#anyway. I’ve picked up a couple extra shifts so I could probably justify two

[victory-cookies]

god I’m so torn. I have a few things I really buy rn but realistically I don’t think I can afford all of them. So I’m trying to weigh what I should let myself but bc I haven’t bought myself anything nice in a while

[iamdeku]

Friday (I’m In Love): Oikawa x Reader

You don’t know Oikawa Tooru. You don’t want to know Oikawa Tooru. But when fate and circumstance bring you two together, you’re forced to confront, over a series of Fridays, your worst fear. You might have been wrong. Also, you might be in love.

Wordcount: 4.3k

Warnings: Some brief bullying from a girl I accidentally named Annoying. Pining.

Oikawa Tooru was one of the most obnoxious guys you had ever met. He thought he was the coolest guy in school, and he was not at all shy about sharing that opinion. He never stopped talking about himself in that high-pitched, whiny voice of his. You hated him. 

So why you had agreed to tutor him was beyond you.

You supposed it paid well enough, but you were dreading your first session. You had prepared yourself to bite your tongue until it bled through his mansplaining. You were probably going to want to die by the end of the experience, but at least you would have some extra cash for the holidays.

Your boots kicked through the drifts of snow, pure as a coal miner after a long day doing overtime. The cold ice crunched under your weight, and you pulled your coat closer, wishing you had a scarf to help provide protection against the biting wind from the cold flushed skin on your face. Your headphones offered some protection to your ears at least, blasting your favorite song in an effort to raise your spirits.

The warm rush of the library’s heating system slammed into you in a wall of heat as you searched for the annoying setter. It took you longer than you thought to find him, expecting the loud man you knew and instead finding someone significantly more studious. He was hunched over one of the library tables, gray cardigan wrapped around his body, glasses perched on his nose.

You hoisted your satchel more firmly up your shoulder, bracing yourself for whatever weird thing was about to happen. Was he trying to look like he knew what he was talking about? Did he want to show off? You really weren’t sure.

You were hesitant to venture forward, but you did anyway, taking a seat next to him. Oikawa immediately looked up, blinking at you a couple of times before giving one of his usual smiles.

“Oh good, you’re here! As much as I’m great at everything, I have to admit that this has been giving me a little bit of trouble. I was so happy to hear you could help me. Iwa-chan won’t anymore, that traitor.”

You couldn’t blame Iwaizume for getting frustrated with Oikawa’s behavior, even if he had chosen to befriend the disaster sitting casually in front of you. You pulled out your books, writing utensils and laptop. You were a self-professed nerd, so you had brought a surplus of pens, highlighters, and other instruments to the table. You had a reputation to keep up after all.

“Well, I guess we should get to work. What part of this are you having trouble understanding?” You asked, pulling open your textbook.

Oikawa explained his troubles to you, and you were surprised to find how intelligent he was. Everything he found difficult to understand was...well, understandable. You could see why he would struggle in those areas, and for some of them you had struggled as well, despite this being your favorite subject. 

Even more surprising, you found out he could be a good listener when he wanted to be. It was alarming, actually, how attentively he could listen. Damn it, he took notes on the things you said, writing down the important parts of your explanations.

As you started to pack up, you saw sparks of the Oikawa you knew.

“Thanks for that, cutie. You’re pretty smart, you know? Of course, you’re smart enough to already know that. Besides, I wouldn’t have asked you to tutor me if you weren’t the best.” He winked. “See you next Friday.”

He didn’t even ask if you wanted to meet him next week. Gosh, he was the worst.

 Even with Oikawa “I’m the Worst” Tooru dragging you down, you were still resolved to keep showing up to these tutoring sessions. They weren’t half as bad as you thought they would be, and you hadn’t stopped needing the money. You could have gotten a better gig, but frankly this was a pretty easy job, easier than you thought it would be. It was, loathe though you were to say it, the best option.

Besides, you were the kind of person who kept their promises, though you weren’t sure you could say the same of Oikawa.

He was late. He was a whole 3 minutes late and you were only on your second session. If he kept up this kind of behavior you were going to have to have a serious discussion with him about timeliness. Your time was valuable, and none of this had anything at all to do with you needing something to justify your dislike of him.

You were halfway through writing your future lecture on timeliness when Oikawa arrived, slightly breathless and windswept, cheeks pink from the cold. Despite looking as though he had run all the way here, he had the nerve to still look all handsome and charismatic. It irritated you.

“Sorry about being late. The guys and I were practicing volleyball and we totally lost track of time.”

He gave you a sheepish smile, recognizing his mistake, and something in the general area of your chest did a little flip. It was probably a rib rotating in disgust.

“It’s alright. Just don’t let it happen again.”

Oikawa gave you his signature charming smile as he sat next to you.

“You know, you could stand to loosen up a little. I know you’re more fun than this, somewhere deep down in that nerdy little heart of yours.”

You rolled your eyes. “It’s not my job to be having fun with you.”

“Ah, but it could be.”

“Just open your textbook, Oikawa-san.”

He pulled the book out of his bag, flipping it open on the desk but not bothering to look down at it.

“Come on. Seriously. I got a way better grade than usual on the pop quiz we got this week. I feel like I should thank you for everything you’re doing for me. What are you doing tomorrow?”

The truthful, sad answer was that you were doing nothing at all, actually. You had tried to make plans with your friends, but they were all “busy” with something or other. While it pained you deeply, Oikawa was right. You had no social life.

You sighed. “I’m not busy tomorrow.”

“Well, that settles it then. The guys and I have practice. You can come watch the end of it if you want, and then we’re all going out for dinner. You should come.”

“I’ll think about it.”

Oikawa’s face lit up in a way you hadn’t expected, and he smiled down at his textbook as he turned it to the relevant page.

“Good. Prove to us that you can have fun after all.”

“Watch it. You’ll remember it’s in your best interest to stay in my good graces.”

Oikawa just laughed at your threat like it was meaningless. He was right to do it. You hated to admit it, but even now he was starting to grow on you.

Oikawa started explaining what he was having trouble with, and just as you were really getting into your subject, you were interrupted by a shrill scream. You stiffened in immediate panic, swiveling in your chair to find the source of the sound. Oikawa, on the other hand, looked momentarily annoyed before pulling his Prince Charming façade into place.

“Oh my gosh!!! Tooru-kun is that you!”

You felt a wave of deep-set annoyance go through you at the girl’s tone of voice. Not only had she caused you to be genuinely alarmed, but she was clearly being way to familiar with Oikawa, unless he had a girlfriend you hadn’t heard about.

“Hey there!” Oikawa turned to face the girl headed towards you, an indulgent smile on his face.

“Oh my gosh! I saw your practice earlier and you were like, so good.” The girl gushed.

“Thank you. That’s very nice of you to say.” Oikawa seemed genuinely flattered at this, if you were so bold as to assume you could tell the difference between the fake him and the real him.

The girl giggled, stars in her eyes before they turned to you, darkening dramatically. “Oh, who is this? Is she like, your girlfriend or something?”

You didn’t like the turn the girl’s tone of voice had taken. There was something distinctly catty to the way she said the world ‘girlfriend’ that made your stomach turn. You had met plenty of mean girls in your life, and now alarm bells were going off in your head.

“No, no. Just my lovely tutor. She’s helping me out in my worst class. She’s very talented.”

Oikawa seemed to have picked up on the change in tone, shifting slightly to be in front of you. Presumably, this was to block you from the daggers the girl was glaring at you.

“Remind me your name, would you?” Oikawa’s smile had grown tense.

“Oh, my name is Miko! How could you forget?” She pouted elaborately.

“Silly me!” If at all possible, Oikawa’s megawatt smile grew brighter as he caught her attention again, drawing her in once more. “I remember now. How have you been, Miko-san?”

You smirked to yourself at the honorific, so different from how she had referred to him earlier.

“I’ve been great! Way better now that I get to catch up with you. I missed you!” She stuck out her lower lip like she was trying to catch something with it.

“Well, I hope to see you at my next game, once we’re back in season. Thanks so much for stopping by!”

Oikawa’s body turned towards the table, clearly indicating that the conversation was over. Miko didn’t get the message.

“What are you studying? Maybe I can join you. I’m pretty smart, you know.”

You had officially had enough. You stood from your place, glaring at the girl in a similar fashion to how she had looked at you earlier, but for very different reasons.

“Listen, Miko-chan,” you said, purposefully pitching your voice up into an imitation of her own calling for Oikawa. “I don’t know who you think you are, but this is a tutoring session. So unless you intend to pay me for my services, I really am going to need you to find somewhere else in this rather large library to study.”

The girl turned to you, and you expected some kind of temper tantrum, maybe a few crocodile tears before she walked away, but what you got was far worse. She smiled at you sickly sweet, planting a hand on your table and leaning in.

“Pay you for your services? Oh, so I guess you’re nothing more than a common who-”

Oikawa stood from his chair, the legs loudly scraping across the floor as he grabbed her arm. He turned her to face him harshly, and you would never forget the look on his face. You had seen the prince of Aoba Johsai wear many faces, most of them some version of the charming, charismatic boy you knew. You had never before seen the look of cold rage he wore now, grip firm on her forearm as he practically snarled at her.

“You’re not going to call her that. You’re not going to call anyone that ever. If I see you at one of my games, I will make sure you are promptly escorted out. Leave. Now.”

The girl stood still for a moment, frozen in terror, before turning on her heel and bolting as Oikawa released her. You blinked in shock a few times, unaware that your classmate was capable of such emotion, let alone such anger.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” you said quietly, the first words to cross your mind. “She’ll go around telling everyone you’re an awful person now. I wouldn’t be surprised if you got in trouble or if she started some kind of weird hate club.”

Oikawa scowled as he sat back down, mind clearly still elsewhere.

“I don’t care. People shouldn’t talk to you like that. Nothing about what she just did was okay. Whatever repercussions I face for that, so be it.”

You stared at him in surprise. Oikawa had come to your defense, at no personal gain to himself. Sure, anyone should have done that, but you never thought he would. Maybe he wasn’t so bad after all.

“Hey.” You nudged his side gently, and he softened, looking down at you. “That invitation to your practice still open? I think I’d like to see you play. I hear you’re ‘so great’ or something.”

He smiled again at your gentle teasing. “Yeah. We’d love to have you.”

  As the months went on, you began to acknowledge that Oikawa was not what you had thought he was. Reluctant as you were to admit it, you considered him a friend now. As you had grown to know him better, it became obvious that everything you had thought about Oikawa before had been a mask he put up to impress people.

“If you keep poking me with that pencil, I will stab you in the eye with it,” you mumbled, not bothering to look up from your paper until a soft spring breeze floated through the library door as it opened.

“Iwa-chan! She’s being mean again!” Oikawa whined.

Iwaizume, ready to join your Friday study session, cast a lazy gaze over the both of you, assessing the situation in half a second.

He shrugged. “It looks like you deserved it.”

“I’m wounded, Iwa!” Oikawa threw an arm over his chest, falling back in his chair.

You rolled your eyes even as a smile tugged at your mouth. You had gotten used to Oikawa misbehaving. Some might go so far as to say you liked it. Some might even go so far as to say you liked him.

You would deny it if asked, of course. The way you blushed when he complimented you was the same as the way you blushed when anyone complimented you. The warm tingle left on your skin when he touched you was just because he was warm, infecting you with it, burning you alive. And the way you couldn’t breathe around him sometimes? Well, nobody could prove that.

Nobody could prove that Oikawa Tooru was your best friend, and nobody could prove that you were in love with your best friend.

Oikawa rested his head on your shoulder, and you wish you could say you had long learned how to ignore the jump of your heart, but you were only human. You still caught your breath, still felt an ache somewhere in your chest when he did it. It was the sort of feeling you got when you saw something in a shop window you couldn’t have but amplified by a million. It was so strong that sometimes you wanted to scream it out, wanted to stomp your feet and throw a fit like a kid in the grocery aisle because you wanted something you couldn’t have but oh, how you wanted it.

It consumed you some days, the way you wanted Oikawa. The way you wanted to peel back his layers, make him reveal that real self you caught glimpses of when he was with you. The soft boy who cried during sad movies, the brave boy who fought for you when you were sad, the silly boy who made faces just to get a rise out of you. It creeped like a sickness through your bones until you wanted to throw up, wanted to lay in bed all day in your sticky sweet misery and sob taffy tears, taste them on your tongue.

“Who are you going with to the spring dance?” Oikawa asked you, breath blowing against your neck in a way he couldn’t know sent shivers through you.

“I’m not going,” you said, returning to your textbook now that Iwaizume had established his presence.

Oikawa sat up, posture stiff with his indignance.

“Not going? How can you be not going? I know for a fact there are at least 5 boys planning to ask you.”

“They asked. I said no. I’m not going.”

“Why not? It will be fun!”

You grit your teeth, trying to ignore the nasty feeling in your gut. You couldn’t very well tell him that you didn’t want to go just to watch him dance with every member of his little fan club. You refused to explain how absolutely heartbreakingly awful it would be to go and watch him rotate through his carousel of girls, all of them beautiful, all of them wanting him, none of them you.

“I’m studying. You know, that thing smart people do when they want to pass their classes?”

Iwaizume snorted.

“I know what studying is.” Oikawa glared. “I thought you would want to come, though. I figured you would already have a dress picked out and a date and everything.”

For a guy trying to convince you to go to this thing, Oikawa sounded almost sad talking about it. He especially seemed rather melancholy at the prospect of your date. You wondered if maybe one of your potential dates was somebody Oikawa hated or something. Not that it mattered, since you had turned them all away.

“I don’t really want to go. These things aren’t really fun anyway. Besides, all the guys who asked me were jerks.”

“That’s true,” Iwaizume said. “Didn’t Itsuki ask you? That guy got in 4 fights just this week. Pretty sure I heard him in the bathroom bragging about…actually, never mind. Point is he’s a jerk.”

“Trust me, I know. They were all like that, too.” You groaned. “If one decent guy had asked me, maybe I would have gone, but apparently there’s something about me that draws in the Itsuki’s of the world. So, I’m not going. I’m just going to stay home and watch tacky movies and do homework.”

“Go with me.”

You froze at Oikawa’s offer. He couldn’t be serious. Didn’t he already have a date? Didn’t he already have girls lining up around the block to go to this stupid thing with him?

“Don’t you already have a date? I thought…” You trailed off, unsure what exactly you had thought.

“No. I…I heard the person I was planning to ask was rejecting everyone who asked her. Didn’t want to risk it.”

For whatever reason, Iwaizume rolled his eyes from where he sat across from you.

“Okay. Well…can’t you just go with one of your fangirls?”

You weren’t sure why exactly you were fighting this. This was what you had wanted, but not like this. You had wanted him to ask you because he liked you, not because he was too afraid to ask some other girl who was apparently too good for the student body population.

“I don’t want to go with them. I want to go with somebody I like.”

Oikawa’s soft brown eyes were too earnest staring into your face. You couldn��t say no to him when he looked at you like that, so open and vulnerable you could almost pretend it was a confession. It would have been terribly cruel of you to turn him down now.

You sighed. “I guess I have to buy a dress now.”

Oikawa smiled. “Yay! You don’t deserve to be cooped up all night in your room. I promise I’ll make this fun for you.”

“You’d better,” you teased. “I’ll tell you once I know the color of the dress. That way you can match your tie.”

“Perfect.”

If you closed your eyes and didn’t think about it too hard, you could almost pretend it was a real date.

 When the Friday night of the dance came, you really did almost believe it was a real date. Oikawa had told you he was going to pick you up, but he hadn’t told you that he was going to bring a corsage or charm the pants off your parents. He was acting like you were the girl he had wanted to take this whole time.

He opened your door for you before you got into the car, taking your hand to help you balance as you stepped into the car in your heels. You were dumbstruck when he reached over to buckle you in and make sure you were safe before heading over to the driver’s side. You tried frantically to control your breathing as he got the car started.

It was a short drive to the school, but the whole way there you could barely talk to him, trying to figure out his game. Was he doing this because he didn’t want you to feel like you were missing out? That had to be it. He was probably just trying to show you what a good date was like.

When you got to the school, he helped you out of the car, and you finally admitted it to yourself. When he escorted you in, despite everything, you sort of felt like a princess. Oikawa looked so dashing in his tux, his tie matching the shade of your dress, everything coming together perfectly for a moment before it came crashing down with the realization that you were not the person he had wanted to take to this thing.

In spite of that, though, he seemed intent to act like it. Oikawa’s fan club mobbed you as soon as you entered, but he ignored all of them entirely for once.

“Sorry ladies, but as you can see, I am escorting my date. Any other day you know you all have my attention, but I’m afraid tonight is all about us.” He flashed you a shy smile as he said it, cheeks turning pink on the word us. “Do you want to dance?”

“Uh….sure.”

He was being weird about this. You didn’t have much time to think about that though before he swung you out on the dance floor, swaying you to the beat of the music. The first few songs were fast, but eventually they played a slow song, and so you two danced a slow dance, Oikawa’s hands settled gently on your waist and yours around his neck. He had you pulled close though, enough so that his head curved over your shoulder and your ear pressed against his.

“So, I was thinking,” he said.

“Oh no. That’s always dangerous.” You laughed a little bit.

“Haha, very funny. But seriously, we’re graduating soon, and I…I don’t want to lose you.”

You couldn’t see his face with the position you were in, but you could hear the tenderness of his voice. Your heart ached with it even as he voiced the thought you had been having for a while now. You were coming to the close of your final year and you had wondered if, when you were no longer in school, you would have to face the reality of Oikawa no longer wanting to spend time with you.

“I don’t want to lose you either,” you said softly.

“Yeah but…” Oikawa released a shaky sigh. “I don’t know if that means the same thing to you.”

Oikawa pulled back, far enough to look you in the eyes. You were too astonished to protest, staring up at him with your mouth fallen open in surprise.

“I want something more. I know you’ve just barely accepted me as a friend and you hardly even tolerate me and I know I’m annoying and loud and brash and obnoxious. I know all of that, but I need you to know that you’re everything I’m not. You’re gentle and smart and careful and considerate and you were the one I wanted to take to this dance. You. Not anyone else. That’s all I have to say.” He laughed bitterly. “I guess that’s my confession. I don’t expect you to accept it.”

Before you could stop him, he let go of you, starting to retreat through the crowd of dancing bodies around you.

“Tooru!” You used his first name in your excitement, forgetting any need to pretend distance.

He stopped when he heard you, a look of desperate hope on his face. You grabbed his hand, pulling him back into you.

“I wanted to come to the dance with you too. You’re my best friend, but you’re so much more than that. I’m so stupidly in love with you, but I never thought that you would feel the same. I do accept your feelings. All of them. Even the big, loud, obnoxious, dramatic ones. I love them. I love all of it. So let’s not lose each other. I was thinking that after we graduate, I’m probably going to go to college, but I don’t know if you have plans to go pro with your volleyball, or maybe-”

You were cut off when he grabbed your face between his hands, crushing your lips to his. Right there, in front of everybody, Oikawa Tooru started making out with you in the middle of the dance floor. Nobody really noticed the two extra teenagers kissing on the dance floor, but you felt your heart soar.

“We can work all of that out later. For now, I just want to dance with you.”

“And kiss me?” You teased.

“Yes. I would very much like to keep kissing you.”

You laughed, leaning into his shoulder again. The song changed, picking up pace to something more upbeat, and you changed your dance style in accordance with it. You could see Iwaizume on the side of the dance floor looking at you two approvingly, and when you made eye contact, he gave you a thumbs up.

Later, you would have to worry about college and volleyball and everything else. Eventually, it would all work out in the end, though not without some troubles. That Friday though, you danced the night away with your best friend turned boyfriend, and finally admitted to yourself that Oikawa Tooru was the best.

[notarelationship]

Along For The Rides, Ch 3

Blaine and Kurt get their summer romance on. Mostly fluff, awkward flirting, a side of misunderstanding and some hanky panky.

Rating: M, eventually. T, this chapter. Words: This chapter - 4102

Warnings this chapter: A couple instances of homophobic slurs

thanks to @honeysucklepink as always! I did make some changes after her read through so please blame me for any mistakes.

--

On Saturday after their shift Kurt and Rachel decide to work their way through the assortment of midway games, but today decide to go to the food stands first. Kurt has mostly managed to avoid eating from the not so varied selection of fried food on offer at the carnival, but as they walk by the stands offering corn dogs, French fries, fried pickles and three different varieties of fried dough, his willpower is starting to wobble. He’s only human.

"French fries, Rachel," Kurt insists.

"Ooh, but funnel cakes Kurt." Rachel is on her toes, peeking into the display counter. "Powdered sugar Kurt!"

"Make sure you get it with extra fairy dust," a gruff voice says behind them.

They both turn to see who spoke, even though Kurt can identify the owner of that voice in his nightmares.

"Do you want something, David?" Kurt arches an eyebrow. David Karofsky made several of his high school years unbearable, until Kurt discovered just how troubled Dave was. After that it had mostly died down to verbal taunts when he was showing off in front of friends, but stayed away from him anyway. But high school was over, they really had no reason to cross each other’s paths.

Kurt looks between the two other guys, football players he barely remembers the names of only a few weeks after graduation. He congratulates himself for a moment on how quickly he’s moved on.

"We would like to eat our food without the threat of contamigay-tion. That's what." It isn’t Dave, but one of the other boys hurling insults now. Kurt rolled his eyes, catching Karofsky’s and he shakes his head as David looks away.

"You know you could both just buzz off," Rachel suggests, stepping forward in all of her five foot tall glory. "We're not in high school anymore, we don't have to interact at all." She crosses her arms with a smug nod and turns toward the food cart next to her.

Kurt frowns as David continues to scowl at them. He looks like he’s going to bounce out of his skin.

"Dave, are you alright?" Kurt asks. He can’t stop himself. He knows what Dave is going through.

Dave just shakes his head jerkily. "Let's just get out of here," he says to his friends.

"Fine." The third boy gets into Kurt's face to say this, shoving him hard in the shoulder. It doesn't hurt, but he loses his balance and falls on the ground.

Kurt starts to yell at him, but a blur of arms and legs appears from nowhere and tackles the guy, sending them both to the ground. All hell breaks loose, and one of the guys lifts the blur up off the ground and Dave swings at him, connecting his right fist with the side of the blur’s face. Kurt scrambles up, pushing to get in between the blur and Dave, and he can hear Rachel shouting for help, but he doesn’t see her anywhere.

In what seems like minutes but is probably less than thirty seconds they are surrounded by a half dozen carnival workers of assorted shapes and sizes, at least one of them with what looks like a sawed off baseball bat with a chain wrapped around it. Kurt silently prays to any deity who might listen to him that no one has a gun.

The first guy shoves the blur into Kurt, and Kurt catches him, wrapping his arms around the blur reflexively, and realizes that it’s Blaine. Cute, curly haired, hopefully gay Blaine had come to his rescue. Kurt didn’t swoon at all. At least he didn’t let anyone see him do it.

"Sam, get him to first aid." An older guy with a walrus mustache turns to Kurt after giving the instruction. Kurt thinks the guy’s name is Larry, but he’s not sure. The guy Kurt saw with Blaine the other morning, and who he’s seen around working on the rides, throws his arm around Blaine’s shoulder and heads in the direction of the First Aid tent.

"Did you see what happened?" Larry asks Kurt.

"Yes we did," Rachel says, pushing to stand in front of the mustache. "David and his idiot friends were hassling Kurt, and when they pushed him over that young man rushed over to help." She points at Karofsky. "Then his friend held him up while David hit him."

Larry looks from Rachel to Kurt. "Did he hit you?”

Kurt shakes his head. "No, he just pushed me and I fell." He rubs at his elbow where it had hit the dirt. “I lost my balance. It probably looked worse than it was.”

"I'd like to take Kurt to the first aid tent as well." Rachel interrupts. "He needs to wash out that scrape." She points to his elbow, which to Kurt’s surprise is bleeding a little from the fall..

Larry nods, then levels a look at Karofsky and his friends. "And you three. We'll be escorting you out. If I see any of you back here we’ll call the police."

Kurt walks off with Rachel, barely hearing Karofsky and his friends protest their banishment. Rachel whispering into his ear as they go.

“Kurt that was the guy from the ferris wheel! The one that tackled Dave’s meaty friend.” Rachel looked at him curiously. “That was very risky of him, he’s not a very big person. Exactly how well do you know him?”

“Not at all Rachel, he came into the garage, like I told you. That was it.” Kurt takes a breath, “I do know his name is Blaine.”

“His name is Blaine.” Rachel throws him an accusing look as she leads him into the first aid tent. “Kurt Hummel, have you been holding out on me?”

The tent isn’t big, but there are a few exam tables and some square folding card tables and chairs, and two nurses that Kurt can see. He imagines that there are probably enough carnival ride injuries to justify real nurses. Blaine is sitting upright on an exam table on the far side of the tent holding what looks like an ice pack to the side of his face.

“No I have not been holding out on you. He dropped a trailer off at the garage the other day. I had to drive him back here. We exchanged names.” Kurt pauses. “He like a medium drip, one Splenda, 2% milk.”

“You have a lot of explaining to do when we leave here,” she barely stage whispers. Kurt is sure the entire tent can hear her. “Excuse me,” Rachel turns and addresses one of the nurses on duty. “My friend was involved in the altercation that took place over on the midway. He needs medical attention.”

“I’m fine Rachel, really.” Kurt turns to the nurse. “I just scraped my elbow, really it’s nothing. If I could just wash the dirt out and clean it a bit I’ll be fine.” He swallows, ticking his head in the general direction of where Blaine’s cute friend is helping Blaine get comfortable on a cot in the corner. “Besides, you have your hands full already.” He looks in their direction and offers what he hopes is a friendly smile.

Blonde Cutie does notice them, and walks to where Kurt and Rachel are standing while the nurse fusses over Kurt’s elbow.

“Hey man, are you okay? Blaine said that guy knocked you over. I’m Sam.” He sticks out his hand. “You’re locals, right? I think I saw you in the ticket booth before.”

Rachel shakes Sam’s hand. “Rachel Berry. And this is Kurt.” She waves a hand across Kurt’s airspace. “We are local hires, yes. Just working the two weeks.” She looks over at Blaine and back to Sam. “But you guys aren’t from around here, are you? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you before.”

“Nah,” Sam says. “We’re full summer hires. This is my second year, actually.” He gestures over to his friend. “It’s Blaine’s first year, though. I think he missed the lecture where they said don’t tackle the guests.” Sam laughs, his eyes darting good naturedly between Kurt and Rachel.

Rachel seems like she has the telling of their life stories under control, so after the nurse finishes with him he wanders closer to Blaine.

“Hey,” he says. He tries to catch Blaine’s eye, but Blaine keeps staring at his feet. “Are you alright?”

Blaine’s eyes dart to Kurt’s for a second and he nods. “Yeah, he didn’t hit me that hard.”

Kurt coughs out a chuckle. “I think that ice pack on your face suggests otherwise.”

“At least he didn’t break my nose this time,” Blaine mumbles.

“He broke your nose before?” Kurt asks, wide eyed.

“What? Oh no, someone else broke it,” Blaine lisps through his very swollen lower lip. “It was years ago. It doesn’t matter now.” Blaine looks up at Kurt for the first time since Kurt arrived at the first aid tent. He drops the ice pack away from his cheek. “How are you? Did you get hurt?”

Kurt shakes his head. “Not really, no,” he answers, holding up his elbow so Blaine can see the bandage. “Scraped my elbow on the ground. I’m fine.” Kurt takes a step closer, taking the ice pack from Blaine. He holds it against Blaine’s cheek, giving Blaine the chance to warm his hand on his thigh, rubbing it on his jeans. Kurt holds his breath a little when Blaine looks at him. “You didn’t have to do that you know,” Kurt says, lowering his voice. “They wouldn’t have hurt me.”

“You don’t know that. They knocked you over.” Blaine swallows, hesitating just a bit before he goes on. “I heard what they were saying to you. You shouldn’t have to put up with that. No one should.” Blaine looks away again, and Kurt wishes he wouldn’t.

“No. No one should,” Kurt agrees. “But David, he has his own problems. It doesn’t excuse him. But it wouldn’t have gone further.” Kurt shakes his head again, more to reassure himself than Blaine. “And it doesn’t matter anyway. High school is over, he’ll go off on some football scholarship and I’ll never have to deal with -”

“Kurt if you’re feeling better we should probably get going,” Rachel interrupts. “My dads are expecting me for a Barbra marathon tonight.” Her eyes go wide when she finally notices that Kurt is holding an ice pack on Blaine’s cheek. “Or, I could just call them to pick me up if you need to stick around here?” She’s beaming at him in a crazy way that Kurt doesn’t really trust. He loves her, but she is irritatingly over-involved in his life. That’s all about to change, too, he thinks, with her leaving and him staying here in Ohio. He’ll miss it eventually, he knows, but not enough to encourage it right now.

“No, no, Rachel. I need to get home too,” Kurt says quickly, returning the ice pack to Blaine, shuddering involuntarily when Blaine’s fingers trail across his in the exchange. He ignores it. “But I did want to say thank you, Blaine, for being willing to stand up for me, even if it wasn’t necessary. I don’t get that very often outside of my family and a few friends. So thanks. I’m sorry he hit you.” Kurt tries a sympathetic smile, but inside he’s tied in knots.

“You’re welcome,” Blaine says quietly, and he looks up at Kurt, and Kurt is caught off-balance by the depth of feeling directed at him from Blaine’s eyes. Then he blinks and it’s gone, and Kurt steps away.

“See you around,” Kurt says, his voice coming out quieter than he expects.

--

"He likes you," Rachel says, as they are walking through the parking lot on the way to Kurt's car. "And he’s totally gay. You should tap that."

"Oh my god Rachel, please never say 'tap that' again." Kurt rolls his eyes. He decides to keep the inclination he has to agree with her to himself, at least for now. “And how do you know that?”

"Sam told me. And why not Kurt? He's cute, and he likes you, and he got punched in the face trying to protect you!" Her voice rises higher as she ticked off each reason Kurt should throw himself at this adorable stranger.

“Sam told you? Rachel you didn’t -”

“Oh of course I did, silly, you’d be staring at each other across the corn dog cart and do nothing about it if not for my intervention.” Rachel softens as she continues. "And wouldn't it be nice to spend some time with a guy who likes you? At least for a little while. Who knows, maybe you can write a musical about your ill fated summer romance after he leaves! I of course can play myself!” She claps her hands together excitedly. “This is so exciting!”

Kurt chews on his bottom lip. This can’t really be happening, can it? Although it does make perfect sense that the only cute, interested gay guy he will ever meet in Ohio is essentially a transient Kurt will never see again after a week.

In Kurt’s fantasies about his future, he always imagined that his inevitable prince charming would be wearing designer suits and offering expensive flowers and taking him out to even more expensive meals. And possibly also buying him gifts, or spa weekends. Or maybe Kurt would get really lucky and make it on Broadway and he would get to be the prince charming.

It had never crossed his mind that when he finally met someone it might just be another teenage boy. Or that he’d be wearing ripped jeans and a very tight t-shirt and have a mop of unruly curls on top of his head. Or that when they met he’d have a busted lip and a once broken nose. And oh my god, what if he broke it regularly in parking lot brawls? That was not the sort of guy Kurt Hummel would date. Right? It didn't matter what gorgeous shade of hazel his eyes were.

"First of all Rachel I do not need protecting and you know it." He tosses a glare in her direction for good measure, as much to steady himself as to stop her from commenting. "Karofsky wouldn't do anything to me."

"Maybe not Kurt, but his friends are less predictable. You did end up on the ground."

"It wouldn't have escalated." Kurt was less sure about that, but since it hadn’t gone too far, he didn’t want to think about it. Once they are in the car and bucked up, Kurt starts the car, but looks at Rachel before he puts it in gear. "And I don't know if I could date a guy like that."

Rachel looks puzzled. "Like what?"

Kurt's shoulder twitches. "You know, one who gets into fights."

"You don't have to marry him Kurt. I'm not even sure you need to ask him his last name."

They stopped at a red light and Kurt turns to look at her.

"I don't know if I could use someone like that Rachel." The light turns green and Kurt accelerates through the quiet intersection. "I really hope I'm not that desperate," he mumbles. Sometimes he felt that desperate. What if he never gets out? What if New York rejects him before he even gets started? He might be that desperate right now.

"I know you're not desperate Kurt." She sounds a little condescending for Kurt’s mood, but he lets it go. It’s been a long day. "But it's your last summer in Ohio. Probably ever, and-"

"Don't jinx me."

"-I know you're worried about not having experienced, things, and at the very least, I think, maybe--" Kurt turns the car into her driveway and she doesn't finish that sentence.

"Think about it Kurt." She leans over and kisses him on the cheek. "He might turn out to be a nice guy."

Kurt frowns. "While as usual I object to your overactive interest in my lack of romantic affairs, I promise you that I will think about what you said."

Rachel almost squeals, patting him on the knee. "That is all I ask Kurt." And with that she hops out of the car and bounds up the steps to her front door, disappearing behind it with a wave.

Kurt sighs, the sound loud in the now silent car. Blaine is certainly cute, and charming in a boyish ruffian way that Kurt is not immune to. He doesn’t seem to be immune to his smile either, despite the split lip and slight purplish tint to his left cheek.

He supposes he could use the practice. He’s never even talked to a guy with any real possibility that something might blossom. He didn't have to do anything. Flirting with a guy who liked him would be more that he'd expected to get out of his last summer in Ohio. It was only for another week, right? How much trouble could he get into in a week?

--

The next day Blaine stops by the ticket booth at least a half dozen times in the morning to talk to Kurt and Rachel; unfortunately Rachel is always there so he can’t get Kurt alone. Not that he has any idea what he would say if he did. He can’t exactly ditch his job and pull Kurt behind the cotton candy stand. So sometimes he only says hello on his way somewhere else, other times he tries to engage Kurt in conversation, asking him about what he had for lunch or if he has a favorite midway game, and if it might be the water gun balloons because Blaine would be there all day working the game if Kurt wanted to stop by and play a game or two.

He then spends the entire afternoon looking for Kurt in the crowds of people wandering up and down the midway. Weekends are usually crowded, and today is no different. Families, eager to take small children somewhere where they can run around in relative safety and not get into too much trouble and teenagers on first dates in the safety of the daytime. Blaine was sure Kurt would come by and visit, but when two o’clock comes and goes with no sign of him he thinks maybe his invite hadn’t been obvious enough.

Blaine’s lip is still sore but mostly healed; at least he’s stopped licking at it. He does still have a pretty good-sized purple blotch covering the left side of his face. Maybe it’s better Kurt doesn't show up while Blaine still looks like he lost at last night’s fight club.

He’s just about given up on seeing Kurt when three kids and what could be an aunt or a babysitter, but who looks too young to be a parent, set tickets on the ledge and pick their positions at the water pistols. Carnival rules generally want there to be at least five players every time they run the contest, and Blaine is supposed to wait a few minutes even when he has paying players in case someone wants to join in, so he adjusts the balloons in each of the clown-head targets to delay the start when someone clears their throat behind him.

“Do you have room for one more?” Kurt is holding up a ticket, a small smile tugging at his mouth. Blaine takes two steps toward him, unable to stop the grin that splits his face as he takes the ticket from Kurt’s fingers.

“Sure.” He winces a little. “Ow.”

“Oh no, don’t hurt yourself on my account.” Kurt smirks at him and picks up a free water gun. “At least not any more than you already have.”

“Yeah right.” Blaine gets the attention of everyone waiting. “Everyone ready? When I ring the bell you can start. First balloon to pop wins a prize.”

Blaine waits until everyone assumes a ready position then rings the start bell. He’s supposed to watch all the players, but he only has eyes for Kurt. The way he twists his face up in concentration, the tip of his tongue sticking out and wiggling just a bit, closing one eye to take aim. Blaine can’t help rooting for him to win. He looks adorable.

It isn’t quite a minute before the balloon pops in front of one of the girls. She squeals through the drone of disappointed noises and Blaine goes into his brief spiel about what prizes she can pick from, but he’s half watching Kurt out of the corner of one eye the whole time. The girl picks a barely recognizable stuffed anime character and then everyone disperses.

Out of the corner of his eye, Blaine notices that Kurt’s waiting for him, but before he turns around he pulls a step ladder over and climbs so he can reach the top shelf, where they keep the high quality stuffed animals, the ones that aren’t strange knockoffs of ten year old cartoon characters, the ones they never actually give away, and plucks the nicest one - an impressively sized giraffe – and holds it out for Kurt.

“What’s this?” Kurt smiles and takes the giraffe. Blaine shrugs, hoping he hasn’t just made a huge mistake.

“Uh, second place?” He tries not to cringe when he says it. He feels painfully obvious. Apparently making out with a few strangers hasn’t made him less awkward with guys. He lucks out though, and Kurt laughs at that.

“I didn’t know there was a prize for second place.”

Blaine thinks he can hear a gentle tease in Kurt’s voice, so he leans over the game’s counter, resting on his forearms so he can get a little closer to Kurt. Kurt’s a little taller than he is, so he doesn’t mind the new angle so much.

“Well if there was I’m sure you would have won,” Blaine answers. Kurt’s cheeks go pink, and Blaine likes it. A lot.

Kurt opens his mouth a few times, not saying anything before looking at his shoes. “I really should get back,” he finally says. “My break is probably over.”

Blaine nods. “Okay,” he says. “Maybe I’ll stop by later.” He winks at Kurt, and feels really lucky when Kurt blushes again. Blaine is smitten.

--

“So?” Rachel is giving him her most encouraging look.

Kurt shrugs. He really doesn’t want to tell Rachel too much. The last thing he needs is Rachel trying to intervene out of some misguided sense that she’s doing Kurt a favor.

“He’s nice, I guess.” He holds his large prize out and shakes it in front of her. “He gave me a giraffe.”

Rachel’s eyes get huge. “He gave you a giraffe? I don’t understand, you didn’t win it?”

Kurt bites his lip and slides into his seat in the little ticket booth, settling the giraffe behind him. He doesn’t answer right away, and his avoidance is aided by a busload of people who all want to buy ride tickets at the same time.

“Nope,” he says, once the crowd had moved on. “I definitely did not win a prize. He just gave it to me.”

Rachel looks at him, nodding with a knowing smile that makes Kurt a little uncomfortable.

“What?” He says, even though he’s pretty sure he knows what she’s thinking.

“You’re going to go for it, right?”

Kurt scoffs, but he can feel an embarrassed flush creep up his neck and he curses his pale skin. Not for the first time. He hopes the bit of color he’s picked up from being out in the sun for a week keeps her from noticing.

“I don’t know Rach,” he answers. But he kind of does know. There is something about Blaine. “Where could it go?” Kurt can’t even tell anymore why he’s trying to talk himself out of it.

Rachel tuts, rolling her eyes. “Come on Kurt, a whirlwind summer romance could be amazing for you! And he’s adorable. If he liked girls at all I’d definitely go for it”

Thankfully, they are interrupted by another group looking to buy tickets before she can continue.

“You’re insane,” Kurt says when the line has disappeared.

Rachel grins and wiggles her eyebrows. “You won’t think I’m insane when he’s got his tongue in your -”

Kurt puts his hand up in front of Rachel’s face, prepared to cover her mouth if necessary to keep her from continuing. “Stop right there. We are not having this discussion.” Kurt glares at her. “Ever.” Rachel giggles and pinches his arm.

[eldradii]

February Tournament

So for this tournament I played the above army. It was a while ago, but I think I should go through it properly in the light of all the recent changes, it helps me understand my games. 

The list was a bit weird, somewhat due to inexperience. Ulthwe Battalion with Eldrad, Warlock, 20 Guardians with a single platform, 10 guardians, 5 avengers, 8 reapers (tempest launcher) and triple serpents with triple cannons. Then a Black Heart battalion with 2 archons, 3x5 warriors, 2 double cannon venoms, two razorwings. Finally an aux support 6 strong reaver squad with cult of red grief so they can advance and charge.

My thinking with the bikes is to be able to tie up anything on turn one with their amazing speed. I justified it as worth a command point because you’d spend a couple CPs to get to advance and charge with Eldar bikes anyway. 

I will try keep my thoughts under headings, first is Takeaways, which means what I think about it going forward and to adapt with; second is Updates - which means how I think about this game with the context of the new FaQ and Ynnari rules. 

Game 1

I played game 1 against Death guard with Mortarian, some terminators, cultists, some plague marines and a bunch of the flying flamer drones. 

I believe this was about midgame. I started off killing what I could, he killed a razorwing. To be honest I don’t remember the details of this game very much. I didn’t really understand what Mortarian did and he sniped my warlock and a couple other things. I believe he killed a plane as well. However midgame (so turn 2) I got to really turn it around as you can sort of see in this picture.

Fired millions of shuriken catapults with doom, planes, reapers, extra dire avengers and the guardians, to shoot him down. It came down to the last FNP roll that he tried to reroll and I just had to vect it. The rest of the game was a bunch of tying up and my usual recon, but finding all these daemon engines hard to shift in addition to the very tough infantry. We ended up pressed for time and finished on a 16-16 tie. 

Take aways: Guardians will kill or really help kill anything with the support of psychic and strategems, and wave serpents were very tough. Mortarian has a line attack. 

Updates: Doom not working cross faction means the razorwings legit take a hit, as they’re hard to keep in Writ of the Living Muse range as well. 

Game 2

Game 2 I played against a ton of big tyranids including a big blob of genestealers and the broodlord. I deployed to one corner with the bulk of my force, and so he deployed mostly opposite. My bikes did a great job getting into his hive guard and stopping them from shooting, plus forcing stuff to deal with them. I move blocked him with the flyers (sacrificing both in the process as they had to fly off the board once he blocked them) and it gained me an extra turn of shooting them before they hit my lines. After that I fed him venoms as my frontline so he couldn’t get into the dark reapers who at this point were comfortably picking off one every turn. A couple fortunate 6 up feel no pains gave me some units that survived; Then it came down to heroes to clean up as is a common trend for me!

Here is the whole gang charging into the swarmlord, only just killing him. I think the guy allocated his fight in death attacks to Eldrad who of course lived just fine. Later he had to deal with the wave serpent in the middle. The guardians clear out genestealers and do a screen job, tying up a couple beasts in combat when they charged in. By the time old one eye made it in I had killed the swarmlord so the characters went in for a second fight:

It’s quite interesting that the venoms survived just fine most of the game. I also believe my reapers stayed alive, but they became less relevant as the end game was just running around trying to clean up his forces to table him. I ended up using the guardian bomb to hide on the other side of the battlefield. It’s a bit after the fact but I do remember the game fondly. Some cool moments with characters. I believe this is when I fell in love with Eldrad!

I ended the game as a slight victor 20 points to 17. I think we got 4 turns in, just not sure why it was so close now I describe it, but I believe we matched kills and holds a lot probably so I was looking at 12 points for my secondaries and then 2 for each turn. 

Take aways: Eldrad is a beast! Really liked him. Archons did some good work too. Looking back, my good friend has pointed out to me that Wyches would suit my playstyle a lot more than warriors because I am often quite aggressive, and wyches are often a little more resilient than warriors (they’re all pretty flimsy outside of venoms) but have a ton more utility. Flyers move blocking was critical - if they’d have been craftworld flyers they would not have been sacrificed. It was good to tie up the hive guard with the bikes. If I had had more reapers I think this game would have been even easier. I don’t take that much away from this game because I anticipate that most tyranid lists like this (even those) would have flying hive tyrants and more genestealers. Guardian bomb is very versatile.

Updates: With the flyer block nerf this kind of tactic would be hard. Furthermore, not being able to use Doom + Poison is a hit. Ynnari guardian bomb in addition to the other bomb is quite interesting as this game I mainly used them to secure a corner of the battlefield by clearing out a cheap unit that was holding an objective, then keeping them there to score me my points. Having two would be nice.

Game 3

This was a game agains the usual Guard + Castellan list. I believe I just ignored the castellan all game. Instead I targeted the Hellhounds and tried to clear out as much infantry as possible. My planes flew around picking off squads and his castellan really struggled to have a major impact. I believe my guardian bomb deep struck on the flank of his deployment closest to the camera in the above picture. I don’t remember losing any critical units, and I was able to easily tie up the carpark of wyverns and basalisks just with the reavers and then seal the tie up with venoms. 

It’s actually quite nice to see how easily this matchup went. Castellan is untouched but really struggles to efficiently deal with a bunch of 6 up feel no pain -1/-2 to hit models. He was splitting fire and it was going poorly which is what happens sometimes with the -1 or -2 with invulnerable saves. 

He was just on the back foot and my reapers were completely safe. The game ended with an 18 points to 13 win for me. A low point win mainly because the game finished around turn 3 or 4 I believe. I still believe I would have won with turn 5 too, but it would have been closer. 

Take aways: No point going after Castellans really, with this army he has to devote a lot from it just to kill a venom or something, can’t really shoot at two things reliably. Meanwhile you just shred the infantry, fly around and score the easy points. 

Updates: Honestly in this matchup since you’re not shooting the castellan the loss of Doom isn’t that big of a deal. I don’t think I got in range to jinx the castellan anyway either. However now the Castellan is at best a 5++ versus jinx (since they cannot rotate to counter the jinx)

So going into day 2 I am coming 6th which is pretty cool! I am exhausted. I find out that I am playing against pure knights + loyal 32. So Castellan, Crusader, two gallants, a loyal 32 with some mortar teams.

Game 4

This photo about sums it up; I did my job and killed as much infantry as I could. My opponent blew my mind by just staying out of doom range and staying in his corner all game. I’ve had it pointed out to me since that if he doesn’t do that I pick off a knight every turn, which also blows my mind, because I was trying potshots with the reapers into non-debuffed knights and barely getting anything done. I did the right thing with feeding gallants venoms and kabalites while scoring as much as I could. I made a mistake trying to hide my reapers with their fire and fade from the various knights and realise on this table there wasn’t really anything I could do to keep them out of LOS. So I just cast protect on them and then lightning fast reactions to try keep them alive. I got caught out by a couple rules involving charging people behind walls with knights, so lost Eldrad and it all went downhill from there. To be honest I went in with the mindset that I probably wouldn’t win, made several mistakes, and my opponent played the better game and won because of it.

Takeaways: Other than the rule interactions, I’m much more partial to having a backup quicken for Eldrad or perhaps a Skyrunner farseer. I’m now of the thinking that you really want two farseers in Eldar lists. Simply because Doom and Executioner are powerful close range spells, and Guide and Forewarned are very good reasons to sit next to your dark reapers. You can’t really do both of these things. I’m also now a bit more optimistic about what I can do against knights - Two razorwings, 7 reaper launchers and 9 shuriken cannons can actually bring down a knight with Doom and perhaps Jinx. 

Updates: Obviously the lack of Doom to team up with the dissie cannons on the razorwing is a big hit. With the flyer nerf it will be harder to get that one turn of blocking the drukhari flyers can do. With Ynnari changes losing the ability to possibly double shoot with reapers is a blow. Positive wise, if I ever decided to go for killing knights, Jinx became a lot better against them. Showing up with a hemlock, doom, and a bunch of reaper launchers seems very strong now. This way I could sit back and kill the gallants in the first couple of turns, then work on the crusaders another time. Feed them venoms to keep them off the reapers. 

We talked out the rest of the game and he ended on talked out 37 points to my 19. Realistically I also picked bad secondaries - should have picked stuff like behind enemy lines and deep struck behind terrain to just get my guaranteed points. 

Out of contention for a placing I believe, I was happy to play against a regular opponent from other tournaments I played. 

This game was pretty fun. The list is pretty much all on the table there - Mars Battalion with rangers, 6 Robot unit, two dunecrawlers with icarus; then a Stygies battalion with the new Manipulus who gives +1 advance/charge I believe, and has a nasty flamer type weapon, 10 + 9 priests, and two drills. 

The bikes did their job of charging the robots, however their scenic bases meant that my opponent got to intervene with cawl into them and pick them up. His bots killed one thing a turn usually. I kept trying to silence them with venoms and other nonsense but it didn’t really work. I did however get good board control and my razorwings annoyingly were staying alive really well. His turn one drill charge I believe forced the reapers to stick out of the transport and end up dying. Eldrad had his hands full mopping up electropriests - I also unfortunately lost my Archon to mortal wounds from the electropriests! 

The guardian bomb went for that L building at the top of the picture to secure me Behind Enemy Lines and that objective, clawing me back a lot of points over the game. I found the kabalites pretty useless this game to be honest. I’ll touch on this later.

The game was a super close 22 to 21 win his way! I don’t often talk about my opponent but it was a pleasure as always to play him. A pretty fun game to close out the weekend with.

Takeaways: Bikes tied up the bots, but suffered due to their big base size, and also losing a bunch to overwatch. I should have pretty much ignored the bots as much as I could and just stayed out of sight against this kind of army. In the future I might have been excited to take Haywire against the robots, but without Doom or double tap it’s much more of a mission, so I think the better thing would be to tie them up with bikes if possible, venoms, etc. This is where wyches would come in - charge the screen, don’t kill many, tie them up on a 3+ with a cp-reroll via the shardnet! Then on their turn I get to kill the unit then consolidate even further, and they’re much more resilient against stuff like random support characters from killing them, just due to the 4+ invulnerable saves. Eldrad was a boss as usual. 

Updates: Nothing really because I don’t feel like Dooming and shooting away at the bots is a particularly good choice for the Razorwings to get into. I never got in range to Doom or Jinx them anyway and I didn’t feel like that was bad for me either. With the Ynnari rules I’d get 2 cp advance and charge from reaver jetbikes, which is very nice, and the wyches being able to get melee doom off would come in pretty handy as countercharges to the electropriests or something. 

Overall thoughts:

When I finished the tournament I was pretty sure the bikes really could have been either smaller in squad size or another venom - not many matchups have many targets that are critical to tie up on turn 1, especially with such a low drop  count to make me go first, and also such a deceptively resilient army. 

I walked away with a huge respect for Eldrad, and a bit less respect for Jinx as I found it hard to connect with an opposing threat. I instead really enjoyed casting Protect on Eldrad! I enjoyed the resilience of the wave serpents and what they meant for my matchups - it was going to be hard for opponents to get serious kills as all my stuff is either chaff or wave serpents, venoms and razorwings, all of which are quite annoying to kill. 

Ulthwe performed just fine, I like it for exactly Guardian bombs, but for everything else it’s a bit of a meh proposition. The way I look at it now, compared to Ulthwe, you can pay 10 points to make your wave serpent both Alaitoc and Ulthwe which seems like a good deal to me, or to just keep them as Alaitoc. Multiple Alaitoc wave serpents is very powerful in playing the mission and their mortal wounds are quite well positioned in the meta.

I felt like Razorwings were always better than craftworld flyers just for their invulnerable save and how cheap they were but, they also aren’t as killy or useful and still are less tanky than craftworld planes. So if I am taking flyers in the future, I believe strongly, as well as because of the Doom nerf, craftworld flyers are better. They’re also better for your mental energy as you can pivot at the end and very rarely will you get in trouble with their positioning. While you’d prefer to play perfectly, not having to worry as much is a load off you during the game, and over a tournament, it’s important to keep your mental energy up.

I didn’t really like the mismatched random troops I had sitting around. I didn’t come up against stuff like 9 mortars and all that, and even then, I found the troops besides the guardian bomb quite useless. Kabalites I can forgive this, because they are 30 points. However I have never felt more resolved that even as wave serpent cargo random craftworld squads are borderline useless. As such, I believe unless it’s very tight for points, I’ll be playing either the full 20 man guardian bomb, or 5-8 rangers, per slot. The reason for this is that while rangers don’t accomplish anything in terms of damage, they can deep strike onto objectives, reinforce your screen, etc; and they do this while being quite resilient at -2 to hit and 3+ saves. If you are coming up to the endgame too, you can make them only be hit on 6s, which is like a second lightning fast reflexes, to blank two big units your opponent tries to kill something with. 

In ITC missions, having a unit of 8 rangers can do really well if you have the spare points, because 5 is not that unlilkely to die to a serious threat, but 8 will often survive on maybe 1 or 2 members most of the time. Then, you can auto-pass them, or perhaps have a fearless source, and then your opponent doesn’t score a kill point. As opposed to 5 dire avengers who will simply die to Mortars, or an Avenger Gatling Cannon. This means the list gives up far less points as the game goes on - what usually happens with the games is you can initially score a lot of points but once their hitters start to hit back, you start giving up more and more points now that you can’t hide in transports or behind buildings. 

I really like Venoms, cheap, mobile. I wanted more of them. It’s a bit hard to manage reducing the kill points you give up to the opponent with them, but if you park them next to buildings or out of sight for the first few turns, you can pile out of them out of LOS, to avoid giving them follow up shooting.   

FaQ and Ynnari in the context of this tournament:

Realistically not much would have changed. The Razorwings take a big hit not being able to do useful things against imperial knights, but they’re still quite good at killing infantry and doing light damage to medium tanks with their shatterfield missiles. That said, I don’t like the disintigrators on the platform that is forced to fly around with no buffs - I like the Crimson hunter exarch much more now, simply because it has its own buffs, and only needs a doom to be able to pitch in against Knights. 

Jinx nerf, not sure about this because I don’t think I ever got to jinx a big target. But it was nice to jinx something close to me and doom it, then kill it with poison shots. With this in mind I am quite firmly ready to at least try the switch to wyches for this kind of list. They shoot less which is fine (ironically they can output similar shooting with their plasma grenade against t3 poor save stuff, which actually makes up for the 5 less splinter shots) but have a lot of utility and also can get Doom from Ynnari, which means they could team up fine to take on threats that break my lines. 

Ynnari changes killed the main way this list would have moved forward, what with Yvraine and a bigger squad of dark reapers. It’s kinda a shame but I’m also hopeful, since just normal Dark Reapers without double tap were very good at shooting. I’m happy to invest a bit more psychic into them and make them Alaitoc too so they are basically invulnerable to mortars and if they’re forced to be shot at, they can be very hard to shift even if you got LOS to them.

The new ynnari rules mean that I’d probably take Yvraine instead of the second Archon, just because she can do some decent mortal wound output, and I’m tempted to just flat run the drukhari as Ynnari anyway, just with the wyches, the archon giving them rerolls easier, and the melee doom coming in useful.

Moving Forward:

I’ve already tried a lot of different lists since, but I thought to revisit the ideas and what worked well for me. So I’d start off by moving the reapers and company to an alaitoc detachment. I think now I drop the razorwings, and I will play an Alaitoc Hemlock instead. The main reason for this is because I like the idea of mobile Jinx, and while CHE is very good, I feel like the hemlock brings a lot to the table with auto-hit guns and I am not discounting the mindshock pod. I think to restructure the list to also include Eldrad and an Alaitoc Farseer, then move into more aggressive screening with guardians and wave serpent/venom with an Eldrad up in their face when the situation calls for it. 

Anyway, this has been good for me to go over. Hope you enjoyed reading!