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13uswntimagines · 4 years ago

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Our Song (Alyssa Naeher x Reader)

Request: alyssa naehex reader thats set during quarantine w/ “Shy” by Alexander Stewart. I just kind of think it’s cute since she’s an introvert and that it would be fitting

Author’s Note: Speical Thanks To @literaryhedgehog

Alyssa knew she should just say it, that admitting it out loud would finally put an end to this madness. She ran a soothing hand through your hair when you sniffled loudly into her chest.

God, she should just tell you how she felt. But, she also didn’t want to overstep. That would make being roommates really awkward. Especially since neither of you were supposed to leave the apartment right now except for essential purchases. And she didn’t want to lose her best friend. That would really suck.

But she wasn’t afraid to say what no one else would- you had a terrible taste when it came to partners. You chose people who didn’t value you, and you always ended up hurt.

This time was no different, well, it was slightly different considering you couldn’t leave your shared apartment to cope like you normally would. Alyssa didn’t know if that was better or worse, considering that you had adapted your breakup routine to just be endless cuddles with her and your favorite stuffed animal.

She had already spent the last hour making comforting noises. You had stopped shedding tears 15 minutes ago, so Alyssa decided it was time to go for some humor. “Hey, so now you and Taylor Swift have something in common!”

“Hmm” You hummed in acknowledgment, your eyes never leaving where Supergirl was playing on screen.

“Well, she was broken up with over text. You were broken up with over text. I think this is the perfect opportunity to listen to her re-recording of Fearless, and really channel those emotions!”

“No, Joe broke up with her in a 27-second phone call,” You lifted your head up off of her very comfortable chest to raise your eyebrow at the woman.

Alyssa was a great keeper, and amazing at crosswords, but she always needed your help when it came to Taylor trivia.

“Then Joe showed more consideration as an 18-year-old child than your 32 year old wanna be soccer star. It doesn’t change the fact that I think listening to Mr Perfectly Fine would be cathartic.”

“It’s kinda funny that she wrote Forever and Always, Mr. Perfectly fine, Better than Revenge and Holy Ground all about the same guy, they’re all so different from each other,” You mumbled, settling back down on her chest. At least she didn’t say that you had as many breakups as she did. That was a rude joke. (One Alyssa wouldn’t dare make. She was more cultured than the media asshats that chased your team around).

“Woman’s efficient,” Alyssa shrugged. “No reason why you can't recycle the same emotion into a different song genre.”

“At least she could make millions off her pain. All I seem to be able to do is kick the ball harder,” You grumbled. Your landlord complained about you practicing in the street because of how hard you sent the ball careening into his precious brick wall. It wasn’t your fault Alyssa was too slow to stop the PK.

“Darling, considering you’re one of the strongest kickers on the east coast, I’d say that pain is going to a worthwhile cause. But you do kind of have the worst taste in relationships.”

“Hey! Savannah wasn’t a bad choice, just bad timing,” You huffed indignantly.

“So that would be one out of…. How many bad relationships?”

“At least one for every Taylor Swift album,”

“Okay, here’s a fun idea, choose an ex for each album,” Alyssa said brightly. Thinking about music would definitely cheer you up. “Wannabe soccer star is obviously your Joe, so represents the Fearless album. Which relationship is your… Drew?”

“You already know the answer to that question,” you said, already picking up your phone to add Teardrops on my Guitar to the music queue. You then quickly added Forever and Always and started scrolling through Speak Now for the next song inspiration.

Alyssa nodded. It was a well-known fact that you had a massive crush on one Hope Solo growing up, and you had been absolutely enamored with her the second you set foot into camp. But Alyssa also knew that Hope was very faithful to a certain veteran.

The veteran keeper had tried to let you down easy, and Kelley was still one of your best friends, but it had hurt in the moment.

“Kristie was my Haunted,” you said, smiling slightly. Dating her felt like a whirlwind, one that took your breath until you never thought it would end. She made butterflies flutter in your stomach, and you were so desperate to say the right thing, to be the perfect partner, that you always felt like you were walking a tightrope. Floating on air, but desperate to keep your balance. “At least she had the decency to wait until we were in the same city to end it.”

“Aren’t the two of you friends now?” Alyssa looked down at you, watching as you scrolled through songs from your comfortable place on her chest.

You nodded with a small smile. “Hmm, we are much better off that way anyway.”

“I bet you I can guess who your We are Never Ever Getting Back Together person is,” Alyssa trilled, reaching down to take the phone.

You playfully snatched it away from her. “Who’s to say I wasn’t going to choose I knew you were trouble?” You raised your eyebrow at the woman, who simply smirked in response.

“I can tell you who that is too if you like,” Alyssa reached for her own phone and took over control of the speakers, adding both songs to the music queue.

“Alright, I’ll bite. Who?”

“You definitely knew Sam Kerr was trouble, and I think it took you 4 breakups with Leah to finally call it quits,”

“I was going to say Leah for 1989, it took me forever to realize how fucked up our relationship was after we finally broke up,”

“I’m sure the distance didn’t help.” With her in London and you in Chicago things just kind of fell apart.

“Maybe,” you hummed, noncommittally.

“Okay, so for Reputation. I’m thinking Don’t Blame Me,”

“You did go a bit crazy for Jane…” Alyssa said with a roll of her eyes. You had almost moved to Houston for that girl, thank god you didn’t. You sunburned like nobody's business.

“Oh come on. You just didn’t like the idea of me moving. And considering how long we had been dating at that point it did make sense!” You argued.

“It was 3 months Y/n,” She deadpanned.

“I was in a wlw relationship. That’s like practically three years, it’s not like I brought a u-haul to our first date.”

Alyssa quirked an eyebrow up at you. “Didn’t you have one of those the first time we met?”

“Yeah, because I wasn’t moving into my college apartment without any furniture!”

“Whatever you say, babe. Who's your Folklore?” She rolled her eyes goodnaturedly.

“I think you skipped an album,” you said. This was weird because Lover was one of Alyssa’s favorite albums. “But, since you asked. I think Kelley is The 1.”

“Ah, our favorite squirrel,” Alyssa’s lips ticked up. You and Kelley had dated in college (something that should have made her jealous), but Kelley was the one pushing her to admit her feelings now.

“We were just too young and dumb,” you said, smiling. “We had a great time together, and it would have been fun if it worked out. But at some point we just realized, we were friends, but there wasn’t anything romantic there.”

“I’m sorry it didn’t work out,” Alyssa said, like a liar.

“I’m not. Her and Emily are like made for each other,” You snorted with the shake of your head. “And at least she wasn’t afraid of the world knowing we were together,”

“Well, yeah,” Alyssa smiled. She had loved seeing the way being publicly out with Kelley had brought out the best of you. “ Okay moving on! Next, we need to narrow down your No body, No Crime.”

“I take offense. Alex is still alive, so that doesn’t count,” You huffed.

“I’m kidding! I’m kidding. I know you didn’t kill any of your significant others,” Alyssa said, laughing. “Though if you listened to the song you would know that’s my job… ”

“Alex was my Champagne Problems,” You mumbled sadly. That relationship had been the hardest for you, as had the breakup. She was terrified of the world even suspecting she wasn’t straight.

You had everything, except the freedom to be yourself, and In the end, you couldn’t take the hiding anymore.

“You did your best, love. But people come out at their own pace. And it was before Obergfell v. Hodges was decided. Being queer was still more likely to be presented as a scandal in the media then.”

“She cheated on me with Serv. She doesn’t get a pass,” You grumbled, crossing your arms.

“I’m pretty sure you were on a break dear,” Alyssa said, though she was inclined to agree with you. Being on a ‘break�� but not officially breaking up didn’t seem like a reason to start dating other people. Still getting over some of the semantics might theoretically help you move on. “BUT maybe we should move on. Who is your Lover?”

Your eyes squinted thoughtfully, a light pink shading your cheeks. “The only person who hasn’t ever left me is you. You let me leave the Christmas lights up until May and dance around the kitchen when you cook.”

Alyssa looked away, not able to meet your eyes. ”I mean, the lights can change color, so they can be thematic all year. And you’re the one who chooses the music to listen to while I cook. I can’t help it if they’re all great for dancing.”

“You can dance to anything. I’m pretty sure you turned a Hosier song into a salsa dance last week.” You giggled.

“The only person I dance with is you, Y/n,” Alyssa said, finally meeting your eyes. She could feel her body start shaking slightly, as the adrenaline kicked in. She was going to do it. She was going to tell you. “I don’t want to dance if I’m not dancing with you.”

“I’d dance with you in a storm in my best dress,”

“I have tried so hard to be supportive about your last several relationships. But seeing you dancing to your favorite song with anyone else… I’ve loved you for three years now and I couldn’t bear it.”

The air was suddenly charged between you, and you realized your faces were just inches apart. It was hard to breathe. You never dreamed your best friend would return your feelings (maybe that’s why you had so many bad relationships).

“Kiss me,” you breathed, slowly moving around so your heads were at the same level.

“That’s not a Taylor swift Lyric,” Alyssa said. In her brain, there was a loading sign currently whirring in little circles, as she attempted to process what you just said. Did you mean what she thought you said?

“Baby just say yes,” You said, feeling so happy that tears were coming to your eyes. You leaned forward getting inches from her face, so close you could feel her breath hitch. “Please kiss me.”

“Yes,” was all Alyssa had time to say before she closed the distance and kissed you.

#uswnt imagine #uswnt imagines #uswnt x reader #alyssa naeher imagine #alyssa naeher x reader

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mercy-burning · 4 years ago

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Pretty Please (Reprise)

Pairing: Spencer Reid x fem!Reader Summary: About a year has passed since Reader and Spencer got together, and they spend the day celebrating. PART 1 / PART 2 / PART 3 / PART 4 / EPILOGUE Category: Fluff, mostly Smut 18+ (dom!Spencer, fingering, slight exhibitionism, car sex, penetrative sex, unprotected sex- creampie, slight degradation) Warnings: Sex, language. As always, if there’s anything I missed, please let me know what I should include in warnings! I want to be as mindful as I can about what I post. Thank you! Word Count: 1.7k

MASTERLIST

NOTE: Thank you all so much for reading this series! It turned into something I wasn’t really expecting, and I’m very glad you all have enjoyed it, because it’s really pushed me to keep writing. Thank you!!! I hope you enjoy this short little spicy epilogue 🥰

***

She knew she was going to be in for it later, but she didn't care. Messing with him was too much fun. Not to mention when he finally got her alone and had his way with her, she would be more than satisfied.

"Y/N, stop it," Spencer said lowly in her ear.

Her hand remained on its course as she smirked, and he sighed, irritated. When she circled the tip of his dick through his pants, keeping her eyes focused on the scene in front of her, he grabbed it, lacing his fingers through hers and setting their entwined hands on her knee.

She pouted, but smiled right after, then turned her attention to the screen.

Spencer and Y/N were coming up on one whole year of being together, and though she just wanted to spend the day inside, he insisted on taking her out. They went out for breakfast, then to the park, and now they were at the movie theater. She tried to enjoy every second, and though deep down she really did—she always enjoyed being with him regardless of what they were doing—she was desperate for him. He'd been away on a case for almost a week and a half, and now that he was home she was feeling particularly... needy.

She hardly paid attention to the movie, her thoughts clouded by images and memories of their first excursion together. She replayed it over and over in her head, the wanting look in his eyes as she sank to her knees and pleaded for him to let her make up for the fact that she'd invaded his privacy. "Pretty please," she'd begged, and since then she always remembered how beautiful he looked in that moment. She never forgot it, and never would in a million years.

If there weren't any other people in the theater, she would have been bolder, maybe even so bold as to re-create that moment right there. Though, as hot as sex in public had proved to be on occasion, she'd come to learn that Spencer was not a fan of germs, and she knew ultimately that even if there weren't any people in the theater, he wouldn't have let her get on the floor to do what she wanted anyway.

They were sitting in the back row, though, and the only other people in the room was a family of four down in the middle. So Y/N wanted to take another risk.

He eventually untangled his fingers from hers once he trusted her to not make any moves, and she took that as her opening. She waited about fifteen minutes, and then reached under her skirt, inconspicuously hooking her fingers through the waistband of her panties and pulling them down her legs as her eyes stayed glued to the screen. She felt Spencer's hand grip her knee in warning, but she didn't care. As she reached for her cup and took a drink from her soda, her other hand dropped her panties in his lap.

That was all she was going to do, and she should have known he'd make this hard on her, but alas, when his hand slid up from her knee and rested at her inner thigh, his pinkie finger reaching over and resting just above her clit, she almost choked on her soda.

"You asked for it," he leaned over and whispered lowly in her ear, pressing a soft kiss to her neck before pulling back. His hand stayed where it was for just a few minutes before he shifted, wasting no time plunging his middle and ring fingers inside her. Y/N bit her lip to stifle a moan, while also clutching the armrests of the seat for dear life as his fingers pumped in and out slowly.

As the movie played in front of them, Spencer brought her to the edge three times, pulling his fingers out and licking them clean as she fought the urge to beg him to let her cum, right before going back in each time. It was torture, but she did, in fact, sign up for it.

When it was obvious that the movie was ending, he picked up his pace and curled his fingers in just the right way, and she almost yelped. He leaned into her one last time, and said, "You're going to cum on my fingers, and then you're going to clean them, got it? Be fast."

That was all she needed to finish, and she came as quietly as she could, her legs clenching around his hand and her eyes squeezing shut as she tried not to call out. When he felt her legs loosen around him, he slid his fingers up through her pussy and circled her clit a few times, making her jolt forward, before pulling away and quietly bringing his fingers to her mouth. She happily took them, sucking them as quickly and quietly as she could. She let out a soft groan as he pulled them out, but then stifled a louder one as he ran his fingers through her again, gathering more of her arousal. She cleaned them off once more before the credits started to roll, and then he stood up, bringing her with him.

As the family ahead of them walked up the aisles and out of the door, Spencer shoved her panties in his pocket and ushered themselves out behind them.

He didn't say a word the whole walk to the car. And even when they started driving, he said nothing.

"Hey," Y/N started nervously as he pulled out of the parking lot. "I... I hope I didn't make you do something you were uncomfortable with. I was onl— wait, where are we going? I thought you said after the movie we'd go home?"

Spencer gave a knowing smile as he drove down an empty alley. "That was before you decided to act like a needy little whore in public. I was going to wait until we got home and be gentle with you, but now I have some other ideas."

She tried to hide a grin, already growing excited and wondering what he was going to do to her.

He parked the car and unbuckled his seatbelt before scooting the seat all the way back and moving to undo his belt. "You're going to ride me until I finish, and maybe if you're lucky you'll get to cum. Get over here." His voice was desperate, and Y/N could tell that his primary goal was to get off, it didn't matter if she did as well or not. But they'd been in that position before, and she knew that even if she didn't orgasm now, when they got home he would give her whatever she wanted. He always did.

Spencer removed his dick from his pants as she climbed over him, her skirt fanning out over them. Without warning he gripped her hips and brought her down on top of him, and she gasped as his hips lifted to meet hers. He did this a few more times before stilling and willing her to move on her own accord. She set a steady pace bouncing on him as her hands gripped his shoulders. His hands, in turn, slipped under her skirt and gripped her ass, his fingernails digging in as harshly as they could. It spurred her to move faster, and he leaned his head back with a groan. "Shit, pretty girl, just like that..."

He lifted his hips then, just a little so he could hit inside her deeper as she came down, and she cried out. She could feel him getting closer, and she knew just what would do the trick. "Fuck, baby, cum inside me, please! Give it to me," she breathed, high-pitched and close to the edge herself.

Sure enough, his cock pulsated inside her and in no time he was filling her up, groaning out her name as it happened. She kept going, though, chasing her own release that was just on the surface, almost about to break through the water. But Spencer pulled her off of him and she whined, feeling his cum start to leak out a little.

"Please, Spencer, I was so close... Please..."

As she hovered over him, her legs barely holding herself up, he gripped her chin in his right hand and looked her in the eye. "I don't know... You were being a pretty bad girl at the theater."

"I know, and I'm so, so sorry..."

He ran his tongue over his bottom lip before biting it, pausing for a moment and then cocking his head and using his free hand to run up her inner thigh. "Beg for it."

"Spencer, please," she whined, leaning into his touch. "I'm sorry, please, just let me cum, I promise I'll be good."

It apparently wasn't to his satisfaction, because he continued tracing patterns along her inner thigh as his cum dripped down it. His eyes searched hers, silently telling her what she needed to say to get what she wanted.

She almost smiled as she said it, dropping her voice to a seductive plea. "Pretty please..."

He smirked, sliding his fingers inside her. "That's my girl."

He fucked his cum back into her with his fingers, curling them and feeling her tighten around him as she got closer. "Fuck, thank you, thank you, ohh..."she trailed off, shutting her eyes and going blind with pleasure. Soon enough she was crying out as she peaked, her fingernails no doubt leaving marks in Spencer's shoulders, even through the fabric of his shirt.

When she caught her breath and loosened her grip on him, he removed his fingers from her and brought them to his mouth, doing his best to get rid of most of the mess. But then, as if he'd had an epiphany, Y/N watched as he pulled his panties from his pocket and used them to clean up between her legs and what little had made its way onto his pants and the seat of the car beneath them.

"You know I put napkins in the glovebox, right?" she laughed as she got off his lap and sat down in her own seat. She grabbed one of them and opened it to bunch her panties in, finally setting it in her lap as Spencer readjusted himself.

"Yeah, but that was more fun anyway," he replied matter-of-factly, and it made her smile.

"Hey, before we go home can we stop for a burger? Car sex makes me crave fast food."

As he started the car and turned on the radio, the familiar tune of Love Song by Tesla picking up where it left off on the mix CD she'd made him for their anniversary, he leaned over to kiss her cheek sweetly. "Anything for you, pretty girl."

#spencer reid smut #spencer reid x reader #criminal minds fanfiction #criminal minds #spencer reid #criminal minds smut

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themandhoelorian · 4 years ago

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Dincember - December 4: Hot Chocolate

summary: Mando has unique ways of showing his affection for his son, like getting him hyper on too many cups of hot chocolate, but it’s only after a long day of bringing the kid down from his sugar high that you realize Mando has similar ways of showing how much he cares for you.

pairing: din djarin (the mandalorian) x gn!reader

warnings: a caffeine addiction, sleep deprivation, the smallest sexual innuendo, Din being sweeter than hot chocolate, not super well edited ahaha

word count: 3.2k

a/n: asdfghkldf this is so so late but this week has been long and exhausting (no this fic was definitely NOT me projecting), and I haven’t had as much time as I’d like to write :/. I’m not even really sure this makes sense, but that’s kind of how my brain works when it’s exhausted, so hopefully on some level that’s accurate ahaha

***

You never understood the appeal of caf until you joined Mando’s crew.

The first time someone offered you a cup, that one day you showed up to the tiny mechanic shop of your first job with bags under your eyes, complaining about how little sleep you’d gotten the night before, you thought you’d been handed a steaming cup of motor oil by accident instead.

The dark liquid felt like lava on the roof of your mouth, leaving the taste of bitter ash on your tongue as you willed sip after sip down your throat. It did pull you out of the sleep-deprived fog, but it was more of a jolt in the opposite direction than a gentle tug, your body shooting into overdrive and hands shaking so intensely you burned your fingers on your soldering iron more times than you could count that day.

After that, you tried to stay away from caf as much as possible. No matter how little you’d slept the night before, how often you were caught staring blankly at the wall instead of untangling a mess of wires, you always refused when you saw a mug of hellfire coming your way. The acrid taste, the jitters, none of it was worth enduring when you just had to make it to closing before you could go home and sleep away the fatigue.

But now, your full time job is taking care of a child, and every night is a night with too little sleep. You spend your days trying to wrangle a warm, mischievous demon into compliance instead of just manipulating cold scraps of metal, and the kid doesn’t have “closing hours”- not with how violently he reacts to the notion of bedtime- so there’s never a sweet finish line to look forward to at the end of the day.

You thought you’d known exhaustion before, felt it heavy on your shoulders those months you worked overtime to make ends meet, but that was light years away from what you feel now. The black hole of sleep consumes you as soon as you get the chance to lie down, and when you inevitably wake to the sound of cries a few hours later, it feels like the weight of the galaxy is crushing your lungs, making it nearly impossible to crawl back out of bed.

So after just a few weeks on the Crest, after that one day when you accidentally dozed off watching the kid play and woke to find him sticking a finger into the barrel of a blaster (thankfully Mando had the sense not to keep his weapons loaded on the ship or Maker, that could’ve ended badly), you bought a caf maker on the next planet and forced yourself to chug a cup every morning since.

The taste still sucks, no matter how much cream you’ve tried mixing in, but it doesn’t make you jittery like it used to, the caffeine just enough to keep you awake, and now you don’t know how you ever took care of the little womp rat without it, especially on the days when Mando returns from his hunts and the child bursts with energy to welcome his father home.

Even if it’s only been a couple days since Mando left, you’d think he’d been gone for months with the way they act at seeing each other again. The kid’s just downright ecstatic, dropping whatever part he’s playing with as soon as he hears the hiss of the hull opening and babbling excitedly as he runs into his father’s arms. He’ll follow Mando’s every move for at least an hour after he’s returned, and sometimes, you have to literally pry him from the beskar so Mando can retreat to the cockpit and set the course to the next planet.

And then there’s Mando. He’ll look stoic as ever as he takes the child into his arms, but you can feel how eager he is to reunite with his son, his affection all but spilling out the sides of his armored chest. He’ll never admit it, of course, you’re not sure he’d even be able to find the words to say it if he wanted to, but he finds other ways to show the kid how much he missed him, how deeply he cares about his little foundling.

More often than not, those methods include spoiling the child to no end, giving into the kid’s every desire and providing him with a few moments of pure, unrestrained joy. And more often than not, you’re left with the not-so-simple task of dealing with the consequences of giving the child his every wish, easing him down from the euphoric high and re-establishing that he absolutely cannot expect that kind of indulgence with anyone but his father.

Like one time, Mando stayed awake with him all night long, conceding five more minutes every time the kid whined when he was told it was time for bed. Five minutes quickly turned into hours as they watched the bright mosaic of hyperspace go by, the kid so happy to just sit in Mando’s lap while he spoke in the soothing tones of his people’s tongue. You were only able to pull the child from his father’s arms in the early hours of the morning, all three of you only half conscious at that point, and you spent several cycles trying to get the kid (and yourself) back on a normal sleep schedule.

Or like today, when Mando returned this morning while it was still dark outside, and you woke to the smell of cocoa and peppermint what felt like mere minutes after you’d fallen asleep. When you finally pulled yourself from the bunk, you found Mando sitting next to the child as they sipped on steaming liquid, his helmet tilted back just enough for him to bring the mug to his lips.

He made the kid hot chocolate, you realized from the way the child threw back his bowl so quickly he left milky brown splotches on his face. Of course. Mando had made a habit of bringing sweets back for his son after he’d once gotten his hands on a chocolate bar you’d splurged on in the market, nearly bouncing off the walls with glee as he devoured the entire thing in seconds. That was a memorable day for all of you: the kid found his new favorite snack, Mando found another way to indulge the child, and you found out that when the kid has sugar in his system, you need caf more than water to survive the day.

So it’s no surprise that several hours and a couple more servings of hot chocolate later, long after Mando’s gone to the cockpit to fly to the next planet, you’re chasing the tiny ball of energy around the hull, running on nothing but an unhealthy amount of caf mixed with a little bit of spite, worried you might collapse before the sugar-fueled monster falls asleep.

You have half a mind to be mad at Mando for getting the kid so hyped up on the decadent drink and inevitably making your job that much harder, but you can’t get the image of them together this morning out of your head, Mando dabbing the mess from the child’s face as giggles bubbled from his tiny mouth. The memory’s shaded with the golden haze of dawn, like those dreams that feel warm and familiar, and you can feel your heart swell re-imagining that moment of perfect bliss, father and son so content just to be with each other and the sweetness in their cups.

And oh, you know you could never be upset at Mando for indulging the kid, creating those little pockets of warmth in a life filled mostly by cold, dead space, no matter how much more work it makes for you. Not when you know that he savors those moments as much as the child, that the days he’s back with his son are the only times he doesn’t have to be tough and menacing and deadly, the Crest the only place he doesn’t have to armor up his feelings just as much as his body.

You’re willing to reign in the kid, be the tough one on the ship, if it means Mando can show his son the softness that lies beneath the beskar, tuck away the sharp edges when he holds the little green menace in his lap. You’re willing to lose weeks of sleep course-correcting after each indulgence if it means he can let the honey of his love ooze thick and messy before he’s off to the next quarry and has to lock his affection behind iron walls again. You’re even willing to drink all the caf in the galaxy, let cup after cup burn bitter down your throat, if it means he can have a moment of peace sipping hot chocolate with his son at the break of dawn.

You’re more than willing, happy even, to do all that and more for him, especially if it means you can catch glimpses of the man behind the guise of “Mando” in the process, a man whose heart you’ve found yourself wondering more and more about lately, wondering if it might one day beat strong and steady for you the same way it does for the kid.

So no, you’re not mad at Mando, not in the slightest. It’s more that right now you’re worried you might not be physically able to do those things for him, the shorter than usual night of sleep catching up with you faster than you can fight it off with caf. You’re pretty sure it stopped working after your third cup anyway, the additional caffeine just making you dizzy and no more energized, and you don’t know how much longer you can keep up with the child’s pace. You’ve played peekaboo and thrown around his favorite silver ball and even tried to show him how to rewire an old generator (not that you had any luck with that), and he still hasn’t crashed from his sugar high.

You have no idea what else to do to keep the child busy, and Maker, you’re just so kriffing tired right now, so you’ve resorted to leaning against the door of the weapons closet, floating in that hazy space on the brink of consciousness, using what little of your energy remains to make sure he at least won’t get his hands on a blaster again.

You’re not even completely sure what the kid’s doing right now, just know he’s somewhere on the other side of the hull, and you can only hope that Mando doesn’t come down here and find you and the kid like this. The last thing you want to do is make him worry, doubt how much you care about his son’s well being, but it’s like he can feel your exhaustion radiating through the ship because the next thing you know, the heavy echoes of his boots fill the hull as he descends the ladder from the cockpit.

You will yourself to sit up straighter as you hear his footsteps getting louder, locate the child before Mando can, but your body is working on a little bit of a lag, and by the time you actually open your eyes, Mando’s walking past you, the child snoring softly in his arms.

Of course he fell asleep as soon as you took eyes off of him, the little monster.

Mando doesn’t say anything as he tucks the child into his makeshift bed before striding back to the other side of the hull, and some faraway part of your brain tells you to explain yourself or apologize or say kriffing anything at this point, but the inky gravity of sleep is pulling you in deeper with each passing moment, and you can’t be bothered to speak when your eyes are threatening to droop shut again.

They must have at some point because you don’t remember seeing Mando approach you, but somehow he’s in front of you now, holding a mug out in front of your face. Maker, you must’ve drifted off, long enough for him to decide you needed some help staying awake and make you a cup of caf, and as you reach for it instinctively, bringing the cup to your lips in the trained motion, you can’t decide if it’s just as a thoughtful gesture or a thinly veiled warning for you to actually do your job.

You hum as the warm liquid coats your tongue, deliciously silky and slightly sweet, and it’s only when you swallow, the milky substance gliding down your throat, that you realize-

“This isn’t caf,” you mumble, looking up from the mug to meet Mando’s gaze.

“I never said it was.”

You just stare at him wordlessly, trying to figure out why he made you hot chocolate when it’s not going to make you any more functional. You have no idea how long you sit there thinking, too far gone to even understand the concept of time right now, but it must be a while because he breaks the silence first with a sigh.

“Cyar’ika, you have to stop drinking that crap. It’s not good for you.”

“Need it,” you respond, almost too quickly considering how long it took you to answer him before. Apparently the only thing you can understand in this groggy fog is your caf addiction. “Gonna fall asleep if not.”

“You’re about to anyway. Come on, you need to sleep.”

For some reason you giggle at that, unable to stop the laughter rising through your chest. He’s right, of course, but it just seems so damn funny right now that Mando, who has told you he rarely sleeps when he’s away, who you’ve never seen rest for more than an hour at a time, is telling you that you’re the one that needs sleep.

“You sleep even less than me, Mando. You can’t talk,” you accuse.

He jerks his helmet back in something like disbelief, and you can’t stop yourself from giggling again.

“Well I’m not the one falling asleep on the floor right now,” he counters.

“That’s fair,” you admit. You take a few more sips of the hot chocolate, closing your eyes in pleasure as the warmth floods your veins. Maybe it’s just because you’re so used to the sharp bite of caf, but the sugary drink feels so good, like something comforting and familiar though you can’t quite place your finger on where you recognize it from. It’s almost like you’re wrapped up in the thickest blanket or, even better, by strong arms as you’re lulled to sleep, and you’re not sure that’s what you were thinking of, but you realize that’s exactly what you want right now.

And then your stupid, half-conscious brain decides to ask for it in the worst way possible.

“How about this, I’ll sleep if you sleep with me.”

You only catch how kriffing suggestive it sounds as the words come tumbling out of your mouth, but then all at once, you’re utterly aware of how much you’ve been embarrassing yourself. First getting caught falling asleep on the job and then accidentally making a very blunt pass at your boss, and Maker, you’re just a whole ass mess today aren’t you? Suddenly you feel very awake, your eyes going wide as you stumble over your words trying to backtrack as quickly as possible.

“Oh stars, I didn’t mean sleep with me, that’s definitely not what I, well, not that I wouldn’t…no, I just- I do need sleep but so do you, even if you’re not actually falling asleep right now, so I was just gonna say that we should both-”

But then your rambling is cut off by a chuckle coming from the modulator, his voice light and playful in a way you’ve never heard before.

If you weren’t so kriffing worried about what he was thinking about you right now, you might’ve thought it was the sweetest thing you’ve ever heard.

“I know what you meant, cyar’ika,” he says.

Oh, thank Maker, you think, waves of something like relief washing warm over your body. You’re not quite sure how he can understand what it is you want when you can’t even articulate it yourself, but your brain is still too foggy to care, deciding it doesn’t really matter how he knows you so well, just that he does.

Mando eases the mug from your hands, the worn leather of his gloves brushing lightly over your knuckles. You whine in protest as he steals the liquid comfort from your fingers, but it’s quickly replaced by his hands wrapping around yours to help you off the ground.

“I’ll make you more tomorrow,” he assures you, his voice as velvety as the drink he just took from your grasp. “But now, we need to sleep.”

We, not you.

You barely catch the distinction as he leads you to the bunk while his thumb rubs soothing circles on your lower back, but it just leaves you even more confused in your sleepy daze. You didn’t think he was actually going to entertain your suggestion, even if he did take it in the more innocent way, and when you crawl into the bunk and he doesn’t follow, you think maybe you just misheard him.

But as you close your eyes, your exhaustion starting to pull you away from reality again, you hear the clang of metal on metal behind you, and a gentle tap on your calf halts your descent into the stillness of sleep as Mando climbs into the bunk next to you.

It’s only after he shuts the door, when your body is pressed to his so you both fit in the tiny space, that you realize he’s taken his armor off, the first time he’s ever done so in front of you. You can’t see him at all in the darkness of the bunk, you’re not sure you could even open your eyes again at this point anyway, but even in your delirium you can grasp the weight of how vulnerable he’s making himself right now, letting you run your fingers lazily across the tight muscles of his bicep and rest your head against his broad chest.

And once again, you’re overcome by the feeling of something pleasant and vaguely familiar, your heart swelling the same way it did when you first saw Mando and the child this morning, the same warmth in your veins as the first sip of hot chocolate. You couldn’t quite place it before, but for some reason, as you listen to the way his heart beats strong and steady against you, you think you finally recognize it, the way Mando’s been making you feel all day, the reason he knew exactly what you needed before you could even realize it yourself.

It’s just a hazy flash in the moment before the black hole of sleep finally consumes you, an inkling of a breakthrough you may or not remember tomorrow, but you think this feeling, the acrid taste of caf replaced by smooth chocolate on your tongue, a strong body turned soft as it’s molded to yours, has a four letter name you thought you and Mando only saved for the child.

Maybe that’s why you’re learning to use it for each other too.

#dincember #the mandalorian #the mandalorian fanfiction #the mandalorian x reader #din djarin x reader #the mandalorian x you #din djarin x you #din djarin #*drops this and runs away in shame*#ahaha this took so long to write and for what?#asdfghkl don't roast me too bad lmao #emi writes

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ad1thi · 5 years ago

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au masterlist

okay ive been meaning to do this for a while, and ive finally got the time to do it so here’s a list of all of my aus!! this is divided by ship for ease, and i do have a lot of pieces that don’t fit into any specific au - so this post is specifically for aus (this is a rly long post so im hiding it under a read more) (also please nobody comment on how similar the summaries are ive never had to think of how im summarising these aus before this post)

all my writing on tumblr // all my writing on ao3

buckytony

1. your pain (is my burden to bear) AU

Summary: soulmate AU where you can feel your soulmate’s pain, and marks that originate from your soulmate’s injuries can be found on your body

2. target and assassin AU

Summary: The Asset has been tasked with the mission of killing Antonia Stark. Falling in love with her along the way was never part of the plan.

3. park bench AU

Summary: they’re both running from their past. in New York, they find each other.

4. taste of your lips AU

Summary: TVD au. Bucky wasn’t planning to stick around in New York, just drop in long enough to fix whatever his brother had fucked up and then leave. But then he meets Toni Stark, and against all odds - he finds himself staying in the one city he’d sworn never to step foot in for all of his immortal life.

5. the second (love of his life) AU

Summary: greek gods AU, Aphrodite!Bucky x Hephaestus!Bucky . Bucky has spent over a thousand years resenting his marriage to Tony, content to ignore his husband in favour of his lover, Steve. but when he’s captured by Joann Schmidt and its Tony, not Steve who comes to his rescue - Bucky finds himself falling for the husband he spent so many years ignoring. Is it too late, or can he fix a marriage that was doomed from the start?

6. waste my time AU

Summary: Tony doesn’t do boyfriends. Tony has a boyfriend - Tiberius, or he will anyway once he convinces Ty that breaking up with him was a horrible idea. But then he meets James Barnes at a bar, and suddenly things don’t seem so black and white anymore

7. elite AU

Summary: a/b/o dynamics. Bucky isn’t planning on starting anything up in his new school, and would’ve been completely content to keep his head down until he graduates. But after a chance kiss with a bambi-eyed omega at a party in the beginning of the school year, things weren’t looking so simple anymore

8. 1000 lives (for you) AU

Summary: James hasn’t been subjected to the Chair in close to 3 years. After all, why would HYDRA use the Chair to control him when they’ve got his soulmate instead?

9. Secret Love Song AU

Summary: Marrying Steve wasn’t what Toni had in mind when she pictured the rest of her life, but it wasn’t any hardship. Of course, that was before James came into her life. (this au has been race and gender bent since the original post)

10. Dilwale AU

Summary: mafia au. Tony and Bucky used to be in love. Now they’ve sworn never to see each other again. ‘Course, MJ and Peter falling for each other puts a kink in those plans.

11. K3G AU

Summary: desi au. As a member of the illustrious Barnes dynasty, Bucky is expected to undertake certain responsibilities; chief of which is marrying someone from a respectable family. Tony Stark from Chandi Chowk might just put a wrench in those plans.

12. buckytony teen wolf AU

Summary: when Tony and Rhodey went searching for a dead body in the woods, a rogue Alpha werewolf was not what they were expecting to find. Overnight, their entire lives change

13. undercover cop AU

Summary: After the events of Afghanistan, Tony can’t bear to work at Stark Industries anymore. Handing over the reins of the company to Pepper, he quits and starts working at Midtown High. but the US government isn’t about to let one of the country’s biggest assets work at a public highschool without even the smallest bit of protection. Enter Agent Barnes, or as Tony knows him - Midtown High’s new gym teacher

14. the K2 AU

Summary: Bucky just wanted to live his life without the Army ever finding him again. Saving Tony Carbonell at a metro station and getting sucked into the intricate life of the italian mafia was never on the agenda.

15. Mara Dyer AU

Summary: fem! Bucky. Bucky was an extremely normal 16 year old girl - if you discounted the fact that her bestfriend and boyfriend died after an abandoned building collapsed on them; and that she was the only person to survive. Then bodies started dropping around her, people that she imagined dying who died in the exact grotesque way she pictured is. and suddenly, there’s nothing really normal about her at all.

16. ACOMAF AU

Summary: fem! Bucky. Bucky kills a wolf. Except its not a wolf, its a Faerie and the High Lord of the Spring Court comes collecting his pound of flesh.

17. centre of his universe AU

Summary: The Asset is fascinated by the Stark Heir.

18. one shot AU

Summary: highschool AU. nerd! tony x punk!bucky. Bucky has has a crush on Tony Stark for his entire highschool career, but he’s never thought he had a shot - choosing instead to pine uselessly while Tony dates what feels like the entire highschool body. Bucky’s resigned himself to the belief that Tony will never be his, until Tony breaks up with longtime girlfriend Rumiko Fujikawa, and suddenly - Bucky has one shot.

19. 1000 lives (for you) AU

Summary: James Buchanan Barnes and Anthony Edward Stark are impossible soulmates - separated by time, distance and space but brought together by horrible pain and suffering. This is their story. Starts from TWS, and is largely canon compliant.

stevetony

1. student of the year AU

Summary: Steve was supposed to keep his head down, get good grades and get a scholarship to a university far enough away that he wasn’t even breathing the same air as his family. But then he becomes bestfriends with Bucky, falls in love with Bucky’s boyfriend Tony - and things get a bit more complicated along the way

2. just friends(?) AU

Summary: Tony did this, thing where he fell in love with his friends. All of his friends, except maybe Steve. (too bad nobody told Steve)

3. captain americana and the heartbreak prince AU

Summary: Steve Rogers has known Tony Stark for 10 years, 4 months and 11 days. He’s been in love with him for the exact same time.

4. om shanti om AU

Summary: It should be noted, for the sake of posterity - that Steve usually wasn’t one to buy into the craze that surrounded celebrities. At the end of the day, they were still people. Tony Stark though, that was his exception.

5. stevetony lawyer AU

Summary: raising a 14 year old boy while juggling a demanding job at the DA’s office wasn’t easy, but Steve made it work. It wasn’t an easy life, but it was a good life. They were happy - and then Peter gets charged with the murder of his classmate Wade Wilson and everything falls apart. With his son facing life in prison, Steve does the only thing he can and calls the best defence lawyer he knows - his almost fiance Tony Stark.

6. schitt’s creek AU

Summary: David! Tony x Patrick! Steve

7. kidnapped! tony stark AU

Summary: Tony gets kidnapped and Steve loses his mind.

8. zindagi na milengi dobara AU

Summary: desi AU. in college, Steve, Sam and Bucky made a promise. 3 weeks, 3 activities, 3 boys and the country of Spain. 15 years later, Sam is getting married and its time for them to make good on that promise, to give him the send-off of the century. But between Sam’s conflicted feelings over his engagement, unresolved tension that threatens to break up the trio; Bucky’s secret agenda and Steve’s workaholic tendencies - it definitely promises to be a trip they’ll never forget

9. arranged marriage AU

Summary: desi AU. Steve has been in love with Tony for years. So when his mother asks him to settle down, he impulsively sends a rishta to the Stark residence; and thinks nothing of it. And then - they reply.

10. betrothed AU

Summary: Tony and Steve are princes of neighbouring kingdoms, promised to each other at birth. But the life of a royal is not as smooth as it seems.

11. the salacious bisexual life of tony stark AU

Summary: As a journalist, Steve Rogers is expected to write articles on a great many number of things. He didn’t realise that could include his ex boyfriend.

12. Civil War AU

Summary: everything’s the same except: (1) Steve and Tony are dating, (2) Steve doesn’t know Tony is Iron Man

13. stevetony lucifer AU

Summary: Tony is tired of being the Devil, tired of following Howard’s order, tired of all the bullshit that comes with divinity. Malibu isn’t great but its a refreshing change of pace, a nice break from the screaming and the pain. And then he meets Detective Steve Rogers and Malibu suddenly has a lot more to offer.

Note: this AU was started by @imposter-human and all credits for it rightfully go to her. i just piggybacked onto it and added a couple of my own thoughts, but this AU is hers.

rhodeytony

1. Dostana AU

Summary: Rhodey and Tony desperately need a new apartment, and there’s a brilliant one that’s close to where they both work. There’s only catch though, the landlord, Pepper (who is stunning) only accepts applications from couples. After a night drowning their sorrows in the local bar, they come up with the brilliant idea to pose as a gay couple for the apartment. They move in, and come up with increasingly stupid ways to impress their new landlord without exposing that their marriage is a shamNeither bestfriend likes to lose, and both of them have their eyes set on one person: Pepper (or do they?)

2. rajput tony stark AU

Summary: desi AU. Toni Stark comes from a long line of rajput royalty. (this au has been genderbent since the original post)

3. civil war rhodeytony AU

Summary: civil war scenes re-imagined with an established rhodeytony and a past stevetonyrhodey otv.

4. me and my bestfriend but make it rhodeytony

Summary: memories of me and LRP but re-imagined as Tony and Rhodey

5. meri pyaari bindu AU

Summary: To the rest of the world, he’s always be a Mr someone - but to Rhodey, he has and forever will be, his very first love, Tony.

6. doctor who AU

Summary: Doctor! Tony Stark x River Song! fem James Rhodes

7. female tony AU

Summary: Tony doesn’t like Rhodey’s new girlfriend. (he’s still trying to figure out why)

stevebuckytony

1. stephanie rogers AU

Summary: Steph Rogers was never supposed to find herself on the frontlines of World War 2. Then again, she wasn’t supposed to do a lot of things. - the mcu re-imagined with genderbent Steve. eventual stevetonybucky otv

2. on your knees AU

Summary: dom/sub AU. Tony is relearning what it means to be alive in a world where he’s not in the clutches of HYDRA, and misinterprets a scene between dom! Steve and sub! Bucky

samtonybucky

1. president tony stark AU

Summary: Tony Stark is sworn in at the 46th President of the United States. Sam Wilson and Bucky Barnes are assigned to his detail.

buckytonynat

1. the Carbonell Family AU

Summary: Anthony Carbonell is the patriarch of the Italian Mafia, Natasha and James are his bodyguards (and lovers). Steve Rogers is the FBI agent who’s vowed to bring him down.

clarktony (superiron)

1. bound by blood AU

Summary: when Clark’s parents die, Howard Stark takes him in. Desperate to recreate the serum by any means necessary he starts experimenting on both his new foster child, and his own flesh and blood son in an attempt to create the next supersoldier. Years later, Clark has broken free of Howard and is now Superman; but he and Tony are connected in ways he couldn’t even begin to understand

gen

1. morgan stark’s villain origin story AU

Summary: Morgan Stark isn’t a normal girl. It might have something to do with the death of her father.

2. blind tony stark AU

Summary: Tony loses his sight when he’s 15 after a kidnapping gone wrong.

3. desi! tony stark AU

Summary: just a link to all pieces that have desi! tony stark in them.

4. slytherin! tony stark AU

Summary: just a link to all pieces that have slytherin! tony stark in them.

5. AU-gust 2020

Summary: a masterlist to all the AUs i did for AU-gust, spanning various ships and fandoms

6. sins of the father AU

Summary: Harley has always known who his birth father is. It just never occurred to him, that his birth father might not know who his son is. im3 compliant. slightly aged up harley keener (he’s in highschool not middle school)

#my writing #au masterlist #this genuinely took ages to compile so please appreciate this #and give my aus some love #making this made me realise how many AUs that i have to update or extrapolate #some of these AUs will probably never be revisited #but who knows maybe if someone shows interest in a dead AU #i might find inspiration to add to it

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lesbeet · 5 years ago

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not to be a nerd but i accidentally just wrote a whole impromptu essay about editing ndjsdksksk im throwing it under a cut bc it's fucking inane and really long but honestly... i just want other people to become as passionate about editing as i am lmaooooo

i also recommend 2 books in the post so if anything at least check those out!

quality books about editing... *chef's kiss* a lot of the basic ones (including blog posts online n such) are geared towards beginners and end up repeating the same info/advice, much of it either oversimplified or misrepresented tbh. but i read one yesterday and i'm reading another one right now that really convey this passion for editing + consideration for it as its own sort of art and i just!!

it's such a weird thing to be passionate about lmao but i AM and i've spent a lot of time the past year or so consciously honing my craft (ik i mention this like 4 times a week i'm just really proud of how much i've learned and improved) and kind of like. solidifying my instincts into conscious choices i guess?

and these GOOD editing books have both a) taught me new information and/or presented familiar information through a new perspective that helped me understand something differently or in more depth, and b) validated or even just put into words certain preferences or techniques that i've developed on my own, that i don't normally see on those more basic lists i mentioned

btw the book i finished yesterday is self-editing for fiction writers: how to edit yourself into print by renni brown and dave king, and the one i'm reading currently is the artful edit: on the practice of editing yourself by susan bell.

the former was pretty sharp and straightforward. the authors demonstrated some of their points directly in the text, which was usually funny enough that i would show certain quotes to my sister without context

("Just think about how much power a single obscenity can have if it’s the only one in the whole fucking book." <- (it was)

"Frequent italics have come to signal weak writing. So you should never resort to them unless they are the only practical choice, as with the kind of self-conscious internal dialogue shown above or an occasional emphasis."

or, my favorite: "There are a few stylistic devices that are so “tacky” they should be used very sparingly, if at all. First on the list is emphasis quotes, as in the quotes around the word “tacky” in the preceding sentence. The only time you need to use them is to show you are referring to the word itself, as in the quotes around the word “tacky” in the preceding sentence. Read it again; it all makes sense.")

and like i said, i also learned some new ideas or techniques (or they articulated vague ideas i already had but struggled to put into practice), AND they mentioned some suggestions that ive literally never seen anyone else bring up (not to say no one has! just that ive never seen it, and ive seen a lot in terms of writing tips, advice, best practices, etc) that ive already sort of established in my own writing

for example they went into pretty fine detail about dialogue mechanics, more than i usually see, and in talking about the pacing and proportion of "beats" and dialogue in a given scene, they explicitly suggested that, if a character speaks more than a sentence or two and you plan on giving them some sort of dialogue tag or an action to perform as a beat, the tag or action should be placed at one of the earliest (if not the first) natural pauses in the dialogue, so as not to distance the character too far from the dialogue -- bc otherwise the reader ends up getting all of the dialogue information first, and then has to go back and retroactively insert the character, or what they're doing, or the way they look/sound while they're giving their little speech

and like this was something ive figured out on my own, mostly bc it jarred me out of something i was reading enough times (probably in fic tbh) that i started noticing it, and realized that it's something i do naturally, kind of to anchor the character to the dialogue mechanic to make sure it makes sense with the actual dialogue

so like. ok here's an example i just randomly pulled from the song of achilles (it was available on scribd so i just looked for a spot that worked to illustrate my point djsmsks)

the actual quote is written effectively, but here's a less effective version first:

“Perhaps I would, but I see no reason to kill him. He’s done nothing to me," Achilles answered coolly.

see and even with such a short snippet it's so much smoother and more vivid just by moving the dialogue tag, not adding or cutting a word:

“Perhaps I would, but I see no reason to kill him.” Achilles answered coolly. “He’s done nothing to me.”

the rhythm of it is better, and the beat that the dialogue tag creates functions as a natural dramatic pause before achilles delivers an incredibly poignant line, both within the immediate context of the scene and because we as the readers can recognize it as foreshadowing. plus, it flows smoothly because that beat was inserted where the dialogue already contained a natural pause, just bc that's how people speak. if you read both versions aloud, they both make sense, but the second version (the original used in the novel) accounts for the rhythm of dialogue, the way people tend to process information as they read, AND the greater context of the story, and as a result packs significantly more purpose, information, and effect into the same exact set of words

and THAT, folks, is the kind of editing minutia i can literally sit and hyperfocus on for hours without noticing. anyway it's a good book lmao

the one i'm reading now is a lot more about the cognitive process/es of editing, so there's less concrete and specific advice (so far, anyway) and more discussion about different mental approaches to editing, as well as tips and tools for making a firm distinction between your writer brain and your editor brain, which is something i struggle with

but there have been so many good quotes that ive highlighted! a lot of just like. reminders and things to think about, and also just lovely articulations of things id thought of or come to understand in much more vague ways.

scribd won't let me copy/paste this one bc it's a document copy and not an actual ebook, but this passage is talking about how the simple act of showing a piece of writing to someone else for the very first time can spark a sudden shift in perspective on the work, bc you'll (or at least i) frantically try to re-read it through their eyes and end up noticing a bunch of new errors -

or she talked about the perils of constant re-reading in the middle of writing a draft, which is something i struggle with a LOT, both bc i'm a perfectionist and bc i prefer editing to writing so i sit and edit when i'm procrastinating doing the actual hard work of writing lmao

it's just this side of fake deep tbh but i so rarely see editing discussed like this--as a mixture of art and science, a collaboration between instinct and technique, that really requires "both sides of the brain" to be done well.

and because of the way my own brain works, activities that require such a balanced concentration of creativity and logic really appeal to me. even though ive seen a lot of people (even professional writers) who frame it as the creative art of writing vs the logical discipline of editing. but i think that's such a misleading way of thinking about it, because writing and editing both require creativity and logic -- just different kinds! (not to mention that the line between writing and editing, while mostly clear, can get a little blurry from up close)

but like...all stories have an inner logic to them, even if the writer hasn't explicitly or consciously planned it, and even if the logic is faulty in places in the first couple of drafts. when you're sitting and daydreaming about your story, especially if you're trying to figure out how to bridge the gap between two points or scenes (or, how to write a sequence of events that presents as a logical, inevitable progression of cause and effect), the voice in your head that evaluates an idea and decides to 1) go with it, 2) scrap it, 3) tweak it until it works, or 4) hold onto it in case you want it later? that's your logic! if an idea feels wrong, or like it just doesn't work, it's probably because some part of you is detecting a conflict between some part of the idea and the overall logic of your story. every decision you make as you write is formed by and checked against your own experiential logic, and also by the internal logic of your story, which is far less developed (or at least, one would hope), and therefore more prone to the occasional laspe

but while ive seen a number of articles that discuss the logic of writing, i don't see people gushing as much about the art of editing and it's such a shame

the inner editor is so often characterized as the responsible parent to the writer's carefree child, or a relentless critic of the writer's unselfconscious, unpolished drivel

and it's like... maybe you just hate thinking critically about your work! maybe you view it that way because you're imposing external standards too fiercely onto your writing, and it's sucked the joy out of shaping and sculpting your words until they sing. maybe you prefer to conceive of your writing as divine communication, the process of which must remain unencumbered by lessons learned through experience or the vulnerability of self-reflection, until the buzzkill inner editor shows up with all those "rules" and "conventions" that only matter if you're trying to get published

and like obviously the market doesn't dictate which conventions are worth following, but the majority of widely-agreed-upon writing standards, especially those aimed at beginners, (and most especially those regarding style, as opposed to story structure) have to do with the effectiveness and efficiency of prose, and, in addition to often serving as a shorthand for distinguishing an amateur from a pro, overall help to increase poignancy and clarity, which is crucial no matter the genre or type of writing. and even if you personally believe otherwise, it's better to understand the conventions so you can break them with real purpose.

so editing shouldn't be about trying to shove your pristine artistic masterpiece into a conventional mold, it should be about using the creative instincts of your ear and your logic and experience-based understanding of writing as a craft to hone your words until you've told your story as effectively as possible

thank u for coming to my ted talk ✌️

#long post //#editing #wref #sefa rambles

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theseerasures · 5 years ago

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Conspicuous Media Consumption, 2019

i mean, everyone's doing these write-ups, right? might as well hop onto the bandwagon

towards the end of last year i had one of my typical existential crises about my media consumption: am i slowly disappearing up my own ass because i no longer care about most of the pop culture people like to discuss ad nauseam? but on the other hand, isn’t it more responsible to find the niche items made by non-mainstream and marginalized creators? on the third hand, wouldn’t i be much happier if i just watched FMA Brotherhood over and over again, preferably while starting a new Mass Effect playthrough at the same time?

the answer to all these questions is probably “yes,” but i decided to try something different going into 2019. for every week of the year, i would try to get through a year’s worth of content for some kind of media, be it comics, video games, TV, etc--they didn’t all have to be recent, or even new to me, but once i was done with that week i’d be done, even if i didn’t finish the content, and i’d make a judgement based what i’d seen on whether i want to continue. mostly, i was trying to avoid what happened to me with video games in 2018, when i was hating every second of playing Uncharted but still felt obligated to finish because everyone and their houseplant liked Uncharted or listlessly doing the Master Hunter achievement in RDR2 because the main quest made me miserable.

the actual outcomes of this Project(tm) are a little more complicated than anticipated--some media i could finish in a day, while trying to play through ALL THE CONTENT OF AN MMO understandably took much longer than a week--but it all kind of evened out. in the end i did 48 weeks of this, and used December as my catch-ups month to follow up on some things i didn’t get to finish. i thought i’d give my thoughts on each of the things i consumed this year as part of this project below in a concise manner--and yes, i know the people who’ve read even one (1) thing i’ve written are probably laughing right now, particularly given how long i took in this introduction just to get to me point, but i really am going to try!! it’s all an exercise in shameless self-indulgence, basically, but hey: if any of you want to chat at length about any of this stuff below, hit me up.

(quick note: you’ll only find media that i chose for this particular project below, so things i watched socially with friends--like certain film properties slorping me back into Disney’s gelatinous monolith--are not included)

Devilman Crybaby (anime, finished 1/5/2019): honestly i should have twigged onto what the year was going to be like when the first thing i drew from the metaphorical barrel was demon tiddies and apocalyptic existentialism. i was determined to dislike it for most of the year due to fundamentally disagreeing with its main thematic thrust, but i kept THINKING about it even months after. at this point i’ve kinda mellowed out. it’s definitely not a must love, but there’s enough queer metaphor and philosophical richness in it to make it worth checking out.

Attack on Titan (manga, 3 volumes finished 1/12/2019): this is the second time i’ve tried to get into this franchise and...yeah, no. i still don’t see the appeal. the fascistic overtones juxtaposed with absolutely no one having a sense of humor wigs me out to no end.

Young Justice (TV, 2.5 seasons finished 1/31/2019): honestly, what even is there to say? they’re my kids. they’re back and grown up and making even more terrible decisions. i screamed when i saw Babs in her wheelchair.

Black Leopard, Red Wolf (book, finished 2/10/2019): i tried VERY HARD to like this book, given how much i liked Brief History of Seven Killings, but it just...didn’t click for me. which honestly is fine, since i don’t think it was made for me either.

Dragon Age (3 games, finished 2/28/2019): i feel like there’s always a part of me that’s going to think of this series as “the other one,” but y’know. it’s good. it’s my second playthrough (as a mage for all three) and it’s good! i even went around killing all the dragons in Inquisition because Knight Enchanter was a blast. appreciate the higher queer content vis-a-vis Mass Effect, even though i couldn’t care less about any of the plot. Dragon Age II is the best one, do not @ me

Bitter Root (comic, 4 issues finished 3/1/2019): i love intergenerational dramas and i love stories about vampire slayers, so this was aces. my only complaint is the pacing was a little slow for a story that was going on hiatus after five issues.

Pearl (comic, 6 issues finished 3/3/2019): i know that he’s done great things and grudgingly admit that he’s probably a net positive in the industry but Brian Michael Bendis can suck my entire dick

Lazarus (comic, 5 trades finished 3/ 4/2019): i really thought this was going to clench the position for comic of the year. it’s Rucka doing Highly Relevant Dystopia! it’s a corporate Lannisters AU! it’s a highly personal story about a woman with high privilege and little agency! what more could you want

Immortal Hulk (comic, 2 trades finished 3/ 4/2019): i vibed with the horror feel, but i don’t honestly think it’s THAT exceptional. being set in 616-verse means there was still ton of baggage i didn’t know or care about, since i’ve now swung more to the DC side of things

thank u, next (album, finished 3/5/2019): didn’t Ariana Grande get canceled this year for some reason? oh well, i liked her album

When I Get Home (album, finished 3/13/2019): i vividly remember listening to this for the first time and feeling vaguely disappointed that it wasn’t more like Seat at the Table until i realized that i was covered in goosebumps. still don’t understand the magic but it is Good

The Bird King (book, finished 3/23/2019): pretty much everything you’d expect from a G. Willow Wilson book--spirituality, the female lead finding Themselves and the Answer and learning they’re the same thing, etc etc. i’m slightly resentful that her Wonder Woman was so lackluster while this was so good, but whatevs

Psychodrama (album, finished 3/29/2019): possibly my favorite album of the year? dense and emotionally raw in a way i really appreciate. Dave has a Mercury and he’s younger than me

Mass Effect (4 games, finished 4/7/2019): wow guys did you know that Mass Effect is good! it is. all of it is actually, even the Mass Effect 3 ending, another controversial finale to a big franchise that i will obstinately defend. even Andromeda, which isn’t AS good as the trilogy but still has a lot of heart. all its bugs have been exhaustively patched since launch anyway

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (TV, 4 seasons finished 5/13/2019): i’m...still kind of mad about this finale, but can’t exactly deny that this show is one of the best things to ever happen to me, or television probably. i didn’t even mind new!Greg that much! tho he was probably the nail on the coffin of me jumping onto the Nathaniel train.

Knights of the Old Republic/The Old Republic (3 games, finished 7/4/2019): did you guys know that KOTOR II was my first ever video game? i feel like that...explains a lot about me. anyway, the first game is a classic and the second is a deconstructive classic and playing either of them is basically a fun way for me to turn off my brain these days. even the MMO wasn’t as much of slog as i worried it would be. the Imperial Agent storyline had some nice surprises and i dig the general atmosphere of ruthless pragmatism and crushing loneliness.

Wanderers (book, finished 7/13/2019): Chuck Wendig is a very well-intentioned man in dire need of a strict editor. still good tho! some VERY punchy emotional bits and an ending that still leaves me with vague existential terror.

Code Geass (anime, 2 seasons finished 7/20/2019): i feel like this is on the polar opposite of the spectrum as Devilman Crybaby, because i don’t think Geass is GOOD on like, any basis, and i actually find its central moral message kind of abhorrent? but some part of my lizard brain LOVED the High Imperial Family Drama (it’s been a good year for me and Lannister types, hasn’t it? well, with the obvious exception of--never mind), so...yeah. have i discovered the true meaning of guilty pleasure

The Farewell (movie, finished 7/23/2019): how could i not a) watch this and b) love this and c) feel emotionally cold towards this at the same time because the situations depicted were so similar to mine that i ended up feeling kind of alienated

The Nickel Boys (book, finished 8/8/2019): i STILL haven’t read Underground Railroad, but here i am a book late and a dollar short to appreciate Whitehead’s new book. the man’s stylistic versatility is jaw-dropping and i appreciate the plotting in contrast to like, 90% of the litfic out there that’s just “protagonist sad in different milieu”

Durarara (anime, 2 seasons finished 8/31/2019): it’s fucking bonkers and i loved pretty much every second of it? even the second season, where i finally got the BruceNat AU i deserved??? the first anime i’ve seen where everyone was relatively soberly dressed. the answer was love and having feelings and asking your middle school best friend to hurl you like a projectile so you can chop your girlfriend’s head off with a demon katana

Lover (album, finished 9/1/2019): i feel like with all the Discourse surrounding Taylor Swift re: she’s the devil incarnate or re: she’s good, actually the fact that she makes fucking bops gets kind of lost in the conversation. i have no vested interest in her as a person but i liked Lover, even though London Boy was “what if Style but stupid”

Are You Listening (comic, finished 10/2/2019): my actual choice for best comic of the year if i were giving out awards like that. it’s coming of age! it’s grief! it’s queers! it’s trauma! it’s magical realism! it’s cats! it’s expressive gorgeous art! Tillie Walden has an Eisner and she’s younger than me

High School DxD (manga, 2 volumes finished 10/10/2019): i don’t even know how to talk about this series?? i actually kind of came around to the whole “main character is a perv but goes hard for consent” by the end of the second volume, but it’s still...bad. i only can have lingering conflicted feelings about one Japanese adaptation of Christian mythology per year

Ghosteen (album, finished 10/18/2019): much like Immortal Hulk i thought it was fine but over-hyped. it’s Nick Cave doing his Nick Cave ethereal music thing. i still can’t tell what any of the lyrics mean, except Jesus is there sometimes

Watchmen (TV, 2 episodes finished 10/29/2019): i am nOT FUCKING CAUGHT UP so please watch out for spoilers. it is on my high priority list of things to be caught up on tho--i appreciate that the plot is blatantly unsubtle but still manages to give me aneurysms and i appreciate the political overtones just kinda...balances on a razor thin wire and also gives me aneurysms. i wanna say i have no expectations and would be fine if it does a full dive into the horrible bland depths of the both-sides porridge, but i’m sadly a fool who wants to believe in Damon Lindelof

Syllabus/Making Comics (2 comics, finished 12/24/2019): it’s funny--even before Making Comics came out i was like “man i miss Lynda Barry” and then BAM. it’s incredible how her work just makes me feel taken care of, even when we’re wrestling with tough topics or she’s demanding that i draw a Batman in 30 seconds. kudos for immediately shooting to the top of my gift list for my sister also

Allegiance/Choices of One (2 books, finished 12/24/2019): fun and largely inoffensive, but i was honestly hoping for more. the level of Empire apologia going on was too much for me, someone who thinks Mara Jade is the best Star Wars character of all time (still?????? still). it reeked a little of Zahn believing his own hype as the only valid guy in Star Wars Legends of whatever

Aldnoah.Zero (anime, 1 season finished 12/24/2019): turns out i also can only have “trash but my trash” feelings about one Japanese mecha show with higher art pretensions and patriotism verging into jingoism per year, and this one ain’t it. it’s not as good as Code Geass and Code Geass ISN’T GOOD. at least Geass attempted character complexity and moved at enough of a breakneck pace to distract me from its questionable bits. Aldnoah is just...bland, and nothing gets accomplished or revealed in 12 episodes, except the baffling and contradictory motivations of the main bad guy.

Baldur’s Gate (game, unfinished): yet again something i really wanted to like, given *gestures at all the BioWare above*. i think it’s mainly the Seinfeld issue, where it actually predates my own experience with video games and was so formative for the Western RPG genre that what was innovative just comes across as kind of staid now. i didn’t DISLIKE it, and will probably play the sequel since it’s supposed to be more character-driven, but by the time i finished the vanilla campaign i just didn’t have it in me to squint at more tiny avatars on the screen, so the expansions ended up a no-go.

most prominent thing i noticed about this list is that only one 2019 movie made it on the list and ZERO 2019 video games did so. the former i’m okay with because i currently live with two film people with whom i’m happy to tag along to the cinema. the latter bums me out a little more, because there WERE a few things i wanted to play this year, but all of them came out just as my semester was reaching its catastrophic boil, so i had no time. maybe i’ll use my free time after the New Year festivities to catch up on those.

to conclude: this worked out pretty well! i ended up finishing all but one of the things, and only a few were bad enough that i have no interest in seeking out more content. i’ll probably do this again in 2020--we’ll see if the scheduling can withstand a full year of grad school hell

#let's break out a new tag for this since this isn't really meta #conspicuous media consumption

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crystalelemental · 5 years ago

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Powercreep in Heroes is a big topic lately, and with good reason. Gen 4 BST came early, and the fallout of this has been...less than stellar, including dancers that are actual combat threats instead of just support, flying and cav units being pushed further and further up, and infantry now essentially mirroring early Gen armor units with their disgusting 173BST totals. Honestly, it is a lot, and for people who spent to make early game favorites work, they're probably falling off the meta pretty hard.

Here's the thing, though. It's really not all bad. Armor units dominated the metagame, and a huge part of that was simply the BST they carried. 180 is obscene when the next best thing is around 158, maybe 163 if you're really lucky. It's a massive improvement over every other unit in the game. Now, I do think that a defensive unit should have higher stats than an offensive one. A defensive unit naturally requires more stats to be good to function; you can't exactly wall out without great defenses, but offense has to be able to potentially muscle past so you need the offensive presence to threaten back, and if you're too slow then the damage output is eternally stacked against you. Offensive units really only need attack and speed.

To a degree, I kinda like the current meta better than when I started. Maybe that's because I have units that can compete, but I feel like it's very rare now that I run into a situation where I absolutely cannot break past a defensive wall, and hyper-offensive teams just need debuffs and speed control, which is what I tend to emphasize anyway. Things feel like they've shifted from "Everyone runs armor all the time, and all you do is turtle up and never take damage while DC/Bold or Wary Fighter and Aether do the work for you." It's still a good strategy, but it's breakable now, and other strategies are just as effective. Legendary Alm is all over Arena every time it's Earth season, but as scary as he is and as carefully as you have to play around him, he's beatable with all the dance support that exists. Units like Sothis are terrifying and some of my least favorite to face, but she's super weak to Chill Speed, which is now a sacred seal. And with the significant increases to flying and cavalry units' BST, I expect they're going to start making a serious comeback as well. Which is good! Variety is important in games, and I feel like Arena has gotten more and more interesting as time goes on. Sure, L!Azura dominates every form of play because they forgot one extra movement space for flying and infantry units is obscene, and that giving a potential +7 to all stats was the stupidest thing they could do, but hey, something has to dominate the game. The biggest complaint against powercreep, and the argument with the most legitimacy, is simply that early game units are falling completely out of favor. We all know a solid 60-70% of all Gen 1 5* units should've demoted. Their stats aren't well aligned, they have absolutely terrible skillsets, and some of them are completely irredeemable even with their refines (Luke). This poses a problem. Those units can still be good, but only if you get them fully merged, and even then they're not as effective as newer units who could do the same thing. A +10 Lucina still wouldn't perform as well as a +0 Brave Alm, for instance. And that's a problem. That's a big, stinky problem, and the solution is...half-assed, to say the least.

The attempt was Dragonflowers. When introduced, they were given to all units, but infantry units only could get up to +10 dragonflower uses. Which is okay. It's a flat boost to all stats, which isn't terrible, but isn't the same as keeping pace with the heavily min-maxed meta we know today. Really, all it did was let BST keep pace, without accounting for combat performance, allocation of those stats, and the fact that weapon effects went from a sentence or two to a paragraph to a novella. Flat boosts just don't quite cut it, and weapon refines are helpful, but not to those who got early refines that just aren't good (ie, Takumi). Worse, Dragonflowers were introduced with Gen 3 BST, which made the quantity of dragonflowers units could have sensible. Infantry units got the highest buff, so old infantry units get the most dragonflower uses. But, other movement types also got the BST increase, so they were outdated immediately (Thea has 5 more points than Clair, and yet they receive the same number of dragonflowers), and now with Gen 4 they're even further behind.

Essentially, the problem isn't that powercreep exists, it's that older units are not being given the tools to compete. I think what the game needs is a major update whose sole focus is on early game units being given across the board buffs. 5 extra points, allocated intelligently, to all Gen 1 units could even be sufficient. Some of the early refines getting a boost would help the 5* locked units continue to be worth existing in that pool. And perhaps most importantly, Dragonflowers need to be a lot easier to obtain. If those are going to be your balancing mechanic, you can't demand players excel at Aether Raids for 6 months just to make one (1) unit keep up. Dragonflowers aren't orbs, they're not something we pay real money to obtain, so there is absolutely no reason to treat them as such a rare commodity (same with Grails, frankly). Also, if you really want to go in a good direction with this, let players decide where Dragonflowers go. Sure, you can have 5 uses of dragonflowers, each stat increasing up to 4 points. Players get to customize their unit how they'd like. Instead of a flat +2 across the board for, say, Karla, maybe you allocate her 10 by putting 4 in speed, 4 in defense, and 2 in HP so she can be a better duelist. Maybe you like Desperation builds and go 4 speed, 4 attack, and 2 defense. Maybe you did that weird wall Karla build with Pavise and Shield Pulse, so you allocate 4 defense, 4 Res, and 2 HP. That...honestly feels like a much better use of these resources than a flat boost that doesn't really help combat potential, gives players more control over how to build their units, and offers greater variety because two players using the same unit are unlikely to build the exact same way.

There are plenty of ways to fix the actual issues inherent within the constant powercreep. The problem is, IS likely won't do them. Overhauling early refines means focusing on units they already consider complete, and because the profits are in the new units advancing the whale meta, they're unlikely to care if older units the rest of the playerbase use can compete. Hell, it's almost better if they don't. And overhauling dragonflowers would be a massive cluster at this point, having to create a way for players to essentially "redo" all the allocations u to this point. Not to mention, their bizarre miser status when it comes to every form of basic resource in this game, even ones that have exactly no attachment to their profits. You'd have to completely shift their focus to be more generous, which honestly is going to be like pulling teeth.

But at the end of the day, I don't worry about it too much. Because the only PvP that exists are Arena and Aether Raids, neither of which are particularly scary. Arena's frustrating until you have finished merge projects, but once your core is done, it's really not so bad. Aether Raids sucks until you hit Tier 21, but then it's really not too difficult to maintain in that tier, especially if you have a Mythic that prevents some Lift loss. A single perfect win with the doubler active is enough to cover an entire week in some cases. And in-game content? The recent Abyssals like Julia and Roy haven't been any harder than older Abyssals like Grima and Tiki. Hell, Tiki's was harder in my mind. So yes, powercreep sucks, and its constant advancement as time goes on can definitely feel like your well-trained and cared for Delcatty has to keep going against an Action Replayed Mega Salamence that can hold Choice Band. But the good news is that AI doesn't change, and once you get use to that, yeah it looks scary, but for some reason they hacked Mega Salamence to know Bulk Up and locked themselves into only using that move, so really, it's not that bad.

Except for the +10 L!Azura/+10 L!Alm combos. That's like walking into NU with a Mega Rayquaza.

#fire emblem heroes

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jokessho · 7 years ago

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[Update]: Seven Plus One Chapter 4

Woop! Sorry it took a bit longer to edit, but I had to go back and re-read the previous chapters to make sure I wasn’t contradicting myself. I wasn’t :)

This one’s a bit shorter, but there’s a bit more going on and some “new” characters.

FFN

AO3

“So how was shopping?” Sora asked as she settled for dinner onto the floor between Mimi and Meiko.

The teenage boys, sitting across from her, looked at each other with mirth in their eyes and smirks on their faces. Meiko, recalling the same trip, rolled her eyes and shook her head slightly, though a smile played at her lips.

“It was good.” Hikari answered, sitting by the window with Koushiro. “Yamato got clothes—we got some new ones, too, for winter. And me and Koushiro got school supplies for when Yamato starts teaching us.” She grinned over at Yamato, who smiled back.

“That’s good.” Sora smiled at her and then returned to her meal.

“So you got your key?” Jou asked the blond sitting next to him.

Everyone except Sora and Jou froze, some with food halfway to their mouths. Meiko, Taichi, and Yamato exchanged wide-eyed stares.

“I told you to remind me!” Taichi yelled at Yamato.

“And I told you I would if I remembered to!” Yamato retaliated.

“How did we all manage to forget?” Meiko groaned.

“Well, Taichi’s always irresponsible, so that’s explained.” Hikari chimed in, sticking her tongue out at her brother.

“Not like you were responsible and remembered.” Taichi stuck his tongue out at her, too.

Jou let out a large breath, pushing his glasses up before rubbing the bridge of his nose. “Maybe take a shopping list next time?”

“Nah.” Taichi waved the suggestion off. “It’s more fun without.”

“But a list would make shopping more economical.” Jou rebutted. “Winter will be upon us soon, so we need to start saving elsewhere, so that we can afford heating.”

“Not to mention we won’t be able to grow our own vegetables anymore.” Sora added, thinking of their small vegetable patch in the backyard.

“Oh, that reminds me.” Meiko said, turning to Sora. “One of Mimi and my colleagues was talking about getting rid of her small greenhouse and I told her that we could take it. I spoke to Mimi and she’s up for keeping vegetables going throughout the winter.”

Sora perked up. “Really?” Meiko nodded and Sora and Jou exchanged smiles.

“How are we getting it here, though?” Jou asked between bites.

“She said her husband could bring it here with his trailer. They don’t even want any money for it—they just want to get rid of it.”

“That sounds really good.” Sora said softly.

“So, wait.” Yamato said, looking from Meiko to Sora. “Mimi’s ‘up for keeping vegetables going’? Mimi takes care of the gardening?”

“Yes.” Sora answered simply.

“Oh.” Yamato looked down at his nearly empty plate and bit his lip. “I thought you took care of it, what with your background and all…”

Sora tilted her head, smiling kindly. “Well, it’s not like I don’t know how to, but Mimi loves gardening.” Sora let out a laugh. “Surprisingly, she enjoys getting her hands dirty.”

“She loves all plants.” Meiko added with an affectionate look on her face. “She talks to them and pets them and tells them all that they’re pretty. You should go with her one day; it’s a whole new side of her.”

-o-o-o-

“Ugh, I can’t believe the amount of homework I got for maths!” A purple-haired girl with large round glasses complained, whilst taking a seat in the school cafeteria. “I have afterschool activities, too!”

Yamato smiled, already seated at his small group’s usual table. He was in a different class from his two best friends, but at least they still had lunch together.

“It’s just busy-work, though, isn’t it?” He tried to console. “It won’t take you that long to answer all the questions, Miyako.”

“Unlike me.” Joined in a male voice. “I’m not as clever as her—or you—so it’ll take me forever to get through all the problems.”

The male took a seat next to Yamato, across from Miyako, and dug into his food immediately.

Miyako made a face. “Geeze, Daisuke, calm down, we have plenty of time to eat.”

“No time.” Daisuke informed between quick bites. “I need to get started on this homework if I want to have it done by tomorrow’s class.”

“Why can’t you just do it at home?” Yamato asked, chewing his food thoroughly.

“Can’t.” Daisuke said.

Yamato and Miyako exchanged amused looks.

“Yes,” Miyako emphasised. “We gathered as much, but why? You need to elaborate.”

A smile graced Yamato’s face for a second, upon recalling Taichi always telling him the same.

“What?” Daisuke’s tone held a teasing amusement.

With a slight delay, Yamato realised that Daisuke’s question was aimed at him. “What ‘what’?”

Daisuke’s brown eyes held a mischievous glint. “What’s that smile for? Something you’d like to share, hm?”

Yamato felt his face heat up. “What are you talking about?”

“That smile.” Daisuke repeated. “Looked like you were thinking of something nice—or someone.”

“Ooh.” Miyako chimed in. “Does our little ‘Mato have a crush on someone?” Miyako’s long hair whisked around as she scanned their surroundings. “Did she just walk in or something?”

“No.” Yamato stated firmly. “There is no one and Daisuke’s just making stuff up. Again. He’s just avoiding the real question.” Yamato’s tone changed to a teasing one. “Maybe he has a date tonight, which is why he doesn’t have time to do his homework at home.”

“Ooh!” Miyako, eyes ablaze, turned to Daisuke. “Is that it? Spill the beans!”

“What?!” Daisuke pushed backwards in his chair, as if putting himself further from Miyako physically would deter the girl. “There’s nothing like that going on!” He flicked some of his rice at Miyako when she opened her mouth. “I just have a video game going that I want to beat. I had to stop last night because my mum yelled at me to go to sleep, but I’m so close to finishing! I just need a few more hours and then I’ll be done.”

“A video game? Really?” Yamato slumped back in his chair. “Hasn’t anyone ever taught you to prioritise?”

“Yes and that’s why I tried to eat fast, so I could start on the homework and at least get part of it done before going home. But you guys held me up.”

Miyoko gave him a flat look. “So you have no intention of doing any of the work at home?”

“Nope.” Daisuke said, finishing off his lunch and pushing his tray aside. He pulled out his math book and a battered notebook, opening both. “I’ll try to get some done in literature in the afternoon, too.”

Yamato rolled his eyes, mumbling: “Whatever.”

The table was quiet for a few minutes, Daisuke working on his homework and Miyako and Yamato eating at a moderate pace.

“Say,” Daisuke started, chewing on the end of his pencil and looking at Yamato. “We haven’t really hung out together in a really long time. We should do something after school today or tomorrow or sometime this week. It’s been almost a year since we’ve really hung out together. Let’s go for ice cream or coffee or something after school today.”

“Am I not invited?” Miyako asked from across the table, looking insulted, though both males knew she wasn’t.

“No.” Daisuke said, sticking out his tongue at her. “So how about it, ‘Mato?”

“Ah, I can’t really hang out today. Maybe some other day? And you have a video game to get to, anyway.”

“Hey! You just told me off for not prioritising. Well, now I’m prioritising you over my video game, so you should appreciate that.”

Miyako smirked. “Instead you’re getting rejected.”

Daisuke threw his pencil at the girl. “Shut up.”

Yamato chuckled at his friends’ antics, taking another bite of his food.

“Besides—and give me my pencil back—I wasn’t rejected; I was just moved to a later day. Right, Yamato?”

“Yeah, we’ll see.”

“Ree-jec-teed.” Miyako sing-sang.

“Ugh.” Daisuke complained. “I ran out of things to throw at you. You never returned my pencil.”

“Sucks to be you.”

“Just give it back, Miyako. I need it to finish my work.”

“Is this the only pencil you have?” Miyako twirled the pencil in her hands, inspecting it. “Ew!” She threw it at Daisuke. “You’ve been chewing on it—gross!”

Daisuke smirked, returning to his work.

-o-

“Yamato!”

Yamato groaned lightly. He had easily managed to avoid Daisuke after lunch, as they were in separate classes. But now the energetic teen was running down the hallways, calling Yamato’s name.

Daisuke landed heavily on Yamato’s back, almost knocking both of them to the floor on their faces.

“Watch it.” Yamato complained, shrugging his shoulders a few times to try and dislodge the other male.

“Did you think you could escape from me that easily?” Daisuke asked cheekily, still draped over Yamato’s back.

“I did hope.” Was Yamato’s mumbled reply.

“Oh, why must you hurt me so?” Daisuke lamented loudly, attracting the attention of a few other students still in the hallway. Thankfully, though, he had removed himself from Yamato’s back. “So you coming round to mine today or should we head to yours? Or just hang out somewhere else for the rest of the afternoon?”

Yamato’s eyes fell to the floor as he started towards the main doors again. “I don’t think I’ll be able to make it today… Or for a while. Sorry, Daisuke.”

Daisuke’s frown turned more into a squint as the pair walked out into the sunshine. “We used to hang out all the time, you know—”

“I know, but things are different; so much has changed in the past few months…”

“Look,” Daisuke paused in his steps, making Yamato, next to him, stop as well. “I know you just lost your dad and are feeling down about it, but that’s no reason to stop spending time with your friends. You need to start looking on the bright side of things again.” Daisuke turned his whole body towards Yamato and took both the blonds hands into his. “You need to allow yourself to be happy again.”

The two stared at each other for a minute before Yamato gently pulled his hands away and continued walking. “I’m not unhappy, Daisuke. In fact,” Yamato thought about his current situation. “I’m actually quite happy with how things are now. Yes, it still hurts, but I’m moving on and—”

Taichi.

Mimi. Sora.

Meiko.

Jou.

Koushiro. Hikari.

He was meeting new people and starting to be glad of his decision to take the vocational route. Once upon a time, he had dreamt of going further with his education, maybe even achieving the title of ‘Doctor’ before he turned 30.

But right now, he just wanted to help his new friends. He wanted to give back to the people who had helped him at his lowest point.

Right now, he just wanted to see Hikari and Koushiro through their high school education, so that they could have better lives. Four or five years would be all it would take. Right now, Yamato was more than willing to invest his time into helping the others.

Hell, he could always continue his education a few years down the line, if he still wanted that. In fact, at a few years older, he would know better what he wants to do with his life.

“Yamato!”

Yamato started, snapping out of his thoughts. He turned, annoyed, to face Daisuke. “What?”

“You back?” Daisuke’s eyes held such concern that Yamato’s annoyance deflated.

“Yeah, let’s keep walking.”

Daisuke didn’t move.

“What’s up?”

“Are you planning on walking home? Don’t you live with your mum now and doesn’t she live really far away? I thought you took a bus or something in the mornings.”

Yamato’s eyes widened briefly, before he pulled his face into neutral. “Yeah, but I can take a bus from somewhere around your place. I thought that, since we can’t hang out, I can at least walk you home.”

Daisuke grinned and took a few running steps to catch up. “Yes!” He threw an arm around Yamato’s shoulders. “Thanks man.” Daisuke gave a long squeeze. “I really have missed spending time with you.”

“Yeah…” Yamato mumbled. “Sorry about that.”

“Don’t worry about it; I know you’ve had it rough.” Daisuke assured with another squeeze and an easy smile. Though in the blink of an eye, the arm as well as the mood dropped. “I just wish you’d rely on me a bit more. I want to help, but I can’t unless you tell me things and trust me to be able to help.”

Yamato cringed at the pang he felt in his heart. “I’m sorry, Daisuke. I do trust you, but I just…” Yamato fished around for the right words, eventually going with: “See? I don’t even know what to say now.” He shook his head, eyes on the ground. “I’m just no good with words or sharing my thoughts or feelings.”

Daisuke reached over to grab Yamato’s hand, making the blond look up into reassuring coffee-coloured eyes. “I know.”

-o-

Yamato let out a deep breath as he rang the bell of his new home.

“You’re back later than usual.” Hikari commented upon opening the door and walking backwards a few paces.

“That’s cause he was hanging out with his boyfriend after school.” Taichi announced, walking up behind Hikari, grinning from ear to ear.

Redness rushed up to Yamato’s face as he dropped his head to toe off his shoes. “What on Earth are you talking about? I wasn’t and I don’t even have a boyfriend.”

Taichi kept the grin on his face as he watched Yamato. Hikari rolled her eyes, already growing tired of the conversation and moved back into the living room to do some school work.

“If that wasn’t your boyfriend, then who was it, huh? You two were awfully close and touchy to not be dating.”

Yamato shoved past Taichi and into the living room, a frown on his face. “What were you doing spying on me?”

“I wasn’t.” Was Taichi’s easy reply. “I was walking past the school and thought that we could walk home together, but you already had company—very good company, by the look of things.”

“Would you just stop that?” Yamato snapped, turning sharply, toe to toe with Taichi. “He’s a friend and that’s it.” Then Yamato turned back towards the living room and his voice took on a more gentle tone. “How are you getting on with your work, Hikari? And where’s Koushiro?”

“Alright. This level is something I can do, though some problems need a bit more time. Koushiro finished ages ago, so he’s in our room.”

“Hm.” Yamato kneeled on the floor, facing Hikari, and started looking over Koushiro’s abandoned work. “These are very detailed…”

“He has a very analytical mind.”

“Clearly.” Yamato affirmed Hikari’s statement. “I can only get him so far and then we’ll need outside help… And Taichi stop pestering me!”

Taichi jumped back from where he had been looking at the papers over Yamato’s shoulder.

“What?” Taichi protested. “I was just checking on Koushiro’s work.”

Yamato’s eyes narrowed. “No you weren’t.”

Taichi smirked. “What was I doing then?”

“Well, I don’t know, but I know that checking Koushiro’s work wasn’t it.”

Taichi crossed his arms over his chest, eyes on the kneeling Yamato. “So what you’re saying is that your other friend can be really close to you, bu—”

“Didn’t I tell you to drop it?!” Yamato snapped to his feet, marching into the kitchen. “I’m going to start cooking. Hikari, bring me your work when you’re done and we can go over the parts you struggled with. And Taichi, don’t follow me.”

Taichi, who had just been slinking towards the kitchen, deflated, letting his posture sag. “You’re no fun.” He called out, sticking his tongue out towards the kitchen, even though he knew Yamato couldn’t see him. His eyes flew down to his little sister, who’s face held a contemplative look. “What?”

Hikari just rolled her eyes and returned to her work.

-o-

“Did anything interesting happen to anyone today?” Mimi asked when most of the ‘family’ were seated around the coffee table; only Jou, Sora, and Meiko were at work. Monday was Mimi’s only day off.

“Not really.” Hikari said around a mouthful of food. “Though me and Koushiro are starting our homeschooling properly tomorrow. We did some exercises to establish our level and now Yamato knows where to start.”

“That sounds great!” Mimi said with a broad smile, genuinely glad that the young girl would have the chance to get proper education.

“I saw Yamato’s boyfriend.” Taichi butted in, throwing a grin Yamato’s way.

“He’s not my boyfriend!” Yamato bristled, grip tightening around his fork.

“Chill.” Mimi grinned. “It’s not like we’re homophobic or anything.”

“It’s not…” Yamato started, though he wasn’t sure how to explain the situation.

Mimi seemed to have come up with something else already. A grin formed on her face. “Ooh! So you two had something going in the past, but are no longer together, but you might want to be?”

“No, not that either…”

“You’re not gay.” Taichi stated neutrally. “That’s okay, too. It’s not like it matters at all which way you swing. I’m also straight.”

Mimi nodded in affirmation and Taichi grinned, but Yamato had difficulty swallowing around a sudden lump in his throat. He didn’t know why. Maybe because he had never really thought about his sexuality before and he was nervous about labelling himself? Though that didn’t sound right…

“Yamato?”

Yamato started at Mimi’s gently inquiry. “Sorry.” He looked down at his half-empty plat, trying to find the words. “I’m just…” He paused again, shrugging a shoulder, and shoving a forkful of food into his mouth. He took his time chewing, whilst everyone waited in silence, eating their own meal. “I just don’t really like labelling myself—or anyone else for that matter.” He shrugged again. “I just like who I like and that’s it.”

Hikari smiled encouragingly whist her brother nodded.

Mimi grinned mischievously. “So you just like this guy. No labels attached, just attraction.”

Taichi gave a bark of laugh and Yamato’s face reddened.

“It’s not like that. I don’t actually like him. Not romantically.”

“Oh.” Mimi seemed disappointed, though she quickly put a smile on her face. “Anyone you do like, then?”

“Mimi!” Hikari scolded, though she was fighting to keep a smile off her face.

“What?” Mimi shifted her gaze to the younger girl. “It’s been ages since we’ve had fresh love affairs around this place. No woman in their right mind wants Taichi, and most others are taken. You and Koushiro are too young for romance.”

Hikari stuck out her tongue. “No where’s not.”

“Oh?” Mimi had a sly look on her face. “Are you interested in someone? You haven’t mentioned this before.”

“She’s not.” Taichi butted in, sending a quick glare at Hikari.

“Oh?” Hikari shot back. “And what would you do about it if I was interested in someone?”

Taichi straightened his back, pulling on an aura of authority. “There is absolutely nothing I could do about it, as a matter of fact.”

Everyone laughed before settling back to their meals. The silence lasted for a few minutes before Mimi’s eyes found Yamato again.

“You never answered my question.” She smirked at the blond.

Yamato nearly choked on his food, having thought that he’d gotten off the hook. “What question was that?”

“Who do you like?”

“No one.” Yamato’s reply was firm and he was quite sure he wasn’t lying.

-o-o-o-

“Yamato.”

Surprised, Yamato stopped and turned, waiting for Miyako to catch up to him in front of the school.

“What’s up?” Yamato asked, playing it cool, though he was slightly tense, annoyed that he was being—yet again—harassed by one of his friends after school. Daisuke had soccer practice, so he had been easy to get rid of, but it seemed Miyako had taken his position.

“Not much. I was just wondering whether you’re really okay, you know? I know you keep telling us that you are, but you seem kinda different and, like, off. And you know that you can always talk to me and Daisuke and not have to worry about what we think and stuff, yeah?” Miyako tone was soft, which was rare for the normally exuberant girl. Mind you, she was a caring friend, but it rarely showed in the way she spoke.

The defensiveness fell from Yamato’s demeanour and a small smile graced his lips. “I know, Miyako, I know. And thanks.” Yamato’s eyes fell to his shoes as he scuffed his toes against the ground. “I know I’ve been a bit different, but with everything that happened… And I’m still trying to get used to my new life.”

“Yeah…” Miyako said sympathetically.

Blue eyes met light brown and Yamato smiled. “I’m getting better.”

Miyako returned the smile with a broad one, eyes squeezing shut. “That’s good to hear!” Miyako’s manner softened again as she turned, throwing over her shoulder: “Well, if you’re getting better on your own, then I’ll be off.” She managed two semi-running steps before halting. “Isn’t that your brother?”

Yamato’s widened eyes followed Miyako’s pointing finger. A lanky blond stood by the school gates, shifting awkwardly.

“Shit.” Yamato mumbled.

“Huh?” Miyako’s hair flicked across her face as her head snapped to face Yamato. “Um, why? I thought you two got along well.”

“Oh.” Yamato’s eyes widened even more as he realised his mistake. “Uh, it’s just that I kind of forgot that we were supposed to be doing something today.” Yamato put a sheepish look on his face. “I just can’t believe I forgot something like that.”

“I can’t believe it either.” Miyako frowned. Then her face brightened in a smile. “At least that’s what I would have said months ago. These days, though…” Her eyes twinkled in jest.

“Hey.” Yamato gave her a shove, then blanched as he realised that Takeru had spotted the elder blond. “Well…” Yamato hedged, staring at his feet. “I guess we should get going, huh?”

Miyako nodded and bounced off with a wave. Thankfully, she had left in the opposite direction, towards the back gates. Yamato was tempted to follow her. Instead, he shoved his hands into his pockets and started marching, head down, towards the gates.

“Yamato—” Takeru started, hand reaching out to his brother’s shoulder, but never contacting as Yamato jerked away.

Yamato continued walking and Takeru watched him for a few steps before catching up.

“Yamato.”

Takeru didn’t seem to know what he was supposed to say, if the repetition of Yamato’s name was any indication. The younger probably hadn’t planned this meeting or had not expected to actually run into Yamato.

The two continued to walk in silence, in the opposite direction to Yamato’s new home.

“Yamato…”

Yamato turned them down a quiet alley, stopping halfway down and turning to Takeru. He crossed his arms over his chest, fixing the younger with a piercing look. “Whatever it is you want, forget it.”

“Yamato...”

Yamato waited, but it seemed his earlier suspicions had been confirmed: Takeru had not planned this encounter.

Letting his hands drop to his sides and releasing a long breath, Yamato half-turned. “If that was all, then please go home. I’ll see you to the bus stop—”

“No.” Takeru had apparently found his tongue and, thus, his extended vocabulary. “I’m not leaving until you tell me why you did.”

The brothers stared at each other for a few minutes in silence.

Yamato closed his eyes and turned to face Takeru, looking defeated. “I left because I don’t want to be somewhere I’m not welcome. And she doesn’t want me there.”

“That’s not true!”

“Yes it is.”

Takeru opened his mouth again, but Yamato gave him a meaningful look.

“Takeru, you know she hates me. You were there when she realised I wasn’t coming back. I bet she was thrilled.”

Takeru bit his lip.

“She was, wasn’t she? Did she throw a party when she realised she would never have to see me again? When she realised she was finally rid of the biggest mistake of her life?”

“Yamato… Stop.”

Yamato’s eyes narrowed. “She never wanted me, you know. Not when I was born and especially not after dad…” Yamato trailed off, still not ready to speak of his father’s fate.

“I’m sure she loved you when you were born. You were her firstborn…” Takeru didn’t sound too sure.

“Do you know why dad was such a workaholic?”

Takeru shook his head, slightly surprised at the turn of the conversation.

“It’s because he had to take time off work when I was born so that he could look after me.” Yamato’s tone was harsh as he recalled what he’d been told about the first years of his life. “She didn’t want anything to do with me—she kept working. Dad had gone to his boss to ask to work from home, but he was given paid time off instead. I was put into daycare when I turned two so dad could return to work and he felt like he owed his boss for the year he got off and that’s why he worked so hard for the rest of his life. She didn’t want anything to do with me.”

Takeru bit his lip, looking at his feet. He knew his mother had taken care of him, working from home and even taking some unpaid days off, just to care for Takeru. It had never crossed his mind that his elder brother never gotten the same treatment.

“Come on.” Yamato’s tone returned to neutral. “Let’s go before you worry her.”

Takeru hung his head, dragging his feet as he followed his brother. He didn’t know what to say or do; he hadn’t known what to say since seeing Yamato after so long. Now he just didn’t know what to do with the information he had received.

“Here.”

Takeru started at Yamato’s voice. They were at a bus stop. He looked at his brother, who refused to look back.

A minute later, Takeru boarded a bus without saying a word.

Yamato watched the bus leave, standing on the curb well after it was out of sight.

“Who was that?”

The voice startled Yamato so badly he actually jumped a few inches, then turned sharply, eyes narrow.

Yamato worked his face and tone into neutral: “Taichi.”

Taichi cocked his head, inspecting the blond. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you by just appearing... Who was that kid?”

Yamato’s eyes shifted quickly from the road the bus had been on, back to Taichi. He frowned. “No one.” He shoved his hands into his pockets again, much like he had not an hour ago when he had ignored Takeru.

He started walking off, still not moving towards his current home—their home.

Taichi caught up, casually putting his hands into his pockets. “Looked a bit like you. Brother? Cousin?”

“I said: no one.”

“Most people are someone.” Taichi didn’t seem deterred by Yamato’s rudeness and clear avoidance of the subject. “I bet it was your brother wanting you to go back home.”

Yamato made a sharp right turn, not speaking.

“I’m right, aren’t I?”

Still Yamato didn’t speak, marching ahead.

“Why not just admit that I’m right?”

“…shut up.”

Taichi followed as Yamato made another turn—this time left—into a more crowded street.

“Do you miss home?”

“Just shut up.”

“It’s okay if you do.”

“Shut. Up.”

Taichi quirked an eyebrow at Yamato, but then his face relaxed again as his eyes returned to the street and people ahead.

“I would miss Hikari if we were separated. That’s why I was adamant about us being adopted together or not at all. Ended up being ‘not at all’ what with Koushiro. Would have been nice, though, if even one of us had gotten a loving family. Maybe it was selfish of me to want to stick together, but what’s done is done. None of the three of us can go back.” Taichi paused. “You could.”

Yamato picked up his pace, shoulders moving closer to his ears.

“I know you hate your mother, but your brother seems to at least care about you. I mean, he did come out of his way to find you and you two don’t seem to go to the same school, so it must have taken a lot of effort to meet you. I’d understand if you want to go back with him.”

Yamato stopped moving. A few passersby bumped into him, mumbling something that sounded like apologies.

“What?” Taichi asked. He, too, stopped a few paces in front of Yamato. “Do you want to?” Taichi’s tone held some sadness, but then he worked his mouth into a smile. “I’ll miss you, but you probably miss your brother, so if you want to go back to take care of him, then you should.” Taichi dropped his gaze to the ground, his tone sombre: “You don’t owe us anything, if that’s what’s keeping you from going back…”

“I don’t—” Yamato started saying before he burst into a sprint.

Taichi’s head snapped up and he stood stunned for a few seconds, but then he rushed into the crowd in the same direction Yamato had run off. It shouldn’t be hard to spot a blond in the mass of dark-haired people, right?

Right…?

After half an hour of searching, Taichi had to admit that he had been wrong. He had no idea where Yamato had gone or how he had managed to disappear like that.

#fic #fic update #seven plus one #own fic

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deltaengineering · 7 years ago

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Spring Anime 2018: Lightning round

I didn’t get around to full writeups this season, but here’s the condensed version. It’s a weak season (the weakest in years) with very few surprises anyway.

3D Kanojo Real Girl

What: Otaku loser lucks into girlfriend.

+ Loser is actually a loser, and how

+ Heart seems to be in the right place

- Writing is clunky

- - some of the most amateurish production values this side of Clione no Akari and I don’t think this is made by one guy

Verdict: no

Akkun to Kanojo

What: Short. A guy is rude to his naively cute girlfriend and then stalks her.

- - Creepy, unfunny and dumb

Verdict: naw

Amanchu! Advance

What: Sequel. Ostentatious anime characters enjoy chilling on the beach.

+ Actually chill most of the time

+ looks and sounds good

+ somehow even more gay than before

- - @_@

- - 8D

Verdict: I watched the first season and enjoyed it more than not, so I might as well.

Alice or Alice

What: Short. Siscon 4koma comedy with a lot of fanservice.

- - Creepier, unfunnier and dumber

Verdict: hell naw

Butlers: Chitose Momotose Monogatari

What: Best I can say is that it’s an otome instaharem of shounen fightmen invading Marimite.

+ makes so little sense it’s sometimes funny

- makes so little sense it’s mostly just baffling

- little chance to become legit

Verdict: nope

Caligula

What: What indeed. Virtual idols overwrite reality, a Persona clone ensues.

+ Denpa stuff is actually disorientating and creepy

+ Makes somehow even less sense than Butlers and in a more funny way to boot.

- Still a bunch of nonsense that will probably not pay off in the long run

- - Protagonist spends the first episode being a Sagrada Reset-class blahmancer.

Verdict: 3 ep rule since it’s still a better Persona than the actual Persona and the dude has little time to do stoner philosophy once shit hits the fan

Comic Girls

What: Hidamari Sketch without the charm, a basic comedic Kiraralike where the joke is that the girls embody manga genres.

+ High production values, pleasant to look at

- Typical Kiraralike cast with little personality besides the blindingly obvious

- - Full of jokes that get old before the setup even starts

Verdict: Not worth it

Cutie Honey Universe

What: Ancient proto-mahou shoujo series by Go Nagai gets its fourth or so anime adaptation.

+ Some choice sakuga cuts

+ Generous helpings of Go Nagai sleaze at its finest

- Design is a weird mishmash of current and 70s

- Does not even attempt to explain anything about the show

Verdict: Mainly aimed at existing fans, of which I am not one. If it turns out to be a classic I’ll hear about it

Devils Line

What: Some Tokyo Ghoul-ish thing about the vampyr police.

+ Probably not half a dumbass fighting shounen

+ nothing too offensive

- nothing particularly interesting either

- looks are completely bland

Verdict: I have already forgotten everything about this

Dorei-ku The Animation

What: Magical devices gives people mind control powers. Everyone’s an asshole.

+ Some actually good character writing

- Trying to be Kakegurui and failing, just too tame for its outrageous conceit

Verdict: Has potential but doesn’t appear to take advantage of it

Full Metal Panic! Invisible Victory

What: Sequel to FMP and it’s still FMP.

+ More serious than basic FMP

- FMP is inherently too silly to attempt seriousness

Verdict: Fumoffu is the only acceptable FMP

Fumikiri Jikan

What: Short about couples(?) at a railroad crossing

+ Reminds me of Tsuredure Children

+ Seems a bit more clever than the usual comedy short

Verdict: At 3m/week, why not

Gegege no Kitarou

What: Truly prehistoric spoopy manga for children about kids who fight youkai.

+ Actually a little spooky

+ Nekomusume

+ Unapologetically for children, but with oldschool charm

+ Does a good job of modernizing the subject matter

Verdict: Pretty good, I’m in

Golden Kamuy

What: Taciturn Ainu girl and tough guy hang around in frozen 1900s Hokkaido to nab some gold.

+ at least sounds like it could have potential

- Does a good job of making its unique setting seem not particularly interesting

- not as bad looking as incensed manga fans allege, but certainly not a feast for the eyes

- okay, that CG bear tho

- - I’m not feeling much character chemistry, which is an absolute killer for this specific setup

Verdict: Probably not

Gurazeni

What: Mediocre baseball pro plans his retirement money

+ not actually about baseball much

- - actually about baseball finances, which is even less interesting

Verdict: Weird but not in a good way

Hinamatsuri

What: Dadfeels show about a yakuza middle manager that gets a girl with superpowers dropped on his head.

+ Nitta being a yakuza thug makes for good comedy

+ Seems way less wish-fulfilmenty than most shows of this type

- Yeah speaking of which, could lose itself in Maidragon-style sameyness

Verdict: I’m feeling it for now

Hisone to Masotan

What: Air Force clerk becomes dragon pilot/emergency food supply. Yeah, the Japanese Air Force secretly has a dragon squad masquerading as F-15s.

++ Psychedelically unhinged dragon vore bonanza

++ Looks really great

+ Secretly a mecha show, but without mecha baggage; Kawamori is involved and it shows.

+ Mari Okada writing means strong characters

- Mari Okada writing means high chance of eventually going into the weeds

Verdict: Either way this is going to be a ride

Isekai Izakaya - Koto Aitheria no Izakaya Nobu

What: Another anime about a Japanese restaurant that connects to a fantasy world.

- Less interested in worldbuilding than Shokudou, and yes I actually enjoyed that aspect

- 100% about Japanese barfood instead

- Weak to nonexistant characters

- - styled like Japanese daytime television, hope you enjoy text plastered all over the screen

Verdict: Isekai Shokudou S2 where

Juushinki Pandora

What: Postapocalyptic robot vs. space monsters fights for the Chinese market.

- Just a bunch of anime characters doing anime things

- - truly hideous

Verdict: I’d rather watch MuvLuv and I’m not watching MuvLuv either

Kakuriyo no Yadomeshi

What: Bland girl gets transported to youkai world where she gets macked on by the boss and opens a restaurant.

- Barebones otome harem setup, though shockingly not based on a Vita game

- another fucking cooking show

- - Nothing’s romantic like possessive creepy assholes

Verdict: Nope.

Last Period - Owarinaki Rasen no Monogatari

What: Mobile RPG adaptation that advertises the game to you while making jokes how terrible gacha and grind is. Hey, Konosuba was popular right?

+ Certainly ballsy

- not really funny besides that

- - I already know mobile RPGs suck, but thanks for the heads up

Verdict: Fuck off and take your smug with you

Legend of the Galactic Heroes - Die Neue These

What: Spess men playing spess chess in spess.

+ Credible and respectable

+ Makes LoGH ultrafans mad because it’s not ugly enough

- space war seems like a video game, both visually and tonally

- if it adapts the whole thing, it will take forever

Verdict: Promising, but there’s always the old one which is at least complete. No reason to watch this particular version right now.

Lupin III Part V

What: Lupin is in ur cloud, stealin ur bitcoins.

++ Classic Lupin feel

++ Ruthless modernization of the bells and whistles keeps it from feeling overly familiar like Part 4

- Comes across as desperate occasionally

- Action is extra unexciting for some reason

- Looks nowhere near as good as Part 4

Verdict: It’s entertaining, so why not

Mahou Shoujo Ore

What: Comedy about a bad wannabe idol that works as a buff male mahou shoujo for the yakuza.

+ Core idea is amusing

- - spends most of the time on anything but the core idea, such as hilariously pointing out how it is indeed a cartoon

Verdict: I’ve tried and not picked up much better mahou shoujo parodies

Mahou Shoujo Site

What: Girl is bullied all day at school and beaten up all night at home, becomes a magical school shooter

+ Certainly effective at setting a, um, “particular” mood

- - relentlessly mean and nasty

- - simply no fun at all, with little reason to believe that that’s going to pay off

Verdict: Not looking for a bad time right now.

Megalo Box

What: Classic underdog sports story about a boxing jobber looking for the big break, now with more cyborgs.

++ looks amazing

++ cinematic-level direction and storyboarding

+ doesn’t reinvent the wheel as far as story goes, but it’s classic for a reason

- Overreliance on dog metaphors is already getting out of hand

Verdict: Would be stupid not to watch this

Nil Admirari no Tenbin - Teito Genwaku Kitan

What: Actual PS Vita otome harem about a bland girl with the power to see evil books, which impresses a bunch of handsome combat librarians.

- takes itself far too seriously

- not a looker

- I can’t remember a single character

- - pacing is criminally turgid

Verdict: I know better otome harems.

Omae wa Mada Gunma wo Shiranai

What: 4koma short about how Gunma is weird and Gunma people are even weirder.

+ It’s like a bizarre perversion of a tourism anime

- 4koma jokes

Verdict: Mmmmmmmaybe?

Persona 5 the Animation

What: High school kid finds himself in a weird woke fever dream. It’s P5, you know what it be.

+ Kawakami

- P5 is too known and too long to make a good anime

- serious issues don’t work with the residual Persona silliness

- Not very well made

Verdict: I’d rather watch a LP (or Caligula)

Rokuhoudou Yotsuiro Biyori

What: Chill boys run a chill cafe

+ very chill indeed, totally works as iyashikei

+ characters are all likeable, even brings the moe in an ikemen show

+ Suwabe! With glasses!

- Iyashikei always has potential to drift into boring sludge

Verdict: I’ll take that chance

Saredo Tsumibito wa Ryuu to Odoru

What: JRPG dudes fight monsters and argue about payment

+ Opening narration is so stupid it made me laugh

+ No seriously, “we changed the Planck constant and now there’s fucking dragons everywhere”

+ a few decent buddy cop moments

- - Rest of the show is just as stupid, but the laughter went away

Verdict: Durr hurr

Souten no Ken Re-Genesis

What: CG men with no neck make frowny faces at each other

- story is vague and hard to follow while at the same time just being an excuse for poses and fights

- - looks like an absolute butt

Verdict: stay far away

Steins Gate 0

What: Sequel. Okabe is sad that Chris is dead.

+ Epic twists will be coming... eventually.

+ Punished Okabe is a better character than he ever was before

- - Rest of the cast is still a bunch of hateable wankers, and even Okabe will be going back to his catchphrase eventually

- - nothing happens in the first two episodes besides establishing that Chris is a Tamagotchi now

Verdict: Possibly a hatewatch but seems to be too dull for even that.

Sword Art Online Alternative - Gun Gale Online

What: Catgirl with pink P90 totally puts serious operators in the PWN ZONE.

+ Main character’s IRL identity seems funny

+ evades most of the memetic SAO failings

- adds a lot of failings of its own

- egregious gun- & tacticool wank

- - boring as shit

Verdict: yeah, guess

Tachibanakan To Lie Angle

What: Unimaginative fanservice 4koma short, but this time it’s yuri so that makes it okay.

- - no, it doesn’t

Verdict: *snore*

Tada-kun wa Koi wo Shinai

What: Regular Anime Dude™ chances upon a weeaboo princess from Europe and her weeaboo bodyguard.

+ Looks real nice, Doga Kobo delivers

+ anime original, so there’s a chance of it ever going anywhere

- Just about the least interesting setup ever

- - comic relief guy friend is tremendously annoying

Verdict: Nozaki-kun was better.

Uchuu Senkan Tiramisu

What: Short. Some sort of mecha parody.

+ Gundamian masterpiece names like “Vulgar Hummer” and “Pubic Hair”

- not actually funny beyond that

- - at all

Verdict: Seems totally pointless, but what do I know about anime comedy

Uma Musume - Pretty Derby

What: School sports show about horse girls that are also idols

+ Premium production by PA Works

+ Lively and colorful

- awful, overwrought gacha game character designs

- characters are as generic as they come

- the setup is just Kancolle again, but without the “escort” pun

- something this wacky shouldn’t be so predictable and boring

Verdict: 3 ep rule, but 3 eps have passed and it didn’t grab me. So no.

Wotaku ni Koi wa Muzukashii

What: Adult otaku meet at work, fail powerlevel stealth check, fall in love.

+ Well written characters once you look past their gimmick

+ Much more respectable than most shows with this exact idea

+ Doesn’t lean on references

- Will have to put in some hard work to make it last

Verdict: I don’t want to like it, but I do. At least so far.

#anime #impressions #spring2018 #all of them #yes all of them

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chronotopes · 7 years ago

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star trek parent child relationships ranked by objective quality

15. elim garak and enabran tain. as a character whose daddy issues serve as pivotal plot points in not one but two excellent two-parters, garak deserves no less than the bottom spot on this list. garak’s dad refused to acknowledge him as his son for years and forcibly locked him in a closet as a punishment, which is a charmingly unsubtle way to let us all know that tain is a homophobic 1950s politician. this adds an extra dimension to the already horribly sad dynamic between the two.

14. gul dukat and tora ziyal. ziyal actually beats garak for the dubious prize of ‘most plot-essential daddy issues’. maybe this is something they bond over? anyway this is some truly shit tier stuff. the power dynamics are truly horrific, she’s not in a place to register this until a week or so before the narrative unceremoniously kills her off, and his biggest achievement as a parent is choosing not to kill her off to preserve his career.

13. julian, richard, and amsha bashir. eugenics is bad, kids! while they are outwardly nicer than tain, and are not war criminals like dukat, the ever present knowledge that eugenics is, in fact, bad, means that they’re basically tied with tain from my pov. another way in which julian and garak are soulmates.

12. worf and alexander. while worf is a pretty great guy, unlike all the other parents on this list so far, i think it’s best for these two to stay apart. also sons and daughters was only interesting during the ziyal b-plot and young alexander seems incredibly annoying.

11. jim kirk and david marcus. to be frank jim and david isn’t much of anything! jim was absent for the majority of david’s life and when he did return david’s life went to shit pretty fast. this wasn’t through any fault of jim’s own but carol really could have benefited from sending david off on vacation for the entirety of the khan thing. from an audience perspective, the only useful thing david does is act as another kirk mirror who is (beta-canonically) fucking saavik, a spock mirror. which is fine but we went over that in tmp. ultimately they land so low not because they’re incredibly troubled but because the search for spock is a badly written movie.

10. kira nerys and kira meru. these two , like the previous two, were characterized by an overall lack of contact. in fact i’m not sure that traveling back in time to find out if your mom was fucking gul dukat counts as a relationship, but i liked that episode even though its temporal mechanics were shoddy. and even though nerys did attempt to kill her for a bit there, meru does love her and nerys does realize this ultimately. and regardless of the questions re: collaborators and how much meru enjoyed the thing with dukat and the degree to which it matters, she did a lot for nerys. and i’m fucked up over how much this show TORTURED my girl but that’s all known already

9. spock and sarek. these two probably deserve to be lower but i’m a sucker for their reconciliation arc! sarek LOVES HIS SON, man, it’s REAL. the mind meld scene in search for spock is a great scene in an overall pretty bad movie. in fact i’m obsessed with sarek’s antics as a father-in-law. still, though, sarek was a total dick.

8. sarek and michael burnham. i’m still only on ep 3 of discovery but they seem pretty cool. she facetimes him midway through a space battle which is perhaps not an ideal use of pacing but it does reflect the degree to which they trust each other and all.

7. beverly and wesley crusher. wesley is a shit but from the minimal tng i’ve seen bev seems to be doing her best. god bless her she deals with a lot. and it’s a compelling ongoing idea to return to in theory, so i’m keeping it up here.

6. spock and amanda. they love each other! fuck jjverse for killing her off, though. that was low.

5. kira nerys and kira taban. well even though i had to look up her dad’s name on memory alpha, and even though (much like meru) taban gets just one episode, they seem like they loved each other SO MUCH and it’s another episode that i’m fucked up over! nerys missed out on his death because she was out shooting cardassians but he forgives her, over in the celestial temple. occupations fuck with people’s priorities. they loved each other is what i’m saying.

4. molly, kirayoshi, miles, and keiko o’brien. (and kira nerys.) one big happy deep space family! they retain a really good home life, mainly, for a family where the mom is written in or out as it suits the writers’ convenience and the dad is formulaically required to be tortured in every season. good on them!

3. nog and rom. (and later leeta.) the extent to which i was ultimately invested in this One Big Happy Ferengi Family is something i could not have AT ALL predicted over the course of my ds9 adventure. they both advanced their careers out of quark’s shitty bar and became compelling characters, AND they loved each other and made it through trials such as ptsd and quark’s continued shittiness. (dw quark i reluctantly love you too.) good on them as well.

2. joseph and benjamin sisko. joe sisko is in like five episodes but he proves to be just as iconic as his son and grandson. his golden moments include calling ben out for getting too Patriot Act on him, being a badass priest in ben’s prophet vision about racism & rick berman sucking but science fiction being great, and running around a desert in his old age out of sheer stubornness. a kind man who gives good advice. a sisko father son relationship that can only be challenged by…

1. benjamin and jake sisko. dodging cliche sources of manufactured conflict as ben accepts jake’s decision not to join starfleet easily! making us all cry in the visitor! warming our hearts as ben supports jake’s career as a writer wholeheartedly! get this lads: ben is the only starfleet captain to balance a career and a family, prophets bullshit nonwithstanding, and he was in the middle of a WAR. your faves could never! prophets bless them forever.

#the takeaway here is that cardassian filial piety is pretty fucked up #also: i'm so sorry i didn't intend for this t #o be so fucking long lmao #trek talk #just katia things

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not-poignant · 7 years ago

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Hey Pia! I know you've spoken about this generally in the past, but I wasn't sure if you had ever posted anything specific. I am also struggling with trying to balance my desire to write, and throw myself into writing, with the physical and emotional limitations of disability. I really want to become more serious about my writing, but I don't want to hurt myself. What kind of 'hard limits' do you have to set for yourself to balance your productivity and how do you determine them? Thank you!

Hiya anon!

I’m definitely not necessarily the right person to go to on advice on this. Like, as we speak I’m currently wearing a wrist brace because my Guyon’s Canal and Cubital Tunnel Syndromes are playing up again from me...doing too much...outside of the limits of disability.

So in light of that, I’m shoving the rest of this under a read-more, because anyone who has been following me for a while probably knows that I am the last person to be a role model re: ‘how to work when disabled.’

To be honest, it’s really hard to strike up a balance. Like, really hard, especially if you have chronic illnesses of the kind that shift and change on a daily basis. What you can do one day, week, month, or year, you might not ever be able to do again, let alone rely on with any sort of regularity. Will I ever write 75,000 words in a month again? Maybe. Should I? Probably not. Can I expect that what I’m sticking to this year will be reliable down the track? No. That side of things sucks. One day I might not be able to write anymore and that’s just...how that goes.

I don’t write to a daily wordcount. This just seems folly for my chronic illnesses (of which the primary symptoms are whole body pain and intermittent inflammation, crushing fatigue and brain fog. Writing with brain fog is literally impossible). So I have a monthly wordcount. This means on the good-to-average days I can spin out words, and on the bad days, I have no pressure to attain a wordcount.

You won’t know how much you can do until you start trial/error, and reflecting at the end of say each two weeks, how you feel what you’re doing is balancing against how you feel, and your energy levels.

I’ve learned that it’s good to stop while things are going well. As in, don’t stop when you run out of words or have nothing left or are exhausted. I don’t always listen to this, but what I’ve learned is that if you stop before the well is dry, you’re a) less likely to feel like shit re: specifically writing the next day and b) you’ll generally know what you want to write when you sit down at the computer (notepad/ipad/laptop/whatever) again. This is good advice for anyone, but especially good for people who need to pay attention to spoon expenditure. Sometimes it can be good to use pacing - i.e. work out how much you can do without hurting your energy levels at all, reduce the number even more, and then try and stick to that. Googling ‘pacing / fibromyalgia’ is a good way of seeing how to get an idea of what your limits are.

Be prepared though, for this process to involve finding your limits, which of course means...sometimes getting sick because of hitting them. It might be that editing takes more spoons than you thought, or reading things for research (something a lot of writers do, and that I do) is draining, or posting things / polishing things for publication is exhausting more than you could’ve known. For me, marketing makes me hit the wall in about five seconds. There is no ‘safe’ level of marketing, if I have to market something outside of say, this specific Tumblr, I can expect to have about two weeks of not being productive at all. That’s just...the way it goes.

Which is why my ‘official’ writing Tumblr/Facebook/etc. are all dead. The cost is too high.

I hate pacing (seriously, I did a chronic conditions management course and it was my least favourite part. Like I said, I’m kind of not great to go to about this stuff since I frequently push myself too far and get really sick.) But pacing is very useful, and there are a lot of good guides about it now.

I tend to boom/bust with what I do. I do expect burnout? It doesn’t always come when I expect it, and sometimes it pounces when I least expect it and have been really careful with my output. So I think it might also help to have a plan in mind for if/when you do hit burnout. And also know the signs of you hitting a flare / burnout / whatever language fits here. Write them down somewhere, check in on that list sometimes. If your symptoms fit the list before you’re too exhausted to write, take a break until the symptoms lessen.

Also, plan ahead. Like, once you have an idea of your monthly wordcount - say it’s 10,000 words a month (that’s conservative, but not unrealistic with chronic disability), that’s 120,000 words a year. That’s one book. Or two very short books. Or one short book and a few oneshots. Or one book and one novella, etc. That doesn’t include time put aside for editing, or formatting, or anything else.

And that assumes that your wordcount remains consistent. That there’s no unforeseen disasters re: health, or long periods of burnout re: health.

Think about what you really want to be spending your time doing, because you’ll need to stay accountable for stray words etc. if you have goals in mind re: wanting to be a writer.

Also, plan breaks. Like, idk if you already are someone who finds it easy to take breaks, but let’s say you hit your wordcount for the week/month/whenever, take a break afterwards. Don’t use all your energy towards the next project immediately, use some of your energy to take a break and recharge a bit.

Um, be patient with yourself (I’m literally giving you advice I don’t follow, lol), and also, it’s important to remember your overall end goals. Are they to make an income? What kind of income? (Realistically, most full-time writers who are releasing 3-4 books per year only ever make around $8000 a year (it’s gone up!), so it’s not a great career for like...income). Is it to have fun? Is it to prove something to yourself? Are you only wanting to write fanfiction, original fiction, or both? Like, all those things I don’t know from your Ask, but are good things to sit down and brainstorm answers for. Because writing for income may produce a very different plan vs. only writing for fun vs. only writing fanfiction.

And it also really depends on your symptoms too. Everyone’s chronic illnesses / and/or disabilities present in different ways, even if two people have the same illness. I’m writing this advice based partly on my restrictions, but my advice would be pretty useless for someone who might have a lot of energy, but is blind, and really just needs advice on what software/hardware they need to help them write. (Actually my advice might be pretty useless anyway, I am not someone who has this figured out - I am like, learning as I go, and usually the hard way. I would be great for ‘how not to fail at this - a lesson learned by example. Over and over again.’)

Personally, I would just...give yourself some time to feel out your writing limits and like, set an alarm or something every few weeks to assess how you’re feeling as a result of writing / editing X amount. If I were less of a workaholic, I think I would’ve done things a lot more slowly. But my personality is the kind that just likes to dive deep into things and deal with the crushing burnout / increased illness afterwards, and hope it doesn’t permanently alter my energy levels.

And sometimes I’m not lucky enough for that to happen. I’m as sick as I am now, in part, because of two decades of going too hard, and not pulling back fast enough (not just in writing, across all things). I think regular people are better at bouncing back, but I wouldn’t know, I’ve always been sick.

I should follow more of my own advice. ;)

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love-laika · 7 years ago

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ive been rereading homestuck over the past week or so and i just finished up the first 4 acts. i figured i might as well put hat time to real use and write up some thoughts

So, I think the primary thing I’ve realized about Homestuck after reading it almost a year after it’ officially “finished” (the fandom died long before but side stories are still going), is that... it's not the same.

I think a lot of the appeal in reading Homestuck back in the day was being part of the fandom zeitgeist. people talk about a lot of fandoms like “you had to be there” but Homestuck is in so many ways, defined by its fans (partiularly in later arcs) that something is lost when its kind of died out.

Second, Homestuck is totally impenetrable. And as a fan, I’m inclined to say like “no, you just have to think about it and rewatch some of the flashes”. That breaks down a bit, though, when you realize that the comic, in totality will take most people multiple weeks to finish. It’s just too high a bar. Of course, the other end of that argument is “don’t sweat the details” which... kind of has some merit actually. A lot of the ridiculous stable time loops and other shenanigans don’t really matter all that much.

I think a symptom of rereading is that I tend to pay a lot closer attention to all of those minute details. It becomes distracting, particularly when you know where all this stuff ends up and the absurd “punchline” to these complex loops doesn’t kick when you already know. The big moments like [S] Descend still land great (largely in thanks to the great music).

For as much shit acts 5 and 6 get for being absurdly long (they represent ~2/3 of the whole comic), Homestuck still feels weirdly front-loaded. The first 3 acts are just

they’re too long.

They just... meander a lot. And I get that they have to establish character, but the least it could do is tell the story in a slightly more straightforward manner. It doesn’t just change points of view: it jumps forward and backward between characters and different points of the day and even to events in much later acts.

Act 4 finally picks up the pace and act 5 starts to get into my favorite parts of the whole comic. It’s a jokey joke to say “skip straight to the trolls”, but like that’s when it gets legitimately good. Obviously, any person who did this would be hopelessly confused and nothing would make any sense. but I understand the sentiment. I don't think it’s a coincidence that Hiveswap is more about trolls than sburb.

And just sort of a brief note, man it sucks that John and Dave have such an affinity for the r-slur. I get it was written in 2009 and Hussie is definitely not the least problematic dude, but it blows. Dave also dropped f-slur. I don't care if its technically in-character (eh) just nah.

HOWEVER, there are still lots of things to like about it! The cynical but whimsical tone of everything is really charming. I’m a sucker for wordplay and this has it in spades. There are so many ridiculous puns. The main four don’t have the texture they get in later acts, but they come off as likable and feel similar to real teenagers.

Anyways, I’m still only a third of the way through (jesus christ) but I’m excited to get to the trolls and the scratch (and vriska)!!!!!!!!

#homestuck #ll redoes hs

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clairelutra · 8 years ago

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check yes juliet (4/?)

the people have spoken

now

don’ t ask me for an update until, like, another year has passed

please

Part one, part two, part four (part 1, part 2, part 3) (tag)

How much sleep he got turned out to be negligible in the long run: he really couldn't be expected to focus anyway, because Marinette wore the Chat Noir hoodie to school the next day too.

And the next.

In fact, she wore it every day throughout the next week.

Adrien got a crash course in 'how to pretend you were paying attention when your crush is wearing a sweater with your signature all over it.’

He failed it miserably.

He was in danger of failing his next history test, too, but that was (allegedly) what the study sessions were for.

(Study sessions were getting steadily less productive as the weeks went on while he, the resident physics expert, got more and more distracted by Marinette and her... Marinette-ness, and Alya, the resident historian, could talk of nothing but the upcoming ball.

Nino and Marinette weren't particularly studious in the first place, and more often than not spent their time together shooting jokes and light jibes at one another.

It made for a wonderful atmosphere, and the sessions were the highlight of Adrien's week, but helping him with his grades they were not.)

Class was better, though only slightly - instead of thinking of followups to Nino's jokes and getting sidetracked by the light in Marinette's eyes, he spent the duration of it wishing he could trade seats with her so he could stare at the back of that hood all day.

He ended up eavesdropping a lot.

He might not have learned a whole lot about calculus, but he did learn about the bakery's customers, what designers Marinette was interested in at the moment, what plans she and Alya had for hanging out over the weekend, a myriad of little things he carefully filed away in his ever-growing mental 'Ladybug' folder.

That folder had rested stagnant for far too long. For all that he could recall any number of her bright grins and off-handed jokes, actual information about her life had been scarce up until very recently. For how often they worked together, his information on her had been painstakingly pieced together from from her reactions to things, her lines, and her jokes.

Until now.

Now his folder wasn't limited to things like 'likes video games' and 'dislikes gifts of live rats' (...certain impulses and cat instincts had been far harder to control before he'd been used to them); now he knew things like what she liked in her tea (one sugar, and one sugar only) and that you should never leave her alone with a cell phone. Ever. (He wondered if that was an instinct she struggled with, at times.)

It had things like how much sun it took to make her freckle (a few hours and her forearms would start to show a smattering of golden spots), where she liked to go to lunch when she had the funds (she was fond of Japanese food, surprisingly; she told him it was because it tended to not be overly sweet), and her reaction to horror movies (she could take the gore but had crawled into his lap and hid in response to the jump-scares and the tension).

(She'd done that last one in the hoodie, too. Adrien wasn't all that fond of horror movies himself but hell if he could be bothered with Marinette's chilly nose nudging the hollow of his throat and two adorable cat ears concealing the killer.)

He knew now that if you startled her out of costume, she would, quite literally, jump a foot into the air (and probably a few to the side, too), arms pinwheeling frantically as she over-balanced, smashed into the nearest immovable object, danced in place, performed acrobatic feats that were out of her reach otherwise, and/or played hot potato with whatever she was holding.

Ladybug was the picture of grace, competence, and self-assured potency.

Marinette had been found stuck in Hotel Bourgeois's dumb waiter, on occasion.

Marinette — no, Ladybug — stumbled and flailed and tripped her way through life, and Adrien couldn't have been more charmed. To think his Lady was this clumsy out of the suit was about as adorable as it was hilarious, and Adrien was starting to think he was in major trouble.

Because as much as he'd adored Ladybug before, there'd always been a certain amount of aloofness, of confident independence — to have that distance stripped away, to have it revealed that she wasn't really some other-worldly being, made her so close, so touchable it took his breath away.

He could touch her now. Text her. Ask her if she wanted to see a movie over the weekend and have her agree.

It was humbling and wonderful and terrifying, all the things he could envision doing with Ladybug now.

Pacing outside his father's study waiting for Marinette and said father to finish whatever they were talking about wasn't one of those things he'd envisioned, but it was still another little proof that she was a part of his life now, not a transient, ephemeral fever dream.

Soundly re-proving that she wasn't some figment of his imagination, the Lady burst out of his father's study, wild-eyed behind a forced, polite smile, letting the door shut itself with a solid-sounding thunk behind her.

"A week," she gasped, staggering up to Adrien and clutching his forearms, grip harsh with a terrifying kind of frenzied energy.

Just what had happened in there?

"A what?" said Adrien intelligently, steadying her as best he could and trying not to get sucked into her gaze, because now was so not the time.

He knew his father could be a bit much, at times, but not outright traumatizing.

Usually.

As far as he knew.

"A week," Marinette repeated, sounding like she was trying to believe it herself. "A week, a week, a week... I have a week to design a lineup."

"...A what?"

"A lineup," she said, letting him go and straightening out her clothing with shaking hands. "For the Christmas showing. One week."

Her hands froze.

"One week," she breathed, corner of her mouth hooked up awkwardly in the most joyous form of panic Adrien had ever seen. "I only have a week."

And with that, she broke every Agreste household rule and charged down the hall at top speed, formal jacket flapping in the breeze and flats squeaking on the tile.

Adrien watched her go, then slowly turned on his heel and opened his mouth to ask the door what the ever-loving fuck? before thinking better of it and going to find Natalie.

Maybe she'd have a clue what that was all about.

She did.

According to Natalie, his father had experienced a work emergency and had decided to dump the least-important lineup of the Christmas showing, a task which would have been a lot for a single, more experienced designer with more time, on one single busy teenage girl, instead of cancelling that particular section like any normal, sensible fashion icon.

Which... well.

His father had a propensity for disappearing for long hours and mumbling to himself while standing in dark rooms alone, so perhaps 'sensible' was not the best descriptor here.

(Adrien had learned to tolerate his father's growing oddities in the years since his mother had vanished, but even for his slacking grip on his sanity, this seemed a bit out there.)

In short, Adrien could entirely understand why he hadn't seen or heard from Marinette in two days.

Understanding, however, did not equate to not worrying.

Especially since Alya hadn't heard from her either.

(Alya, upon hearing the news, had winced and laughed and told him not to worry — Marinette had probably just buried herself under her rejected designs.

Alya didn't seem to understand that this was precisely what Adrien was worried about.)

Walking into the bakery at around lunchtime, her mother confirmed his suspicions when she greeted him with a wry smile and a, "See if you can't get her out of the house, Adrien. Goodness knows she needs it," as she assisted a customer with their order.

"My father-" Adrien started, pausing in the doorway, unsure if that sentence was going to end in an apology or a defense.

"I know," Sabine said with a peaceable, understanding smile, not looking at him as she deftly arranged a customer's croissants in a take-home box.

Adrien had the mad urge to ask her what he had been going to say, because she seemed to know far better than he did.

He didn't, but instead worked his way over to the working side of the counter and asked, "Is she in her room?"

"Hasn't come out since she got home on Monday," Sabine said, snapping the box shut and wrapping it in black ribbon in neat, economical movements. She slid the package to the end of the counter with a flick of the wrist and twisted sideways to pick up a pair of tongs. "Speaking of, would you take these up to her? I don't think she's eaten today."

Adrien blinked as the treats piled themselves up like magic, and then Sabine handed him the whole platter and shooed him into their living area with the same unfalteringly mild smile.

Adrien shooed.

At Marinette's door, he held the platter in one hand and rapped softly in the wood with the other.

No answer.

He waited a few seconds before rapping again and calling under his breath, "Marinette?"

Still no answer.

Had she left?

He pushed open the door, half-expecting a shriek or a shoe thrown at his head, and got nothing.

Warily, he poked his head through the opening, and the reason became apparent.

Marinette was asleep.

Adrien's mouth twitched into a smile as he pushed the door open and climbed into the room. He picked his way through the dense litter of crumpled drawings (Alya had been on the money, it seemed) over to where Marinette was dozing, cheek resting on yet another design.

She looked peaceful, despite the dark smudges below her eyes. Her mouth hung open, tiny line of dried saliva trailing from the corner of her lips to the desk. Her hair was tangled into stringy locks, wild bedhead doubtlessly exacerbated by her frantic scalp-scrubbing as she tried to brainstorm far too many ideas in far too little time. Her hand rested palm up by her cheek, long, tapered fingers curled in a way that struck him, abruptly, as vulnerable, open.

Adrien's chest contracted viciously, throat gone very, very tight.

He had to look away then, had to skitter away from the sheer force of that emotion, unsettled on a level just a little too deep, a little too personal.

His eyes fell on the neat pyramid of his gift, multicolored spools of professional-grade thread lifted sneakily off (that is, asked politely of) the designers in his father's main workshop. They occupied the only clear space on the desk, the crumpled wads of designs forming an odd semicircle around the thread structure.

Adrien widened the semicircle to make room for the platter Sabine had sent him up with, carefully shuffling rejected designs to the side with a good deal more thought than their creator seemed to have graced them with.

The clink of the ceramic must have disturbed Marinette, because she stirred not a few seconds later.

"Mmn," mumbled the sleeping Marinette, and Adrien looked over just in time to see her blink open sleep-fogged blue eyes.

Adrien's throat snapped shut, heart swelling too big and warm and tight for his chest, slamming against his ribcage like a sledgehammer.

He couldn't define precisely why watching her wake was so huge, except that it just was. She was open and soft and defenseless like this, with mussed hair and dazed eyes and—

It was a state of vulnerability she experienced every day, one that he had never witnessed before, one that he thought... maybe...

"Adri-ien?" she whispered foggily, and the little crack in her missing voice threatened to be his undoing.

"G'morning, Princess," he whispered back, face aching in a way that told him he was smiling helplessly, hopelessly.

She blinked up at him for a few moments, confused wrinkle on her brow and the remnants of her in-progress design marking her cheek.

His fingertips tingled with the urge to rub the design away, but found he didn't quite dare, and stilled his hand before he could.

Marinette's eyes went wide as soon as they focused on him.

"A-A-A-Adrien?!"

She promptly shot up off her seat and tumbled backwards, arms flailing wildly, and hit the ground with a painful-sounding thump.

He moved without thinking, making an awkward attempt to both catch her and help her and ending up simply staring at the distance between his outstretched hand and the girl on the floor.

Marinette also stared at the outstretched hand, turning an absolutely adorable shade of pink in the process. Her hands flew up to her hair, running her fingers through it and patting it down in what he abruptly realized was an attempt to calm the bedhead.

"A-Adrien," she squeaked. "Wh-wh-what are you doing here?"

Cute.

"I came to see how you were doing," he admitted.

He technically had an excuse about making sure she didn't miss the press conference for Ladybug and Chat Noir that took place this afternoon, but it had long gone flying out the window, entirely forgotten.

"O-oh," she said, voice coming down from it's double-octave jump. She accepted his hand. "I'm okay."

He gave her a dubious look, then pointedly glanced at the whirlwind of crumpled, rejected designs littering her floor.

She puffed her cheeks and glared as she slid back into her seat. "Really."

He didn't dignify that with an answer. Instead he said, "I'm... really sorry for my father."

Because he could try to defend his father's... eccentricities to her mother, but Marinette was the one getting the brunt of the responsibility here, and she deserved an apology for the sheer amount of stress that knowing his father could induce.

"It's... a great honor," she said, a little wry.

"It's a challenge," he corrected her dryly, looking away at the half-expected pang of jealousy. "One of those one of those old kings would give. 'Complete this impossible task and I'll let you marry my daughter.'"

That got a giggle out of her, even as his heart stuttered at the unintentional implication that she'd been asking for his hand in marriage.

If she had asked that, he had no doubt his father would immediately lock him up in some tall tower or faraway dungeon, never to see the light of day again. His father, though odd, was overprotective at the best of times, and at the worst... well.

(There was a whisper of resentment in his heart — if you just gave me a chance, maybe I could give you something to be proud of — that grew with every new restriction, bitter like bile on the back of his tongue and dark in the pit of his heart.)

(But no, delicate Adrien, helpless Adrien needed to be protected far more than he needed to be relied on.)

"It's kind of funny you're more of a knight than a princess, then, isn't it?"

Adrien jolted out of his reverie to the sound of Marinette's gentle murmur. "What?"

"A brave hero in kitty ears," she mumbled sleepily, affectionately. She smiled faintly, almost knowingly up at him from where she'd pillowed her head on her desk again. "My—" She swallowed a yawn. "—My knight in shining armor."

He stared at her, reeling and flushing and flustered and absurdly, absurdly pleased.

She let the moment linger, same soft, devastating smile playing around her lips while he stood and stared, before looking up at her clock with a frown. "What's today?"

"The 13th, why?" he answered, shaking off his daze with difficulty.

Marinette blanched. "The press conference!"

"Oh, right," he said, original reasons for his visit coming back to him as Marinette stumbled out of her seat in a hurry. "The press conference."

He watched in amusement (and affection) as Marinette flailed wildly in the direction of her dresser, stumbling so hard she nearly cartwheeled before she caught herself, and started digging through her wardrobe like a madwoman.

She found what she was looking for, to judge by the grateful, too-wide smile she gave the garments she resurfaced with, and made a mad dash for her hatch door.

"Ah," he called out. "You've got something..."

He tapped his cheek with two fingers when she turned to look at him, because he was pretty sure she would either not notice or fail to remember to clean it off if he didn't say anything.

She raised her hand to the spot he'd indicated and scrubbed her cheek intensely for a moment, leaving it bright red and smudged even worse. She then looked at her fingers and scowled, before giving him a brief thank-you wave and disappearing down the hatch.

He watched the door swing shut, then heard a cacophonous crash. He winced, calling out, "Are you-"

"I'm okay!" Marinette muffled voice cut him off. It was followed by a smaller series of crashes and a few squeaks and, finally, by the snap of what he could only assume was her bathroom door.

He snorted, feeling unaccountably full for how untouched the plate of pastries next to him was.

That's my Lady Luck, all right.

Pastries were eaten, cheeks were cleaned, heroes were transformed, and they were all set for the conference... except for one small problem.

"I think we're in the wrong place."

Chat took stock of the empty schoolyard playground, which didn't look like much of a place for a press conference to him. "Astute as always, my lady."

"Did we get the street name wrong?" Ladybug wondered, frowning at the locator displayed on her yo-yo's screen.

Chat leaned over her shoulder to see where the locator placed them, and inhaled a lungful of her scent. Intoxicating. He swallowed discreetly and tried to ignore the rampant butterflies in his stomach as he looked at the map.

Frowning, he studied the way the streets connected. There was a likely looking place for a convention center that might have been where they had been directed by the head of the press conference near the edge of the screen. He was pretty sure he'd seen that area on his car's GPS when going to one of his father's press releases.

"Hey," he murmured, pointing it out.

Ladybug jumped, snapping to face him.

"Do you think we were supposed to be... here...?" he trailed off, noticing just how close her flinch had put their faces. Her nose brushed his cheek at the slightest movement of his head.

Oh.

She was so close.

Blue, blue, blue... She was so close Chat could only drown in blue. She was so close he could feel her body heat like a hearth fire, could hear the way her breath caught, could smell the sleep and soap that lingered on her skin.

She was so close he could kiss her with just a little tilt of his chin, could press his lips against her cheek, against her nose, against her lips, and with the way she was looking at him, he thought she just might let him.

It was all just too much, after this morning.

He unconsciously licked his lips, heart thumping louder with every pulse, drawing into her like he was magnetized, because he couldn't not kiss her, not after this morning, not with that look she was giving him.

Brrrrring! Brrrrring!

He squawked, jumping back, arms pinwheeling frantically for balance as he skittered over the lawn in his surprise.

She screeched and also jumped back, though she fell into a martial arts pose he was pretty sure he'd seen in a movie instead of floundering gracelessly like he had.

They stared at each other, gaping, a mutual what the hell was that!? passing soundlessly between them for a fair few seconds before the chatter of excited children filtered out from the school building.

He and Ladybug turned to the source of the noise as one.

A crush of happy children poured out of the double doors, babble staggering to a halt as the class realized, one by one, that, yes, those were the heroes of Paris standing on the edge of their playground.

Then, as one entity, they surged forward in a rush, incomprehensible babble coming back with a vengeance and becoming more comprehensible with every foot they approached.

"Ladybug!" and "Chat Noir!" were the easiest and most common out of the auditory slush, followed by "What are you doing here?" and "Is there an akuma?"

"Ah," said Chat, shooting his partner a grin, unable to resist. "It seems we've been... spotted."

"Was that a pun."

Chat only had time to choke back a self-satisfied snicker before the fastest of the children, a tall, sprightly young girl, hit him at waist height, babbling, "You saved my sister! Thank you! Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

Chat crouched, self-satisfaction shifting out for something softer, kinder. "All in a day's work, young lady."

The girl giggled, and Chat tapped her button nose, smiling involuntarily for what felt like the umpteenth time today.

It was a good day.

The other children had other questions, "Can you play with us?" and "What's your favorite color?" and, oddly, "Do you like garbanzo beans?" all hitting the two heroes at machine-gun pace, but all Ladybug had to do was hold her hands up in a gesture for silence and the whole crowd went silent.

"Don't worry," she said into the silence, commanding. She held up a finger with every question she answered, and Chat mused that they may just as well be at that press conference. "There is no akuma. We're here because we took a wrong turn. My favorite color is pink, and I do like garbanzo beans, but I'm not too sure about Chat." She tilted a little grin at him before her face fell back into military seriousness. "And I'm sorry, but we can't stay to play. We have somewhere important to be."

The chatter turned into a wave of disappointed protests and pleading eyes, and Chat could see Ladybug's resolve waver just a fraction.

"It's just a press conference," he found himself pointing out. He wasn't sure if it was the dark smudges under her eyes or the exhausted kind of longing he caught in that waver that made him say it, but he warmed to the idea quickly.

She needed a break.

"It's just publicity. No one's gonna get hurt if we don't show up."

"We have responsibilities, Chat."

The flat, defeated tone she said it in just sealed the deal for him.

"Not big ones," he added, tilting his head just a little with his most winsome smile. "What's the worst that could happen?"

The girl whose sister they'd saved joined him in his pleading, followed quickly by several other children.

"Please, Ladybug?"

Ladybug's eyes flicked from one pleading face to the next, resolve crumbling like dust. She cast Chat a dark look for his betrayal.

He touched her elbow, holding it loosely as he said to her in an undertone, "Forget about the press conference and about my dad. One day off won't hurt."

Exhausted eyes fell to his hand, and something strange flashed through Ladybug's eyes. She pulled her arm away and mumbled, "Chat. We have responsibilities."

"Ladybug." He hadn't meant to sound so urgent, but that exhaustion was wrapping anxious little thorns around his heart. "You need a break. Please."

She was going to argue, he could see it, and he didn't think he had any counter arguments this time. She opened her mouth, took a breath, and—

Stopped.

She looked at him, really looked at him, and stopped. Something flashed in her eyes, a mix of shock and aching uncertainty and something unidentifiable, infinitesimal, huge, and she finished off with, "Okay."

Chat let go, feeling like his world was rocking to bits and unable to pinpoint precisely why.

Chat loved kids.

They were bright, innocent, clean in a way that had nothing to do with germs or runny noses.

They had no rigid preconceptions, no complex social rules, no hate burned into their mindsets; just a motherlode of energy and imagination that was a joy to witness.

You could make a child's day with a gift and a few well-chosen words, watch them light up even after the most traumatizing of akuma attacks with only attention and a small gesture. They were credulous, starry-eyed, enthusiastic - every day was an adventure or a thrill, something worth feeling something about. They were simultaneously selfish and giving, oblivious and empathetic in the way only the truly innocent could be.

There was a reason Ladybug left him to the clean up when children were involved, even if it meant facing down the media alone.

In the space of that afternoon, Chat was a king, a lord, a hero, a monster, a robot, and a horse. He was killed in action five times and only resurrected twice. He instated 'victory knights,' who were honor-bound to protect his kingdom together (a feat for the shy girl and the schoolyard bully, but he kept a close eye on them and made sure they worked it out) and was dared into seeing how many children he could carry at once (five, as it turned out — a number seriously hampered by how delicate and wriggly his burdens were).

The third time he was 'killed,' Ladybug was summoned from the tea party the girls had trapped her into.

"Only true love's kiss will break the spell!" insisted his first victory knight, the shy wall-flower who'd run for backup at his 'death.'

Ladybug, previously giggling at being dragged from the climbing structure into the middle of an all-out war, fell abruptly silent.

Chat felt his breath hitch.

One month ago, he would have jumped at the chance to tease, to flirt — hell, even yesterday he might've let the setup be, let Ladybug talk her way out of it - but now, so soon after that almost kiss, so soon after watching her wake, in the midst of whatever the hell their relationship was right now, the possibility that she might not talk her way out of it inexplicably terrified him.

He staggeringly raised a fist a few inches off the ground and groaned out, "Fist... bump..."

"Fist bump?" echoed Ladybug, odd note coloring her voice thick.

He made a show of cracking open an eye. "True... love's... fist bump issss... even stronger..."

His first victory knight shushed him without remorse. "You can't talk if you're dead, your majesty."

He blinked both eyes open and grinned sheepishly at his loyal servant. "Sorry, Sir Bella."

"Shh!"

He cleared his throat and shut his eyes again, trying not to grin.

Ladybug didn't say the word, but he could practically hear the affectionate 'dork' in her long-suffering (yet slightly relieved — and just what was he supposed to think about that?) sigh as she padded her way over through the grass.

There was a moment of hesitation in which he worried (hoped?) she might ignore the out and actually stoop to kiss him, but then he felt the familiar press of her knuckles against his, gentler than he was used to feeling them but unmistakable all the same. His chest caved in a confused jumble of relief and disappointment.

He covered the emotion by slowly raising his arms and sitting up zombie-style. He slowly opened his eyes and prepared his 'uuuugh... braaaaainssss...' speech, only to lock gazes with a chubby young sprout who, Chat remembered suddenly, had adamantly refused any mention of zombies. Chat switched out his speech on the fly.

"I am the Great Crusher Robot 5000," he said in his most robotic voice to a chorus of delighted squeals. "I have arisen from mere mortal flesh by the power of True Love's Fist Bump to protect the earth from the deadly Smorgs from outerspaaaaace."

And then the game was off again.

Ladybug was dragged off again by the limpet clinging to her leg and it was discovered that Chat could toss any seven year old clear into the air, and robots and 'true love' were summarily forgotten.

(The tossing was a nerve-wracking experience for heroes whose catching appendages ended in claws, but Chat was very careful and somehow it all worked out bloodlessly.)

The leader of the opposition's sudden remembrance of The Great Crusher Robot 5000's evil qualities worked out slightly less so, but scraped knees weren't something Chat had the power to prevent one-hundred percent of the time, so he let it go.

It was at about that point that he felt eyes on him, and he turned to find Ladybug watching him from atop the jungle gym, chin in palm, expression distant.

He caught her eye, and tilted his head in silent question.

She smiled, soft and wistful, and his breath caught.

“You…” She trailed off, glancing away and back, the flutter of eyelashes and clear blueblueblue eyes catching him on the upswing. “You’d make a good father.”

His heart stopped.

He—

He’d misheard that, hadn’t he?

Hadn’t he?

(That little bit of his brain that was mostly Chat and that did not. Shut. Up. Ever. said, Great! I’m ready. Let’s get started. Right now. Immediately.

The rest of him just reeled wildly for the umpteenth time today.)

She turned away, back to her tea party, still smiling that smile that left him unsteady on his feet.

The children swarmed around his legs, pressing into the backs of his knees in an attempt to bring The Great Crusher Robot 5000 down, but he could barely feel them.

“But Ladybug, Chat Noir isn't old enough to be a daddy. He’s a boy,” protested the little girl who’d been hanging onto her, in the well-informed tone of a child who had heard that exact phrase many, many times before.

Her sibling must have been a fan, or something, Chat thought distantly.

(—chips of ice, blue like antifreeze—

The corners of his heart whispered was it even possible for him to be a good father?)

“Boys grow up, you know,” she said, meltingly soft in a way that kick-started his heart back into gear and straight into overdrive. “He won’t be too young to be a daddy forever.”

Chat Noir, protector of Paris against the forces of superpowered evil for three years running, fell in battle to a pile of seven year olds very quickly after that.

A few weeks later, Chat wondered, not for the first time, why on earth the Protectors of Paris Ball was held outdoors.

It was held in late fall every year. Surely someone, someone would have though to move the party indoors out of the freezing cold.

It was a bit strange that Chat seemed to be the only one who noticed this, being that he was the only one here wearing a cold-resistant suit, but notice he did, if only by the goosebumps on his lady's arms.

He blamed (thanked) the cold for the way she leaned into him, sweet-smelling and looking like... like that.

Like heaven and hell in high heels, except that she wore flats, not heels. Mobility was a higher priority than glamour, she'd told him multiple times over the years, even when surrounded by the rich and famous.

Like a princess, like a queen, like something ethereal alighted on the surface of his world, as present and enticing and real as she was untouchably out of his league.

And the more she tipped that affectionate little smile up at him, the harder it was to keep his hands off.

She made it a lot harder by choosing that moment to break through his revere, stepping dangerously close.

"Hey," she murmured.

Chat's hand came to rest on the small of her back before he could think about it.

He shot a small glare at the offending appendage. Just where did it get off trying to bring her even closer?

Before he could remove the hand, Ladybug slipped her palm up to rest on his hip, burning warm through the suit. "Let's dance."

Chat blinked. That was odd; normally she waited until most of the guests had greeted them before trusting him with her dignity on the dance floor. He followed the line of sight she was pointedly turned away from, and understood — the young man walking their way was a rather... ardent admirer of Ladybug's. One who had a bit of trouble with the word 'no,' as he'd proved multiple times over the years.

Chat grit his teeth, sudden rush of ill will towards the 'gentleman' souring in his mouth, fingers twitching in his annoyance.

The last bit brought his attention to the exact placement of his fingers — tangled with the laces at the bottom of Ladybug's bodice.

Oh.

The darker voices in his head happily pointed out how easy it would be to sharped his claws and slice through those bindings. He didn't get farther than imagining the dress sliding down her shoulders before he forcibly defenestrated the thought and guiltily untangled his fingers. He slid his hand over to a much more appropriately platonic space high on her hip, incidentally drawing her that much closer.

Oops.

Ladybug didn't help him keep his distance at all, instead tucking the long, hot line of her body into his, close enough that her rosy cheek brushed his suit, close enough to rest her chin against his shoulder and grin winsomely.

Chat's heart was trying to punch a hole in his ribcage even before she opened her mouth.

"Isn't that what dates do at dances? Dance?"

Dates.

Was this a date?

They arrived together — they always did. It had never been a date before, but things had changed between them, leaving Chat thoroughly lost on what they were now.

But here they were, together, and she called them dates.

"I... wasn't aware we were dates."

"Ah, sorry," she said, pulling back while still smiling. "I forgot that I sent that memo by snail-mail."

She stepped even closer, breath ghosting against the space below his ear and sending a hot shudder down his spine, pooling, quivering in his belly. "Consider this your update?"

"Considerate it considered," he whispered back, wondering if she could feel his palm shaking, wondering if she could feel his heart shaking from this close.

She poked his side, grinning bright and impudent and oh so warm. "Then consider you and me dancing. Sometime in the next week would be nice."

"I'll pencil you in for next Saturday," he promised, brushing his nose against hers and feeling it in the hairs on the back of his neck, in his ribcage.

She was beautiful and dangerous and Ladybug and Marinette and she was his date.

This might well be the best night of his life.

Electric eyes and a childish (adorable) pout at the ready, she twisted away and said, "Well, I guess I'll just go and take my empty dance card over..."

"Oh, would you look at that," said Chat over her smug grin, reeling her back in. "My schedule has miraculously cleared. Free evenings as far as the eye can see."

"You dork."

The reproof was lost in the joy of the endearment, and he was laughing in spite of himself as he lead her out onto the floor.

She chased him, fingers tangled with his, lilting giggles cascading around his ears from distracting, cherry-red lips, and he didn't even try to tell himself he hasn't been dreaming of this for weeks.

He whirled around as soon as his foot hit the designated dancing square, lightly populated with polite, social dancers, and grinned at his date.

His date.

He could walk on air right now.

Ladybug shot him a look, one that was probably meant to be condemning or quelling or something, but she was flushed and smiling and sweet and so gorgeous he was absolutely sure he was about to make an utter fool of himself on the dancefloor, and the effect was lost on him.

His date.

"I still can't dance," Ladybug admitted on a sigh, apparently having accepted his smug good cheer as something she couldn't change.

"You really do need to learn how one of these days," he reminded her wryly as she stepped into his arms, so close she could probably hear his heart pounding. "What will Paris think if they find out their darling Lady Luck doesn't know so much as a waltz?"

She poked his chest. "C'mon kitty, why would I need to learn when I have you?"

"My lady, one would almost think you enjoy needing to rely on me and my sweet dance moves at these events," he teased, breathless.

He knew that wasn't the reason she never got dance lessons — their lives were both busy enough between their civilian responsibilities and vigilante activities — but the night was intoxicating (she was intoxicating) and a boy could dream, couldn't he?

She didn't deny it.

Ladybug bit her scarlet lip and flashed him a coy, guilty little smile, and Chat tripped over his own two feet.

Oh god, she didn't deny it.

She did, however, stumble into him, nose nudging into the crook of his neck and light perfume hitting him like a pillow to the face.

"Sorry," he croaked out of a very dry mouth, steadying her automatically.

She didn't take her face out of his neck, and when she did, it was with a flush a few shades darker than her previous and a case of shyly fluttering eyelashes.

She ran a gloved fingernail over the groove where his shoulder-pad attached to the rest of his suit, sliding over the stud at the point, studying it as though it was the most fascinating thing in the room.

"Is that really so surprising?" she mumbled quietly, as though she wasn't sure whether she wanted to be heard or not.

She was trying to kill him.

"I-I mean, you are my partner." she tacked on slightly louder, hurried and defensive. "It's not weird to ask you to help me with this... is it?"

She ended on a much weaker note than she started, giving him an insecure little glance that faltered away as soon as he met it, cheeks tinting even darker.

She was trying to kill him, and she was succeeding.

"I-I can take lessons!" she babbled on, taking his silence as an affirmative, rather than a sign of his impending death. "If you mind! I mean, I thought you didn't mind, but if you do I really don't—"

"I don't mind," Chat finally managed to get out, rediscovering the air he'd left behind in his lungs when she gave him that little glance.

She gnawed her lip, disturbing the cosmetics. "You sure?"

"Really sure," he said, possibly a bit too fervently. He was really very, very sure. "You can ask me for anything."

The smile he got for that made his ears burn.

"Then can I ask you for this dance?" she said, soft and low and really very close to his heated ear and...

Oh.

They were half-way into the song already.

Blushing out of embarrassment this time, he tugged her into the steps, counting the rhythms in his head.

But hearing her ask if she could rely on him and actually having her rely on him were two very different beasts indeed.

She followed him as easily, as smoothly as he followed her in battle. They were normally in-sync to an insane degree, honed by years of saving each other's lives, by years of teamwork and implicit, absolute trust, by years of a life where non-verbal communication and attention to minuscule cues and shared glances were the keys to survival and victory both, but this...

This was something else entirely.

They weren't fighting for their lives.

They were dancing.

They were moving together in an activity that existed purely for recreation, for pleasure and exercise, twisting together in low light, in fairy lights, physically intimate in full view of all of Paris.

She was trusting him to keep her from screwing up in front of all of Paris, and she was trusting him to do that with her eyes closed. Literally.

He swallowed hard and carefully twirled her into a spin, watching her as her skirts swirled around her thighs, the graceful follow-through of her off-hand, the peaceful smile that never left her face.

Her eyes didn't open once.

He took a deep, steadying breath and pulled her back against him, hand holding one wrist aloft as the other spread over her stomach almost of its own accord.

She leaned back and arched into him, letting his clawed fingers slide up the bodice of her dress until they rested just under the butterfly of her ribs, and turned her face into him, eyelashes fluttering against the corner of his jaw.

"Doing okay?" he checked. His voice came out rougher than he expected, but just about as affected as he thought it might.

"Mmmn," she hummed, seemingly only half awake.

Chat's mind took that noise and ran headlong into the gutter with it.

She leaned into him even further, so close her could feel her lips curl against his skin.

"I'm good," she whispered, throaty and relaxed and mind-liquifying. "You, kitty?"

Well, his knees were a lot weaker than they had been five seconds ago, but he was good.

He wouldn't make it through this dance if she kept that up.

Impulsively, he pinched her side, and with his most annoying smirk, he said, "Claw-some, my lady."

If they'd been alone, she would have squawked. As it was, she made a muffled noise of outrage and yanked back a few inches to give him a look of utter betrayal.

He took those few inches of grace gratefully, and shot her a not-quite-sheepish grin as apology.

She narrowed her eyes and stepped lively, skipping out of his arms with a dangerous look in her eye.

He wondered briefly if he'd made a terrible mistake, and then she was pulling him into a twist identical to the one he'd just pulled her through, except instead of ending with him in her arms, she dipped him low, sly smirk on her face and nose mere centimeters from his own.

"Getting frisky there, eh, kitty?" she purred, cerulean eyes gone velveteen-dark and ocean-bottomless.

Oh fuck.

He strangled himself on a yip, a noise that might have been an agreement or could have just been a squeak, forced out through the static silence in his head, and she let him up.

Ladybug took the lead this time, although less in a dancing capacity and more in a safeguard capacity, making sure they didn't run into anyone while Chat recovered his bearings.

She was trying to kill him, but at least she was being polite about it.

He trembled his way through a turn or three, moving more off sheer muscle memory than any sort of design, mind tumbling over the exact cadences, the dimensions of that tiny little crack in her voice, the wavelength of that purr, and Ladybug guided him through it, keeping him safe while he recovered from her.

"That was unfair," he hissed at her under his breath as she pulled him close in a move that would have his late instructor rolling in his grave.

"That was revenge," she hissed back at him, flashing white teeth against red lips in a little smirk that set him back several steps on the road to recovery.

He huffed at her, trying to hold on to his annoyance in the face of that look.

He failed. His blood had scorched his veins at the very sight of it.

They fell back into the rhythm of the dance, staying on for the next set and the one after that and the one after that, slipping into improv when the dances he'd been taught just wouldn't cut it (or just weren't enjoyable enough — he'd been taught nearly every formal dance in the book, but Chat was not a rule-follower, or a square). Ladybug followed him through them all, not distinguishing between the well-known, the lesser-known, and the entirely made-up, warm and soft and solid and in his orbit.

It wasn't until the band announced they were packing up that he realized they had honest-to-god danced the night away.

The crowd had thinned greatly, the hosts showing people out in droves, only the most tenacious of the journalists left to document the going ons, Alya among them. Chat was pretty sure she'd stick around until she was kicked out.

"Looks like the party's over," Ladybug noted, surprised enough that he suspected he'd lost track of time as badly as he had.

She stroked his bicep quietly, and he took it as a signal to let her go. He hesitated, holding on for as long as he felt he could get away with, before reluctantly convincing his fingers, his hands, his arms to release her.

The late-night air hit him hard through his suit, swirling in the spaces she left behind when she stepped back. She flashed him a little smile as she moved, and he returned it, pretending his body wasn't aching in protest of letting her go.

He watched her survey the party, looking for the host so they could say their goodbyes, admired the slope of her nape and the stray locks that had escaped her elaborate up-do as she chased the man down and made their excuses.

This dance had shown him something he hadn't fully grasped before.

Ladybug trusted him.

Finishing up, she tittered politely at something the host had said and walking backwards towards Chat. She waved one final time at the host and turned on her heel. By the time she faced Chat, the forced smile had melted into a look of exasperated exhaustion, shoulders slumped and skin right around her eyes.

"Done?" she asked, all too obviously ready to leave.

She trusted him.

"Yeah," he said. "Just a second."

She tilted her head curiously.

He took her hand and carefully slipped off the glove, catching the tips and sliding the material away, and then he met her eye and held it.

Slowly, he raised her bare hand to his lips, heart thumping erratically in his throat as her eyes went wide.

She trusted him.

He kissed the tips of her fingers, smiling at her without really meaning to, ignoring the storm of gaps and suddenly flickering camera flashes from the remaining media people.

She let him.

She trusted him.

"Ch-Chat- what?" Her voice fluttered, exertion-flushed cheeks flushing even darker.

"Thank you," he said, a note of something in his voice he didn't want to name, something that gave those two words far too many meanings. He hurriedly tacked on, "—for the lovely evening, my lady. It was an honor to escort you."

Her shock-slack red lips twitched up into a wobbly smile, an odd look in her eye as her trembling fingers curled into his.

She trusted him.

She really, really trusted him. She trusted him to catch her, she trusted him with her back, she trusted him with their friendship, with her laughter and her joy and her dreams.

She trusted him with her dignity. With her insecurities.

She'd always trusted him with her life. Now, she trusted him with her identity, too.

They were getting closer all the time, and it had a way of making him hope. A way of making him wonder.

A way of making him think maybe, maybe, maybe one day...

Maybe one day, she'd trust him with her heart too.

Adrien pushed open the gate of the cat shelter, leading Marinette in behind him.

He hadn't had to beg for this, surprisingly. The lion's share of her work for the fashion show was over and done with, and when he'd suggested that she join him on one of his volunteer visits, she'd agreed almost immediately.

The look on her face when he introduced her to one of the older litters was well worth the entirely too knowing grin Sonia, the head volunteer, had given him when he'd walked in shoulder-to-shoulder with the girl he'd been talking about for weeks. Like she knew exactly how big it was to bring Marinette here, to a place this important to him.

(Like she knew he was practically under a compulsion, slowly introducing Marinette to every little nook and cranny of his life and praying to God she liked what she saw while wondering just what the hell he was doing.)

Marinette, for her part, seemed to be experiencing revelation.

Adrien had introduced her to The Hoard.

(Or so the batch of older, weaned kittens were affectionately termed by their caretakers.)

"Why hello," she cooed at the gaggle of kittens, hands clasped on her knees as she stooped close to them. She followed it up with a delighted squeak as one of the kittens batted her necklace.

Nursing the infant kittens was a time-consuming job, but it was methodical: suckle and toilet them, stroke as necessary. It was one of Adrien's favorite jobs.

It was also somewhat mindless, and left him with enough attention to watch Marinette out of the corner of his eye.

She took to the kittens almost immediately, which was completely unsurprising — the only person Adrien had met who didn't like kittens was Chloe — but somewhat more surprising was how quickly the kittens took to Marinette.

Forget eating out of her palms — all she had to do was hold her hands out and she had them attempting to climb into them, the more adventurous clawing their way up her chest in their quest for more pets.

He muffled a laugh in his shoulder when a little black tom made it high enough to sniff her chin, the infant on his knee complaining softly at the jostling. Petting its tiny head with a whispered apology, Adrien turned away to focus more fully on his task.

His focus lasted all of ten seconds before his mind started to wander.

He watched Marinette play with the kittens out of the corner of his eye, watched her nearly leap out of her apron (now wasn't that a thought) at a kitten's surprise attack from behind, and found himself snickering all over again.

"Careful," he couldn't help but call over. "Don't you know that seven out of ten attacks are from the rear?"

"I'll attack you from behind," she sniped back without heat, distracted almost immediately by her charges of the afternoon.

"Please do," he quipped, returning his eyes to the fed kitten, putting away the bottle and picking up the paper towel.

Marinette whipped around to stare at him, and, belatedly, he realized what he'd just said.

Shit.

"Please forget I said that," he begged, flushing and paling at once.

"...I think that might be worse than the time you said, 'or what, you'll spank me?'"

"You started it," he grumbled, ears and neck heating up. Oh god why.

Marinette scooted up to him sideways, leaning into his space with a shit-eating grin, kitten in her lap and elbow on his shoulder. "So..."

"Don't start."

"What kind of 'attacking' were you thinking about, kitty?"

"Stop."

"Because it looked to me like—..."

"I will pay you to stop."

"Thinking such things in front of the children." She tsk_ed, slowly shaking her head, still grinning. "For _shame."

"Do you want your money in fabric, cash, or cheese?"

"Video game time." She spread the fingers of the hand attached to the elbow that rested on his shoulder, grin going downright sleazy. "For five rounds of Ultimate Mecha Strike 2, I will stop."

"That game ruined the series," Adrien groused, almost en route at this point.

Marinette made a disparaging noise in the back of her throat and pushed off of him to cradle the kitten to her chest.

"Don't listen to your father," she cooed to the little black tom, effectively stopping the heart of the other 'black tom' in the room. "He speaks lies."

He took a second to catch his breath again before shooting back, "I speak only the truth. UMS2 is an abomination. Your mother is consorting with—"

Oh hell did he just call Marinette his wife?

His 'wife' stared at him with big, shocked blue eyes, going pinker and pinker as the words sunk in, then coughed and looked away.

Adrien returned to the kitten in his lap, holding the paper towel in one numb hand and wondering what it was for, drowning in embarrassment and trying not to think too hard about just how it felt to say those words.

(It felt like belonging.)

"So," said Sonia, looking in on them with a leer. "When's the wedding?"

Marinette screamed, launching both herself and the kitten up and backwards, flailing limbs narrowly missing the horde at her feet.

Sonia burst out laughing.

"Sorry, sorry," she gasped, catching a tear at the corner of her eye with a gloveless finger. "You two are just too cute, y'know?"

"No," Marinette grumbled, pink and baleful and plucking furry denizens off of her apron, making sure they were unhurt as she did so. "I really don't."

Adrien expelled a relieved breath.

She was okay.

"Mhmm..." Sonia hummed, setting her chin on the heel of her palm with a grin that was equal parts smug, knowing, and amused. "Well—" and here she straightened back up, "—try to finish up in the next fifteen minutes or so, okay? We have a schedule to keep."

Adrien and Marinette nodded obediently in sync, and Marinette picked herself up, careful of the kittens.

"Oh," Sonia added as she left. "Not that I wouldn't understand, but please try to keep the hanky-panky to the minimum. Think of the children!"

Marinette spluttered, and Adrien spluttered with her, despite knowing Sonia full well and knowing he should have expected that parting remark.

"'Hanky-panky,'" Marinette muttered, echoing his thoughts rather succinctly, though with considerably more aspiration, picking up the black tom again and brushing his fur with her fingertips. She softened immediately.

Adrien could only describe what happened next as a revelation.

She tipped back, nose-to-nose with the tiny black kitten in her palms, giddy, giggly grin on her mouth, eyes scrunched at the corners with her joy, the stress of her week fading, slipping of her shoulders in the face of that young whiskery critter.

She glanced at him over her shoulder, a different kind of affection softening her countenance, and stuck her tongue out. Jealous, kitty?

The smile was nothing he hadn't seen a hundred, a thousand times before, warm and happy and trusting and teasing and here with him, present and solid and real, but that was what did it. It was no big thing — a little thing, a minuscule thing, really — but that was what made it click.

Oh, he thought.

It's you.

#ladynoir #adrinette #adrienette #ml #miraculous ladybug #my fic #check yes juliet #//gives this 2 u all by roundhouse-kicking it out a 13th story window #may there be nothing left when it hits the ground #no spiderman kisses for queue

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