#anyway godlike gang for life

[eruscreaminginthedistance]

[oc-siblings-bracket]

OC-Siblings-Bracket 1.6

info down there because these posts are long ↓

Aster & Rita Flint by @misspelled-magic

Info:

They are prophecy kids! Twins! Deeply hurt but still choose love! Both of them have sick magic powers (Rita is stopping time, aster is minds/illusions). They are holders (have a spirit (godlike entity) inside of them)! They are silver and gold themed. They are my lovelies.

Sophie Cherubi Flarph Cranberry Bumblebee & Samuel Somalma-Gintoro by @meangreenmotherfromouterspace22

Info:

my blorpos! my skrinkly dinklys!!!

Sophie and Sam are adopted twins, or so they call themselves anyway, with there being literally exactly a month in between their birthdays, October 22nd and September 22nd respectively.

Sophie was technically, the "first" sibling, having been taken in by the twins father, Felix, at 6 months, and she's always been something…special, Sophie. from as little as 1 she could make objects disappear and appear as she pleased, randomly change the colour of food and water, and even her own physical appearance, changing her naturally blonde hair to black to match her father. Sophie was an Avatar of Creation, part of a long lineage of beings known as The Hins.

The Hins, born every time a previous one perishes, are the embodiment of pure creation, or as its known in universe, The Soop. the avatar can be anyone, anywhere, and in this case, it was Sophie! Hins have a general omnipotence, as well as a slight ability to divine the future and the ability to manifest and create anything they wish, although this has to be honed throughout a Hins life. Sophie, though, started off with some pretty powerful clairvoyance. and one day, when she was about 3.

She saw a boy lost in the woods, in her minds eye. he was scared and frightened, bruised and scratched. Sophie wanted to see why anyone would be so hurt as that, to make sure he was ok! like any good little girl would. so she snuck out the house, unbeknownst to her father. and she went to look for this lost and hurt boy, and found him, exactly where she'd thought he'd be. the kid didnt approach her at first. for someone her own age, Sophie had never met someone so afraid of other people before. she shared whatever she could find, sticks, bugs, sweets, even the coolest of rocks, trying to gain his trust. and eventually, the boy spoke to her! his name was Lukas, Lukas Selevure, and although Sophie couldn't have known it at the time. she was about to rescue this boy from a truly horrible fate.

Lukas Mother, Lucinda Selevure, was something of a mad scientist. a mad, mad scientist, if you will. Her Son, her only son, nothing more than an experiment for her. because Lukas was born with powers of his own. control over the cold, over ice, and snows. Lucinda had had powers as such before too…only to have lost them, through divine intervention due to her developing a whole "it is my divine right to rule the world" complex. and she planned to use her son, to give her back her powers. So Lukas, knowing he was in danger, but not knowing how, Ran. he ran fast and far, as far away from Lucinda as he could. and the universe, or fate, or luck, or maybe just a little girl looking to help, brought Lukas to the safest place possible for him. a Family.

Sophie told her father, of course she did, about what Lukas was going through, and Felix Somalma (as he was at the time), did not hesitate for a second to take this boy in. legality be damned, lawsuits be damned, that kid was not safe around Selevure. Lukas was renamed, to Samuel Somalma (a name he himself picked out, to match with Sophie! the S gang for life), and his appearance was altered so drastically he looked nothing like his mother anymore. but everything like his Sister and Father. of course, Sam didnt escape entirely unscathed. Lucinda still did monumental damage to him. but he wouldnt ever be hurt by Selevure again, not with his twin sister by his side.

The twins grew up happy as clams, at least until. the stepdad came along. Felix was a kind man, a good, softhearted, friendly man. but that made it very easy for the wrong man to swoop in, and take advantage of that. that man was named Ethan Andrikos, and from the second he darkened their door, Sophie and Sam knew, he was trouble. they stuck by each other, as they watched Felix slowly become less and less himself under the eye of their shitty vampire stepdad, fought back however they could. and eventually, the two even put together a court case, a whole court case, just two kids! all so they could save their dad. and the divorce was long, and messy. and unfortunately for the twins, required them both to be sent to separate houses, to prevent any risk to them in case of Ethan trying…something.

Neither of the Somalma twins wanted to be apart, of course, they'd spent their whole lives together! they would barely manage apart. and they struggled, absolutely, for a while. but it just made coming home all the sweeter, to a house without a shitty stepdad, with their old dad back, their old rooms and everything. nothing could keep their family apart, and certainly nothing could keep them apart either. They were always in the same classes at school, and really, each others only friends, because well. with powers as bizarre as theirs, and lives as odd too. no one really wanted to get too entrenched into the lives of the Somalmas.

they're both 22 now, as the current story goes, Sam having left school and gone to a music university, Sophie having dropped out to. become a supervillain? yeah i mean considering her powers, it would work. and they both still live with their dad, i mean, they're a hispanic family and all, they cant really imagine going anywhere else! and their dad, something of a serial adopter, has, well. adopted a fair few more siblings. but for Sophie and Sam, its always them against the world. a pair of nerds whose spent all their lives as best friends, picking each other up when they're down, teasing and playfighting as siblings do but never not being their for each other. it's the SS siblings for life! and sure, Felix remarried. and they're a little skeptical of the new dad too. but whatever they go through, they go through it together!!

Misc facts:

both of them have autism. their whole family has autism, actually. its like their thing /lhj/pos

Sam has had a lifelong hyperfixation on Sonic the Hedgehog that Sophie actually started off for him, getting Sonic 2 for them both to play CO-OP on!

Sophie meanwhile hyperfixates on Star Wars. they were 5 years old when Revenge of the Sith came out and ever since them, Sam goes to see every single star was movie with his sister, even the ones he knows she'll hate, just so she has good company for them

Because of Sams ice powers, and general apperance, he gets called, lovingly, "the abominable snow-sam" by his sister. he is not fond of this /lh

Sophie has many nicknames for her brother actually, including Snow Queen, Elsa, Vanilla Ice, Frappe boy, Snowcone Mcgee, it goes on

Sam has one nickname for Sophie. Dumbass. it gets the point across very well, he thinks

up until they were about 12, Sophie was the tallest sibling by a whole 2 inches, being 5'4 to sams 5'2, until sam SHOT up to a whopping 6'2, and Sophie stayed exactly where she was. no she is NOT salty about this

Sam is very much Mentally Unwell trademark as a result of everything he went through as a child, including some stuff i left out for brevity (laugh /lhj), so as a result he has extremely bad social and generalised anxiety, as well as Depression, which he's unmedicated for.

this results in Sophie being one of the only people who Sam comes out of his shell for, one of the only people he'll even bother talking to.

Sophie as well, despite being the opposite and extremely extroverted, still relies on Sam in conversations as something of a comedic foil, she bounces off him perfectly and finds shes her most authentic self with her brother to help and play support.

they both grew up in London with their dad, but in the cannon recently moved to a place named Yeah City, Ohio (which is an RP i do with my friends!) where there family has grown exponentially.

aside from their dad, Felix, their joint favourite family members are their adopted younger sibling, Mavis, who they both try very hard to be the cool older sibling too, and their uncle Vincent Lance, who they both try and impress because hes like. a cool immortal autistic musician man and they both think thats cool as shit

demigirl and demiboy solidarity!!

Sophie is bisexual aro/acespec and sam is just Bisexual. sibling solidarity!

once had a birthday party together where Sam slept through the whole thing and Sophie staged a kidnapping of the employees for banning her from the ball pit (she kept putting mouse traps in the pit)

Sam, despite his anxiety, is ironically pretty fearless, while Sophie is very easily frightened despite putting a brave idiot facade. the best example of this is Sophie at age 5 being fucking terrified of Monsters Inc, while Sam was happily watching pg-13s by 6.

Sam, because of his ice powers, sometimes just. sits in the freezer, in the house. Sophie will sit on top of the freezer and talk to him through the lid, its peak bonding time for them

Sophie loves wearing hats, always has done, and some of her favourites, like a character hat of Yoda Star Wars, were brought for her by Sam!

Sam regularly dyes his hair because of his tragic backstory, and every time he does it he swaps the sides the black and brown dye are on to fuck with friends and family

At one point Sophie got possessed by an evil void ghost thats not relevant here, but a side effect of that is that she's stuck with dark black streaks in her hair that'll never come out. to make her feel better about it, Sam calls it "Emo Solidarity" due to his own. Emo-ness/lh/pos/aff

….god im so sorry this is so long /lh

[humangods]

GENERAL INFORMATION

► FULL NAME: Valeria Aguilar ► NICKNAMES: Val ► GENDER & PRONOUNS: Cis Woman (She/Her) ► AGE: Ancient (appears 50) ► BIRTHDAY: November 22 ► SEXUAL ORIENTATION: Pansexual ► OCCUPATION: Hitman / Mercenary

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

► RELIGION: Agnostic ► EDUCATION LEVEL: Ph.D. (at least two and multiple degrees) ► ECONOMIC STATUS: Wealthy ► SPOKEN LANGUAGES: English (fluent), Spanish (fluent), French (fluent), Italian (intermediate), Mandarin (intermediate), Portuguese (intermediate), German (novice)

PERSONALITY

► JUNG TYPE: INF/TJ ► ENNEAGRAM: Type 5w6 ► MORAL ALIGNMENT: Chaotic Neutral ► TEMPERAMENT: Melancholic ► QUALITIES: Adaptable, Dauntless, Determined, Outspoken, Patient ► FLAWS: Cynical, Distant, Opportunistic, Secretive, Self-serving

BESTIARY

► SPECIES: Human ► POWERS: Accelerated healing, Immortality, No longer ages

APPEARANCE

► FACE CLAIM: Penélope Cruz ► HEIGHT: 5’6” ► EYE COLOR: Brunette ► HAIR COLOR: Dark brunette ► TATTOOS: None ► SCARS: None ► PIERCINGS: Left earlobe (two), Right earlobe (one), Helix (right)

BIOGRAPHY

Trigger Warning(s): Death, Murder

Valeria wasn’t always known as Valeria, but she’d gone by countless ones that it was impossible to keep a running, mental list of them all. Rather, she remembered her life in eras as that was the only way a person like her could keep track of the more memorable events in her life. She wasn’t like most, or anyone else that she knew of: Valeria discovered she was immortal.

It never occurred to her to question her fast healing abilities until she suffered more serious wounds that disappeared as though they never happened at all in a matter of hours that would’ve taken someone else weeks to recover from. This discovery immediately ostracized Valeria from everyone else she knew and that was when her life on the constant move began. This was several millennia ago, and since then Valeria had undertaken a variety of jobs. When she was younger, and still aged, she took every opportunity she could. It didn’t matter if it called for her to be unscrupulous or cast aside whatever morals she had, of which there were few. Valeria used her feminine wiles to her advantage, conned people out of money and information which she later sold, but not all her jobs were of the more ethically grey or undeniably illegal variety. She’d worked more average jobs, but none had held her interest for long, not that they ever needed to when she had to move some years later anyway.

The experiences that always stuck with Valeria was when she worked as a petty criminal. Thieving was easy and she never minded getting her hands dirty -- bloody, even -- and it led to her falling into working for gangs. It started as violent robberies and escalated to killings, and Valeria found that for better or worse she was good at it. She drifted through time and her own existence working primarily as a hitman and a mercenary, working solo or as part of a company or organization, and while she never enjoyed the act of murder itself it made the most sense for her to stick with it. Immortal or not, people in the business of death wanted to remain unknown by everyone except the ones who needed to find them for their services. And this worked out perfectly for Valeria who had to be a ghost for a multitude of reasons.

But when her body hit fifty it ceased any aging. Valeria didn’t know why it stopped at that age, why not sooner or later, but she didn’t question it. Despite her godlike length of time on Earth she never gained any profound insight or clear cut answers to her immortal condition and had at some point given up trying to find any.

The fact she no longer aged meant she had to move more frequently, change her identity more often. It was tiresome, but now being a master at her craft meant she always found work because there was always someone who wanted a killing done no matter what era it was.

RELATIONSHIPS

► MOTHER: Rosa De La Cruz (deceased; unemployed) ► FATHER: Matthew De La Cruz (deceased; merchant)

MISC INFORMATION

► Never stays in one place for too long so as not to raise suspicions of her irregular existence. ► Holds multiple degrees from different universities, but hasn’t been back in recent lifetimes. Instead, she stays well read to keep up with the times, but she lacks the interest and time to sit in a lecture hall and do homework. ► Though an independent mercenary, she may take up regular contracts from the same criminal organization or individual until she grows weary of them or if it’s time for her to move on and transition into a new identity. ► Flirts at the worst moments. Also bad at flirting. ► Has grown weary from such a long existence, but does find her unique experience of having lived through so much of history to be special. Whether she likes that or not is another matter.

[asterigos]

GENERAL INFORMATION

► FULL NAME: Valeria Aguilar ► NICKNAMES: Val ► GENDER & PRONOUNS: Cis Woman (She/Her) ► AGE: Ancient (appears 50) ► BIRTHDAY: November 22 ► SEXUAL ORIENTATION: Pansexual ► OCCUPATION: Hitman / Mercenary

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

► RELIGION: Agnostic ► EDUCATION LEVEL:  Ph.D. (at least two and multiple degrees) ► ECONOMIC STATUS: Wealthy ► SPOKEN LANGUAGES: English (fluent), Spanish (fluent), French (fluent), Italian (intermediate), Mandarin (intermediate), Portuguese (intermediate), German (novice)

PERSONALITY

► JUNG TYPE: INF/TJ ► ENNEAGRAM: Type 5w6 ► MORAL ALIGNMENT: Chaotic Neutral ► TEMPERAMENT: Melancholic ► QUALITIES: Adaptable, Dauntless, Determined, Outspoken, Patient ► FLAWS: Cynical, Distant, Opportunistic, Secretive, Self-serving

BESTIARY

► SPECIES: Human ► POWERS: Accelerated healing, Immortality, No longer ages

APPEARANCE

► FACE CLAIM: Penélope Cruz ► HEIGHT: 5’6” ► EYE COLOR: Brunette ► HAIR COLOR: Dark brunette ► TATTOOS: None ► SCARS: None ► PIERCINGS: Left earlobe (two), Right earlobe (one), Helix (right)

BIOGRAPHY

Trigger Warning(s): Death

Valeria wasn’t always known as Valeria, but she’d gone by countless ones that it was impossible to keep a running, mental list of them all. Rather, she remembered her life in eras as that was the only way a person like her could keep track of the more memorable events in her life. She wasn’t like most, or anyone else that she knew of: Valeria discovered she was immortal.

It never occurred to her to question her fast healing abilities until she suffered more serious wounds that disappeared as though they never happened at all in a matter of hours that would’ve taken someone else weeks to recover from. This discovery immediately ostracized Valeria from everyone else she knew and that was when her life on the constant move began. This was several millennia ago, and since then Valeria had undertaken a variety of jobs. When she was younger, and still aged, she took every opportunity she could. It didn’t matter if it called for her to be unscrupulous or cast aside whatever morals she had, of which there were few. Valeria used her feminine wiles to her advantage, conned people out of money and information which she later sold, but not all her jobs were of the more ethically grey or undeniably illegal variety. She’d worked more average jobs, but none had held her interest for long, not that they ever needed to when she had to move some years later anyway.

The experiences that always stuck with Valeria was when she worked as a petty criminal. Thieving was easy and she never minded getting her hands dirty -- bloody, even -- and it led to her falling into working for gangs. It started as violent robberies and escalated to killings, and Valeria found that for better or worse she was good at it. She drifted through time and her own existence working primarily as a hitman and a mercenary, working solo or as part of a company or organization, and while she never enjoyed the act of murder itself it made the most sense for her to stick with it. Immortal or not, people in the business of death wanted to remain unknown by everyone except the ones who needed to find them for their services. And this worked out perfectly for Valeria who had to be a ghost for a multitude of reasons.

But when her body hit fifty it ceased any aging. Valeria didn’t know why it stopped at that age, why not sooner or later, but she didn’t question it. Despite her godlike length of time on Earth she never gained any profound insight or clear cut answers to her immortal condition and had at some point given up trying to find any.

The fact she no longer aged meant she had to move more frequently, change her identity more often. It was tiresome, but now being a master at her craft meant she always found work because there was always someone who wanted a killing done no matter what era it was.

RELATIONSHIPS

► MOTHER: Rosa De La Cruz (deceased; unemployed) ► FATHER: Matthew De La Cruz (deceased; merchant)

MISC INFORMATION

► Never stays in one place for too long so as not to raise suspicions of her irregular existence. ► Holds multiple degrees from different universities, but hasn’t been back in recent lifetimes. Instead, she stays well read to keep up with the times, but she lacks the interest and time to sit in a lecture hall and do homework. ► Though an independent mercenary, she may take up regular contracts from the same criminal organization or individual until she grows weary of them or if it’s time for her to move on and transition into a new identity. ► Flirts at the worst moments. Also bad at flirting. ► Has grown weary from such a long existence, but does find her unique experience of having lived through so much of history to be special. Whether she likes that or not is another matter.

[fishing-lesbian-catgirl]

hello i know a little bit about guilty gear and understand much less, but uh if you want could you do a lore dump on axl low?

I’d be happy to! His story isn’t the most plot significant but it is certainly interesting.

Note: I will be referencing events talked about in my other post so I don’t have to describe every single thing.

An important thing to know about Axl is that his lore is supposed to be convoluted and confusing, because his whole gimmick for the early games is that he is constantly being hurtled back and forth through time against his control. Most of his story beats involve him happening to appear at a certain time and place and be involved in the plot before being thrown through time again.

Axl Low was just a mostly ordinary (for a guilty gear character) guy in late 1900s Britain. He was very skilled at martial arts and took it upon himself to end gang assaults in the neighborhood by fighting gang members. He was apparently very successful and managed to run gangs out of the area without a single casualty. He was dating a girl named Megumi, who he was deeply in love with. They both swore their futures to one another, but fate had other plans. In a completely separate timeline, Megumi was the one chosen to become the vessel of the magical focus that was created by the combined will of humanity to achieve a bright future during the various apocalypses. Megumi was granted godlike power and became I-no. In 1998 in Axl’s timeline, his nearness to Megumi for some reason caused him to be hurtled through time to the year 2178, 3 years after the end of the Crusades.

He spent the next 2 years searching for a way back to his timeline with no success. But then he heard about the Sacred Knights tournament that supposedly granted a wish to the winner, so he joined. The whole thing turned out to be a hoax caused by Testament to resurrect Justice. He aids in the plot to stop Justice and Sol Badguy succeeds in killing Justice. Axl was let down that his opportunity to go back to his time was a lie, but then the crowd of the tournament cheered him on and he realized he could make new friends in this future, right when he reached out to the people he was hurtled through time again.

Most of Axl’s story goes along these lines, he appears at a certain place in time, partakes in whatever plot hijinks is happening, and then gets thrown through time again. None of it is particularly important, and I’m trying to avoid just paraphrasing the wiki page, so I’ll just get to the parts that matter for his overarching story arc. Just know that he does time traveling shenanigans and meets his own double a couple times, at one point he gets sent back to 1998 but before he can talk to Megumi he is whisked away again.

Anyway he eventually learns of That Man and tries to seek him out because he’s supposedly a time traveler. He then meets I-no, who works for That Man at the time. His next important time slip involves him being sent to a desolate future version of 2192, where The Original tells him to deliver a message to That Man, Axl doesn’t understand what the message means but agrees all the same. Then he’s slips through time to Bedman (a creepy guy who lives his entire life in a dream strapped to a robot bed, I don’t really understand Bedman’s lore other than that he tries to kill people a lot of the time)‘s nightmare theater, but before Bedman can kill him, I-no pulls him back through time to the desolate 2192, intending to kill him for knowing about the existence of The Original. He explains that he has a message from The Original so she sends him back through time to give the message to That Man.

Afterwards Axl realized I-no’s time powers can send him back home, so he tracks her down, but when he finds her he learns that if he were to be sent back in time, it could potentially change and destroy the timeline he is currently in, so I-no doesn’t want to do it. Axl gives up on returning home and tries to find purpose here in the future, he eventually even learns to control the time powers he has, allowing him to slow down, compress, and potentially even freeze time.

From this point on Axl doesn’t slip through time much if at all. He tries not to look back on the past, but eventually realizes it would be possible to trade places with Megumi, bringing her to the future at the cost of himself, but that it wouldn’t succeed at bringing them together.

Axl starts having premonitions of the future, including one where Happy Chaos (who used to be The Original) tells him that they haven’t seen eachother since 2192 (the year he met The Original in the desolate future). Axl gets a premonition that something bad is going to happen at a certain area of the city, on the day when it happens, Happy Chaos blows up a building to free Nagoriyuki (a black vampire samurai and one of the coolest characters in guilty gear) as Chaos intends to take control of Nagoriyuki and use him for his plot to restore I-no to godhood. When the explosion happens, Axl freezes time and teleports the civilians in the building to safety, where he meets and has a brief conversation with I-no.

At the end of the Strive storyline, when I-no has ascended to godhood and is fighting with essentially everyone else who don’t want her to abuse her power, Axl tries to reason with her, but it doesn’t work. Axl and Ky distract her, and Sol Badguy steals her magic electric guitar and uses it to strike a presumably lethal blow to I-no. While she lay there presumably dying, Axl cries and begs her to remember something. With I-no defeated Axl finds himself alone in a park, when suddenly Megumi from his timeline appears next to him bearing a message from I-no. I believe the implication is that I-no did what Axl considered earlier, trading places with the Megumi from his timeline to bring her to the future, this way in the end Axl and Megumi finally get to be together, and I-no’s whereabouts and even whether or not she is still alive remain a mystery. And Axl and Megumi lived happily ever after.

I just wanted to say that since Axl is one of the few characters with a definitive concrete end to his story arc, I’m curious how/if it will be continued whenever the next guilty gear releases, but that is a long ways away

[silvormoon]

My Hero

A little vignette set in my superhero universe. Juudai’s been giving his all to being a good hero. Sometimes, he just needs someone to give a little something back.

It wasn’t easy, being the most powerful super in the world.

That sounded trite. Worse, it sounded self-congratulatory, a way of boasting that he, Yuuki Juudai, had much grander and more important problems than the humdrum things mere mortals had to deal with. It conjured up images of some movie star or millionaire lounging on their sofa sipping champagne while they talked about how stressful their life was.

And the point was that it wasn’t easy for Juudai, and he didn’t even get the champagne to make up for it. Granted, his life did tend to involve a lot of sofas, but mainly in the, “Can I crash here tonight?” kind of way. The hardest part was that he knew he could change that if he wanted to. He could make himself famous overnight. He could have as much money as he wanted. People would line up for miles to get the kind of treatment he could provide. He could make the world his oyster, if he wanted to, or crush it under his heel, and no one would be able to stop him. That was the whole reason why he worked in the dark, kept his name out of the papers, and slept in a tent or on friends’ sofas and spare beds, earned money doing odd jobs when he had any money at all, and spent a lot of time second-guessing himself.

But he wasn’t doing any second-guessing tonight. Tonight, he had found the hideout of a gang of criminals who had been peddling a bogus drug they claimed would give people temporary superpowers. What it did was to give the user a sense of euphoria, a feeling that they were all-powerful and omniscient. Several people had died from jumping off buildings or doing other equally risky things under the influence of the drug, and Juudai had decided someone needed to put a stop to it.

Just now, he was waiting near the front door of the lab. Yubel was standing over the collection of about a dozen men they’d captured together and was giving them all vicious glares if any of them so much as breathed too loudly. Juudai was aware of a few more who had fled out the back door, but he and Yubel had managed to capture the three ringleaders, so he doubted the operation would be starting up again any time soon. They had been using some specific know-how blended with the application of some unique superpowers to synthesize the drug, and those powers were gone now. It was a shame, really. A power to synthesize chemicals like that would have been invaluable to the medical community. Perhaps if this man learned his lesson, Juudai would let him have it back someday.

For now, he watched as a number of police officers warily approached the building.

“It’s okay!” Juudai called out to them. “My partner and I have things pretty well nailed down here.”

The lead officer edged a little closer. He was eyeing Juudai warily, and Juudai didn’t blame him. Most supers at least tried to look like superheroes when they were on the job. Juudai was wearing ragged jeans, hiking boots, a fleece-lined brown leather jacket that had obviously seen a great deal of life, and a T-shirt advertising a band called Sugar Snow. He looked more like a college student out for a beer than a superhero.

“Doing a little spur-of-the-moment heroing, are you?” asked the officer suspiciously. “Care to show me your license?”

Juudai produced his ID card and flicked it towards the officer, who caught it neatly out of the air.

“Thank you, sir,” he said, and ran it through a scanner at his waist. He looked at the results. His eyebrows rose. He scrolled rapidly through the rest of the file, then looked back at Juudai.

“You’re the Haou?” he asked.

Juudai shrugged. “Apparently. I mean, I didn’t come up with the name, but it’s sort of stuck to me now so I figured I might as well own it.”

“If you’ll excuse me, I didn’t think you were real,” said the officer, handing his card back.

Juudai shoved the ID back in his pocket. “Yeah, well, I like to keep a low profile.”

“I can certainly understand that, sir,” said the officer, a bit more respectfully. “But I would like to see some proof, if you don’t mind. May I...?”

“Huh? Oh, sure,” said Juudai, who had been through this song and dance before. There were ways that a villain could disguise themselves as a hero, many of them quite hard to detect. S-levels, though, tended to stay stable, so one way of proving a person was who they said they were was to test their blood and see if their S-levels matched what was printed on their ID card. It wasn’t foolproof, since it was possible for two people to have the same S-levels, even if the odds of any two people matching were one in several hundred. Nobody, however, had levels like Juudai. He offered his finger to be pricked, and watched as the numbers on the little scanner lit up. It showed 9999, just as it always did.

“You are him,” said the officer. He was visibly impressed now.

“Yeah, that’s me,” said Juudai uneasily. “Look, we’ve got these guys all tied up in the back, so if you wanna...?”

“Oh, yes, of course,” said the officer.

Uniformed men poured into the building and started doing official things. Juudai watched a little while to make sure everything was going as it should, then quietly slipped away when no one was looking.

“I wish they wouldn’t always do that,” he complained, woefully regarding his finger. “Just because I’m famous doesn’t give people the right to punch me full of holes.”

“You don’t have to let them do it,” said Yubel.

“I know,” he said. “It’s just not fair. If I had a normal power like flying or punching holes in walls or laser vision, no one would ever ask if I am who I say I am. They’d just go, ‘oh, you’re Wonder Guy, can I have your autograph?’”

Yubel gave him a knowing look. “And you’d want that, would you?”

“Not really,” Juudai admitted. “Well, maybe a little.”

“Do you know what your problem is?”

Juudai smirked. “I’m sure you have a list.

Through all he’d done in the years since he’d left school, Yubel had been his constant companion. Juudai had promised, after all, that they would stay together once they had found each other, and Yubel took him at his word. Through rain and snow, through train delays and cancelled flights, through cheap motels and leaky tents, gang wars and monster battles and helping lost children find their parents, whatever Juudai did, Yubel did too. Even on those days when everything went wrong and they were both feeling thoroughly sick of each other, Juudai was always thankful that he didn’t have to do all this alone.

“I think,” said Yubel, “that you’re burned out.”

“What do you mean, burned out?” said Juudai. “It’s not like I do very much. Mostly we just travel.”

“That still counts as doing things,” Yubel pointed out. “Anyway, you know what I mean. I’ve been watching you. You’re all give and no get. You do all these wonderful things but you don’t stick around to enjoy the thanks, because you’re afraid it will go to your head. Sooner or later, you’re bound to run out of give.”

Juudai scowled. “You know...”

“I know why you do things the way you do. You don’t want the whole world beating a path to your door demanding you give them all godlike superpowers, or take the powers away from people you don’t like,” said Yubel. “I’m just saying, it might be time for a vacation.”

Juudai knew his laugh sounded forced. “I don’t exactly have money for a tropical vacation.”

“Then ask one of your friends. Any one of them would let you stay with them for a while.” Yubel smiled. “It wouldn’t hurt to relive your school days for a while. Do you remember all the fun we had? The annual snowball fight, staying up late telling ghost stories, eating popcorn and watching movies in the common room...”

“Yeah, I remember,” said Juudai. He smiled a little. “Those were the good old days. Man, I’d give a lot to have another go at some of those games we used to play in Chronos’s class. Remember the time you got tangled up in that net so bad they had to cut you loose?”

Yubel huffed. “I could have gotten out if I’d wanted to.”

“I know,” said Juudai. He took out his phone and poked at it for a moment. “Hey, you know, there’s a gym close by that has those reinforced training rooms for playing capture the flag and stuff. We could see if we could scrape up a team. And then we could, I dunno, grab a pizza or some ramen or something, and then maybe catch a movie? And tomorrow I’ll call around and see if any of our friends mind having a couple of house guests for a few days.”

Yubel grinned. “Now you’ve got the idea.”

Juudai grinned back. “Knew there was a reason I kept you around.”

Yubel reached for his hand. “You keep me around for a lot of reasons.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” said Juudai. “Come on. Mission ‘Have Some Fun For A Change’ is officially under way.”

They began making their way towards their destination. Somewhere in the distance, Juudai could hear sirens. There was always something going on in a big city like this, and a part of him itched to be part of the action, but he knew Yubel was right. Sometimes, the person he needed to protect was himself. He was lucky he had someone by his side to remind him of that.

It doesn’t matter how strong I am, he thought. Sometimes I still need a hero, too. He was glad he’d found one.

“So, Yubel, what movie do you want to see?”

“I don’t know. What’s playing?”

“Well, there’s one about this secret agent who...”

“I am not sitting through another movie full of cars exploding. Pick something else!”

“I didn’t say I wanted to see that one!”

“No, but you were thinking it.”

Laughing and bantering with each other, they walked away, hand in hand.

[peace-coast-island]

Diary of a Junebug

Magic, resilience, and familial bonds 

A familiar face is back at the camp - and this time with company! If things seem a bit more magical than usual, there’s a reason why.

That’s right, Kat and her family are here with us on vacation! Earlier last week Daisy Jane and I visited Crescent Moon to attend the unveiling of a memorial dedicated to those who fell in the rebellion. It was nice seeing the BFF Squad again - probably the shortest time since we last saw each other. 

We extended the invitation to Hawk as he’s the only one in the gang who hasn’t visited the camp yet but he’s spending the week visiting family. Though he said that even if he didn’t have any plans, he felt that it was best if it was just Kat, Micah, and their dad. After all, they have a lot of lost time to make up for - which was why Kat and I arranged this whole thing.

So basically Kat and her family are basically sorcerers and then some. On her mother’s side she’s a powerful angelic sorcerer and on her dad’s side is half sorcerer and half elemental. In other words, Kat and Micah have the potential to be kinda OP as they have a godlike mom and a hybrid dad.

With no more battles to fight, the Crescent Moon family is slowly trying to adjust to a new life. For the most part things have settled down, though there’s still a lot to get used to - especially for Kat and Micah’s dad. After being missing and presumed dead for sixteen years he has a lot of catching up to do and while things are going well, it’s still rough at times.

After losing her mom and having to take over as leader, Kat has become everyone’s rock, especially for her dad and brother. While Kat’s title is queen, her family isn’t really what you’d consider as royalty or nobility. Like they do live in a castle and are descended from royalty but it’s more kinda like living in a mansion with your friends. The Crescent Moon castle’s probably the most homiest castle I’ve ever seen - aside from its grand size, you’d think you were living in a mansion or a fancy apartment.

Kat’s the kind of person who’s not afraid to use her powers when push comes to shove. She knows how to use her influence to help others and that’s why the rebellion succeeded. While she had to make some hard decisions and deal with failure, Kat and her friends ultimately saved thousands of lives and put together a once fragmented community. 

While Kat was carrying a rebellion on her back, Micah had some growing up to do. For the most part, he just tagged along with his sister, which he didn’t mind at all. Because he’s young, he’s not expected to deal with the same responsibilities Kat and his friends were dealing with. Aside from Devi, who’s a couple years younger than him, he mostly stuck around Kat’s friends. 

Devi’s one of those kids who was forced to grow up at a young age as she had to become the head of her family at the age of ten as she had no other family left. She’s mature than most people her age to the point it’s easy to forget how young she is. Sometimes Micah can be a bit of a bad influence on her as he can easily encourage her to act recklessly. Both also have a tendency to bite off way more than they can chew.

In a way, Micah was sheltered. Kat was too, but for her it was inevitable that she’d have to be involved with the rebellion. Micah was a bit of an outlier as up until this generation, there was only one heir. So in a way, no one knew exactly what to do with him in terms of rank and status - not that it really mattered anyway. His mom was overprotective of him for understandable reasons and Kat was similar. While he knows how to fend for himself, everyone else just kinda expects him to sit back and let the grown ups do the work.

With Kat having to take on her mother’s place, Micah had to deal with life-shattering changes. While Kat is a lot like their dad, Micah takes after their mom. Up until the big reunion he never met his dad, having been born eight months after his presumed death. Evangeline didn’t know she was pregnant until she almost miscarried, which would’ve been devastating because she already lost her husband. In the end she pulled through and named her child after the father he would sadly never get to know.

Other than with his dad, Micah never really understood or dealt with the impact of grief and death. Then he and Kat lose their mom and both realize that they’re not so invincible. Now with him being second in line, Micah was terrified. Though not to the same extent as Kat, he was suddenly thrown into responsibility as if a worst case scenario happened, then he would have to step up and lead. Obviously that didn’t sit well with him and he didn’t want to admit that such a thing could happen so he fought against it. 

He and Kat had their low moments in dealing with their mom’s death and accepting harsh reality was one of them. It wasn’t easy, but eventually they came to terms with what happened. 

The reappearance of the elder Micah is still something that Kat and Micah are getting used to. Kat was only around five when the incident happened so she didn’t have too many memories of him. His absence weighed heavily on Evangeline, who was said to have blamed herself for his death.

As it turns out, Micah Sr. somehow barely survived, except he was stranded. During his time trapped in between dimensions he was determined to fight his way back home. From using scrap metal to create a prosthetic leg to weaponizing his powers to fight against unpredictable hostilities, with nothing but his wits and the memories of his family, he hung on. It was by accident that AJ found him after a failed attempt at activating a portal and almost destroying a universe in the process.

After being rescued he found himself caught up in the chaos that it wasn’t until much later on it that the impact of his disappearance hit him. It’s no surprise that he lost track of time so everything became a fog to him. Someone - either Hawk or Elara - had to break it to him about exactly how long he’d been trapped so that was enough to put one into shock. 

It’s still a lot for him to take in but he’s getting better. Kat is a lot like her dad that it’s pretty funny. A couple days ago Kat posted a picture of herself and her dad when he was her age and it’s almost scary how much they look alike. No wonder AJ and Elara instantly clicked with him - he’s not just a supportive mentor figure but also the super cool much older friend who everyone looks up to. Micah Sr. has that charm that makes you feel safe and at ease, the kind of guy who you can confide in and have fun with.

I think the biggest thing Kat has in common with her dad is resilience. Both are known to be stubborn, which can be a blessing and a curse. When the going gets tough, they fight back. They were super close when Kat was little, which is probably why Kat can read him so well. Kat and Micah Sr. have such a sweet relationship - I’m glad that after everything they've been through, they finally have each other.

As for the younger Micah, he’s still getting used to having a dad around. Likewise, his dad’s still getting used to being a father of two. While Micah is more like his mom, he also takes on his dad quite a bit. Both are the youngest and only sons so that was how they bonded at first. Growing up, Micah felt the shadow of his dad’s absence and because of how everyone usually tiptoed around the subject, he never really saw his dad as a person. Because he never knew his dad, Micah felt somewhat detached, like he was aware that something’s missing but at the same time he couldn’t understand because he never had it in the first place.

It’s interesting how one’s absence can leave such an impact. You can’t change the past, but you can carry on with the present. 

The biggest hurdle for Micah Sr. is the passage of time. The last time he saw Kat she was a small child and now she’s a young adult. Things were a bit awkward as he was a bit disoriented about that. There’s also the guilt about missing out on so much, which Kat said weighed down on him a lot. 

At least there’s Micah, who’s independent for the most part but still needs a lot of parental guidance. I’m glad that he finally got to meet his dad, someone who was once an enigma to him. After getting over the initial awkwardness, they’re getting along pretty well. Micah was kinda intimidated by his dad as well as in awe of him. There were some mishaps as both would try too hard to impress each other and wind up in some sort of trouble, but in the end they became closer. Since I last saw them not too long ago, their father-son bond has grown stronger and I’m happy for them.

Seeing the three of them together, showing off their powers and having fun at the campsite, it’s a joyful sight to see. From making bubbles at the ocean to creating unusual magical flowers at the garden - the camp’s been brimming with magic since they arrived!

[harry-leroy]

Multiples of 4 for Edgar :)

Hello! Thank you so much for the ask:) So, these ideas you’re about to see are relatively new, and I’m not sure how I feel about all of them yet. (Let me know if any of this makes any sense whatsoever). But, I figured I’d leave them here because all of this is a journey - things change, things move around, it’s cool. These are (very) long, so I’ll leave them under a cut:) Thank you again for the ask! 

And before I forget, I’ll tag @suits-of-woe so that way the gang’s all here:) 

4. Best places to kiss on their body

Edgar doesn’t strike me as the affectionate type. His mother loved him too much, his father not enough. Edmund makes fun of him for how squeamish he gets at the thought of having a love interest, but at the same time, Edgar thinks it’s disturbing just how much Edmund uses his looks to get what he wants. (We’ll say that Goneril and Regan aren’t the first girls that he’s brought in the bedroom - and Edgar knows it). Of all the world’s enigmas, love hasn’t been one that Edgar’s attempted to try and figure out, because it never makes sense, especially when he hears about what’s happened to Cordelia, and what happened between his own parents. He’d rather remain an independent figure with no fear of getting overtaken or overrun by something that’s so unpredictable and destructive. He also thinks of himself as austere in keeping himself from love, though occasionally he finds himself to be terribly lonely. That said (that went on a tangent), he wouldn’t mind a kiss on the cheek or on the forehead. There’s something filial about it that reminds him of the kind of affection he missed in his childhood.

8. Bad memories / experiences

The Edgar Project is just one really bad memory trip. In the play, we’re in Edgar’s head (for the most part), but there are little interjections of reality that slam their way through his thoughts. The drums, the trumpets, Albany trying to get Edgar to wake up at points. Some of his memories are muddled - Gloucester’s strange, godlike omnipotence, the echoes of the original language having been things that he’s heard at some point in his journey, but he can’t remember where. His memories force the dead back to life, only to have them die again, and throughout he can’t help but feel that the wheel is coming out for him next. It borders on (or maybe it is) an example of post-traumatic stress disorder.  

What happened with his mother was also probably a bad memory that he doesn’t remember (because she died when he was only a baby in my play), but it shows in his personality. He’s incredibly sensitive as a child, and can’t help but show it (whereas Edmund quickly had to learn to hide his tears), but as he grew up, this sensitivity became existential and so he shut himself up, hoping to save himself from the promised end. Edmund always knew that his brother wasn’t capable of handling the violence of the world he’d have to control as Earl of Gloucester, and even Edgar dreaded the day that he would earn his inheritance, but he never told his father that. Edmund just wanted his hands on it, so badly, and he knew that he was so much more capable than his brother was. (Edgar probably knew it too, and maybe even perhaps Gloucester).

When he’s starving on the heath as Poor Tom, exposed to all of the elements, probably feverish, hypothermic, he’s experiencing near torture, and even though Tom gets dropped off somewhere on the way to Dover, he’s constantly crawling back into Edgar’s mind. In hindsight, it’s retribution for all of the times that he subconsciously took advantage of Edmund, but crossing Albany was too much - Albany never hurt Edmund, at least to Edgar’s knowledge.

12. Grudges and Vendettas

His father is someone he’s never been able to work himself around, and there was probably a period in which these two really struggled to see eye to eye. With the sort of violent manipulation that Gloucester’s learned over the years, he pulls a sort of guilt-tripping on Edgar, using every sort of “woe-is-me” excuse for when Edgar points out his fatal credulousness (which I’m sure that he did far before the cliff scene), among other faults. Though when they get to the cliff scene, Edgar’s tired of it, and in a fit of power-hungry frenzy, he puts his father through that ridiculous fake-suicide. Though when Gloucester is in “ill-thoughts” the second time, Edgar begins to ache for his father, eventually revealing a strange, broken sort of love that’s existed between the two of them all these years, but so much else got in the way.

Edgar also resents the way that his father has treated Edmund all these years. It’s not Edmund’s fault that he’s a bastard, and at some point in their childhood, Edgar realizes that. He often finds himself siding with Edmund when Gloucester pulls out any of his comments on Edmund’s bastardy. This caused Edmund to look up to his brother for a while, until Edgar started hanging out with other crowds, and eventually started shutting himself up. It was then that Edmund realized that he was using his brother as a shield, and an unreliable one at that. And then Edmund was sent away for nine years, and there was nothing that Edgar did about it (or could do). Edmund just always wanted to be in his big brother’s position, to be his father’s heir. He notes his brother’s increasing eccentricity, and manipulates his brother’s austere and sensitive image to make him villain-like, which is why it’s not a surprise to anyone else when Edgar gets kicked out. Cordelia’s always been constant in her love, which is why everyone is so shocked.

Perhaps one of his other biggest moments of cruelty is when Edmund plots to kill Albany. Edgar isn’t able to get past this one. Tearing out his father’s eyes was a long time coming, but Albany’s life? It forces Edgar to go back right where he’d rather not: to civilization. 

16. Dark secrets / “Skeletons in the Closet”

Because he spends much of his time behind closed doors, he’s not quite sure if the world knows who he really is. Not much of his secrets are “dark” or compare to “skeletons in the closet” (and least in his mind). Essentially (my thoughts for now), he suffered some sort of breakdown in his later teenage years. Edmund found him, though Gloucester (treating Edmund second-rate as per usual, and also denying that his elder son could have had some imperfection), believed that this breakdown had something to do with Edmund, and so he was sent away in the hopes that Edgar would recover. Edgar recovered in some areas, though in others, he never got over his breakdown. Tom becomes the physical manifestation of what Edgar’s been feeling on the inside for years, which is why it’s so easy for him to slip into that role. Though, when Edgar was recovering, he secretly wrote letters to Edmund (because Edgar knew that Edmund did nothing wrong), but guess who was keeping notes on Edgar’s handwriting???

Cordelia was also one of the only people who knew that Edgar hadn’t completely gone off the deep end (because he hadn’t), and he’ll never forget the kindness that she showed him, which is why he absolutely aches when she is killed. Albany was the other person, and showed him that there’s a non-violent way to get through court-life, mentoring him for when the day comes.

20. What-ifs / Alternate Timelines

I suppose this is a place to put down some of the extraneous ideas in my head that don’t have a spot in The Edgar Project (yet anyway…). If this were a modern day production, I’d want Edgar’s desk to have all sorts of Camus and Huxley all over it. He’d have a chalkboard with all sorts of writing that only makes sense to him. I also feel like (in general - regardless of the time period) Edgar was really mean to Edmund when they were little, partly because Edgar was ridiculously spoiled and he didn’t know any better at that point. However, Edgar’s empathetic self couldn’t take it eventually when he saw Edmund so upset about all of the little moments building up, so he eventually becomes the boy with a heart of gold who couldn’t take all of the cruelty that the world threw his way, and it was worse that it was the people closest to him that fed on this cruelty to survive. This is also where his sense of trickery develops, as he wants to appease those closest to him at the same time, so he plays the game, but this too breaks him when he has his breakdown, and later during the plot of Lear. It absolutely terrifies him when he starts to feed on this cruelty himself - he never knew he really had it in him. It’s the fiend that bites his back, and everyone’s back.

[hiswhiteknight]

The Mistletoe Mystery (2/2)

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Reader

Summary: The Avenger’s gang tried to setup a mistletoe connection with the Reader and Steve Rogers. Unfortunately, a mission got in the way, so with a little help from Tony, Steve and the reader get another try. 

Words: 2200 (sooo long)

Warning: Pure Fluff

PART 1

It was day after the party, a cleaning crew had cleaned up most of the tower, but you stayed behind to make sure the transition back to a penthouse/office was complete properly. It was nearly Christmas, so everyone was with family and friends. You had gotten time earlier to spend time with your family. Though it felt good still being here, you could feel the success and happiness of the evening before, even if the Avenger’s themselves couldn’t be here very long.

Holiday music played in the background, as you rearranged little Knick knacks and Tony’s toys, “Tony mentioned you were here,” you heard a voice arise behind you. You jumped a little, turning towards the charming and amusement from Captain America himself.

He was dressed in his uniform still “Captain,” you swallowed. You could feel the hairs stick up and a chill down your body, “What are you doing here?”

Still making a beeline towards you, he chuckled and smiled at you, “Well, I work here. And I just got back from a mission.” He now stood in front of you towering over you, “What are you doing here? No holiday plans?”

“My family and I celebrated a week ago,” you wanted to avoid the blush creeping on your face. You couldn’t remember a time you and the Captain were alone together, “So I planned to tidy up here before curling up with the Christmas Carol and some hot chocolate.”

He nodded, looking behind him, “Sam and Buck, left to go to some beach somewhere.”

Letting a laugh slip, “Of course Wilson would want to pick up some babes during the holiday season.”

“Quote and unquote, cuffing season,” Captain continued to grin.

You tried not to make a barfing sound, while you pivoted out of the direction of Captain Rogers. Your reaction made him glow more, “Anyway, Captain,” he stopped you with his hand gently grasping your upper arm.

This caused you to turn towards him again, noticing how close he was to your body, “Steve, Y/N, Steve.”

You coughed slightly, trying to contain the sudden heat radiating off your body, “Right,” you get your bangs to block your face again, “Steve, ugh, what are you doing during this cuffing season?”

Another chuckle left his lips, trying to make eye contact with you, “Much like yourself, I’m working or at least I’m finishing up. I’m told the world is safe for the night.”

A voice from behind you caught both your attention, “Seems you both are done with work and have no plans at all. Rogers, you should take Y/N to that cabin I mentioned.”

“Excuse me,” you said over Tony, trying to get the reigns of this conversation. No way were you getting set up by Tony Stark. You were a strong independent person, you could do your own bidding in principle.

“I’ve got this cabin, Rogers refused Pepper’s invitation to our penthouse during the holidays. Refused the Barton’s invitation, so I offered my cabin not too far away. It’ll have snow, fireplace, many boring books like the Christmas Carol,” you squinted your eyes at him, fighting all urges to punch him for meddling like this. “Why spend the holiday alone, when you could spend it together,” he pointed between the two of you before he tossed his keys at Captain Rogers. He spun quickly, walking away before you both could argue.

Shaking his head, looking back at you, “Sorry about him, don’t feel the need to go to this cabin if you don’t want to. I don’t mind spending time on my own.”

You looked at him longingly for second. You didn’t feel bad for him, but there was something pulling you to say yes and you couldn’t figure out what reason it was, “Are you really going to the cabin for the holidays?”

He shrugged his shoulder, “Seems peaceful, away from the hustle and bustle. I think it’ll be nice to have things slow down and just enjoy life being normal.”

His blue eyes triggered something in you and the way he painted the scene the cabin could be, “Peaceful sounds nice,” you shrug, a blush reaching your cheeks, so you turned away.

“Really,” he said it like he didn’t believe me at first, like he misheard my words – but his tone held a glimmer of hope, “You want to go?”

“You deserve normal, Captain,” you said, looking at the ground, only glancing up for a second or two before darting back down on the ground. “And I’d like to help you with that,” he started to clear his throat. You sense he felt like you were doing it out of pity or obligation, but you interrupted before he could say something, “Plus, I like normal and the holidays.”

His smile brightened again, “Alright, let me go get changed and pack. I’ll meet you by the jet in 45 minutes.”

“Sounds great Captain,” you gave him a gentle smile back at him.

He turned again to face you, “Y/N, it’s Steve starting right now.”

Remembering how you defined it as an intimate interaction at the party, you blushed again, “Alright Steve from Brooklyn.” He sent you an electric smile again, which made you weak in the knees before jogging down the hall.

You nearly collapsed on the chair, remembering to breathe now that the conversation with your crush was over. You took a second to feel your body move again before you realized you had to get moving yourself. You had to pack up all your stuff before meeting you uber crush at a jet, a scenario you never thought would ever happen.

Steve and you had made it to the cabin, which was a gloriously quaint and magical little cabin. This had be a gift to Pepper or something because it didn’t fit Tony Stark’s image, “Tony was right,” Steve laughed next to you dropping your and his bags, “Not a statement I like to say often.”

“Preach, Steve, preach,” you laughed, stepping further in. You and Steve followed each other around the small cabin, expecting everything, and getting a feel of the place, “So Mr. Rogers, what now? Want to call it a night or-,” you questioned.

“How does Hot Chocolate sound,” he asked, making his way into he kitchen, “My mom made the best hot chocolate when I was a kid.”

You sit on the stool at the bar of the kitchen, “Sounds amazing,” so you sat and listened to him tell stories of when he wasn’t the first Avenger, just simply a boy. The more he talked the more you fell harder for him. Clearing your throat, you needed something to distract you from the beating of your heart, “Have you ever seen the Muppet Christmas carol?”

“I’m sorry,” he questioned, sliding you another cup of hot chocolate, “Muppets Christmas Carol?”

“Oh, you will love it,” you got up picking up your mug. Tony had this lovely nook by a window filled with pillows and blankets. You could see the snowy scene of outside. This nook faced the television perfectly, “It is my favorite Christmas movie of all time. Forgive me if I sing,” you grin back at him after you got the movie started. He sat in the nook, lifting a blanket for you to get under. You scooted onto the nook, cozying into the cushions, letting Steve cover you with a blanket you shared. He reached his long arms over to get you cup of hot chocolate before grabbing his. And you both nestled in and started to enjoy the movie, trying not to notice how close you both were to each other or how natural this connection felt.

After the ghost of Christmas present, you had fallen asleep on Steve’s chest, his arm wrapped behind you. All the work you’ve done that day got the best of you and all you wanted to do was rest. Steve looked down at you, grinning at your peaceful face. This is exactly what he imagined when he thought peaceful and normal, he just never thought it’d happen for him. He pulled the mug from your hand before it could spill. He adjusted your blanket and pillow before he continued to watch the movie you put on for him.

You woke up after a few hours, looking up at the television which was off now. You looked up to Steve, who was sleep, gently breathing in and out. It was almost unreal, he looked like a normal man – well a normal Greek godlike man, but not a superhero you used to see as untouchable.

He must have felt you moving and blinked open his eyes, “Hey,” he whispered.

“Hi,” you whispered back. You didn’t want to make it seem you were staring at him, which you were, “It’s snowing,” you pointed out to him.

He straightened up again, looking at the window with a smile, “Magical,” he smiled back at you. The room was lit with candles, which made the magic park of this cabin even more romantic and special, “Do you want to,” he motioned with his head towards the door.

“Play in the snow,” you grin, saying with a question, “Really?”

He stood up, reaching for your hands, “I know how to have fun every now and again,” he teased.

Sending him the greatest smile, you stand, using his hands as leverage, “For that, I have no doubt,” you laugh again. You could remember a time you felt like this. You pulled on your snow jacket and boots, and let Steve pull you outside, “Do you want to,” you ask him, not knowing if he’ll get the reference.

“Build a snow man,” he sent a laugh erupting through the woods, “I understand the reference,” he poked at you, “And I’d love to.”

You spent some time perfecting your snowman, modeling him after Tony Stark your gracious host. You can’t remember laughing so much, “This is perfect,” you point at your masterpiece.

“Yeah,” he nodded with a sigh, looking down at you and your red nose. He saw your expression of amazement, “What,” he asked.

Spinning around in the snow, fell down to make a snow angel. Without asking, Steve reached down for your hand and pulled up and away to admire your angel, “Perfect,” you said.

“Yeah,” he says again with a sigh, giving you a special look. He was staring into your eyes with admiration and joy. You liked him so much.

“I haven’t felt like a kids in such a long time,” you shared with him, trying to ignore the feeling you both were sharing. You could feel the blush in your cheeks. You couldn’t understand in moments like this why you felt shy.

He cocked his head at you, admiring you in a whole. You felt like he was going to kiss you, “I agree,” he said taking a step towards you. You both were already so close. You went to step back, but his hand met your cheek, causing you to pause for a hot second, “Wait,” he whispered and looked up, pointing with his other hand.

You looked up as well, noticing the mistletoe hanging from a branch above, “How does this keep happening,” you whispered. Steve looked down at you with a great big smile, “I don’t mean to sound rude, but I think I have magic because these things just keep popping up when I want to,” you stop yourself, another layer of blush creeping over you whole body.

Steve was still holding your cheek, “When you want to, what,” he teased. You tried to look away again, but Steve brought you to look at him again. His eyes piercing your soul, “Y/N, Sam and Bucky moved your mistletoe at the party, hoping it would push me to get the nerve to kiss you.” You listen to him intently, trying not to get annoyed the boys for touching your decorations. “And I put this one up when you went to grab some of Tony’s clothes,” he teased, “Because I wanted to kiss you,” when he said that he never looked more brave or more hot. “And since we don’t want bad juju on our holiday, as you put it earlier, do you mind if I-,” he started to say.

Not letting him finish his sentence, you pulled on his jacket and kissed him. And it felt like magic sparked and you were spinning, you leaned against the tree to regain balance. Steve had his hand on your cheek and the other on your hip. When he pulled away you were seeing stars, “Wow,” you breathed out.

He put his head against yours, “Yeah.” He pulled back then to look at you, “I’m glad we did this.”

“I am too,” you whispered back.

Steve put your hand in his and started to walk inside. Before you reached up to the door, he turned back to you, “Merry Christmas,” he whispered, “And happy cuffing season,” he laughed.

You shook your head at him, before touching his cheek. He leaned down to kiss you gently on the lips again before pulling you inside to kiss you some more.

[somethingvicked]

Masquerade of Life

@therevolutionhasbegun

Chapter 3

Bella

Bella was not really feeling up to "sister time" as her sister called it, liquored eggnog or not. She couldn't tell Claire the reason why she was feeling like she did, and even if she could Claire wouldn't understand. Her little sister was a nice person, no question about that, but from what Bella knew she had never had a boyfriend, never loved for real.

Not that it mattered anyway – any boyfriend Claire would have in the future or past wouldn't be… him.

Just as she thought that, she thought she saw something by the window. Something that looked very much like… But as she blinked it was gone again.

"Now," her sister said as she opened the ice cream container and scooped some into her mouth, "tell me what's really going on here."

Bella sighed. Why did Claire have to ask that? Why did she just have to try and fix Bella? Bella did her best after all! For Charlie's sake and now Claire's too. Couldn't they just be content with that?

"I can't tell you," Bella said with a deep sigh. "And besides, you wouldn't believe me anyway."

Claire shook her head, making some of the black colored strands of her bob cut fall down her face. She stroke them away with a manicured hand, the ice blue color of her nail polish matching her eyes so different from Bella's own.

"You don't know that!" Claire said, smiling a bit. "Come on, try me!"

Bella just scoffed under her breath, tears burning behind her eyelids. She couldn't. It wasn't allowed. Sighing loudly she took a sip from the eggnog her sister had brought, wincing a bit as it really was strong.

Suddenly she saw something out of the corner of her eye again, turning hear gaze toward the window. And there he was. Just as if he had just climbed in through her window like he did back then.

A gasp tore from her throat and she couldn't hear anything more of what Claire said, not feel her hand on top of her own. Edward…

Edward was scowling at her, as if she had done something to annoy him but… What could that be? He was the one who left!

When Claire turned toward the window and apparently didn't see anything. Bella shook her head a little and Edward was gone. He wasn't there... It was just a hallucination. 

Maybe because she actually thought about bringing him up… Does speaking about something make it more real, Bella wondered.

If she broke this long silence about the Cullen's, the supernatural world she had fallen into… Would she see more of Edward?

She missed him so much, it was like having a big hole inside her chest every minute of every day. Even a vision of Edward was better than that… It had to mean that it was real – what they had was real. He couldn't leave her even if he left her. They belonged together.

Bella smiled, a real smile for the first time in months. Then she took a deep breath, turning to Claire.

"Do you believe in the supernatural, Claire?"

Claire raised her eyebrows before answering. "You mean like, psychic abilities? Or as in Bigfoot, haunting and possession?"

Bella frowned. Claire watched way too many horror movies but unfortunately she didn't believe in the ones that Bella would have needed her to believe in.

"No, not really those. I meant more … I think it's best if I take this from the beginning. Just, please don't interrupt until I'm done, okay?"

Claire frowned and Bella noticed that she was fiddling with her cuticles – something Claire always did when she got nervous, just like Bella's nervous habit was biting her lip.

For some reason it pleased her that she managed to get her twin nervous. Hopefully she would take this seriously then.

So Bella told her everything from the beginning. How she had seen the Cullen's for the first time already at the first day of school in the canteen – how everyone gossiped about them and how they kept to themselves.

She told Claire about their first Biology lesson together, how Edward had glared at her, covered his nose and sat as far away from her as he could, making her think she smelled bad.

Claire looked less than pleased upon hearing this, but she kept her promise and didn't interrupt, so Bella continued.

She kept the story going with how Edward had suddenly disappeared from school, despite the fact that his siblings still came in everyday, only to then reappear one day, being unexpectedly friendly toward Bella. And with a different eye color too, the yellow of topaz instead of black onyx.

Claire rolled her eyes a bit at Bella's breathlessly description of Edward's eyes, which made Bella irritated. She had never seen Edward's eyes, she could never understand how beautiful and hypnotic they were – so easy to get lost in!

Despite her annoyance Bella told Claire of Tyler's van, how Edward had somehow stopped it with his bare hands, appearing beside Bella out of the blue, even though he had been on the other side of the parking lot with his siblings.

She briefly mentioned Carlisle, the pale, blond godlike looking doctor that seemed to belong rather in a soap opera about a hospital than working in a real one. With the same golden eyes as Edward and the rest of them – even though they weren't actually related.

"Do you understand what I am saying, Claire?" Bella asked her sister that had gone a little pale now.

Claire shook her head. "No. It can't be… That's just…"

Bella sighed. Apparently she needed to tell the whole story to make Claire understand. 

And people said her sister was the open-minded one!

So she continued. She revealed the fact that the Cullen's disappeared whenever the weather was nice and sunny, the following days being no exception and how she had went to the La Push beach with a few other kids.

Her sister's eyes suddenly brightened at the mention of Jacob – she apparently remembered him better than Bella had the first time they met. But when Bella told her about how she had tried flirting with Jacob to get information on the Cullen's, Claire looked angry.

"That wasn't nice, Bella. Toying with his feelings like that – you couldn't have done it any other way?"

"It was just a test," Bella defended herself. "I didn't think he would fall for it, actually."

Claire snorted. "And that makes it okay? He's what, 15? How much experience with girls do you think he has? Especially older ones?"

Bella just shook it off. That wasn't even the point here. "We're getting off the subject!" she pointed out and steered them back to the legends Jacob had told her.

Then she continued with her trip to Port Angeles with the girls – how she had wandered away on her own to buy a book. Only to nearly end up getting gang raped, if it hadn't been for Edward showing up in his car.

She continued with describing the dinner at the restaurant, their conversation and the drive back; how Edward had told her about his abilities to hear thoughts but that he couldn't hear Bella's. How Bella had guessed what he and his family were.

She kept talking for almost an hour and a half, telling Claire about how she and Edward became a couple despite the fact that her blood appealed to him like nothing else, his wonderful family (except maybe Rosalie. Bella honestly didn't understand what she had done to her) that lived of animal blood, calling themselves vegetarians. The baseball match, the meeting with the three human blood drinkers, James, Laurent and Victoria.

The chase with James, how he had seen it as a challenge to kill Bella. How he had called her in Phoenix, thinking that he had their mother, which made Bella sneak away from Alice and Jasper and meet him in their old ballet studio. And everything that happened afterward, up until he had left her after their birthday. She even pointed out the scar on her wrist from James' teeth.

Claire was silent for a long while, stroking over the scar with the tip of her finger as she digested the amount of information Bella had told her.

"You do understand, Claire? What they are?" Bella finally asked.

"Yes. I think I do. Your boyfriend and his family … They are vampires. There’s actually vampires," Claire said, rubbing her temples. "Shit, I feel faint," she added, draining her cup of eggnog in one gulp.

Then she looked up at Bella again, her eyes fiery. "How the hell could he be so stupid?" she said harshly, making Bella flinch.

"What do you mean?"

"Edward, of course! Doesn't he have a brain in that head of his? Through all your story I've thought he reminds me a little bit of Jim Jones but to just…"

Bella suddenly felt her temper flare. "What the hell do you mean by that?" she said in a high pitched voice, interrupting her twin.

Claire raised an eyebrow at her. "Oh, come on, Bella! First he wants to drain you, then he wants to be friends but tells you to stay away from him – all while he stalks you and climb in through your window, watching you sleep, like you’re the salvation to his damnation! But the only way to that is by getting you damned and he won’t allow that. Yet puts you in danger, nearly getting you killed by another vampire, thankfully saving you and then … What? From what you're saying you two loved each other – he basically said that you were his life now. And you loved him back, you wanted to join him as a vampire, right? To live an eternity with him? Might not be the first thing our parents would want for you, but never mind that now. So what does he do after that accident on your birthday? He just leaves you here, thinking you are going to go back to live a normal life after everything you went through – all because he couldn't stay away from you? But then he suddenly can! He sounds like he needs a healthy dosage of Litium, to be honest! Or just a smack to the face, along with a big reality check! He might be a vampire but he behaves like a little boy that both wants to hide his allowance and spend it on candy!”

Bella didn't know what to think. She didn't think her sister would be happy that she had dated a vampire, but the fact that her boyfriend wasn't human didn't seem to be Claire's problem. But the things she said about Edward… She didn't know him! Edward was right, he had always been right. Bella didn't fit in with his world – it was as simple as that. That was why he left her, but Claire made it sound like it was Edward's fault – like Edward was some slow-minded idiot!

The thought made her angrier and angrier. She trusted Claire, and this is how she repaid her?!

Before she even knew what she did Bella raised her hand, tempted to slap her little sister in the face, so hard that her teeth rattled inside her mouth. She hadn't even comprehended her own thoughts before Claire's crystal blue eyes turned dark and hard, resembling deep frozen lakes.

"I'll give you one warning, Bella. Don't." Claire bit out with such a firm tone it would have made a military general impressed.

Bella suddenly remembered that her sister was the one that had practiced kick boxing since she was thirteen. But she wouldn't use those moves on her, her sister, would she?

Bella realized that if she actually hit Claire, she would probably be the one that ended up on the floor, not Claire. She had the strength of a feather and had never practiced martial arts. She was the weak little lamb, as Edward had said.

But she would not forgive her sister for speaking about Edward like this. She didn't understand anything!

"Out!" Bella whispered and pointed to her door.

"Bella…" Claire started, getting up from the floor.

"I said, get out! You have no right to speak about Edward like that! You don't know any of them! I regret telling you this – I should have known that you wouldn't understand! No one can understand what I'm going through! I wish you hadn't come home!"

Claire suddenly got all pale again, the hard expression back in her face. "You and me both, sister. Because clearly you are so infatuated with that guy that you can't see when someone is trying to help you. I came home to help you, Bella. I'm sorry if I hurt you with what I said – you're right, I don't know Edward. But then again, I won't get know him either. Because he's the one that left you here, without looking back. Yet still you defend him. You might want to work on that…"

And with that Claire turned around, getting out through the door, shutting it again with a firm click. Bella guessed she would have slammed it shut, if not for the fact that Charlie was sleeping. A sob escaped her, as she felt all alone in the world.

That is, until she saw him again. He stood by his usual place, by the window, looking disapprovingly at her.

"That was a very foolish thing to do, Bella."

[theninthpen]

Ittoleo and Thomaliet

One-Act Play- De Guzman, Y.M.D.

ITTOLEO AND THOMALIET 

A One-Act Play

by

Yezha Mariz D. De Guzman

CHARACTERS

Thoma – 23 year-old outlander human housekeeper

Itto – 200 year-old Inazuman Oni gang leader

TIME

1860, nearing the end of the Edo period.

PLACE

Kamisato Clan Estate, Inazuma

Scene 3

Midnight. Kamisato Estate private balcony. THOMA leans against the railing, looking up at the sky. Rustling leaves are heard. ITTO is hiding amongst the bushes, unbeknownst to THOMA.

THOMA

O Itto, Itto, wherefore art thou Itto? Deny thy master and refuse thy name or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love.

(ITTO utters a muffled laugh while admiring THOMA in the bushes.)

THOMA

What’s that sound? (Looks down) Itto? What are you doing here?

(ITTO reveals himself from the bushes.)

ITTO

O, speak again, bright archon! For thou art as glorious to this night, being o’er my head as is a powerful godlike being of the heavenly principles.

(THOMA fumbles)

THOMA

You heard everything?! Wait, no, why are you here? You shouldn’t be here especially when the Kanjou commission is still on patrol.

ITTO

Could I not meet up with my lover who I miss oh so dearly? Besides they won’t mind, I haven’t been destroying any public property lately so it should be good.

(ITTO chuckles as THOMA rolls his eyes.)

THOMA

I could always visit you in Narukami Island, and besides, even if you aren’t destroying any public property you are still breaking and entering on private property.

ITTO

Technically it’s breaking and entering if I get caught. But you won’t let me get arrested now, would you?

THOMA

Of course not! But you still shouldn’t be staying here, wait for me, I’ll come down.

ITTO

No, just jump, you’ll be suspicious if you go down late at night. Don’t worry babes, I’ll catch you.

THOMA

You do make a point, but one thing first. Don’t call me “babes” like that ever again.

ITTO

You got it babes!

(THOMA face palms)

ITTO

(Spreads his large Oni arms wide open.)

THOMA

(THOMA Hops on top of the rail, looks around to see if anyone was around before jumping off the rails.)

(ITTO jumps in the midst of THOMA falling and catches him within his arms.)

ITTO

I told you I’d catch you. (Winks at THOMA)

THOMA

Of course you would, you’re a 7 feet tall Oni, how can I ever doubt you being able to catch me? Nonetheless I’m glad you did.

ITTO

So does this mean I get a prize?

THOMA

From catching me from my bedroom balcony? Don’t you want to save these for even more special occasions?

ITTO

Aww come on! I haven’t even seen you in weeks since you’ve been doing housework for the stupid Kamisato Clan. Hmph!

(THOMA laughs)

THOMA

Well it is my job and they practically saved my life so I owe them this. But okay, since you’ve been patient you can get one kiss on the cheek and just one, got it?

ITTO (nods in excitement)

THOMA (Gives ITTO a kiss on the right cheek.)

Are you happy now Mr. Oni lover boy?

ITTO

Hmm there seems to be something missing.

THOMA

Oh, what is it?

ITTO (Gives THOMA a kiss on his left cheek.)

THOMA (Flustered. Smacks ITTO on his chest lightly.)

STUPID ONI!

ITTO

AH! What’s with the violence? You being cute right now isn’t going to heal the sudden attack you’ve made against me.

THOMA

It’s only a light smack! and besides I was just caught off guard, but honestly I shouldn’t expect less since it’s you. Anyways we should get out of here before anyone sees us.

ITTO

Okay babes, but do you still want me to carry you like this? You seem to really like it.

THOMA (hides his flustered face beneath the muscular chest of ITTO.)

Yes. please.

(ITTO escapes with THOMA outside the borders of the Kamisato Estate.)

BLACKOUT

[sayonaramidnight]

@grumpy-jedi replied to your post: I’ve been having some kind of PoE meltdown...

Tell us about those NPCs! :D

I don’t have much info on them, but I’ll try my best, cause I like them ;)

(I remade them in Deadfire, because it has a nice dollmaker + multiclassing <3)

Icta the loremaster

Icta used to run a well-prospering magic shop in Aedyr until her dishonest competitors hired some thugs to burn it down and end her business. Thanks to her protective spells she managed to save a few most valuable books and potions and then set off to the Dyrwood in hope for starting her business over. On her way to Defiance Bay she stopped by Caed Nua... and didn’t leave. Her goods piqued the interest of the thaynu, so they haggled for a while and in the end Sora asked Icta to manage the Caed Nua library, which was in dire need for many, many more valuable and interesting books. And Icta accepted the offer.

They constantly argue about acquiring new books, because Icta is quite stingy thrifty where Sora is extravagant, but they usually can work out a compromise. They also argue about Sora’s non-existent love life, for Icta wishes a safe and steady relationship for her lady and plays a match-maker sometimes (unsuccessfully).

She’s friends with all the merchants in Caed Nua, especially the fellow dwarven lady from the curio shop. She’s afraid of fire and refuses to use her chanter skills, because she has a singing voice of a toad. She also keeps chasing all the pets away from the library, but secretly loves them all and would kill for them.

Devin the swashbuckler

A bit of a brigand, a bit of a blade for hire, Devin was quick to change the company and the place to live every time he was bored. His last gang was disrupted near Caed Nua by Sora’s troops and he himself was imprisoned right after Icta recognized him as one of the thugs who destroyed her shop. He never confessed to that crime (claimed not to remember all of his dirty jobs), but Sora had him work up for that anyway. So now he’s one of the mercs at the keep, except he works for free.

He holds resentment for both those who fear his kind and the other kinds of godlike, especially the pretty ones. Like Sora. Yup, he often tells her she has no right to be salty, because at least she looks pretty. However, when asked about his own past, he refuses to elaborate.

He seems to have a crush on Llira.

Llira the “priestess”

When this pale elf stood at the gate of Caed Nua in the middle of the night, claiming to be a priestess of Wael on a quest for true wisdom, the thaynu personally welcomed her with tea and a conversation. However, Llira was actually a con artist who was trying to run away from the law’s long arm and figured that pretending to be a priestess of Wael would be the easiest way - all it takes is talk as cryptic as possible, right? Wrong. Sora quickly  saw through her, but was too amused with her efforts to expose her. In the end Llira became a frequent guest in the keep... and on her way to priesthood, whether she wanted it or not.

She tells a different story every time she’s asked about her past - and tries to make all the stories as entertaining as possible. All that's known for sure is that she used to have a partner in crime, but never reveals what happened to her.

She also enjoys playing a match-maker for Sora, but unlike Icta she does it just for fun.

Setri the hierophant

An orphaned orlan boy who used to be a wizards’s apprentice/pet. The wizard was quite an asshole though, so Setri trained his cipher skills in secret, until he finally used them to ‘persuade’ his master to let him go. Afterwards he was just straying for some time, not used to be on his own. Sora and her team met him soon after claiming Caed Nua and both Grieving Mother (oh no, a lonely child!) and Edér (oh yes, fluffy!) insisted on keeping him. It was quite a challenge for Sora, who’s never been good with children, but Setri was a clever kid and one of the few people who could remember Grieving Mother, so she decided to take care of him, if only for a while. Later she sent him to the Dunryd Row, so he could have a proper cipher training, but he became another frequent guest in the keep

He survived the riots and currently works hard to have the Dunryd Row rebuilt..

Safina the celebrant

Another regular in the keep, an elderly Vailian performer who was famous in her youth for playing femme fatales on stage and later became a traveller who sings songs, tells stories and praises Hylea wherever she goes. She’s a very warm and cheerful and motherly person who has no tragic backstory and just doesn’t want to retire yet.

She never married, because there was way too many attractive guys around to choose only one.

She’s best friends with the Steward of Caed Nua and they often share gossip and laugh together.

[zenlesszonezero]

Join Zenless Zone Zero with Tsukishiro Yanagi, the deputy leader of Hollow Special Operations Section 6! Beneath her ordinary office lady exterior lies a meticulous, emotionally intelligent big sister to the team.

[jiskblr]

#16: Magic

Worldbuilding prompts (OK, this one I had pre-written)

Schools of magic teach the basic concepts and how you think about your basic sensory impressions differently; this means that they have different base concepts that they use as building blocks to build their spells, and so there really are schools of magic like martial arts schools in Wuxia. Spells written to be generalizable and used by just about anybody are formulated in the language of mathematics, mostly limited to algrebra, trig, things that in theory everyone can learn well enough. Some things are not mathematics but they're still used pretty widely because everyone's impression of them is basically the same. But the more complicated you are going to get, the less likely the concepts you're using are going to be understood the same way in everyone's head, and so the more complicated the basis of the spell the more specific it has to be. So it's easier to come up with a very complicated spell which doesn't have that many anchors if their concepts make sense to you in specific particular ways. If someone else took the nearest neighbors to the concepts you used, and tried to reformulate the spell themselves, it wouldn't work at all. Ritualists do slow, focused magic and pay careful attention to their senses to create anchors. Sorcerers do fast messy magic, battle magic, and use sharp, obvious sensory impressions, usually pain, as the anchors. Archmages do complex, intricate, godlike magic because they found an archmage hack and have attention or easy anchors in massive supply. Formula spells are based on mathematical language because it is universal. It is very difficult to make complex effects with formula spells. Tradition spells are based on a particular conceptual framework, handed down through schools of magic teaching their students to think in a particular way. This is also called "monastic" magic, since most schools are in seclusion to keep their secrets and protect themselves from governments or rivals invading them while they are unprepared. Personal spells are based on idiosyncratic manners of thought for a particular mage and are extremely difficult or impossible to teach to anyone else. They can be correspondingly more complex, by being built on complex ideas that seem intuitive to the mage. Ritualist formula magic is called "industrial" or "rote" magic, because it's the simple and repeatable frequently used for factories and similar. Ritualist tradition magic is called "craftsman" or "academic" magic, because it's learned like an academic subject and used for a wide variety of specialist tasks, much like a skilled trade. Sorcerer formula magic is called "brute" magic, because it's a blunt instrument but very powerful. Armies and riot police use brutes; gangs and similar frequently try, but without getting training in safety and focus brutes have a short life expectancy. Gang wars that escalate to recruiting brutes get the big guns called in to shut them down. Sorcerer tradition magic is called "battle magic", even when it's not directly used for combat. By far the most common use of tradition sorcery is monastically-trained armed forces special ops, sometimes on the battlefield and sometimes covert ops. Personal magic is called personal magic, or whatever style it resembles. There aren't any wide-ranging commonalities, except that most personal magic grows out of academic or battle magic and non-experts usually won't notice the boundaries. Archmagery is archmagery and blurs the lines between ritual and sorcery anyway.

[samuraigaz25]

You Only Live Once

You know, if you think about it, it’s actually Victor who falls in love with Yuri FIRST and it’s Victor who loves harder than Yuri. True, Yuri has always admired Victor since he was 12 when he saw a 16-year-old Victor skating on television, but his love for Victor was essentially that of a fan adoring his idol, a love that lacks what you may call a deep, personal connection. Yuri has always seen Victor as a god, not as a man and definitely not as a lover. To Yuri, Victor was more like an unattainable legend.

Victor on the other hand, pretty much falls in love with Yuri after their first ever personal encounter at the Grand Prix banquet a year before. Yuri goes from being incredibly anxious and shy to the charismatic playboy who comes to town (a.k.a the Grand Prix) and seduces everyone with his super Eros drunk dance moves (if you watch carefully, the choreography in Eros somewhat resembles Yuri’s dance moves from the banquet. Victor never forgot them and probably doesn’t want to) and enchants everyone in the room.

Intoxicated and ready to enjoy life, Yuri battles Yurio first and beats him effortlessly. Yuri then pole dances with Chris before challenging Victor, and Yuri carries out his challenge with full Eros as they pretty much strip in front of the entire ballroom. Victor is the last to battle Yuri and Yuri not only challenges Victor to a dance off, but also asks Victor to be his coach should he lose the battle. Yuri also invites Victor to come to his family’s hot spring resort in Hasetsu, which probably hit Victor hard in the kokoro as we later find out that Victor yearns for a life and love despite his successful career.

Yuri throws himself drunk, vulnerable, and with complete honesty at Victor, inviting Victor wholeheartedly into his life in a way no other person had done before. And it was in that innocent yet incredibly Eros moment that Victor fell for the hot drunk mess who was grinding up against him in front of EVERYONE. Yuri doesn’t hide the fact that he wants Victor in his life, and Victor is all for it.

Victor takes part in the dance off anyway even though he’s never really had a conversation with Yuri before save for their meeting after the Grand Prix finals. He totally accepts his fate to be Yuri’s coach should he lose, and from the pictures, it’s seemingly obvious that he fell in love with Yuri’s drunken YOLO-ness even more. In essence, Victor falls hard for Yuri’s inner ability to live life to the fullest–a quality Victor realizes has been missing from his own life.

Even though he is Yuri’s mancrush, Victor actually endures a considerable amount of rejection from Yuri despite the latter being the initial seducer. When watching the series for the first time, it looks as if Victor is some confident playboy who flirtatiously tries to win Yuri over, but this is far from the truth. Victor is head over heels for Katsuki Yuri and tries desperately to connect with him on a deeper level. For most of the series, Victor himself is unaware that Yuri does not have any memory of their dance off, as he reacts in shock when Yuri remarks that he didn’t have the courage to talk to Victor at the banquet the year before in episode 10 (let’s keep in mind that a half-naked Yuri practically dry humped Victor in a crowded banquet hall while confessing for all to hear that he wants Victor as his coach). It should only be natural that Victor would feel seduced and cast aside (hence the story of Eros) as he had no idea Yuri couldn’t remember what they shared at the banquet, which makes Victor’s feelings for Yuri all the more deep. Despite Yuri’s constant rejection of Victor’s affections, our Vicchan persevered. Why? Because he loves Yuri.

When Yuri calls himself a dime-a-dozen figure skater, he is both right and wrong. For those of us who are not in the world of figure skating, Yuri is selling himself short: he’s Japan’s representative for the Grand Prix Final, which means that he had to be the best to earn a spot among the top 6 finalists. But for a legend like Victor, Yuri is technically just one of many figure skaters in the world. If Victor merely wanted to train someone to win the gold medal, he could have just picked anyone from the rest of the very talented figure skating gang. In fact, it would have made more sense for him to choose Yurio, who was more driven than Yuri to win at the time, and is also a fellow Russian (more gold medals for Russia, no?). But Victor chooses Yuri instead, not just because he believes Yuri to have insane potential, but also because he needs Yuri’s love, a love that makes him feel alive and inspired. Yuri’s determination to win at the Onsen On Ice against Yurio was Victor’s reassurance that he had made the right decision to pursue his feelings for Yuri and to invest his time and effort into building not only Yuri as a skater but also their relationship as a whole.

One thing to note is that even though Yuri is more than willing to gush about Victor to anyone who’s willing to listen (especially the audience), Yuri pretty much avoids Victor’s advances at the start of the series because he feels unworthy. He first avoids taking a picture with Victor because he feels he isn’t good enough to be Victor’s peer despite Victor’s efforts to make friends with him; he feels uncomfortable with Victor’s outward display of bold affection when he first arrives at the onsen. He’s tensed around Victor and shuts down most of Victor’s attempts at intimacy, like sleeping together in the same bed or talking about past relationships and romance. Ultimately, Yuri has difficulty opening up to Victor at the beginning despite Victor’s sincere efforts to get to know him. However, Victor does not give up and continues to break the walls around Yuri’s glass heart. It is Victor who fights to get through, while Yuri struggles to keep Victor at bay. Yuri himself admits that he has issues with being seen as vulnerable and weak, but Victor never relents.

But wait! Didn’t Yuri skate to Victor’s Stay Close to Me as a sort of love letter to Victor? Well, that may seem like the case at first glance since Yuri skates Victor’s program with such passion, but when you look at it closely, it feels more like his performance was a love letter to Yuko instead. While Victor may have seen the video as Yuri’s way of reaching out to him, Yuri definitely had no intention of proving his worth to Victor via his skating of the program. Yuri wasn’t aware that he was being recorded, nor did he know that Yuko wasn’t alone at the time. Yuri had intended for his skate to be a private exhibition for Yuko; Yuri had been wanting to retire and wanted to perform something meaningful for Yuko that they both loved together: Victor Nikiforov’s masterpiece.

After Yuri’s skate ends, it is heavily implied that he was about to confess his feelings for his childhood friend, only to be interrupted by her three daughters, thus rendering the confession inappropriate to say the least (Yuko is revealed to be happily married and is a mother of three). It could even be assumed that Yuri was probably more emotionally invested in Yuko all those years, which explains why he never got a girlfriend in the first place. Due to his lack of confidence and assertiveness, Yuri never tells her how he feels even though the two of them get along very well and share a love for ice skating. Yuri probably suffered from unrequited love and watched in silence as the only girl he ever loved, his Ice Princess married Nishigori and started a family with him. Victor may have had Yuri’s undying adoration, but he didn’t have Yuri’s heart.

Unlike Victor, who falls hard for Yuri at first hug during the banquet, Yuri gradually falls in love with Victor as the series progresses and slowly begins to see Victor as a man rather than a legendary god whom he can never compare to. He slowly starts to see Victor’s flaws and allows himself to get angry at Victor and stops being apologetic about feeling different emotions other than admiration for Victor. He begins to accept that Victor is a human who makes mistakes, just as Victor accepts Yuri for who he is. Victor unknowingly shatters the last piece of resistance in Yuri by threatening to quit as his coach should Yuri fail to make the podium at The Cup of China. This successfully draws out Yuri’s true feelings from within his fragile heart and Yuri becomes more honest with Victor. In turn, Yuri’s insecurities break down Victor’s perfect, godlike image as well. Victor isn’t as flawless as the world thinks him to be. Both of them are lacking something, and they found it in each other.

Eventually, Yuri reaches a point where he becomes consciously aware that he wants Victor as more than a coach, but this realization isn’t instant nor is it definite. Even though it is Yuri who places the golden ring on Victor’s finger in front of the cathedral and subsequently breaks the Internet with his proposal, he is also the one who decides to end their partnership because he once again feels inadequate. Victor, despite all his efforts to break through to Yuri is once again rejected and shattered by Yuri’s uncertainty. At that point, we see a different Victor, a dejected and almost broken Victor; a Victor who thought that he had finally found life and love, only to have his happiness ripped away from him by the very person whom he cares for most in this world. 

Victor arguably loves Yuri more than Yuri loves him: Victor puts his career on the line for Yuri, a huge gamble given that he is at the age of retirement; he literally packs up all his things and moves to another country just to be with Yuri; he sticks by Yuri despite all the pressure from others to give up on being a coach and return to skating while he still has time left. Victor never falters in his decision to take Yuri on his journey to gold and even decides to stay on as his coach while returning to the ice; a task that will undoubtedly take up an incredible amount of time, effort, and determination on Victor’s part.

While we all can agree that these two are soulmates who were meant for each other, it is most unfair to say that Victor and Yuri have a magical relationship that just happened to work out beautifully. True, they were meant to be together, but they also worked hard at it. They laughed, they fought, they cried, they inspired each other, and they supported each other. Victor helped Yuri to be more confident in himself and salvage his career as a skater, but it is Yuri who is the true savior in this pairing: it is Yuri’s love that ultimately saves Victor as a human being.

Victor is now more than just a legendary skater who is expected to shine and dazzle at every event; he is more than just his scores, his rank, and the gold medals that his peers envy; he is more just the one to beat in competition; he is more than just Victor without a personal back story: He is Yuri’s coach, Yuri’s friend, his lover, and his fiancé. And he has not only gained Yuri, Yuri’s family and friends are now his family and friends, and Makkachin has found some new humans to play with as well, people who care about him and Vicchan very much–and they are happy together.

Through Yuri, Victor has gained not only a love, but also a life of his very own that doesn’t just revolve around ice skating, and is filled with people who love him not only as Victor Nikiforov the legendary skater, but also as just Victor himself, the man he is on the inside. Katsuki Yuri’s love was something that Victor fought very hard for, and it has rewarded him greatly in return; a precious treasure I’m sure he intends to keep forever–a new chapter in his life with a new purpose, new meaning, and new people to share it with; and I have no doubt that Victor plans to live his newfound life with Yuri to the fullest, because after all, You Only Live Once.

[milynya]

Deer in the headlights (Enjoltaire)

My first Enjoltaire-fanfic (actually my first fanfic in the Les mis-fandom) and I’m not a native English-speaker, so I’m sorry if there are some severe mistakes. Anyways: Enjoy, if it’s a little enjoyable, I certainly hope so ^^;

——-

“Met a [boy] in the parking lot And all I did was say hello [His] pepper spray made it rather hard For me to walk [him] home But I guess that’s the way it goes“

It really wasn’t a good story to tell. He fell in love on a goddamn parking lot in the middle of the night, how could that possibly be exciting? Grantaire remembered that he had felt down the whole day, hadn’t eaten since yesterday, hadn’t slept for three days and hadn’t shaved properly for a week. Actually, he was looking for a gas station to buy a drink while trying to convince himself he didn’t need one. Well, he failed gloriously. Who would have expected such a surprising development in the sad story of his life? Probably everybody who ever met him. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and followed the line of parking cars. He wouldn’t make the day without drinking, again. What happened to the bright kid he used to be? All that was left was a wrecked shell, barely able to live. Sometimes Grantaire wished he could become one with the shadow inside the hood of his jacket und just stop existing. He watched his feet walking on and on automatically. It took some seconds toll notice, that there was the sound of another pair of shoes meeting the pavement, much faster than his own. He spotted the back of a guy a little taller than him. Neat suit jacket, nice haircut and a really appealing backside. Maybe that guy knew the closest gas station. He had to have a car parked here after all. Grantaire tried to collect his senses to at least attempt a working conversation. He didn’t come any further than a raspy “He…“ and a thought like ‘Goddamn, I met a fucking angel’ when the guy turned on his heels and something hit him in the eyes, burning like fucking hell chose to make itself a nice new home there. He pressed his hands over his eyes and cursed like his life depended on it. “Shit, are you crazy? Is that pepper spray? Why did you do that?“, he babbled. Must be the shock. What kind of devil was this angel going around spraying people in the eye with pepper spray?! “Jesus“, muttered said angel. “So you’re not one of this homeless-gang-whatever-guys attacking and robbing people around here?“ Well, that hurt almost more than the pepper spray. Grantaire blinked, he still couldn’t see anything and his eyeballs burned like fire. At least angel-boy had been shit at aiming, Grantaire had had worse things meeting his eye properly. “You really know how to compliment a guy“, he answered as drily as he managed. “You don’t happen to have some water that I can wash out my eyes?“ He kept blinking and reached out to steady himself on the car to his right. There had been a car, hadn’t it? “I do actually“, said angel-boy, his voice sounding much smaller than before. Grantaire felt a bottle been pressed into his hand and he let the water dripp onto his eyeball. A reliefed sigh escaped him as the world reappeared before him. Then he saw angel-boy and that was that. As easy as breathing, he fell in love. Well, not quite as easy, it was a lot more painful. Maybe it was a good story to tell after all.

“Tell me again, was it love at first sight When I walked by and you caught my eye? Didn’t you know love could shine this bright? Well, smile because you’re the deer in headlights.“

Oh, and what a complete asshole In-love-him was. Teasing, arguing, insulting to cover up how completly vulnerable he felt. Goddammit, he couldn’t even handle his life when nothing happened and now he should cope with it with everything happening at once? Because a lot began to change and it started with the angel insisting to drag him along to a bar to meet a friend of his who should take a look at his eyes. Grantaire joined their strange club faster than he could pronounce 'cult’. Luckily for him, it wasn’t a cult after all, but just a naive idea by a bunch of young people. He probably would have joined it anyway, he never knew what was good for him and what wasn’t and he had an angel-like, no, godlike reason to bear whatever shit they were planning to do, just so he could drool a while. He even remembered to shower sometimes and relearned to make conversation with the weird people his favourite god collected. Granted, he rather liked them. They were intruiging unconcerened what others thought about them. But yeah, back to him being an asshole. He just couldn’t shut up, keep his stupid opinions to himself. In the unbelievably short time of two minutes mere presence and two sentences, he managed to upset Angel-Enjolras so much, that he outright shouted at him and in addition cause a chaotic discussion among the rest of his friends. So much for drooling silently. But hey, Enjolras was breathtaking anyway and his fury was like being in the middle of a thunderstorm, frightening and electrifying at the same time. Like a deer in the headlights. He hadn’t felt this alive for a long time. Love at first side with a force of nature. He was so screwed.

“Met a [guy] with a graceful charm But when beauty met the beast he froze Got the sense I was not [his] type By the black eye and bloody nose But I guess that’s the way it goes.“

Enjolras was fuming. They had about Jehan, about his long hair and his wide trousers and colourful shirts. He liked to think that a lot of things could be resolved by talking and explaining. But dear god above, a fist was so much more effective sometimes. He wiped the bit of blood of his face that was dripping out of his nose and eyed his bruising hand. He had to calm down, to breath. They had paid for their stupid, narrow-minded mobbing-campaign. Now he had to find somebody to look after his hand and he was a little reluctant to call Combeferre again. He felt guilty for always making his best friend patch him up, especially because he had warned him to solve problems this way. And yes, he knew it too, that it was wrong trying to beat some sense into idiots, but he just couldn’t see Jehans look again, every time they had to pass this part of the city. It just…wasn’t fair. Wait, didn’t Grantaire live around here? He did and his look was more shocked than Enjolras had ever seen him. “Hello, Grantaire“, was everything that came out of his mouth. Wordlessly Grantaire let him enter and he continued to be silent, until he had cared for every single wound and Enjolras had thought about a dozen time, that even Combeferre’s lecture would have been better than this. This silence, the gritted teeth and the looks. Jesus, he knew he had a black eye, but was it really that bad? Usually, Grantaire liked to watch him and Enjolras liked that Grantaire liked to watch him and how he liked to watch him. Just a little bit. But it seemed like a black eye and a bloody nose weren’t exactly his type. He wasn’t disappointed, or was he?

“Tell me again, was it love at first sight When I walked by and you caught my eye? Didn’t you know love could shine this bright? Well, smile because you’re the deer in headlights.“

Enjolras confusion had just begun then. He didn’t know before how careful Grantaires fingers felt on a bruise or on his cheek. He didn’t know the concentration in his eyes while cleaning the last rest of blood of his face and he certainly didn’t know how much he liked to watch this man himself. And of course by watching he couldn’t help but notice a few things. How he had trimmed his beard to an atttactive stubble. How he wore clothes with less questionable stains on them and how he drank less. And he liked what he saw, how gentle Grantaire was with his friends, making them laugh and cheering them up. How well he fit into the group and after all: How he had grown onto Enjolras himself. He liked to have his strong voice speaking against him. He liked how he keeps teasing and testing until they argue and he even more liked it, when they get along well again after the steam is out of their arguements. It hurts sometimes, but it’s part of their strange friendship. Enjolras wouldn’t want to miss it and he finds himself standing before this thought wide-eyed like a deer in the headlights.

“It’s suffocating to say But the […]male mystique takes my breath away So give me a smile or give me a sneer 'Cause I’m trying to guess here. […]“

His first try bringing it up Bossuet hit his head so hard on the table by accident, that he fell unconscious. Enjolras felt a little reliefed, he didn’t feel prepared for this conversation at all. The second try, Grantaire had a really bad day. They ended screaming at each other, then avoided each other for two days, till they both made some shitty attempts at apologizing. Enjolras felt irritated, but not yet in a bad way. The third try, Enjolras was called by his co-worker mid-sentence and he had to leave to help at his work-place. He started to feel mildly annoyed. And then the fourth try, Courfeyrac joined their table telling a terrible joke and the right mood was gone. Enjolras was frustrated, outright frustrated. So, no wonder that at fifth try, he didn’t want to give anything a chance to get between Grantaire and his love confession, so he just kissed him hard, lifting him up by his homeless-person-jacket. Grantaire froze for a total of two seconds, before he kissed back with all the force of his short-grown existence. The first thing he said after breaking the kiss was: “I should have brought a pepper spray.“ Was that… a rejection? Enjolras frowned till Grantaires face nearly split in half as the biggest of smiles found his lips and he pulled Enjolras down to kiss him again very enthusiastically.

“Tell me again, was it love at first sight When I walked by and you caught my eye? Didn’t you know love could shine this bright? If life was a game you would never play nice If love was a beam, you’d be blind in both eyes Put your sunglasses on 'Cause you’re the deer in the headlights […]“