#and that was all my practice summed together instead of separated out

[obstinatecondolement]

Jazzed up the Google Sheet I use as a music practice log a bit while I was setting it up for December. I actually understand the syntax of the formula I stole off Reddit from someone else's practice spreadsheet now.

[39oa]

(nonsensical hrpf data exercise) degree centrality graphing & other archive insights

intro/prior work

hello 🙇‍♀️ i'm not sure this post will make any kind of sense at all, but i love analyzing ao3 data and i especially find it fascinating in the realm of sports/hrpf because of the amount of player- and team-related attributes that offer dimensionality to fandom analysis when examined in parallel with archive metrics. i've already kind of done hrpf overviews on two separate occasions over the past year or so, but my method of collection differed in each instance and also always gave me new things to chew on and potentially explore, such as expanding on the link between player talent and shippability and whether high-draft picks have more fic written for them on average.

i most recently examined player data based on aggregated relationship counts since 2022, but this was a limited snapshot meant to piece together recent ficdom trends (see top ships since 01/01/22) and not be representative of fandom overall. basically, things i want to visualize/talk about now are:

hockey is so widespread as a sports fandom because there are 32 teams in the league, which when compared to a community like f1 makes it difficult to succinctly summarize primary relationships for. there is no self-contained grid of 20 drivers that remains generally fixed within a season, where every move in/out of that "roster" is highly reported upon and instrumental to fandom makeup, but instead a more amorphous network of malleable rosters featuring high-variance cascading orders of character visibility; in short, the difference between the most and least popular driver in f1 fandom is not the same as the difference between sidney crosby and that one ahl lifer who was called up to your 4th line two months ago because your team is utterly decimated and gunning for bedard.

Still: because rosters are so malleable and trades happen with some amount of frequency, and because hockey is still an "insular" ecosystem in terms of geographic accessibility and junior-age development (for better or worse; mostly for worse, but that's neither here nor there), players intrinsically have a low degree of separation between one another, whether it be as teammates now or as friends growing up in the ohl, ntdp, etc. i therefore wanted to take that a step further and look at it through fic metrics especially: can we use a summary of ficdom's real, tangible output and visualize it through a similar network? (+ where and how does that network differ from player connections in practice?)

back to the impact of draft pick # and assessments of talent relative to popularity, i also wanted to look at the most "successful" ships in ficdom from this network and evaluate the different distributions and impacts of their respective attributes. are certain player positions more popular? which nationalities are the most commonly shipped?

etc. But let's just get into it.

process

getting any kind of information from a 60%-locked fandom on ao3 is a nightmare and introduces a myriad of data-collecting limitations, so i do feel it important to disclaim that what i present in this post functions more in the realm of Approximate Interpretation and Potential Correlation than any actual 100% objective representation of fandom metrics.

a perceived limitation i have with character tagging metrics on ao3 is that they don't exactly reflect shippability; that is, if q.hughes is tagged as a character in a n.hischier/j.hughes fic, it gets attributed to his character tag but doesn't actually say anything about how many Relationship Fics exist for him on a whole. my best solution for this was essentially uncovering most of a player's relationships and summing their individual fic counts to create an approximate # of "relationship fics" for each player. so any kind of shippability graph going forward will use that metric.

i used ao3's relationship tag search and filtered by canonical in the men's hockey rpf fandom and only pulled relationship* fics ("/" instead of "&") with a min. of 20 works. ao3's counts are... Not the most accurate, so my filtering may have fudged some things around or missed a few pairings on the cusp, which again is why all the visuals here are not meant to show Everything in the most exact manner but function more so as a "general overview" of ficdom. although i did doublecheck the ship counts so the numbers themselves are accurate as of time of collection.

(*i excluded wag ships, reader ships, threesomes to make my life easier although i know this affects numbers for certain players, hc/gm ships, and any otherwise non-NHL Player ship. for ex., this eliminated anna kasterova/evgeni malkin, tyler brown/tyler seguin, and kyle dubas/william nylander, just to name a few)

all ship data was collected march 16, 2023.

PART 1. SC87 ship networking

when i first began this exercise i tried graphing ships for all the first-overall picks from 2003-2022 because i wanted to get an overarching sense of their connections. however, doing so made me realize that sidney crosby was by and far the most-connected node in the graph (and basically all hrpf in general) with a degree of 11, and that he was centering one huge component to which only two ships failed to connect (op/kj and slaf/xhekaj). basically:

so then i was like, right! let me instead use sidney crosby as my sole starting node, map out all ships with 20+ works from him specifically, take the players he connects to and map out their corresponding ships (excluding sid) and just keep iterating until i basically reach a final child node. through this, i yielded 112 ships and 98 unique players, with my final connecting node coming 9 degrees of separation away through brady tkachuk ↔ tim stützle/quinn hughes. unfortunately i can't actually host this little code snippet anywhere lol but i also wrote an input to check the pathways between any two players which was kind of fun:

here is the actual network graph with colors from automatically generated clustering, which doesn't really mean much but i thought was one nice way of presenting it. the edge width refers to the sum of fics for each ship and the node size refers to the degree, or number of ships, for each player.

i then also joined my player set with a dataset that included draft year, drafted team, position, etc... and through that color-coded the graph with the team each player was originally drafted to (i always struggle between using current team and draft team because which one matters more is super contextual, but... using draft team made my life easier this time so i hope it's still interesting.) here i only included colors for 13 teams that had 3+ players each:

→ [full-size graph]

we can do a bit more analysis based on this specific sidcros network, like which players are the "most-shipped" or overviewing cross-team shipping tendencies:

but! of course, not ALL big hrpf ships lead back to sc87. using him as a central node essentially just helped me filter out excess "noise" when searching for relationship tags on ao3, because now i could exclude anyone connected to him at all (note: the relationship fics from my set equaled upward of 19,000 works, accounting for 60.4% of the entire men's hockey rpf archive) and hit other significant tags more efficiently.

through this method, i singled out a new set of 76 ships and 134 unique players (notice the significant decrease in overlap), which i then combined with my sid ships to create one massive set of Hockey Ships With Over 20+ Works On Ao3 that i could analyze holistically. no idea if this makes any sense but bear with me:

PART 2. general ship insights

i won't bore people with endlessly listing out ship rankings but here's the previous top chart with the new ships slotted in:

now for some overall player analysis!

first i wanted to look at how attributes like draft round, nationality, and position (F/D/G) are represented in the player set.

the nationality distribution is pretty close to all active nhl players this season, so there aren't major disparities there. however, the vast majority of players 1) were drafted in the first round and 2) are mostly forwards, with the forwards also seemingly reflecting the general philosophy of faster development/higher recent-round representation. we can take this overview a step further and actually examine the fic averages for each characteristic as a proxy for measuring shippability/ficdom popularity.

first, i scatterplotted all players by their draft pick and number of fic to (try and) show the heavy skew toward top picks (inspired by the gar draft pick value curve and other similar plots). this is... well, limited in many ways, and if i had an actually adequately large dataset i could specifically plot averages per distinct pick number and try to present something there, but the problem is that a lot of these later pick numbers only have like one player so there's way too much variance LOL.

but just for the sake of this exercise i excluded j.benn as an outlier and grouped fic averages by round (left below). again, noting the sample sizes, let's just say that first rounders on average seem to have the most fic written about them, even if it's not a particularly shocking insight. we can also try creating a histogram for "shippability" by draft year, binning here for every 2 years, to see which draft years appear to have had the most success (right below). note the peaks around 2005 and 2015, aka the sc87 and cm97 ~Generational Years~ 🤔

i've also been interested in figuring out which positions are commonly preferred—since centers are so often the faces of a franchise and are essentially the most sought-after position, and since goalies occupy a positionally static role/are less oriented toward contact (and the presumed homoeroticness thereof) in the way skaters are, is that reflected in the fic metrics as well? turns out: yes.

some ship analysis

learning more about player data in a vacuum is fun, but we also have all of this relationship data that lets us examine how different characteristics interact with each other, which is meaningful as well! for example, we know that forwards are heavily represented in the dataset, but is center4center the most common combination? or is there love for a franchise center and his beloved winger or the team's dependable 1d?

(fought for my life trying to figure out how to map this properly so please accept a horrible bar chart instead) as it turns out, the most common combination is centers/wingers, followed afterward by centers/centers. i don't know whether this really means much to me because i'd like to dissect the combos even further (is C/C more often 1C 2C or cross-team rivalry 1C shipping? are C/W usually linemates? etc.) but 🤷‍♀️ here's a graph.

i also distributed ships by their nationality combination, displaying to the surprise of no one a heavy preference (a whopping 66.4%!) for north american-exclusive shipping. i also thought stacking by "draft year" (= averaging the draft year between both players for each ship) offered some interesting insight into usa4usa shipping having slightly younger representation. also i do think usa/germany being singlehandedly driven up this chart by one family is remarkable and hilarious LOL.

also in the realm of draft year analysis, i wanted to look at draft year differences and whether fandom preferences seem to lie by way of same-age-ish pairings and In-Class Bicycling so to speak. graphing ships by these differences spanned a range of 20 years, with the oldest "age" (draft) difference being 20 years between zdeno chara and charlie mcavoy. overall, of 175 ships with a drafted player, 60.5% were drafted within 2 years of each other (18.2% in the same draft), and only 5% had a draft difference of 10 or more years.

then, of those 32 ships drafted within the same year, i distributed their counts by year to see which draft classes featured the biggest in-class clusters, leading us again to the Famed Class of 2015:

closing thoughts

i'll stop here :saluting_face: something else i had on the agenda that i don't really know how to adequately explore with this dataset is basically stanley cup champion stuff, e.g. looking at players and ships and fic counts from winning teams and how/whether a sort of "winning bias" has been trending down as of late (see the relative success of ships from teams like phi/ana compared to tbl/stl)—temporal data is so particular and difficult to wrangle with ao3 though so i'll have to let this one percolate a little bit.

finally, another thing (!) that i love examining is captaincy and how it often helps inform shippability; C/A/guyswithletters shipping obviously generously overlaps with being drafted early, high-impact players, some positional stuff like Young Star Center having the role foisted onto him, etc. and many of these aspects are immediately identifiable in top ships like 8771, 1634, 1386... just to name a few obvious ones. unfortch i don't really have the time or space to look at that here but it's something i'm still interested in maybe expanding on, and i also never ended up collecting actual skater *performance* data which would be super fun to eventually get to, e.g. mapping ficdom output to not just background identifiers like draft year/pick but also 1) actual tangible evaluations of player goals/points/(salary?!?)/etc. and 2) some dimension of draft outperformance/underperformance, which is pertinent for scenarios like late-round picks who have defied career expectations (see outlier jbenn having a shit ton of lifetime fic) AND early-round picks whose trajectories have not panned out as expected for whatever reason; often the ~tragic~ frustration of being a bust actually invites more narrative focus and scrutiny, but at the same time ficdom trends have pointed themselves to being attracted to many historic, talented, generational, and so on players, who more often than not are also winners, which potentially posits a need for some sustained line of access/visibility to high-expectation players significantly before they're regarded as "busts" in order to organically grow and generate initial interest that can survive the renewed reality of their situation. but who knows

again, i don't know whether any of this even makes sense or is interesting to literally anyone at all, but i personally enjoyed just dicking around graphing shit and getting to join a ton of tables together for absolutely no reason lol. that's all!

[mayasdeluca]

Well here we are at the end. It feels incredibly weird and surreal that this is the last time I'll be doing a reaction post after an episode. I think it will really sink in months from now when the show really doesn't come back but honestly I'm feeling so many different emotions right now and it's because of the episode and also just because of knowing this is the last of everything.

I feel like this finale episode really summed up my whole experience with this show. They'll do some things really well and some things that really just make you question why on earth did they think that was the right choice. Stuff that makes you so frustrated because they just get in their own way and could be doing things that isn't wasting the potential of real magic.

It feels like Maya and Carina were never able to really shine and be highlighted in the way they could have been. They shied away from the true chemistry and connection and love story that they had instead of embracing it. As soon as they would get some focus, they had to give it to someone else or insert someone else into the storyline. It was like they couldn't give the queer women too much for whatever reason. This has been a pattern since their relationship started so I'm sadly not surprised it ended the same way.

I get they had a lot to fit in so I wasn't expecting everything to happen like I envisioned. But they really didn't pay off the cliffhanger in any way. All this speculation about Maya quitting her job, all this worry about how she'd be freaking out about being near death and realizing she could lose the family that she finally has, all these possibilities about her getting injured, having some smoke inhalation, Carina being worried tat she'd have to raise their children alone and practically none of it gets addressed? Carina doesn't even find out that Maya was in that situation? We don't get to see them hug in relief as soon as they see each other? Maya doesn't even make a comment about how she thought she was going to die and lose everything she finally has? Again, didn't expect all of this, but not even a little of it?

And then instead of Maya being the one to collapse from smoke inhalation after being surrounded by an insane amount of flames, it's Andy...because of course Andy would have to be the focus. She's Captain, it's her station, they all had to come together to rally around her. Because it was already too much for them to worry about Maya for the first two minutes of the episode. We couldn't have Carina even come across Maya while she was in the field (what exactly was the point of that then? Delivering babies is a Maya and Carina thing)

I enjoyed the scene of Carina telling Maya she was pregnant. I love that it paralleled their proposal scene and we got the great camera spinning kiss like in 4x14. But again it's like we just have to be satisfied with the bare minimum and that's it. That was our only glimpse really of present Marina in the last episode. The way they did the flashforward scenes was super confusing and choppy in my opinion, not really knowing if it was the real thing at first or just what these characters were envisioning. (And don't get me started on how Maya and Carina's visions only included becoming mothers).

I don't know how to feel about Maya being Captain of 19 again honestly. Andy being Chief was...an interesting twist because I wasn't expecting that either but it always felt like 19 was Andy's station so why did they get away from that already? The whole series led up to that moment. Why couldn't Maya have her own station? I do love that her shirt had Deluca-Bishop on it though.

Will always be grateful that the show gave us Maya and Carina. What Danielle and Stefania did with these characters both separately and together will always be special. But part of me will also always feel a little sad and bitter about what could have been if they really embraced Marina as the main couple of the show and didn't let double standards get in the way and just let them be the bisexual loving wives that they are. So many missed opportunities and it's a shame.

Sending love to everyone feeling all types of things after that. It was a lot and I'm here for anyone who needs to vent. ❤️

[c-e-d-dreamer]

Falling For Your Fools Gold: Chapter 4

A/N: And we’re back babyyyy! Excited to get back into all my chapter WIPs but especially excited to get back to sexy, pirate Cassian ;) Hope everyone enjoys this chapter! Also, I like to imagine Fifth Harmony’s That’s My Girl playing in Cassian’s head at the beginning here. Trigger warning for injuries and blood. 

Chapter Masterlist // Previous Part // Next Part

“One. Two. One. One. Two.”

Nesta follows along to Baz’s instructions, hitting her closed fists against his palms in the combinations he calls out. Even with the linen wrapped around her knuckles, she can feel every punch, but in these past few days, she’s started to relish the ache there, pride swelling deep in her gut as she continues to learn more, continues to grow her own strength. Every bruise, every split knuckle is proof of how far she’s come, how many steps she’s taken away from that rigidity, that expectation that society forced upon her from a too young age, that darkness trapped in the corners of her family’s manor house in Adriata. It’s certainly not how Nesta imagined breaking free and finding her freedom, certainly not how she expected it, but she’s not complaining.

Baz swings his arm across and toward Nesta, but she’s quick to duck out of the way just as she’s been taught. She stands back to her full height, keeping her arms up as she returns to the punch sequence. Another swing of his arm and Baz starts to walk Nesta back across the deck of the ship. She stays light on her feet, moving and dodging and punching until Baz finally drops his hands back to his side with a wide smile.

“Nice,” Baz tells her, shaking out his hands. “I think we can officially declare you’ve mastered hand to hand.”

“Really?” Nesta asks, already feeling excitement building at the prospect of finally graduating to using her dagger.

“I don’t know, Baz. Perhaps she should really test it first.”

Nesta doesn’t even bother swallowing down her sigh or holding back her eye roll. She had hoped that after spending a large sum of Cassian’s money at the market when they were in port, he might finally leave her alone, that they could have some tentative, albeit separate peace between them, but of course things are never that simple.

Instead, Cassian has quietly watched each of Nesta’s sessions with Baz. Most days, he doesn’t say anything, but Nesta will always feel his eyes on her, his gaze burning a wildfire across her skin. Other days, he’ll offer small comments or critiques, and on the rare occasion, he’ll guide Nesta’s movements again. And all the while, Baz will simply stand by looking amused.

Like now.

The first mate in question currently has his lips pressed together, but it does nothing to hide the smirk he’s desperately trying to bite down. His brown eyes practically twinkle with amusement as he watches over Nesta’s shoulder, and Nesta is half tempted to put all her new skills to work, punching him in the face as well as the annoying pirate captain behind her.

“What do you say, princess?” Cassian continues, and even without looking, Nesta can hear that stupid grin dripping from his tone. “Are you up for a little sparring?”

Nesta huffs, but she turns around to face Cassian properly, settling him with her coldest, most unimpressed stare. “Fine, but only because it will give me an opportunity to knock you on your ass.”

“That’s not very ladylike,” Cassian teases, his eyes alight with amusement, but he raises his arms and gets into a fighting stance.

Nesta mirrors Cassian’s stance, her eyes quickly sweeping over his frame, accessing for any tells of what he might do, any weaknesses she might be able to exploit. Cassian circles around her slowly. It’s reminiscent of their first meeting, when he had done the same thing in her cabin on her father’s ship. It already feels like so long ago. Like another life, like a dream. Although, Nesta is beginning to wonder if that life or this one is the nightmare in the end.

Nesta moves in a circle with Cassian, keeping her steps careful so he won’t be able to catch her off balance, so her feet don’t get tangled. She doesn’t miss the way his gaze glances down quickly to her feet, the impressed face he makes. She opens her mouth, a dry remark already poised and ready on the tip of her tongue, but it’s the opening Cassian’s been waiting for. His arm swings out, and Nesta just barely blocks the hit.

Cassian continues the offense, swinging punches in quick succession. Nesta retreats back and away, but he’s quick to follow. As Cassian steps forward to keep up his onslaught, Nesta decides to take advantage of his unbalanced stance, spinning and ducking under his outstretched arm. Unfortunately, she’s only able to land one punch against Cassian’s side before he’s turning as well, blocking her next attempt. He sweeps Nesta’s feet out from under her, and she falls hard against the wood of the deck.

Despite the pain splintering out at the impact, Nesta feels more determined than ever. She jumps up to her feet, and goes on the offense herself, swinging punches until it’s Cassian that’s retreating. She takes advantage of his imbalance again, but this time, she shoves at his chest hard. Cassian goes tumbling back, but his fingers curl around Nesta’s wrist and he pulls her down with him until they both go sprawling across the deck. Nesta is quick to scramble up, straddling Cassian’s chest to pin him down and pressing her forearm against his throat.

“Yield,” Nesta tells him, her voice hard despite the way her chest heaves from the exertion.

“I think you’re the one who needs to yield, Nes.”

Nesta blinks in confusion at Cassian’s words, at the smirk pulled firmly across his face, but rather than say anything more, Cassian merely glances down. Nesta follows his gaze and notices the metal glinting in his hand, the dagger now poised against her abdomen. It takes Nesta’s mind a moment to catch up, to understand exactly what she’s seeing but then her head snaps back up to glare at Cassian.

“You cheated,” Nesta declares, her anger only growing as Cassian continues to smirk unfazed. “It was meant to be hand to hand sparring.”

“I’m sure Baz taught you the first rule of fighting, that there’s no such thing as a fair fight, especially when you’re fighting a pirate.”

Nesta lets out a frustrated growl, shoving off of him. “We go again. A rematch.”

Cassian chuckles, standing up as well and making a big show of dusting off his clothes. “You’re on, sweetheart.”

Nesta resets back into her fighting stance, waiting for Cassian to raise his hands and mirror her. He gives a small nod to indicate he’s ready, and Nesta doesn’t bother waiting for him to make the first move, doesn’t bother staying on the defense. Her anger and frustration feel like a beast writhing deep in her gut, chomping at the bit to be released and desperate for a taste of blood. She throws punches and kick combinations in quick succession, every smack against him sparking within her, every blow landed fanning those flames.

For all that Nesta thinks she has the upper hand, though, Cassian spins them around, knocking Nesta off both her balance and her focus. He wraps his arms around her, holding her back against his chest and pinning her arms to her side. She tries to wriggle free, tries to find enough space that she can make a counter attack, but his hold is firm, his strength clearly outmatching hers.

“Do you yield?” Cassian asks lowly, his breath fanning out hotly against Nesta’s skin.

Nesta lets out a huff, opening her mouth to begrudgingly agree before his words from earlier clang around her mind, an idea quickly forming. She arches her back against him, and with Cassian’s mouth still pressed near her ear, she can hear the way his breath hitches at the gesture. She turns her head to face him, looking up through her lashes and making a big show of glancing toward his lips. As she slowly starts to lean in, she can feel Cassian’s grip finally relaxing.

Once she has the space enough to move, Nesta picks her leg up and stomps her heel down hard against Cassian’s foot, slamming her elbow back into his abdomen. The pirate captain lets out a shout of alarm, but Nesta spins out of his hold and faces him. A hard shove to his chest sends him stumbling back and falling against the deck once again, but this time, Nesta makes sure she steps back before he can latch onto her wrist with his hands.

Nesta walks over to Cassian, pressing her foot against his chest and pinning him down, offering him a smirk of her own. “How’s that for unfair?”

A loud laugh comes from Nesta’s right before Baz pretends to be coughing instead. Nesta expects Cassian to glare at his first mate at the response, but instead his smile is wide as he blinks up at Nesta, and she swears she sees pride twinkling amongst the golds of his hazel eyes.

“I think she’s officially ready for weapons training.”

~ * * * ~

On the fifth day of learning the skills and particulars of the sword with Baz, Nesta steps onto the main deck to find not just the first mate waiting for her, but another pirate as well. It doesn’t take long for Nesta to recognize him as the pirate whose gaze always follows her around the ship with that distrustful look in them. The same gaze he watches her with as she approaches. It has Nesta’s hand anxiously and instinctually going to the hilt of the sword that now sits at her hip.

“Nesta,” Baz greets with that same easy smile he always wears. “I hope you’re ready for today’s lesson.”

“Yes,” Nesta answers cautiously, her eyes glancing toward the other pirate once again.

“I’ve taught you all I really can, and you know practicing makes perfect,” Baz explains after following Nesta’s questioning gaze. “Kallon’s the best swordsman on the ship, so he’s agreed to spar with you.”

“I don’t think he cares for me,” Nesta leans in to whisper to Baz, hoping not to be overheard by Kallon, but judging by the snort from the pirate in question, she wasn’t successful.

“It’s not personal,” Baz offers, his voice quiet as well. “Kallon is just superstitious.”

Nesta continues to eye Kallon dubiously at that, quite confident that it’s more than just his superstition about women on ships, but she doesn’t say anything more on the subject. Baz walks her through a few stretches to start, and then she and Kallon are facing off, swords raised between them.

For a moment, Nesta swears she can see the deep brown of Kallon’s eyes darken, that his mouth quirks up just that smallest bit, but before she can dwell on it, he’s stepping forward and swinging his sword. Nesta is quick to deflect, knocking Kallon’s swing to the right and away from her body, but then the pirate is lunging forward again.

Baz certainly wasn’t kidding about Kallon being a skilled swordsman. His movements are quick and every attack of his sword is filled with enough force that each time Nesta deflects, each time her sword clashes with his, the vibrations shake all the way up her arm. It also means that Nesta spends the entire fight on the defense, never once having an opportunity to advance on him.

As the fight continues to go on, Nesta can feel herself growing more and more tired. Sweat beads along her brow, her chest heaving as she tries to keep up against Kallon’s onslaught of attacks. Her arm feels heavy, the weight of the sword leaving her muscles trembling slightly as she tries to keep it held up. She turns her head back toward Baz, ready to relent and ask that they call it quits for today, but then there’s a sharp pain along her side.

“Kallon! What the fuck?”

Nesta’s sword drops back down to her side. Confused and shocked, she looks down, surprised to find a long tear in her blouse along her ribs, red already beginning to seep in and ruin the white fabric. She presses her hand against the cut, wincing at the pain that ricochets through her body, that radiates from that spot. Her fingers tremble even more when she pulls her hand away and takes in the blood staining her skin.

Her heart pounds in her chest, her ears ringing, and it’s only when a firm hand squeezes at her shoulder, when she looks up and finds Baz’s face right in front of her, that Nesta realizes he was speaking with her. His eyes are swimming with concern, his lips pressed firmly in a frown, as he moves his hand to put pressure against her wound.

“We need to get you to Wiley. Are you okay to walk?” Baz asks, but suddenly Nesta’s mind feels too sluggish, words too far for her to reach. “Nesta.”

Nesta swallows hard, but she offers the pirate a nod. Or her best attempt at a nod. Baz settles Nesta’s arm across his shoulders, gently wrapping his own arm around her waist, and the two of them head below deck. Baz leads them into the makeshift medical cabin, Wiley quickly clearing space for Nesta to lay down. Nesta can’t swallow down her wince as Wiley peels back the fabric of her blouse, pushing it up and away so he can work. He wipes at the gash with a wet piece of cloth then quickly presses another piece of cloth against the wound.

“Hold the pressure,” Wiley instructs Baz, the first mate stepping closer to do just that.

Nesta squeezes her eyes shut, unable to watch as Wiley starts to thread surgical thread through a needle. Already her stomach starts to roil at the implication, her nervousness spiking. She’s never been particularly good when it comes to this sort of thing. Nesta can still remember that time Feyre had fallen out of a tree and seriously injured her arm when they were children.

A shuffle of feet has Nesta’s eyes opening again, and when she turns her head, she finds Cassian now standing in the doorway. His expression is stormy, hazel eyes hard and mouth pinched tightly in a frown. But his gaze doesn’t look toward Nesta, instead it’s pinned to Baz.

“Who?” Cassian asks, a dark promise lacing his voice.

“Kallon,” Baz answers quietly.

Cassian doesn’t say anything more, merely turns on his heel and leaves the cabin. Nesta watches him go, her eyes lingering on the doorway even after he’s vanished from view, and she considers asking Baz what exactly the pirate captain intends to do. But before she can, Wiley steps back over, and Nesta’s stomach drops as her attention is once again drawn back to what’s coming. At the first pinch of the needle against her skin, all Nesta can do is squeeze her eyes shut and focus on her breathing.

After Wiley has stitched, covered her wound, and given her some sort of herbal concoction for the pain, Baz helps Nesta back to her cabin so she can rest. She grabs one of her newly purchased books and curls up with it on the bed, wincing at the stretch and pain in her side until she’s able to find a comfortable position. She only makes it three chapters before the exhaustion of the day starts to weigh down her limbs as surely as it makes her eyelids feel heavy. The book slips from her fingers and into the blankets, and soon, Nesta is giving in to sleep’s siren song.

She’s awoken by the sound of clattering against wood. She blinks her eyes open, and it takes her a few moments to adjust to the sudden darkness of the room, just the candlelight casting the whole space in a soft, orange glow. Her mind still feels foggy with the remnants of sleep clinging to it, her limbs still sluggish and heavy. The whole thing leaves her feeling disorientated, having no idea how long she was sleeping.

She finds Cassian standing over by the desk, a bowl and plate of bread in front of him seeming to be the culprit of the clatter. As if he can feel Nesta’s eyes on him, he turns his head to meet her gaze. The candlelight leaves his face cut in shadows, draws emphasis to the scar on his cheek and through his eyebrow.

“Sorry,” Cassian offers quietly. “I just wanted to make sure you ate something.”

Cassian picks up the dishes and walks over toward the bed, holding them out for Nesta to take. She reaches out and does just that, but her eyes catch on Cassian’s hands. His knuckles are split, dried blood smeared across the skin there. The sight has Nesta’s breath catching. Part of her wants to ask, wants to hear Cassian say the words she knows would come, but she swallows them down.

With a muttered thanks, Nesta settles the dishes in her lap, picking through the fruit and cheese before deciding to tear off a piece of bread and nibbling on that. She can still feel the licking flames of Cassian’s intense gaze on her, but when she glances up, his eyes aren’t on her face, but pinned to her side.

“It’s probably best to change to a fresh bandage, just to be safe,” Cassian explains, reaching out his hand before he seems to catch himself. “May I?”

Nesta nods her head, scooting forward on the bed to give him better access and lifting the hem of her blouse. Cassian unwinds the cloth Wiley had tied around her waist with careful fingers, and Nesta tries and fails to bite back a wince when he pulls the cloth away from her skin. She turns her head away, not particularly interested in seeing what she’s sure is still a nasty wound, but thankfully, Cassian doesn’t comment on her squeamishness. He merely steps over to the basin of water and soaks a cloth in it.

His hands are surprisingly gentle as he slides the wet cloth over the affected area, his fingers slow and careful. He cleans the wound with such tenderness that Nesta finds herself looking toward him in surprise, but Cassian keeps his head bowed. His hair falls forward against his shoulders, scraping against his temples and framing his face. His eyebrows are drawn low, hazel eyes flickering in the candlelight even as they stayed focused on the task at hand.

As if he can feel Nesta’s gaze on him, Cassian looks up, his hand stilling as their eyes meet.

“Does it hurt still?” Cassian asks, his voice quiet. “I can ask Wiley for more tea for the pain.”

“It’s alright. It’s nothing I’m not used to.”

The comment has Cassian frowning, his lips parting and a question seemingly poised on the tip of his tongue, but he swallows it down. He steps away from Nesta, setting down the cloth he used to clean her wound and grabbing a fresh, dry one. He wraps the fresh cloth around Nesta’s waist, her skin prickling with each pass of his fingers against it. The feeling soon morphs into another wince, though, when he ties a knot directly over the wound, keeping the pressure tight.

“Thank you,” Nesta tells him, tugging her blouse back down.

“You don’t have to thank me,” Cassian replies, washing his hands and then his face in the water basin.

Nesta nods, but there’s a part of her that feels like she does, a part of her that wants to thank him for more than just helping to clean her wound. It’s a voice that goads and whispers in the back of her mind, reminding her of the freedom she’s found on this ship despite being a prisoner. If she can even still call herself a prisoner at this point. It reminds her that she’s been given the opportunity to learn to fight, allowed to truly be herself with no one to reprimand her for sharing her opinion or being too harsh with her words. There’s no more societal shackles nor fresh scars; at least, not the scars born from the shadows that still seemed to lurk in every corner of that manor house even after her grandmother and mother had passed.

The words weigh heavy on Nesta’s tongue, pressing against her windpipe until a lump is lodged firmly in her throat, but she can’t seem to squeeze them out. She can’t find the way to thank Cassian for what he’s unknowingly gifted her by bringing her onto his ship. The idea of thanking a pirate, thanking the infamous Lord of Bloodshed for that matter, is terrifying.

But even more terrifying still, is just how much Nesta would mean it.

—

Updated Taglist (let me know if you’d like to be added): @moodymelanist​ @nesquik-arccheron​ @sv0430​ @talkfantasytome​ @bookstantrash​ @eirini-thaleia​ @ubigaia​ @fromthelibraryofemilyj​ @luivagr-blog​ @superspiritfestival​ @hiimheresworld​ @marigold-morelli​ @sweet-pea1​ @pyxxie​ @dustjacketmusings​ @hallway5​ @dongjunma​ @glowing-stick-generation​ @melonsfantasyworld​ @isterofimias​ @goddess-aelin​ @melphss​ @theladystardust​ @a-trifling-matter​ @blueunoias​ @kookskoocie​ @cassiansbigwingspan​ @unlikelypersonalknight1​​ @blurredlamplight​

[likegemstone]

tempo

I am realizing that, for me, when making art of any kind though specifically for me it's mainly writing and drawing, tempo is key

You know those days when you sit down to write and the words beg aching, painful effort to come out and when they do they're all warped and stuck together at odd angles, so reading them back nearly gives you a headache?

And those days when you pick up a pen or brush and instead of making a scene, a figure, a Piece that is more than the sum of its parts, you are only making marks. Disjointed, stiff strokes that are completely separate from each other, but WHY IM DOING THE SAME THING I ALWAYS DO, WHY HANDS NO WORK???

For me I can even switch in and out of the awkward, bumbling creative stage several times in any one session. And I feel like I'm doing the same thing the entire time, so why sometimes the hands work, the words come, and sometimes it's like I've suddenly regressed years in my creative abilities?

tempo.

this is just what I call it because I once watched a Sinix video (art youtuber/streamer, makes incredible art and super helpful videos) and that's what he called it. It's been a year or so since I watched it I think, so I don't remember exactly how he defined it, but what I mean when I say tempo is when your body, brain, and soul are working in tandem. Your soul feels a Thing and your brain turns it into an Idea and your body makes it into Art.

In that Sinix video, he talks about some art exercises to get you back on tempo and it's great advice, really valuable info and I feel like kinda the heart of the exercises can be translated into writing/other art exercises as well with a bit of thought.

I might talk about that more if anyone is curious but rn I just wanted to mention how one thing that is super important for me in once again finding my tempo when I'm all out of sync is: being kind to myself when I'm in that place.

It's totally natural, understandable, valid to be frustrated when the Thing Isn't Working and There's No Clear Reason Why, and me personally, my first instinct is to beat myself up. To spiral. To quit. I've done it before, why can't I do it again?

But when I take a step back and look at the full picture, I notice this is just a thing that happens. It's part of being a creative. The tempo comes and goes, so while it might be gone now, I know that it will come back.

Not only that, but I have some of my own little practices that I have found help me get things back in sync, so now I have a list of things to try! Tools to use. Instead of sitting there trying to force the tempo back and beating myself up when I can't, I switch focus onto something proactive--using one of my tools.

And on top even of that, I have learned to pay enough attention to my process, my tempo, what helps and what doesn't, that now I can recognize little things I do that tend to get me *off* tempo, so I can check and make sure I am not doing any of those things, then try again~

[windvexer]

Practical Magic Tech: Spellcasting Altars (101)

This post is part of a series of animistic, spirit-oriented spellcasting for beginners. Go to the masterpost to see them all.

This is a 101 theory post. Go to the masterpost to find actionable steps for altar building and consecration.

Loosely defined (remember, we aren't trying to label everyone, we just want to clear the weeds in our corner of the magical universe), an altar is a sacred space used to facilitate two-way communication and movement with the unseen worlds.

Altars are often built to house and honor gods and spirits. There is a fairly significant difference between someone building an altar or shrine to honor their god(s), and a spellcasting altar for witchcraft.

Our goal with a spellcasting altar is not really to honor anything. We can build a separate altar or shrine to honor a god if we would like to do so.

Instead, for the purposes of this series, a spellcasting altar is:

A hardwired connection to the otherworld,

Which makes gathering metaphysical energy easier, and

Drawing power out of the ethereal and grounding it into physical objects is easier, which means

Successful manifestation is easier.

Delivering targeted spells is easier.

Also, it's beacon that naturally accumulates and collects spiritual power (this is why people can put things on their altars to automatically charge them).

And it's powerful method of classical conditioning.

Classical Conditioning: It's Hella Useful

If you use a spellcasting altar for most of your spellwork, after a little while just being in its presence is going to click you into a magical headspace.

Yes, spellcasting altars are imbued with actual magical power and have very useful metaphysical properties. But their utility extends beyond the metaphysical.

Also they're a great place to store all your spellcasting stuff.

(By the way: try using a specific stimulus, such as an earthy grounding scent or wearing a headband, every time you practice grounding, centering, and exiting a magical headspace. It's a really really helpful tool)

Does it need to be a physical altar?

No. A physical altar is only one piece of spellcasting "tech". If that tech is not viable for you, you have many other techs to draw upon.

Digital altars can also hold metaphysical energy. True magic can be done through web pages. Ask anyone who's been in an occult server on the rough side of the web.

All that being said, you don't necessarily need any altar. They're a handy tool but no one tool is everything.

Let your path serve you, not the other way around.

What about size? What about shoebox or mint tin altars?

Oh boy, get ready for my favorite hill to die on!:

Spellcasting altars are nothing more than container spells.

In a jar spell you take, idk, some rosemary for sleep protection, some iron nails against nightmares, and some lavender for sweet dreams. You put them all together in a jar and consecrate them to your intent and those independent components come together to create something greater than the sum of their parts in order to effect magical change.

In a spellcasting altar, maybe you take a candle for connection to the otherworld, a crystal to accumulate energies, and little colorful stones to represent the Western buildingblock elements (fire, earth, air, water). You put them all together on a specially marked flat surface and consecrate them to your intent and those independent components come together to create something greater than the sum of their parts in order to effect magical change.

When you cast a container spell, you are linking up a variety of powers to work together in the long term. And nobody is out there telling you to get a gallon-sized glass jar. In fact it's popular to use the teeniest little jars possible.

Get yourself a mint tin if that's what you prefer. Hell, a matchbook with a sigil drawn inside. Make your altar into a notebook or a tumblr blog. All that is necessary is that you find it to be useful; that it gives you more back than what it takes to use it.

But I do have one thing to say in support of the classic on a shelf/flat surface altar: They're kind of like hypersigils, and that's really handy

What if you made a container spell for general prosperity, and then put that container spell inside a bigger container spell for general empowerment of everything placed inside of it?

That's what a spellcasting altar is!

It's a big cauldron of power designed to help you manifest your desires and link power to objects in the way that you choose. Start adding other finished spells back into it, and it's like a magical combo move that multiplies power and makes it easier for you to manage everything there.

Too much volatility and movement in your financial life? Take some of the prosperity stuff off of your altar - and just like that, the magic in your life has shifted.

All your spells are lagging and there's not much motion? Light a spicy, fiery candle on your altar to give everything there a tangy boost.

Feeling irritated by someone? Print out a picture of them and place it on your altar, facing away from you. No spellcasting, chanting, or ritual required - an act of magic was done because an action was taken in a magical place designed to manifest every intent you put within it.

The real benefit of spellcasting altars is that they do a lot of the heavy lifting for you.

You're probably not interested in practical magic because your life is great and you already have enough time, energy, interest, or ability to manage everything in a mundane way agreed upon by Society.

I actually think there's a pretty good chance that you're interested in practical magic because there's not enough of you to go around to deal with things in a mundane way.

Magic is real, and real things tend to take real work.

So how is it helpful to turn to a new methodology of managing your life, when it takes just as much time and energy as you were spending before?

Spellcasting altars, even small ones, even digital ones, help us out. They automatically collect power for us to use later on, so we don't have to drink our precious Get Stuff Done juice. They house doors to the otherworld you can just open and close, instead of having to create the door every time you need it. They help us automatically get into the spellcasting mindset through a hardwire connection to the otherworld and the magic of classical conditioning.

Spellcasting altars do specific things and fill specific needs. Therefore, they're not going to be necessary or even useful for everybody. Try them out and see if they're useful for you. If so; a tool has been added to your toolbox. If not; you have considered and discounted something unhelpful, and now you can move on to better things.

This post is part of a series of animistic, spirit-oriented spellcasting for beginners. Go to the masterpost to see them all.

[cuntycassandra]

Breaking down Hunter and Omega’s relationship: pt 4.

Hi everybody. My biggest apologies for the delay on this series over the past two weeks, I’ve had a lot of medical issues going on, alongside a big decision in my life I had to make before the end of September taking precedence. However, with a little more time on my hands and a new team of proof readers behind me, I’m hoping to be back on track soon enough! I hope you enjoy my analysis of ‘Cornered’, and please always feel free to reply/reblog/send an ask with your opinions and discussions! I love to hear and reply to them! 💛

(Pasted paragraphs: I would just like to add a disclaimer here. I am, in no way whatsoever, slating the other batchers for having differing relationships with Omega. I absolutely adore everything single one of the boys, and I think they all have wonderful and unique interrelations with her. Although I may point out these different approaches in comparison to Hunter’s, I am not stating these engages are wrong, just different is all!

I’m going to separate this into a little series- covering each episode in a separate post, which I’ll have tagged as the series progresses. Once I’ve tackled these two, as they’re my favourites, I’m going to move on to each individual Batcher and perhaps a few other dynamics such and Hunter and Crosshair, or Wrecker and Omega! Let me know what you guys would like to see!)

(Thank you to this weeks proof-reader: @very-depressing-waffel 💛)

Cornered: S1/E4

Although minimal, I absolutely love the small interaction between these two in the opening scene of this episode. While it would make sense for Hunter to take the chair, as he is navigating co-ordinates, instead he allows Omega to sit down and rest, the pure affection between them is particularly radiant in these moments. I’d also like to note that it is Hunter’s order to originally send them to Idaflor, where we can only assume he is heeding Cut’s previous advice given on the subject of ‘disappearing to start a new life’. By connotation, this essentially means Hunter was extremely ready to settle down with his brothers and both raise and protect his newly found little one. However this clearly becomes an evident concern of Hunter’s as Omega begins to whine, claiming she desperately wants to explore the galaxy instead of hiding away on an uninhabited planet. Although appreciating her enthusiasm, he insists they cannot risk it, not right now, showing he has all further plans to take her to see the universe whenever it may be safe to do so. Her safety has become his priority.

Also, another little mimic on Omega’s part is mentioned after Tech’s evaluates their situation- “Well, Pantora it is.” “Pantora it is :)”. This angel, she steals my heart.

Moving on slightly to the arrival of Pantora, Hunter’s civvies and Omega carrying his backpack for him, which is as big as her little torso might I add, makes the world spin. Notice too how her eyes never leave him for a moment, it’s a typical child trait when wanting to catch an adult’s attention for good behaviour. After Wrecker mentions the implications of sightseeing, which ultimately peaks Omega’s interest, Hunter is quick to diffuse the situation by insisting this is only a quick supply run. I strongly believe this is because although he intends to take Omega into the city with him, most likely recognising her desperation to explore, his main intention is to keep her safe and protected, I personally spy a compromise here. Finally, regarding this little interaction, when inviting Omega to join them, he calls her ‘Mega, ‘MEGA!!! Hunter is the first member of the batch to nickname her affectionately, and her little excited cheer in response says it all!

When strolling through the busy marketplace, I noticed that alongside drinking up all sights she can set her eyes on, Omega continues to perform the aforementioned ‘smile at parent because I am both well behaved and very excited’ technique, breaking away from her awestruck staring to give Hunter a cute grin, which he affectionately returns under the realisation that her purity and innocence has erupted through something as simple as a marketplace, another endearing trait his charge has displayed. I’d also like to shed light on the protective hand-on-shoulder movement Hunter uses after the squad of troopers pass by him, Omega, and Echo. His wary stare and protectiveness is an extreme diversion from his usual headstrong attitude, which we know is correlated to his need to protect his charge. (Hand-on-shoulder, AGAIN. Comforting Dad alert!!)

When offering to trade with the Gran merchant, I noticed that whenever Omega picked up a new item to inspect or show off to Echo, Hunter glances over his shoulder to observe her. I have reason to believe he might not only be watching her explore, but keeping an eye on her after the incident on Cut’s farm. I can practically see Suu’s words of advice ringing in his ears, and he wants to make sure she stays out of trouble. And after she does inevitably knock something over, although he scowls a little in her direction (as any parent would), Hunter swiftly turns his look of annoyance towards the Gran as he begins to scold Omega, once again showing his protectiveness in her regard, and in all honesty, he has every right to respond this way, we’ve already established this salesman is stubborn and conceited.

The entire plot of this episode is centred around Omega’s inevitable separation from Hunter and Echo as she ends up running off to chase a voorpak, who has stolen her new doll. We cannot fault Omega for her behaviour, it was a little juvenile at most, but we must take into account this would be her first time in such a situation, and she has never been taught otherwise. Hunter’s immediate faltering smile as he realises Omega is missing is honestly gut wrenching. He has just received 3,000 credits, a hefty sum for what they’re in need of, and now he’s lost his ward, and the pain and concern is fully mirrored through his halting eyes.

I’m moving ahead slightly to add a little character-action comparison! Now, this may just be me nitpicking, and I mean no hate to Fennec Shand (I actually ADORE her), but did anybody else notice the difference between her hold on Omega and how Hunter holds her? Fennec’s fingers lay beneath the nape of Omega’s neck, almost curling into her tunic’s collar, and so while it may seem protective, it actually holds very possessive and controlling connotations. Whereas when Hunter places a hand to Omega’s shoulder, his fingers are quite loose, and it only ever rests up her upper shoulder, allowing the girl freedom if she so much as wishes it. It’s extremely docile. Furthermore, I wanted to briefly comment on Hunter’s tenderness when retrieving Omega’s new doll, most likely using it to track her recent movement. His hold is very gentle, considering he is now clinging to the last piece of Omega he has contact with, and a noticeable shred of panic holds his upper body rigid for good measure. It’s very nicely animated.

Coming ahead swiftly to the brief ‘positive’ interaction between Omega and Fennec, I haven’t seen this mentioned before but I personally see the discussion concerning the need for protection when travelling the galaxy as a small nod to Omega’s newly found connection to the boys, and Hunter specifically. Omega insists it’s a good thing she has her ‘friends’. Noticeably, she is still very hesitant to label them as her brothers, as she most likely feels excluded to an extent (bearing in mind the boys were raised together with the exclusion of Echo, no matter her previous ties to them, Omega was always going to feel isolated to some extent), but not enough to deny she has an attachment to them, and vice versa. Hunter has already shown on multiple occasions (Kamino, Saleucami, the moon from episode 3) that he would do whatever it takes to protect her, but it’s nice to see Omega’s perspective on the newly found emotions too.

Finally, Hunter is able to catch up to both Omega and Fennec, and the sudden change in his demeanour and her aura of innocence is extremely present here. Hunter drops the worrisome parental act fairly quickly, and it’s replaced with the familiar soldier we all know and recognise, he needs to exhibit such strengths to assert the extent he is willing to go to protect Omega. Equally, upon realising Fennec doesn’t quite have her best interest at heart, Omega wastes no time jumping (recklessly) into action to save both herself and Hunter anymore trouble. Of course, being a weightless little girl, she isn’t able to do much, and Hunter ends up in a physical altercation with Shand, where he actually ends up taking his eyes off the assassin to address Omega directly, insisting she run. This not only shows just how much he cares about her, but how desperate he was to ensure her safety by putting himself at risk by not only getting into a fight, but exposing a vulnerability by taking his eyes off of her. (Her worried little face as she flees too, poor girl 😔)

(This point doesn’t have much to do with the relationship between these two, so feel free to skip over it if you want, but I did want to briefly comment on Omega’s timid exterior as she runs to Wrecker in the maintenance tunnels. It truly helps to perceive her genuine age and immaturity, the way she cowers into his neck and sits in his arms especially.)

After Tech informs Hunter of Omega’s current predicament involving the maintenance tower, it’s easily noticeable that when questioning Tech’s information, his voice mirrors the exact tone and edge it held when berating both the former and Echo after their ship was impounded in Saleucami. To me, this shows a clear connotation between the dire situations, and how quickly Hunter has taken to his new role in Omega’s life, and his job as her primary carer. Not to mention, she is literally hanging mid-traffic lane, and in desperate need of assistance. Alongside this, we see previously in this episode that not only was Hunter worried about attracting unwanted attention, after receiving such a thing and accidentally allowing Omega to hang in the balance (pun unintended), he actually steals somebody’s hoverbike in an attempt to rescue the little one, seeming to not care he is attracting even more unwanted attention. There is no hesitation on his end.

The look of absolutely HORROR that crosses this man’s face as Omega drops from the tower and just about hits the hovertruck below. We haven’t seen a look like that cross Hunter’s features since Crosshair’s ‘betrayal’, another indication to his immense worry for the newest member of his family. Equally, this is mirrored by Omega’s wide eyed, petrified stare as she momentarily watches Fennec shoot straight for Hunter’s bike, realising both she and the closest thing she has to a parent are still in serious peril. We need to take into account that this little girl has never experienced something this grim before, and the internal panic is evident for both herself, and Hunter especially.

This brings us down to the “HUNTER!!” comment from Omega as she dangles from the hovertruck. I personally believe her first initial thoughts were not to warn Hunter of the oncoming Shand, but instead a desperation to cry out for help from her guardian. This escalated as she notices Fennec approaching, and her eyes even widen as she calls out for Hunter to watch out, giving further evidence that her first thoughts might not have correlated to her eventual dialogue. It’s also important to note that despite her incredibly tragic situation, Omega is still much more worried about Hunter’s predicament than her own.

(Slightly unimportant, but I love the way Hunter leans in to take Omega in his arm before Shand knocks him out of the way. It’s very parental.)

I never noticed this before, but as Hunter catches Omega’s hand and hauls her onto the bike, he actually scans her over briefly to check for any injuries, before insisting she hold on tight. Notice how his voice isn’t scolding or harsh, he’s very calm despite the dire situation, doing his best to remain neutral for Omega’s sake, especially considering the day she’s had. It’s also important to note that this is further improvement from the situation on Saleucami, another example of their ever-growing relationship.

The WAVE of relief that rolls from Hunter’s entire demeanour as he places the backpack down in the Marauder cockpit, knowing he can finally rest now that Omega is safe, while simultaneously anticipating the flurry of issues about to storm their already hectic lives with a bounty hunter after the kid. His eyes are exhausted, his shoulders are only slightly slacked to insinuate his rough exterior, and yet he still does his absolute best to comfort Omega as she begins to get upset over the prior events and the unknown future.

And, finally, a small action but important nonetheless. I noticed that Omega’s eyes quiver slightly as she begins to get upset, and in her final moments on screen, they direct towards Hunter. This may seem unimportant, but it provides further evidence to the notion that she seeks him out for protection specifically. She’s upset and frightened, so she looks to him because he protects her. It is set up as if she’s about to toss herself into his arms, because she needs him right now.

I hope you liked my analysis of Hunter and Omega’s relationship in episode four of The Bad Batch! Of course, I’d love to discuss these two with anybody who might be interested, so please feel free to drop me an ask or a DM, and if you’re captivated enough I’d totally recommend looking out for my future posts on the topic!

As always, much love to our ‘Megs and Hunter, thank you for reading! 💛

Part One: Aftermath

Part Two: Cut and Run

Part Three: Replacements

[sugako]

alfajores y mentiras

timeskip!oikawa x reader

sum: after faking dating oikawa for a few months things start to heat up between the two of you and come to a head one night

cw: 18+ minors dni, nsfw, smut, fluff, alcohol use (no one is drunk tho), mirror sex, spanking, oral (female receiving), face sitting, fingering, slight edging, size kink (implied), semi-rough sex, creampie, ‘princess’ nickname again

wc: 3.3k 

a/n: part 2/2, this is mostly smut idek how it got this long but pls enjoy!! (part 1 if you want the intro)

Three months passed and being Tōru Oikawa’s fake girlfriend was just part of your life. You went to most of his games, you ate lunch and dinner together when both of your schedules allowed, and he gave you obnoxious kisses on the cheek and forehead whenever he possibly could. Each time his lips skirted a little closer to yours or his touches lingered longer and longer, but you pretended to not notice. It was nice in a way, all the emotional benefits of a relationship without actually being in one. But at the end of the night you were always alone in your bed, a wall away from him.

Any complicated thoughts you currently had about the arrangement were drowned out by booming music and the light buzz in your system from the drinks. To celebrate a new brand deal the team was partying in a club far fancier than any you had been to. Oikawa had personally chosen the tight blush mini dress you were wearily adjusting yet again. Leaning heavily against the high table, you watched as he sauntered back.

“A water, for my princess.” He set the glass in front of you and pressed a short kiss to the crown of your head. “And another drink for me.” 

“Thank you, Tōru.” You hummed. The nickname had grown on you. It certainly hadn’t helped that he had started to call you it even when you were out of earshot of others. 

He sipped his drink, but didn’t take his eyes off of you. Impossible to escape his intense stare, you finally met his gaze. 

“What?” You asked quietly. 

“You look really good tonight.” He said lowly while leaning into you. When his hot breath hit your cheek you couldn’t help but shiver. 

“T-thanks, so do you. I mean, you picked out this dress, so thank you.”

With his roughened fingers, he tilted your head up. 

“Can I kiss you, princess?” His normally whiney tone was low and huffy now.

“You kiss me all the time.” You giggled nervously and tapped your cheek. Pursing his lips, he took your hands into his and leaned in so his breath fanned across your face. 

“I want to really kiss you.” 

Gulping hard, you made no motion to move. “You’re just drunk.” You knew that was a lie. He had barely drank all night and the barely touched drink on the table beside you was only his second. 

“I’m not.” His thumbs massaged the back of your hands, sending you into a confused spiral. If you really kissed him than this entire fake relationship would feel like a real relationship and you knew he didn’t want that. You wanted… well, you weren’t sure what you wanted in the long run, but right now you didn’t mind being kissed by Tōru Oikawa. 

“Okay, uh, yeah, go ahead then.” You stammered out. 

With your soft ‘go ahead’ his lips were attached to yours. You had expected his touch to be rough and lust-filled, but instead he was kind and passionate. Any concerned you had about the nature of your feelings were pushed aside when his hands slinked lowly around your hips. When he finally pulled away, you were both panting hard. 

“It’s late. I wanna go home.” He gulped down a little of his drink and grabbed your purse, practically dragging you out of the club. If anyone noticed your quick departure, they didn’t say anything. In seconds he had hailed a cab and you were on your way back to your apartment. 

He was uncharacteristically silent, obviously deep in thought, but his hand closest to you kneaded deeply in the soft flesh of your bare thigh. Attempting to keep from squirming, you clutched onto your seatbelt as though it would keep you grounded. As soon as the cab stopped and you had paid and tipped the kind driver, Oikawa was dragging you away. His hand was still clamped tightly over yours when you stepped into the elevator together. 

You couldn’t begin to wonder what was going on in his head, but you had other thoughts on your mind. 

“Tōru?” You asked quietly as the machine whirred and began quickly moving up the levels. 

“Hm?” He finally looked at you, eyes hungry and sparkling. 

“Can we kiss again?” 

He responded by clutching you around the waist and meeting you with another deep kiss. You felt his hot tongue poke just past your lips, demanding entrance. Without hesitation, you offered it to him, moaning as he pulled you impossibly closer. Only when the elevator dings that you’re on your floor do you separate again. As you step out into your hallway, he speaks at last. 

“Come over.” He says, already dragging you toward his door. You hum in agreement.

If you really wanted to, you could tear your hand out of his or speak up. But you don’t. When he gets the door open, he shoves you through and slams it behind him, backing you up against it. Your small purse drops from your hands onto the floor as you leaf your fingers through his soft brown hair. “You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do this.” His mouth latches onto your neck and you cry out. “And tonight in this fucking dress.” Large hands snake down from the sides of your ribcage to the hem of the dress. “I just… fuck, I want to keep doing this with you, but I…” 

His head slumps toward the floor, eyes downcast. You reach out and cradle his face in your hands to force him to look at you. 

“You what, Tōru?” The look of concern on your face in genuine as he looks as though he may cry any second. 

“I want to keep acting like you’re my girlfriend, but I don’t think it’s acting if I actually like you.” He paused to take a breath. “We’ve been friends for a little while and I’ve always thought you were cute and I really like spending time with you, but now… I couldn’t imagine ending this.” Oikawa’s pale cheeks flushed as he awaited your answer. 

“Me either.” You whispered, wholly unable to contain your grin. He brought you into a bone crushing embrace, sighing deeply against your shoulder. 

The moment, while awfully sweet, was stung by your overwhelming need to keep touching him. Your hands freely roamed up and down his back, eliciting a small, breathy moan from him. He lifted his head off your shoulder to capture your lips yet again. You tugged away at his jacket, which he quickly discard on the floor. His hands squeezed into your ass before he crouched just enough to wrap both hands around your thighs. 

“Jump, princess.” 

You didn’t need to be told twice. With your arms wrapped around his shoulders and legs around his torso, Oikawa hoisted you up. The stretchy fabric of your dress hiked up to reveal your scant white, lacey thong. His eyes rolled into the back of his head at the sight. You kept sloppily kissing what little exposed skin you could above the collar of his dress shirt. 

Before moving he kicked off his shoes and helped you take off your own with one hand. When his hand came back up to cup your ass, he moved just a little too sharply, accidentally smacking you. A jagged moan forced its way out of your throat before you could think about what you were doing. You could practically hear the gears turning in his head. He let out a short, wicked laugh. 

“Very interesting…” he mused, beginning to walk toward his bedroom. After nudging open the door with one hand he brought it down on your bare ass hard. The sharp sting went straight to your pussy. This time, you tried to silence your much louder cry against his shoulder. “Whoopsie, my bad.” He snickered and turned on a soft lamp in the corner of the room. 

His arms dropped you onto his low bed and he immediately began undressing. You glanced around the clean and fairly barren room, trying to figure out why it felt so large even though it wasn’t. At last the answer was right in front of you when you met your own face in the wall mirror that spanned over his sliding closet beside the bed. His devilish eyes met yours in the mirror when he had freed himself everything except his boxer briefs. 

Your mouth drooled at the thick outline that pressed against the soft black fabric. Finally, you tore your eyes away from the mirror to really look at him. Unable to wait for him, you tore the dress off over your head as the bed dipped beside you. Not having worn a bra, since it wasn’t needed with the dress, left you only in your soaked panties. 

Oikawa barely admired your body before latching onto one of your breasts. His tongue circled your hardening nipple while he eagerly sucked and nipped at your sensitive skin. With one free hand he toyed with the opposite breast. The other hand smoothed up and down the skin on the inside of your thighs, just barely brushing against your clothed mound. The thong left little up to the imagination and barely covered you, but that wasn’t a concern you had right now. 

Just as his long fingers finally cupped your damp sex, he popped himself off your chest to press a wet kiss against your lips. 

“So wet already, princess.” He said with a grin. You whimpered as he tugged the lace of your panties and the rough fabric brought needed friction against your clit. “And so sensitive too.” He cooed down to you. “Has anyone touched this little pussy since we started going out? Hmm?” His thumb pressed down hard just above your clit, the sensation driving a sharp cry from you. 

“N-no,” you breathlessly sputtered out, “No one.” You gasp when you hear the soft squelching noise from how he’s kneading your cunt. 

“I bet you could cum just from this, huh?” 

“Uh-huh,” your whine is lewd. It’s almost infuriating to agree with him, but you do anyway, too swept up in the feeling. The soaked fabric and his fingers work in a steady rhythm against you. The sparks build up in your stomach, tightening that familiar coil. Your squirming under his every hot touch, hips bucking up to meet his motions. Just as you feel yourself nearing the edge, he pulls away and yanks you up with him. He yanks the flimsy fabric off of you and tosses it onto the ground.  

He kisses away the disappointed look on your face. “I’ll make you cum in your panties another day, baby, I promise. C’mere,” He leans back horizontal on the bed, “Don’t be shy now.”

Confused and heart racing, you do what you expect him to want and reach out to palm his cock. The angry red tip is peeking out just under the band, leaking a bead of precum onto his toned lower abdomen. When he laughs, you yank your hand away in shame, worried to ask what you did that was so funny. 

“No, no, I’m sorry. I meant come here and sit on my face.” He says slowly so you can hear every word. 

“Oh, I, uh… yeah, okay.” The words barely make it past your flustered lips as you crawl up his body. He helps adjust you over his broad shoulders, fingertips digging into your hips as he lowers you down. Only when you relax and look up do you realize you’re facing yourself again. From his position on the bed, Oikawa, rolls his eyes back just enough to watch you when he takes his first lick.

“Watch me make you cum.” He says quietly, the little hums from his voice vibrating into you. When he feels your body tense again, he slaps your ass just enough to jolt your clit against the tip of his nose. You twitch under the sensation, having been so close to release just moments ago. 

Your eyes are locked to where his tongue is endlessly lapping up your slick. The transfixing image forcing your hips to twitch and buck against him every so often. He encourages every soft whimper and moan you make with a deep, vibrating grumble between your thighs. When his tongue forces its way into your drooling hole you actually cry out, hands crashing against the top of his head to tug at his soft hair. 

His sweet, wide brown eyes meet yours clouded by lust. Your thighs are shaking around his head by the time he’s done fucking you with his tongue, but before you can relax he’s attaching himself to your pulsing clit. 

“Tōru, gonna, hnngh… gonna cum.” Your voice is hoarse and ragged as you’re watching all of your own movements in the spotless mirror. 

It doesn’t take much to set you over the edge. You can’t really tell what he’s doing, all you feel is pleasure as that tight coil snaps and your thighs clamp down on either side of his head. His sturdy hands keep you upright as your hips thrash against him. You can feel the hot wet drip of your own cum sliding down your thigh as he messily laps you up, easing you through the shattering orgasm. 

When you settle at last, he scoots out from under you and holds you in his arm, still facing the mirror. He shifts you into his lap, spreading your legs apart with his own. You watch as your soaked cunt continues to clench around nothing. One of his hands holds you upright against him while the other caresses through your folds. He easily slips one finger into your hole, sighing happily as he lightly rests his chin on your shoulder to watch. 

“Look at yourself, princess. Such a pretty little pussy and it sucks my fingers in so well.” He added a second, long finger and scissored them inside of you. It should have been more embarrassing, but your eyes remained locked exactly where his fingers were pumping and curling into you. 

“Want you.” You huffed, trying to catch your breath. His cock was pressed just against the lowest part of your back and you could feel that he craved you too.

“You can have me soon, I’m just making sure you can take me.” He punctuated his words with a particularly wide sweep of his fingers that made you crumble against him. 

“I-I can take you.” You argued. Happy with how you had relaxed around his fingers and not wanting to wait a minute longer, he popped his fingers out of your tight hole. He displayed his drenched hand for you. When he separated his fingers they remained obscenely connected by your thick cum. 

“You’re so cute.” His voice almost sounded casual as he nuzzled into your neck. Frustrated with the wait, you literally took matters into your own hands, taking his slick-cover hand into yours and sucking off his fingers. Your hips rutted back into his cock, hard. Oikawa shuddered against you with a broken gasp. “And a tease.”

He ripped his hand from your mouth and threw you to lay normally on the bed. In seconds, he was looming over you again, pressing soft, cuddly kisses against your lips. Your grabbing hands found his waistband and tugged down until his cock was free. It slapped against your tummy while he shuffled to pull the underwear off the rest of the way. 

You pulled him in for a deep kiss, desperately trying to lift your hips up to meet his. The thick length of his cock brushed against your slit with every slight movement of his hip. You realized he had been right to prep you so much. He was large. It shouldn’t have been surprising considering he was a taller guy, but you hadn’t expected such girth and length. 

“Want me to fuck you?” He whispered when you pulled away from one another. 

“Yes, please, please.” 

His classic grinning smirk was back as he lined himself up with your entrance. 

“No need to beg, princess.” He eased the tip in, grunting as he tried to move slowly. “You’re so tight even after all my hard work.” His overly whiney tone is enough to somewhat snap you out of your lovey lust-clouded haze. 

“You didn’t work that hard.” You try to scoff, but it turns into a choke when he slips a couple more inches in, stopping just at the thickest point of his shaft. You whine and quiver below him, gripping onto his muscles shoulders to keep grounded. The stretch burns delicious inside of you and you can’t wait until you can take him all the way. 

“What was that?” He hums. Part of you wants so badly to just submit and take back what you said, but another more devious part decides to push back. 

“If you worked so hard then it shouldn’t be so hard for you to fuck me.” Your softer tone betrays the playfully biting words, but it’s enough to make him nearly bottom out in you. 

“It wouldn’t be hard for me to fuck you. I’m just letting your tight pussy get used to this big cock.” 

You can’t help as you flutter around his length at the words. The slight movement is enough to suck him in the rest of the way. You loudly moan into his ear when his tight balls lightly tap against your ass. 

“Fuck, you feel so good,” you sigh, trying to relax around him. As much as you want him to fuck you hard right there, you know you have to wait. 

“Tell me when you’re ready, baby.” He hums, watching as your eyebrows knit in frustration. Taking one arm that’s propping him up over your frame, he reaches down to press at your clit, hoping to offer some distraction while you’re being molded to his shape. 

You were struggling to focus on anything other than his cock splitting you. His nimble fingers brushing warmly against your clit was just enough to lull you into comfort. 

“Ready.” You puffed out. 

“Y-yeah?” Oikawa moaned as he slowly pulled himself almost all the way out of before evenly sliding back in. He continued on like this, going slow and deep inside of you until you were clawing at his back and demanding more. 

“Please, harder.” 

Your plead is immediately heard by Oikawa who kisses you softly on the temple. “Of course, princess.” His tone is gentle in comparison to his hips that immediately snap into you. The force is almost startling and his speed matches it. 

His stamina seems endless as he ruts into you like he’s feral. Your body is burning with pleasure, so pleased to be filled up with him, you almost don’t notice when his fingers start to toy with your clit again. He’s panting little huffs into your ear, whispering sweet praises and nothings. His honeyed words only encourage you to cum faster. 

You legs wrap around his middle, forcing his hips in closer, as you cry out beneat him. It’s too much, convulsing around his thick cock. Your cunt sporadically clamps around him, desperately trying to keep him in place as he fucks you through it. Fucked out, you limply hang onto him. Your head lolls to the side to simply watch the two of you in the mirror once again, lips parted as you gasped for air. 

“Mmh, good girl.” He kisses you sloppily, grinning as he notices you watching yourself get fucked into the mattress. His words make your pulsing center flutter around him again and you feel his perfect thrusts start to get a little sloppy. 

“You gonna cum?” You slur out, rubbing small circles into the muscles of his back. “You wanna cum in me?” 

“Y-yeah, gonna cum in that perfect tight little pussy, princess.” He chokes out, hips stuttering. He sheaths himself all the way inside of you, shallowly pumping as his cum shoots inside of you. You’re holding him close, sighing into his skin at the way his hot cum fills you up. He catches your mouth in a sweet, but messy kiss as the last of his seed spurts into you. 

“We should’ve started actually dating a long time ago.” 

[thinkingisadangerouspastime]

(pt 1) i really enjoy all your atla analyses & you've done a great job breaking down the usual arguments re how eip shows that kataang shouldn't have happened. i'm curious about your take on one specific argument that i just saw today, in an analysis of the show by a zker that was otherwise quite good and respectful (i know you've already talked about eip a lot, so no problem if you don't feel like rehashing). the premise: aang didn't just pressure katara in eip, he threatened her.

(pt 2) they point to when katara joins aang & asks if he’s alright: “aang: no, i’m not! i hate this play! katara: i know it’s upsetting, but it sounds like you’re overreacting. aang: overreacting? if i hadn’t blocked my chakra, i’d probably be in the avatar state right now!” the suggestion is he’s threatening her when he says ‘i’d probably be in the avatar state right now’ to describe his anger. i think this take exaggerates and oversimplifies it, but interested in your thoughts on it.

Hello my friend!! It is true I am Old inside and don’t like rehashing dhdlksjslks BUT your comments on my posts are always incredibly kind and insightful so I am more than willing to do a bit of rehashing for you 🥰 Besides! I’ve seen this general take before a few times and it’s always irked me for the exact reason you point out - it simultaneously exaggerates and oversimplifies the situation (and honestly that’s an impressive duality since it’s seemingly contradictory, so hats off to them lmaooo) - and now is as good a time as any to address it. So, for starters, let’s go ahead and get the excerpt they love to focus on so much:

Cut to Aang standing alone on a balcony. Katara enters and walks up to him.

Katara: Are you all right?

Aang: [Angered.] No, I’m not! I hate this play! [Yanks his hat off and throws it on the ground.]

Katara: I know it’s upsetting, but it sounds like you’re overreacting.

Aang: Overreacting? If I hadn’t blocked my chakra, I’d probably be in the Avatar State right now!

Here’s the thing about so-called analyses of this excerpt: in a manner extremely convenient to the poster, they never seek to contextualize this moment. (I mean, to do so would deplatform their entire “argument” - perhaps that’s why they avoid performing a full analysis?) So let’s avoid that pitfall from the start.

Firstly, below are some links to related posts; I’m going to do my best to summarize the most relevant parts, but for anyone who desires greater detail, I gotchu 😤

This post explains why EIP (the play, lol) is imperialist propaganda and is intended to belittle the entire Gaang.

This post explains how Aang never acted “entitled” to Katara’s affections, particularly in regard to EIP.

This post breaks down the infamous EIP kiss like Snopes Fact Checker, covering common misconceptions, important perspectives to consider, etc.

Alright. With that out the way, it’s time for some context.

Aang and Katara have this conversation on the balcony after watching 95% of “The Boy in the Iceberg,” a play chock-full of Fire Nation propaganda that demeans the entire Gaang in order to prop up the Fire Nation as superior (hence why the play ends with Ozai’s victory). Here is my general breakdown of Aang and Katara’s treatment in particular from a previous post:

- katara, an indigenous woman, is highly sexualized and portrayed as overly dramatic and tearful, because the fire nation objectifies women not of their own people and views them as less intelligent and less emotionally stable

- aang, the avatar, the sole survivor of the fire nation’s genocide of the air nomads who is incredibly in-touch with his spirituality and femininity, is portrayed as an overly-airy and immature woman. the fire nation portrays him with a female actor to demean him (like, that’s classic imperialistic propagandist tactics) and furthermore writing his character as a childish airhead reinforces the fire nation sentiment that the air nomads were weak, foolish people who did not deserve to exist in their world

In other words, these kids have just watched almost an entire play that preys upon their insecurities and depicts them using racist and sexist stereotypes about their respective nations. It is completely understandable that tensions might run a little high and that their interactions would not be as balanced as usual (Katara and Aang have a great track record of communicating well with each other, as it happens!).

So we have to keep that in mind when examining the aforementioned excerpt. But there are other factors to consider, too! Namely: they are kids. Children. Teens. Aang is 12, Katara is 14.

If we want to be scientific, a person’s brain doesn’t finish developing until they are 25, lmao, and the preteen/teen years are when the prefrontal cortex that controls “rationality,” “judgement,” “forethought,” etc. is still developing. This doesn’t mean Aang and Katara are irrational and make poor decisions 24/7 (obviously not), but it does mean that in an intense, highly emotional situation, like after watching a play that intentionally demeans them and depicts them as inferior, they are more likely to overreact, more likely to be emotional, and more likely to make mistakes. Like, I’m serious, lol. “Teens process information with the amygdala.” That’s part of the brain that helps control emotions! It’s why teens sometimes struggle to articulate what we’re thinking, especially in situations that require instinct/impulse and quick decisions, because we’re really feeling whenever we make those choices. Acting more on emotion. Our brains simply haven’t finished developing the decision-making parts, lmao.

In sum: Aang and Katara are both kids, not adults, and should be interpreted as such. This doesn’t negate their intelligence, because they are both incredibly smart and Aang is arguably the wisest of the Gaang, but they are human. Young humans. They have emotions, and we should not be so cruel as to assume they’d never act on them.

So taking that all together, we can now acknowledge the high stress Aang and Katara are under, understand why they might be upset (*cough* imperialist propaganda is hurtful *cough*), and examine how their youth might play into their emotional reactions. And funny thing - all analyses that come to the conclusion of Aang “threatening” Katara here do not usually bother with this context. I can’t imagine why!

And you know what, let’s add one more piece of context: Sokka states that Aang left the theater “like, ten minutes ago,” which is what cues Katara to go look for him on the balcony. The reason I mention this line is because to me, it suggests Aang knew he was more worked up than usual! He chose to separate himself from his friends so he could process his frustration! He did not take his anger at the play out on them; instead, he purposefully took time and space to be alone.

With that in mind, I don’t understand at all how Aang’s Avatar state quote could be interpreted as a threat? Canonly, Aang is someone who was aware enough of his frustration to separate himself from the others - yet the logical next step is him threatening Katara as a result? He knew his intense emotions were because of the play (which he says himself), so the logical conclusion is that he then pinned the fault on Katara? What?? Sorry, that interpretation has no textual basis, lmao. But I digress!

Aang tells Katara, “If I hadn’t blocked my chakra, I’d probably be in the Avatar State right now!” As you said, this is the line people point to in an attempt to justify their (baseless) conclusion that Aang is “threatening” Katara. So let’s bring in the two key pieces of context: imperialist propaganda and age. Given that Aang is 12, and given that Aang has just watched almost a full play that demeans him and everything his people stood for (and let’s not forget it also mocks his and Katara’s love for each other)…

His reaction is understandable. An exaggeration and needlessly dramatic, but understandable. He feels vulnerable and insecure and Aang is human. He is human and flawed and he overreacts here and I love that A:TLA shows how even our heroes, even people who are truly good at heart and in soul, can get overly upset (especially given the aforementioned circumstances!). Would Aang actually be in the Avatar state at that moment, had it been possible? Of course not! He’s young and he’s hurt and as such he says something dramatic to convey his anxieties and frustrations. The line is not meant to be taken literally, and seeing people do so despite all the factors that should be taken into consideration when analyzing it… Cue a long, tired sigh from me and so many other A:TLA fans.

And to be honest? I cannot fathom how people watch this episode and come to the conclusion that Aang is “threatening” Katara. To me, this episode - besides being a recap episode - is one that humanizes our cast even further. Aang snaps at Katara, kisses her when he shouldn’t (which the story appropriately treats as wrong). Katara pushes down her true feelings and retreats into herself, afraid to start a relationship with the boy she loves because she’s already lost him once before and can’t bear to do so again. Zuko further confronts the hurt he’s enacted upon others, especially upon Iroh. Toph practices being vulnerable and accepting vulnerability from others by conversing with Zuko. Sokka witnesses how others have erased his contributions and labelled him as nothing more than the token nonbender in the group. Even Suki learns that she is not the only person who holds a place in Sokka’s heart and that she can never replace what he has lost.

To watch this episode where our heroes must come to terms with how the Fire Nation deems them inherently inferior, with how they have more fights to overcome in the future with the Fire Nation than a single war, and to come to the conclusion that… that what, Aang is abusive? A monster? Irredeemable? That he would threaten his best friend, someone he loves in every way?

Wow. That says more than enough about the viewer, doesn’t it?

[sapphire374]

Soy Sol: Chapter 11 (The Cut that Burrows Deep)

Wattpad Link

Ch.1 / Ch.2 / Ch.3 / Ch.4 / Ch.5 / Ch.6 / Ch.7 / Ch.8 / Ch.9 / Ch. 10 / Ch.12 / Ch.13 / Ch.14 / Ch.15 / Ch.16 / Ch.17

Ámbar feels like every step she takes, the more she can feel her heartbeat. It’s like she’s carrying it in her arms with nothing to guard it, out in the open alone. She opens the cold rusted handle of the entrance to the restaurant. There she is, her biological mom trembling while drinking a glass of water. Ámbar sums up all the courage inside her and takes the chance to approach her. When she grabs the seat in front of her, Sylvania can’t help but stare in shock. “Wow Ámbar, you truly have grown.” Ámbar may have brought all her walls down for the people she loves, but she puts them back up with this stranger.

“You can’t say that since you were never there for me. That’s no fair,” Ámbar chided. Sylvania chokes up and avoids eye contact. “Look Ámbar, I now know after everything that has happened the big mistake I made, but at the time it felt like the best option for you. I was young and didn’t have the means nor felt ready to take care of a child. I thought Sharon would’ve been a better parental figure instead of a young girl like myself. I later on regretted it and that’s something I shall have to carry with me for the rest of my life.”

Ámbar grips onto her purse trying very hard to hold back all her tears. She wonders why did this lady chose Sharon specifically and why did Sharon try to keep it a secret for so long? “I understand you were young, but I know that’s not the whole story because I have memories being in a different house that was NOT Benson Mansion. You saw me, you knew me, and didn’t like me enough to keep me,” Ámbar rebuked. Sylvania is showing tears now, she’s choking up with every word as her hand trembles just to take a sip of water. “It wasn’t like that at all Ámbar. I tried, I really did try to see if I was capable of taking care of a child. I noticed my arms weren’t so comforting for you. Sometimes when you love someone, so much, you have to let them go because you care,” Sylvania responded. Ámbar doesn’t know whether to believe what she’s saying or not. She wishes she can get out of these tornadoes of lies that always come chasing her. She’s sick of it all. She wants the truth. Is that too much to ask for?

Silence crowds the room, they’re breathing the same air but can’t even look at each other. Sylvania speaks up again. “I know this feels hard to believe but why do you think I came back? It was for that reason, I thought Sharon would be a better parent than me and would take great care of you. I realized I was sadly wrong.”

“Sharon? Of all people? What made you think that a woman who put a place on fire because she was jealous of her own sister would be a perfect parent for a child? Do you know she never showed me affection or love? I had to learn it all on my own. She only showed any signs of care when she needed me part of her plan that only benefitted her. You left me to a person who only cares about themselves,” Ámbar fumed.

“It wasn’t like that at all. I had no idea about her being the cause of the Benson fire and she had already adopted you before that even happened. When I met her, she was a kind woman, I was friends with Lili from work, so I had already knew the family. I assumed that Sharon had a good heart just like Lili, even though she was seemingly different. The whole time I would interact with her, she was always nice and seemed to really want a child because she always felt alone. It all just felt fitting.” Ámbar is trying to put together all the puzzle pieces in her head with Sylvania’s story. Part of her doesn’t believe it but…. It does kind of make sense. For her it justifies nothing even though she has hope.

Before she gets up from her seat, she leaves a wad of cash. “Ámbar where are you going? We haven’t even ordered yet?” Sylvania asks. “I’m not feeling hungry anymore, here’s some money for dinner.” Ámbar heads out the door with no remnants behind other than the tears that fall to the floor.

Jam and Roller

“Eyyy amigo I’m so happy for the release of your new music video!” Gastón exclaims to Matteo. They’re both drinking smoothies while watching the Youtube countdown from Matteo’s phone. These are the special moments Matteo loves to share with Gastón since he’s always been his pal for the longest. He also loves sharing it with Luna too, but they sadly haven’t hit it off as well for a while. Matteo is hoping Gastón’s plan will work for the upcoming days.

Simón heads to their tables with a fresh batch of popcorn. “Wow, how exciting! It’s even more special since you get to enjoy it here at the Jam and Roller with us!” Simón states. Matteo grins but it slowly fades when he sees Luna walk into the cafeteria and completely ignoring him. “What happened?” Simón asks when he sees Matteo’s vivid expression abruptly change. “No nothing, I just wish I got to share this moment with another person too.” When Simón turns his head and sees who Matteo is staring at, he realizes what Matteo meant.

Nina pulls out her purse and hands her phone to Luna. “I know you’re trying to pretend you don’t care but you do. Watch the video, it’ll get rid of all your curiosities.” Luna shakes her head in disapproval. “Nina, the least I want to do is watch a music video of the one I love flirting with a girl who has a huge crush on him as well. They’re practically soulmates, meant for each other,” Luna exaggerates. “Oh c’mon, I know it’s complicated, but you know that’s not true. If you’re not going to do it for him, then do it for yourself. You deserve to see why he arrived late to your date.” Luna glares at Nina and decides to take the phone.

Once the music video is out, everyone begins to cheer for Matteo. Luna sits even more depressed seeing at the ‘amazing’ chemistry Matteo and Viviana had in the music video. She can’t help but doubt herself even more when all the comments from his fans say they ship him with Viviana. “Nina, I’m not feeling so good. I think I’ll just head home.” Nina nods and Luna begins to get up from her chair and head out. Matteo notices and follows her out.

“Luna! Luna, wait up! I need to tell you something,” Matteo yells out. “Matteo not now, I’m not in the mood. Congratulations of your video, it was very nice. I just don’t feel so good okay.” Matteo catches up to her and stands in front. “Look Luna, I don’t know if you’ll listen to me now but please go to tomorrow’s concert I’m having. My manager is having me make a concert to promote the single, but it wouldn’t be the same without you. Please Luna. You never miss any of my concerts,” Matteo begs. Luna gradually smiles. “Really? You still want me there?”

“Of course, I do Luna.” Luna now can’t help but blush. “Matteo, of course I’ll go. Even though I’m still a little upset at you calling me jealous, standing me up on our date, and not believing or listening to me, I still care. Since you want me there, I’ll be there.” Matteo is surprised by Luna’s comment and begins to graciously smile too. It was a moment for them, they hadn’t had one like this in a long time. It felt needed.

Nico is in the rink sitting on one of the chairs, he seems to be working on something since he has his notebook open with his pen. Jim enters and sees him alone. “Hey there, what are you working on?” Jim asks. “Oh just a few verses, I’m trying to get ahead on the Roller Band song for the competition, but nothing seems to come into mind,” Nico says. Jim heads to the seat beside him. She sits down and carefully glances over his blank page. “Oh yeah you do seem to be having some trouble,” Jim chuckles. “If you’d like I can help, I’m use to writing songs with Yam.” Nico turns and faces Jim, “Yes of course. I need all the help I can get; it’s been a while for me since I got to write a song with the Roller Band.” They both laugh together and get working on the song.

Jazmín dashes to Delfi holding a small slip of paper. “You won’t believe what just happened?” Delfi carefully places her books into her locker after seeing Jazmín rush to her. “Is it something new for the Fundom or for your blog, Ja Jazmin?” Delfi predicts. “Nope, you’re very far off. Look at this,” Jazmín hands Delfi the note. The more she reads it, the more her eyes grow like a flower blooming in the season, keeps opening. She’s in plain shock as Jazmín nods from her amusement. “Right! I have a secret admirer!! I have to post about this on my blog!” Jazmín frantically grabs her phone from her pocket but right when she’s about to film, Delfi stops her. “No Jazmín, this is something special. Honestly, I think this is something you should keep for yourself, every celebrity likes to keep their personal life separate from their work life,” Delfi advises. Jazmín thinks for a second and says, “Nahhh I’ll still post it, plus this can even help us discover who the anonymous writer is!”

The Restaurant

Yam is wearing her golden shimmery dress that Jim helped her pick out. She’s very anxious about her date with Ramiro, she wants it to go out perfect since this was something she had been dreaming of for a while. He puts down the menu and slips his hand under hers to her surprise. He gives her a shy smile. “I had been dreaming of this for a while. Before, I would always try to move on, but I just couldn’t. My mind just couldn’t forget about you,” Ramiro admits. Yam begins to tear up. “I felt the same way for so long but never said anything worried you didn’t feel the same way. I’m so happy about this moment. I don’t care how long I had to wait, it was totally worth it.”

Throughout the whole night, Yam and Ramiro shared college stories and even old memories of each other. How Yam never stopped writing songs about him and how Ramiro would skate imagining about her. Everything went smooth till dessert came. A random man with a suit and tie approached their table and faces Yam. “You look familiar, are you Yamila Sanchez from that Ja Jazmin blog?” Yam stays startled and stutters, “uhhh yes why?” The man quickly pulls a card out of his pocket. “Hillside Records, I’m the owner. I would like to set up a meeting with you for a chance at a record deal.” Yam immediately glares at Ramiro for a response. He shows his approval and gestures for Yam to respond. “Yes I would love to!” Yam exclaims. “Great! I’m available tomorrow at 5 pm. There is one important detail I have to tell you,” the man says. “Yes, what is it,” Yam asks. “The record company is not in Buenos Aires. It’s in California.” He proceeds to hand her the card. “Think about it, I’ll see you tomorrow.” He leaves and Yam shows her disappointment to Ramiro, she couldn’t believe how such an exciting offer can turn to something so depressing. If she took this offer, that means she would have to leave her family, her friends, and her chance at being with Ramiro.

“Look I know this is hard to think about but just follow your heart. If this is something you truly want go for it, I can wait longer,” Ramiro grabs her hand and holds it. “I don’t know what to say. I never knew me pursuing a music career would mean I have to leave everything and everyone I love,” Yam gradually lets her tears fall onto her glittery dress.

[muwur]

snapchat headcanons

✧ hc’s ✧ for using snapchat w ur boi toi ft. the pretty setter squad

❧ gn reader

✎ 3.1k words

a/n: kinda a combo of how they use sc and the kinds of snaps they send you! along w wat u send them, and uh... dating stuf n shenanigans? texting/snapping habits? my fantasies? IDEK ANYMORE EOFHEFJ

this was born from the recesses of my mind , which desired nothing mor than snapchats from suga , us sending cute selfies , others bein dumb n chaotic , no context videos , n him snapping me photos of some mangoes on sale he said he’ll buy for me DXX it’s too late for me now

doing research on hq bois and surfing thru sc features (im just now realizing theres quite a bit?? im hoping i address most of them at some point lolol) instead of real life tings aHHhhhHAHA

requests: open! will be working on a suga one i got, dw, requester!

sugawara

✧ sends good morning and good night snaps

✧ so he’s rlly good at keeping streaks, probs has the longest ones (one of them being y’alls streak)

✧ posts tidbits of volleyball practice on his story every once in a while

✧ snaps you pics of his sleeping teammates when they’re coming back to school after a long day of matches , adding a single ‘❤️’ as a caption

✧ he will also create colorful masterpieces on all of them

✧ gives daichi a santa beard, tanaka a squiggly stache (i imagine it to look like spongebob n patrick’s seaweed ones now that were mEN), n kageyama sum angry brows,,, wait he already has them lolol u good der kags

✧ posts a picture of you when you’re hanging out, captioning it: “🥰“

✧ has conversations with you purely via snaps

✧ ranges from casual chats and checking up on u to crackwhoring ( ** indicates the photo, while the “” quotes indicate the caption, all snaps are italicized, otherwise its regular dialogue)

✧ suga: *peace sign* “hey sweetheart, how r u?”

✧ you: *pics of homework* “ahh, drowning in school ;-; i cant wait for this week to be over fghjkl”

✧ suga: *close up with :o on his face* “let’s study together tmrw!”

✧ or

✧ suga: *complete darkness* “its 3 am n i cant sleep”

✧ you: *the top half of your head, laying on a pillow* “ ;( aw babe. do u want me to send something to help u sleep?”

✧ suga: *still in darkness* “y u still up?? go sleep. n 🥺 yes pls”

✧ you: *snaps pics of feet* “that’ll be 50 bucks, pay up” 

✧ suga: *darkness remains* “can we make a trade instead? i promise to make it worth ;)”

✧ ok now u BOTH cant sleep (im sry my crackheading be acting up around 2am eeryday, i stan a mischievous suga--)

✧ video chats (in the darkness lol) instead until you both pass out (im not in luv u r 😭)

✧ super down to take filtered selfies w you

✧ does all the silly ones with you (things like ’angry face’ or the frog one)

✧ but also rlly digs lookin cute with you using some heart crowns, y’all an aesthetic (n crakhead) duo fosho

✧ def subscribes to life hacks and tries them out himself, has a 50% success rate

kageyama

✧ doesn’t rlly use snapchat too much

✧ but when he does

✧ will either send you a picture to indicate he’s at volleyball practice (wow wat a sexi lookin gym floor)

✧ or some random picture of whatever he’s doing at the moment (*drinking milk*)

✧ this is mostly in order to save streaks

✧ he’s so bad at streaks

✧ “why does it matter?? what’s the point of sending just black screens or whatever’s in front of you at the moment??”

✧ can’t keep a consistent streak for more than 3 days and also doesn’t care (until hinata challenges him to see who can have the longer one)

✧ when you send him videos of him playing, he really focuses on them to try to improve his technique. asks you to send those vids to him (assuming u saved them, which u did)

✧ but when you look over his shoulder when he’s watching a video and give him some compliment (“i recorded at the perfect moment! that was a really good set, kageyama!”), he gets a bit flustered

✧ gets even more flustered but pretty happy whenever you post videos on your story showing karasuno winning some points with captions like:

✧ “footage of the legendary quick >.>” or “karasuno crows flyin high!” or “these bois make my heart 😭 im so proud”

✧ you WILL catch him off guard in photos, using filters that surrounds his head w/ emojis like 🥺💖🥰💘

✧ you also put these on your story (to his dismay)

✧ ppl comment on these mor than anything else (n for those who dont rlly kno kageyama, theyre kinda surprised to him like this)

✧ hinata snickers “hey kageyama you look pretty good here--”

✧ takes some selfies with you, mostly cuz you want them

✧ saves them after u send them over (n secretly cherishes them)

✧ occasionally watches his subscriptions, they’ll usually involve sports, mostly volleyball (who woulda guessed)

✧ you use his bitmoji to test out random facial expressions you would never see him wear

✧ you: “can you smile and wink like this? act like you’re the obnoxious charming guy in a shojo.”

✧ will actually attempt, but it looks so bad that you die inside and he never wants to try again cuz of ur laughing outburst (you: “😭😭 bb im sorry i couldnt help it”)

oikawa

✧ literally sends you anything and everything

✧ morning bathroom selfie to show off how good his hair came out that day, saying:

✧ “he has risen”

✧ or “i woke up like this”

✧ and my favorite, “you’re lucky you get this content for frEE”

✧ selfies with iwa, who just looks annoyed and exasperated at the camera

✧ sends you pics of his lunch and snacks (“bet u wish u had milk bread too”)

✧ always packs extra milk bread so he could convince you to stay at his practice after school--

✧ FILTERSS

✧ I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENUF

✧ will either use the filters that make him kayooottt (cute)

✧ loves the ones named ‘hearts,’ ‘soft,’ ‘peach,’ ‘butterfly cheeks,’ vsco filters LOL, etc

✧ uses ‘big mouth’ when he feelin a bit sASSY; also loves to use this one when he rants, it channels his inner valley girl

✧ sometimes he’ll be snacking or drinking something while he does so (“hey guys today im gonna eat these milk buns from my favorite bakery and this bomb orange juice and complain about this little kid who talked smack to me earlier and almost made me cry--”)

✧ takes cute selfies with you, is an aesthetic selfie king, puts them on his story to show off he’s hangin with you

✧ but on your story you only post the ones he looks bad in LOL

✧ has separate stories for his every need, some r private (and lucky you, ur included in all of them)

✧ titles them ‘mean things iwa said to me today,’ ‘ranting hotbox + mukbangs,’ ‘a day in the life of oikawa,’ ‘volleyball 🏐,’ ‘unpopular opinions,’ etc. 

✧ fitting room photoshoots lol

✧ “y/n, what do you think of this??” “and this?” “oOH WHAT ABOUT THIS??”

✧ ends up calling you through video chat so you can live critique his choices

✧ “oikawa, please no, i can’t be seen with you in public if you wear those--”

✧ also changes his bitmoji’s outfits from time to time, hopes you’ll notice, but you don’t LOL (oikawa: ;((((((( )

kenma

✧ uses sc usually just to reply to messages ppl send him

✧ indifferent about streaks, but keeps a few with ppl he’s closer to

✧ mindlessly plays the snapchat games with you, finds some of them kinda cute

✧ you both made his bitmoji for him, dressing his up in the orange cat suit

✧ you also helped make kuroo’s and put his in the black cat suit to match--

✧ snaps you every time he gets a new game, starts playing it, and once he finishes

✧ started to post some gameplays and reviews on his sc story (might as well add them to sc since he was already on other social platforms), and ended up amassing a large following

✧ follows the tech and gaming stories on sc

✧ as well as the ones with cute animals--

✧ open to selfies with you, usually wears a calm expression and holds up a peace sign

✧ even occasionally sticks his tongue out

✧ his story is occasionally heavily bombarded with candids of him w/ pretty sc filters, all taken by you

✧ but of all the filters, you love using the clout glasses on him

✧ especially when he’s just minding his own business

✧ “kenma, in his tru habitat” when hes cocooned in a blanket

✧ “kenma, on his way to steal yo manz” while on his way to the bathroom

✧ “kenma, next iron chef. watch out gordon” as he’s cooking instant ramen

✧ “kenma” n das it

✧ but he thinks it meme-y so he lets you do whatever you want, kinda digs it

✧ you end up dedicating your snap story to memes of kenma and the nekoma volleyball team. ppl are in it for the shits n giggles n hot bois

✧ you later discover someone else did the same thing with their volleyball team filled with hot bois from shiratorizawa, and you befriend tendou and share funni internet tings

akaashi

✧ 99% of his photos include either you or bokuto or both

✧ bokuto spams akaashi’s story and contact list with selfies and videos of himself using weird filters, often gets you to join him

✧ has several streaks, but will send something with more substance than a black screen or his bedroom window

✧ will usually involve smthng that just happened to him or smthing he saw, like:

✧ “a kind older lady offered me some apples in return for helping her”

-or:

✧ “how do i break the news to bokuto that the yaikniku place he’s been wanting to go to for the past week ,,, is closed today”

✧ o n let’s not leave out:

✧ “is it possible to conjure a ghost using a wooden spatula, ketchup, and a chalk drawn hexagram? bokuto’s been paranoid ever since he tried last night and i dont know what to tell him. seriously, help”

✧ looks through stories occasionally, comments whenever bokuto makes questionable decisions

✧ also comments on whatever you’ve posted. his words range from “you’re cute” to “why,” depending on the content

✧ ppl know when y’all are hanging out cuz he’ll post smthing to indicate he’s with you, usually it’s some candid and you’re not paying attention

✧ appreciation posts for you as well! esp if you got him something, like onigiri or his fav, Nanohana no Karashiae , for lunch! (akaashi: *snaps a pic of his food* “thank you y/n for feeding me”)

✧ prefers video calling over texting/snapping whenever possible tho

✧ occasionally reminisces thru his sc memories

✧ enjoys the flashback feature and will send them to you and bokuto (cuz they’re about y’all anyway lolol)

✧ also has secretly saved a bunch of selfies of himself, consists of him trying out a lot of the filters (he feelin himself)

✧ you, one day, looking thru his phone and discovering them: “akaashi, you’re so pretty wtf”

✧ akaashi: “...”

koganegawa

✧ sends you selfies of him before practice

✧ during breaks

✧ and after practice, usually makes a comment about how it went for him that day like:

✧  “i hit a decent toss today and futakuchi actually complimented me!”

✧ that, or:

✧ “i got yelled at 17 times today 😢😩”

✧ has quite a few streaks, his longest ones being with you and hinata

✧ def uses filters

✧ tries out every funny one he finds and sends you videos

✧ “look y/n im an aaaaAALlliiEEENnnNNN oo oo hoo hhhooOOh”

✧ “now im a chicky nuggy!!” (chicken nugget)

✧ also enjoys the doodle feature

✧ but he uses the filter with the clout glasses unironically--

✧ usually when smth good happens to him and he feels happy and/or cool about it

✧ “just beat the boss in this game on my 69th try B)”

✧ “kogane, that’s--”

✧ plays sc games with you and thinks bitmojis r cool

✧ kinda sad he cant find a hair option that matches him tho lolol rip

✧ you: “you hair’s just,,, unique,,,”

✧ subscribed to anything sports and fitness, as well as pop culture so he can stay in the loop

✧ also watches everyone else’s stories, pointing out whenever he sees smthing cool and/or interesting

✧ “woahh, karasuno’s at nationals right now! i wish we could’ve won, but next year for sure!!”

✧ you encourage him at all his games, hyping him up irl and online

✧ “koganegawa: best setter 😍!!”

✧ luckily you didnt record the parts he completely messed up LOL

semi

✧ before going out with you, snaps you a pic of his casual outfit like:

✧ semi: “does this look ok”

✧ you: “babe you look great, tendou was just messing with you”

✧ will make unwanted appearances on tendou’s snap and complains to you about them

✧ “i didnt consent to being part of his meme page” and

✧ “okay, but he didn’t only have to share all the moments i messed up--”

✧ also indifferent about streaks but will do them

✧ sometimes sends snaps/streaks indicating he’s practicing his music

✧ when you see these you usually ask him to send you vids or if you can come over n watch

✧ initially is a bit shy about it but he loves what he does and you and knows you’re genuinely interested and supportive so he agrees

✧ secretly rlly enjoys having you as his personal audience

✧ lowkey into asmr, like the soap cutting shit as well as chewing crunchy things

✧ also watches food porn and clips of mukbangs, then can’t resist going on youtube and watching the whole thing

✧  “y/n, can we try this, it looks so good--”

✧ will also often watch oikawa’s stories, especially his ‘ranting hotbox + mukbangs,’ and makes comments about him being an idiot

✧  “this kid he’s talking about is a savage”

✧ but admits they’re quite entertaining

✧ just looks serious in all the selfies you take with him

✧ you: “can you look like you’re enjoying yourself?”

✧ semi: “i look cooler like this tho”

✧ sc memories filled with shenanigans from you and the volleyball team, doodles, and mirror selfies with him experimenting diff looks (you: “tendou, you got him way too concerned about this”)

✧ also enjoys showing off he’s with you, taking a short video of you when you hang out

✧ you: “semi, i look bad right now”

✧ semi: “but you can never look bad”

✧ you: “🥺 bb”

✧ viewers: “aw”

✧ shiratorizawa: “can he be this nice with us LOL”

shirabu

✧ his main mode of communication with you is mostly through the regular messaging app, so he doesn’t use sc too much

✧ also doesn’t care for streaks and is bad at keeping them

✧ will answer to you or his senpais rather soon tho

✧ but lets all his other notifications pile up a bit before finally going thru them

✧ goes through the snaps he receives really fast, spending like 2 seconds each to look at them cuz aint nobody got time for dat

✧ doesn’t even rlly open goshiki’s LOL

✧ you have fun using filters on him and taking videos while he’s just doing his own thing peacefully like studying

✧ it takes him a second to notice and when he finally looks up, he just gives you an exasperated look

✧ cue you cracking up with laughter bc the filter finally shows up on his face

✧ his eyes and mouth are now on mike wazowski

✧ that, or his face becomes so disturbingly moRPhed like an alien

✧ caption: “ken-chan, my future medical man 😍”

✧ “y/n, please, this is like the 7th time in the last 20 minutes--”

✧ finally convinced him to take a study break and hang out with you

✧ which usually consists of snacking and light banter while you lay your head on his lap

✧ and scrolling through snapchat stories and showing him what everyone else is up to and cool things you’re subscribed to

✧ “loooook, dr. miami’s doing another butt job! is this the line of work you’re studying so hard for?”

✧ “no, it’s really not”

✧ is actually very soft with you and likes having the photos and vids for memories

atsumu

✧ sends you snaps where his brother looks bad, captioning it:

✧ “this is evidence that im the hotter twin”

✧ likewise, osamu sends you snaps where atsumu looks even worse

✧ like, the mans passed out, looking rekt and open mouthed, drool seeping into his pillow

✧ osamu: “u still have time to break up with him”

✧ also lucky for you, atsumu also loves to take unflattering photos of you and send them to you randomly at like 2 am

✧ you: “nani tf when did you even take this??”

✧ usually posts a snap while he’s out somewhere like at a match, the gym, outside on a run, a party, or just hanging out with you or his frens

✧ however, makes sure you look good if you show up on his story cuz he wants to show you off

✧ doesn’t really care for streaks, but has a lott

✧ but also has a tON of unopened snaps

✧ is the type to send just a black screen n call it a day, or maybe spice it up by sending a pic of the sexi gym floor (a comeback) w his shoe in the corner

✧ will, however, consistently respond to you and kinda looks forward to ur snaps (secretly hopes you show ur face)

✧ but when you dont:

*in class*

✧ atsumu: *a smirk on his face* “your content’s kinda dry today” 

✧ you: *your sexi desk* “my nudez ain’t free, i demand compensation”

✧ atsumu: *grasped his chin in thought, but angled the cam up bc he needa hide his phone in class lolol* “what if i... take you out on a romantic excursion”

✧ you: * your face but with ‘sausage’ filter* “🥵🥵🥵🥵 yessir, what u want”

✧ rlly only wants to have pics of your face wat a closeted sOFTIE

✧ likes to have content on his flashbacks

✧ usually has other social media sources to keep up to date with things

✧ actually rlly digs using sc filters, mostly ones that’ll make him look like a queen

✧ captions a selfie of you two like: “me >>>>>>> y/n”

✧ but nearly everyone who comments on it is like: “i think you flipped the sign, bro 🤥”

✧ judges ppl who are into soap cutting asmr (you will never hear the end of it if you also like it)

a/n: sc kinda dying for me, my use went from suga to an atsumu to like nearly nonexistent LOL

also o gawd i already have ideas here n there for a pt 2 so stay tuned fjxnwfesd hope it takes me less long cuz this one took me fkin foreva LOL

idk y i made semi like mukbangs but i feel like he’d be rlly into them--

[phantomphangphucker]

Wild Masters - Chap. 5: From Rags To Riches

Vlad shows his face, queue a lot of snark and an exasperated Flynn.

Danny turns to the lab stairway, “I’ll get it”, glancing at everyone as he starts heading up, “I’ll holler if it’s Vladdie!”. His dad gives an excited double thumbs up.

Sticking his head around the kitchen entryway into the living room confirms that it is indeed Vlad, in his pompous ass suit and now staring at him looking extremely supremely unimpressed. Danny snickers at him before walking into the living room proper, sticking his hands in his pockets, “sup, vampy. Come to see your brat? He’s twenty-four by the way so don’t bother trying to groom him into your prime villain protege or anything. Also-”, snicker, “-he doesn’t how to read, so there’s that”.

Vlad glares, “you must be joking”. Making Danny snort, “I fucking wish actually, he doesn’t know what a cellphone is. What twenty-something doesn’t know fucking cellphones? He’s probably never seen a meme before. The horror”. Vlad rolls his eyes as he steps in, “yes, that is certainly the biggest issue with that problem. I’m sure”.

Danny gives a very cheeky, “yup”, before turning his head to shout towards the lab door, “HEY YO FLYNN! IT’S VLADDIE! GET UP AND GREET YOUR POMPOUS-PAPPIE”. Turning to look back to Vlad, who has decided to grace him with a flash of his red ‘scary eyes’. Oh how rare and bless-ed he must be today to get a glimpse of those ruby reds. Note: he was being sarcastic as fuck there, green eyes are way better anyway. So there.

Flynn steps only halfway out from the doorway, leaving half of himself hidden but making his staff absolutely fully visible and just stares at Vlad. It’s actually vaguely creepy.

Vlad stares back.

And Danny just looks rapidly back and forth between them. “Whelp, this is just a touch awkward”.

Flynn huffs and continues staring.

Danny pulls out his phone and waves it around, “these things come with a timer, you know. So I can totally just start that up and you two can make this dick measuring contest genuine”, pointing at both of them, “or we can talk like good little adults”. Flynn glances at him, “shorty”; making Vlad smirk at Danny’s expense. Danny frowns in fake offence, “hey”. But at least that gets Vlad to tug on his suit jacket to straighten it and step forward to actually greet Flynn, so hey, it’s something.

Sure Vlad’s form of ‘greeting’ is looking the half of Flynn that he can actually see over and giving a snide, “well at least you’ve got some build on you”. Which Danny rolls his eyes and crosses his arms over, “wow, way to be a dick, frootloop”. Vlad side-eyes him, “I’m still debating your demise”. Danny throws back a very apathetic and unaffected, “mmm okay”. Resulting in him having to dodge a very half-hearted swipe from the man and bounce out of Vlad's easy arm reach, “gotta be quicker on your toes, old man”, smirking, “what? that old age catchin’ up to ya?”, vaguely dancing over to Flynn and grabbing his Minotaur shawl thing, yanking him fully into the kitchen, “and get fully in here you, and face your maker”.

Flynn glares and huffs at him. Expected. Half the sounds the guy makes seem to involve either huffing or grunting. Wonderful sign of some serious lack of socialisation right there. Vlad’s rich asshole circles are going to love him so fucking much. Just like how they love Danny. Once again, note the generous helping of sarcasm he is mentally pilling on there.

Turning to look at Vlad and holding out the photo of alternate Vlad with alternate Maddie, “anyway, proof ‘cause I know you just love that stick that you’ve shoved so far up your ass you might as well be a popsicle”. Vlad leans forward, inspecting, and blinks vaguely disbelievingly. Danny rolls his eyes at the man not touching the photo, “let me guess, this has been in my pocket and is thus too dirty for you to sully your hands with?”. Vlad nods at him quickly with a smug smirk before straightening back up, “though the atrocity that I’m wearing in that deserves to be surrounded by the filth that fills your pockets”.

Flynn blinks, “yah, yer rivals. Tho figured ya’d be evenly matched”, looking to Danny -though Danny’s pretty sure this guy is trying to just play off the whole ‘meeting my dad for the first time in fourteen years and instead of being a dad the guy shit talks my half-brother’- Flynn points at Vlad while speaking at Danny, “ya could end ‘im. Don’ end my pa tho”.

Danny sputters and bends over wheezing while Vlad looks offended, “hear that vampy?!? He’s saying you’re weak!”.

Flynn instantly jumps to his defence, “‘s not that he’s weak. Ya’re jus... excessive”. Making Danny snicker, “can’t argue that”, because yeah Danny knows he’s over-fucking-powered. That’s kinda what happens when you’re the literal King of the entire Realm of the dead and all the ghosts therein. Regardless Danny keeps laughing and slaps his knee repeatedly. Which Vlad scoffs at, “get ahold of yourself, my boy”.

Danny can hear the raised eyebrow in Flynn’s voice, “‘my boy’?”. Danny looks up as Vlad huffs at Flynn, “yes I guess it would be rather rude of me to be calling Daniel that with you here”. Danny snorts, “like you care about rude, Mr. Plots Others Demise Directly In Front Of Their Faces”. Vlad waves a dismissive hand at Danny, “their intellect and worth is beneath me to care. Family has at least earned some level of attention from me. You should know that by now”.

“Still not your son”.

Flynn grunts, “an I am. Ya might be ‘ore stuck up than my ya”, then Flynn smirks and Danny has a feeling the guy is gonna say something that’ll piss Vlad off, “makes sense wit name like Plasmius”. Oh yeah, Vlad’s gonna be mad.

Vlad snaps his angry red eyes on Danny, sounding more than just slightly violently angry, “you told him”. Danny just bends over further and wheezes. Flynn pokes Vlad’s chest aggressively with the tip of his staff, “back back, no fightin’ in food room place”. Danny just wheezes more at that, “Ancients, it’s called a kitchen, man. Oh Zone”. Flynn grunts, glares, and removes his staff from Vlad’s chest to smack Danny over the head with it. “Ow”. Sure that didn’t actually hurt but it’s the point of the matter.

He can hear Flynn’s scowl, while the guy looks back to Vlad, “an ‘sides, I’d know what ya are any way”, gesturing the staff tip around Vlad’s body while Vlad quirks an eyebrow at him, clearly more curious about Flynn than pissed at Danny. “Can sense it ‘round ya an smell it on ya’s clothes. Yain’t all human. ‘Ore human than tha red one wit her suit on tho”.

Danny straightens up and brushes off his pants, snickering, “yeah he knows about Valerie too, surprise knowledge. Did you not notice his glowing green ass eyes?”. Watching Vlad squint and hum at Flynn, who just sits and lets Vlad stare at and analyse his eyes, “hmmm so you can see my ecto-field then?”. Flynn shrugs, “‘ore er less”. Danny chuckles, “you could say that that ‘bout sums it up”. Flynn looks to him and squints, “not addin’ anythin’”. Making Danny facepalm, “it’s another saying, man”. And Vlad actually has to turn to the side and sigh into his hand, it looks like the man is having a very hard time not insulting Flynn repeatedly and in ever-increasingly deeming ways; huh, guess he was willing to actually try to not be a complete and utter dick to his own son. That earns him a few points in the ‘not the definition of evil’ category.

Vlad looks back after a steadying breath, “be that as it may, I’d rather you not divulge my ghostly status to anyone. Flynn was it?”. Flynn squints, “that’s my name, ya”, looking to the side and huffing, though not letting Vlad out of his sights, “an I won’”, looking fully back to Vlad and sighing before just slowly poking the man with a finger. Both Danny and Vlad elect to merely watch and see what this previously non-existent Zone nomad will do next; Danny’s just glad his folks stayed downstairs or this entire meeting would be a bajillion times awkwarder. Danny wouldn’t be able to make such blatant jabs at Vlad, Flynn wouldn’t be able to discuss anyone’s ghostliness, Vlad wouldn’t be able to even be in the ballpark of honest.

Flynn pokes Vlad again, muttering, “yer real”. Alright, okay, the whole ‘here’s your father’ thing might have just hit the guy properly now. Vlad tilts his head ever so slightly, “indeed”; and Danny suddenly feels like he’s intruding on a very personal and private moment or something.

This is too much for Danny. Danny shoots both his arms out to the side and smacks both of the men on the back to smush them together, “ugh! Just hug already goddamnit!”. Both Vlad and Flynn sputter and cough, screwing up their faces; but they immediately separate and effectively turn their backs on each other.

“Don’ do ‘hugs’”.

“Neither do I for that matter”.

Danny practically growls, “oh for fucks sake”, and just telekinetically maneuvers them into forcibly embracing each other: which predictably and obviously gets him a pink ecto-beam straight to the face hard enough to send him crashing out the kitchen window immediately after he cuts it out. Flynn also pelts him with a rock, but that’s not exactly something that would cause Danny any notable kind of damage; though he is kinda curious where the rock came from.

At least they fucking hugged. Mission accomplished.

He can hear Vlad huff, “anyway. Now that Daniel’s finished being his insufferable self, I imagine you rather need legal documents. Since I doubt you exist in the legal system”. Flynn just huffs so Vlad continues, “right then”. Danny can’t help snickering to himself as he lies in a pile of rubble and some bushes when Vlad speaks up again actually sounding ever so slightly befuddled, “it would seem you already do”.

Flynn sounds slightly more befuddled, “what”. So Danny takes that as his queue to crawl back in through the shattered window, “oh yeah, blame Tuck. Dude probably preempted what I would have eventually asked him to do and just did it before I asked him to”, grinning smugly at the two men, “yeah my friends are awesome like that”, looking to Vlad specifically, “sure is nice to have genuine friends, eh Vladdie?”; Vlad points at him with a scowl and shoots a small ecto-beam. Danny doesn’t bother blocking or even moving and just lets himself get knocked back into the rubble/bush.

Flynn blinks, “... Red girl was ‘ight, do ya know tha word ‘dodge’ at all, shorty”. Vlad makes a sound that is almost a laugh.

“Hey”. Flynn shakes his head and Vlad smirks as Danny scramble crawls back in through the window, “I will have you know-”, grunt, “-I took that hit for comical effect”, landing on the floor with a not so graceful ‘oof’ before righting himself to be cross-legged and looking up at the two men, “and if anything is gonna get me hurt then it better be my terrible sense of comedy”.

Vlad rolls his eyes, “at least you know it’s terrible and unpleasant”. Danny points at him, “my name’s a literal pun, of course it’s terrible. Not unpleasant though. Also-”, holding up a finger and grabbing out his phone to quickly scroll through it, “-and yup! Tuck hacked the gov! Man my main man really should scare the government more or at least enough for them to properly put him on a watch list or two, geez”.

Flynn blinks, “ya lost me”, while Danny pockets his phone. Vlad also blinks. Okay wow there are similarities here and it’s kinda freaking Danny just a tiny bit, it’s creepy alright. Vlad shakes his head at Danny, “you can let your tech boy know that for once he has impressed me”. Danny grins slightly manically, whips out his phone, goes to the voice memos app, and holds it up ready to record, “care to repeat that?”, grin never faltering. Vlad sighs into his hand, sounding truly and exaggeratedly pained, “Tucker, you have impressed me”. Danny cheers, “yes!”, quietly to himself while double fist-pumping.

Flynn shakes his head and mutters, “ghosts”. Probably deciding that this behaviour is very befitting of ghosts, which yeah is probably true. Least Flynn just seems amused by it rather than annoyed like Danny’s folks would be. Vlad seems to agree as he sighs and side-eyes Flynn, “at least you seem unbothered by our more... ghostly behaviours, most humans get put-off just enough to make them rather unsuitable for any kind of close relations”.

That gets Danny to inhumanly quickly jump to his feet, startling Flynn enough to get that staff pointed at him as he near shouts excitedly, “did you just admit you can’t make friends!”, pointing animatedly at Vlad, “I’ve spotted character development!”. Vlad just glares at him, which is fair, while Flynn relaxes his stance. Danny sticks his hands back in his pockets and relaxes against the countertop, “anyway, since you’ve apparently given Flynn here your fatherly approval -congrats on the kid by the way, what should I bring to the baby shower?- you gonna stick him as your heir instead me now. Pretty please?”, and gives an overly innocent smile.

Vlad sighs, “I’m going to murder you”, and shakes his head, “you’re the High King, of course not, I’ve certainly got to keep you in my relations somehow”, grinning smugly, “I can certainly have two heirs. I don’t see why not. Try as I might, you know how I am quite a greedy man”. Danny snorts because that’s bullshit, Vlad absolutely doesn’t try to not be greedy; but well... when possession is your Obsession... Danny chuckles, “and try as I might, I just can’t keep that hero complex down. Guess I’ve just gotta keep an eye on your dealings with Flynn here, huh old man?”. After all, when protection is your Obsession...

Flynn promptly smacks both of them with his staff, “Obsession posturin’”. Danny rubs his head and grumbles incoherently. Vlad acts like nothing happened, instead insulting Danny’s behaviour, “well don’t you sound kingly”. Danny flips him off. Vlad looks to Flynn, ignoring Danny entirely, “regardless, you’ll definitely be my heir too. Whether you want to be or not”.

Danny snorts, “I don’t think you need to threaten the guy to be your son, vampy, geez. Would it kill ya to be nice?”. Vlad grins, “yes”; which Danny rolls his eyes at. Flynn huffs and shakes his head, “heir’s some money thing, he’s my pa not money loan”. Danny blinks, surprised the guy knows what a money loan even is. Chuckling, “eh heir’s kinda the best you get from old Vladdie here”, and jabs a thumb at Vlad.

Vlad scowls, “that is because you keep snubbing me and refusing to renounce your fool of a father, Daniel”, side-eyeing Flynn, “Flynn doesn’t seem to have that particular issue”, and then gives Flynn a truly stiff and awkward head pat. Flynn looks like he’s judging him heavily for that, “I’m stayin’ ‘ere. I don’ trust ya”. Danny coughs and laughs while Vlad jerks and looks like he just got stabbed clear through the heart and Core. Ouch Vladdie, looks like someone got snubbed again. Tough luck, try not being evil next time. Or maybe it was the awkward head pat that did it?

All three flinch or jump at Jack’s sudden excited, “yes!”, while popping out from the lab doorway, practically shoving Vlad out of the kitchen, and very quickly side-hugging Flynn who very obviously stiffens and shrinks away from the contact. Oh shit, how long have his folks been there?!? Fuck. His mom also giggles from the doorway and walks in giving Flynn a sweet smile while pulling Jack off him, “as we said, there’s definitely room for you here”. Flynn just nods slightly while slowly relaxing as Maddie pushes Jack out of the room to go clean the spare room upstairs with her. Danny, meanwhile, is busy side-eyeing Vlad as the man borderline flat-out snarls at Jack’s receding form.

Flynn stares at Vlad himself, muttering lowly at Danny, “he hates ‘im. He really really hates ‘im”. Danny sighs and watches the deep violent hatred shining in Vlad’s eyes, “yeah, yeah he really does”, frowning and probably sounding sadder than he really means to, “I wish that wasn’t how things were. Everything would be a lot different”; because really? If Vlad didn’t despise his father, the two only natural halfas in existence would probably get along. Maybe be genuine family or healthy rivals even. Instead of the weird toxic degrading bantering archenemy thing they’ve got going on and have been actively -and mutually, if he’s being honest with himself- fuelling. Maybe, maybe, that mentor/apprentice situation, that Vlad dreamed of and Danny had needed, could have became reality; but that ship has long since past. In Danny’s more introspective and thoughtful moments, he mourned that fact. Part of him hoped Vlad acknowledged and mourned that fact too, instead of just feeling bitter and ripped off. Maybe. Hopefully.

Flynn frowns at him, “yer ghosts an yer humans. Act like it”. Danny blinks at him, “uh, I don’t think you exactly know how humans act. No offence”. Flynn huffs at him, “am one, know ‘nough”.

“Uh, I’m not gonna agree with you on that one”, glaring slightly and whispering, “also, sssshhhh about the ghost shit, man”. Flynn rolls his eyes and promptly catches Danny off-guard, “an I’m keepin’ tha Masters name”. Danny chokes slightly, well damn; Vlad’s gonna get an ego boost from that.

Vlad, having of course heard -damn you ghost ears- snaps his head around and grins triumphantly at Danny then approvingly at Flynn. “Flynn Masters”, grinning smugly at Danny again, “might just have a better ring than Daniel Masters”.

Danny snorts and rolls his eyes, “if you’re trying to make me jealous it ain’t gonna work”, snickering, “but FM, like FM radio”. Now Danny’s wearing the smug look while Vlad glares at him. Danny finger guns at Vlad as he starts walking towards the steps, “now how about I let the Masters caspers not have to be actors due to me being one of the present factors while y’all deal with your family matters”, saluting, “so seeya later gangsters”. Vlad’s left eye twitches, “I will murder you, boy”.

Flynn blinks and looks to Vlad, “he always like this?”. Vlad sighs and nods, “unfortunately”, shaking his head, “he certainly has a taste for puns and word games, I think it’s born from some form of a sadistic side”. Flynn huffs, “dramatic”, huffing again, “an I need a drink aftar all yer ghostin’, pa”, and uncaps his liquor bottle for a swig. Earning raised eyebrows from Vlad and the same lean over sniff that Danny did, “ahh, you’re a fan of alcohol”.

“Make mine own”.

Vlad nods approvingly, “I've dabbled in the art of wine making myself in my spare time”. Flynn offers his drink earning him a quirked eyebrow from Vlad, who of course tries some. Leaving him humming to himself and tapping his chin, “you’ve been at this for a while. You might be a son of mine yet”.

Flynn huffs, “‘ere I thought we ‘ready established that. Yer my pa. Pas that”. They were, in fact, already past that. Vlad just rolls his eyes but pulls a flask out of his pocket and offers it to the guy, “here. Since you’re a Masters, you drink whiskey like a Masters”. And Flynn talking a swig from that is what Danny walks back downstairs to, “so what y’all talking about?”.

Vlad turns to him, “just how you were going to apologise for your years of abuse to me all in the name of brotherly love”.

“That doesn’t sound like me at all”. Danny then blinks at them, with Flynn lowering the flask and shrugging at. Danny throws a slight glare at Vlad, “really? I leave for what? ten minutes? and you start boozing the guy up? Really?”, muttering more so to himself, “I mean sure, Flynn started drinking after ten minutes, or whatever, of meeting me. But still”. Vlad smirks some, “yes, being around you for any prolonged period of time could drive anyone to drink. Why, the first thing I did after meeting you was drink”.

“That’s because dad assaulted your prized football, you going senile on me?”.

Flynn glares at Danny and takes another swig of the whiskey flask, which Vlad looks oddly triumphant over; especially considering Danny just insulted him. Flynn shrugs again and side-eyes Vlad, “eh, mine’s bettar”. Vlad waves him off, “you just don’t have a taste for it yet”, tapping his chin, “though yes, yours is quite good”.

Danny blinks, “did the Vlad Masters just genuinely compliment someone without it being backhanded or a thinly veiled threat? Shocked! Betrayed! Dismayed! The horror!”, tilting his head, wait a fucking minute, “wait, did you drink Flynn’s stuff? You know that’s ectoplasm in there, right?”. Flynn grunts, “well he does now”. Vlad blinks and Danny is detecting just a hint of shock there; Vlad is also clearly eyeing Flynn’s liquor hip bottle with a fair bit more appreciation now. Flynn making a disgusted face kinda cuts off Vlad’s appreciation though and Danny feels like he’s getting a flashback to that time Tucker had to eat all those blood blossoms. “Are you gonna throw up?”.

Vlad scowls, crosses his arms, and sticks his nose up in the air, “of course not, a Masters can handle his liquor”. Danny rolls his eyes while telekinetically moving a trashcan over to Flynn, “I don’t think that’s the problem here”.

Both of them look down as Flynn just kinda sits on the floor, puts his staff to the side, and throws up; at least he aims into the bucket instead of onto the floor. “Congrats Vlad, I think you just poisoned him”. Danny furrows his eyebrows a bit though when Vlad actually holds his hands out, bends down, and pats the guy on the back. Okay... guess Vlad’s being decent... Danny doesn’t actually know what to do with that. Ah the fact that he doesn’t know what to do with Vlad acting like a decent human being is probably actually concerning, come to think of it. So Danny does the logical thing and slaps himself across the face.

Vlad gives Flynn a not awkward head pat this time, “there there, just get it out of your system”, he hums, “I am rather surprised though, two sips isn’t exactly much”.

Danny sighs and taps his chin, “well when you consider the fact that he’s lived off nothing but ectoplasmic fauna and flora, makes sense that his body would kinda have forgotten how to fucking digest human food you stupid nutcase. Geez, for a guy who plays chess you’re not very smart”. Vlad looks back to him and glares slightly, “I’m surprised you know that. Did you actually pay attention in health class for once?“. Danny rolls his eyes at that particular jab, “one of my friends only eats plants and one only eats meat, what do you think happens every time some bull crap happens where they have to break their diets?”.

Regardless Danny sighs some and bends down next to Vlad and Flynn, joining Vlad in the back-patting/rubbing. Snickering at the guy some though because people taking you too seriously or being all nice ‘n shit when you’re throwing your guts up was more embarrassing than helpful, “maybe don’t eat or drink shit without ecto in it, yeah?”.

Flynn grunts, expected, “ßhût üp, ßhørtŷ”. Making Danny and Vlad blink, Vlad grins like an idiot while Danny chuckles, “huh, guess you speak ghost. Though talk about a thick accent there, Ancients”. Vlad shoves Danny head, which Danny let’s knock him over on the ground, “it’s͢ ͘q͟u͘i͜te͞ ͞a̕ ̧useful ̡sk̛i̡l̡l͜,̡ ͜why I̕ thi͡nk he̕’s m͏o͠re f͏l̴u̸e̵nt͠ tha͏n҉ ͜yo̶u, Dan̕i̵eļ”. Danny stays laying on the ground, “I’m̕ ̸a̡ na͏t͠iv̵e spea̡k̷ȩr, so̧ ̛I̕ ͠don̕’̡t͞ ̡th̶ink̷ so”.

Flynn leans back, pushes away the bucket, and puts his arms on his knees, “ÿæ ßtåŷįñ’ thërë¿“. Danny nods with a grin from the floor and gives a thumbs up, earning a head shake from Flynn.

All three snap their heads to the kitchen entranceway as feet pound down the steps and Maddie and Jack come barging in, everyone then looking to the lab door as Jazz pushes it open while dusting off her pants and grumbling, “I so do not envy Danny having to clean that all the time”, pausing and looking up around everyone before zeroing in on three people sitting/laying on the floor, “Flynn! Danny! What happened!”, and runs over while glaring at and obviously blaming Vlad, who stands and readjusts his suit like he’s embarrassed to be caught caring. Well get caught by anyone other than Danny anyway; which makes sense ‘cause Vlad would probably be all caring about Danny if Danny wasn’t, you know, not evil.

Danny rolls over onto his back, looking at Jazz, “guess who can’t stomach human stuff?”, and jabs a thumb towards Flynn while Maddie rushes over and helps Flynn stand. Well okay, Flynn mostly waves off said help and stands up on his own, but still; Flynn also promptly grabs up his staff again. That staff’s probably some kind of comfort item for the guy.

Jack laughs as he comes to stand next to Vlad, “guess we’ll be cooking with a lot more ecto!”. Danny can practically feel malicious intent wafting of Vlad. Flynn grunting, “I’m ‘ine”. Which Maddie looks at him sweetly over and Jazz shakes her head at, “well let’s move into the living room anyway. Then you-”, glaring at Flynn, “-can sit down, and we can all hear what happened to you”. Vlad nods and hums, “yes I would like to know how I acquired a son from another timeline that’s been living nomadically in the Ghost Zone”.

Jack laughs as they all walk into the living room, “yup! Most we know is that some darn ghosty called Misery Vex took you at some point!”. Maddie and Jazz watching Flynn with slight worry as they walk. Danny just eyes Vlad to see if Vlad shows even the slightest amount of recognition regarding this ‘Misery Vex’, he doesn’t -fuck Danny’s luck- but Danny can’t exactly expect the man to know of every ghost ever. Regardless Danny skips over, puts his hands behind his back and sticks his face next to Vlad’s, “guessin’ you don’t know who that is either?”. Vlad scowls, “‘fraid not, but when I find them, and I will, I’m going to make them beg me to end them and then I’m going to find out how good ghost skin is at reupholstering my dining room chairs”.

Danny blinks, “I forgot there was a reason you and Skulker got along. Also, I doubt you have the skill set to be skinning anyone. Also also, I’m amazed you care that much”, and smirks.

“Must you mock me so, boy”.

Danny grins, “well.., how would you like me to mock you? I’ll hear your requests”, shrugging, “sure I might ignore them, but I’ll certainly hear them”. And finally flops to sit down on the love seat, Vlad sitting next to him with scowl. Jazz opts to sit with Maddie and Jack on the couch, while Flynn takes the chair; got to give the loner nomad his personal space after all.

Flynn huffs, “yeah, Vex’s is tha one that pulled me in ta tha Infinite Realm”. Jack doesn’t give him a chance to say more, tilting his head, “is that what ghosts call the Ghost Zone?!?”. Danny and Vlad both quietly sigh into their hands. Flynn squints at the large man, “ya nevar asked ‘em?”.; at least Maddie and Jack have the decency to look sheepish. Flynn squints more, “it’s what it’s called. Propar name”. Danny chuckles and waves Flynn off, “eh, then Zone can be slang”, ‘Zone’ was in fact common slang. Flynn rolls his eyes.

Vlad sighs quietly again, “linguistics aside, was there a reason Vex took you? And I’m just to assume you’re in this timeline purely due to your old one ceasing to exist”. Which Danny mutters, “duh”, at. Everyone ignores him as Flynn shrugs, “don’ know, like I’ve said ‘ready, ain’t stickin’ ‘round half spider creature-”. Danny’s wondering if the guy’s getting tired of explaining that. “-bark armour wasn’ friendly lookin’ eithar”.

Danny eyes Flynn’s bark armour, “guess yours doesn’t make you look all that approachable either”. With Maddie jumping in, “did you get that idea from It?”. Making Flynn blink at her before looking to Danny, “I did say Vex’s a lady, ‘ight?”. Danny nods but Jazz is the one to audibly sigh, drawing Flynn’s attention as she talks, “yes but-”, side-eyeing her parents, “-ghosts don’t get pronouns”.

Maddie rolls her eyes not unkindly, “now honey, we’ve talked about this, ghosts aren’t sentient or complex enough to understand gender and we don’t call plants ‘he’ or ‘she’-”. Danny coughs into his hand, “Sam does, you know”; which goes ignored. Maddie continuing, “-so why would we do so for ghosts? It would be like assigning gender to lightning”. Danny sighs internally, and he bets both Jazz and Vlad do as-well.

Flynn just stares at her for a while before blinking, “moron-”. Danny has the distinct feeling his folks are going to be hearing Flynn calling them ‘morons’ an awful lot. “-they have preferances. Blobs are no gendar, not tha Cored”. Vlad sighs dramatically, “what does gender have to do with my son's abduction”. Danny chuckles to himself faintly, guess Vladdie really grabbed onto the whole ‘I have a son’ thing with absolute confidence. Made sense. Ancients if Danny accepted him then the man probably wouldn’t stop using the word ‘son’ at every possible opportunity for a solid month.

Jack laughs almost awkwardly and scratches his head, “nothing! I guess”. Vlad scowls at him.

Flynn clears his throat, “well she-”. Nice passive-aggressiveness going on there. “-couldn’ ‘xactly follow me aftar I slippin’ inta some rock crag”, grunting, “ghost can’ go through rocks ‘n what not there”. Jack looks like he’s physically restraining himself from peppering Flynn with questions about that. Danny thinks this should be obvious though, since ghosts not being able to phase through ectoplasmic constructs/formations is literally how ghost shields worked. Like, duh.

Vlad just nods with a hum, “so you’ve been on your own since?”; which Flynn nods at. Maddie huffs, “I’m amazed the ghost didn’t chase you down”; Flynn shrugs, clearly not about to claim to understand why himself. Which yeah, abducting a kid through a portal seemed like a lot of effort to put in to just turn around and let the human run away; probably thought that this random human child wouldn’t be able to effectively avoid capture or survive on his own. Well surprise mother fucker! Flynn’s a Fenton -well a Masters too but whatever- being able to handle ghost shit is in his genes.

Danny decides to ask something that’s actually mildly important for him to know, “so bark armour and the lower half of a spider, anything else?”. His mom quirks an eyebrow at him so Danny elaborates/makes up an excuse, “wouldn’t it be good to know what a ghost that may come after him looks like?”. Earning an approving hum from her. Danny’s more interested in Vlad muttering to himself, “an Arachne then”; sweet, he’s got a species now.

Flynn grunts, “purpal skin, lotsa black eyes, bare bark crown-”. Danny almost chokes at that and he’s sure Vlad at least went slightly wide-eyed, because crown implied royalty. Which just great, that meant Danny was going to have to deal with whoever all kingly and shit. “-an clothes were shinebettle, I think-”. So basically shiny latex leather? Alright, that’s a look. “-an wendigo mane pelt ovar spidar half-”. Well that all but confirms Danny’s suspicions that Vex is from or at least frequents the FairLands. The only wendigo’s that didn’t just turn to ectoplasmic ash when destroyed were the faebeast ones. Hooray for having to probably go see Oberon. “-She had a fauchard ta”. Danny nods to himself.

Jack taps his chin, “that still doesn’t explain why though”, earning shrugs all around. Jack grinning, “we should hunt Vex down and find out!”. Which Vlad actually grins at, “yes, you go do that”. Danny kicking the man subtly and whispering, “Vlad no. Bad”, he knows the only reasons Vlad’s encouraging that is ‘cause his folks might torture the ghost and because the ghost might harm/kill Jack.

Maddie shakes her head and chastises Jack, “you’ll be doing no such thing, we don’t know the Zone is actually safe”, glancing at Flynn, “regardless of Flynn’s survival. Flukes happen”. Danny thinks it would make way more sense to guess it's safer than they thought than to just assume Flynn got lucky. But hey! At least he doesn’t have to worry as much that his folks are just going to run wild in the Zone anytime soon.

Vlad rolls his eyes though speaks somewhat sweetly, “dear Maddie, always being the voice of reason”. Maddie grimaces, and Flynn glances between them with a slight frown. Vlad digs in his pocket when his ringer goes off though. Speaking up after reading the screen, “seems some of the underlings are too moronic to deal with some problem alone”, looking up to everyone, “so I must be taking my leave now”, and stands up.

Jack jumping up, “well we can finish up Flynn’s room and he can join us after you’ve said your goodbyes! Wouldn’t want to interrupt that!”, and laughs. Maddie smiling sweetly and following him once again upstairs. Jazz sighs and moves to follow them, “I’ll make sure they didn’t get carried away”; while Danny just stretches and lounges out across the loveseat. Watching Vlad talk down at the still seated Flynn.

“I guess I’ll have to leave dealing with this Misery Vex in your and young Daniel’s hands. I don’t particularly have time to deal with petty ghost squabbles”, side-eyeing Danny, “he’s quite experienced with those though, so I doubt he’ll fail to be an effective meat-shield if needed”.

Flynn rolls his eyes, “I don’ care ta ‘deal with’ her at all. ‘Ine as is”. While Danny snorts at Vlad, “Ancients, you’re such a fucking pissant”.

Earning squinting from Vlad, “I’m the mayor and one of the richest people in the world”, huffing, “and I’m nothing to scoff at power-wise”.

“You are staying that... to the literal king... of death”. Danny smirks, “I’m fucking lucifer, bitch”. Vlad and Flynn blink and stare at him. Danny rubs his neck, “eh, too much?”. They both nod slightly. And there the similarities go being creepy again. Vlad shakes his head slowly, looking back to Flynn, “ignoring that, you can contact me for anything. Particularly if you decide being here isn’t worth the effort or annoyance”, and pats Flynn’s head, “you’ll want for nothing regardless”, making shooing motions at him, “now run along and help your mother and sister stop that imbecile from installing an anti-ghost auto-detection machine gun on your ceiling or some other nonsense”. Danny vaguely hates that his dad might actually do that. Though he’s surprised that Flynn actually does as he’s told with only a mild amount of suspicious squinting. Maybe he’s tired of Vlad’s existence? Doubtful but Danny can hope. Probably more likely the guy just wanted to get closer to being able to have some alone time, and room set up was an effective way to do that.

Danny waits till Flynn disappears upstairs to speak up, “hey Vlad?”. Vlad doesn’t even look back at him, instead just staring up the stairs, “hmmm?”.

“Don’t fuck this up. You know, like you always do”. Danny glares seriously at Vlad as he goes to stand up and Vlad actually looks to him with a quirked eyebrow, “but if you ever hurt him you won’t need to wonder where your god is anymore, because he’s coming for you and he’ll be fresh outta mercy”, squinting, “all these fucks will have flown off, never to return again. And you will be left crippled, withered, dried up and crapped on. At the bottom of a shitty little well where people will throw out their rotten fruit down on you and the remnants of your shitty little life”, glaring more, “we clear”. Vlad nods a bit stiffly; after all, when the king orders something or warns you, you fucking listen. Danny decides to really hammer it home though, “the fucking heat death of the universe will not be able to even approach the level of damage that the amount of fucks I will no longer give will cause you. What I’m saying is, I wouldn’t mind tearing out a length of your intestines, rolling it in a pan, sprinkling on some nice cinnamon and maybe some raisins. You know, for texture and a little added surprise. Then sliding it right into the oven for a nice little cinnamon bun”, chuckling meanly, “there’s even some icing pre-made in the fridge. So I’m all ready to go, bitch. Then I could use your hollowed-out torso to ride you like a meat toboggan. I’m sure your fucking intestines could be utilised as perfectly fine ropes to control my descent down the bloody snow-covered hill all the way into the depths of madness that you were birthed from years ago”.

“Daniel... you’ve made your point”, Vlad actually sounds slightly disturbed. Danny rolls his eyes and puts his hand in his pockets, “yeah well, so long as you don’t go making god sacrificing his only son look like a good parenting technique”.

“I... won’t”.

Danny pats Vlad on the arm, “good talk then”, and finger guns before heading upstairs, “and I’m still not your fam, frootloop”. Vlad just scowls at him and leaves, closing the door slightly louder than necessary. Return to normalcy achieved.

[amphii-writes]

Random Haikyuu Head Canons I Have

these are all taken from my discord server cause i remember to write them there, if you want to request fanfics, my requests are W I D E open! there is also nO order! these are just all the headcanons i could find tbh

warnings: mentions of blood, and just overall wild times, swearing

Asahi loves knitting sweaters because his shoulders are broad and he also loves seeing the reactions from his teammates when they get a sweater from him! He says he buys them but he doesn’t

Aone likes knitting socks because he has big feet and he loves fluffy knee high socks but his team will never know

Asahi and Aone regularly hang out and knit together! (after asahi wasnt scared of him anyways)

Nishinoya gives you shiny rocks he finds because “your eyes shine like them!”

Yamaguchi likes to have your head rest on his chest while cuddling!

Aone likes to bake

Aone dressed like a polar bear because koganegawa told him to- halloween was amazing

daICHI HAS A KISS THE COOK APRON

Daichi secretly can make some kick ass steak and is amazing at grilling sorry

Okay but real talk, Kenma and Yaku swear like sailors and it scares everyone because they always whisper the most foul, insulting things under their breath. Hearing it is like seeing a cryptid

Speaking of cryptids, Fukunaga and Shibayama are THE most true crime, mythology, and mystery obsessed fanatics on the team and often fanboy about it together 

Fukunaga’s obsession with moth man has gotten to an unhealthy stage

Kenma absolutely had a vampire phase and has read twilight. Only Kuroo knows and has sworn to secrecy via blood pact

Kuroo’s a musical nerd. Knows all of the lyrics to Hamilton, BMC, DEH, Heathers, Rent, Beetlejuice, Etc. Kenma considered dropping him because of it

Iwaizumi tells the worst dad jokes and Kyotani, wanting to beat him, started doing it too and it drives everyone insane

Yahaba and Matsukawa get along surprisingly well. Both are true crime freaks and bond over their forensic files obsessions

Matsukawa didn’t really like his thick eyebrows so he got one of his female friends to pluck it for him, but almost cried and gave up after the first hair. Oikawa called him a pussy for the next year

Hanamaki jokingly flirts with everyone on the team so most of them just got used to it, but it still confuses Kindaichi to the point of mental breakdown

Makki called Kyotani ‘puppy’ as a joke once and now mad dog is truly terrified of him

Kyotani’s dog absolutely ADORES Oikawa and it’s the funniest shit to the rest of the team

Mattsun and Makki play DnD and once convinced Yahaba and Kyotani to join. Kyotani kept rolling to fight everyone and Yahaba was a bard that kept rolling to seduce everyone. They kept yelling across the board so they had to kick them out

Outside of his school uniform, Goshiki specifically wears only plaid

Tendou makes little chocolates for the whole team every once in a while so they don’t think he’s scary

Semi and Shirabu once had a fistfight in an abandoned McDonald’s parking lot while Tendou filmed and Goshiki cheered them on

Everybody makes fun of Shirabu’s haircut but nobody dares to say it to his face. its gotten to the point where they say he got it done by a blind old lady

There’s a running joke about Shirabu also getting his haircut from prison but Goshiki is starting to suspect that it may not be a joke

Yamagata and Tendou are good friends with the mutual goal of collecting as much blackmail on their team as possible

Tendou loves animals generally considered to be ‘ugly’ like rats, crows, reptiles, etc.

80% of Goshiki’s playlist is shit overplayed on the radio. Him, Shirabu, Tendou, Kawanishi and Ushijima have a permanent ban from the aux cord

Nobody watches YouTube with Ushijima because he never skips the damn ads (other than tendou)

Suna once said y’all’dn’t’ve unironically and made a first year cry

Akagi once said UwU unironically and had an identity crisis.

Osamu has one of those rainbow gaming keyboards and is constantly on a discord call. Atsumu always yells weird shit in the background to embarrass him and once pretended to be him

During Seijoh group chat arguments. Hanamaki and Mattsukawa like to drop facebook minion memes in just to piss everyone off even more

mattsun and maki both have separate photo albums in their phones labelled ‘minion memes to piss everyone off’

Hinata carries a pocket knife and no one has no fucking idea why

mattsun and maki both have matching rat fursuits that look like they actually where in a sewer- they chased oikawa around

For all his talk of plant analogies and metaphors, Ushijima cant grow shit

Goshiki’s Bangs are the way they are because his favorite character was Rock Lee from Naruto

Oikawa has watched Ouran High School Host Club front to back so many times and he can quote all of Tamaki’s lines by heart -He keeps bothering Iwaizumi to “be his Haruhi, since you’re shorter than me”

Koganegawa has definitely gone as an Angry Bird for Halloween

Fukunaga has those reflective cat eyes, and he has terrified Yamamoto on several occasion

Hanamaki and Matsukawa have a teddy bear that they pretend is their child and they share custody

Suga always sprays whipped cream straight into his mouth whenever he sees a can

Nishinoya definitely bit people as a kid

Nishinoya would be the guy to wear shorts all year round and even if it's snowing, he'll insist he's not cold

Tendou is still stuck in his emo phase and would fangirl over Creepypasta with me and I appreciate that (me too buddy, me fuckin too)

Kyoutani LOOKS like he’d listen to viking death metal, but in reality he listens to Mother Mother and knows all the words to Ghosting

Sugawara would definitely encourage me to dumb shit and not stop me, and you’re all dumb for thinking he wouldn’t 

KENMA IS NOT ‘uwu owo’ SHY, HE IS ‘your fucking gross’ SHY SO LITERALLY STFU

Bokuto listens to Nicki Manaj. And knows all the words. To every. Single. Song.

Ushijima for some reason knows an odd amount of 90′s-2000′s R&B and he will hum along to the songs if they come on the radio (he also loves Dolly Parton) ((he says he relates to her music))

Bokuto once ate instant ramen for an entire month

TERUSHIMA DID TRY TO FUCK A PLANT WHILE SHITFACED AND GOD I STAND BY WHAT I SAID

atsumu let’s you put makeup on him and pretends to eat the brushes (do yk what im talking about- like n o m)

tendou ran for school president as a joke but actually won

i 100% believe that all of karasuno’s third years apologize when they bump into inanimate objects, but when suga is really tired or stressed out, he’ll yell at them instead.

Tanaka, Nishinoya, and Taketora have a group chat called "Bros who want sum hoes" and they send each other hypebeast memes and shit

Sugawara knows how to do a bunch of flexible shit because he sometimes goes to yoga with daichi and asahi's moms, its fucking hilarious

tanaka and noya both breakdance- they work as a team and sometimes go to tokyo for underground competitions- saeko drives them

Daichi knows a little ballet- nobody other than Kiyoko knows because they saw each other at the ballet class and had to work together- dont tell tanaka and noya that he lifted her though

Osamu once put glitter on Atsumu's pillow- he still finds hot pink glitter on shit

kita knits and crochets with his grandma

Kita's grandma knows everyone's names because kita talks shit bout them, her favorite is Aran

Kuroo has burnt his eyebrows off doing an experiment. His goggles didn't cover all his brows,,, so he just showed up to practice like that. No eyebrows and a chemical burn

kenma has played all kinds of games, but he was dared to play corpse party by kuroo. He wasn't scared because of the gore, he was thinking about the trauma the characters went through. Punched kuroo the next day because that game was fucked up

Lev isn't a strong swimmer, so he often grabs people by the head to keep himself up. happened with kenma and lev couldn't walk due to the force of kenmas suprised water kicks

akaashi has those fancy pens that you have to dip in ink and they're so nice

Bokuto has and will eat pencil erasers again

Daichi once almost lost his shit at his team but instead he lost his shit at the door that decided to stub his toe on the way out of the gym. not the best thing to be found yelling to.

Yamaguchi for sure has been dragged to one of terushimas parties because he didnt wanna say no. oh and terushima has like frat boy level parties too. Yams has for sure had some wild nights and doubts anyone other than Tsukishima and the party-goers will ever know

Akaashi can actually flirt very well! He reads romance novels sometimes and has analyzed any and every book in his possession! so he's actually quite charming

Daihsou unironically posted on twitter after mika broke up with him "I still see her shadows in my room"

Mattsun and Maki run a fake oikawa account; its been going ever since twitter even started getting popular and they even started sending messages in spanish. The posts would range from "I love all my fans!" to flirting with them :) Oikawa is pissed cause the account got verified before he did and most of his fans also follow the fake oikawa. Tooru has no idea who runs it JUST IMAGINE OIKAWA JUST LIKE RANTING TO THE SEIJOH 3RD YEAR ALUMNI AND JUST "no Iwa-chan, you dont understand! they run a fake account and pretend to be me!" while makki and mattsun laugh their asses off

Oh, kenma for sure has pretended to be a girl on discord and has gotten someone to buy him stuff. after they do he says in his normal voice "fucking simp" and then hangs up and blocks the other persons discord

Yamamoto, despite his rough appearance, loves kids and has and will be a human jungle gym

suna in middle school had a game with his friends about who could make kids cry the fastest

The twins switched places back in middle school and nobody could tell because of how great they are at acting like eachother

Daichi once arrested coach ukai for public intoxication after a game :|

Daichi has arrested many people from his old volleyball team but the most memorable case was when he arrested tanaka and noya for reckless driving. poor idiots got so scared when they saw their old captains face in their mirror and started to pray

tanaka, while trying to intimidate someone, once said "You dont gotta tell me twice, i may be straight but these hands are bisexual" and he often cringes at night thinking about it

Kageyama, as a comeback to Tsukishima, said "one thing about us royalty is that we love to feast" and he also fuckin hates what he said

the third years made a cult for Kiyoko. they chant every wednesday "i'll do anything for kiyoko, she makes me go loco"

oikawas fangirls are known to be fucking rabid

yAMAMOTO AND KENMA AFTER THEIR FIGHT WERE FORCED BY KUROO TO MAKE IT UP: so they dyed their hair together

Makki and mattsun sang two trucks in front of the entire team. everyone was so confused. Makki: "twO TRUCKS HAVIN SEX!!" Mattsun: "oH yEs!"THEY'D SWITCH OFF AND HAVE LIKE CHOREOGRAPHY TOO LIKE THEY'D DO A TANGO WHILE THE SONG IS LIKE "two beer trucks, making love"

tendou once called Oikawa "mr. no-nationals" and got kicked in the shins before iwaizumi could save him

Tsukishima had a my little pony phase

you work with matsukawa at a morgue and he makes dead people jokes while you fix some dead guys face with wax and makeup he'd be like "so didnt he like,,, stick his head out of the sunroof of a moving fuckin car??" he'd be singing dumb ways to die the entire day

i feel like Kuroo has one crazy accident a year. like it might not be deadly but its fucking crazy like for example: Kuroo for sure has ridden in a shopping cart at past midnight with kenma (who pushed him down a hill) causing Kuroo to get scratched up hella well. he lied and said he spent the night with a girl and kenma fucking hated himself cause he would be the girl if that was true

Mattsun has flirted with the 4th years moms before (AS A JOKE), and because of this: he is known as “fuckin milf hunter” sometimes by the team

Warning, this next headcanon is talking about cannabis, weed, mary jane, the zoink root. so if your uncomfortable, please dont read below :)

dude i wanna get high as SHIT with Asahi 

i think Asahi would be one of those mfkers who takes one hit and is gone 

ASAHI ACCIDENTALLY GOING TO PRACTICE ZOINKED 

IMAGINE HIM SEEING TSUKISHIMA AND JUST "he looks so judgemental,,, im scared" 

OR LIKE A MAD DAICHI AND JUST "i'm gonna,,, im gonna go jump out the window now" 

Noya and Tanaka would know tho, i feel like they'd have a 6th sense when it comes to weed. they probably get some from Saeko cause she'd rather they do it in the house. they'd smell asahi like fucking dogs and just so,,, big guy had fun without us huh? 

DAICHI WOULD KNOW ABOUT ASAHI BEING ZOINKED, SMASH HIS FACE INTO THE WALL, TURN AROUND WITH A RED MARK ON HIS FOREHEAD AND WITH A BEAMING SMILE AND FEUX ENTHUSIASM SAY: "YOSH, LETS WARM UP!"

[moonbeambucky]

Know It All

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Reader [College AU] Word Count: 5300 Warnings: fluff, minor angst

Summary: Your grades and patience are tested when you’re paired together for a class project with the one person you cannot stand, Bucky Barnes.    

A/N: This is my submission for @jaamesbbarnes​ and @sgtjbuccky​ Milestone Celebration Writing Challenge. My prompt was “Looking for trouble, are we?” I cannot thank Sam @buckyofthemyscira​​ enough for being a wonderful beta and helping me get on track when I was so lost with this and to Allie @all1e23​ for her help with a plot conflict. My mind was working against me on this one but I hope it turned out well. gif source (x)

The brisk air of autumn winds fill your lungs as you stepped outside, energizing your body faster than the coffee you finished not long ago. Coffee was practically a requirement as a college student, a must for an early Monday morning class, especially when that class is calculus, taught by the nice but a little stiff and robotic Professor Vision.

Leaves crunch under your boots as you walk to the building for your next class. It’s a short distance away yet still you pick up your pace, huffing as you rush towards Lee Hall so you could get a good seat for your next class which happened to be your favorite.

If there was anyone more excited than you about American History it was Professor Coulson. You had first taken his introductory class a few semesters back and found he had an excellent way of bringing out new details to a subject you thought you were well versed in.

Naturally, when he was teaching another class you needed for your requirements you jumped on the chance at signing up. As you walked into the large lecture hall you glanced to the left, greeting Professor Coulson with a cheerful smile, a smile that dropped the moment you noticed someone was in your seat.

You stomped your way up the steps to get to the fourth row, stopping dead center at the incredibly annoying person you knew was testing your patience.

“Move Barnes, you’re in my seat,” you huffed, arms crossing over your chest.

A sly smirk spread across the face of Bucky Barnes, a person you could sum up in one word, slacker.

“I don’t see your name on this chair, doll.” He winked; a simple gesture that made your anger boil over.

Class was about to begin so you sat down, leaving a seat in between so you didn’t end up in part of MCU history as the girl that strangled a classmate during class.

Bucky was the only damper on an otherwise perfect class. He didn’t take notes, he didn’t participate and he didn’t ever study. If Professor Coulson called on him it was like Bucky had no idea what the class was even doing. He would always stutter as he tried to catch up, turning towards you as he sighed after successfully bullshitting his way through another question; which pissed you off even more, because despite an open lecture hall with plenty of seats Bucky Barnes chose to sit next to you.

It was obvious you were a smart student. Your hand raised every time to be called on, you took amazingly detailed notes and aced every test, which is why you had a feeling a certain someone decided his new spot would be beside you. Cheater.

If he only studied and gave a shit about his grades he wouldn’t have to try to copy off you. Well you made sure he couldn’t. During tests you hunched over your desk, curving your arm around your paper to protect the answers you spent countless hours studying for.

Throughout class you tried to ignore the eyes you felt on you, seeing Bucky’s goofy smile through the corner of your eye. He was not going to succeed in distracting you. Nope.

You were going to continue listening to this lecture about World War II and not at all think about the way Bucky’s bright white teeth stand out against the scruff of his face. He’s probably too lazy to shave just like he’s too lazy to study.

Bucky let out a chuckle when he heard you humph under your breath. His audible laugh caused you to whip your head in his direction, flaring your eyes at him before they rolled back into your head.

“By Wednesday I hope everyone will have read pages 346 to 403 just in case something pops up,” Professor Coulson said, smiling to the large hall.

Grabbing your laptop you placed it neatly in your bag, tucking away a small notepad you kept out just in case and made sure your pens were capped tightly before they went into their own separate compartment.

“Wow, you’re such a nerd.”

You looked up disdainfully at Bucky’s large frame standing over you.

“The world won’t end if you misplace a pen, you know.”

You don’t respond. Tossing your bag over your shoulder you walked down the steps, calling out to Professor Coulson with a big smile as you waved him goodbye.

“Later Phil,” Bucky said as he left.

You rolled your eyes again at his boldness. Sure Professor Coulson said you could call him by his first name but it still seemed inappropriate. Of course Bucky didn’t care.

As you continued walking down the hall, you felt a presence beside you.

“So, are you going out for lunch now or are you going to head to the library like always? There’s plenty of time in the world to study, you could take a little break you know.”

Your lips scrunched together as you frowned, picking up your pace as your feet took you faster to anywhere that was away from Bucky.

“You just gonna ignore me?”

Your fists tightened so hard they were shaking, itching to feel release if you could only punch the smirk off Bucky that you knew he had.

“Doll?”

You spun around immediately, pointing a finger in his face.

“I’m not your doll so stop saying that! Why are you bothering me? We’re not friends. Just stay away from me Barnes.”

Bucky remained in his place as he watched you turn the corner, huffing with anger. His lips stretched out flat, an uneasy smile that gave way to a small frown, wishing things were different.

Professor Vision rambled on for an extra five minutes and would not let the class go, meaning now you had to run to Lee Hall if you were going to be on time for your next class.

Beads of sweat ran down your temple as you finally got into the building, panting as you raced up two flights of stairs. Your heart was pounding like a drum against your chest as you attempted to catch your breath during the power walk to the room.

It was bad enough you were probably going to be late, with eyes on you as walk through the door, now everyone was going to see you looking like a sweaty mess on top of it.

As you pulled the door open expecting the worst you were surprised to find that no one was looking at you. Professor Coulson was addressing the class as he was discussing something he had put up on the large screen.

Even though you wanted to see what it was you needed to take your seat which was surprisingly open. Bucky was sitting in the same row a few seats away but he had left your seat open.

He couldn’t help the smile that spread across his face, watching as you anxiously got yourself in order. It was unlike you to be thrown off from your usual precision.

“Incredible Bucky.” Professor Coulson admired the photo. “Where was this taken?”

“After the Battle of Azzano.”

Your head turned towards Bucky as he answered, with a wide eyed stare of disbelief having never heard him speak in class before, not in a real class anyway…

Before your mind wandered somewhere you didn’t want to revisit you straightened up, finally looking at the screen. It was a black and white photo of a group of soldiers, arms thrown over each other smiling despite some visible injuries; a bandage wrapped head, cuts and scrapes along their faces.

“Can anyone tell me what happened in the Battle of Azzano?” the professor asked again.

Your hand naturally shot up, smiling widely as you were called on. “About 200 members of the 107th infantry were captured by the Nazi’s, with their Captain leading an unsanctioned rescue mission to free them.”

“Correct. It nearly got him a dishonorable discharge but instead his superiors believed his actions in saving lives of not only U.S. Military but British and French soldiers who were captured as well should be awarded with a special medal, the Shield of Bravery.”

Again you felt Bucky’s gaze on you and turning your head your suspicion was confirmed. His smile was soft as he stared at you, his eyes expressing a strange aura of... Joy? Pride? You’re not quite sure and honestly you didn’t want to find out. Your head stiffened as you set your own gaze forward to begin taking notes.

As promised Professor Coulson “surprised” everyone with a pop quiz, one you know you would have aced regardless of the day you spent studying.

“Okay class, time is up. Pass your quizzes forward.”

Rustling paper echoed throughout the hall as you added your quiz to the pile you were given, walking it over to the person that sat in the row below you a few seats to the left.

“I’m gonna let you all leave early…” the Professor’s sentence was interrupted by a roar of cheers. “...but first I want to give you a heads up for an upcoming project. The details are posted online. Let’s say it’s due in 2 weeks?”

A wave of groans echoed from the back of the hall.

“Alright, 3 weeks.” He smiled as the new date went over a lot better. “Let’s make this simple, whoever you’re sitting closest to is your partner, if anything is uneven just join the nearest group. See you all next Monday!” he said, closing his laptop.

Panic flooded your body like a tidal wave, crashing down and dragging you under. It was hard to breathe, realizing the one person you wanted nothing to do with was going to be your partner for this project.

Bucky wore a smirk that made you roll your eyes and groan.

“Looks like we’re partners.” You didn’t respond.

With deep breaths you put your things away and got up, exiting the room and savoring your final moments of peace. Bucky shrugged his bag over his shoulder following you out.

You pushed open the door to the stairway, a forceful shove as a final act of letting out the anger you felt for being partnered with Bucky.

“We might as well get started,” you said, as you began descending the stairs.

“Get started?” Bucky scoffed, “It’s due in 3 weeks. We have time, doll.”

You shook your head. Of course Bucky wants to be lazy and save everything until the last minute. Well, that’s not how you do things.

“Don’t call me doll, and just because it’s due in 3 weeks doesn’t mean we can’t start now. Plus I want to get this over with.”

Bucky skipped ahead to hold open the door for you. “Uh huh, you mean you don’t want to spend more time with me?”

His tone was light and playful as his face became almost cherubic, batting his eyelashes, his lips pulling into a sweet smile that was almost convincing if you didn’t already know him.

Your face twisted incredulously. “Why would I want to spend time with you?” You shrugged your long knit cardigan closer over your body as you passed him, stepping outside into the chilly air.

Bucky scoffed again, his patience beginning to run thin. “Please doll, you’d be lucky to spend time with me.”

“Yeah right!” you chuckled, walking aimlessly beside him. “Your little act didn’t get passed me today Mr. ‘I’m going to kiss the professor’s ass with an old picture I found because that’s a great way to distract him before a quiz.’ You know it would be a lot easier if you just studied!”

Bucky’s smile soured into a sneer. “Oh like you, Miss ‘I’m scared of letting loose and actually having a good time so I’ll drown myself in studying as an excuse to be a stick in the mud,’” he mocked with a higher pitch in his voice.

“You don’t know anything about me!” you snapped, stopping on the walkway to yell at him, ignoring the looks of curious students as they passed by.

Cocking his head Bucky smirked, “Actually I do. Maybe you pushed it down but I remember you. Drama 101 with Professor Laufeyson two years ago.”

His words carry you back to the open room, where a black tiered platform with more chairs than students sat across from a stage. It wasn’t very large but the burden of stepping on it sat like a boulder in your stomach.

You remember it vividly, standing in the center as the bright lights burned away your confidence. The words of your monologue became a scramble of alphabet soup in your mind. Terrified and shaking, you stood silent in front of the class until a meek apology croaked its way out.

Head hanging low with disappointment as you sat back in your seat, watching as the rest of the class did what you couldn’t do. You hated how acting came so easy to them; to be a different person, to let go. Bucky did that with ease.

You envied him and his ability to be free and act silly or speak with a weird voice. He could do whatever the role demanded and you hated it. You hated not being good at something, hated that you couldn’t get over your insecurities, and you hated that Bucky could do something you were too afraid to do yourself.

“He was begging you to break out of your shell but you couldn’t. Guess you can’t study your way to an A for everything.”

Tears burned their way to your eyes at the sharpness of Bucky’s words. “You’re a real jerk, you know that?” You had no other comeback, you couldn’t fight the truth.

Before you gave him the chance to say anything else you took off. Feet pounding on the pavement as you raced to get as far away from Bucky Barnes, the biggest asshole you’ve ever met.

Bucky didn’t show up the following Monday. It was a relief to not have to face him after the way you left things. Not because you cared about him; you were more concerned with hoping he didn’t see you cry.

His absence didn’t stop you from thinking about him. While trying to pay attention to the lesson you cursed Bucky out in your head. Cutting class… what are we in high school? What’s the point of paying for college if you don’t even show up? But he doesn’t care. He doesn’t care about anything.

On Wednesday Bucky strolled into class just as it began. He trudged up the steps stopping at the row in front of yours. You expected him to move towards the center in front of you but instead you watched him shrug off his backpack, slouch into the chair and pull out his laptop.

Throughout class you kept glancing over towards him. His screen remained blank, turning black after neglect as Bucky rested his cheek against his palm, elbow propped up on the desk. Go home if you want to sleep during class!

When class ended you saw Bucky waiting for you at the door. With a deep breath you prepared yourself for whatever he was going to say.

“Hey,” Bucky said with much less enthusiasm than usual. You stared at him, giving a silent acknowledgement with a raise of your brows. “I need your number.”

Your response denying his request shot out like a speeding bullet. You didn’t even have to entertain the idea. Giving someone like Bucky your number would be an invitation to middle of the night calls, pranks or worse.

“How are we going to work on the project then?”

“Work on the project? That’s funny,” you laughed dryly, shaking your head.

His brows furrowed and just as Bucky was going to speak again you cut him off.

“Forget the project Barnes. I’ll do it myself and you can slap your name on it. Let’s be honest, I’m sure that’s what would have happened anyway.”

Maybe it was a harsh truth but it was a truth you knew from experience. It would be easier to complete the work on your own and have Bucky stand up there when it was time to present. He shouldn’t complain anyway, this would be an easy A for him.

“You’re a real bitch Y/N.”

Your jaw dropped open as you turned to face Bucky. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed, jaw clenching tight as his ocean blue eyes were set ablaze.

“Excuse me? How dare y–”

He lifted his hand as he began to talk over you. “All this time I’ve tried to be your friend, since Drama! I say hello, I ask how you’re doing and all you do is ignore me.”

As Bucky ran his hands through his hair he turned his head away from you for a moment and you could swear the light reflected a watery shine in his yes. “You hate me for whatever reason and I don’t know why I kept trying but you don’t know shit about me!”

He began to walk away before coming back. “For the record, that picture was of my grandfather. His funeral was 2 days ago but I guess you’re too much of a selfish know-it-all to give a shit.”

Bucky stomped away this time for good, leaving you alone in the hallway feeling like absolute shit.

After finally motivating yourself to move, your feet took you to the library. Setting up your laptop you decided to do a little studying, but instead of academics you focused on researching something unknown, Bucky Barnes.

Finding him on Facebook was easy. Last year you made friends with Peggy Carter during your shared anthropology class and she happened to be dating Steve Rogers, aka Bucky’s best friend. On Steve’s profile you searched for “Bucky” and surprisingly nothing came up. When you searched “Barnes” you saw his profile, James Barnes.

Well that was something unexpected. How did you not know Bucky’s real name was James? A quick glance of his profile doesn’t show much information seeing as the most recent post was a meme someone named Sam tagged him in over a year ago. Great.

Looking at Bucky’s friends you were more successful in finding the profiles of his family. His father George rarely posted anything except for some comments on baseball and a sweet picture of what had to be Bucky’s sister. Dressed in a cap and gown, she was surrounded by her parents and Bucky, holding a diploma in her hand. Must be high school. She’s definitely younger than Bucky.

His mother Winifred’s page was a goldmine of information. It was George’s father who passed away. Henry James Barnes, a decorated World War II veteran who earned a purple heart after losing his arm in battle.

She posted several pictures of Henry throughout his life; some with his wife and the large family they had, a newspaper clipping of him with his oldest son Charles at 1955 World Series when the Brooklyn Dodgers won and the one Bucky shared with the class.

Every picture told the story of a loving husband and father who became a grandfather many times over. And there it was. Henry sitting on a floral couch holding baby Bucky against him. It made sense, clearly Bucky was named after him, and based on the other pictures posted they were very close.

You felt compelled to learn more about Bucky, going through his mother’s old posts and photos to see what you might find and what you uncovered seemed unbelievable. Student of the Month. Honors Society. The Dean’s List. Bucky was… a good student?! No, not just good, he was an excellent student.

You sat back against the hard chair wondering why you judged Bucky as hard as you had. He had never done anything personally to you for you to hold a grudge, and as you thought about what he said earlier he was right.

In Drama he tried to talk to you, tell you it’s okay, to shake it off your nerves and go for it, but you brushed him off, twisting his kindness into a condescending lecture. Even in History, when he saw you had class again together his eyes lit up. He sat beside you, asked how you’ve been and you gave him the cold shoulder.

Everything you thought you knew about Bucky Barnes was wrong and you needed to find him to apologize. You walked around campus hoping to run into him but that was useless. Now you regret not exchanging numbers.

The need to speak to Bucky grew as the days passed. Studying was nearly impossible. You couldn’t think about anything except him. Then you felt it, that aha moment. You were looking for Bucky in the wrong place.

It took a bit of digging to find Bucky’s Instagram (thankfully Steve still had his connected to his Facebook) but there it was, his life on display through vibrant pictures. Coney Island at night caught your eye, from the bright lights of the rides and games against the dark midnight sky, to other pictures of the Brooklyn Bridge with a beautiful sunset glow.

Your lips tugged into a smile while looking at Bucky surrounded by Steve and a few other friends but when you came across an old picture of him obviously drunk your smile grew into a large grin that stretched across your face.

Bucky was a mess, with glossy eyes that didn’t quite focus, long messy hair sticking to his sweat covered brow and yet he had the brightest, cutest smile ever, all while clutching a Kermit the Frog plush.

The most recent photo was of him and his grandfather with a touching caption that made your heart do a funny flip in your chest.

The circle around his profile picture turned pink and suddenly you wondered if you should click on it. If you do, he’ll know you were stalking his page but there’s a chance his story could tell you where he is. If you don’t you’ll have to wait two more long and torturous days before you can apologize.

You wanted to stop, to let it all go and begin studying for the weekend but you couldn’t. You were wrong and needed to make things right.

Click.

It’s a photo of a beer bottle with condensation dripping down onto the counter top, a faint glow of red from the lights behind the golden bar. Thankfully he tagged the location, Starks.

Quickly you changed out of lounge pants and threw on some jeans and boots, grabbing the nearest jacket and wrapping a scarf around your neck. With your phone in hand you headed out to the bar, hoping Bucky would still be there.

There was a small crowd beside the entrance, people you would normally feel intimidated by but you pushed on, passing them without hesitation as you were determined to find Bucky. Rock music blared as your eyes scanned all the people sitting at the bar but Bucky was not one of them.

A man behind the counter with dark eyes and finely sculpted facial hair made eye contact with you, flashing a big smile. You nodded back, smiling but moving along. Drinks were the last thing on your mind, although if you didn’t find Bucky you were seriously considering drowning your sorrows in whatever libation would take your guilt away the quickest.

You were nearly ready to give up until you heard it, the sound of Bucky’s laughter. You followed it towards the back, seeing a row of pool tables with Bucky on the end. He was accompanied by Steve and someone with a contagious laugh and gap-toothed smile.

Watching from afar you were happy to see Bucky happy and joking with his friends. Apparently you hadn’t blended into the crowd well enough as Bucky lifted his head and caught you in the gaze of his blue eyes.

“Well, well,” Bucky began. Since there was no point in hiding you walked towards him. “Looking for trouble, are we?”

Your heart began to race and you weren’t sure if it was from the flirtatious tone in his voice paired with the smirk he would not stop staring at you with or the fact that he looked damn good.

A simple grey sweater has never looked better, stretched across his muscular frame you never quite paid attention to before. Dark jeans stretched over thick thighs that made your mouth water.

Swallowing a nervous gulp you asked, “Can we talk?”

Bucky turned towards his friends, giving a silent look they must have understood. Grabbing their drinks they left leaving you and Bucky alone at the pool table.

“Bucky, I–”

“Hang on,” he said, walking around the pool table to grab the sunken balls from the pockets.

You waited a little impatiently for him as he racked up the balls, wanting to get your apology over with.

“Okay doll, you want to talk and I want to play so we’re doing both.” He smiled, grabbing a pool stick off the wall and handing it to you. “So what’s on the line?”

Confused, you asked what he meant as you chalked up the end of the stick.

“Well, we have to play for something, doll.”

All you wanted to do was talk to him but if he wants you to play this game literally, then you would.

“Fine. If I win, you have to stop calling me doll.” You smirked, watching his face sour with dismay.

“Really doll?” Those big blue eyes became even bigger as he pouted feigning sadness.

“I said stop,” you warned.

He dropped the pout, pulling his lips back into a sly grin. “You didn’t win anything yet, doll,” he said, winking at your unamused face.

As Bucky chalked up the end of his pool stick he mulled over ideas in his head. “Now if I win I promise to leave you alone...”

Your brows knit together with confusion. Why would he leave you alone? It should have felt like a relief and yet for some reason it upset you.

“... but first you have to give me a kiss.”

All of your worries flew away with his finished sentence. “Excuse me? No. Don’t be creepy Barnes.”

“Okay, okay, relax doll.” He held his hands up defensively. “I didn’t say it had to be on my lips alright. A peck on the cheek is fine. Deal?”

For some reason you agreed, probably because you really wanted to apologize to him. Despite Bucky’s stipulation you felt really bad for how you’ve been treating him.

Walking past Bucky you took off your scarf and jacket, throwing them on top of his familiar leather jacket. You set yourself up to break, leaning over the table to adjust the position of the cue ball and Bucky couldn’t help but stare at your backside.

“Need me to teach you, doll?”

He pictured himself leaning against your body, his hands gently sweeping over yours guiding the pool stick in the proper position. The thought got him a little too excited and thankfully you couldn’t see the way he adjusted his stance, shaking off his desire.

“You’d like that wouldn’t you?” you asked rhetorically, hitting the cue fiercely and sending two balls in.

Bucky’s mouth was agape in surprise.

“You don’t know everything about me either,” you smirked playfully as you set yourself up to hit the solid balls you claimed.

Leaning against the wall, Bucky tried his best to hide his proud smile as you nailed the next shot. This game might be over way before he expected and quickly he thought about asking for best 2 out of 3 to keep you there longer. He didn’t even care about the kiss, he honestly wanted to keep hanging out. Thankfully you missed the next shot and Bucky took his time figuring out the best angle to try for with the cue’s current placement.

It was now or never you decided, wishing you hadn’t walked past the bar because liquid courage would really come in handy.

Clearing your throat you finally spoke up. “I’m sorry about your grandfather.” Bucky picked his head up from the table, his face dropping to a solemn expression. “It seemed like he lived a great life.”

A simple chuckle and Bucky smiled again. “You stalkin’ me doll?” His tone was light and then he dropped it again with a more serious thank you.

Bucky took a shot and missed but he didn’t care about the game. “I should apologize too. You’re not a bitch or a stick in the mud.”

Your lips pulled into a lopsided smile. “Thanks. Well I might be a stick in the mud,” you admitted.

Walking closer to you, Bucky leaned against the pool table. “No,” he disagreed, shaking his head. “Maybe more like a twig.”

He was happy to see you burst into laughter at his joke. This was the side of you Bucky had been waiting to see. He knew it was there, buried under the layers you built up in your quest to be a perfect student.

You continued to play, talking through the game as you got to know each other for real for the first time.

“I was so jealous of you in Drama. You were so carefree. I guess I twisted that in my head to think you didn’t give a shit about anything. I’m sorry.”

Bucky aimed to sink the next ball. “I do give a shit,” he said, striking the cue. “I study, but I have fun too.” He grimaced as the ball barely made it towards the pocket.

“I could probably take notes on that,” you replied.

“You would take notes. Where’s your laptop and your precious pens?” he teased.

“At home,” you chuckled. A wide smile spread across your face as you set up to take a shot.

“You look cute when you’re all smiley like that.”

The warmth of your cheeks intensified at his comment. Feeling your whole body begin to race you completely messed up the shot.

“You did that on purpose! You’re distracting me!” you grinned.

Bucky smirked, dropping his voice to a much lower octave, “Maybe I really want that kiss.”

You swallowed a lump that formed in your throat, urging him to continue playing. Things were close but a bad miss on Bucky’s part allowed you to hit the final solid ball, calling the 8 ball and sinking it.

“I’m gonna miss calling you doll,” he said, dropping his head down as his lips pulled into a frown.

“Considering I won I think I’ll let you continue calling me doll.”

His head picked up at your words, seeing the smile you wore that truly did outshine the sun.

“Oh, look at Y/N. She’s out having fun and breaking rules!” he joked.

Shaking your head, you chuckled, “Shut up Bucky.”

“Hey, I think that’s the first time you’ve ever said my na–”

You caught him off guard by pressing your lips to his but as soon as Bucky realized what happened you felt him smile against your lips, parting his own to kiss you back. His arms wrapped around your body as he pulled you closer, deepening the victory of his loss.

The crowd seemed to disappear as you lost yourself in the kiss, thankful that Bucky was holding you because you felt like a feather blowing in the wind. When you parted for air, you did so slowly, not wanting to separate your lips from his.

It may be true that you’re a bit of a know it all but now as you proudly fail at holding back a wide grin you realize there’s so much more to learn about your new favorite subject, Bucky Barnes.

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[rosebloodcat]

A Harry Potter Confession/Rant

Ya’ll are free to ignore it if you want. I’m putting it under a Read More so it won’t clog up the dashes of anyone who doesn’t care about it. If you DO click the Read More, be warned, this got really frigging long.

Firstly, I want to say I love Harry Potter. Like, I really love it and it means a lot to me.

It was an introduction to fantasy for a lot of people. It’s created amazing communities, connected people around the world, and spread a ton of wonderful, uplifting messages.

The kind of power that comes from Love, that something as simple as caring can make huge difference for another person.

Harry Potter has gotten a lot of people to think critically about the world around them, and reminded them that things aren’t always as wonderful as they first appear.

It touches on things like racism and classism in a way that people can understand. It tackles things like morality and how it is different for every person who sees it. That doing what’s right wasn’t easy, and sometimes even the best intentions could make things worse instead of better.

The stories are amazing and suck people in. The foreshadowing is done well in each book and lends itself to the stories in subtle and fantastic ways.

No one had written a series like hers and took off as well as what she’d created. There had been other Magic School-type stories before, but she’d found the right channel to send it out. And now it’s something everyone can name and talk about.

For me, the great thing about Harry Potter was the doors it opened.

How modern fantasy for kids could be written. How a magical community could work in modern world (along with all the good and bad things that were in it). How something as amazing as magic could stay hidden for as long as it had (and the effects it had on everyone involved).

It’s community and the people mean so much to me, and it’s become a strong center to my own views and life.

But that doesn’t mean I’m oblivious to it’s flaws.

Looking at the way the world works, and the relationships of the people in it, gives a very clear view of Rowling’s flawed world view.

And people have written entire essays on all the flaws of her writing, so I don’t think I really need to go into tremendous detail about them all. But I think I can sum the basic idea of it pretty well.

Yes, she can write a great story. But that doesn’t mean she wrote a great world. (As all of her post-story retconning shows.)

Looking back, I openly admit many instances in the books had red flags that showed how bad things actually were.

From character relationships to the corrupted government, the racism and classism, the sexism and abusive undertones. Even just the shitty tracking of things between stories and blatant ignorance of how schools and societies should function!

There are so many flaws and screw ups I can hardly keep track of them all.

So many of the character relationships read as abusive or horribly fractured, that would leave more broken hearts and hurting feelings than should be let stand.

Ron/Hermione is one “couple” I can think of. They’re constantly fighting and at each other’s throats, and had only ever tried to get along due to being friends with Harry.

They’d be that couple who would always be fighting and breaking up with each other and separating, then forcing themselves back together because “This is how love it supposed to be, right? We always fight because we love each other. It’s why everyone said we were like an Old Married Couple. Right?”

(No, that’s not how it works. I know some people still ship them, but I feel like they’re better off friends than lovers. It’s less hurt for them both.)

Or Mrs Weasley, who ruled her house with an Iron Fist and would force her family to follow whatever plan she had set up for them.

From destroying the twins projects and trying to force them into a Ministry job, or her obsessive coddling of Ron and Ginny, or even forcing her husband to not talk about his hobbies/passions and making him need to work in the shed just to enjoy things he liked.

She drove of BOTH of her oldest sons away from home with her overbearing nature, yet so few people seem to see the problems with that.

Remus and Tonks getting together out of grief and just about falling apart when she got pregnant. I honestly don’t know if they were in love or were just together to deal with their grief. (Which would definitely cause problems later down the line if they’d lived.)

(And let’s not get into Harry and Ginny. I think that’s one pairing that everyone else has already beaten into the ground.)

The fact that all of these are the GOOD GUYS, the people that usually show some form of ideal the writer has, says a lot about how Rowling thinks love should be.

The Ministry is so blatantly corrupted and poorly planned, it’s a wonder the Wizarding World hadn’t just flat-out collapsed on itself yet.

Rowling goes out of her way to argue against everything she’s set up that would have made it possible to save the Wizarding World from it’s own corruption. From ways to get around the Truth Serum to blocking people from entering minds to find the truth.

She’s making thousands of excuses for why she didn’t use her own tools to make things easier for her character, but the actual reason is simple. So simple that if she just said it, she could have avoided all the problems people had with it.

She wanted a corrupt government for the story she was writing.

That’s it. That’s why there were no trials with Veritaserum. Why prisoners weren’t interrogated by people who could preform Legilimancy. Why no one had to swear magical oaths to prove they were telling the truth or weren’t on the Dark side.

I can’t speak for anyone else, but if she had just said that instead of making excuses, I would have been fine with that. Sometimes, as writers, we have to admit that the reason we didn’t do things that would have made it better for our heroes is because we needed things to go bad.

AND THAT’S OKAY. Not every story needs to have a million well thought out arguments for why the bad guys were able to get as far as they did. Sometimes we just need to say “they were really corrupt/clever” and that’s fine.

Rowling was really bloody lazy, had no idea how to do things practically, and had a ton of sexist/racist/toxic views that she really should have just kept her mouth shut about.

A ton of the issues in Harry Potter go back to this.

Her researching skills were terrible even when the things she needed to look up would have been as simple as looking at the weekly paper. (The price/value of gold is literally something you can look in the weekly news paper to find.)

She never looked at how culture differences would have effected things when she talked about “international” magics and said things that were just plain stupid because of her lack of research.

(The Mahoutoko School of Magic. ”Mahoutokoro” literally translates into “Magic School”, meaning the school is called “The Magic School, School of Magic.” I don’t think I need to explain why that’s stupid.)

She had no idea how to arrange a schooling/class schedule and was completely oblivious to how understaffed her magical school was. None of the class schedules made sense, none of the arrangements made sense, and even the number of students in the school makes no sense.

(Without getting into how many schools of magic there are in the world when you consider the size of the human population.)

Then, of course, there are the racist/anti-lgbtq+ stereotyping done through the magical beings of HP. From Goblins to werewolves, there’s a lot of poor, negative, and outright offensive representation wrapped up in there. (Really, her Anti-Trans stuff is just the tip of the iceberg there.)

That said, I still really love Harry Potter.

I know it’s flawed. I know there’s a ton of bad shit wrapped up in it. I’m not saying people should excuse it.

It’s a flawed work by a flawed person, and people should remember that.

We shouldn’t try to erase or ignore those flaws by trying to explain them away or claim someone else wrote it. Because that allows for complacency.

It implies that we can excuse these things in other works if we like them enough and that they aren’t problematic. If we can ignore them in one place, we can ignore them in other places. That they aren’t as bad if we can pretend they aren’t there.

And that is a problem. People need to accept that, just because they don’t like something, they can’t just disregard it and act like it isn’t there.

It’s real. It’s there. And we need to acknowledge it.

But just because the series isn’t perfect doesn’t mean people can’t still enjoy it.

We shouldn’t magnify the bad things in it until that’s all that can be seen. Because that would erase all the good things people have come away with from this series.

People shouldn’t be shamed or put down for liking Harry Potter.

There are people who’ve discovered importing things about themselves because of Harry Potter. People who found strength to get past difficult and traumatizing events in their lives. People who have found their best friends and even love because of their connection to this series.

There are even people who have found the confidence to embark on their own writing and artistic journeys because of Harry Potter. That it inspired numerous wonderful and amazing things created by it’s fans.

And I think that’s just as important as all the flaws that Rowling’s stories have.

We can still love something while admitting that there are bad parts to it. Books and media don’t have to be perfect. They don’t have to be utterly flawless to be considered “enjoyable”.

We don’t need to act like everything has to be black and white, perfectly defined good and evil, to be good. We can still love things while accepting that there are problems with it.

I just wish more people could understand that.

TLDR: Just because Harry Potter is a flawed, imperfect series written by a flawed, imperfect (and kinda shitty) person doesn’t mean people can’t still like it. And I really wish more people would accept that.

[jonny-byerss]

Why Jancy Is Endgame

So, recently, I’ve seen quite a bit of Jancy hate which I literally don’t understand, because how can you look at Jancy and think “Wow, I hate them”...like, it genuinely baffles me that people don’t ship Jancy, like how? They have SO MUCH CHEMISTRY it’s unreal. In all three seasons, it’s evident that there’s something more between them than just “monster hunting partners”. So, recently, I have been asking multiple people including my irl friends why they think Jancy is endgame and this is what I’ve come up with.

1.) The Duffers Aren’t Dumb

Even though quite a bit of people are disappointed with the way they’ve taken their writing, you have to admit one thing: they aren’t dumb. They’ve been setting Jancy up to be canon since S1, and fans have been rooting for them to get together since S1. It’s not until Steve’s turn-around that people started hating on Jancy.

Jancy is definitely more popular than Stancy for sure. To a majority of fans, even if Jancy isn’t their favorite Stranger Things ship, they still at least ship it. And, with the exception of hardcore Steve stans, most people who like Steve as a character admit that Jonathan and Nancy fit better together than Steve and Nancy ever did. We know the Duffers like to give in to what a majority of fans want, and Jancy seems to be what a majority of fans want.

There’s 3 core ships that the Duffers have been building up since S1. Those are Jopper, Jancy, and Mileven. It’s obvious in S1 that these ships are going to become canon eventually, and they’re also the three core ships of the show that people love. They also tend to focus on these three relationships quite a bit in their writing, with the majority of major relationship moments being with these three ships, especially Mileven. It’s obvious they want us to root for these ships.

The main point I’m trying to make is the Duffers have been setting Jancy up to be canon since S1. They have shown us many moments in all three seasons that show us just how much chemistry Jancy has. From the bed scene in S1, to the hallway scene in S2, they’re obviously trying to show us that Jancy is meant to get together.

Not only that, but Jancy was ACTUALLY supposed to be canon in S1. I don’t know how many people know this, but Steve was supposed to die in S1, and Jancy was supposed to get together. The writers liked Joe Keery so they decided they needed to find a way to keep him on the show. It’s clear to me that the writers themselves are rooting for Jancy, which means that they want us to root for Jancy too.

I’m not here to say how the Duffers should write the next seasons, and I myself don’t know what happens in the future seasons, but I do see the clues that the Duffers have given us since S1 and I also believe that the Duffers know what they’re doing. They know what the majority of fans want and it’s clear to me that they want us to root for Jancy, so obviously they’re gonna keep them together.

2.) THAT Ending Scene In S3

A lot of people that say “Jancy has no chemistry” clearly have not seen their last scene in S3. To me, that scene is a promise. A promise to each other and to us that Jancy is in it for each other.

In this scene, you can see that they are so painfully in love. They don’t want to leave each other. You can tell it breaks both of their hearts that they have to separate for a bit.

I could do a whole analysis of this scene, and I just might do that later, but to me, what they’re saying to each other is ��We’ve been through so much together, why can’t we go through a little more?”

Sure, long-distance would be harder in the 80s, but I do believe that their love is strong enough to last. They clearly both love each other very much. And there’s always phone calls and letters and visiting each other on breaks.

When thinking of the LDRs that the Byers move caused, lots of people think of Mileven, but Jancy is actually way more likely to be endgame than Mileven at this point. We don’t know what happens in future seasons or if the Byers eventually move back, but we do know that Jonathan and Nancy are seniors in high school and almost 18. Mike and Eleven are barely starting high school and have more time to be apart than Jancy does. Once Jancy graduates, they can do whatever they want. Sure, one could say that Jonathan might feel an obligation to stay with his family, but we also know that he has an ambition for NYU. We have no idea what Nancy wants. I can honestly see her go to college for journalism or something similar. What’s to stop her from going to NYU or somewhere in NY with Jonathan?

We don’t know what the Duffers have in store for Jancy’s future, but I trust that they can give Jancy the perfect ending they deserve. That scene in S3 has so much underlying meaning to it, like the fact that the song that play in the background during it is called “You’re a Fighter”. I have a whole different thing planned on analyzing that scene, and I’ll post that later, but basically, with that scene, to me, the Duffers are trying to say “They’re in this for each other. They’re so in love that they’re going to make it work”

3) They are the most mature relationship on the show

I’ve seen quite a few people say that the argument they had in S3 is “proof they are incompatible” but that is simply not true. In fact, if anything, it shows how they are exactly the opposite. Here’s why.

So, every couple fights. It’s the ability to work through a fight and come out stronger and more understanding that shows just how committed a couple is to each other. Jonathan and Nancy are a prime example of this.

Jonathan and Nancy come from different backgrounds. This argument of “I’m poor” and “People are being sexist towards me” is a very adult argument. I mean, most teenage couples you see have fights about jealousy-type crap. Jancy’s fight is a fight that adults would have. That’s why I believe they are a very mature couple.

Not only that, but the key thing to remember is that they both admitted that they felt bad for what they said and apologized, reaffirming their commitment to each other. This is a fight that they can grow from as a result. Because they apologized and acknowledged their wrong-doings, they have a better foundation for understanding each other in the future and they can grow as a couple. This can also give them a perspective on life that maybe they didn’t think about before.

Honestly, Jancy has been through a lot crap together so they kind of have to be mature. Plus, Jonathan himself had to grow up faster than most children, which gives him a perspective on life that he most likely passed on to Nancy.

This is why I believe Jancy is the most mature couple. Instead of letting their fight get the best of them, they acknowledged their wrong-doings and became more understanding of each other as a result. It takes real maturity to do something like that.

The reason I compare them to the other couples is because, look at Mileven’s fight in S3. It seems sort of childish compared to Jancy’s. And Lumax has broken up 5 times apparently. And Jopper, gosh, they have a lot of issues to work out. Jancy seems to have effectively worked out their differences and become stronger as a result.

Charlie Heaton (Jonathan) himself said that when he first read the S3 script, he thought that Jancy seemed like a married couple, which I think says a lot about their relationship. They are so mature and comfortable with each other like that. He also said this, which basically sums up what I said, here:

4) They are more than just “shared trauma”

I’ve seen a lot of people criticize Jancy by saying stuff like “Shared trauma isn’t a good foundation for a relationship”, but I’m about to prove why that’s bullcrap, because Jancy is more than their shared trauma.

So, shared trauma seems to be what the writers like to point out about their relationship. In the ending scene in S3, Jonathan tells Nancy “We’ve got shared trauma”. He is referring to what Murray said to them in S2 when he was telling them why they should get together. Just because “shared trauma” is what Murray emphasized, doesn’t mean it’s their only foundation.

I’d quickly like to point out though, that shared trauma is actually a real life relationship trope and there are real-life couples founded on this. But, I’d also like to point out that Jancy’s trauma isn’t just any trauma. They didn’t just fight in Vietnam together or something, like it’s not every day your loved one gets kidnapped by an otherworldly demon.

I think the main emphasis that the show is focusing on when they say “shared trauma” is the scars. I mean, when Jonathan said that line in S3, he was touching Nancy’s scar that he shares with her. They are the only two people with those matching scars. Those scars are something that unites them and reminds them of the past they share.

Their “trauma” isn’t just how they met either. I mean, they obviously knew each other before the events of S1. Their brothers are best friends. I’m not saying they were friends or anything, but they were definitely acquaintances.

Their trauma is how they grew closer. I mean, before their first traumatic experience, they seemed to be getting on each other’s nerves a bit. It’s not until Nancy almost became Demogorgon lunch that they started realizing they could trust each other. After that, they realized they worked well together and they may or may not have fallen in love.

Also, let’s not forget all the flirting they did before their traumatic experience. The darkroom, even the target practice scene.

I think the key thing to remember with their trauma though is that, because they both went through similar experiences, they understand each other in that way. I mean, part of Stancy breaking up was because Steve didn’t realize the trauma she was going through and didn’t understand fully how to help her. Jonathan understood in a way what she was feeling because he went through something similar.

And yeah, shared trauma might not be a good foundation, because obviously there’s other things to consider in a relationship, but if there’s anything S3 showed us it’s that Jancy knows how to communicate and work through their problems, so clearly that’s not an issue for them.

5) The love triangle is done

I’ve seen some online articles that say things like “Now that Jonathan is gone, Nancy will go back with Steve”. I’ve even heard people say “Nancy will go with Robin”. Both of those are bullcrap.

First of all, Stancy’s arc is finished. S2 showed us how incompatible they were by showing how Steve hasn’t been a good support system for Nancy and showing that Nancy no longer loved Steve. Nancy obviously felt something more for Jonathan, who could support her in a better way than Steve could, because Jonathan had similar experiences. After they broke up, they were done. And when Jonathan and Nancy kissed the love triangle was over. It was solved.

I think most of the fans can agree that they are glad the love triangle was solved, that way Nancy’s story can be about more than just boys. It would be stupid for the Duffers to bring it back and it would ruin every ounce of character development that Steve and Nancy have gone through. And I am confident that the Duffers aren’t stupid.

Part of Steve’s S2 arc is getting over Nancy and accepting that she no longer loves him and even finding a friend in Dustin. Part of Nancy’s arc in S2 was realizing she should embrace that girl she was for a week in November 1983. She gets justice for Barb and even embraces her feelings for the school outcast. Nancy and Steve can still be friends, and even Jonathan and Steve, but that’s it. Nothing more. It’s been decided that Nancy doesn’t love Steve, she loves Jonathan. Even if Jonathan is far away, it’s possible to love him from a distance.

And about Robin and Nancy, it’s also highly unlikely. Again, I think most fans are tired of Nancy’s love life and love triangle and are glad it’s over. Adding Robin to the mix would make it even more complicated.

First of all, it’s not canon that Nancy is bisexual. The only canon LGBT character is Robin. It is implied that Will may be as well, but nothing has been confirmed.

I can see Robin and Nancy being good friends, but Robin did call her a priss in S3 and also, it’s like an unspoken rule in best-friendship that you don’t date their exes. Robin and Steve are best friends. This would break that rule.

I do know, based on leaked photos, Nancy and Robin most likely work together (maybe even with Steve) in S4. I believe, however, that the relationship is fully platonic. It would be nice for Nancy to have a friend that’s a girl after her loss of Barb, and Robin is a good person and would be a great friend for Nancy. I also believe, however, that Nancy is 100% dedicated to Jonathan (based on the last scene in S3) and will only be working with Robin (and maybe Steve) because they know something that would be useful.

Basically, what I’m trying to say is: Nancy’s love life arc has ended. It’s been decided that Nancy doesn’t love Steve and he can’t give her what she wants. And I think most Ronance shippers are just trolls, tbh. No one seems really serious about any Nancy and Robin relationship that’s anything more than platonic.

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And I think that about sums up why I believe Jancy is endgame. Jonathan and Nancy clearly love and care for each other very much as shown in all three seasons. Plus, there’s the fact that THEIR ACTORS ARE LITERALLY DATING IN REAL LIFE! (Seriously both Jancy and Natarlie are relationship goals).

I am extremely confident that even if Jancy does break up at some point, it won’t be for long and they’ll somehow find their way back to each other because they are soulmates. That is a guarantee. I have full confidence that the Duffers can give their relationship the perfect ending they deserve. I’d like to hear your guys’ feedback (please try to keep negativity away). Do you believe Jancy is endgame?

And here’s proof that Jancy loves each other: