and off the ice.

“Never, though I’m hoping by the end of the night ill see a photo of me after the win.” He chuckles thumb running over your hand.

“You’d have to secure a win first Barnes.”

Your breath catches in your chest as he closes the distance between the two of you, “I’ve already won though.”

Your reply is caught on your tongue, Fury voice breaking through the haze, “Barnes you’ll have time to catch up with y/n later get your ass in the lockers now!”

Bucky let’s your hand falling, chuckle brewing in his chest as he steps back, “hope you’re not watching Wilson or Rogers to closely tonight hotshot because this wins for you, and I’m going to be the one bringing it home.”

You watch him walk away, his gaze lingering on you till he disappears through the locker room.

And God how you hoped he would.

[star2fishmeg]

ᴛᴏɢᴇᴛʜᴇʀ, ᴘᴇʀғᴇᴄᴛʟʏ | sᴍᴀʟʟ ᴡᴏʀʟᴅs

Pairing | Quinn Hughes x afab!reader Summary | six years later Quinn and y/n find themselves back in the place it started and old memories truly are precious...but so are new ones Authors Note | enjoy the (long) blurb @thehugheslover, sorry it took so long! This is only going to make sense if you read Feel This Way!!

The familiar clink of pool balls hitting each other, music at a moderate volume but mainly muffled by laughter and chatting and the back doors wide, opening the basement onto the patio where meat roasted on the barbeque under the balmy sun. Everything had stayed. The world was almost the same as they were back as teenagers but this time, they weren’t as naive, and everyone had grown up. Really grown up, into adults with jobs and lives, new ambitions and what happened six years ago were nothing but fond memories protected by the walls of the lake house. 

Y/n and Quinn sat on the sofa, turned slightly to face each other so they could look out into the rest of the room, her finger gently brushing over the stain between them. The second her skin touched the fabric, it all came flooding back like film tapes, the night Brady stayed over in particular. 

“We were so stupid, but it was a lot of fun,” she began with a chuckle, Quinn turning his head in interest, watching her trace around the splotch, “The Vodka Incident, when Brady brought that vodka, and we all thought it was fucking amazing.”

Cole’s voice groaned out from the distance, followed by Trevor and Jack’s obnoxious laughing, clearly relishing in Cole losing their game of pool. The couple giggled, glancing over at the group, their memories fading in and suddenly they were bought back to that night, and they were sixteen with three fifteen-year-olds and little Luke sat in a circle. The way Cole’s face had screwed up hideously, Jack and Trevor’s attempts to be ‘cool’ but landed them both in the bathroom and gagging and Luke tucked into her side most the night. 

“Yeah, Luke used to cling to you all the time, he was literally your shadow,” he said, watching Luke take a cocky bow after a successful turn, “and Brady, oh my God, you two used to torture me, like, come on, ‘who do you currently have a crush on?’ while you were sitting on my lap? You two killed me.”

Y/n laughed fondly, watching Brady enter the basement waving tongs like a magic wand, passionately interrupting the guys by fact checking them about something too muffled to make out from where she was sat. She then remembered the argument she and Brady fell into that everyone retold as if they’d thrown fists at each other, “Honestly, I thought you’d be jealous that I’m close with Brady too, but I was so wrong.”

“How about we not bring up my teenage insecurity, I felt so lame,” he smiled, hand taking hers and interlacing their fingers. He remembered that part too well, Jack and Luke loved to bring it up with him because for them, it was peak comedy and a learning curve on what not to do. Watching it happen was not as funny, but Quinn was their older brother, so how could it not be funny? “You don’t even understand, y/n, I got a scolding, from Jack.”

“Well, I was also lame so we’re even. Luke told my brother about the whole thing and that fucker did not let me live it down.” She grinned and placed a kiss on his nose, “You know what he said? ‘Yeah, everyone knew Quinnifer was, like, in love with you’ the little loser.” 

He groaned playfully at the nickname, even after all the years her brother still called him that. He really couldn’t escape that one, he’d somehow obtained it during college, y/n’s brother just started calling him Quinnifer out of the blue and his only explanation being that the women love it and it’s catchy, but it was better than other thing’s he’d been called.

Looking back over at the group, their friends that’d grown up with them, but whose personalities hadn’t changed, they wondered what it’d be like if they were sixteen again, and what they’d do differently. But they weren’t sixteen anymore and all the angst had been and gone, that chapter closed. Quinn was captain of the Vancouver Canucks and y/n was flying in her own career, and while they’d achieved so much by twenty-five, Quinn still had a list he wanted before he could feel satisfied.

Moonlight shimmering over the ripples of the lake, warm lanterns illuminating along the dock just like it always had. Y/n and Quinn’s bare feet padded along the wood leisurely, hands encased in each other’s and not a word spoken between them, they just needed a bit of peace away from everyone, even just for a moment. Passing the boats harboured up, Mila came to mind. Not in any other way than what happened that day and how he felt y/n’s desperate, burning glares from the other side of the boat, how he wished it was y/n breasts pressed against his shoulders and not some random girl’s. 

“I should’ve just told you how I felt from the start,” Quinn mumbled, but his voice clear from the serenity of the dock, nothing but crickets singing and distant chatter, “Like, we wouldn’t have had to go through that confusing, are-we-are-we-not phase. I can’t believe I was such a pussy.” 

Y/n giggled, swinging their arms, “Don’t blame yourself, I was also responsible. I told most the story to some friends in college, and even they thought it was obvious we liked each other. I sort of wish we hadn’t had that situationship, like, we were just hurting ourselves.”

“Yeah, no, I agree. Had me crying myself to sleep, it was fucking stupid.” 

“I know, Jack told me the night of the Vodka Incident, he saw you crying when we were going to sleep.” She didn’t need Jack to tell her Quinn cried that night, she felt his tears on her skin and the way he’d squeezed her like she would evaporate, his favourite teddy bear. She just never said anything, no need to bring up the painful past when they were living in their own paradise in the future. 

The more time she spent in the lake house, the more the memories swirled in her mind, not dwelling just remembering the times she couldn’t during the hockey season. The lake was a sanctuary, a museum of youth that held so many minor details you’d never see unless you were searching for them, like the names etched into the decking, aged but still prominent.

Quinn glanced down, barely reading the names scratched into the wood until he walked over something he distinctively remembered scratching with Brady, right before they were off to college; Q + y/n in a heart. He stopped right above it, tugging y/n back to face him, sweat forming on the back of his neck with butterflies in his stomach. Y/n blinked twice at him before raising a brow. He pulled his hand away, wiping both on his shorts before taking a deep breath.

“Uh, hey, listen…” his eyes shifted to her ‘Q’ necklace, to her eyes and then back to the etching on the floorboards before her necklace again.

“Q?” she asked, head flooding with multiple scenarios, piecing together location and their ages, his sweating, the fizzling in her chest and down to her stomach, “Oh God, you’re not getting traded, are you?”

His eyes widened, “Huh? No, no, Jesus no. It’s uh…well…um, just wanted to tell you how much I love you and appreciate you. You’ve, um, been by my side forever and I’ve been, uh, thinking about the future…”

He dropped to one knee, sliding a little, velvet box from his pocket and held it out in front of her, eyes sparkling under all the little lamps but more importantly because when he looked at her, he saw the most beautiful woman he’d ever met. The most caring, supportive, girlfriend. His best friend who, no matter what, never gave up on him. He gazed at her with dilated pupils that may have well been hearts. Y/n’s eyes widened, her lips parting slightly as she gasped gently, hands covering her mouth, and she struggled to hold back the tears welling in her eyes.

“Y/n L/n, I have loved you since we were fifteen and only you can make me feel this way. There isn’t anyone else I’d rather spend the rest of my life with, in sickness and in health. Will you make me the happiest man alive and marry me?” Quinn’s voice shook, not a filler word tumbling out for once. All those days rehearsing his speech in the mirror paid off, all that stress lifting off his shoulders and she watched his hands tremble.

Y/n nodded desperately, tears spilling down her cheeks, “Yes, of course!” 

He grinned from ear to ear, corners of his eyes creasing as his eyes watered, wiggling the ring - polished with her birthstone - from the cushioning and sliding it onto her finger, his arms wrapping around her waist firmly. He held her close into his chest, spinning her around with his face buried in her shoulder, his heart swelling. When they rounded back to their original spot, they melted into each other’s bodies as they always had, t-shirts soaking up the salty tears of joy, the realisation of how far they’d come hitting them like bricks. Y/n and Quinn Hughes, forever and always. Their new chapter, with new adventures and the start of their own little family one day.

small worlds | @bunbunbl0gs

(To be added to taglists, just comment or ask via ‘pass me the puck!’)

[Masterlist]

[Requests CLOSED]

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[brbsoulnomming]

Heart On Your Sleeve Part 3

Part 1 | Part 2

written for steddiebigbang2024 and belatedly posting here!

-----

Dustin shows up at his house the next morning.

"You have a concussion," Dustin says when Steve answers the door.

Steve squints at him. "Did you get your medical license when I wasn't looking?"

Dustin rolls his eyes. "Haha, very funny. Are you going to let me in?"

Steve doesn't really have a reason not to.

All right, well, he's got several reasons not to, starting with the fact that Steve isn't actually feeling so great and ending with Dustin being like thirteen and somehow always around when the world is ending.

But Steve is lonely, and feeling kind of pathetic, and none of them seem like good enough reasons, so he opens the door and lets Dustin in.

"From my mom," Dustin says, setting down a Tupperware of brownies on the coffee table.

Steve immediately knows he's made the right decision, taking a massive bite of chocolate, fudgy heaven. It's only after he's devoured one and he turns to Dustin to ask him to tell his mom thanks that he sees that Dustin's plopped his heart onto the coffee table, too.

"Hearts out, Steve," Dustin says matter-of-factly.

"Why?" Steve bitches. "What do you even need to look at it for?"

"You're in the Party now! Party rules, you have to show your heart before you can get your walkie," Dustin says.

Steve pulls a face, and immediately regrets it as it makes his eye and nose burst with pain. "Who says I even want to be in your party?"

Dustin's face falls. "Don't you?" he asks, sounding hesitant and uncertain.

It makes Steve's resolve crumble immediately.

"How about we start with friends?" Steve offers.

The kid's face lights up at that, giving him a gap toothed smile, but then he nudges his heart closer to Steve and looks at him expectantly.

Steve sighs and takes his own heart out, wincing a little as the motion twinges his bruised ribs. He sets it on the table next to Dustin's.

"There you go," Steve mutters.

Now that the light's better, he can see a hole right in the middle of Dustin's heart. It's small, but it goes all the way through, and it makes Steve's own heart give a soft pulse in empathy.

Dustin catches it, looks up to follow Steve's gaze, and drops his eyes. "My dad," Dustin mutters.

"Hey," Steve says softly, reaching out without even thinking about it to turn his heart a little.

There's two overlapping holes in the same place on his own heart, and Steve rubs his thumb over them, biting the inside of his cheek at the way it still prompts a soft echo of longing. "My parents," he tells Dustin.

Dustin looks around, like he's only just now realizing that there's been no sign of them since he rang the doorbell. "Oh," he says, soft and full of understanding.

It's honestly the most understanding he's ever received about his parents choosing to be mostly absent from his life, which makes him feel kind of pathetic, but also makes his heart warm in a way he's not sure it ever has before.

Dustin reaches out, stopping just short of touching Steve's heart as he gestures to the jagged line cutting through it.

"Nancy?" Dustin asks.

Steve's jaw sets.

He doesn't want to talk about it.

Dustin seems to take that as answer enough, though, because he just goes back to eagerly examining both of their hearts. Steve's is bigger than his - of course it is, because Dustin is thirteen, but they're both the same deep, vibrant red, and they both beat strong and steady.

It's barely any time before they're beating in unison.

Dustin looks back up at him, beaming that wide, goofy smile of his. "Cool," he proclaims.

—

Every time Dustin comes over after that - and it's a lot, honestly, Steve still doesn't know what to make of it - he plops his heart onto the coffee table and waits expectantly until Steve takes his out and puts it next to Dustin's.

They never touch each other's hearts, they never even talk about it, but at least twice a week Steve's able to breathe a little easier, able to actually relax.

—

He waits at the picnic table in the woods after school on his first day back.

Munson looks bored at first when he gets there, but then he does a double take, like Steve's injuries are worse now than they were at lunch.

Or maybe it's just that he's up close now, instead of on the other side of the cafeteria, or maybe it's just that Steve's tired and in pain and he doesn't give a shit about pretending like he isn't.

“Jesus Christ, Harrington,” Munson mutters, dropping his lunchbox on the table.

Steve shrugs. “I'd say you should see the other guy, but everyone did already.”

Munson is looking at him with suspicion, eyes narrowed as he takes him in. Steve wonders if he doesn't buy the story that's been floating around, if it's too easy to see that he and Hargrove both look pretty fucking bad for just blowing off steam and getting carried away.

Wonders if he'll call him on it.

Munson's expression smooths out, though, and he flips the lunchbox lid open. “How much do you want?”

Steve's eyes flick down to the chains on Munson's leather jacket, but no heart there today. Not that he could see anything if it was - Munson's been wearing his heart pinned to his jacket off and on since the last half of Steve's freshman year, but it's always wrapped up tight in chains or leather so that no one could get more than a glimpse of it.

Everyone said it was a flaunt of defiance against tradition and a way he could cheat people in his deals while maintaining the appearance of a fair exchange, but Steve always kind of figured it was just because he was tired of people demanding to see it whenever he sold to them while being reluctant to show theirs.

That, and it was like everything else Eddie Munson did - loud and in your face and purposefully drawing attention to what he wanted you to see, while guarding what he didn't close to his chest.

Steve's never bothered with attempting a mutual show of hearts the handful of times he's bought from Munson before - they aren't exactly new business partners, not even the first time he actually bought from Munson himself, and frankly Steve's never needed to see Munson's heart to know he's trustworthy enough that he's not going to give him bad shit, even if he does overcharge him.

But today's different.

He gently pops open his own chest, ignoring the faint twinge of his ribs, and takes his heart out, setting it on the table next to Munson's lunchbox.

Munson's eyes widen for a moment before his jaw sets, lips thinning out in a flat line as he looks down at Steve's heart and then back up to his face. “What the hell is this?”

“My heart,” Steve replies evenly.

Munson looks unimpressed. “I'm not showing you mine.”

“I didn't ask you to,” Steve says, unable to stop himself even though he knows he's being kind of a dick.

Munson looks at him for a moment. Then, “Whatever. How much do you want?”

Steve opens his mouth to say he isn't here to buy today, but - actually, no, he could probably use some weed to dull the pain and help him sleep. It's routine for a moment, both of them ignoring Steve's heart beating on the table next to them as they make the trade, until Steve's baggie is tucked inside his jacket and Munson's shoving cash into the back pocket of his jeans.

“Pleasure doing business with you, Your Majesty,” Munson says, doing a little bow.

“Munson, wait,” Steve says.

Munson straightens, raising an eyebrow at him.

“Hargrove tried to blame this on you.” Steve gestures at his face. “Told me you sold him some bad shit.”

Munson goes very, very still. His eyes flick down to Steve's heart, so quick that Steve's not sure he would have noticed it if he wasn't watching Munson so closely.

“That so?” Munson asks. There isn't an edge in his voice - if anything, there's such a quiet neutrality to those two words that it almost feels more dangerous than if he'd tried to put a warning in them.

Eddie Munson's never scared Steve the way he does half the school - honestly, shitty as it is, Steve doesn't exactly think of him all that much - but there's no denying that Munson is no pushover. He can't tell if Munson is afraid, or angry, or just itching for a fight, but Steve didn't come here to freak him out.

He holds his hands up, palm out, and purposefully drags his gaze down to where his heart is beating calm and steady. “I don't believe him.”

Munson looks down at Steve's heart, lingering for a moment before darting back up. His expression is still unreadable. “Why are you telling me this?”

“Because he said he was going to spread it around, that you were lacing your stuff with something,” Steve says. “I'm pretty sure I convinced him it was a bad idea, but just in case.”

“You convinced him it was a bad idea,” Munson repeats flatly.

Steve shrugs. “I told him he should be nicer to you, that you always sell me the good shit.”

That gets a little snort out of Munson, startled and almost amused, and Steve grins at him.

“It won't be hard to tack that onto the rumor if he tries to spread it,” Steve says. “So you should be safe.”

Just like that, the amusement in Munson's expression is gone. “Yeah?” he asks, disdain clear in his voice. “And why does King Steve give a shit if I'm safe?”

It's an obvious challenge, and for just a moment - for just a moment, Steve wants to tell him.

To tell him how the King Steve shit first came about because Carol loved fairy tales when they were little and his parents were gone so much that Tommy called him king of the castle, that he has tons of people who call him their friend but the only people who come close to understanding him are his ex, her new boyfriend, and a gaggle of middle schoolers who're waiting for him to come pick them up.

That he's more tired than any seventeen year old should ever be.

“What kind of king would I be if I didn't protect my people?” he says instead of any of that, refusing to look at whatever his heart is doing.

It's high school, it's politics, it's bullshit, but it's still a game he has to play for a little longer.

Munson is watching his heart, now, and whatever he sees makes something complicated cross his face. For a moment, Steve picks up a hint of longing, but it's gone by the time he looks back up.

“Well then,” he says, wide grin back in place as he bows again. “Consider this court jester protected, Your Majesty.”

—

The phone rings at one am a few days later.

He isn't asleep - had been, earlier, but a nightmare had tipped him quickly into wakefulness, and he hadn't gone back - so he answers it almost immediately.

Nothing good comes from one am phone calls.

“How many teeth do you think those things have?” Max demands without so much as a hello.

“I don't know,” Steve bitches before he's thought better of it. “You want to come over and count the bite marks on my leg?”

There's silence for a moment.

“Yeah,” Max says, and Steve's gut twists.

“It's one in the morning, Mayfield,” he says. “What are you going to do, skate over? It's dark and cold as shit out there.”

“Didn't stop us at the junkyard,” she shoots back.

He's quiet for a moment. Then, “I'll pick you up.”

She snorts. “You're going to show up at my house at one am and pick me up? Yeah, that'll be a great look for you.”

“Then it looks like you're out of luck, and you'll have to pick out the teeth marks on my leg tomorrow.”

She doesn't say anything for a while. He doesn't rush her, just settles back with the phone tucked between his shoulder and his ear.

“Why'd you do it?” she asks eventually.

“I ask myself that about a lot of things,” he replies. “Which one?”

He half expects another snappy retort, but her voice just goes even quieter.

“Put yourself in front of me. Stand up to him.”

Oh.

“I don't need protecting,” she adds, and yeah, there's the attitude.

“I know you don't need it,” he says, even though that's a lie. She does need it, they all do. “I know you can look out for yourself.”

That's not a lie.

“But you shouldn't have to. You should have someone who'll look out for you.”

She scoffs. “And that's going to be you?”

He shrugs, even though she can't see it, and it hurts a little. “Why not?”

She's quiet again. “You don't even know me.”

He does, is the thing. He knows the way her eyes looked when she said Billy was going to kill her, he knows not being able to rely on the people you should count on most, even if it's not the same.

He knows how he felt the summer before high school, when his father finally grew too frustrated with waiting for Steve's heart to change, how he picked it up and nearly threw it across the room. He knows the sound of his mother yelling, how viciously they fought. How his father never touched him or his heart again, but Steve now knew what lurked behind his eyes when he smiled too big.

He knows how his mother has looked at him with disappointment more times than anything else, after that.

But he doesn't say any of that. Instead, he says, “So let's change that. Skate park or arcade tomorrow?”

“What?” she asks, clearly thrown.

“After you're done staring at my leg wound and counting teeth like a creep,” he clarifies. “Am I taking you to the skate park or the arcade?”

“Hawkins doesn't have a skate park,” she says dismissively. “It has abandoned parking lots and dirt holes.”

He waits.

“Arcade,” she says. “And I want popcorn.”

—

His walkie flares to life at night, sometimes.

After the first time, he leaves it on a different channel than their usual one - makes sure the kids know which one it is, if they need to use it - and sometimes, they do.

Okay, more than sometimes. It's not like Steve's sleeping all that well, though, so he doesn't mind when it happens almost every night for a few weeks.

“Steve, you awake? Over,” Lucas says one night.

“Yeah, I'm up,” he mutters into the walkie. Then, after a moment's pause, “Over.”

There's silence, and that wakes him up more than the walkie itself had.

“Lucas?” he asks.

“What if you weren't there?” Lucas says.

“What?” Steve asks.

“At the junkyard. With Billy. What if you weren't there?”

“But I was,” Steve says, frowning.

“I know, but what if you weren't?”

Steve sits up, rubs at his eyes a little. “I'll always be there when you guys need me, okay?”

“You can't promise that!” If it was Dustin or Mike it might have been an angry bite, but Lucas just sounds frustrated. Maybe even a little scared.

“Sure I can,” Steve argues, even though he kind of knows Lucas is right. “I have the walkie, right? You guys call me, and bada bing bada boom, I'm there.”

Lucas is quiet for a moment. “Are you still trying to get Nancy back?”

“What? No, of course not. Why?”

“Dustin said you were bringing flowers to Nancy when he made you help him look for Dart.”

Right, of course he did. Do these kids keep any secrets from each other?

“This isn't about Nancy, okay? This is about you guys. I showed my heart to Dustin and I have my walkie and everything, doesn't that mean I'm in your party?”

“You actually want to be in the Party?” Lucas asks, sounding skeptical. “But you're Steve Harrington.”

“What's that supposed to mean?” Steve asks.

“Aren't you way too cool to hang out with us?” Lucas retorts.

This is - quickly becoming a conversation that Steve doesn't really want to have over a walkie talkie at past midnight on a school night. He huffs out a frustrated breath of air, then pushes the talk button on the walkie again.

“This weekend. Arcade or shooting hoops?”

There's a pause. Then, “Really?”

Steve swallows down his urge to be a dick. “Yeah. Really.”

“Basketball. The park?” Lucas asks.

“Nah, we can use the hoop in my driveway. Come on by whenever.”

—

Lucas is good. Unpracticed, especially at any kind of teamwork, but good. Steve has to be careful, with his injuries, but they still get some good work in, and it's fun.

It's not until they're finished and raiding the kitchen for some snacks that he asks, “So what was that about, a few days ago?”

Lucas noisily pops open his can of New Coke, and takes such a long drink that Steve's pretty sure he's doing it to avoid answering. Steve just raises an eyebrow.

“Nancy used to hang out with us,” Lucas says, almost reluctantly. “She even played D&D with us a couple of times. Then she went to high school, and then she started dating you, and suddenly she's too cool to hang out with us. Then - then everything with Will, the first time, and she promised Mike they'd spend more time together, but she didn't. Just kept dating you.”

That's - a lot. He hadn't known that about Nancy, except that she wasn't as close with Mike as she wanted to be, that she didn't know how to talk to him about everything that happened. He thinks about protesting that hey, he's the one who got Nancy to talk to Mike about Will - and had to be a part of it, ugh - but again, he's trying not to be a dick.

“So you're, what, worried that I goaded Nancy into not hanging with you guys?”

Lucas makes a face at him. “No, Nancy doesn't do anything she doesn't want to do. I believe you that you'll be here if we need you for Upside Down stuff again, but why would you hang out with us for the in between?”

That's a fair question. He wants to be flippant, wants to deflect with something like because Dustin keeps showing up at my house and won't leave me alone, but -

He remembers how terrified Lucas looked with Billy pinning him against the cabinet. He kind of wonders if anyone's talked to him about it, or if it got lumped in with all the other weird terrifying shit going on.

“Because it isn't always Upside Down stuff,” Steve says softly.

Lucas goes quiet. “El says Hopper told her you guys fixed it so Billy would leave us alone.”

“I think Max did that well enough, but yeah, Hop and I had a plan.”

“How?” Lucas asks.

Bullshit, is how, Steve wants to say, but he doesn't. “Billy's on the basketball team, and he wants to stay on the basketball team.”

Lucas frowns. “So?”

“So I've been on the team longer than him. Coach knows me better, the guys are used to looking to me. Well - some of them.” In all fairness, the basketball team's been kind of split - some of them gravitating to him, some to Billy, some trickling back and forth like kids with divorced parents.

“So… you're one of the cool kids, and you like us, so the more douchebag ones stay away from us?” Lucas asks.

Steve's nose scrunches a little as he considers that, but it's… not wrong. “Yeah, I guess so. Most of them are good guys, they don't like bullying anymore than I do. It doesn't stop the ones who are assholes from doing it where we can't see it, but it helps.”

Lucas looks like he's considering that for a long moment, until finally he nods.

Steve thinks that's the end of it, but later, as Lucas is heading out to leave, he asks, “So what happens if you're not there, and you can't see it?”

Steve resists the temptation to pinch the bridge of his nose - mostly because he knows it'll hurt like hell.

“The Y is offering self defense classes,” he says, when he's gotten himself under control. “I was thinking about taking one. You in?”

Lucas is in.

This is already written, and my plan is to post one part a day until it's all up here!

-----

Part 4

Taglist (always happy to add more to this if anyone wants): @fairytalesreality @lostonceandneverfound @wheneverfeasible @awkwardgravity1 @theintrovertedintrovert @ravenfrog @scarlet-malfoy

[tracklessreason]

Hi. It's me again.

WHERE THE FRICK IS BUMBLEBEE?! Sorry, let me calm down and retry.

Thank you for answering my last ask, I can't help but notice how no one knows where Bee's ghost is. And Megatron is the one looking into the Matrix... Is he haunting Megatron? Trying to stop him from doing it? Helping him?

Is Optimus's ghost following Ratchet around like a sad puppy?

Also just the pairings- Jazz with Megatronus? THat sounds... like fun.

Do the primes miss the other Primes and ask their host if they can check on the other bots that got shrapeneled? Maybe one of them asks if they can find a way to talk with the others... or maybe they can talk trough the hosts... maybe... (ah ah possessed arc)

(PS I really vibe with Hive's whole deal, he is very cool :D and I'm devastated that I'm the one that discovered how he explodes)

Hug hug!

Hi again!!! Don't worry, Bee is still here!

His spirit is just...struggling. He's weak at first, flickering like a dying light bulb. He hasn't left the fractured core of the Matrix still in his corpse, but his soul signature is so weak no one can find him. He's just sort of trapped there for a while, in the burnt out room he died in. Until Megatron of course.

Megatron breaks into the autobot base, walks past every sleeping mech he could easily have snuffed, and steals the Matrix core, and by unintentional extension, steals Bumblebee. Now at first, Bee is rightfully upset. He hates being at the gloomy decepticon base, he hates Megatron for taking his voice, he's just mad. Time passes as Megatron tinkers with the core, and Bee regains strength enough to....throw things???

It shouldn't be possible. Somehow this unstable remnant of the Matrix doesn't contain him, but merely houses him, and as he grows stronger, he can appear as an apparition to Megatron. He uses it almost solely to hinder him. With no voice (even ghost Bee gets no respite) all he can really do is mess up Megatron's workspace and insult him through pantomime. Really he doesn't understand why Megatron puts up with it, but aside from the occasional fit of rage at his antics, the decepticon leader ignores him as much as possible and puts his all into trying to restore the Matrix.

Before long he starts having one sided conversations with Bumblebee. Its mostly complaints at first, and insults towards him and the autobots and whatever else goes wrong in his life outside of this little workshop Bee cant leave. It soon gives way to more private matters; intentionally or not, Megatron is revealing his very convoluted, very mixed feelings about Optimus Prime.

The war has gone on too long, why couldn't that idiot just see things from his perspective, he deserved to die, he will be brought back, how could his oldest friend just leave him like this...

To Bee it sounds...exactly like how Optimus felt about Megatron, just drowned in molten anger issues. Against his self preservation instinct, Bee decides to work towards putting this whole mess to bed. Nothing better to do.

With what limited knowledge and communication he has, he does his best to try and help Megatron fix the Matrix. They have spats still, and plenty of set backs, but things smooth over when Megatron (begrudgingly) admits to feelings of regret over taking Bee's voice. As an olive branch, Bee explains something to Megatron that he's been dying to know: how Optimus died.

Things sour fast. Megatron is determined to murder Starscream, Bee is frustratedly trying to explain that if he does so, this little partnership of convenience is over, and he will ensure that the Matrix is never restored. The end of the war relies almost solely on Megatron reeling in his damn anger, and Bee doesnt intend to allow any slip ups. He has no idea how this will end when Megatron leaves the workshop that night.

On the other side of things, the Primes are having a real...weird time?? The ones without hosts can communicate with each other, but the other four are basically cut off from all but their hosts. They don't have the ability to take control anymore, and even if they did, their hosts are nowhere near as easy to possess, nor as willing, as Hive Prime was. Ratchet especially has threatened to tear the Matrix metal from his frame and grind it to dust if Prima so much as thinks about trying it. The other three hosts are similarly put off.

Once again the Primes are relegated to giving advice, but it's not advice anyone seems to want, and yeah, it's mostly because of the wild pairings. Megatronus is constantly clutching his pearls over Jazz's laid-back attitude and deliberate ignorance of his wishes. Prima's calm rationality does little to temper Ratchet's snappy demeanor and only really gets on his nerves (how can you be so calm after what you all did?). Ironhide straight up refuses to acknowledge Quintus. Drift is probably the only one feeling alright with all this. Alpha Trion is generally reasonable, and isn't interested in having control over Drift's form, nor was he interested in it with Hive, so they just vibe like college roommates.

It's uncomfortable, but the Primes are used to sharing space. The worst part is actually sharing it with fewer mechs than usual. The Primes all miss each other to varying degrees, but for the most part are either too egotistical to admit it, or think it improper to mention.

Of course, grand prize for worst ghost time currently goes to Optimus. Dying, watching Bee suffer, feeling his friend's life force extinguish...

He might as well be a husk right now, full on silent treatment is all he's capable of at the moment. The other Primes know better than to try and speak with him. This is their doing to begin with, the channeling of their energy that strained Bee so heavily. Optimus follows the elected council around during the days, but at night he sits outside the room where Hive's body rests. He was there the night that Megatron broke in.

It takes immense effort to travel far enough out from the base to go see Megatron, and he needs several cycles to recover after every attempt, but he keeps doing it, knowing he could fade away permanently. When he gets there, he's too weak for Bee or Megatron to detect him. But he can hear their talks. He misses them both more than words can say.

(Sorry the response is so long, lol. This ask really got the gears turning in my head. I hope at least that makes up for being the one to find out that Ending 3 Hive dies bloody. I'm really flattered to hear you like him! For me that's quite high praise coming from you. Hug hug!)

[vezpr]

------------------------ toxic. ]

SUKUNAxF!READER ☽☾ COLLEGE AU ☽☾ ONESHOT ☽☾ AO3

☽☾ 𝐬𝐲𝐧𝐨𝐩𝐬𝐢𝐬: Gojo shows you a video of your boyfriend, Sukuna, making out with another girl at a party, so you decide to get revenge. Poor Nanami.

☽☾ 𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬/𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐬: 18+MINORS DNI, smut, porn with feelings (not necessarily good feelings), sukuna x reader, nanami x reader, ft gojo for as long as I can stand him :b, human Sukuna, college au/ no powers, toxic/ mutually abusive relationship dynamics, cheating, spanking, hate fucking, face slapping, throat fucking, hair pulling, light choking, no aftercare, degradation, name calling, drug and alcohol use mentioned, size difference, oral sex, piv sex, I suck at tags

☽☾ 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 4.3k

"Satoru, can you at least pretend not to enjoy this, please," you say, holding your phone away from your face as it rings. 

The man is glowing, his lanky frame sprawled across of one of the mismatched sofas in his apartment, one boot propped on a coffee table littered with the controlled chaos of his studies. He looks as if his head might actually explode with the force of unexpelled I-told-you-so's. "He's an asshole. I told you that before you ever hooked up, right? Forget him!"

"Damnit," you hiss, pausing in your frantic pacing long enough to redial your asshole boyfriend's number after being sent to his full mailbox half a dozen times. 

"Why don't you try cool down a little before you talk to him," Nanami says from the opposite side of the room where he sits hunched forward, elbows on his knees, watching you pace. Always the reasonable one. "Nothing productive can possibly come of talking to him while you're like this."

You shoot the blonde man a withering glare, but hit the end button on the call, shoulders sagging, chin to chest as you cross to his side of the room. "I know you're right, Nanami," you reply as you slump, defeated, onto the sagging cushion next to him. He clears his throat when you splay your legs and your knee brushes his. You lean your head against the back of the couch and turn your face towards him, lips pursed in a pout as you feel the stinging threat of tears in your eyes. "It's just that... right now, I don't feel like I can cool dow-"

You sit bolt upright as your phone buzzes in your hand. The screen lights up with his face, framed in soft salmon waves that contrast with the hard black lines of tattoos tracing the angle of his jaw. You've been together for a year, practically moved in together right away, and still, even the digital representation of his garnet eyes makes your heart stutter just like it did the first time you saw him. 

"Hey, I really don't think you should-" Nanami begins.

"Sukuna," you answer, rising from the couch and crossing the arm that isn't holding the phone to your ear over your ribcage, as if that will prevent your heart from beating out of your chest.

"Who are you with," he asks, apparently hearing Nanami, who continues to lecture you in the background. But, fuck, if the rasp of his voice doesn't make your insides squirm in a way they definitely shouldn't right now.  Why do you have to be so hopelessly obsessed with him?

You shoot your friend a pleading look and wave your hand at him. He sinks back into the couch, shaking his head, but he shuts up. 

"Who's throat did you have your tongue down last night," you demand, voice rising already. When your question is met with silence, you add, "Go- someone showed me a video."

"Nothing happened," he replies, his voice steady and calm, as if he were ordering a coffee, which really makes you start to lose your shit.

"Do. not. fucking gaslight me right now. It was you, I fucking saw-"

"I mean nothing happened after that. You didn't see a video of me fucking anybody. Didn't even hear about the possibility of me fucking anybody. Because I didn't fuck anybody. I mean, shit, I got home before you." He pauses and your heart starts to slow just a little. Maybe it really didn't go any farther than that.  Maybe this doesn't have to be a big deal... but then he opens his stupid mouth again.  "Couldn't stay hard because of the molly."

"Fuck you, Sukuna," you scream-sob, holding the phone under your chin. "Fuck you! If you were here I'd slap your motherfucking face so goddamn hard I swear to god!"

He laughs, of course. "Calm down, baby. I'm kidding. I knew that white-haired prick was watching my every fucking move. I just did it to piss you off after you left with that blonde guy that's always limping after you like a lost puppy."

You glance up at Nanami, wondering if he heard, but he is studiously examining his cuticles. Even Gojo looks uncomfortable as he busies himself with straightening the papers on his desk, his luminous eyes peeking at you through the platinum locks that have fallen over his forehead in the process.

"I left because you were so fucking high. Laughing at everything, grinding your teeth like a crackhead, going on and fucking on about how you feel like a god among men or somevweird shit like that. It's embarrassing as hell! I ask you to go to one little party-"

"Exactly, you bitched and moaned until I agreed to hang out with your loser friends - who just so happen to all be men that want to fuck you-" 

He is getting loud now, apparently loud enough for your companions to hear because Gojo, with a flourish of his wrist, cheerfully interjects, "I don't want to fuck you."

"Shut up Satoru," Nanami hisses.

"-It's like you get off parading yourself around them in front of me... but I digress. My point is that I don't know what the hell would make you think I would be willing to endure that shit sober."

"Oh, so now it's my fault you fucking cheated on me?"

He's quiet for a minute and you hear him sigh into the receiver. "I got a question for you. You didn't get home til late, where were you?"

"Well, I was hungry so we stopped to get something to eat..."

"For like... had to have been at least four hours?"

"I guess we lost track of time talking..."

"Talking. Okay. Well that sounds fucking fantastic, babe but-"

"Well at least I didn't tongue wrestle him in front of half the fucking campus!"

"You know what... I can't do this now, I'm at work. That whimsical motherfucker had all day to start this shit and of course he waited until I'm at work. When I get home tonight, we're gonna have a nice long chat. Maybe not four hours but..."

"I'm not going to be home when you get home tonight."

Another tense silence. "Don't fuck with me, babe. You really don't wanna do that."

"Don't fuck with me, babe!" You echo in a shrill, mocking tone. "You know what kind of people say that? 'Don't fuck with me?' Weak, scared little bitches. And you should be scared, because you're never gonna find somebody who will want your worthless, piece of shit ass like I did. Ever."

"Baby."

"Please fuck with me, babe, find out what fucking happens," you spit out before hanging up on him. 

When your phone vibrates, you're still rooted to the spot. You lift your shaking hands to read the message.

you better be there when I get home

You scoff. 

"Nanami, can I stay with you tonight?"

He had been watching you, but now his eyes slide away behind the glare reflecting off his glasses. "You really think that's a good idea?"

"Please? I don't want to be home and I don't want to be alone," you must look quite pathetic, because he nods begrudgingly.

"Great," says Satoru. "This man has been needing to get laid for decades."

"Shut up, Gojo," you and Nanami both say at once.  

Although he is the same age as the rest of your friend group, the man has his shit significantly more together than anyone else. He had skipped most of the partying, failing, switching majors, and the rest of the general fuckery and graduated first. Got himself a good job, something to do with stocks. He's got a mortgage, while the rest of you are struggling to pay rent. He's too good for the rest of you, truth be told. 

You look at your phone, as you had approximately every  ten seconds since you left Satoru's apartment, but nothing from Sukuna. He wouldn't be off from his job until almost midnight, anyway. Maybe he really doesn't care what you do. You pull down the menu from the top of the screen and hover your finger over the location toggle. Nah, let him suffer, you think to yourself as you decide to leave it on. Or come get me if he actually gives a fuck.  Sliding the device into your back pocket, you walk up the driveway to Nanami's door and knock.

Too good for you. But he doesn't seem to know it.

"Hey," you say with a tight smile when he lets you in. "I come bearing gifts," you hold up a bag of takeout and a bottle of wine. There's actually another one in the trunk, just in case.

You're pretty sure neither of you are watching whatever movie is playing. You don't even remember what it's called.  Gradually you notice that he relaxes, softens into the couch, turns his head to look at you, smiles a little. You smile back. It's easy to just be with Nanami like this, quiet.

You do end up retreiving it after the first one is empty. The man is wound tight like a spring. And you swear he clears his throat everytime you accidentally brush against him grabbing food from the coffee table, or refilling you glasses. What does that mean? You wonder silently.

"You sleep with those on," you tease, poking his calf with a socked toe.

He looks down, "What my shoes? No." He smiles, warm. Tipsy maybe, both of you. 

You laugh softly. "Take em off. You live here, you know."

He shrugs and toes them off. "Happy?"

"No," you deadpan.

His smile falters and you laugh.

He lets his head fall against the back of the couch and rolls his eyes. Looks at you and smiles again. "I don't drink much," he says.

"I know," you scoot closer, knees pressing into his thigh. "You drunk?"

He looks down at the point of coat, then back into your eyes. "No. Are you?"

"Nope." You reach out and lift his glasses off of his face.  He lets you. Doesn't even clear his throat or look away. When you lean back to set them on the coffee table, you begin to lose your balance, but he catches you around the waist and pulls you back.

"You sure?" He asks, resting his hand on the small of your back. 

"I'm sure," you smile, reaching for his tie. "Don't you ever get comfortable?" You ask, loosening it. 

"Not really," he says, pulling you towards him. 

"Hm," you hum, straddling his lap as you pull the tie free from his collar. You smile at how nonchalant the two of you are, as if this isn't happening. Like he didn't pull you into his lap. Like you aren't brushing a blonde fall of hair off of his forehead as he looks up at you, honey eyes half-lidded. Like his hands haven't slid under the hem of your tank top, warming the skin of your back.

You're just friends. Yeah. Just talking.

His mouth is warm and soft, wine-tart. He smells like cedar and ocean salt. When you hear your phone ping softly, he's got a fistful of your hair, pulling your head back to press his mouth into your neck, tongue gentle against the tender flesh. No teeth. Without looking you know the unique little tone means your device has been gps located. You moan when he pulls the strap of your tank top down and takes your nipple in his mouth. You hadn't worn anything under that. 

Oops.

You had been working on the buttons of his shirt, palms sliding across his pecs. He pulls away to let you slip it off. "I could take care of you," he says, breathless, as he loosens his watch and works his hands out of the sleeves. "You wouldn't have to ever have another day like you had today."

"I know," you say as you wrap around each other, mouths fastened together, moving like you have years rather than just the next handful of moments. Him the living sea, rolling over you, the shore, a dead thing made of dirt. I can take care of you, his hands whisper. Your atrophied heart clenches, and, for a moment, you wish it could be true.

A car door slams outside. 

He pulls away and looks at you, ugly realization dawning in his eyes. "Oh," he nods grimly. "I get it."

He sighs raggedly and shakes his head as pushes you off of his lap gently. His hands a soft suggestion, unlike Sukuna's demanding touch. You feet hit the floor just as the first splinters fly from the doorframe.

How many kicks, you think bizarrely of a little cartoon owl with a sucker. How many kicks does it take to break down Nanami Kento's door? Three. Three kicks.

You are frantically feeling in between the couch cushions for your discarded top when Sukuna shoulders through the broken door. 

"It was unlocked, jackass," you hear Nanami say, "That's gonna be expens-" then a couple of thumps, the soft crush of bone and cartilage, and the loud thud of a body crumpling to the floor.

Trying to pull Sukuna off of him is like trying to move a mountain. You pull at him and scream in your panic sharpened voice, "Please, Kuna, stop! Please stop! Don't hurt him!" Although, you can see that it's too late for that. 

You reel backward when he rounds on you, but you need not worry about falling. He catches you by the hair and pulls you up. He looms over you, his vastness swallowing you like his pupils swallow the blood of his irises in the blue flickering light from the television. He is every inch the monster you know he can be. "Don't fucking call me that, woman," he growls into your ear.

You crumple to the floor when he lets you go. "Been too soft on you, brat," he toes at Nanami's limp form before stalking to the coffee table. "Gonna have to re-educate you. Lucky i don't just fucking destroy you both." He picks up an empty wine bottle and hurls it at the TV. The crash has you flinching as the screen spiderwebs and the speakers sputter. His belt buckle clinks as he unfastens it and your cunt drools like pavlov's dogs at the sound. You wonder if he knows how completely he has you.

You watch wordlessly as he pulls himself out of the fly of his jeans and pisses all over the flickering set. He turns his gaze on you and tucks himself away. The leather of his belt hisses against denim as he pulls it free of the loops.

"Now what am I going to do with you," he says, stalking towards you, one hand in his pocket, the other lazily trailing the belt behind him. The grin on his face is cold and sharp as a knife edge. He must be feeling better already. 

He brushes past you and seats himself on the arm of the couch.  Elbow on the back of it, he leans his cheek against his fist as he looks down at you. "Come here," he says.

You look over at Nanami's limp form. You can just see the rise and fall of his chest as he breathes.

"Don't look at him. He can't help you. Never could. Now, I won't say it again. Come. Here."

You begin to get to your feet.

"No," he says, eerily calm, and you freeze midway to your feet. "Crawl."

"Come on Kuna," you coo, voice sticky sweet. "I'm really sorr-"

"Shut the fuck up. Nobody wants to hear your sorry's. Now get over here."

So you drop back to your knees and start to crawl. You sway your hips and smile up at him, ever defiant. He snorts and shakes his head. "You are such a little slut."

"Stand up," he says, when you arrive at his ankles. Even seated as he is on the arm of the couch, he towers over you when you obey. 

"Strip," he says, then, "faster," when you are to slow to peel your clothes away. He leans forward and slides his fingers through your folds. 

"Wet," he says.

"For Nanami," you retort, only half a lie. You are still mad at him, after all. 

His hand flies so quick you barely see him move before the back of his hand connects with your cheek. Seeing stars, you're reeling backwards, but he catches you, draws you across his lap. The belt burns across the fat of your ass as he brings it down on you over and over in fast, hard bursts. Tears sting your eyes as you squirm and bite at your bottom lip, but he's strong and has little trouble holding you in place with his one free hand clasping your wrists together behind your back. 

"Told you not to fuck with me," he's growling, and your pussy clenches around nothing. You wish he would just fuck you already.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," you sob, "Please, please, please!"

Finally, he relents, the belt slithers to the floor. "Are you really sorry?" He asks, his voice softer now, some of the aggression soothed out of it by the burst of violence. "Actions speak louder than words, you know." You fail at biting back a moan as he suddenly shoves his fingers inside you, growling as he feels you clenching around him. "You want my cock?" He asks. Craning your neck you look up at him over your shoulder, nodding frantically.

"On your knees then," he says, releasing you. 

"You're a sick fuck, you know," he says as you crumple to your knees between his feet. "Might even be worse than me." He lets his jeans pool around his ankles before stepping out of them. Grasping the base of his cock, already rigid and leaking, he smacks it lightly against your cheek, smearing your feverish skin with precum. "That's why he-" he nods behind him at Nanami's unconscious body, "-could never do it for you."

Your tongue darts out to wet your lips, which you drag along his tip murmuring, "can you take this off too-" you tug at the sleeve of his hoodie, "-I wanna see you."

He grunts and pulls it over his head, groaning as you pull his cockhead into your mouth, tongue tracing his slit, the ridge if his glans. You know that he is at least partly right, you are sick. But you wonder if he brings it out of you. Could you be different with Nanami? You think of his mouth on your neck, your hands on his chest.

"If you want to see me, open your eyes," Sukuna says, something jagged in his tone, like suspicion. So you look up at him, run your fingers up the fronts of his thighs to the dips of his abdominals as you take his cock deeper. Your eyes follow the lines of tattoos outlining his chest until you find his face, jaw slack, eyes heavy as he looks down at you.

You release his dick with a wet pop, sucking in air. "You're perfect."

"I didn't say stop," he grasps, fisting a hand in your hair, using his other to pry your mouth open unnaturally wide until you are drooling down his tattooed wrist, eyes shiny with tears as you look up at him. He slides his cock between your lips, controlling the angle of your head with his hands, sinking in until your nose is pressed against his stomach. "Told you to fucking be home when I got home," he growls, smashing ypur face against his groin so that you can't breathe.

You sputter and gag around his cock as he stays fully seated inside you. "Ssh, ssh it's okay," he soothes as his fingers wrap around the soft column of your throat, feeling the bulge of his length there. "Oh, fuck, baby, you are really lucky you feel so fucking good, 'cause you really fucking pissed me off," he moans as uses your hair to bob your head up and down on his cock until your jaw burns and tears spill out of your eyes. "You really are sorry, huh?"

You do your best to signal in the affirmative as he continues to fuck your throat, but you find you have little control at the moment, so you just hope he gets the message. When he finally pulls out, and stuffs the strings of drool that stretch between your lips and his cock back into your mouth with his thumb, you nod, gasping. "I am. I am sorry," you manage to sob out in broken syllables around his prodding fingers.  Although your brain is a little too wine blurry and cock drunk to accurately recall exactly what you're sorry for. And weren't you mad at him for something? 

Your muddled thoughts are interrupted as he yanks you up and bends you over the arm of the couch as if you weigh nothing. "Tell me who you belong to, baby," he growls as you feel the fat head of his cock bully it's way between your folds from behind. "Because it seems like you forgot."

"You, I belong to you," you answer dutifully, drawing out the final vowel into a long moan as he sheaths himself inside of you with one hard snap of his hips. 

"Fuck," he growls, twitching inside of you, "say it again."

"I'm yours, Sukuna," you whine, peering over your shoulder to look at him. 

"Yeah," he moans, rolling his hips into you, his cock dragging along every tender aching inch inside you. "You're mine," he pounds into you faster, harder, pulling you back into him by your hair. "I'm gonna stuff you so full of cum, baby." He always talks so much when he's fucking you. Now he's babbling something about making you pregnant. You're too stupid with lust to even begin to reflect on what an almost comically bad idea that is, although you suppose you understand it. Another way for him to stake his claim.  Then his teeth are bruising your shoulder, marking you, and you're arching into him, your walls beginning to flutter around the sweet, familiar shape of him.

He pulls out as soon as he feels you starting to squeeze down on him. "Want you to look at me when you cum," he rasps. You guess you know why.  You make it a point not to look over his shoulder as he threads his arms under your hips, lifting you to wrap your legs around his waist before he impales you again. 

"Oh fuck, Sukuna," you whine as he stretches you, a perfect pain.

"Say it again," he murmurs, pistoning up into you with more speed now, but less control as he nears his end. 

"Yours," you manage to choke out before he slips a hand around your throat, stealing your breath, making your vision darken as you seize up around him, milking him as he spills inside of you. He is clawing and biting at you everywhere he can reach as he devours your lips, pouring a muffled string of curses into your mouth. You wonder vaguely, if any small part of him cares about you, or if he only cares to own you.

You are intertwined, leaning against the wall, twitching and gasping. You're too busy murmuring nonsense into each other's ears to notice when Nanami sits up and slides the remaining wine bottle off of the coffee table. The one the two of you didn't quite finish off. 

You've got your chin hooked over Sukuna's shoulder, your fingertips tracing the circles tattooed there and he's panting, "I want to tell you something," when you see Nanami walk around the couch, holding the bottle by the neck. 

"I don't know why I could never say it before," Sukuna whispers as Nanami raises the bottle. You lock eyes with him, but you don't say anything. 

"I-" There's a soft thud as the bottle connects with the back of Sukuna's head. His eyes roll back as he falls away from you and hits the floor hard. 

Nanami barely looks at you as he shoulders Sukuna's limp body and carries him outside. You are pulling on your sweats when he comes back, gathers the man's clothes and tosses them outside. You cross your arms over your bare chest as he walks past you into the kitchen. "Get dressed and get out, please. I'll get you an uber," he says, pressing a bag of frozen peas to his face. He sinks into the couch, wine bottle between his knees and uncorks it with his thumb. His back is to you.

"Nanami?"

"What?"

"I'm sorry, but I can't find my top. Maybe you're sitting on it?"

He sighs and leans forward to set the bottle and the makeshift icepack on the coffee table. Then he's wrapping his shirt around your shoulders, it smells like the cedar and the ocean. You look up at him through damp lashes, bruises already starting to bloom in the hollows of his eye.

"I'm sorry."

"Thanks," he says before he returns to the couch.

Sukuna is standing, although weaving, in his boxers, looking dazedly at his pants when you shoulder through the broken door.

"Hey," he mumbles, stumbling forward. "Where the hells my belt?"

Nanami sinks back into the couch, frozen peas pressed to his face. Takes a long pull off the bottle before deciding that's probably not going to help much. He stares at the broken TV screen, the flickering bars of light reflecting in his eyes.

Maybe after he works this job a few more years, he could just start over somewhere else. 

Like Malaysia.

Yeah.

That'd be nice.

[owlets-outlet]

my mouthwashing good ending headcanons:

on the tulpar:

1. anya tells swansea and daisuke about the assault pretty much immediatelly after the crash. the crew seals jimmy in his room with insulation foam until they get rescued.

( i was thinking about letting the crew kill j*mmy, however. he doesnt deserve that mercy. so he lives and is jailed forever. )

2. the crew dont know what to do about the baby. anya doesnt want to use pills for diy abortion, mainly because thats what jimbo told her to do and she doesnt want to listen to him.

in a dangerous twist of fate, she miscarries, because of stress and low bodyweight. its not a dramatic miscarriage, the fetus just dies in the uterus. anya suspects she miscarried, but doesnt tell the crew so they dont worry about her.

3. the crew gets rescued just in time- anya was on the verge of dying from the infection that started festering inside her from the miscarriage.

immediately after rescue:

anya and curly are rushed to the hospital. they got treatment on the rescue ship already, but that was only the bare minimum. pony express pays only for the bare minimum treatments.

curly is hooked up to a sci-fi mind reading communication device. its not perfect, but they manage to find out what happened. jimmy is arrested.

swansea:

after losing his job and breaking his dry streak, hes surprisingly okay. using his severance pay and his savings, he opens a small business, becoming a freelance electrician.

he doesnt drink as much as he used to, but he drinks regularly. he still buys himself sneakers on his soberversary though.

daisuke didnt even have to beg him too hard to be accepted as his apprentice, really.

daisuke becomes his other child, basically, he visits daisuke and regularly treats the him and the crew to meals, just like he does with his bio kids.

he also takes daisuke thrifting sometimes, judging his outfits on a scale of 1-10.

daisuke:

hes back to living with his parents.

daisuke really wanted to continue being swanseas apprentice, not just because he liked swansea, but because he really wanted to feel useful somehow.

he doesnt really vibe with most swanseas kids, but hes polite everytime they visit the shop where he helps swansea.

him and anya do gaming nights, often hopping on discord call in the late evening.

he still struggles with impostor syndrome, feeling like he didnt do enough for the crew of the tulpar.

curly:

he struggles with his mental health extensively. hes traumatized by being forced into being a bystander and his new disability keeps reminding him of that fact. his old crew encourages him to keep going though, and daisukes family pays for his therapy sessions.

he underwent many surgeries, mainly skin transplants (he still looks. uncanny though), rhinoplasty (more like. he just got a whole new nose altogether) and added eyelids (made his eye look smaller than before) and lips.

while this IS the Future, many of the cool 'solutions' to his disability are too expensive. pony express only paid for curlys wheelchair with a communicator and a cheap pair of prosthetic arms. the motor abilites of these arms are limited, as he cannot even write with them. theyre purely there just so he can operate his wheelchair by himself.

he wants to save money to buy new legs and arms, mostly just because he'd love to get back into weightlifting again.

after being fired, he mostly relies on disability pay and benefits.

he dropped many of his old friends, because they sympathised with jimmy, but he still has a close knit group of friends, with whom he lives.

he wanted to quit being a pilot long before the crash, and his old crew convinced him that he should pursue something new, to help him move on.

with the financial support of daisukes parents (daisuke begged them), curly enrolls in med school. he chose a proffession where he would help people.

thanks to this he grew even closer to anya.

anya:

tried to distance herself from the crew, because she felt like dead weight, but they didnt let her. daisuke talked her and curly into therapy.

she couldnt afford to try to get into med school again, and even then, she wasnt sure if she even wanted to do that anymore.

but, due to his disability, curly needed a notetaker and, well. the stars just aligned.

being his notetaker, anya gets to attend all the lectures with curly, helping him with his studies while she absorbs all the knowledge. this gave her the confidence she needed to decide to try again, sometine in the future.

asides from this, anya took up running again. she runs regularly, planning to run a marathon one day. she also gained a lot of weight after coming back, resulting in a mean bulk, gaining quite a lot of muscle.

sometimes she runs together with curly and daisuke, and curly also coaches anya in the gym on occassion.

the whole crew regularly meet up for brunches and birthdays. :)

[chithereader]

losing my cool / aaron hotchner

part 2 to playing it cool !!! hope you like it word count: 1.6k pairing: aaron hotchner x f!reader genre: angst at first, but fluff!!!!!! cw: more sickeningly sweet and soft aaron x reader, mentions of insecurities

The smile on Aaron’s face slowly fades as he takes in your frozen stance. You’re staring at him like he just shot you in the back and worry starts to fill him, “Honey..?” waving his hand in front of your face, hoping it would be enough to break you out of your stupor. 

 “Hello?” Still waving his hand in your face, your eyes darted to his. Your body is in a state of shock– in your mind, there’s a tiny version of you desperately digging her way out of a landslide of disbelief. Waves and waves of doubts and insecurities hindering you from processing what is happening. 

Aaron watches as your mouth moves with barely any sound coming out. Like a fish out of water, you’re scrambling, “W-what?” That’s… a bit too shaky to be good. 

He pauses to think. The doubts are starting to creep up on him. 

Maybe he was too rash with his question. 

Maybe that wasn’t the best way to spring it on you. 

Maybe he should have waited for a better time.

Maybe he should have planned something. 

Maybe she isn’t ready.

Maybe she just doesn’t want to marry me. 

He tries hard to swallow all these dark thoughts, clearing his throat to fake the confidence that’s slowly diminishing, “I said, ‘Marry me.’” After he says those words again he stills, hoping that this time he’ll get an answer. And that.. it would be the answer he so badly wants. 

But time slows down and his heart soon follows as he watches tears start to pool in your eyes. You’re shaking your head– they’re tiny shakes and you look panicked. This isn’t good. Not good at all. 

He really wasn’t expecting this. It never occurred to him you’d say no. Or ..not yes. Aaron’s mind is running a million miles per hour. He doesn’t know what to do, or say. He barely even knows how he feels. And so he defaults to doing the one thing he does best (as a prosecutor at least): object. 

This is triggered by your movement. You move around him, leaving the kitchen towards your living room. Your goal was to sit on the couch, craving some stability as your legs get weaker the more you’re processing what was asked, how you reacted, and how it could be coming across. 

But Aaron’s legs are longer than yours. Before you even reach the couch, he’s holding your arm firmly and gently at the same time. He’s got that furrow in his brows that makes him look stern, but his eyes betray him as you can clearly see the worry in them. 

“Well yes!” he says in disagreement. He doesn’t understand why you haven’t said yes, and as much as he isn’t the kind of man to ever force a lady into anything, a part of him is scared of what he’ll hear if he asks you why you’re not saying yes. 

Though instead of allowing that fear to paralyze him, he allows it to control him. To bear its face because the softer, more rational part of him is hiding. 

You’re avoiding his gaze, crossing your arms– you’re turning away from him. “No- Aaron, you– I don– I ca–” 

You know he’s studying you. You can feel his eyes roaming your face, your neck, your body. He’s taking in everything he can because you’ve given him absolutely nothing so far. And oh how you wish you could voice it all out. 

You just wish it was easy to say I don’t think I’m enough for you. What if you realize one day that I’m not good enough? Are you sure? Are you sure about this? About me? What if you start to want someone smarter? Prettier? Hotter? What if you want someone who is as accomplished or important as you? What if you get bored of me? What if– 

You’re broken out of your thoughts when he suddenly straightens. He looks as if he’s realized something and the next thing you know you’re hit by a gust of wind because he’s running up the stairs. 

Within an instant you run after him. A dozen scenarios are running through your head, the worst being Aaron packing your things because he’s going to ask you to leave. Your heart beats faster as you reach the top of the steps. You peek into your room and see him rummaging through drawers. 

Your worries quiet significantly when you realize they’re his drawers. And just when you’re about to approach him, he turns around meeting you halfway. You’re both illuminated by the sunlight that’s coming through the bedroom window you’re standing in front of. 

He’s still. He’s got a serious look on his face. You take him in, trying to read him but he’s got his profiler look on– unreadable and determined. His voice rattles you, “I’m sorry. That was a mistake.” Firm and devoid of any emotion. 

Oh god.

You’re shaking your head, reaching to hold him by his arms. You start to cry, “Aaron please, that’s not what I–” but… he’s going down on one knee. 

What?

He watched multiple emotions flicker on your face. Defeat, panic, confusion– “It was a mistake. I shouldn’t have said that. I– I planned to do it better than that. I don’t know why I let it slip out, you deserve better than that.” 

Before you can process it, Aaron’s holding out a ring. He’s holding your hand in the other while tears are streaming down both your faces. You have no idea how you heard it but you guess it’s simply a testament to how attuned you are to him when he whispers, “Please, please, please. Will you marry me, honey?” 

Time stops. Literally. You can feel your heart in your chest beating louder, heavier. It’s pounding as if begging to be heard. Begging to let Aaron know that it beats for him and him only. You’re lowering yourself to kneel before him. You want to see his face properly. His eyes. His nose. His lips. This is the man you love. This is the man you want to marry. Your eyes are simply capturing every angle of this moment. 

You’re leveled now. Equals. You grab both his hands in yours and you stare into his brown eyes. You want him to know you mean it, as you nod your head slowly and breathe out, “Yes.” A smile breaks across his face, tears starting to stream again. 

You watch him as he tries to put the ring on your finger, getting it on the first try even if his sight is slightly hindered by his tears of happiness and relief. The sun makes the ring sparkle, catching your attention and you look at it properly for the first time. 

It’s beautiful. Aaron would argue that the stone screams you – grace, loyalty, peace. He catches your eye and the both of you start to smile. You start to giggle, wrapping your arms around his neck while his arms snake around your waist. 

He buries his head in your neck, breathing in your scent while silently thanking the heavens for granting him this. You break apart, startled to hear tiny footsteps nearing. The both of you start to stand up from the floor, straightening yourselves out and wiping the remaining tears staining your faces. 

You both look to the door, waiting for the little boy to show himself. You hear a soft knock right before the door opens slowly, a head peeking in, “Daddy?” 

Aaron goes to the door, opening it more for Jack to come in. The little boy goes straight to you and you pick him up in your arms with ease, resting him on your hip. You have your left hand holding him stable, and even though the little boy’s still groggy with sleep he notices the sparkling addition to your hand. 

You take notice of how his little face lights up in excitement and you have no idea what about it he understands, “I help Daddy buy you that!” His voice is full of pride, genuinely proud that he had played a part in picking. 

You’re confused, not fully understanding what Jack means. Looking to Aaron for an answer, you’re surprised to find him blushing. He looks shy and he’s shrugging at you but you can tell he’s trying hard to play it cool. The smile fighting its way on his face betrays him. 

You decide to take your chance on the adorable kid that is now fiddling with your ring, watching in amazement at how much it’s twinkling in the light. Children are the most honest people you know anyway. Pursing your lips with squinted eyes, you investigate “What do you mean, bubba?” 

“Daddy asked me what ring pop you want, so I asked you when we watched Spiderman and you said your favorite is the green one so I tell Daddy you want the green one!” 

Your heart stutters and the tears start coming in again. Aaron asking Jack for his opinion for your engagement ring. Jack thinking it's a ring pop. Jack asking for your favorite ring pop flavor. Jack being proud that you got the ring you want, pop or not. 

Brought out of your thoughts by Jack wanting to leave your hold, you put him down. You watch as he happily walks out of your room, presumably to go to the kitchen. You look at Aaron again, and just as you’re about to say something about what you just found out, you realize one thing. Spiderman.

You gasp. Covering your mouth in surprise, you slap his arm lightly, “That was our third date!”

Aaron laughs loudly, rushing out of the room before you can throw questions at him or even comments about how insane he is. He couldn’t care less. He was right. 

a/n: just want to say thank you so much for the love and support i've been getting for my hotch fics!! as someone who's new here, it all means so much to me <33 i recently made a masterlist as i plan to write so much more and branch out to other characters i've been perpetually in love with!! leave requests of what you want to read or characters i can write about, i'd love to write for you guys ◡̈ tagging the people who wanted a part 2 for this: @pear-1206 @dedicatedfangirl2001 u guys are so sweet

[tsukimara]

Oh wow.. r-request are open.. t-Tsuki-Chan… w-well don’t mind if I do.. c-can you w-write f-Floyd, Riddle, and Epel with a jellyfish s/o w-who can’t control their stings.. hehe.. *blushes cutely.*

—🎀

๋࣭ ˖ 𐔌Boys with jellyfish S/O who can't control their stings!࿐ . ۫

-ˏˋ⋆➔ Characters: Floyd, Riddle and Epel <3

-ˏˋ⋆➔ Hcs, Fluff, Romantic (but it can also be read as platonic), Gn!reader

-ˏˋ⋆➔ Warnings: None!

-ˏˋ⋆➔ A/N: AAAA HELLO 🎀ANON!! T-thank you for y-your request... *Looks away blushing* (We are not crazy I promise)

FLOYD:

• A sea creature? And a jellyfish at that?! You 100% got his attention!

• LIKE OMGGG YOU'RE SO CUTE!! Let him squeeze your cheeks!!!!!

• This boy is so in loveeee.

• He just needs to hug you- !! Oh this sting was unexpected. You can't control it? Well that's fine, that doesn't stop him from hugging you!

• He wouldn't take it too seriously, he'd just laugh it off and ignore your stings.

• In short, he will test how many times he will get sting if he hugs you for a long time. He won't lie your cuddles are interesting now!

• Sometimes he touches your cnidocytes specifically to see how they feel. He doesn't do it often because he doesn't want to get stings all over his hands.

• But if he's in a bad mood he can get a little irritated but don't worry! It will pass quickly when he remembers that you can't control it and he will go back to teasing you.

• Floyd is an electric eel (correct me if I'm wrong), right? If so, I doubt he would feel your sting very much. They would actually tickle him a little.

• He'd love to help you control your stings but doesn't really know how. Even though they don't bother him, he knows you don't want to sting EVERYONE who touches you.

• Like hey don't be sad! Hug him instead of others! He doesn't mind.

• He actually thinks it's a good 'weapon' to scare others away if they bother you.

• Still, he will help you, he will ask others and look for information.

• "Sorry I sting you again..." "Sting? It was more like a little pinch than a sting zappy!"

• Ah yes, his nicknames.

• He likes to tease you for not being able to control your stings so he gave you the nickname 'zappy'.

RIDDLE:

• Ummm, that's interesting..

• I think he would be slightly interested in your cnidocytes, but that doesn't mean he wants to touch them.

• He's not much of an affectionate person so he's not too worried about being stinged by you.

• However, if he was standing too close to you and you accidentally touched him with your cnidocytes, expect a yelp from him.

• He'll think you did it on purpose so he'll scold you.

• "Hey! That hurt! You can't do that. What if you hurt someone else? Your behavior is incorrect." "I'm so sorry Riddle!!! I don't know how to control them!" Oh-

• Since you told him that, he'll pay a little more attention when he comes near you. Not in a bad way but he doesn't want to get sting again.

• Now he'll know he can't scold you so much for something you can't control.

• Of course he will also tell you to be careful because he doesn't want anyone to get hurt (Actually he doesn't want you to feel guilty but he won't admit it).

• For that he will try to help you with them somehow. No matter what, he will look for a solution to your problem so you don't have to worry about it anymore.

• He knows that every time you tried to hug someone it always ended badly so you stopped trying to hug others.

• Riddle isn't really used to things like affection, but he'll try to dress up so you can't sting him and he'll let you hug him a bit.

• Just don't tell anyone!

• He will dress like this most of the time until you guys find a solution to control your sting.

EPEL:

• Epel doesn't really know how to react.

• Yes, you have something cool to defend yourself but he won't lie, he doesn't really like being stinged.

• But when he finds out that you don't do it on purpose, he will look at it differently.

• "Ouch! What was that for?- Ah right, that was unintentional." He'll try not to sound mad at you because he's not, he just never expects to get stinged.

• Over time he will get used to them and will say that you can knock down whoever you want!

• When he gets sting, he claims it didn't hurt him at all, showing that he is tough.

• It actually hurt him, but he didn't want you to think he was weak or you to blame yourself!!

• " !!- N-no, What are you talking about? Uhh... It doesn't hurt that much! See? I'm not as weak as others."

• He says it would be fun to prank someone with your stings.

• Epel is not a very affectionate person but he doesn't mind physical contact, sometimes it just makes him blush.

• That's why he will dress in such a way that you can hug him or hold his hand without worrying about hurting him.

• Even if the clothes don't fit and Vil might pick on him, he'll still dress like that. He wants to show you that he cares about you!

• He will help you control your stings, no matter if he will have to read thousands of books or ask everyone in the world if it means it will help you.

• He will even try to get something that can help you control them!

• If that means you'll be happy then he will be too!

-ˏˋ⋆➔ Twisted Wonderland Masterlist

-ˏˋ⋆➔ Masterlist

-ˏˋ⋆➔ Rules request

[hyperbali]

This seemed to go over well on r/dragonage, so I will also share it over here!

The question was:

Which DA Romances Do You Think Would Be Open To Having Kids?

DAO

Alistair - if he's got that Strong Theirin Bullshit going on, I think he's having a couple kids regardless of if it's with HoF or Anora. He's a great goofy dad but can't discipline worth a damn.

Leliana - Mmh... she would probably prefer to adopt rather than give birth, I think. Even then, she seems more like an auntie than a mother.

Morrigan - Did not ever foresee or want it for herself, but is a pretty decent mom by virtue of not wanting to be like Flemeth. Not a "cool" mom, but would let her kids have their independence.

Zevran - I can only ever see it being on accident, as beforehand he would have absolutely denied it - but once the possibility is in reach, he can't let the idea go. Ultimate Girl Dad.

DA2

Anders - Nope. Back in Awakening he liked his freedom without fetters too much, and over the course of 2 he gets too focused on becoming a martyr. Ain't ever gonna happen.

Fenris - Not something I think he actively wants, but is willing to take responsibility if it happens. He's the kind of stoic dad that it's hard to get an outward reaction from, but he's definitely protective of his kids.

Isabela - HAHA. That's adorable, kitten! (She probably just ends up kind of semi-adopting a galley kid, but in a way one would adopt a stray outdoor cat - leave it to its business.)

Merrill - Kind of taken aback by the idea, but secretly grows on it. I think she'd probably end up more of a mother figure to refugee elves, though.

DAI

Blackwall - Much as it's cute to think of him as a dad, I think what he did with the mercenary company is going to haunt him too much, even if he goes back to being Thom. He's content with the Inquisitor alone.

Cassandra - So long as she's not Divine, she would be willing to consider it - but would only want just one. Hard disciplinarian, but secretly a softie on some occasions.

Cullen - He's gonna end up having to build an entire farm community just to house all the impending kids and dogs. This man wants a BIG FAMILY.

Dorian - The thought of it is instantly repellant to him just on the basis of it having been expected of him for so long. He'd also be quietly terrified of ending up like his own father, hurting his own child while thinking he's doing his best for them... so no, definitely not happening.

Iron Bull - Hadn't ever really thought about it... ever, but if he's Tal-Vashoth, his heart melts when he sees any of his own babies for the first time. Any kid's got him wrapped around their little finger, and a whole host of aunts and uncles in the Chargers.

Josephine - She wants at least two, but preferably three - it simply wouldn't do for any of her children to grow up lonely. Hilariously, she's one of the strictest parents.

Sera - She sort of just wants to keep the Inquisitor all to herself for as long as she can, but if her wife really, really wanted it, she'd shrug and say why not? An alright mom, especially when they're still little, but I think she'd get really frustrated when they hit their teens.

Solas - He would like to say he doesn't wish it were possible, sometimes. He would like to say that.

DAV

Bellara - She would go nuts tracking down every single child-rearing research material she could and generally get herself anxious about it, but she'd turn out to be one of the best moms of the bunch.

Davrin - Willing to adopt after a while, especially once Assan starts getting older and leaving for longer periods of time as he gains his independence. That kiddo is definitely growing up with the best boy bird-cat-dog protector. Bit of a gruff dad, but he means well and can ease up with help.

Emmrich - Either way you shake it, probably not. Either he's content with Manfred and wouldn't want to chance leaving a young child behind when he eventually passes, or he just can't because he's a lich. For the latter, though, I think he'd be a great dadly mentor for the ages.

Harding - The ultimate in mommy cottagecore. TELL me you can't see her hiking through a forest with a bundled baby on her back, a kidlet skipping at her side, singing together as they head back home for the day. Adorable.

Lucanis - Incredibly unnerved by how much pressure is on him by being The Last Man Standing of the Dellamortes and what that means for their legacy, as well as being terrified over the possibility of what Spite could do to a child... but man, the thought haunts him. He wants to feel part of a close family again so bad. He would cry the first time he held his baby.

Neve - Probably not interested in having any of her own, but definitely ends up being kind of the boss-slash-denmother of a bunch of urchins in Docktown. She (lightly) bullies them into eating and sleeping, and they're her eyes from the shadows.

Taash - Their hang-ups over their mom are way too intense for that. Helping other Qunari and/or Tal-Vashoth adjust to a non-Qun life is about as far as that idea is gonna get.

[ananinidraws]

Fuck it, Super Mario pride HCs

Mario is that one cis guy who at first is a straight ally and thinks he's hetero but then realizes "oh actually guys are kinda cool too". Bisexual with a preference for women, but open to all

Weegee is soooo queer. Always has been, and has an incredibly suportive brother too. Doesn't have a prefered gender romantically, def not cis and on the aroace spectrum, so polysexual, genderqueer and demiaroace. And yes, those were picked specifically cuz all the flags have green in them

Bowser is very confident about his transmasc-ness and displays it proudly. For those of you who said in tags of my previous posts that the scars are painted on, correct, except they're more akin to tattoos, cuz he thought top surgery scars looked sick as hell. He's still questioning orientation wise though. Like Mario, he's always thought he was straight, but unlike him, he's finding it more dificult to nail down what exactly he is

Trans aroace Peach! Trans i will elaborate further on a diferent post (i have some theories that tie into that, but i'll post about that soon), but i see Peach as that one aroace friend who looooves being affectionate with her closest friends. Hearts and love motif characters being aroace and the love being their platonic love my beloveds

Bisexual QUEEN, with no strong preferences. Also Daisy got top surgery cuz she could and cuz she wanted to

Your honour, she loves women. And is also ace, cuz Rosa just gives off ace-spec vibes, to me at least

Pansexual, slight preference for women. After she and Mario broke up they'd go "my goodness i love girls" "me too"

I. I really don't think i need to explain this one. The Bean Kingdom's fruitiest man

Shoutout to @nartblartmallcop not only cuz they inspired me to do the pride hcs in the first place, but also because the hc of Wario and Waluigi being ALL or NOTHING really made me open my eyes to that hc cuz it's AMAZING (these two posts, if you're curious)

And lastly Wapeach, cuz i love her, her gender is No

[soni-dragon]

Eye of the Pheonix is actually one of the best merlin episodes because:

merlin and Gwen besties shenanigans; “what’s he actually thinking about” “you”

cold open to the most tender merthur scene

Merlin sleeping outside all knight for arthur

Hiccuping scene and arthur getting so annoyed

“But the perilous lands are… perilous”

“The task is meant to be completed alone and unaided” the start of the best continuing joke of all time

Putting the rest under a cut cause it’s long

Little morgwen moment in the market i love (one of the last we get….)

Cute arthur and gwen scene! Hehe

This is just the shipping episode of all time everyone wins

“You’ll need help” and the first thing merlin does is go find gwaine

smiles “hello, gwaine” “ah, merlin :)”

Immediately puts an arm around merlin

Throws merlin off a roof. this is what merwaine is all about :)

Gwaine is still Gwaine and not whatever the writers did to him after becoming a knight

Bridge guy (Grettir) is great and Arthur’s “no I’m prince arthur of camelot” i love you you’re so dense sometimes

“You need strength and magic” and then gwaine and merlin come along and NO ONE seems to think two seconds more about the implications

“ive been to almost every tavern” “so have i” you’re telling me merlin spent all that time looking for specifically gwaine to help him when he knows arthur is in danger

ANOTHER MORGWEN SCENE (ik morgana just wants her to leave) but we weren’t completely robbed

Arthur not realizing that he feels like shit and thinking hmm that’s weird, this is THE dense, damsel in distress arthur episode

Gwaine is two feet away are you really telling me he didn’t hear bridge guy call merlin Magic

“Strength has arrived the trio is complete” immeidate sword draw

But also the establishment of them as a trio i really love and they never did anything else with it

Gwaine with the flowers :))

THE ENTIREY OF THE FIRE SCENE

*THE* MERWAINE SCENE EVER

“a pheasant” gwaine please

“Why do you want to do this?” cause he’s in love with you merlin

“Same reason as you” (hesitates) (eye contact) “help a friend”

“arthurs lucky to have us”

…

“not arthur” SCREAMING

we’re back to the fond looks

gwaines tiny nod of assurance when merlin looks at him like ??! after he says not arthur

“youre the only friend i have” and i couldnt bear to lose you

Gwen finding out morgana has magic

“she’s changed” break my heart why don’t you (i dont want you to change) BRING HER BACKKK this is making me miss the arc morgana could have had so badly

They caught up to arthur SO FAST goes to show how arthurs going through it

Not wyvern they have four legs actually (tho their designs are cool)

This would have been such a good episode for gwaine to learn merlin is a dragonlord & has magic

Arthur conveniently is knocked out (as always) when merlin does cool magic stuff to save him

When merlin orders them to go and they bow their heads and walk away they look like kicked puppies

The famous arthur waking up to merlins silly little smile and being 100% not appreciative

whatthehellareYOUdoinghere? why can’t you ever just say thanks? augh THANKS!whatforcompLeTlYrUiNiNgThEqUeSt?!

i am supposed to be doing this ALONEEEE

“Are gwen and morgana here too? we going to have a surprise party?” i love you sassy arthur and yes you absolutely should have a surprise party

Do you want us to help you or do you want to do this ~aloneeee~

MERLIN!

The little smile and nod like yeah they got him

“this is a quest merlin not a treasure hunt” well it is sort of- “MERLIN.”

How is that one stone completely sound proof

The cockroaches are icky but y’all have gloves its not that bad you couldn’t even feel them

Set up with the water of avalon and something that actually follows into later episodes

“Merlin.” + arthur doesn’t want to show he actually cares about him vs. gwaine pulling him into a hug

“look what i found” merlin and gwaine shared looks of no you didn’t

The trios conversation at the end i love their dynamics + merlins pause and genuine thanks

Eoin macken looking pretty <33 (he always does)

Merlins little overview of the quest hes so excited awww

Immediate shift to sassy merlin the Duality

I wish Gwen knowing about morgana’s magic would have been explored more i want to see her join gaius and merlin in plotting and going on little quests

Anyways yeah to conclude i miss Gwaine sm :(

[totallyjustabunchofhocuspocus]

Thiiiiiiiiiisssss. Like, being completely honest, a lot of the issues we've been complaining about have pretty much always existed in the show--they've just been covered up by the really awesome character dynamics. Like--okay, when I was in college my dad and his wife bought a house that had been owned by an eccentric retired English professor and he'd done up his living room to look like a Shakespearian-era theater. I'm not exaggerating. The walls were painted to look like curtains, there were wall sconces with torchlight lightbulbs, there were murals, there were fucking GARGOYLES, it was amazing. And then my dad's wife painted over all the artwork and murals and took down the cool sconces and the gargoyles and let me tell you, EVERY flaw in that room became obvious. There were cracks in the walls, the baseboards were crooked, the lighting was really poor, the floorboards had water damage. None of which had been noticeable before because you walked in and it was like walking onto the set of a period drama. Anyway--it really feels like the show has lost what made it special this season because we hardly see the mains that we all fell in love with interacting, and all the beautiful details and side characters that made it interesting are just...not there. The flaws in the design are made more obvious because there's nothing else to draw the eye.

HenRen are sidelined like they're always sidelined except for child drama, but we don't have Hen and Chim bestieism to distract us from that fact.

Bobby and Athena are not addressing any of the issues in their marriage like they never do, but we don't have Bobby aggressively dad-ing everyone around him or Athena being a badass WITHOUT blatantly abusing her badge or sweet moments with Harry and May to distract us.

Buck is emotionally intelligent and mature until the story requires him to be an idiot who has the emotional maturity of a blueberry scone, like always but now we don't get to see him be smitten with his boyfriend or have beautiful moments with Chris or Maddie or Eddie to distract us (the scene with Jee was great and a perfect distraction...for the thirty seconds it lasted)

Eddie is three life-altering traumas in a trench coat pretending to be a functional human being like he always is, but now there's no Chris scenes to distract us.

There's just flat out no Ravi, May, Sue, etc to add to the scenery to distract us. And sorry, Brad is a piss-poor substitute.

This got way longer than I intended, but I'm really just so disappointed that in the face of *makes vague gesture at the state of the world* my comfort show has jumped on the general trend of "what is the absolute least we can give the consumer before they rebel?"

Like, we have PROVEN that we will forgive many, MANY flaws in the story for these characters...but they're not giving us the characters!

So yeah, there's cracks in the walls, the baseboards are crooked, and there's waterstains on the floor.

i think so many of the current problems in 911 could be fixed if they’d just let the characters have actual conversations with each other like they used to

[paingoes]

Crash Out - Sabina

hi. this one is pretty dark. heres some backstory on paris’s parents. it’s about forced marriage and offscreen/implied forced pregnancy and rape. nothing sexually explicit is depicted, just implied. heavy overtones of domestic violence as well.

(Content: abduction, lady whump, forced marriage, physical abuse, familial whump, royal whump, intimate whumper, defiant whumpee, domestic violence, starvation, referenced child endangerment, implied noncon, suicide, poisoning, death, unhappy ending)

“Oh shit,” Paris sat up in the passenger seat, pushing the sunglasses up off his eyes. “I’ve been here before.”

The city below glowed in the early morning light, pale and crystalline. The glass spires jutted out from the soft grass. It looked cold, somehow. Twinkling. Lorelai had never seen a town look so fragile. She’d have never thought to describe one that way if she had not seen it herself.

“What?” she asked. “On conquest?”

“No,” he answered huffily, as if this were an unreasonable assumption to make.

“With my mom,” he explained, looking off into the middle distance. “Her family’s from here.”

Lorelai slid out of the car, slamming the door shut behind her. He followed her out, down the smooth stones that made up the pathway into the city center. 

It was a pleasantly cool day, but the architecture made the whole scene feel wintery. She imagined that she was entering into a kingdom of ice. She remembered Thales, how cold it had been on the night of the ball. As she slipped her hand into Paris’s own — the non-dominant, the less injured one — she felt the same chill. It wasn’t all unpleasant. There was a beauty to it.

 All it had to be was a supply run. The imperial currency was standardized, good enough for all the planets in its territory. The further out they got, the more open the locals became to haggling. She leaned forward against the counter of the fruit stand. The vendors liked her. Everyone always liked her.

After a while of staring off into the hillside, Paris propped one arm against the barrel.

“You know where I can find a Selene Lucia?” he asked them.

They were nice enough to draw up a map, the pencil carving a path up into the hills. No exact address, but Paris swore he’d know it when he saw it. By her estimate, if he’d come with his mother, he hadn’t been here since he was seven years old.

The pale buildings petered out on the climb, the houses became sparser, more residential. In time, he really did abandon the map, working purely off the distant memory. 

The trees shaded the sidewalk. She traced her fingers along the black fence that divided the path from the lawns, listening to the pleasant vibration it made in her fingers. The leaf canopy cleared for a split second as they passed another gate.

“This is it,” Paris said abruptly. He stared at it dumbfounded.

“You think she still lives here?” Lorelai asked, frowning.

“Don’t see why not.”

Neither of them moved.

“Are you coming?” he asked. It seemed like he already knew the answer.

“…If you want,” she offered. He shook his head. The one and only time she had met his father, it hadn’t gone well. She didn’t want much to do with his family.

“Call me if you need help,” he said as he pushed the gate open.

“You too.” She nodded, heading back down the hill. The sun was higher in the sky now. The city reflected it straight into her eyes, nearly blinding her.

~

“Oh, god,” Selene Lucia said as soon as she opened the door.

“Hi,” Paris said, pleasantly surprised to even be recognized. 

She pulled him into the house, slamming the door shut behind him.

“Are you being followed?” she asked.

“Uh, no, ma’am. Don’t think so. Not now.” Paris ran one hand through his hair.

“What are you doing here?” She narrowed her eyes. Her face had creased from years of that same, skeptical motion.

“I don’t know,” he admitted, “I was in the area. I just wanted to stop by.”

He needed to do laundry, too. He decided not to mention that now.

Selene sighed. There was some relief there, he could tell. Maybe she thought he’d come asking for more. 

He looked around at the house. It was smaller than he remembered, but still nice. Light filtered in through the sheer curtains.

She led him into the violet-colored kitchen, the dark sharpness of him clashing against the scene. She’d been working when he knocked — and this she resumed. He leaned back against the counter, rocking gently against it, watching the knife cut thin lines through the stalks.

“Do you need me to do anything?” he offered. She shook her head. He shrugged, looking back down at the linoleum.

“You’re wanted in five hundred different territories,” she said.

Five hundred sixty one.

“Yeah,” he said, not looking up. For some reason, he hadn’t thought that’d be her first reaction. 

“It’s your father’s fault, you know. Leaving everything in the air like that. It wouldn’t have happened if he-“

“-if he believed he could die?” Paris finished. He’d had the same thought, a million times over.

She made a soft and exasperated sound — and said nothing else.

“You didn’t…call or anything. After he died,” he said tentatively. 

“We had no contact,” Selene said.

“My phone number is public record,” Paris said, not hiding the hurt in his voice. He leaned forward, his arms crossed over his midsection. She didn’t turn to look at him.

“I don’t know why you’d expect that from me,” she said.

“I didn’t.” He shrugged. “I just…I don’t know. It would’ve been nice.”

“Would it?” She asked, turning now.

He frowned. What was he supposed to say to that? He hadn’t even realized he wanted it until he entered the house. It hadn’t occurred to him at all.

“I don’t know why you didn’t,” he said. “You didn’t call me when she died, either. You didn’t reach out at all.”

She seemed to lose her resolve then. She signed, nodding her head in the direction of the kitchen table. He sat down where indicated. The whorls of wood grain stared back up at him. Their shapes had mesmerized him when he was little.

“Is ginger tea fine?” She asked as she lit the last of the stove’s burners.

“Yes, ma’am.” He agreed, though he knew he wouldn’t drink it. He tried not to drink from any open containers — and he watched her hands carefully as she prepared it, wary of pills, wary of poison.

She placed two pale yellow teacups down on the table. Powder blue chinoiserie decorated the edges of the saucers. Steam floated delicately off the golden surface of the water.

“Do you know how your parents met, Paris?”

~

On a morning wet with dewdrops, Selene and Sabina tread happily through the underbrush. The sky was pale and overcast, but the sweaters their mother had knit for them kept them warm and comfortable. Sabina picked at the roses and the sweet briar that bloomed out of the damp earth. Twin blonde braids fell down her back. They were stained with mud at the edges when she’d bent down to touch the grass.

Selene watched the skies with a kind of dormant worry. There was something she was always waiting for, but never really expected. But it had come anyway. It had landed last month.

There was a place the land crested, the point at which the forest gave way to the clear valley. When they were little, they had dragged their sleds out to it on snowy days and laughed as they flew down the hill.

With the easy familiarity of someone who had walked this path since birth, Sabina moved to the top of the ridge. She was startled to find that in the valley below, a large ship was parked. It was more expensive than anything she’d ever laid her eyes on.

All dressed in scarlet against the verdant grass, a man stood tall and impervious. For a split second, his eyes fell on her. And that was all he needed.

~

The Emperor arrived in fine robes, in the middle of town, all his footmen swarming in droves about him. His color was pale, in a way that is supernatural. Not at all sickly. He was in good health. 

In the market, Selene crowded closer to the exit, while all Sabina seemed to want to do was stand her ground. The Emperor fixed his eyes on her, matching her boldness. His hands didn’t shake the way hers did, but the length of her was all resistance.

He liked it.

“Briar Rose,” he said, sing-song, “Was that you in the canyon the other day?”

Unbelievably, his hand moved to trace her braids. She smacked it away, teeth bared, furious.

“Go fuck yourself,” Sabina hissed. 

All she got in return was a chuckle. It was the sound birds made when the bullet missed their heart.

~

The knock came in the middle of the night, with only Selene up to answer it. She peeked through the curtain, and immediately drew far back, down onto the carpet.

“Daddy,” she cried, in a pitch she had not reached since childhood. 

He came instantly and sent her back to her room, far from the thin door that separated their house from nightfall. But her room was right by the entrance. She pressed her ear to the ground to listen.

“Would you accept a dowry?” came the low drawl of the Emperor. “For the youngest. The blonde one.”

“She is my daughter,” Father’s voice came out wrathful in return. “You can take the rest of the world - god knows you already have - but you will not touch her.”

“I would take good care of all of you,” he promised. “I don’t mean to distress her. I think it’d be best if we were all on the same page about this.”

Milky, sick. Selene cried until she couldn’t breathe, then cried more. Sabina slept in the next room, fast asleep, unknowing.

~

Roses. There were thousands of them, clogging up the yard, on each surface of the porch. Roses, roses, roses. The scent was overpowering. It was like something out of a nightmare. When she moved to open the door that morning, Sabina met a stiff resistance. That was thick the petals were stacked.

They came with a note. Father snatched it away before Selene could read, but Sabina had seen it.

She heard her sister crying down the hall. She watched it through a crack in the door.

“I don’t wanna go,” Sabina sobbed, “Mama, I don’t wanna go, please.”

She hid her face in the fabric of their mother’s dress, bent over on the floor, inconsolable. Already flinching away from any touch.

~

“You will come quietly,” the Emperor said, “Or you will come in chains. It makes no difference to me.”

Sabina swung at him as if she could knock his head straight off. It took five men to drag her off in those glistening, golden chains. She was soaked with sweat and tears, an awful slickness, a thrashing.

~

Castle Thales was dark in wintertime — and to her starved body, each room was freezing. Each door had a lock — and she had no keys.

He left her in her own bedroom the first nights. Locked up there, hands bound, until she was ready to *calm down*. He’d thought it would take days. It ended up taking months. It was only when the food stopped that she became handleable.

Sabina glared daggers at him. Her hands shook too much to hold utensils. He thought it was from fear, but it was all just fury. 

She dreamt of killing him nightly.

~

“It won’t be as bad as you think,” Constantine promised her as he lifted the veil. “It does not have to be this hard. You make it this way.”

She glared and glared and glared and flinched as his hand traced her bare arm. She was too pale now. She’d been locked away from the sun for too long. Now her skin was as white as the ripped wedding dress.

“You’re a queen now,” he said, like it comes as an assurance. She wanted nothing more than to beat him until he stopped breathing.

“You could have all you ever dreamed of,” he said. He doesn’t know her at all. Tears formed in her eyes before she could stop them. He moved to wipe them away for her. She bit into his hand as hard as she could and grinned when she drew blood. It was the first time she’d smiled in months.

~

She was slapped violently for that, which surprised her, because up to this point he had seemed so hesitant to hit her in the face. He threatened to yank all her teeth out, replace them with dentures, and take them out whenever he decided she’d lost the privilege. 

This seemed unattractive, which gave her reason to doubt the threat. But she could not call his bluff, so she stopped biting.

One of his men whipped her back until it was bloody. She hated it. She reveled in it. She was making him so mad. 

She cried as the maids worked to cover the bruises, the skin still tender even at the soft touch of the brushes. The crying wet her face. They had to keep restarting.

There was no need to cover up the whip marks. The corset did it all on its own — coarse, scratching, irritating the unhealed skin. The maids undid her long braids. Her hair reached all the way to her waist now. 

She reached out for the scissors on the vanity and cut it all off.

~

He was mad he couldn’t pull her hair anymore. He could bunch it up by her scalp, but it wasn’t the same. His was a cold anger. He probably liked to think of it as controlled. He loved to think of himself as controlled.

“It looks good on you, darling,” Nezu said over dinner, just to piss them both off. Sabina made a gagging sound in the back of her throat. She reached for the unused knife by her right napkin and wields it menacingly. As menacingly as she could manage, which turned out to be a lot.

Nezu looked excited at the prospect of getting stabbed by her. In disgust, she put the knife back down.

“Picked a good one,” he said approvingly, just as soon as the Emperor rejoined them.

~

“Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck you!” Sabina held the saber in both hands. It was decorative, plucked straight off the wall, but it still held an edge. It could still kill. She meant to. She really meant to.

“You are unwell,” Constantine said. “You don’t know what’s good for you. You don’t know when to quit.”

She lunged at him. He gasped and darted away. She’d only missed him by an inch. She howled in frustration.

If they’d trained her, she’d have been a brilliant fighter. But they hadn’t. And she wasn’t. She left all of herself exposed for the next lunge — and he downed her.

“I’ll kill you,” she swore, with his hands wrapped tight around her throat. “If it’s the last thing I do, I swear, I’ll kill you”

“Sabina,” he cooed sadly. “Rose. All I want is for you to be happy.”

“I want you to fucking die,” she sobbed. 

It was a final hurrah, one last gift to herself. When the sobbing died down, there was nothing else left.

~

The baby came a year later. He’d stopped hitting her while she was pregnant. She did not know if this was temperance, or if it was merely because she’d stopped fighting. They’d both been reluctant to resume the old routine. The baby changed things. It was soft, pliant. So easy to break. Sabina cried when she held it for the first time, cried every day after that. It had kneaded at her chest, half-blind, sleepy. It didn’t know anything.

“Constantine?” She said softly as he swapped out the bandages. The Emperor up in surprise. She so rarely used his name. 

But when he did look, she didn’t know what else to say. The terror must have shown through her. She felt all her body was wretched, torn apart, aching. She couldn’t take anymore.

He seemed to recognize this. He never hit her again.

~

Years passed before she saw her family again. When her son is five years old, she brought him back to that porcelain city, back to her parent’s old house. Both of them dead now, the million wars ravaging even when she cannot see them. She didn’t get to go to the funeral.

She’s stopped crying so much at this point. There’s a dignity to her, one she’s managed to scrape up off the floor of the palace. She was the tough one. She always had been.

She sat up in her sister’s kitchen, drinking ginger tea, manicured nails tapping softly at the porcelain cup. Selene sat across from her, pale, as if she’d seen a ghost.

~

They wrote letters after that. Constantine had agreed to it, perhaps sensing that his wife had no bone for conspiracy left within her. She was locked into it now, more than she ever had been before.

There’s a desperation to her script. God, she was so unhappy. Selene wrote back just as soon as the mail was delivered, sent it out the same day. It was all she could do. It never seemed to amount to much.

Sabina hinted at it. Selene swore she knew the end.

There’s a flower that grows in the garden of Castle Thales. It is indistinguishable from the heritage rose, but a single blossom could kill when ingested.

When they did the autopsy, they found fifteen of them in her stomach.

~

Paris stared back at her from across the table, totally frozen. The teacup sat in front of him cold and untouched.

“She died of sepsis,” he said slowly, emphasizing each word.

Selene looked at him with such pity that he thought he might be sick.

“She died of sepsis,” he repeated, “Slowly. In the hospital. She didn’t commit suicide.”

“Paris,” she said softly, “It took a week, didn’t it? Did you see her before the end?”

He propped one elbow up on the table and hid his face in his hand.

“I was at school,” he muttered. “She was already comatose when I got there. She died the next day.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. 

And of course she said it now, thirteen years later. She wasn’t there when it happened. Nobody was. There was absolutely nothing.

“You understand, surely,” Selene said, “why I was not so devastated to hear of your father’s death.”

There was still something so haunted in her look. He couldn’t bring himself to look up from the wood whorls. He didn’t even hear her standing up. He flinched at the sudden brush at his hand, gentle as it was. She tilted his face up as if to study him.

“God, you look just like her.”

The doorbell rang. Selene startled.

“I thought you said you were alone.”

“She’s my friend.” He stood up quickly. “She’s the only one.”

He opened the door. Lorelai stood cheerily on the step.

“Look what I got.” She grinned. She held up her hand at his eye level and let the necklace dangle from its chain. At its end, the rose charm shined in the dying light.

~

On an air mattress in the cleared out living room, they laid in a tangle of limbs. Lorelai’s breath was shallow, light, pleasantly exhausted. Paris traced the flesh of her breastbone, intent, almost like he was trying to find something. He had told her the whole story, in hushed tones, in the dark.

“I don’t want to get married,” he said quietly, at the end.

Lorelai laughed under her breath.

“Paris, we were never gonna get married.”

“Yeah, I know. I just…” he trailed off. “l don’t know. I’m sorry.”

“What are you sorry for?”

Oh, what a question. He shrugged.

“…I took you away from your family,” he said it hushed, as if it was confessional.

“Is that how you remember it?” She laughed again. “That’s not what it was. I wanted to go. I asked you first.”

“I just don’t want to hurt you,” he said, finishing the thought. What either of them thought when they first started out hardly mattered anymore. It seemed so far away now.

“Then don’t,” she said.

~

They left before the sun rose, trudging the long way, past all the grave sites.

“I guess it’s weird for me to keep this now,” Lorelai said as she studied the pendant.

“It’s just a necklace,” Paris shrugged. “It doesn’t have to mean anything.”

But they both knew it would always hold that weight.

The grass was frosty as if it had snowed. There was so much mist in the air. It was cool and refreshing. It was the perfect morning for it. 

They passed by another memorial site. Victims of the war that Empire was waged. An orator could list them all day and never run out of names. Paris paused to watch as Lorelai moved up the knoll and placed the pendant by the base of the stone. Not for Empire. Not for Rose. For Sabina.

~~~

tags:

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[msunitedstatesjames]

Ranking Veilguard Companion Questlines:

This ranking is truly based off how much I enjoyed the questlines overall, not how much I like each character. I liked all the companions and overall liked their quests, but some really stood out to me more than others.

7. Neve

Neve was one of my favorite companions in terms of personality, and depending on the choices you make she can have a really interesting role in the endgame. However, her quests felt kind of bland and one note to me. Evil blood mages are kind of old hat in the DA games at this point, and Aelia just didn't really stand out from the crowd as a villain. There were some pretty gruesome moments in the final quest where Aelia is puppeting people, but overall I just didn't find these quests to be super memorable.

6. Harding

This one should probably be higher up the list just for its lore implications, but for some reason I just didn't feel all that engaged with her storyline. I guess I wanted a little more. Harding implies that she's struggling with her powers, but we're never really shown much of that, other than the fact that she has confusing dreams now. She talks about her anger in regards to the Titan revelation, but again, I think we needed more. She only really seems angry for brief moments here and there, which makes it a little hard to believe when her final choice is pretty much whether or not to hold onto her anger. She does talk about how she's kind of a people pleaser and likes to seem cheerful as a result, but if that's the case they still coild have done more with that.

5. Bellara

Going into this, I had to remind myself about some of the details of Bellara's storyline, because other than the situation with her brother I didn't immediately remember her plot. The problem I have with her story is that sometimes it feels like there are two separate issues at play, the Archive and her brother. They do end up being connected, but it feels kind of loose. Dealing with the feelings of betrayal and grief in regards to her brother did add an important emotional resonance to her story, so that helped rank her above some others. The choice you make in the end feels very meaningful in terms of the world, but we don't have the chance to see it play out in any meaningful way within the game. I would have liked to see a noticeable shift of some kind, at least in Veiljumper territory, based on Bellara's choice, but all we got is one moment in the finale where the game has to tell us we're seeing the results of her decision.

4. Lucanis

Lucanis's storyline had some pretty cool scenes. The Ossuary. Going into his own mind. Confronting Zara. But considering everything he has going on, at times his storyline seemed like it needed more fleshing out. This dude is a non-mage possessed by a demon. Is that ever really explained other than by the fact that Zara was just a freaky, evil experimenter? We've had so many characters in DA with absolutely nightmarish experiences with possession, and honestly everyone is just pretty cool with Lucanis and Spite just being a chill partnership, maybe because he's not a mage. I know there are comments about how people probably aren't actually cool with it, Lucanis says as much about the Crows in the end, but we don't really get to see that. It might have been interesting for there to be more tangible tension between Lucanis and those around him based on his demonic possession.

3. Taash

I really struggled with where to place Taash's questline, as some aspects felt quite weak and others felt deeply meaningful. In the end, I surprised myself by ranking them so high. When I immediately look back on their questlines, there doesn't seem to be a lot there. Taash hunts around for some dragons, has dinner with their mom, and finally in the end fights the Dragon King. Taash's story is perhaps less related to the overall plot of Veilguard than any other character but Emmrich, which didn't necessarily help. And though I find Taash's quest for identity to be an important one, it doesn't lend itself to the same kind of excitement as some of the others. Still, emotionally this series of quests ends up doing a lot of heavy lifting. Specifically, I found Taash's relationship with Shathann to lend a lot to their story. Even if you can't relate to Taash's struggles with gender or identity, almost everyone can relate to the struggle between a parent and a child. I was never quite sure what to think of Shathann. And I think that's very real. When I look at the parents of my friends and loved ones I often see the duality of everything they've done out of love for their children and everything they've done that has harmed them. At times I found Shathann to be caring and protective, at other times to be borderline abusive and too desiring of control over Taash's life. And though this situtaion might be extreme compared to many people's experiences with their parents, there's an almost innate toxicity to all parent child relationships at one point or another, as a child tries to grow in one direction that might not be what the parent wants or hopes. And I think these quests walk that thin line we all tread at one point or another in our lives, where you have someone that you love even when you feel that they don't deserve your love or deserve you, but you still can't help but care about them anyway. But in the end Taash does love their mother, and when Shathann dies Taash's rage feels very real, as does their entire relationship dynamic throughout the game.

2. Davrin

Davrin's story benefits from being perhaps more closely tied in to the world and the story of Veilguard than any other. The Grey Wardens and the Blight have always been central to DA, and only Origins has made them more central than Veilguard did. But Davrin and Assan really did steal my heart. At first, I didn't find Davrin to be especially exciting. He seemed like just another stoic warrior type. But the more time you spent with he and Assan and the other Wardens, the more you came to love him. The Gloom Howler storyline, along with the return of the griffons, was fascinating and the stakes felt extremely high. The stakes felt so high in fact that I often wondered how Davrin remained so calm as Rook paraded around the Necropolis Gardens or Arlathan while the Gloom Howler was off somewhere doing who knew what to the world's only family of griffons. The choice you made about the griffons was honestly the hardest in the game for me. Many of the other choices felt obvious from a typical heroic video game character sense of morality, where the game designers seem to want you to pick the happy, cheerful, forgiving route over any other. But the griffon choice had no obvious answer to a question I didn't even expect to be asked, and I stared at the screen for a while before I made it. My one problem with this is that it felt bizarre for Rook to even be making such a choice. And the other good thing about this quest is that at least you get to visit with the griffons a few times after the choice to get a little taste of how your choice is panning out. The interesting thing will be to see if this choice plays into any future DA stories and games.

1.Emmrich

All right, I can't even pretend to be unbiased here. If you scroll through my blog you will see countless Emmrich posts. This dude was my unexpected romance choice and my unexpected favorite companion in the game. He has interesting commentary in most situations, his voice acting is delightful, and he stands out as a fresh and unique character among many wonderful DA companions over the years. But this is supposed to be about his questline, not just how much I adore him. I've written extensively about my love for these quests elsewhere on my blog, but I'll restate the basics here. His questline had one major thing going for it from the very beginning, that being that we've heard much about the Mourn Watch and the Necropolis, but have never had the chance to experience any of it. I was immediately intrigued to learn more about them. I very much expect a certain dark and spooky vibe from Necromancers, but in many ways the Necromancers in this questline defy expectations. Yeah, they're still kind of weirdos who love everything to do with the dead, but Emmrich is a kind, compassionate weirdo and Hezenkoss is, despite being the villain, kind of just a dorky chick. And yet, somehow this makes her the best villain in the game. She's evil. She tortures souls. She wants to embody a giant skeleton and rule over Nevarra City as a giant, immortal skeleton queen. She wants to commit murders because her peers are too dull, too stupid, or have committed plagirism. She has weird little gestures she does as she discusses her evil plan. She uses overdramatic, stereotypical villain language like calling everyone "fools" and complaining about Emmrich's "sanctimonius bleating." She completely believes that Emmrich is the main character in this story, he must be because she believes herself to be the main villain. She's just as much of a nerd as Emmrich and equally as skilled, and in fact reflects quite poignantly the atrocities Emmrich could have committed if he wasn't so deeply compassionate. She's an extremely memorable villain compared to others in the companion quests (and even the main quest), and she's all the better because she helps define Emmrich that much more clearly, which is exactly the job of a good companion quest and a good villain. She's so good that she's even brought back to bicker with Emmrich from beyond death for the rest of the game. All that, and I haven't even touched on Emmrich's big choice. The lich choice is so effective because it forces Emmrich to confront his very clearly stated worst fear, death, which is doubly interesting considering his occupation. It's also such a good choice because it presents you with an immediate and tangible effect, unlike many other quests. Either you save Manfred and Emmrich remains mortal, or you lose Manfred and Emmrich transforms into an immortal skeleton. Either way, you're bound to notice and feel the difference. Even without a major main quest connection, this storyline was just so well done.