#and yes i am a mess of emotions

[jeonjcngkook]

you don’t understand how bad ive waited, ive yearned, for still with you to be on streaming platforms.. its been my comfort song since day one. its been my song of hope, helping me through toxic relationships, hardships, covid and deaths in my family. it has comforted me when nothing else did and stayed by my side when nobody else would. this song means the whole world to me, and now i have it in my library forever and always. if theres one thing i want to thank jungkook for; its for still with you.

[starry-bi-sky]

Okay so this is almost a direct copy-paste of my earlier reblog but only the Xin Yuan parts, because its long enough to be its own post and i want to share it! It deserves it's own post <3 typical starry stuff to write a 2k word long reblog, unfortunately.

I say almost because I went through to proof read and ended up adding more stuff.

I've been cooking on this idea for the last two days since I saw the Xin Mo!Shen Yuan post but??? I can't find anything on Xin Mo's backstory or how it came to be -- which means that's free fucking plot right there baby. That's a sandbox and im making LIFE SIZED CASTLES. I'm so excited.

The idea of Shen Yuan transmigrating centuries before the events of PIDW as Xin Mo -- but when he wakes up, he's not the sword. He wakes up in the body of a young boy named Xin Yuan. Now it makes sense for this boy to be a demon, but the drama, the intrigue, the spice of Xin Yuan being a human child.

SY wakes up as a boy below the age of ten, and the System tells him where he is, and SY is excited to meet his favorite protagonist -- only to gradually realize that he's like, a thousand years or so before the events of the novel. The rant he gives the system is legendary.

Bc what's the point of getting dropped into PIDW if he's never going to meet his favorite character??? This is a scam! BUT he settles into his new life, he's like, some orphan street rat or some other tragic airplane-esq backstory.

The system gives Shen Yuan his first mandatory quest: become a righteous cultivator. Which was like, kinda his plan/hopes anyways, except! There's like?? No official cultivator sects anywhere? The Cang Qiong Mountain Sect hasn't even been established yet, and there are pockets of cultivators running around, maybe some groups or schools popping up and then sinking back down, but nothing's really taken root!

If he asks someone how to become a cultivator, there's no straight answer. No "oh you can go to X to do that". He's pissed! How can he become a cultivator if there aren't any schools around to teach him? Deus ex machina, that's how.

Out of sheer luck, SY manages to help save a rogue cultivator, and promptly gets adopted by said rogue cultivator, who gives SY the name 'Xin Yuan'. He is ecstatic. And you know what? It's actually pretty fun!

He's getting to travel the world of PIDW in its early stages, and gets to see the building blocks for the eventual main story. He's discovering all this local flora and fauna that are foreign to his old world and unmentioned in the book, and he's learning cultivation! Granted, its unsafe, newly(ish) discovered cultivation, but it counts!

Wistfully, he thinks about perhaps he'll do something grand and get his name carved into legend. Something that would eventually help the protagonist later down the line in his quest for revenge.

The system remains silent to his thoughts.

But Xin Yuan doesn't take much stock in that daydream anyways. It's nothing more than fantasy to him; wish-fulfillment. He does discover however, that he is positively brimming with spiritual energy. Overwhelmingly so.

It's both a blessing and a curse, as it puts a strain on his meridians if he's not careful, and leaves him prone to qi deviations for the exact same reasons. He already has a heart demon or two from a few traumatic experiences in the past.

(bc hey! angst a day keeps the writer sadism at bay, and all that)

I'll say he's about... eight when he gets picked up by the rogue cultivator, who I'm calling Lin Kai bc he deserves a name. They travel around PIDW up until Xin Yuan is twelve, where he goes through a traumatic experience that results in a heart demon.

It's after that that Lin Kai decides to put a stop to his wandering, and find a place to settle down to raise Xin Yuan in. Coincidentally! They settle down in a nice mountain region that's thriving with spiritual energy. The mountains at the time were called something different, but they will be eventually known as the Cang Qiong Mountain Sect

Coincidentally, the mountain Lin Kai and Xin Yuan end up on is Qing Jing Peak. XY does not realize that the mountain he's on is Qing Jing. The System does not tell him. But he likes it there, more than he was expecting. And as much as he's traveled around, he really does enjoy being in one place.

He has a tendency to go down the mountain and help the village setting up down there, and when he's a teenager he starts venturing out more and more.

Xin Yuan forgets sometimes that he's in a novel, especially after settling down on Qing Jing peak. The system becomes remarkably quiet since there's no quests for him to do and not a ton of opportunities to get B-Points. He cultivates with Lin Kai, helps tend to the garden they're growing, goes down to the village to play with the other kids.

There's one boy he's best friends with, a boy whose not all that good with words, named Liu Zhihao. He's got potential for cultivation though, so Xin Yuan drags him up the mountain when he can so that Liu Zhihao can sit in on lessons with Lin Kai. He drags him all over the forest at the foot of the mountain to go look at bugs and animals.

(One time, when they're fourteen and Liu Zhihao has been learning cultivation for a few years now, Xin Yuan drags him out of bed late one night to go look at the stars. Xin Yuan tells Liu Zhihao about ascension -- something that still feels like a far off dream to many in this time -- that night, while they're sitting on the wet grass.)

("We should ascend together." Xin Yuan tells Liu Zhihao, jade eyes gleaming. Never let it be said that Xin Yuan doesn't love deeply, no matter what kind of love it is. He was always so lonely as Shen Yuan, Liu Zhihao is his best friend. "We'll become immortals, and then we won't ascend until the other is able to.")

(Liu Zhihao stares at him silently, his face unreadable. Then, quietly, he asks; "Promise?")

("Promise.")

When he starts adventuring outwards, further away from the mountain and the village, Liu Zhihao sticks to him like rice. Not that Xin Yuan's complaining, that's his best friend after all, and Liu Zhihao has become a formidable cultivator. He deserves to show off his skills.

He starts making something of a name for himself by the time he's, like, 18 -- although that name is in its baby steps, along with Liu Zhihao. They're slowly growing renown.

Perhaps XY uses his knowledge of PIDW and cultivation in general to help make advancements in the cultivation field. Although the system prevents him from sharing too much, it doesn't mean he can't practice it himself. Perhaps he's one of the first cultivators to develop a golden core. One of the first known immortal cultivators. One of the first to have a spirit sword.

(Although I don't know the logistics of any of this since my knowledge on xanxia/cultivation stuff in general is all still pretty new and google wasn't all that helpful lol.)

Either way, its my excuse to eventually make Xin Yuan come across as ethereal to other people. Peerless beauty SY for the win. Hs wifebeam is too strong, Xin Yuan has a line of suitors following after him and he's completely unaware of it. The rest of history is not.

Demon realm stuff has been stirring up since Xin Yuan was a kid, but at the time it was rare and in the beginning stages. Its been steadily ramping up and the system is sending him on more and more treacherous quests -- some of them mandatory, some optional. SY doesn't often take the optional ones unless it comes with a sufficient B-point reward.

for all intents and purposes though, he's a wandering rogue cultivator with Liu Zhihao, going from place to place to either help a town or village, or to discover more creatures or artifacts (although there aren't that many). Just all around living his life. He participates in a few major quest lines that are sure to get him mentioned in legend, even if it's a background character way.

(Unbeknownst to him, rather than being a side character in these legends, he's named directly. You can't become one of the first immortal cultivators and NOT get name dropped for clout.)

He has a spirit sword named Shā Mó, (杀 shā - to kill/weaken/counteract/reduce) (魔 mó - evil spirit, demon, possession). He routinely goes back to QJP to see Lin Kai, or to rest when traveling has worn down on him and he wants nothing more than to sleep somewhere he knows he'll be safe in. It becomes more frequent as Xin Yuan becomes more famous. Liu Zhihao often comes with him.

it all comes to a head though when the rifts between the demonic realm and the human realm become too great, and the balance between both realms becomes unstable. A demonic emperor's influence, wanting to merge the two realms so he could conquer both to satiate his own greed.

Typical evil king stuff. This comes to a climatic head in a great battle between every cultivator available and the demon emperor's army. Xin Yuan was one of the many who helped lead the charge.

In the end, it was Xin Yuan who ends up defeating the demonic emperor, but the rift that the emperor used to cross between worlds is destabilizing as well. Except instead of trying to close, it's getting bigger and bigger, threatening to swallow the heavens and earth and demonic realm whole.

You know how Yue Qingyuan's soul is bonded to his sword due to a qi deviation? Let's take it a step further >:)

Xin Yuan uses himself and Shā Mó to close the rift. However, it takes all of his spiritual energy to do so, as well as him filtering the demonic qi into his body to redirect it back to the demon realm.

In the end, Xin Yuan and his beloved sword Shā Mó fuse. Xin Yuan's soul becomes trapped in the sword. His physical body is unable to handle the immense amount of power it takes to close the rift, and is destroyed. He is immortalized in legend by his grieving cultivators.

(Liu Zhihao ends up ascending alone. He ascends with the hope that one day he'll see Xin Yuan again, even if it's in the face of someone else. Lin Kai does not ascend, too weighed down by the grief of losing his son.)

Xin Yuan, now Xin Mo, falls into a stasis. He's very confused and disorientated when he regains 'consciousness'. The system has been silent for most of his life, only popping up to give him mandatory quests, hints, points, or to answer any questions.

But once he wakes up, it cheerfully pops up again, congratulating him on completing the origin story of Xin Mo. SY freaks the fuck out. he'd shake the system screen if he could, but he doesn't have arms. or legs. or eyes for that matter.

He can sense his surroundings, but its all like imprints to him. He can sense the energies, but he can't see anything. It's all very disorientating and horrifying after years of being human. Like a sensory deprivation chamber.

The closing of the rift and the cycling demonic qi tainted both Sha Mo and Xin Yuan irreparably, and it did some kind of damage that resulted in SY needing to feed in order to use the spiritual powers. Kinda like how Xuan Su uses YQY's life force for it's spiritual energy, but instead of feeding on his own lifeforce, Xin Mo feeds on others.

The rest is history. Xin Mo is originally tied to the story of Xin Yuan -- believed to be all that remained of the man after he sacrificed himself to keep the realms separate. It's believed that the force of the realms closing permanently infused Sha Mo with demonic energy, turning it into Xin Mo.

But, like many stories do when faced against the tide of time, things get lost; chipped off; changed. Xin Mo is steadily separated from Xin Yuan, especially once it becomes clear how parasitic the sword really is, until they are all but separate entities themselves and the origin of Xin Mo's creation all but forgotten.

The years blur together when Xin Mo is not being wielded, and at first Xin Yuan was agonized by the fact that he stole the lives of all his wielders. He knows it's only a novel, but his decades spent in this life have softened him, and he's grown attached to the world around him.

But time erodes the mind like water erodes stone, and he becomes numb to it, then eventually anticipating of it. He forces himself to remember what he knows of PIDW's plot, and kinda fixates back on his old obsession on Luo Binghe. But while PIDW stays in his mind, his memories as Xin Yuan fall to the wayside.

Not forgotten, per se, but... tucked away. The system prevents him from forgetting fully.

Xin Mo isn't fully a demonic sword either i think, but instead harbors an ugly cocktail of both spiritual and demonic qi. Special circumstances and all that. Everyone just assumes he's a fully demonic sword because that's usually at the forefront, his spiritual qi weakened from the initial fusion and from years of not being fed spiritual qi. It's part of the reason his wielders always end up destroyed by him, other than the whole, yk, 'overwhelming qi' thing.

Nobody would recognize Xin Mo's human form as Xin Yuan other than some truly ancient demons. Of which Meng Mo might. But even that's iffy because there's a lack of surviving paintings of Xin Yuan, but also because of XM's demonic appearance and supposed lack of connection to XY.

Xin Mo has never spoken to his wielders before, not in the same way he does Luo Binghe. He tells Luo Binghe this, and he also tells Luo Binghe down the line that he is both spiritual and demonic -- something he also never told his wielders because there was no point to it.

okay okay i've got to end it here because its already gotten ridiculously long -- of which im both apologetic and unapologetic for -- but i DO think the Shang Qinghua and Shen Yuan meeting (and reveal) would be fucking hilarious. Especially if SY has learned how to pop between sword form and human form by then -- although i guess it doesnt matter either way because SQH's reaction is still the same.

And that reaction is internally screaming and going "hey what the FUCK?? WHY DOES XIN MO HAVE A HUMAN FORM??? WHAT IS THIS??? SYSTEM??? EXPLAIN???"

meanwhile from his place on the sword hilt xin mo is squinting at Shang Qinghua in bewilderment and going "aren't you supposed to be dead" but doesn't pay too much mind to it because its not like its going to change anything.

...up until he catches shang qinghua going "WTF" silently from his little corner while all eyes are off him. One moment SQH is standing beside his king, and the next he's been tackled to the ground by one wild-eyed, human-shaped Xin Mo.

everyone, including SQH, thinks Xin Mo is going to kill him. It is a surprise to everyone when he does not, and instead dissolves into deranged, uncontrollable laughter after spitting out some phrase in some ancient tongue and watching SQH's eyes grow wide in recognition.

[thasorns-moved]

Next year... will I be the only one with feelings? Amane. Sorry! Forget what I just said. I didn't mean to rush you. Forget it. I won't forget. Today I want to answer you about the other day. I had something I wanted you to eat, but I didn't know how to reach out to you. So I didn't contact you. I want to see you.

KIMI TO NARA KOI WO SHITE MITE MO (2023) 君となら恋をしてみても, dir. Matsumoto Hana

[natasha-in-space]

So I'm replaying Ray's After ending rn, and it got me thinking that what I adore so much about Rika as an antagonist is just how damn scary she can be. I always found those who cause harm with good intentions (at least in their point of view) much scarier than those who hurt you with pure intention on hurting you. I think the best example of it is this CG in particular:

Look at that. Such a loving, gentle expression on her face. Probably kissing his forehead. Because she loves him. Heck, without any context, this CG looks even sweet, if you think about it. And yet, all that is while Saeyoung is forcefully sedated on a powerful concoction of drugs even a trained agent like him can't do anything about (and Saeyoung WAS definitely trained to deal with this sort of thing, hence it's mentioned that this is a 'special' kind of drugs). He looks miserable. Bags under his eyes, his expression pained and troubled, even his hair is paler than usual. All that as a direct result of her actions. But she's utterly blind to it. What's scarier, is that she knowingly shuts off her understanding of what's really happening. She's not oblivious to it at all. She just chooses not to see it that way. Simply because she doesn't want to.

Rika is the type of antagonist that will cup your cheek into her warm hand with the most loving of smiles on her face, all while you are getting elixir poured down your throat. Even whispering to you that you're doing great, that the pain will soon pass, and that she can't wait to see you reach the happiness she knows you deserve. I won't be surprised if she even cried genuine tears of compassion during some ceremonies for her believers. All while being the sole reason behind their suffering.

And that's... God, that's terrifying to me. I love that about her.

Rika Kim, they could never make me hate you

[wexhappyxfew]

whispering prayers into her hair

(a/n): requested by @sunny747 for Annie x Brady and ‘wrapping arms around the others neck when standing behind’. ie — annie and brady being two adorable people in a horrible situation and all their deepest thoughts seem to surface underneath a cold sun. and oh. annie wants to be a mom (distant sobbing). please enjoy this rather sad piece and commentary on two people struggling to hold onto each other in a world like this. (plz know i am sobbing !!!!) thank you so much for this prompt - quite literally has altered my life <3

Staring was the worst part.

At what was just past the barbed-wire fence; what stood between her and the world on the other side.

It had been six months and she was still standing here, still on this side of the fence, still staring at the opposite end of the threshold. Through the wires, the wood, and the dust. The world was on the other side and she was here.

Annie knew she shouldn't be out here alone - especially with the way the Germans had been ever since the British had dug those tunnels. She crossed her arms tighter over her chest and let a sigh escape her chapped lips as she squinted in the bleak sun, the warmth seeming to dissipate just as it reached her body.

Glancing over her shoulder, she watched as some of the men in the bunk room next to their groups began playing a scrap game of ball in the dust pit that could become a makeshift play field when needed. The kick-kick-kick of the pathetic ball bounced about, as the wind whistled past her ears and the sound of silence hung above. There were little-to-no animals around the place - no birds sang, no crickets chirped, there was no sign of life except for the American officers.

Otherwise, they were a dead zone.

A black 'x' crossed out a dot on a map.

"Hey, little birdie." Annie glanced over her shoulder and saw Brady coming towards her. Hands shoved deep in his pockets, his coat looking a little too big now on his form, his broad shoulders now swamped in the scarf and the wool button-up, he still looked like the John Brady from her first day on base at Thorpe Abbotts. Even with his hair a little longer and his cheeks dotted with stubble, and that scar nestled near his jawline.

He was still John Brady.

"Hi." Annie said, watching as he approached her, that lopsided smirk growing on his face, as his eyes fought to keep that grin growing.

He'd been growing quieter in the coming weeks, she'd noticed. Not majorly, not anything that would make her incredibly concerned though, she would always worry - about the crew and about Brady.

He'd say a little less at dinner, when they all sat around and were inhaling what food they had, and then when they were all sitting around, and she was tucked into her bunk, attempting to read (she never did get through any of the books or even a page anymore), she'd glance towards Brady's bunk and catch him in his silent prayer.

His lips a silent whisper, his hands clasped together, eyes and those long lashes gently shut. Everything about him calm and at peace.

And by the time she was curled up beside him, she swore he'd been whispering prayers into her hair, against her forehead and through their threaded fingers, like if he said it enough it'd get them through. And she clung to that more than anything.

He came to stand beside her, this awkward distance between them as they stood there, eyes locked on one another, this fence in between them and the world, dust at their feet, the war at their backs. Hands empty. Annie couldn't look away.

"How are you doing?" she asked him quietly, watching as his face winced slightly, like the question was more hurtful than the response, "You didn't eat much at breakfast." Which was true - his plate still had some oatmeal (they called it oatmeal) on it and he had looked withdrawn and distant. And Annie had watched, her stomach in knots.

It reminded her of when she had to get her siblings ready for school and sometimes one of them wouldn't eat - usually because they didn't feel good or were upset about something - and she'd get a pit in her stomach because she wasn't sure how to fix that. And she had felt that here. Watching Brady.

"Okay." Brady said with a nod, a stiff smile. She wanted to make him smile. More than anything. "Just wasn't super hungry." Annie caught his gaze for a moment and nodded slowly.

"I don't know," Brady said with a shrug, his smile falling, face focused on the world just past the fence, "just think this place is getting to me a bit." And she could see it in his face - just saying that, admitting that - she could see it hurt. He looked over at her and nodded weakly. "You know?"

"I do." she answered quickly, wanting to comfort him as her immediate response to the pain in his voice, "And I try to tell myself it's not. That doesn't usually work anyways, but…." Brady quirked out a small grin that faded just as fast as it'd appeared.

"You shouldn't be out here alone." Brady said quietly, hands shoved deep into his pockets, but it wasn't in a way that was scolding or even upset. Just a statement, a fact, something they all kept a conscious eye on.

"I know." Annie said quietly, her voice strained as she looked out through the barbed wire again, "I just….couldn't keep staring at the bunk room ceiling, you know?" Brady chuckled slightly, like it was some funny inside joke they'd all remember one day.

"I know." he said, voice soft, as they met each other's eyes again. He put on a hopeful smile, as best as he could it seemed. "The sun suites you, An, by the way." Annie caught his gaze, the small flutter in her chest warm, gentle and comforting.

God, the sun. So bright and gleaming even in this gloomy world that had been their ever-present for the past six months - in this bitter cold, this dull air - the sun still would shine even on days where Annie felt like it shouldn't.

"Who was your letter from?" Brady asked - it had seemed like he'd been waiting to ask her that question all morning - between his longing stares, those split second gazes where she swore she could breakdown in front of him and he'd patch her right back up. With all that, it seemed he just wanted to be there with her, to ask her that, alone.

Annie watched him, biting back her lip as the cold rushed over her cheeks. Something in the way his face was strained, like it pained him to even beg the question, knowing her response would hurt either way - knowing her response would hurt him, because it hurt her. The ache never dulled in a place like this.

"Dad." Annie said, her voice a whisper; quiet and shallow.

Seeing her dad's handwriting had sent her into a new dimension - she was sure of that. She couldn't remember the last time she'd even gotten a letter since being back at Thorpe Abbotts. So seeing his handwriting there, loopy and scratchy had made her heart ache in a way that she knew wouldn't fade in a lifetime.

You're mother isn't doing well, kid. She's really sick now, won't eat much or drink much, keeps saying something's tugging her arm. She's calling out for you. Don't know what to say. Keeps saying it's my fault you're gone. She's going down the tubes.

Annie looked to Brady, who was watching her in that unspoken way where it seemed everything and nothing was on his lips, that vulnerable glint of his gaze destined only for her, the want to reach out towards her.

They were always reaching towards one another, she thought.

In every lifetime there was, she was reaching for him and so was he.

But stood out here - in the open - with the eyes of the Germans on their backs, waiting for them to pulsate into the barbed fence just to shoot them, to make a run for it, she couldn't risk it. Instead, watching him made her yearn for every bit of him and more in those other worlds, those other times.

"What was he saying?" Brady asked quietly, tightening his jaw a bit, noticing her evident quietness. Annie sniffled and crossed her arms together in front of her and shifted her shoulders.

"Mom's probably going to be gone soon." Annie whispered quietly, looking at him, "She keeps asking for me. She's blaming Dad. For me being here. For me even joining up in the first place probably. It's…..it's basically a shit show."

"Annie, I'm sorry…." Brady whispered shifting towards her, that unspoken distance when they were outside the bunks room seeming to make a reappearance as he froze and then watched her as she stared back at him.

"It's okay…..it killed her." Annie whispered quietly, nodding, "Having to take care of us kids. Her and my dad…..one night, they were talking about it all. She never wanted to be a mother. She never wanted any of that. But that was what she got and that was her life and she drowned herself in cheap liquor to get rid of that pain." Annie looked at Brady with tears in her eyes. "I didn't want to end up like her."

Those inches between them pushed on her stomach like a heavy weight; it hurt, physically hurt. Annie glanced up behind his head towards the guard station, before looking back at Brady and his crestfallen face.

What hurt was, there were no amount of words a person could say take it all away, to magically get Annie back home to watch her mother's passing, to be there with her family.

War didn't care, the Germans didn't care, life didn't care.

Despite being dealt the short straw with a mother who wanted nothing to do with her, Annie still wanted to be there for the end of her life. She still had that want to be there for a mother who was still her blood. And that want made the guilt explode inside her chest and suffocate herself nearly to death.

"It's why you joined up," Brady whispered quietly, looking down at her, "in the USAAF. You didn't want that life."

"Yeah." Annie whispered back with a nod, "I'm sorry, you probably came out here to want to talk about anything else rather than this." Annie reached up to wipe at her eyes, but Brady only gave her a smile and watched her.

"You know I came out here because I wanted to be with you, you know that?" Brady said with a sad smile, "Now, c'mon, you got me interested now. What was it like? Joining up for yourself?" Annie watched him and couldn't help but smile a bit.

"It was probably the proudest I'd been of myself in my life, to be honest." she said, "Especially after the war broke out and I had enough money to get myself doing something more than farm work. I flew a few planes with kids from school. At the fair. Little things, but enough to make me want to do it more." Annie smiled up at him. "And sometimes they say you can't do something and usually that's enough to make someone do it."

Brady seemed to step forward and cut off that silent agreement to not make contact when outside the bunkhouse or in daylight hours - and he didn't seem to care.

For a moment, they just took to watching one another there, listening to the sounds around them, the chatter of voices in the background, the shuffling of feet, the linger of stale air. It was consuming, but yet, when looking at Brady, she didn't quite mind the sudden presence and stillness of the world around her.

"I remember seeing a poster," Annie said quietly with a smile, "in the local market. Surprised something like that even made it up, that's to say, even got put up in a market in Mankato, but….I saw it and." Annie looked to him. "I knew what I wanted to do right then and there. Then I signed up. 'Your Fight Too Sign'. Must've gotten the masses out because of that." And Brady juts smiled at her that wide grin, standing there like he couldn't look away from the sight of her. Despite where they were, despite it all, he could still stand there and look at her like that.

"What about after this?" Brady asked her, "Where you going?"

"I always wanted to be a mother." Annie said quietly, her heart squeezing as Brady's head tilted to the side and that certain, pained look erupted across his face as his fingers trailed to the side of her cheek. She nodded.

"You will be." Brady said quietly, encouraging smile on his lips, "When you get out of this. That guy's a lucky son-of-a-bitch." Annie watched him, her big eyes exploring his face before settling on his gaze again.

You, she thought, I want you to be that lucky son-of-a-bitch. And she couldn't seem to form the words, tell him that all she ever wanted was right here in front of her, but that look in his eyes, the war standing around them, she couldn't. Making promises that she wasn't sure would come true or not.

"Do you want kids?" Annie asked him quietly, watching as Brady smiled just as the word 'kids' left her lips. She managed a watery smile. "You'd be such a good dad. I know that."

"I do." he said with a small smile, "Always have."

"I know you'd be a good one because that one time I got way too drunk, you made sure I got into my bunk and had water and ate the next morning. You even let me use your sunglasses. And you didn't have to, but you did it just because." Annie said with a smile, watery grin, "They'll be lucky." Brady watched her inches from her face, seemingly taking a minute to simply watch her and then nodded.

"They will be." he whispered back, before licking his lips and smiling at her, "Why do you want to be a mother?" Annie watched him.

"My mother told me I wouldn't be one. A good one." Annie said quietly, watching as something shifted in Brady's gaze - from soft to protective in a manner of seconds that was enough to make her heart race, "But it means I can selflessly love this child that is my own. Nuture them into their life, fulfill them with all that is goodness and love that I never got myself. Give them a better life than what my own childhood was. I can give them what they deserve." Annie smiled. "I get to be the person I never had." The emotion swirling in Brady's gaze was enough to make her smile, eyes welling with tears, and reach out towards him and brush his cheek fondly.

"That's what growing up is sometimes, not for everyone," she said, "being the person you never had when you were little." Brady seemed to lean into her touch a bit as they stood there, cuddled in jackets and wool sweaters and warm hands, underneath a cold and frostbitten sun, staring at each other like it was their last time together ever again.

"What are you going to do if we get out of here?" she asked him quietly.

"We will." Brady said back to her, clenching his jaw, "We're getting out of here. One another or another." Annie stared at him. "I'll be heading back to New York, most likely." Annie cracked a smile at him.

"With your parents?"

"Yeah." Brady said, "I'll try and get my gig back teaching. Play some more music." Brady watched her. "I can finally take you on a date." Somewhere in that string of words, Annie felt her body shutter to a stop and all she could do was stare back at Brady with wide eyes, slightly glazed over and frozen as she watched him.

"A date?" she asked him quietly and Brady grinned instantly, and nodded.

"A date." he said quietly back, "You and me. Where I grew up. In the mountains." Annie couldn't help but watch him with some much awe in her eyes - despite how battered and bruised they looked, he was making promises that could be hard to keep in a place like this, looking at her the way he did. He didn't seem to care or mind and when he looked at her that way, she believed it would happen to.

She wanted a life outside of this and she wanted, somehow, someway, to share that with John Brady.

"I'd love that. With you." Annie said quietly with a smile, staring at him with wide eye still, taken aback by his words, his forwardness, his sudden step over that invisible line they had drawn when they had both started acting like more than just friends. When whatever 'this' was appeared more than just what friends were to each other. And they'd been just too scared to acknowledge that maybe there was something more there.

"What's it like? New York?" she asked him quietly as she stared at him. Brady grinned.

"You'll have to wait and see. It's a surprise." he said with a chuckle, "One that'll be worth waiting for."

"What about a hint." Annie said quietly back to him, "In the mountains and all?"

"Here," Brady said softly, placing his hands on her shoulders and slowly turning her towards the barbed wire fence and holding her there. Warm hands on her shoulders, pulsating through to her skin, she felt a shiver run over her as his face appeared above her shoulder.

"You see that out there? All that greenery, trees, shrubbery?" he asked her with a smile, a nostalgic twinge to his voice that made her long for the sight of where John Brady had lived and breathed as a small child - who had grown to become the person standing there with her now. What had made him to be the person he is today. Her heart clenched.

"Imagine all the birds out there, the wildlife. Frogs, birds, foxes, sometimes bears, the cicadas in the summer. Leaving the windows open. You can hear the frogs from the lake. Everything's alive." Brady said, his voice dropping, "So different from here." Annie tilted her head to look up at him. "You'd love it, Annie."

Staring at him there on her shoulder, she slowly felt his arms wrap around her neck loosely and hold her against him. Leaning back against his chest, enveloped in the warmth from his jacket and his arms and simply his body, she had never felt more relaxed in a place like this, comforted by the touch of a person who she was growing more and more feelings and thoughts for by this point in time. And someone who had seen her in far too many phases of life now than she would've thought.

Looking out past that fence, she did imagine a life in New York, near those Finger Lakes, John Brady playing his saxophone as the sun set, listening to the frogs and the cicadas and the birds, his gentle, jazzy thrum, watching his eyes glow with mirth and life, a quiet step away from war and this camp and the world. A place where she could let herself simply be. A home. With him.

And for a moment standing there, she could imagine her life where it was just the two of them, watching the sunset, listening to the world around them, being enveloped in the presence of one another. She could practically feel it, reach out and grab it with her fingertips. It was so close. It was right there.

[thresholdbb]

Sometimes you just sit in a room while Kate reads to you

[aelswiths]

Aelswith & Aethelflaed (aka Aelswith being so proud of her baby girl) in 2x03

[lorainedoesthings]

Coming on to say that chapter 5 is… a thing. I’m not even going to lable it, it’s its own thing. I’m very scared of it. It’s going in the opposite direction from which it started.

[labradorable]

mentioned once after sexting with my long distance bf that i was gross but didn't wanna move and he said some day he would clean me up himself so i didn't have to worry about it...... today (after legitimately the best sexual pleasure ive ever experienced??? jesus) he got up to grab wipes and just so gently and lovingly cleaned me up before walking me to the shower and. um. bursts into tears

[vampiremansionpoolboy-moved]

going insane over the fact that happiness and care and concern and love is underneath every interaction between newt and hermann in pacific rim

[longagoitwastuesday]

*reading a thesis about the evolution of the concept of infinity in China with a large amount of tabs open with diverse articles or word combinations to further look for information, all the while seething, blood boiling* I wish Satoru Gojo would fucking cease to exist

[eliasbouchardslut]

she doesn't think you're abandoning her. she has served you well for many years and she is tired now. let her rest. I love you. you are abandoning no one, disappointing no one who matters. and she knows this. let her rest, now.

gd i know you're right but fuck it's so hard to say goodbye i'm so bad at it like i know it's a damn car but she's been a constant in my life for 7 whole years.... i just imagined seeing her for the last time and burst into tears. ugghhhhhh

[sschmendrick]

I kinda miss hanging out with old people. All my friends used to be old people.

But the older I grow, and the more I'm expected to behave well like a normal adult, the harder I find it to keep those links. I'm lost between trying to stick to a script I don't know the words of to have a proper normal and interesting relationship for them, and allowing myself to screw up a little, be boring, be interested in stuff they aren't, having opinions they don't agree with (for silly stuff like music, though yk me), not be cool. Cause the latter stresses me out. Cause I see no reason for people to want to be friends with me if not that.

[dapurinthos]

you waited a single month before picking up a new kid.

i cannot believe you. this is up there with realising that this is happening at a place called shurrupak with a green beach, named after the sumerian city of shuruppak, also the namesake of shrupak, the holiest site on kaleesh, located on the shore of an ocean. i'm not saying this is the yam'rii crisis, where the kaleesh were pushing them off of their planet because they were 1) enslaving them and 2) eating the eggs of sentient creatures & the yam'rii/huk got the trade federation to tattle to the senate and the jedi to intervene on their behalf, causing general grievous's all-consuming hatred of the jedi.

now: am i saying this is part of the huk war? not really. am i saying this is part of the bitthævian war, ported over from legends in a sly-wink-wink-nudge-nudge way, that dooku & qui-gon fought in, where the republic convinced the kaleesh that the bitthævians were going to invade them so they would fight for the republic aka the war that grievous's own great-grandmother fought in? yes.

(the same way that shili is located in the same sector as yinchorr, which makes it plausible that that event is also still canon and plo koon picked ahsoka up, taking a detour on the way back from the battle of uhanayih.)

[padfootastic]

Sunday Snippet

tagged by by @narcissa-black-supermacy and since i’m incapable of anything except our first cousins au rn, here’s a lil sneak peak.

“Now, I realise Walburga has a—different style but—“

“You can say gaudy, Atta, it’s okay,” Sirius adds cheekily.

“—but it isn’t right that you’ve not been taught how to take care of all this,” she runs a gentle hand down Sirius’ tightly braided hair. “A girl’s hair is, after all, one of her most precious possessions.”

“Take care of all this?” Sirius echoes, wondering what she meant by that. Of course, she knows that most of the reason her hair is the way it is for convenience’s sake. Tying your hair in a loose ponytail or a messy bun only works if you’re a white girl with silky straight hair. Less than ten minutes of keeping her hair unbound and it became pricklier than a thorn bush. She also knows that there’s ways, if she so chooses, that she can look different. She’s seen the other brown girls in her schools noticed their intricate styles that looked nothing like her own strictly ordered, slicked back hair.

Euphemia cups Sirius’ chin with her thumb and forefinger, guiding grey eyes to brown. “You’re beautiful as you are, Sirius, but you shouldn’t have to fight your body, not now nor ever. It’s an extension of yourself, don’t forget treat it as such.”

And as Sirius sits there, still horribly confused, over the course of the next hour, she gets a crash course in the art of taking care of curly hair. Not waves, like she’d always thought, but curls. She’d never realised how similar their hair types were—Effie atta preferred clipping it in the back, daringly open—but after the time they spent together, Sirius was amazed.

Because her aunt was right—she had been fighting parts of her body for her entire life. Hair too unruly? Shove it into a brain or bun tight enough to cut off circulation. Breasts not cooperating? Squeeze into an extra sports bra on top, no matter the strain on her shoulders. Pimples? Popped on sight, no mercy. Not one thing was easy, or gentle.

She never realised her body could be made for gentleness, that she could learn to be so. Sirius had to grow up strong—kids were both cruel and thoughtless, a terrible combination for anyone who looked the way she did and spoke in the accent she had. Mama tried, but she had to spend so much time on her own self that it left little for her. Besides, she’s glad she didn’t learn from her mama; no one wants to be like Walburga, not if they didn’t severely hate themselves. What Sirius knows, she scraped together herself.

open tag for anyone who wants to show off a lil ;) go for it!

[katyspersonal]

Idk why you get hate when your blog is one of the most honest i have come across and your lore posts are so meta that i don’t even think most bb youtubers have discovered what you have lol. Y’all just got jealous haters.

It is far not the first time I've heard explanation that people are just jealous, really :') 👍 Like... That Alfred-chan (aka Clod Frollo) simply hated me and was jealous and latched onto the first chance to justify the unending wish to remove me is painfully apparent at this rate. Inventing up bigotry, harm and opinions that were never there to get the chance to declare someone you hate a "witch" is the oldest trick in the book! If you convince people the person is bad and harmful, you are automatically justified to treat them however you want.

It might be my lore, because they were really mad at the fact that I write essays on multiple occasions? Like, they try to paint it as me "having no life" or "being mad", but. dude. dude you are projecting. If the only way you could write essay on a topic you care about is abandoning all your chores and needs and/or getting mad at someone, then I have bad news for your intellect? :/ This is a very common attitude from people that cannot say anything interesting on their own and just post the same two-sentence brainlet takes about how much male characters/fans suck or how their [LGBT headcanon] is the only true interpretation and everyone who disagrees can't analyse media. 🤔 So how can they feel better about not having as many interesting headcanons or good theories? They've picked the low-effort way - to attempt destroying the value of "lore essays" by painting them as a bad thing! I will be real tho - they've gotten like, two asks about their headcanons in a lifetime (both about the same character, ironically) and shown that they CAN post something good when they want to, so eventually it is the matter of choosing low-effort way. Destroying is easier than creating!

It could also be freedom, and honesty, like you said. Some people's only trump card is being """good"""! Some people think if they put 'transphobes DNI' in their bio and regularly seek to call out bigotry that isn't here they are automatically a good person who is now allowed to stalk, harass, be toxic in general and push even genuinely innocent people under the bus. But I do not have to compensate for lack of personality and latch onto any ideology or activism - I am already a pretty awesome and interesting individual on my own. 😎 Not to mention how they have to put on the hard show of fighting "for the common good" to keep their following engaged, meanwhile I still have very genuine and deep support even despite my honest fuck-ups (forget the fabricated accusations!). I don't have any other theory than them knowing (maybe subconsciously) that by surrounding themselves by witch-hunters ideological soldiers, they've trapped themselves in the situation where if THEY fuck up - their "fans" will turn on them, if not cancel them. Building following based on ideology instead of shared interest (or one's own unique radiant personality, like mine 😎) is the worst thing you can do to yourself. Because... guess what? Correct, because that sort of people eats their own.

________________________

I'd appreciate no more personal asks like this for some time, because I genuinely start to feel guilty talking about myself so much (in my personal blog.... hmmm logical...). But again, kids, remember - you must make your worth with cool shit like talent, great personality traits, positively encouraging others, etc and not in ideology and making up witches you could "defeat". That person has the capacity by having some nice ideas, being able to craft stuff, drawing. They could easily win all the supporters they've lost back and outgrow me by LARGE merit if they apologised, admitted mistakes and committed to cultivating positive emotions, discussions and content. It is basically so easy and it is so much cringe to take so many Ls because of jealousy and obsession?