#are way more difficult to draw than the female ones. why did i design them (beau) like this

[kokoasci]

expressions! (2/2)

been working on these for the last few weeks finally finished them a few days ago !!

[dragon-kazansky]

Bridgerton shade of blue

Benedict Bridgerton x Female Reader

Benedict bumps into you, quite literally, at a ball while trying to escape his mother's attempts to find him a partner. You decide to humour him with a dance, not realising just how entwined you would become with him. It seems the universe will find every excuse to push you and Benedict together, no matter how much you fight it.

{Masterlist}

{Previous Chapter} - {Next Chapter}

Season one

Chapter Eight - Sparkling diamond

♡♡♡

Benedict joined his sister, Eloise, out in the garden again long after the other had gone to bed. She was smoking on the swing like last time.

As Benedict takes a seat on the opposite swing, she passes him the cigarette. He takes it.

"I found bits of your sketchbook in the fireplace," Eloise says.

"Are you spying on me now?"

"You'd actually have to be interesting for me to bother spying on you," she chuckles.

"The drawings in that sketchbook were abominable," he says firmly. "I could not stand to look at them."

"I believe that is why they call it a sketchbook." Eloise looks at them. "I write in my diary, which is not the same as wiring in my novel."

Benedict chuckles.

"It must be very difficult to want something and not be able to get it."

"Eloise..."

"If you enjoy drawing but need practise, then practise," she goes on. "Hire a drawing master. Find a young lady to act impressed."

You cross his mind. However, he doesn't want you to act impressed. He wants you to be impressed by his work. Genuinely so.

"If you desire the sun and the moon, all you have to do is go out and shoot at the sky. Some of us cannot.

"Look no further than Lady Whistledown. She possesses a huge talent for writing, and yet she must hide away and publish under a false name."

"Yes, because if anyone knew who Whistledown truly was, she'd be strung up for what she said," Benedict states.

"That is not my point. Whistledown is a woman, therefore she has nothing, and still she writes. You're a man, therefore you have everything. You are able to do whatever you want. So do it. Be bold."

Eloise envies her brothers.

"At least that way I can live vicariously through you." She rises to leave.

"Eloise... are you Lady Whistledown?" Benedict asks.

Eloise laughs.

"You're an accomplished writer, always scribbling in that diary of yours. You certainly know everyone else's business. You have more opinions than anyone else I know in London. You would have my full support and admiration either way, sister."

Elosie laughs again.

"So... is it you?"

"No." She looks at him. "Though if it were... do you honestly think that I'd admit it?"

Elosie heads back inside.

Benedict is left with his thoughts.

♡♡♡

The ballroom was elegantly designed. Soft shades to light up the room. You find yourself without a dance partner, however.

Prince Friedrich was in the middle of a dance with Cressida Cowper.

The duke was standing sternly off to the side with Lady Danbury. They appeared to be talking quietly, though judging by the stern faces, it was not a pleasant conversation.

You find yourself gently, and you admire the room. Benedict wasn't here. You couldn't see him at all.

That is not to say you had gone unnoticed. You glance to your left and find a perfectly suitable gentleman looking your way. You smile softly and turn your gaze away.

Tactics of flirtation were not completely out of your power.

Before anyone could make a move, however, the doors at the top of the stairs opened. It wasn't so much the doors that caught everyones attention, more like who had come through them.

You swear you all breath left you when your eyes landed on Daphne coming down the stairs with her mother. She was wearing the most beautiful silver gown you had ever seen, and her hair was beautifully done. She looked like, well, a princess.

In her hand was a feather fan. It went beautifully with her attire. She began to descend the stairs.

All eyes were on her.

Prince Friedrich was at the bottom of the stairs. Not once did he look away. You watch with interest as Daphne gets closer, closer, and closer to him.

The prince leaves Cressida's side to meet Daphne at the bottom stair.

The duke does not move.

Daphne stops.

"Miss Bridgerton, I simply musylt have your first dance." He speaks to her softly.

"It would be an honour, your highness." She curtsies.

A moment passes between them, and then you watch as Daphne drops her fan. Just like that, the prince kneels down to pick it up.

The prince kneeled.

You don't even realise the soft gasp you let out as you watch.

Prince Friedrich offers her the fan, and she takes it. She smiles at him and then gives the fun to her mother as she takes the prince hand.

They dance.

The duke leaves. Though he turns back to look at Daphne before he goes.

In the words of Lady Whistledown, why settle for a duke when one can have a prince?

♡♡♡

The invitation to attend the boxing match came from Anthony Bridgerton. You were rather pleasantly surprised by his invitation.

Anthony apparently needed some help to keep his mother quiet about finding a wife for himself.

You laughed.

You follow the siblings until they reach the prince. He approaches Daphne, but greets you, also. You curtsy.

Anthony then offers you his arm. "Shall we?"

You chuckle and take it, allowing him to lead you over to some seats. As you settle, you turn to the eldest Bridgerton.

"Where are you brothers?" You ask.

"My brothers? Currently talking to one of the fighters." He gestures to the edge of the ring where you spot Colin and Benedict.

You don't even notice you're smiling.

"You and my brother seem to have grown rather close." Anthony points out, looking at you.

"I can assure you there is nothing untoward. Your brother is my friend, as are you all now." You smile at him.

Anthony chuckles.

"Benedict seems to have a lot on his mind at the moment. I am not one to get in the way of someone's business."

"Smart woman," Anthony chuckles.

You nudge his arm lightly and wait for the fight to begin.

As the match is announced to begin, the other brothers find their way to you and Anthony. Benedict looks rather surprised to see you. "I had no idea you were attending."

"Your brother invited me to keep your mother off his back. It seems that is all I'm good for." You chuckle.

"No true, but appreciated none the less," Benedict comments.

You smile, and he takes the empty seat beside you. It does not go unnoticed that you keep your arm looped with Anthony's. He doesn't comment on it.

The fight is intense. You gasp with every hard punch. The men around you cheer on their victor.

You had never witnessed such a match before, and you would be lying if you said you were not somewhat into it.

As the crowd stands, you stand with them and cheer along with the Bridgerton brothers. William Mondrich was their friend, and he was putting up hell of a good fight.

Benedict finds it amusing how excited you seem to be.

Mondrich wins!

You cheer along with the brothers. You laugh at the excitement. It was a thrilling match, indeed.

Anthony helps you down from your seat and speaks close to your ear so you can hear him. "We're off to collect our winnings. I shall see to it you get home right after."

You nod and thank him. As he leaves to fetch his earrings, Benedict turns to you.

"Did you enjoy that?"

You chuckle. "I did. Surprisingly."

"I must say, I did not expect to see you in attendance."

"I am full of surprises."

Benedict looks at you quietly for a moment. "Yes. You are."

You smile and look away. However, his gaze lingers on you for a bit.

Later, the Bridgertons see to it that you get home safely before they head off to the club. A place for the gentlemen only.

Anthony helps you up into the carriage and thanks you for humouring him today. Yo return the gesture and wave as the carriage leaves.

Colin has to nudge Benedict out of his thoughts.

♡♡♡

@callmemana - @lilscast - @imgondeletedis - @benedictbridgertonss - @clownsdiehard - @wxnterwidow333

@sillynilly27 - @autumn-slaves - @ben-has-arrived - @ajdelilah - @aadu2173

@booknerdlife - @tamlinrose - @sarahskywalker-amidala - @cheryyluv - @louschan - @lou-la-lou - @cultish-corner

@hopshusushi - @katherinejess - @nannabug - @afunkyfreshblog - @f0x33 - @dd122004dd -

@jupitervenusearthmars - @orchiidflwer - @bespinnn - @captainlunaxmen - @winchestersimpalababy - @acupnoodle

@ms-fandomgirl - @fablesrose - @anyaisinyourcloset - @meowzerzstuff -

[c-rowlesdraws]

Are there any examples of, I guess the term would be, gender transgressing? GNC? Quarians? Like do we see female quarians w/o the hood up or male ones with the hood up? I've never seen a reason why the hood thing is gender divided as like part of religious practice or anything

we don't ever see quarians breaking with gendered exosuit styling tradition in canon (that we know of), but that's not surprising. This is the series where one of the developers joked in an interview about how it would be difficult to make female turians, because what could you do? Give them lipstick or boobs? Haha!! So like. That's the level of nuance this universe as presented to us is operating on. But thanks to the magic of fandom and imagination, I can speculate about alien gender presentation as much as I like.

I imagine quarian exosuit wrappings as being based on clothing styles from when everyone still lived on-planet, just with more practical, pared-down silhouettes to save on fabric and not have any loose fluttery bits to get in the way for those who do a lot of manual labor on the Fleet. Maybe quarian women of 200 years ago wore something like a saree pallu draped over their heads, and that's survived as the full cloth hoods over their helmets, with a partial hood as the more masculine style.

My quarian OC Kesh'Vataar is nonbinary (nb people can exist in any species of course, but I also don't see why the quarians would only have binary genders, they're aliens), and I tried to draw them a suit that blended "male" and "female" design elements and also kind of did its own thing:

especially with the patchwork, hand-me-down nature of quarian suits, I imagine most people would have their own variations on gender presentation rather than adhering to a rigid standard. In my mind, the Fleet's population looks a bit more diverse than what we see in-game.

[tare-anime]

Finally I finished reading Eyes Only the english translations.

The highlight of this book for me? Endo and Lin's commentary 🤣🤣🤣👏👏

It is very interesting to see that I get the impression that out of all Forgers, Endo loves Yor the most (but it's highly probable that I'm biassed. Duh!!)

I mean, we know that Endo loves strong female - fighting heroines. Especially if we look at Endo's previous works. Like the two serialization: Tista and Gekka Bijjin. Both has strong female heroines as the leader. And then, his one shots also featured female leads. Perhaps only his latest one shots: Ishi ni Usubeni (the one with Medusa kid which later become Anya's prototype) and I spy (the prototype of spy x family) that featured male character as leads.

No wonder Endo can creates so many amazing female characters in spy x family. (Not that the sxf male characters are bad. Far from it!)

But it warm my heart when Endo shows that Yor was the longest he took in creating the character design. (And I also notice that Endo loves to draw Yor in so many cute outfits and accessories 🥰 and also seems to get hurt the most for my whumpy needing souls delightment #ahem)

At the same time, the badass yet cute and naive Yor is the one character that he got trouble the most to develop!

I still remember back then, when we were still at chapter 38-39 ish, Endo did have more breaks than usual, chapters that is focuses on side characters like Damian, Bond, Yuri, Sylvia (short mission), Frankie, all that make the small fandom fans 'restless' for the "too many fillers chapters"

And then there was a tweet of him telling the fans to be patient, because he was planning something.

And then, BAM!! Chp. 43 dropped. A Franky and Yor chapter, that end with Yor getting a call from Shopkeeper. Yes, the chapter we just got the anime episode (ep. 29!)

The small fandom at that time was going ferall over "Garden" name drop. And keep chanting "Yor arc Yor arc Yor arc Yor arc!!"

And then BAM!!! We got one of the best arc ever: Cruise Arc.

With that one gorgeous Yor ilustration that make the small fandom around the world decided 4-6th April to become Yor's day. On the spot.

It's one amazing experiences, ngl.

So if one asked me whether Yor has been pushed to the back, I dare say no.

It's just writing an interesting assassins plot is difficult.

Especially in a story where everything is grey.

WISE is described as the "good" guy who tries in all their might to stop the war. (But are they really? Why are they snooping around inside other country? And why are they badmouthing Ostania?)

SSS is described as the "bad" guy cause they oppressed their own people and manipulate young energetic talent as Yuri to serve them. (But what if it is needed to keep 'peace' from the rebels which of course can be found everywhere in a freshly stopped war country?)

A good story can work with two opposing sides going head to head.

But then there's Garden. Where are their position? A story about three way "war" can be difficult to tell, overly complicated, and too much. On one side, Garden can't be the "good" side because they murder people. But they can't be "bad" either if the people they murder are the bad guys. However who to tell which one is good which one is not?

And most important, how to make Yor as a protagonist that is not a villain.

That's hard.

So, judging from the past experiences (when Endo took more breaks than usual), plus this amazing detail analysis by @itsmaferart, I dare say Endo is cooking another Yor or Garden centric arc, after the Eden and SSS vs WISE.

I have high hope for this. 😁😁😁😁

So we shall wait and see.....

Tldr; I think Endo loves Yor. He is preparing for something awesome for her. and I'm not complaining. 🤣🤣🤣🤣

[dragons-and-martyrs]

Another note about my EPIC + HTTYD AU, more focused on dragons themselves

I’ll start this off with the fact that I do Not care if dragons were canonically not named until the times in HTTYD (Examples: Death Song, Night Terror, Light Fury, Typhoomerang, etc.)

They are going to be named that in the AU, I do Not care. All species, subspecies, and hybrids in the Entire franchise are within this (this includes Rescue Riders, The Nine Realms, RoB, SoD, Titan Uprising, Dawn of New Riders, Legends of The Nine Realms), the only difference is redesigns to make them more like the dragons from the movies/three TV series and four shorter films. The species name changes I’m actually making are as following

The Boomback (done very dirty with its design and name, it has Never been shown to do anything regarding its back and the only fire stuff were its egg, which isn’t even unique to it as Most dragon species have eggs that explode! So its egg heats up, which most don’t, that’s still not fitting with the name, and I apologize if I missed Something I never finished Rescue Riders and the wiki has very little information), I’m turning them to a Stoker-Mystery class and am currently in the process of finding a new species name, also giving them more abilities.

Jörmungandr, for obvious reasons (One this takes place in Ancient Greece why would it be named after a Norse mythological figure in this AU) (and two even despite that factor why would they name an entire species after Jörmungandr rather than one individual? Like…. You’re not gonna say you found a female Jörmungandr in any hypothetical situation or a Jörmungandr egg, or a baby Jörmungandr…. I firmly believe that’s an individual of the species), however, I did tie the name into the original one by renaming it to the World Devourer (name still a draft, but something along those lines for sure)

The Gigantic Grumplumper, not ever shown within Rescue Riders but named, which I think personally does not have the best name, and am giving a design akin to a franchise-style mixture of the Flying Gator and Giant Bee-eater from the books, also drawing inspiration from pelicans and giving it a jaw that can expand so it can swallow things larger than it, as it will be a cannibalistic albeit omnivorous dragon, it also will take inspiration from the Slitherwing’s looking like a large snake except with wings in that it will essentially look like a purple kaprosuchus with a size comparable to the Sea Gronckle except longer, and with bioluminescent markings to attract prey, whilst they’ll also feed on plankton similar to how a whale shark does and if offered to them they’ll gladly eat fruit, and they are opportunistic hunters and willing to eat humans, they’ll be an aquatic species, and their wings will be more adapted to help them swim, albeit they can still fly. Whilst this does make them closer to more of a true fandragon as even their name is being changed, their name is poor, their egg will not change, and they do not have any design for the species at all. I am thinking of a name tying into the theming on gators, potentially something like the Whooping Gator or the Gulping Gator, which whilst aren’t the coolest names are certainly much better than Gigantic Grumplumper! (Why are your lumps grumpy? You deserve better even for being a one-off named-once dragon), although I will tie their personality and some physical characteristics into their old name, as they’re already very large dragons, they’ll also be extremely territorial, alongside a physical characteristic of their scales being rough and bumpy (with the exception of their more vulnerable belly, with smooth almost rubbery(?) scales), much like a crocodilian. A secondary usage of their bioluminescent markings, outside of luring prey, is also for courtship! And they Are trainable but their willingness to eat humans does make that a difficult challenge, with hatching one from and egg or freeing one from a trap being the easier ways to do so (although the mothers are Very protective of their eggs so maybe trainers should stick to saving their lives). They’re a Tidal-Mystery class.

The concept Songwing, as only the Rescue Riders Songwing will retain the name (I don’t like repeats, the only one I actually like is the two Chimeragons, as that’s meant to match up in-universe, and they’ll also match up in-universe with this AU, with the DoNR Chimeragon seen as a gift from the gods, and the SoD Chimeragon seen as a punishment from the gods, also the comics Submaripper is canonically also called the Ripwrecker). The concept Songwing has its name changed to the Melodywing, being very similar names yet being different. Their abilities include shooting white-hot fire and shooting a weaker version of Death Song amber, easier to break and more built for capturing animals like deer, sheep, cows, etc. than other dragons, although they’ll eat Terrible Terrors, Night Terrors, and other small dragons, including young hatchlings of dragons they wouldn’t usually eat. Their bodies are slightly more on the fragile side, and so their wings have eyespots on the insides, looking similar to the spots on tails of a male peacock, these serve a purpose to ward off more powerful opponents. They have a long, spiky, whiplike tail that is fully prehensile. Their wings are vast and they only have back legs, using their large wings to help them walk when they need to but using flight itself as a primary method of moving around, with hatchlings learning very young to fly. Similarly to the Death Song and Slithersong, the Melodywing has a hypnotic song, which works on dragons and a variety of animals, but not on humans. They are capable of unhinging their jaw like a snake to bite larger things and eat larger prey, and have three rows of very sharp teeth. Their eyes are bright white and good for outright hunting at dark, as they’re awake for half of the night and half of the day, hunting at the night and luring prey at the day, sleeping the other halves. They’re capable of mimicking the sounds of other dragons, and use it to aid in either warding off larger dragons, and luring smaller ones. Their singing doesn’t lure their own species, unsurprisingly, and serves as good for courtship. They’re trainable, although it tends to be difficult except for with hatchlings, and even then the hatchlings can be feisty. They’re a Strike-Mystery class.

I am also giving the Deadly Nadder the dual class of Sharp and Tracker, we’ve already established that it’s possible for a species to have two classes, so I don’t get why they retconned the Deadly Nadder being in the Sharp Class entirely when IT IS LITERALLY THE SHARP CLASS SYMBOL

This wound up turning into somewhat of a rant about changes as well but that tends to happen sometimes with me.

[fmp2emilycywinski]

Planning Out My Character’s Character Design

The information I have on this character is that she is a female bounty hunter/assassin, and she has weapons. She has a red cloak with a hood.

So I started to draw faces that look very different from the art style I usually do. I wanted to try and make the art style look more Korean Manhwa art. Mostly because I have never done that before and I admire the way they draw people. I made the face longer in shape.

One thing I have noticed about Japanese anime is that Japanese cartoons don't draw their characters to look like cartoonish humans, they draw their facial shapes using cats!

And now that I know this, there is no way I can't un-see it.

But this is an art style I usually do so I really wanted to do an art style that leans towards more realism which Korean anime tend to have.

I drew the eyes not very different to how I normally do but I did put a small ring in the iris of the eye which I did once in college when practising my realistic eyes. This is because I liked the idea of putting a ring in the iris of the eye so I thought putting it on my character would be a good idea. I like how it looks so far and I can't wait to see it complete.

After I finished the eyes, I drew the nose. I did the nose way differently than I usually do. Usually, I do a triangle shape and put in a line for the bridge when needed. However, this time I just put in two dots for the nostrils and some blush marks that I like to do just so I can add something between the eyes. I love how this looks, I am very happy I tried to do this nose style instead because I usually hate drawing naturally because most of the time they don't look great but I'm happy I found a way to incorporate them in a way that makes them look pretty.

I also changed the way I drew the lips, usually, I draw two dots to show the corners of a character's mouth. I don't like to join these two dots because it's not something people do in Japanese cartoons and I liked to have an element of Japanese art styles in my art. However, I'm not doing a Japanese art style and one thing I have noticed is that Koreans like to draw mouths as one single line and maybe another line to resemble the bottom lip. So I adopted that.

Looking at the face I created, the more I love it. I just love how it looks, it's so esthetically pleasing to me and I feel like I have achieved what I wanted. Which was to create a Korean Manhwa art style.

After I finished the face, it was time for the hair. So I started to jot down some hairstyles that I thought would look good, also hairstyles that can be found a lot in Korean females on Webtoons and anime. I came up with one straight hairstyle, one wavy and another that is very commonly seen in Korean Webtoon comics.

Looking at all of them I like the straight-hair version because I feel it would suit the character but also because of how quick and easy it is to draw this hairstyle. So this eliminates the wavy hair. I like the second hairstyle but sadly it's quite modern and that's not what I'm going for because my character will be living in a fairy tale/medieval world. So straight had for the win!

Next up are the clothes. The first one I drew was a classic fantasy outfit with a long skirt and a Victorian-inspired shirt with short boots and a classic red cloak. I do really like how this one looks however there is one problem. She is a bounty hunter so she would probably find it difficult to fight when wearing a skirt. So to fix this solution, I created another outfit that would be good for a bounty hunter.

I gave her low booty shorts, knee-high boots, a skin-tight black long-sleeved crop top and a bit of boob armour that can be found in a lot of women's armour. And then I added her classic hood. I finished it and then took a step back and the more I looked at that design, the more I hated it. I have no idea why I hated it, it looks so strange to me and I just can't imagine her wearing this outfit. It's too sexual and that's not how I feel my character would act. It's so out of character so I just had to change the outfit.

So the I created a mix between the second and first outfits. I took the shorts but rose them to her waist, I then used the Victorian-inspired shirt and the knee-high boots. I also did something new with her cloak and made it very long, to the point it is dragging on the ground, I also made the edges of the cloak look like tree roots because I felt like it would fit the forest theme of her story.

I love how this is looking! The outfit and hairstyle suit the character I am going for and I can't wait to start drawing her posed with everything coming together!

[auntie-venom]

Will of Fate

Chapter Two

Fandom: Star Wars: The Mandalorian

Story Rating: Explicit

Chapter Rating: Mature

Characters: Din Djarin x Original Female Character

Summary: There hasn’t been an unidentified spacecraft in the stratosphere of Arkadia in over two decades, let alone three in one day. Those skilled or mad enough to venture into the Chaos unguided were few and far between. That means no one has ever made it to Arkadia who wasn’t intending to be here.

Until today.

or

Din Djarin finds an unmapped planet filled with beings who have the same powers as the Child, but know nothing of the force or the Jedi.

Chapter Summary: After a daring escape from an Imperial Squadron, Din is forced to make decisions while injured.

Word Count - 2,860

Chapter Warnings: Language

Will of Fate Masterlist

Read on Ao3

A/N: I have no beta so I hope I edited well.

I have about ten chapters of this fic already written.

I'd love any feedback.

Chapter two

Honestly, at this point Din should have expected this day to end the way it did: crashed into the side of a canyon on an unknown planet out in the Outer Reaches of the galaxy. Ever since the kid has entered his life it’s been nothing but chaos. 

“—dalorian, are yo—“

His mission of finding the child’s people, the Jedi, was not going as well as he hoped. Following a lead that took them to a low traffic section of the Unknown Regions took many jumps and just as many days, and which ultimately drew the attention of remnant Imperials. Trapped in the bramble of the Galactic Barrier with a squadron of TIE fighters and no ability to get to any of the few designated safe jump spots Din fled to the wilds of Unknown Space out of desperation. 

“—your blood press—“

He was able to lose some of the fighters to a gravity well that he barely missed himself. At one point through the chaotic chase he found himself weaving through an asteroid field that had no discernable movement pattern. They nearly had a fatal dead end set in their future until the kid used his powers to slow an incoming colossal asteroid. It was enough for them to barely slip through. That maneuver took out two more fighters, but the kid went down with exhaustion almost immediately and Din closed his pram for safety. As they barely came out of the asteroid field he noticed a planet with three small moons and decided to take his chance there. 

“—ear me Silver?”

The voice was definitely talking to Din. He swam through the heavy darkness towards the lilting voice that was irritating him. How could the voice be so clear?

“Oh, you reacted to tha—“

The ships comm unit, that’s where the voice was coming from. He’d recognize the signature static that comes with incoming transmission anywhere. 

“Is the lovely Lori lost?”

Din feels his jaw clench at the jabbing nickname and his vision finally swims into focus. There is a moment of confusion as he can not grasp why he can not take a deep breath before he realizes his body was uncomfortably collapsed sideways at a deep angle, only held by the safety harness of the jumpseat. He tries to straighten his body and finds it more difficult than it normally would be. He has to keep his muscles engaged to sit correctly in the seat. That isn’t normal. His brain is still in a fog when he notices a soft glowing light coming through the left side of the viewscreen of the dark cockpit. He strains his neck to look towards the light only to wince away at the brightness of it.

“Oh, sorry,” says the same feminine voice over the comm before the light dims. “I’m sure you’re pretty concussed after that.”

Din tries again to look at where the light is coming from and sees an upper half of a figure hanging down from the top left corner of the viewscreen. Instinctively he draws his blaster before he fully registers the image in front of him. He blinks a few times and just stares at this figure trying to understand how they are able to hang at that angle. 

“Hey Silver, I see your heart rate and blood pressure have stabilized. You took a mighty tumble, are you able to respond to me?” The figure asks, completely disregarding the weapon pointed at her as she waves a little at him, redirecting some of the rivulets of rainwater that are making their way over the viewscreen…the streams of water that were slanting in the same direction as her.

Kriff.

She isn’t the one at a weird angle, the Razor Crest is. As soon as he makes that connection everything starts to come more into focus; It’s why it’s taking so much effort to sit in the jumpseat correctly. Shaking his head Din groans in frustration briefly wishing he could rub at the pressure that is sitting behind his eyes. He lets out a low grumbled curse of Mando’a of frustration at how slow his brain is reacting.

“Oooooh, you kiss your ba'buir with that mouth?” comes a playful singsong response from the woman.

He jerks his head back to the figure, his blaster lowering slightly. There is very little detail he can see with such low light. The only fine details he sees is a broadly grinning face that was lit up from a violet holoscreen that overlays her eyes.

“Gar jorhaa'ir Mando’a?” Din didn’t even bother to try and hide the shock in his voice.

She wrinkles her nose and hums at him with a shake of her head.

“Now don’t get your hopes up, but my Mando’a is both rusty and very limited to polite manners and filthy curses.” She slowly raises the brightness of the glow rod and tries to dam the pouring water around her face so she can see into the viewscreen better. With the additional light he sees that she is wrapped in a dark colored cloak and tendrils of wet hair have escaped from her hood in an attempt to follow rain and gravity. Lightning flashes around her as she gives him a soft look, “Not to alarm you my lovely Lori,“ Din bristles at the nickname, “but you’ve been in a bit of a wreck. I didn’t want to just enter your ship unannounced, clearly a wise decision.” Her hand twirls towards the blaster pointed at her. ”So I figured I’d at least try to make contact via your comm before attempting any heroic extractions.”

He appreciates that. Not enough to lower his weapon though.

She gestures to the left side of his ship, “One of your engines was on fire for a bit, but the rain helped. However,” she continues, taking her hand and splaying her pinky and thumb out to make a crude shape of a ship before trapping it between the viewscreen and her arm. “You are currently wedged in a canyon hundreds of feet above certain doom.” she ends the statement with a seemingly sardonic thumbs up.

Finally feeling like his brain is catching up with his body, Din whips his head in the direction of where the child was supposed to be. The child was his first priority and the fact that his head injury has delayed his instinct is worrying. He scans the cockpit trying to see beyond the scattered mess the crash caused until he notices the closed pram had landed on the back panel of the cockpit beside the door. 

“Your companion’s vitals are stable, they appear to be deeply asleep,” she says. He looks back at her in confusion and she gestures towards the violet visor as if to explain how she knows. It’s like she knows what he is gonna ask before he vocalizes it, which would normally be disconcerting. 

He rips off the jumpseat harness to make his way over to the child’s pram. The journey is difficult due to the rotation of the ship and the fact that his limbs feel like they are moving in slow motion, but he gets there and opens it, sighing in relief at seeing him unharmed. He is still passed out from using his powers to try and help them escape from The Empire.

“What do you want?” Din asks flatly, turning to look back at her. The blaster still gripped in his hand but no longer aiming at her.

“Ahh, so he does speak basic?” She smirks at him before shifting into something a little more sincere, “I saw the dogfight and the crash, I just want to help.” She holds her hands up in a placating motion. 

The easy way she goes from flippant to genuine spins Din’s head a little. He is struggling in getting a better read on this unknown woman. Dank farrik, he must be more injured than he thought. It isn’t wise to be injured around strangers with unverified motives.

“I don’t nee—“ Din’s rejection is cut off by the sudden movement of the ship. It rotates further over with an ear-piercing scrape of metal on rock. The woman yelps, eyes wide in fear as she hugs the viewscreen in an attempt to not slide off. Din grabs the frame of the cockpit doors with one hand while the other snags the child’s pod. He was able to keep his feet beneath him as the Razor Crest once again settled further onto its side. He glances back to the window to see the woman was gone. He momentarily thinks she slid off to her death before he hears the static-overlayed curses.

“Let me see you out of the, apparently still crashing, ship before you decide you don’t need my help, yeah?” her slightly panicked voice rings through the comm at a higher pitch before he can even start to comprehend she wasn’t in fact dead at the bottom of the canyon. The ship groans around him and it pushes him to answer more rushed than he‘d like.

“Fine.”

He tethers the floating pram to his vambrance and makes his way to the cockpit door. It is disorientating to navigate while he is on the wall of his ship rather than the floor, but he manages. With the power still out he has to pop a maintenance panel to manually crank the cockpit door open. 

Stepping onto the door frame’s side Din looks up to the ladder that led to the hull that now lay above him. Gripping the opening he pulls himself up ignoring the pain in his ribs, that were definitely at least cracked, to sit on its ledge to look into the hull. He would easily be able to use the grappling hook at the end of his fibercord whip to hoist him out of the hull, but there was still the obstacle of opening the door. He was still assessing how to reach the door’s maintenance panel when the portside hull door suddenly opened and heavy rain started pouring in. Din’s head snaps in its direction, his vision spinning at the abruptness of the movement.

“How did you open the door?” Din says, bringing the blaster back up towards the light of the glowrod backlighting the rain spilling in from outside. She shouldn’t have been able to get in. The power is out.

“I’m clever.” Came the response directly from the source and no longer ringing out on his comms. It was apparently all the explanation she was giving him. 

He sees the silhouette of her head dip into the open doorway. The violet visor is gone so her face is hidden in shadow. She lowers part of her torso further and holds a single hand open towards him, but he ignores it in favor of raising his blaster at her again. She gives a heavy, but shaking, sigh at his action. 

“I offer all of my will to the safety of you and your companion,” she makes a fist and taps her chest twice, “through fate’s will I bind to you.” She holds her hand out once again as an offering and when he doesn't move she pleads with a with a slight strain in her voice, “Gedet'ye”

He balks once again at the heavily accented Mando’a. The attempt to placate him with familiar words is almost a comfort, but it is the promise she made that captures his attention. Mandalorians are people of honor so he recognizes an oath when he hears one regardless of not fully comprehending the full meaning. This woman just swore, to whatever she believes in, safety for him and the child. Though he may not understand it, Din respects a person who holds their word in such reverence.

He holsters his blaster. 

He doesn’t need her, he has his grappling hook, but for some reason he wants to trust her, test her, to see if her oath is a worthy one. So he tucks the kid’s pod under an arm and leans to reach towards her. She stretches to meet him halfway and they lock their hands around the other’s forearm. Her fingers bury themselves under his vambrace and into his forearm in a tight grip. 

“We are going to swing you up to the other side of the door, okay?” She squeezes his forearm gently. 

“You— what?” He takes note of how small her arm is and nearly scoffs out a laugh. “There is no chance you can bear my weight.” 

“My will is strong,” she says and he feels her shrug before she starts counting down.

Din rushes to prepare to swing and once she gets to one he feels her pull him forward with a strength he did not expect. His body twists as she turns with the swing until he is now swinging backwards. He has a spike of panic but keeps the arm attached to hers locked straight and he feels the strain in his shoulder at the trough of the swing. He doesn’t think he is going to make it when he feels a burst of momentum on the upswing that he can’t source and he is suddenly outside catching himself in a seated position with his feet dangling in the hull on the side of the door that was next to the side she kneels at. The rain sparkles in the light of the glowrod and she looks at him with a knitted brow of concern. His arm is still gripped firmly in hers and he just stares at her.

“You good, Silver?” She loosens her grip and jostles their arms side to side in an attempt to gather his attention but doesn’t let go of him. He takes a moment then nods at her and releases his grip on her arm and she follows suit. She nods back giving him a smile before tapping her face and her violet visor appears once more across her eyes. She makes a gesture with her left hand and there is a matching hologram over her right arm that she interacts with. Din guesses it must be some sort of interface.

“You might want to move your legs, I’m going to close the door so your ship doesn’t end up an exotic pool,” she says with that same gentle smile. He does as she suggests and he watches her type some more into her interface before the door closes. It’s only when she goes to unplug her bracer from the ship that he notices she had pried a panel out to get access to the electronics of the door. But there is no power to activate. 

“Are you able to power the ship with your device? Is that how you got in?” Din asks, gesturing to her interface. Her smile brightens at his question. 

“Not quite the whole ship, but I am able to reroute some power to small areas when I am hardwired in. Enough for me to slice into certain systems,” she rambles as she stands to her full height. She grabs the glowrod and walks towards him before indicating behind him to start walking in that direction. “We were lucky enough that your comms were a separate power source than your ship and I was able to hijack that remotely.” 

He turns and sees the dark mass of the rocky cliff face. Lighting flashes and he gets an idea of how far down they are. 

“Lucky, huh?” He finally responds to her. She snorts out a breath at his dry tone.

“I suppose luck is relative in this case,” she says back as they reach the cliff. 

Din is a well traveled man, but he is struggling to place her accent. It’s vaguely familiar but particularly distinct. It almost sounds like a Core accent but it’s a little more melodic and not quite as smooth, so it was no help to him in figuring out where he is. 

He looks down at the woman as she grabs a cable that is hanging from atop the cliff and she turns to face him. She is very short, not quite reaching his collar bone, and he is once again questioning how she swung him so forcefully. 

“I’m gonna loop this around you and I’ll activate the winch from here,” she tells him while slowly doing as she explains, both arms around his waist momentarily to pass the cable behind his back. She tightens the cable to itself and goes to meet his eyes as best as she can. “You trusted me to help you out of your ship and I am trusting you to lower this cable back down to me once you are up there.”

He pauses at her forthrightness and finally nods at her. He pulls the child’s pram tighter under his arm and grabs the cable with the other hand and places one foot on the face of the cliff with a nod to her to indicate that he is ready. She dips her head to him with another gentle smile and presses something on her bracer interface and the winch starts winding.

Translations:

Ba'buir = Grandparent

Gar jorhaa'ir Mando’a? = You speak Mando’a?

Gedet'ye = Please

<< Chapter One

Chapter Three >>

[scriptaed]

his side, her side finale | 00:00

genre: angst/fluff/implied smut; 

pairing: reader x jungkook;

length: 4.6k;

synopsis: a collective snapshots in time shared between two, whose fates were undeniably intertwined and futures would never come to be.

No matter how infinite the pages could write itself, in the way that he catches her stealing glances from across the room or the scalding spark imprinted on her hand by the touch of his own, there really are only three versions to every story: his side, her side, and the truth’s side; and in your unsolicited albeit self-justified defense, the truth is, what was once seemingly perpetual is now merely trivial. The imagery that once had you kicking and screaming into your sheets at night, the fleeting moments that were shared by both but valued by one, and the inevitably incessant burden of jealousy brought upon by a fervent want that could never be had could only have been falsified by a break—spatially, temporally, and heartfully. The mind can only tug so much at one’s strings; and yet, to be bent, only time could prove possible.

...and that time is exactly what is needed by all.

her side;

“Are you joining us for dinner tonight, Y/N?” 

“Huh? What?” your ears perk at the sound of your friend’s call. 

“Oh, there she goes again,” your other friend interjects with the roll of her eyes. You almost collapse when she swings a hand over your shoulder. “Are you sure you don’t want to get your ears checked?”

“No, but I might have to get my eyes checked,” you joke, despite pulling in all the performance points you could win with a disdainful scan up and down her less than professional attire. Thankfully, your act is gleefully extended by her cheesy gawk of an expression. Putting up a merciful pair of hands in the air, you laugh, “hey, in all seriousness, it’s not my fault you guys keep drooling over boys.”

“Uhuh, so you’re trying to tell us that boy talk is what’s putting you to sleep?” your friend’s accomplice crosses her arms, raising an accusatory pair of brows. 

“Yeah,” you say much too seriously so you throw in an airy laugh, “I mean, there’s more to life than boys, y’know?”

“Right, like…?”

“Like…” your voice trails off because, for some reason, your mind goes blank as you attempt to recall your lifestyle from your previous hometown. “Like… hanging out with friends! With you guys!”

“Gah! You’re only able to say that because you have dozens of boys chasing you around the office. Us, on the other hand, time just… it just keeps ticking…” the two of them sigh in synchronization and you feel the heat of her arms retract as she shakes the hand of her one and only sympathizer. 

“Psh,” you can’t help but grin throughout the frown elicited by their vivacious performance, “you guys have plenty of time. Just enjoy life for now and I’m sure you’ll find someone along the way.” 

“Wait, but seriously,” her voice suddenly rises from her previously sullen state, as does her head on her friend’s shoulder. She looks you dead in the eye, and, honestly, you almost feel as though your privacy had just been invaded. “You really haven’t ever liked anyone before?” 

“Uh…” you scatter through the disarrayed files that were your buried memories, eyes squinting at the sun that peeks through the clearing sky after a day full of rainfall. “Elementary and middle school don’t really count… too busy studying in high school… college was full of fuck boys I couldn’t care less for… and at work…”

The more that you hear yourself ramble, the more the reality of your lonesome future settles into the already burdened shoulders of yours.

“At work? You mean here? Or do you mean your last job?”

“Well,” you frown, trying to recall every male colleague that had piqued even the tiniest of interest in you; and as the two of your friends lean in, you start to lean back, despite the charging light bulb that flickers from the unlocked recollection of two years ago. “There was a guy who liked me and told everyone at work that he liked me, which I thought was really weird… nice guy, kind of a nerd, but I didn’t like him that way. Who else? Uh, hm—”

—bzzz. 

The vibration against your back pocket pulls the plug from your train of thought. 

“Aw man,” you hear your friends curse in the background, “just when we were finally getting her to spill something.” 

The name on your screen has your heart skipping with delight.

 Yezi [5:20 PM] Hey, I know you’re gonna forget, so you before you do, we’re having dinner together tonight :) 

“It’s okay,” your friend pats the back of the other, “there’ll be some cute enough boys for her at tonight’s barbeque, I’m sure.”

“Ah shit,” you curse under your breath, hastily typing a response before peering up at your friends like a deer caught in the headlights, “actually, guys, turns out I already made plans with my friend from home. I’m sooo sorry.”

“Oh, really?” the two of them gasp. “Isn’t that a two hour train ride from here?” 

“Yeah, so I really got to go now,” your phone tumbles into your bag as you begin to widen your strides like a woman on a mission. 

They shake their heads in unison, “no, no, it’s okay!”

“I’m seriously so sorry guys,” you say as you pant, the distance between you and your friends widening by the second and forcing you to whirl around as you pace backwards. “I’ll make it up to you next time and do whatever you guys want, okay?”

“Really? Anything?”

“Yeah,” your hands draw a wide, inclusive circle into the air, “anything.” 

“Even a blind date?” 

“You know what? Why the hell not?” you chime, whirling back around with your back on them and a smile hidden away. Skipping off into the opposite direction toward the train station, you exclaim nonchalantly, “new year, new me!”

Lately, either through a stroke of luck or a reset of a life in a new town, there’s been something spectacularly whimsical about tonight’s air; and when a zephyr passes by, lifting you to the tip of your toes to an invincible high and relaying the confuzzled whispers of your friends—

“—wait, it’s not a new year, it’s already April—”

—you finally acquire a two year long-sought sensation: golden.

-

“I can’t believe you almost forgot about our plans!” 

“Hey, I had a reminder set on my phone just ten minutes after your reminder” you quip with pursed lips, “and I still made it on time, didn’t I?”

“Yeah,” Yezi prims with a stern look plastered across her face, gesturing, ���with your hair and clothes damp in rain and your face smiling like a wagging, clueless beagle.”

“Well… beagles are cute, so I’ll take that as a compliment?” 

She frowns, ignoring your remark, “did you not check the weather forecast?”

“I did.”

“So why didn’t you bring an umbrella?”

“I forgot.”

“Ugh, you forget everything these days,” she plants a palm to her forehead before returning to her plate, “well, I’m glad that at least you’re so carefree nowadays. You’ve finally settled into your new workplace, huh? You look so happy now.”

“You talk—” it’s difficult to speak with food being stuffed into your mouth “—as if I lost a loved one.”

“Well,” she grits her teeth, as if biting her tongue, and proceeds to slice the slab of steak, “I wouldn’t say that’s too farfetched.” 

Frowning, your words come out muffled through puffed cheeks, “whaddya mean by dat?”

“You can’t tell me you forgot about what happened last time you were in town.”

“Uh…?” you furrow your brows, tracing into a forgotten yet familiar field you had long neglected for your own wellbeing. Last time you were in town, last time you were working here, last time you went out on a company party, last time you walked through this town’s treacherously embracing frosty breeze, last time you were dining here, last time you got wasted, not just here but anywhere, last time you shed tears… all the last times of this town shared only one similarity, a similarity you had subconsciously left behind at some point in your transition between the past and the now. 

“Do I really have to say it myself?” she leans in, concerned. “I don’t want you bawling your eyes out again…”

Did she possibly mean… him?

“Jeon Jungkook,” she blurts, “there! I said it!”

Her utensils clatter onto her plate as she tosses her hands in the air in mercy, almost as if bracing herself for the storm after the calm, observing you intently but warily; that supposed storm, however and ever so fortunately, never arrives. 

“Oh,” you utter, words slipping from your lips like sand through a palm, “I’m not crying.”

“You’re not crying,” she confirms, astonished. 

“It doesn’t… hurt anymore?” you almost ask yourself. 

“It doesn’t?”

“It doesn’t,” you utter, shaking your head. Just as she’s caught off guard, you lurch across the table to pinch her cheeks, “but that doesn’t mean I appreciate you bringing him up during a perfectly lovely night!” 

“Sho—” she furrows her brows in combination to her squished cheeks “—he doesh make you shad shtill?”

“Well, he doesn’t make me elated,” you finally release her from your wrath, returning to stare downward at your food, “but I guess it makes me reflect fondly on the past. It’s kind of like a scar. I know how much it once hurt but I can’t feel it to the same magnitude anymore. Actually, instead, the happy, jittery moments are more vivid to me than the tears that were shed. Is that… odd?”

“Like… like what? Examples?” 

Like when his arm bumped into yours for the first time on the walk after work, like when he discretely went out of his way to ensure your safety across the bridge home, like when he enamored over the ‘ripped abs’ of a fully nude female character design of an upcoming project whilst you stood awkwardly with a set of breasts in full display for the two of you, like when the two of you escaped to become the aloof, static noise of an unbefitting party, or like when he held you in his hands and kissed you at the stroke of midnight, the butterflies live on—even today—to shield you from the dampened blows struck by dull weapons of jealousy, insecurity, and remorse. 

With time, the silver lining finally showed itself like a sun shining through after a stormy night. You’ve finally accepted the truths behind every weapon. She was pretty. They were pretty. She never wronged you. They never wronged you. They deserved his love. His heart belonged to whomever he desired. 

He never badmouthed his peers and, as blunt of a man as he was, he never pointed out your flaws, even if that meant you would later return home only to find mascara flakes on your cheeks. He treated women like a gentleman, as contradictory as it may seem from his appetite demeanor; and while you fell for him for that, you also cursed him for that very reason. He didn’t owe you anything… up to a certain point until the lines were too blurred to decipher between the truth, the deserved, and the faulty. Be it Ji-eun or Jennie, you’ve come to terms with his relationships. 

As much as your relations with him seemed to run on a fragile thread of fate, your time had run out and the window of opportunity had been shut—but hey, at least you had fun.

“Are you… smiling?”

“Hm?” you look up to find her staring at you in concern. Blinking blankly, you quickly clear your throat and retract the smile you had subconsciously adorned. “I am?”

“I… don’t know if I should be worried or not,” Yezi downs another glass of iced water and you’re about to follow suit until she almost chokes on her water, “hey—isn’t that Jennie over there?” 

“Jennie?”

You almost curse at Yezi for teasing you over bygones that should’ve been left as just that, but she really wasn’t lying. You can’t believe your eyes when you whirl your head around to look through the darkened tint of the restaurant’s window panes. You might have never really spoken to Jennie, but that figure is undeniably Jennie. 

“What is she doing?” you squint, struggling to grasp a clear vision of her silhouette under the dim, orange street light beside her. You could only catch a hint of her side profile but those cheeks and unique sense of fashion definitely belonged to her; on the other hand, the constant stumbling and the hand to her head, almost as if she’s about to collapse at any second, did not resemble her. “Oh, oh, hold on, wait, whoa—we should help her!” 

You scramble to your feet and bolt out the door whilst Yezi takes care of your abrupt leave with the restaurant staff. A freezing blast of wind welcomes you as soon as you step into the sidewalk but you waste no time. Abandoning the cold behind you along with the past, your mind is set on aiding the collapsed woman on the streets. 

“Hey! Jennie, hey!” you call out to her as you sprint to her side, dropping to the floor without caring to notice the shards of glass that consequently cut your knees as you carefully roll her limp body onto its back and away from the sharp hazards. The pain has you wincing and seething under your breath, but the conditions of the person lying before you has you even more concerned. Her skin is even paler than usual. Her chest rises and falls rapidly in an evident struggle. Your taps against her shoulder gradually become frantic shakes until all you can hear is your voice and the whispering commotion of bystanders behind you. “Jennie! Can you hear me?!” 

“Y/N!” you turn around to find Yezi peering down at you from above. “What happened?”

“I don’t know but something’s definitely not right,” you say as calmly as you could, “call 911. I’ll call her family.”

“Got it,” Yezi nods, immediately dialing the numbers on her phone but pausing in the midst of the ring to face you, “wait, do you know anyone from her family?”

Gritting your teeth, you frown as you dig into your memories, “...no, I know she might have had a boyfriend back then, so he might know, but I don’t know if they’re still together and I don’t even know his number…”

“Do you know anyone who might know her boyfriend then?” 

“Well…” 

The ending trails of your voice are whisked away into the returning wind of that fateful night. Hands gripping at your phone and eyes staring at the stranger yet familiarity of a name that glares off the screen, it’s an inevitable force that has you stupefied yet marveled at the revival of a tugging string that ties you to him through the strangest, most meandering paths. 

-

his side;

It was almost like a fever dream. Her name plastered across his screen and his eyes squinting through the glaring light that illuminates his room. It had been two years since he had any contact nor mention of her; and now, out of the blue, in the midst of a nap after gym session, she calls him for help. He couldn’t believe his ears when he first heard her voice, believing it all to be another one of those numerous dreams that had him regretting his past or questioning his choices. He shot straight up in bed, phone grasped and glued to his ears that blocked out the computer fan that ran in the background. 

Even now, after throwing on a sweater and jacket and bolting out the door in a state of rescue, he can’t quite believe his eyes; because there she sits on the hospital bench, in the signature slumped boyish manner and the confused blank stare off into the distance that still has him quirking a smile in remembrance every once in a while. In her favorite white blouse and her only slack of black dress pants, it’s almost as if nothing had changed, almost as if she had never left. 

It’s almost like time had bent to his incessantly subconscious pleas and reversed its works; but the almost will always be an almost, for as long as those hallmark vivacious eyes and those rekindled mien of ambition lives. As far as Jungkook knew, she left with a dreary heart and returned with a fiery purpose. 

Despite all that, he can’t help but notice the way she fidgets in her seat, nearly sinking and avoiding all contact the second his presence had been noticed. Instead of the sheepish flickering stolen glances of the past, he finds himself at odds with the way she fights to return the locked gaze of his eyes. She fought so hard that she might have forgotten how to speak, rendering a soft chuckle from his lips because the girl he endlessly dreamt of might still live after all; and for the first time in a long while, Jungkook has to put forth the effort to fill in the silence. 

“Why did you call me?” he asks plainly as he stands before her.

“Well, I didn’t know any of her friends except you…” he watches as she fidgets with her hands, gaze falling to the floor before returning to him, “are you going to visit her? I think the doctor should be okay with it if you’re her close friend.”

“No, Kai will be here soon,” he explains, finally bending down and placing the bottle of rubbing alcohol beside her on the bench. “I have other shit to attend to.”

“Oh, right,” she mumbles. The evident surge in annoyance amuses him that he just can’t quite wipe the smirk off his face. Turning her head, she continues, “you must’ve had plans with Ji-eun tonight. Sorry for the trouble.”

This is it. This is the moment that replayed on repeat like a broken tape in his dreams. This is his chance to mend the wounds he had inflicted upon the confessing girl who cried her eyes out on the cab home that one, indelible night. 

An uncomfortable silence fills the air with the exception of the unscrewing of a plastic bottle and the gentle return of the bottle against the metallic bench, which is then followed by another staggering silence. 

“We’re not that close and I’m not dating Ji-eun now.” 

The girl turns with the quirk of a brow, especially when she spots him kneeling before her with a soaked cotton ball. “W-Wait what? Wait, shit, ow.”

“I don’t talk to Jennie as much as you think,” he states as a-matter-of-factly and continues to gently pat the cotton against the wounds on her knees. After hesitantly placing a band aid over the wound—something he had never done for anyone else nor for himself who just “sucked it up”—he finally lifts his gaze to interlock with hers, observing intently as if to soak the reality of it all in now before the inevitable tape begins to replay for the near future. “I broke up with Ji-eun before you left.” 

“And...” she utters slowly, “why are you telling me this?” 

Just like in the pool on that one night, her challenging eyes never budge and neither do his.

“I thought the past you would’ve liked to know,” he states. Head tilting to the side as if to get a better look, he remarks, “shit, you don’t look away anymore, huh?”

“Why would I?” she quips, snorting and finally breaking contact to stare off to the side. “It didn’t matter if I knew or not. It’s not like we were a thing.”

“Really?” Jungkook hums, gathering the scraps of cotton and paper before standing to his feet with a genuine soft sigh. It’s hard to brush off the two year old sinking sensation in his chest for something so nonchalant, but he manages to do it like he always does with that stoic look on his unreadable face. “Cause I thought we were.” 

“What?” she gapes and he only gazes firmly back at her. “Why? It’s not like I… liked you.”

“Really?” Jungkook’s eyes flicker up at the ceiling for a brief second, lips pursing as he concludes the cards on the table: the unapologetic albeit risky truth or the defensive albeit purposeless self-deception. Unbeknownst to her, Jungkook had all the cards in his hands. 

“Yeah,” she mumbles, avoiding his gaze and shrugging, “and it’s not like you liked me.” 

Peering down at her from above, the boy’s crooked grin gradually settles into the silence along with the usual unreadable mien that he wears on the daily. “How would you know?”

Finally turning to return his gaze, she raises a brow at him before uncrossing her arms and standing to her feet. One step, two steps until she stands before him as close as she could recall on that night, she utters the one mutual truth of the night. 

“Because you never told me.”

The brief silence filled with tension seems to last an eternity, yet neither of the two could take their eyes off the other. A rush of thrill intermixed with panic floods his blood. His fight or flight system screams at him to obey the very laws he had followed all these years but his mind warns him that change is a necessity for this euphoric heat that radiates from this very moment. He’s never quite felt like this before: throat knotting and heart leaping nearly out of his chest. 

“Let’s—”

“—I need to catch the last train home,” she blurts, quickly taking a step back to distance themselves. 

Like a magnetic force that she is to him, her retraction almost pulls the breath from his lungs along with it.

“What?” he frowns, trying to steady his breath. “It’s 10 right now. My last ride is at midnight.” 

“Yeah, well mine is at 11 and I still have to walk there,” she shrugs indifferently to the entire ordeal—something that Jungkook takes to the heart. 

“What?” he mutters, “the station is right next to this hospital.” 

“What can I say? I’m a slow walker,” she prims, bowing her head and waving her hand to bid farewell. “Thanks for the band aid and all the help today. It was nice catching up. See y—I mean, take care.” 

He stands there in silence, too stunned by the constant turn of events. Distracted by the crestfallen weight in his chest elicited by his shattered hopes, Jungkook raises a hand in response to her pressed, upcurved lips. He can only mumble a seemingly indifferent, “...see ya.”

There she goes—as gracefully as she had reentered his life and as fleeting as she had left for a second time. All this time he knew his side of the story: growingly regretful, discovering a yearning he never knew was within his capabilities, and helplessly pondering over a past he could not change and wondering if she did the same. At some point in time, those feelings became a fragment in time and that person he wished she knew became a version of his present self. He moved on, he forgot the magnitude of the pain, but he never quite came to terms with what it all could have been. 

And all at once, the very moment he stands before her, the past him whomst he had perceived to be temporary comes flooding back into reality—flesh, fervent, and feelings of an immensity he could never have been prepared for—and if he were to be honest, he thought it would have been the same for her. 

He never really knew her side, after all; but at the very least, he desires to hear it from her, herself. She never missed him, she never thought of him from time to time, she never woke up from a dream of him so vivid that it felt so real that she was left with a melancholic loneliness in the air—those words would close the gap in his chest. 

If there’s one thing Jungkook had absolute control over at this very moment, it’s the last chapter of their shared novel in time and this is not the conclusion he imagined. 

Before he knew it, Jungkook finds himself sprinting down the train station. Across the coldly lit hallways, up and down the stairs instead of the ‘shitty, slow escalators,’ and cutting through the nearing midnight breeze of the platforms until the breeze finally brought him to the last unvisited area, his daunting final destination. 

Checking his watch, Jungkook’s chest heaves as he holds his hands to his knees in an attempt to catch his breath. It’s well past 11 now, nearing midnight, and he’s standing at the platform in the opposite direction of her new hometown. To the mere bystander, this platform really didn’t make any sense; but to Jungkook and his inkling, perhaps by a disheveled and desperate state, every twist and turn of the wind brought him right where he believes he belongs. 

Puffs of his breath mark the airy night as he watches his last ride pass by the rails before him. Every cart, every seat, he scans them all. No one. His heart sinks with each check, each flicker of the eyes, and he begins to curse himself for his state of delusion until the last cart of the train flashes by to reveal his finale. 

And as if by some sort of invisible string, life had somehow led him to her once again.

Because there she sits, across the wide yet surely crossable gap of the railway, legs crossed and hands folded in her lap, as if she had been waiting for him all this time. 

Jungkook stands there, stupefied by the works of fate, “why are you—”

“—hey, Jungkook!” she calls out to him, voice echoing across the vast, empty station. “What were you going to tell me back at the hospital?” 

Taken aback by her question, Jungkook chuckles to himself in utter amusement; and as if by the magic sifting through the night, the nearby tower bells ring across the remaining distance between the two at the precise stroke of midnight.

“Let’s date!”

The boy’s zestful holler resembles more like that of a cheerful proclamation, for the way he holds his hands to his lips before throwing them freely into the air garners a giggle from his spectator. His voice projection accompanies the bells, perhaps too softly and thereby physically undetected, but she could hear him nonetheless. 

“I liked you and I still like you so damn much, you dumbass!” 

After witnessing the boy’s courageous display, the words she’s been waiting for but never knew she needed until their paths crossed once again for a limitless nth time slips from her like second nature, almost as if she’s practiced it in her dreams all this time. Her loud proclamation, however, slips beneath the bells like an accompaniment to a ceremonious work of fate. 

The two of them stand on opposite sides of the platform, their confessions are far and wide and perhaps inaudible, but the dorky smiles adorning their lips as they gaze across at their inevitable final chapters serve to prove an undeniable fact. 

Whether by sheer will or by this invisible string, whether by his side or her side, the truth is: their eternities will be forever tied, forever golden.

[chronic-claire-universe]

HI CLAIRE!!! I AM COMING BACK AGAIN TO JOIN THE MATCH UP 😩 I hope you don't mind!

CONGRATS AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY BEAUTIFUL CLAIRE!!! I hope Ran always come to your dreams every single night 😌💖 We should discussing our fantasy about him again soon 😌

And here is me! (I edited this so I can give you a complete description about me)

I'm 8w9 INTP sp/sx sun: Leo moon: gemini, my height is 153cm and I have a petite body. Mentally ill? Yes, I am bipolar and having anorexia (more like relapsing again after surgery). When I am at my manic episode, I almost kill my family at the car-crash because I got too irritated that I pulled my sister's hair while she was driving—luckily she's a good driver or I am gonna be in jail rn 😩 When I was a kid, I used to get into some fights with boys (I won ofc) but since my father died, I tried not to get into fight ( I don't want to deal with my mother's dramatic and victim-mentality ass ) and I (gladly) never fight again after that 😌 That's why I really good at sport ( as a female I always got the highest point—even when compared to the male, I still on the top 5 on sport ) I really good on art ngl that's the reason I am at uni rn because I got scholarship (I won several art competition)! Also, I did english debate competition back then, but we were this 🤏 close to get into semi-final but bruh we defeated by 0.20 point! 🥲 I can do all those things by self-taught!

When I feel sad or miserable, I punish myself by starving myself lmao. Or I will usually get quiet and cut people around me. 

My social skills? Fine I think. I weirdly get along with a lot of people (everyone kinda knows me) but I never talk to them first. Even though I have a lot of friends, I only have one close friend ( tragic right:") )

My personality is rude—blunt in the rude way(?), I do whatever I want to because I seek freedom of expression, LOVE debating about certain issues, and surprisingly I'm quite a wise person. But, I have no jam. Right, I couldn't make any jokes since I usually use the wrong tone in my voice :( I prefer to keep my joke inside my imagination or write it down somewhere. I always try to dominate my man, but I want my man to dominate me too ( do you get what I mean here? 😭 ) I love to be alone too. I HATE loud voices, reptiles, and crowds. I'm not the type of person who easily shows my love to anyone. I think because I have a really high pride *sigh. I felt like my kin actually is Rindou Haitani. But when I took the quiz I got Kazutora, Getou, Mori, Eren, and Dio Brando (that's the funny one)

I'm working as a graphic designer. Which somehow makes me currently don't have any interest. But I love listening to music (pop-rock and r&b ) . I love watching wwe/mma and hate romance anime/movies.

I'd like JJK and Haikyuu match up, please🥺  NSFW and I want male!

—Sorry for long ask :(

Hey my sweet plum, I read your request thousand times, let me say that I got worried and a bit sad hearing what you had to face in your life. I hope your mental health, despite your bipolarism, it isn't too messed up, lot of genius such as Michelangelo suffered bipolar disorder and see what he was capable to create! Ran woke me up this weekend, he wanted company 😁

Anyway, here your escort for my birthday party:

Jujutsu Kaisen - Megumi Fushiguro

Babe it was him or Nanamin, I opted that Megumi could be better since he has more patience than Nanami for your bratty attitude.

Megumi has the sharp mind to get through your facade, to understand your struggles and cope without problems with your rythm.

When you're manic episodes appear, he knows how to support every idea you get, even the strangest one. The first times he was worried to see you this active and in the mood to do things but now he got used to it.

Talking about these episodes, he enjoys when you're in the mood to debate with him or others.

He often suggest to watch some educative documentaries or biopic movies especially the ones that involves human rights. You get in a fiery mood when you watch it and try to explain why the things that the characthers had to endure are atrocious and illegally and how we should fight to eradicate them from the society.

Going to the other facade of the your personality, the depressive episodes are quite difficult to handle, you stay a lot in bed, you don't want to do anything.

He always brings you a cup of tea and cuddles you for hour, sometimes he gives you a paper to let you draw.

He hates when he needs to get you up for work, he knows you struggle and sometimes even cry but in the end when you get a grip you feel a little bit better.

In these cases, he brings you out for a jog or just a walk with his divine dogs or the little bunnies ready to pet.

Overall Megumi has a lot of patience with you but he's repaid when he sees the portrait and the things you cook for him, the struggle worths the prize in the end!

Haikyuu - Daichi Sawamura

I decided you definitely need a calm but strict man in your life and Daichi is perfect for this!

In Haikyuu universe you definitely play in the female team and you met Daichi during a combined training! You're a middle blocker in your team and you can't get me think otherwise!

You are strong and Daichi is astonished to see this, but when Nekoma came for the second time in Miyagi and Kuroo got on you, to give you some advices for a better tecnique, that's where Daichi got really jealous! He saw you for first and he definitely doesn't want, that roosterhead to hit on you!

"Marv go out with me!" it wasn't a question, it was a statement "I guess asking isn't in your knowledge, but Daichi there are proper times when to ask me out. Not when I'm sweaty and in a middle of a training!" you say with sharp eyes, Kuroo laughed at your bluntness and went away, but Daichi reply "Yep, sorry I got carried away and I felt to say it know" you smirk and say "Jelous are we? Ne Daichi don't blush!".

Your relationship is pretty natural, your dates consist in training and homemade dinner

You're pretty active and energetic in Daichi's mind, that's why when you went in one of your depressive episodes he got really worried.

As Megumi he took a lot of care of you, but the difference is that he prefers that you recover from yourself, also, if you have a therapy it's really difficult for you to take it in these moments and he obliges you to eat something and help you bring down the pill.

Normally you would hate these moments, but Daichi knows really well how to handle them, comfort foods such as pizza, tacos, ice cream, sushi are there for you to help you improve your mood and somehow it helps.

When you get a bit better, you can't go out training but you definitely draw or play sports with the Wii at home, this is definitely quality time for him.

Overall it could sound strange but Daichi doesn't hate these episodes, because he can see that you can do chores or just have fun, and this is definitely a proof of strenght for him!

He definitely loves Marv the warrior girl!

I finished! Babe hope this wasn't too sad for you, but I figured out that seeing you needed fluff and comfort, thanks for opening up and join the event, if you want to help me with a little gift here this is my Ko-Fi!

[thebrownssociety]

i noticed that in a past post you had mentioned daffy was in the front lines of world war 2. how was that like? how did toons particularly handle war?

Not particularly well. Toons are not designed for war, they're designed to make people laugh. Added to that that most of the toons were very young [under 15] when they were sent to the front and the story gets sadder.

Warnings: Mention of War and descriptions of PTSD [I have done research, but this is Toon version, so it's not going to tally exactly with humans]

Disclaimer - this is a headcanon. I have mentioned the companies here and Walt Disney [briefly] stating the obvious, it's all made-up.

All of the companies involved did there best to help/protect the toons as best they could. None of the female or children toons were allowed to go and there was a limit on how old the 'adult' toons had to be before they could go. That ended up being 5. The companies wanted 10, the Military wanted three, five was a compromise - although the companies had to fight hard to get that. In the end it boiled down to 'Either five, or they don't go at all'. The companies also re-negotiated the initial year the toons would be away down to 6 consecutive months. The companies wanted three months, so it was another compromise.

Stating the obvious, none of the toons enjoyed it much. Even the ones who thought they would thrive [Like Donald, Yosamite Sam and other 'tough' toons] found it difficult. Not to say they don't remember some bits of it fondly, mainly the comradeship they found, but for the most part it was hell on earth. After the first lot of Toons who's gone in the first month [about 30, mainly background toons, Prince Florian and Sylvester] came back from the front they looked so pale and ghostlike [visually, a shell of there former selves] that none of the others wanted to go and the companies tried to pull them out of it. [This being near the end of 1943] But they weren't allowed to, so the toons had to go.

The time the toons were fighting was 'only' Jan 1943 - end of war, Sep 1945, and the toons were only there for 6 months, but it was a long, terrifying 6 months.

The weird thing was that after the first initial couple of months while there coulor came back and they looked more life-like again, they seemed okay. Really! They could still act - and act well - they joked with each other in a normal manner and they talked to people. Sure, there were a few of them showing more difficulties adjusting - like Daffy who was acting paranoid and was constantly on the edge and Donald who's already-existing anger issues went through the roof, not to mention Elmer who was mute for a few months after coming back and Pete [Disney] who locked himself away and wouldn't come out, not to mention the at least 30 of background toons who were all showing extreme level of difficultly, but, hey, that was only a couple of toons, right? In the grand scheme of things. The rest of them were fine.

They were not fine.

It took a good couple of years [between 5-10] But eventually the cracks started showing. The Toons who had fought in the war started reacting weirdly to loud noise. Jumping onto the ceiling and refusing to come down, hiding under things and in things [like jugs and cups and cracks in the wall] whenever they thought they were under attack. They were having frequent, intense nightmares and a lot of the toon were displaying mental health issues like paranoia and splitting themselves in two [literally. It depended on the toon as to what exactly the personalities looked like, but as a general guide they'd be one 'young' one from around the time they were first created and another one that was closer to there normal age, but looked and acted completely different. Doctor Scratchesniff theorised it's what the toons worse fears about themselves are, visualised and brought to life.]

The toons were also having flashbacks to the war, which is bad enough on its own, but because they're toons the flashbacks literally engulfed them and whoever was near, drawing them into a world that they hadn't been in for about five-ten years. This, as you can probably imagine, was quite a major problem so the three major studios - Disney, Warner Bros's and Hanna-Barbera - put there heads together and came up with a solution, and that solution came in the form of Doctor Scratchensniff. [I do have a separate headcanon on him, covered in my 'Mental-Health' headcanon] The idea was that D.S. would work across all three studios and have enhanced toon powers.

While it's well known that a lot of Toons have been affected by the war, I'll go through a few of the toons that [I headcanon] have had the most noticeable difficulties after the war.

Daffy - He now goes back and forth between his 40's characterisation [screwball, Clampett version] and his greedy-jerkass characterisation in later years. The way it works is he will be the 'sensible' persona of the Greedy Daffy for most of the year [who, for all his faults, does care about his friends/family and can take care of Plucky easily], then he will suddenly switch back to his 40's persona. [Who, although he does still care for his friends/family, he can't express it as well and he has NO IDEA who Plucky is.]

After a bit of help and counselling from D.S. he has identified his major triggers [and Daffy has informed the rest of the LT's so they're aware of them]. For example, flying a plane will instantly put him back in the 40's mindset. For a time it was flying in general that put him in the mindset [which was fun when the LT's went to Australia] but now Daffy's okay with it and can manage small journeys easily. Longer journeys he struggled with, but he simply doesn't go on long plane journeys.

He also doesn't like Toons taller than himself getting in his face, [much taller, I mean. Bugs is alright.] He'll go into 'Fight' mode and try to attack them. Non-expected loud sounds like a car backfiring or fireworks can also remind him of war. Daffy's reaction when he hears something that he's not sure of what it is, it to try and find it and attack it. Either that or he would teleport away to a small space [like a jug, under a staircase or a crack in the wall] and not come out until Avery/Elmer/Porky calmed him down. [Bugs does try, but Daffy tends to get more wound up whenever Bugs tries anything, so the rabbit had to stop.]

Donald - I'm not going to spend long on Donald, mainly because his issues have [I'm fairly certain] been touched on in canon? His triggers are a lot like Daffy's except that Donald is MUCH more likely to try and attack anything he thinks is a threat rather than run away from it. He has inadvertently hurt [both physically and mentally] people he cares about by doing this, but they understand the reason why. Doesn't necessary make it easier, but they understand.

The main difference between him and Daffy though is that Donald has always wanted help. Ever since he realised he was hurting the people he loved, he wanted help. He had time off from work, Scrooge stepped in and insisted Donald and the boys move in with him so he didn't have to worry about a roof over his head and getting food and stuff. [Unfortunately this genuine well-meant, kind act only added to Donald's general feeling of uselessness]

The good news was that not only did Donald have extended family support, but he was best friends with Mickey and Goofy. Mickey was able to lean in Walts ears and convince him to treat Donald more leniently than he might have other toons, he also did his best to help Donald come to terms with what had happened to him during the war. Goofy could - in theory - do a lot less than Mickey, but he WAS more available and completely willing to take the boys off him for a couple of hours/days/weeks if needed. Goofy can cook - and cook well - so he'd bring food over for Donald so that if [as happened often] he didn't feel like cooking he'd have something ready to heat up/put in the oven.

Elmer - Some of the toons when they were put in charge of there units got on quite well, in that they had men who were willing to listen to them, and treated them kindly. Elmer's troop wasn't like that. He was very young when he was sent there [8] and was still more like Egghead. A bit silly, a bit hyper and not as hard as he needed to be. He cried the first time he went into battle and had a lot of trouble trying to gain the respect of his men. This has had a knock-on effect in that he thought everyone around him hated him and didn't like him. Even when he went back to Toontown, he just thought all his friends/family were being nice to him because they had to, not because they genuinely liked him.

Over many years Elmer has come to accept this isn't true and has been in therapy with D.S. in order to discuss it further. On a different note the main immediately noticeable difference upon coming back from war [aside from the fact he was mute for about two months] was that he started sleepwalking. His sleep had never been great at the best of times, but the war gave him such bad nightmares that he hardly ever slept. When he did eventually get to sleep, he started sleepwalking. Elmer being Elmer somehow didn't notice this at first? He thought it was completely normal [?] to start the night in your bed and wake up in Toon-World Australia having somehow swam his way across the ocean and hacked his way through the Australian outbacks to the middle off Australia, while asleep. He then had to spend several days trying to get back to Looney-Tune Street. With this in mind, it was really only a matter of time until it was noticed by the others.

They do there best to look out for him, if one of the LT's see Elmer sleepwalking, they will follow him/go with him and try to look after him. It should be noted though that despite the fact Fudd is clearly asleep, he is somehow aware of his surroundings and should someone attack him he will fight back and, most times, win.

[ayuuria]

Yashahime Translation: Prince Animage May 2021 Issue (Part 3)

Please do not repost this translation without my consent! This includes screenshots of any type and amount. If you wish to share this translation, simply link to this post.

For more information regarding the use of my translations, click here.

Due to the amount of content in the magazine, I have decided to the split the translation into three parts as follows

Part 1: Elder Son’s Resolve! Interview with Director Satou Teruo

Part 2: We Won’t Give Up On the Future! Father-Daughter Round-Table Talk with Narita Ken, Matsumoto Sara, and Komatsu Mikako

Part 3: The Strength to Overcome Destiny. Interview with Director Satou Teruo

The Strength to Overcome Destiny Director: Satō Teruo

The Words of Sesshōmaru’s Mother Speaking on Behalf of Everyone’s Thoughts

— Please tell us what you are feeling now that the broadcasting of episode 24 has ended.

Satō: It truly went by fast. With the Corona disaster, we had many struggles starting from the cast auditioning phase and having the actors perform in a different way compared to before. This work was created with a lot of first-time experiences on both the creator’s and actor’s side. The way the dubbing* was done was completely different than usual in that we recorded with only a small amount of people. Up until now, teamwork was created when everyone was boisterously​ dubbing together which is what brought out the goodness of a work, but we weren’t able to do that this time. That being said, we couldn’t gather in other places either aside from dubbing, so of course we didn’t have an opening or closing party… … I think everyone went through all sorts of difficulties. Even so, we overcame it and finally reached this point. I feel so grateful to the cast and staff.

* Translator’s Note: The word dubbing here does not have the same meaning as what we’re used to like foreign language dubbing.

— At the final phase of the story, it was revealed that Zero’s words and actions stemmed from her yearning for the Dog General.

Satō: In episode 23, the Lady Mother (Sesshōmaru’s mother) asks Zero “What exactly did you want to do?” and I think she spoke on behalf of what everyone was thinking. Zero’s actions starting from when she said “I wanted to protect my younger brother, Kirinmaru” had a slight twistedness to it and in the end, it was revealed that Kirinmaru was just an excuse for her to let out her jealousy. It was when all the rainbow pearls were gathered that Zero, who had not opened her heart until then, was stirred up.

In episode 23, Zero also throws a question at the Lady Mother “When Izayoi (Inuyasha’s mother) previously came through this path, how did you feel?”. The Lady Mother and Zero loved the same man. For this perfectly impactful dialogue between the two of them, we had Sakakibara Yoshiko (the role of Sesshōmaru’s mother) and Sakamoto Maaya (the role of Zero) record together. Zero is a troublemaker but she has an adult perspective and bewitching looks so I think she turned out to be an interesting character.

— On the other hand, in the beginning, it was thought that Kirinmaru was an absolute villain. However, as the story progressed, we begin to see him show that “Maybe he’s not such a bad person?”

Satō: To Kirinmaru, the Dog General is his eternal rival. In a sense, his grandchildren (Towa and the others) are like his own grandchildren. Even while fighting, he had something like a parental affection budding (within) that he no longer saw Towa and the others as ones he had to defeat with a moral purpose**. I think that he bestowed upon the name “Twin Azure Dragon Wave” to Towa’s technique because he had that side to him.

** Translator’s Note: By moral purpose, they mean the classic theme of rewarding good and punishing evil.

— However, in the final episode, it is that Kirinmaru who kills Setsuna.

Satō: It was quite a shocking development and I think there were many people who were surprised. Nowadays, there are not many works that back a character into a corner to this level and I think Setsuna fans especially were shocked by this… In the final episode, Towa was entrusted with a broken Tenseiga from Sesshōmaru. I can’t say too much yet about what that means but I hope that people will look forward to that in the second chapter (season).

Carrying the Destiny of Their Parents, the Children Themselves Move

— Up to this point, which character did you have the most fun moving Director Satō?

Satō: Takechiyo. I mentioned this in the Animage February issue interview as well but as a therapeutic character, I was really saved by Takechiyo. Onsite (aka the studio), Moroha was the favorite. She’s like a female version of Inuyasha and the way she speaks is similar to Inuyasha so I think for those who knew “Inuyasha”, she had the most familiarity and was easy to move. It’s just that because of that, there’s a tendency to start the story with Moroha. The focal point of this work was “The story of Sesshōmaru’s daughters” so we did struggle to balance with that.

— Then who was the most difficult?

Satō: Perhaps Zero, who burned a lot of calories in terms of drawing. She outfit is already showy as is and she ended up fighting in it. At first, we assumed that “Zero would possess Kirinmaru and fight in his form.” We did not plan to move her this much. Thus, since she was a key person in the story, we had (animation character design) Hishinuma Yoshihito-san design her to be flashy and impressive so that she was easy to remember. She ended up fighting though. Hishinuma-san kept reminding me “She’s not going to fight like that right?”… … I feel truly sorry about this (laughs).

— Lastly, please give our readers who are looking forward to the second chapter (season) a hint regarding the story.

Satō: Until episode 24, the child generation of Towa and the others got caught up in the quarrel of the generation before them consisting of Sesshōmaru and Kirinmaru. In the second chapter (season), the story will connect from confronting their parent’s destiny to the child generation’s story of “There’s something only Towa and the others can do”. In the end, Towa and the others are the root of the story after all, so instead of continuing to be pulled around by the parent generation, I would like to depict the girls moving on their own. We are diligently in the middle of production with that in mind.

— To begin with in episode 4, when Towa and the others were told about the source of evil within the parent generation from the spirit of the Tree of Ages, they did say “That has nothing to do with us”.

Satō: That’s correct. They said why should we have to do it. Setsuna has a dryness to her to begin with and Towa has the sense of a modern person of “How should I know?”… … There was a part of me that personally didn’t want a protagonist that would suddenly get swallowed by destiny. I wanted them to reject the unreasonable request. It’s just that as a result, they’re currently following the Tree of Ages’ wish as is… … Did the Tree of Ages have an influence on that? That part is also a point going forward.

The Two Who Encircle the Dog General

Through the Meidō stone, Sesshōmaru’s mother reaches out to Zero who is in the Meidō, a path that connects this world to the underworld, after Zero lost her life to Setsuna’s blood blade. Seeing through Zero’s heart that she yearned for the Dog General and that her hate for the half demons that carry his blood stemmed from jealousy, the words “How pitiful… women who are deeply in love are” spill from Sesshōmaru’s mother.

The Twin Azure Dragon Wave

With Towa’s emotions heightened from Setsuna’s death, she manifests a power so strong that it makes Kirinmaru’s eyes go wide. Associating the technique with Sesshōmaru’s, Kirinmaru bestows a name upon Towa’s technique that releases a shockwave in the shape of a two-headed blue dragon “Twin Azure Dragon Wave”. Getting hit with Towa’s Twin Azure Dragon Wave and Moroha’s Crimson Dragon Wave at the same, Kirinmaru is seriously injured.

[abluescarfonwaston]

Loid opened the door.

“You’re married!?” A female voice screeched.

Loid closed the door. Holding it closed as the person on the other side banged against it frantically.

“Loid?” Yor’s voice was high and concerned. Butter knife clenched in her hand. “Who’s that?”

Anya’s eyes went wide. Loid pressed his forehead against the door as it pounded.

“That.” He lamented. “Is my sister.”

“Stop yelling. The neighbors are staring.” He scolded when he finally opened the door.

She shoved past him. Taking in the apartment. Surveying their domain before her eyes settled on them.

She was all blue eyes and wild blond curls.

His sister.

Yor’s hand stayed tight around the butter knife. Half afraid she attack.

The hand not holding the knife was firmly clasped between both of Loid’s sister’s. Blue eyes drilling into her as she opened her mouth – undoubtedly to comment on how quick it must have been or how she wasn’t good enough or how she didn’t approve- and said,

“You deserve better.”

The door clicked closed behind Loid as he sighed. “Olivia –don’t.” He plead.

“No you seriously do. I once listened to him wax poetic about bumblebees for eight hours straight and I once watched him dive into an empty swimming pool and-“

“Yor, Anya, meet Olivia Stahl. She’s been working abroad the last few years. She was an intern I helped train during residency.”

“You helped train me?” She turned on him. “I’m sorry which one of us drank that spiked cocktail just to prove a point about how strong his liver was? Because I specifically remember telling you not to drink it and then you downing it in one go because-”

He did not make eye contact with her. Eyes train well above her head as he continued on ignoring her. “I didn’t realize she’d come home. Lovely to see you again Olivia but I only made enough for three so you’ll have to be going now-“

“Auntie!” Anya jumped out of her chair and hugged her leg. Halting his shoving her back out the door. “I missed you!”

There existed gratitude and irritation in equal measure in his heart. Gratitude that Anya had decided to play along with the situation. Irritation that her ploy would slow his removal of Olivia.

Olivia smacked his stomach with the back of her hand. “Well your daughter has decided I’m staying so I’m staying! It’s fine I’ll just eat your portion.” She settled herself down in his seat with a smirk. Anya stared up at her expectantly. Olivia smacked her forehead and dug around her bag pulling out a small figurine. “Sorry I didn’t bring your official present Anya. I heard he’d tricked some poor woman into marrying him and I forgot your gift at home.”

She’ll just pick something up later and pretend she got it abroad.

“But maybe you can keep an eye on this little fellow for your Dad until then?”

It was a small figurine of a bumblebee. Incredibly lifelike. Its eyes tiny ordered hexagons. She frowned and shook her head.

He plucked it from her palm and set it on the counter. “A Bombus Fernaldae. Will you drop this joke? It was one time.”

“It was not just one time! And the fact you could identify what kind of bee it is says plenty about how much you secretly like it.” She turned her focus to Yor. Ignoring Loid’s put upon sigh. “So tell me how he managed to trick you into marrying him.”

“I- well I actually asked him?”

Her lips curled with revulsion as she stretched the word “Why?” into an eight syllable groan.

Loid sat down with a new plate serving himself a new meal while Olivia ate the remains of his old one. “Eden requires children who apply to have two married parents. She was helping us out.”

You’re telling her that? I thought we were keeping it quiet.

“Oh I gathered what you got out of it but I was asking what she got out of it.”

“She doesn’t owe you an explanation Olivia.” He scowled. Olivia yipped in pain drawing her legs up onto the chair.

“Don’t kick me!”

“Don’t interrogate my wife.”

“Is it blackmail? If you need me to get rid of him for you I can-“

“I’m not blackmailing her!”

The conversation rapidly dissolved into bickering. Full of stories and inside jokes that were thrown and discarded far too quickly to unravel.

Loid ran his hand through his hair for the fifth time in as many minutes. The floof levels rising higher and higher. His locks growing more and more bedraggled as they continued.

Anya’s wide eyes snapped between the two of them like a riveting tennis match.

“Actually,” She started, interrupting the flow of their verbal sparring. Loid froze mid stab of the steak on Olivia’s plate. Suddenly remembering they weren’t alone. “Loid helped me out. Being single at my age can attract the wrong kind of attention.” Screams of the people the secret police dragged away filled the space between words. “And my brother was worried. I was very lucky to meet Loid when I did.”

Olivia side eyed Loid. “Lucky. Right.” She smiled brightly at Yor. “You have a brother?”

Loid settled back into his chair, the impish grin falling away as the conversation drifted to calmer waters.

“Walk me out?” She requested after the last of the dishes were put away.

He nodded. Anya’s eyes followed them out the door.

“Anya you have to finish this if you don’t want to miss spy wars.”

Her focus turned back to the homework with a groan.

She offered a cigarettes to him.

“I quit.”

“For your fake family up there?”

He shrugged. “We’ve both read the studies. Seemed as good a reason as any.”

She blew out a smoke cloud. “Sure but it’s not like cancer’s going to get a chance to kill us.”

“Was there a point or did you just want to make my laundry more difficult?”

She hummed. “Can’t it be both?” Elbowed him.

He settled against the brick wall with a sigh. “What’s the job?”

“Get a solid night’s sleep? How’s that for a mission.”

His head tapped against the wall. Eyes closed and face turned upward to the hazy sky. It did nothing to hide the lines of deep seated exhaustion.  “They send you to do a psych eval?”

“Should I?”

“I’m fine.”

“Fine like I’m just overworked but am actually fine or fine like you’d get your makeup perfect before going in for an eval?”

“My makeup is always perfect. Yours however-“ He tilted his head to peer down at her. Tossing a cheeky grin her way.

“Is impeccable.”

“Just like I taught you.”

“You did not!” Shoving him. He bobbed to the side dramatically before returning to his position. “They seem nice.”

“They are.” His eyes found the carton in her hand longingly. He tore his eyes away. “Bombus Fernaldae huh.”

“Going to pull a cuckcoo bee on them when the mission is over?”

“The mission comes first.”

“Not going to turn you in for wanting more asshole.”

His eyes dragged up to their window as she took a drag of the cigarette.

“We can’t be more than we are.”

“Did you just make a bee pun? Cause I will tell the entire department. I’ll report you for that. Assault on a coworker.”

“I rented a castle and they barely batted an eye. No one will believe you Nite Lite.”

“I have an actual title these days you know.”

“And I promise I will never use it.” He assured like that was the problem. Which it wasn’t. He pat her head. She considered biting it off. “Just overworked. This has been. Good for me I think.”

“Aside from the potential cleanup?”

“I try not to think about that.”

She snorted. “She deserves better.”

“Of course.”

“Don’t agree with me. It doesn’t make you less of an asshole.”

“She knows it’s fake. It’s not like I’m lying to her about that.”

“Oh so she knows that. Great and I’m sure your brat totally got the memo about how-“

“Stop.” His voice heavy and dark. “I didn’t design the mission.”

The smoke curled in the air. “Yeah I know.”

Cold threaded its ways slowly into their jackets.

“Did she actually propose?”

“She did. I was so shocked I fell flat on my face.”

“Ugh! Don’t tell me shit like that! Literally no one ever believes me when I tell them what a mess you are! It’s Agony! Agony you hear me?”

“So sorry my lying is more effective than your honesty.” He leaned over her. “It’s this handsome face of mine. People instinctively think I’m put together.”

She gripped his smug face. Shoving it away as he pushed against her. “I will break your handsome face and then we’ll see if anyone can put you back together!”

He laughed as she shoved him away. She stopped.

It sounded genuine.

It had been so long since she’d heard him laugh like that. Not since his last partner had been –

Twilight cocked his head at her questioningly.

“She still deserves better than you and your knockoff curries.” She told him one last time. Stamping out the cigarette butt with her shoe.

But it seems like she might be good for you.

[xenoblademisadventures]

Why the fuck does Mythras armor exist?! Here boobs are right there! they are wide open for attacks and getting hit in the chest hurts like hell!! 0/10 devs were horny and bad for combat

From a purely strategic mindset, I think the lack of leg or back armor is worse since that's a larger area to hit and is harder to defend against than a boob window. Besides that, I wouldn't consider it a huge deal that the person who wears a sundress into battle and is also a laser sword that shoots orbital missiles and is from a fantasy anime where sword beats gun doesn't have practical combat attire. Mainly because the setting and rules for how combat are allowed to work isn't realistic in the first place and embracing that lack of logic means you can lean more into other elements of a character's design. Trying to offset it could also put you more into the uncanny valley of the audience not know whether you're going for realism.

The larger issue with the boob window is that it makes her boobs way too overdesigned and draws attention from more important parts of her character design, such as her face and core crystal. That's also one of the two reasons why Smash Bros Mythra design looks really good while Xenoblade 2 Mythra looks horrible, they made the boobs slightly less overdesigned and redirected all of the attention the design draws to them upwards (towards her face). The leggings also really help the design because now there's a noticeable amount of dark colors to offset the light colors.

Smash bros did Mythra pleasant in a lot of ways. The fixed design is very good, but another favorite is how they made her sword activate and deactivate to punctuate her attacks. In Torna especially, her swordfighting looks really weird because her twinky arms are swinging a sword that's the size of her around like it's nothing, so it's really difficult to get a sense of weight. Having her turn the sword on and off lets her swing fast and look like a powerful blur. It emphasizes the movement really nicely. That definitely isn't the only way to fix the initial issue, but it definitely is an option that had a nice end result.

Besides that, there's the sexism angle. Zeke's open tiddies are there because it says something about his character. Both that he's a ridiculous funnyman and that he rejects Tantal. Mythra has a boob window because it's sexy. Zeke's boob window gets made fun of in a scene about how he's too stupid to freeze to death, Mythra's boob window gets made fun of in a scene where she mistakenly believes that Rex was trying to assault her. The boob windows are just not the same.

Xenoblade 2 is just very sexist in several ways and the character designs are one of those ways. I wouldn't consider factors like sexism and racism as a direct factor in how good or bad a character design is (like, the Makna Armor in Xenoblade 1 is some of the best designed armor sets in the game, that doesn't mean it isn't also blatantly racist), but it should still absolutely be a factor when discussing the design. Especially since stuff like sexism and racism is about trends rather than individual moments 99% of the time. Like, you're not going to get the game directly saying "women exist to support men" (at least in most modern games, I believe Xenogears directly said something along those lines in Disc 2). But you are going to get female characters being more likely to be put into support classes or fill supporting roles. In Xenoblade 2, a lot of the blades are women, is a healer, Morag is a tank. Those are both supports while Rex and Zeke are the damage dealers. When the protagonist is a dude, the story puts more focus on his personal story while when the protagonist is a girl, the story is more evenly spread between who gets the focus (Shulk, Rex, and Fei vs Shion, Elma, and Lora). And connecting this back to the character designs, Mythra's design wouldn't be sexist in a vacuum, but considering the overall trend of the female characters getting skimpy sexy gear while male characters get a lot more armor looking stuff that isn't about sex appeal, it does become sexist. I think Xenoblade X's alien armor sets illustrate the problem the most drastically out of any game in the series.

So, that's why I wouldn't consider the heavy sexism in Mythra's character design to be a reason that the design being bad, but it is definitely a bad thing that needs to be addressed when talking about it. I wanted to bring this up because people skirt around the issue a lot when talking about titty armor being bad and it is a legitimate reason to dislike the design.

Overall, Mythra's character design is difficult to work with because it has too many hanging parts that didn't need to be there, it doesn't say a lot about her personality, character designs don't follow the setting consistantly enough for Mythra's design to say anything about it, and the design draws a ton of attention to her boobs opposed to important stuff because sex appeal.

[wolfish-trickster]

Loki x female!artist!reader

Word count: 1 281

Summary: you were going through a difficult time and your boyfriend wants to make you feel better.

Warnings: adult themes (nothing too explicit), little bit of sadness

A/N: i felt kinda depressed lately, so I wrote something to cheer myself up. This might have some grammar mistakes or typos, so please try to ignore them. Enjoy :)

Loki admired you. From the way you looked to the way your magnifficent mind worked. It never ceased to amaze him how creative a human's mind can truly be. He has seen all those paintings in art galleries, and witnessed all those adventures written in books, hidden in the deepest parts of library. He has seen architecture that took his breath away. He never really thought something so asgardian could be seen here on midgard too. He must admit, some of the midgardian pieces were too shoddy for his liking. He even despisedcertain parts of midgardian culture and art. Probably because he missed his home too much, a place where he grew up surrounded with those beauties. He never made even the faintest effort to understand midgardian art. Until he met you.

You showed him different kinds of art. You even taught him few things. He never stopped admiring you, even after several years of living together. He never got tired of you and your talent.

On one night, after a very difficult day, you were lying in bed covered by the smoothest sheets to ever exist. You were safely cuddled against Loki, sleeping soundly, getting your deserved rest. But Loki wasn't sleeping, no. He was thinking. Thinking of a way to make you smile again. It has been a long time, since he saw you smile, truly smile. Not faking smile to make him feel better. He saw you, fighting whatever got into your way throughout the day, everyday. It tired you, drained you of your power. And yet, you still smiled at him (even if it was fake smile). You never brought up your own problems, istead you listened to his, and that made Loki feel two things: selfishness and love. Selfishness, because he should've insisted on listening to your problems too and love, because it just showed what a caring person you can be. Even in your darkest times. He loved you for it even more, if that could be possible.

As careful as he could he untangled himself from your warm embrace, got up from bed and went on a dangerous mission of searching for your sketch-book. You always had one filled with doodles, paintings, drawings or designes.

When he found the said book, he started browsing through it, page by page, looking for something you started working on a while ago. And he found it. 'Tomorrow will be one happy day for my darling' Loki thought with a small smile blooming on his face.

-

As soon as you regained consciousness, you wanted to go back to your dreamland. Away from your struggles. From mean people, from every day stress, from your anxiety, from EVRYONE. Well, maybe not everyone. Not from your boyfriend. You started blindly looking for his body in your king-sized bed, but to no avail. Maybe he got up sooner than you? But whenever he did, he stayed in bed watching after you. And then teasing the living hell out of you, for snoring so laud it woke him up. He never meant it in the bad way, you always tickled him for revenge. And tickling turned into make-out session and that to love making. You loved those times, that's why you groaned upon descovering he left the bed.

You slowly sat up and looked around your bedroom. Not too big, but not too small either, pretty cosy looking. You dragged yourself to your wardrobe to put something on yourself, you couldn't just walk around your house naked now, could you? 'I'm sure Loki wouldn't mind' you thought after picking one of his green t-shirts. He rarely wore something from Earth and if he did it was just his all black suit. You occasionly gave him sweatpants, few hoodies and t-shirts, so you could steal-ehm borrow them like a normal girlfriend would.

With nothing but his t-shirt and fluffy socks on you made your way downstairs. Soft bubbling of water and sound of cutting was coming from kitchen.

Loki didn't cook often, but when he did... Let's just say you were always full afterwards.

You rounded the corner and plopped down on sofa. Damn, that was a lot of stairs. Snuggling with pillows you tried to spot your god, but he was nowhere to be seen. How about a quick nap before breakfast? It's saturday afterall, the lazy day.

"Oh, you already woke up. How did you sleep my sweet?" asked the velvety voice you loved so much.

You turned around, ready to hug him to death, but you halted when you saw his clothes.

"What, the living hell, are, you, WEARING?" you didn't mean to scream that last lart, you really didn't, but seeing this too early in the morning would startle anyone.

"You do not like it? One of your own creations?" aked Loki with that smug smile on his damned lips.

He was wearing your redesign of his asgardian battle armour. It was more leather than metal, Loki's signature green, black and gold. Looked more badass too with horned golden headpiece instead of the whole helmet with slightly shorter horns. You thought he didn't notice, but how couldn't he, when he just loved every little thing you make?

Maybe you were quiet for way too long, cause Loki started anxiously picking on his palms, never a good sign.

"I love it Lo, I just... I never expected you to do something like this. You never cared about my designs before, " that send hurt straight to his heart. You always asked him about his projects, his interests. He has never done something similair. Out of respect, he thought. To give you space. Now he blames himself for the dissapointed way you said those words.

"Darling, of course I care about everything you draw. May it be a mindless doodle or a piece of art. I've seen the joy drawing brings to your life. Your eyes are so bright whenever you make art, and lately that light has faded. I wanted to make you smile again, to see the playful twinkle in your eyes I fell in love with. I figured this was the way, but... Maybe I shouldn't have gone through your book. "

He reached up, ready to change your design into his usual attire, when you cought his hand. Loki wanted to say something when you cut him off with a sweet kiss. He closed his eyes, one hand cupping your cheek, the other snaking around your waist pulling you closer.

You pulled away first, breathing heavily. Your head spinned. It always does when you kiss the love of your life.

"I love you Loki. Thank you for making me feel better. But next time don't go through my sketch book, what if I designed something for you and you'll spoil your surprise?" you asked with a smirk on your lips.

"I love you too darling. And don't worry. As long as you smile, I won't. By the way, did you really design something for me, except what I'm wearing?" he gave you the same smirk, giving you eskimo kiss.

"Hmmmm, you'll have to wait and see" you murmured against his lips.

"You minx, you know I'm not a patient man."

"I know, I know. What about we eat breakfast and then I can give you different kind of surprise?" your lips barely brushed his ear, sending shivers down his spine.

"I love the way you think, darling. Now go sit by the table, the sooner I finish the breakfast, the sooner we'll get to your surprise."

'What a pleasant way to start a morning' was the last thing you thought when Loki parted himself from your embrace.

[paragonrobits]

why dimitrescu when rose is also big: an observation on the nature of the Big Sexylady perspective and why rose was never a tumblr sexyman

so im thinking about how Lady Dimitrescu is the first female character to really fit the ‘tumblr sexyman’ vibe, in terms of how people have reacted to her, and I thought: Why didn’t rose quartz ever get this treatment?

like, she’s canonically not that much shorter than Dimistrescu is. She’s enormous, she’s thick, she’s curvy. She’s too wide to fit through a door! She’s a massive super soldier, designed for power and smashing in a va-voom package! so how come people never fixated on her like that?

sure, you might SAY that it was SU’s art style, as opposed to the more realistic designs but... have you SEEN the art styles people like to use around here? Or in any big name series that isn’t live action? The realism of the series is not a concern.

Like, JAsper was REAL popular as a sexygirl icon for a while, for precisely the same reasons I pointed out that Rose ought to have been; she’s big. but Jasper was controversial, for reasons I’ll get into in a bit.

So I think the actual reason, besides the age-old point that people respond differently to characters, comes down to a few details:

1. There is a certain charisma and purity towards villains who are bad and own it, the ones likely to have a card signifying how super evil they are; they laugh and sing songs about how super evil they are. they don’t pretend to be sympathetic, they don’t try to win the audience over with a sad backstory, they’re just unapologetically Bad. and this kind of attitude is a common in the tumblr icon! They’re not without nuance (Sans is an essay all on his own, and Junkrat is what he is because he grew up in an irradiated wasteland and had to be sharp and ruthless to survive), but they’re uncomplicated and fun in their simplicity.

Rose is anything but simple. She’s massively controversial, and that tends to push people off.

2. Rose Quartz, character wise, is not in the best position for this sort of thing. She started out as a distant figure that everyone loved, but no one said much about; we knew NOTHING about her personally. we knew that she fought for Earth, that she loved Greg and Pearl. we knew things she did, things she cared about,  but we didn’t actually know about her personality. Now, if she HAD been, with her goofy and melancholy persona with an edge of perpetual regret mixed with love for the world, she might have been. but again, she was a deeply complicated character, and layered characterization can be difficult to really get into for the sort of things that draw the tumblr sexyman vibe.

Jasper, as implied earlier, works on the same principle. Is she sexy to a bunch of people? Yeah. but while she WAS hugely popular for a while, there were still too many controversial elements for her to pick up in the same way. A tumblr sexyman can be complex and controversial, but there must be a certain purity to them; they can be evil, but not in a way that might make people uncomfortable.

3. It actually took us a while to find out that she was both a literal giant (not including her original Pink Diamond form), and massively thick. And from a certaion perspective, stacked as hell (as much as can be noted in that show’s art style, but certainly by the standards of Gems). But it wasn’t immediately clear how big she actually was, and since visuals are the first thing most people tend to drift towards... well, by the time Jasper had been introduced, people latched onto her build and when it was clear that Rose had pretty much the same body, it was largely overlooked.

Essentially, due to the slow burn nature of SU’s storytelling, the gradual build up of Rose’s character and actual appearance, it wasn’t obvious what she was about for a while and by now, only people who are already into her are ready to hop aboard the ‘Rose could probably bust Dimistrescu’s outfit because she’s fucking huge’ train

[noona-clock]

Traveling Love (Collab) - Part 4, Final Chapter

Genre: Fluffy/Romantic AU

Pairing: Nam Joo Hyuk x You (Female!Reader)

Warnings: None

Part 1, 2, 3, 4, Masterlist | Words: 2,094

A/N: Welcome to the third series in the monthly Love In Fours Ways collab with myself, @jackiejacks923​ @prettywordsyouleft​ & @this-song-thats-only-for-you​ . We have all taken inspiration from 4 illustrations (linked below), and during the last week of the month, we will each be sharing a 4-part mini-series based on those drawings.

Credit to: Puuung - Love Is In The Small Things

Part 4: Tucking Her into a Perfect Sleeping Burrito

You’d never experienced the feeling of Post-Vacation Blues quite as acutely as you were now.

When you’d planned this trip over the last several weeks, you’d had a feeling it was going to be wonderful -- not only because your destination had too many fun and exciting things to do and see and visit and eat, but because you were going with someone you loved. Plus, Joo Hyuk had really needed this vacation.

But you hadn’t been prepared for just how wonderful. 

If you could’ve designed your perfect vacation with no limitations, it wouldn’t have been as perfect as the one you’d just taken with Joo Hyuk. You had absolutely never been on a trip like it, and you would absolutely never go on another trip like it again.

It’s not like you did anything extremely special or note-worthy; you explored the city, you took pictures, you ate delicious food, you saw beautiful scenery. Very typical vacation stuff!

Something about it had just been... special, and no amount of money or planning would ever be able to recreate this past week.

...However.

And you were very reluctant to admit this however, and you certainly wouldn’t admit it out loud to Joo Hyuk.

But. However.

All of the planning and the fact that you’d known how very much Joo Hyuk had needed a break from work had built up quite a bit of pressure for this vacation to be as perfect as it could be.

It had been as perfect as it could be, but perfect never comes easily.

You’d worked hard to help it become perfect, and now that it was all over and you were very soon to arrive back home...

You were feeling it.

All of the work you’d done before the trip, all of the activities you’d checked off during the trip, and the unconscious demand lurking in the back of your head for the trip to be just what Joo Hyuk needed... It was all coming to the tipping point the closer you got to your apartment, and by the time you stepped in through the front door, you felt like you were going to collapse with exhaustion.

“It does feel good to be home, though,” Joo Hyuk said, and his tone made it obvious that hadn’t been the first thing he’d said.

Were you already so tired that you were zoning out and missing full sentences?

“Mm,” you hummed, deciding not to let on that you were kind of about to drop right here on the floor and fall asleep -- that you were so exhausted, you’d completely missed the first part of whatever your boyfriend had said.

“I’m just going to check my email,” Joo Hyuk murmured as you began to lug your suitcase back toward your shared bedroom.

Again, you simply hummed in response -- and that’s how you knew your brain was fried. Joo Hyuk checking his email just after arriving home from vacation should have made you stop and warn him that he at least needed to wait until tomorrow to get back into Work Mode. But, no. You just hummed and trudged through your apartment to go unpack.

When you reached your bedroom, you let your suitcase fall to the floor, and you dropped onto your knees beside it to unzip it.

Your arms felt like lead -- or like they were stuck in Jello -- as you began to take out your clothes and put them in a pile next to you.

If you were in your right mind, you would have taken your suitcase closer to your clothes hamper to cut out the middle man.

But you were, apparently, just too tired to think efficiently at the moment.

Joo Hyuk’s voice suddenly cut through the silence, and you jumped a little --

...Wait.

How had he checked his email so quickly?

And why had his sudden presence startled you that much?

...Had you been --

“Why didn’t you tell me you were that tired?” Joo Hyuk said softly as he crouched down next to you.

Well, then. You had just fallen asleep while unpacking your suitcase.

You knew you were exhausted, but you didn’t realize you were that exhausted.

“Sorry,” you murmured, your brow furrowed as Joo Hyuk reached to pick you up. He slid one arm behind your knees, the other across your back, and stood up to carry you bridal-style to your bed. “I guess it just hit me all at once when we got home.”

“No, don’t apologize,” he replied, carefully leaning over and setting you on top of the bed. “You did a lot of work, and we were pretty busy this whole week. You just get some rest, and I’ll finish unpacking, okay?”

The second your head hit the soft cushion of your pillow, your eyes began to droop. You weren’t sure if you even responded to him, and the last thing you remember was Joo Hyuk reaching for the throw blanket at the end of the bed.

An indeterminate length of time later, the scent of something cooking tickled your nose. You smelled it first before you even blinked your eyes open, but when you did open your eyes, you found that not only had Joo Hyuk covered you with a blanket...

He had wrapped the blanket around you like the tortilla of a burrito.

A smile tugged at your lips, and you nestled into the blanket even further, letting out a soft sigh of contentment.

You were wrapped up in your blanket like a burrito, the apartment smelled like the most delicious dinner was cooking, and you had just taken a much-needed nap.

There was no way you could be even remotely upset right now. Not even the tiniest bit.

With a groan, you began to sit up so you could unroll yourself and make your way to the kitchen. The smell of dinner was just too tempting to resist, and your stomach was on the verge of letting out a rather audible grumble.

But before you could even lift one corner of the blanket around you, you heard footsteps shuffling toward the bedroom. And when your gaze landed on the doorway, you saw Joo Hyuk had appeared gingerly carrying a steaming bowl, his hands covered by your favorite floral pot holders.

You managed to inch up into a seated position by the time he got to the side of the bed, and you asked, “What’s this?”

“I thought I would make you some soup,” he answered, perching on the edge of the mattress and shifting the bowl to cradle it in one hand. After slipping the pot holder from his now free hand, he took the spoon from inside the bowl and dipped it into the soup.

“Babe, you don’t have to feed me,” you chuckled, though you still accepted the spoonful he offered, slurping the soup carefully. Once you’d swallowed it, feeling the comforting warmth sliding down your throat, you added, “I’m not sick! I’m just exhausted.”

Joo Hyuk held out another spoonful of soup for you, waiting until you’d taken it before replying with, “Yeah, but you took care of me this whole week -- and a long time before then, too. It’s time for me to take care of you.”

“I did not take care of you,” you retorted with a soft grin.

“You absolutely did.”

“I just planned our trip! Once we actually got there, we did everything together.”

Your boyfriend let out a soft sigh and leaned over to set the bowl down on the nightstand. “I know, but... I know it hasn’t been easy because I’ve been so stressed out.”

“It really --”

“Just let me finish,” he interrupted, shooting you a playful smirk.

You pressed your lips together and snuggled back into your pillows.

“I know I’m not always the easiest person to live with because I don’t share things easily. Or... at all. Unless you force me to. And no one should have to do that to their partner, so I’m sorry I clam up when I’m stressed. But if it annoys you or worries you, literally no one would know. You either do an amazing job of hiding it or...”

He trailed off, so you took this opportunity to say something.

“Or I just know that’s how you are, and I love you. Unconditionally,” you said quietly.

Yes, sometimes it did annoy you that Joo Hyuk had such a hard time sharing how he felt. Sometimes you did feel like you were nagging him to be more open and forcing him to tell you what emotions he was experiencing.

But... you also understood that emotions can be super tricky. And complicated. And hard to express. Everyone is different, and everyone handles emotions differently. So, if you loved Joo Hyuk unconditionally, you had to accept that he was one of those people who just had a difficult time with them. 

If you didn’t accept that, wouldn’t it be a condition to your love? You only loved him if he expressed his emotions freely?

So, you mustered all your patience and you gave him time. You helped him out as much as you could and stepped away when you felt like you needed to.

Joo Hyuk smiled down at his lap, shaking his head gently. “I... don’t know how I got so lucky finding you, but...” He lifted his gaze, looking at you with more love in his eyes than you really even knew what to do with. “I hope you know how much you mean to me, and that I never want to take you for granted.”

“Of course, I do,” you murmured, finally wriggling your hands free from your blanket burrito so you could cradle his ridiculously handsome face in your palms. “I know you, and I know that you letting me in is just one way you show me that you care. You may not realize it, but you do a lot of little things, and I learned pretty quickly that they all mean you love me.”

Joo Hyuk grinned bashfully, and you leaned in to capture his lips in a brief kiss.

“And I love you, too,” you whispered. “And I really love when you turn me into a blanket burrito and make soup for me, even if I’m not sick.”

Your boyfriend chuckled lightly, his breathy laugh grazing over your lips.

“It’s really good soup, by the way,” you told him as you pulled away and reached for the bowl on the nightstand.

“Thanks,” he replied, setting one of the pot holders in your lap so you could put the bowl there. “I used that cookbook you got me for Christmas last year.”

Your eyes widened, and you beamed over at him. “You did?!” you marveled. “Oh, now I really know you love me.”

“Please don’t take that to mean I want another one this year,” he laughed, shaking his head. “One cookbook is enough.”

“No, you can never have too many cookbooks!” you argued playfully. “Just like you can never have too many blankets.”

“That is also not true. We’re only two people, we can’t use that many --”

“But what if I want to be a different blanket burrito every day of the week?” 

Joo Hyuk quirked a brow at you and opened his mouth to reply... but he stopped himself. He leaned over and pressed a kiss to the top of your head.

“You’re right,” he mumbled before he got up and headed back out of the bedroom. “You’re right. You always are.”

Rather than crow triumphantly after him, you simply smiled down at your bowl of soup. You bit your bottom lip to stop yourself from squealing, and that’s when you knew without a shadow of a doubt that Joo Hyuk would be by your side for as long as you both shall live.

After two years, he could still make you bite your lip and squeal like a young girl with a schoolyard crush. He could still make you smile like a kid on Christmas morning. He could still make your heart and stomach flip just like he could the first time you’d met him.

...I mean, you’d already known he was your Forever, long before this. But you know what I mean. You just knew even more.

At home, on vacation, stressed out, in a blanket burrito, with a bowl of soup, out on the balcony, under the stars...

Whenever, wherever, however -- it didn’t matter.

Forever and ever, even more, he was yours.