#and the ones i could get my grubby hands on for !! era

[yuzuuu4]

trickstar when they appear together in any story

[uncouth-the-fifth]

click, p.2 - Sam Winchester/Reader

read it on ao3.

Pairing: Sam Winchester/Reader (late s5) Tags/Warnings: angst, love confessions, romantic sex, oral sex/cunnilingus, (aka, Sam pussy addiction: the shequel), Sam is Lucifer's vessel, reader is AFAB. Word Count: ~11k. Notes: i was commissioned for the second time by the lovely @daffodil-mania, who wanted a continuation of her last fic set during the "say yes" era of s5. (sooooo dangerous to let me put my grubby hands on this version of Sam, btw). i cannot express how BUCK FUCKING WILD uncouth-nation went for the first part of this fic, so this is for all the wonderful people who gushed over click, commented, threw me some kudos, or even just read it and liked it. lots of love, and i hope you enjoy <3 i did my best to rip out your soul as best i could. THIS CAN STAND ON IT'S OWNNN AHHH. i mean. if u wanna read it <3 Ask to be added to my taglists for future posts!

FIVE YEARS LATER

The walk from the bus stop to your apartment is a safe and easy seven minutes. If you were any other person in any other world, you’d glide onto the bus after your night shift at the university, hop off at your stop, and bumble toward your apartment without a single care in the world. Maybe stare at your phone the whole walk back. Text a hot guy who isn’t the physical manifestation of the devil on earth. Normal stuff.

But this is your life, so you sit front seat on the bus, hands in your lap, tapping a nervous beat against the angel blade hidden in your book bag. The windows rattle in their frames and gleam with rain. You could get off at your stop and take those easy seven minutes home—but the bus driver could also be a demon, so.

Since you aren’t in the mood to die a slow death tonight, walking a few extra blocks to keep anybody from knowing where you live will have to work.

On day two of this, you’d called Dean and asked if you were being extra paranoid. He’d kindly pointed out: Extra-paranoid is just extra-survival. I dunno about you, but survivin’ a lil’ extra sounds fan-fuckin-tastic to me right about now.

He’s right. You know he’s right. But it still doesn’t feel like a good answer, and that makes you picture Sam, twenty-three and still bright-eyed, running his fingers down your bare back and scowling. I’m sick of surviving. One of these days, I want to actually live my life.

But that had been before the apocalypse, before Dean’s deal, before everything. Sam was a different man now. Hunting had reached into all three of you and ripped all sorts of things out, but you would never forgive it for taking Sam’s hope for something better. God, you missed that Sam. You missed him more than anything.

The city bus lumbers up to the curb and spits you out onto the sidewalk, where you superstitiously hover, waiting for the other passengers crawling away from their night shifts to scatter. It’s only when the bus is a dark spot in the mist down the street that you start to walk, your whole body caked head to toe with oily rain. 

This time, you take a random left toward your apartment and serpentine street-to-street, never walking the exact same way the same week. By the time you’re closer to where the bus could’ve actually dropped you off, the lingering smell of old research books has been practically power-washed out of your clothes. You try to think of anything but the freezing, biting, face-stinging rain… and, like a moth to a flame, your mind floats back to Sam.

It’s been over two weeks since he dropped the nuclear option. Over two weeks ago, Sam wanted to say yes to Lucifer, and over two weeks have passed since the massive, unstoppable-force-meets-immovable-object fight that’d erupted as a result.

Dean had blown up. Sam had pushed. You’d burst into tears and clawed into Sam just as deep, because why, why would he ever go there—why would that even be a fathomable possibility in his mind? Did he really think so low of himself? How could he ever give up like that? How could he leave you—?

The worst part was easily the way Sam had reacted. With Dean or John, he could yell himself hoarse, but when it came to fighting you all he could do was sit and take it. He put his head down and nodded at everything you said, even the cruel things. In some ways it made you angrier, but also inconceivably, cosmically guilty. This was Sam’s choice. And of course, because this was Sam, his choice was to save the whole goddamn world. Not a single bone in your body carried that level of selflessness, yet Sam bled the stuff.

You were still furious with him, but only because being mad at him was the only option you had left. The right thing to do would be to tell Sam, I trust you to make this decision, this is your life, and let him take that jump… But you didn’t have it in you. Saying that felt like pushing him over the ledge yourself, or telling him you’d never cared about him in the first place. If you were angry at least you were still fighting for him in some way.

You’d been on board for everything—trying to find a way out of Dean’s deal, trying to kill Lilith, everything. But the argument with Sam had torn out the final piece of you that could stand this, so you packed a bag, told Dean you’d be in a strict research-only role, and booked it back to your hometown. It was cowardly and stupid and beyond selfish, but you knew your stance. The hunt had taken everything from you. You refused to let it take Sam, too.

Maybe, Sam would take you stepping away as a serious sign to change his mind. You couldn’t imagine a world where Sam and his Winchester stubbornness would ever do that, but. It was a nice wish to hold onto.

By the time you make it up the steps to your apartment building, you’re soaked to the bone and audibly making pathetic shivering sounds. Your bookbag feels heavier than ever, digging a trench into your shoulder as you fish around for your keys. The second your apartment door is open the true weight of your exhaustion hits you—

—and then utterly disappears, replaced by a shock of pure adrenaline.

There’s a new pair of boots by your front door.

You catch the heavy door before it goes swinging against the doorjamb, straining your ears against the ringing silence. The bedside lamp is on in your room.

On dead-quiet feet, you slip in, click the door shut behind you, and slip off your bookbag. Your angel blade is in your hand in a second, but you risk a few extra steps toward your kitchen table to wiggle loose the pistol you taped underneath. Just the weight of your weapons in your hands flicks the hunter muscle memory back on in your body, and before you can think you’re hiding in the shadow beside your bedroom door. Listening.

Soft breathing. The pages of a book turning.

You know, instinctively, who it is—you would know him dumb and blind and dead. But these days, anybody could be piloting his body around.

You suck in a deep breath through your nose, heart throbbing in your ears. You wait until the fingers on your gun aren’t shaking anymore, then burst inside the room, slamming the door into the wall and whipping your pistol up to eye level.

Sam’s head flinches towards you. He is exactly as you saw him two weeks ago; solemn, determined, and open, the air around him practically steaming with safety and goodness. He’s sat comfortably on your bed, reading a book he brought with him. Despite everything, your belly still curls with butterflies when you lay eyes on him. Sam. Definitely Sam, and no one else.

Still, your paranoia has gotten you this far. You both stare at each other for a beat, equal parts scared out of your minds and relieved. Without a word, you keep your gun trained on him, and Sam lets you, his eyes big and understanding. You shuffle sideways to your dresser, and without turning away from him, pop open the top drawer and toss him the silver flask of holy water you keep hidden inside. 

He catches it. So, not a shapeshifter, then. Sam takes a drink of the holy water, even turning to the side so you can see the water go into his mouth. (A demon in Missouri had slipped past the three of you by pretending to sip—only Sam would know that.) You’re still a little terrified, but you manage to pull your weapons back down to your sides. You still don’t know what to say.

He’s really here. The part of you that had worried the argument with Sam would be your last wails with joy. He’s here, alive and in front of you. No matter how awkward you feel you can’t bring yourself to stop staring at him. By the buttery light of your bedside lamp, he literally glows with beauty, and you realize he’d scrubbed his boots off on your welcome mat to not track mud in, and he’d hung up his rain-soaked jacket in your shower to dry. Stupid polite Sam things.

You dare to glance back at your kitchen, then swivel to squint at him. “Did you… do my dishes?”

Sam lets his hands relax into his lap and nods, shy. He’s looking at you in a way he never really has before, eyes big and soul-rending. “…Yeah. I used the key you gave me to get in… Hope that’s okay.”

There’s another long pause. Usually when you stare at Sam, he doesn’t stare so intensely back, but you share a weird mutual moment where you just stand there and take each other in. It’s so obvious it’s painful, but if he’s doing it then you feel entitled to devour him with your eyes too.

“I got, uh, bored. Waiting for you,” Sam clarifies. “Thought I’d make myself useful.”

Sam stands from the bed. For a second you think he’s heading straight for you, but he moves toward the dresser behind you, kindly tucking the holy water back where it was stowed. You flit out of his way as fast as you can and set your weapons down on the closest available surface, feeling off-kilter. Why would he come here? Is he going to tell you that he changed his mind?

You hold onto the question, but you know it’s too out of character to hope for. Despair sinks into your gut like a rock in a pond. You know why Sam’s here. He would never make this decision without telling you first—without at least saying goodbye in person.

Your throat locks up with tears.

Behind you, Sam hums, “You changed your hair.”

Right. You’d altered it to be more undercover. You resist the urge to reach up and play with your hair, or give in to any of the fluttery feelings you always feel around Sam. “It’s safer.” Tightly, you ask him, “What are you doing here?”

Sam drags a long breath through his nose. You clutch the end of your bookshelf, your chest crumpling with misery. Please don’t say it. Please, please, lie to me if you have to.

“...I’m not taking the jump,” Sam breathes.

There’s more that he says after that. He talks about how you and Dean are right, and how, surely, after everything that the three of you have been through, there’s got to be another way to end this. You’ve always found another way in the past. Sam explains all this to you in a sure, quiet voice, like this is something he’s thought about for a long time, but you barely hear him after those first words. There’s this persistent tension in your chest that’s telling you that there’s something wrong here, but you don’t care—you don’t give a single fucking shit, because Sam—Sam isn’t saying yes. Sam’s staying.

“…are other ways I can make up for the mistakes I made,” he’s telling you, scrambling to fill the nagging silence.

You take a moment to force back your tears, and Sam, nervously, keeps talking.

He swallows, trying to smile. “I-I would’ve called and told you, but something tells me you wouldn’t have picked up.”

When you’ve got your bearings back, you push away from your bookshelf and turn to face him. Your legs are so leaden that you feel as if you have to physically pick up your body and drop it down the other direction, but you manage it. “What… what made you change your mind?”

Sam gets one look at your face and wilts with guilt. He doesn’t answer your question in words—just shoves his hands in his pockets and stares down at his feet, then around your room, as if his reason was in the air with the two of you. In the apartment. His eyes flicker over you just once, and you understand. Seeing you leave really had scared him.

“Be careful,” you start to joke with him, “you start validating my childish reactions and we’re gonna have a whole new set of problems on our hands.”

Sam scoffs. “It wasn’t childish to run away.”

You raise an eyebrow at his word choice, which gets an honest-to-god laugh out of him. A real good Sam Winchester laugh, dimples and all. The last dregs of anxiety in your gut melt at the sound, and Sam reassures you, shrugging, “You needed to get out. In case you forgot, I kind of invented wanting to get out. I understand. I really do.”

You know that he does. That’s not exactly going to stop you from feeling guilty about ditching them, but at least it kicked some sense into him. God. For the last five or six years, your every moment had been spent with Sam and his brother. Even just a couple weeks without him had drained you, and having him back only makes those feelings more clear. Sam’s presence commands the space in a way that turns your shitty, undecorated bedroom into someplace magical, someplace good and safe and warm, and just seeing him standing there draws the ache out of your spine.

Your reach out for his sleeve. Somehow, he’s more real than ever, a tangible person instead of the memory you’ve chased for so long.

“You’re really not saying yes?”

Sam unwinds your hand from the fabric so he can hold it instead, your fingers scooped in his fingers. You’re given a firm squeeze and are hypnotized by him in an instant, the world narrowing down to this moment between just him and just you.

Sam looks into your eyes when he promises, “I’m not going anywhere.”

The tears you’d resisted before return in one big, merciless wave. You’re so tired and the rain was so fucking cold and you’re so sick of being scared that Sam, thank god, Sam, is everything you could possibly need. He’s not going anywhere. Before you can stop yourself you’re clutching him for dear life, shoving your face in his shirt and crushing his body against yours. These last few weeks have submerged you in survival mode, and you don’t realize how deep until Sam pulls you out of the current. He’s warm and dry, and when you inhale to sob he smells like a 24-hour-laundromat, the Impala, and home home home. You could’ve lost that. You could’ve lost him.

“Th-thank you,” you choke out at nothing in particular, “thank you.”

You’ve cried a lot this week, so there are not many tears left to shed. Still, Sam holds you through all of them, swaying back and forth with you and cooing in your ear. You hear him sniffling too. When you’re both all sobbed out, you pull back to tell him you love him, to remind him of all the things he needs to hear, but Sam strangely doesn’t let you. The second he feels you pull away he clutches you back against him, and you get the uneasy impression that you’ve been comforting him more than he’s been comforting you. His whole body’s shaking.

Sam hugs you for longer than he ever has before. It’s a little worrying, but you’ve both needed it so much that you don’t even complain.

After a while, Sam slips back, and in traditional Winchester fashion tries to play off his vulnerability. He’s always been a dead-silent crier, so you have zero way to gauge how bad things are until you see his face. He looks like he’d sobbed his heart out. Your shirt is still wet from the rain, but even then you can feel Sam’s tears soaking your shoulder. Saying anything about it will just embarrass him, though.

“...I-I, uh,” you lick the tears off your lips, mumbling, “I don’t know bout’ you, but I’m beat. Do you have somewhere you gotta be, or,” you add hopefully, “or can you stick around?”

This is the part where Sam will start coaxing you to drive back with him to where he and Dean are holed up, you’re sure of it. You’re already plotting in your head what to pack and what to take, but Sam never brings it up. He doesn’t worry about tomorrow yet.

He presses his lips together. “I was hoping I could stay here tonight, actually.”

This is an even better answer. You’re nodding before he’s even finished the thought, stroking your hand down his chest. It twists your gut in knots to see him like this, so you start to steer the conversation toward something more playful, something less daunting to think about.

“You’re lucky I like you then,” you smirk. Somehow, you manage to peel yourself out of his bubble and teeter toward your dresser, scrubbing the tears off your face. “Make yourself comfortable. I dunno about you, but I’m getting the fuck out of these work clothes, I’m freezing. Do you need anything to sleep in? I’ve got at least five years of your stolen shirts in here.”

You hear him ease himself down on the end of your bed again, but there’s no sassy retort, sly comment, or any sort of line about you and your stealing habits. Instead, sweet and simple, he says, “I’ll just sleep in this. You can have them.”

Okay. Weird.

Since he didn’t take the bait, you throw out another line and try again. This time, you kick off your shoes, open a drawer, and turn back to him with two of his shirts in hand. “Really?” You wave them teasingly in the air. “You sure?”

They are some of his best shirts, easy. You’re not a cheap thief. The first is a holey, feather-soft Red Hot Chili Peppers tee, and the second is a deep maroon Stanford sweater. He has so few artifacts from that time in his life that there’s no way he won’t want this one back. Right?

But Sam just gazes at you, his whole face soft and loving as he says, “You should wear the Stanford one. It looks good on you.”

Those old hot-shivery feelings for him seep down your spine, and you feel in real-time how your cheeks flood with heat. Damn, okay. Consider yourself wooed.

You’ve been down this road with Sam many, many times—enough to know when he’s flirting with you. The forbidden labels had never been thrown around, but. Well. Sam had been your first time, as well as the many other times after that.

He’s usually leagues more subtle than his brother, but for whatever reason he’s pouring it on by the truckload tonight. When you turn around he’s nothing but big, happy puppy eyes, waiting patiently for you at the end of the bed. (Like you’re his girlfriend. Like anything about this is normal at all, and you and Sam are going to tuck into bed together like it’s any other night). Fuck, you missed him.

The bathroom is only a few steps away, but this is Sam, so you decide to just throw on your pajamas right here. Your shirt is so wet that it hits the floor with a slap. It also takes some experience to wring yourself out of your denim-turned-cement jeans, so it’s not the sexiest show in the entire world. Still, Sam’s gaze traces sensual lines down your back. You would rather go to literal, actual hell than wear your bra for a minute longer, so the second you’re free of its death grip, a long happy sigh drains out of you. A similar dreamy sigh drains out of Sam. Dork.

“I will never get tired of that,” Sam murmurs. You expect to hear some kind of hunger there, but the timber of his voice bleeds with admiration and fondness.

There are very few ways to be a normal human being while Sam Winchester adores your nude body with his eyes. The best you can do is burst into flustered, giggly laughter and give him a good eyeroll, your entire face cooking like a stove burner.

“Alright, loverboy,” you scoff, “I’m gonna go brush my teeth and take my makeup off—”

“Can I help?” Sam asks.

You sputter out another laugh, confused. “You wanna brush my teeth for me?”

“No,” Sam shakes his head, smiling big, “Lemme take your makeup off for you.”

Okay. Weirder. But it’s sweet, and you like this side of him, so you decide to indulge his mood. “...Sure.”

You go about your night-time routine. Sam continues to be a weirdo, trailing you into the bathroom, leaning against the doorframe, and blinking slow endearing blinks at you as he… watches you brush your teeth. Just. Stands there, watching, utterly enamored with this little moment of domesticity with you. On the surface level you’re a little thrown off, but it falls under the category of Freaky Sam Things that made you catch feelings for him in the first place, so. You grin into your toothbrush the whole time.

When he’s satisfied by his little ogling fest, he drifts off to hunt around for your makeup wipes. Either you’re predictable or he knows you too well, because he finds them within seconds, and patiently sits back as you finish up your routine, watching you like you’ll disappear on him the moment he turns away. Click click, you feel inside you.

“Okay,” he says when you’re done. “Close your eyes.”

You do. You wait for the cool touch of the wipe on your face, but instead, Sam’s big, rough fingers find your chin and hold you still. It takes conscience effort to not melt into his touch like a cat in a square of sunlight. Your willpower is nothing on Sam’s, though, so you give in quickly, sinking into his hand and sighing through your nose. In gentle swipes, he cleans your face. It must be a nightmare of smeared mascara considering how you’d cried earlier… And yet Sam had still been so transfixed by you. He’s the fucking best.

Sam’s hand tilts your head from side to side to survey his handiwork. Pleased, he tosses the wipe in the trash and says, “There you go.”

You open your eyes and go to double-check his work in the mirror, but Sam hasn’t removed his hand from your chin, and you really, really don’t want him to. His thick thumb comes up and caresses under your lips. He looks at you like he loves you, and with all the honesty in the world, he utters, “...You are so pretty.”

…The only way for you to survive this is by throwing him a dry look. “You’re full of shit. What’s your game, Winchester?”

That earns you another authentic Sam laugh, along with a handsome boyish smile. “There’s no game. What are you talking about?”

You squint at him. Liar.

“This.” You gestured between the two of you, suspicious. “You’re mooning over me. Why are you mooning? Are you planning something?”

A ripple of discomfort rolls across Sam’s face, but it passes too fast for you to read. His hands go right back in his pockets and he leans into the doorframe again. “I’m just… happy we’re not fighting,” he confesses.

Oh. That makes sense. Sam hasn’t exactly made up with you like that before, but. These times change everyone. You ease up on your teasing and admit, “Me too.”

“I’m sorry for scaring you away,” Sam says, and far, far too seriously for your liking, he whispers, “I’m sorry for everything.”

Your answer slips right out of your mouth without hesitation. “I forgive you, stupid,” your brows furrow together. “And I’m sorry, too. I said some pretty shitty stuff back there.”

Sam wilts against the doorframe a little. “Nothing I didn’t deserve.”

A dull pulse of anger flares in your chest, which flickers out and dies not a second later. There’s so much you want to say to that.

It is so fucking unfair—biblically, cosmically unfair—that Sam, the good guy to end all good guys, thinks of himself this way. He is the kind of righteous they make saints out of. And yet he sits in your silly little bathroom in your shitty little apartment and gives you that look, the look that says, I deserve this and so much more. I deserve to rot in hell for all eternity. He gave you that exact look when he brought up saying yes. He gives it to you now, because Sam sees everything as a sin to serve penance for—freeing Lucifer from the cage and making you a little worried. He thinks he’s so evil, so beyond saving. It makes you want to get your fists in your shirt and just shake him. 

You’re good! You want to scream. Just for once in your life, listen to me! None of this is your fault!

There’s nothing you could say to him that would ever make him let go of his guilt. But, at the very least, you could help him forget about it for a while.

“You beat yourself up too much,” you scold. Then, softer, you add, “C’mere, Sammy.”

Sam does as told, planting himself right in front of you. God, he’s changed. You look him over with a bittersweet smile. He used to be so spindly. The last few years have filled him out, forcing his body into something ready for war. The hunt reached in and tore all sorts of things out of people, but you’d been wrong about what it’d ripped out of Sam. His optimism was still there, warm and humming in the tissue of his body, and just seeing it fills you with hope. He looks so different from the man you’d had all to yourself in that cabin, but you can feel that he’s still in there. He’s still your Sam.

You take his face in your hands, smoothing your thumbs into his dimples and quietly, needily rasping, “...Can I take care of you?”

Sam’s whole body shudders with relief. “Please, yes.”

The next few beats of this dance haven’t changed. Like always, Sam comes flying in with a big, smashing kiss that shatters any leftover barriers between you. You’re not Sam’s girlfriend and he’s not your boyfriend, but Sam makes you his with this kiss. (If only for a little while). Your noses mash together and his eyes squeeze shut and then everything is just Sam, Sam, Sam at every angle. His hands are at his sides then suddenly they’re all over you, taking two greedy handfuls of your waist under the Stanford sweater. He jams your hips against his and kisses you senseless, towering over you, surrounding you, so that when you pull back to gasp for breath your lungs are flooded with his familiar heady love potion.

Either he’s giving off some Poison Ivy-level pheromones, or your body is so familiar with these steps that it knows what comes after this kiss… because you’re instantly wet.

You realized a long time ago that you and Sam have sex a bit too often for it to be considered “casual,” but even if it was, Sam is not a casual kind of lay. After that first soul-stealing kiss, Sam stares you down like a four-course meal, spins you around, pushes you down chest-first onto the bathroom counter, drops to his knees—

—and shoves his face between your legs like it’s his goddamn job.

In the middle of all your surprised shrieking and squirming, Sam nuzzles his face into your panties and moans deep and bassy in his throat, “Yes.”

Like he’s won something. Like he’s been waiting weeks to do this. Holy fuck, you’ll never get tired of that.

The second you have even an atom of your reason back, you slap a hand over your mouth. Neighbors! Sam has already forgotten what neighbors are, and is holy-mission-from-god-determined to make you noisy. He’s extra hungry for it tonight, too. You squeak out his name, not so much in shock, but more because having those huge hands squeezing where your ass starts to round out tends to produce a reaction, and Sam rumbles like a lawnmower in approval. Holy fuck.

He doesn’t have to ask you to spread your legs. One of the hands appreciating your ass slides between your thighs, cupping you through your underwear, and you have to try not to squeal when the meaty pad of Sam’s thumb swipes across your clothed folds. He presses a big kiss in that exact spot as he drags your panties down your legs, and it’s a weirdly sweet gesture that makes your heart and your belly flutter with shivery heat. Fuck. Fuck, you missed him so much.

The first few times Sam had sprung this move on you, you hadn’t exactly had enough time to fully rev up. But Sam is deadly efficient in and out of the bedroom, so he makes a point to get you extra wet (for him) with his spit, laving his hot, slippery tongue over you in one long swipe. He eats you out with all the obscene, noisy enjoyment of somebody gorging on the juiciest fruit they’ve ever tasted. Even you are scandalized.

It becomes embarrassingly clear that covering your mouth isn’t going to keep Sam from what he wants. The high, desperate moan you try to stifle only makes him work harder. You press an arm flat to the counter and bury your face in it for strength, since you’re weak and whimpering for him already. 

Sam was good in bed when you met him. But, by nature, he is a relentless and avid learner, and it’s been five whole years since he put his mouth on you for the first time. Now, Sam is a certified pussy-eating weapon. He knows your body better than anyone possibly could. You’re over the edge in a minute flat.

Your climax flies through you in one whizzing, sparking rush, then keeps flying, until your body’s squeezing out little squeaky pleas for mercy of its own accord. This is his favorite part. You claw into the countertop and wail for it, pushing at the floor in your socks to gain any sort of leverage. To press closer? To squirm away? You have zero fucking clue, since the thought part of your brain has been blasted into a smoking crater. Sam wraps a big arm around your spasming thigh to pin you open, and holy fucking shit, could that man suck the chrome off a tailpipe. His mouth is a whirlwind of licking and suction just on the right side of oh fuck too much that makes your skin feel like it’s fizzing. You are a thread that he’s just pulling and pulling until you’re so thin you could snap into nothing—

You wait for the moment when Sam pops off you, stands up, and goes for his zipper, but he never does. He remains on the floor, determined to lick you through overstimulation and straight into round two. But that’s a whole minute you could spend with his dick inside you instead, and there’s no fucking way you’re wasting that. Not when he’s here and real and not going to say yes. Sam’s not going anywhere. He’s staying, he’s alive, and the world isn’t going to end tomorrow.

“No no no,” you bite out in one short, rattling breath. “S-Suh—Sam, please please—” An unexpected sob shreds out of you. “Miss you. Need you.”

You’re actually, genuinely crying, and not entirely in the fun sexed-out way. Sam backs up. He’s not even halfway standing when you wrench him up the rest of the way, straight into a desperate, maddening kiss. It’s a brutal cross of teeth and tongue. The need for body heat and skin and him burns through you like genuine bloodlust, so you cram yourself up against him with life-or-death urgency. You get your nails into him until you feel something like shirt fabric and viciously yank it over his head, waiting for the moment when he grabs your wrists or shoves you onto the bed o-or—or starts to blow off steam. Cause’ that’s what this is all about, right?

He drags your mouths apart. Sam pants, “Slow down.”

You stop.

This is. This is new.

There’s no slowing, with this. You both go and you keep going until there’s no more fuel in your tanks, and you crawl out of bed the next day feeling like you’ve beaten the rot out of each other. You’ve never once slowed down during this before, and as your wheels spin to a halt for the first time, reality filters back in around you.

Sam stares at you. His hair is all over the place. A patchy blush speckles up his heaving chest, burning in his ears and in his cheeks. Your slick shines on his lips and the bulb of his nose. He’s just standing there and fucking looking at you, but for whatever reason it feels like the color has seeped back into the world.

“S’okay. Gonna be okay,” Sam hushes, bleeding with sweetness.

He picks up your hands, moving you as if you were a delicate glass he was turning over in each palm. Each of your hands are kissed in the center (oh my fucking god) then wrapped around his neck, and when he has you in his bubble he scoops up your face and kisses you.

It’s a boyfriend kiss. Not a blowing off steam thing, or any other excuse the two of you have used to feel each other. A genuine, I’m your boyfriend and I love you sort of kiss, foreheads pressed together, noses touching, the whole nine yards. It’s the kind of kiss that’s meant to say something. Every inch of what he’s trying to tell you echoes through your body in one ringing smash, like you’re a big cymbal he’s taken a mallet to. 

He slips off your lips and hovers, bracing himself for impact. You suck in a rattling breath.

…Then you press up onto your tiptoes to give him a kiss of your own, just pressing your lips against his, unmoving. It’s undemanding; an answer. You try to find the words to describe the shift that’s occurred between you, and end up feeling stuttery and shivery and fucking elated. Romantic. It’s fucking romantic.

“Sammy,” you sob out.

“Shhh. C’mere,” Sam whispers, his voice throaty and whiskey smooth. “Lemme make it better.”

He tries to walk you straight back out of the bathroom and towards the bed, he really does, but you stop Sam every other step to overwhelm him with obsessed, affectionate kisses. God. His chapstick is all over your fucking mouth (along with your slick) and his hands are everywhere else, feeling instead of grabbing.

“You always do,” you breathe, and that might be the most honest thing you’ve ever said to him in bed.

Sam gets this quiet, pleased smile on his face. No matter how naked and turned-on you are, you’ve always got a snappy reply ready, and you’re about to throw one at him—until you’re fucking obliterated. He smoothes his palms down your arms. Your wrists are scooped up again. With all the tenderness on the planet, Sam slides in close, kisses your throat, and places both of your hands firmly on his belt.

“Take it off,” he rasps.

This. This isn’t the first time he’s given you that order. But knowing, feeling that he’s playing this all out like it’s more than a fling to him… that Sam’s gonna fuck you like you’re someone special to him… sweet jesus, it makes you lightheaded.

“Bossy,” your murmur, grinning.

You’re downright feverish going in to kiss him next. Sam parts your lips with a slow, sinful swipe of his tongue, and there must be a drop of psychic still in him, because suddenly you’re flooded with visions of that filthy mouth between your legs. You can still feel the ghost of him there, keeping you open with his thumbs as the blunt tip of his tongue pushes you somewhere vast and sparkly and wonderful. This is going to be even better.

He sounds like he’s praying when he says, “I just like to watch you.”

Muscle memory serves. You work his clasp open without peeking down and let it hang in his belt loops, mostly because it lets his jeans sling low on his hips in the most enticing way. His belly twitches at even the slightest touch of your hands; always so responsive. Sam drops his forehead on your shoulder to watch you work, and you take the rare opportunity to kiss the top of his head. This is one of your favorite parts. When his button is undone and his zipper’s down, you’re free to smooth your hand under his waistband and take a big handful of him.

You reach in and—squeeze. Sam’s hand snaps up to clutch your arm. His nails dig in, and he rocks forward onto his tiptoes to really dig into your touch. “Yes.”

It’s the kind of soft, needy sound that makes you want to smother him with kisses and hug him until he suffocates. Instead, you cooly purr into his hair, “So sensitive, Sammy.”

A hoarse, sharp laugh snaps out of him, which dissolves into a shuddering groan. You tug at his jeans until they’re somewhere you don’t care about anymore, and forget about everything else entirely at the sight of his cock. All these years of sneaking around with him have conditioned you. Just seeing the pretty speckling of dark hair that leads to it, then the real deal, hanging blood-hot and heavy between his legs, makes your tummy flip and your mouth water. One of a million embarrassing Sam-reactions you’ll have to bring to your grave.

You take his cock in your hand, trying to swallow back the slutty amount of saliva in your mouth. Sam whimpers. A real, desperate sound, with his nails stinging down your arms and everything.

“Know you wanted to slow down,” you struggle between open-mouthed pants, “b-but—can’t—don’t wanna wait—”

Sam physically curls towards you, his hips seizing into your hand and his arms hooking around your shoulders. You’re dragged in for a sloppy kiss so deep you swear it melds your souls together. Sam is just as affected, rumbling like a racecar in approval.

“Then don’t.” He begs.

If this was any other night, Sam would just take. You’d be face down and drilled halfway through the mattress by now, no preamble, all business. He got off and you got off and everyone was happy that way. Sam would want the room dark and you would hide your face in the bedding, the two of you eager to touch and experience but terrified of breaking the illusion. He’s so generous that you suppose he’s got to have at least one place in life where he’s selfish, and you’re happy to be his outlet for it, but.

You’ve never seen him take this way before.

He looks at you and he never really stops, transfixed. You don’t doubt you could walk in a circle around him and Sam’s eyes would follow you the whole way, his gaze oozing with longing and something else—resolution? Faith? You push him onto the bed, and he drops down as if hobbling into a pew for the first time, unsure how to clasp his hands in prayer because it’s only ever been something done in his head before.

You stand there for a moment, unsure of what to do next.

“God,” Sam utters, spellbound. 

You’re blushing so hard that you forget to be sexy as you crawl into his lap, but Sam doesn’t care, still giving you those big slow doe blinks to express his love. It’s so different from the Sam you know (yet also so deeply, deeply him) that you forget what it means to be sexy entirely. He coaxes you closer to plant tender kisses under your chin, and the plan to seductively peel off your sweater for him and flash him your tits blips out of existence.

You wait for the moment when Sam shreds the Stanford sweater off you. Instead, those wonderful fucking hands tease under the hem to squeeze your waist, and Sam croaks out between kisses, “Should wear this all the time. You’re beautiful in anything, but this… you’re… mmn.”

Your heart gives a pathetic flutter. You press mindless kisses against his mouth and rock your bare core down on his lap, because he’s never acted this way before and you don’t know how else to return the favor. “Not nearly as beautiful as you, Sammy.”

The only reaction you get from him is a single huff out of his nose, like it’s something he can’t commit a whole laugh to. Like none of that matters anymore, like it would never matter for Sam, because his body may be beautiful, but it hardly belongs to him anymore. God, you’re shitty at compliments.

You’re fucking wonderful, you suddenly want to tell him. A whole swarm of little truths and sweet nothings roars straight up to the surface of your mind, a whole sea of better things you could say to him, but then one of those perfect hands is slipping between your legs and Sam’s asking you in that perfect, tinted glass voice, “You still on the pill?”

“Yes, doctor,” you tease.

Another flood of sticky heat rushes between your legs, because that question is always a precursor to being pressed into and filled and stuffed end-to-end by Sam’s dick. The one barrier that doesn’t—didn’t exist between you.

“Good,” Sam sighs, relieved, grateful. He never turned down going raw in the past, but he’s downright starved for it right now. Closer closer closer, his whole body begs.

You’re tugged in by a big hand hooked around your back, and you fall right into Sam’s summer-warm, sweat-sticky chest, giggling. He loops both arms around your middle and teddy-bear squeezes even more laughter out of you. The only way to hold yourself up is by planting two hands on his shoulders… which turns into his cupping his neck… then caressing his face, because it’s impossible to be witness to that quiet boyish grin and not shower him in affection. There’s all these little freckles on him that you can only see up close. He feels good, mystical good, prophetic-chosen-one type good.

This is the moment. You can feel the blood in your body pounding between your legs, and Sam’s cock bumps not-so-innocently against your core as you kiss one another. Every shift of his hands sends your muscles clenching tight, bracing for impact, but Sam doesn’t push into you just yet.

Your confusion must be clear on your face, because he says, “Just let me feel you for a second.”

And, obviously, you’re not an idiot, so you let Sam feel you for as long as he pleases. For the next ten uninterrupted minutes, you makeout like lovesick teenagers, whimpering and sighing and swallowing every sound the other makes. You’d always pegged him as a romantic. But seeing it, feeling it, adds a whole new dimension to him you hadn’t realized you’d been craving.

By the time the pool of need in your gut has opened up into a blackhole, Sam has caressed or squeezed or kissed every part of you ten times over. He continues to be weird and obsessed with you. (So still in character, then). Sam even pinches the ends of your ears and smooths his thumbs over the bumps of your ankles, being sexy about it but also a little terrifying. He touches you like he’s never gonna see you again.

Around the time that Sam starts suckling marks into your neck and trying to tickle you under your arms, you giggle out, “O-Okay—okay! Enough—!”

“Enough what?” Sam cocks his head. His hand makes another dive for your belly, making you shriek and squirm with more giggles. You try to wriggle away to protect your tickling sides, but Sam’s too strong and you’re a little in love with him, so it’s easy for him to pull you flush against him and blow tingly-warm breaths beside your ear. He purrs, “You need it that badly?”

“Fucking yes! So quit torturing me,” you pant, and you’re pretty sure this grin is going to get stuck on your face.

Sam’s smile gets even bigger. “Only if you say please.”

Your attitude slips from your grip like water. Next time, you’ll play push and pull with him, but right now there needs to be a lot more pushing and pulling in a different context.

The words are out of your mouth in an instant. “Please, Sam.”

As reluctant as he is to stop teasing you, Sam’s a little in love, too. He leans back enough to fist his cock in one hand, and you can’t help how your breath hitches when Sam’s touch follows the curve of your ass to where you’re soaked and sensitive for him. Those thick, maddening fingers spread you open. The velvety tip of his cock finds your hole right away, and your legs nearly give out when Sam starts to swipe himself up and down your folds one dizzying stroke at a time. Back…. and forth. Up… and down. Jesus fucking Christ.

“Okay, fine…” He concedes, his eyes glittering with joy. “You’re just so cute when you act all tough.”

Maybe not all of your attitude is gone. You bark out a laugh, telling him, “I hate you.”

Sam presses down for the last time, then presses in. You don’t mean to look into his eyes when he fills you up, and that’s probably what does you in. Sam’s rosy face flutters and twists with pleasure, but he never stops looking at you, not even once, terrified to miss even a small moment. The long hitching moan that slips out of you makes his whole face darken with desire. You’re pulled onto him deeper and deeper and deeper until—click. Cue the angel choir.

Your fingers dig desperately into his hair. Sam curls into you in one slow pulling movement, a thread pulled taut, until his face is stuffed in your neck and his hands are mindlessly scrabbling down your back.

“God, I love you,” he moans.

Soon your pussy feels achy and hair-trigger-sensitive and beyond full, which could mean that you’re all the way on him. It’s impossible to tell, since the first full minute of having Sam’s dick inside you sends you straight to the moon every time, where everything falls in peaceful slow-motion and the whole world hums with cosmic, sparkling pressure. You shove your face into him and nuzzle in a daze, little ripples of electricity sparking up your spine.

…Wait.

“What?” You register, slow.

Sam is still clutching you for dear life, even if the moment’s slowed and you’re both comfortable. He hugs you full-bodied, nose in your neck, tilted forward, the kind of hug where he sways you side to side with joy. Sam sucks in a harsh breath. Can’t hold back anymore.

“I love you,” he gushes. The words burn out of him, declarative, overjoyed.

There’s so much you want to say to that. But then Sam digs his fingers into your ass and pulls you off his lap, only to gloriously sink you down the rest of the way, and. Fuck fuck fuck. His cock drags thick and hot against the pliant walls of your pussy. You couldn’t be any more full if you tried, clamping down on him with long, silky ripples of pressure that outline the shape of him inside you in obscene detail. It’s the kind of mind-blowing that’s beyond comprehension, beyond feeble human understanding. Your eyes squeeze shut and you whimper into his hair.

“God, I love you,” he chants again through grit teeth. “So much. So fucking much.”

You find his face with your hands and kiss him quiet, tasting the promise in his mouth. When you part and the two of you really start to move, you kiss him again, and again, whispering where only he can hear, “I-I love you too.”

It should scare you how easily the confession slips out. You should be terrified, because even if you live to see next week, or next month, or next year, even if Sam isn’t saying yes to Lucifer, those words are a death sentence. And yet.

“I-I miss you,” you choke out, “I need you.”

“Me too. So much,” Sam soothes, his voice tight and sharp with restraint. You know his instinct is to jackhammer up into you and never stop, but he puts in effort to resist, letting you both marinate in the wonderful, glistening, twitchy feeling of each other. His hands are rubbing your back and he is so fucking warm, turning the rain outside to steam.

He doesn’t bounce you on his dick. It’s more of a slow, cresting drag, waves stroking a beach. You don’t think you could handle much more than that, anyway—sometimes these positions make him feel big enough to pop you like a balloon. What you can’t fit on your own, your weight pushes you down onto anyway, turning your whole body into a big expanding bubble of pressure ready to burst at any moment. You clutch at his shoulders and just throb around him for a second.

“Nuh-uh,” Sam leans away, not letting you shove your face in him like you want. Instead, a big hand cups one side of your neck and keeps you in front of him. “Wanna see your face. Look at me. Look at me,” he insists, genuinely pleading.

When your eyes find his, that’s when he decides to snap up into you for real. You don’t even get a full look at him. The arm slung around your waist drags you up off your wobbling knees, then slams you down into a beautiful, endless white space popping with color.

“Sammy!” You choke.

That’s the magic word. You’re instantly thrust up into four more lightning-fast times, one-two-three-four, and hitch out four squeaky gasps to match. Sam’s eyes bore into yours with every beat, blazing with liquid love. For a second you wonder if you’ve fallen back into your rough routine again. But then words and thoughts melt out of your brain altogether, because Sam draws you into the tenderest, sweetest kiss human beings are capable of, fucking into you deep and smooth with that deeper, smoother voice, “Keep saying that.”

Sammy Sammy Sammy, you rattle out under your breath. Sam hisses out your name the exact same way.

You do your best to help him out a little, bobbing up and down in his lap, but’s a drop of water in the ocean for him. All Sam cares about is seeing your reaction. He soaks up everything you do like a sponge, moaning when you moan, gritting his teeth when you bite your lip, grinding up as you stir down. The weight of his eyes on you is so heavy that your skin stings in its wake. Again, it’s Sam’s brand of freak-sweetness that makes you get stupid notions in your head about wedding rings and anniversary presents. But that’s—

…something he knows about. Something he just said to you five minutes ago. Above the haze of bouncing, rhythmic pleasure, you’re flooded with relief. You can tell him! Holy fuck, you can tell him!

“I love you,” you gasp out again, and just saying it feels like it could save the world. “O-oh, god, Sam—”

The breath you have left is stolen from you by another fierce kiss from him, so passionate it lets you taste the bassy, happy hum that rumbles in Sam’s throat. You’re devoured by feverish kisses for a full minute, then Sam pops off you to sob, “So much—so fucking much, yes.”

He slips a hand between the two of you to thumb your clit, stirring in and never once stopping. Every so often he’ll brush up against where you’re hot and filled to the hilt with him, your bodies sliding together with slick, filthy noises that are so—so fucking much that your thighs cramp up, protesting the constant pistoning. But the pleasure is easily worth the burn. Your core booms with long echoes of pleasure that shudder through the trembling spiderwebs that make up your nerves. You make a move to lean back on your hands and switch up the angle, (since you’re a damn good cowgirl, thank you very much), but Sam refuses to stop kissing you. He physically pulls you back in with a hand fished around your neck and kisses you breathless, determined to pound you to your climax one thorough snap of his hips at a time.

“So beautiful,” Sam gushes. His voice is hoarse and thready, like he’s moments away from bursting into tears of pure desire.

You smooth your hands down his flushed cheeks, telling him between huffy moans, “It’s okay, s’ okay, Sammy… so pretty… love you so much…”

You feel him pull the Stanford sweater up over your ass and out of his way, exposing more, more, more of your bare skin for him to touch. Sam palms the slope of your back and your belly in a daze, but that’s still not enough—he’ll never be satisfied with how little of you he’s had. He wants more. He wants forever. You embrace each other to the fullest, cheeks smushed together, chests flush, his parted lips claiming your throat, making you his—but. Sam’s breath ratchets up. Not enough not enough not enough—

In one ragged motion, Sam rolls you both over, tossing you back-first onto the bedding and smothering you with his weight.

A squeal of delight jumps out of you. “Hey!”

If Sam wasn’t all over you before, then he literally is now, dropping onto his elbows so he can cup your face in both hands and surround you completely. “Sorry,” he croaks, “need you. Need to fill you up.”

You whisper against his lips, “Then fill me up already.”

His thumbs press into your cheeks a little. Sam’s breath fans across your face, throttled by the lump in his throat.

“Tell me you love me again.”

Um. You don’t exactly have the sexy heat of the moment to hide behind this time, but you still want to say it for him. His eyes swim with something unreadable. Desire and love, enough love to put a lump in your throat too, but a third thing also. It worries you.

You bring your hands up to stroke his wrists, and give a bit too much of your soul to him when you promise, “...I love you, Sam.”

The words hit him like a bullet. Sam shudders from head to toe, unable to reign himself in any longer, and plants a long, surging kiss on your mouth that makes your belly flash with nuclear levels of lust. He squirms his hands underneath your body so he can cradle you against him—genuinely cradling, one palm cupping the back of your neck—and then burrows into you face-first, groaning your name as his cock nestles itself as deep as it can go.

With all of his weight on top of you, you couldn’t move if you wanted to. You caress and kiss and dig your nails into him, and somewhere along the way you’re given a dose of whatever has made him fucking insane for you right now. It fogs your head and turns your reason to ash, so when Sam returns to ruining you for any other man, you whimper, “Please don’t leave me.”

“Oh, baby,” Sam hiccups out, and something strange hangs in his voice.

You would ask him what’s wrong, but the shuddering, flimsy scraps left of your brain are busy being blasted all over by white-hot pleasure. Everything scorches. Sam’s bare skin and his breath and his hands feel fucking molten, melting you down like hot glass. You’re pinned down in every possible way, and it pushes the sinking, gorgeous pressure inside you all over your body, like it’s not just Sam’s cock filling you up, but him, just him, the source of all good in the world. Holy fucking fuck. His hips glide back and then thud back into you again and again and again. You get why it’s called making love, now. You can taste your love for him in the back of your throat, feel it sitting in a sticky film on your skin. It hangs like humidity in the air of your apartment. And jesus christ, it bleeds from Sam, glowing off him like fucking radiation.

When you’re shamelessly wailing gut-deep in ecstasy, Sam peels himself off you. He forces himself to sit up. His chest putters up and down with desperate little breaths, and a gloriously big hand scoops under your thigh and welds it against your chest. Whatever he sees from this new angle—probably your wet, abused pussy stretched tight around the full base of his cock—makes Sam gape, utterly transfixed. You watch as his mouth falls open, and then those dark, soul-swallowing eyes crawl up your body to meet yours.

“Keep lookin’ at me,” Sam rasps.

Even if he doesn’t sway your opinion with a few dizzying, stomach-deep drags of his cock, (which he does), you’re convinced. You lock eyes with him—and then suddenly feel stupid for not watching him the whole time. A long curl of hair hangs in his eyes and sways as he fucks into you. His expression flutters with these sinful little giveaways, exposing just how starved he is for you, how in love. Maybe if you’d looked back sometime in the past five years, that’s what you would’ve seen: how much this has always meant to him. He searches your face for the same pleasure, obsessed with his effect on you. 

“Fuck,” you shudder out. “C-could cum just watchin’ you, Sammy.”

“That’s right,” he hisses, and you’ve never heard him sound so damn happy. “Cum for me. Please. Look so pretty when you do.”

Usually, when he makes you cum, it’s the roughest part of the whole act. He’d get both your wrists pretzeled behind your back and pinned viciously in one of his hands, and that’s when you’d know the big finish was coming. His pace would go from bouncing to bruising. But this Sam, your Sam, would stop time if he could, so he slows down even further, winding you closer and closer to the top of the mountain with little figure-eights of his hips. He gazes down at you the same way you’re sure you must gaze up at him. Beautiful, he murmurs under his breath.

You utter another, tight, almost-sob of, “love you so much, Sammy,” and his dick twitches wildly shoved in you to the hilt.

“Ohh—shit,” he chokes out, and his other hand snaps desperately towards yours on the bed. They find each other easily, and you squeeze his hand with everything you’ve got, infusing in him all the love he’s infused in you.

The slow, mounting tsunami of perfection you’ve been moving towards finally overcomes you, and in one long gorgeous slippery rush you cum for Sam. And because your life is a movie—he cums for you too. He rocks faster and falls forward to kiss you, your faces pressed together, your mouths slotting against each other, your pussy squeezing down on him in golden rippling strokes. Sam hisses your name out between his teeth as he cums. You’re lanced straight through by a whole fucking universe of fluttering, flickering pleasure. To be honest, you’re a little pissed about it—because it’s the best fucking orgasm you’ve had in your entire life, and it’s all because Sam raggedly chants those words to you again and again, laying sloppy, obsessive, head-over-heel kisses all over your face. Love you love you so much baby you feel so good squeezin’ down on me.

You could’ve had this ages ago. How much more time could you have had with him, if you had just stopped being stupid?

Sam’s crazed, sobbing, hitching I love yous somehow become, in true Sam fashion, a low spiral of thank yous. He lays there and clutches you until there’s a Sam-shaped imprint in your body. You’re pretty sure he would stay inside you all night if he could, but you coax him into some cuddling instead, since you both are in desperate need. It’s. It’s new, but it feels cleansing in the holy way.

What feels like hours later, your brain dimly connects to the rest of your body. You’re halfway through detangling Sam’s hair with your fingers as he hides face-first in your chest, pretending he’s not embarrassed that he cried. At least, that’s what you assume. The Winchester mind is a mysterious one, and as much as you would hope to know what Sam’s thinking, the slow hand drawing circles on your hip tells you nothing. Is he shy that he got emotional? That seems silly, since you both sobbed into each other earlier. Is he embarrassed about everything he confessed? Does he regret it?

Just when your train of thought really starts to take the curves of your spiral hard, Sam tiredly croaks into your neck, “I meant what I said, y’know.”

He draws in a lungful of your perfume through his nose, soaking up as much of you as he can possibly get. His hands smooth over your body, innocent and loving, caressing you, memorizing you, begging silently for forgiveness. 

Sam is a dead-silent crier. But you hear him sniffle as he gushes, “God, I love you.”

Maybe if you hadn’t been so tired, you would’ve picked up on it. Or maybe you’d heard it in his voice, seen it, something, and ignored it, hoping it was something else. Everything he felt, he put into a teeny, unmarked box that he’d bury god knows where, far from where anybody could be hurt by it. Sam didn’t—he wouldn’t say that to you. Not unless it was the last time he ever could. He would feel it, but it’d go right into that box where it couldn’t hurt you. You should’ve known.

Lie to me, you’d begged him. 

…And Sam had.

_

The dull realization that you are awake sets in around noon. Noon as in after-noon, well past when you’re normally up and at em’. When you wonder why the hell you slept in so late, you remember last night’s rain, thrashing against the windows all night, and Sam, his face haloed by lamplight and bleeding with quiet resolution.

Sam. Alive, and not going to say yes.

He’d been the one to keep you up all night. With his mouth and his hands, yes, but then afterward he’d been hellbent on talking. Just… talking. You’d been sluggish and cozy and sated after having sex, but no matter how close you came to falling asleep, Sam wouldn’t let it happen. For two straight hours he asked you every question he could come up with to keep you up with him.

Do you remember when we met? Cause’ I do. Do you remember what I said to you? Do you remember what you thought about me? I remember thinking how similar we were, y’know, how much we’d get along. You were so pretty… my whole face went red every time you looked at me. Do you remember…?

Being cuddled, kissed, and protected by the man you love really tempts a girl to doze off, too, so this was not an easy battle. But Sam persisted. He studied your face intently, uttering I love yous even when sleep started to pull you under. Hearing any Winchester drop those words on you still blew your fucking mind, to be honest. Sam especially. But it was romantic as it was worrying, so you’d shut him up with a kiss goodnight and echoed it back to him. Love you, Sammy. It was probably just an anxiety thing, you assumed—Sam, for some fucking reason, was a pretty insecure guy, so you imagined that was his way of making sure you wanted all of this. He seemed… scared. He wasn’t used to being wanted.

The apocalypse was still on. Maybe the world would end tomorrow, or maybe you’d get lucky and live a whole lifetime with Sam. Regardless, he’s never saying yes to Lucifer, and that alone means that there’s still hope for the future. You’re going to spend every second of it making Sam feel wanted.

Sitting up in bed, you scrubbed at your sleepy face with the heel of your hand and stared around the room. Sam was physically incapable of staying asleep after five in the morning, so the familiar evidence of his military-efficient morning routine was all over the place. You smiled to yourself. He’d picked up after the two of you, and had tucked another blanket over you in your sleep. Stupid chivalrous dumbass.

To think, you’d been terrified you’d never see him again just last night.

You push out of bed, only to almost buckle onto the carpet rag-doll style. Even being torturously gentle, that man manages to make you sore. With a very, very happy groan, you hop (and wince) into some clean underwear, then traipse out into your kitchen to show that dork who’s boss.

“Dammit, Samuel, you’re not my maid—” you start to say, but of course, this is Sam, who wouldn’t miss a morning run for anything. Right. That explains your empty kitchen.

…But it’s afternoon. Sam would be back by now. Your gut prickles with a bad feeling, and you superstitiously sweep your apartment, looking for him. His clothes from last night are still sitting in your hamper, his shirt folded neatly in your dresser and his watch on your nightstand. A spike of nausea rolls through you seeing that his jacket is gone—and his boots. But his duffle—it’s. It’s still on your kitchen table. It looks a little smaller than usual, but his books and his laptop are still inside. He probably just ran out to run some silly errand for you, determined to make up for worrying you so much. Yeah.

You force your hunter’s paranoia down to a simmer, padding over to your breakfast table. There’s a big ol’ note smack dab in the center of it, perched on his half-open duffle bag, and you start to play with one of the bracelets Sam left behind as you pick it up.

You cross your fingers, smiling ear-to-ear. “C’mon. All bets on breakfast. Please be getting me breakfast, please be getting me breakfast—”

…That’s not what the note says.

You read it.

Then you read it again, and the hammer falls, crushing the breath out of you and doubling you over the kitchen table. You read the note for the third time, needing to be sure, and the thin sliver of hope you had—maybe you’d just read it wrong, m-maybe he was fine—turns to ash. He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t.

You’re fighting back a surge of ugly, choking tears in an instant. He’s… Sam… he…

Your whole apartment lingers with the heat and goodness of him, like he’d been here just minutes ago. Just seconds. Even your clothes still smell like Sam. Just inhaling it tears chunks out of your reason, like—like you’d just missed him. Clawing around for something to do, you pace in a daze between your bedroom and the front door, desperate to recreate the moment you realized he was gone. You’re still just in the Stanford sweater and your underwear, but you don’t give a single shit and go careening out into the hall, stalking up and down your floor for him—because, b-because Sam wouldn’t, he wouldn’t do that to you—he would tell you first, he would never leave you in the dark like this—

…But you know Sam. And if it meant fixing his mistakes, saving you, saving everyone… Then he’d say yes in a heartbeat.

“These belong to you. You deserve a world to live in. I’m sorry - Sam.”

- tags: @samssluttybangs @cookiemumster1@lacilou@cevans-winchester @leigh70@ seraphimluxe @emily-roberts @emme-looou @aloneatpeace @williamstop @ornella0910 @chaoticshepardplaid @dakota-dream @lcvecstiel @goghkiss @spnexploration @stoneyggirl2 @urm0mmmbbg @mulattomoon @poeticsorcery @deansapplepie @rennydenny @babydollfoster @badlandsbrunette @hallecarey1

[necrotic-nephilim]

for the dialogue prompts ask game

"You're enjoying this, aren't you? Freak." and jaytim <3

send a ship and a quote and i'll write a short fic!

i'm delighted this was the most requested prompt and ship. just for that it got bumped to the front of the line. the sexual tension is implied, but this is mostly just 3k of a torture scene during Tim's Robin era. enjoy <3

“I’ve got a present for you, Hood.”

Jason didn't have to look up to see who was talking to him. The voice was a familiarly grating one. He hadn't exactly been hiding the location of his current base. It was used for meetings with the drug lords under Jason’s thumb. Plenty of his men came through, looking to buy weapons off Jason or try to barter for more territory.

That didn't mean Black Mask was welcome.

Jason picked up a random gun from the table in front of him, making a point to loudly load and cock it. “You can't buy your way back into my good graces, Mask.” He cracked his neck. It'd been a while since Jason has fought Roman. He could use the workout.

“This present isn't something money can buy,” Roman sounded a little too gleeful. There was a heavy thud, followed by a human-sounded groan that made Jason turn his head with morbid curiosity.

Well. Jason would be damned. It really wasn't a present just anyone can pay for.

“How the hell did you of all people manage to pull this off?” Jason asked. He walked across the room, heavy boots loud against the concrete. Crouching in front of Roman’s little present, Jason hummed. “I sincerely doubt you have the skills to catch Robin on your own.”

Tim Drake, hog tied, gagged, and glaring like a bat out of hell, squirmed on the ground with an annoyed growl. His face was bloody and the handle of a shiv was sticking out of his thigh. Jason grabbed him by the chin and tilted his head up, just to be sure he was the real deal.

He was. That scowl was unmistakable.

“You underestimate me,” Roman said, pleased with himself. “I killed a Robin, you know.”

Roman couldn't see Jason’s face under his helmet, but Jason still looked up at him, arching an unconvinced eyebrow. More interesting though, was Tim's reaction. Another angry growl, this time directed at Roman.

“Of course, she barely counted as a Robin but-” Roman shrugged and spread his grubby hands- “I'm more dangerous than you know. More valuable.” He tilted his head to the side, giving Jason a ghastly smile. Jason had vaguely heard stories of a girl who was Robin for a short while. “But I’m giving you the honor of killing this Robin.”

Well, wasn't that a gift.

Jason couldn't say he wasn't pleased to have Tim tied up at his feet. Just the sight made him smile. But wanting Tim dead? That unfortunately would just cause Jason more issues than it was worth. Roman didn't know Jason’s history as Robin. No one did, but the Bats. And if those Bats knew Jason actually killed Tim, they'd make his life a hell of a lot more difficult.

It was tempting, though. Jason was already picturing half a dozen ways he would do it, if he could.

So goddamn tempting.

“You think I want the strings attached to this gift?” Jason was careful not to overplay his hand. He made a show of grabbing a handful of Tim’s hair and yanking his head back to get a look at him. If Roman knew Jason didn't actually plan to kill Tim, it could reveal too much about Jason’s past for comfort.

“My requests are reasonable,” Roman hummed. He was wandering around Jason’s warehouse, looking at Jason's weapons. “All of my men and territory pooled together with yours. For thirty percent of collective profit.”

He really was desperate. When Jason first met Roman, the man wouldnt have taken anything less than eighty.

Jason had heard rumors that Roman was losing ground to the Maronis. It clearly held more truth than he realized.

“What about that nightclub you own on the East End?” Jason asked, studying Tim. His face being hidden was a plus. Tim couldn't read him, no matter how hard he was clearly trying, eyebrows knit together.

Roman sputtered. “What about it?”

“I want in,” Jason said. “At least fifty.”

In truth, it wasn't about the money. Jason could get money just about anywhere. But he’d heard rumors about the girls that worked there getting beaten by their pimps. Jason had been looking for a way to get that under control.

He could always double cross Roman after a couple months, once he gained the support of Roman’s men. It would be easier than shooting fish in a barrel.

“I built that establishment from the ground up,” Roman hissed.

Jason only shrugged. “I could just kill you, then kill Robin.” Under Jason’s grip, Tim flinched and started to squirm harder.

Silence.

“Fifty is reasonable,” Roman said slowly, fighting against every word. “But I want to watch you kill the Boy Wonder.”

Jason shifted his weight. “Why?”

“Sadists enjoy admiring each other's work, don't we?” Roman leaned against a table, sliding his hands in his pockets. “I want to see how you’ll do it.”

That complicated things.

“You want to waste your whole night here?” Jason tried to sound bored. “I’m going to drag it out.”

Roman just laughed. “I did the same with the girl. There's no fun in giving them the easy way out.”

Jason needed time to think of a plan that didn't end in a dead bird on his hands. Which meant he needed to stall.

“Whatever.” Jason shrugged. “Do what you want. Just don't touch my shit and stay back there. I don't want you breathing down my neck.”

With a pleased nod, Roman leaned against a table. He pulled a cigar out of his pocket and lit it.

Jason cracked his neck and pulled his kris dagger off his belt. He cut the gag off of Tim, knicking his cheek with a small cut. Tim actually looked nervous.

Leaning forward to not be heard by Roman, Jason lowered his voice to a whisper. “Put on a good performance, or I'll have to actually start hurting you.” It was the only hint Jason was giving Tim about his working plan.

Tim’s expression changed. His brow furrowed, then mouth formed a small ‘o’ of understanding. He gave Jason the smallest, almost imperceptible nod. He understood. He would cooperate. There was still hesitance. Jason didn't blame him.

He still had to make Tim bleed.

Jason raised the dagger, making a show of considering what to do with it. He brought the blade down on the part of Tim’s chest plate with the thickest armor. The knife would still definitely pierce skin, but a shallow wound.

Tim grunted, face twisting up. He was going the smart route, making it look like he was trying hard to not react. Jason hummed in approval. He twisted the kris around, digging it into Tim’s suit more. This time, the sound Tim made sounded a bit more genuine.

“You can scream,” Jason said loudly. More for Roman’s sake, to play up the sadist act. Of course, a small part of him did want to hear Tim scream. “If you don't make it interesting, I'll just have to get more creative.”

Tim gave Jason a rude scowl. He really should've been more grateful. Jason still could just kill him.

“What toys do you keep here?” Jason asked. He routed around Tim’s utility belt, looking for something interesting. Tim tried to twist away. Jason kneed him hard in the stomach, pulling a groan out of him. “Hold still.”

Jason tossed aside uninteresting things, like lockpicks and fingerprinting kits. A small noise of victory came out of him when Jason’s fingers curled around a tazer.

“This looks fun.” Jason turned it around in his hand, fiddling with the settings.

Tim was violently shaking his head.

Jason pressed the tazer against Tim’s suit and turned it on.

Tim’s whole body jerked and he screamed through grit teeth. Jason watched his expression changed like a hawk. Of course Tim was acting it up, but still. It was something fun to watch him writhe in pain.

“It’ll hurt more if you press it against his bare skin,” Roman called out.

Jason looked over his shoulder. “If I want your useless input, I'll ask for it.” His tone was deadly enough to make Roman stiffen and nod.

Killjoy.

Jason shocked Tim with the tazer again while hunting some more around the belt. Every tortured noise Tim made was music to Jason’s ears.

The next interesting thing Jason pulled out was a small emergency flare.

With a curious hum, Jason lit the flare. Tim flinched and gave Jason a concerned look.

“What are you-” Tim asked shakily. He was cut off by a hard punch to the face. Blood poured from Tim’s nose.

“Don't rush me,” Jason growled. He pulled his kris out of Tim, setting the tazer aside. Jason held the blade against the hot flame from the flare. The metal warmed until it glowed bright red. “I’d really recommend holding still, unless you want to lose an eye.” Jason brought the red hot blade to Tim’s face. Tim froze, breathing hard.

instead of cutting, Jason just pressed the flat of the blade against Tim’s face. A horrible cry came out of Tim’s throat, but he stayed still. The scent of burning flesh filled the room for the long minute Jason kept the hot blade in place.

When he lifted it, Tim curled in on himself, coughing and choking on the blood from his nose. The wavy design of the kris left an interesting mark on Tim’s cheek, swirling back and forth.

“If that scars, I swear to god-” Tim mumbled through grit teeth, moving his mouth as little as possible.

“It won't scar,” Jason hissed back. “Probably.” Which was a shame. He sort of hoped it would. Jason cleared his throat to raise his voice. “I want Batman to know who killed you,” he explained, spinning the kris around in his hand. “He’ll see that and he’ll know whose blade it was.”

“You’re sick,” Tim wheezed. His voice was so small. Too small for Roman to hear. Jason huffed in annoyance.

“Don’t be shy you��re going to insult me,” Jason taunted. He tapped Tim’s thigh with his shoe. A reminder they were doing this for show.

Tim inhaled sharply. “I said you're fucking sick,” he raised his voice. He spat out a mouthful of blood, clearly trying to hit Jason. Jason just shifted out of the way, letting it splatter on the concrete.

“That was rude.” Jason was glad his helmet hid his smile.

He looked at the flare still lit in his hand, shrugged, and put it out against Tim’s stomach.

“Oh god!” Tim tried to twist away. The suit protected him from the worst of it, but he’d have at least second degree burns. Not to mention the parts of the suit that were currently melting and burning into his skin. “Fuck!” Tim’s scream definitely sounded genuine. He was stuck between trying to stay still to keep the burn from spreading and trying to get away from the pain. It was a glorious little struggle to watch.

The flare eventually ran out of juice at about the same time Tim’s lungs ran out of air to scream with. Jason tossed it aside and studied the new wound, pressing his fingers into it exposed raw flesh.

“Stop,” Tim begged, shuddering in pain. “Please, fuck-” he shrieked when Jason dug a nail into the burn.

“He folded easier than I thought he would,” Roman chuckled from his spot across the room, blowing out a mouthful of smoke.

“Well, you see how fast Batman goes through ‘em,” Jason said nonchalantly. Roman didn't know that was a self jab, and he didn't need to know.

Jason cut through Tim’s chest plate, exposing his bare skin. The fabric got stuck and torn on the burn, pulling a whimper out of Tim at the wound being agitated even more.

It always was a damn shame just how pretty Tim Drake was.

If Roman wasn't in the room, Jason would've torn off that damned domino mask by now to get a good look at Tim’s eyes while Jason hurt him.

Jason sliced Tim’s chest open, a wide arc just above his nipples. It wasn't too deep, but still made Tim cry out.

“Now I know-” Jason said, going back to Tim's belt- “somewhere in here, Batman makes you carry acid to cut through metal and whatnot.”

“No, no,” Tim wildly shook his head. “Please don’t.” He went pale at the thought.

Jason found the little vial he was looking for and held it up, right in front of Tim’s face. “Should've done a better job hiding it.”

He unscrewed the top and tipped the vial, dripping it into Tim’s fresh cut. Jason was careful not to use too much. Only a few drops were needed to start eating into Tim’s flesh.

The scream from Tim was blood curling. He tried to fold in on himself, twisting around on the ground like a wild animal.

Jason’s heart was pounding.

The shiv that was still stuck in Tim’s thigh got yanked out so Jason could drop poison into that wound too.

“Stop!” Tim’s voice already hoarse. “I'm gonna- I'm gonna throw up, god.” He sounded hysterical. His head tilted back and he sucked in lungfuls of air.

“You better not on my boots,” Jason warned lazily. He spilled acid into the burn mark on Tim’s stomach. Then, he got an even better idea. “Open wide.” Jason grabbed Tim’s jaw and forced it open with his fingers.

“Shit-” Tim whispered. His tone of voice sounded different. “Jay- don't. Seriously, please-”

Jason ignored him and let a few precious drops fall into Tim's forced open mouth. Then he forced Tim’s jaw shut again and clamped a hand over his mouth. He plugged Tim’s nose too, just for good measure.

The noises were muffled, but unmistakable. Jason’s body was thrumming just watching Tim twist and struggle to get out of Jason’s vice grip.

When Tim’s face started to turn red from the struggle for oxygen, Jason regretfully let go.

Tim immediately spat out mouthfuls of blood and spit, trying to get it out of his mouth. He was wheezing.

Not screaming, though. Jason was about it to lift the kris to stab Tim again, when he got a better look at how Tim was shaking.

Shudders running up and down his body. His legs were squeezed together. When he breathed, it came out in soft moans.

Jason’s heart almost stopped.

“You’re enjoying this, aren't you?” Jason murmured. So quiet he almost didn't hear himself. He got a glare from Tim that seemed to be an affirmation. Jason’s mouth curled into a cruel, unseen smile. Jason tapped the hilt of the kris against Tim’s crotch, making him flinch. “Freak.”

The realization only made Jason want to hurt Tim more. In all their fights, how hadn’t Jason noticed Tim was a masochist? This changed everything. He didn't have to hold back so much.

He actually wanted to see what it took to break Tim now.

Jason stabbed the shiv into Tim’s hip, as close as he could possibly get to Tim’s crotch. Tim squealed, flinching. Then his full body shuddered again. And just when Tim sighed in relief that Jason had avoided his most sensitive area, Jason picked up the tazer again and pressed it right there, against Tim’s crotch. And he turned it on.

This scream from Tim was different. Still tortured, but in a new Jason’s own pants were getting tight.

“Get out.”

“What?” Roman asked, when he realized Jason was talking to him.

“I said get out,” Jason repeated himself. He stared at Tim's bloody, shivering from. “You got a show while I warmed up, now I want some privacy.”

“But-”

Jason pulled a gun out of a holster. He fired it in Roman’s direction. Not quite hitting him, but instead blowing the cigar out of his mouth.

Roman made a pathetic, scared noise. “The deal was-”

“Do you want my men keeping the Maronis off your territory or not?” Jason growled.

“Fine.” Roman stood up, adjusting his jacket awkwardly. “Mail me a finger or something when you finish. I want a trophy.”

“I’ll save a middle one just for you.”

Roman scoffed, but held his tongue, storming out of the warehouse.

“Ass,” Jason muttered. He pulled off his helmet and tossed it aside.

“You didn't have to use the acid,” Tim said, notably sour about it.

“Big words for someone who enjoyed themselves a little too much.” Jason sliced off the rope holding Tim’s ankles and wrists, then tugged off his domino mask. Tim groaned in relief, getting to stretch his joints. He carefully got to his hands and knees, breathing hard.

“Thank you-”

Jason grabbed Tim by his hair and wrenched his head up. He pressed the kris to Tim’s throat. It pulled a gasp out of Tim and he tried to grab Jason’s arm. Jason just twisted his wrist, easily dislocating it. “Oh nuhuh, you little freak,” Jason purred, enjoying Tim’s yell of pain. He leaned in close to Tim’s ear and grinned, all kinds of fun ideas running through his head, now that they had privacy.

Things were about to get a lot more fun. Probably for both of them.

“I'm not done with you.”

[lazyneonrabbitt]

Bath time

Daryl Dixon x reader

Daryl's early Alexandria era dislike for showers seems to be rubbing off on his kids..

🐺 🐺 🐺

"Oh my god.."

There in front of you stood your two adorable furred children, now entirely a muddy brown. And their father, less muddy brown but for sure in need of clean clothes.

"You." A stern finger pointed at Daryl. "Pups. Bathroom, now." You turned around to open doors and run the water in preperation. "And take your shoes off."

You heard Daryl kick his boots off and huff as he picked up the kids to carry them upstairs.

It wasn't difficult for them to realize where Daryl was taking then and started squirming in his grasp, trying with all their might to escape but in the end they failed and all four of you now stood in the large bathroom.

The shower was already running at a nice temperature to get the clumps of mud out of the kids' fur but it took both of your hands to keep one kid in place, let alone rinse them off and scrub their fur without having them jump out of the tub.

You needed Daryl's help. He was currently standing at the door, making sure no grubby paws grabbed at the handle and ran off, while said grubby hands were grabbing and pulling at his trousers in an attempt to escape.

"Dee, please be a dear and put her in the tub. I need help.." you admitted in defeat as Hunter slipped from your grasp and made it halfway out of the tub before Daryl's large hand had grabbed him and put him back under the shower stream together with his sister.

"Mmaaaaammm..." loud whines filled the room as they both fiercly protested.

Daryl held both pups far enough under the stream so you could rub at the clumps of mud slowly washing away.

Hunter seemed to have given up halfway through so cleaning him wasn't too much of a fuss, until the shampoo came out.

At the sight of the bottle of doggy wash he wormed out of Daryl's grip, who was more focused on keeping the ever feisty Rose under control with just one hand.

Hunter managed to hop up and out of the tub and slip on the edge, dropping his full, soaking wet body onto yours with a loud flop and sending you both to the ground.

"Ohw, come on!" You groaned as you grabbed at his slippery limbs and get yourself upright at the same time, while Daryl watched you with a shit eating grin on his face. "Looks like the lil' momma's boy weren' havin' it no more."

"Could have helped.." you mumbled as you sat your son back into the tub and shuddered at the gross wet shirt stuck to your skin.

When you got no response you looked over to him. Both his hands were on Rose, but he paid no attention to her chewing on his wrist and instead was clearly distracted by the fact you wore nothing underneath the thin, currently very see-through shirt.

"Hello? Assistance?" Struggling to keep Hunter in the tub you snapped Daryl out of his trance before he reached out to hold his son in place again.

A soft thanks was all he got before you got to rub the shampoo through Hunter's fur, making sure none got in his face. It was a huge struggle already with his paws shoving away your hands and his constant shaking, sending soapy water everywhere to the point of even getting Daryl to complain.

"Ya can't wash'em any quicker?"

Your head snapped to his side giving him a death glare before going back to make sure every inch of your son was covered in soapy bubbles and rinse him off again. "In case you forgo-- oh my god.." you spit out the soapy water that got info your mouth as Hunter shook out his fur again while still under the stream. "In case you forgot, I don't have wolf strength." You struggled to put Hunter back on his butt so you could properly rub the remaining shampoo from his fur. Maybe you overdid it a little, but he was so dirty..

"Wha? Ya can't even handle a kid?" A deep sigh left you before repeating yourself.

"No, Daryl." You state clearly. "Little human me can't handle a werewolf child with werewolf strength. Especially not when they're slippery and wet." An understanding grumble left him as he held onto Hunter's fur a bit tighter to keep him still.

His whines of protest only got more over time as Rose was still gnawing at Daryl's wrist that had bled and healed over a couple of times by now already.

Hunter's long drawn Nooo's and Mammaaa's combined with fake sniffles made an almost believable schtick if he hadn't pulled it so many times before.

"You're almost done, sit still for a minute and I'll let you out."

When he realized his tricks werent working he sulked under the water as you got rid of the last bits of soap bafore moving him out from underneath the stream.

The second he stopped feeling water on his head he full-body shook himself out, sending water all over the place.

"Oh thats just rude, baby." The towel you readied for him first went to your face to dry off before grabbing onto Hunter and wrapping him in a tight hug. It was the only way to get him out of the tub and dry him off at least a little bit.

Now that he was out of the tub and no longer a muddy threat you moved on to clean the more feral of your two children.

Daryl luckily had already moved her under the water entirely to remove large clumps while you prepared for shampooing.

With two hands holding her you were a little more confident in a quicker wash this time but wow were you wrong.

Within the first minute she had snapped at you twice.

Daryl only stared proudly at his daughter currently defending herself against the evil soap monster that was her mom. He cooed her a bit, hoping to bargain with some tasty meat as reward she'd be at least a little more calm.

But of course just as you were somewhat comfortable washing off her legs, Hunter threw his full weight into you to dry himself against your back and so shoving you forward enough to get your entire head under the water, soaking your hair.

You pushed back to sit on your heels again, throwing your head back to get your wet hair out of your face before sending an angry glare at your son out of reflex.

He quickly realized he was in the wrong and ran off, grabbing at the doorhandle and escaping the bathroom.

"Fuck.." you groaned as you turned back to cleaning off Rose, who had picked up her brother's moves and let out a laugh as she shook herself out every time your hands left her body.

"I'm taking a shower after this. You babysit and give them a treat or something."

With newly found strength you pulled through and got Rose cleaned in record time, letting Daryl handle the drying while you took off your soaked clothes and hopped into the tub.

You felt Daryl's gaze on you the entire time, complaining as Rose bit his finger when he wasn't watching her.

"Watch your kid." You pointed at her as you stepped over the tub's edge. "You can gawk at me all night long when they're asleep."

An agreeing tone sounded over the running water and a few moments later you finally got the bathroom to yourself, warming up and rinsing the shower walls off in the meantime.

It was times like these when you doubted yourself a bit, being a human raising two pups that could easily overpower you within the year. What if Rose bit you for real? Would she turn you? Can they do that at their age? The bathroom door opening caught you off guard, peeking tour head from behind the curtain you spotted Daryl standing there in clean clothes and with a worried look on his face.

He stepped up to the tub and questioned the sad emotions he was smelling all over the top floor.

You gave him a short version of your doubts as he helped you out of the shower and dried you off. "Yer a strong one, pups love ya." His hands on the towel lingered on your chest longer than needed when he leaned in for a kiss. "They jus' hate showers."

You huff out a laugh at that understatement when the door slammed against the wall and a still slightly damp Hunter clamped around your leg. "Wav momma."

"See?" Daryl gave you a smug 'told ya so' smile.

He easily wrapped you in the large towel and picked you up, careful to not smack Hunter with your foot.

Rose waddled past just as he walked through the doorway. She probably followed her big brother but her wobbly legs made climbing the stairs quite the challenge.

Once in the bedroom you were tossed onto the bed and clothes quickly followed as Daryl dug through the cabinet and threw a full outfit at your head.

You thanked him and got dressed, watching your kids try wrestle eachother to be the first one on the bed until Daryl picked them up and set them down onto the matress.

Without a second to spare the two jumped up against you for cuddles, their dad happily joining as well.

🐺 🐺 🐺

A/N: I hope you're not tired of kid content yet! I love the pups dearly and hope to be writing for them for a while longer ♡

[uhgood-girl]

why jikook?

i've been asking myself this a lot recently bc well, why them? why not tkook? or ynmin? hell, jihope even, they're underrated as hell honestly, have you seen that hot tub video? hobi was ready to unhinge his jaw to swallow jimin whole (and who (jk) could blame him.)

but jikook, in a not joking way, hits different. they always have. it's been years at this point that i've been deep in this rabbit hole (within the larger bts rabbit hole, my god, how deep does it go) but i don't recall making the conscious decision to fall in.

maybe a little background?

i'm a fake love army. actually, if we're getting technical, i'm an outro tear army bc it was in the comments of the freshly released fake love music video that i saw someone recommend outro tear if i enjoyed fake love and then it was over for me. extremely not fake love at first listen, who's voice is second on this track? i NEED to know. i'm a yoongi/rapline bias to this day. fake love still fucks though, don't get me wrong, it's a never skip for me.

for that first year and then some, i consumed backlogged content like it was my day job. i am a prone to hyper-fixations hermit, basically, who was going to stop me? my therapist? nah, she picks her battles.

i watched everything i could get my grubby little hands on like someone would be testing me on it later. (shoutout qdeoks, you were so real) i didn't open stan twitter for the first time till probably the end of 2018, really just in time to be slapped in the face full force with the shitshow that was a hate campaign against these boys i was deeply invested in by then, the likes of which i had never experienced in an online space up to that point. it was a truly, truly wild era, don't ever let anyone tell you differently.

all that to say, i've been here for a hot minute and i developed my own first impressions on bts and the members as individuals in a vacuum. no one had to point jikook out to me, they stuck out on their own.

potentially relevant disclaimer before we continue: i am really really queer. i grew up in the united states conservative deep south and had to change high schools my sophomore year bc i was outed and then violently ostracized for being in a relationship with my same sex best friend at the time. it is safe to say i have a lot of feelings about and experience even when it comes to having to be low key (understatement lol) about who you love. i am not here just to make my barbies kiss.

actually, on that note, jikook wouldnt even be my chosen barbies out of bts. if we're in true fantasy delulu hours here, i would want yoonjin to be real. god, that would be the stuff, they're so old married as it is. peak romance.

i think the first place jikook ever truly caught my attention were the memories dvds. jimin has always been a sweet, bby angel taking care of all his members but i remember thinking that he seemed to pay a little extra, special attention to jungkook. and of course, why not, jk's the maknae after all. all of them have always been doting on him and deservedly so. but in those briefly shown really serious, quiet moments, jimin was often first in line. a spot very easy for him to obtain tbh as jk never seemed to be very far from him anyway. maybe if you've never in real time lived the satellite jeon accusations (hi pandemic army, bless you, i hope you make it to 2025 when we have them all back without restrictions) you might find them easier to dismiss but it was so consistent back then in all of the content being released. and once noticed, i don't know how anyone ever un-notices it. but i was in deep before i even realized the water was boiling.

should i talk about why not tkook? or ynmin, for me? i'm just pulling those as examples bc i know they're the popular contenders here but all joking in the beginning of this post aside, none of the other members interpersonal relationships, in any configuration (sadly, RIP yoonjin romance), have ever struck me as anything other than puppy crush/deep friendship/family. and that's not bc i don't think over half of those men aren't queer in some form or fashion because WHEW, that is an entirely different post and we simply do not have the time to unpack rn but it's not for lack of looking.

i started in a vacuum, but i have by no means stayed there, i walked in all of those front doors and sat down and said "convince me." i've got the time and lack of life, i am ready to be won over. what have i missed?

to this day i still regularly try and check my own confirmation bias, i'm obviously looking for jikook at this stage but i'm still ready on my toes if any of the others want to get crazy. (yoonjin i am rooting for you, we're all rooting for you)

and i'm not here to really persuade or sway anyone one way or another either. there are a 1000 other blogs on this site that can probably offer you better explanations, specific clips, and detailed break downs of moments throughout the years and even then people are going to see what they want to see. i just wanted to write some of my own thoughts down finally.

though...i guess if i had to point to any one single piece of "evidence" it would definitely be tried and true gcf tokyo? but if watching that the first time didn't ring through you like a gunshot, i def don't think there's anything i could say beyond that.

honestly, i think so much of "why jikook" for me boils down to the pit in the bottom of my stomach that i used to get when i first began to notice them. when i got past the initial warm fuzzies inspired by the sincerity of their interactions, my immediate second emotion was concern.

i remember the first time i heard some of the other boys make an offhand joke about them being a couple and i got anxious, fast. i thought hide, hide better, please be safe. i began to pay extra attention to the other members in general too when jikook would do things and felt like i could sometimes see a similar anxiety to my own in their expressions. for a long time, i just worried about them and where i saw other people rejoice in their more obvious moments, i was slow to celebrate.

despite my initial hesitation, it's now been about 5 years since the first time they ever made me double take. they're a few years younger than me but i feel like we've been growing up together. (parasocial? idk her.) they're less conspicuous these days, and for lots of obvious reasons, but i feel like overall, their confidence in themselves and each other is quite high. i know that's probably a funny thing to say in light of this last week especially, but i stand by it. i've seen this song and dance before. i have managed my own expectations in the past, taken full steps back only to be beaten anew over the head so many times with enough "coincidences" i felt borderline foolish to try and deny anything. jikook are truly some sort of neuro-spicy pattern recognition drug, i swear.

and i've never really gotten to talk about any of this with anyone before! i'm shy irl, and shy online apparently bc i have just been lurking around the outer lines of this circle this whole time like some creepy creep but i've decided i'm over it. fuck it. growth.gif. idk that i have anything important or new to contribute to the conversation but my god, no one else seems to let that stop them so i might as well take my turn on the soapbox, no?

so 📢 JIKOOK REAL (?) jikook sus. jikook make bandaged queer little heart go boom boom.

[ciboriaadastra]

It's Blacktober, so I'm gonna be brave and drop all the Black headcanons I currently have for DC

Putting it under a read more because I added a lot more notes than I originally thought I was going to.

Dick Grayson — Afro-Romani. Nicknamed Cricket because he was a super skinny kid with ADHD who chattered almost nonstop

Jason Todd — Afro-Filipino (3rd generation). Nicknames include Jay-Jay, JT, Jaypee (spelled exactly that way), PJ, and Peter Poppins (he brought an umbrella to a cookout once because the forecast said it was gonna rain, somebody made fun of him, the nickname stuck). Jason Peter Todd just sounds like a name that's simultaneously Black and Filipino idk. Black Millennial name + I swear so many Filipinos are named Jason, especially in the U.S. They named him Peter after St. Peter (he doesn't have to come up with a Confirmation saint and name himself like I had to...man, Jason would be just old enough to get the sacrament just to die the same year.)

Selina Kyle — Eartha Kitt is my live action Catwoman. I need not say more.

Harvey Dent — Black mama and white dad. Old folks who knew him exclusively called him Junior, never by name. Harvey Dent just sounds like an old Black man's name too, like I'm pretty sure a distant cousin on my dad's side is called Harvey. Also, I never see Black characters as mob bosses, so I'm gonna lay my grubby little hands on him. I actually wrote a whole essay on the social commentary that could be explored if Harvey was a lightskinned Black man, but I'm gonna keep that to myself for now.

Minhkhoa Khan — Mom is Black, Malay, and Filipino. Dad is Chinese, Vietnamese, and Thai. I don't have nicknames for him yet (I'd also have to find an excuse for characters to give him any </3)

Walk with me on this one. I'm imagining this haircut as curly on top with a fade rather than just straight hair with an undercut. I don't think he has 4 type hair; but if he did have 4b or 4c, he'd be the guy who'd laser focus on picking his hair so he can ignore you </3

For his mullet era, see Prince for reference. I think people only hate mullets because they're almost always seen with straight hair, and straight hair cannot emulate the sheer cunt that curls serve in every moment tbh.

Also, this just looks like a durag to me. Seems to be tied like one. Every time someone draws this head covering, it looks exactly like a durag. What does he need a durag for if not to keep moisture and protect his curl pattern?

He's also my personal win for the kingdom of Blasia.

Halo from the Young Justice cartoon — she's mixed Black to me. I think Qurac is meant to based on Iraq? So maybe she's Black and Iraqi. idk I just think Black Muslims should be seen more in media.

Everyone in the Superfamily — I read that one post years ago about how logically Kryptonians should be darkskinned if their powers come from absorbing yellow son energy (people without color reflect it instead) + someone else talking about Afro-Latino Superboy. I agree with all their points (don't ask me for either of these posts, it was three fandom lifetimes ago).

Zatanna Zatara — that one post on twitter fancasting Ayo Edebiri as Zatanna. I am walking together with that person. I see the vision. A win for #BlackGirlMagic. Give "Justice League Dark" new meaning (you can throw tomatoes for that one)

[fiftysevenacademics]

I am in the oldest cohort of Gen X. Cable TV didn’t come around till I was a teen, and commercially-available Internet, not until I was well into adulthood with a child of my own. Growing up, the only free media you could enjoy were network TV and radio. If you wanted to hear specific music on demand, read particular genres of writing, or see movies, you had to buy records, subscribe to magazines or buy books, or go to movie theaters. Or, you could borrow books, magazines, and music for free from a library.

It was completely normal, even a point of pride, for people to pay for subscriptions to multiple newspapers, typically, your local paper and a larger regional one, and multiple magazines. If you couldn’t afford to subscribe to stuff, you went to the library. Kids saved up their allowance money or, if they were teens, got jobs so they could buy the records (vinyl) they wanted because radio never played their favorite songs often enough.

You only got the TV channels whose signals were strong enough to reach your TV set, which meant that if you lived out in the sticks (like I did growing up), even with rooftop antenna you still only got one or two channels, and in some places, you couldn’t get any. Everyone my age remembers fiddling with the “rabbit ears” on top the TV or yelling directions at their dad while he was up on the roof tweaking the antenna to get better reception. It was the 70s equivalent of “can you hear me now?”

Needless to say, I took to the Internet like a kid in a candy shop. All the news! All the entertainment! All the knowledge and aesthetics and giggles and drama and tragedy for the price of an Internet connection.

But as the Internet matured, it turned into the grubby capitalist hellscape we have now. It was probably always the inevitable outcome of giving capitalist enterprises and complete strangers unfettered access to our wildest dreams, fantasies, and thirst for knowledge, but we were having so much fun it was easy to think we had some kind of control, or that the party would last forever.

Now, the websites and networks we love the most are shutting down, the music and video streaming websites we’ve gotten used to enjoying for free or minimal cost increasingly dictate what, when, and how we enjoy media and can snatch it away from us at any moment. What passes for news is often just gossip passed around on social media because newspapers are being devoured by hedge funds and being run more like money laundering operations than journalism with integrity.

To those of you who grew up entirely in this era, it might feel outrageous to be asked to subscribe to media you enjoy, or to purchase physical or digital versions of music or movies that you can own forever. I, too, hate paywalls and do what I can to get around them, and I, too, have been badly spoiled by the Internet.

But I do recall a time when I subscribed to a half dozen magazines and the local paper, how much fun it was when one of my magazines arrived, to sit down with a cup of coffee and flip through it, deciding which articles to read now and which to read later, or just enjoying the lavish pictures. I recall going out in the morning to collect the paper and that brief moment of anticipation as the headline and cover photo unrolled in my hand. I remember flipping through the fashion and lifestyle magazines at the library for hours when I had time to waste and wanted to immerse myself in some kind of aesthetic for the day.

It all really wasn’t so bad. In fact, it had its own distinct pleasures and inherent boundaries that are lacking in today’s streaming and digital media.

So now I think we’ve come full circle. The only way we can continue to have an Internet we enjoy is by paying for the services we find most fun or useful. It took some time for me to come around to this because, like I said, I, too, have been coddled and indulged for the past thirty years.

But once I started looking at it as the same thing as subscribing to a magazine, which I used to love to do, it all made sense. If you want Tumblr or any other website, publication, or social network you love to stay around, you should subscribe if you can afford to. If you regularly read a magazine or newspaper online and find it very useful or fun, you should subscribe or donate, even if it doesn’t have paywalls. Buy digital or physical copies of albums, songs, or movies/shows you love—don’t count on Netflix or Spotify to let you enjoy them forever.

[renrenlady]

Ranking Shaperaverse Songs from Worst to Best Within Their Album

First up:

24- Voodoopunk

Listen. I have listened to every single one of Paul’s albums. I’ve hunted each and every one down and listened to the ones I could get my grubby hands on. I’m very familiar with his work and his musical habits (he has a very particular set of trademarks ie: symbol crash to end a song, repetitive word/lyric use throughout albums to create a through line, etc) but one thing that just does not resonate, does not vibe with me are these very long winded instrumental songs interspersed with singing. I’m a huge lyric person, so I definitely have a bias and it’s not that the music itself is bad, but this song is always gonna be a skip for me. I’m just not gonna sit and listen to pretty much the same thing over and over again, although I would LOVE to see this performed live. I think it would be incredibly fun, but from a listening standpoint, there are much better songs on this album.

23- Edgar Builds a Business

There’s gotta be a worst and best, and unfortunately this lands on the former side of that scale. Despite me absolutely loving Kate coming in with the connective tissue, the central theme of the show (really, all of Paul’s shows if you think about it) “circles never stop themselves” it isn’t enough to get past the extremely repetitiveness of the song. One could make the argument that, because we are heading for a more industrious/business era it’s only natural for the song to be repetitive and maybe even a little boring. One could also argue that because Edgar is such a boring little evil incel bitch, perhaps he’s meant to have such a tedious song. Whatever the case may be, it has a lot of verses, lots of instrumental breaks and it usually also gets a skip, unless I’m listening for lore purposes. I have to admit that the second to last verse where he addresses the issue he has with Silof is my favorite part of the song, it really lets us peak into his head after the break up and is almost the epitome of his evil if not for the last verse/conversation he has with a recently divorced Fay over dinner. (Side note- I absolutely love the headcanon that Silof is Amelia’s father. I don’t know if that’s canon or been made canon, but it’s absolutely delicious and makes DoNA a complete circle with no loose ends.)

22- New Albion 3

The lesser out of the four. While it does tie up some storylines (or ties them up from the perspective of a first time listener) and it does have a humor to it, it’s extremely transitional and it shows. You might be thinking ‘well no shit it’s transitional that’s literally what the song does’ but when I say it shows, I mean that you can just feel Paul really wanted to write this song and be done with it. It falls into the unfortunate section of not being the last one as most of us in the western world are very used to a ‘rule of threes’ way of things. Particularly stories. But I did say it had humor and it ending abruptly with the sentient plant’s story coming to a close is some unexpected humor I enjoyed. (Also is the plant a post human? Did I read that right on the wiki? Is the fucking plant able to control reality? Somebody tell me, please.)

21- The Movement 2

So. The thing is I don’t think I like gen 3 all that much. It’s still interesting and Byron and Amelia are fascinating characters- also Jasper gets to really shine in this act! But it definitely has the more instrumental, bring me to church kind of songs. We get an interesting advancement of understanding the character dynamics with Amelia fully admitting to loving Byron who is never gonna love her back, but it just doesn’t make up for the repetitiveness of this song. Much like New Albion 3, I think this entire act suffers from not being the last to go, it feels very transitional despite it being arguably one of the most important acts due to the founding building blocks of Radio Hour being done within it.

20- The Movement 1

Much of the same critique of the one above this, but I will say what gives it more of an edge is the reestablishment of Edgar’s ‘business theme’ where Byron uses it for campaigning. It’s a bit of musicality that I really enjoy from Paul, connecting the characters through motif and parallelism. Byron hates his dad so god damn much, and yet still employs the same tactics he used when he was a young man looking for a purpose. McAllisters don’t fall too far from their tree huh?

19- Annabel Has a Doll

The origin of Kate’s ‘circles never stop themselves’ motif and it’s haunting beautiful when you go back and listen through. It essentially sets up the theme of every album following the first and is, what I think, the central part of what Paul is trying to convey. I could get into the philosophy behind his work for hours, like make a whole video essay on it but for now- this song. It’s on the lower end due to the fact that even though it is a hilariously frantic and manic bop, it can get really grating after the third verse. Like getting hit by a hammer over and over again with the constant and loud and insistent melody. Like I said, there has to be a worse and best, and I just think there are better songs on this album. Oh also- the beginnings of the Elysium theme? Fucking brilliant.

18- We Bid the 1st Generation Adieu

This is a brilliant way to introduce the concept of time jumping and also not getting too attached to the characters we see. It’s exposition without it feeling like exposition and Kate is always a delight to hear. It’s just that it’s a very short, transitional song and it’s. Yeah. That’s kind of it. We bid adieu to this review and move on to the next.

17- Bonfire of the Dolls

This song is a doozy in the best way possible. The climax of gen 3 and it completely delivers after creating such a delicious amount of tension between the living, the dead, and those who stand in between them. It’s the culmination of a society finally ready to snap and it is displayed so beautifully through a kick ass score that evokes such a frightening kind of emotion. A mixture of fear and pain and loss and somehow, love. Byron calling for Jasper in a desperate attempt at saving the one thing he only truly selfishly cared about gives me chills every time I listen to it. What this song suffers from however is the large amount of instrumentation. Don’t get me wrong, it sounds very good and the way Paul creates the ‘screaming doll’ sounds is so incredibly cool. But this would definitely benefit from having a visual element which is a problem I see across pretty much all the albums. Now that I call it a problem, I feel as though it’s a harsh word to use. I think it’s more like the show doesn’t need such long musical breaks if it’s never going to be staged. Still have the breaks, but perhaps shorten them? My mind can only supply so much imagination before I’m just replaying moments over and over again in my head.

16- The Ballad of the Gambler and the Monk

Full disclaimer I think this song is a fucking bop. I think it’s a certified, fun to sing along to jam. I love how this is the interlude of the story, reminding us of how exactly we got to this point of societal collapse by showing us how everyone was doomed from the start essentially. The music too has this old, nostalgic feeling to it which makes you feel like you’re being transported back to somewhere else, away from the chaos and the death and relentless evolution of New Albion. The only issue I have with this number is that for most of it, we already know the story due to it being explained to us. The opening lines of this show are telling us the story of the gambler and the monk. They only go more into detail about what happened at the end of the game, introducing us to the concept of reincarnation with incredible subtlety, but I really wish we had gotten more of a glimpse into just who these two were, and more importantly, who they were to each other. Now that’s a big wish considering it might’ve been difficult to have some establishment for these characters before Paul knew he was going to make Janissury, but some more detail to an already known story would’ve been nice considering a whole song was dedicated to it.

15- Edgar Gets His Heart Broken

Oh Edgar. Edgar you silly stupid bitch. You silly stupid bitch baby boy. Your song is objectively hilarious to listen to and I enjoy hearing your heart get broken every time. Although his incel anger does backfire on…well, New Albion for the rest of its existence, it was pretty funny watching it happen in a musical number. Lime pie//dying inside? Instant classic. Also the origin of the ‘one day you will learn’ theme and it’s honestly one of the best motifs Paul has ever written. It’s a perfect reprisal line and can be interpreted in so many ways, it just open to possibility. I don’t really have any critique for this one, it’s a concise and well paced story that gives us exactly what we need to know about gen 2 and it’s a bop. There are just better songs that come before this.

14- Annabel Raises the Dead

God damn does this song kick. These cats are cookin. When that piano/xylophone/I don’t even know what fuckin instrument barrels in with that tight ass arpeggio. The instrumentation is gorgeous, it’s evocative as all hell with its frantic nature and atmospheric sounds. The sole reason this isn’t further down on the list, is because I have this (most likely) singular issue with the actual notes themselves. Specifically the notes Annabel sings. Now, we’ve heard Laura Osnes sing, and I mean sing but what I can’t figure out is why despite everything being so incredibly frantic and high energy, are the notes she singing fall so…flat? And I don’t mean flat as in pitch I mean flat as in it just doesn’t match the energy. Annabel is a mad isolated scientist, why wouldn’t her melody line be an insane roller coaster? Why does it continue on in this sort of monotone way? It does get better at the end, with the bridge giving us insight into what the actual fuck is going on. But overall it leaves me wanting more in regards to a dynamic musical experience. Annabel’s part in the song holds the whole thing back with its sort of awkward melody where she’s singing these low, honestly uninteresting notes when the music is kicking all kinds of ass. Love this song, but I wish it was different.

13- Fay Considers Edgar's Proposal

Get his ASS Fay, make him eat shit. With his own musical motif of course. This song gives me chills when I listen to it, never a skip. For this entire time Fay has been living outside the main narrative, the sole reason why our easily corrupted protagonist gets…well, corrupted. To many, some may resent Fay in the beginning of gen 2 due to her somewhat vague couple sentences of break up. We have no context for how she feels or what her motivations are besides finding someone in a better financial/status position in life- but then this song comes on. Then we understand Fay really and truly did love Edgar. Filled with school-girlish, young love, Fay was head over heels. She fell in love with a young man who was most likely just as much in love with her. And during this song, Fay no longer sees that young man anymore. She feels betrayed, wondering how exactly she became a piece in Edgar McAllistair’s game of business and commerce. Wondering where the young man went and when he got shot out the back and replaced with the miserly and revenge ridden capitalist sitting before her, having taken everything from her. And then to top it all off with offering her late father? Her explosive ending is a stroke of genius and my only complaint is that this song is too short.

12- New Albion 4

This is the first instance of us hearing a more dieselpunk sound, the roots of Radio Hour beginning to grow into the cobbled ground of New Albion. It is haunting to listen to the second time around and frightening the first. Times are changing and by the sounds of it, for the worst it seems. Kate introduces us to a new kind of city and paints a very geometric and drab image in my mind where a dark cloud looms over a frightened and paranoid people. We are introduced to Soldier 7285 and the origin of one of the slappiest songs Paul has ever written, ‘the day we come’ motif. It is evocative of Javert from Les Mis, a solid and clear cutting tune that constantly comes in like a thick wall, impenetrable. You can basically hear the brainwashing going on and it’s honestly a great example of police/authority indoctrination. The words are empowering 7285, making him feel like he is justice, he is an important extension of the law and the law is just. It is unwavering. It’s an incredible piece of music and it was really difficult to decide to put it at twelve.

11- We Bid You All Adieu

There’s something about this number that breaks my heart in the best way possible. Like the way you felt when the children accidentally left Narnia or seeing Frodo Saul away to the Lands of the Undying. There’s still more story to be had, peoples lives still go on, but we are no longer viewers. The characters will live on as will we and…that’s that. The song is a perfect button finish to the mad and frightening escapades of the McAllistair family, bringing us not a sense of closure but drawing us in even more as to wonder what happens next in and to New Albion. I love the way it makes me feel, the only reason it falls here, just short of the top ten is because at this point we have heard this musical refrain many, many times and while that isn’t necessarily bad, repetition isn’t always the best choice, though perhaps in Paul’s case, the easiest when creating a new show every year.

10- The Suicide

Coming in at number ten we have our girl Amelia signing out! I have very similar thoughts to this as I did with Fay, getting the context of Amelia’s life is extremely heartbreaking. Also the discordant, chaotically violent way Paul displays abuse from a father is unfortunately accurate and phenomenal. Every time I listen I get so incredibly uncomfortable and displaced when that part comes and that to me is what makes this song a success. And then the twistingly sad nature of Elysium getting a reprise through Amelia’s epic goodbye to life just ties the whole thing together so neatly. Amelia is also a huge perpetrator, much like my blorbo Annabel in creating a chain reaction of events that will eventually lead to some crazy ass shit. I admire what this song contains and what it does.

9- New Albion 2

Full disclaimer, I love all of Kate’s parts and solos. I adore this one because of the charm we still have with this narration convention as well as development of the background characters! I want to hear more about the two women, the albatross Simon and the brilliant mouse Sam! It gives the city so much more life whereas the first one is an intro to help us build the world and the others lose a bit of charm after a while. This one I think is the most fun and I really enjoy listening for what are essentially clues/future callbacks for the future albums.

8- Priscilla Contemplates

I had no idea what Miss Priscilla was saying the first time around and if I didn’t take the time and effort to really listen to the words, this song probably would’ve been in the twenties. But after thinking it through and really tasting the words, I think this is one of the best poetically written songs Paul has ever wrote. It’s gorgeous in writing, describing such an odd and strange feeling from a girl who is living such an odd and strange life. And the way it ends with the phone call? Chills. Can you imagine being Jasper in that moment? This is a scene I would kill to see staged because of just how raw it can be. Priscilla is the best of the McAllistairs- as though reincarnation finally got it right this time.

7- The Day They Come

Not a ton to say about this one other than the fact that the rising panic is kick fucking ass to listen to. The way the music portrays Jasper and Priscilla arguing yet still desperately trying to be quiet. The inevitable way Soldier and the others are proudly and dutifully singing their vows. It’s short but it’s a riot, also RIP Byron and his trophy wife I’m pretty sure they die in this one if not died way before.

6- The Old Trunk in the Attic

I don’t know what the wide, general opinion is of this particular song but it, to me, absolutely belongs in the top ten. It’s strength is that it completely stands out from the rest of the discography. When Paul takes that moment to just create music from poetry, evoke feelings from us that we’ve never felt before. The delicate way the melody and instruments are done, the nostalgic yet unfamiliar list of items we all have a collective (but not real) memories of seeing going through our relatives belongings before. It’s what is a great representation of what makes the Shaperaverse so special. Just these moments of singularity, of importance when to the characters it’s just a Tuesday night. There’s so much gravity in this one song, I think we all forget just how much the rest of the discography relies on this specific moment- save of course for Annabel’s breakthrough. It’s beautifully sung by Kate and I put it on loop all the time.

5- Annabel's Lament

Humanizing our mad scientist with a ‘where did it all go wrong/how did I get here’ song is brilliant. One could argue it’s a verse too long, but to that I say the word ‘opera’ is in ‘pulp opera’ which is how Paul describes his works so. Yeah it sounds like a verse too long cause it’s opera. Anyway Annabel, like the logical thinker she is, lays the map of her life bare as she is finally ready to face the grotesque music she has composed entirely for herself. She’s trying to find the source, the answer as to why, why she cannot seem to escape this deep pit of loneliness she has been stuck in ever since her father set the high expectation of ‘be a success, then you’ll be happy’. And y’know what the crazy part is? I don’t even think she really figures it out in the end! Isn’t that wild? Yes she sets Jasper free because she loves him and on some level realizes his suffering- but the main reason she lets him go is because HE was supposed to be her success and, confoundingly, she still. Isn’t. Happy. Annabel doesn’t understand why this didn’t solve all her problems, why despite having worked for years and years, pushing everyone and every opportunity for social interaction away she still can’t get what she wants and this is the beauty of Paul Shapera’s works, but especially highlighted in his first. Annabel is trapped in a cycle, a circle. And the great tragedy is that she is the first act- there was no way her story was going to end happy. Instead she begins (or if you think about it, just another in a long line) a curse which takes four generations for her lineage to break. But the greatest tragedy of them all is that Annabel didn’t just curse her family tree, but the entirety of New Albion as well. Or perhaps- it was already cursed from its conception? I could keep going about Annabel and her lament, but overall this song feeds the story and lore part of my brain that is never satiated and the music has the intensity that I was looking for in Annabel Raises the Dead. It builds and builds until Annabel is screaming at an inanimate object, tragically missing the point of her own sad story as her ax flies.

4- New Albion 1

Where it all begins. The set dressing done in this song is brilliant in two ways. The first being that as just a listener, it’s like a pop-up book is opening and unfolding in your brain. Like a DM just before the beginning of a long, long campaign setting up the most intricate and alive world you’ve ever had the pleasure of stepping into. This is how musicals should be (something I’ve noticed is that immersion is distinctly lacking in modern day mainstream shows) where they entice you, guide you into a story before plopping you right down into the action. It’s exciting to hear what’s around every corner of this intensely strange city. The second is that when this is staged, despite imagination not being all that necessary, it is as though Kate is conducting the city to come to life herself. Set pieces gliding in from stage right, the one eyed red haired dwarf strolling onto stage tossing a pair of silver dice in the air, the city itself rising as Kate builds upon it. New Albion 1 works because it is not complicated, it tells you things as they are because what they are is already a wonder to imagine or see. And the continuous line of ‘and Annabel McAlistair is raising up the dead’? Brilliant intrigue, instantly letting us in on the score. More stories should try this method, after all why do people like Hamilton or Hadestown or Heathers or Natasha Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 so much? Their intros lay it out and we get to sit back and enjoy the spread. Also of course, this is the origin of the New Albion theme, the one all the narrators use. It’s just beautifully simple and strange and it makes me emotional whenever I hear it across the albums. Even when I’m all the way in the future, watching Jane fight for her life and Han Mi struggle with creating her own narrative, I hear that familiar tune and think about where it all began, with a sad lonely blorbo trying to bring back to life her own blorbo.

3- Priscilla and Jasper Play Cards

This song is disgustingly good. It’s a final act showdown, an earned epic moment in the narrative. Finally everything that has happened in this fucked up city is reaching a head in Byron McAlistair’s basement of all places and it is beautiful on delivery. The reprise of so many important motifs, my favorite being Jasper saying ‘be my angel’- the chills I get every time I hear him use that line is outrageous. Now I’m not sure who is right, but my interpretation of Jaspers line in that moment is that he’s asking Soldier to be his ‘angel’ by shooting him and finally, y’know, letting this man fucking die. But then I saw someone else say Jasper is saying this to Priscilla, begging her not to do this for him as he has finally accepted being alive again and doesn’t want her to die due to finally loving a McAlistair. Whatever the interpretation, canonical or not, it is a rip out your heart kind of moment. Sacrifice, duty and love all culminating to finally end the cycle of madness started so long ago in an epic trio of fantastic vocals. And when Priscilla finally can hear the music, the message Kate has been trying to get through, it’s breathtaking. You have to wonder how Kate feels when this happens, when she’s actually listened to. And just when you think it’s over…

2- I Will Bring You Down

…A new hero starts the cycle anew. This song is so fucking dramatic, so very end of an action movie sounding song and yet it works. It works because this is a relatively new character who is now able to think for himself, not just rehash the creed which will haunt this city for generations to come. And his thoughts (the music) sound incredibly unique to everyone else and that is a sign of so much care and attention from Paul. It’s a call to action, a sign of a new age coming whether the city and its people want it or not. It’s the beginning of a new story placed squarely as this shows finale. Finally, when the dust settles it is not a McAlistair who ends the tail in triumph, but a random soldier who kicks of another set of events. Circles really do never stop themselves.

1- Elysian Night

It’s hard for me to express what I feel when I listen to Elysian Night. Usually when I’m talking to people about it I end up struggling and stuttering and start spouting about something ephemeral leaving the person I’m talking to trying to decipher my words. What can one say about Elysian Night that isn’t already felt when you listen? Much like The Old Trunk in the Attic, it stands out amongst the rest of Paul’s works while somehow being the golden center of the sewn together quilt. It’s honest, it’s raw. It’s all the thoughts Jasper has been desperately trying to say after three generations of living. Picking apart other songs on the radio just to craft this one that will hopefully (tragically and inevitably fly over peoples heads) send the message about how he and every other doll in the city has been robbed of something that can barely be described. How do you not love this song? How do you not feel every emotion Jasper has raging on inside the machine that is his body? It’s close to one of the best songs Paul has ever written and I’m grateful to be alive in the time I am to be able to listen.

Thank you so much for reading if you’ve gotten this far! I’ll probably do another one for Radio Hour as it is my favorite of all the albums and we’ll see where this all goes. If you have any questions or would like to share your own opinion about the songs or have a bone to pick with me about the order they fall into, feel free to send me an ask or use the comments on this post. I never really get to talk about the Shaperaverse with people in real life and despite the discord community being amazing a full of incredible people, I find it hard to interact so I lurk most of the time. Thanks again for reading and happy listening!

[gloriousmonsters]

Hey btw I absolutely want to hear that Yu-Gi-Oh propaganda. Hit me

*sam reich voice* you have until I cut you off to sell me a manga about a Japanese teenager being possessed by an Egyptian pharaoh

Honestly, recommending Yu-Gi-Oh is a bit hard just because of its multiple forms; the manga, the first anime, and the second anime. All of them have good points; some more than others, but there's a few things each has done that I prefer. If you got into just one, I'd rec the manga; if you go anime only, you HAVE to watch at least a few episodes of the original anime before the follow-up.

This is because Yu-Gi-Oh is two (or three. four?) stories stuffed in a trenchcoat and if you miss out on the story it was at the beginning, what happens later will not be nearly as good. I have a lot of other things I want to say but I'm going to put a short version after all my screaming so ctrl-f 'give me the short version' for that, lol

HIT ME WITH THE LONG VERSION. I WANT A TED TALK

Yu-Gi-Oh is a horror story that takes a swerve into shonen through the Power of Friendship, but never loses its horror elements. You might know the basics, but I'll lay it out--Yu-Gi-Oh focuses on a sweet, shy boy named Yugi, who has no friends and gets occasionally bullied by another student, Jounouchi. But when an opportunity arises to take revenge, Yugi passes it up, choosing to treat Jounouchi as his friend instead. Jounouchi turns out to be a golden retriever at heart and immediately becomes his ride or die for life (their names put together literally form the word for friendship. it's stupid i love them). Oh, and a dark personality takes over Yugi and engages the guy who hurt the two of them in an unhinged 'penalty game' where the guy's left tormented by visions :)

Yu-Gi-Oh does a few laps through the grubby teen horror genre, and it's amazing. People are in danger of getting stabbed daily at this school and ALL of them want to stab the protagonists (or beat them up, or steal their spot at the school fair, or--). The only thing that makes Yugi's 'dark personality' the good guy is that the people he tortures are so awful. Yu-Gi-Oh Season 0, as the first anime is usually called, captures this vibe beautifully, everything is dark shadows and bloody sunsets and glowing eyes. It pretty much went wherever while the manga struggled to catch up, so it really builds its own little world; not something you need to watch more than a handful of eps of if you want the overall canon, but delightful in itself.

The horror era doesn't end, but peaks before it really mixes with shonen, with an arc villain called Kaiba Seto, an unhinged rich boy who's taken over his adoptive father's company and is in the process of converting it from a vague business + military tech operation to gaming and theme park related stuff + vague business (king shit) and who after suffering a penalty game from Yugi's dark side proceeds to construct a revenge that involves a death amusement park where he tries really hard to kill all of them, and an attempt to beat Yugi('s dark side) in a card game in front of an audience. Yugi('s dark side) promptly wins and shatters his mind, shrugging that he'll pick up the pieces if there's anything left to salvage.

Then everyone starts playing card games all the time. 

The thing with Yu-Gi-Oh is that you have to buy into the central narrative, which is that this card game is essentially sacred. It's called 'dueling' for a reason; it's about honor and proving yourself and philosophical argument and Friendship and, rarely, about actually having fun. If you can buy into this, dueling is SO fun I promise. Although I'm always nostalgic for the wild west 'different game/toy every time' of early Yu-Gi-Oh, many of my favorite moments in the series are duels.

And when you've bought into the premise, Yu-Gi-Oh rewards you with ALL the juicy emotional moments and dysfunctional characters fumbling toward better things and gay shit you could want. I love it primarily from two angles--one, it's at its heart (especially in the manga and the last-ish arc of the anime) about becoming a better person in whatever way you can. It sounds cheesy, but I will go on record as saying that the Battle City arc is one of my favorite narratives about trauma and finding ways to move on from it.

The other angle is that it's batshit and LOADED with characters that are just. So fucked up in various ways. It's a kooky Ancient Egpytian fantasy narrative stuffed into a sports manga about cards continually being stalked by its horror roots, you can pick and choose your own elements of worldbuilding because shit does NOT make sense, and every villain is a GOLDMINE of not only delight but noncon opportunities (*mabel voice* noncoppurtunities). We've got somewhat hinged sadists. We have unhinged sadists. Combat sadomasochists. We have mind control that's actually pretty inventive and creepy. We have people with all-consuming grudges and pretentious depressed bitches who sublimate their trauma into murder. The more consensual ship options are just as varied and delightful.

Kaiba Seto also crawls out of his coma to become the third main character and trust me, if you like Kinnporsche you will almost certainly LOVE Kaiba, especially in the manga. He is a Kinnporsche-ass character. Narrative about trauma and cruelty and power and daddy issues up to here. Huge asshole. My sweet baby boy. Every filler arc the anime added is basically about him and he deserves it, even if they don't fit with the overall narrative.

Oh, and in the fourth season of the anime the writers do a bunch of drugs, watch Atlantis: The Lost Empire, notice that the censors have gone out for lunch, and rapidly assemble an arc where you put up with about forty-five combined minutes of pure stupidity in order to get a urban fantasy horror shonen fusion where we talk about the horrors of war and the fate of humanity and how cults pull vulnerable people in and radicalize them, and do some of the most glorious indulgent fanfiction bullshit ever. It's the horniest and darkest season and will probably punch you in the gut if you have depression and gives us the best filler villains in existence (one of whom was the guy I originally made that post about, lol). Despite its flaws, it functions remarkably well as a conclusion for the story, which is good because the last arc of Yu-Gi-Oh mostly doesn't exist? Like there's a little bit of content at the beginning of the manga arc but other than that it's just. Not there. Weird!

THAT IS A LOT OF WORDS, VIC

I apologize, I have a lot of feelings.

GIVE ME THE SHORT VERSION

Yu-Gi-Oh is a paranormal romance bundled with a story about friendship and personal growth wrapped in a horror story masquerading as a shonen manga and it FUCKS. There are so many little guys you look at and go 'wow! there's something incredibly wrong with you!'. If you can get into it it will Get You. Also I need more people in this fandom that aren't solely into my NOTP or twentysomethings that call ships 'illegal' please for the love of God. I will write fic for you if you get into it. Yes, this is a bribe. pspspsps

WHAT ARE YOU EVEN SAYING I SHOULD READ/WATCH

bare minimum is read the manga best minimum read the manga up to the end of battle city and then watch YGO season four and then read the beginning of the last manga arc as if it were a gradually fading ancient text that crumbles into the dust the moment you say 'wait, what the fuck' out loud. you can also just watch the anime with the background assumption that everything was 2x darker and 1.2x gayer in the manga

THAT SOUNDS DAUNTING, HOW DID YOU EVEN GET INTO IT

Honestly I don't know how I got into it either but this pit's great once you slide down to the bottom. 

WHAT IS YOUR PARTING WISDOM, SAGE?

I don't know if this needs to be said but never expose yourself to the English dub it's horrendous

[a-s-levynn]

Hello!! 3, 11, and 26 for the ask game? Hope you're having a good day ♥️

Hey there! It is suspiciously nice so far so we'll see how the rest goes. I hope you have a nice day as well! 💖

3. What playlists do you have on your phone? I always say i don't but that's not really true anymore. I tend to do playlists of concerts i've been to lately. Because it's fun to e listen them after a while. I also have a few saved lists made by others. Not many but they exist. To be honest i think i kinda lived my mixtape dreams out with my walkman and then discman and than ipod and than small memory phones eras back than. Ever since i got my grubby hands on spotify i don't really bother anymore. Tho i love seeing other's lists. It's like taking a little peak through a window into them. And also in general i still enjoy listening to full albums the most. Well either that or being stuck on one single song for 5 days in a row. There is hardly any inbetween.

11. What was your childhood dream job? I answered it not long ago, i'll link it here for you. But i basically just don't really remember what i wanted at a young age and when i got a bit bigger i just.. barely wanted to be anything at all.

26. Do you believe in second chances? Usually i do. There are certain things that cross a line even for me but those are usually things you go to prison for. But in most cases i do believe people deserve the opportunity if they make an effort. All i have to do is meet them halfway. It's on them if they fuck it up again. But if i don't see an effort, than that's their choice as well, but then i don't have to meet them half way either. I acknowledge that shit happend but i like to focus on the aftermath and the things i have to solve and sort out after. They either want to be a part of that or not. I'm open but i need to see a first step to make my own as well. But if i see one, i'll do one. Or at least this is the short version of the idea behind it for me. I probably could write a book on this alone.. And also it get's a bit muddy when i am the one who fucks up because i never think i deserve a second chance and that's a whole different story.

[leggyre]

Have you ever played the danganronpa games, anyway? I know many people who like the series but have never played the actual games, so...just wondering

youre OUT HERE questioning my DANGAN RONPA CREDENTIALS????????!?!?!?!?! you here citing the deep magic even though i was there when it was written??????

but i can imagine a lot of people who never played come from the translation thread era. i thought i'd remain one those forever because the official english translation came out for the PSP only but then the PC version came out and-- yes i have played all three of the main games

(and YEAH i could've watched someone play on yt when it was translated but class trial gameplay is SO fun i actually chose to wait for a version i could get my grubby gamer hands on. i tend to do that and its usually the reason i end up far behind on fun trendy viddygame stuff(quote from man who will play celeste eventually i swear))

[notebooknonbinary]

Rubs my grubby little merthur hands together. Sorry if you’ve read any of these. This list turned out a lot longer than I expected it to lol.

One of the greats, in my opinion, is And like the cycle of the year, we begin again by katherynefromphilly. You might have already read it since, like many fics in this fandom, it’s an oldie but a goodie. It’s Post-series, Arthur returns plot. The way this author handles all the necessary OCs/side characters is Chef’s kiss. The plot is awesome. And the merthur is so lovely it makes me cry. (And it has a sequel which is always a plus). Gets a bit steamy in some parts but I think they’re largely skippable.

Bumps and Bruises by platonic_boner is a sweet one shot about Arthur making an (incorrect) assumption about Merlin’s various injuries. Very good read.

Of Faith and Hope and Love by versaphile is a Magic reveal fic/canon divergent around the plot of the Secret Sharer (when gaius is kidnapped by alator).

The Lie In Which You Linger by flowersheep Arthur courts Merlin instead of Gwen in season 4. Lovely lovely fic on my reread list.

If you’ve seen Stargate (which is a pretty good sci-fi show I’d recommend it), there’s a crossover fic called the Scholar. It’s post canon (a lil canon divergence) and is more background Merthur and cracky in a funny way most of the way through, before it develops a plot that is actually very interesting. It’s a good read!

Destiny Ordered You to Die, But I Willed You to Live by ironfamjam. Arthur isn’t completely knocked out by Cornelius Sigan, so overhears the confrontation between him and Merlin. I Love fics like these sm.

If Ever, Now by Athena1919, Where Merlin decides to help Morgana with her magic in S2, and Arthur gets jealous of all the time they’re suddenly spending together. Very fun fic!

Complementarity, Entanglement and the Uncertainty of Destiny —or— A Feminist Mage in King Arthur's Court by Jenrose & procoffeinating. It’s a time travel fix it fic where Merlin reaches the end of the world w/o sign of Arthur and realizes he has to go back in time. It’s a mind boggling in a good way, this fic.

Ashes to the Wind by lilupon Arthur goes on a hunt by himself and when he gets back Merlin is being charged with sorcery. It’s a very sweet fic despite the dire setting.

Darkest Before the Dawn by RocknVaughn is a good fic for crying. Takes place during the Wicked Day. Magic reveal and a somewhat bittersweet ending. Technically it’s pre-relationship but they make it clear that it’s not platonic.

Good Fortune, another one by platonic_boner. Arthur makes Merlin a lord. I love this fic v much. It’s sweet and funny. (Platonic_boner has actually written quite a few merthur fics and I didn’t realize that until I was putting together this list)

For Arthur, (the author has orphaned the work). Canon era, Merlin finds out about his immortality. Another one for crying. Also, ya know TW for suicidal thoughts and attempt

…

(Also IK you asked for Merthur fics but if there are two non-merthur fics that I could recommend…it would be These Ghosts Might Be Mine by PeaceHeather. which I could argue is pre-relationship, considering the amount of devotion merthur have for each other is around or surpassing canon. Also it’s time travel which I adore. The other one is a series on ff net that was my favorite fic series when the show was still running. It’s outright Het than ghosts is, but the romantic relationships are all background and tbh the plot more than makes up for it. It’s a series rewrite series, and the first one is called A Question of Motives by Alaia Skyhawk (it’s a series rewrite started at season 3 but they went back and wrote prequel fics for S1&2 and also precanon). Even tho Merthur aren’t together in this one, the care and love and characterization the author put into them and the Knights and their own original stuff makes it worth a read anyway.)

mutuals what are you favorite merthur fics 🧍🏼‍♂️ (canon universe pls)

[thekillpetition-if]

Hector Z. - The Journalist

(According to Luddy)

Hey Boss! Lucy here! Compiled some profiles (and got some dirt) like you asked. What is this for exactly? None of this has anything to do with the current case, you and you knew them already. Whatever. Disclaimer: All pictures acquired from social media and other public means, I’m redacting faces for privacy and legal reasons.

Second is Hector Z. Getting this guy to talk was easy, they loves to talk. I still can’t figure out what the Z. on his name stands for, though. 

About -  A journalist who made it their life-long mission to cover every one of your ongoing cases- And to leak any juicy information he could get his grubby hands on. I still can’t get my head around how he managed to get a glimpse of one of our new cases when I literally left the only copy in the office fridge while I was getting coffee. 

Skills - Creeping about. Big stealth points if he’s in a game, I guess. Or maybe he got so many contacts whispering in his ears. I have no idea how he get those leaks, but it was obviously not legal. 

Personality - Loves to talk. And when I say loves to talk, I mean he loves to communicate. He listens as much as he talks. Also, he’s very generous, though that might just be him trying to pry some info from me through coffee bribes. Lots of underlying motives when it comes to Hector, but a the end of the day, it’s just for his scoop. 

Brief Background - BJMC degree from Verson University. Very prestigious -> New Morlene Times in International News Section, then in Law & Politics. Can’t find their gopher era. This doesn’t make any sense. 

Dirt - I’m pretty sure they got information on our cases through unethical means. I just can’t prove it. Yet. 

Appearance -  Shorter than average height, a bit on the skinnier side, dark brown skin, dark eyes, and medium-length dark wavy hair. Of Indian descent. Everyone who first met them will always note their perfectly arranged white teeth. Sharp jawline. Hot. And yes, that statement is extremely objective. 

[eeb-rody]

It's late and I'm not going to be able to sleep so do you know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna put together a comprehensive timeline of my blorbos from the past decade

Feel free to analyze and/or bully me

- age ???: my first one was zazu from lion king, when I was a child I was absolutely fixated on that little shit

-ages 8-10: James from Pokemon, I was simply enamored with this man, I wanted to wear his skin

-age 11: ninth doctor and I stand by it

-ages 12-14: okay there were a couple, Spock from star trek and Crowley from supernatural, because I was both terrible with people and very horny, I fixated and I fixated HARD

-age 15: smithers from the Simpsons???? Honest to God I can't explain this one but he was my beloved off and on for a While

-ages 16-17: this era is an absolute blur, there were many and it was bad

-age 18-??: Fucking starscream, because a year in isolation had made me consume every piece of transformers media I could get my grubby little hands on for some god awful reason. Anyway every version is just horrible, I would like to put him in a purse like one of those shitty dogs and carry him about

-right this second: Laszlo Cravensworth. I will not shut the fuck up about Laszlo Cravensworth and his Good Lady Wife and Terrible Adult Baby Boy

Anyway I probably missed some. But I have watched many shows and these are the characters that my brain decided I needed to think about constantly 100% of the time for months at a time

[chojuuro]

do you like or hate kabuto?

short answer: yes

long answer: also yes.

i have what may seem like conflicting feelings toward him, but understand that a) my venus placement is in aquarius and b) he deserves a little throttling as a treat

let me explain (under a cut because i got Started)

kabuto is someone who is SO interesting and weirdly personal to me. a kid who grew up with no identity of his own, who's trying to find his place in this world the way he knows best. which, i mean, he's been kinda fucked since day one and it DESTROYS MY ASS and not in a fun way

he was, i think, 7 when danzo picked him up, after 3 years in an orphanage where they just. gave him a name. because he had amnesia and DIDN'T. KNOW. HIS BABYHOOD. boy didn't know his NAME or his parents or anything

and THEN danzo got his grubby hands on him when he was SEVEN. worst part is he went willingly because he wanted to help the orphanage with the funding that danzo cut.

and THEN THE OROCHIMARU SHIT ASLKFJ and then when kabuto killed nonou unknowingly and then had his entire identity crisis, probably his first real one. hm. HM.

at which point orochimaru showed up, ensnared the poor boy with promises of identity, of finding out exactly who he was, of making a name for himself.

kabuto has been a spy his entire life. dozens of different hats, of different identities, of different masks to hide the kid who never really got to explore or figure out who he is. orochimaru died, and kabuto spiraled.

orochimaru was his only constant. the only thing he could come back to, that he knew, vaguely, would always be there. that he knew he always had a solid place with.

after the amnesia, after the orphanage, after ROOT, the spy work, the death of his mother, orochimaru's slimy grip, after trying to deal with the aftermath of everything? dude is a fuckin shell of the man he never got to be. and it KILLS ME.

don't get me started on how he's a fucking nun now. i do not perceive nunbuto. but i can't help but feel like maybe he wound up running the orphanage because he literally had no idea where else he could go. ROOT doesn't exist anymore, also FUCK that place. orochimaru is doing whatever That era of orochimaru is doing and i imagine part of kabuto wants to distance himself from them, at least for a while. no way the hospital would trust him enough to work there, even though his medical ninjutsu is SO strong and he could be licherally one of the best medics in konoha. he probably IS. but will konoha give him the chance to prove himself for it? not in a thousand years.

and maybe im biased bc little 11 year old me simped for him really hard. maybe im biased bc i can totally get the loss of sense of identity, the identity crises, the wanting to be better. the internal struggle of not knowing who you are, of having other people tell you who you are for you.

he's done a lot of really fucked up shit, obviously. he's literally a criminal. brought souls back from the dead just to fuck around and find out during the war. shows up uninvited at ALL TIMES. he's pretentious and he's smarmy and he's an asshole who worked under orochimaru for a huge chunk of his life, so you KNOW that he's been On Some Shit and honestly? to little fault of his own. he's a victim of circumstance, of grooming on multiple accounts, of his own mental health and the lack of care that konoha takes in anybody's psyche. good thing i have an oc to fix that for me aha

let me be clear that this does not excuse any of his actions. but it does explain them.

anyway *climbs off my soapbox* i love He but i kinda wanna beat him up sometimes

[watching-pictures-move]

Put On Your Raincoats #21 | Double Chinn Double (Double) Feature (with Hyapatia Lee)

By the time the '80s rolled around, Bob Chinn, best known for his collaborations with John Holmes (the inspiration for Boogie Nights), had been directing movies for over a decade. For much of that time, he'd been making them for peanuts (in an interview with the Rialto Report, he recounts being once asked to make a movie for five thousand dollars, which was handed to him in fifties on the spot), but in the early '80s, he was directing for Harry Mohney's Caribbean Films, working with respectable budgets (by porn standards). Some of these films starred Hyapatia Lee, one of the most popular porn stars of the era and one of the first contract girls. Now, I suspect these aren't necessarily the defining works of Chinn's career, and I do intend to get to some of his movies with Holmes. But Vinegar Syndrome had a sale and there were two double features of their collaborations going for dirt cheap, and because I am weak and foolish with money, they ended up in my cart and a few weeks later in my grubby little paws. How did this happen? Through the magic of Canada Post, of course! Anyway, what I found was that these didn't represents any extremes of artistic ambition. They were neither seeking to elevate the genre, nor were they hackwork. Rather, they represent a happy medium, movies that seek to deliver the genre's goods in a polished, diverting package. Slick cinematography, courtesy of Jack Remy. Catchy theme songs that wouldn't sound out of place if you caught them on the radio. Flashy titles. Lee recounted the atmosphere on set as one of professionalism and engagement, where everyone present wanted to do as good a job as possible. Chinn claims to have been losing interest in his work at this point, but the results onscreen are the result of confident execution by somebody who had been doing this kind of thing for years and knew how to put the production's resources to good use.

The first one I watched was The Young Like it Hot, where the operators at a phone company worry about being replaced by computers. To keep their jobs, they scheme to go the extra mile in helping their callers. As this is a porno, most of this help is sexual in nature, as when Rosa Lee Kimball stays on the line while an obscene phone caller played by Bill Margold finishes. (In an interview on the DVD, Margold says after shooting his scene, he was invited to record additional dialogue. Being the method actor that he was, he insisted on whipping it out during the recording session despite the lack of cameras.) Sometimes they are informative, as when Bud Lee (real life husband of Hyapatia at the time) explains why the perineum is referred to as taint ("cuz it taint cunt and it taint ass"). But the highlight of their efforts are Shauna Grant's increasingly life threatening home improvement advice to one poor sap played by Joey Silvera. Hyapatia Lee is ostensibly the star, and has a certain charisma, playing the supervisor, but this is really an ensemble piece, and she's joined by more experienced actors like Kay Parker and Eric Edwards. The latter I've occasionally found bland elsewhere, but he has a nice obnoxious quality that serves him well as the villainous manager whose idea it is the automate the operators' jobs. The movie reflects a very real concern (that's very much still an issue in the modern workplace), but overall this is a breezy, affable comedy.

A bit more serious in tone is Sweet Young Foxes, a coming of age story whose dramatic parts are more sensitively realized than I expected. The screenplay was written by Deborah Sullivan, Bob Chinn's wife at the time, and this is a case where a movie definitely benefited from having been written by a woman, and it seems like an earnest effort to capture the anxieties and yearnings of its young women protagonists. Lee moves closer to a real starring role, and is joined by Cara Lott and Cindy Carver as her friends, who aren't quite as strong actors as her but do have decent chemistry. I can believe they're friends even if their line delivery can be stilted. (That the movie has a good ear for genuine sounding dialogue also helps.) Kay Parker is especially good as Lee's mother, hitting some of the same notes as Taboo, and has a credibly emotional masturbation scene in front of a mirror that did not leave me unmoved. (In what way? That's none of your damn business.) This was shot by Jack Remy, the same cinematographer who worked on The Young Like it Hot. That movie looked nice and slick, but this one is a little more stylish, with the solo sex scenes in particular resembling magazine centerfolds. There's also some nice new-wave-ish music that shows up on the soundtrack, which I certainly didn't mind. I do wish some of the sex scenes didn't run quite as long (the previous movie kept them refreshingly concise) as I'd prefer more of the runtime was dedicated to the dramatic elements, but what's there is still good.

Body Girls goes back firmly to comedy territory, where Hyapatia Lee and the members of her gym are trying to win a bodybuilding contest despite a rival gym's attempts to undermine them. This comes in the form of a pair of schlubs in yellow tank tops who break into the gym after hours to sabotage their equipment, only to be foiled by Hyapatia and her girls who just happened to be having sex in the locker room as people do. Of course, despite Lee's attempts to teach them a lesson (which depending on your proclivities, may have the opposite effect), they don't give up, and during the contest threaten the judge at gunpoint. Not one to take things lying down (okay, poor choice of words here), Lee finds a way to influence the judge back in her favour. (The judge is played by Francois Papillon, bringing a dopey charm to the character as he fumbles through his lines in his French accent.) Her method is pretty ridiculous and certainly in service of genre requirements, but I did laugh.

Now, there's probably a dilemma in audience sympathy here as both Lee and her rivals are cheating, but Lee's methods are more agreeable and directed at the judge instead of her rivals so I guess we ought to root for her. She's also buoyant, charismatic and has a real star quality, and is joined by such fan favourites as Shanna McCullough and Erica Boyer, all of whom sport wildly different hairstyles. As can be expected given the exercise theme, most of the ladies have toned, athletic bodies (and given the decade, voluminous coiffures), with the exception of Tigr, who brings a wiry punkish energy that stood out to me despite her limited screentime, and she also performs the miraculous feat of making a mullet look cute. (I'd previously been moved by her work in Kamikaze Hearts, the great mockumentary about a porn production and her relationship with Sharon Mitchell. She didn't stay in the industry for too long, but I'd be interested in seeing more of her work.) The screenplay was written by Lee with her husband Bud (who plays the judge's assistant with an agreeable presence that's neither too alpha nor too schlubby) and is full of exercise-related dialogue. Most of this is pretty clunky and calling it wordplay might be a bit generous ("sexercise" features at one point), but I did appreciate the effort. Also as is requisite for the premise, the longest set piece in the movie is an orgy in Lee's gym with the various participants snaked around different pieces of equipment. I must note that one of the male actors resembles Barry Gibb and that Francois Papillon is shown to wear a tiger-striped speedo. Did I enjoy the movie? Yes, but not for reasons cited in that sentence.

At the end of Body Girls, Bud Lee suggests to Hyapatia, "Let's get physical", which is the title of the next movie. (Body Girls also features a character looking at dirty magazine with stills from Sweet Young Foxes and ends with a plug for some of these other movies, anticipating the MCU's narrative and marketing strategies by a few decades.) Now, all of these movies have had decent theme songs, but the one in Let's Get Physical has lyrics that are plagiaristically close to those of Olivia Newton-John's 1983 hit. (The delivery however is more shrill but not unpleasing.) This movie is a drama where Lee plays a dance instructor trying to put together a ballet performance despite her strained relationship with her impotent husband played by Paul Thomas. (In the interview I listened to, Lee speaks well of almost everyone she worked with on these films, with the pointed exception of Paul Thomas. If there was bitterness behind the scenes, it arguably helps their performances.)

Lee wrote the screenplay for this one, and unlike Body Girls with its surface level references to bodybuilding and exercise, the dialogue here feels packed with knowledge of the real thing, which is understandable given Lee's real life interest in dance going back to her childhood. (I looked up "Luigi jazz dancing" after finishing the movie and was pleasantly surprised to learn it was a real thing.) This movie goes all in on her star power, and features a number of dance numbers that seem genuinely interested in the form rather than just leering at the performers. (There is one scene where the song Lee dances to sounds suspiciously like "Beat It".) I did appreciate that the sex scenes were kept relatively concise and tied into the dramatic aspects, although in some cases, the choices made could be goofy, like the scene where Lee makes love to her student Shanna McCullough while Thomas, in a dramatically justified but still awkward gesture, watches from another room and jacks off. (I assume he's playing the audience in this scene. Also, McCullough's character remarks "I've never done this before" when going down on Lee, and yeah, okay Shanna.) Other highlights include a car stunt that may or may not have been lifted from elsewhere but still looks decently executed, as well as a dream sequence where Thomas (or his character at least) plays the piano and sings a song. This is held back a bit by the genre's demands, like when it places a completely superfluous sex scene at the end after Lee's reconciliation with Thomas, but on the whole this is probably the best one of the lot.