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ilariyalavorowrites · 9 months ago

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Stalking me, Stalking you(CSI Nick Stokes)

Imagine: You never saw it coming, you never knew he was there until the moment he struck. For months, this individual had stalking you from the shadows, trying to find a way into your life. Never quite able to but in his mind, time was running out and soon enough you would be completely out of reach. This was the moment to act, to ‘rescue’ you and steal you away.

Warnings: Angst with a happy ending, kidnapping, hurt but eventual comfort. Suffering, lots of suffering, slow-moving plot, stalking, obsessive behaviour.

Pairings: Nick Stokes x Reader and Reader x OC (one-sided)

Word count: 2,240 words

Universe: CSI

Reader gender: Female

Part one of ten

Tagged: @just-call-me-the-old-hag @horsedragonllama

Sunday, 10:45 am

With your acquired piping hot morning cup of decaffeinated coffee, confined to the conveniently supplied to-go cup, you were ready to head out, to head back home and get the final chores finished before your mother arrived. Tomorrow could not come soon enough, it had been way too long since your mother last visited a few years back but this would be different.

Dinner reservations had all but been confirmed. You were awaiting the relevant information as soon as your partner had it in his possession as he had insisted on handling this little task himself. This would be the first time your mother and he would be in the same room. It was rather nerve-racking as you hoped that nothing would go wrong and they'd get on like a house on fire.

Lost in your thoughts, as you wandered through the crowded little coffee shop, one that you had regularly visited twice a week over the past four years. You only saw the stranger coming once it was too late to prevent the collision. His shoulder knocked into yours hard enough to send you spinning and before you could react, your coffee flew out of your hand, spilling its dark content all over the tiled floor.

“Damn,” You said, mildly annoyed but knowing the popularity of your favourite coffee shop. There was always a chance that something like this could easily happen. It's just your turn. You would look back and laugh about this later with your mother.

“It’s my fault, sorry about that. Let me buy you another one” An unfamiliar smooth baritone voice spoke, catching her attention. You raised her gaze to meet theirs, ready to politely decline as after all, it was just one cup of coffee nothing to cry over. With a friendly, nonchalant smile upon your lips, you open your mouth to reply…

Monday, 9 am

Evelyn had never been truly comfortable flying but when her daughter had called around two and half months back with an open invitation and her airfare fully paid, she jumped at the chance. After sending one more message to both her daughter and husband, Evelyn boarded the plane.

Driving down had been an option, Evelyn had never been the most confident driver, especially over long distances. On those long lonely straits of road, she would always worry needlessly about every little thing, even if her husband had been along for the ride. Flying had been the only option since her husband was still not back from his fishing trip. An hour and a half was nothing, it would be over before she knew it.

Just before she turned off her phone, Evelyn checked one final time to see if either of them had replied. Her dear Bob had but her daughter had not. This hadn’t been the first message that she hadn’t responded to.

Evelyn had spoken to her the previous morning to confirm what time she would arrive at the airport so that she would be prompt to pick her up but after that, it was utter radio silence. This was hardly unusual due to the nature of her daughter’s job but this felt different. For her daughter was truly a creature of habit, always calling back if she had missed more than one call that day from either parent and replying to text messages by the next morning.

She had done neither of these as Evelyn had tried calling last night and once more before leaving this very morning. She even used the keypad to text carefully a goodnight message and the one before boarding. She preferred to call over using the messaging function on this newer model of phone that had been purchased as a Christmas present. Her family wanted her to try and keep up with the times and have a way of contacting them whenever she left the house.

It had been sweet though but it wouldn’t have been her first choice of present. She knew that her daughter worried about her, but then Evelyn deeply worried about her child’s safety especially since they had not lived in the same state for the last five years.

All she could do was wait until her plane landed safely at Las Vegas Airport and the sight of that ever-infectious smile beaming from just beyond the barrier in the Arrival Hall. The pleasant image would be enough to get through the flight as she laid back in her seat, closing her eyes and relaxed as much as she possibly could.

An hour and a half flew past and Evelyn found herself standing in the right place with a suitcase in one hand and her purse dainty held in the other as her eyes scanned the crowd. She had checked the signage on the walks to ensure that she had gone in the right direction, as it was most definitely possible that the airport had more than one arrival hall in this terminal but this hadn’t been the case.

She had been walking up and down for the last twenty minutes, her eyes passing over each of the many faces staring back at her from the barrier. None of them were the ones that she had been expecting. This was strange as her plane had not been delayed and her trip through security had not taken long. Maybe her daughter had been held up in a traffic jam, yes that had to be it.

Evelyn made her way through the crowd, all whilst looking for a seat to rest and continuing to wait as she was certain that her child wouldn’t be much longer.

Minutes ticked past, soon becoming tens of minutes and before long an hour had passed. Evelyn was concerned as her eyes had remained fixed upon the exit doors, watching as they opened and closed as people flooded in and out but her daughter had never stepped foot across that threshold.

With one hand, she fished out that dreaded mobile phone and swiftly dialled her daughter’s number. It rang for a few moments before being diverted to voicemail. Without hesitation, she spoke knowing that she had few options in a city where knew no one beyond her child.

‘Sweetheart. It’s your mother. I’ve been at the airport for a little while. I know you are on the way and have likely been caught up in some dreadful traffic on the way here so I’ll get a taxi as I do have your address and you head home. I’ll meet you there

She placed the phone back in the depths of her purse before heading outside to find a taxi as seeds of worry and doubt blossomed into life.

Monday, 11:10 pm

Detective Captain Jim Brass had seen it all. There was not much that shook him to the core anymore, after all the years spent with all that he had seen with the ever-loyal team of hardworking CSIs that made up the graveyard shift.

His officers were just as hardy as he was, well maybe a few were still green and somewhat naive but in time, they would be as hard as diamonds on the outside at least. Seated in his office, he was ready to burn the midnight oil when a quick succession of knocks alerted him to the presence of someone at his door.

The words were on the tip of his tongue, to summon them to cross the threshold and enter but this individual did not wait as the door was swiftly pushed open. He frowned, annoyed at this sudden intrusion but as his gaze fell upon the familiar face of Officer Rodriguez of Day Shift, a thousand questions rose erupted within his mind.

Why was he still here? His shift ended hours ago but yet he remained within the department. His pale and drawn face was far from the usual for this stern man who lived for the badge.

“Sir, I’m sorry for just entering but I felt that you needed to hear this” His voice lacked its normal steady tone, it was similar to that of the many terrified fathers that he had encountered over the years. “I’m listening, Rodriguez” He patiently spoke briefly, to allow the man to find the rest of his words.

“My partner and I were called to the scene of a 406, from the information that we had received from dispatch just seemed like a run-of-the-mill job. However, when Sawyer and I rolled up at the address, it was far from ordinary”

Jim watched on silently as the story began to unravel. “A distraught older woman was waiting outside the property for us, and quickly it was established that this was the mother of the individual that owned this unit” It was plain to see the professional nature waning as the officer continued to relay his report.

“The owner was discovered to be one of our own” As he heard the name, the cogs began to turn, as he tried to make sense of what had led to this but yet, he lacked the whole picture as if only a few matching pieces had found and place down upon the table, the jigsaw was slowly coming together.

However, this still perplexed Jim, why was a simple burglary being hand-delivered to his door, unless there was more to this than a case of a stranger breaking into the home of a member of law enforcement and taking anything that wasn't nailed down.

A small case that dayshift would need no assistance from either swing or graveyard but this didn’t feel as if they were reaching out for a fresh set of eyes to look over the evidence. He would bite and see where he ended up.

The memory of the morning still fresh lingered at the forefront of Rodriguez’s mind. It was hard to push aside as he relived each step, trying to see if he missed any detail. No matter how miniscule it initially seems could open doors down the line.

“She’s been paid leave for thirty-six hours as her mother was due to arrive this morning. Using a few vacation days left over from last year” He relayed the information readily to the younger man. A basic set of facts that most of the department was already aware of. She had been rather openly vocal about the pending arrival of her beloved mother.

Each shift had been part of the active countdown that drove many mad but much like any other family, they took in on the chin and revelled at the sight of her excitement. Both men remembered the smile that never faded, it didn’t matter which end of her shift they encountered her, there it would be.

The years of service had not yet tarnished and hardened her heart, but it would come eventually. That one case that they could not get past, sleepless nights and a drive to find a way to justice that went above the call of duty. Jim had his, he knew that Rodriguez had his own.

The sight of Conrad Ecklie and the click of his office door closing behind the said man spoke volumes, this was not going to be good news in the slightest. “Sir, The Detective in question never turned up at the airport to pick up her mother and has not been seen since the morning before that”

Monday 11:20 PM

Nick held his phone as he walked through the station’s front doors, his focus transfixed firmly upon the tiny screen of the device. Still no message back but then again he wasn’t expecting her to answer straight away especially now that her mother was in town. He had the breakfast date to look forward to once he finished this graveyard shift.

Tomorrow was going to be his day with his girl, meeting up with her at their regular breakfast joint and then sitting down to dinner with her mother later in the evening. Nick would message her the details later on during his first break of the night.

Nothing could easily railroad this wonderful feeling, for the first time, in a long time things were going swimmingly with his love life. He never knew that these were famous last words, ones that would haunt him in the days to come.

As his eyes rose from his screen, he could not help but notice the scene in Brass’s office. Ecklie was a familiar sight, flitting in and out whenever the need arose but an unfamiliar Officer who should have clocked out hours ago, now that was unusual.

Catherine lingered in the hallway near the locker room, leaning into the wall behind her with her arms crossed over her chest. Her eyes trained upon the glass-walled office. “Evening” He greeted his dear old friend as he stiddled up beside her. “Do you know what’s going on?” He enquired curious to know if she had any insight into the strange situation.

“No, but I don’t doubt we’ll be in the dark for long. All I do know is that it’s do with one of the day shift’s newest cases” She replied, her curiosity had been piqued the moment that she entered ten minutes earlier.

In tandem, their phones beeped and the same text message was displayed on each of their devices. What a way to start a shift, Nick knew that he would have to tell about this in the morning.

FAMILY MEETING

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sprite-writes · 10 months ago

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gunmetal blue

chapter 1/?

Dale Cooper/Reader

Summary: Agent Cooper is saddled with a new partner–against his better judgment. She’s a mess–aimlessly stumbling her way through the FBI with a past shrouded in mystery. Grappling with this change, and a puzzling case in a small town, Cooper’s lost. He finds the path forward in the last way he’d expect.

word count: 2,605

A/N: woah new fic! this is sort of my side project while I work on cloudy day, but it'll still have semi-regular updates! super self indulgent because I love twin peaks, even if everyone had moved on LOL. hope u enjoy <3 as with all my writing, special thanks to @lightning-writes

Dale wasn’t the type to be needlessly anxious. He was the farthest thing from an overthinker, he was a pragmatic man, he kept his sensibility about him. So, admittedly, it was out of character the way his leg had started to involuntarily bounce, brow sweat, and chest tighten. Gordan Cole’s office had never felt so small.

He should have known something was wrong with the way Gordan had called him into his office, hands clapping on his shoulders, guiding him into the room like a lost child. Now, with the announcement hanging in the air, he understood.

“I’m sorry, a-a new partner?”

“That’s what I said, Coop! Is your hearing going too?” Gordon’s deafening volume usually has no effect on him, but this time he flinches. Dale shifts, and the leather beneath him squeaks. Gordon doesn’t even look up from his computer, skillfully avoiding Dale’s appalled stare.

“Gordon, with all due respect, I don't need nor want a partner. Has there been something unsatisfactory about my work? Or-”

“Did you say something about a factory? Anyway, It's not up to me. She was sent here straight from the higher-ups. All I did was sign the paperwork.”

Dale sighs, his frustration thickening in his chest. His captain's eyes flick to him.

“I would’ve fought it if I thought it was such a bad idea, Coop. Don’t worry so much, She’s a sweet girl and a—how would you say it? A damn fine agent.”

“Isn’t there anyone else she could be assigned to?” he asks, and it feels like begging. Windom is 3 years behind him now, but that's three years he’s spent adapting to solitude. The idea of someone next to him on the field again unsettles him deeply, drudging up feelings he’s worked hard to forget.

“Agent, I know how you may feel about this. What, with your past and all, but keep an open mind. I think this could be good for you.”

Could be good?

“Sir–”

A knock on the door cuts him off, the frosted glass door swinging open without hesitation. The interruption leaves him with his complaints still sticking to his tongue.

“Gordon! I brought you coffee – you still take it with two sugars, right? Because there’s a cane’s worth in there.”

His vision is crowded by a woman in an oversized blue FBI jacket—besides her abrupt entry, she’s also out of uniform. Her denim blue jeans hug her waist and fray at the knees, with a jarringly casual t-shirt. The unprofessionalism rubs him the wrong way.

Two milky-colored coffee cups get dropped on the desk. Despite the breach of protocol, Gordon seems pleased to see her. There’s an affinity in his eyes, but she's a stranger to Dale.

“Well if it isn’t Miss Blue herself! We were just talking about you.”

“We?”

Her hair flicks over her shoulder, and her eyes widen.

“Oh! Hi! Sorry, I didn’t see you there. I’m Blue.” She sticks out her right hand for him to shake– and it knocks straight into the two coffee cups, sending one tumbling towards Gordan and the other into his lap.

“Shit!”

He bolts up as hot coffee soaks his trousers. He vaguely registers Gordon's laugh as if an Agent didn’t just waltz in, wreck his office, and Dale’s drycleaning.

“Oh hell, I’m so sorry!” she shrills, peeling off her jacket frantically. The cheap polyester of the academy-issued zip-up presses against his wool-blend pants, the woman’s feeble attempt to clean the mess.

Dale’s anger alights, but he breathes deeply to tamp it down. Patience is a virtue, he tells himself.

She continues to dab at his pants, he pushes her hands away, taking the stained jacket from her, and tossing it on the chair behind him.

“It's fine, it’s fine,” he tells her tightly, despite the heat of his emotions, and the mild burns. When it rains, it pours, he supposes.

She looks up at him, clearly mortified.

“My bad, Sir,” she says lamely, and her expression scrunches up more.

“A hand, Kid?” Gordon asks and she’s more than happy to take her attention away from Dale. Gordon wipes his desk with a handkerchief, and with her hands free, she begins moving damp papers from his desk.

“Well, I’ll tell ya, Blue, you haven’t changed a bit since they shipped you off,” Gordon says fondly. Blue grimaces in a subtle way that Dale only notices because of the daggers he’s staring into her.

“I don't know about-” she begins. Gordon steamrolls her, likely not hearing a thing she said.

“Well, I suppose this is as good an introduction as any. Dale, meet your new partner, Special Agent Georgia Blue. Blue, meet Dale Cooper.”

He wanted to be surprised, really he did, but with fate’s track record, he didn't know why he would expect any better.

Dale goes home late that evening. With him, a stack of manilla folders all relating to one Georgia Blue. He recognizes a level of invasion here. He justifies it simply; Blue is an invasion of his space, so this grants him a degree of invasion to hers. He tries not to think about the morality of it too much, mostly because he knows if he does, he’ll be returning the files unopened. He lets his curiosity win this battle.

It doesn’t matter anyways; half the documents are redacted, large blocky sharpie lines interrupting every other sentence. He skims over what he deems unimportant– her physical description, age, schooling– when one thing catches his eye. Her bureau status, ambiguously labeled as ‘probationary warning: under review’

The FBI files aren’t all. There are DEA reports, too, all titled Operation Architect. He whispers the words to himself, something familiar in the back of his mind, vague memories and mentions of this Operation Architect. From his understanding, it had been DEA business, just watercooler talk that had made its way down to his office. He reads what he can.

January 10th 1988, SA Georgia Blue establishes contact with target, indefinite undercover placement to begin immediately.

Undercover placement? The rest of the paragraph is blocked out, and he’s left with more questions than answers.

His day feels like a pill he can’t swallow. He had vainly hoped that by understanding who this woman was, it would give him some artificial control of the situation, maybe even make it easier to choke down. He doesn’t understand why the dread in his chest continues to bloom.

He yawns, interrupting his thoughts. He supposes the rest of his investigation can wait for the morning, it wasn’t like the issue was going away anyways.

There are a few blissful moments the next morning when Dale wakes up, where the nightmare of yesterday is just that - a nightmare. The redacted files are forgotten on his desk. He makes his bed and brushes his teeth, and it isn't until he’s halfway through shampooing his hair, while he’s mentally scaling down his to-do list for the day that he remembers his plans are meaningless compared to the derailment that is Agent Blue. That is, his new partner Agent Blue. Just rolling over the word in his mind causes a headache to bud.

“Agents Cooper and Blue, partners, at your service,” he spits bitterly to himself. He gets shampoo in his mouth.

He’s bitter all the way to the station, questions and resentment swarming his mind.

He doesn’t even bother to chirp his usual good mornings to the doorman. Anger fits him like a jacket two sizes too small, he has to squeeze his way into it.

Perhaps the comfort of familiarity would calm him, he thought. A warm cup of coffee and the sanctuary of his desk. That’s what he needed.

“Good morning Dale,” Diane calls as he passes reception. He waves noncommittally.

“Morning Diane, any messages?”

“Not today, but Gordon wants to talk to you—he said to just come by when you have time.”

Dale sighs, and wonders what Gordon could possibly have in store for him this time.

“Is that all?”

“There’s just one other thing—I had to move your desk closer to the window to make room for the new girl – but don’t worry! I put everything back just as it was, and I was real careful too,” she smiles.

His eye twitches.

“Alright, Diane, thanks,” he mutters.

His desk is a foot from the window now, approximately 3 feet from where he had it before. He recalls the day he requested it to be there—having carefully stood in each corner of the precinct to find the exact shade-to-light ratio to situate himself.

It’s fine, he reasons, he’ll just squint.

In the ideal 4-foot spot from the window sits a brand new desk, with his brand new partner. If she hears him approach, she doesn’t show it, eyes glued to her dark computer screen. It doesn’t bother him, not one bit. He had spent the last three years' worth of mornings enjoying his coffee in silence, and, new partner or not, he would like that to remain the same. Who cares if she ruined his wool pants–doesn’t mean she has to say good morning to him too.

He sits down, much too close to the sun for his liking, and dives headfirst into paperwork. Still, he spares glances at her, in intervals, and mostly just wonders, why? Dale is a good agent, he knows this. His work and reputation precede him; a lone wolf, he thinks of himself. Then, out of nowhere, without warning, he’s saddled with a partner? An agent he’s never even heard of, who is apparently dipping half into DEA work. An agent who’s on probationary warning.

Perhaps they want him to babysit, he concludes. A rookie agent with some kind of classified disciplinary infraction, and they want him to turn her around. The thought reheats his anger. He’s a federal agent, not an academy trainer, and he has half a mind to let Gordon know that fact.

Five minutes into tense silence and deep thought, a hand smacks down on his desk. He startles but recovers smoothly.

“For yesterday,” Blue says tersely. His eyes follow her stony expression to her manicured hand. She moves and reveals a crumbled $50 bill she’d slapped on his desk.

“Agent?” he asks, confused and exasperated.

“For the pants, alright? Please, just take it.”

He stares at the bill quizzically.

“Ma’am, while I can appreciate the gesture, I assure you that it’s not necessary—“

She holds her hand up to stop him.

“I don’t care. I’m not taking the money back.”

She returns to her desk, intentionally angling away from him, staring intently at the computer screen that he can now see isn’t even turned on.

“...The power button’s on the back of the monitor.”

“...right.”

The computer screen comes to life, and she doesn't spare him a glance.

Partners, indeed.

When he finally has a moment to see Gordon, he’s gone over his speech 5 times in his head. Gordon, you know I respect you and your decision-making, but I am not a babysitter or some sort of camp counselor. I am formally requesting the reassignment of Agent Blue.

He says it again and again in his head, all the way to the door. He knocks loudly, in a way he knows Gordon will hear, and he gets back a muffled, “Come in!”

He does. When Gordon catches his eye, his expression is uncharacteristically unreadable.

“Close the door behind you, Coop,” he tells him. Dale shuts the door and takes his usual seat across from his boss.

“I’m glad you had the time to talk, I’m sure you have more than a few questions after yesterday,” he says levelly. Dale notes Gordon talking quieter than normal, it gives him an odd feeling like he’s in trouble.

“I do, Sir. I would like to firstly say that while I respect–”

“Now hang on there, Coop. First things first, I’m going to need you to return those files on Blue.”

Dale freezes, and his puffed-out chest deflates. It takes him a moment to form a sentence again.

“...May I ask why, Sir?”

Gordon sighs and fiddles with the wires of his hearing aid.

“You haven’t done anything wrong. This is all just a bit more complicated than I can tell you right now. I’m afraid I’m sort of left in the dark here, too. I’ll tell you what I can, but it’s not all that much. Anything else you learn is at the discretion of the bureau - and Blue. And I don't think either of em’ wants you poking around.”

The situation feels much bigger than him all of a sudden, even though it felt like something he could hold in the palm of his hand just a moment ago.

“Alright,” is all he can think to say.

“I knew Blue when she was in the academy, and let me tell you, she is bright. A little prodigy in her class, a bit like you, I’d presume. Anyway, I met her through her field training, she was a NAT here for a little while. Wasn’t too interested in homicide investigation, though. No, she’d taken a real liking to narcotics. Nasty business, I always thought, but to each their own,”

As he talks, he leans in close to Dale. Gordon’s inside voice is still quite loud, but Dale can tell he’s straining to lower it.

“She graduated and went straight to doing investigative work with the DEA. If I know you, and I do, I know you’ve picked through her file already. Do you know what Operation Architect is?”

“I saw the name, but I don't know much about it, no.”

“Neither do I, that’s DEA business, but I know she was on it, undercover for over a year. And I know it didn't go great. She was relocated here after the ordeal.”

Dale was hoping for this conversation to be more enlightening. He still feels trapped in the dark.

“I meant it when I said none of this was up to me. My boss wanted Blue assigned to you. I’d wager it's because of your good work, you’ve got a handsome reputation, but I couldn’t tell you for sure. Regardless, she's sticking around for a while, so make the best of it. She’s not quite how I remember her, but as long as she hasn't done a full 180 in a few years, I think you two could get along pretty well.”

Silence weighs down the room. Dale lets the new knowledge permeate his skin.

“Alright,” he says because there really isn’t anything else to say.

“Alright,” Gordon parrots.

Dale sits like he’s waiting for something else to happen. The crushing finality of it sits on his chest. All the determination he came in there with is withered away to nothing, just ashes of a once burning fire.

There’s no shirking this now, he has a partner. Cooper & Blue, FBI.

“I know this isn’t easy for you, and I wish there was more I could do. But to be completely candid with you, I don’t think it’ll be nearly as bad as you’re anticipating.”

Dale nods absently, drained of anything else to say. Gordon understands.

“You’re dismissed, Coop.”

He gets up, politely pushing in the chair.

Before his hand can touch the knob, Gordon grabs his attention again.

“Well, one more thing, actually.” Dale tenses, and the dread in his chest that had gone numb begins to flare up again.

“If I were you, I’d show her a bit of kindness. This line of work is messy, and I can't imagine what the hell happened for her to get sent here.”

Dale can’t imagine either.

#twin peaks #dale cooper x reader #dale cooper #twin peaks: the return #gordon cole #harry truman #laura palmer #yay chapter one!

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dreamdepot · 7 months ago

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Dreams of the Kingdom - Chapter 8: Sage of Water

Edited 7/9/2024 - Updated chapter navigation links.

Previous < First > Next

It's time to banish the sludge from the Domain once and for all, but things keep getting stranger. Are these voices and visions helping or hurting you?

AO3 Wattpad Or below the break!

(Also, next week... Korok Space Program...)

Once again, you found yourself in the skies, but this time the air felt eerily still. The Great Wellspring floated miles above the Domain. Gravity was stunted and leaping between the floating islands was nearly effortless. The only sound was the roar of the fountain filling the massive carafes. Your trio had only one of the faucet locks left to go before you could wash away the belching source of the sludge.

“I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this!” You kicked your legs as you fell tantalizingly slow back to the temple floor. The strange low gravity was disorienting, though Link and Sidon seemed to take it like second nature. The latter made sense, as he nearly swam through the air. The former… well, your knight was simply amazing. Even with the power of the Triforce with you, it seemed hard to keep up with him sometimes.

“No offense babe, but maybe I should take care of this one?”

You glared up at the switch crystal hidden in the spinning tower. You groaned, but flashed Link a thumbs up. “Go for it.”

Link looked up at the tower. “Do you have an extra Hover Stone?”

“Uh, yeah, here.” You tossed him a device capsule from your pack.

“Thanks!” He caught it and grabbed several other pieces of junk with his Ultrahand.

You watched as he started to build something that looked needlessly complicated. “It’s a good thing Link isn’t evil. I sometimes worry how long Hyrule would last if he decided to embrace chaos.”

“Who knows?” Sidon mused. You nodded but snapped back in a double take. Your friend was replaced by a tall, light blue Zora – but a species of Zora that you recognized from ancient artwork, not one from the modern day. He was flecked with turquoise scales, and had deep, dark blue eyes with swirling starry specks. You rubbed your eyes and he changed again, this time looking more sharklike than usual with a tooth necklace and a bright yellow surfboard under one arm.

“Sidon, what happened to you?!”

“What do you mean?” Sidon asked. Suddenly he had returned to normal. “Are you feeling okay, [Y/n]?”

You took a few deep breaths and rubbed your eyes. “I-I-I don’t understand. You were different! You were…” Your voice trailed off as you saw the concern on Sidon’s face. Your voice dropped to a whisper. “Sidon, am I losing my mind?”

“Hey now, I’m sure you’re not… but why would you think that?”

You thought back over the past few weeks. “Seeing things that aren’t there… dreams of another time in another body that’s not mine… hearing voices and whispers from Ganondorf…”

“My friend, you’ve been under a lot of stress lately. Maybe it’s just your body telling you that you need to rest?”

“How can I rest when it’s in my dreams too?” You groaned. “It’s… oh man, Sidon, I know it sounds crazy, but it feels like this isn’t supposed to be happening.”

Sidon stared at you and motioned to the waterworks.

“Yes, I know that everything with the Demon King shouldn’t but… if feels like something is wrong beyond that. It feels like time itself is wrong. It’s like I have multiple sets of memories all fighting to be correct.”

Sidon thought for a moment. “Do you think, perhaps the Demon King can alter time itself?”

“I have no idea how. As powerful as the secret stones seem, I don’t think they’re powerful enough for that alone.”

Speaking of time, you watched Link leap into the air and draw his bow. The way he was skilled with archery made it look like he could slow time by sheer focus. With the switch struck, the water drained, revealing the way to the final lock.

“My friend, perhaps it is best that we take this one step at a time. Even the mightiest currents have a way around them.”

“Thanks Sidon, the only question is how.”

==============================

With the locks open, the carafes were full of pure spring water. “Ready, guys?” Link asked.

You drew your sword and Sidon brandished his trident. “Ready,” you said. You braced yourself as Link tapped the activation sigil. What kind of monster would emerge to fight you? A mass of sludge? A demented slimy Deku Baba? The carafes dipped forward, drenching the altar in gallons of water.

Suddenly, a glob of sludge escaped, darting to the central plaza. The three of you pivoted, and Link summoned Tulin’s spirit to his side. The sludge melted away to reveal the sickliest, shrimpiest octorok you’d ever seen. “What… is that?”

“Is this some kind of joke?” Link muttered.

Sidon shook his head. “I don’t understand. This looks like a Mucktorok, a sort of trickster monster from fairy tales. The Demon King is using it to poison us all? There must be something el-” Sidon was cut off by the Mucktorok belching a pile of muck. A massive sludge shark emerged for a brief moment, merging with the trickster before diving back into the goop. “Hmm, I see,” Sidon grumbled. “Get ready!”

The shark darted across the plaza. “Sidon, water!” you shouted. Sidon encased you in water again, and you flung a wave at the shark, knocking it on its side. The shark melted away, leaving Mucktorok running and flopping around. Tulin’s shade fired an arrow, knocking the monster down, and Link charged in, slashing away.

The Mucktorok was slippery, though, and slipped back into the muck, forming another shark and filling the plaza with slime. The shark dove again, sending a wave of slime that almost knocked you off the edge. The extra sludge made it much harder to move, and every attempt to use Sidon’s water or Splash Fruit barely made a difference. Even when Link finally scored a hit, knocking the monster from the sludge, the Mucktorok began to leap between each of the slime pools.

Each strike missed, as the Mucktorok stayed just out of range, leaping into another slime pool. “Okay, he’s getting on my nerves! Link, please tell me you have a spare hydrant?”

“Way ahead of you.” Link popped open a few Zonai capsules, attaching two hydrants to a Hover Stone and a wheel, constructing a floating makeshift sprinkler. “Sorry Sidon.”

“Believe me, no offense taken,” Sidon groaned as the Mucktorok leaped past him again. “If you get that side, [Y/n] and I can take care of this side. That infernal creature won’t be able to hide.”

The Mucktorok seemed to hear and chose to blow a raspberry at you, before making another sludge shark. This time though, Link’s sprinkler washed away the slime. You swapped to a bow and took aim, tracking the shark. “Sidon, ready?”

“Go!”

You fired the arrow, knocking the Mucktorok out of hiding again. This time however, the Mucktorok’s eyes grew red, and it screeched at you. “Oh, it didn’t like that!” You shouted as it changed tactics. You felt that same odd pain in your head. Instead of summoning its sludge shark again, the pest created a massive wall of slime that spouted tentacles of slime.

“A sludge Morpha?” Sidon muttered.

“What?”

“Morpha, a monster that once plagued our people a long time ago. It seems Mucktorok and Ganondorf want to dredge up the past.” Sidon said, with a glare you never expected to see from him.

You stared at the monster. “This… this isn’t supposed to happen…” you murmured, rubbing your throbbing temples.

“Are you alright?” Link asked, holding his shield up as he sidestepped towards you.

You took a deep breath. “Yeah. Yeah, let’s fry this guy.”

“Eww, even I’m not hungry enough to eat him,” Link groaned.

“Figure of speech. Sidon, any advice?”

“Not unless you have a hookshot.”

You studied the way that Mucktorok moved around the tentacles, then you looked at Link. “Got it! Sidon, can you bait it out with your water?”

“Will do!” Biding his time, Sidon aimed before letting a wave loose at one of the tentacles, revealing the head of the Mucktorok.

You coated the arrowhead in the sticky elixir. With careful aim, you let it fly, sticking to the side of Mucktorok’s head. “Now Link!”

Link summoned Recall, pulling the arrow, and Mucktorok free from the sludge wall. Sidon wasted no time, stabbing the creature. Finally, the Mucktorok spluttered and wheezed. Streams of gloom burst from its body as it deflated like a balloon, finally imploding and exploding in a burst of demon energy.

“Good riddance,” Sidon muttered.

“Look, the sludge!” you said. Just like with the snow, the sludge disappeared into thin air. The water flowing from the cistern was now clean and clear. You had no doubt the same was happening down in the Domain as well. Last but not least, the secret stone emerged from the altar, glowing brightly.

Before you could say anything else, you found yourself swept up with Link in a bone crushing hug. “Thank you, my friends! Thank you! Twice now you have saved us. The Zora shall tell stories of the Swordsman and Prince for ages to come. I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you.”

“What are friends for?” Link said, tapping Sidon to let you both at least breathe.

“Having the Domain safe and sound again is reward enough,” you added. Sidon set both of you back down. “Now, before we head back, I think there’s something with your name on it.” You motioned to the secret stone.

As Sidon spoke to the former Sage of Water, you felt a presence reaching out to you. Thankfully it wasn’t Ganondorf, but it was just as, if not more, powerful. A voice was trying to reach you, but it was garbled. “Lady Din?” you whispered.

You couldn’t make out the voice, but the tone seemed to indicate it wasn’t her. Was Ganondorf right? Were there more people in your head? Most of all, were they trying to manipulate you or guide you? For now, it didn’t matter, since you couldn’t make out the words.

All you could hear was a beautiful harp.

==============================

“Welcome back!” Lady Yona greeted the three of you as you arrived back at the throne room.

“Well, well, I have to say this feels a bit like déjà vu!” The great King of the Zora, King Dorephan chortled, slapping the side of his throne. “Saved once again by Link and the Prince!”

Muzu nodded. “The sludge is gone. Even I have to admit we owe you a great debt.”

“No words could express the depths of our gratitude. Thank you, heroes, from the bottom of my heart, I thank you. As for you Sidon,” King Dorephan continued, “though [Y/n] and Link certainly played a key role, your own efforts to save the domain were nothing short of magnificent. I have always believed in you, Sidon. Now, you have unequivocally proven your worthiness to bear the crown. That is why I shall joyously take this opportunity to pass the throne to you.”

“Father… this is so sudden!”

“No, it only seems that way. In truth, it has been heavy on my mind for some time. Sidon, my son, it is time to ascend the throne as the new king and lead Zora’s Domain to a brighter tomorrow.

“Me, the king?” Sidon looked between you and Yona. Yona gave him a reassuring nod. He then looked to you.

You flashed him your own smile. “Sidon, you’ve got this! There’s no one better I could imagine leading the Zora.”

He took a deep breath and nodded back. “Thank you, Father! I will not let you down! I swear it.”

“That’s the spirit, my boy!” Dorephan laughed. “The High Prince and the finest swordsman in all of Hyrule shall bear witness to this momentous occasion!”

==============================

Everyone gathered at the center of the Domain, now freshly cleaned.

“Silence, everyone!” Muzu shouted.

Sidon stood on the balcony, flanked by Yona, Link, and of course you. The sun sparkled on his scales, making him look more regal than ever. The crown looked like it couldn’t have fit better on his head. Sidon raised his arm. “I hereby inherit this crown from my father, the Exalted Dorephan. From this moment on, I shall be King of the Zora!” He then motioned to Yona. “At this same precious moment, I ask that you also open your hearts to your new queen, our beloved Yona!”

A cheer rose from the crowd, as Yona stepped forward. You noticed she didn’t climb the steps to be directly beside him. You also caught the fleeting look of adoration to her attendant. “The sludge threatens us no more. We are once again free to swim through crystal waters beneath azure skies without fear. We could not have achieved this without our dear King Sidon, our heroic Link, our valiant Prince [Y/n], and all of us who call the domain home. I am so proud and so very grateful to count myself among the Zora of the Domain. However! That does not mean that all matters have been resolved.”

“Right you are, my queen!’’ Sidon said, striking his royal pose. “So long as darkness lurks in the depths of Hyrule, this peace we have fought so hard for could vanish like a bubble on a needle. We shall not allow that! It is now time for the Zora to help Prince [Y/n] and Link prevail! Everyone, I ask that you lend them your strength! Doing just that shall be the first task that I and my partner in leadership shall undertake as your king and queen!”

A great cheer rose up from the crowd. You cleared your throat and called out, “All hail King Sidon! All hail Queen Yona!”

“All hail King Sidon! All hail Queen Yona!”

Sidon was cheered to the echo, as you all returned to the throne room. “I wish we could have made it a proper party,” you said.

“We’ll certainly make it a full celebration once the Demon King is defeated,” Yona agreed.

Sidon shook his head. “Parties can wait. There are more important matters. If the Princess Zelda I saw in my vision while talking with the previous Sage of Water was the real one in the past, then the one that attacked Father must not have been the same,” Sidon said, scratching his chin. “Questions upon questions.”

“It’s not the first time either,” Link said. “We’ve been running into fake Zeldas left and right.”

“I wish I could accompany you on your journey, but given I’ve just ascended the throne, I must be with my people. My sincerest apologies.”

You nodded, “Of course, Sidon, we understand that completely.”

“We’ll do our best to keep gathering information for you. Oh, and Prince [Y/n], would you allow me to speak with you for a moment alone? Royal to royal, you could say.”

It was easy to tell there was something special on his mind. “Of course, Sidon.”

He led you to a more secluded part of the throne room. Part of you had to laugh, it was the same spot as a kid that he always took you when he had secrets to share. Due to the design of the throne room, no sound spoken in that part of the room could be heard anywhere else. “You know, proposing would have been quite timely after a coronation…”

“No. That would’ve been tacky. I’m not ready and I wasn’t about to steal your thunder.” You sighed. “I hope that wasn’t what you brought me over to talk about.”

“No, no,” Sidon laughed. “It’s actually something a bit more important. When you and Link arrived, I certainly wasn’t feeling myself. The pressure of being a good leader and trying to keep one’s people safe can certainly get to you. I wanted to thank you for being there to remind me that friends are always there to share the burden.”

He looked at you expectantly. “Of course, Sidon, Link and I will always be there for you, but I’m not sure if I’m following?”

“You put on a brave face, my friend, but I can see it in you too. You’re not yourself lately.”

“Sidon, I…”

“My friend,” Sidon said quietly. “Remember, no matter what, you’re not alone. You have all of us supporting you, and most importantly, you have Link.”

“Sidon, without Zelda, everyone is counting on me and-”

“And they all know what you’ve done in the past for them. You don’t need to face this alone.”

You felt your chest unclench. “Thanks… really.”

“Of course,” Sidon said with his usual grin.

He took you back to the rest, addressing both you and Link. “Please promise that you shall once again grace our fair Zora’s Domain with your presence sooner rather than later! Whatever comes to pass, know that you and I will always be connected… by the power of a sage, no less!”

==============================

The sun hung low in the sky as the two of you made your way across the eastern edge of Hyrule Field, heading towards the Great Plateau and ultimately Gerudo Town. You stretched and shrugged your shoulders. You fished out the rock that you found Depths, watching it sparkle in the evening light. The stone still made no sense, but it certainly was beautiful. You slipped it back in your pack. “If we keep up this pace, we should be able to get to Riverside Stable by nightfall. What do you want for dinner? I think I have some extra meat…”

Suddenly, Link grabbed your shoulder, flinging you back and drawing his sword. “Hey, what the hell?”

“That gloom pool moved,” Link hissed, keeping his eyes trained on the distant pool.

“Don’t be ridiculous, the gloom can’t…” You stopped as you noticed the sky was growing darker, shifting to a red hue. The pool was moving and moving fast. Five hands reached from the gloom, yellow eyes embedded in the palm watched you with unblinking focus. A tinge of fear shot up your spine, but you drew your bow. “Link, what is that?”

“A Blight?” The monster screeched and scrambled forward, trying to grab at you. You loosed an arrow, striking one eye dead on. The hand shrieked before withdrawing to the ooze. The other hands countered, snatching a tree log and flinging it at you. You drew your sword, slicing the log in half.

While they were distracted, another volley of arrows flew towards them. Link had summoned Tulin and Sidon’s shades to help, while Link drew his own sword. Suddenly, the hand you struck down reemerged, seemingly without damage. “We need to take them all out at the same time,” you said.

“On it!” Link swapped to his bow, nocking a bomb arrow. With the explosion, some of the hands turned white and retracted. You chucked your own bombs at the remaining hands, sending them into retreat.

“Okay… that’s taken care of…” you huffed. You watched as the leftover gloom began to shrink back… and then congeal. “What… the…” The gloom bubbled and churned as the air grew stale. A terrible being rose from the goop, a clone of the Demon King himself. Before you could react, the monster charged you. Link leaped in, parrying the blow just in time.

“Move!”

You strafed to the side, eager to put some distance between you and the Phantom Ganon. Gloom oozed from his feet, each step decaying the earth. Link caught up to you, raising his shield just in time to block another slash of its cursed sword. “Ideas?” he grunted, parrying the blow. The two of you had to keep backing up to avoid the gloom from swallowing you. You drew your bow, firing a few arrows to slow down the menace, but it pursued you relentlessly.

“I don’t know,” you said, “working on it.” Regular attacks didn’t seem to do too much. At this point the best strategy seemed to be to simply whittle him down. Then, the Phantom swiped at Link, knocking him back.

You clenched your fist, feeling the power of the Triforce come forth. “That’s it!” The golden energy traveled up your arm in veins of light. “Leave us alone, Ganondorf!” A ball of light formed, and you flung it at the Phantom. The light burst and crackled around it, paralyzing it to the ground.

Link wasted no time, charging in with his sword, knocking Phantom Ganon back. You followed behind, chaining his strikes with a rising cut. Strike after strike, Link and you traded off. Finally, the gloom monster recovered, knocking you both back.

Once more you threw a ball of light at the Phantom, but this time, it batted it back. Link volleyed it back, smashing it into the monster. Before it could react, Link parried its dark sword away and flurry rushed in for the kill. A stab clean through the monster’s forehead made it collapse into a few dark clumps.

“Been a while since I’ve been able to do that…” you panted, looking down at your hand. The glowing light slowly faded, but the tingle in your arm remained. “It feels different this time. It’s like the power is traveling through me on its own.”

“Maybe it reacts more to the gloom?”

You rubbed your arm to get rid of the pins-and-needles feeling. “That’d make sense. Just hate the exhaustion that comes afterward. Even that feels stronger than normal.”

Link helped you up. “Come on, let’s get you some rest then. I’ll cook some stew and we’ll set up camp.”

“Just promise me you’re not going to try to put Lynel guts in it again.”

“One time. One time I try to make a stew to make us strong as Lynels, and you never let me forget it.”

==============================

“If I’ve told her once, I’ve told her a thousand times,” you mumbled, gently cleaning the cuts on Link’s arm. “I wish she’d fly more carefully, but no, she’s so reckless! Granny Syrup’s gonna be so mad at her, flying around and not doing her chores…”

“It’s really alright,” Link said, picking at the bandage on his leg. You smacked his hand without looking and reached for more red potion, shoving it into his hands.

These dreams were slowly becoming routine, and seeing various versions of Link was almost a bit exciting – or at least it would be if the dreams made sense to you. This Link seemed fairly similar to yours in a few ways, but perhaps more than anything was the look in his eyes. This Link was an experienced warrior, and the steely determination behind a cool demeanor was something you were intimately familiar with.

“It’s not though! You’re working so hard to help everyone, she doesn’t need to be getting in your way!”

“At least I get to visit you each time. Who could say no to visiting a cute witch boy?”

You stopped for a moment then blushed furiously. “You… it’s not nice to tease!” You wrapped the last bit of the bandage, but then noticed Link was wincing as he leaned to the side. “Okay, shirt. Off.”

“It’s fine.”

“No, it’s not. Off.”

Link groaned and lifted up his tunic. You had to bite your lip to keep your face neutral. While not bleeding, Link’s body was covered in welts and bruises. “Okay, I might have taken a few more hits than just from Maple.”

“Where did these come from?”

“Giant octopus called Octogon.” Part of you wanted details but Link’s life was so strange, you simply started on the ointment to ease the pain. “Hey, that’s cold!”

“Is the big hero weak to cold? Goddesses help us, Veran just needs to throw a snowball at you.”

Link rolled his eyes. “It just caught me by surprise. Besides, this is nothing compared to Kholdstare back in Hyrule’s Dark World.”

You paused. You could practically feel the smirk from Link, knowing he had you now. “Fine, I can’t resist.”

Link beamed. “Okay, so get this, there’s this giant iceberg in the Dark World side of Lake Hylia. A long time ago, someone carved it out…”

==============================

The story led to another and another about Hyrule’s Dark World, even after you had finished patching him up. It had gotten late by the time he finished. After locking up the shop, the two of you walked through the torchlit streets of Lynna City. Link had just finished telling you all about the Dark World version of Hyrule’s Death Mountain.

“Um,” you blushed, straightening your hat. “I was thinking, if you’re not busy…”

“Yeah?” Link said, leaning in with a little smile.

Your cheeks burned. “Well, tomorrow I was gonna go check out the Goron Dance Hall.”

“Oh, hey isn’t that place like ancient?”

“Yeah, I heard the Gorons have been dancing there since even before Queen Ambi’s reign. I heard it used to be part of a volcano, modeled after their capital city of Goronia.” You felt like you were babbling. “My friends in Subrosia set me up with some dance lessons and the Gorons said I should bring a friend. It might not be as cool as the Dark World, but-”

“Sure, it’s a date!”

“Great, I’ll – wait, a d-d-date?!” Link just headed out into Labrynna Field with the biggest grin on his face. “Wait, I haven’t said when we should meet!”

“Don’t worry, I won’t be late,” he said, pulling a beautiful harp from his bag. He winked, and with a strum of the harp, disappeared in a golden shimmer of light.

#tears of the kingdom #legend of zelda #x male reader #link x male reader #my stuff

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hekate1308 · 19 days ago

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There Was Winter’s Cold A Destiel Advent Calendar December 18

Masterpost

Dean had always lived by the sentence no time like the present, mostly because when he had been young, there really had been no time like the present – he’d had to do certain things to ensure he and Sam survived and got to school on time, and that had been that.

But even now, he knew there were some things best dealt with right away, and returning a water wraith to his rightful home certainly felt like it.

Plus, there was a full moon, so they were in luck – or not, as Dean’s stupid heart would remind him, but again, that was not a problem to deal with now, he could wallow in misery later –

They had not even known each other for a week. It was absolutely ridiculous to imagine that there was anything between them or something special about Cas, apart from the obvious. This kind of stuff – it didn’t happen. One didn’t magically fall in – one didn’t feel drawn to –

The point was, nothing like that happened within such a short amount of time. This wasn’t a fairytale, this was real life (alright maybe it was a bit weird to claim that when he was talking about trying to get a water wraith back home, but that was not the point at the moment).

So, really, he tried to reason with himself, what had happened? Look at it from an outside perspective – he had come across a guy who needed help, yeah, a somewhat strange guy, all things considered, but still, a guy who needed help, he had provided him with that, and now the guy had everything he needed to go back home. Nothing lost, nothing gained… no, that was wrong. It was a net positive to help people, Dean had always lived by that, and so he would now, too.

Maybe he could see Cas again? Probably not the best course of action, all things considered, since he was… was.. but still, he would like to know that he was doing alright, that he didn’t have to worry. And after all, if eh could spend time outside the water after he had been thrown out, certainly eh could do short visit? If he wanted to, of course but perhaps he didn’t… this was all so needlessly complicated, of course because Dea made it so, he had no delusions in that regard.

Why couldn’t he be interested in a nice normal gal or guy, really, like Sam? Yeah, find someone like his brother’s other half to settle down with, who didn’t come from a very wet place and actually knew how to talk to people and what the internet was…

But that would never be good enough for him now, no. Not after he had met Cas.

Damn it.

Again, again, again, he could and would deal with that later. First solve this, then go wallow in his misery.

And there it was the river.

If he had known would he still have come here that night that was barely old news and yet felt like forever ago?

Of course he would have. He felt absolutely sure of that. Just knowing Cas for a few days was so much better than not knowing him at all, like never feeling this way about anyone.

The thought whether this was how Sam felt about Jess and Bobby felt about Ellen crossed his mind, but he was not going to dwell on that. This was not – he’d get over it.

Cas was quietly walking at his side, and Dean wondered what he made of it all. Was probably happy to return home and everything. Why shouldn’t he be.

Then, suddenly, “Dean, I wish to thank you for everything.”

“It’s not over yet, buddy, no reason to thank me.”

“Still – you took me in, and you showed me so many new things… I… thank you very very much.”

He didn’t know where to look, so he looked at the stupid bucket eh was carrying. Then he remembered to nod. Better than nothing.

They continued on their way, and he wondered just how his life had turned out that way. He was just a guy trying to navigate his existence, like so many others, and yet somehow…

Oh God, don’t get philosophical now, Winchester. Won’t do any good.

And then there it was. The moon, shining on the water.

Even Dean, who knew it brought him one step closer to saying goodbye to Cas, had to admit that it looked pretty damn beautiful.

And, as a matter of fact romantic, but this was not the moment. That moment would never come, if they were successful, and why should they not be. He handed Cas the bucket. “Go ahead.”

Cas nodded at him, then took the bucket.

Their fingers touched ever so slightly and Dean told himself not to treasure the feeling.

#my writings #spn #destiel #advent calendar #dean winchester #castiel

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no1ryomafan · 1 year ago

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Yknow for most of my tumblr rants I like to keep stuff vague even when it’s apparent what thing I’m aiming at because I don’t like to trash talk people openly who I don’t know or formally knew especially on the most mundane subjects but there’s one particular thing that has been bothering me about fandom culture that I’ve noticed as of late that I gotta rant about:

And that’s the whole ordeal of “you need to consume this series in a certain way” mindset as apart from leading into general bad traits fandom culture has-toxicity and gatekeeping-I feel this is just another reason why some people get easily scared off by getting into certain things.

To further elaborate I wanna first say there’s nothing particularly wrong with advising a set order of things to consume in a series under the context of either:

<someone asked to begin with what order to watch/read/play something <a series has multiple sequels that are connected in some capacity so advising the correct order because sometimes it’s not the “chronological” that’s the correct way

Those cases you are making sure the person gets into a series by following the story the way it’s intended, that’s fine, I’m more so talking about how a handful of certain fandoms are centered a series with multiple canons and they don’t really overlap yet fans try to act authority over how you should consume the media when at that point it’s just a matter of “which series looks the most interesting too you”.

I’ve seen this behavior pop up a bit in getter fandom and while it’s not anything toxic-thankfully-I really don’t agree to the notion of you need to read all of the mangas JUST to understand the Animes when they’re ALL in their own canon. But this post isn’t actually about Getter because the general atmosphere I’ve seen in my own circle is “we really don’t care where you start as long as you’ve seen Getter” which I appreciate and can’t really get too upset over the series discourse, I’m more so noticing this happening in a different older anime fandom I was kinda apart of being Soul Eater.

Now I’ve only seen this said by two people so I’m not gonna claim this is a general thing by the fandom-fuck knows how many soul eater fans there are anymore even if it’s more recognizable than getter-however I get the vibe this is something fans when newbies get into the series advise: To not get super into SE as it be unnecessary, for those who don’t know it’s one of those animes that was unfortunately cursed with “starting off a solid adaption for the first half but by the second half it completely diverted from the manga and the anime content is not only different but inferior from its source” which from what I seen, had a lot of old SE fans advise newer fans to watch the anime up to a certain point aka right where it changes from the manga and than going to read the manga with the stuff the anime didn’t adapt, and than after you finish the manga you can go back to watch the anime if you so choose.

I really, really, REALLY do not like this approach and despite what I said early about “different iterations” this one even worse given the context SE doesn’t have that many canons outside of these and a spin off series.

Literally this entire process could be avoided if someone just said “don’t watch the anime because it’s not a good adaption, read the manga” because even if that sounds gatekeepy it’s at least not a unnecessary back and forth process with the anime being CLEARLY redundant. Sure, SE like 100+ or so chapters but even if watching the anime adapt the first half is faster than reading it, it just makes things needlessly complicated to newer fans.

It’s also not the end of the world if someone watches the show and never reads the manga because guess what? We all like stuff that is FUNDAMENTALLY flawed. People are too worried about their media being perfect when no series is and there’s nothing wrong with liking something that’s a bit messy because people still keep up with series that are hella fucking messy. If they complain about the anime sucking but refuse to read the manga that’s on them, not your issue because they knew what they were getting themselves into if someone was warning them. We also just gotta deal with people not giving stuff we like a second chance after the first time because needlessly shoving a “order” in their face isn’t gonna make them feel inclined to check it out again.

My only advice I can give from this long messy rant of a post that went too far on tangent about something I don’t even know is said by many fans-and if anyone finds this and is active in the SE circles please feel free to correct me-is NEVER advise someone a order of getting into a thing unless there IS canons that do connect with each other by being direct follow ups. Don't get mad at someone for getting into a series from the most confusing or hated iteration, because if they are actually interested they'll want to consume more of it even if they have a weak first impression.

Never force anything onto ANYONE and just welcome new fans with open arms, thats a way to make a safe space even in some of the worst fandoms.

#meg text #im not tagging the two series I mentioned here lol #I would’ve mentioned more like TF or Gundam but I haven’t experienced enough of them only been more of a outsider #I would’ve mentioned mega man but I try to distance myself from fandom talk (also that be more bias then me slightly mentioning getter lol)#I do stand by tho you don’t need to play every classic or x game to get zero/zx/legends though #or that you need to play all of battle network to get starforce bc the latter hardly references the former #but if anyone has any other fandom shit like this they can relate too feel free to share because I’m worried if I was too mean 💀#(if my assumption about soul eater was hella off I’m sorry but I got the vibes hard)

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jahayla-parker · 8 months ago

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The Master Part 10

2.5k wc

Series Navigation

T-Minus Two Weeks

“Y/n,” Tom spoke softly, cautiously making his way to her workstation.

“Oh, did you need something?” Y/n questioned in a monotonous tone, only briefly sparing him a glance before looking back down at her work notebook.

Tom pouted but kept his head high. “Erm, yeah, can we talk?” He requested.

She paused her scribbling momentarily before sighing. “I’m sorry, I’m busy,” she replied, nodding down towards her desk. “Maybe Olivia could help with whatever you need to talk about,” she offered, glancing over to her left where her friend was seated a few tables away at her own desk.

“Y/n/n,” he whined with a huff. “You know that’s not what-“.

“Sorry, but.. if that’s all, I really should be going, Tati’s weapon needs touch ups,” she lied. She abruptly stood up and backed away from her table. “Olivia is over there if you need her,” she said respectfully, pointing to the left before turning to leave.

“Y/n,” he sighed, moving to follow her. “I need-“.

“Tom,” she replied, her voice cracking.

He faltered, his chest seizing at the way her pain audibly broke through her stoic attempt upon saying his name.

She cleared her throat. Without turning around to face him, she corrected herself. “Mr. Holland,” she addressed even though it felt wrong. “If-if what you need from me is anything other than professional, I’m going to request that you seek someone else for it”. She gritted her teeth in order to keep her tears at bay as she dragged herself away from him.

Tom gaped as he watched her leave. She hadn’t referred to him by his surname like that since they first met on set and she was so nervous. As hurt as he was by her not talking to him, the realization only made him more confused and worried about her. He could hear the hurt in her voice, but he had no idea how to fix it. His heart was at war with his mind. She’s asked him to leave her be. But, he had a feeling that’s not what she really needed. Before he could even decide if he should go after her and try again, he felt someone place a hand on his shoulder. He looked over at them to find Olivia. He looked in the direction y/n had gone before back at Olivia, silently asking her if she knew what was going on. Only, Olivia simply shook her head before leaning against him. He sighed and continued to stare down the hall y/n had left to.

Tom sat stiffly as y/n adjusted the space around him. He was afraid any movement would spook her. He hadn’t realized he’d been holding his breath as she shifted the props to his right until she slowly walked his way for now couldn’t breathe at all and the breath he’d been holding felt like it’d left his body. His sorrowful eyes watched her every move as she came up to him to adjust the props he was wearing.

Y/n bit the inside of her lip as she willed herself to not meet Tom’s gaze. She’d been tasked to make some quick repairs to the shoulder holster he was wearing in this scene as two of the snap fasteners on his chest straps had popped off and caused the holster piece to sit lopsided after his fight scene. Realistically she knew it didn’t take her long to fix the piece, but it still felt like an eternity standing there before him. She knew he was analyzing her and she felt so exposed and vulnerable. She sucked in a breath when his fingers tenderly wrapped around her wrist before her hand could fully leave his chest. Yet she still refused to look up at his face. She couldn’t handle seeing his eyes. She had to hold her ground. She’d done the hardest part of this already, ending things. Now she just had to get through the last few weeks on set and she’d be able to break down when she was truly out of his sight when filming ended. “Oh, here,” she whispered breathlessly as she needlessly adjusted ‘Nate’s’ ring necklace before pulling her hand back.

Mark eyed Tom in question as he watched y/n behaving so strictly professional around him. But Tom wasn’t looking his way, he was still watching her. Mark sighed to himself as he tried to think of how else he could get to the bottom of what was happening. When she came back over to Mark with the touched up prop-gun in her hand, he decided to see if he could get her to talk. “Hey kiddo,” he smiled softly.

“Hey Mark,” She greeted sweetly, her eyes flickering up to meet his as she brought the fake weapon back to him now that she’d adjusted the scuffs and ‘staining’ on it from a few takes ago.

“You alright?” Mark questioned, squinting at her knowingly.

She merely hummed and nodded stiffly. “I’m great,” she lied. “Yourself?” She asked politely as she passed him the faux-gun.

“Huh? Oh, I’m fine,” Mark mumbled.

She giggled faintly at his evidently distracted state. She assumed it was because the director had just finished telling Mark some changes he needed to make for the scene. “Clearly,” she joked lightheartedly. “Good luck,” she added with a kind smile before making her way off the set.

It took a lot of effort for Tom to hide his frown in order to do the next shoot of the current scene. If it hadn’t been painfully obvious before, it was now. Y/n had a problem with Tom in particular. She was still friendly and close with the others on set. Just not him. He hated the sinking feeling in his stomach and the guilt that plagued his mind. He didn’t know how to make things right, be he needed to.

“Here, I’ll give it to him for you,” Olivia offered, holding her hand out.

Y/n smiled faintly in appreciation as she passed the bejeweled key prop to her friend. “Thank you…, I just..,” she sighed. She should be better at this. She should be able to handle being simply professional with Tom without wanting to burst into tears. But every time she had to interact with him with, it was like the wound reopened.

“Tom, no,” Olivia cooed, her voice far too gentle for the context. She rubbed his back and laid her head on his shoulder as she donned a sympathetic frown. “Just leave her be,” she instructed, turning his torso away from where y/n was.

Tom’s eyes were narrowed as his mind continued to recall every moment from the past week, desperately needing to get to the bottom of this. He felt Olivia at his side as she tried to get him to focus on something else, but he couldn’t keep his eyes away from y/n. Not even when she kept her back to him as she worked instead of grinning over at him between tasks the way she would have before the other night.

“Come on, you’re far too hot to be looking so sad,” Olivia commented flirtatiously. She dragged her hand down Tom’s chest as she continued to try to turn him away.

“Y/n, please!” Tom begged, his voice cracking as he trailed closely behind her.

“What?” Y/n cried quietly, sharply turning to face him as they turned down an empty hallway.

“Talk to me!” He pleaded. “What did I do?!”

She shook her head, staring at her feet. “Nothing”.

“Darling, I-“

“You didn’t do anything, okay?!” She scoffed. She sniffled as tears began welling up in her eyes. She shook her head in frustration with herself. How she ever let herself be led astray like this was beyond her. However, as she looked up and into his beautiful dark chocolate colored eyes, it all made sense again.

He saw the tears in her eyes and reached for her hand only for her to step back as she shook her head.

“I was just kidding myself, I know that now,” she murmured.

“What?” He asked breathlessly.

“Tom, don’t. Okay? It’s fine. I was naive, but I know now that it was foolish to think you’d actually go for me, that you’d-,” she sighed and trailed off, unable to keep speaking her heartbreak aloud. “I mean, maybe,” she sniffled in a futile effort to compose herself. “Maybe if I didn’t give in so soon.. it could’ve lasted longer… but-“.

He squinted at her in confusion. “I.. we… what? I don’t… what ever are you going on about?”

“I get it,” she lied, her voice breaking softly. “You know?… you had your fun. I did the dirty work for you, okay? You can go ahead and find someone else to be with now”.

He gaped widely but the rest of his body was frozen with shock. Is that really what she thought? Didn’t she know him better than that?! “I… y/n, I’m not like that, that’s not who I am,” he defended with a slight scoff over having been wounded by her implications. “I don’t just go around sleeping with people. When we had sex, it meant something, it meant a lot to me,” he argued, “it was so special. I thought you knew you that”.

She sniffled and weakly wiped her eyes with the back of her shaking hands. She wanted to believe him, but Olivia’s reminders of her insecurities were far too loud. She couldn’t handle letting Tom officially break her heart. She had to be the one to end it before it came to that; which it would. “I.. I think it would be best if we keep things strictly professional for the duration of filming, ‘kay?” She mumbled, turning to leave before he could answer.

“Y/n/n please,” he pleaded, stepping closer to her. “We are so good together! I feel it and I know you feel it too," he remarked. She had to.

“Please don’t follow me,” she requested in a frail voice having heard his footsteps behind her.

“Girl, are you sure you’re okay?” Sophia pressed. She’d been trying to get y/n to talk to her about whatever went down between her and Tom, but she’d not gotten anywhere. “Would you rather talk to Olivia about it?” She proposed. “I could go grab her”.

“No!” Y/n gasped, flinching at her abrupt reaction. “I mean, no, but thank you,” she mumbled. “I’m fine, just… tired is all,” she lied with a fake smile. “I need to pee,” she whispered before jogging off.

In reality, y/n did want to talk to Olivia. As much as y/n loved Sophia, she didn’t want to complain to Sophia about her costar. Plus, Olivia already knew the reasons why y/n had to call things off with Tom. It would be easier to just talk with Olivia instead of catching Sophia up to speed. But alas, Olivia had been acting weird. It was the last thing y/n needed right now. Yet, just when she needed her friend the most, Olivia had distracted herself from y/n. Even more so than that, the last time she’d talked to y/n about all of this, instead of being sympathetic, she just told y/n she was overreacting and to get over herself. So, it went without saying, y/n really didn’t want to talk Olivia until she was back to being her friend again.

Y/n tried to keep her head held high as she made her way to the restrooms. When she made it inside, she turned on the cold water and cupped some in her hands. She lifted her hands and splashed her face with the frigid water, causing her body to suck in a deep breath. She could do this. Two more weeks. There was hardly anything left for her to do anyways. She could wait it out. Even if it meant doing so on her own. She began the process to splash herself again when she heard a voice coming from the bathroom stalls behind her.

“They really broke up?” A voice asked from the far left stall.

It sounded like y/n’s friend Rachel, one of the makeup artists for the cast.

“Finally,” another voice replied with a bitter laugh.

Y/n froze, the cold water flowing over her hands. She recognized that voice. It was Olivia. Surely they weren’t talking about-

“Tom would be so much better with you,” Rachel said. She commented something else as well, but her voice was muffled by the unrolling of the toilet paper from the next stall.

So it was her and Tom that Olivia and Rachel were talking about. Olivia wanted them to break up? Although, it kinda made sense. Olivia thought y/n would be hurt if she and Tom continued to date. Surely that’s all this was, right?! The pit in her stomach suggested otherwise but she tried to hold out hope.

“Right?!” Olivia exclaimed. “Like he’s going to be so helpful for my career,” she laughed. “He’s already practically putty in my hand”.

Y/n could practically hear Olivia’s smile as she added, “Y/n was way in over her head”.

Olivia wasn’t wrong. She was in over her head. In more ways than one. This was all too much. She thought Olivia was her friend. She thought she’d encouraged y/n to break up with Tom because she actually cared for her. But none of it was true. She was right about having been naive. She’d been naive enough to believe Olivia was her friend, that she’d had her best interest at heart. She’d been naive enough to think she could trust anyone on this set. After all, she didn’t think of Rachel as a super close friend, but she thought she could trust her to not talk about her behind her back. Yet, here they were. All while, y/n was going through the worst heartbreak of her life. As if that wasn’t bad enough, her best friend had plotted against her. And to top it all off, she still had two weeks left where she’d have to be around both of them.

Wait.

Did she?

Now that y/n thought about it.. perhaps she didn’t have to stick around. She wasn’t proud of it, but she could see a way out and wanted to take it. There were two weeks left, but she’d finalized all of her major projects already and was just on standby to adjust things between takes as needed. Something which the other crew members could do on their own without much inconvenience. While still not proud of herself for deciding to take such a shortcut, she exited the bathroom and pulled out her phone before she could change her mind. It didn’t take her very long to type up the resignation email and before she’d even made it back to her desk, she’d pressed send. She grabbed her bag from under the table and took one last look around at the venue before she rushed outside to head back to the apartment complex.

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#tom holland imagine #tom holland fanfic #tom holland fanfiction #tom holland imagines #tom stanley holland #tom holland x reader #tom holland x y/n #tom holland x you #the master series #original post

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rosiewitchescottage · 1 year ago

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There's a fine line between people objecting to LGBT content because they don't want their children being to!d about Same Sex Love.

And people objecting because either we don't like the sexually explicit material finding its way into school libraries and children's libraries, and/or needlessly confusing gender ideology being pushed into children.

Now. I'm sure that there will be parents who simply don't want anything related to Same Sex Love anywhere close to their children.

But not everyone who objects is in this category.

There are many members of the LGBT Community included.

Gays Against Groomers as a prime example.

Grooming isn't entirely about sex either.

Pushing Gender Ideology into children is seen as grooming for a particular world view.

What's wrong with a female girl simply being masculine or androgynous rather than feminine?

This may simply be her way, with no other reasons. But she may turn out to be a lesbian, same sex attracted.

She may be dealing with some trauma or worry, that puts her ill at ease with her developing female body.

This isn't the same as gender dysphoria, needing to live as a boy and man, maybe having to take medication all his life etc.

Yes. This is the right path for some people. But it's rare.

Most of these girls simply need to learn that their female bodies are the right place for them to be, and that they can be girls in whatever way is right for them.

Exactly the same with boys.

Yes. In rare cases a lad with gender dysphoria will need to be able to live as a girl and later a woman.

But far more will simply need help to learn that it is perfectly fine to be feminine or androgynous boys and men.

They may turn out to be gay men, same sex attracted. They may simply be feminine or androgynous, with no especial reason.

They may have Autiam, they may be dealing with a trauma in life.

We shouldn't be confusing children by detaching biological sex from woman/girlhood, man/boyhood.

Gender Non Conformity more often than not simply means not conforming with the social stereotypes traditionally associated with our biological sex.

Point out that some people DO need to live as the opposite sex, by all means. Let them know that it's perfectly fine.

But that it's rare. And that most people live as their biological sex. But that we can express it in whatever way is right for us.

Objection to sexually explicit content being pushed into children, is NOT automatically homophobic or transphobic.

Not unless people are targeted specifically for being same sex attracted or for a gender identity. No way is that acceptable.

We're talking about challenging inappropriate behaviour and attitudes.

Neither of which come automatically with being same sex attracted or with being transexual

A drag queen should NOT be twerking, lap dancing or pole dancing for children. Yet there is video footage of all these things happening.

Drag is an art form meant to be performed in front of adults. A sadly recently deceased British Drag Queen Lily Savage (aka Paul O'Grady) talked about drag in London gay clubs, when being openly gay was still very risky. And clubs were one place that gay men could let go and be themselves.

If drag queens are going to perform in front of children, then their material needs to be 100% family friendly.

To use a very British comparison. It's the difference between a drag show and a pantomime, with a man playing a funny, thoroughly over the top female character known as The Dame.

Both of which I love. But I know which is suitable for children and which is not.

Sex Education should be concerned with sexual health, contraception, consent and the building of strong, healthy relationships.

There is footage of angry parents reading aloud from books available in their children 's school library, and get this. They're asked to stop, because the material is too explicit to be read out in public!

Then, how the hell does it belong in a school library?!

There's a book for four year olds about a gay grandad. Now, in itself that's fine.

A grandad with a husband, rather than a wife? No problem.

Except that the pictures show leather bondage gear. NO! Little children should see same sex couples looking like any other grown ups.

There's no good excuse for doing it any other way.

Content showing explicit m/f sex would be just as wrong. And if there's any of it about, that needs to be off children's bookshelves as well.

Extremely dangerous how "grooming" in the context of child sexual abuse went from being a very specific pattern of isolation and trust-building with the aim of abusing someone to "telling children anything that contradicts their parents' ultra-conservative worldview is grooming" to "selling rainbow flags in a store is grooming" to "literally anyone I don't like is a groomer".

These days the word seems to most often be used by people who don't care about what it actually means and just want an easy "this person is irredeemably evil, kill them now" button.

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casspurrjoybell-28 · 4 months ago

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The Alpha's Addiction - Chapter 41 - Part 1

*Warning Adult Content*

Heat - Kao

I don't remember it being this painful, to crave an Alpha so badly that your core cramps up, clenching around nothing, needing it to be a Alpha's manhood.

I moan in discomfort, sweat beading on my brow despite the cool towel Oliver brought me.

This is absolute torture, the puddle between my legs is only growing, preparing my body for penetration that won't come, I will have to suffer like this, it's all I can do.

Oliver glances up at me from the other side of the room, where he continues his homework.

"You're sick, Mama. You need Juliet to come check you."

I shake my head, managing a weak smile.

"I'm not, baby. It will pass."

What feels like a stab to the abdomen suddenly shoots through me and I gasp, curling up in agony.

My canine sinks into my lip, only intensifying the pain.

"Oh, fuck," I mutter beneath my breath, vision going blurry.

Why is my body punishing me for not having sex?

I used to be punished near-constantly with the act of sex in the Blood Pack.

I can never catch a break.

Why am I finally having another heat, after all these years of its absence?

This must be a fluke.

A last ditch effort by my body to trick me into taking my mate back.

To make me believe I'm no longer infertile, just to rip the possibility of having Cyrus's pup away from me again.

There's no way I can get pregnant.

Going so long without a heat is a sentence to a barren womb.

With nothing to nurture it for so long, it cannot give life.

I squash the sprouts of hope like weeds.

To hell with this, I wish I'd pass out, rather than endure this nightmare called a heat.

Oliver abruptly stands up.

"I'm gonna get Cyrus. Something is really wrong with you."

I bolt up from the bed.

"No, Oliver. I told you, I'm fine."

His lower lip puffs out as he frowns.

"I don't like when you pretend you're okay. You need him. You never want to see him now and it's hurting you. I learned at school that being apart from your fated mate is bad."

"Please, I get it but..." he runs to the door.

"I'm sorry Mama. I have to do this..." before I can convince him otherwise, he's left the room.

If I tried to go after him, I imagine I'd make it two steps before falling into a useless heap on the floor.

Is this what I've come to?

A pathetic mother who makes his child needlessly worry after him?

I sling a shaky leg over the edge of the bed, cringing at how my pajamas stick to my skin with sweat.

I'm only wearing thin shorts and a light loose top, the latter plastered to my chest and putting my nipples on display.

I brush a hand over one, whimpering at the ache the touch induces, they're hard with arousal.

'I want Cyrus to suck on them with those full lips of his, suck and bite them hard until they're red and raw...' the door busts open, revealing the hulking silhouette of an Alpha illuminated by the candlelit hall.

It's grown dark outside already, so I can barely make out his features in the dim light of the lamp and moonshine from the window but I know it's him.

The immediate tensions that seeps into the air, taut between the two of us.

"Oliver told me you were ill," his voice is icy but underneath, I swear I hear a note of concern.

He's out of breath too, something that would only happen to a person as in-shape as he is if he came here the fastest he could or am I imagining things?

Perhaps the way I ruthlessly ripped his heart out a month ago has already significantly lessened his affection towards me.

He was the one letting Beau all over him.

I swallow nervously.

"Where is he? Where is Oliver?"

"He's with Morgan," he replies, taking one step further into the room and I nearly faint because the wondrous, masculine perfection that is his scent surrounds me and my defenses practically melt.

I take a big whiff, wanting to drown myself in it.

My wolf prompts a small whine from my mouth and I squeeze my thighs together as hard as I can in an effort to get any semblance of relief, of friction.

'Oh, fuck this. Why is the mere scent of him reducing me to this depravity?'

I don't know how much longer I'll be able to hold out... he shuts and locks the door hard behind him.

"But you're not sick, are you, Koa?" he stalks closer, strained features finally coming into the light.

His blue gaze rakes over me in hunger.

"You just need a good fucking," those vulgar words in that gruff, sexy tone of his are enough to have even more slick dripping from me.

"No... no..." I deny, face going red in humiliation.

From the way his nose flares as he takes a long breath in, he can smell how aroused I am.

What a stupid time to lie, there's no hiding your heat from an Alpha, from the Alpha 'meant' to claim it.

"Oh really?" he stops at the edge of the bed, looming over me.

I can only bite my lip at the large tent in his pants.

The urge to pull the waistband down and take him to the back of my throat is overpowering and I can only grip the blankets in restraint.

"You're saying," he tilts his head with the deadly grace of a predator, locking eyes with me.

"That you don't want me to spread those pretty legs of yours and pound you senseless with my cock?"

Just like that, all my efforts were for nothing because I'm moving before I'm even aware of it, clawing bedsheets out of my way to get to him.

I leap from the mattress, pouncing on him like a feral animal and he grunts from the impact but doesn't falter.

He takes me into his arms with eagerness, hands digging into my ass to pull me up against him, any semblance of control he had left completely snapping.

I attack his mouth with my own, moaning at the first taste after months.

Pine and rain and everything I've been missing.

It's a devastating clash of teeth and tongue as I let myself feast on the one thing I said I wouldn't.

'Cyrus. My Alpha. My mate. Mine. I want all of him. I need all of him, like nothing else.'

I'm writhing against him, fingers digging into the fabric of his shirt so hard that it rips beneath my nails.

I tear it from him, greedily exploring his heavenly torso with my hands and nearly cumming at the mere feeling of his smooth skin and the ridges of his beautifully defined muscles.

How can someone be built so perfectly, have a frame that sets off fireworks in my own, just by rubbing up against him?

Holding my entire body up with his left arm, the fingers of his right hand find the space between my legs and press into me through my shorts.

"Moon Goddess, you're soaking wet," he growls against my ear.

"Are you that desperate for it?"

"Yes. Yes..." I whimper, grinding down on his hand.

"I want... I 'need' cock."

"Fuck, you talking that way, when you already smell like this," he buries his face in my neck and takes a deep whiff.

"I could cum to your scent alone, little wolf."

I bite at his lip, sending a sultry, heat-fueled look up at him.

"I'd rather you do that inside me."

I only have to blink and he's pulling my sorry excuses for pajamas off one-handedly, snarling with impatience when the shorts get tangled around my ankle.

I whine at the delay and he takes his cue, moving us across the room in a few swift strides to pin me up against the wall, the delicious pressure of his bare body on mine sending a shiver up my spine.

"Koa."

He's laying into me with such ferocity I can barely breathe.

His hot tongue explores every corner of my mouth, sucking on my own as I moan into it, tears of frustrated want building in my eyes.

His cock is rock hard against my ass, rutting up between my cheeks but it's not enough.

I roll my hips down on him hard, as if to get him inside me.

I can't go another second without it.

"Please," I beg as he mouths at my neck, the feeling of canines grazing my skin only making me more needy for it.

He trails his tongue up my jaw.

"Please, what?" I nearly cry at the taunt in his voice.

"Put it in."

"Speak clearly," he orders.

"What is it that you want?"

I want to pull his hair in frustration but my wolf urges me to give in, whining to be bred.

"Fuck me, Alpha. Fuck me like I'm yours."

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spotsandsocks · 2 years ago

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Love Is Transformational

Amazing cover art by @ronordmann thank you so much.

911 Halloween week Day 7 free choice (witches transformation and magic)

14.4K mature

Maddie Buckley has magic and while trying to help her brother something goes wrong leaving Buck completely transformed and in a precarious position. There’s only one person who can help her while she tries to fix things and get her brother back to the way he was. A story where Buck moves in with Eddie but not in the way Eddie ever hoped for, for one thing he’d hadn’t expected fur and whiskers to be involved. It’s a good job he likes cats.

Maddie Buckley was born with a secret she had to keep from the world, a little later she was given a secret she had to keep from her brother.

Slowly her life became full of secrets but eventually things changed and some secrets were shared and others revealed.

Maddie thinks she’s better at not keeping too many secrets these days but some things are still harder to share than others. Some things she still needs to keep hidden away.

This may be one of them, her eyes fade from purple to brown as she looks down at the floor in horror at what’s happened.

This is a problem. A big one.

She expects her brother would agree with that assessment although he’s hardly in the position to express that right now. His blue eyes met hers and despite the unusual circumstances she can tell he’s unimpressed, but then who wouldn’t be?

This wasn’t supposed to have happened. All she can do is drop to her knees and mutter her apologies.

Maddie’s used to secrets but she doesn’t think she’s going to be able to keep this one for very long. Chim will notice when he gets home. Bobby will notice when Buck can’t go into work tomorrow. Eddie will guess something is wrong when Buck’s constant stream of texts abruptly stops.

So with limited time to fix it she spends the afternoon trying to correct what she’s done. She fails over and over again. She tries until she’s exhausted and after the fourth time she has to rescue her brother from his niece she knows what she has to do. Where he needs to go while she sorts everything out, because this is fine, she can totally fix this. She just needs some more time.

Chim comes home and stares open mouthed as she explains what’s happened. He agrees she needs help and there’s only one person to go to, only one person Buck would want to be with right now.

Which is why she’s on her way to Eddie’s house.

The phone screen remains dark no matter how long he stares. He glares at it, resting there on his coffee table, taunting him. Eddie resists a few moments longer then scrubbing at his face he gives in. He picks it up and double checks that there are no new messages that he might have missed. It seems unlikely after all because he’s been staring at the damn thing for the last five minutes.

There are no new messages.

The phone goes down again accompanied by a weary roll of his eyes at his level of co dependency. One afternoon and evening of no texts from Buck and he’s worried and miserable.

He's being ridiculous, just because Buck hasn’t text him for hours doesn’t mean something’s wrong. That thought doesn’t stop him checking the phone one last time or prevent him from tossing it away with an irritated noise, annoyed with Buck for ignoring him and with himself for minding.

Buck is probably just at the gym or at the store. There are any number of things he could be doing; maybe, Eddie thinks with a dark scowl he's on a date.

If Buck’s getting lucky it would explain the radio silence. He hadn’t mentioned anything like that but that doesn’t mean it isn’t happening.

Eddie is honest enough to admit to himself that he doesn’t enjoy the thought of Buck being on a date but on the other hand being on a date has never stopped Buck texting before so it’s still unusual not to hear from him.

Nibbling on the edge of a nail he tries to reassure himself. Nothing’s wrong. He’s just worrying needlessly. He should go to bed, he’ll see Buck at work tomorrow anyway.

He takes three steps towards his bedroom when the abrupt knock at his front door startles him; his heart starts pounding, his current apprehension about Buck’s is putting him on edge. He approaches the door nervously, a knot already forming in his stomach.

A quick glance at the time shows him it really is too late for casual visitors which means he’s not being paranoid, something’s happened and he braces himself for something bad, what he sees when he opens the door does absolutely nothing to settle his nerves.

“Maddie?”

The sight of Buck’s sister on his doorstep generates a vicious spike of adrenaline in his blood, the desperate edge to his voice telegraphs his anxiety clearly.

“What’s happened? Is he ok?”

He looks past her in the hopeful expectation of seeing Buck, although how he thinks Bucks 6ft frame is hiding being Maddie is anyone's guess. He’s so busy worrying that he doesn’t notice what she’s holding.

“Eddie don’t panic.” Maddie seems calm enough but the words make his heart sink, nothing good has even followed those words, they fall in the same category as ‘we need to talk.’

Unfortunately that’s what she says next.

“We need to talk, can I in come in?

That’s when he notices it - the cat.

Maddie offers no explanation for the animal in her arms as she crosses the threshold into his home.

Now he’s noticed it, the cat captures his full attention. It’s large; ginger and white and it’s being held tightly to her body. The animal is looking right at him and as far as cats have expressions this one looks annoyed. He’s never seen a cat look annoyed or anything so identifiable before, outside of Chris’ cartoons. This one does though.

Maddie says his name again, drawing his attention back to her, “Eddie, Buck’s ok.”

The cat makes a loud noise and Maddie turns the animal slightly so she can glare at it.

“He’s fine.” she repeats firmly and with emphasis, if Eddie didn’t know better he’d say she was talking to the cat not him.

The cat makes a break for freedom, it twists and jumps out of her arms and lands neatly. It stalks across his floor and jumps up onto the couch where it turns and sits very still looking at them both. It’s very large for a cat and has blue eyes. Eddie finds himself and the cat staring at each other and Maddie has to say his name again to get his attention.

He drags his eyes back to her, the cat’s presence and unusual aura is distracting him,

“If he’s ok, why are you here?”

“Well” the pause is ominous “it’s a little bit complicated.” Maddie doesn’t quite meet his eye.

This time the cat makes a noise that sounds like ‘prumph’. Eddie side eyes it and Maddie sighs. She rubs her hands together, her anxiety obvious, with another quick look at the cat she takes a deep breath and starts.

“So - Buck told you about us right?”

She waits for confirmation, Eddie nods, he knows what she's alluding to. Buck told him months ago. It had been something of a shock although he thinks he handled it pretty well.

“Yes, he said you're magical.”

Witches to be precise.

“He told me everything.” His expression hardens then because he does know about them and not all of it had been good. Buck had indeed told him everything, saying he didn’t want any secrets between them. Buck had looked at him blue eyes wide and trusting and said he wanted Eddie to know the real him. Eddie had been touched by the level of faith Buck had in him.

More explanation had followed that initial reveal; Buck apparently only had a little magic but Maddie’s talent was much stronger than his own. There were reasons for that and Eddie had not been impressed.

Buck had kept his eyes downcast as he explained why his magic was lesser than his sister’s, he’d been unable to look Eddie in the eyes as he spoke about it; the memory of Buck’s haltering explanation still made him furious.

Eddie had listened in growing horror as Buck told him how his own parents had used him, drained the majority of his gift away in an effort to feed the spell meant to cure his older brother who had been dying. A spell that hadn’t even worked.

Eddie feels the echos of the cold rage that had spread through him that day as Buck kept going with his story, explaining that until quite recently he had known nothing of the spell, that his parents had hidden what they’d done letting him think he was just born faulty, Buck’s word not his, letting him grow up thinking he was simply less magical, less gifted than his sister.

Maddie’s not looking at him now, he knows she feels guilty for keeping all that hidden. Buck hadn’t even known he had a brother until last year. It had taken him a while to forgive her, Eddie’s impressed that he did it so quickly.

Maddie’s eyes have drifted back to the cat. He wonders vaguely if it’s a witch thing, taking cats out when you go visiting.

Maddie takes a deep breath before telling the rest of her story.

“Well, Buck and me, we were trying something today, we thought we’d found a way to… that maybe we might be able change…” she stops again, “well that doesn’t matter now but it went … wrong.” Her eyes peer up at him on the last word.

The cat meows again as it flops down on his couch.

Eyes drawn by the movement Eddie notices it has markings on its face, white fur around one eye contrasting with the ginger. It’s left eye.

His stomach clenches, an ominous feeling growing steadily, panic clawing through his veins.

“How wrong?” He almost doesn’t recognise his own voice, it’s low and urgent, “Maddie what happened?” he demands, desperate for an answer. “Where’s Buck?”

She winces, then nose wrinkled up, mouth scrunched into a guilty moue, she looks at the cat.

It takes a heartbeat to process what she’s trying to say and another to deny it before his whispered ‘No’ echoes round the silent room. She can’t mean…Eddie shakes his head and repeats his denial more firmly.

“No.”

Maddie nods, biting on her lip. “It was an accident.”

The cat mewls sadly from its spot on the couch.

“You… you turned Buck into a cat?” It’s suddenly extremely hard to breathe.

Her voice is small and apologetic “Kinda.”

“Kinda!?” His voice in contrast to hers rises sharply then falls into an angry hiss as he points at the couch “that’s a cat Maddie, an actual cat!”

“I know,” she looks and sounds deeply puzzled “I don’t know what went wrong. We thought either it would work or it just wouldn’t. We didn’t expect… this.” she sighs “I’ve never done anything like this before.”

The cat yowls loudly, head twisted to the side, its eyes fixed on her in a hard stare.

Maddie frowns back, she steps closer, lowering her voice, “That wasn’t my fault and you know it.” The cat goes “mrwrarr” and turns around. She folds her arms and mutters “anyway it was only a tail that time.”

Eddie’s knees feel a little weak, sitting down seems wise. It’s a lot to process but Maddie’s last sentence has to be investigated.

“You gave Buck a tail?”

She sits down opposite him, next to the cat. He can’t quite think of it as Buck yet.

“Yeah” her voice reflects the awkwardness of the fact, Eddie can’t really imagine the kind of apologies that go with giving your brother a tail.

“It was just once but he’s never let me forget it.” She glares at the cat who's now ignoring her, “he had to miss Junior prom, he was so mad with me.”

Eddie can't help thinking Buck might have had some justification for that.

“Mom and Dad kept him off school for a month. Which I personally think was an overreaction, the tail only lasted two weeks.” Maddie sounds a little defensive about the whole thing. Eddie decides to keep his opinions to himself.

Then he registers what she said, two weeks - his eyes widen in shock, that can’t be right.

“Is he going to be stuck like this for two weeks?”

“No” she scoffs dismissively, then deflates “well… probably not, a few days, maybe? Possibly a bit longer?”

Eddie’s heart sinks with every word she utters; he wishes she sounded more convincing.

Maddie plasters a smile on her face “I’m going to ask around for some advice, look for a way to reverse it but I’m sure it'll just wear off by itself.”

He listens unsure who she’s trying to convince him or herself. Or maybe it’s the cat.

The cat: aka Buck. He’s sitting perfectly still on the couch, staring unblinking at his sister. He looks unimpressed, it seems like a fairly typical expression for a cat.

“So you’re sure it's not permanent.” He’d like a guarantee but he’s not getting one. Maddie remains silent.

The cat turns his furry little head when Eddie speaks and the sapphire gaze is focused on him like a laser beam. His breath catches because there’s more than a cat looking back at him.

“Buck?”

The cat meows at him and Eddie suddenly believes, not that he thought Maddie was lying but he suddenly knows in his bones that the cat is Buck.

Maddie still hasn’t answered him and she’s taking far too long for Eddie’s peace of mind. He prompts a response.

“You are sure he’ll turn back aren’t you?”

Her response lacks the conviction he’d like to hear, she doesn’t quite mask the wobble in her quiet ‘Yes.”

“Maddie?” His own voice is thick with concern, she needs to do better than that if she expects him to believe her.

She tries again. This time her voice is bright and confident.

“Of course it’s not permanent” but she doesn’t look him in the eye when she says it.

Eddie gulps in more air, he’s feeling dizzy, fighting the growing panic inside him. It can’t be permanent. That’s just not an option. Random thoughts flit across his mind and one suddenly sticks, “What about work? He can’t just not show up.”

“Chimney’s going to tell Bobby tomorrow, they’ll put him on medical leave.” So Bobby must also know about Buck and Maddie then.

Eddie wonders how Bobby will fill in those particular forms, absent due to having whiskers and a tail? Unable to work because paws aren’t compatible with fire fighting equipment? He stops that train of thought, he’s getting distracted, his mind trying to focus on anything that’s not the cat still staring at him.

“Can he stay with you?” Maddie’s still talking to him “ I can’t leave him alone and I know this is where he’d feel safest.”

“Really?” that slips out in a tone that reveals how pleased he is that Maddie thinks his home is Buck’s safe space. She definitely notices and he finds himself at the other end of her penetrating and knowing gaze.

Buck's sister smiles at him kindly “Of course. He loves being here with you and Chris. I never hear the end of how wonderful you are. How much he… ” the cat head-buts her hard, she turns to him with an innocent sounding “What?” And Eddie’s heard that tone from his own sisters.

More yelping and mewling from his newly furry friend has her rolling her eyes.

Maddie says “Don’t be silly, of course not.” and scratches him behind the ear, there’s a small purr and he assumes that means Buck’s getting what he wants.

Eddie looks at the cat then back at Maddie “Can you understand him?

Maddie wiggles her head from side to side in a noncommittal fashion, ”Well he’s talking in cat and I’m listening in human so there’s definitely a communication barrier but I get the general sense, I think the spell links us a bit which helps and… “ she says, eyes dropping to the cat whose now cleaning his ear with a paw, “ I do know my brother quite well.”

The cat finishes washing and jumps down. He moves to sit on the floor by Eddie’s feet. When he gets no attention he rams his head into his leg. Eddie’s hand twitches but is it appropriate to smooth Buck when he’s a cat? It’s a dilemma, God knows he’s had ideas about running his fingers through Buck’s hair when his best friend is human shaped but he doesn’t ever give in to those thoughts does he so he denies himself the impulse to reach out now.

That means he has to ignore the insistent pushing against his leg. He refuses to look down, keeps his eyes on Maddie. She looks like she’s trying not to smile.

Buck stops nudging him and sits again with a grumpy little mrrrrph. A quick glance downwards shows him an upturned face still waiting expectantly.

The glance is obviously enough of an invitation for Buck because the cat, (think of him as a cat, Eddie tells himself), jumps and four paws land on his lap, that’s quickly followed by a pink nose and a head rubbing against his chest.

Cat Buck obviously has an agenda and he’s a weak man, he’s always liked cats anyway, he can’t be expected to resist this one. If Buck instigates it, it must be ok right?

He finds his hand stroking the cat's head which only encourages the furry little beast. Its purring becomes louder.

“Can he understand us? He asks Maddie.

He asks the cat too. “You getting any of this buddy?”

The cat mews back which might be an answer, it’s hard to tell.

Maddie’s response this time is slower, “I think he understands, not as much as a human but definitely more than a regular cat.”

Something flashes behind her eyes, something she’s not saying. There’s a brief glimpse of a worried crease on her forehead but he blinks and it’s gone. He’s about to ask but cat Buck bumps his head against Eddie’s chest again and he's distracted.

A few more moments pass as he fusses the cat.

“Maddie, this isn’t just a bad joke is it?” It’s his last hope and Maddie dashes it.

“No, I'm afraid not.”

“How are you so calm?” The words burst out “Does this sort of thing happen a lot?”

“No Eddie” she sounds unimpressed, “ people turning into cats does not happen a lot, even if I am a witch.”

She stands then with a heavy sigh, “look I need to go, get in touch with those people as soon as I can.” The unreadable look crosses her face again “the sooner we get him back the better.”

He nods “He’ll be safe here until he turns back.”

She smiles again “I know.”

She turns to go but the nagging doubt is still there so he calls out after her,

“Maddie?” she turns, “there’s… there’s nothing else I should know, right?”

She smiles at him and Eddie thinks it's just a little too bright, too cheerful to be real.

“Of course not”

He wishes he believed her.

Maddie sighs heavily as she leaves her brother behind with his best friend and the man she suspects he’s in love with. It’s the best place for him but she feels terrible.

They’d been trying to reactive his magic and it had gone so horribly wrong she can scarcely process it.

She’s heard about transformations like this a few times and the stories aren’t giving her a lot of hope.

She turns the key and starts the car. She has a lot to do and not much time before she might not be able to fix this at all.

The only stories she’s heard have ended with the transformation becoming permanent if the person doesn’t change back within a few weeks.

She adds that secret to the others she’s kept over the years and drives away.

Eddie sighs, Maddie’s gone and he’s alone with his best friend.

His best friend who's currently a cat. This was not how he was expecting his day to end.

Buck jumped off his lap when Maddie got up to leave, he followed her to the door and Eddie let them have a private goodbye. He’s straightening up cushions for something to do when he turns and finds himself under the scrutiny of those eerily familiar blue eyes.

Buck makes a very handsome feline. His lips twitch, of course he does. If Buck got turned into a pumpkin he’d probably win best squash in show.

Eddie laughs out loud at the thought, god, he might just be a tiny bit hysterical. This is utterly ridiculous. He looks down, brown eyes meeting blue as they so often do but this time it’s so very different.

He’s worried and scared for his friend. Maddie hadn’t been particularly reassuring about how long this would last and he can’t shake the feeling she hasn’t told him something.

Buck mews to capture his attention, he can’t imagine being a cat is Buck’s idea of a good time. He rubs at his eyes, feeling stressed. How are they going to do this?

He crouches down to talk to him, “Hi there.”

Cat Buck blinks at him slowly.

“You know I was worried about you tonight. Knew something was wrong.”

All Buck has to say about that is ‘mrrrwarawr’ which is of minimal help.

Eddie reaches out a tentative hand and Buck sniffs at him then rubs his head against his fingers. Eddie sighs,“This is not good, Buck. Not good.”

The cat stands and butts his head against the outstretched fingers more enthusiastically, looking for ear scratches that he quickly receives.

“You know this is weird right?” Buck makes a quiet meep as he sits back down on the floor. “Really weird.”

Cats can’t shrug so that’s not what happens but his new house guest tries anyway, shoulders shift strangely.

“Glad you agree” he says wryly blowing out another heavy puff of air, then the practicalities of the situation occur to him and grateful for something to do he stands and says “You hungry? Think I’ve got some chicken you can have.”

Buck perks up at that and making a significant amount of noise that Eddie can only assume is agreement heads towards the kitchen with a happy bounce in his step.

Eddie watches him go, the fact that the cat heads straight to the kitchen is just more proof it really is Buck. He shakes his head and follows him, they’ll get through this, strange as it is. They always do.

Read from Chapter 3

#911HW2022 #911 fox #buddie #Halloween fic #911fic #911 fic #eddie diaz #evan buck buckley #buddie fox #Eddie x buck #spotty scribbles

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cinnamonest · 3 years ago

Text

Yandere Profile - Link (Legend of Zelda)

ABSOLUTELY YES. MY BOY. LOVE OF MY LIFE.

As some of you may know, today is the release date of Skyward Sword HD for Switch!! So I decided to release this one now in honor of that :3

NOTES:

I went towards the idea of a Princess!reader because that just opens the gate for sooooo much potential. I'm leaning heavily towards the ZeLink interactions in BoTW and Skyward Sword just because those games have the most interaction between the two.

Also! This is great bc it gives me the opportunity to explore an idea I've actually had a long time! I've always thought about how many opportunities there have been across the games for Link and Zelda to be kinda like "haha well seeya later" and just... bolt, run away from everything, abandon their roles and responsibilities and all that. Like, if OoT kid Link got her before Ganon did and ran, if SS Link just decided to get her on the bird and bolt before everything went down, if botw Link was just like haha what if we ran away from everything together... jk... unless...?

And final note, Link is a great pick for the very traditional yandere -- sweet and : ) but can snap into darker personas. I really liked writing this bc I tend to have more self centered yans and less of the "worships the ground you walk on" type of yans like I think Link would be, so it's a nice change.

As usual now the nsfw section is divided by a ---- line.

TWs: fem reader, heavily implied Zelda!reader, stalking, murder, very brief mentions of gore/dismemberment of rivals, manipulation, very brief suicide mention, themes of reincarnation (I’ve been told this can be triggering to some people so just in case)

TWs (nsfw section): noncon, somnophilia

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Severity Scale

Intelligence/Perceptiveness: 4 Brutality: 8.5 Physical capability: 8 Mental/emotional instability: 7 Restrictiveness: 6 Sexual sadism: 5 Stubbornness: 8

What are they generally like? Lucid, aware? Obsessive? How do they behave?

The primary trait of Link that any darling -- any person, really -- would notice is that he is, well, quiet. He has always been a man of few words, and really, he often doesn't know exactly what to say. On his own, at a first glance, he really does seem like a gentle, humble spirit, someone who blends into the background pretty well, who isn't particularly prideful or reckless or aggressive.

Which is why, to be honest, he might sort of evade the gaze of most people -- he doesn't stand out. You remember him as the boy that smiled at you now and then, it's a soft, gentle sort of smile, one that you feel conveys nothing but the utmost innocence and contentment with the world. You know he's pretty good at fighting, but doesn't get into fights needlessly, he's accomplished and respected, but has never been the guy everyone is talking about -- he's in the background, against the wall. Never speaking, always looking out, sometimes at the sky, sometimes carefully watching people. Sometimes you see him, gaze blank and tranquil, and wonder what he's thinking about. Whether he's the village boy in the time of Twilight, the trained and honored warrior that slept for many years, the boy that came down from the sky -- you can't help but feel at ease around him, safe, you can't help but find him endearing and pleasant.

Yet, you always seem to notice him. Other people... forget he exists, sometimes, he's so quiet. You never do, for whatever reason.

When he needs to get something across, he prefers to express himself through actions, not words. If you lived in Skyloft, or Ordon village, you might find problems mysteriously solved, work suddenly done that you don't remember doing. That fencepost outside your home that broke has been replaced overnight. A village child went missing and he comes back a few hours later with them in tow. Always humble, never demanding or expecting thanks, he tells you in his quiet voice that he's happy to help you.

And should you ever ask him for anything, he'll drop whatever he's doing to help. Anything for you, he says with a smile, which makes you feel a bit guilty when, honestly, you're not even sure you're remembering his name right.

And yet, sometimes, you feel so at ease around him it seems unnatural. He seems so easy to trust. You feel like you've known him forever. And sometimes you feel... for just a split second, less at ease. You find yourself randomly stiffening at his calm, sweet voice. You find yourself looking around when you're alone, as if you feel someone is there, and for some reason, his face flashes through your mind. Sometimes when he looks at you, you feel sort of cold. It's almost like invoking a memory you don't have, like some kind of learned instinct you can't recall a reason for. But those moments are fleeting, they come and go before you can even process them, replaced by warmth and comfort.

If you do spend time with him, if you find yourself gazing out your window when he's training, the next thing you notice besides him being quiet and sweet is that he's strong. It's almost ironic, how all the other knights or village boys are so aggressive and rowdy all the time, many of them taller or bulkier, and yet, none of them could ever dream of defeating Link. Not one can match his agility, speed, prowess. Such a pleasant, calm person, with so much skill, strength, and power, but that power is so rarely seen exerted. People marvel at his talent, they say it's as if he has the experience of lifetimes and lifetimes of battle in his blood.

And it's why you feel at ease when he's assigned the task of guarding you. His capabilities are unmatched, and yet you'd never fear any harm to you from him. Both of those traits put together make him the best candidate to protect you.

Of course, you do find yourself doing most of the talking. Sometimes you find yourself rambling to fill the silence, and you fear you're annoying him, but when you stop he raises an eyebrow and asks why you got so quiet. Did he do something wrong? He seems to worry about that a lot -- has he done something bad? Has he made you upset? Are you mad? At first you think he's worried about his position security, but after a while you realize he genuinely worries about it.

And when you do continue your ramblings, you're surprised to find he remembers your words -- every little thing you say. Things you don't even remember telling him. He asks you about that relative you mentioned one time, his eyes light up and he walks a bit to the side because look, it's your favorite flower over there, he'll get it for you. It's impressive, really, how he manages to remember such things. He must take his job very seriously.

He does enjoy giving you such things -- he loves giving you gifts. It's usually things he finds, wholesome little things -- makes a crown out of the flowers you like so much, finds something interesting here or there, while he was off-duty he saw something in the markets he thought you'd like and got it for you. You almost feel guilty, it's so constant that he's giving you things.

Sometimes you ask him about himself, you realize he knows so much about you and you so little about him. He blushes, he rubs the back of his head, he insists there's nothing interesting about him, he wouldn't waste your time like that. It takes time to get him out of his shell, but eventually, he tells you this or that, little stories from his life.

Sometimes you take long walks, you like to get out of the stuffy walls and have fun outside, he accompanies you across Hyrule. Sometimes it feels familiar, you pass places you've never been that give you a feeling of nostalgia, deja vu, a sense that you've been here before.

He’s protectiveness incarnated. Insanely so. He can spring to his feet at a moment's notice and deals with anything that comes for you before they can even get close.

It makes you feel safe, but there's something else there. It's a ferocity that is so contrasting to his normal self, different even from the times you've seen him fight as he trains. It's a glint in the eyes, an aggression in his expression, that almost makes him seem like a different person. And it lingers for a moment, once the creature is dead and his sword hand falls to his side, he turns and glances at you to his side, a hand raised to wipe the blood off his face, and for that lingering second, it's still there, his blank expression and wide eyes -- a ferocity so intense it starts to look like bloodlust, chaos, destruction. And then, it's as if you imagined it. Smiling and telling you it's gone now, you're ok. You're glad he's so truly devoted.

In fact, he's so dedicated to his job that he starts... doing it... outside of his job hours...? Well, today he was given the day off, and you were told to stay inside because you didn't have to go out. He comes knocking on your door, says not to be startled if you hear someone outside your door move or shift or anything, but he just wanted to let you know in case. He'll be right here. Keeping watch. So don't worry. You're safe.

And likewise, he was supposed to have a day off when you were supposed to enter the town. You were assigned two other guards to watch you, since it's a special trip, so you're surprised to find just Link waiting for you. He took care of it, he says, he didn't feel right leaving your safety up to someone else, he doesn't trust them. So they agreed to let him take over for today.

All of this said, he doesn't have to grow alongside you, he doesn't have to be the childhood friend, the knight who guards you. He doesn't even have to have met you. Fate works in odd ways like that. There's a sort of inexplicable instant attachment he takes to you, almost as though it's some kind of destined, divinely inspired sort of thing. He would describe it as saying you feel familiar to him.

He's also, notably, prone to a more traditional trope of what you might call humility whiplash. For the most part, he's got that overly humble, worshipping, "I don't deserve to even stand in your presence" sort of mentality. However, although it's rare and requires a lot of wearing down his mental state, if pushed far enough, he can have brief moments where he snaps into more or less the complete opposite -- entitlement, arrogance, aggression, getting mad at you for the behavior he'd normally take with a smile on his face. Thankfully, unlike some yanderes that have a whole snapping episode towards their darling, his are very very brief, usually only a matter of seconds or a single snarled sentence before he snaps back to normal, wide-eyed and apologetic and telling you I don't know what came over me. It’s... a little frightening to say the least, but you blow it off, tell yourself that hey, everyone has moments like that... Right?

How likely are they to kidnap their darling? How quickly will they do so?

For the most part, he doesn't need it, he can pretty easily cling to your side well enough to be assured of your safety, and he manages to scare off the undesirables not with a glare, but a smile that's just a little too sweet and far too persistent -- it unnerves people. You hear a lot of people say that something about that guy rubs me the wrong way. Or that he gives me goosebumps for some reason. Even the people he scares away themselves can't pinpoint exactly what it is, all they know is that, despite being reputed as kind and quiet (and maybe a little dense), somehow a lot of people agree that something about him puts people at unease, and that's all he needs. Because they stay away from him, and if he’s by your side all the time, that means they stay away from you too. Why keep you trapped when you can just be isolated?

An aware Link is a a unique scenario. One scenario that's rather... interesting to imagine is a Link that defies fate itself, a Link that decides to be selfish in one of those rare snapping moments of his. Perhaps he makes a decision when everything starts going down, when the chaos is beginning, or perhaps he has somehow managed to gain knowledge of the bigger picture at work, the reality of the nature of your existence and his.

Perhaps he begins to think it's unfair. To suffer again and again. To prove himself again and again, and not always even to reap any benefits, to work so hard and yet still -- still -- you slip out of his grasp. He longs for a life with no tribulations, no struggle, no fights to be fought. He begins to feel like it's what he wants the most. He begins to feel like maybe it's what he deserves. So many lifetimes of struggles, if the higher powers won't give him a reward, he'll take it himself.

And perhaps, for all their higher power, not even the great goddesses themselves would have ever predicted it -- humans are ultimately creatures of will. To defy fate and to run away from destiny -- it wouldn't be the first time a human has tried such a thing. Sure, Hyrule may be destroyed. The people may all die. There may be nothing left. But you know what? He's stopped caring. If you're alive and he's alive, tucked away in your little corner of the world where you've found respite, well, that's all he needs. Even if you're on the run from forces that would want to find you, even if the threat of the final third of the triforce owner looms over your head. He'll ignore it, he'll look away.

You'll live a quiet little life together, a happy life without suffering, without quests and enemies, without strife, without worry. That's what he tells you when he steals you away, lifts you out of your bed one night. Says to be quiet, there's danger outside your door, he's rescuing you. You have no reason to not believe him. He waits until things go down, a castle under siege, but rather than taking you to where you're supposed to go, he climbs onto the horse and starts... riding away. It gets further and further into the distance, and you might ask why, what's going on? You have a job to do, he has a battle to be fought. But he says you're going far, far away, someplace you'll be safe.

But what about the divine beasts, the seals, the Twilight, whatever threat runs in this world in this time, what about the threat of Ganon, you ask? He says it doesn't matter anymore. You were doomed to fail, he thinks, it's either stay here and die, or run away. All that matters is you. And he'd like you to feel the same way for him. You will with enough time, don't worry.

He just wants this happy, quiet life with you that he’s been denied time and time again. It’s all he wants. If fate won’t give it to him, he’ll make it happen himself, and carve out the life he is determined to have, defying even the will of higher power.

How difficult is it to escape from them? How do they keep you restrained? How do they deal with attempted escape?

He gets it. Really, he does. "Stop following me!" You yell. Well, he understands why you might feel that way, but this is kinda his job. He thinks you're naive. Not that he would ever, ever have a thought that you're imperfect, of course! It's because you're so perfect and pure that you're... less aware of the dangers all around.

He'll let you think you're free, perhaps. He's more than capable of being quiet, quiet is kind of his thing. Watching you from a short distance is easy. Of course, his horse might make a noise, he can't really help that, or he might misstep on a branch or something. And then you turn around and get all mad again. Now you're even more angry. Well, he can also tell your guardians/father, who will encourage you to accept it. You can't help but feel a little bad -- he's just doing his job.

Now, our aware, runaway Link, well, does he really need to keep you restrained? What would you go back to? Certain death, a land destroyed? Sometimes you mention home, and he's quick to remind you that home doesn't exist anymore. His home is where you are. Can't you feel the same way? You found peace here in this little place -- a village far far away. Travelers, you call yourselves. What's the point in going elsewhere? How would you ever survive without him? He's not very good at being subtle or skillful about the psychological manipulation, it's obvious he's trying to scare you into not leaving, but... it still works, because really, he has a point.

He doesn't want to have to use physical restraint, in any case. And for the most part, it's not needed, because one important aspect of your relation is that his job kinda revolves around you (in some incarnations), or, perhaps you live in the same little village, but either way the thing is that his presence does the job well enough -- he's always there, perhaps more so than almost any other yandere. Even when you think you've managed to get away from him for a moment, somehow his face pops up out of nowhere. How he manages to pull it off is a mystery, you swear he manages to find you so well and predict your movements it's inhuman.

But if you really, really pose a problem, a smarter and sneakier darling that somehow manages to keep slipping out of his grasp and running off (you never get away for more than about 20 minutes or so, but nonetheless), you keep trying to run off when he's sleeping (he wakes up in approximately 25 seconds if your presence is absent from the bed, but that's still enough time to run out the front door), every time he turns his head (which isn't often) you're trying to disappear... well, in that case, he can reach a point of deciding more straightforward measures are necessary. He hates to do it, really, at least when he's not yet at a snapping point. But it's for your own good. And he says so, quite apologetically.

But it's not so bad, it's not like you're being chained to a wall or anything. For one, he got leather ties so you'd be more comfortable, but more importantly, as your guardian, he figured the best thing for you to be tied to would be... himself. Think of it like friendship bracelets! It's just... got a 5-foot chain connecting them. This way you can't sneak off at night, and you won't get too far when he's distracted. It's a safety measure.

How easy are they to trick, deceive, or manipulate?

He's a learner. At first, it's easy. Honestly, he is a rather naive, gullible boy, sometimes he reminds you of a happy dog with his bright eyes. He likes to believe the best of people, give them the benefit of the doubt in all circumstances, and that goes double for you, who he believes can do no wrong.

And even when you do lie to him, it's still not wrong. You didn't do anything bad. Clearly there has simply been a misunderstanding, and you thought you had to lie. Or perhaps you simply forgot a detail or were confusing something with something else. It wasn't malicious on your end, he knows that.

He's actually significantly smarter than he lets on in practical knowledge, though. Those dungeon puzzles pay off, you know? He's got pattern recognition down. So over time he learns how to distinguish when you're lying to him or attempting to deceive him, and sees through it increasingly well.

And yet, he doesn't really... get mad over it, most of the time. Again, he's just capable of deluding himself into believing there's a reason. He believes so strongly in your goodness that he finds a way to interpret everything you do as out of benevolence. So you snuck out the window and didn't tell him you were going for a walk because you just wanted to get away from his suffocating presence for once? You were just thinking of him. You didn't want to burden him and wanted to give him a break. Well, that's thoughtful, but don't worry, he doesn't need a break. He thinks it's precious you're so considerate of him though!

You don't tell him you were talking to that person, and you lie and say no when he asks, because you don't want him to worry, and because you underestimate how dangerous others can be. He's told you a million times and you don't listen, but that's ok, it's because you're just so pure you see the best in everyone. Everything you do is good.

Because he perceives your lies, he will still work against and around it. He won't confront you on your lies, he'll just make sure to deal with the situation -- you lied about sneaking out, well, he'll just keep watch and be ready to meet you outside next time. You lied about talking to a person, well, he'll just have to make sure they stay away from you instead.

If you're trying to trick him, he just plays along until necessary. Smiles and nods. He gets the suspicion you're planning a break-out when he told you he was leaving to go get something from town... rather than saying so, he just decides, you know what? Why don't you come with him? Oh, you're feeling sick, you tell him it's ok, go without you? Well, he can't leave you alone then! Because you're clearly not and just trying to get him to leave... or, as he says, he can't just leave you alone. He'll go another day.

He's fairly manipulable when it comes to praise and affection. You can easily Pavlov him into certain behaviors or patterns with just the slightest words of praise and affection. He's not a very outwardly expressive person, tends to stay quiet, but you can tell how he feels inside when you give the slightest praise, a hug, a kiss on the cheek -- you can see that soft hint of a smile and tell that inside, he's basically melting, even if it's not obvious to most people. And, much like the lying, he’s honestly often aware of it, but he just can’t help it.

How lenient are they? What privileges can you have, and what will you be denied?

He tries to get you the things that he feels will make you happy. Your happiness is incredibly important to him, and he usually thinks about how any action he plans to take might affect you, spends a lot of time debating choices of things to do or say and try to determine how each one will affect you and choose accordingly.

As such, he goes out of his way to support the things you want to do. Have a hobby? He'll find the best materials available. Want a book or a food? He'll obtain it through some means. Even if procuring it involves a side-quest-y set of mundane tasks or scouring the world for 70 of this and 50 of that to exchange it for the item from an obscure specialist, it's all worth it.

The only thing he just doesn't give up on is the constant vigilance and insistence on being by your side more or less every waking second. And every sleeping second. And just every single moment you're alive. It's for your safety.

This is actually one of the things he can get a little nasty about when it comes to how he deals with it, because he quickly has the bright idea that if you don't get it, he'll make you understand. Of course, he can't actually risk you getting hurt, so he stages it. Allows you to sneak off, or at least think you have, and walk right into the path of those monsters he lured, or the people he hired to intimidate you. Of course, it's only natural that he shows up at the last possible second, right on time to save you. You should expect that, after all, it's his responsibility to protect you, of course fate works out perfectly like this. See, he was right, it's so dangerous, and without him you'd be dead. Hopefully you grasp that now.

What kind of rules do they have? What kind of punishment would they use?

His is mostly related to vigilance. Where are you? Who have you been talking to? Who was that person you were talking with just now? What did they say? He's not nosy. He just cares about you. It’s in the job description. You ought to understand just how much certain bad people would love to find you and hurt you. That's why he has to know.

This isn't our modern world, so there's no phones or tracking devices to speak of, just himself, which, well, might as well be a tracking device since he never seems to have difficulty finding you. Sometimes you're not sure how he does it.

He tells you that you don't have to be with him 24/7, but you will be, even if you don't realize it. He's aware enough to know that you'll feel suffocated and get mad if you're aware of his presence all the time, so he gives you your "alone" time, aka, the "follow her quietly from a 20+ foot distance" time. It all feels the same to you. Well, sometimes you feel eyes on you, but you shake the feeling off as paranoia.

So it's not so much that he sets rules and reacts when they're broken, but rather, he works his way around anything you might do so well that he doesn't need you to follow his rules, or really, you take them more as suggestions. But honestly, that's kind of worse. It's enough to drive a darling to the brink of a mental breakdown very quickly. With Link you will inevitably become paranoid, nervous, you feel like you're going insane because he manages to pop up everywhere, he always knows what you did when you did it and you have no idea how it is even conceivably possible for him to know some of the things that he knows. He confronts you very plainly and quietly, often sweetly, asking why you did this or that or telling you it's ok, you don't have to hide anything, surely there’s a good reason, and if not, he forgives you anyway. In a way, it's worse than an angry confrontation. You begin to feel like he's omnipresent, like he can read your mind, and it truly takes a mental toll and affect you worse than any normal yandere's concept of punishment.

This ultimately works out well in his favor. The more you just do what he wants, the less it feels like a violation or intrusion that he knows these things, since he was there with you, it makes sense, and you continuously get bent to his will.

How do they deal with rivals, or perceived rivals? Will they get rid of them? Will they kill them themselves, or find another way?

Ah, and thus we get to that brutality rating.

It would be unthinkable to think that any sort of scum would even dare. Even he isn't worthy of being with you, and someone else thinks they could be? So, he more or less views "rivals" as an offense. When they're threats, well, he's allowed to deal with them. When they're not, well... he has a wonderful reputation. If he says he overheard that person planning usurpation or assassination, that they realized he was listening in and wildly attacked him, everyone will believe him. Even if the death seems a little... non-immediate. And uh... frankly... overkill. How exactly... did those limbs get perfectly severed during equally armed combat? And was it... really necessary... to kinda spill entrails all over like that? He'll apologize, of course, he was just so outraged by the thought of someone hurting you or your family, you know? You notice his eye twitches a bit as he says it.

He has a lot of... bottled up frustrations, which we'll touch on in the nsfw section as well, but it tends to manifest in those two ways: sex and violence. Rather than exerting stress and anger and frustration as it comes, he lets it fester. He tries to maintain being the noble, humble, self-sacrificing person he feels he should be. That is... difficult to do for a long time. People expect a lot from him, even in timelines where he's not necessarily realized as the hero quite yet, he usually has a lot of responsibilities. But then you tack on the whole hero thing? The weight of the world is sometimes, quite literally, on his shoulders. Do you have any idea the kind of stress that comes with that knowledge? It's not pleasant. And it quickly bottles up, a very very fragile bottle set to eventually shatter in a matter of time.

On a longer sort of quest, he just kinda... leaves a trail of destruction in his wake. Enemies don't actually just poof out of existence the way they do on-screen, you know. Anyone coming across an area he's just been through is met with literal piles upon piles of corpses, sometimes monsters, but sometimes people. He takes a very scorched earth sort of policy when it comes to dealing with things.

He's able to easily get close to people, with that sweet face and puppy eyes and lithe body, people don't really feel on guard around him nor intimidated. That makes it significantly easier to infiltrate enemy hideouts, earn favors, and work his way in to be able to commit mass murder more easily. Granted, no one thinks too much of it because they *are* truly enemies, after all, they *did* need to be taken out and well, if the rulers can choose to either send a group of ten soldiers or just one guy and get the job done equally well either way, they'll go with the latter option. No one thinks anything of it, except the occasional person who laughs and says something to the effect of remind me to never get on your bad side, haha! He gives that sheepish, sweet little smile, and jokingly tells them that yeah, better not.

How easy is it to make them mad? What does their anger look like?

For you, nearly impossible. For others, at a hair trigger.

For the most part, he conceals anger well until, as aforementioned, it bottles up and bursts. The truth is he gets irritated virtually all the time by other people. People who talk to you. Look at you. Smile at you. He’s actually rather easily annoyed even when you’re not involved, but again, he’s good at hiding it until it builds.

His rage has a commonality with his calm -- it's quiet. At least, at first. When it's directed at others, his eyes narrow. It's the telltale sign that someone has ignited his rage. It burns on the inside, it starts off as a spark that builds and builds and grows larger and larger until it's a blazing fire that consumes everything in his path. It's a loss of composure, a rare moment of complete loss of self-control. From his own perspective, it feels like he's not in control of his own body, it's all a blur happening in front of him and when it's over he's looking down at his own hands, unable to process his own actions, sometimes unable to remember them.

But it's violent, merciless, unforgiving. It does not yield to begging, it does not leave anything alive unless forced to. You remember the first time you realized how unnatural it was, how shocked you were at how he did something that certainly went against the code he was sworn to follow, the very first time you felt truly afraid of Link. It was a walk in town -- someone called out to you, spitting obscenities about you and your family, your lineage, threw something at you -- he caught it in his hand and crushed it, and quickly, without a word, advanced on the offender. And, to make a long story short, you had to prevent him from beating a man to death in public in broad daylight. He was forgiven by his superiors, but even they seemed shocked. You had to pull him off, and when he jerked his head around to look at whatever was stopping him -- before his face softened as he recognized your own face -- the split second you saw the burn of hatred and fury in eyes that were normally so soft and loving, was nothing short of unsettling, you still recall the chill that ran down your spine.

And honestly? It's terrifying. And the first time, it's shocking. Sure, you knew he could fight. You've seen him fight off monsters, bokoblins and lizalfos and the like. But something is different about seeing the blood of a human being run down his sword, dripping onto the ground, to see the bodies and the blank, numb gaze on his features he always has after it's over. The absolute lack of hesitancy he has to run human enemies through before they even have a chance to explain themselves, how unbothered he seems by the carnage left in his wake. The way he turns back to you, drenched in red and smiles, tells you it's ok, you're safe now. There's no need to look so scared.

And it changes how you view him, in the long run. Less of a guardian angel, more of a guardian dog, one that defends your name when you never asked him to. Pleads to tell him not to fall on deaf ears -- you just don't understand why it has to be this way, he says, you can't comprehend the threat they posed. From the sweet boy that leaves you flowers and repairs and instead leaves a wave of destruction in his path you would not have thought possible.

Directed towards you, though, it's entirely different. He tries his best to have patience with you, no matter what. He smiles, he tries to make excuses as to why you'd say this or do that, why you'd feel a certain way, and he's rather good at deluding himself to give you the benefit of the doubt.

But when it reaches an end, when he can no longer lie to himself, when you push it to a point that you truly make him mad, it's more of a snap. The times he'll lay hands on you in a truly violent way are rare, and as aforementioned, very brief. It's usually not so much of actually a blow, so much as a grab. He just can't get what he's trying to tell you through your thick head, so he stresses it, trying to make you understand as he grabs you by the upper arms, shaking you with each word, and he only stops when he sees the pain and fear in your eyes, drawing his hands back at lightning speed. He saves you from some danger very narrowly, one of the few times he lost track of you for a moment and had to frantically search before coming across you being attacked. What would I have done if something happened to you? Don't you understand that? He's so lost in the relief it takes him a moment to feel you beating on his arms in the embrace, choking and wheezing that you can't breathe, that his grip is so tight it feels like he'll snap you in half. He draws back again, and he apologizes, but it will certainly happen more than once.

So they see you as above them, beneath them, or equal to them?

Above. Like, so, so, so far above. He feels like he doesn't even deserve to look at you. Of course, neither does anyone else, so he's just, you know, stepping up to bear the burden of wrongdoing to keep people even worse than him away from you.

So it's less that you're just above him so much as you're above everyone. He's actually, perhaps surprisingly, a little bit of a pessimist about the world. The world is full of so many terrible people and so many horrible things happen that he's borne witness to. It's a "world cold and hard, (y/n) soft and warm" sort of thing. You're the one good thing, the thing that makes him happy, the ultimate source of comfort he has, and he has to prevent you from being defiled by the evil of the world, keep you innocent and sweet (even if he's just deluding himself to think you are those things in the first place).

This ties into, again, how he interprets every action you take as good and benevolent -- he has the "you can do no wrong" mentality. Even very blatantly malicious things, he'll interpret in a way that makes you somehow still come out a perfect, innocent angel. If you do harm to others, well, they simply deserved it. You did something technically wrong, but you knew no better, or you were desperate. You can't be held responsible for any of it. And if you're mean to him, well, he probably did something to make you upset.

How determined are they for you to love them? How hard will they try to make it happen? Or are they content just having you?

Sort of a duality. Yes, he's very persistent. He thinks about it all the time. Every time you yell and try to run and hurl nasty insults at him, it hurts far more than you realize. He doesn't let it show on his face or in his voice, but it really does, and it gets to him sometimes. He's hyper observant of every little thing you do, your body language, your tone, the way you look at him, and the slightest of differences can change his mood internally, although it tends to look the same outwardly.

He makes little mental notes of it -- today she didn't flinch when I touched her shoulder. Today she didn't frown when she saw me coming. Little things like that will make his entire day. Likewise, the inverse kills him inside. He aims to make every day one of the former days, where the littlest signs of acceptance or even kindness and affection give him a sort of high that makes him feel like he's floating.

He tries his best to do things that he thinks will, well, earn love. Every opportunity to do something for you, he takes it. Everything he sees he'd think you'd like, he buys (or steals, or... loots from a dead body) for you. On and on that idea goes. And although he doesn't say too much, when he does speak to you, he usually has something nice to say. He views it in a formulaic way -- ironically, think about it like those collectibles in overworlds. You get enough of this or that thing, and once you have enough, you can go talk to this or that person and donate them all and get a reward, right? He's accustomed to viewing things that way. Love should be the same way. If he just completes enough tasks and gathers enough items, eventually he'll unlock your love.

That being said, even if it doesn't happen, much to your despair, he just... doesn't. Give. Up. He doesn't quit. No matter how many times you tell him, it doesn't make a difference. You can tell him you'll never love him, and it's like it goes in one ear and out the other. He keeps trying. And he never, ever, ever stops trying. What did you expect? The boy's been fighting the same enemy over and over across lifetimes, needless to say his spirit has build up some persistence.

Bonus: Is there anything that makes them unique, in comparison to other yanderes?

Bonus: Zelda/Triforce of Wisdom Darling

And don't worry. If it all goes wrong, when he fails, those divergences in time where the hero is vanquished and evil wins out -- it's not the end. Somehow, that's the feeling he gets, holding your little lifeless body up, running hands across your cold skin. Somehow, he feels oddly calm. Like it hurts, but it's ok. Like he'll see you again. Maybe not soon, but one day. This time didn't work out. But the next one will.

And that's the feeling you'll always have. Every time you meet him and you feel like you've met before, the lingering memories when you wake from your dreams -- flying through skies and sailing on oceans, a child, an adult, a boy you've never met, or one you've known all your life, but it's always the same face, the same voice, the one right beside you in the waking world. You sometimes wonder if he has the same feelings, the same dreams, the same sense of something greater than yourselves at work, the sense of being just smaller pieces in a much bigger picture.

The sense of permanency, that each other is all there will ever be -- regardless of how it makes you feel, regardless of how that scares you, sometimes you feel like you can never be free. Sometimes, when you think of running away, those dark moments when you think of even escaping from life itself, it feels futile. It's as if you know it would never hold him away forever. As if death is insignificant. Perhaps in this lifetime, you'll become aware of why that is, or perhaps not.

With other obsessive lovers, just the idea of til death do us part is a terrifying thought. But, for Link, not even death can keep him away from you. Your suffering is already determined by the will of higher power, for the sake of a greater good.

In truth, it’s the goddesses who made him this way intentionally -- it’s designed to ensure your safety, even at the cost of your suffering. Again, for a greater good. Sure, you may live one lifetime to the next desperately locked in the same cycle in which your freedom and will is stripped from you, but in the end, it serves a purpose.

Nor will he change -- perhaps this one this time is a bit more spirited, more calm, more pessimistic, more optimistic... but in the end, at their core, they're the same soul, with the same will deep, deep down. The same drive to find you and protect you. The same love for you, an all-consuming love that destroys everything in its path to you and leaves ruin in its wake.

And if fate should one day keep you apart, should things change, for whatever reason, it’s unable to change him. There's another force even more powerful than fate determined to keep you together. The only thing more unavoidable, inevitable, and unescapable than fate, is Link himself.

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General perverseness: how sexual of a person are they? What’s their drive like? How touchy do they get? Do they have any reservations about sexuality?

In moments of passion, he changes a bit, unlike other more submissive yans who stay consistent in their reverence and desire to please.

You see, after a while, being as lenient and tolerant and flexible and completely devoted as he is... constantly self-sacrificing in so many ways, to you, to Hyrule, to the world... some frustrations build up. It's a big, big bottle of emotion, all tucked away and festering, getting greater and greater and eventually it has to explode somehow.

His reservations and inhibitions fall away. Perhaps a darker, more selfish side comes out. Perhaps that's why he's so rough. He knows he'll regret it later, the bruises from how hard he grips, the marks from the bites, but the hormones and the heat takes over. He'll feel bad for defiling you. He'll apologize. And he'll do it again. And again. And again.

But once the resolve crumbles, it topples. That is, he can't partially maintain it -- if it's partially gone, it falls apart completely. He lets go, so to speak. And when he lets go, you find that underneath that carefully constructed resolve and willpower that holds him back, he can be a very, very rough and possessive lover. In his normal state, he wouldn't dare think of you as a possession, or as something he's even worthy of. He would like so, so much to think that, to feel like he's allowed to -- but he doesn't. He chastises himself for even having such a desire. But in those moments, when his resolve is gone and his brain isn't thinking quite too clearly, he might even have to audacity to say "mine." Even if it's not true, not now, maybe it will be. He would like that so much. His and his alone.

And in a moment of clarity, he might even throw away the inhibition on purpose. The more selfish side, the same Link that drags you away from your destiny -- he's already forsaken his responsibilities, hasn't he? Why care anymore about the structures that no longer exist, your status and his, if there's no kingdom left? He likes that it happened, even. This way, this time, you can throw off those titles, those roles. Without your status, your title, there's nothing stopping him from making you his. And you will be his, and nothing more. It's all you need to be. So he doesn't have to care anymore about any of that, he doesn't have to stop himself from going wild. Biting into every little spare patch of skin, covering your body with marks that make him feel comforted to see.

As far as drive it's a bit of a two-sided duality. Outwardly he's not a very sexual person at all, blushes and stutters and averts his gaze at the slightest mention of suggestive topics, tries his best to be Respectful(tm) by always looking away when you're in a compromising position, or your skirt flies up, etc etc. Given how constant his vigilance is, he has a tendency to accidentally walk in on your changing or bathing, except unlike with many yanderes, it's genuinely an accident. Not that the image doesn't stick in his mind, nor does he wish he hadn't gotten to see, but he does feel guilty, and it was genuinely unintentional. He kinda freezes up, so it takes a moment for him to actually snap out of it and run out.

That being said, he quickly develops something of a masturbation addiction when he's younger, it starts as more of a stress reliever than anything, He's so sweet and always feels bad about talking about his problems and feelings, so that and, well, violence are the only ways he can get it out. Thus he learns to channel stress and nerves into sexuality, and once he has a real living body and not just his hand, that dependency on cumming to relieve it doesn't change.

How forceful are they? Do they care about your willingness?

Particularly so, yes, cares quite a bit. And it takes a while for him to feel comfortable. Even consensually, the first few times he touches you for several months, he's got trembling hands and stays quieter than ever, constantly freezes up every time you move or make a noise because he thinks he's done something wrong. He has to be coaxed into feeling more comfortable before he gets used to it, but he will build confidence over time.

As addressed before, though, if he's pushed and pushed and pushed long enough, you can get a darker side to come out. This is most likely something that would only occur post-kidnapping in a distant time, once he's far away from any possibility of consequence and destruction has set in to the world around you. He starts to get a little bitter, if you've been mean to him. It all builds up. Don't you get that he's literally saved your life? That he devoted every waking second to you? Isn't he kinda entitled to some thanks? The cycle of time never rewards him. Even the figures he helps over time rarely give him more than a verbal praise and thanks, maybe an item here or there, and then disappear. His role feels thankless. He starts to feel like he deserves something, something tangible, in return.

Surprisingly, though, he actually does not take the route of guilt-tripping or emotional manipulation or gaslighting his way into it like a lot of the sweeter yanderes when he does have that snap. His snaps/breakdowns are rather extreme in terms of how much of a polar opposite they are to his normal state, rather than just a slight bend of his normal personality. Rather than taking the route of most yanderes like himself, he just gets directly physically forceful. Still somewhat sweet, though, reminds you he loves you, he'd die for you, you're his entire world. You'd argue that doesn't really change the actions, but considering how frightening he is in that state, you're not dumb enough to vocalize that.

The guilt consumes him alive afterwards. Like, immediately afterwards. He's still panting and twitching and buried inside when it sets in. That being said, he doesn't get to stuttering and profusely apologizing, like he does over smaller offenses. It's all done and he can't take it back, so he just kinda collapses and says nothing. He's not the best with words, you know. It's an odd mixture of guilt and, honestly, a bit of satisfaction and relief. It feels like letting go of some self-imposed burden, that feeling of finally surrendering to some deep want, even if it comes with a lot of remorse, the relief of finally letting go does have a good feeling as well... and because of that, it’s another one of those barriers that, once broken, can’t be built up again.

What sort of kinks or fetishes do they have, or would they fill?

In all honesty the boy is, for the most part, a fairly gentle and vanilla lover. He doesn't really need anything special to get off -- he's easily excited and cums very very easily too. Just the prospect of getting to stick his dick in you in any capacity is enough to make him nearly burst at the thought honestly.

In general, as aforementioned, he's very very cautious and gentle to a point, but has a tendency to get actually kinda rough once he gets into it. The thing is, the roughness aspect is actually unintentional. He's one of those boys that is a little bit unaware of his own strength, doesn't process exactly how hard and fast he's going. He just gets lost in the feeling, kinda enters a dazed lusty haze where he's less aware of his actions. Doesn't realize he's literally got an iron grip pressing your head down on his dick or into the bed until you start flailing your hands because you can't breathe. Doesn't realize how hard he was gripping until he sees the bruises on your arms and hips later. That sort of deal -- poor thing is just unaware and doesn't have enough blood in his brain to think straight.

Biting

Surprisingly a really big one for him. (Remnants of a past life cycle with some lupine experiences perhaps?) In all seriousness, he could not explain exactly why if asked, it's one of those "I just like it" sort of things. It feels like yet another way to conjoin the two bodies, pulls you close. The marking aspect is also nice. Granted, he feels guilty afterwards, tries to help it heal. He has that same duality where moments ago he was this intimidating beast of a human being, rough and growly and jerking you like you were weightless, and now he's back to this bright eyed softie stuttering while he apologizes.

The guilt is mixed with a bit of enjoyment, though. It's constantly conflicting -- sure, part of him understands it's embarrassing and will help you cover up, but part of him doesn't want to, he wants people to see. Part of him looks at the marks and tells himself internally to never do that again, and part of him sees them and just wants to give you even more. It's a constant internal conflict, poor thing.

As far as a place, he likes the neck and shoulders best, simply because it's the most visible and it's the most passionate ones to create, when your bodies are tightly locked together. That being said, though, he also has a thing for biting at the insides of your thighs. It's another one of those I just like it sort of things.

Sometimes, when you're asleep, or pretending to be, you can feel him trace the bite marks with his fingers, softly running them over the circular pattern, just enough to barely ghost over your flesh.

Somnophilia

It puts him at ease. This one is particularly prevalent towards the beginning of your relationship, before you really know... how he is. He has this image of you as so pure and he couldn't bear the thought of defiling you with his horrible horrible thoughts. The guilt eats away at him for a while, but eventually he just can't hold back, but how could he ever do anything to you and risk consequence? So... the solution he comes up with is waiting until you sleep.

He tests the waters to see how heavy of a sleeper you are. Calls your name at increasing volume, lightly runs his fingers over your hair, pokes your face, whispers in your ear, runs his hands over your arms. Just to see what makes you rustle, if anything, so he knows the limits. If it turns out you're an incredibly light sleeper, well, unfortunately that means he's limited to just jerking off to your sleeping form, but that's ok. Just seeing your soft face and the cute way you breathe, the slightest way your lips open, that's enough for him.

If it turns out you're a heavier sleeper though, well, he tries to fight the temptation, but ends up going further. Slowly climbs onto your bed, careful to make the weight shift as gently as possible. Slowly pulls the covers back. Runs his hands up and down. It's a lot better when he can actually see your body as he jerks off, honestly. If he's feeling particularly risky, he might press your thighs together, feel how soft your skin is to his cock, how nice the squeezing pressure between them is.

He gets easily lost in a haze, though, so he inevitably ends up accidentally cumming on you and has to frantically find a way to lightly dab it up without waking you. He panics quite a bit, but that doesn't stop him from doing it again the very next night.

Overstimulation/Forced Orgasm

It just means he's doing a good job, really. Sure, you squeal and kick your feet back and forth and tug at his hair, but that's just because it feels good. Orgasms equate to love and feel good, right? Sure there's a little bit of pain when you go overboard, but then it just leads to feeling even better, right?

It's kind of an irrational compulsion rather than a logical goal, though. He just has an impulsive need to feel you quiver and spasm and clench, it basically gives him a chemical high hit and a wave of reassurance, makes him feel good in both the physical sense and the emotional sense. The first one sends him into this compulsive need to feel it over and over and over again, as many times as he can. It's another one of his internal conflict things -- sure, he knows it's hurting, but he just has to get one more. Just one more. But of course, every time turns into "just one more" when he's been saying that for half an hour now.

And, to be honest, it kind of gives him a pride boost to think he can make you cum against your will. How many people struggle to achieve that even when both parties are trying? It makes him feel good in an adequacy sort of way, he feels needed.

Size Kink/Distension

You know, there's a well-known thing among the male-lovers in this world when it comes to size. It's never the arrogant, loud guys, it's never the social butterflies, it's never the tall guys, it's never the beefy muscly guys. No, they're not the ones that end up somehow bestowed with absolute monster cocks. It's always the soft, lean boys who don't talk much. And they're always painfully unaware of it, too.

He's no exception. Not to the size or the complete lack of awareness. He hasn't spent a lot of time around guys his age too much, he's always been the one sent for some special task and ends up out in the wilderness by himself on journeys, or, in some lifetimes, accompanying you most of the time. He doesn't know what the average dick looks like, so he has no idea he's far above average.

This might sound like a plus, and of course in some ways it is, but also he doesn't think about the fact that the average body isn't properly equipped to handle it. You're supposed to just kinda put it in, that's how the sex works, right? Poor thing, especially if it's entirely consensual sex, he's just kinda ???? because why are you in pain? What is he doing wrong? You have to eventually explain it's literally just his body, not something he's doing.

That being said, naturally, he's a humble person, but hearing you say that does kinda... make him feel good inside. A little bit proud. He's not a person who takes a lot of pride in many things, so he likes having this one thing, and quickly notices you can visibly see it through the bulge it makes in your stomach. Especially if it's in a position where your back is pressed to his front, every little movement creates the bulge, so expect to get a lot of that.

He doesn't really bring it up much or talk about it when he's actually fucking you, it's more like, as with many things, something he's quietly aware of and silently enjoys a lot internally, even if it's not voiced.

How do they feel about pregnancy or babies? Do they want them?

Yes and no. It has to do with his overactive protection instinct. What if something happened or went wrong? He couldn't take that. He couldn't lose you.

At the same time, he likes kids, and he's very good with them, very patient. And over time, realizes that a kid would be the perfect tool of manipulation, and besides that, isn't it a beautiful thing, an ultimate manifestation of love?

So how to work around that... Ultimately, what he decides to do is have a kid... Just not by blood. There are plenty of orphans in Hyrule, wandering the streets and the wilderness, picking one up is easy. ...You wouldn't leave this poor child to suffer out there, to fend for themselves, would you? Nor would you leave him to take care of it by himself... Right?

What kind of (nsfw) punishments would they use?

Oh, it's not like he thinks of it that way. He would call it... a reminder. You put yourself in danger again? You tried to go back again? You were gone and for ten whole minutes he didn't know where you were? What could the solution to this issue be? The only thing his brain can really come up with is making sure you need him. Making sure you're content and satisfied here with him so you don't go running off.

Thus we return to the forced orgasm thing -- see, you do need him. It feels good, right? You say it hurts, and maybe it does a little, but ultimately you wouldn't be cumming if it wasn't good. No one else can ever do that. No one else knows you like this. No one else was made for you like this. You can't replace him. You need him. And he can keep going as many times as it takes until you see that, too. Even if he gets milked dry, he has a mouth and hands for a reason.

And by "until you see that," I mean until you say it. In his more... emotionally intense moments, he gets a bit insistent. He needs to hear you say it. Admit it to yourself. And to him. That you need him, that you depend on him, that you'll never leave again. And don't think your patience and tolerance can stand a chance of outlasting his -- it will keep going until you say it.

What body parts of their darling do they like the most?

He's one of those wholesome type of boys who goes with something sweet. He says maybe your hair, your face, your skin, your eyes. It's all so comforting. So familiar. Of course, not to say that he doesn't like your less wholesome mentionable parts, but he wants to be chivalric about such a question, and feels answering that way would be too disrespectful.

In his unspoken thoughts, though, he likes the hips. It's a part of you he can grab onto and hold you close with. He puts his hands there a lot and holds tight, like he feels like at any moment you could slip out of his grasp. And, I mean, it's nice to look at, can't forget that.

#atml #scheduled post #yandere x reader #yandere legend of zelda #yandere link

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the-haunted-office · 2 years ago

Note

"Well, I mean-" she starts and then losing track of where to go with it, so she ends up dropping it altogether.

As An steps past her, she goes ahead and changes into pretty much what An described - a t-shit and shorts. It's what she would have worn while alive and so figures there isn't anything wrong with it. It does make her feel a little bit more self-conscious, considering her skin pretty much looks like wet paper and is somewhat translucent. The process of changing isn't done by literally removing one set of clothes and slipping on another, although she could do that. It's instead done just by the clothes morphing themselves into the t-shirt and shorts. Much easier to do things that way and it's done within a couple of seconds.

As soon as they're both through the portal, she closes it. "Just a bit of exploring. There are a lot of gateways here," she says, picking up one of the smooth round colorful orbs and showing it to her. Its perfectly smooth and semi-transparent, and shines brightly as the sunlight hits it. "It's sea glass. You ever seen any before? It's kinda neat - just pieces of glass left behind by people that has been tossed about in the waves for so long it's all smooth and looks like jewels almost."

Doom hands over the piece and picks up another. There are also plenty of seashells and bits of seaweed and driftwood and other human artifacts that washed ashore long ago. Twisted pieces of metal. Several busted old car tires. A shopping cart with three of its wheels missing. What looks like the remains of a refrigerator. Most of the unsightly objects have been pushed aside, leaving a clearing of just the sand and sea glass and seaweed. It's clear that she's been here before and had cleaned it up a bit.

"So, yeah, there's the ocean," she says, gesturing needlessly at the warm water lapping at the shore. "Oh, I should probably tell you - don't worry about wildlife like sharks and things. I can see where they all are and there's nothing over here but some like, little crabs and fish and things like that. They wouldn't dare try to take a bite out of you. That's my job, eh?" The ghost grins.

At this point Doom is sort of starting to feel that she might be able to get away with anything. She can disappear for as long as she wants, do what she wants, destroy what she wants, and never get even a sideways glance about any of it - except from Cyrus, but that's his default setting and so he doesn't count. She doesn't quite know how to react to that, so she pushes it all away to examine later. Besides, there's been enough bullshit going on lately - why should she need to spend every minute of every day agonizing over it? Nobody else does.

She's just about ready to open up a portal to transport them directly to some beach she found while out exploring when An mentions bringing a bathing suit. She may say it's not to fluster her, but the ghost can't help but be flustered anyway, because now she's wondering if she should wear one too. Even when she was alive she didn't have much confidence in her own appearance.

"Heck yeah, let's g-ooohhhhhkay, sure! I mean, ah, you can wear whatever you like, right? I don't get to dictate that," she says, eyes glowing a little brighter. She goes ahead and opens up the portal anyway, through the other side of which you can see a beautiful white sand beach that's speckled with all manner of colorful orb-like shapes. "Suppose that means I'll be needing to wear one too, ahahaha, not that I need to or anything because like, water doesn't actually make me wet, right?"

Doom stands there and holds the portal open, waiting for An to walk through first like she's holding a door for her.

#eyes of mercy

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whumpzone · 3 years ago

Text

Lost Property - 24

(masterpost)

Previous - Next

CW: dehumanisation, pet whump

Lydia had ordered room service. Having breakfast among all the other people in the restaurant seemed like it might be needlessly stressful for Colton after last night’s drama. Sitting in the armchair next to the window she crunched down on a fruit salad with apple, pineapple and melon. Surreptitiously glancing over, Lydia was gratified to see that the pet was eating, too. Col was taking quick, slightly nervous bites, but when he caught her looking at him, he didn’t immediately look down.

“What do you think?” She asked. “Do you like it?”

His lips quirked up into a tiny smile, just for a moment, before Col ducked his head.

“Yes, Ma’am. It… it is very good.”

“I’m glad.”

She fell silent, hesitating. The way Linden had talked of Colton last night, it sounded as if he was as fragile as overnight ice. As if he wore only the thinnest coating of control over internal chaos. His owner had thought that only being in the presence of strangers at the conference would have been enough to tip him over the brink.

Judging by the hysterically crying man in her lap last night, Linden could very well be right. Heaven knew that she herself had made plenty of decisions to shelter Coriander from the world around, even when those decisions were made above his head, with Cory having no say. And yet…

And yet, the man she had glimpsed earlier last night, defending her. That had been no shrinking violet that should be kept wrapped up in cotton wool for their own safety. Maybe a somewhat challenging, but pleasant, outing was just what he needed today. Lydia made up her mind, she would at least give him the chance to choose.

“Col, I would like to ask you something.”

“I would like to ask you something…” That was normally a bad thing. A question would require a reply and that reply could be wrong - or factually correct, but not the reply the person wanted to hear. A pet could get in trouble either way. Still, the wave of familiar anxiety didn’t rise quite as high as it should have. Col found that he was able to focus on Lydia’s explanation.

Questions were normally a bad thing- but Lydia wasn’t a normal pet owner, was she?

“We need to work for a couple of hours in the morning, but we have the rest of the day free.” She said, her warm brown eyes on him. “I had an idea for an excursion. To be honest, I thought that it might be a bit too much for you and I was thinking that we just shouldn’t go. But after last night…” Lydia gave him a wry smile. That smile and the impressed tone in her voice made Col’s heart flutter with warm pride. She thought that he had been good! “… after last night, I’m beginning to think that there’s probably not much that you can’t handle.”

“I was thinking of going for a bit of a hike at a nature reserve nearby. It is supposed to be fair weather today and the area itself is said to be very beautiful. If you want, we could go there. But we don’t have to. It is up to you.” She nodded her head, earnestly. “I can go there another time, so you don’t have to worry about that. We should do something that you want to do.”

Silence filled the room for a few seconds as Col wrapped his head around the many confusing questions. Questions that he knew a pet shouldn’t be asked, even though it seemed to keep happening. But, in a way, it was another similarity with Master, and that was comforting.

“I don’t… have wants,” he started hesitantly, and Lydia watched him neutrally, letting him continue. “I am happy to accompany you in anything you wish. But a walk would be - would be nice, Ma’am.”

He watched her face, dreading the slightest indication that his answer wasn’t the right one, but she only smiled in that sweet way of hers. “That’s great, Col. Thank you for choosing. I was going to take Coriander originally, as a surprise, but now I’m excited to see how you find it.”

She would have taken Cory? So, this was a thing pets could do? A high-end pet like that engaging in the same activity made Col feel far better about the whole thing. He wouldn’t start forgetting his place, of course, but Col must be doing something right to be worthy of replacing Coriander on an activity where Lydia could have easily just left him in the hotel.

He summoned his courage and gave Lydia a quick smile, then bowed his head. This could be nice, he told himself. I’ll do my best at it.

There was a crush of people passing by in front of their table. The din of conversation, chairs scraping and music playing was too loud for comfort. Colton could feel his pulse ticking faster than usual at the side of his throat, the muscles between his shoulder blades involuntary tense, his whole body ready to switch into fight or flight. But he wasn’t panicking, not yet.

One thing that made him feel safer was that they were sitting in a square of floor space hemmed in by tables. On both his left and right side, tables full of books kept the browsing visitors at bay. It was strangely familiar, almost like being inside a cage, where you knew that the people outside the bars couldn’t reach you unless they unlocked the door.

Another thing to hold on to was that Lydia was sitting diagonally in front of him. There was a table just in front of her heaped high with books and other merchandise and she was smiling and talking easily and cheerfully with the prospective customers.

A third thing was that he had been given a task. Every now and then, Lydia took a paper bag from underneath the table and handed it to a customer. When that happened, Colton was supposed to take an empty paper bag and fill it with three books from piles just in front of him, one with a red cover, one in black and white and the third blue. Just one of each, place them all inside the bag, and put the bag on the floor below the table. It was a simple task, easy to do even with his clumsy hands. Every now and then, Lydia gave him a smile or a nod, lighting a little bit of warm pride in his chest. He was being a good dog, a helpful one. That almost made the stress of the occasion worth it.

Almost.

taglist part 1:

@cupcakes-and-pain @whump-em @wh-wh-whu @neuro-whump @carnagecardinal @cowboy-anon @whump-me-all-night-long @redwingedwhump @myst-in-the-mirror @haro-whumps @eatyourdamnpears @bloodsweatandpotato @pinkraindropsfell @whumptywhumpdump @theydy-cringeworthy @whump-in-progress @whumpsy-daisy @nicolepascaline @whumpcreations @briars7 @shiningstarofwinter @whumppsychology @alex-ember @miss-kitty-whumptastic @whumpy-writings @in-patient-princess @youtube-fandoms-bands @goblinchildindabog @mazeish @distinctlywhumpthing @inpainandsuffering @canniboylism @incoherent-introspection @kim-poce @broken-typewriter @the-monarch-whumperfly @whumpers-inc @grizzlie70 @lil-whumper @writingbackwards @sunflower1000 @wingedwhump @thecitythatdoesntsleep @thingsthatgo-whump-inthenight @onlybadendings @rabass @wolfeyedwitch @melancholy-in-the-morning

#hes doing better!! :)#hes doing better and plans are being made #lost property #lydia and linden #pet whump

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bitsandbobsofwriting · 3 years ago

Text

Twin!AU Part 3:

Hunith and Uther alike have to face the consequences of their actions, Merlin (and everyone, really) decides that family doesn’t end in blood.

Part 1 Part 2

TW: Suicidal ideation (mostly past, but it sort of... flairs up a little here I guess)

Hunith’s face falls and she physically recoils at Merlin’s harsh declaration.

His hard gaze doesn’t leave her, even as she glances at Arthur, a little behind Merlin and to his side. The blonde has his gaze fixed on Hunith, but he looks away the moment they make eye contact, unable to stand the confused pain in her expression:

“Merlin? What happened?”

Lancelot and Percival approach slowly after handing the horses off to a couple of stablehands, and Gwaine puts his hand on Merlin’s shoulder, not that The Warlock notices; he clenches his jaw tightly before speaking, but continues resisting the urge to look away:

“You lied to me. About everything.”

Hunith’s eyes go wide and she gulps, opening her mouth and shutting it again as she struggles to think of a response. It’s then that Merlin finally looks away, gazing over the top of her head at the empty courtyard. Arthur quietly intervenes, his authoritative voice full of warring emotions despite it’s low volume:

“We should take this somewhere more private.”

Merlin doesn’t even nod, just turns around and walks back towards the castle, hands clenched tightly at his side before he pushes the doors open and stalks in without looking back. Gwaine and Arthur share a concerned look before the older knight rushes after him. Arthur gestures for Hunith to go first, but not without stopping her with a hand on her shoulder, and a muttered, almost teary:

“You had no right.”

Her face falls even further, but The Regent steps back and looks away before she can reply, and she timidly hurries through the door after Merlin and Gwaine. Arthur gives Lancelot and Percival a pointed look:

“I imagine we’ll be in my chambers, make sure we are undisturbed. I don’t want anyone interrupting unless the world is about to end. Let Leon and Morgana know that they can take charge of any meetings today.”

They both nod, but Lancelot jogs up the steps to stop Arthur before he can leave:

“I... know what she did was wrong, but don’t let Merlin be too harsh. He’s always been close to his mother, he’ll regret it later if he pushes her away completely.”

Arthur almost snaps out something about how Hunith isn’t Merlin’s mother, but he keeps it to himself, sighing and nodding:

“Yeah, I know, but she... she needs to know what this has done to him, how much he’s suffered needlessly because of this. There isn’t... I know she probably just did what she thought was right but... she needs to know. Merlin deserves an apology, and he certainly deserves the truth.”

Lancelot nods hesitatingly, but doesn’t say anything else, stepping aside to allow The Regent through. He catches up to the others just as Merlin slams the door open to his chambers, continuing to not look back as he heads over to the large dining table, leaning his hand against the back of one of the chairs and staring towards the window.

Gwaine and Arthur approach slowly, standing either side of him but not touching him as they wait in suspense for someone to start the conversation. Hunith already has tears in her eyes as she stands on the other side of the table, trying and failing to get Merlin to look at her. The harsh glare he laid on her before was horrific, but this... him being unable to look at her at all, that is worse:

“Merlin, please, I only did what-”

She’s cut off by Merlin’s harsh instruction:

“Sit.”

She glances to Arthur once more, but he just nods wordlessly at the chair in front of her; the only sounds in the room are the scraping of the chair on the stone floor and Merlin’s laboured breathing. He was evidently trying very hard to hold his anger in, and when he says nothing more once she’s sat down, Gwaine puts his hand back on his shoulder. He shrugs it off, finally turning to face Hunith but remaining unable to look in her eyes:

“Why?”

A tears slips loose from her eye and she sniffles, taking a deep, shaky breath and fiddling with her hands on the table. Arthur absent-mindedly wonders if Merlin would still do that too if he’d been raised with his actual family, if it was natural, or if he’d picked it up from her:

“Please, Merlin, I’m so sorry, I didn’t-”

Merlin takes in a sharp breath, tightening his gip on the chair in a way that looks painful, shaking his head:

“No. No apologies, no excuses. I want to know exactly why you lied to me, why you took this from me.”

His voice is deadly in a quiet kind of way, like he could snap clean in two and set the world alight at any moment. Gwaine looks worriedly between the other two men, clearly thinking on the same lines as Lancelot, but neither of them notice, Merlin’s gaze stuck to the table and Arthur’s stuck on Hunith:

“I would have told you one day, Merlin, you-”

Merlin finally looks up at her, the blazing fury in his eyes contrasting in a rather horrific manner with the steady stream of tears on his cheeks:

“One day when? Arthur’s known about my magic for ages. I’ve been in Camelot for years, you have had every opportunity.”

Hunith lets out a low sob, but doesn’t look away:

“I didn’t think you were ready, Mer-”

Merlin bites his lip and turns away, running his hands through his hair harshly before turning around again, quick as lightening, and pointing an accusing finger at her:

“No, you weren’t ready! You weren’t ready to face the fact that you lied to me about who I am, because you knew you had no right, because you knew I would be angry!”

Hunith stands, but doesn’t make any moves to approach Merlin at Arthur’s harsh glare and Gwaine’s worried gesture. He doesn’t think Merlin or Arthur would hurt her, he’d never even consider the idea, but he knows that his partner needs space to be angry:

“I didn’t want you to be upset,-”

Merlin scoffs and lets out a sob of his own, wiping his face harshly before responding loudly:

“Gods, I wonder why I would be upset! Maybe because you lied to me about everything?!-”

Hunith shakes her head desperately, but Merlin carries on without pause:

“-You had no right to keep this from me! I grew up alone, with no one but you to rely on because you made me think I was some kind of beast! Keeping me from Camelot, I understand, keeping it from me as I child even, I understand. But you’ve had years of opportunity, you are selfish, a hypocrite and a coward.-”

Hunith looks horrified at his admission, mainly the sudden reveal at how her treatment of Merlin had effected him independently of the lie:

“-I hated myself, I was terrified, I didn’t want to exist, because of you! You made me think I was some kind of unnatural monster and then you sent me to Gaius under the guise of teaching me control, so he could carry on the lie for you! He promised me I wasn’t a monster, that I wasn’t born evil, over and over, but he’s lied to me from the moment I met him, how am I supposed to trust anything he says?! How am I supposed to trust anything you say when I was just some unwanted, throwaway thing that you never asked for, and got rid of at the earliest opportunity?!-”

Gwaine and Arthur stare at Merlin with matching heartbreak in their expressions; it seems that Merlin is upset at more than just the base lie. The New Prince doesn’t even try to stop the tears, his breathing quick and ragged, and after a few moments of thick silence, he takes a deep breath and quietly continues:

“-I didn’t have to be so alone, that was all you, and Gaius, and Kilgharrah, and everyone else who lied to me. When I had nothing, I had you, and you lied to me.-”

Merlin’s voice cracks, his breathing shaky and his face pale as his entire world seemingly crumbles down around him:

“-You took my brother from me and you had no right. You’re not my mother, you’re just as bad as Uther.”

With those last words, he storms from the room, Gwaine hot on his heels. Arthur stays however, feeling the need to comfort the crying woman, but also feeling, maybe slightly cruelly, that she deserves this. He sighs, pushing the though from his mind and moving around to put a hand on her shoulder as she buries her face in her hands, sobbing:

“I... you did your best, I think he knows that, but that doesn’t change what you took from him, from both of us. He needs time.”

She just about manages a nod, and Arthur sighs again, standing awkwardly for a few minutes before he realises she isn’t going to stop any time soon. He gently pushes her to sit back in the chair before heading to the door, following Gwaine and Merlin.

They’re not in the corridor when he shuts the door behind him, but he’s not surprised at that. Merlin has always been private about his true emotions, always kept them close to his chest, he wouldn’t want anyone to see him having a breakdown in the middle of the hall. Months ago, Arthur would have thought it was left over fear of his magic being discovered, but now he bitterly thinks that it probably has more to do with the way he was raised.

He runs a hand through his hair, sparing a glance to the—previously unnoticed—worried looking guards. Thankfully, they were two of the men that had been trusted with the truth (Arthur reminds himself to thank Leon later for paying attention to who was stationed where), so Arthur isn’t too worried at the fact that they had likely overheard the one-sided yelling match. He fixes them with a commanding stare and clears his throat:

“Escort the Lady Hunith to the physician’s chambers when she emerges, leave her with Gaius, but don’t rush her.-”

They bow briefly in acknowledgement of his orders, and his question comes out quietly:

“-Do you know where they went?”

They needn’t ask who, and one of the guards answers lowly, matching Arthur’s volume:

“I think they headed to Sir Gwaine’s chambers, Sire.”

He nods and mutters a quiet thank you, slowly heading in that direction, knowing he had to go see them but also wanting to give them few extra minutes of privacy. They still had a lot to take care of, they’d missed several council meetings over the last few days, and whilst Arthur trusts Leon and Morgana to keep things rolling, he really should be making regular appearances. That, and they still haven’t dealt with Uther; to be perfectly honest, Arthur is surprised that rumours haven’t started spreading about The King’s disappearance and Arthur’s sudden growth of responsibilities, but he’s grateful. Don’t look a gift Griffin in the mouth or... something.

He finally stops outside the knight’s room—nodding at Lance who wordlessly stands guard in the corridor—before flinching at the quiet crying he can hear from inside. He knocks a few times softly before entering, shutting the door behind him and approaching the bed. Gwaine sits leant against the headboard, tears in his eyes as he holds a shaking Merlin in his arms. The Warlock lays besides Gwaine, in the middle of the bed, his face buried in the knight’s chest and his hands twisted into the fabric of his tunic.

Arthur lets out a deep, mournful breath at the sight of his brother so distraught, and he moves around to the other side of the bed, raising his eyebrow in question at Gwaine and settling next to Merlin at his singular nod. Merlin doesn’t seem to notice his presence, not until Arthur settles a hand on his back and whispers his name. He instantly calms a little, and Gwaine mentally scolds himself for the slight flair of jealousy; Merlin had discovered he has a brother, that his best friend is his brother, it’s no surprise that he calms easier in his presence, especially considering the reveal unburied so much hidden trauma.

After a few more minutes, Merlin turns to be laying on his back, though he makes sure to stay in Gwaine’s embrace. The knight leans down to press a kiss to the top of his head, and though he can’t see it, he can almost feel the slight smile on The Warlock’s face. Arthur moves his hand back to his lap, looking at the two of them out of the corner of his eye; he sees nothing but worry and utter adoration on Gwaine’s face, and he wonders just how he hadn’t approved of their relationship. Gwaine’s whispered words just solidify Arthur’s newfound belief in the man:

“I love you, Merls, no matter what.”

Merlin lets out a quiet, choked laugh, and Gwaine considers that a win, even more so when Merlin responds in kind:

“I love you.”

Despite their relationship not being a particularly new thing, Arthur hadn’t even considered the possibility that they’d reached that far, that their partnership was that solid; perhaps that had something to do with their general lack of PDA, which he had always wondered how Gwaine had put up with. He grimaces with a quiet realisation, but it catches Merlin’s gaze and he raises a questioning eyebrow, his tears thankfully dried. Arthur glances up at Gwaine, who smirks at him knowingly, before looking back down to his brother:

“Making you Crown Prince is something I’m actually quite looking forward to, but I’m going to have to crown Gwaine as well.”

Gwaine snorts in amusement but Merlin turns pink and coughs slightly:

“Well.. we haven’t really discussed marriage, Arthur.”

Arthur looks to him with an apologetic expression:

“Merlin, royals have different courting rules. Royal partnerships tend to be incredibly short before a marriage has to happen. Back when me and Gwen were courting, we hid not only because Uther wouldn’t have approved, but also because we didn’t want to rush things. I’m especially glad we did now, otherwise we would have had to be married by now. The whole kingdom know that you two have been together for at least a year, the moment you’re crowned...”

His voice trails off as he comes to a second, horrifying realisation. He stands from the bed and stares at Gwaine with wide eyes and a pale face:

“Oh my God. Oh my God. If neither me, you, or Morgana have children... once you two have been married... Gwaine will officially be third in line for the throne. Oh... fuck.”

Merlin and Gwaine freeze for just a moment before they burst into loud laughter, and Arthur shakes his head, pacing slightly and not paying attention to the knocking at the door. Lancelot walks in slowly, an amused smile of his face despite his confusion:

“Do I even want to ask?”

Arthur fixes him with an almost distraught gaze before glaring half-heartedly at Merlin:

“Why? Why couldn’t it have been Leon, or Lancelot?? Elyan or Percival?? Hell, I would have been happier with fucking George.”

Gwaine’s laughter gets even louder but Merlin calmly wipes the tears (of laughter, thankfully) from his face and looks to Lancelot with bitten lips and held in hysterics:

“Arthur just realised that once all the crowning ceremonies happen, Gwaine will be third in line for the throne, if I’m the last one to die and there aren’t any children.”

Lance’s eyes go wide and he clamps a hand over his moth in a poor attempt to hold in his laughter. He fails miserably, bursting just like Gwaine and Merlin had moments earlier. Arthur fixes an annoyed glare on him and waves a desperate hand:

“This is not funny.”

Gwaine just shakes his head as he finally manages to calm himself, wiping his face clean and sitting up straight, one hand still on Merlin’s shoulder:

“It’s hilarious, Princess. God imagine Geoffrey’s face. Imagine the council.”

Arthur just takes a deep breath and looks to the ceiling again:

“Fuck. Ok, alright, whatever. That is a problem for another time.-”

He looks back down to Merlin with an apologetic smile, after shooting one last withering glare at a still-smirking Gwaine:

“-You feeling up to council? I’ve missed a fair few, and I think it might be a good idea for you two to start making appearances as well. That and... as much as we’ve told them you have magic, it might be worth showing it off a little.-”

At Merlin’s wide, fearful eyes, Arthur holds his hands out placatingly and hurries to continue:

“-You don’t have to, but they're working on the ban repeal. Obviously not anything huge, but passing jugs or paper or whatever with magic might help desensitise them to the idea. Plus, now that you’re semi-officially royalty, and you have Gwaine or Leon trailing you almost everywhere, no one would dare attack you. And if they do, you have every right to defend yourself in whatever capacity you deem necessary.”

At Merlin’s still nervous face, Lancelot quickly tacks on:

“And they all know that Arthur would go ape-shit if anything were to happen to you.”

Arthur gestures at the knight and nods in agreement, nodding further at Gwaine’s quiet “He’s not the only one.” . Merlin takes a deep breath and shuffles off the bed, standing and straightening his clothes out with unsteady hands:

“Let’s go. You’re right, I’m going to have to get used to stupid council meetings at some point if you’re insisting on crowning me, might as well be now.”

Arthur and Lancelot smile proudly and Gwaine moves to stand at his side, straightening his own clothes before running his hands through Merlin’s hair, flattening and neatening it. Merlin stands still and lets himself be assessed and fixed with a soft smile on his face, and Arthur feels almost as if he were intruding on something personal and domestic, even more so than when they were professing their love for each other; he looks away awkwardly and Lancelot raises an amused eyebrow at him.

The four of them finally exit the room, Arthur and Merlin falling into step besides each other, Gwaine slightly behind them, and Lancelot trailing the three of them with his face pulled into a blank mask and his hand on his sword.

This time, there is no hesitation before they enter the council room, and no raised eyebrows when Merlin takes his rightful place alongside Arthur at the head of the table. Flanked by Morgana, Leon, Lancelot, and Gwaine, Arthur effortlessly takes control of the meeting, hurrying things along with a proud confidence and an easy authority that was slowly but surely being taken on by his brother, at his side.

The council session lasts for the remainder of the day, and though at least half of the councilmen yelp, Gaius obviously not included, when Merlin first starts floating things about or magically highlighting words or moving the room’s lighting around with a flick of his wrist, most of them are used to it by the time the sun touches the horizon.

Arthur finally calls an end to the meeting when it gets dark. Though he was in a slightly manic mood and desperate to get as much work done as possible now that he was actually free to attend meetings, he could see that the others, Merlin especially, were flagging. He knew it would happen eventually, he can’t imagine The Warlock has been sleeping much, and he definitely came to some sort of private, horrifying conclusion around half a candle-mark ago. The hitch in Merlin’s breath, the widening of his eyes, and the slight, tiny flair of every candle in the room thankfully went unnoticed by everyone bar Arthur, Gwaine, and Lancelot.

When the room empties of councilmen, Merlin stands and paces away from the table, hands fiddling roughly with his sleeves. Arthur waves Morgana and Leon away, thanking them briefly before nodding pointedly at the door. Lancelot follows shortly, and Arthur has half a mind to send Gwaine away as well, but he knows that would be somewhat selfish as the other man approaches his partner’s turned back:

“Merlin? Something wrong? I thought that went remarkably well.”

Merlin’s head turns quickly, his furrowed brows confused:

“What? What went well?”

Gwaine raises an eyebrow, glancing briefly at the neatly stacked paperwork on the table:

“The meeting? About planning your coronation and the legalisation of magic? That we’ve been in all afternoon?”

Merlin untenses slightly, turning around properly and using one hand to rub at his eyes tiredly:

“Oh, yeah right. It did go well. They didn’t freak out too much at my evil sorcery, did they?”

He tries to go for a joking smirk, but it falls flat, and Arthur walks towards him to put a hand on his brother’s shoulder:

“What’s on your mind?”

Merlin sags even more and Arthur quickly steps forward, gathering the suddenly distraught man in a tight hug. Merlin easily accepts, burying his face in Arthur’s neck and clutching the back of his tunic with shaking hands:

“I compared my mother to Uther. I told her it was her fault that I didn’t want to be alive. She’s never going to forgive me.”

Arthur shuts his eyes, stroking a hand through Merlin’s hair and muttering a quiet:

“Oh, Merlin, she loves you more than anything in this world, there’s nothing to forgive.”

Merlin doesn’t look up, but shakes his head roughly; before he can argue, Gwaine steps around the two of them, pressing a kiss to the nape of Merlin’s neck before stepping back and stroking a soft hand over his back:

“What she did was wrong, Merls, you’re allowed to be angry. And now you’re not so angry anymore you can go sit down with her and talk it out, ok? There was no way that first conversation was going to be anything other than difficult and heartbreaking, but you got through it, and now you can sort it out properly.”

Merlin relaxes just a touch, and Arthur gets the disturbing feeling swelling in his gut that Gwaine knew of Merlin’s (hopefully, former) despairs before the whole... twin thing. When The Warlock finally pulls away, he thankfully looks a little more confident, despite the drying tears on his cheeks; Arthur gives him a soft smile and nods towards the door:

“Tonight, or tomorrow?”

Merlin takes a deep, fortifying breath, and walks towards the door purposefully, wiping his face clean before taking Gwaine’s offered hand in his own:

“Tonight, now. I should... I need to talk to Gaius as well. I’ve been unfairly punishing him for long enough, I think.”

Gwaine smiles understandingly, though Arthur, who rushes to catch up and walk on Merlin’s other side, shakes his head with a frown:

“Not unfairly, Merlin. It would be well within your rights to cut them out of your life for the foreseeable future for this. But I also understand wanting to forgive them so you have more... support. They may not be blood, Merlin, but... they are family, and that’s ok.”

Gwaine gives him an annoyed look at his first words, over Merlin’s shoulder, but doesn’t say anything. Merlin stops in the middle of the hallway, suddenly and without warning, and Gwaine grunts slightly when his arm is pulled back. The Warlock spares him an apologetic smile before turning his gaze to Arthur. Arthur raises an eyebrow, but Merlin tilts his head and frowns:

“Arthur you do know that... I consider you family above all others, right? you’re right, family doesn’t have to be blood,-”

He squeezes Gwaine’s hand, almost subconsciously, and receives a gentle squeeze back:

“-but after what we’ve found out, after all of this, all that we’re doing to... fix it, to fix what was done to us... you’re everything, you’re my brother. Me forgiving Hu... my mother, and Gaius, doesn’t change that I trust you above them, I consider you before them. They’re family, but you’re family first.”

Arthur’s eyes widen slightly at Merlin’s stern assertion, but he wills the tears in his eyes to disappear as he nods once, his jaw clenched with emotion. Merlin smirks slightly and rolls his eyes, muttering something about an “emotionally repressed idiot” before pulling him into an eagerly returned hug. Gwaine just snorts at both of them, happily leaning against the wall with crossed arms as he waits. They pull away fairly quickly, hyper aware of the fact that they were in the middle of the corridor, and whilst basically the whole citadel had picked up on the fact that something had changed, is changing, they didn’t want to let on too much until official public announcements were made.

They hurry in their journey to the Physician’s chambers, it was getting late and they wanted to sort this out as soon as possible; Gods know Merlin isn’t going to sleep a wink until he's spoken to his mother again.

They pause momentarily outside the door, taking deep breaths as they attempt to block out the hushed conversations coming from inside, not wanting to eavesdrop. Merlin turns to Gwaine with a nervous frown:

“Would you mind... waiting out here? Just for a minute?”

Gwaine gives him a soft smile and nods, pressing a kiss to his forehead and muttering “Call for me when you want me to come in, alright? I’m not going anywhere.” before giving Arthur an encouraging clap on the shoulder and stepping back to lean against the opposite wall.

Arthur sends a grateful smile the knight’s way, receiving a respectful nod in return, before he turns to the door. After a nod from Merlin, he raises a hand that shakes only slightly, and knocks. The murmured conversations stop immediately, and Gaius’ voice calls out:

“Enter.”

With one last look to each other, the brothers open the door and walk in together, shutting it gently behind them and turning to face the shocked pair. Hunith stares at Merlin with tears in her hopeful eyes, but Gaius quickly clears his throat and stands straight:

“How can I help, My Lords?”

Arthur sighs and Merlin shakes his head at the Physician’s formal address of them, rubbing a tired hand over his eyes before taking a small step forward :

“Don’t... I’m not... just Merlin, please.-”

His voice is quiet and tired, and the pleading tone it takes on deepens Arthur’s frown. He lets out a shaky breath, biting his lip before looking up to Hunith and continuing:

“-I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have yelled. And I didn’t have any right to say those things; you’re... you’re nothing like Uther, and you did your best in a terrifying situation. You didn’t know any better, I shouldn’t blame you for how I turned out.”

Hunith’s tears overflow once again, and she takes in a shuddering breath as she steps hesitatingly towards the Warlock:

“Oh, my boy, you were right. I wasn’t ready to lose you, and I let that fear overcloud my judgement of what I knew to be right. I’m so sorry sweetheart, I should have told you who you were a long time ago, and it wasn’t fair of me to expect Gaius to carry on the lie, especially when you met Arthur, and especially when he found out about your magic.”

With that, Merlin pulls her into a tight hug, height difference be damned as he buries his face in her neck and shakes. Arthur gulps as he looks upon the scene, sharing a small, mournful smile with Gaius, the Physician understanding The Regent’s forgiveness in the small nod of his head. The hug doesn’t last quite as long as Arthur was expecting, though he supposes that forgiveness is more than just saying it aloud, and Merlin still has a great deal of self-worth related issues to get over, thanks to Hunith’s overly cautious raising of the boy. The Warlock clears his throat, his hands still on his mother’s shoulders as he gives her a weak smile:

“Igraine says thank you, by the way, for raising me with so much love.”

Hunith lets out a small chuckle, wiping away Merlin’s tears with soft hands:

“It was my honour, I’m glad that your... mother, is pleased.”

Merlin’s frown is brief, and he responds quickly:

“You’re my mother.”

Hunith’s smile grows, as does Merlin’s and she nods shakily, almost whispering:

“Ok... I... ok.”

Merlin lets go hesitatingly, but turns to Gaius after a moment or two. The Physician quickly interrupts anything the younger man could have said with a shake of his head and a soft smile, pulling him into a hug as he softly speaks:

“It’s alright, my boy. You were well within your rights to be angry, we had no right to lie to you in such a way.”

With Gaius and Merlin’s soft conversation happening to the side of the room, Hunith turns to Arthur with a hopeful smile on her face. He returns it faintly, and she pulls him into his own hug. He stiffens in her hold, wide eyes darting around the room as he clenches his hands at his side. It only takes her stroking a hand through his knotted hair for him to relax and hug her back:

“I’m honoured to have been able to raise your brother, Arthur, and I am sorry for keeping him from you for so long, it was selfish of me. I didn’t consider what you were losing, in not knowing that you weren’t alone, only what I would lose should I tell the truth.”

Arthur gulps and nods, but tightens his hold on her as the tears come to his eyes:

“It’s... ok. I understand, I think. The danger you put yourself in to raise and protect him was immense, I just wished I’d known sooner, so I could have done all of this sooner.”

They pull back, but Hunith keeps a tight hold on Arthur’s shoulders, an assessing frown on her face as she raises a hand to cup his cheek. Arthur leans into it, blushing slightly under her motherly gaze:

“I know. But you’re doing wonderfully, Arthur. You and Merlin will be the saviours of this Kingdom, I’m sure of it. Your mother would be so proud of you.”

A tear slips loose from Arthur’s eye as he harshly bites his lip. His voice comes out small and unsure, and Hunith has to resist the urge to pull him into another hug:

“You think?”

She just smiles and nods instead:

“I’m sure.”

Merlin and Gaius look upon the scene fondly, and Arthur’s blush deepens when he catches them staring. He steps back from Hunith who smirks at him knowingly as he frowns at Merlin:

“Shut up, Merlin.”

He just laughs and shakes his head:

“I always knew you had a soft spot for my mum.”

The Regent shakes his head and rolls his eyes, ignoring Merlin’s continued laughter:

“Either of you eaten? I’m starved.”

Gaius and Hunith’s smiles come a lot easier at that, and they shake their heads. Arthur leads the way out of the chambers, smiling and nodding at Gwaine’s raised eyebrow. The knight returns the smile, quickly sidling up to Merlin and re-taking his hand as Arthur speaks:

“I’ll let the kitchens know to have five meals sent up to my chambers, I’ll see you there in a moment.”

They part ways in the corridor, all of them with easy smiles and lighter hearts, especially when Gwaine eagerly regales his interpretation of Arthur’s reaction to having to crown him.

The next morning was once again tense. Arthur’s assertion late last night that he intended to finally deal with Uther weighs heavy in everyone’s minds.

Hunith and Gaius are once again tucked safely into the Physician’s chambers, and all of the King’s most trusted knights are called to stand guard in the corridor. Merlin and Arthur wear their smart clothes (a suggestion by Morgana that Gwaine thought was funny enough that he begged and begged until Merlin gave in), and they take in with them Leon and Morgana.

Uther looks manic, his hair unkept, his face unshaven. His clothes are clean at least, but they’re rumpled, likely due to the near constant pacing of the former King. The room is dark, the curtains obviously haven’t been opened in several days, but the dim candles highlight the mess throughout the room. Uther may still be being passed meals by the guards, but out of concern for the staff’s safety, no servants were granted access to tidy or otherwise serve.

His head whips around when the door opens, his enraged face turning red at the four people stood smartly by his door. He storms towards them, but Morgana, no longer scared of the consequences, holds a hand out and mutters a few golden words, halting him in his tracks. He apparently hasn’t lost his voice though, as he turns to Merlin:

“WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO MY DAUGHTER?! YOU-”

Merlin rolls his eyes and clicks his fingers, his eyes also turning golden as Uther’s mouth shuts with a clack. Leon manages to hold his smirk in, just stands still as the perfect guard, his hand on the hilt of his sword, but Morgana doesn’t even try, smiling openly. Merlin holds Uther’s furious gaze for a few more moments before looking to Arthur at his side, tilting his head in question. The Regent nods at him before stepping forward, his back straight and his face and voice Kingly:

“You will listen, and you will listen well, because I will not repeat myself. You are the only abomination in this room, and you will live with that for the rest of your days. How long that is, is up to you. I am Regent, soon enough I will be King, Myrddin will be Crown Prince, and Morgana will be Princess; when that happens, magic will finally be fully legalised, and the public will be made aware of your crimes. I will not hide things from my people, not like you have. No matter what you deserve, I struggle to bring myself to sentence you to execution, and you’ll be humiliated to learn, I imagine, that Merlin argued in favour of letting you keep your head when I brought it up.-”

Uther glances angrily at Merlin, but looks back to Arthur when he realises that he’s still incapable of speaking:

“-Therefor your options are as follows: You may go to the summer home on the coast, where you will be under constant guard, but will otherwise have a semi-free life. You will stay in Camelot, but live out the remainder of your days in this room only. Or me and Merlin will take a week long trip away to, say, Nemeth, whilst Princess Morgana and Sir Leon announce, organise, and undergo your execution. You have today to decide, we’ll be back this evening.”

Arthur doesn’t bother waiting for a reaction, turning his back on Uther and gesturing the others to lead the way through the door. He pauses momentarily, one hand on the door frame as he turns back, a mournful frown on his face as he quietly speaks:

“If you had just told the truth, if you had just owned up to making a mistake, you, me, Myrddin, Morgana, we... we could have been a family. You’re the one that ruined that, you’re the one that tore us apart, and I swear to you now, that whatever option you pick, I will never forgive you.”

That only seems to enrage Uther more, but Arthur isn’t quite sure why he bothered to hope for another reaction. He shuts the door behind him, waving at Merlin to reset the magical locks as he sighs and rubs tired hands over his face:

“Well at least that’s over and done with.”

Leon pats him on the shoulder consolingly, and Elyan raises an eyebrow, glancing around at the others and sighing when he realises no one else is going to ask:

“He didn’t take it well then, I’m guessing?”

Arthur takes a deep breath and stands straight, shaking his head. Morgana is the one to answer however, and Arthur appreciates the way she makes a genuine attempt to keep the humour out of her voice:

“No, he wasn’t best pleased, but I think he’s accepted that he has well and truly lost this battle. Something he’s not entirely used to, I suppose.”

The knights nod in understanding, and Merlin lets out a deep breath, tilting his head slightly:

“Weird to think that he’s my... dad... ugh.”

They all chuckle at that, even Arthur, though they all stop with concerned frowns when Merlin suddenly straightens up with wide eyes and an open mouth:

“Oh... my God... how did I...- What?!”

Arthur puts a hand on his shoulder, his frown deepening:

“Merls?”

The Warlock just ignores him, turning to Morgana with still wide eyes:

“You’re my sister! I’ve been focusing so much on how Arthur’s my brother that I didn’t even consider the fact that you’re my sister!”

Morgana takes in a sudden breath, and all bar Leon (who just raises an eyebrow and then rolls his eyes when he realises that he’s the only one unsurprised by this) stare at the two of them in shock. Morgana slowly pulls Merlin into a hug, and the two of them clutch each other tightly as a grin grows on Arthur’s face. Leon gives him another clap on the back, this one more congratulatory (if a little confused. Honestly, how did they miss that?), and the others cheer just as Gwen turns the corner into the corridor. She smiles confusedly at Merlin and Morgana, still hugging, as she sidles up to Leon, whispering:

“What’s the occasion? They find Uther dead?”

Leon laughs but shakes his head, leaning down to mutter his response:

“They only just now figured out that they’re siblings.”

She looks up to him quickly with a disbelieving raise of the eyebrows:

“Wait, just now as in, just now?-”

Leon smirks and nods firmly, and Gwen shakes her head as she laughs:

“-It’s been almost a week.”

Leon laughs as well leaning against the wall as the others chatter excitedly among themselves:

“Yeah, apparently you and I are the only ones who had considered the idea. These are all the smartest people I’ve ever come across...”

He trails off, but Gwen looks up at him with a teasing smirk:

“And yet sometimes...?”

They both laugh quietly, shaking their heads when Percival catches their eyes and tilts his head in question.

The group walks away soon enough, heading to one of the smaller dining rooms for an early lunch and a chance to discuss their intentions for this afternoon’s council meeting. Morgana, Merlin, and Arthur walk together, and conversation flows between all bar Gwaine, who stares at the back of his now betrothed’s head with the quiet adoration and lowly simmering excitement of someone that knew the man he loves is finally getting all that he deserves.

END of Part 3!!!

Part 4 will be VERY short. Will be just about post coronation and public announcement, will probably contain Merwaine’s wedding, some casual magic, some more family bonding.

I hope y’all enjoyed this!!! I wrote it surprisingly quickly once I set my mind to it

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