#anyways. that video reminded me to start picking things to look forward to again bc without that i wouldn’t have made it past 16 and i sure

[darlinimamess]

.

[comfyswitcherblanketfort]

IUI - The Way I Love You

bear with me here folks

I know the Idiots are usually soft af. but my lovely spouse/fiance/soon-to-be-fiance and beta @dani-dandelino hit me with an idea and I added a dash handful of angst bc i couldn’t help it

Warnings: feelings of inadequacy, fear of breakup (no actual breakup I promise), miscommunication, drunk af Geralt, past shitty relationships, happy ending tho I promise, there’s tears but they’re happy I swear.

______________________________________

Geralt only ever got sloppy drunk when Jaskier was the DD. It wasn’t necessarily that he didn’t trust anyone else, it was that he didn’t trust his drunk boyfriend not to goad him into something stupid. 

The last time they’d both gotten fucked up outside of their apartment they woke up with three traffic cones and a “Speed Hump” sign in their living room. When they asked Triss what happened she sent them a video of them giggling as they tried to fit the sign into her trunk.

After hanging the sign in their apartment, they decided it may be best to take turns. 

This particular instance, they’d dropped Triss and Yen off and were on their way home, Geralt’s head lolling against the window as he fought to stay awake. 

“I’m not carrying your perky ass upstairs,” Jaskier laughed, snapping his fingers near Geralt’s ear. 

Geralt grumbled but sat up straight and leaned into Jaskier’s outstretched hand, “Radio.”

Affectionately rolling his eyes, Jaskier pulled his hand away and flipped on the radio. Geralt immediately gasped and started singing along off key and slurred. The first time Jaskier heard Geralt scream along to Taylor Swift he’d been shocked, if extremely endeared. 

“BUT I MISS SCREAMIN’ AND FIGHTIN AND KISSIN IN THE RAIN! IT’S TWO AM AND I’M CURSIN’ YOUR NAME! SO IN LOVE THAT WE ACTED INSANE, AND THAT’S THE WAY I LOVED YOUUUUUUUUU!”

Jaskier turned the volume down to a reasonable level when Geralt cranked it so loud his ears might start ringing. He rolled his eyes when Geralt started singing it to him, taking the shortcut home and trying to ignore the little pit forming in his stomach. 

When the song ended Geralt turned the radio down and picked up his hand not gripping the steering wheel, “Jask?”

“Mhm?”

Even in the car, Geralt glanced around conspiratorially before whispering, “I have a secret.”

Fear flared in Jaskier’s chest but he took a deep, calming breath, reminding himself who he was talking to. His boyfriend thought secrets were fun. Mostly because Geralt’s version of a secret was keeping what he made for dinner a surprise until Jaskier got home. He’d even felt guilty not telling Jaskier he was seeing a therapist when they’d started dating. For all his gruff exterior and suspicion, Geralt really was an open book with those he loved and trusted. Jaskier had a very different idea of what secrets in a relationship meant. 

“What’s that, love?” 

Geralt giggled as he traced the edges of a magnolia on the back of Jaskier’s wrist, “That is the way I love you.”

Luckily for Jaskier’s car, they were rolling up to a stop sign. He had time to loose his breath for a moment and fight back the initial feeling of shame and anger with himself before he pulled his hand away and gripped the steering wheel as he punched the gas. 

Through gritted teeth, he said the gentlest thing he could think of, “We don’t kiss in the rain.”

Geralt frowned, almost pouted at him, “I still love you.”

A part of Jaskier wanted to scream at Geralt, another part wanted to pull over and make him walk home, thankfully the loudest part reminded him the idiot was just drunk. He didn’t know what he was saying and he thought he was being sweet. There was also a good possibility he would cry himself to sleep in the passenger seat if Jaskier yelled at him and last time he tried to carry Geralt to bed his back hurt for a week. 

“I love you too,” Jaskier sighed as he pulled into their parking spot. 

He didn’t sleep well that night. Not because his sweaty, smelly, and fidgety boyfriend clung to him in his sleep, but because he couldn’t stop thinking about the ride home. 

Jaskier had lived in relationships like that for most of his adult life. Hell, even in his teens. They were nothing but all consuming passion with no connection to support it and left both parties jaded and lost. When he left his mentor he’d sat in Yen’s chair for hours and hours, until his arm had gone numb, and the only thing he could think was ‘never again’. 

And now Geralt thought he was being cute. The ridiculously meticulous and serious man was only ever sappy when he got drunk and now instead of reveling in it like he’d like, Jaskier was staring at the clock on his nightstand calculating how exhausted he’d be in the morning as the minutes ticked by. 

Turns out, he was at least in the land of the living by the time Geralt shuffled into the kitchen with his hands in his hair and a pained expression. 

“Feel like shit.”

Jaskier hummed in agreement as he sipped his morning tea and shifted in his seat to see better out the window. 

After popping a few anti-inflammatories and nibbling on a cracker before giving up on food, Geralt lumbered up behind Jaskier and draped his arms over his shoulders, “What’s wrong?”

“S’nothing. I’m just being… touchy.”

Geralt pressed a light kiss over the hellebore tattoo on Jaskier’s neck, “I doubt it.”

Tears threatened to spill from his eyes as Jaskier laid his hand over Geralt’s arm across his chest, “I don’t want to lose this.”

“Why…? What makes you think you would?” Geralt was a little slower on the draw hungover, but he knelt next to Jaskier’s chair and rested a hand on his knee as he waited for a response. He only ever looked so worried when Roach had an abscess and it broke Jaskier’s heart. He didn’t want to say it and ruin everything. 

After a deep breath in, he mumbled out his answer, “Do you really love me like that song?”

“What song?” Geralt breathed, his thumb brushing back and forth over Jaskier’s knee.

“The uh, Way I Loved You one.”

Geralt searched his face for a beat, the crease between his eyebrows only deepening, “Of course I do.”

“Fuck,” Jaskier breathed, biting his lip to keep it from wobbling as he forced all the air from his lungs in the hopes it would do something to stop the tears from falling. When it was clear he would lose the battle he leaned forward with his elbows on the table, hiding his face in his hands.

“You… don’t want me to?” Geralt sounded close to tears himself, but he didn’t take his hand off Jaskier’s thigh. 

“No- yes! No?” Jaskier sniffed and wiped at his face but didn’t lean back to look at Geralt, “I- Geralt I can’t just fill a hollow relationship with lust. We ha- I thought we had more? But if you want the- the fights and the hate fucking- I don’t- Geralt I don’t want that. Not with anyone but not with you. Ne-”

“Hey, hey,” Geralt tugged at Jaskier’s arm, gathering him to his chest when the brunette melted into sobs, “I don’t want that. That’s not what I meant. I’m sorry, love. I’m so sorry I let you think that.” He cradled Jaskier’s head to his shoulder, pressing kisses into his hair between softly spoken apologies and reassurances. They stayed there until Jaskier’s tea went cold and his sobs were closer to little gasps. 

Eventually, Jaskier lifted his head and met Geralt’s eyes, “H-how do you love me?”

Geralt licked his lips, his voice barely above a whisper, “Not- It’s not hollow.”

Jaskier squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his forehead to Geralt’s, “Please?”

One of Geralt’s hands came up to cup Jaskier’s cheek as he took a deep breath, “I’ve never loved anyone like I love you… I never wanted to be romantic with anyone until you. You… You make me feel… safe. I’m never bored of you or numb or sick of you. This is the first relationship I’ve had where I bother to fight, Jask. I love you so much it makes me do things I never thought to do and I’m glad and I never want to change anything about us. Never.” 

A shiver ran down Jaskier’s spine as relief flooded his whole body. His throat ached from crying and his shoulders were sore from holding all that tension in a way they hadn’t for years, but he’d never felt so good. Geralt loved him. Him. Not some tumultuous relationship or the sex or the drama of it all. Someone finally loved him for him. 

It hadn’t really hit Jaskier till then. They’d said ‘I love you’, sure, but he hadn’t really believed Geralt, just like he’d stopped believing the string of selfish lovers before him. 

“Thank Mellitelle,” Jaskier laughed, just on this side of hysterical as he tightened his grip around Geralt’s shoulders, “I fucking love how boring we are. And you. Fuck I really really do love you.”

“Even when I smell like my regulars?” Geralt teased, intentionally huffing a little extra and dosing Jaskier in his horrendous hangover morning breath.

Jaskier wrinkled his nose but smiled and kissed him anyway, “Of course.”

“Mhh,” Geralt pulled away for a moment, brushing his thumb over Jaskier’s crows feet in a silent request for him to open his eyes, “Can we go back to bed?”

“The crying does it for you, huh?” Jaskier chuckled, his voice was still weak but his laugh was genuine.

“I’m so dizzy, Jask,” squeezing his eyes shut and shaking his head ever so slightly, Geralt plopped back onto his heels. If Jaskier hadn’t witnessed just how much he drank he’d say he was lying, but Jaskier was truly surprised he’d even climbed out of bed this morning.

“Mkay, up. Back to bed then.”

They settled under the blankets and tangled themselves back together. Geralt hummed, closing his eyes and squeezing Jaskier a little tighter.

New, happier tears threatened at the corners of his eyes but he pushed them down, opting to trace the corner of Geralt’s buttercup tattoo peeking out of his shirt, “I love you.”

Geralt took a deep breath in before he sighed out a rumbling, “I know.”

“No, Geralt. Really,” Jaskier laid his hand over the yellow and green ink, “I’ve said these words more times than I can count but I don’t think I ever really understood them until you.”

“Jaski-”

“I love you,” Jaskier’s interruption was far smaller and far more fragile than he had intended. His words just continued to spill out, “You’re steady and calm and I’ve never had that. I don’t know what it’s supposed to be like and I’m constantly scared I’m gonna fuck it up…”

Comforting fingers ran through his hair as Geralt murmured his reply, “Me too,” Jaskier just squeezed his shoulder in a bit of solidarity and a bit of selfish comfort, “But I think we’re doing alright…”

“Why’s that?”

“Well,” Geralt started, shifting so he was practically engulfing Jaskier, “we both still love each other, and...” his boyfriend pinched him when he trailed off, pretending to fall asleep in a way that always mad Jaskier giggle, “Ow- and you use the hooks by the front door.” 

“I do, don’t I?” Jaskier sniffled, “And you used your words.”

“I’d use all the words for you.”

“All of them?”

Geralt really was drifting away this time, his words coming slowly as his arms relaxed and Jaskier felt their full weight over him, “Not well, but I would...” 

[cyoza]

hey cyoza my friend I have a request "I think I'm in love with you." number 11 from fluff.

Thank you for your request! I tried to keep it lighthearted and involve the teens a bit more in this, just to explore bc I feel like sometimes I write so heavy sometimes. I know the Dickkory isn’t as in your face but I just wanted it to feel like ‘yeah he loves her and what about it’ type energy. even if he doesn’t know it. 

Anyway, 

I hope you’re happy with it! 

- 

‘I won fair and square and you know it!’ 

‘Stop lying! Everyone saw you push me on that final lap!’ 

Dick stifled a groan as he was thrust awake by the overlapping yelling. He rolled over and picked up his phone on the bedside cabinet to check the time. 

10am. 

Dick couldn’t remember the last time he had slept in so late. 

He attributed the majority of the reason he was so tired was because of Kory. She had slinked into his room at midnight and spent the remainder of the night's darkness doing things to him that he couldn’t ever have conceived. The memory of the night before caused certain parts of him to jump to attention. He furiously attempted to push the thought aside and instead tried to focus on having a cold, cold shower. 

Soon enough he was dressed and down to the main area of the tower. Much to his surprise, it was Kory and Gar who were nestled into the sofa, both with controllers in hand, playing what looked like Mario Kart. Conner next to them, glancing between them and the game in concentration and slight confusion as they played.

‘Morning, Sleeping Beauty.’ 

It was Jason’s sarcastic droll that sounded out from the kitchen area. Dick looked over to see him, Rose and Rachel sat at the breakfast bar, empty plates in front of them. 

The comment announced his arrival and caused the three on the sofa to look over at him. Dick pretended he didn’t notice the way his heart rate spiked when Kory’s eyes met his. He found he had to clear his throat before he spoke. 

‘Haha, very clever.’ 

‘Seriously, what did you take 10 sleeping pills last night or what?’ Rachel asked rhetorically. ‘I’ve never seen you sleep past 8am.’ 

‘Can’t a person just be tired?’ He muttered  defensively, making his way over to the sofa and flopping down, folding his arms in defiance. 

‘You two leave Dick alone.’ Kory came to his defence, tapping a hand on his knee and throwing him a heated smirk. ‘Maybe he had a long night.’ 

Dick could hardly stop the scarlet hue that blossomed across his cheeks at the comment. 

She knew exactly how his night had gone. 

He decided instead to deflect the conversation away from the topic.

‘You guys playing Mario Kart?’ 

‘Yep! You wanna game?’ Gar offers him a controller but he shakes his head, declining. 

‘Nah, I’m good.’ 

‘Come on, Grayson.’ Kory ignored him and took the controller to shove it into his hands. ‘We’ll play against these two.’

Dick sat forward to hand the controller back when a simple glance at Kory’s excited and jovial face crumbled his resolve completely. Letting out a sigh, he settled back into the sofa, selected his character and began to play. 

‘Don’t take this the wrong way, Dick, but you kind of suck at this game.’ Kory stated, narrowly missing a banana peel. 

Dick’s Toad was coming last and there was no sign of that changing. It didn’t help that they had picked out Rainbow Road to play on meaning Dick had come last approximately 10 seconds into the game and stayed there. 

‘You were the one that made me play, Kory.’ Dick reminded her, frowning as he crashed into a banana peel Gar threw behind him.

‘I didn’t realise you were this bad.’ She told him. ‘Lucky for you, I am not.’ 

Kory’s Princess Peach character overtook Conner’s Bowser at the last minute and crossed the finish line in first place just in time for her to come first, meaning that he also came first. Kory let out a triumphant yell as she threw her arms up in victory. 

‘No way!’ Conner exclaimed. ‘You have to have cheated!.’ 

‘I didn’t take you for a sore loser, Kon-El.’ Kory said smugly, even as her eyebrows raised in innocence. ‘Besides, I had a human on my team and I still won.’ 

‘She’s got a point there.’ Rose called out to them from her place at the breakfast bar. 

‘Stop stirring, Rose.’ Rachel reprimanded her, slapping a hand on her arm but regretting it immediately when the young teen gave her a moody look. 

‘I’m technically human -’ 

Gar’s statement was cut off by various groans before the bickering started yet again. Dick watched as Kory argued lightheartedly with the teens, shoving and slapping each other when they touched on a particular nerve. He felt something begin to stir in his stomach the longer he looked, something warm but invigorating. Eventually, Kory’s voice rang out over the others and broke up the arguing. 

‘Okay, okay! Best two out of three.’ She bargained, picking up her controller once more and restarting the game. 

But Dick found he couldn’t command his hands to pick up the controller, feeling the warmth bubble up and across his chest as he watched the scene, watched her. Dick had never in his life imagined that he would be here. Never imagined that he would again be in a place where he could play video games on a Saturday morning as the people he loved sat squabbling over such menial things. 

‘Dick, come on, have you even moved?’ Kory took her attention away from the game to throw him an encouraging smile. 

Although the action was intended to be quick, it seemed to move slowly in Dick’s mind. Her hair rippling in a burgundy wave behind her, her lips tilting up in a smile causing her eyes to brighten. The warmth in his chest felt closer to flames licking at his heart. 

‘I think I’m in love with you.’ 

Six pairs of perplexed eyes darted to him, mouth’s open in shock. 

‘What?’ 

Then he realised what he had said. 

I think I’m in love with you. 

Fuck. 

He had meant to ask them what they wanted for dinner. 

Dick felt his face explode in what he could only assume was the darkest shade of red known to man. He quickly hung his head and mumbled an ‘I gotta go’ before scurrying out of the room to his own bedroom. He quickly shut the door behind him, and pressed his back against it, willing his heart rate to slow down. 

Did he love her? 

I mean sure, he spent most of the day thinking of her and what she was doing. The thought of her being in the slightest bit of pain caused him more hurt then he could have anticipated and he couldn’t imagine his life without her. 

Oh, god. 

[eijiroukiriot]

i don’t have a fancy name for it or anything but this is my kirishima playlist

I posted about my krbk playlist a little while ago but since it’s Boy Day I wanted to finally post about my solo Kirishima playlist too!! The only other thing I have to say is that I Love The Boy and that’s what this playlist is for :) 

Spotify Link

song descriptions under the cut!

(bc of how i want to format the explanations, this list will be out of order with the actual playlist but that doesn’t actually matter that much!)

i. Teenage Icon - The Vaccines 

“Oh look at me, so ordinary

No mystery with no great capabilities”

-I guess it’s pretty fitting to start the list off with a very Middle School Kirishima kinda song! Something I really love about this one is that it’s very steeped in this idea that “oh I’m not great, I’ve been blown up my whole life but I’m really nothing special, I should just stop pretending to be” but then the choruses and the bridge are so upbeat that it feels like it’s made peace with it! Maybe even like it’s celebrating it? Like, this isn’t wallowing in self hatred, it’s an anthem and I feel like it’s the kind of thing Kirishima would listen to in middle school and think “yeah, I’m not special, so what, who cares” 

ii. Whatta Man - I.O.I 

the one w the classic “whatta man whatta man whatta man” hook but a kpop song

-as kirishima is the only boy alive, this song talking about a very good man must be dedicated to him

-put in the ioi ver instead of the classic one bc i love girls 

iii. Embers - Owl City

“And we'll watch the sky as it fills with light

And though the embers are new, whatever you do just don't let the fire die” 

-Something you are gonna learn very quickly about me is that I Love Owl City 

-A lot of Owl City songs are about overcoming hard times and facing forward and this one hits me more than a lot of other generic Encouraging Songs because “don’t let the fire die” feels like such a genuine sentiment, like more than “you’re a firework” or whatever because it encapsulates the idea of “this is your decision to make and something you’re gonna have to put in the effort but you can turn your life around, you don’t have to hate yourself, you can make the decision not to” which I feel is a very Kirishima sentiment

iv. I’m Gay - Bowling For Soup 

“It sells records when you're sad these days, it's super cool to be mad these days -

I think rock and roll is really funny when it's serious” 

-now. there is the very obvious meaning here

-But mostly this feels like a very Kirishima-ish song to me since it’s all about getting out of the “everything sucks and talking about that all the time makes you cool” mentality and not taking things so seriously, focusing on the positives and trying to make other people happy too!

v. I’ll Make a Man Out of You - Mulan

(picking a lyric to express kirishima in this one feels dumb when all you need to see this as a Him song is to imagine him belting it out) 

-the 12 year old that still lives somewhere inside of me and spent hours watching videos w titles like Total Drama Character Theme Songs on youtube is Extremely proud of herself for this one 

vi. The Squip Song - BMC 

“Freshman year, I didn't have a girlfriend or a clue

I was a loser, just like you”

-Look the fact of it is this song has extreme Kirishima Energy and to convince you of that I could write a lot of stuff or I could just link you the animatic I made please watch it I worked very hard

-Lyrical content aside I think the funky guitar and the horns and the amount of screaming in this song are Very kirishima 

vii. Fiji Water - Owl City 

“If I only knew then what I know now, I’d stand like a one man band, and I’d say

‘All this is new to me, but here’s how it’s gonna be - there is more to me than meets the eye” 

-owl city part 2! It’s about him seeing himself as a regular kid but getting called by a record label and flown out to talk about a record deal, and it’s cast in this light of “I didn’t see myself as much then and I was surprised it could all happen to me” but trying to make the most of it anyway, which reminds me a lot of Kirishima still doubting himself but getting to UA anyway

-The last line “I laughed when I got back home and I thought, ‘there’s no such thing as luck’” is my absolute favorite part of the song and when I imagine that as kirishima getting home after crushing the entrance exam and falling face-first onto his bed laughing...well! a bitch is soft!

viii. I Wanna Meet Richard Dreyfuss - Gabriel Gundacker (the guy who made the “you are my dad” vine)

“Hello, don’t mean to interrupt your flow

But I’ve got something you need to know, and it’s very specific, so here we go:

I wanna meet Richard Dreyfuss” 

-This song is from an album dedicated to a fan’s process of wanting to meet, NEEDING to meet, giving up on, trying to forget about, (brief intermission about saddles as he forgets about), apologizing to, finally meeting, and saying a satisfied goodbye to Richard Dreyfuss and it’s one of my favorite albums of all time

-At first I just thought the song sounded pretty Kirishima in terms of earnest effort and slightly-soulful high notes but then someone sent me an ask like “WHY IS THE RICHARD DREYFUSS SONG ON YOUR KIRISHIMA PLAYLIST” and I realized it would totally make sense for Kirishima to write an entire album about wanting to meet Crimson Riot, so, checkmate 

ix. Angel, Please - Ra Ra Riot 

“Long as I feel I can tell the danger did it - oh, you guard yourself, you do

I wasn't hurt but I know you're the curse, I know you were” 

-i am not gonna lie the first time i heard this song I just wanted so so badly to make it abt kirishima bc 1) album cover is red 2) band name has riot in it

-Anyway so after a month of listening to it w that mindset I can say pretty confidently that this song makes me think of Kirishima’s big fat crush on bkg so really it should be in the krbk playlist instead of this one but I do what I want 

x. Beautiful Times - Owl City

“My heart's burning bad and it's turning black but I'm learning how to be stronger” 

-Owl City part 3 :)

-This one is the most focused on the dark side of things and the “struggling through the depression” angle but I really do think the ending is a beautiful sentiment and that line up there reminds me of him

-I feel like...things never get easy right away and there’s always gonna be some doubt there no matter how good you feel, and the only thing we can do about that is to keep trying to make things better

Songs that are also in my krbk playlist which I wrote about here that I won’t describe at length again but that I mostly associate with Kirishima: 

xi. Hooked on a Feeling - Blue Swede

xii. Kimi Janakya Dame Mitai - Masayoshi Oishi

xiii. Knock Three Times - Tony Orlando & Dawn 

xiv. If You Wanna - The Vaccines 

xv. Slayers - Matt Fishel (I do want to say that this one is a big one bc it literally feels like what Kirishima would come up with if he tried to write bkg a song) 

xvi. I’m Totally Obsessed With Him - Matt Fishel 

xvii. Television/So Far So Good - Rex Orange County

xviii. Mamma Mia - ABBA

Aaaand, songs that all remind me of Kirishima just because they’re bops filled with loud, boisterous, cheerful, and at times comedic Kirishima Energy:  

xix. Young Volcanoes - Fall Out Boy

xx. Flyers - Bradio 

xxi. Don’t Stop Me Now - Queen

xxii. Mr. Brightside - The Killers

xxiii. Sincerely Me - Dear Evan Hansen

xxiv. Uptown Funk - Bruno Mars

[sasukebarmitzvah]

watching every naruto opening and discussing my opinions because im bored liveblog

original

took me a little while to warm up to it idk why maybe because its not as up tempo and its a shonen and i want to get hype but i love it now. love the part where the camera pans around team 7 fighting randos they are babies… also its so funny when sasuke holds out his hand to naruto to help him out of the lake and he jsut fist bumps him. gay boy

Haruka fucking kanata baby!!!!!!!! a fav. like we all know this. i listen to the song just regularly a lot and every time it comes on shuffle im like Oh my god its haruka kanata. read the english translation of the lyrics… sns

this one got stuck in my head for a while lol. i like seeing everyone babie and i like naruto shaking his head at the end to dry off like a dog

DDMnanannaddnnaaaaa naaaaaaaaa nda aaWE ARE FIGHTING DEAMERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OOLI OLI OLIOOOOoohh!!!!! very fun very good also a very good time in the show, hello tsunade

**edgy shonen opening where theres something important in front of a chain link fence**

lol skipping 6-9 bc thats the huge chunk of filler which i didnt actually watch most of

shippuden

heros come back is SO GOOD absolutely one of my favs. banger first of all. i love how its actually choreographed and naruto sakura kakashi are like moving to the beat and i love the part where the animation is like pencil sketchy and theyre running and their bodies warp bro its just cool. the part where everyone dramatically reaches for gaara is fun, also love deidaras moment. anyway i shake my ass to this song eveyrday

distance oh god oh fuck. YOU ARE MY FRIEND!!! the sasuke and naruto stuff where they are little baby at the beginning at the end we return to the same place theyre there and like about to stab each other i’m going to scream. i lvoe the song of course. hello sai! i love team 7s little spotlight moments where they get to pose to the music its so cute. why is sasuke snake jesus? DO you remember that long lost DREAM!!!!!!!!!!

BLUE BIRD YA BANGER ok the whole symbolism. when naruto falling next to sasuke rising is positioned like yin and yang lol. when naruto is falling from the sky but then sasuke comes to mind and he springs into action lol. ok random people from the fillers i dont care about. naruto fell in the lake he picks up the bird feather interspersed with a couple shots of sasuke horgh. additional reading: paper bag by fiona apple

closer is one of the ones where im like eh its ok its not my favorite and then it gets to the chorus and my dumb ass is jsut screaming YOU KNOW THE CLOSER YOU GET TO SMETHING THE TOUGHTER IT IS TO REACHIT. the funniest part where narutos moping and thinking of sasuke and then he just perks up and smiles at the camera like. gay boy. like getting to see the asuma fight scenes in this op, also it was so funny seeing him get all the screentime in this op knowing hes about to die like yeah very subtle

SHA LA LA!!!! LOVE IT i love it i love it soooo much first of all banger second of all naruto looking into the water and his reflection is sasuke. lollllll. metaphor m-e-t-a-p-h-o-r the little prechorus bit in the middle gives me chills. love sasuke walking into the purple pool like a smug motherfucker thats my boy. at the end zooming into sasukes pupil zoom out it’s narutos eye oh the poetry..

signs another one of the ones where im like eh whatever its fine but not my fav but by the chorus i am standing on the table freaking out. like fuck jiraiya but this one got me a lil. the lighting and choreography of the sasuke itachi fight bit is sooooo nice and pretty, love getting to see all the new players in the story. baby ame orphans fading to the shot of yahiko as pain.. :(

this one literally makes me cry. i get chills what the fuck. definitely one of my favs. am i a bitch? maybe. i like the song by itself but like the way the rise/general shape of the melody flows with the visuals its like oh god oh fuck. again fuck jiraiya but like the role his character serves as a link between these disparate groups of people and the way thats used in this opening… how it starts and ends with him writing and this is the arc where naruto reads tales of a gutsy ninja and he learns about how he got his name and jiraiya wrote the book and hes WRITING and im going CRAZY!! i’m starting to tear up watching it rn. the shot of konan and the pains in that moment just before they leap forward. Sayonaaaaaaara aa lksasldfkwpoeifjhnuerIELFeuiertekdjsnlfweiourbg kakashis moment is cool in this op. also love to see the girls getting fight scenes in this op cus they sure dont in the actual show LOL anyway yeah im at the part where the melodys just hitting sooo different oh my god naruto frog eyes

DIVERRRRRRR. FAV literally like naruto is drowning. hes drowning and everyone is pushing him up so he can breathe again everyone is fighting to save him and thnen he s ouf ot the water and then he sees sasuke drowning and he JUMPS BACK IN. FOR ONE PERSON EVEN THOUGH ALL THESE OTHER PEOLE were working to help him out he dives back in for SASUKE whos drowning in the eyehole of obitos mask which is cool. ok yeah this is another one where im like tearing up because THe cymbal is em….. the way The movement of the visuals is choreographed with the song is so much. nico TOUCHED the fucking walls.

this one kinda annoys me i dont know why it just wasnt my favorite. love the sasuke and naruto staring at each other intensely moment though, would this be a shippuden opening without that. also the part at the end where sakura holds up her kunai and it like slashes and covers sasuke and naruto… inch resting…

newsongs so weird i love it. like what the hell is going on. why is naruto running like hes from some weird gmod video from 2013. love the LITERAL choreography, everyone dancing to the song like this is a musical. theres just a lot of weird moments which is fun. love sai naruto and sakura making the seal together to shoot lightning. raikage leaping gracefully across the beach

i do not enjoy this one. i just dont. it just feels like we’re bootlicking which of course we are because this is the war arc and everything is a nightmare

i remember seeing the first episode with this opening and i was excited bc its like… great another naruto pining for sasuke one this is what im here for. a light banger. minato manlet monday. ohh right this was the one where gaara sees his dad again and his OH I SEE SASUKEE

Banger! nico did indeed touch the walls again. i like that this one is like visually thematically consistent thru the whole thing, i like the nighttime dimly lit atmosphere with the bursts of brighter colorful lighting, also whenever i see tsunade i freak out. narutos cute at the end

SUCH A BANGER!!! also very cool visual style, appreciate it for that like the last one, its got that pretty consistent aesthetic with the red sky and the high contrast black blocking its fun and cool to watch. did i mention the song is a bit of a banger. obito passing thru the rock is cool too bad hes an idiot

ok from this one there were two lines i remember always seeing in the english sub that made me freak out. and one of them was like “this red hot love burning my heart” and it was over kakashi and obito fighting like damn OK. also the “i put the candle out with my finger” thing sticks in my head idk why. hate that we have the narutos big meaty claws i mean manly hands moment though. omg its hashirama and madara and then it CUTS TO SASUKE AND NARUTO IN THE SAME POSE LOL OK…

SILHOUETTE IS a banger… not as much so as some of the others but its a lot of fun. very colorful op, we got some naruto pining for sasuke, classic. also love the thing where ppl are running and they age as they do and they sort of grow into their present selves, a fun visual bit. the end where narutos like obito be nice now look at all these people behind me who think youre a meanie please be nice :(((((((((

another one with a really good visual principle ugh i love how the style of the show is integrated w the styles of more traditional printmaking its very swexy and nice to look at

LINE uugrgh i love this one, maybe a fav… naruto chasing after the light and sasuke trying so hard to snuff it out as they both reflect on their memories of each other oh god oh fuck… also i love the bits where it just has all the characters in a row like it reminds me of that one post about how in the endgame trailer they had a shot of all the female characters together to be like Girl power!! and someone was like yeah thats them showing u exactly how many women theyre going to disrespect LMAO but yeah i do love this op. also the song itself being slower w/ the triplet tempo is a nice change of pace

blood circulator hee hee… the version of this with naruto and sasuke moments is A Lot but even just the generic first version is fun. the part where narutos like knocked on his face hes sinking into the tar and hes not even trying to save himself hes just staring at sasuke, but then he sees sasuke distressed and he goes bijuu mode immediately like What did u say about my mans? there is some homoeroticism

i really hate everything about this i hate it all. sasuke is cute. thats it. ok first of all why did choji cut his hair his long hair look was so gooooooood. hinata bimboification? i mean if anything it was fun to watch these fillers just cus it was fun to watch kakashi be the hokage but really goofy and also the Crumbs tossed to the kakairus… but yeah i hate everything temari got bimbofied too like ugh please let her be a dyke :( this isnt even me talking necessarily about the opening this is me just being like i hate the naruto ending. LOL SASUKE AND NARUTOS NO HOMO BRO HIGH FIVE AT THE END LOLLLLL

ok im done

[skia-oura]

Orange Lilies 12/12

A/N: Here we are, at the conclusion. Thank you all for taking this journey with me!

Prologue // Previous

Ao3

What comes after.

Epilogue

           Tommy Hangar, while late-night dusting, absentmindedly turned on the TV to a ‘breaking news’ report about some disaster in Kabul. She paid it little mind—it was just for background noise, after all—until she heard the magic phrase, “Alcor the Dreambender,” and then suddenly she was Very Invested in this cover story. Tommy dropped the Everlasting Handheld Dustmop (also known as a rag with a bunch of spells in it in order to make it hardier and better at dusting) and stared for a moment before she recovered her wits.

           “Hon,” she called out, easing onto the couch like she was afraid it might bite, gaze focused on the screen on the wall showing a couple of well-dressed reporters. “Hon, you want to see this!”

           “I’m in the bathroom!” Filara’s voice was muffled by the door and distance between them. Tommy reached out with one finger and slid the volume up on the television unit.  

           “…see, the damage to the city was located in a somewhat economically depressed sector just east of the main downtown center. It seems to have started in this block of rented townhomes, as you can see from the aerial shot provided by first responders to the scene.”

           “Then hurry pissing and get out there, you want to see this!” Tommy yelled.

           “It’s a number two!” Tommy heard, but shortly after there was the sound of the toilet unit being flushed. Tommy leaned forward, her elbows on her legs, and stared at the devastation depicted even as the news anchors described it.

           “Shockwaves were reported at 3:26 local time to a nearby fire station from a location nearly a kilometer away from the epicenter. Shortly after, several buildings shook as though an extended earthquake event was occurring. Pedestrians were thrown from their feet, and some were crushed under collapsing walls that were torn apart by the force of the blows exchanged between two demonic forces. As we said earlier, one of the two demons was positively identified to be Alcor the Dreambender.”

           On the screen, buildings were partially to fully collapsed the closer they were to the epicenter, a partially still-standing block of townhomes. One of them had a hole in the roof, from what Tommy could see before the view faded back to the two anchors, faces stern. Down the hall, the bathroom door opened.

           “That’s correct, Penny,” the centaur said, their tail swishing behind them in what Tommy thought might be agitation. “Several consulting demonologists on the second-response team were quick to point out that not only was Alcor the Dreambender participating in a fight, but his opponent was another rather strong demon titled Lilith. From what we understand, the battle lasted perhaps three minutes above Kabul before being relocated to the nearby Hindu Kush mountains, but the consequences of the short encounter were huge for Kabul.”

           “All right, what do I have to see?” Filara asked, reaching over the back of the couch and pressing a kiss to Tommy’s neck. Tommy shivered and reached up to curve her hand along Filara’s cheek.

           “Just watch,” Tommy said. Filara hummed, then did that thing where she just climbed over the back of the couch instead of walking around to the other side like a normal person. Tommy sighed, and adjusted so that she could lean against Filara, her chin hooking into the valley of Filara’s shoulder.

           “So far, almost five hundred residences and places of work have been labeled non-viable, just over fifty have been found dead, and a further ninety six people have been injured. Experts estimate that there should be another one hundred casualties, though they differ in opinion on how many of these casualties should be fatal or simply injured.”

           Filara hummed. “This is awful, but why should I be seeing this?”

           “Shh,” Tommy said, patting Filara’s stomach.

           On screen, the centaur’s human companion nodded gravely. She picked up a data pad, glanced down at it, and then addressed the camera. “While it is historically one of the less traumatic incidences of fighting between Alcor and other demons, experts say to exercise caution. According to these experts, Alcor’s reemergence after such a long period of inactivity is something to watch. Please do not attempt to summon Alcor the Dreambender, as you will be putting your life as well of the lives of everybody around you at risk.”

           “Oh,” Filara said. She rubbed her hand down Tommy’s side. “Ah. I see.”

           “Unsurprisingly, when looking at historical cases such as the event that caused the formation of the Californian Federation over two millennia ago, this demonic encounter also made big changes to the environment. Mishana, take it away.”

           The centaur nodded. “Of course. It seems that, from initial reports, that the massively toxic Kabul river has somehow been purified of said dangerous toxins. The river has never been clearer. This footage, of the site where experts are nearly certain the remainder of the demonic encounter took place, will show you this odd phenomenon currently taking place.” The camera shifted to pan a view of what looked like it was a normal mountain range just a while ago, but now was some kind of weird freaky smooth melted-stone valley. The hair on the back of Tommy’s neck stood up just looking at it. She got further goosebumps at the way the river changed from murky and viscous to clear and quick at one point near the far end of the valley.

           “Well,” Filara said. “I’m not sure I ever want him in my house again, nice as it was to talk to him.”

           “Don’t think we have any kind of choice,” Tommy said, quietly. She stared at the screen. “And, well, as fucking awful as that horror shit looks, it can’t be all bad? I mean, the river’s so clear you could probably peep through it and see somebody changing on the other side.”

           Filara huffed. “Yes, romantic, way to remind me of how we met.”

           “Accident,” Tommy drawled. She had let Filara know that her windows should probably be dimmed, just in case, and by the way that was a cute mole she had on her butt. “Also, this house is in one piece, right? And so are we? And that little kiddiwink hangs around him. Could be worse.”

           On the screen, the news agency showed videos of the destruction in the mountains next to ones of the devastation in Kabul proper. Filara sighed. “Could be worse indeed.”

Pandemonium Server: “Sigil_Works”

General Channel

 Karl Svinhish 7:39 AM

Posting in all channels: Just as a reminder to all personnel, today is a half-day! Please only work three hours of your six. If you work more, we will know. We will find you. You will go home at some point.

 Ennis Hart 7:41 AM

lol what u gonna do, u can’t stop us from thinking at home, we got shit to get done and thru before the Terminator comes back

also u don’t gotta do that in all channels smh

 Karl Svinhish 7:41 AM

We cannot stop you from doing anything outside of the workplace, but please be reminded that as Thinktank department personnel, our insurance does not cover you for any sigil work done outside the premises!

 Sally Minh 7:42 AM

wait, mr. farkas is back??

 Ziyi Zhang 7:42 AM

Wait what??? My favorite????? Where was he????????

 Ennis Hart 7:42 AM

how the shit is bentley farkas, destroyer of dreams and rejecter of perfectly good plans, your fav

 Ziyi Zhang 7:43 AM

Bentley Farkas is a God among Mortals and you should not profane his name like this

 Sally Minh 7:44 AM

honestly, mr. farkas is Sigils Goals

 Anish Wellington 7:44 AM

Do we know what happened to him? He was kidnapped, right?

 Lucas Onderon 7:45 AM

yall are loud way too early in the morning. go away morning people

 Ennis Hart 7:45 AM

yeah he kidnapped i think?? i think sally took that phone call

also lucas turn us on mute if you want to sleep

 Lucas Onderon 7:46 AM

But now were talking about the mysterious mister farkas I need to put in my two cents

 Sally Minh 7:47 AM

yes, the police said that there had been an incident and that it looked like mr. farkas had been the victim of some kind of kidnapping, and had officially been listed as a missing person. they only  told me because literally nobody else was at work.

 Anish Wellington 7:48 AM

Thank you Sally. I will be sleeping again but if there are any updates, please tag me.

 Sally Mihn 7:48 AM

Ok!

 Lucas Onderon 7:48 AM

and that is that benny boy might act super nice and be super smart and all that shit, but he got a stick up his ass and needs to chill out instead of freaking out over every single proposal we send him. hed gotten unbearable after minhaj left.

 Ziyi Zhang 7:49 AM

#internlife

also u know that @BentleyFarkas is in this chat, right?? He’s going to see all of this.

 Lucas Onderon 7:50 AM

hes nerver in here nayways

lkadjklwj

*never in here anyways

 Karl Svinhish 7:50 AM

Please refrain from being rude! We do not tolerate bullying and rudeness in this chat, especially when those being bullied have been kidnapped and recently escaped said kidnapping!

 Ennis Hart 7:51 AM

holy shit wait he escaped?? Not police action or whatever??

 Sally Minh 7:51 AM

Is he okay?

 Ziyi Zhang 7:52 AM

yeah is he ok? Any deets?

 Lucas Onderon 7:52 AM

Bentley ‘gives in to puppy dog eyes’ farkas actually escaped? What?? you cant just leve it at that

*leave

@BentleyFarkas explain

 Karl Svinhish 7:53 AM

Leave him alone! He is recovering, and will be on indefinite leave of absence.

 Lucas Onderon 7:53 AM

Paid???

 Karl Svinhish 7:53 AM

There is the possibility that he will be working remotely!

 Ennis Hart 7:54 AM

But u said we cant take work home???? insurance doesn’t cover outside work premises????

 Karl Svinhish 7:54 AM

That’s for the Thinktank department! Bentley Farkas has been consistently attentive to detail and is one of the leading minds in this field, and as such we have entered negotiations with our insurance agency.

 Ziyi Zhang 7:56 AM

why you hatin? bentley farkas is a god of sigils. i would say more but bentley is in this server.

 Ennis Hart 7:56 AM

U don’t see him in thinktank do u

 Sally Minh 7:56 AM

bc hes too good for thinktank

Bentley Farkas 7:57 AM

That’s bc Im too good at practics 4 u

 Lucas Onderon 7:57 AM

bc hes overrated is what and thinktank knows that

 Ziyi Zhang 7:57 AM

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! BENTLEY??!??!!??!?

 Sally Minh 7:58 AM

mr. farkas???

 Lucas Onderon 7:58 AM

holy shit

 Bentley Farkas 7:59 AM

The rumors of my death were highly exaggerated. but im only saying that im alive and have my hands on a phone. i probs wont be coming back to work for a while. working things out.

 Ennis Hart 7:59 AM

send us a pic or ur an imposter

 Karl Svinish 8:00 AM

Please don’t feel pressured to do anything Bentley! We’re with you all the way. Also please send me the documents we discussed yesterday as soon as possible.

 Bentley Farkas 8:00 AM

It’s ok, promise not to scream.

IMG_59703

 Ziyi Zhang 8:00 AM

@AnishWellington GET BACK IN HERE HOLY SHIT

WHAT THE FUCK BENTLEY

           “Hey, this is Torako Lam! Leave a text for me after the beep, unless you’re my dads, in which case leave me a VM so that I can hear your voices! Have a great day, and stay cool.”

-beep-

           “Hey Tora, this is your dear old Dad! Just calling in to check and see how you’re doing. You missed our weekly call yesterday. I know that Bentley going missing has been a big blow, and I’m worried about you. Please call me back! If nothing else, I can sort of keep you company for a bit. Love you lots!”

-beep-

           “Torako, is everything okay? You haven’t responded to my texts or your Father’s. Your workplace said that you were on suspension. I just want to make sure that you’re doing all right. Tyrone hasn’t answered his phone either, and Bentley is obviously out of the question. Please call us back. Any time is okay, even at a god-awful hour in the morning. Love you so much, bye.”

-beep-

           “Torako, this is Mama. Your Father called me, said that your Dad and he hadn’t heard from you at all lately? What’s up with that darling? They’re getting frightened that you’re dead. I told them that that’s nonsense, you’re far too tough for that. Your Father and I made you, after all! Then again, we made you, so I am a very small bit worried. If you have some troubles you can’t tell your Dad or Father, you can tell me. I know I’ve been busy recently, but I can make time for you. Loves and smooches, your Mama.”

-beep-

           “Torako, what’s going on?? It’s been a week, and all we’ve heard out of you is one solitary ‘I love you, I’m alive’ text. Which, thank you, but also that’s worrying! Are you in danger? Is Tyrone gone too? I tried talking to some of your old hurling friends, but none of them know where you are. I will get on a port to your apartment in the next day if you don’t respond. I love you, but please tell me that you’re okay! Goodbye.”

-beep-

           “Yo, Tora, it’s Hana, long time no talk! So your Dad contacted me yesterday about you being like out of town or out of touch or something? And I’m a little concerned?? I heard from him that your life partner went missing, which is sad and also makes me worried about you. Are you okay? I’m here for you if you need me. Catch you later!”

-beep-

           “Torako, this is Officer Akuapem. Hepsa has been getting better. They think she can return to work next month. I hope things are going well for you. We are continuing to investigate. There seems to be a lead into Canada. We have been tracing emails. Maybe you already know this; we had a report of a break and enter a few days ago. It was to someone we thought might be tied into the investigation. Please be careful. Don’t do anything stupid.”

-beep-

           “Tora, this is Lata’s mom. She said something about seeing you last night! Thank you for following up on that message; you don’t seem to have received any of my texts, so I thought I would try my had at a VM. It’s been so long since I left one! Again, thank you very much. When you find Bentley, let him know he was missed! I hope he is okay. That’s all, thanks! Goodbye!”

-beep-

           “What’s going on Torako? Why did you send me that cryptic message that you love me and that if you don’t message me again you failed? What are you failing? Are you doing something stupid? Please don’t do this Torako. Don’t do this to us. Please be safe. I love you. Be safe. Stay safe. We love you.”

-beep-

           “This is your Father. Please be careful. Your Dad is worried sick. We love you. Stay safe. Come home soon.”

-beep-

End of messages. Do you want to delete these messages? Select yes, no, or other options.

Other options selected. Your options are: respond with call, respond via VM, respond via text, respond via film video, select and archive messages, forward mes—

Respond with call selected. Which messages would you like to respond to? Please select the releva—

Message “What’s going on Torako? Why—” selected. Sender: Dad. Time: 3 hours ago. Are you sure you want to select this message? Yes or—

Understood. Calling in three…two…one.

-ring-

-ri—

           “Torako??!”

“Yo, hey Dad. Uh. Hi. How are you.”

“Torako?? Are you okay?? Where are you, what’s going on, is everything all right, what in the Fathomless Seas made you send such a frightening message?”

“So, funny story.” A laugh. “Not funny, but I’m more or less okay, only minimally hurt and traumatized. It’s fine. Also we’re outside right now.”

Silence.

“Outside??”

“Yeah, and uh,” Torako said, “Bentley’s been through shit and there’s some stuff we haven’t told you. So like. Yeah. Don’t scream when you come outside.”

Footsteps. “Scream, why would I scream?”

Opening door. Quick inhale, then the start of a scream before it is muffled behind a hand.

“I’ll explain everything, I promise,” Torako said. “Can we…come in?”

A pause. When spoken, the voice is a little strained. “Okay. Come in please.”

“Thank you, now let me just—” A click, and a dial tone that cuts out.

           The study was large and well-lit by two giant windows. Their thin, magically reinforced glass panes somehow seemed to let in more sunlight than they should be capable of, like they were capturing brightness and magnifying it to a subtle degree. There was a slightly dusty off-white desk in front of the shorter window at the head of the room. Stacks of books and papers and tablets towered in neat, short little hills, and there was an old-fashioned ballpoint pen sat in the middle, near a clear space for the user to sit at and work. A pair of archivists gloves was nearby, and a desk lamp floated at one corner. At the other corner, there was a small vase with two bright orange lilies caught in stasis.

           Runes flared along the edges of the ceiling, turning brighter and brighter until they burst in a small thunderclap of sound. The wallpaper tore, burned, and ash rained down on the formerly pristine room. It dotted the long red couch perpendicular to the desk in deceptively soft flakes, fragile and dangerous all at once. Flakes of burning wallpaper continued to fall down even as another presence filled the room, blacks and golds and browns and pale skin. Alcor the Dreambender cast his gaze about the room, face utterly still as he took it all in. The ash did not touch him. Nobody entered the room.

           He blinked, long and languid, at the floor to ceiling storage shelves containing all matter of memorabilia and research materials. He stared out the window at the deep, endless ocean, waves crashing against the cliffs below. He set his eyes on the desk, inhaled, and then drifted closer. With one gloved hand, he picked up one of the stacked antique books—Gleeful, Silent, Ferocious—and looked through it, flipping the pages slowly. He paused on one and read it more carefully, then snorted. “They get the funniest ideas,” he said, and he shut the book, set it on the desk carefully.

           Then he tilted his head at the tome. It had some wrong bits, but it wasn’t all that bad. There were a few that were decent, actually. Dipper tugged them from under the other stacks, sending them sliding down and across the desk. Torako would like them, he thought. And a couple were like, super rare, so if nothing else she could sell them online and get bank.

           Alcor slid the books into his stomach, feeling a little sick at the memory of pulling the three of them out of him: Bentley unconscious and with a sluggish heartbeat, Torako wide-eyed and trembling and barely keeping it together, Haji freaked out beyond measure. He’d made a deal—those memories for the means to get out of Kabul and somewhere safe—but Torako had refused to, clutching Bentley to her with a wild, nearly feral look on her face. But they were safe, now. They were safe.

           Though, Dipper thought as he considered exactly what he’d just done with the books, he’d still be careful about pulling them out in front of people. Maybe he wouldn’t pull them out in front of Bentley or Torako at all. Yes. That was the safest option. Torako’s dads would also possibly mind it if he extricated the books from his demonic bowels via tentacle too, thinking about it. Alone. Alone it was.

           He then looked up at the splash of orange, the lilies in the crystal vase, spinning slowly midair. Alcor the Dreambender reached out, and his gloves melted away so that his bare fingers could touch the petals. Lurid. Bright. Beautiful.

           If he’d gotten his hands on Fantino’s soul, they would have either been eaten, or would have suffered debilitating allergies to flowers for the next several lives.

           Instead Dipper withdrew his fingers and looked at the flowers. Then, he reached out again, blue fire sparking along the channels of friction ridges in the pads of his fingers, and touched them. The fire sputtered, then flared, consuming the flowers and shooting down the line of magic tethering them to the desk. Dipper stared at it, looked through the desk to the manuscripts of new publications in progress, and smiled. The fire wouldn’t stop until the house burned down.

           Dipper stayed a moment longer just to see the books and the desk and the tablets burst into flame, and then he blipped out of the study and its long, beautiful windows and its pristine pale features. The windows caught the light inside and amplified it, gently, subtly, to glow a soft blue that didn’t alarm the neighbors until it was too late for anything of Dr. Vallian Fantino to be saved.

           The air was heavy with salt, enough that when Bentley opened his mouth and breathed he could taste it on his tongue. It was also heavy with the sound of the tide, crashing and crumbling and receding with the tide. This beach was empty because of the dangerously sharp rocks tumbling on the seafloor not even two meters in from the edge. Honestly, though, that suited Bentley just fine, early in the morning with the night coolness still clinging to the breeze. Bentley closed his eyes, and breathed it in.

           It had been five days since they’d gone home, to Torako’s parents, and he still wasn’t tired of the feeling of natural air against his skin. He was tired of having to eat soft, bland food, and was tired of how odd it felt to go to the bathroom, but he wasn’t tired of being somewhere that rubbed against his skin and filled his chest with thrumming energy. He wasn’t tired of being able to refuse to go to a hospital, and instead have a hospital come to him.

           He also wasn’t tired of the feeling of sand on his skin. Bentley smiled, and wriggled his feet deeper into the soft sand. When he opened his eyes, the residual magic of it glimmered, just enough to be noticed but not enough to be distracting. It was nice. It was okay. It would be okay.

           Out further, where the sand became damp and the waves foamed with the force of their collisions, the water also glimmered, deep and dark like Dipper sometimes was. Bentley could see it now, more than ever: Dipper’s continuing influence on the islands, even after a long two millennia. It would have been something that explained how Dipper was able to hide his energy signature here so well. It would have been something Bentley’s Dad would have loved to know. Bentley set his face in his hands, his elbows on his knees, and looked out to sea.

           “What would you have thought of all this?” Bentley wondered out loud. The wind picked at his short hair, his long sleeves and his pants, and he felt cold despite the relative warmth. He thought about Fantino, and said, “What do you think of me now?”

           “What does who think of you now?”

           Bentley stiffened, but let out a deep breath and looked up over his shoulder. “Torako,” he said, and the warmth inside him wasn’t fake even if his dumb brain wouldn’t let go of the fact he’d dreamed about her being mean. Ugh.

           “Me? I think you’re pretty great,” she said, a crooked smile on her face. She dug her toes into the sand, sandals hanging from two hooked fingers. Bentley let out a fond, exasperated sigh.

            “Thanks,” Bentley said. “I think you’re pretty great too. Most of the time, at least.”

           Torako gasped and held her hand over her heart. “Only most of the time? Your conditional love wounds me.”

           Bentley snorted. “Sit down already, you goof.”

           She laughed and sat, legs stretching out, heels digging long trenches into the soft sand. Bentley watched how the morning sunlight glinted off the scars running root-like over her shins and calves, tangled and thin and innumerable. They too glimmered with magical byproduct. Everything glimmered these days, just about.

           “Hey.” Torako nudged his shoulder with hers. “It’s not a big deal, doesn’t even hurt.”

           “Because the doctors caught it in time to mitigate the damage, you mean.” Bentley shut out false memories of physical and emotional abuse and leaned into her. “Otherwise, you might have barely been able to walk because it would have hurt you so much.”

           Torako hummed. “Eh.”

           “Your bones had been shattered and then fused back together,” Bentley said. “You’re lucky it was fresh enough and magical enough that they could do a localized rewind on the bones.” Curses weren’t generally regarded as lucky, but in this case it was lucky that they could treat Torako’s leg as a curse.

           “Not the end of the world.” Torako shifted her legs so that her ankles crossed. Sand clung, dry, to her toes. “Besides, it didn’t happen, I’m fine. It’s a non-issue at this point, unlike you.”    

           This time, Bentley gasped and held his hand over his heart. “I’m an issue?” He knew when to leave something alone, even if shattering and melting was pretty damn traumatizing in his book.

           “Shut up, you’re not,” Torako said, grinning. She tousled his hair, and he hid a smile behind one hand at the familiarity. “No, I’m talking about what that place did to you—and don’t say it’s just cosmetic, you little shit.”

           Back at you, Bentley thought but didn’t say. “I mean,” he said instead, waving a hand at his face, “It kind of is? I look very different, and the nurse that visited said there wasn’t anything physically wrong with me.”

           “Pssh, I don’t need a nurse to tell that you’re also cold, like, all the time.” She pulled him closer and he let her, because he was cold and she looked very warm. “And you look at stuff funny sometimes, and you haven’t touched sigils since coming back, and the theft detector at the grocery store screamed at you going in. I think we need another specialist to come in to see you, actually.”

           “Let’s not. Also, the detector wasn’t my fault.” Bentley frowned at the waves further out, not because they had done anything wrong but because the grocery store experience had been awful. He would have made the very bad decision of running away if Torako hadn’t been with him, and if she hadn’t been shaking herself. They’d ended up just going home and letting her dads do the shopping.

           “Yes, that is true. But they never went off on you before, so that place absolutely did something to you. Somethings, even.”

           Bentley took a deep breath. He closed his eyes, then gave her a little noncommittal hum and snuggled into her. She was warm, as he’d thought. Torako slid her hand into his. He listened to her heartbeat, steady against the backdrop of crashing waves. They curled further into each other in silence. Bentley ended up with his legs slung over the valley of her lap, head resting at the hollow of her collarbone, her chin nestled on top of his head. Her arms were secure around him. It was…nice.

           He’d almost drifted off when she asked, “So what’s next?”

           The first somewhat intelligible sound he made was “Huh?” It was also probably the third of fourth sound he’d made, the first few being byproducts of transitioning into clearer awareness. Somewhere in the distance, seabirds called out. The horn of a fishing boat sounded, the blare of it softened by space. Bentley let out a slow breath, content.

           “What do we do now?” Torako asked. “Somehow, even if by some miracle I graduate, I don’t think that Officer Akuapem would support me entering the police force. And will you even go back to work? What do we—what happens, after the shit that we just went through?”

           Bentley cracked his eyes open. Before him, the beach stretched on into the horizon, buildings rising out of it and pressing up, up into the sky. On the left was the sea, dark with crests of white, shimmering with sunlight and supernatural energy. “I’ve been considering it. Going back, I mean. But…”

           Torako squeezed his hand, and waited for him to answer.

           “Sigils are…hard.” Bentley looked at their hands, at his mismatched fingers interspersed between hers. “And I don’t think I’ll stay there forever. Plus, you’re higher priority. I’ll go wherever you need to.”

           “No, silly, I go where you go.” She hugged him tighter. “You were in there a long time. You call the shots.”

           “And you found me,” Bentley murmured. He shifted back so he could look her in the eyes, so that she knew how much she meant. How much she mattered. “You searched long and hard and found me. I wouldn’t have…” he stopped, suddenly filled with shame and guilt and horror. He looked away, to the sea.

           Torako leaned forward to kiss him on the forehead. “You would have died,” she said. “You would have killed yourself.” Her voice shook a little when she said the words for him.

           Bentley swallowed against the stiffness of his throat, because she was right, and because he couldn’t say it. He knew it, but he couldn’t say it.

           “And that…” Torako took a deep breath. She pulled him back to her with soft but firm hands. “That really upsets me. Really. But you were—alone, and desperate, for so so long, so. I understand. It’s not okay but…I understand.”

           He squeezed her hand, watched the waves crumble into the sand. Watched them pull back, and do it over, and over, and over.

           “And we’re going to talk about that, as soon as you’re ready. First, though—what’s next? We can’t stay with my dads forever. Tyrone just about gives them a heart attack every time he shows up, I’m sure of it. They’re going to snap eventually.”

           Bentley managed a short laugh. “Yeah.” He breathed in, then out, then in and asked, “What do you want?”

           “Me?”

           “Yeah,” he said. “I might be able to do remote work. So. What do you want?”

           This time, Torako was silent, and Bentley waited.

           “I don’t want to make you upset,” Torako said at length.

           “You won’t.” Bentley turned and pressed his cheek to her collarbone.

           She still hesitated. Birds called, the ocean sang a symphony, and somebody let out a jubilant shout for whatever reason, and Torako remained silent next to him.

           Bentley shifted to press a kiss to her collarbone instead of his cheek, and then slid his forehead to the same spot. “I promise.” If he got upset, he’d get over it.

           Torako let out a sigh of frustration. “Like, I miss it. Cult bashing. Parts of it, I mean, not everything. Being away from you sucked a lot.”

           He hummed to let her know he was still listening.

           “And I hate that you were missing. Like, even cult bashing, when I knew you were safe, I hated it. When I didn’t know? Hell. It was stressful, I was always tired, Dipper was a mess and I was a mess and everything was awful. Except, it kind of wasn’t. Looking back, there were parts I liked, you know?”

           When she didn’t continue immediately, Bentley prompted, “Like?”

           She nuzzled her nose into his hair. “Putting pieces together,” she murmured. “Not having all the bureaucratic tape to deal with. The thrill, sometimes. Imminent danger, not so much, but the adrenaline was…nice.”

           This wasn’t upsetting at all, though Bentley could maybe see why she thought he would think so. He didn’t say that yet, though. “So what’s next then?”

           There was a moment where all he heard from her was her breath, and then she asked, “You’re not upset?”

           “No,” he said. “So, tell me—what’s next?”

           “I,” she said. Then, she laughed and she tousled his hair again. “I asked you first, fishbrains! What’s next, huh, Bentley?”

           “Hey!” He swatted at her hand and rolled off her lap to kneel next to her. She was smiling, hair still slightly damp from her morning shower, tank-top sliding off her right shoulder. Her eyes gleamed with something that wasn’t magic, but Bentley almost felt was. Fondness blooming gentle in him, he raised his hands and cradled her face between them. Her smile slipped, eyes wide, and she looked at him like he was the most amazing thing in the world.

           He loved her, he realized again. He loved her like he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. He didn’t love her like he wanted to engage in any kind of kissing, or groping, or even dating, but he wanted—he wanted. He wanted her with him for the rest of his life, and it was a realization that he’d made a long time ago but still didn’t know quite what to do with. Torako was—vibrant, and wonderful, and he’d long resigned himself to the possibility of another person wedging themselves between them, better and stronger. And maybe it wasn’t a healthy thought; pan trios, and quads, and even quints existed in the world, but something in him didn’t want another person. The rest of him knew that was selfish, and wrong, and that if Torako wanted to go, if she needed to go—he wouldn’t get in the way.

           But by the seas and the stars did he love her.

           “We…take it a day at a time,” he said.

           “That’s specific,” she said, eyebrows quirking and mouth slanting up, cockeyed.

           “Oh hush. We take it a day at a time,” he said again. “We figure our shit out as we go, and know that things’ll go wrong but that’s okay. We talk.”

           “I would hope so.”

           He smooshed her cheeks in, and she laughed, eyes squinting almost shut with joy. Bentley laughed at the sight of her.

           Gripping her cheeks between his fingers and pulling them out a little, he said, “We do stupid shit and try new things and try old things again. We…don’t stay on Minte de Daos, because, you know, Tyrone.”

           Torako reached out and grabbed his own face, so he quickly let go of her cheeks. She smirked at him. “Good plan. Very detailed.”

           “And,” he said, shuffling closer. The sand shifted around him. “We go back home. You see about school, I see about doing work away from work and cutting it down to part time, because I’m…messed up.” He bit his lip, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath before soldiering on. “I’m messed up, and I need help but I can’t get it because of what exactly went down. So I do my best to help myself. And I do my best to help you help yourself.”

           Torako nodded. Her palms relaxed against his cheeks. “Yeah. I can’t be your therapist, and you can’t be mine.”

           “And then, when you’re done with school…you look into options. Like, I don’t know, a private investigator.”

           She wrinkled her nose. “Ugh, that’s so much paperwork.”

           “So something else,” Bentley said, just as he heard a soft noise, like something tearing, like the sound of smoothing out a sheet of paper. “We can—we can figure it out as we go. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

           “What are we figuring out as we go?” Dipper asked. “And why are we holding each other’s faces?”

           Bentley looked up at Dipper, staring down at the both of them. Torako did the same. Dipper’s eyes were black and gold, even though the rest of him was as human as possible. “What to do next,” Bentley said.

           “Yeah, Tyrone,” Torako asked. “What’s next?”

           Dipper frowned at them. He pressed his lips together, and something flashed across his face before he shoved it down. Bentley’s smile dimmed, and he opened his mouth to—apologize? Say something?–when Dipper grinned wide and a little too sharp, and said, “There’s lots of options, but apparently one ends with either Torako or Bentley with sand up to their necks, so. There’s that!”

           Bentley looked at Torako, her face framed by his hands. Torako looked at him, and squished his cheeks a little. Then Torako looked up, smiled prettily in that way that made Bentley’s internal alarms scream with urgency, and said, “I think you left out an option,” before tackling Dipper into the sand. Dipper squawked and went down flailing his limbs and sending beach flying everywhere.

           “Get off! I am an almighty creature of pure energy!”

           Torako caught Bentley’s eye over her shoulder, and he grinned. With a little trepidation, a little nervousness, he sunk his finger into the sand. There was a moment after where he stared at the sand, its magic, and wondered if this was really such a good idea. He’d caused a lot of damage, back in the pocket dimension. The sand had power of its own, who knew how that would interact?

           Dipper screeched, Torako laughed, and Bentley drew a sigil. Behind them, the ocean undulated, waves cresting white out of the darkness of the water, seafoam fizzing against the porous sand of the shore. The tides moved, the currents shifted according to latent, now natural energy. Above, seabirds called and searched for food. A fishing boat pulled in its haul, protected by spells to ensure it wouldn’t lose any of its catch to mercenary fowl. A man on the beach a kilometer away kept staring at his phone and grinning. The mermaid civilization a few clicks away wove new birthing homes into being. A children’s class practiced hula on the shore, a cervitaur held up a shell to the sun to see how the light shone through, an old married couple held hands and walked, slow, along the tide where the sand was wet and firm and their rings glinted in the early morning.

           The world glimmered, bright.

[phan-of-the-pen]

I Dare You To Stay: Chapter 12

HI YALL IVE GOT A NEW CHAPTER OUT OF THE BLUE THAT I JUST WROTE BC @dansyellowshirt AND AN ANON WERE LOVELY AND MADE ME SMILE SO IVE BEEN TYPING FURIOUSLY FOR THE PAST HOUR OR SO ENJOYYYY

Tags for chapter: F L U F F, kissing

Words for chapter: ~2.7k

Fic Summary: Dan Howell is a barista working a shitty job, frequenting his shitty apartment, and living a shitty existence, hiding his asexuality and going for a PHD in self-depreciation and depression. Phil Lester is a part-time intern, part-time employee at a local weather station, trying to get experience in his field and make a name for himself, while juggling a second job at the nearby Tesco’s to give him some financial breathing room. Their paths were never supposed to meet, but what happens when they do anyways, one rainy day in Manchester?

(ao3!)

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~~~~~~~~~~

When Dan woke up it was dark in his flat. The television was off—which was not how Dan remembered leaving it—and none of his lights were on. The only source of light in the whole flat were the blinds on his big window being drawn, letting the moonlight filter into the room and giving everything the softest edge.

He groaned after a moment of realizing that he was awake, shuffling his body a little to try and get more comfortable. It was dark—obviously he wasn't supposed to be awake yet if the sun wasn't even up so why the fuck was he?

Dan started to try and think back to what had happened earlier to put him in this position, however, when he started to move, whatever he was lying on top of shifted as well and let out a soft-yet-very human sound. Dan held his breath and suppressed a scream. What the fucking hell-

Dan tried to jerk his body up into a sitting position only to fail due to some kind of weight resting on the small of his back. His heart still racing, Dan snapped up his neck instead of his whole body only to come face-to-face with Phil's sleeping one.

What the goddamn hell-

Oh.

Everything came rushing back to him all at once, and relieved at the fact that he hadn't been tied down to his couch by burglars or something just as utterly ridiculous in his sleep, Dan let out a breath and relaxed against Phil, feeling the anxiety in his system start to drain out.

His peace of mind didn't last long, though, because half a heartbeat later he was blushing horribly and his head was already thinking of a million different excuses to...to explain whatever this was.

Phil was lying on his back on the sofa, head propped up against the armrest. Dan was curled on top of him, his head tucked under Phil's neck and right up on his chest (Dan had a feeling that Phil's chin had been resting on his head while they had both been asleep. The thought made his heart race a little bit faster). Their bodies were tangled together under the duvet, their legs intertwined and Phil's arms cast around Dan's waist, Dan's own arms pulled under himself. The duvet itself was draped over the both of them in a bit of a mess, slipping off of the sofa and onto the floor at the one corner.

Dan glanced up once again. Phil's face was smushed comically against the junction of the back of the couch and the armrest, mouth parted and hair sticking up in more ways than what was probably physically possible. His glasses—when the fuck had they appeared?—were askew and slipping off the bridge of his nose. Dan felt a dopey smile spread across his face. Phil was adorable when he was sleeping but still as much of an endearing mess as he was when he was awake. Unbelievable.

He reached up and lifted the black frames from Phil's face, gently to try and avoid waking the older man. Phil didn't even stir, and Dan twisted around, reaching with his arm out to place the glasses on his coffee table. Phil grumbled in his sleep at Dan's fidgeting and brought his arms a little tighter around Dan's waist, one of his legs twitching. Dan snorted out of amusement, but settled back into place and held himself still.

Under normal circumstances, Dan's head would be going crazy. He would be unconsciously psychoanalyzing everything in the situation and he would be doubting himself in his normal manner. But in a pleasant change of heart—or mind, rather—his head was staying blissfully quiet. Dan didn't have an explanation for it; it might have been because of waking up not too long ago, or maybe because he had absolutely exhausted himself with all of his emotional distress lately, or something else. Regardless, Dan wasn't going to force it. The quiet thoughts were a welcome change.

Dan let his eyes drift up past Phil's face and to the exposed window and the stars outside of it. He had always loved to look at the stars ever since he was younger, and now that he was laying on top of Phil, letting himself be held, his head quiet, everything was so much better. If time decided to freeze right at this moment, Dan wouldn't even care.

~~~~~

The next thing Dan knew, he was yawning and cracking his eyes open.

He groaned from the light nearly blinding him as soon as he lifted his eyelids even a little bit, and moved to tuck his face into the couch cushions, but ended up snuggling down further into the duvet still draped over him and shifting his whole body as well to try and get more comfortable. Dan started to nod off once more, when he suddenly realized that he was alone on said sofa.

Picking his head up and blearily opening his eyes, Dan looked around the lounge. He didn't see Phil anywhere, but his glasses weren't on the coffee table anymore.

Did he leave?

Dan jumped as a loud yelp sounded form the kitchen and as well as what Dan could only guess was something metal—a fork or knife, maybe—clattering to the ground.

"Phil?"

Dan didn't get an answer, but he could hear Phil muttering to himself in the background, so very reluctantly, Dan rolled off of the couch and tugged the duvet tighter around his shoulders, not willing to give up the comfort just yet. Dan padded into the kitchen. A large handful of his cabinets were open and there were two bowls of cereal on the counter, the box of Crunchy Nut that Dan had left on the floor yesterday next to the poured cereal. Phil was bent over, picking up a spoon from the floor, which was probably what Dan had heard falling.

"Phil?" Dan said again, with a bit of a yawn this time, rubbing his eye. He was tired as hell.

Phil jumped about a dozen feet into the air and dropped the spoon yet again, it clattering away from Phil's foot. Phil spun around with a hand on his chest, eyes wide.

"Dan! You scared me!"

"Phil," Dan sighed, rolling his eyes a little but smiling nonetheless, "sometimes I'm surprised by you, really."

"Look, here I am trying to get us both a nice breakfast-"

"Of cereal? Scratch that, of my cereal?"

"Oh shut it. Like I said, here I was, being the perfect guest and you just scare me. Rude." Phil said, sticking his tongue out and picking up the dropped silverware. He slid the now-dirty spoon into Dan's sink and went to reach for another, but Dan stopped him.

"Don't bother, I don't think I have any milk to pour in anyways, so we don't really need spoons as long as you don't have some weird 'no-eating-with-hands' thing I need to know about." Dan walked over and picked up his bowl of cereal, giving Phil a little, appreciative smile. "C'mon, we can eat in the lounge on my couch."

Dan didn't really wait for Phil, but he could hear him moving—presumably—to follow Dan. As an afterthought, Dan called over his shoulder, "And close the cabinet doors!" to which Phil replied with a very indignant sounding "Yes, mum!"

Within a few moments of Dan dropping himself back onto the couch, Phil was there as well, sitting on the other end, their legs both in the middle and on top of each other. Dan was reminded of a few nights ago, with them playing video games, his feet draped over Phil's lap, and what happened after. Dan looked at Phil out of the corner of his eye. He didn't really mind if he could get the chance to kiss Phil again. But the question was; did Phil?

They ate in silence, but it wasn't an oppressive one, just the two of them munching and enjoying each other's company. Dan's thoughts were still a little hopeful, a little wary, but he tried to keep them tame enough to not show; he didn't want to ruin this with his insecurities.

Dan finished his breakfast first, and he tapped his fingers against the ceramic for a few moments before he gave in.

"Hey, Phil?"

"Yeah?"

He had to know.

"Last night you said we wouldn't talk about anything until I slept, and well...I don't have work for-" Dan looked at the clock on his wall, "-another hour." He purposely left half of his question unsaid, and Phil nodded in understanding, making Dan simultaneously breathe out a little sigh of relief and tighten his grip on his bowl in anxious anticipation.

"Just because of time, I don't think we should talk about anything too heavy," Phil began, finishing the bite in his mouth and swallowing, "but, I think you're right. We do have a bunch of stuff to sort out."

"Mhm...what do you, uh, want to sort out then?" Dan asked. He felt nervous and unlike earlier, he was sure that it showed with how his fingers wouldn't stop moving along the ceramic and how his shoulders were tense and pulled tight to his body.

Phil just smiled and plucked the empty bowl from Dan's hand, putting both of their bowls on the table near them and scooting forward. Phil clasped one of their hands together, and with the skin-on-skin contact his heart started to beat a little bit happier in his chest. Phil leaned in until their faces were close enough for Dan to see the starbursts of his eyes, and let his other hand fall to the side of Dan's head.

"Can I kiss you, Dan?" Phil asked, his voice low.

"Yes," Dan breathed, his voice even quieter than Phil's.

This kiss wasn't like the ones they shared that night. It was softer, but still filled to the brim with emotion. These emotions, however, weren't like the powerful, fast, desperate ones that had dominated their kisses before. They were much more gentle, filled with a more soothing warmth, and—dare he say it—drenched in a feeling that Dan couldn't help but think as something similar to adoration.

Phil's mouth was warm and his lips were velvet soft, dragging across Dan's, his thumb brushing Dan's cheekbone over and over, making Dan's head spin. Dan's eyes had long drifted closed, and he just let himself relax into the cushions, absolutely melting under the kisses Phil was giving him.

He nipped at Dan's lip and pulled back, Dan's head following him until his neck just wouldn't stretch anymore and he had to let it fall back against the sofa, a pout on his features but not even caring if Phil saw.

"Phil, come back," Dan whined. Phil giggled at his antics, but decidedly didn't lean back in to kiss Dan breathless like he wanted him to. Instead, Phil brought their linked hands up so they could both see them and started to play with Dan's knuckles.

"Dan, I wasn't kidding when I said I've fallen for you, completely and utterly. You're Dan Howell and you have my heart, right here in your hands." Phil squeezed Dan's hand with his own. "I would love nothing more than if you gave me the chance to be your boyfriend. To take you out on dates, and watch shitty Netflix movies with, and dance in the kitchen with at 3AM when we certainly should be sleeping, and, yes, to play with your hair just like you said you love. I want to kiss you and surprise you at the coffee shop and do all the cheesy things couples do." Phil leaned in and dropped a series of little, feather-light kisses to Dan's forehead. "What do you say," he whispered, "will you give me the chance?"

"Phil," Dan said, drilling his eyes shut. He could feel his insecurities rising again, just as illogical as usual, and just as self-depreciative. "I can't love you completely, like how you deserve. If we were to date—and god, do I want to date you—you'd have to give up sex because I'm sorry but I'm too sex repulsed to try and do anything with you, and I'd never be able to stand anything like an open relationship, and-"

"Dan, Dan, shhh," Phil said, starting to stroke Dan's cheek again. It was incredibly soothing, and helped settled some of Dan's racing thoughts. "I don't care. I don't care. I can live perfectly content with never having sex again for the rest of my life if I have you, Dan. You are a thousand times better than sex, alright? And you can love me completely even if you aren't sexually attracted to me. I don't need physical pleasure to be happy or be loved 'as I deserve' even if that's what your ex and parents told you when you came out. All you need is love to give, and I have a feeling that you have a lot of that from shutting yourself out for so long."

Their gazes were connected, and Dan didn't know if he was going to start crying or laughing—maybe both. Phil was smiling gently, his eyes so tender in their expression, and Dan wanted nothing more than to kiss this man, to kiss him and hug him and just hide them both away from the world to just be happy together.

So that's what Dan did.

Dan surged forward, wrapping his arms around Phil's shoulders and pulling him in, their mouths crashing together. Dan kissed him like he was a dying man and he was trying to commit the feeling of Phil's mouth to memory, and Phil returned the sentiment just as eagerly, carding his hands through Dan's hair and following every press of Dan's lips with his own.

God, why did Dan ever try and deny himself from falling in love with Phil? Why did he get so caught up in being scared of what happened in the past to enjoy the future? Why didn't he start kissing this man sooner?

Dan didn't know any answers to his questions, but fuck it didn't matter.

They broke away because they had started to run out of air and Dan brought his hands up to Phil's face, cupping it, and nodding, shaking his head up and down furiously, moisture shining in his eyes. He couldn't help it—he didn't remember the last time he had felt. So. Loved. And. Accepted.

"Yes, yes yes yes, Phil, god, I'd want nothing more," Dan whispered, chasing his own words with little kisses on Phil's cheeks, his nose, his forehead, everywhere.

Phil's entire face lit up like the fucking sky and a smile blinding enough to shadow the sun took over his face. He brought them back together, and this time their kiss was slow, both of them smiling into it, wrapped up in each other.

"Daniel Howell, you just made me the happiest man on this side of the Thames."

~~~~~

No matter how much Dan might not have wanted to, they had to disentangle themselves much sooner than preferable because Dan had to shower and get ready for work. He had already been let off the hook by Jaime once, and he refused to leave her hanging like that for a second day in a row. Plus, he needed the money desperately.

However, things were different than his normal routine. Because when he got out of the shower, Phil kissed him on the way in. Because Phil was standing in his kitchen, scrolling on his phone, in Dan's own clothes because Phil only had his Tesco's uniform and he had already slept in it last night. Because they had walked out together, Phil's hand snaking down to intertwine in Dan's within a block of leaving Dan's flat. Because Phil had gone out of his way to walk Dan to work even if it was in the opposite direction of his own flat. Because Phil kissed Dan sweetly on the lips before letting him go, promising to stop in later.

But as Dan walked in the shop, a million emotions swirling in his chest, threatening to burst, they settled, each one fluttering away until only one was left, making Dan's limbs feel light and warm, putting a dumbstruck smile on his face that he knew would end up lasting the whole day.

Dan was happy.

And he wouldn't change it for the world.

[sunshowers-and-sunflowers]

I tried to write about love

I posted this piece on fet and some man told me to “Go fishing and talk to someone” but the joke is on him bc I HATE fishing.

Admittedly I did come in hot...I tried to clean it up for tumblr so it doesn’t get taken down. TW: mentions of abuse and toxic relationships, blood and consensual acts of harm. Oh and suic*de

One of the only reasons I haven’t killed myself is because I know love is real.

 If I had never experienced it, I might have ended my own suffering. But every day I wake up and I remember what it felt like to be in love. And I can’t die when there is a possibility, I could feel that way again.

 I love a lot of people. Actively and passively every single day.

My platonic love is overwhelming. It’s a bright orange, like creamsicles with the soft pale-yellow swirl. It is messages asking about your day. It is always paying for lunch. It is a text exactly one hour after you left asking if you made it home safely. It is a warm blanket draped over you while you fall asleep watching a movie with me. It is a warm hand placed on your arm accompanied by the warmest most sincere smile I can muster. It is holding you while sobs rack your body and you shiver in my arms. It is absorbing your punches as you scream their name, pound my chest and curse. It is slowly rubbing circles with my thumb while we hold hands. It is carrying napkins, tissues, chapstick, change, extra sunglasses and a snack at all times. Just in case you need it. It is sending you positive encouraging messages reassuring you of your brilliance. It is four-hour long phone calls while you talk, and I nod along even though you can’t see my face. It is a handmade card for your birthday even though we’re nearly 23. It is remembering your parents, grandparents and siblings’ names. It is a soft kiss planted on your forehead. Rustling your hair. Laughing until I cry even though your joke definitely was not that funny. It is playing the same three songs when you get in my car because I know you like them. It is being the voice of reason. Reminding you to study instead of go out. There is no scolding, but a silent disappointment when you make the “wrong” decision. It is a heavy sigh when you tell me about repeated behavior that is causing you pain. It is a firm but gentle nudge forward towards your dreams. It is holding you accountable for your actions. It is forgiving you. Your favorite words fall into my vocabulary and when I catch them coming out of my mouth I can’t help but smile and think of you. It is seeing your favorite things and texting you a picture. It is searching for the perfect meme that I know you’ll love. It’s spending too much money on gifts and wanting to spoil you with material items because I am not good at expressing my love with words. It is a privilege to be by your side and watch you grow. It can be intense, but it is always soft.

 My familial love is a dark purple, the deepest color in a bruise. It is beauty even when there is pain. It is picking up after you. It is cooking your favorite meal and dropping it off at your house. It is calling you and hearing the same things I have heard since childhood. It is listening to the same story I have heard one hundred times but smiling and nodding along anyways. It is staring at old photos of us for too long. It is sneaking my cousins their favorite snacks. And not scolding them when they curse. And laughing at their stories. And never letting them win card games. It is ice cream during the hot summer. It is kissing their heads and whispering I love you and I can’t believe how big you’re getting. It is saying “I remember the day you were born” and choking up with tears. It is knowing I’d give the world to them if I could. It is holding my grandmother’s hand. Running my fingers through her hair. Listening to my grandfather talk about the Army, and every job he’s ever had. It’s remembering how he let me play games at the carnival even though I never won anything. It’s forgiveness. Forgiveness for all the things I needed that you could not provide. Forgiveness for the raising of voices, the breaking of dishes and the hurling of insults. It is never sharing how I felt as a child, because I know it would break you. It’s sitting in silence and watching HGTV with my father for five hours. It is sweeping his floors, and helping him fold laundry because I worry, he won’t do it without my help. It is watching TV with my mother even though she pauses the show and stretches a 30-minute show into almost 2 hours. It’s sitting down on the couch, and then being immediately asked to grab something and doing it anyways. It is birthday cards, and Christmas cards, and even Easter cards every single year. It is the soft rays of an early morning drive. It is the swelling in my chest when I remember you are all human. It is feeling satisfied, but still sad, that you tried your best and it was not enough.

Then there is the love that drives me. But I guess there isn’t just one.

The soft yellow, a warm ray of light slipping through the blinds. Looking straight at the sun and smiling.

The waking up at 11 am on a Sunday, limbs tangled, light spilling into the room, a barely audible hum and a feeling of peace. It is making chocolate chip pancakes with smiley faces that exist for ten minutes at most before you devour them. It is reaching across the table with a napkin to wipe your face. It is grabbing onto your forearm in public when I am scared. It is the intertwining of feet at the dinner table. It is grocery shopping together and running with the cart. It is laughing so hard that people start to stare. It is watching your favorite movie 100 times and not complaining once. It is waiting to watch the next episode of tv with you even though I’m dying to find out what happens. It is leaving love notes in your lunch. Or on the bathroom mirror. Or the refrigerator. It is sending you snapchats of ugly faces because I know it makes you laugh. It is standing on my tip toes begging for a kiss. It is holding hands while we eat dinner. It is waking up at 3 am and looking at your face, so moved by your existence that I start to cry.

 Then there’s an apple green.

Riding carnival rides and screaming together. Carving pumpkins and one of us definitely cuts our finger. It is singing karaoke and neither of us knows the chorus. It is pulling your pants down as you cut an apple in the kitchen but as I run away, I run into the wall. It is buying dinosaur band aids because I know you will love them. It is rolling the windows down and driving far over the speed limit while we both scream into the inky night. It is driving at the dead of night; darkness surrounds me and your snoring is so loud I cannot hear the radio. It is being horribly drunk in public, and I warn you about getting sick, but you keep drinking and we end up in the bathroom, me holding your hair back while you spill your guts. It is loud electronic music in a club as we flail our bodies around. Your face looks so good in neon flashing lights. It is doing dishes together and accidently flicking soap on you. It is the time I dumped noodles in a soap covered drainer and you never let me live it down. It is being sprawled out on the couch while you play video games, I scream at the TV pointing out all of your enemies as they shoot you dead. It is being selfish and not pausing the show even though you fell asleep 20 minutes ago. It is your morning breath that I can taste but don’t care because I have to kiss you as soon as I wake up. It is when you force me to cut your hair and my hands shake terribly but I am so moved by your trust in me. It is when you make me try new food and I hate it so you eat it all. It is anger when you say you don’t want any fries and then proceed to eat all of mine, but I don’t say anything. It is playing hide and seek in the aisles like we are children, not held down my societal expectations. It is holding back all the “I told ya sos”. It’s the absolute chaos sharing your life with another person brings. But god I’d take all the chaos in the world as long as you’re by my side.

There’s a lilac color. Like lavender.

It is so similar to platonic love. Picking up after you, seeing things and thinking of you, trying my best to make you happy. But it is different. It is running my fingers through your hair absentmindedly. It is leaving lipstick kisses all over your face. It is doing your laundry because it saves time. It is telling you my fears and hopes for the future. It is kissing all the spots on your body that you aren’t ready to love. It’s holding your hand when you try new things. It is listening to your hopes and dreams. It is encouraging you to be who you are inside. It is picking up your habits and being amazed when I catch myself doing them. It’s slipping your name into conversation with other people. It is laying on freshly cleaned sheets and listening to your heartbeat. It is our fingers intertwined during a nap. It’s getting used to your little quirks. It is finishing each other’s sentences. It is knowing your standard Chinese food order. It is going to corporate Christmas parties and watching you interact with all your co-workers as I stand in the corner. It is running a thumb across your lips. It is familiarity and comfort.

Then there’s a deep red. Like dried blood flecks on my face.

It’s the screaming and crying and shaking because I need you to understand me, but you just can’t seem to. It’s the splitting my knuckles on the wall that I punch out of frustration, and you gently wash my hands and bandage them in silence. It is the awkward silence when I meet your family and they just don’t seem to like me. It’s the pain that shoots across your face when they ask me “So what are you?”. It’s being curled in a ball on our bed, desperately sniffing your shirts because I haven’t seen you in days. It’s the white-hot pain that shoots through my body when your fist connects with my jaw. It’s the absence of air in my lungs, and the audible struggling as your fingers squeeze the life from me. It’s wearing pants in the summer because I can’t let anyone see all the bruises you’ve left on my thighs. It’s the strands of your hair, ripped from your head and grasped tightly in my fingers as you leave bite marks all over my body. It’s the slightest hint of blood on your back as my nails dig into your skin. It’s the sound of flesh hitting flesh in my car parked in an abandoned lot. It’s my backseat being covered in white and red fluid, clashing against my tan carpet. It is the smell of sweat. It is stained sheets. It is screaming into the void with you by my side, but not being sure what we’re screaming about.

It can be confusing. When it’s crying your name out. When it’s begging you to hurt me. When it’s feeling empty when I’m not with you. When it’s chains and shackles. When it’s warm breath pleading “Take the pain for me”. When it’s being covered in bruises. When it’s shaking uncontrollably when I’m with you. When it’s flinching when you go to touch me. When it’s crying in my room because you aren’t there. When you are all I can think about. It is a slightly metallic smell. Slightly off-putting but also intoxicating too.

But I know for sure what it isn’t.

It’s not emptying my first aid kit every month because we just seem to run through bandages like it’s nothing. It’s not sweeping up broken glass from our living floor. It’s not sweeping up pieces of ceramic in the kitchen. It’s not the smell of bleach as I scrub the spots of blood from the bathroom floor. It’s not the heat radiating from my cheeks as you humiliate me in public, in front of your friends because I dared to suggest you needed assistance in any form. It’s not crying. So many tears. It’s not waking up at 2 am to an empty bed. It’s not doing our laundry alone because you have worked 10 days straight. It’s not looking in the mirror and not recognizing who is looking back. It’s not cursing and screaming and crying and pulling away. It’s not knocking glasses off of tables as I run from you. It’s not waking up at 12 am to greet you as you come home from your closing shift, but finding you on the couch, talking to someone else through your headset. It’s not unanswered text messages. It’s not boiling water washing over me as I sit curled into a ball in our shower. It’s not wearing headphones and blasting music for a single second of peace. It is not our apartment filled with the sounds of chewing because we have nothing to say over dinner. It is not constant pain. It is not constant fear. It is not fearing for my safety.

I live every day because I think I might get to see the soft hazy yellows, or the bright candy apple greens. But the fear of rusty reds keeps me alone. It drives me to pull back from every encounter. It plants seeds of doubt in me.

And so, I settle.

I dream of those colors, while isolating myself. I consume literature and media that paints with such pretty colors. But me? I can’t imagine ever picking up a paint brush again.

And so I long for something I will never pursue.

I live knowing love is possible but not willing to risk it all again. Only to be left bloody, bruised and alone.

I’ve got no problem with blood, or bruises. But being alone while someone out there knows every inch of me?

I’d rather not.

[ts-seychelles]

EP. 2 - “Old Yeller Me Out Back” - DAN

Ep 2: So like, I'm annoyed because last round OF COURse, the other tribe picked to save jared. God i hope nicole goes because I don't want to deal with that shit every round its gonna be annoying.

the hosts are holding me hostage ;-; this is so sad. Lets see what tea I can spill. Roxy, Zach and I are basically in a poly and I think I'm gonna back stab him so I can only have Roxy for myself. I aint gonna share hurmph. Jealous wifeu. Oh and johnny idk if he backstabbed me but we were talking about dying so that's something

I was such a flop this first round, I’m literally embarrassed to still be here hahaha. I never would have played a game like this a year or two ago. Oh well, coming out of retirement has it’s disadvantages. As for the tribe, I feel really good about Ash and Dan and Augusto, they all seem great!! I want to work with those 3, I think an alliance would be great, but I don’t know yet how they feel about each other, so I’ll wait until I figure that out before I approach it. I want to try Jared, but it’s hard bc he’s been exiled so we really couldn’t strategize this round, idk who he wants to work with. I don’t feel good about JG, Frankie, Drake or Regan. Idk if they just don’t like me or if they wanna target me, but they have literally either ignored me/left me on read or had the most dry conversations with me. Like I’m so social, I can talk to anyone, but not brick walls, come on now. Ash told me yesterday that they were throwing my name around, which was terrifying. The only reason I didn’t vote earlier is bc I didn’t know if I was going to have to do something crazy. You can’t change your vote, so I didn’t wanna screw myself, but I guess that’s what I did anyway. I literally forgot about tribal, I was watching a damn Harry Potter movie totally clueless that I was getting a self-vote. So sorry hosts and audience, I don’t wish to disappoint and I am doing my best, but this is such a busy time for me. Hopefully I’ll still be here when my life is a bit less hectic. It’s exciting to be playing again, I just need to get my groove back hahaha

So Allison is gone..... am I sad about it? .......no.

Moving into this reward challenge, feeling pretty good about this team. We get along well, and a relatively quiet. Hope that's the same experience everyone else is having and it's not just me.

So far I’m in 0 alliances but I think that’s ok. In Ko Chang I was fresh off an ORG where I was a major goat and let someone else run my game and I wasn’t particularly nice to the other side, so I was a Nat10 essentially. Still got 4 votes tho by begging and pleading 😌😌😌😌but I went into Ko Chang wanting to change that and actually run the game to win and be respected, ended up getting blindsided for being too controlling, and now in an attempt to finish my business I’m trying to change my game AGAIN and succeed by building genuine relationships and I think I am. I actually like my tribe a lot and I think I could be legit friends with Ash and Augusta especially, vs last season I kinda disliked a lot of them on a personal level. I’m just gonna take it slow and build genuine relationships with people and be nice and maybe it’ll be what it takes for me to win.

Me throwing this reward challenge because I don't want anyone on my tribe to get closer to figuring out the idol has been found and I'm the one that has it? Sounds like a plan!! Crooks and Zach are "comparing" idol search notes with me and I'm scared because I was open with where I searched, but only because it was the FIRST FUCKING TIME LOOKING FOR IT!!! I didn't even know how to LIE about not finding the idol, but aye, at least I got one, so I'll take that as a W

https://youtu.be/6SiwJELGFp8

Okay so this rigging for Alex Crooks is UNREAL. First a graphic design challenge and now a music video challenge? Boiiii. I’m gonna kermit. I hate that this is how the game is starting. If we lose I hope I get sent to ghost island so I can chilllll. But they’ll prolly send JG or someone else who isn’t very active. *SIGH* I called with Jared for a little bit tonight. What a good seed. I probably talked too much game with him, but he seems really nice and all. Yeah he’s Nicole’s boyfriend, and that’s something I need to consider moving forward, but tbh my cold bitter gay heart felt warm talking to him. He actually made me genuinely laugh and seems like a nice kid. I’d be willing to get third for a Nicole/Jared final 2. I’d stan.

We won reward too! Let's just keep winning and not have to ever worry.

WOW We love an episode two winner edit starting to emerge!! Hi I'm Johnny. Some of you may know me a a sociopath, others may know me as the nice jewish frat boy, and others know me as the one who harassed Regan and overused VL Confessionals during Tumblr Survivor: Flops, but NONETHELESS..... Your king has arrived! tbh being cast for the season didn't surprise me, because I knew I was getting cast lowkey, but starting the game up and getting to see who is actually in this group of people is pretty stellar, and I'm pleased with it, especially me being on this tribe compared to being on the other tribe. I have started to feel confident in the social relationships that I'm working on, but lemme do a quick rundown ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- (Going down the line for initial trust) Mr Crooks - Well first off...... the last time we played together was over a year ago, in a little place called Japan, and it did NOT go well for him and I. I thought he was bad at conversations, he didn't want me to have a say, but just kinda vote with him instead, and he got VERY snippy at me when we were talking about getting rid of a villain, I proposed Sarah, and then he ran and told Sarah and almost got me sent home. But since then, Alex and I have become friends, and I think it's really good that we're in this game together. I am essentially going to play like a dickhead and try to make myself a top three person for everyone, and just hope that it can all get me to a swap or the merge, where I can start going wild. Nicole - I love Nicole to death. Another person i very much want to work with. I know the feeling may not be reciprocated, specifically from her boyfriend Jared on the other tribe, who has beef with me from Game Changers, but I am definitely hoping for the best now, and I think that her and I will definitely work together, at least in these early stages. Zach - Zach is one COOL motherfucker. Has a lot of super cool stories to tell, and we spoke a lot when we did 99 bottles together. He and I (and Alex) have been comparing notes for idol searches, so I think he wants to work with me. I can tell he still has some newb in him because he wanted to make a six person alliance with myself, him, Alex, Nicole, Vi and Roxy, but I just don't think a six person alliance is really what is going to help us at this point in the game.... it can only hurt us if certain people are smart enough, and I also don't trust certain people in that group :/ Ruben - Pretty solid dude. Just getting to know him, but he keeps talking about how I'm talking to him more than everyone else, so I'll take it as a win. Our conversations have been pretty one dimensional, but we spoke about who may be the first boot, so I'm not too nervous for THAT now Vilma - Another one I really think I can work well with in this game. She seems like such a nice soul, and I don't see that devilish side to her yet, but I'm sure it's going to come out at one point or another, but she seems very open, and I know doing 99 bottles with her is just going to initially keep me safe with her hopefully. Vi - Vi seems cool. I have been told she's a bit of a floater, I've seen it at times too, but I definitely don't think that she is going to be too much of a force, and if anything, her social game might lack, which can just help my positioning in this initial tribe. Would LOVE to work with Vi, especially dragging as many people who've done well in the past with me as deep as I can to keep other threats around me, but yea.... Vi is cool, and taught me how to make my own sushi, so we rollin Asya - I trust Asya, I want to work with Asya, but what I'm hearing the general consensus is that she isn't talking to people as much. I can agree I don't think our conversations have been STELLAR, but I definitely think we've spoken enough, so idk how everyone else is feeling, but I've heard a mix of Asya and Ricky being the least active... As long as it ain't me Roxy - I only trust Roxy now because I don't think she'd make the stab at me this early, and I'm trying my hardest to make her feel comfortable, werk up this ORG flirt I've got going on, and hope it takes me somewhere. We've played together twice in the past, and both times she has made a stab at me before I was able to make a stab at her, and I'm sure she's thinking the same thing in her mind, but also there are a lot of people who dislike each other and have beef, so hopefully Roxy can see me as a number for as long as possible and not make a move on me Ricky - I like you personally, but you've just been sick this whole time, and apparently you're friends with Roxy according to some people/what I've heard, so idk.... kind of scary, but we'll see what comes of us. I'll start talking to you more soon ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- So yea, there's my tribe... I know I like them all as people, which is going to help me spread myself thin within the tribe, I just need to keep reminding myself to not stick my neck out or try to do ANYTHING substantial until later. I've gotta keep my social relationships in tact, I've gotta play the field, lower my status a bit as someone who could be voted out, and just hope for the best. Having an idol in my pocket certainly helps, and with my LOVE of music videos right here, I think I have a chance to get some "This Is Me" redemption, if my tribe actually would rather do that over Immortals, since we literally only have two options because Isaac is a dumb thot. This also spells Andrew all over it bc I gave him an idea similar to this for a season we hosted together, so yea. I blame all the gays. THANKS !!

Regan is kinda annoying me with her woe is me shit, Don't get me wrong I still love her to death, however she's complaining in the tribe chat about every suggestion we make towards the music video, and then she comes crying to my dms about how shes going to get voted out for every little thing she does. She also threatened to quit as well which is really messy imo. Idk if I can stay allied with her for long as I dont want to associate myself with paranoid messes.

I woke up at camp yesterday morning and was PARCHED, just simply like.....dying of thirst. So I decide to go out to the well, and there's a cute little parchment sitting there. It has my name on it and everything so I'm like....it's TREEMAIL FOR ME? JUST ME?? Amazing. So, I open it up and....it's a Legacy ADVANTAGE. I am so hyped honestly, but I have absolutely no faith in me to actually use this correctly in any way shape or form. The names on it are Johnny, Andrew, Crow, Jared, Me. So that means Jared must've found it at Ghost Island and willed it to me BUT, that worries me for him because I feel like people will think he has it and will subsequently vote him out. Which would just leave me feeling guilty because I shot my boyfriend, got him sent to exile, he willed an advantage to me, then his tribe voted him out because of said advantage which I still have.....I love a moral dilemma. I actually hate it. I know if we lose immunity again, the tribe is going to want to send Regan to Ghost Island which means that they will probably 90% vote out Jared. But, then again I don't know the tribe dynamics over there. I should have more faith that Jared can make connections and more faith in him in general. He did make it to 2nd when I've only made it to third. I contemplated throwing this challenge just because I have more faith in Vi or Ruben being at the bottom of our totem pole than Jared being at the bottom of his just because his tribe seems.......not invested enough to think it's a smart strategic decision to literally keep him until merge, use us for numbers but then chuck us away because both of us can't win an individual immunity. But then the challenge was a music video which is virtually impossible to throw and even more impossibly able to do it in a light that's not suspicious. I need to solidify an alliance of some sort or something like...this is too wild. I get how me and Jared can be targeted because of the whole couple thing and the fact that we are um....both kind of amazing at this, not to flex but....we're amazing at strategic thinking it's kind of what we do and just how our minds are built, his moreso than mine. But, like I reaaaaaaaaaaaaallly hope I can allude to some sort of weakness that makes people keep me around much longer and him around much longer again on his tribe. I'm not saying their tribe is gonna lose immunity bc that's cocky but, if it does come down to our tribe flopping at it, I might be set. I think Johnny might try to get me out that little rat. But, besides that I think I would have Asya and Ricky on my side, and maybe even Zach. It's hard because Jared and I are....an inseparable duo. I would literally never vote him out unless he like, asked me to. I know how much he invests in these games and would never do that to him. If that ends up being my downfall, I feel like I can't really be mad about it. Like oops, cared too much about my boyfriend's feelings and got voted out of an online game :// Anyways in terms of the game, the Legacy Advantage is going to stay a secret. I'm not telling a single soul and I have faith in Jared to keep his mouth shut about it too, seeing as though he might know what I've gotten? I doubt it would be randomly given to me and he'd have to have some knowledge if his name is written down on the bottom of it too. So far my order of people I trust (most to least) is Ricky > Johnny > Alex > Roxy > Asya > Zach > Vilma > Ruben > Vilma and I just called Johnny a rat so that's saying something. I just feel like I'm about to get the rug pulled out from under me. Oiy vey.

I cannot believe that Isaac has tailor made the beginning of this game for me. Flag Making challenge? Great. Casanova? My only good flash game. Music Video Challenge? Yeet. I hope my tribe doesn't expect me to pull this much weight, but I think I solidified my spot in the tribe. As long as Regan and Dan never interact with me in this game I think I'm solid.

https://youtu.be/dWtZc9xEfNM

That last vote was the HARDEST and WILDEST vote in Tumblr Survivor history… said no one. As sad as I am that I never really got to know Allison and as concerned as I am that she’s doing alright (we really don’t know), I’m happy she left and we got that out of our system. Hopefully, this will allow us to win and do the damn thing! My only concern is that Samantha self-voted last tribal and that coupled with the fact that her name was on the chopping block somewhat makes me a bit nervous. That being said, this is a case of deja vu that should really just stay in the past. What I mean is that I’ve always been the type of person that looked out for other people and it’s bitten me in the ass. In Bhutan, I took out an alliance member because I valued my friendship with Ari and it ended up getting me out since she was seen as more valuable and I was untrustworthy. In Great Lakes, I gave up the chance at safety at Exile for Emmon to save an ally and it got me taken out since I was also seen as a major threat. Samantha is probably my closest ally here at the moment, but if she’s on a sinking ship, I don’t mind using the only life vest on myself for a change. I think I finally figured out that while I am someone who tries to stay loyal for the most part, if someone is digging themselves a hole during the premerge, you just have to let it happen. Maybe a big part of my unfinished business is minding my own.

(A LITTLE WHILE LATER)

Reward challenges are always a mixed bag as people don’t try as hard since it’s “just a reward” and while that may be true, advantages of any kind in a game like this shouldn’t be taken lightly. Think about it from this perspective, our tribe currently has lost one member and likely to lose another (fax, no printer rip) so if the other tribe wins an idol clue then they have yet another advantage over us. If we swap next round like I think we might, a numbers disadvantage and the likelihood of not having a power just ruins our chances. But anyways, this wasn’t our challenge to win because this game is MESSY and people (coughAlexcough) are good at like everything. But yeah, I just wanted to put that out there cause it was on my mind. Also, I’m super happy that Jared’s back since he and I are pretty close! Although, I wish he would tell me about Ghost Island but I also shouldn’t expect as much this early on. We did talk about potentially making an alliance and who we would want in it and… it was a bit of us not giving out info and thoughts on the game. It makes sense, we’re in the “avoid too much game talk, anyone but me” stage but we did come to a consensus that Ashen is cool and that we both like Samantha and Regan, but it never evolved into anything else. Another challenge loss is likely to change the lack of info though, I’m sure of it.

Ya know what’s fun? Being on a flop tribe. I’m truly enjoying myself. Everyone I hate is on the other tribe so I can’t wait for a swap or merge so I can get picked off quickly :~) hehehehe I love it

i feel like the game is moving slowly because I need to just keeping talking to people, and I'm in no alliances yet, and I'm sure some exist, but I'm just GAH.... I wanna keep winning, but I also wanna swap next round to just get the strategy of the game going ffs Send help to my dying soul

https://youtu.be/mpgD-uqZknI

I like this tribe but they will not shut up. Honestly, it's nonstop. There killing my phone. I don't know how much more I can take.

Imagine being a racist and animal killer sympathizer and supporting the greatest showman?

(AFTER TAKING A WALK TO CALM DOWN)

Honeslee im just over this game hahahahaha. Like everyone else in our video sucked???? I mean I wasn’t like amazing either but like come on. Okay Ashen’s parts were cute. But Regan looked like that spinning Lana Del Rey gif. Besides losing the challenge tonight I got into a fight with both my boyfriend and one of my really good friends. So depression is real sisters. I’m spiraling. Maybe they’ll put me out of my misery tomorrow and Ol Yeller me out back. But until then I’m gonna make like Gabby on survivor David vs Goliath and cry.

So we lost because the judges liked their song choice a lot better, even though their video is a straight rip off from the one in flops. It's just honestly annoying if I'm being completely honest. Oh well I'm in the lowkey alliance with Ash, Augusto, and possibly Sam as well which is an interesting alliance tribe dynamic. I just feel good because the judges complimented me and Ash, and I finally completed a music video challenge! I honestly wish we won because I wanted a night off the stress of everything, but oh well. The first name I'm hearing already is Regan because she is being a mess, and I love her to death but messy players are dangerous in games like these. Still can't believe we lost to a fucking plagarized video its so crappy.

I pushed hard for JG to go to Ghost Island because IF it's anything like the CBS season then whoever is sent to Ghost Island will probably choose a power to be given to someone still in the game and I'm kind of praying that since I had a good relationship with JG while hosting him in Deception he might consider passing me whatever advantage he finds lol

okay so ive gathered there are three pretty inactive people on our tribe: vi, ricky, asya I don't think they're inactive per se, I just think they talk less to certain people, but I know Vi and Roxy are friends, and honestly I consider Asya and I pretty good friends too, so idk... Ruben says if we were to lose he'd wanna vote out Vi because Vi hasn't said a single word to him, so we'll see if that could be swung. It'd keep me safe another day teehee

I have never been more disappointed in competition results in my entire game career. The other tribe completely stole the theme and video and won with it ?? The judges literally picked them bc they love the song and they didn’t know it was stolen. I’m so annoyed and upset that we are having to lose another person, it makes me actually angry too. I’m also annoyed that Jared just like didn’t put me in the video. I sent him so many clips, and he used TWO! And I’ve talked around, he did that with other people too. Dan was the star of the video, so much so that the judges complained about not enough tribe participation. I’m not saying I could do a better editing job, I don’t even have a program to do so, however, I want so badly to ask Jared why the fuck he cut me out so much. I don’t even know who we are voting out this round. Ash came to with me an alliance of augusto and drake, which I love ash and augusto, but last round, ash told me drake was saying my name ?? I agreed of course, but I will be very skeptical of him until I know I can trust him. I wish JG didn’t go to ghost island, he’s the one I would want gone the most, just bc he won’t talk to me ever. I guess Frankie would be my next option for voting out? I love dan and I really wanna work with him. I also confided a lot of stuff in Jared last week, which is why I’m so confused why he didn’t put me in the video. I was wanting to work with him but now I’m not sure. I need to look for the idol before tribal tomorrow. I really hope my self vote last round and my absence in the music video doesn’t somehow target me. It would be a good strategy for Jared if he wanted me to look bad tbh.

Isaac is a racist

ALL AMERICANS SHOULD BE NUKED

so uhhhhhhh I wanna cry because I love all these mfs on my tribe. I don't wanna vote out anyone. other than think I THINK IM SAFE tonight because I have augstuo, drake, and sam in an alliance. but like no one is really safe. I don'td knownimmfucking high we are thinking reagan or frankie. personally, I'm thinking reagan because she scares the frick outta me. but I guess we will c

We're swapping tonight and Crooks is going to be on a tribe with Dan...... watch it happen L O L

Those judges sucked. Like wtf was that idk bruh Also I really like Jared and Augusto and can. But I already knew the latter 2. I think,its gonna be frankie and I like Frankie so that sucks. But I like everyone. Tbh it would be smart to vote jared out but you know whatever. I chose to work with him though because I like Nicole so

I’m in a tribe of stars. Cept if I were to make this metaphor they’re all long dead. Unless one is the sun. That’s the winner. I just want to be Pluto ;-;

The game is getting more difficult now that I am faced with going to tribal council. But I know I'm the smartest player on this tribe so I'll be able to figure it out. I went through 10 different phases of thought at work today, but I played my ass off to position myself so let me just date my perspective at this moment- 6 pm, before the 2nd tribal council, November 30th. Here, I'll try to paint a picture of the dynamic. -the nucleus of the tribe **/Dan and Regan's relationship -outer layer **/myself, Augusto, Sam -secret trio (weak trust level) **/myself, JG, Drake -Frankie and Ashen solo-dolo Dan initially floated Drake's name out, but I knew I didn't want that. I chose to bide my time, and everyone was slow to the trigger in terms of suggesting a name. I spent the day heavily cultivating every single relationship, except for Augusto who was not around much. This is fine because our bond is already quite strong. I really worked from the shadows today. I intentionally pressed Drake's insecurities and instilled confidence in him to throw out a name, without ever alluding to someone saying his name. I don't want to give anyone info until I need to, and I don't want anything being traced back to me. I got as much info as I could from Drake. He said prior to my conversation with him, he tossed around the idea of voting Frankie to a few people, and that they responded well. I waited to scout out if it would get back to me. Surely enough, Regan messages me about it. I really leaned into a proposed partnership in this game with Regan. It's unsettling because she can be a loose cannon. We'll see how that goes. I reaffirmed that it is not a bad move to vote Frankie, and slowly the name started to spread. I tried my best to lock it down with everyone without showing a bias. I called with Regan for a bit. I just want her, along with everyone else, to feel as good about me as possible. At this hour it looks like Frankie will be evicted. Things change quickly though. Trust Rankings: 1. Sam (she dangerous tho) 2. Augusto 3. Regan 4. Dan 5. Drake 6. JG 7. Frankie 8. Ashen

Shocker, we lost the immunity challenge! It should be my catchphrase at this point… but anyway, I’m sad we lost and I kind of thought we wouldn’t but not all things can go my way. A lot has happened over the past two days and I feel like I might be at the center of it all in some aspects? Firstly, Ash approached me about an alliance with me, Ash, and Drake which surprised me if I’m honest because Drake and I talk but I didn’t think he’d want to work with me and then I’m also surprised they are close it seems. Furthermore, we added Samantha to our alliance and it is something I’m super happy about since Samantha and I are super close. The only dilemma I have is that I am working with Dan, Jared, Regan, and Frankie as well and that’s basically the entire tribe minus JG, who was conveniently sent to Ghost Island. I love being social and whatnot, but these are the times where I wish I wasn’t AS social. Honestly, I’ve been trying to be more lowkey about it as well like leaving people on seen or going a day without a chat… but even then I can’t seem to make it work. It’d be a shame if my unfinished business remains unfinished if I’m seen as a social threat and am taken out because of it. So yeah, now that JG is away from the tribe I have to choose between people I can work with. In the alliance chat, Ash suggested we voted off Regan which is something I wasn’t super happy about because Regan and I are close and have the same enemies per se (ie. Johnny) and Drake thankfully suggested Frankie lowkey. Frankie is someone who I adore, but he’s too lowkey to ever really work with I think? Plus it makes the most sense to me since he is so quiet and it would be easier to keep tribe unity and not expose me as a player, which is why I tried to push for it somewhat. After we came to that consensus however, the info about Frankie being the target wasn’t given from me to others and that makes me seem lowkey as well (Regan and others told ME that Frankie was the target as if I didn’t know, which is cool). My only hope is that once JG comes back, he stays on our tribe if we lose again so he can be voted out and I can save face with everyone else. We love a complicated game (‘:

OKAY I SWEAR I'M GOING TO WRITE A CONFESSIONAL SOON I'M REALLY BUSY RIGHT NOW SORRY SORRY SORRY

[clickntreat]

Can’t get a read more to work, so sorry, you’re gonna have to scroll past this whole thing if you don’t wanna read about horse training stuff 

(or just press j if you’re not on mobile)

So, more background to explain what Lady knows/what I’ve done with her so far since some have asked and for a bit of clarification. Some video has been posted and more will be posted soon too. This is concerning the behavior analysis/ training post I made last week so I’m tagging those that responded

@themotherfuckingclickerkid @clickerhorse @clickercake @mylittlehony @french-link @theclassicalhorse @spanishequestrian

(I hope I didn’t miss anyone?) and @anyone else who is interested/wants to help: As far as NH stuff, (skip this paragraph if not relevant to what you meant you needed to know? kinda long. it covers about 8 years of our lives. I summarize at the end of this paragraph with a tl;dr anyways) taught her the typical groundwork stuff like backing up and moving hind and forequarters away from pressure via direct pressure applied to her sides/chest/nose as well as those “mean looks” backed up by waving sticks around aggressively and hitting if she was unresponsive and wiggling the rope and whatnot. “Desensitizing” to swinging the whip around, ropes tossed around her, plastic bag, being touched everywhere, etc. and the NH version of “lunging” / “lunging for respect” (ugh). Did the whole join up thing, spent some time using John Lyons stuff which inspired me to teach her to set herself up at the mounting block (kinda) uh… then my journey took me to Parelli so did the basics of his games, which taught her somewhat to target things (I used this to actually get them to allow me to deworm them without restraints by just giving them treats first for targeting the dewormer, then for letting me stick it in their mouth further and further, etc. Went very well! Probably a key part of me beginning my clicker journey lol). She was always very laid back and very lazy, and therefore very motivated by rest, I learned to use after way too long, and also food ofc, but that was a no-no. I needed Respect from her, not to bribe her. She nearly always required at least one physical hit to get her anywhere beyond a walk, under saddle and on the ground. Under saddle, I rode in a more western fashion, and was inspired like many other little girls by Stacey Westfall’s bridleless performance, and so tried to train for that just by giving a cue to turn that required no reins (I always used outside leg to turn her away from the pressure, idk what you guys consider correct) before backing it up with a neck rein and then a direct rein. Made… some progress there. When I rode bridleless, at the best I got using -R, could get w/t/c with a whip and Lady was always willing to stop so that was no problem, but turning was basically only if she wanted to turn that way anyways. Things improved slightly when I began rewarding big efforts like attempting a jump or trotting/cantering on cue with a break or ending the session, then it reached the point she began charging at the nearest jumpable object if I asked for anything more than a walk just so she could stop. Began rewarding for not charging at a jump uncued/not rewarding an uncued jump and that helped… soon after I began clicker training..

(tl;dr she knows basic NH groundwork, and is essentially green broke with those methods, and was never very willing to cooperate/took a lot of force usually to do anything besides walk aimlessly and I don’t blame her)

Side note, also summarized at the end, I did train her to do some tricks during that NH time period, and I did train those with +R, “because they were tricks, not necessary behaviors” or whatever. Those include smiling, giving kisses, hugs, standing on a platform, striking her foot out when I did to train spanish walk (never got that finished), started training a bow??, which would’ve led to lay down but decided to not train that bc I was afraid she’d just start laying down to get out of work lol, I now regret training bow bc 1. I never finished it and 2. she offers it when I pick up her left foot and hold it for longer than she likes, and smiling bc she offers it sometimes when I just wanna touch her face and isn’t very impressive lol, but the others are great. The kiss is good for when she doesn’t seem to be getting what I’m asking, so I use that to kind of “restart” before trying again with a smaller step or clearer cue or something, and it and the hug are just cute af imo, and she never offers them in an aggressive or nervous way so it’s okay when she offers them off cue, I just don’t reward lol. The leg thing is especially useful. On trails or in new places, when she’s nervous, I can use it to bring her focus back on me and it calms her down very well. It also set us up for “do as I do” so she now steps forward/backward/on things with the same foot I do, which is also very useful. With another horse they might not have worked that way, but for her they’re great.

(tl;dr she knows some tricks)

Idk how to summarize the rest so no more tl;dr’s

Last summer (2016) was when I began clicker training. I spent several sessions - with all the horses actually- charging the clicker with non-mugging exercises, clicking and treating when they quit searching my bag for treats, and once that was solid, clicking for calm, head forward behavior. Once that was solid and they made it obvious they knew click=treat, I started working on other things, but not much with the other horses so just talking about Lady again now: I made a target with a ~6″ section of pool noodle slipped over the end of a riding crop, did some work with that; in general did everything I used to do, but would only ask with the lightest pressure and reward any attempt with a click and treat, and never punish if she didn’t do as I asked. (example: lightly touch her shoulder with my finger, maybe kiss to let her know “I’m asking you to move” and if she leaned her weight slightly away, great, I’d click and treat. If not, I just didn’t reward. eventually of course she would actually step until i quit asking and rewarded) She became much more willing in everything. 

Side note just to brag: My favorite development since using clicker training with her is that since we only have the pasture and the round pen to work with, and with treats they all want to be by me to get some, I need them restrained away from me, so I pour some grain in the round pen to lure the horses in then lock them up, and when they’re done eating, take the one I want to work with out. After a few times, Lady began walking out with me instead of eating the grain with her buddies! I can think of no higher honor than being chosen over grain with her buddies… she’s “second in the hierarchy” so it’s not like she has to fight for it. and if for whatever reason I make her stay in there, she nickers to me whenever I look in her direction <3

Anyways, so with clicker training, on the ground, as far as things she has down very well, she has learned to not mug/default to standing calmly with head relaxed and somewhere not in my pockets and to boop a target. I also use clicker training to reward standing still for grooming and fly spray and for allowing me to clean and trim her feet, which are things she already did, but now I reward her for it. idk if that’s good/bad/neutral or what...

Under saddle, first I taught her to position herself by the mounting block when I stood there. I did this to give her a chance to tell me she doesn’t want to be ridden. I don’t ride much right now bc I’ve become more concerned with saddle fit/bareback hurting her (I’ll probably be asking for help with that soon) so she doesn’t really know this, but end goal is to have her consent to being ridden by standing there for me (obviously, not standing there would be her refusing), and to be able to tell me she doesn’t want to anymore by returning to the mounting block. Under saddle, after maybe two or three short bareback and bridleless sessions using clicker training, she now turns willingly every time I ask. 

On the ground, what I have been working with her on  since I got back home from college is just staying by me and doing as I do, not getting ahead of me, etc. and she actually offered a behavior last week that I’ve been shaping since. I was at her side and turned about 45 degrees from her, and she stepped her hindquarters over so that she was aligned with me, facing the same direction, and that’s kinda what inspired the work on the ground that I’ve been doing. Just stay by my side, if I turn, you turn, if I step over, you step over, if I step back, you step back, etc. I use (what I think is?) a high rate of reward, never asking for more than like… an absolute max of 6 steps/strides before rewarding, and usually averaging closer to 2 or 3, even with stuff we’ve done for a long time, and of course clicking for the slightest try for new things. I break up that work with rewarding for standing still when I’m not cueing anything to remind her that sometimes I just want her to stand still.

The only time she pins her ears is when I ask her to trot/canter, and she never does anything actually aggressive/puts me at risk, and her ears aren’t even super pinned, just laid back a bit more than usual. Anyways, hopefully I can get the rest of the videos up today, but this explains everything I can think of, some of which might not have been caught on video. 

[survivordivergent]

EPISODE 1 (PART 1) - “WHY U NO MORE ACTIVE DO U WANNA DIE” - PAYTON

Are you really giving me another tribe of 4??? These Hawaii teas, I'm not here for it!

So far Eliza is chill I like them. It is really refreshing to be able to straight up talk to people about being a catfish. It is nice to not fully hide it because idk if I could. So casually talking about the perils of being a fake person with other fake people is pretty nice. But as I said before also ironic that we are on Candor and we are all dirty liars. SPEAKING OF WHICH I totally can see how I am a candor, but I did not fully expect it when it happened. I am really excited to see how this season will operate and if there will be a choosing ceremony and I can jump ship and join Dauntless and get a bunch of tattoos because they do that there

Alright Eliza is the only one who has spoken to me so far but it's literally only 8:16pm so I can slow my roll. Also 10/10 definitely guessing who certain people are... whoops. But they're only guesses!

Not sure which name I'm supposed to be putting... guess I'll put both!

For those wondering, Ed Creegan is a portmanteau of the first name of the Barenaked Ladies' guitarist and the last name of their bassist. I've been on a huge BNL kick lately and I'm a bassist myself. The Ed was just to make sure Google searches didn't pull up anything if anyone tries digging too deep.

Uh, I think I'm gonna try and play this one in the spirit of an alias game. There's no fun in trying to figure out who everyone is, because that takes out the mystery and encourages pre-made friendships. I'm sure it'll come out eventually, but right now I'm looking forward to playing with Kyle Burton, Betty Goldman, Will Cannon and... wait, four person tribes? Shit. This is gonna be tricky.

http://prntscr.com/dfffeg 

yall really put me on a tribe with three ~girls.........and two of them picked avatars that were in ....... iconic...female-centric......alliances................................ im out.

Omg I'm so nervous! A tribe of 4?!? Are you kidding.

This is gonna be the death of me I'm telling you now. I could be teamed up with my mortal enemy

Anyways I'm aligned with Geo. that happened. He doesn't know it yet but I do.

BYE I FUCKED UP IT'S BEEN ONE HOUR AND I'VE ALREADY USED A GILMORE GIRLS REACTION GIF, THERE'S NO WAY THIS IS GOING TO LAST

Confessional #1 Abnegation Day 1

I was excited coming in here, it's a season full of aliases and it means a fresh start. People don't have any preconceived notions of you, which is great.

However, I'm a little worried that because we don't know who we are, that people are going to be relatively quiet around camp, and that's got me sketched out. I might be paranoid, but I feel it in my gut.

From my first impressions, Carolanne is, in your face, a loud personality. I personally feel like I may have a rocky time trying to connect with them. Melissa is a chill individual, they crack jokes, and I'm all down for it. Lake gives off this... aura about them that I think they might be trying to downplay. They come off as super smart, I don't if it's the name, but I can feel it. They're going to be someone to keep my eyes on.

It's going to be scary trying to manage these new relationships, because I do want to know these people, maybe again. Woof, let me tell you, this is going to be an interesting season. I hope at least.

Confessional #2 Abnegation Day 1

It hasn't even been three hours but we won reward. Uh, icons truly. I think that me and Melissa did really well together, it was the two of us that basically did the challenge, mainly Melissa, but we killed it. Amity had won reward before us, but we still managed to get second.

This is great, it's a morale booster, and it unites our tribe. The only thing is that the reward, is the freaking idol. Oh how I hate them. Apparently we get a chance to look for them or something of the sorts. We're getting reward tomorrow, so there's no specifics.

Having an idol is a target on your back, you don't know exactly what to do with it, and it's hard to find them. This is all from my opinion. If I don't end up finding it, it won't be that sad, but there is a risk that the person I would like to go home plays it and screws up the plan. I'm not saying that there is anyone, at the moment, but it's a fear you have in the back of your mind.

Confessional #3 Abnegation Day 2

If i had to pick my favorite on the tribe so far, it's definitely Melissa. They're the most active person, and they killed the challenge. We bonded really well so far, in my opinion, so maybe there's potential to become an alliance in the future.

Even though I am on the Abnegation tribe, a.k.a. the selfless tribe... I'm pretty sure, I do want to play a more, selfish game. I have to play for myself, I've been dragged along before because I have cared a lot for my allies, but I end up getting stabbed in the back. If I have to cut people off or break promises, I'll do it, I want to get the title of Sole Survivor.

The idol system was announced to us, and it's got me freaked out, there's something about it. In the post it exclaims, "But be warned, to find each idol you will have to embody the core values of whichever faction the idol corresponds to." I might be overthinking, but I feel like it may give opportunities to visit other tribes or even swap. I'm not sure, but there's definitely something fishy going on with the idols. You have to expect the unexpected in these games.

Speaking of the other tribes, there's three people that I feel I may know. Ed from Amity, I sense something about him. I think I know him. If there's somebody that I have to guess, it's Erudite's Percy. Seamus is that you? It sounds like him, even though he's in Wonderland, I know that they will allow players still in the series play again. Otto Apollo, has this air about him that reminds me of someone. We'll have to wait and see.

By the way, I'm just putting this out there, but I do believe that Eddie freaking Bracco is playing in this game. We talked before, and he mentioned this series, saying it's an interesting idea. You know who's hosting this season too, Jenn, winner of his first tumblr season. I was with him, and he was saying stuff about applying, but that was like two days before the game started. Plus, he hasn't been replying a lot to me <.< I thought you loved me Eddie!! I talk a lot about other things, and have long confessionals, so Imma be annoying to the hosts I bet. BET!!

Day 2? I think

I've still talked the most with Geo but we got our first challenge and I wanted to quickly contribute something before they all did it without me again and Geo completely shot down my idea!! And then he says ahhh we could be called altitude because we like to get high and the weeed.  I don't think that's actually what he said but that's how I read it.

I've already sworn my alligience to Mr. Geography Man but it's not too late to slit his throat.  

Geo will be sinking to the bottom of Lake Harper if he doesn't start playing smart.

Confessional #4 Abnegation Day 2

We have our immunity challenge, and I'm like, we should try to get an idea on what to do guys. First we're talking about the name for our faction, and Lake immediately says Fides. WHAT?! That sent immediate red flags to me. The fact that they would just say the name of a tribe that is going on in the community. Now I'm thinking, Lake is connected to Lazio, they're either a player or a host. That's really sketchy to me and if they think I didn't notice that, they must be insane.

Carolanne, rubs me the wrong way. I was talking to them, and all they said was, "I agree" in two different chats! Okay Carol, thanks for caring. I must've drinken some paranoia juice during the challenge because my radars are going off the charts right now.

Okay! So let's look at the Grade A passive aggressiveness that's happened on Candor tonight.

Example A, done by me: On 12/5/16, at 8:13 PM, Payton Rodriguez wrote: > be there or be medevaced, probs

Example B, done by Eliza: On 12/5/16, at 9:16 PM, Eliza wrote: > by avoiding tribal, perhaps??

More to come, probably.

So it's Day 2. I feel like I could do better socially but the tribe is generally quiet so I'm not too worried for now. We got first in reward which is great. I'm giving myself a little tap on the back because I pointed out the one thing our tribe was doing wrong. Right now, I think my closest connections are Will (who I already have my suspicions about) and Ed (but again, it's only day 2). Betty doesn't seem to be around that much from what I've seen in the chat. But who knows. She could be chatting up a storm with the other guys and leaving me on the outs. I feel good about the immunity challenge, I'm working on some ideas I'll share either tonight if people start becoming more active tonight, or just tomorrow morning before I leave. As far as my strategy goes, right now I just want to get to know the people on my tribe as much as possible, and use that social connection to leverage some deals. There's 5 idols too, so I want to see if I can get my hands on one this round, just for that extra safety. It never hurts. Anyways, I'm supposed to be getting a new laptop soon, so hopefully I can start doing video confessionals because my fingers hurt. Bye!

I think I may have low-key started some Peter discourse. I didn't mean to do that. Well... hopefully that doesn't go badly for me.

More low-key passive aggressive savagery (no offense to the people in Dauntless I'm just going by the books), from me:

On 12/5/16, at 10:18 PM, Payton Rodriguez wrote: > we’re candor, not dauntless, we’ve still got our intelligence

Passive aggressive, via Eliza: On 12/5/16, at 11:32 PM, Eliza wrote: > Peter can help us out with the rest tomorrow

@peter why u no more active do u wanna die

I'm panicking just a bit bc I couldnt be here to help with the very first challenge because of hosting duties.... I'm really hoping to be able to bond with Jill and Payton more. ITS SO WEIRD because I know that I know these people. I just don't know who they are! Its crazy and it's going to drive me nutso

Lake......doesn't.......drink....... THANK GOD I THOUGHT IT WAS GOING TO BE HARD TO FIND THE FIRST PERSON I WANTED TO VOTE OUT but now WHEW

[clickntreat]

More background? To explain what Lady knows/what I’ve done with her so far since some have asked and for a bit of clarification. Video will be posted soon too. This is.. pretty long so I made it a read more (or tried to. I hope it works. also, no one I tagged should feel obligated to read or help) This is concerning the behavior analysis/ training post I made last week so I’m tagging those that responded @themotherfuckingclickerkid @clickerhorse @clickercake @mylittlehony @french-link @theclassicalhorse @spanishequestrian (I hope I didn’t miss anyone?) and @anyone else who is interested/wants to help:

As far as NH stuff, (skip this paragraph if not relevant to what you meant you needed to know? kinda long. it covers about 8 years of our lives. I summarize at the end of this paragraph with a tl;dr anyways) taught her the typical groundwork stuff like backing up and moving hind and forequarters away from pressure via direct pressure applied to her sides/chest/nose as well as those “mean looks” backed up by waving sticks around aggressively and hitting if she was unresponsive and wiggling the rope and whatnot. “Desensitizing” to swinging the whip around, ropes tossed around her, plastic bag, being touched everywhere, etc. and the NH version of “lunging” / “lunging for respect” (ugh). Did the whole join up thing, spent some time using John Lyons stuff which inspired me to teach her to set herself up at the mounting block (kinda) uh... then my journey took me to Parelli so did the basics of his games, which taught her somewhat to target things (I used this to actually get them to allow me to deworm them without restraints by just giving them treats first for targeting the dewormer, then for letting me stick it in their mouth further and further, etc. Went very well! Probably a key part of me beginning my clicker journey lol). She was always very laid back and very lazy, and therefore very motivated by rest, I learned to use after way too long, and also food ofc, but that was a no-no. I needed Respect from her, not to bribe her. She nearly always required at least one physical hit to get her anywhere beyond a walk, under saddle and on the ground. Under saddle, I rode in a more western fashion, and was inspired like many other little girls by Stacey Westfall’s bridleless performance, and so tried to train for that just by giving a cue to turn that required no reins (I always used outside leg to turn her away from the pressure, idk what you guys consider correct) before backing it up with a neck rein and then a direct rein. Made... some progress there. When I rode bridless, at the best I got using -R, could get w/t/c with a whip and Lady was always willing to stop so that was no problem, but turning was basically only if she wanted to turn that way anyways. Things improved slightly when I began rewarding big efforts like attempting a jump or trotting/cantering on cue with a break or ending the session, then it reached the point she began charging at the nearest jumpable object if I asked for anything more than a walk just so she could stop. Began rewarding for not charging at a jump uncued/not rewarding an uncued jump and that helped... soon after I began clicker training..

(tl;dr she knows basic NH groundwork, and is essentially green broke with those methods, and was never very willing to cooperate/took a lot of force usually to do anything besides walk aimlessly and I don’t blame her)

Side note, also summarized at the end, I did train her to do some tricks during that NH time period, and I did train those with +R, “because they were tricks, not necessary behaviors” or whatever. Those include smiling, giving kisses, hugs, standing on a platform, striking her foot out when I did to train spanish walk (never got that finished), started training a bow??, which would’ve led to lay down but decided to not train that bc I was afraid she’d just start laying down to get out of work lol, I now regret training bow bc 1. I never finished it and 2. she offers it when I pick up her left foot and hold it for longer than she likes, and smiling bc she offers it sometimes when I just wanna touch her face and isn’t very impressive lol, but the others are great. The kiss is good for when she doesn’t seem to be getting what I’m asking, so I use that to kind of “restart” before trying again with a smaller step or clearer cue or something, and it and the hug are just cute af imo, and she never offers them in an aggressive or nervous way so it’s okay when she offers them off cue, I just don’t reward lol. The leg thing is especially useful. On trails or in new places, when she’s nervous, I can use it to bring her focus back on me and it calms her down very well. It also set us up for “do as I do” so she now steps forward/backward/on things with the same foot I do, which is also very useful. With another horse they might not have worked that way, but for her they’re great.

(tl;dr she knows some tricks)

Idk how to summarize the rest so no more tl;dr’s

Last summer (2016) was when I began clicker training. I spent several sessions - with all the horses actually- charging the clicker with non-mugging exercises, clicking and treating when they quit searching my bag for treats, and once that was solid, clicking for calm, head forward behavior. Once that was solid and they made it obvious they knew click=treat, I started working on other things, but not much with the other horses so just talking about Lady again now: I made a target with a ~6″ section of pool noodle slipped over the end of a riding crop, did some work with that; in general did everything I used to do, but would only ask with the lightest pressure and reward any attempt with a click and treat, and never punish if she didn’t do as I asked. (example: lightly touch her shoulder with my finger, maybe kiss to let her know “I’m asking you to move” and if she leaned her weight slightly away, great, I’d click and treat. If not, I just didn’t reward. eventually of course she would actually step until i quit asking and rewarded) She became much more willing in everything. 

Side note just to brag: My favorite development since using clicker training with her is that since we only have the pasture and the round pen to work with, and with treats they all want to be by me to get some, I need them restrained away from me, so I pour some grain in the round pen to lure the horses in then lock them up, and when they’re done eating, take the one I want to work with out. After a few times, Lady began walking out with me instead of eating the grain with her buddies! I can think of no higher honor than being chosen over grain with her buddies... she’s “second in the hierarchy” so it’s not like she has to fight for it. and if for whatever reason I make her stay in there, she nickers to me whenever I look in her direction <3

Anyways, so with clicker training, on the ground, as far as things she has down very well, she has learned to not mug/default to standing calmly with head relaxed and somewhere not in my pockets and to boop a target. I use clicker training to reward standing still for grooming and fly spray and for allowing me to clean and trim her feet. 

Under saddle, first I taught her to position herself by the mounting block when I stood there. I did this to give her a chance to tell me she doesn’t want to be ridden. I don’t ride much right now bc I’ve become more concerned with saddle fit/bareback hurting her (I’ll probably be asking for help with that soon) so she doesn’t really know this, but end goal is to have her consent to being ridden by standing there for me (obviously, not standing there would be her refusing), and to be able to tell me she doesn’t want to anymore by returning to the mounting block. Under saddle, after maybe two or three short bareback and bridleless sessions using clicker training, she now turns willingly every time I ask. 

On the ground, what I have been working with her on  since I got back home from college is just staying by me and doing as I do, not getting ahead of me, etc. and she actually offered a behavior last week that I’ve been shaping since. I was at her side and turned about 45 degrees from her, and she stepped her hindquarters over so that she was aligned with me, facing the same direction, and that’s kinda what inspired the work on the ground that I’ve been doing. Just stay by my side, if I turn, you turn, if I step over, you step over, if I step back, you step back, etc. I use (what I think is?) a high rate of reward, never asking for more than like... an absolute max of 6 steps/strides before rewarding, and usually averaging closer to 2 or 3, even with stuff we’ve done for a long time, and of course clicking for the slightest try for new things. I break up that work with rewarding for standing still when I’m not cueing anything to remind her that sometimes I just want her to stand still.

The only time she pins her ears is when I ask her to trot, and she never does anything actually aggressive/puts me at risk, and her ears aren’t even super pinned, just laid back a bit more than usual. Anyways, I’m using this free day to dig up the footage I have and post it so I’ll have it up, but this explains everything I didn’t get into video.