#anyone but like two people. so this ought to be fun. i would try edits but i suck at anything other than rudimentary editing imo

[a-cloud-for-dreams]

Mira's Unofficial RC VDay List

here's a list of everyone i want to write for but in case i don't maybe this will spark someone else's creativity

gabrielamala (if they're not on the list consider me gone) || forbidden romance/making-out in secret OR unrequited love/cooking together

dorandevi (*insert discord feral dog meme here*) || forbidden romance/making-out in secret OR idiots in love/blushing

audreymalek (yes he's my lil freak i love him & academia LIs leave me alone) || star-crossed lovers/hickeys

dmitrylane or greglane (idk i love them both) || only one bed/blanket-sharing

vespernova || childhood sweethearts/“we were never just friends”

audreydavid (for llili chan <3) || kissing in the rain

vyx with anyone (probably ava) || sunny vs grumpy/slow-dancing

[numericalpie]

I am assuming the questions are in your post? Lol? Not sure...

My lovely mutuals, consider yourselves tagged if a fanfic-author game would apply to you!

How many works on ao3?

7! Honestly I never thought I would get past one

Top 5 by kudos:

the merciless old verities | This is the only work I've done for a prominent ship in my main fandom, so tbh I kind of expected it, but it's a lot of fun! It ballooned quickly away from what I thought it would be and I'm a little scared of it sometimes. You can only write so many death scenes before even that becomes route, y'know?

gonna die in a small town | oh my god I LOVE this one. holy shit. It is my only Stardew Valley fic - I might write more eventually - and it's just a vaguely slice of lifeish romp around how the Stardew villagers would experience my first save file. I love it so much. Eventually I ought to write a sequel.

what's your name? | One of the things that has always bugged me about the acotar world is how quickly Clare Beddor's death is brushed aside, as well as the strange relationship between Feyre and Nesta. So here, I stuck the two things together and killed Nesta instead of Clare. Mostly this focuses on the buildup to the event, but still. A lot on their childhood, too, and pre-canon lore that I wish we got more of in the series. Or maybe not. I don't think I'd trust Maas with that, tbh. It was really important to write, for me, and the response I've gotten has indicated that it impacted others as well. Which is frankly delightful.

if we dreamt of snow | My getting-back-to-writing-fic. My baby. My 117k demon. I love her to bits and pieces. I already cannot reread her without forcefully reminding myself that I swore I would not go back and edit anything, so I could see how (and if) my writing progressed. Honestly I still cannot believe I wrote it.

everything in life is about death | Nesta instead of Clare, the remix. It turns out I had more to say. Or I wanted a different way to say it. This one focuses more on the aftereffects of her death. Could it be better? Yes, but as it is I think it accomplishes what I wanted it to. Surely that means something!

Do I respond to comments?

Yes! It absolutely floors me that anyone reads what I write at all. Comments make my day every single time

Angstiest ending?

I cannot emphasize enough, I wrote two separate fics in which I killed Nesta and Feyre had a hell of a lot to process about it. It's a toss-up, I think. Probably what's your name?

Happiest ending?

if we dreamt of snow by a landslide.

Do I write crossovers?

No, but that's not to say I wouldn't. If I ever found the right thing, maybe. I could see myself sitting Stardew Pierre down with Raskolnikov from Crime and Punishment. I should write that.

Ever received hate?

No! Everyone's been very nice. And, to echo dear @vvalllerie - who is 100% lying btw, I've never touched Haikyuu in my life and I still read Valerie's fics from time to time - I don't think what I'm putting out is good enough to warrant that kind of attention.

Ever had a fic translated?

No.

Ever co-written?

Also no. I would in theory be open.

All-time favorite ship?

Honestly, I couldn't tell you if I tried.

wip that I will probably never finish: the merciless old verities. I'm still chipping away at it, but guys I'm not kidding when I say this thing has ballooned beyond my comprehension.

Writing strengths?

I feel like I'm pretty good at worldbuilding. It's all subjective, though. Sometimes I produce decent descriptive paragraphs and etc.

Writing weaknesses?

I cannot, and I do mean cannot, write about people having sex or romantic interactions. It is a struggle every single time. The other part, the intimacy of knowing someone, I think I can do. But the other day I sat down with the goal of writing a cute little f/f story and I instead wrote 6k of an entirely different story that did not, in fact, feature romance at all. I was simply trying to get out the bisexual urge to daydream about women and instead exorcized a demon or something.

Thoughts on writing dialogue in different languages?

I have done this, though rarely, and tried to be as respectful as possible. If I know the language myself I tend to be more confident.

Fandom/ship I haven't written for yet?

Within me there is something brewing for the Oresteia. I've been thinking about Clytemnestra for so long. Someday I'll write it.

Favorite fic I've ever written?

if we dreamt of snow, my forever baby. And kinda hectic inside, because every single time I sit down and try my hardest to channel the 300k enemies-to-lovers we all want to have within ourselves. And then I write something with Mariah Carey blaring. It's so fun, I really recommend listening to "Heartbreaker" while writing banter. Nothing like it!

okay whatever this thing is, thank you @kings-highway for the tag. i enjoyed delaying my getting out of bed at 3:30 in the afternoon in favor of this

how many works on ao3:

22! which considering i’ve been writing for less than a year, is pretty good in my opinion

top 5 by kudos:

1. the craving (shouyou’s version). i’m actually really proud of this one and it’s one of my favorites that i’ve written. based on the craving by twenty one pilots, of course

2. Illness, Injuries, and Iceland. guaranteed this is because i wrote it for king and they reblogged it. thanks pookie for making me write ushiten

3. Sweet. this one.. i wrote based on my own experiences with depression. it’s very difficult for me to express these types of feelings explicitly so i love to project onto my fav characters. daisuga especially

4. Love, In Itself. i’m actually really surprised at this one because it’s pretty short and it was actually a request from a friend!

5. Cry. my one and only oisuga fic, only got one chapter. apologies for making daichi the bad guy

do i respond to comments:

yes! i try very hard to respond to every comment i get. i love getting comments since i don’t get very many, and i know the amazing feeling of having an author acknowledge you and thank you for your comment, so i try to let people know that i appreciate each and every comment i get!

angstiest ending:

uhhhhh it’s not done yet, but run (until you feel your lungs bleeding) is gonna be SO angsty hehehe. iwaoi of course. i’m very excited for it. if you want one i’ve already finished, tho, it’ll have to be i know that losing dogs exist, because i bet on them and i am one. sakuatsu, mcd, entirely based on my own experience w a disastrous breakup i had. thank you to king again for being there when i needed it most.

happiest ending:

well most of them are. but in my opinion, it’ll have to be my iwasuga fic Quetzalcoatlus! one of my FAVORITE fics i’ve written. i just. *sniffle* i just love them so much

do i write crossovers:

no. honestly i don’t see the point. i like getting immersed in the fics and i can’t do that if they aren’t even the same fandom

ever received hate:

nope. only some very disappointed commenters begging for me to continue my fics. im sorry guys i promise im trying

do i write smut:

none that you’ll ever see. a very select few people have access to it.

ever had a fic stolen:

no idea. probably not. they aren’t good enough for that

ever had a fic translated:

nope. have had a few people comment in different languages tho that was pretty cool

ever co-written:

no way. i need control. what the hell. MY fics. did have an idea for a collab but dunno if the other person even wants to do it still. if you got this far down tho please let me know if u do 🙏

all-time favorite ship:

sorry to everyone who thought it was daisuga. it’s oidai. forever. my babies.

wip that i will probably never finish:

unfortunately, i have a trio of wips that all go together. all mcd fics, one happy, one sad, and one right in the middle. iwaoi is the sad one, daisuga is the happy one, and the one right in the middle is sakuatsu. all titled from/based on songs

writing strengths:

uhhhh. uhhh. the characters? making them relatable? no idea. not sure if i have any. i’m just vibing

writing weaknesses:

erm. probably the fact that i start long fics with only an idea and no plans, so then i never finish them because i was just writing as it came to me

thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages:

dunno. do what you want. i’ll only do it if i know that language

fandom/ship i haven’t written for yet:

oidai. i know, i know. i really want to but it has to be PERFECT so i just. haven’t done it yet

favorite fic i’ve written:

chaos theory, no doubt. haikyuu and dinosaurs? two of my favorite things ever? yeah, no hesitation, it’s chaos theory

tags:

i dunno who’s been tagged in this already so if you have just ignore this. buuuuut here pookies <3

@numericalpie @artisticxlly @thatfanficauthor107 @otakurooster907 @cabbybaby

[fire-emblem-drabbles]

Pairing: Josuke x reader

Prompt: “Who hurt you?”

Description: You weren’t meant for stand combat, that you knew. Love Club was worthless in a fight. Still, you hadn’t expected to be ambushed like that; if you survived to ever see Red Hot Chili Peppers stand user, though, he would have a lot more to worry about than your stand... You're lucky, then, that Josuke happened by your sad form.

Content Warning: mentions of minor blood and gore

Rating: Sfw

Word Count: 955

Notes: Lmao so this was meant to be a yandere prompt, and boy did I try but it just took a life of its own and said ‘nah I don’t wanna’. Regardless, I like it.

Edited: This one wasn't too bad, just some spacing and minor fixes.

~*~

Fuck it hurt, it hurt so bad.

How were you supposed to know your stand didn’t work on other stands-- just on other people? It’s not like you could fight Red Hot Chili Peppers with your stand. No, Love Club was useless in combat.

You were lucky you could grab her and run somewhere where he couldn’t follow you. Still, here, right next to the sea bleeding out wasn’t your idea of fun.

You couldn’t move the two of you anywhere else safely at this moment. You could only hope Chili Peppers got bored and went off to do other things.

You were too weak to call back Love Club right now. And she was a stand other people could see… granted, she looked like an ordinary cat, it still probably wouldn’t look good if anyone saw both you and a cat bleeding from large stomach wounds.

You weren’t sure what to do. You doubted anyone knew were you were here--you had been attacked while you were all alone after all. You had thrown your phone somewhere so Chili Peppers couldn’t hurt you any more, so calling anyone was out.

Maybe the two of you would just lay here and bleed out by the ocean… There were worse ways to go, right?

“I’m… I’m sorry Love Club… I… I don’t think we can get out of this one.”

Weak as she was, Love Club still gently nuzzled her head into your palm, laying beside you where the shore met the grass.

“I hope… I hope Josuke and the others are okay. And that they kick the shit out of Chili Pepper and his user for us!”

You gasped at a particularly sharp pain, groaning as it blossomed all over your stomach and chest. Okay, yeah, this sucked pretty bad. If you made it out of this alive and ever met his user a stand fight wouldn’t even be necessary-- you would kick his ass yourself.

You had finally closed your eyes, ready to resign yourself to your fate when you heard a voice-- a familiar one at that.

“Hey, _____, there are better places to take naps you know.”

Were you just hearing things or was that Josuke?

You didn’t dare move much lest you cause yourself to bleed more but still, you peaked open an eye to see his lazy form approaching you from the cliffs.

“Josuke I swear to god--!” You choked on your breath, heaving heavily as you sat up on your elbows. “This is no time for your lame fucking… fuck… lame fucking jokes!” You took a deep breath. “I’m dying over hear asshole!”

His bright blue eyes widened as he saw you clutching the side of your stomach with Love Club by you not looking much better.

“Oh shit!” He sprinted the rest of the way towards you, kneeling by both your bleeding forms. “I had no idea you were hurt, shit, shit…” He was panicking, watching as you merely groaned and flopped over again in pain.

“Just heal me you idiot!” The words hurt to leave your throat, it was so sore and dry. You ought to hit Josuke after this.

“Uhh, right! Right…!”

With that Crazy Diamond came out and worked his magic, making it so it was as if you and Love Club had never been viciously attacked by Chili Peppers in the first place.

You sat up with a deep breath. It still hurt, a lot, but at least you could move and breath properly again.

Suddenly serious now that you were more lively, Josuke spoke. “How did this happen? Who hurt you?” He growled out, looking around the area.

“Who do you think? It was Red Hot Chili Peppers.” You frowned, watching as Love Club happily cuddled into Josuke. She always did like to be pet by him…

“That asshole!” Josuke tightened the fist of his free hand, glaring off into the distant ocean. “He should have known by now you can’t fight back!”

“No shit, why do you think he went after me when I was alone!” You sighed, shaking your head. “Man… this really sucks.” You continued looking down at your stand. Chili Peppers may have been a bird but Love Club really could do nothing about him…

“You can’t go out alone anymore _____.” Josuke looked serious as he caught your gaze. “You and Love Club… an enemy stand user could take you down at any moment. If I hadn’t come in time…” Josuke looked away for a moment, not wanting to say the words.

“Listen, listen I know… but Josuke it’s not like you can be with me at every moment.” You frowned.

“We’ll see about that.” Josuke stood and offered you a hand, which you gratefully took, blush dusting your cheeks. “I’m gonna keep you and Love Club safe from now on, okay?” You nodded dumbly, a little taken aback by Josuke’s claim as you picked up your stand.

“Y-yeah um… if you say so.” You tried to stay nonchalant, so he wouldn’t realize the words were getting to you. “I believe in you Josuke so um… I know you can do it, and all that.” You waved your hand dismissively at him.

“Now uh, lets hurry up and find my phone, okay? I had to throw it somewhere so Chili Peppers couldn’t follow me…” You rushed on ahead intent on finding it in the field.

In doing so, you missed the dumb smile that came to Josuke’s face, and the charming blush that came with it.

“I won’t let you down!” Josuke ran beside you, laughing all the way. You couldn’t help but smile as well. Maybe today didn’t have to be so bad after all…

[poptod]

Pretty, Little Doll (Merriel Shelton x Reader)

Description: Merriel makes friends with the pretty little doll serving ice cream.

Notes: jus thinking about ice cream. implied female reader, but this.. is too much. theres just too much here. youve been warned. edit: wait no u havent. the warning is that theres suggestive themes and such WC: 2.3k

+

After working long hours in the broiling sun of the south, what felt best down his parched throat was a beer––a bar where many of his friends and coworkers drank at, and the waitresses wore low-cut dresses with short hems and long stockings. That sight went down wonderfully with several drinks, but what drew his attention today was a newly opened shop.

There was no sign, but the large, pristine windows gave a good view of the inside. Clean, white walls with several tables and chairs to the left, and a counter to order at on the right. Behind it stood you, dressed to the nines in ruffles and bows as you opened up the shop, displaying buckets of ice cream.

Merriel grinned. Lopsided and toothy, and he jogged inside, sweat and dirt still trailing down his skin and clothes. With his shirt slung over his bare shoulder, he met your eye and his cocky smile returned as his chin tilted high.

"Afternoon," he drawled as he approached the counter, barely grazing over the different flavors before returning to you.

"Good afternoon," you said in a much quieter voice, though you did mimic his smile, just more politely. "How may I help you?"

"You new here?" He asked, gesturing generally to the shop.

"Oh, yes," you said. "My grandmother always wanted an ice cream parlor, so.. I thought I could help her."

"That's awful sweet of ya," he said as he leant on the counter, tilting ever closer to you. "This ice cream sweet as you, boo?"

Your mouth fell open, eyes widening as you did a double take. For a moment you were at a loss for words, but you quickly attempted to stammer out a response, a blush burning your face.

"Well, um, we have, uh, strawberry, and um.. chocolate, vanilla, cherry, and uh, banana. And bourbon."

"Bourbon?" He said, a single brow kinked upwards.

"It's my grandma's favorite," you said with a sheepish chuckle.

"Damn, girl. Grandma knows how to have fun," he laughed.

"Would you like to try it?"

Only if I can lick it off you, he thought, his attention drifting to the soft skin of your neck. The thought of it melting down and pooling in your clavicle. While usually he didn't bother to censor himself for anyone, you seemed a little fainthearted. His chances with you would probably be ruined after one too-strange comment.

"Sure," was what he said instead. "Long as it's cold I don't care."

"I understand that. I moved here recently and it's certainly something to try and adapt to the heat," you rambled as you stuck a tiny plastic spoon in the bourbon ice cream, giving him the single bite. "Are you a local?"

"Been here long's I remember," he said, taking the spoon. "What time do ya get off today?"

"Oh, um," you fixed the ruffles on your collar, "I won't be finished till late. We're not all set up yet."

"If y' need some help, I'd be happy to offer my expertise. I do a hell of a lot a' nailin' things ta the wall."

You stared at him again, once more losing your words. He hadn't quite meant what he said, but the fluster he left you in had him grinning, humored by the connotation you'd incorrectly understood.

"That – that'd be very nice of you," you said, wringing your hands. "I don't want to bother you. You look.. busy."

He didn't miss how your eyes raked up his body, from his wrinkled, dusty pants up his bare waist and chest still gleaming with the sweat of morning work. His jaw could cut hearts and he knew that very well; accented it whenever he could as he cocked his chin upwards, watching carefully as your breath froze.

"I won't be busy tonight. How 'bout this." He walked up right to the counter, pressing his hips into the edge of it. "I come after I finish up ma' own job, and I'll give ya' a hand. Don't even gotta pay me."

"Really? But –"

"Don't worry 'bout it. 'S nothin' for a pretty doll like you."

"At least let me get you a cone? It's hot out today," you offered, reaching for the largest waffle cones you had.

The guys wouldn't really take well to him eating ice cream instead of drinking, but he figured they'd eat their words when they saw you.

"Won't say no to that."

As much as he wanted to boast about you, how pretty and sweet you were and how he so easily slid his way into your life, he didn't want his friends finding your shop and vandalizing it with their own dirty boots and flirtatious looks. Only he could do that.

In the evening he returned as promised, having walked from his house on the outskirts of town to your shop on the main street. The build, decorum, and location of the shop screamed rich family to him. No one in his state would be able to afford a business on main street, much less fully renovated and repainted. He could ask you, he decided, about your family, your grandmother, and of course you.

Inside, you were closing up the tubs of ice cream, hauling them out of the display case and into a back storage room. He knocked before he entered, earning a muffled 'come in!' from you.

Before either of you could speak, both the buckets in your arms began to slip, and he ran round to the other side of the counter to help. He took one from you to ease the load.

"Careful, cher," he said, grabbing another bucket in his other arm. "Don't wanna break yaself."

"Thank you," you said, mostly ignoring his comment. "My grandma is in the other room, so just, um.. be polite and proper."

Fat fuckin' chance, he thought in his head, but fortunately did not say aloud as he followed you.

The door swung open into a freezer room, where an old lady stood in the corner, covered head to toe in coats as she stirred.

"I keep telling you to let me do that," you sighed, setting down your container before rushing to her side.

"I can do it quite well myself. I'm not useless, you know," your grandmother said, staring you down with a glare. You hesitated, gauging her carefully, before you relented with another exasperated sigh.

"Fine, alright," you said quietly. "I'll go work on hanging up all the paintings and such."

"Thank you, dear."

You motioned to him as you passed by, pushing open the door and heading out of the freezer. He once again followed you, watching your ass with a grin you never saw.

"We need to hang up these," you said as you brought him to one of the circular tables, each of which carried a small pile of paintings, license plates, or tin posters.

"You got a ladder?" He asked, glancing to the high walls.

"Yes sir," you said, sorting through the different posters. He quirked a brow, intrigued by the possibility of that nickname.

"I neva did get ya name," he said as he leant on one of the tables.

"(Y/N). What's yours?"

"Pretty name for a pretty doll," he half sung, the same, one-sided smile stretched lazily across his face. "My name's Merriel."

"Also a pretty name," you said, picking the largest poster to start with. A pin-up girl in a sailor's suit. "Our ladder isn't all that steady. Will you hold it for me?"

He opened his mouth to offer himself up, but with one look to the ruffled skirt you wore, he shut himself up.

"'Course," was what he said instead.

Everything was a bit of a game––one you were unwittingly a part of, and one where you played your role rather well. A sweet, unassuming little thing, essentially a toy for him, accepting his help and letting him in. He hated to act the predator, but when it came to you he couldn't help it.

That was how he saw it. Hunting you down and taking you for his own at the end of a long chase. However, to any outsider, it appeared in a much simpler way; a young man doing anything for someone he'd developed a crush on. That was how it truly was, though the innocence of his crush was abruptly stripped away as he held the ladder, staring shamelessly up your skirt.

"Merriel?"

"Huh?" He said, broken out of his dreamy trance.

"I said could you hand me another nail," you said, pointing towards the package of nails with your hammer.

"Oh. You sure ya ain't gonna fall if I leave?" He asked with a grin. You chuckled, shaking your head.

"I'll be alright."

"If you say so, boo."

After a little while he supposed he ought to offer some more help than holding a rickety ladder, and took your place at the top with a hammer in his hand and nails in his mouth. As promised, his experience with nailing things to the wall (nails specifically, not women) made him much faster than you, and the entirety of the wall behind the counter was covered within fifty minutes.

"Thank you for your help, again," you said as you put away the hammer and nails.

"My pleasure," he said, the image of your thighs still fresh in his mind. "If y' ever need help.. I'm happy t' to be of service."

"Well, thank you. Come stop by again soon. On the house," you said as he left, peeking your head out the door and giggling.

"You know I'm stoppin' by again, get two things done in one trip. Some'in sweet for th' eyes and the tongue," he laughed, watching your face light up with a blush.

And it ain't just the ice cream, he thought.

Over the course of the coming summer, he left drinking for the evening, and instead visited your shop over his lunch break. You insisted on giving his cones for free considering he continued to help you out, but he usually found ways to sneak you the money anyway. You were not, as he assumed earlier, a very rich family.

His favorite activity, which he found rather early on, was to sit outside on burning hot days, his shirt draped over the back of his chair as he ate. Through the pristine glass, he spied you watching him often.

You couldn't help it either. Most of your life was spent in your family cabin, cutting you off from many teen and early adulthood experiences. People flirting with you was a lot to deal with, especially when it came from someone as pretty as him, the smooth dips and ripples of his lean muscles shining with sweat and dirt from his construction site.

His tongue. Ever since he made that comment on that first evening you met, you hadn't been able to get it out of your mind. How it rolled and drawled between his puffy lips drawn backwards with his teeth, in a very specific method you'd pinned down to 'the Tongue Thing'.

Your heated, embarrassed blush only worsened as ice cream dripped down his fingers from the heat, cleaned up by a sharp and precise tongue. You could hardly breathe watching him like that, but as he caught your eye you turned quickly away.

His bravado had clearly earned a huge boost from catching you mid-drool, prevalent in his step as he waltzed back into your store. You hardly met his eye, pretending to clean up the counter, but that didn't stop him. He walked right up to you, leaning down with his elbows on the stone, forcing you to stop and look at him, which you did with incredible reluctance.

"You been watchin' me, cher?" He asked, close enough to see his reflection in your wide eyes.

"No," you said quietly.

"A' think you're lyin'," he said, leaning in closer yet. "Betta' not do that. Could land you in some trouble."

You raised your brows.

"Are you threatening me?"

"Not with anythin' ya can't take," he said as he raked his eyes purposefully slow down your body. When you appeared to be at a loss for words, he said, "I'll ask ya again. Were you watching me?"

"... and if I don't answer?" You tested carefully.

"Well then, I think there's too much space between us," he said, grinning cockily as he jumped the counter, crowding you suddenly.

You drew in a sharp breath, backing up as he continued to step forwards till he pinned you to the wall with his hips.

"Tell the truth, baby." he drawled, carefully setting his hands on your hips and pulling you in. Something hard poked you.

"I – I wasn't staring, I –"

He half-grinded into you, pressing you tighter against the wall as his hands drew upwards, resting at your waist.

"Such a pretty thing," he mumbled beneath his breath, watching your stumbling reaction closely.

By pinning you with his hips, he had free roam to move his hands, one of which toyed with the hem of your skirt. It was wrong, certainly, and it was also illegal since you were in plain view of main street, but he lost control the minute his fingertips brushed the soft, supple skin of your thigh.

Your breathing hastened, hips yearning for something, though you didn't know what. When the rough skin of his fingers suddenly brushed inbetween your thighs your hands shot up to steady yourself on Merriel's shoulders. He laughed, running a finger through your lips, finding you already soaked and not wearing underwear. Instantly his laugh faded, devolving into a long, needy moan as his hips once more pushed up into you.

"Th – there's someone – someone coming," you said, eyes darting to the front door.

Immediately he was off you, stepping to the side as you straightened yourself out. You walked forward with shaky legs, which he most definitely noticed, and took the mother and son's orders as usual. When you finished you glanced to him, your heart stopping at the sight of him licking your slick from his fingers.

"I guess your ice cream is as sweet as you, boo," he murmured in your ear, giving you no chance to react before rushing back out to return to his construction job.

[dizzydancingdreamer]

A Very Merry Mikaelson Christmas | Elijah #4 & #10

Request: @iirocioii “Hii!! If you are still taking Christmas requests could you do number 4 and number 10 with Elijah please :)) btw I love your blog!” THANK YOU SO MUCH 💕💕 Please do enjoy :)

Prompt(s): “Where’s that holiday cheer, hmm?” & “Do you think this is enough?” “You bought everything in the store! Twice!”

Word Count: 1.2k

P.s. I edited this in the car if there are mistakes I am sorry

Christmas Master List

“‘Lijah, how many people are coming for Christmas again?” you murmur, standing dangerously close to the edge of the sidewalk as you shuffle through the contents of your bag, “do you think this is enough? I don’t want to run out of cookies tomorrow.”

He huffs, grabbing your jacket and tugging you, a little harshly, back from the cars whizzing past you. In his defence, you are pretty much in the middle of New Orleans traffic. He would prefer not to lose you to the wills of Bourbon Street the day before Christmas. Regardless, though, you still don’t look at him. Do you have enough sprinkles? Maybe you should go back. You’re so distracted you don’t see the people rushing by, almost getting yourself trampled numerous times. How many sugar cookies are you baking again?

“Baby,” he pulls you through the Christmas Eve crowd and into a nook beside the baking shop, his voice a little more high pitched than usual, “you bought everything in the store!” He rests his hands on your shoulders, bending slightly to catch your eyes, “Twice! Unless you’re baking for all of New Orleans I think we’ll be okay.”

He sounds off and your chest stings a little bit. He’s not usually so rough with you. You stare out at the bustle on the street, your palms aching a touch. You set your bags on the ground, wringing your hands together once they’re free. You know it’s not inherently directed at you but his tone is still a tad upsetting. You don’t want him to be mad at you, especially when you’re just trying to do your best to impress his friends and family.

You glance up at him, pouting slightly, “Eli, I’m sorry, I’m just trying to make sure it’s perfect. It’s our first Christmas together.”

Elijah sighs, running a hand through his hair. When he moves it back to your shoulder his hair is a mess, sticking up at weird angles. That won’t do, you muse to yourself, reaching up to smooth it back into place. That’s better. You slide your hands down his chest, grabbing the lapels of his coat. Even when he’s frustrated at you, you can’t help but want to make sure he’s okay. He’s your Elijah, after all, and that doesn’t change when he’s grumpy. He smiles at you, some of the tension leaving his face.

“No, I’m sorry. I know you do, baby,” he leans down further, pressing his lips against yours quickly, “but let's not get hit by cars on Christmas Eve while we do it, okay?”

You giggle, the knot that you didn’t know was building in your stomach unravelling instantly, “you’re no fun. Where’s that holiday cheer, hmm?”

Elijah rolls his eyes, kissing you once more before straightening and grabbing the bags you had set down. You smile gratefully at him- who knew sprinkles could be so heavy- before grabbing onto his arm. The two of you continue down the street, winding through downtown New Orleans and enjoying the winter day. Snow begins falling as your mind wanders once more to the cookies you have to begin baking soon. Is there going to be enough icing for the snowflakes?

“‘Lijah,” he glances down at you, his brows raised, “I really think we ought to go back and get more stuff.”

He laughs, grabbing your hand so he doesn’t lose you as the two of you enter the crowded Witches Christmas Market. It’s an annual event; all the New Orleans covens come together to fundraise money and sell goods. The market draws people from all over, each desperate for a taste of Bourbon Street magic. You don’t blame them, it’s quite the sight. You, however, are here for only one thing and you have just spotted him. Vincent Griffith.

“Why don’t you ask Vincent, love,” Elijah says loud enough to gather the witch’s attention, “I’m sure if anyone will be able to reassure you that you don’t need to bake for the whole of the continental United States, it will be him.”

You swat the man gently, scrunching your nose at him before running to Vincent and throwing yourself against him. He happily wraps you up in his arms, spinning you around and almost bumping into a few people trying to browse the booths around the two of you. They scowl at him but he just rolls his eyes, clearly not at all conscious of the space you’re taking up. You giggle freely, reveling in the chocolate and peppermint scent rolling off of your best friend. This year, as newly appointed regent, it’s officially Vincent’s job to make the hot chocolate for the market. It’s a tradition and each year the recipe is better than the last.

“Darlin’, where have you been?” Vincent sets you on your feet and you sway for a moment, dizzy from his antics, “you’re a ghost these days, I swear.”

A few more giggles slip out as he leads you towards his stand, “haven’t you heard? We’re hosting Christmas tomorrow. Apparently it’s a whole month’s affair.” You slip your arm through his, swinging your limbs back and forth as you walk, “don’t you worry though, Griffith, I would never forget about you.”

Vincent shakes his head, his own laughs swirling through the air, mixing with yours, “I know you, doll. You’re just saying that because you want free hot chocolate.”

“No!” You bump your hip against his, a sheepish smile on your lips, “okay, maybe a little. I do love you though, you know that.”

He passes you a smile, ushering you ahead of him inside the warm booth. He turns to one of many crockpots, lifting the lid and revealing the heady scent of freshly melted chocolate to the tent. You close your eyes, breathing in as much of it as you can. You already know this year’s hot chocolate will be the best yet. You open your eyes to Vincent pouring the heavenly liquid into a canister.

He sets it down before turning to you, holding up a clear bottle of something that smells suspiciously like peppermint liquor, “alright, darlin’, this here is my secret ingredient so you can’t go sharing this with the out-of-towners you hear me?” He shakes the bottle, his eyes shining, “now then, one or two?”

You’re about to be responsible and answer ‘one’ but then you think back to the bags you left in Elijah’s arms and the long hours that you’ll spend baking when you get back to the compound.

Speak of the devil. As if he can hear your thoughts, Elijah steps into the tent, nodding at Vincent and wrapping an arm around you. He doesn’t have the bags anymore, no doubt having already dropped them off while you were distracted. He kisses the top of your head and pulls you against his chest, whispering a quiet I missed you against your hair. You shake your head but snuggle back, catching your best friend’s eye once more.

“Better make it two, Vincent,” you resign, tossing him a grin, “I’ll be up late tonight.”

“That’s my girl!”

[miss-choco-chips]

Robin and Red X

Just a silly thing I wrote for @animemangasoul. Hopefully this makes you laugh a bit, hon! No edit whatsoever.

The titans were having a difficult time reconciling their easy going, funny, sure of himself leader with the hot mess in front of them.

“Uhh…”Wally, the bravest of them all, places a careful hand on his shoulder. “Maybe we should… call your dad?”

Robin turns to look at him so fast it almost looks like his neck broke. Beast boy screams, turns into a rabbit and jumps into Raven’s arms, because the sound that came from Rob’s mouth wasn’t human at all.

“If any of you call Batman, I’ll personally ensure living hell for everyone in the Team. This is MY case!”

Wally hastily retreats, hands up in a surrender gesture. 

“Okay, okay! I’m just saying, chill. This Red X dude has been giving us all too much trouble, maybe Bats could point us in the right direction or…”

They think Dick said ‘no’, but it was more of a demonic screeching.

“But we’ll respect your wishes! Because you are our friend!”, and you scare us shitless, he added in his mind. 

Roy signaled at Wally, the moment Dick turned his back to them again. Something like ‘are we calling the Bat anyway?’, to which Wally replied ‘I don’t have a death wish, fuck no’.

They never really get around to capture Red X, but no one dares to bring up asking Batman for help again. The mysterious anti hero keeps kicking all their asses each and every time they face him, always having a countermeasure for their specific powers or abilities, but honestly? He’s not as scary as an unhinged Dick could be, so they’d rather fight him than wait for bathed breath for Dick’s revenge if they went behind his back to solve the case with his old mentor.

-.-.-.-.-.-

Jason hasn’t inherited the Robin cape from his predecessor. Dick wasn’t happy, seeing a new kid using his suit without permission, when he himself apparently hadn’t been ready to let it go.

But Jason wanted to be Robin. Needed it. All the good he could do… the people like him he could help… This was his chance of doing right. Of proving the world (proving himself) he was not like his father, a complete and utter trash that belonged in the dumpster that was Arkham. That he, a street rat, could be a hero.

So he fought for his right to the mask, even if he sometimes felt the itch to go wild and do his own thing. Because honestly, being Robin was awesome, but having Batman constantly breathing down his neck? Yeah, not so much.

So when Dick, now Nightwing, approached him one afternoon while Bruce was out on business, he was both weary and desperate for some distraction.

Which was exactly what the dude provided.

“What I’m going to show you”, Dick starts, slowly, after he’s checked there are no ears on them, ”it’s Robin’s secret. The only one we manage to keep from Batman. What our ancestors saved for us, our legacy.”

“We are the only two Robins, dipshit.”

“Shut up this is a formal process. Do you wanna know or not?”

“Just… tone down the roleplaying.”

“Fuck off, that’s the best part.”

Curiosity trumping annoyance, he watches as Dick places a briefcase in the coffee table where he was doing his math homework.

“This right here, it’s all the information, anything you ought to know about our mantle’s most important endgame. This is Robin’s never-ending mission. Our Moby dick. Red X.”

-.-.-.-.-.-.-

When Jason approached Tim with the briefcase, Tim’s first thought was ‘he’s going to bribe me’- an automatic response after working on Wayne Enterprises for months now. 

The second was ‘he has someone’s head there hasn’t he. Am I going to be an accomplice? What crime was this, and can I hide it from Bruce?’.

The third and final ‘maybe I should ask him first’.

His -thankfully sane now- predecessor reached the little nook where Tim had tucked himself, in hopes of staying hidden from Damian long enough to enjoy the mannor’s wifi without having to stand his bitching. He sits cross legged in front of him.

“So. Give me all you have on Red X.”

This was… unexpected, but not unprecedented. The family tends to think of him as a convenient alternative to some criminal wikipedia sometimes. 

Obediently (because then he’ll get to go back to his research sooner), he rattles out what little he could scrounge on the antihero. It was, admittedly, not much; any younger hero had not heard of Red X, as he’d been dormant for some years now, and the older ones were forbidden to talk about him by Dick himself. The first Robin had claimed ownership of the antihero, and anyone caught working on his case without his permission would find themself with their life turned around  in the most inconvenient of ways before they could even finish burying the evidence. With Bruce taking a neutral stand on the matter, merely respecting his son’s wishes, no one was willing to risk the fury of someone with Batman’s resources and knowledge.

Except, apparently, Jason, because he was opening the briefcase and turning it in his direction.

“Let me tell you a lil story, that Dickie shared with me some years ago. I wasn’t a good predecessor for a long time ‘ere, Timmers, and I wanna make it right by properly passing this on. The true legacy of Robin; the mystery of Red X.”

“I… I’m not Robin any longer”, he blurted out, though his fingers twitched to touch the contents of the briefcase, to go through all that juicy, sweet treasure.

“Doesn’t matter. Dickie gave Robin without your permission, but this… this only I can pass on, just as you can only pass it to the brat when yer ready. No one can take this away, or Dickie loses the claim he has on Red X.”

Jason opens the briefacase all the way, then.

Tim drops his coffee.

Suddenly, there was something way more important. As unholy as it sounded.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

When Damian was invited by Drake to their own private ‘bonding night’, he was weary but hopeful. He’d been trying to fix their bond for some time now, so he could not ruin this chance, as suspicious as it sounded.

So they watched a movie, ate vegetarian pizza (Damian felt emotions when he realized Tim knew, paid attention) and complained about their older siblings and their role as Robin.

“It’s just… a heavy burden”, he admits. If someone can understand his feelings, it’d be Timothy after all.

“I get you. There’s also the matter of Dick’s and Bruce’s expectations on you.”

“I have to be perfect for them, all the time. The smallest mistake and… I could lose my family. But I feel so trapped…”

Tim’s hand found his and squeezed it. When Damian looked up, the older teen had a compassive look on his eyes.

“I might have the solution for that.”

As if he had planned this (perhaps he had), Tim retrieved a briefcase from under the couch they were occupying.

“Dick gave this to Jason, and he to me. Now, I’m passing this on to you.”

Damian tilted his head, a bit confused.

“I.. am already Robin.”

Tim smiled and pushed the case closer to him.

“This is even better. The freedom to the bindings that come with the suit. Open it.”

Curious, still weary but unwilling to lose any ground he had gained with his brother, he obeyed.

And promplty dropped it to the ground.

“What is this?!!”

“This”, Tim smiles, cheshire-cat-like, “is the Red X costume, and all his toys. Including, but not limited to, a perfect holographic devise, to use to make people think you are fighting Red X, to clean your name should anyone suspect the truth. I’ve been using it all this last few months, to…”

“Ruin my life?!”, he yells, because it’s not a secret Red X had came back from dormancy to utterly fuck with Robin, taunting him and beating his ass at every turn. It had been doubly frustrating, because everyone refused to speak about the antihero to him, so he had no information on the man to hunt him down properly.

“Chill. I just.. needed to vent a bit. And this suit helped me, which is the entire purpose of Red X.”

“I...don’t understand.”

Tim placed the briefcase in the coffee table and inched closer to Damian.

“Dick created the alias back in the day, when the pressure of being a perfect Robin became too much and he just… wanted to fuck shit up. Unwind a bit. He couldn't do it as himself and lose all the respect from the other heroes he had managed to amass, so he needed a scapegoat for it.”

Damian felt a tug of interest in his gut. He tried to surreptitiously look at the briefcase. 

“Being Robin is tiresome. It’s too heavy a burden. Always perfect partner, always a goodie two shoes… Red X allows you to go wild, be gay-do crime sort of thing, without meddling from any other hero in the community. Burn a warehouse. Use the rocket launcher B has under lock and key. Fuck whoever dumb crimefighter  you dislike the most up. Stir shit whenever you feel life’s been too quiet. Let go and have fun... Damian, aren’t you tired of being nice? Don’t you just want to go ape shit?”

His fingers were digging into the suit before his older brother could even finish talking.

[irandrura]

The Elder Scrolls - a disclaimer and rant

I am going to make some posts about The Elder Scrolls, and in particular, its background, setting, and characters. That means that a disclaimer is probably necessary.

Here’s the tl;dr version: yes, I know about the lore. Please trust me when I say that I was really super into it about a decade and a half ago, and I’ve kept an eye on it since. I have read the Michael Kirkbride forum posts. I have read C0DA, The Seven Fights of the Aldudagga, Sermon Zero, the Loveletter from the Fifth Era, and so on. I know the forum roleplays like The Trial of Vivec. I know that Ayrenn is really a time-travelling mining robot from outer space. I think all the stuff I just referenced varies widely in quality, opinions quite reasonably differ on it, and it’s frequently at odds with what’s actually depicted in the games, but at any rate, I promise that I know it.

So when I go on and talk about Psijics – I know, all right? I know. I am choosing to engage with the setting on a level that focuses more on characters, human stories, and, well, the narratives of the games. The TES apocrypha is interesting, but of limited relevance to the things I’m interested in. There are many valid ways to enjoy TES. Okay?

Now, the longer part:

If you haven’t played TES, and… actually, scratch that, for like 90% of people who’ve played TES, none of the above needed to be said. The thing is, when you play a TES game, it is a fairly straightforward elves-and-wizards-and-dragons fantasy setting in the D&D mould. Indeed, the earliest versions of it, back in the 90s, were based on a D&D campaign. So there’s relatively little surprising about it, and “it’s like D&D” will carry you most of the way towards understanding it.

However, TES games are also renowned for containing lots of in-game books you can read, which are often some of the most striking and evocative parts of the games. These are supplemented by a large library of apocrypha: often unofficial material, posted by developers (and ex-developers) on the internet. The most infamous of these writers is Michael Kirkbride, who has some… very unusual tastes and interests, but there are a range of other names as well. In any case, the result is that TES has an ‘expanded universe’ composed of these non-canonical writings. Often canonical texts in-game hint at some of this vast, unofficial hinterland, and sometimes ideas invented in the apocrypha sneak back into the games themselves.

Further, the apocrypha often hints at what seems to be a very different setting to the one directly experienced in the games: one that’s less about warriors and wizards and adventure and more one about divine magic, transcendence, myth, and meaning. The descriptions often seem to be somewhat at odds. This can best be demonstrated with some examples.

For instance, here is Michael Kirkbride’s description of a High Elf warship, written before any game had depicted the High Elf homeland:

Made of crystal and solidified sunlight, with wings though they do not fly, and prows that elongate into swirling Sun-Birds, and gem-encrusted mini-trebuchets fit for sailing which fire pure aetheric fire, and banners, banners, banners, listing their ancestors all the way back to the Dawn.

This is Old Mary at Water.

 You will immediately notice two things. The first is that this sounds really cool. Some of it you need some context to parse (the old elven homeland is called ‘Aldmeris’, hence ‘Old Mary’ as a mocking nickname given by its foes; the High Elves believe that they are literally, genealogically descended from the spirits that created the world at the Dawn), but even so, man, that warship sounds awesome. This Kirkbride guy can write. The second thing, though, is that it is extremely unclear what any of this even means. Given that descriptions… what does this ship look like? Try to picture it! What the heck does ‘crystal and solidified sunlight’ look like? How exactly does a trebuchet throw fire? What?

You might then go on to play a video game where the High Elves are taking part in a war to conquer the continent. If you’re like me, you’re probably keen to see one of these fabled warships. But then it turns out that in-game, High Elf ships look… like this. Or like this.

(Indeed, the High Elves are often a good example of this. An earlier written text, in a pamphlet enclosed with the video game Redguard, described the elven capital of Alinor as “made from glass or insect wings” or “a hypnotic swirl of ramparts and impossibly high towers, designed to catch the light of the sun and break it into its component colours”. Needless to say, should you visit it in a game, it does not look like that.)

After a while, you start to notice that there is very little connection between the world implied by the apocrypha and the world experienced in the games. Kirkbride says that the “closest mythical model” for the ancient knight Pelinal “would be Gilgamesh, with a dash of T-800 thrown in, and a full-serving of brain-fracture slaughterhouse antinomial Kill(3) functions stuck in his hand or head”, and says “Pelinal was and is an insane collective swarmfoam war-fractal from the future”. Indeed in Kirkbride’s descriptions Pelinal seems to have been an ultraviolent schizophrenic who led a wild, genocidal band of anti-elven warriors, was very definitely gay, and who had only a red, gaping hole where his heart ought to be (which in turn is a reference to the missing heart of the creator-trickster deity Lorkhan, whom Pelinal was in part a mortal incarnation of). You might find that really cool or you might find it banal, but there’s no denying that it’s extremely different to the Pelinal whose ghost you can meet in-game. The apocryphal Pelinal is a mad butcher whose closest mythic model, contra Kirkbride, actually seems to be Achilles; the game Pelinal is a straightforwardly sympathetic chivalric knight. This is complicated somewhat by the in-game books being written by Kirkbride and therefore being gonzo bananas insane, so the ‘canon’, such as it is, is unclear – but at any rate it is impossible to deny that there’s an incongruity.

I could go on with examples for a long time. I haven’t even mentioned the most famous – the 1st edition PGE description of Cyrodiil compared to what it actually looks like in Oblivion – or more recent ones, like the gulf between Alduin the mythic dragon who will consume the world and indeed time itself in its terrible jaws and the frankly quite underwhelming beastie you fight in Skyrim. The point I’m making is that there are effectively two TES settings: one relatively down-to-earth, immersive, and depicted in great detail in the video games, and one that’s this absurd mash-up of magic and science fiction and whatever psychedelics Michael Kirkbride has been taking this week.

I write this long disclaimer because it has been my experience discussing TES in the past that people who are mostly interested in the former – in the relatively grounded setting experience in the games – sometimes run into an elitist attitude from people who are interested in the latter. Sometimes fans of the apocrypha can come on much too strong, or gatekeep the idea of being a fan of ‘TES lore’. Any sentence that starts with “actually, in the lore…” is practically guaranteed to go on to be awful.

My point is not that the apocryphal TES is bad. As I hinted above, in my opinion its quality varies extremely widely: there are things that Kirkbride has written that I think are pretty cool (I unironically love the Aldudagga) and there are things he’s written that I think are indulgent tripe (C0DA stands out). Ultimately it’s all about what you enjoy, and I would never try to tell anyone that they shouldn’t have fun reading or speculating about or debating the zaniness of some of these texts. Indeed, as far as online fandoms and video game fan fiction goes, TES probably has the most fruitful ‘expanded universe’ that I’ve ever seen, and I think that’s wonderful. Kirkbride himself has said that “it’s really all interactive fiction, and that should mean something to everyone” and “TES should be Open Source”, which is a position I wholeheartedly endorse – and does a lot to take the edges off some of the worse things he’s said.

Rather, my point is that everyone should enjoy what they feel most interested in, or most able to enjoy. Further, I argue that there is absolutely nothing wrong – and for that matter absolutely nothing less intelligent or less intellectual – about a person preferring to engage with the version of TES most clearly depicted in the video games. Part of this might be defensiveness on my part, because in my opinion what TES has always done best is a nuanced depiction of cultural conflict: this is particularly the case in Morrowind and Skyrim, and ESO’s better expansions tend to deal in this area as well. As such I take relatively little interest in the metaphysical content of much of the apocrypha. For me, Shor, say, is most interesting as the protagonist of several conflicting cultural narratives, rather than as a metaphysical essence.

I would also argue that the most recent game content has taken a good approach by going out of its way to legitimise a range of possible approaches to the setting. The latest chapter of ESO, Greymoor, includes a system where the player can dig up ancient artifacts, and a number of NPC scholars will comment on them for you. This allows the game to indicate in-character scholarly disagreement over issues fans have previously debated. One item shows disagreement over whether the mythical character Morihaus was literally a bull, or a minotaur, or whether he was a human allegorically referred to as a bull. Another one points to disagreement over the possibility of magical spaceships: apocryphal materials have referred to ‘Sunbirds of Alinor’, ‘Reman Mananauts’, etc., as sorts of magical astronauts, but that seems so ridiculous given what we’ve seen in the games as to be easily discounted. I like items like this in-game because they seem to say to players, “It’s okay to disagree over questions like this – no one is doing TES wrong.”

That said, I am reasonably positive that I’m in the minority here, because I am in the camp that usually says that legends exaggerate, and so Morihaus probably wasn’t a bull and magical spaceships don’t exist. This is not a popular position. My reason, of course, is that I think tales are more likely to grow in the telling rather than shrink, and I have a dozen of what I think are hard-to-deny examples of this happening in TES (e.g. heroic narratives of the War of Betony are very different to the grubby reality you uncover in Daggerfall, or Tiber Septim is almost certainly from Alcaire rather than Atmora). However, this means that I openly take an opposite methodology to Michael Kirkbride. Kirkbride was once asked by a forum poster whether some in-game writings are exaggerated. His reply was: “I prefer, "It is very possible, as is the case throughout this magical world, that some of the exaggerated claims made about some subjects pale in comparison to the Monkey Truth. ZOMGWTFGIANTFEATHEREDFLUTYRANTS."”

Needless to say, I find this implausible, and it means that, for example, I interpret the Remanada as an obvious piece of propaganda, inventing a story about Alessia’s ghost in order to retroactively explain why Reman, probably born the son of a hill chieftain with zero connection to the previous dynasty, really has imperial blood. This is a very different but in my opinion more historically plausible take than Kirkbride’s, who has a naked thirteen year old Reman standing atop his harem and slaughtering recalcitrant followers.

I’m not saying that my approach is objectively correct. It’s all fiction – and as Kirkbride said, TES is open source. The only thing that matters is what you the reader, player, or interpreter find the most interesting. For me, that means generally favouring what is seen in the games over the developer apocrypha, which I can take or leave.

At any rate.

I’m going to go on and make some more fannish posts about stuff in ESO that I liked.

Just… if it’s relevant, be aware that I am familiar with the zany stuff. Some of it I like, a lot of it I don’t like, and I feel no obligation to use it if I don’t like it.

There. Disclaimer over.

[smallnico]

Are you a Gold Star lesbian? (Just in case you don't know what it means, a Gold Star lesbian is a lesbian that has never had the sex with a guy and would never have any intentions of ever doing so)

EDIT: i’ve been told this anon is a bot, and a lot of people have received this same message. who would program a bot to do this and why is a mystery to me. assuming no harm is done in doing so, i’m going to keep my response up instead of deleting it because i spent a good amount of time writing it, and i think it’s informative, which is why i wrote it in the first place.

~~~

i’m going to do you a favour here and assume you didn’t mean any harm by asking me this, that you just didn’t know better or didn’t think it through. i’ve said some pretty weird things to people on impulse, so i know how it feels when people react aggressively when you weren’t trying to insult them or freak them out or anything. normally, i would just block you for something like this and delete the ask, but given the number of asks i’ve been getting these days after a long drought of interaction, maybe it’s a good idea to re-establish some boundaries, not to mention explain to someone who might not know better why i have so many objections to the concept of a ‘gold star lesbian’.

first off, even when i’m hosting a frank discussion about sexuality on this blog, i never want to be asked about my sex life. some people are comfortable talking about theirs on tumblr -- i am not one such person. people are welcome to enjoy this blog and ask the occasional question, probe me for opinions, but my personal life is not open for spectators. there’s a meaningful difference between asking me about my sexual orientation and my experiences as a queer person, and asking me who i’ve had sex with. one is an opportunity for education, and the other is inappropriate and invasive. i’m already really dodgy about answering questions about my personal life, about friends and location and whatever, so already that ought to be a good warning to never ask me about my sex life. it is none of anyone’s goddamn business. this is a recipe for an instant block, and to restate, the only reason i’m not blocking this anon is because it’s a learning opportunity, and i’m feeling generous today.

the other reason i’m answering this question is because it’s an opportunity to save you, anon, from the trap of believing in ‘gold star lesbians’. i already know what the term means, and i’ve long since formed a firm opinion about its uselessness. 

1) a lesbian is not a better or worse lesbian for having/not having sex with men. there are a wide range of lesbian experiences that have room for a sexual history/future with men, and nobody -- absolutely nobody -- has the right to claim superiority over these people based on their comparatively “”pure”” sexual history. some lesbians formerly identified as straight, bi, pan, etc., and some may identify with those labels in the future. some older lesbians went their entire lives thinking they were straight, being married to men and having children before discovering who they are, does that make them less of a lesbian? does that make their current identity less qualified? i’ve been questioning my sexual orientation since i was thirteen years old, and not that it matters, but i don’t even identify as a lesbian anymore. am i tainted somehow? 2) let’s not pretend it’s not about purity, and let’s not pretend that purity means fucking anything when it comes to the spectrum of human experience. nothing is pure, nothing human will ever be pure, and anyone who claims their whatever the hell makes them pure is inflating their own pride at the cost of others they’ve arbitrarily declared are dirty. 3) men are not dirty. sex with men is not dirty. people who have sex with men are not dirty. you don’t get an award for not having sex with men, and the idea that ‘not having sex with men’ is a reward in and of itself is deeply unfair to both men and the people who find men attractive. there are a lot of excellent reasons people choose to have sex with men. the choice to have sex with men is not something i’m willing or even inclined to slander, even if the person making that choice is a lesbian, and even if they’re making that choice for pleasure.  4) sometimes, it’s not a choice. let’s not pretend rape in all its inglorious forms doesn’t count as sexual history, and hopefully we can all agree that, even if you’re 100% certain someone has never been raped, asking them to recount their sexual history to see if they qualify for some kind of honour is, at best, a rude and senseless violation of their privacy.  5) let’s also not pretend the concept of a ‘gold star lesbian’ isn’t borderline transphobic. i’ve seen a lot of people define ‘gold star lesbian’ as “a lesbian who has never touched a penis”, which naturally frames trans and some intersex women as dirty, while also discounting their womanhood. even if the term isn’t meant in a transphobic way, it has altogether too much flexibility as a concept for use by transphobic lesbians and terfs and not enough value in and of itself to bother reclaiming. 6) the label seeks to frame a specific lesbian experience as superior to any other experience, and does so at the expense of other queer people, and for what? is there a point to policing people’s identities and sexual experiences beyond “proving” one person is “”more queer”” than another? it’s ludicrous. it invalidates their experiences to make a select few people feel like they’re inherently better than everyone else, and i’m against that dynamic on principle. 7) if anyone thinks i’m reading too much into this, two things. one, it’s one of the only things my degree qualifies me to do, and two, just look at how the phrase ‘gold star lesbian’ is worded. you get a gold star. it’s a reward, an accomplishment, a sticker on your nametag, something which separates your from and prizes you above others because you did something good. in this case, ‘others’ is functionally everyone else in the queer community, and ‘something good’ is abstaining from sex with men. we’ve already been over why sex with men should never be seen as an inherently bad thing, and we as queer people should know better than to exclude each other for failing to conform to an arbitrarily ‘standard’ experience of sexuality.

i’m sure there’s more, but i’ve already spent enough time on this response. anon, if you’re reading this, it’s okay if you didn’t know better, and i hope i could teach you something today. i do get the feeling you asked this question in earnest, so as long as it doesn’t happen again (in which case, again, you will be blocked), no sour grapes. but to you and everyone else following this blog, this is an example of an inappropriate question -- for reasons on top of how many objections i have to the ‘gold star lesbian’ label. we have fun here on smallnico.tumblr.com, but i’m a real human being out there in the world, and this blog is my platform and spectacle, not me. there’s a reason i’m on tumblr and not twitter or instagram. 

[callioope]

Author Interview

tagged by @theputterer -- thank you :) 

Name: Liz

Fandoms: In terms of posted fics, mainly Rogue One and Star Wars (OT). I have at least one fic posted in A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones, Community, and Howl’s Moving Castle (book). But I also like The Clone Wars and Rebels. I’ve been reading mainly ATLA fic for the past couple weeks. 

Where you post: AO3 and sometimes here on tumblr. There are a few drabbles I’ve posted on tumblr that I really ought to crosspost on AO3 for posterity. 

Most popular one-shot: “In Which Sophie is Late, and Howl Noses Around in Her Business” (Howl’s Moving Castle) With 698 kudos. Uh. Wow. I was not expecting that! It’s literally my only HMC fic (although I do technically have other unfinished drafts) and it’s not even a year old, and surpassed my second most popular one-shot which was posted in 2015. Pregnancy trope is popular I guess. It is amusing to me that my most popular one-shot is not in my favorite OTP fandom (rebelcaptain). Howl’s Moving Castle ended up having a wider audience than I anticipated. 

Also as a disclaimer, but popularity is weird to gauge because do you go by hits or kudos or comments? I went with kudos because hits could count people who clicked on my story and then didn’t like it. But it’s hard because hits also include re-reads, so, idk. 

Most popular multi-chapter fic: “The Last Stark” (A Song of Ice and Fire) 815 kudos. This was finished in 2013 so it’s had plenty of time to accumulate the kudos. It’s a Gendrya Anastasia AU (“Aryastasia” was my working title for this one lol). So again, popular trope, in a popular fandom, in a popular ship. This fic is so old when I reread it, I usually find myself wanting to edit it, especially the ending. I was so ready to be done writing this that I think I rushed the ending. Oh well, writing plots is really difficult!

Fic you were nervous to post: Every fic? lol. I’m never not nervous to post a fic. But I’m definitely more nervous posting in a fandom for the first time. So posting “Whatever I Do (I Do It To Protect You)” (Rogue One, rebelcaptain) was pretty nervewracking, especially since it’d been awhile since I posted anything. [OOOH, fun fact, but WID celebrated it’s 4 year anniversary yesterday! Ha, that’s funny.] I was working on this fic for weeks before I posted it. 

I was also super nervous to post my Jeff/Annie Community soulmate AU, “Intro to Neurochemical Compatibility” because (a) first time posting in that fandom, (b) I decided to use script format which I know is not everyone’s jam, and (c) the premise is just so ridiculous! But I had fun with it. 

Also gift exchanges are always nerve-wracking because I worry the giftee won’t like it. My giftee never responded to my 2020 rebelcaptain secret santa fic so I’m actually constantly worrying that they didn’t like it and feeling bad that I failed them. :/ 

How you choose your titles: with so much agonizing. gosh it’s so hard and honestly i have so many titles that i hate. I’ve got a couple song lyric titles. a couple quotes. a couple “how to...” apparently that was a whole phase I went through. Either the titles come to me immediately, or I put off choosing a title until the absolutely moment I need to post it, and then spend hours agonizing over a quote/song lyric/phrase that fits and probably begging others for help.

Do you outline: YES. Possibly overly so. I’ve ran into issues in the past, when I was much younger, where I didn’t resolve problems proposed early in the story. So I need to know where the story is going in order to lay the proper groundwork. Also, if I do not write things down I forget them five minutes later. I also think outlining is a useful trick to jumpstart writing, so if the muse just isn’t present, I’ll try to lure her out by outlining. 

Complete: 19 fics. 

In progress: Oh boy this is so hard to count. As far as what’s posted? Technically only one: “How to Lose a Spy in 10 Days” (Rogue One, rebelcaptain). Despite the fact that I think the deadline was extended multiple time, I procrastinated and ended up rushing chapter one to meet the rebelcaptain rom-com challenge deadline. Didn’t really have a proper outline for this one, even though I knew vaguely what I wanted it to be about. I wrote chapter two but I hated what I wrote so I ... I kinda abandoned it. I mean technically, I never consider a work abandoned, I always intend to get back to it. Some day when I have the inspiration I will. But this idea ended up being a challenge I didn’t feel ready for at the time, and then my interest moved on to other ideas.

I also had a longer story planned for “you must become an island (the horizon is all we have)” but only posted one part of it to finish it on time. Ideally this fic would be part of a series, but again, motivation is needed so we’ll see

Technically I have 22 rebelcaptain ideas alone (including some listed in this post) at various states of completed, plus a handful of Community and HMC ideas. Of the ones I’m most interested in, there’s probably about 14 that I really hope to finish and post some day. 

ETA: omg i totally forgot that i was idly considering trying to finish my rebelcaptain soulmate AU in time for Valentine’s Day, but at this point I haven’t had any motivation to write so I don’t think that’s gonna happen. that fic has been sitting in my drafts since 2018 and in my drafts it will continue to sit.

Coming soon: “soon” is relative but these are currently the ones I’ve focused the most on recently:

Fencing AU (rebelcaptain)

You’ve Got Mail AU (rebelcaptain)

Post-War Fic with @allatariel (rebelcaptain, plus a LOT of other ships, includes Rebels characters, OT characters, and... maybe some others :) )

Palm Springs/time loop AU (Jeff/Annie)

Do you accept prompts: Wellllll here’s the thing. When I’ve asked for prompts, I haven’t been the best at fulfilling them in a timely manner. For that reason, I don’t encourage prompts but I’m not opposed to them. (I suppose technically exchange fics are prompts, and I wrote a bunch of fics in 2017 for rebelcaptainprompts, but I’m not gonna count those because I don’t think that’s what the question here is really going for)

“The Climb (A Lie, A Hero)” (Rogue One, rebelcaptain) was actually a prompt. 

I solicited prompts for my birthday in 2019, which I didn’t end up fulfilling until exactly one year later. 

Technically the You’ve Got Mail AU is a prompt, someone prompted me to write a fic for my favorite go-to comfort movie.

And, uh, the certain someone who tagged me for this meme prompted me in a comment back in October 2017 to do a Luke and Leia swap where Leia grows up on Tatooine, so that is sitting in my WIP list. 

Yeah, this is why I don’t solicit or encourage prompts. The return rate is just not fair for the prompter. 

Upcoming story you are most excited to write: this fluctuates on any given day. the fencing AU is so close to being done (well the first draft anyways) so i really really want to just finish it! But yeah it’d be anything on the coming soon list above.

tagging: @allatariel, @cats-and-metersticks, @lothcatlovesysalamiri, @veritascara, @brynnmclean and anyone who sees this and wants to do it! also ofc per usual no pressure if u don’t want to.

[adventuresloane]

The Wanted (Revised Hurloane Fic) -- Chapter 2

Summary:

“They had nearly as many names as they had stories told about them. Ram. Raven. Red. Devil. Deputy. Outlaw. Short ‘n Long. Ghosts of the Rapids.”

Hurley’s a bounty hunter, the Raven is an outlaw, and the desert is a lonely place.

(The 50k+ Old West Hurloane AU Where Hurley Becomes A Thief Too that no one asked for. Updates every Friday. Edited and reposted from an old version of the story–more significant changes to come in later chapters. T for non-graphic violence and discussions of death/injury/trauma.)

Other Chapters

Read on AO3

They woke up that night to a hand shaking their shoulder.

They sat straight up and tried to pick out shapes around them. The sky was still dark as fertile soil, and it bore plentiful stars.

In front of them was Bane, crouched on the ground with a lantern only bright enough to light both of their faces. Glancing over, Hurley saw the two black lumps on the ground that were the still-sleeping forms of Barbra and Jerry.

Bane looked at them pointedly for awhile, then stood. Nothing further was needed for Hurley to know that he wanted them to follow.

He led them to where Hurley had been hoping, maybe against hope, he wouldn't. He came to a stop a few meters in front of the door to the wagon. They looked at the ground.

"Just because you went against my orders once and had it work out," he said quietly, "doesn't mean I expect you to make a habit of it."

They bit the inside of their cheek. It was the only way of holding their tongue at the moment.

"You suppose we were too rough, then? That's why you insisted on undoing the ropes?"

They sighed. "Sir, I just don't believe in kicking people when they're already down. She's not a threat now."

"That doesn't surprise me." He paused, then gestured toward the wagon a little with the hand holding the lantern, causing it to swing on its creaky metal handle. "Let me tell you something about that one. And it's not one of those bullshit tall tales about the Raven that people like to pass around. This is true."

They looked away from the locked door and back to him.

"She's been caught only once before, as far as anyone can confirm. Another posse from another town did what we're doing now, only they didn't do it nearly as well as they should have. Most of the accounts say that they just bound her wrists, left her tied to some tree or post near their camp, and then went to sleep. Well, you can imagine what happened. Someone like that, unguarded, you can bet she got away in the night." He let out a sigh through his nose. "That was nearly five years ago. Compared to now, the Raven had only had a handful of robberies under her belt, smaller ones. And it was well before she killed anyone."

"Sheriff..." they said, but they took too long thinking of where to begin, so he went on.

"I'm saying this because I like you, Hurley. I think you're like me. Both of us feel the need to protect the innocent as much as we need to protect ourselves, and you'll do what you have to do to protect. And when you get more experienced and maybe become my deputy--" They looked back at him with a jolt at that. "--since I get the feeling that would suit you, you can start making more judgment calls yourself. But keep this in mind when you do. Had that first posse handled her capture properly, Abernathy would still be here today, not to mention everyone else she's thought to have killed in other towns, and I think about that. And do you know what else? Maybe if she'd gone to prison at that time five years ago, she would've eventually gotten out and lived the rest of her life, instead of facing the gallows. I think about that with these people, too."

Their mouth felt dry as they took in the night air through it. They had been ready to defend their decision before, but Bane was maybe the one person who knew how to shut them up.

He sighed again. "Anyway, that's it. I don't mean to berate you. Listen. Tomorrow morning, I'm going out to scout for signs of other bandits reported to be in the area. I'm leaving you to stay behind and keep guard." He spoke emphatically as he brought out his rope. "The Raven is to stay tied before then. I'll undo the ropes tomorrow, but not until she's worn out enough. I don't want you or anyone else here put at a disadvantage around her."

Hurley mulled over whether to push back. Maybe they should've been honored to have such a responsibility, but on the other hand, it seemed pointed and deliberate that he would choose not to take them along when they'd been the one to catch the Raven. But they thought better of it anyway. "I won't be, sir."

"Good." He then went over to the wagon and took the lock off the door. Then, with the hand that was not holding the rope, he pulled out his gun. He looked back at Hurley, and while they did not follow him this time, they only met his eyes for a few seconds before glancing away.

Just because they didn't see didn't mean they couldn't imagine. They heard a thud, then a louder one followed by a grunt. Bane said something that they couldn't make out. Then, quickly, he was outside again.

"I think we ought to get some sleep," he said before walking past them. They paused before heading back with him toward the fire.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Just after first light, as promised, Bane left with the other men. As Hurley had realized while lying awake last night, he was also leaving them with an opportunity.

They opened up the wagon almost as soon as the others were out of sight. "Me again!"

"Outstanding," muttered the Raven, glancing heavenward as though locked in place half-way through an eye-roll. To Hurley's relief, but not to their surprise, Bane had made good. She was back to only having the chains around her ankles.

They knelt in front of her and reached out. "Hands, please."

"You think I'm going to just let you cuff me some more?"

"I'm going to shackle your wrists, but then I'll undo the ones on your feet so you can walk around better," they answered patiently. "It's not good for you to have your ankles shackled too long. It'll start to get painful."

"Take off the ones around my feet first, then."

"I'm not stupid, uh, Devil, was it?"

"Then I'm not letting you do shit to me."

Hurley thought, then shrugged. "I can't make you do anything. All I know is it's not good for you to be chained the way you are for too long, and I thought you'd want to change that sooner rather than later. So you don’t get hurt.”

She didn't respond, which, they hoped against hope, meant she could be thinking it over. Without warning, she thrust out her hands toward them. She had what could nearly be described as a pout on her face, like Hurley used to see on their younger siblings, and it was difficult not to snort out a laugh at it. Those were simple and fun memories, so Hurley tried to enjoy them without thinking too hard about them.

After they had finished fastening and unfastening chains, they turned to her and waited for her to make eye contact. When, after what must have been half a minute, she finally did, they nodded their head in the direction of the open wagon door and then stood. Bane's warning rang through their head, and they quickly countered it by reasoning, again, that Bane had never actually told them not to let the Raven out of the wagon. It wasn't as though Hurley were leaving her unguarded, as those others had. When Bane came back, he would see how well they had the situation under control, in their own way.

They turned when they reached the threshold to find that she was still sitting on the floor, examining them with one cocked eyebrow. "Don't you want to go outside? You can if you want." She only kept looking at them, so they went on. "I think it'd be a good idea for you to walk around more, for one. So you're not just sitting and getting stiff."

There was another beat. Then, gradually, she started to stand. Just by looking at her, they'd been able to tell right away that she hadn't slept well, but now they saw the full extent of the toll the night had taken on her. Her movements were slow, and she tried not to move her arms more than she had to. She paused and winced more than once when she moved the wrong way. Bane was right. Hurley was definitely at more of an advantage since she had been left tied overnight.

"Can I ask you something?" They didn't wait for a response before going on, "Why didn't you try to shoot me when I caught you? You could've. I saw the gun they took off you."

They waited some time for an answer. For awhile, it seemed that she would not give it at all. Then: "I wasn't quick enough. What else would you expect?"

But it wasn't just a matter of not being quick on the draw. She hadn't even thought to reach for it while her hands were free. They considered it as a new, welcome wind blew. The air had been largely still and hot for the many days that they had been in the desert, and they liked how the gusts came on with the sounds of ocean waves in their ears. They realized that they missed rain.

When they looked back at her, she was looking out at the horizon with her face to the wind. "Here's another question, then."

"Is this an interrogation?" she quipped without turning their way.

"It's curiosity. I was wondering...I heard you got caught once and got away."

"I did." The Raven's smile was sudden, startling, and bitter.

"How?"

"What do you think, Red?"

"I think I should've known by now I wouldn't be getting a straight answer."

"Well, it's not that it's a story I don't like telling," she said. "Just not to you. Not keen on letting you know how I got away."

The wind sent the loose sand skittering across the ground like sideways rain. As they watched it, Hurley said, "That's not what I meant. I mean, you just ran off into the desert alone and survived?"

"Sure." She shrugged. "I don't have a problem out here. That's just other people."

"Alright, but--" They stopped as they saw a near-empty canteen start to roll away and jogged to retrieve it. It was nearly lifted off the ground before they caught up to it.

The Raven watched them while, around her, loose sheets used for bedding began to flap. Concern was on her face now, they saw.

After a while, her focus went back to Hurley. "Storm's coming."

They looked at the vast, featureless sky and then back to her.

She just rolled her eyes. "Don't be stupid. Grab some wet bandanas so we can put them over our faces," she said before she went back into the wagon, shutting the door behind her.

They had to pause to ponder what that meant. Slowly, they looked back at the sky, and initially, there was nothing. But as they squinted against the brightness they saw, where the cornflower sky met the near-orange earth, there was a thick and muddy smudge. It stretched almost as far as they could see to the left and right. A thin line on the horizon, until, too soon, it wasn’t, and it grew and bloomed before their eyes into clouds, the towering clouds of a storm, except that these were billows of dust. Too big to go around, too quick to outrun. Even if they had had any option other than staying put at the camp.

They watched it until they couldn't anymore. They turned toward the wagon as the wind buffeted hard. After a few steps, they stopped, then grabbed a few pieces of cloth and soaked them with water from the canteens. It wasn't until they came back into the small space that they remembered that the wagon didn’t lock from the inside.

They couldn’t even cough. That’s what they found when the dust storm finally came, after the wind shook down the wood of the wagon and made it creak, after the sun no longer shone. They couldn’t cough, no matter how desperately they wanted to, because immediately after a coughing fit, they would automatically gasp and inhale, and what they would inhale was the air that was now more dust than air. They had hoped that the lack of openings in the wagon would prevent the worst of it, but even so, the fine, fine dust came in through the single tiny window and through the gaps between the slats and through the crack in the door. They felt that every time they breathed, their lungs were filling and turning to a pair of hourglasses. All of this came to them in darkness. They didn’t open their eyes once as the storm enveloped them, though they felt the dust collecting along their squeezed eyelids. It stuck to the corners of their eyes where the tears gathered as they struggled not to let out a cough.

The chill, though, was what surprised them. As soon as the light was blocked out, the heat, once stifling inside the enclosed space, rapidly drained away. In its place came a cold that soaked into their bones. They had always known that the desert could be as cold as it was hot, but it was always the cold that came as a shock to their bones.

It was only when, after gods-know-how-long, the wind stopped that they looked. The haze of unsettled particles in the air gave the world a sepia tone. But they made out the small piles of dust along the edges of the floor.

The Raven was still beside them. As they turned to look at her, they found her with her eyes closed and her head slumped against her shoulder. She breathed, faintly.

It took them several tries before they could get out a sound, with the way their throat had become coated in a layer of dirt. “Hey,” they finally managed to croak as they moved in front of her, “are you--?”

In an instant, a pair of hands slammed against their sternum and knocked them back. They caught themself on their elbows before their back could slam into the ground, but by that time, the Raven had gotten to her feet, suddenly not dazed in the slightest. Before they could do anything, she reached into their pocket and pulled out the key to the cuffs.

Hurley rolled over to look at her upright. She had started to move away, fumbling with the key as she struggled to unlock the shackles despite the small amount of slack the chain afforded her. That bought the time they needed. They grabbed her and dragged her to the ground with one pull. She growled, but before she could push back, they shoved her chest back to the ground with one hand and then pinned her hands above her head with the other. She flexed against them for a moment before going still and wild-eyed, with a heaving chest.

They stared down at her. “You know, you’re not as strong as you look,” they said hoarsely, still panting.

She just huffed.

Once they got the key back, they got up to push the door open, slowly. They tried not to gasp when they saw. Beyond the camp, the nearby desert looked nearly unchanged--the sand was still just sand. But where the sandstorm had come up against the features of the camp, it had done damage to them. Dust and grit piled like snow. They thought about all it must have gotten into, the food and the tools. Where they saw things that had been there before missing, they wondered whether the objects had been buried or blown away.

It took a moment for them to breath again, but they did. It still hurt a little to do so.

They stepped into the reformed outside in order to do what they always did, which was to deal with what was in front of them--with the fire pit full of dust, with the water full of dust, with the dust that had formed drifts against the wagon and buried the wheels hopelessly. "It's okay," they said, maybe to the Raven behind them and maybe just to themself. "We're okay."

When the posse was not back by midday, Hurley began to wonder.

When the hottest part of the day arrived, when the whole party would normally stop and rest, they thought that perhaps the others were doing that now, wherever they were.

When the sun began to sink, they waited for far too long to build a fire. They weren’t especially good at doing that, anyway--with how long it took them most of the time, they might as well wait around for the others to return rather than struggling themself. Anyway, Bane normally built the fires, letting one strike of flint against flint ignite the tinder. They had even seen him do it with sticks, faster than anyone else. When the color had left the sky, they finally went at it, and the effort they exerted was almost enough to get them to stop shivering as the evening chill overtook them.

It wasn’t until quite late in the evening, when the wail of the coyotes had been ongoing for hours and they had nothing to do but sit and listen to it, that they could no longer prevent themselves from considering it. The storm had been moving in the same direction that the posse had been traveling, far faster than they had been traveling. This part of the desert was flat, far more open and barren than the areas full of sheltered canyons or stone formations. Was there anything out there to act as a shield from the wind? Was there anything there, even, that stood taller than Bane? How much worse would it have been without the wagon as shelter?

They struggled, more and more, to keep their feet on the ground. To keep from feeling that they were floating detached from the rest of the world in the night. Like a boat whose moorings had silently come loose and had begun to drift out to sea unnoticed in the dark. They tried not to believe that they were alone. It didn’t work. They were.

They stared and stared out to the east. There was no way that they could have slept, even if they had felt like it. Eyes were on them, always. Even when the Raven seemed to sleep--which she didn’t much--they didn’t allow themself to be convinced. They had learned their lesson. They knew they were being scrutinized. Of course she would try anything if they so much as managed to doze, and while they had dropped the key into their boot so that she didn’t have a prayer of sneaking off with it without their noticing, her quickness still posed too much of a risk. They kept on looking as yellow leaked into the sky with the approach of morning. Everything up to their eyeballs ached. They had not even blinked enough overnight.

They almost surprised themself when, as the sun began to shine at full strength, they uttered quietly, "They're not coming back."

"Oh, your posse?" came the response from behind them, from the woman lying on her back and lackadaisically tossing a coin into the air, though they had been speaking mostly to themself. "Yeah, I doubt it. Not if they got caught out in that shit."

They physically flinched. Having someone else voice it was somehow even worse. But they had to refocus. Not think about what had happened and not think about the likelihood of Bane’s return in the future. There was only what was in front of them. They took a breath and turned to her, saying, "Since we might be out here together for a bit, I figured I'd ask again. What's your name?"

With a degree of petulance that would have been impressive if it weren't infuriating, she replied, "The Raven."

"Right. What's your actual name that you use when you're not hiding behind a criminal alias?"

"Devil."

"Okay, listen up. I know you're giving me a hard time because you're upset and need to take it out."

"Oh, please don't misunderstand me. I'm giving you a hard time because it's funny." She rolled over onto her belly. "And what do you mean we're gonna be out here for awhile?”

“I mean I’m getting you back to Goldcliff.”

She hissed a laugh. “Right. Of course. By yourself, with your broken, horseless wagon.”

“I didn’t say I’d try to do it by myself.” They came closer to where she sat, next to one of the half-buried wagon wheels. “All I need to do is keep us alive until someone passes by who can go and get help.”

Her expression changed back to ire now. “You’re out of your fucking mind! There isn’t nearly enough traffic this far out here to just wait around for some rescue. We’ll die sitting around here first.”

“No, we won’t,” they said simply. They had made a promise to Bane. They committed, then and there.

She only glowered at them. Then, quick as anything, she went to knock them off their feet, but they were expecting it this time, and they weren’t slow either. They pushed her back down and, before she could recover, clapped a chain around her foot. They attached it to the unmoving wheel and then backed away from her.

They shouldn’t have looked back. They wouldn’t have, had they not heard the chains jingling. She pulled back on them for a bit, as though to test the strength of them, and then stopped. Something shifted. She quit resisting, suddenly. The fight fled her in a way that was more obvious to them than when she had first been caught two days ago. (Had it really only been two days?) She stared at the line of metal links that swung lightly between her ankle and the wagon. Then, she hunched her shoulders and pressed her mouth and nose into the collar of her duster. Her thick hair kept most of her face concealed.

It was just for now, they reminded themself. Just until they knew what they were doing.

[mackinmacki]

Be Mine, Valentine (White Rose Week #3)

Fandom: RWBY

Pairing: White Rose

Word Count: 6871

Rating: G

Synopsis: Weiss and Ruby figure out how to do Valentine’s Day together.

Prompt: Valentine

Links: FFN | AO3

Notes: I’ve made my edits, added the links, and changed the title, because it made no sense.

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"So, Valentine's Day is around the corner, huh? Bet you're pretty excited about buying some chocolates for your crush." Team RWBY had separated into pairs, in order to diversify their training. Weiss and Yang had gone to the training room to practice hand to hand combat, which doubled as strengthening Weiss's arms. Of course, Yang being Yang, it hadn't taken her long to start trying to distract both of them with unnecessary topics like 'Valentine's Day'.

"First off, I do not have a crush on anyone. I do not know where you get such ridiculous ideas." Weiss huffed as she threw another punch at the punching bag Yang was holding. She understood that hand to hand combat was important, because one couldn't always rely on having their weapon at the ready. However, her body wasn't built for such things. At that point, she was sweating from her exertions, which didn't benefit someone as prim and proper as her. Her clothes were becoming soaked through with it, sticking to her cold, sweaty arms and legs. She definitely needed a shower the moment they were done. "Secondly, we are training to become huntresses. Where do you find the time to celebrate such trivialities?"

"On the day of that triviality," Yang replied, smirking as she watched Weiss wipe sweat from her forehead. She was close to making her teammate take a break, because otherwise she would force herself to continue until she collapsed. Weiss sure was lucky she had someone as cool and thoughtful as Yang looking out for her. They weren't Freezerbros for nothing. "Life isn't entirely just us training to be huntresses. We're allowed to have fun, ya know?"

"I am aware," she replied tersely, throwing a fist at the punching bag. Her punches were becoming weaker, her breathing noticeably heavier. "But what's the point of Valentine's Day anyway? It's just a day for people in relationships to throw their happiness in the face of those who are without companions." That had come out more bitter than she'd meant it to, and she quickly deviated from that path. "In case you weren't aware, I do not have a partner, nor a crush to make a fool of myself towards. This sort of holiday is more for you."

"You do have a partner, though: Ruby." Yang pulled the bag back, out of Weiss's reach. By the way the poor girl looked like she was about to collapse, it was clearly time to take a breather. She let the bag swing back and forth as it tried to come to a stop, beckoning Weiss over to the nearby wall. "C'mon Weiss, time to take a breather. Have some water before we get back to practice."

"She is my partner, not my partner." Weiss pursed her lips, realizing how strange that sounded. Sighing, she followed Yang over to the wall, where she watched as her teammate flopped down on her butt and popped open the tab top on her water bottle. She waterfalled it, water dripping down her chin and onto her tank top before she offered it to Weiss. "Thank you." She took the water and drank it with more prose, slowly sitting down next to Yang.

"You can be real with me, you know?" Yang slung a sweaty arm around Weiss's shoulders, which made her instinctively recoil. "We're Freezerbros, right?" Weiss rolled her eyes at the cutesy nickname: a bastardization of their duo attack name that Ruby had come up with. "You can tell me that you like Ruby. I'm not gonna be mad, promise."

"If you think I care about how you would react to something like that, you ought to think otherwise." This was a good time to not mention that she had a few stray thoughts concerning Yang using her strength to shatter her like one of her summons. "I really don't understand why you think I have feelings for Ruby. What could have possibly made you believe that to be the truth?" She saw a glimmer appear in Yang's eyes: one that showed a challenge had been thrown down, and she was ready to compete.

"Let's see..." Sticking out her hand, Yang started to count off the reasons on her fingers. "You act like being around Ruby is such a bother, but you're constantly watching over her whenever she gets in over her head. I've caught you staring at her when she isn't looking multiple times. For example, you were watching her talk to Blake about what the two of them were going to do just this morning, with the most longing look I've ever seen."

"That... That is not what happened!" Weiss's blush said otherwise. As pale as she was, when she grew embarrassed, her blush took over her entire face. It flooded with a deep red, letting Yang know everything she needed to. "I just happened to be staring in the direction she was standing. I was not staring at her, and you would do well to remember that!" She could deflect all she wanted, but her blush told the true story, and she couldn't hide that.

"Whenever we're training, you're always looking over at Ruby rather than at Blake or I. Honestly, I feel hurt." She didn't seem hurt, though, grinning all the while. Weiss made sure to stick her tongue out at her, like a mature young adult. "You talk about her all the time, and I mean all the time. I'm surprised you don't even realize how often her name is on your lips."

"I... do not know..." The fact that she was malfunctioning right in front of Yang almost made her feel bad for being so blunt. However, Weiss was a blunt girl herself. Surely she could take her own medicine. She coughed into her fist, trying to straighten herself up. "Yang, I do not have a crush on your sister. I do not talk excessively about her, nor do I look out for her any more than another partner would do. By that logic, Pyrrha and Nora must have crushes on their partners, and I find that hard to believe." Suddenly, Yang yanked her arm away from her shoulder, having taken a drink of water and then spit it out all over the bottle and the floor. "What the hell, Yang?!"

"Bwahaha, oh my... You... Bwahaha!" She lost control of herself, spilling water all over the floor as she convulsed with laughter. For a full minute, she couldn't answer any of Weiss's questions: the way her face switched between concerned and annoyed just made it better. Finally, she was able to speak while flat on her back, her shirt now drenched in water. "Did you just say that it's hard to believe that Pyrrha and Nora have crushes on their partners?"

"What's so funny about that?" Blushing deeper, Weiss shrunk back as the realization of what Yang was trying to say struck her. "No way... Oh come on! You can't tell me that Pyrrha has a crush on Jaune!" Yang just grinned at her, telling her all she needed to know. "Unbelievable... She could do so much better." Sighing, she ran a hand through her hair, feeling overheated. "W-Well, I don't care how they feel about their partners. It's completely different between Ruby and myself. We're just friends!"

"Uh huh, just like Blake and I, right?" She was sure that if she made Weiss blush any more, the blood might actually burst from her cheeks. "Look, this Valentine's Day, just call me Cupid Xiao Long, alright? I'm gonna get Pyrrha and Nora to confess to their partners, and I'll do the same with you before the day is done. Everybody will be happy, and you three will thank me. Perhaps with a steak dinner or two. Your treat, of course."

"In your dreams." Weiss rolled her eyes, standing up and punching her fist into her palm. "Now come on. Are we here to train or gossip about things that you made up inside that silly little mind of yours?" Grunting, Yang got up on her feet and shrugged her shoulders, heading over towards the punching bag. It didn't matter how much Weiss pretended that she wasn't interested in Ruby. Everyone within a twenty mile radius could see the truth, and she was going to show Weiss that fact, even if she had to drag her kicking and screaming towards it.

As for Weiss, she resumed punching the bag Yang was holding, if only to ignore the embarrassment that had grown like weeds inside of her. There was no way Yang was right. She absolutely did not have feelings for Ruby. Just because her heart felt like it did weird things whenever she was around didn't mean anything. She was not going to give Yang the satisfaction of being right. Her and Ruby were just friends, nothing more. Besides, she was positive that Ruby felt the same way. If Ruby had anything close to a crush on her, she surely would have noticed.

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"Ugh, I can't believe Valentine's Day snuck up on me like this!" Ruby pressed her forehead against the nearest tree, threatening to bonk the two of them together. Luckily, Blake was there to keep her from doing anything too stupid. "How did I not realize what month it was?! I was so focused on trying to be a good leader, and all of the Grimm attacks, and it just..." She shrugged her shoulders helplessly, pulling her head away to look at Blake. "I've gotta figure out what to do, and fast!"

"I think you're taking this too seriously," Blake responded, arms crossed as she watched Ruby run the gamut of emotional distress. The two of them had only been about halfway through their training when Blake had decided to put a stop to it. Ruby was clearly distracted, and they weren't going to get anything done unless she let out what was going on. It had been easier than she had expected, to be honest: the moment she put a halt to the training and asked Ruby why she was so distracted, everything came out. "This is Weiss we're talking about here. She has the romantic range of an Ursa."

"But she's rich, Blake! And cultured too. She probably has all these expectations of what Valentine's Day should be, and I don't know if I can fulfill them." Sighing, Ruby dropped down onto the grass, leaning against the tree. Truth be told, she'd had feelings for Weiss for quite some time now. It had happened so naturally that she didn't even question it. She just knew that Weiss was the one for her. Now, her being the one for Weiss? That was the tricky part.

"Yes, but have you ever seen her show any ounce of interest in those romantic trappings?" It was hard to believe that she was involved in this conversation. As much as she didn't want to admit it, she had her feet in Weiss's camp on this one. Valentine's Day wasn't that important to her. Even though she had a partner, having one specific day to shower each other in love was superfluous. It did make sense that the two sisters would feel differently, though. They were alike in more ways than one might expect. "Besides, she already likes you. You doing anything for her will be fine."

"Wait, what?!" Ruby shot up like a rocket, staring at Blake with wide, disbelieving eyes. "She likes me?!" Suddenly she was right in front of Blake, grabbing her shoulders with a pleading expression. "Blake, how could she like me?! I'm the weird kid who knocked over all her stuff and stole her leadership role! There's no way! I mean, sure, she's become nicer to me over these last few months, but..." She scratched her head, then started furiously running her fingers through her hair. "For real?! Weiss Schnee likes me?!"

"Do you know any other Weisses?" Blake replied dryly. Though she had grown used to the antics of her teammates over their time together, she still often felt the struggle to best help them. Being a psychiatrist or a sounding board wasn't something she ever grew up being. She could barely understand Yang sometimes, and she loved her. Trying to figure out how to tie together the unnecessary dance Ruby and Weiss were always going through took less shots from Gambol Shroud than she was used to. "Have you really not noticed all the times she's openly stared at you?"

"Well, no..." Ruby tapped her fingers together awkwardly, a hint of pink on her cheeks. "But I've stared at her all the time! I would've noticed if she did too, right?" Blake just stared impassively at her, which told her all she needed to know. "Oh... But, I... We..." She sputtered out multiple attempts at a proper sentence, but kept failing. "Me and Weiss? She likes me? I-I have to do something huge for her, then!"

"You really aren't listening to me." Sighing, Blake rubbed her temples. This was a lot of trouble for a relationship that she was sure would end up highly combustible. Truthfully, she had never understood Ruby's infatuation for Weiss. It had always been patently obvious, but... why? Yes, Weiss had become a nicer, more understanding person over their time as teammates, but she was still a Schnee, no matter how many changes she tried to make. Her and Ruby were just such different people.

"I gotta get started!" Ruby shouted, inadvertently admitting that she wasn't listening. "We'll practice later, okay? I promise! I gotta figure out what to do for Weiss, though! She'll want to date me for sure after this!" In a flash, she was gone, leaving a few rose petals in her wake. Blake just sighed, flicking a petal that was floating down in front of her.

"How are we going to survive these two trying to ask each other out?"

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'This is ridiculous!'  Weiss was in the shower, washing off the sweat and grime from her and Yang's intense training session. Standing underneath the shower head, she was stewing from what Yang had told her while they were taking a break. 'She doesn't know anything! I don't have feelings for Ruby!' Yang thought she was so smart, and that she knew everything. Well this time, she was dead wrong. Just because she thought that she had caught Weiss staring at Ruby a few times didn't amount to anything.

Okay, so maybe she was finding herself more respectful towards Ruby in recent times. Despite her original hang-ups, Ruby had proven herself to be a competent leader. While she didn't have the leadership style Weiss would have, it did seem to work for her. All four of them had become some kind of family, as odd as that may sound. Sure, she and Ruby were closer than she was with Blake or Yang, but that was just because they were partners. It was only natural that they would be more comfortable with each other.

She ran her fingers through her hair, trying to shake the words that Yang had said out of her brain, but she couldn't. That obnoxious woman was now making her revisit her prior interactions with Ruby in a new light, and she didn't like what she was coming to realize. She couldn't stop thinking of Ruby now: the way she led the team, the way she threw herself into everything she did, the way her eyes shined when she smiled-

'Stop it!'  she scolded herself, stepping out of the way of the water. This entire concept was ridiculous, and she was being ridiculous for even entertaining it. Ruby was her partner on their team, and that was all. There was nothing going on between them in terms of romance. They didn't like each other like Yang thought they did. Besides, there was no way someone like Ruby would like someone like her. Especially after all the times she had treated Ruby so poorly in the past.

Wait, what was she saying? Was she feeling guilty? Sure, she had been a bit hard to handle in the past, but she had definitely improved since them. She had told Ruby early on that she would be the best teammate Ruby ever had, and she felt that she had lived up to her side of the bargain. There was no reason to feel any sort of negativity towards how she acted in the past.

Then why did she feel like it didn't make any sense for Ruby to like her? She placed a hand on her chest, feeling her heart beating faster just from the thought of her team leader. That made her frown, wondering just what in the world was going on. Yang couldn't possibly have a point. She didn't like Ruby, right? At least, not like Yang was saying she did. Sure, she liked her as a partner, and as a friend, but more than that? Blasphemous.

And yet, now all she was thinking about was Ruby. She was the only thing on her mind. Maybe, just maybe she'd had a few stray thoughts about Ruby. Just a few, mind you! It wasn't wrong to think of other people, even if it wasn't something to be expected of her. She was too much of an aloof princess to be thinking of other people, especially in ways that would make her blush from embarrassment. Which was why she absolutely was not thinking of someone as cute as Ruby-

Oh, who was she kidding? Shutting her eyes, she slid down onto the shower floor, hiding her head on her knees as the water kept falling around her. It was a terrible thing to admit, but... Yang was right, dammit! She did like Ruby! More than was appropriate, and more than she should. How long had she held such feelings for Ruby? She honestly wasn't sure, as she'd been so adamant on denying the truth that her mind had completely wiped out any exact dates. All she knew was that it had been a problem for longer than she cared to admit.

The truth was, she held back on those feelings for a bigger reason than having Yang tease her endlessly for them. She had come to realize just how wonderful and innocent of a soul Ruby was. Of course, that might have been because she made it into Beacon two years early, but she knew that it was more than that. She just lived her entire life with an incredible amount of optimism: more than Weiss had ever seen in her life. The way she had taken Weiss on as a partner and dealt with all of her crap for so long was impressive, to say the least. She knew for a fact that she didn't have so much patience. How many times had she lost her temper with Ruby and said something she didn't mean? Too many times to count. In all of those moments, never once had Ruby raised her voice at her or admonished her in return. She had patience well beyond her years, and cared so much more than could possibly fit inside her body.

To think of herself having something resembling a romantic relationship with Ruby was laughable, but not because of the reasons she would say out loud. Not for any of the reasons she would think of either, when she was trying to strong-arm her brain into ignoring the truth. In reality, she didn't deserve Ruby. How could someone who had been so rude to Ruby turn around and say she deserved her? It was a laughable concept. Honestly, there were so many problems with her thinking that she could be in a relationship with Ruby that it made her laugh out loud. That laughter was lost in the sea of tears that were falling from her eyes, however.

She stayed in the shower crying for longer than she intended. It was unusual for her to zone out like she had, but when she returned to reality, she was momentarily confused about where she was. When she realized that the shower was still running, she stood up to turn it off. Then she just stood there, staring at the floor with an empty expression while water dripped off her body and down the drain.

For the first time in her life, she needed to talk to Yang. She needed advice from Yang. Admitting what she was going to admit was going to be embarrassing: worse, it would be terrifying. However, if she wanted to stop the crazy thoughts that were swirling around her head in that moment, she knew Yang was the only person she could talk to. Stepping out of the shower she wrapped a towel around her body and her hair, tightening them up before walking slowly into the dorm room.

"Wow, even for you that was a long shower," Yang remarked, looking up from her scroll. However, her teasing petered off when she saw Weiss standing there in a towel with a dejected look on her face. "Hey, uh, you alright?" She expected Weiss to say that she was, and that she needed to mind her own business. When she gave her head a slight shake, that was when Yang knew something was wrong.

Immediately she was on her feet, heading over to put an arm around Weiss's shoulder. "Hey, hey, what's wrong, Weiss?" She guided Weiss over to Ruby's bed, where the two of them sat down next to each other. While waiting for Weiss to respond, she gently rubbed her shoulders, trying to make her feel more comfortable. This was Weiss she was dealing with. Something major was obviously going on for her to be in such a state in front of other people.

"You were right," Weiss whispered, unable to look Yang in the eye. "I like Ruby. I've tried so hard to not think about those feelings, and they suddenly ate me up inside while I was taking my shower." She clutched her towel to her body, feeling tears threatening to come out again. The last thing she wanted to do in that moment was cry in front of someone, even if she was spilling her secrets to them. "It's terrible, Yang..."

"How is that terrible?" Yang blinked in confusion, wondering what the hell Weiss was talking about. Hearing that Weiss did have feelings for her sister was great! She had been right, and since she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Ruby felt the same, her job as Cupid was going to be super easy. "That's great! Think about it: it's Valentine's Day soon. That'll be the perfect day for you to confess your feelings to Ruby. She's going to be so happy!"

"I doubt it," she scoffed, shaking her head sadly. "After the way I've treated her, there's no way she would feel the same about me."

"What are you talking about? Of course she likes you!" Yang was being thrown for a loop. No, several loops, like one of those roller coaster-building simulators she played on the school computer as a kid. Hearing the complete lack of confidence in Weiss's voice was foreign to her. It was like someone else was talking, and using Weiss like a ventriloquist dummy.

"I didn't say she didn't. I'm saying she won't feel the same about me as I do about her." Weiss shrugged off Yang's arm, standing up to head back to the bathroom. "She likes me as a friend and as a teammate. That's all I can expect from her, and I should be able to respect that." As she was walking away, Yang just watched her in complete disbelief. She suddenly jumped up and ran after Weiss, grabbing the bathroom door before she could lock herself in.

"Woah, woah, hold up! You really think Ruby doesn't like you like that?"

"I wouldn't have said it if I didn't mean it."

"That's debatable, but anyway, you're wrong. Ruby does like you. She likes you a whole lot. Honestly, the two of you are the last to know that you like each other." It was a wonder either of those girls were as smart as they were. When it came to picking up on romantic cues from their literal team partner, they sure were dumb. Being Cupid wasn't as easy as she imagined. She needed a long vacation after Valentine's Day. 

"Did you not hear anything that I said? There is nothing about me that she could possibly be interested in. You've been around me long enough to know how difficult I am, haven't you?" She was huffy enough that she somehow avoided the embarrassment of admitting that she was a difficult person to get along with. Ironically, she was being difficult about being difficult. That was just the way a Schnee worked.

"Well, yes. You are the most difficult person I've ever met." She laughed at how Weiss glared at her, as if she hadn't been the one to bring up the topic. "It doesn't matter what I think, though. I'm not the one trying to get with you. That's all Rubes, and she is definitely into you. I promise you, if you ask her out on Valentine's Day, she'll say yes. That's a Yang Xiao Long promise, and those are ironclad, my lady."

"I'm sure they are." Weiss rolled her eyes, still holding doubts about Yang's words. However, it did give her enough doubt towards her own doubt to make her wonder if she should take that advice. Maybe she should actually do something for Ruby for Valentine's Day. There was a first time for everything, after all. If she got rejected, though? If Yang was wrong? She would be laughed out of Beacon. "Can I go dry off or what?"

"Sure, sure," Yang laughed, stepping aside to let Weiss into the bathroom. "Think about it, Weiss!" Weiss just rolled her eyes and shut the door, making sure to lock it before she set about getting fully dried off. Now she couldn't stop thinking about what Yang had said. Ruby liked her? As in, she really liked her? That seemed too incredulous to believe, and yet Yang had said it without a hint of teasing. It was one of those moments where she was being serious, and it made Weiss question if her doubts were wrong. Maybe Ruby actually did like her. If she did, then wouldn't she be a fool for not at least attempting to ask her out?

What if Yang was wrong, though? Or at least, what if she was overstating things? If she tried this on Valentine's Day of all days, and she was rejected, she would never live it down. Even if only Ruby and herself knew the truth, she'd be driven to insanity thinking about how mortifying her life had become. Yang had seemed so sure, though... Augh, this was so confusing! Why did romance even exist? 

She leaned against the sink, staring at her reflection and sighing deeply. This was going to take some figuring out, and she didn't have much time to do it.

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'I can't believe I'm doing this.'  Weiss was walking towards the dorms, trying to swallow the lump that had formed in her throat. It was Valentine's Day, and she had finished up one last practice of her glyphs. She had come up with this grand plan to show Ruby just how much she meant to her, and she had gone out of her way to make sure everything would go off without a hitch. That didn't make her any less nervous, though.

'I can't believe I'm doing this!'  Ruby was jogging out of the dorms, too excited to take things at a regular pace. She had come up with this great idea for how to ask Weiss to be her valentine, and it felt romantic while still having her own personal charm. Her entire being was vibrating with excitement over what could happen and nervousness over being rejected. Blake had convinced her that her feelings were mutual, though, so she was ready to go for broke that day.

As it turned out, the two of them were inadvertently heading right for each other. They saw each other across the courtyard, both of them stopping with wide eyes. The two of them stood in place, as if waiting for the other to make a move. Eventually, they just decided that it was pointless to wait, which meant they ended up walking towards each other again at the same time.

"Ruby," Weiss greeted courteously, feeling her drive to speak her mind falling apart. Staring into those wide, bright silver eyes, she felt like she could see everything she admired about Ruby on display, and it was blinding. It made her feel as if all of her faults were being exposed, proving that there was no way she could ever deserve someone like her.

"Hey Weiss," Ruby responded awkwardly, scratching her head. "I, uh..." She swallowed nervously, attempting to shake herself out of those feelings. "I wanted to show you something, if you weren't too busy. I mean, if you are, that's okay. I can show you another time. Even though it's Valentine's Day, and it's kinda a Valentine's Day thing..." She just kept rambling and rambling, but Weiss was focused on Ruby's mentioning that she wanted to show her something for Valentine's Day. Could it really be true?

"Ruby, if there's something you wanted to give to me for Valentine's Day, wouldn't it be best to not wait until Valentine's Day is over?" She found herself smirking slightly when she saw realization cross Ruby's face. "Besides, I... I also have something that I wanted to show you." Now the smirk was gone, and she was feeling just as awkward as Ruby.

"Is it for Valentine's Day?" There was so much hope in Ruby's voice. Weiss could only nod, her vocal chords deciding they didn't want to work anymore. That made Ruby's eyes light up, and her entire demeanor changed. "Oh, oh goodness, oh, okay, okay! Well, can I show you mine first? I promise it's worthwhile! I mean, I hope it's worthwhile. You can tell me if you don't like it. It's okay if you don't-"

"Ruby, you're rambling again." Somehow, it actually made her feel better to hear Ruby going off the rails. At least she wasn't the only one struggling to get the right words out. "Yes, you can show me whatever it is you have." There was a worry that, if Ruby's gift was so much better than her own, she would be outstaged before getting to show what she had. Though, if she went first, and then Ruby blew her out of the water afterwards, she'd still be in the same boat.

"Okay! Well then, uh... I need you to hold onto my hand." Weiss stared at her skeptically, which she seemed to have expected. "I know it's weird, but I need to use my semblance, and it'll only work if both of us are moving together." She held out her hand, looking Weiss right in the eyes. "Do you trust me?" Well, when she put it like that, how was she supposed to say otherwise?

"Of course I trust you." Rolling her eyes, she grabbed Ruby's hand and held on tight. "You owe me a new wardrobe if I throw up." Ruby giggled, both of them knowing that Weiss wouldn't follow through on that threat. Squeezing Weiss's hand, Ruby gave her one last reassuring look before activating her semblance.

Suddenly, the world was passing them by like someone had smashed the fast forward button. Everything in the courtyard was a blur, flying around so fast that Weiss was forced to close her eyes. She kept them closed even after the world stopped spinning, which meant that Ruby had to gently tap her shoulder before she would open them again.

When she opened her eyes, they immediately widened. Floating in the air above them was a heart, created out of red and white petals. As the petals slowly floated down to the ground, she looked over at Ruby. She was practically bursting at the seams, trying to see whether or not Weiss actually liked it. 

"Ruby, I..." She was fascinated by the white petals dancing along with Ruby's normal red petals. Was that why she needed her: to get those specific petals? "It's beautiful..." She was in awe of what Ruby had created. Her semblance had always been useful, but she hadn't expected to see it be used for something so artistic. It was making her heart thump loudly.

"Really? I'm glad you think so!" There was a blush on Ruby's face, which was a rare sight to see. Normally she was fine with anything she did, even if it embarrassed her. "I wanted to do something special for you, but I didn't know what to get you. I mean, you're rich and all, and you can have anything you want! This was my best idea for something that you might not have." She tapped her foot on the ground, looking at Weiss hopefully.

"I assure you that I don't need anything special." She shook her head fondly, turning to watch the petals continue to fall. They hit the ground and started drifting away on the breeze. "You're right, though: I am rich, and I can get anything I want, so... it's nice to receive something that only you can give me." She started to blush, but she felt compelled to keep speaking. "It's actually not important to me what it is that you give me. It's just... important that it comes from you."

"Oh, well then, I guess that was a pretty good gift, then." Ruby giggled, blushing deeper. "I was hoping you'd like it, and that it'd make you want to be my Valentine." Something Weiss had come to notice about Ruby was that when she was bored or nervous, she would fidget in place. The more she would fidget, the more bored or nervous she was. At that moment, she was shaking so much, it looked like she was about to disappear in a blur. "I-If you want to, of course!"

It was hard to believe what she was hearing. After all those days suffering through her insecurities, wondering if Ruby really would want to be with someone like her, it turned out she wasn't the only one in such a mood. Not only did Ruby want to be her Valentine, but she was nervous about her saying no. Out of all the ridiculous thoughts... She couldn't believe how it had come to this.

"Unbelievable..." When she noticed Ruby was staring at her, she shook her head and prepared to put her own plan into action. "Ruby, rather than answering that, I think it would be better if I showed you what I wanted to give you. Is that alright?" Ruby nodded, suddenly mute. It was cute in a way. "Alright, please stand back." Doing as she was told, Ruby gave her room to work. She pulled out Myrtenaster and started her summoning.

A glyph formed beneath her as she stuck her sword into it. Ruby watched with wide eyes as an icy knight appeared in front of her, holding what appeared to be a bouquet of flowers. The knight bent down on one knee, offering the flowers to her. She took them, stunned into silence. They were cool to the touch, but she didn't mind. All she could do was continue staring at the icy flowers in her hands.

"Woah... That's incredible!" She was positively beaming, smiling brightly around the knight at Weiss. "That was awesome, Weiss! I didn't know you could summon this kinda thing!" She put the flowers up to her nose and sniffed them. They smelled like ice. "I thought you could only summon things that you defeated."

"That's true..." She started to sweat internally, deciding it was best to not mention how she had demolished an entire garden of flowers the day before in order to get that summon to work. "B-But anyway, I wasn't sure what to get you either. I wanted to give you something that was special, but I've never done this kind of thing before." If she wasn't careful, she was going to start rambling like Ruby did. "I hope you appreciate the effort." Wait, that sounded rude. "That didn't come out like I meant it to..."

"It's okay, Weiss," Ruby giggled, stepping past the knight to stand in front of Weiss. "I really like the flowers, but I like that they came from you more." She couldn't stop staring at Weiss, which let her see that Weiss couldn't either. That was what gave her the confidence to say what she wanted to say. "So, does that mean you want to be my Valentine, Weiss?"

"Yes. I would love nothing more than to be your Valentine." Smiling, Weiss let her summon dissipate. The knight disappeared, as well as the flowers in Ruby's hands. However, the cool feeling still remained tingling on her skin. Both of their gifts had disappeared on the wind, but the sights remained imprinted on their memories. "If you will be my Valentine as well."

"Yes!" Ruby grabbed Weiss and pulled her into a tight hug, surprising her when she lifted her off the ground. "Yes yes yes! I want to be your Valentine, Weiss!" She started to spin Weiss around, having a deceptive amount of strength in those arms. That's what happened when she lugged around a heavy metal scythe as a weapon.

"Ruby! Put me down this instant!" She was finally put down after another couple of spins, and she made sure to glower at Ruby for that. However, she couldn't stay mad at her for too long. After all, they were officially Valentines. That was something she hadn't believed could ever be true just that morning. 

"So, now that we're Valentines... what do we do?" Still nervous despite their current status as Valentines, Ruby was bouncing from foot to foot, as if she was trying to get some quick cardio in while they spoke.

"We don't have to do anything. Isn't it just enough that we're together?" Weiss smoothed down her skirt, rolling her eyes at Ruby's wild behavior. "Besides, I don't think either of us know what we're supposed to do now that we've told each other how we feel."

"Well, I can think of one thing." Ruby smiled, suddenly looking very shy. It didn't suit her at all. "Maybe, now that we're Valentines and all, we could maybe... kiss?" They both blushed one after the other, with Ruby realizing what she had just asked and Weiss realizing what had been asked of her.

"I suppose that would be a good way of consummating us being Valentines." She couldn't stop blushing, not wanting to admit that she really just wanted to kiss Ruby, regardless of what day it was. Her lips looked so inviting... "If you're going to kiss me, then hurry up and do it."

"Yes ma'am!" Ruby put her hands on Weiss's shoulders and kissed her, not even thinking about what she was doing. Of course, Weiss was overthinking things, and she didn't reciprocate at first. All she could do was think of the fact that Ruby's lips were on hers. She was actually kissing Ruby. They were Valentines, Ruby liked her, and she was kissing her. This couldn't be real, could it?

It felt real, though. There was no doubt that the soft, pliable lips pressed against her own were Ruby's. That was when she finally kissed her back, letting her hands fall to Ruby's hips as they both got lost in each other's lips. They didn't pull away until they both were losing their breath. Gasping for air, they looked in each other's eyes, neither of them able to deny the truth in their gazes. They both really did like each other, and there wasn't a need to worry anymore. At least, not about starting a relationship, anyway.

"So, shall we go back to the dorm, Valentine?" Ruby giggled, loving the way that sounded on the tip of her tongue. It made her feel a tingling sensation on her lips, and she wanted to say it again and again. So of course, she did. "Valentine. Valentine..."

"Yes yes, I think we get the picture." Weiss cut her off, blushing somewhat. She was smiling, though, happy to hear those words coming from Ruby's mouth. It made everything feel more real. If there had been any doubts about what she was to Ruby, they were gone in that moment. Ruby wanted to be her Valentine, and she found herself believing her a hundred percent. "Yes, let's return to the dorm, Valentine."

"Eeee!" Squealing excitedly, Ruby took Weiss's hand and headed back towards the dorms. Rolling her eyes fondly, Weiss followed her, holding onto her hand the entire way. Neither of them felt like letting go, even if some of their fellow hunters and huntresses saw them. It would be quite the gossip, they were sure, but in that moment, neither of them cared. Today was Valentine's Day, and that meant it was just about the two of them. What other people thought didn't matter.

[a-stitch-in-time-and-space]

Queers in Space (DS9 Edition) Part 1 (Seasons 1-midway season 5)

Continuation to Queers in Space (TNG)

Benjamin Sisko: Similar to Picard's Captain-Gender, Sisko is Dad (some characters, like Julian, might occasionally look at him and think Daddy, mainly when he's being Righteous). He’s very caught up in caring about everything and is just happy he’s got such a large family (although he wishes there were more babies he could dote on). What he otherwise really loves is getting pegged by beautiful women.

Kasidy Yates: Speaking of women who peg...  She uses she/her pronouns and “woman” but her relationship to gender is like... not relevant. Not needed. Whatever. Call me whatever and I'll respond to it. And she's pan. She's been in space for long enough to have realised that attraction is attraction. Chaotic bench, I love her.

Jake Sisko: he's a burgeoning bisexual, Byron is his literary inspiration and he's the only man on DS9 who's pretty consistently half-well-dressed (you cannot change my mind about this). He and Nog have tested kissing. Mayhaps they may try out more in future.

Kira Nerys: Her lesbianism was so powerful that she was barely allowed to interact with other women (mirror!Kira may have been a bad bisexual trope, but she was also far closer to the truth). Not just a lesbian, but stompin' about in her butch boots and padded shoulders for the first half of the series, damn! All those guys she keeps dating are her beards.

Jadzia Dax: Omnisexual, poly, genderqueer babe - the poly part is why I cannot fully ship her with Worf, even though I love that she’s with a partner she can spar with (in ahem multiple ways). The whole point of trill is to experience life to the fullest and Jadzia takes that brief very seriously (that is canon!). At heart she's also very romantic. The fact that she and Nerys don't seem to have any storylines together is homophobia.

Julian Bashir: Trans, queer, dork. He canonically comes aboard knowing nothing about himself or the universe, he's just here to learn and have a good time and be an idealistic hero and accidentally fall in love with both his best friend and a lizard spyman and we're here cheering that wonderful foot-fetishist on like proud parents (Benjamin has literally sat him down to give him his blessing, but also express his confusion about his tastes).

Elim Garak: Blessed by the mouth of Andy Robinson himself, omnisexual and into Julian and down to clown and generally just a chaotic energy of fun and murder and sex, in whatever order. I read a thing about Cardassians choosing gender through specific make-up and the blue mark on the forehead, and they're all intersex and honestly Yes This! Garak opted out. He dresses like the genderqueer slut icon he is.

Miles O'Brien: I could go 50 different places with him. At first I wrote him off as a straight cis guy, but then as DS9 went on I became less sure... for one, there's Julian and the poly marriage with Keiko and Nerys. For two... it'd be fun if he were gendershrug. “I'm an engineer, I haven't got time to think about that” - does this open up the possibility that in the future all humans choose their own gender? I mean, the federation is supposed to be a form of minor utopia, so yes, and Miles just never got around to it and never will.

Keiko O'Brien: My poly, pan queen. I didn't see her and Nerys coming at aaaall and may I just say I am thrilled. It's what she deserves. She has two hands and a large heart (and a large bed too). She's a lady, but by now I've entirely decided that cis just doesn't exist at that point in the future. Gender is A Choice and she liked the sound of woman and like with everything else she liked the sound of, she grabbed it with both hands and went “mine” (she did that with Miles and Nerys as well).

Worf (Part 2): Ds9 is when Worf got more interesting to me. He was fine on TNG, but here, my word. Both the worst and the best. Okay, yes, he's very monogamous, I will relent. But also he's got a much bigger bi energy going for him, which I celebrate. On that note, if Garak isn't his type, what kinda person is? I'm assuming he's just not into Cardassians as a rule, because of their culture-biases. He likes a partner who'll punch him in the face before propositioning with all their cards on the table. What he needs is to get pegged.

Odo: Ace and aro. He’s full of love. In order to mimic “solids” he tries to make sense of his emotions from their perspectives and so comes to the conclusion that he definitely isn’t allowed to love Quark and definitely ought to be in romantic love with Nerys, but once he understands himself better, he doesn’t feel such a need to limit himself. He has unlimited hands you guys!!!! (sometimes he has no hands, but that doesn’t limit him either). He’s tried out various body shapes, and he likes the sound of “man.” He can’t place his finger on why, and honestly he doesn’t have to. It’s his identity. Hope he realises how loved he is.

Quark: He thought he was your average straight man on the station, but ds9 has a way of bringing out your true colours and it turns out he’s in love with an occasional bucket of goo. He expresses this by snarking at aforementioned goo-man. This isn’t even me, this is just... canon facts. Ferengi have strong binary genders. Quark is a man, but he’s later not-so-secretly sympathetic towards people who veer away from binary gender, such as...

Rom: Is “not having the lobes for business” code for being trans-femme? Kinda feeling it is. In a way it’s harder to be trans-masc, simply because afab people in Ferengi culture have a much harder time escaping the home planet in order to explore themselves, and Rom will eventually launch a campaign for equality for trans Ferengi (what is “trans” in Ferengi?) Also he’s more ace than he realises. He has urges (that one episode... definitely proved that), but they’re not directed at anyone. He likes being loved. Surprisingly sex doesn’t play as big a role in that as he might’ve thought it would.

Nog: "Doesn’t have the lobes for business” but is kinda chill about gender. Probably due to having grown up amongst other humanoids. Especially come starfleet academy he fully embraces gender and sexuality definitions as being “eh” to him. It’s not his interest, so he doesn’t define it. That being said, he’s also somewhere along the bi/pan spectrum.

Leeta: Pan-ace. She likes a certain amount of attention, and she has strong sensual attraction and she doesn’t mind sex, but as long as she’s loving and loved, she’s happy. After dumping Julian (like they both deserve), she gets a bunch of sugar-parents, who pay her school for her. It’s like hunger games out there, with how every one of them tries to impress her the most. She likes the attention and she loves studying, she can do it all. Be a bombshell and a smart cookie.

Gul Dukat: His gender and sexuality are “idiot clown-man.”

[halberdierminister]

July Monthly Goals Check-In

1. Write 250 Words Each Day Well, I started out very faithful to this. But sometime around the middle of the month, I got pretty choppy. I honestly don't know exactly how many days I skipped. I'm gonna try to write a fair amount today when I can and hope that it is enough to make up for it. Which is fine. It has been an otherwise very productive month in many other ways, so I cannot be too upset about it. I may start running a wordpress blog with a friend of mine, and if I do that may keep me more on track with these.. We shall see. We shall see.

2. Read 55 Books This Year I finished reading 55 books in May! Last month I read 10 more books. THIS month, however… I read 31 books. That brings me to a total of 97 books read for the year!!! A lot of them have been VERY short books. Lots of poetry collections, manga volumes, graphic novels, etc etc etc. But not exclusively!! I was hoping to get to 100 books by the time I wrote this but the last couple days, I have not been able to make the magic happen. But that's fine! That's TOTALLY FINE. This will be a very significant get, but I have months to get over that hump. By the time you hear from me on this goals check-in next month, I will undoubtedly be decently well over 100 books, and I can talk about why that personally feels so good then!

3. Get A Full Time Job I did not get a full time job this month. BUT. I applied to 38 full time jobs. Got a bunch of rejections. HOWEVER, I have scheduled EXACTLY ONE JOB INTERVIEW so far so that is good news! And that would be a VERY good job if I were to get it! Some of these jobs are actually pretty exciting things and I feel confident for the first time in a while that I might actually find a good job IN MY CAREER PLAN!!!! Also I almost lost my part time job but the library director was able to convince the village to let me stay on as a substitute, and it has paid off surprisingly well. I've been working two to three shifts a week on that, which is more than any of us expected. So I guess what I'm saying is I am making good progress again and I hope I can have something positive to report by the time I'm thirty. Eugh.

4. Move Out Speaking of being almost thirty. I really do not want to be here. If I get the job I interview for, I would be able to move in with my friends in Milwaukee just about as soon as possible. So that is good news. Every day it gets more tempting to just say "screw it" and live down there. But that won't help me find a job. And the job really is the important thing.

5. Drink Less Soda I mean yeah. Occasionally, I drink-a the soda. But not too much. I am good at drinking less soda than I did last year or the years before that. That's because I would have several sodas each day, to the point where it worried some of the people I know.

6. Get Something Published Just found out that I'm getting something else published today! So that is one new poem published this month! I also had my fic in the Lalonde Zine come out, but it turns out that the Lalonde Zine was more of a shared Google Drive folder than an actual zine. Maybe I should offer to compile the zine into one document? I should do that. That would be a good thing to do and it would give me a lot of experience with doing that, something I haven't really done in a while. So the practice would do me good! And then I would feel better saying that I got published there too. But yes so besides the Lalonde fic, I have had two poems published in zines, one poem published in an online literary journal, and one fic published in an online fanzine this year! If you include the articles I wrote for school newspapers, I have gotten at least one thing published every year for the past fifteen years. If you don't count the articles (or the Lalonde fic yet), I have had 30 pieces of fiction and poetry published since 2005! That's pretty neat! I want even more though!!!!!! I found a publisher's website that accepts unsolicited manuscripts. I'm going to try to put together an honest to god actual collection of my poetry, one bigger than either of the two digital chapbooks I have made. I have a friend who is a professional editor -- not of poetry, mind you, but I might be able to convince her to give it a shot -- and I would honestly hire her at full price to take a look at it. I actually will need to seek a lot of feedback from a lot of people, so if you want to read a document full of a bunch of my poetry, lemme know and I will show you what I've got when I've got something.

7. Finish Writing A Legitimate Businessman Finished in April! No new news. But just because I completed this goal doesn't mean that is the end of it! I do still have the sequel to work on, even though I haven't done any of that this month. And one of these days I am going to get around to sitting down with the printed copy and a pen and editing the shit out of it so that I can write draft #2! I think I'll probably throw draft #2 up on wattpad (why not?? I've been curious about that website and know absolutely nothing about it) and maybe I'll make a nice looking e-book out of it that I can distribute on noisetrade or itchio or something! I wonder if I could get it printed on demand or something. Obviously not for profit. But like, maybe I have friends I want to send a nice printed copy to.

8. Write More The Revelation of Takaya According to Jin Finished in Februrary! No new news. A friend of mine has offered to bind a copy of it when he has access to the materials, and I think that'd be dope as hell. I ought to work on compiling it into a nice document. I don't know if that's what he would need. He would probably want to do that work himself. Sometimes I think about the concept of making an illustration for it? I don't know. I can't draw. But I might not need to draw for the thing I have in mind. Really I should be consulting with him on that. Ah well. Either way, I hope that ends up happening. That would be so friggin cool.

MINOR GOALS

9. Finish Playthroughs Of 1. The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild: Finished in January! 2. Persona 1 Main Quest Good Ending: I didn't do anything on this whooooops. Getting into the second half of the year without once having touched it. I ought to get back to this. 3. Pokemon Sword: Finished in March! 4. Pokemon Let's Go Eevee: Finished in February and March! 5. Persona Q2: I have finished the fourth dungeon and gotten to The Twist!!! It's weak. This really is the kids' version of a Persona game. Minus like… the fact that it's still rated M for partial nudity. There was exactly one moment of horror and even that was like… just a bit scarier than The Nightmare Before Christmas. But I did some of the side quests and those are actually decently fun. So I have the final dungeon left. I just wanna sort of power through this. I'll worry about completion when I do new game plus, whenever that might be.

10. Record More Ukulele Videos I did not do this. I want a new microphone. These are not inherently related things, as I do have a microphone already. I have everything I need to do this. I just haven't done this. And I would like a new microphone. Also, an amp for the uke would be nice. I should text my old coworker, see if he still has one to sell.

11. Record Let's Plays Neither did I do this. How could I? My parents think video gaming is the Devil's Lettuce. And they are always home. They would notice if they heard me talking to my computer. And that is assuming that I had something I could play on my computer that anyone would want to watch. I need a better computer. A gaming computer. An editing computer. I'm lucky that these are the same thing.

12. Duolingo? I was SUPER gung ho in the end of June and the beginning of July, but before too long I petered out. I've used a couple streak freezes and have really been doing mostly the bare minimum to not drop out of the emerald league. But I've got a streak of about 208 days, and that is nothing to sneeze at! Do I feel like I'm learning? I dunno. But I am at least interacting with Spanish just about every day so that… that's got to be helpful, right? right?

This was over one thousand five hundred words. Wait! Sixteen hundred exactly.

[tiaragqueen]

can i request a shy and gentle yandere jimin that manipulates the reader into staying with him? he would never hurt her or others but threatens to hurt himself is she wants to leave. thank u and i love ur writing 🤩

Yaksok

✂ Pairing: Yandere! Park Jimin x Reader

✂ Word Count: 2,9k

✂ Trigger Warning: Self-harm, mentions of depression, suicide attempt, manipulation, possessiveness

✂ This story is fictional and for amusement only. I don’t believe any of the members would do this in real life. As always, thank you for reading and I hope you have a good day!

Donot re-upload my writing to another website or use it without mypermission.

[Edited]

***

To be honest, I didn’t expect this one-shot to get so dark. I had to prevent myself from imagining certain scenes too vividly in case I became too uncomfortable. They’re not too explicit. So, if anyone feels the same way as me, please don’t force yourself to read this. Feel free to click the back button. Thank you.

If you like mywriting, please support me on ko-fi!

“I don’t think I can do anything without you. I can’t live a day without you. I’m gonna try to handle you. I’m not dangerous. So, baby, don’t worry.” – Stuck [Monsta X]

Jimin’sfavorite expression of yours was when you were simply glowing. No, not in a literal sense. It was when you skippedaround, with a huge smile gracing your darling face, and the sunlight hittingall the right spot of your visage. Heespecially loved it when he was thereason for your joy. It gratified himto know that he had succeeded in making you happy, however small it might be. Because your smile was worth it, and Jimin would do anythingto see that sight forever.

However,he couldn’t find it in himself to be as happyas you did today.

“Baby,you look beautiful. Where are you going?” Jimin asked, sitting on the marooncouch with his legs spread wide.

Hewas indirectly inviting you to sit on his lap; something that he always didwhen you both didn’t have anything to do that day. He simply loved wrapping hisarms around your stomach, or sometimes, you would be the one who hugs him frombehind. Jimin was initially wary with your offer, thinking that you might nolonger like sitting on his lap, while turned out you just wanted to repay his favor.

Thatwas what he loved from you; your sense of gratitudeand indebtedness. Sure, Jiminshowered you, unconditional love, freely and never demanded you to reciprocate, but it felt nice when you acknowledgedhis efforts.

“Oh,really? Thanks!” You grinned shyly, the apples of your cheeks reddened alittle. “I’m actually going to go out with my friends.”

“Who?”

Youlooked up, trying to remember the names of your friends who would join.“Bambam, Lisa, Jennie, Kai, and Xiumin.”

Thebeam on Jimin’s face slowly disappeared like a setting sun. “Xiumin…?”

“Yeah,Xiumin.” You nodded absent-mindedly as you put on your shoes. “You stillremember him, right?”

Oh,yes. Of course, Jimin still remembered that guy.How could he not? Xiumin was, afterall, your ex. The man who had datedyou before you met Jimin. The man whogot to be your first in everything;first kiss, first hug, first touch. Though, you’d claimed that you never hadsex with him. Jimin felt an incredible relief washed over the rock that weighedhis chest, because how could he go on knowing that that filthy guy had taken your virginity?

Yeah,sure. Jimin hadn’t touched yousexually, either. The furthest thing he’d ever done was a make-out. But evenso, he was careful not to step the boundaries that you’d set before you twostarted dating. It wasn’t as if you refused to be intimate with him. It wasjust you wished to prevent unplanned pregnancy, and he readily complied,however heavy it felt to him.

Jiminfrowned as he tried to word his question properly. He didn’t want to hurt your feelings, but he also didn’twant you to leave him. Especially to meet up with that… that guy. He knew that you’d parted ways with Xiumin peacefully, asyou felt that the relationship was going nowhere, but Jimin still couldn’tshake off the jealousy that bubbled on his chest. What kind of man doesn’t feelthat way when his girlfriend is about to walk with her ex?

“Doyou really have to leave, baby?”

“Yeah,we’ve been planning that since last week.”

Last week. You’d been secretlyplanning to go out with other people – with your ex – since last week. Well, technically it wasn’t so much of a secret since Jimin hadn’t asked about ityet. But at the very least, you could give a heads up right?

Thiswas too sudden. Too much for him tocomprehend at once.

“Chim?Jimin?” A hand snapped in front of his glazed eyes. “Earth to Jimin.”

“Don’tgo,” he whispered.

Youstrained your ears in order to hear him more clearly. “Huh? Did you saysomething, Chim?” you inquired.

Helooked up, gaze resolute yet pleading.Begging you to just say yes. “I said,don’t go.”

“Whatare you talking about, Jimin? Of course, I’ll go. It’s been a long time since Imet my friends. Surely you can allow me to have some fun once in a while,right?”

“AmI not important to you anymore,[Name]?”

Youstraightened up. Jimin preferred to call you with affectionate nicknames, sofor him to suddenly call you with your name suggested that he was being serious with you. Of course, it didn’tmean you would immediately obey his plea. You were his girlfriend, not his maid. There was no reason for you to kowtowjust because he refused to let you go out.

“Jimin,you know that you’ll always be important to me, right?” you said earnestly. Youhad seen first-hand how hysterical Jimin could be when cornered, and you’d liketo avoid it at all cost. Patience wasn’t something that both of you really hadbefore, but if you wanted to keep this relationship, then one of you needed tolearn how to be patient. Therefore, you’d decided to take on the challenge andbe the voice of reason in case Jimin got too agitated. It wasn’t easy, given how prone he was to anuncontrollable display of emotions, but it was worth it.

Atleast, that was what you thought.

Afew years ago, if someone were to tell you that you would date a man-child, youwould surely scowl and tell them to piss off. Because you didn’t need a guy wholiked to throw a tantrum nor restrict you in any way. However, fate just hadthe strangest way of setting you upwith your partner. And now that you already met one, you ought to maintain it.Besides, where else would you find such a devotedboyfriend like him? Someone thatdidn’t mind his pride as a man and loved to throw himself on to you at pretty much any given opportunity.Someone that didn’t pretend to be cold or aloof to make you chase him like oneof those foolish love-struck girls.

“Then,just tell them that you’re sick and stay at home with me.” he whined as though it was that easy to decline an invitationthat used to be a ‘small-talk’ amongst you. Your friends already had theirlives and lovers, thus making the reunion a difficult thing to do. And now thatyou were finally available, and onthe verge of going out, Jimin decided to act like a toddler?

“Ican’t, Jimin.” You took a deep breath to quell the bubbling anger in yourchest. Oh, how tempting it was tojust scream and curse at his selfishness. “This is the only day where all of my friends have a day off. Besides, it’s notlike I’d take long anyway. I’ll definitely be home around seven pm.”

Jiminbowed his head like a guilty child. For a moment, you’d thought that he finallysurrendered. But you were proven wrong when he stared at you dead in the eye. This time, there was nosign of pleading that you saw earlier.

“Ifyou leave,” he paused for dramatic effect, lips set into a thin line. “ThenI’ll hurt myself.”

Perhapsyou should’ve used those precious few seconds to prepare yourself for hearinghis next statement.

“Whatthe fuck, Jimin?!” you shouted, unable to conceal your shock anymore. “Are you crazy?! Did you even know what you were saying?”

Jiminsaid nothing. He didn’t even bat an eye at your exclamations. Usually, he wouldstart defending himself. But now, he just kept silent.

Andthat was scary because this was thefirst time he’d ever been trulyserious with you.

“Chim,I–” you sighed, massaging your throbbing temples. How did a simple question goto a heated fight like this? “I thinkyou should rest or something. Get your mind off of that ridiculous thought. If you’re jealous because Xiumin is there, thenI assure you I have no romanticfeelings for him anymore. I’m not some woman who would go behind my man’s back.You know me, Jimin. I’m loyal. Iwouldn’t date you if I still loved Xiumin.”

Thebell suddenly rang, shattering the growing tension between you. You ran a handthrough your hair and sighed.

“I’mout now. Don’t get close to knives or any sharp things. I’ll bring home somepizza later.” you mumbled before heading to the front door to greet yourguests.

Jiminlistened to the boisterous voices of your friends’ and your cheerful one. Younever spoke to him that way. Heck,you never even greeted him sojoyfully like that. Your tone was alwayscalm, resembling a mother that tried to pacify her wailing child. And your face… It never glowed when meeting him.

Wereyou happy with him? Were you just humoring him all along? Did you feel burdened being in a relationship withhim? He knew that it was wrong to attempt to manipulate you, but was it so wrongfor wanting to spend more time with you?

Youloved him, right?

Frowning,he went into the kitchen. You had told him to not touch any sharp things, but you had disobeyed his demand. So, why should he obey yours?

Jiminpulled a knife from the cutlery drawer and inspected the sharp edges. It wasnewly sharpened and had never been used before since you tended to use the sameones for eating. The blade reflected his forlorn face as he brought it to hisarm. Slowly, he pressed the tip against his skin and winced a little at theharsh sting. He dragged it along the once smooth surface and crisscrossed eachline. Blood began to trickle from the self-inflicted gashes, creating tinypools on the white floor.

Onlyone name floated in the iron smelledair when he finally gathered the courage to slit his wrist, signifying what might be the end of his life.

“[Name]…”

Yourstomach was churning.

Itwas odd since you hadn’t eaten anything,and yet you felt like wanting to puke. You stopped on your tracks, holding yourtummy with a pained frown. Maybe the meat you ate last night had reached itsexpiration? No, of course not. You clearlyremembered the expiry date when you went shopping two days ago, and it stated aweek from now.

Unlessthe factory purposefully put stale meat inside one of its products…?

“[Name],”a deep voice called your name. You glanced towards the speaker, finding Xiuminalready stood beside you. “Are you okay? You look constipated.”

Yousmiled wearily, paying no heed to the subtle tease. “Yeah, well. I don’t feelso good.”

Hecocked an eyebrow and tilted his head a little. “Why? We still haven’t eatenanything, though.”

“Right,but suddenly I just feel like vomiting.”

“Maybeit’s a sign of pregnancy?”

Lisasnapped her head towards you, eyes dilated and mouth slightly agape. It was themost scandalous expression you’d ever seen from her. “Eh, what’s this? [Name]’spregnant?”

“My,my. You’re growing old now, eh?”Beside her, Bambam wiggled his brows teasingly.

Youslapped Xiumin’s shoulder and shot a vicious glare to the snickering duo, heavyblush coated your cheeks. “Shut up, both of you! And Xiumin, how could you eventhink about that?”

Xiuminstifled a giggle at your flushing face. “Well, how else am I supposed to guessthen?” he questioned. “It was the only logicalexplanation.”

“Well,that wasn’t the only explanation,okay?” you retorted, crossing your arms at his quick - and honestly blasphemous- conclusion. “I might behaving a minor stomach-ache rightnow.”

“Areyou saying that you haven’t had sexwith Jimin yet?”

Bambam‘oh’-ed at the bold inquiry, while Lisa giggled against her palm.

“Xiumin!” you hissed, glowering in thescariest visage you could muster.

“Okay,okay, I’m just joking.” The said man wiped a tear that escaped from his eye andraised his hands in mock surrender. “But, seriously. Have you ever-?”

“No,”you immediately cut him off. “I don’t want to get a pre-marital pregnancy.”

“Oh,okay. That’s understandable.”

Youpeered at him. “Well, what about you?”

“Nah,we’re taking it slow.” Xiumin sighed and looked up at the darkening sky. “Don’twant to rush anything.”

“Butyou’re gonna propose her, right?”

“Later,when the time’s right.” He looked at you through his peripheral vision. “You?”

“Idon’t know,” you shrugged. Marriage was something that crossed your mindoccasionally, yet never had the guts to bring it up to Jimin in fear ofrejection. You didn’t even know if he wanted to have a family since he seemed content with just the two of you. “Someday, I guess. I’m not so sure.”

Xiuminhummed. “Just don’t forget to give me the invitation.”

Yourolled your eyes and smiled. “Obviously.”

Whenyou broke up with him, you feared that you might break your friendship too.Xiumin had been your best friend since elementary school, and you couldn’t bearto see him turning his back on you after years of being together. But you’dunderestimated his maturity because the following day after your separation, hehad texted you first. It then occurred to you that while you no longer datedhim, it didn’t mean you couldn’t still befriend him. Sometimes, you wonderedwhat you did in your past life to deserve such a mature friend like him. Someone that was willing to move on from the pastand tie back any loose strings that you’d accidentally cut back then.

Theringtone of your phone blared amidst the light chatters. Jennie stoppedchatting with her boyfriend, Kai and glanced through her shoulder.

“Yourboyfriend’s calling you already,[Name]?” she asked.

“Oh,uh,” you quickly fished out your phone from the bag and frowned at the caller.“No, it’s not him. Wait a minute.Hello?”

“[Name]-noona, where areyou?”Jungkook’s breathy voice rang your ear.

“I’mout with my friends in the city. Why?”

“Oh, um, well. There’sa, uh… bad news.”

Thecolor instantly drained from your face as every sound became white noise.“What? What do you mean ‘bad news’?”

“You see, Noona.” Jungkook coughed acrossthe call, and you resisted the urge to snap at him. “I came to your apartment to play video games with Jimin-hyung, but hewasn’t in the living room. So I searched for the whole place and I found himlying on the kitchen floor.”

“And?”you inquired impatiently.

“He was bleeding, Noona.There’s a lot of gashes in his arms, and I also saw a knife beside him. Thepolice suspected that he was trying to kill himself from the laceration in hisleft wrist. Luckily, the paramedics saved him in time. He’s in the hospitalright now.”

Ifyou weren’t already shocked, then you were frozen.Hollow eyes gazed forward as you attempted to digest his explanation. Jimin…tried to kill himself? But, why? Whydid he do that? Did he secretly havea depression? No, that couldn’t be it. He always asked you to coddle himwhenever he was feeling down in the dumps. And besides, he was the type to wearhis emotions on the sleeves. So, why?

Therealization dawned on you as you rushed to the hospital, ignoring your friends’frantic calls. When Jimin said that he would hurt himself if you left him, youhadn’t expected him to truly carry itout. But, of course, you were stupid to think that he was being plain ridiculous. When did he ever lie to you, anyway? He always kept his promises, and that wasone of the many traits that you liked from him.

Andnow, when the situation had turned grave, you finally realized the terrifying depth of his love.

“Jimin!”

Youburst into the room, indifferent to the noise you’d caused. Jimin lied on thebed with gauze covering his arms. Tears stung your eyes as you slowlyapproached him, still couldn’t get over the fact that he really did attempt suicide an hour ago.

“J-Jimin…”

Thesaid man fluttered his eyes open and beamed at the sight of you. “Baby, you’re back!” he croaked.

Younodded vehemently. “I’m here. I’m herenow, Jim,” you whispered, trying to reassure yourself that you hadn’t lost yourboyfriend yet.

“I’mglad,” he smiled softly; a simple yet meaningful action that pierced yourheart. “I thought… you wouldn’t come.I miss you.”

Cradlinghis bandaged hand, you gently kissed his knuckle. “Of course, I came. You’re myboyfriend, after all.”

Jimin’ssmile widened a fraction, the hopeful gleam returned to his drowsy eyes. “Then,will you promise me that you won’tabandon me again from now on?”

“Iwasn’t abandoning you, Jim–”

“Will you?”

Youstared down at his imploring face. You knew what he was doing, and you knew whathe wanted you to do. Sure, you might not be the sharpest person in the world,but you were aware of the manipulation people often attempted to project on toyou.

Andyet, you willingly let yourself be manipulatedby him. All because you loved him too muchto see him die on his own hands.

Butwas it really love, when you only felt pityand guilt at his current condition?Was it really love, when you merely humoredhim like a lowly servant you came tobe?

Youdidn’t know, but you nodded anyway.

“I will.”

Wereyou the victim here? Or was it him?

Nevertheless,the joyous smile on his face was worththe emotional baggage that you’d carried these past few years.

“Thankyou, baby.”

Andat least, he appreciated yourefforts. However wrong his tacticwas.

[southomens]

Day 8 of Ineffable Holiday: Holiday Shopping

Hello! I’m writing my little comment at the beginning this time as this turned out to be a longer fic (~1500 words), maybe ignited by a ridiculous amount of alcohol and some sober editing. 

This is Day 8 of an #IneffableHoliday prompt list. Check the hashtag or follow @soft-angel-aziraphale because there is some lovely art posted :)

As always, you can also find it on Ao3 here. Feel free to leave me a comment, I’m addicted to those :)

“Oh, no. No, no. Bad luck for us would actually mean dreadful luck. It’s not something we should be risking. Big risk fan, me, though. But not today, I think n-” his rant was halted by two warm hands cupping his cheeks. Crowley could feel the blood rushing up his neck as he opened and closed his mouth looking for something to say. He gave up and then relaxed, soothed by the comfort of being held by Aziraphale. Time seemed to slow down as the angel closed the space between them and paused just an inch away from him, hesitating. Crowley could not stand it any longer and grabbed him by the lapels, making Aziraphale gasp, to finally, finally kiss him.

It seemed that the freezing wind could not dissuade people from shopping. Perhaps it was due to how close they were to Christmas Eve, perhaps it was that it was the thing to do that evening. Aziraphale dodged yet another grandma carrying more bags than she should be able to.

“Oh, dear, this is a nightmare!” the angel complained.

“Uh, well, you did say you wanted to go shopping for the holidays so you are having the complete experience,” Crowley answered, shrugging it off.

“I did, but it seems I wasn’t completely aware of what I was saying… This reminds me of Hell, with all the people and the queues and everyone running. Look at them, not even one of them is enjoying themselves!” he was shocked, trying to understand what was going on around him.

“It’s the 23rd, of course nobody is enjoying shopping. They’re desperate! The last ones, those who have slothly postponed over and over again their duties and now they are paying for it. It’s brilliant!” Crowley grinned.

“Brilliant? Wait, Crowley. Was holiday shopping your idea?” Aziraphale stopped walking and a man bumped into him before continuing his way without apologising. 

“Uh, not exactly. I wish it had been, I mean, turning a religious holiday into Hell? It’s genius! They beat me to it, but I got credit. So, if anyone asks, yeah I did come up with the last minute holiday shopping.” 

“Dear fellow, how many more things did you give yourself credit that I don’t know of?” Aziraphale asked, partially amused by it if it weren’t for the constant bumping with people and the general unpleasant ambient.

“That you don’t know of? Plenty. Yeah, many of them. About two per year? It was my job, innit?” 

“My goodness, and did they believe you? That seems like a rather big amount of lies, Crowley.”

“That’s right. You’re talking to the serpent of Eden. The original sin. The first tempter. I’m quite a good liar, you know? Telling people what they want to hear” they had started walking again but now people seemed to diverge their path just to let them pass, in a way that reminded Crowley of Moses.

“How would I know? I mean, if you are such a good liar, as you said, I wouldn’t be able to notice when you lied to me. So I guess not, I don’t really know,” Aziraphale explained. He had always assumed that Crowley, being a demon, wouldn’t always tell him the truth. It was expected of him, it was in his job description.

“Well, I don’t lie to you,” the demon pointed out. “What would be the point? You would probably get so mad at me that we wouldn’t speak for a century or so, which has happened in the past even though when I was telling you the truth, and that’s something I’m not willing to go through again. Not good. Well, the nap was good. But everything else sucked pretty badly. Did you know I woke up in the middle of World War II? Let me tell you, it was not a pleasant surprise.”

“And yet you came to rescue me,” Aziraphale slyly smiled at Crowley.

“Yeah, well. That’s what friends do. Or so I’ve heard,” Crowley shrugged it off and entered the first shop he saw, a decoration store filled with Christmas trees of all shapes, colours and materials, a wide variety of presents, shiny rolls of wrapping paper and intricate ornaments, as well as funny accessories with a consistent holidays pattern. They were surrounded by Santa Clauses, reindeers, snowflakes, trees, presents, bells, mistletoe, stars, red and green imprinted everywhere. A Christmas carol could be heard above the noise all the potential shoppers were making in their frenzied purchases.

“Oh, look at this, Crowley!” Aziraphale said, putting on a headband with reindeer horns. A bunch of tiny bells sewn to it jingled. “It’s adorable!” the demon looked at him, his beaming smile and his blonde curls, and blushed.

“You look ridiculous, angel.” he said, immediately turning around and faking interest on whatever stupid thing was standing on that particular shelf. He fiddled around, willing the blush to disappear.

“You should try those ones over there.” Aziraphale said, peeking over Crowley’s shoulder.

“What? No! These? No, not in a million years, nuh-huh. I’ve got standards. Unlike some people around here.” 

“Whyever not? They’re fun. And you like sunglasses,” Aziraphale insisted, having way too much fun in Crowley’s opinion. The demon sighed, took off the pair he was currently wearing and put on the heart-shaped ones Aziraphale was pointing at. He turned around, defeated.

“Oh! Oh, you look utterly adorable!” the angel jumped on his feet and clapped. “We must buy these.”

“Why? They’re made of plastic, angel. No sense of aesthetics. These - they’re hideous! It’s humiliating,” he whined as Aziraphale took him by the hand and led him to the counter, where there was no queue to wait. “You do realise this can be considered torture, right?”

“Oh, hush. I will wear this headband so you don’t feel ridiculous - not that you look ridiculous. I insist, you look adorable.” Crowley felt like he was about to combust any minute now. Not knowing anything better to do, he tried to bit back.

“How is that supposed to help? I’m not adorable, I shouldn’t look like it. I’m a demon” Crowley moaned as Aziraphale ignored him and paid for both articles. They exited the shop and went on to the next one.

“I love this shop, I love how it smells even from the outside. Marvelous,” Aziraphale briefly sniffed around before opening the door to let Crowley in. Three counters, forming an inverted U, received them. They were filled with a wide variety of sweets, treats and chocolates, each of them more intricate than the other. Aziraphale wiggled in excitement before approaching one of the clerks.

“Hello,” the angel greeted with his usual kindness. “I would like to have the usual, if you please.”

“Right away, Mr. Fell,” the lady answered before going to the backroom.

“They know you here.” Crowley said, not impressed in the least. Aziraphale was probably known in every chocolate shop in the entire United Kingdom. Probably also in Belgium, Switzerland and France. And any other country that may have chocolate shops.

“Oh, yes. It has been one of my top twenty-five chocolate shops in London for quite a while now. I’m surprised I haven’t bring you here before,” Aziraphale answered. 

“I guess we still have things to show the other…” Crowley muttered. 

“Quite right, dear.” the angel smiled shyly. “It keeps things interesting, wouldn’t you say so?”

Once Aziraphale had his box of chocolates, they both agreed they had had enough of the Christmas shopping experience. Crowley led the way to a small winery closeby. It was crowded, but once again, they were lucky enough to not have to wait before having a seat in a small corner. 

The demon was still wearing the hideous glasses while Aziraphale moved his head from time to time just to make the tiny bells on his headband jingle.

“Two red wines for the loveñy couple…” the waitress placed two cups on the small table as Crowley struggled to say something.

“Thank you, dear,” said Aziraphale instead as he tried to hide a smirk behind his glass. “Hm, this is quite nice.” The demon agreed to it even though he hadn’t had a sip yet. He had always enjoyed those moments when Aziraphale would show his most bastard side and it had been nice to openly do it with the freedom they now enjoyed. But there was this smugginess about him today that was disconcerting.

They kept drinking for a couple of hours, idly chatting and discussing about that first time they celebrated the winter solstice and that other time where they got drunk on eggnog and then regretted it. They fell into a comfortable silence. Aziraphale looked around, taking in the surroundings and the people around them when he noticed something hanging from the ceiling. He opened his eyes widely, the epitome of shock.

“Is that… is that mistletoe?” Aziraphale asked, gesturing with his index finger towards it.

“Whuh?” Crowley had been sprawled over the table for a while now, the glasses no longer sitting properly on his nose. He looked to where Aziraphale was pointing. “Huh… I guess it is?” there was no point in denying it.

“Well. We ought to do something about it. Otherwise it’ll be bad luck. I think.” Crowley stood up straight, startled. 

“D- do you mean… Like, uh, that we should…” he trailed off.

“Kiss, yes.” Aziraphale said. “Unless you want to risk the bad luck.”

[the-signs-of-two]

I made a post yesterday asking if you would be interested in hearing my thoughts on Sherlock and the Sherlock fandom in light of the recent influx of Good Omens-stuff, which has made some people in the Sherlock fandom afraid that the fandom is dying. I received nothing but positive responses, which both surprised and delighted me to no end, so here we are.

This is going to be a bit of a long and rambling one, so strap in.

First of all, I need to talk about some personal stuff that I haven’t really talked about on this tumblr before. That is my Asperger’s (I was diagnosed less than a year ago, I’m still processing it and I haven’t received an “official diagnosis”, just the word of a psychologist specialising in girls and young women with Asperger’s – just putting that out there). I know a lot of people in the fandom have similar problems, so I’m not sure how much I need to explain. But I do want to say that the way Asperger’s is generally written about and portrayed online (on sites like Wikipedia or the like) is, in my opinion, often very negatively worded and gives an exaggerated idea of what Asperger’s is, at least when it comes to milder cases such as me.

A characteristic of Asperger’s is what’s known in English as “restricted and repetitive interests”, which I find to be a very negative term. I much prefer the Danish term særinteresser (“special” or “peculiar” interests). Basically, it means that a lot of people with Asperger’s develop a keen and often very intense interest in a certain quite niche subject – if you’ve heard Cabin Pressure, think of the way Martin obsesses over planes and memorises an enormous amount of plane trivia.

For me, it’s always been an abnormally strong obsession with various media. I’ve obsessed about various franchises through the years, but Sherlock and Sherlock Holmes has been the one and only for at least 4-5 years now. It doesn’t necessarily mean that my interest is stronger than other people in the fandom who spend a lot of time and get a lot of enjoyment out of Sherlock, but it certainly is stronger than the average fan and it has some, shall we say, specific expressions. I LOVE talking about Sherlock – I find it really difficult to describe the kind of excitement and positive energy I get from talking Sherlock, but think of the way children get excited when they do something they love and the excitement is just bursting out of them. I don’t need something new to talk about either. I write meta when I get a good idea or I get inspired by other people’s meta and throw in my two cents, but generally speaking, I don’t need something new to discuss in order to discuss Sherlock. I just want to talk about it! I try to keep it to a minimum on here because I think people… wouldn’t really… care…, but I’d love to discuss things like what I think characterises Sherlock and John, what I look for when I watch a Sherlock adaptation in the characters and in the relationship between the characters, my top ten Sherlocks, my top ten Johns and my top ten adaptations (side note: if anyone is interested in that, PLEASE drop me a comment or an ask, I’d be absolutely delighted).

So… all that to say that I consume Sherlock and Sherlock Holmes and participate in the Sherlock fandom because it gives me an immense sense of satisfaction as well as an outlet for my excitement that doesn’t bother my surroundings. That is what I think the core of fandom is and always should be: enjoying and celebrating what you love unapologetically in a safe, supporting environment, where you don’t have to rein in your feelings in fear of negative social consequences. And I think that’s always very, very important to keep in mind – it’s all about enjoying what you enjoy.

In my opinion, all fandoms should aim to promote that enjoyment and reduce negativity. Of course it’s the internet – negativity is hard to get rid of completely. But, speaking only for myself, I’m here to have fun.

That is why it will always be my opinion that no matter what you ship, that should be met with acceptance and respect. I don’t ship Adlock or Sherlolly (just to mention two prominent ships in my fandom that I am not a part of), but I would never ever argue that shipping Johnlock is “better” or “more correct” than shipping anything else. Shipping Johnlock is simply my preference and, frankly, I don’t consider it my business what other people enjoy. I can join them in loving the show as a whole and then we may go our separate ways when we want to talk shipping. I hope and believe that Johnlock might be made canon someday. But even if it does, I don’t think that matters much when it comes to shipping. Johnlock becoming canon matters for representational reasons and for the people who already ship Johnlock, but shipping is separate from and can live without “the canon stamp of approval”. What’s canon and what’s not doesn’t legitimise some ships relative to others because, again, shipping is about enjoyment and I think everyone ought to be free to enjoy whatever the heck they want to enjoy.

That applies to other fandoms as well.

As a quick disclaimer, I haven’t watched Good Omens. I probably will at some point, it looks really good (but I’m not gonna lie: I’m mainly interested because of Benedict, Mark and the setting).

So… Good Omens. You can probably guess what I’m going to say: people may enjoy whatever they enjoy. Some might leave Sherlock behind and make a full transition to Good Omens. Some might be really into Good Omens now and return to Sherlock in a while. Some might just be experiencing a short crush on another fandom and return to Sherlock very soon. Some might just be dipping their toes into it. As Moriarty would say: It’s all good.

I’m fully familiar with crushes on other fandoms. I go through such phases too every once in a while. I recently went through an intense The Lord of the Rings-phase after watching the Extended Editions and all (yes, ALL) of the additional material.

However, I’m also fully familiar with the fear that you yourself or other people in a fandom are moving on. Whenever I go through one of these phases where I get really into another fandom for a while, I get really upset because I think I might be leaving Sherlock behind. And our fandom is in a very precarious position at the moment. It’s been two and a half years since we last had any new content and that content was… uhm… a mixed bag. We don’t know if we’ll ever get more and, if we will, we don’t know when. And if we won’t get new content, somehow we’ll have to reconcile ourselves with S4, which is really hard. Fandoms tend to stagnate after a while if no new content is added, and I think that’s what a lot of people fear is happening. And it’s a very natural fear, whether you fear you yourself losing your interest in a fandom or the fandom itself shutting down: you don’t want something that has given you so much enjoyment to end.

But I don’t think we’re there. There’s still so much to do and talk about and analyse and create in this fandom. People post new fanfics and upload new fanart every single day. I’m able to reblog tonnes and tonnes of great content from other people in the fandom on a daily basis. I have nearly 1000 followers on here (as a side note, it is absolutely crazy and I am so blessed and thankful to all of you!). Of course, many of them might not actually check out what I post anymore, but seeing as I almost exclusively post Sherlock stuff and have done since the very beginning, clearly there’s still a lot of people who are interested in this content. Heck, even the creators are still desperately trying to keep everyone invested by trying to get us all drunk on themed cocktails.

So my final comments are these: I understand both the appeal of a new fandom (especially a fandom with a cast and crew as supportive of their fans as GO seems to have) and the fear that you or others might be moving on. But I want to stress the importance of having a fandom driven by excitement and enjoyment. So those who are really into GO at the moment should absolutely not be made to feel bad about that. People should be free to post and enjoy whatever the heck they want and that goes for everyone. I, for one, don’t think our fandom is anywhere near done and I will continue to post all Sherlock-Sherlock-Sherlock for the foreseeable future while we wait for S5.

Tagging the people who asked for this: @colourfulwatson @anchored-in-high-tide @catwillowtree @gelos @johnlockedinwarstan @why-are-you-cryingg (your username will not link for me for some reason, I’m sorry, I hope you see this) @cherylbombshellofthegay @royalworldtraveler @flowery222 @ebaeschnbliah @sherlockslove112