#bc of the golden loop ending

[unlucky-words]

sitting here like

[astral-catastrophe]

Thinking about a LOZ game plot that starts similar to botw2, with Zelda and Link exploring and finding Ganondorf’s remains, but it takes a more interesting turn.

Ganondorf speaks to them, and though his body shows signs of being almost entirely decomposed to the bones falling apart, his voice is young.

Link and Zelda then go and adventure, seeking places and riddles Ganondorf told them. They see through his own eyes his he grew up, too stressed and too worried to fully protect a kingdom. They watch the young king, doing everything he can to help when their predecessors, the ancient Zelda and Link come along.

they watch as their predecessors go and threaten Ganondorf, who had not yet done anything wrong. They watch as their predecessors eventually hunt Ganondorf down and kill him.

Zelda and Link are terrified to return, and once they do, Ganondorf is sad. He understands why they would not want to free him now, but this only urges them on and makes the duo more determined.

After all, this was only a child king around their age.

so they go and find a way to bring the young king back to life, and from there, the trio recovers, then sets out to finish the actual reason for Link needing to draw the master sword.

[pedrospatch]

call it what it is

Jackson! Joel Miller x Female Reader

summary: A disagreement over patrol duty leads to declarations that have been long overdue.

warnings/tags: 18+ ONLY, MINORS DNI. established relationship. HEFTY AGE GAP (reader is in her 20’s and joel is 56). ellie and joel are fine bc i said so and they deserve nothing less. reader handles a rifle, joel’s a little too overprotective and almost seems controlling, but i promise he is not. well, maybe just a smidge. arguing, admission of feelings, joel miller says i love you (yes this is ooc, no i do not care bc i need this old man to tell me he loves me). angst, fluff. quite a bit of side character interaction before we get to joel and reader in the second half. the only physical description of reader is that she is shorter than joel. fair warning, i am quite rusty.

word count: 4.2k

a/n: hi hello. i have not shared a wip in over 2 months. i was going back and forth on whether or not i wanted to share a fic with so much going on but decided i wanted to get back to doing what i enjoy. that and ofc that new footage was a boost of inspo. i am sending so, so much love to anyone who happens to see this author note, whether you read this fic or just happen to see this note in passing whilst scrolling. i know things have been tough, but i am here with you. <3

Joel wakes with a gentle start. Yawning, he rolls over from his side onto his back, blinking the sleep out of his eyes as warm, golden sunlight filters into the bedroom through the sheer, white linen curtains drawn over the window. He stares up at the ceiling, his breathing slow, steady, and even. He’s still getting used to it, it seems. Waking this calmly, with a tranquil peace he had been so certain he would never in his life feel again. He knew it couldn’t be a mere coincidence the nightmares had all but stopped tormenting him in his sleep when the two of you stopped doing that awkward little tap dance around one another and began sharing a bed, a home, a life.

No more bolting upright in sheer panic in the middle of the night, heart pounding and drenched head to toe in a cold sweat. No more believing he’s failing in his sleep. No more waking up feeling like he’s lost something.

Even his dreams about Sarah had become so, so much more pleasant. Images of her in that field on that night were replaced by different memories, like watching her teammates dogpile her after she’d scored the winning goal in their soccer tournament, or the big, triumphant grin she’d flashed him over her chocolate milkshake as the pair sat in their usual corner booth at their favorite fifties-themed diner in Austin—much to Joel’s surprise, Sarah had politely declined her teammates’ invitation for pizza once the match ended, choosing to celebrate her victory with him. Just the two of them.

“Y’sure you don’t wanna go with your friends, kiddo?” he’d asked, raising an eyebrow. He had been certain she was approaching the age where she would start spending less and less time with her old man. “I wouldn’t mind, y’know.”

“Positive,” she had reassured him with a smile, looping her arm through his and leading him off the pitch. “I’d much rather be with you, dad.”

Rather than smelling metallic in his slumber, he smells the grass that stained her white and blue striped jersey. Her cheeks are smeared with dirt, not with crimson.

Stifling another loud yawn, Joel stretches his arm out over towards your side of the bed, his calloused fingers seeking the warmth and softness of your naked body—instead, all they find are empty sheets, cold and long abandoned. He turns his head, and as suspected, you are not laying there beside him. That’s hardly out of the ordinary. Out of the two of you, you were the early riser, up before the neighbors’ rooster even had the chance to sound the alarm. Joel knows how much you treasure your quiet mornings lounging on the porch swing he’d built for you as you watched the sunrise with a hot cup of coffee in hand. He often made a genuine effort to get up and join you, but lately, his patrol rotations had been all over the place thanks to a shortage of patrolmen. He found himself sleeping in whenever he had the chance, seeing as he never knew when he might have to work a damn double. Or maybe it was just his age catching up with him.

He checks the time and then rolls out of bed, groaning when his sore knees and his aching lower back protest his movement.

After taking a quick shower using whatever hot water the kid had left for him after her own shower—much to his annoyance, it was not very much—Joel brushes his teeth and gets dressed for the day before pulling on his boots and heading downstairs into the kitchen where he finds the culprit responsible for the cold downpour he’d been forced to wash himself under. Ellie’s sitting at the table, absentmindedly stirring her oatmeal around her bowl with her spoon as she flips through one of her comic books. Just as he’s about to greet her, he spots the clean, empty coffee pot on the kitchen counter and frowns. You hadn’t even made coffee yet?

Now, that—that is out of the ordinary.

“Where is she?” he asks.

“Well, good morning to you too, old man. Oh, I slept great, thanks for asking,” Ellie quips without looking up at him as she flips the page. She mumbles something under her breath he doesn’t quite catch, something like, and you get on my ass about my manners?

Rolling his eyes, Joel snorts in response and pads over to the coffee maker on the counter. He spoons in some of the grounds he’d traded for earlier that week into the reusable filter, pours in water from the tap, and turns it on to brew. He grabs two ceramic mugs from the wire dish rack beside the sink and sets them down on the counter. “She out back?” he questions, yanking the refrigerator door open—he tries to remember the little things, like how you enjoyed your coffee with a bit of milk as well as a dash of cinnamon, if you had the rations, or something to trade for the precious spice. He always made sure that you did.

“Nope.” Ellie shovels a spoonful of oatmeal into her mouth and adds thickly, “She went to get some eggs.”

Joel shoots her a look of disgust over his shoulder. “Jesus, Ellie! How many times do I gotta tell you? Don’t talk with your mouth full. It’s bad manners,” he scolds her, shaking his head. He turns his attention back to the refrigerator. As he reaches for the glass bottle of milk, he pauses and his eyebrows pull together in confusion when he sees the wicker basket on the top shelf. “Wait a minute.” He feels her stiffen in her chair. “Why the hell would she go get eggs when we’ve got a full basket of ‘em right here in the fridge?”

She clears her throat. “Oh, uh, my bad. I got confused. Think she said she was gonna go get more honey? Uh, I used the last of it to make my breakfast this morning and she, uh—she wanted some for her toast. You know, ‘cause she really likes putting honey on her toast,” she rambles before piling more oatmeal into her mouth.

Closing the refrigerator door, he turns to her, his eyes narrowing with suspicion as uneasiness settles deep in the pit of his stomach. “Ellie?”

There’s a momentary pause. “...yeah?”

This time, Joel doesn’t bother to chastise the teenager for talking with her mouth full. “Where is she?”

Ellie nervously swallows her food and holds up both of her hands. “Hey, I already fucking told you, man.”

“Look, I know you like the back of my own hand, kiddo. And I know damn good and well when you’re lying to me.” Joel crosses his arms over his chest. “Now tell me the truth. What do you know that I don’t?”

Groaning, Ellie sits back in her chair. “Ugh. She made me swear not to tell you! She’ll fucking strangle me if I do—”

“Yeah, well, not if I fuckin’ strangle you first myself,” he threatens her. “M’Serious, Ellie. Tell me what’s going on. Right now.”

“Alright, alright! Jesus,” she huffs. “She’s with Tommy. He’s been taking her out of town to do target practice in the mornings, just the two of them. She usually gets back to the house before you get up,” she admits.

Joel’s arms fall back to his sides, his shoulders tense. “And how long has this been goin’ on?” he asks, rigidly. There’s a sudden tightness inside his chest, a feeling he hasn’t felt it in a while, but is still all too familiar to him.

After Tommy spread the word around town that more people were needed for patrol duties, you’d expressed an interest in the role, but Joel had been all too quick to shut you down, telling you he didn’t want you stepping foot outside the community’s gates.

“No,” he’d said. “Not happenin’. S’too dangerous.”

“But Joel—”

“I said,” he lowered his voice. “No.”

He hadn’t offered you an explanation as to why he was against it, refused to give you one good, solid reason as to why it was acceptable for him to risk his own life to protect Jackson, but it wasn’t acceptable for you to do the same.

Joel hadn’t known how to tell you the truth. How he needed you far, far more than you needed him, how the mere thought of losing you, the best fucking thing that could have possibly happened to him since the world ended, made him feel like his heart was going to stop.

A few weeks had passed since then, and thankfully, you never brought it up to him again. You had lost interest in patrol duty. Or so he’d thought.

“How long has this been going on?” he repeats after a minute.

“C’mon, man! Haven’t I already snitched enough?”

“Ellie,” Joel bites out her name. “Tell me. How long?”

She sighs in defeat. “Two weeks? Maybe three?” When she notices the muscle in his jaw tick, she grimaces. “You do realize why she didn’t fucking tell you, right?”

“Don’t,” he warns her, sharply.

“I’m just saying,” Ellie mutters, peering down into her bowl.

Without another word, Joel angrily storms past her and straight out the front door, snatching up his rifle on the way. He heads straight for the stables, trying to ignore the anxiety flaring inside of his chest.

Focus.

Now, breathe in. And breathe out.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Breathe in.

Breathe...

You exhale as you slowly squeeze the trigger.

Y’squeeze it like you love it, you had been told by your reluctant instructor.

The round fires off into the distance and you swiftly grab the bolt handle, bringing it up, back, forward, and then down again. You pull the trigger once more, then repeat and continue firing one shot after the other for a total of five rounds.

The rifle’s recoil nearly sends you flying backwards, but a strong hand on your back keeps you nice and steady. That same hand then moves to your shoulder and gives you three firm taps.

“Alright, alright! Christ,” Tommy laughs. He withdraws his arm from around you and shakes his head. “Fuckin’ calm down, Annie Oakley.”

Picking up his binoculars, he rises to his feet and looks through the lens at the makeshift targets that he’d set up for you, three empty soup cans lined up in a row on top of a wooden fence about twenty-five yards away—your longest shooting distance to date.

“Well?” You don’t even bother masking your impatience as you lower the rifle, carefully propping the weapon up against the tree stump you’re perched behind. Rubbing your sore shoulder, you hope the kickback won’t leave a bruise. You wouldn’t know how to explain that to Joel. “How did I do?”

His response comes in the form of a long, low whistle.

There is no telling if that had been good whistle, or if it had been a bad one. You groan. Now was not the time for him to dick around. “Please tell me I got at least one of them?”

“You got ‘em all, actually.” Tommy replies, lowering the binoculars and peering down at you. There’s a glimmer of pride in his eyes. “Good job, kid.”

Kid? Not exactly a nickname one wants to be called by the brother of the much, much older man that they are romantically involved with. It’d taken Tommy months to accept your relationship with Joel, especially when you moved your things out of your unit and into his over the summer. Part of you wonders if him referring to you as a kid is simply his own subtle way of telling you—no, of reminding you, that he’s still not comfortable with it.

And perhaps he never would be.

After all, you had still been a teenager when you first arrived to Jackson a few years ago, stumbling upon the town just a few months shy of the twentieth birthday you weren’t sure you would survive long enough to see.

You were indeed a kid when you’d met Tommy Miller.

Were.

Scowling up at him, you snap, “I told you to stop calling me that. I’m not nineteen anymore, Tommy.”

Having read your mind, he gives you a small smile and acknowledges, “Yeah, you’re right. You definitely ain’t a kid anymore.” He offers you his hand and hoists you up to your feet. Before dropping your hand, he gives it an apologetic squeeze.

You relax a little and smile back at him. “Did I really get all three?”

Tommy nods. “You sure did. You’re a damn good shot. I gotta be honest with you—I didn’t expect you to be this fuckin’ good,” he admits sheepishly.

Chuckling, you scoff, “Thanks. I think.”

“It’s a compliment, sugar.” He winks and flashes you a lopsided grin. “In fact, I’d say my work here is done.”

“Great! So when are you putting me on the roster?”

His grin instantly vanishes. “Uh, listen. About that....”

He trails off, and your heart sinks a little.

Tommy wouldn’t back out of this now—would he?

“Oh, no. Don’t you dare go back on your word, Miller,” you say, lightly poking him in the chest. “We had a deal. You said if I did well enough, you’d think about it.”

He nods in agreement. “Exactly. Said I’d think about it. And I think that puttin’ you on the roster for patrol ain’t a good idea.”

Your mouth falls open. If he never had any intention of holding up his end of the bargain, then what had been the point of teaching you how to shoot?

You didn’t understand.

“You just said it yourself, I’m a great shot! I’m a good on horseback, too. I’m stealthy. I’m diligent. What more do you fucking need from me, Tommy?”

Tommy’s chest heaves with a heavy sigh. “Joel would fuckin’ murder me with his bare hands if I even thought about puttin’ you on patrol duty. Hell, he’d murder me just knowin’ we’re out here and I’m teachin’ you how to shoot. It’s a damn fuckin’ miracle he still hasn’t caught onto this, y’know.”

Shocked, your eyebrows shoot to your hairline. “This is about Joel? Are you serious?”

“‘Course it is.” He pauses. “Listen, now I know the three of us had our—differences—when he first told me ‘bout you two. Still takin’ me a bit of gettin’ used to, but I can see he’s real serious about you. I know my brother, and I know he won’t risk losin’ what’s most important to him. Ain’t no way in hell. He doesn’t want you out here and you know that as well as I do.” Tommy shoves his hands into the pockets of his jeans, shrugging as he shuffles his weight from one cowboy boot to the other. “Unless he’s alright with it, I ain’t gonna put you on the roster.”

For a moment, you’re at a complete loss for words.

Upon seeing the crestfallen expression on your face, he makes a suggestion. “You can try talkin’ to him ‘bout it again if it means that much to you. Ask him—”

“Ask?” You want to laugh. You almost do. “I’m an adult, Tommy. I don’t need his permission to do this. Or to do anything for that matter. Joel doesn’t tell me what I can and can’t do.”

Tommy smiles wryly. “Well then, if that’s the case, why are we sneakin’ around and doin’ this behind his back?”

Your shoulders slump in defeat.

Because the ramifications could be disastrous.

Joel had made his stance on the matter abundantly clear, and yet here you were, deliberately disobeying him.

“Stumped you real good, didn’t I?”

Before you can even start to think about how you can possibly respond to that, you hear the sound of hooves in the dirt behind you, followed by whinny of a horse.

Tommy’s face pales as he glances over your shoulder.

“Shit.”

There’s no need for you to ask. His grimace says it all.

Somehow, you will yourself to turn around just as Joel’s steed comes to a halt beside the mare you and Tommy had ridden out on together. He jumps out of the saddle, grunting at the forceful impact on his knees when his feet hit the ground. His rifle hangs from a worn, brown leather strap slung across his back.

He approaches the two of you looking absolutely livid, and your throat goes dry.

“The hell is goin’ on here?” He breezes right past you, roughly shoving his brother with both hands. “Why the fuck would you bring her out here, Tommy? What the fuck is the matter with you?”

“Joel, c’mon. Take it easy—”

“Don’t fuckin’ tell me to take it easy!”

“Joel!” You reach for his arm. “Wait, it’s not his fault!”

Joel shoves him again, then takes him by the collar of his shirt and pins him against the ponderosa pine tree behind him. “You’ve been bringin’ her outside the gates behind my fuckin’ back for weeks, asshole?”

The panic begins to set in—he’s taking his anger out on the wrong person, and deep down, he knows this too.

“Joel! Stop! Let him go!” Grabbing fistfuls of his jacket, you try pulling him off of the younger man. “Stop it! It’s not his fault! I asked Tommy to bring me out here!”

He whirls around, his nostrils flared, jaw clenched.

You’ve seen this side of him a handful of times before.

But his anger has never been directed at you.

“What?”

Immediately, you let go of him and take a step back. “I asked Tommy to bring me out here and teach me how to shoot so that I can start working patrol,” you explain, hoping, praying, he doesn’t catch the slight tremble in your voice. “This was all my idea, okay? If you’re going to be mad at someone, then be mad at me. Not at him.”

“So you did this after I fuckin’ told you I didn’t want you out here?” Joel seethes. His neck becomes flushed, his tan skin now a deep shade of red.

“Joel—”

He cuts you off. “I had to find out from Ellie? You tried to get her to fuckin’ lie to me? After all the work it took for me and her to—” Stopping mid sentence, he places his hands on his hips and shakes his head.

“Joel. Please.” Behind the anger in his dark brown eyes, you detect something else. A mingle of hurt, concern—fear?

Tommy awkwardly clears his throat. “Well I’m, uh—I’m gonna head back to town,” he says, touching a hand to the back of his neck. “I’ll let the two of you work things out in private.” As he passes Joel, he lightly claps him on the shoulder. “Girl’s a sharp shooter, big brother. I’d reckon she’s almost better than you.”

His effort to lighten the mood fails. Miserably.

Offering you a subtle nod of encouragement, Tommy hops into the saddle of his mare and takes off towards the commune.

Silence falls over the both of you. It feels suffocating.

Unfamiliar.

Finally, you speak. “Joel, please just hear me out—”

“What the hell were you thinkin’? Or were you just not thinkin’ at all?”

“I was thinking I want to pull my weight in Jackson.”

“You already have a fuckin’ job,” Joel reminds you.

“Making sandwiches and serving whiskey at The Tipsy Bison?” You scoff, crossing your arms over your chest. “I am capable of more than that, Joel. So much more. Don’t you believe I’m capable of doing more?”

“I don’t want you out here,” he grits through his teeth. “Capable or not, I don’t want you outside Jackson’s walls. I don’t want you on patrol and that’s fuckin’ final. You understand me?” Now it’s him who falters, and you wonder if you’re imagining things, or if that’s really a tear you see sliding down the side of his face, disappearing into the salt and pepper scruff of his beard.

“That’s not your decision to make, Joel. It’s mine.”

“M’responsible for you. It’s my job to look after you—to protect you.”

Something about the way he is looking at you, it feels like a punch to the gut, and it’s at that precise moment when you begin to realize that he’s not angry. He’s afraid.

“Joel, I know that all you want to do is protect me,” you sigh, letting your arms fall down to your sides. “I know you do. But you’re doing me no favors by trying to keep me sheltered. By treating me like I’m defenseless. Don’t forget, I’m a survivor too.”

“You already know how fuckin’ dangerous it is out here. Clickers, raiders—”

“I can handle it,” you insist, stubbornly.

“You’d be puttin’ yourself right in harm’s way!”

You shoot back, “You mean, the way you and so many other people put yourselves in harm’s way every single day for the sake of keeping Jackson safe?”

A frustrated growl rumbles through his chest. “Christ, why are you bein’ so fuckin’ foolish? You’re just askin’ to get yourself killed!”

“I can take care of myself!” You realize your hands are shaking and curl them into tight fists at your sides in an effort to hide it. “Just accept it, Joel! Accept that I can take care of myself, alright?”

That is all it takes to tip Joel over the edge he’s been teetering on. “Then what do you fuckin’ need me for?” he shouts, his voice thundering over the quiet plains of Wyoming. “If you can take care of yourself, what’s the point in us bein’ together? Why are you with me?”

“Because I love you!”

As soon as the confession comes tumbling out of your mouth, you take a step back, your wide eyes meeting his own. Until now, neither of you have ever called this what it is, been bold enough to say it’s love.

Loving after so much grief, so much loss, is daunting. It’s something you thought you would never be capable of doing again, not in this lifetime. Not in this world. It’s happened, though.

You love Joel Miller.

And he loves you.

He’s never told you he does, but he’s shown you.

From the way remembers how you take your coffee in the mornings, to the way he laces his fingers with your own, holding your hand when he’s buried inside of you, whispering sweet nothings into your collarbone every single night.

“You—you what?” Joel’s whisper is hardly audible.

You inch your way closer to him, your voice soft. “I love you,” you declare once more. “I’m not with you because of what you can do for me. I’m not with you because you can take care of me.” Closer. “I’m with you because I love you—because I’m in love with you, Joel.” Closer, until your chest brushes against his, and he can smell the subtle scent of your homemade, rosewater soap. “The only thing I need, and have ever needed from you, is your love in return.”

His throat bobs. Before you can utter another word, he lifts his hands and gently takes your face, cradling it in between his large palms, gently. His eyes search yours, immediately finding the sincerity behind your words. Leaning down, he brushes the tip of nose against your own as one of his hands travels down, his long fingers curling around the nape of your neck. His thumb lightly strokes the column of your throat.

“I love you,” Joel says hoarsely. Three words he hadn’t said to anyone in over two decades—it feels foreign to him, they ring strange in his own ears. He tries it again, clearer this time, and with a little more confidence. After all, he’s only saying what he has known from the very start. “I love you.” His other hand moves to your hip, pulling you even closer to him. “M’gonna love you for the rest of my life, baby.”

He leans in further and presses his lips to yours lightly, at first, but he wastes no time in sweeping his tongue across your bottom lip, silently asking for more.

Your mouth parts for him, and he backs you against the ponderosa, kissing you deeply, greedily, like he’s a man starved.

You whimper into him, your hands sliding up his broad chest and past his shoulders until they’re tangled in his soft, graying curls. He breathes you in, like you are the oxygen he needs to stay alive.

It isn’t until you both hear the sound of rustling behind a nearby shrub that you’re forced to pull apart. “Don’t move,” Joel instructs in a hushed voice. He keeps you pinned against the tree, his hand abandoning your hip. He glances around, slowly reaching behind his back for his rifle. His tense shoulders relax when the both of you see a pair of rabbits dart out from one dried bush and straight into another. Exhaling an amused huff, Joel shifts his attention back to you and rests his forehead against yours.

Smiling, you reach up and softly graze his beard with your fingertips. “Guess it’s about time we called this what it is, huh?”

“Guess you’re right, darlin’.” He lifts his chin, brushing a kiss onto your forehead. “M’sorry for raisin’ my voice to you. For talkin’ to you the way I did. S’just, the thought of somethin’ happenin’ to you out here scares shit out of me.” Taking a step back, he pulls the strap of his rifle from around his shoulder. He chews the inside of his cheek and silently stares at the gun in his hands. After a minute, he meets your curious gaze. “Do you really wanna do this, sweet girl?”

You nod. “Yeah. I really do.”

Joel sighs. “Can I put a condition it?”

“Depends on what that condition is.”

“I’m your patrol partner. Every shift. Every rotation.”

You roll your eyes. “Joel.”

“At least for the first few weeks,” he bargains. “Last thing I need is for you to be paired up with some fuckin’ idiot who doesn’t know what the hell they’re doin’.”

Knowing that would be the only way he’d have some peace of mind, you decide to agree. “Fine. We’re patrol partners.”

“Alright then.” Joel nods and hands you the rifle. He flashes you a small grin. “Show me what you got, baby.”

divider credit to @/saradika 💛

for fic notifications please follow @joelsgreysupdates!

[immamapletreekid]

doing so well so fine then bam i remember jjba is a thing

[just-jordie-things]

megumi and the reader making out??? idk the context tho. but pls yeah? 🥹🥹

ok this ask is old but i saved it bc it was golden and open ended enough i am happyyyy to provide :3 :3

___

megumi is the kind of boyfriend that gets carried away... which might not be all that out of the norm, if he wasn't such an oblivious hypocrite about it.

he's all "sweetheart, we have to go, they're waiting" while actively hooking his fingers through your belt loops to pull you in closer. your reaction is seized by his lips on yours again.

he'd barely even pulled away to scold you, and yet here he was tugging you closer and closer until you were left no choice but to crawl into his lap, legs prettily sprawled over both of his in that way you both knew he liked.

and then he has the audacity to warn you again while his teeth graze over your lower lip, capturing it without quite biting down-

"you're going to make us late"

- this is ironic because he's all bark and no bite.

you should be used to this by now, as megumi always found a way to wrap you both up in the heat of the moment when you're supposed to be somewhere. this time it's a movie with your friends, who were probably awkwardly stalling in the common room. five minutes ago you were all excited for this movie. but at the present moment it's barely clinging on to the back of your mind.

except when megumi's busy reminding you how now is not the time for a makeout session. only to silence himself by making out with you. you could almost laugh- if you weren't rendered breathless by the hot and heavy kisses he's laying against your lips.

his fingers are stating to push past the hem of your shirt, and you really tried to get yourself to push his hands away so that you could put a stop to this while there was still time... but as soon as your hands land on his he's grabbing you by the wrists and pulling you in closer until you're chest to chest. you huff with a mix of annoyance and desperation, but megumi seems indifferent to the sigh you've muffled against his mouth.

truth was, he didn't have a care in the world how long his friends waited on you both. if he was busy with you- especially when you're being so good and pretty on his lap for him- there was nothing that was going to take him away from this moment until he was damned ready to do so.

he liked the way you pretended to struggle and convince him to get up and go, the quiet whispered whines of "gumiiii" into his lips while you, too, were too wrapped up in him to really care enough to crawl out of his lap. so who was the real hypocrite here?

so he chuckles when he feels you melt a little deeper into him, your arms heavy against his chest as your fingers reach into the hair at the nape of his neck, how heavily you're breathing through your nose, your chest rising and falling against his as you push just a little harder to be closer. if he didn't know any better he'd think you were trying to push him all the way down till his back hit the bed and you'd be victorious in caging him beneath you. (he thinks he'd quite like it if you had your way with him right here and now, even if that movie is starting in less than thirty minutes) but unfortunately, you're too soft pliable under his hands to make a move like that, so megumi gathers that you'll just give in to his every will and kiss until he decides for the both of you that it's time to go.

his hands squeeze the soft flesh at your hips, his lips barely detching from yours as he opens his eyes to get a good look at you. in this moment, he thinks you're the prettiest thing in the world. your brows furrowed in frustration with him, but your lips swollen and pouty as soon as they aren't paired up with his. no movie was more enticing than the image right before his eyes. even the mental picture won't do it justice.

"what 'm i gonna do with you, hm?" he muses, lips grazing yours before you're the one seizing forward to continue what he started.

and you both know exactly what he has in mind.

(yuji and nobara get a text like three minutes later with a horrible excuse standing them up for the movie. neither one of them are surprised but they talk their shit anyways !!)

[tragedycoded]

the loop may be ended...

... but there was demand for a playlist, and the old one sucked.

While the 1872-73 timeline is mostly marked by power ballads (it's a love story) the rest of the songs are either straight-up d̷͍̼̒̍o̸̮͝ơ̵̻m̷͎̂ ̷̨̑̎m̵̦̮͝e̶̺͕̍̓ṱ̴̈̽a̸͖̎̍l̶̩̈́̂ or they're some flavor of experimental/noise/atmospheric black metal. Or they're strategically placed video game soundtracks that make me burst into tears bc I'm ridiculous, but prob sound out of place to an emotionally stable individual.

Anyway they match up with the chapter order until you get to "Litany of Desire," which covers chapters 10 + 11. After that it's [chapter number] -1.

Body Void and Xiu Xiu were thrown in for the somatic sound effect. I had to be careful which "meant to make you feel weird" songs I included; I may think it's funny to listen to ultra-low frequency tones high off my ass until I trigger my occipital neuralgia and puke, but that's a personal choice.

Rambling about the individual songs in Act 1 under the cut. Anyway. Tagging the DMLS folks, plus @astramachina and @sableglass and @words-after-midnight bc MUSIC.

@leahnardo-da-veggie @the-golden-comet @cowboybrunch @finickyfelix

@lychhiker-writes @wyked-ao3 @saturnine-saturneight

@gioiaalbanoart @davycoquette @zackprincebooks @jev-urisk

1) "The Bad Luck That Saved You From Something Worse": You hear that noise at the beginning? I hate it. It feels like feelers inside my skull. That's the feeling of restarting at the beginning of a time loop--something shitty happened and I have no clue what I was doing or what I'm supposed to do next. #hofercore

2) "The Parasite" - the first time I heard this song, Sullivan and Royston popped into my head.

Then Royston started bitching me out because it wasn't his fault they were here and Sullivan wasn't dead and they weren't supposed to be here and behbehbehbehbeh.

3) "No One Like You": Not just a '80s song because Jamie is a millennial. No no. There's a reason I put this as The Song for the beginning of the bar fight loop (there are loops within loops bc I love myself. Twine loves this too.)

Each time they go it gets harder bc Sullivan keeps forgetting everything lol.

4) "High Plains Eulogy": This is the first Royston POV chapter and he has eyeballs. He realizes he's fucked up. IDK if he realizes there was literally nothing he could do to get here any sooner. (I'm willing to give him this much: Sullivan being pissed off and avoiding returning his letters fucks the run every single time it happens.) This is the first of many "Royston is a visual learner" chapters.

5) "Psalm III - Olam Teshuvah": You hear the dripping and screaming in the beginning? I think I'm being clever and warning you what's going to happen with Martin, who is just standing there in a catatonic stupor.

6) "Ace of Spades": This was, at the time, the most ridiculous thing I'd ever written. It is 100% Royston's fault the shootout happened in the first place, let alone escalated to the degree that Sullivan couldn't reel it in. Sullivan would have compared it to bullriding, if he'd "ever partaken in such a foolish activity."

7) "Ashen Era": Johnson and White are explaining the tree to Sullivan. I'm warning you about the tree with this song.

8) "This One Has No Heart": I mean… [gestures at Martin; gestures at Royston] … they're both fucked.

9) "Hysteria":

Director's Commentary moment, are you ready?

In the prologue, Hofer's ears start ringing. This is because there was a previous run where he caught a bullet in the neck and fucking died. (Tinnitus is a warning you're about to do the same stupid shit that got you killed previously. Sullivan doesn't really get that bc he keeps finding new exciting ways to die.)

When Hofer got shot in the neck, that restarted the loop--Sullivan dies in that cabin if Hofer doesn't treat his leg. So as far as Royston was concerned, he was just in the train, shot full of the Delilah Special, and now he's opening his eyes and Sullivan is fine and he doesn't know if Sullivan remembers/hates him/etc. and he can't fly out of bed all dramatic like he wants to bc he literally has no control over his skeletal muscles (thanks, hemlock and whatever else Delilah hit him with.)

If anyone has any interest in seeing an entire post like this a) you're crazy and b) I would be more than happy to do one with more effort/spoilers.

[deathlonging]

the issue is of course when you play dh1 you root for corvo. unscrupulously. it doesn't matter if the goal is to instate a child empress on the throne and have her heretic father control the empire because by story rules the goal is getting closure and closing the revenge loop. and you can say this is what the devs intended bc they did confirm low chaos is the path corvo canonically ends up taking. so to have emily be spoiled, selfish, a little complacent due to this mythical golden age--that tracks. it's angela carter's snow child it's srb's gretel it operates by and relies on the conventions of the gothic and fairytale genres

but dh2 violently breaks you out of the magical realism imposed on genre convention in the name of being more politically aware and ironically hence fails at any effective commentary abt the dhworld. the attempt at being didactic is useless bc the very premise of the gameplay rests on dramatized versions of familiar fairytale archetypes which you cannot reconcile w the realism of a self-conscious ruler without making your main character the villain (which emily already is; only, unacknowledged by the narrative) and the ending of your story falls flat, neither achieving tragedy's catharsis nor victory's comfort due to its cognitive dissonance. there are plenty of stories about evil ppl that approaches them on their playing field the dlcs themselves are one. and yet by 1. making emily the mc and meagan merely her captain 2. trying to be more didactic 3. changing the story from a fairytale tragedy to a fantasy dh2 fails to understand what made the simple story of s1 so arresting (lol) and loses all claims to subversion

[rescue-ram]

Now I'm curious, how would you adapt a modern version of Mash?

Oh man thank you for giving me pretext to ramble about this. I have too many thoughts about Cursed Hypothetical MASH Reboot.

Genre Change MASH is from the golden age of sitcom and is one of the best examples of the genre. Tragically, really good sitcoms don't get made, and the shorter lengths commissioned mean we wouldn't get space for the sillier or more experimental episodes that make MASH so charming and memorable. This is also why any remake or reimagining could never replace the original. There's also less "suspension of disbelief" with modern audiences, so I think modern MASH would have to have a more grounded setting and consistent time line, so RIP time loop. I think the modern genre that would best fit MASH is dramedy. Classico MASH already had elements of "get 'em laughing so they cry harder" and Hypothetical Remake MASH would play that up. Basically, we're gonna "Better Call Saul" this bitch.

In writing out my ideas below, I realized hitting the main plot beats I imagine makes this sound like. Depressing. Which it kind of would be! But I want to emphasize that in my mind's eye this would still tonally be a comedy right up until It Isn't. Similar to BCS, characters encounter obstacles, handle them in very funny ways, but things Keep Happening and compounding and at the end you realize all those funny things have added up to something horrific and inevitable.

General Thoughts In my beautiful mind, this is five twelve episode seasons, each corresponding to a roughly six month period- the first two seasons are 1951, climaxing with Henry's death, first episode or two of season 3 is Trapper leaving/BJ arriving and then 3/4 is 1952, and the final season is 1953 and the ceasefire. Fortunately, because the characters in MASH are pretty well fleshed out with a lot of traits I think they could be turned into dramedy characters pretty easily, and you can take the Big Things that happen to them and play them straight/expand on them into proper arcs. Also, pulling in more historical details could be really interesting, and an opportunity to unpack how Fully Evil the war in Korea was. In reading more memoirs from doctors who served in MASH units, I was struck by how much contact with international forces they had, and the surprising amount of contact with their Chinese/Korean counter-parts. I think more of both of those things would be fun to incorporate into Hypothetical Remake.

Expanded Roles for Nurses We need more women. And fortunately, we got them! Even though there is Not A Lot of existing canon, I really do think we have enough on the recurring nurses to act as seeds for fuller characters. I would love to see Kellye developed as a supporting character from the start. Struggling to articulate this, but I think a deeper perspective on anti-Asian sentiment could be explored through her, possibly with some connections to the history of colonialism in Korea in particular. The character was described as Chinese and Hawaiian, but given her credited surnames of Yamato and Nakamura getting a little into her Japanese heritage and the resentment of Koreans towards the Japanese could be interesting as well. I also think "Dish" Schneider's conflict, torn between loyalty to her husband/fiancee and her attraction to the handsome funny guy who relentlessly flirts with her, could be a source of drama. I also really like Ginger's recurring "thing" with Trapper in canon, and expanding that into an actual friendship and digging into the racism and taboos against interracial relationships of the period would be interesting. You can take Margie Cutler as a young and inexperienced nurse and give her a little coming of age arc. I would also love for Knocko McCarthy to be a foil for Margaret- as the second most senior nurse, she chafes under Margaret's command and kind of collaborates with the Swampmen to subvert her, culminating in Margaret calling her out that if she didn't side with them against her, they'd hate Knocko too, and them growing closer over the series.

Ho-Jon and Expanded Roles for Korean Characters Many have written about the shitty representation of Koreans in MASH, and Hypothetical Remake could remediate that significantly. I think giving Ho-Jon (or a similar new character) an expanded role would be good, with more ties to his family out of camp and conflict over whether or not supporting the occupying American forces and the south is the right thing to do or the expedient thing. I also think there's some dark comedy to be mined from a slightly subversive Ho-Jon taking advantage of racism and being seen as ignorant or interchangeable to get away with shit. Would love for Black Market Guy to be a recurring character. There's also a great real life story I read where a MASH surgeon formed a bond with a Chinese doctor after accidentally connecting to a PLA radio channel, and I think that could be adapted into a really fun source of comedy (bonding with "the enemy" over shared indignities, surprising similarities, etc) and ultimately drama (Hawkeye finds out about a US or ROK attack that will cripple that doctor's unit or put him in danger- does he say nothing, knowing hundreds will be injured or killed including maybe his new friend, or does he commit treason and risk prison or death to warn him- and how does he live with not knowing what happened when he has to choose inaction?) Any of the Very Special episodes could be adapted and expanded. And of course, Hypothetical Remake would have Korean writers, or consultants, or at the very least a goddamn baby name book so we don't end up with a dozen characters just named Kim, or worse random syllables.

Radar I would love to keep Radar as one of the main POV character throughout the whole series and use his unique position to bridge between different storylines- he's an enlisted man so he has that perspective, he's close with Hawkeye and the surgeons, he's assisting Henry/Potter so he has ties to command, give him a friendship with a nurse and you're set. Given the comedy-to-tragedy arc of dramadys, I would love to take the book detail that he enlisted with dreams of glory and becoming a general and lean fully into that. He starts out season 1 as a sweet naive farm kid flying by the seat of his pants to figure out his job, he gets more and more enmeshed with the military over the course of the series, currying favor with the brass to pull strings to help the unit/his friends/himself, and it ends with Potter giving him a recommendation for officer school- an outcome fully framed as a tragic loss of self to a corrupt institution.

Hawkeye I think Seasons 1 and 2 in particular could be driven by the Hawkeye and Trapper committing outrages and crimes in the name of justice/not giving a shit, and then having to spend the rest of the season engaging in more outrages and crimes to Bugs Bunny their way out of consequences. The central tragedy arcing through the series is the Destruction of Hawkeye Pierce. He starts out determined to stay himself, stick to his principles, and not let the army change him. The glimmer of hope at the end is that he has survived and gets to go home, but At What Cost. I also think making him bipolar makes the most sense- early season Hawkeye hints he's had highs and lows before, but always managed to cope, but under the increasing stress his mental health gets worse. Insomnia due to overwork triggers a manic episode (adapting Dr Pierce and Mr Hyde) about halfway through S1, with a major change in his relationship with Trapper associated with that, and his first on screen depressive episode triggered by Henry's death, which gets him his week of R&R he goes AWOL from. He holds it together through S3 with increasing amounts of self-medication for BJ's sake, and S4's overarching storyline for him is a fully Catch-22 expansion of The Late Captain Pierce with increasing levels of franticness to resolve it, and S5 is a full blown "I'M NOT EVEN SUPPOSED TO BE HERE" crisis culminating in the equivalent of GFA, and a brief psychotic episode triggered by his mood dysregulation and moral injury. An expansion of The Late Captain Pierce would be a great source of absurdity and drama, the ultimate consequence of his alienation of Everyone In Bureaucracy or Command (they all dislike/hate him for his antics and disrespect in S1-3 and no one wants to help him in his predicament, with a few spitefully refusing to help outright), and necessary to explain his presence in Korea in 1953 since his enlistment should've ended by then (since key members of the bureaucracy Hate him they refuse to count the months he was "dead" as part of his service, and his father is in too poor of health/financially strained from his cancer scare to advocate for him successfully stateside). I also think "playing straight" all the nurses breaking up with him after Ceasefire could be interesting. Like, S1 Hawkeye is a ladies man who's saying all the right things and juggling multiple relationships, but after they realize he doesn't Capital L Love any of them they start to distance from him- not unfriendly, but less a source of support. That alienation from others, first with the nurses at the end of S1 then others in camp, causing a vicious cycle of increasingly erratic behavior leading to less support etc culminates in his breakdown towards the end of the series.

Trapper My beloved boy ♥️ who has less of an arc and more of a vibe in existing canon, so we get to make some shit up whole cloth. Either keep the book/movie canon they were friendly in college, or make them childhood friends- not close, but some kind of pre-existing relationship. First episode is them stealing a jeep and bonding as they get into Shenanigans and Danger on their way to camp. Some people have the headcanon that Trapper lost a brother in WWII because of Wayne Rogers' acting choices, and I think a backstory like that could be interesting. He starts out a little ambivalent about the war, not wanting to be there and very aware of the human costs, but also feeling he has a duty. As he and Hawkeye get into more and more Situations trying to expose war crimes or fix injustices and even basic supply issues and are met by indifference or incompetence, he gets disillusioned. After Hawkeye's manic episode, he decided the one Actually Good thing he can accomplish is keeping his friend sane until they can get back home, since he starts to increasingly see his medical work as futile and the UN intervention as hopeless/harmful. They get closer and rely on each other more and more in S2, and in my based and gay pilled vision this is explicitly romantic and sexual, albeit with serious ambiguity if they would've had this relationship outside the trauma of war. Towards the end of S2, Trapper starts to get sick, and it turns out stress and increased alcohol & tobacco use contributed to an ulcer- it almost seems like he'll be sent home, but as in Classico MASH he begins treatment at the 4077th- and then Henry dies. Hawkeye spirals and they have to send him away, and then Trapper has to help pick up the increased work load. His symptoms get worse and he tries to cope and hide it, and develops peritonitis. When he realizes he's going to be evacced to Tokyo and then back to the States, he has a bit of a fucking meltdown. Mission Failed, he can't be there for his friend, and he blames himself because it was partly caused by his alcohol abuse. This is not just me being a Trapper simp, he has to go home before his enlistment is up for plot reasons since we no longer get the benefit of fuzzy timeline, and the genre convention of dramedy is you always Reap The Whirlwind at the worst possible moment.

BJ Ironically, I don't need to change anything about BJ to turn him into a dramedy character. He already has a "negative character arc", and you just take the major beats of that, set them in a linear escalation, and tighten them up. He starts out bright eyed and idealistic, determined to keep his head up, do his duty, and get out. Hawkeye meets him at the air field, having missed Trapper. Hawkeye blames himself for Trapper's health problems, and wants to do better by the new guy, offering him support and guidance. BJ bonds with him through the craziness, but as stress increases he starts acting out in small petty stochastic pranks, and then Peg's letters and missing his family build his anger, and he lashes out at Hawkeye because he suspects (in that "he's not right but he isn't wrong either" way) that Hawkeye's friendship isn't really because of BJ himself but because BJ is Trapper's Replacement. He suspects Hawkeye and Trapper were more than friends and he's simultaneously jealous and repulsed- he wants to totally replace Trapper and for Hawkeye to like him best, but he also loves Peg and misses her terribly and resents Hawkeye for "making" him want him. His chaotic unhinged repression is funny until it's briefly terrifying, then sad. As Hawkeye's mental health deteriorates, he tries to be supportive, but is ultimately overwhelmed by the intensity of Hawkeye's crisis and pulls back, though they mend things somewhat at the end.

The Hawkeye/Trapper/BJ Nexus In summary, our core duos are codependent trainwrecks, but while TrapHawk are more of an enabling and felonious "Thelma and Louise" style folie a deux, BJ and Hawkeye are more of an epic highs and lows "if you can't be with the one you love love the one your with" "hand in unlovable hand" mess.

Margaret Don't have nearly as much to say about our girl because I suck and have been writing this for almost 2 hours now because I'm insane but she has one of the best character arcs in MASH and Hypothetical Remake would really just intentionally start laying out her conflicts and growth from episode 1. She would also have more independent story arcs of trying to manage the nurses, and navigating advancing her career in the face of sexism. I would love to see her messy and complicated relationships with powerful men explored more fully. She bonds with Frank first to have a relationship where she's more in control than with her superiors, then as an ally to push back against the TrapHawk Chaos, then as she grows more confident (and TrapHawk get in over their heads) she is able to let go of the cloak of power military pretensions give her and be more herself.

Henry and Potter Henry remains a lovable incompetent. The one headcanon I have I'd like to use in Hypothetical Remake is that he's pretty severely dyslexic- I base that off his mispronunciations and malapropisms and canonical issues with reading (in Classico MASH doing things like holding a paper upside down or not being able to read maps and the words on them). He got through med school by having his wife read his textbooks out loud and type his papers, and brute force memorization. This is part of why he over relies on Radar to manage his paperwork and is easily scammed into signing off on things- he really can't tell what he's signing unless he uses all of his focus to decipher the text, and he's a trusting person so he rarely does. @marley-manson I LOVE your take that your ideal Potter is the exact same character in the show but the narrative treats him as an antagonist, and that is the vibe Hypothetical Remake would have.

Frank and Charles Again not a lot to say here, secondary characters and minor antagonists, but they would remain big sources of commentary but their pathos would be played up more in a dramedy.

Mulcahy Again, not too much different from canon, just more intentional building of a tragic arc. A smart sensitive guy who grew up poor and thought the church would be a path to respect or maybe even greatness got told to be a math teacher by his diocese, enlisted as a chaplain when the war broke out as part of his personal quest for meaning and significance, is confronted by the horrors and damage to innocent lives but still tries to believe in a greater purpose and good to what's happening, struggles with feelings of powerlessness and futility, and when he's finally able to do something heroic loses his hearing, which costs him his vocation- he's permanently disabled and would be unable to return to his old role as a parish priest/school teacher.

Recurring Characters Sidney my beloved ♥️ We bring back Sam Pak as a returning character. Also General Hammond and other members of the brass. I think Oliver could work really well as a recurring character.

Klinger Whole bundle of thoughts on this guy I wanted to save till the end. Because I adore Klinger, he's incredibly funny and one of the kindest and most principled characters on the show, and he's also incredibly 70s and I don't think could work as he was in a 21st century dramedy. I can see three potential paths to adapting him. A) Lean into the young, brash, hustler side of his personality, and he's a straight guy who thinks the craziest thing someone could do is wear a dress. B) An explicitly gay character who refuses to admit to being gay for a discharge because he finds the idea of being judged less than or broken for his sexuality incredibly offensive, but did drag back in Toledo and also refuses to stop being himself just because he got drafted. C) Principled pacifist serving as an orderly because of the draft who refuses to wear the uniform and started wearing dresses as a protest against bullying/abuse- oh, your gonna call me a sissy and steal my clothes because I refuse to use a gun? I will not only wear a dress, I will zhuzh it up into something amazing, because I would rather wear this outfit you intend to humiliate me with than that damn uniform.

[swallowtailed]

palisade 37 !!!!!!!!!!!!

THEY WEREN’T LYING THAT DIVINE CAN CYCLE

perennial is the time loop and she is in the time loop!!!!! the wheel turns!!!!!!!!! incredible. i love this. 

no wonder perennial was moved by figure begging for another chance.

from a structural pov i appreciate that this is explicitly the last chance bc it keeps pressure on the players without having to resort to multiverse stuff. also a well-timed reveal for the tension in the back half of the season.

it frankly explains a lot that picking clem was a three-millionth-year-in-the-time-loop decision

also this only raises MORE questions about what’s going on off in that arm of the galaxy. they’ve worked out time travel????

oh re the intro, “according to the world i’m a hypocrite or drowned” BANGER LINE. also “the truth”/“the worst”… poor gur

other things did happen in this episode that i am also excited about. what were they again. oh right

thisbe the new bearer of integrity!! golden horns!! really racking up crew entanglements with divinity. extremely exciting. 

(i do think we are gonna need some new words by the end of the season, or a clear decision against.)

that whole sequence was so compelling—i feel like we rarely see thisbe pursue her desires so directly. her determination to reach out and understand is fascinating. and that integrity chooses people who want to change the world—wondering if this could be a direction for thisbe’s new illusion strats. 

and “my head is somewhat heavier but it doesn’t bother me” heavy is the head that wears the crown huh thisbe. excited to see where this goes !

also on engagements with divines, asepsis’s view of its role changing because brnine saw it as “a divine without a community”—sets this down next to palisade discussing his different relationships with different excerpts, “the etiquette you make with one another” (which is a very loving way of looking at it, i think). divines are socially constructed; divinity is contextual. u know.

dre has been fucking killing it as figure this season. that scene with palisade was really good. saying “this feels like a metaphor” about playing duck (lmao) was exceptionally funny because that is always true about figure all of the time

coriiiii…. i am so glad cori is able to trust her crew and find safety questioning her religious upbringing with them.

i do feel like i understand eclectic better now. we’ve gotten a few more flags: he believes in welcoming people who help him; he feels that divines are too much of a risk; he sees the cause as taking over palisade. (it is also kind of touching that he’s so insistent that they adopt a random lock & cross cop, specifically—i found that scene kind of frustrating, but it’s solid character work.)

we also learned this ep that brnine thinks they are the sexiest crew member (they’re right). however this leaves the question of who thisbe thinks is sexiest. assuming it was someone not already present in the scene but aboard the blue channel, that leaves hunting, midnite, or saffron. does thisbe think saffron is sexy?? i would believe that. she has the most physical forms, leaving aside phrygian (who i think murch said she thought was hottest?? wires??), so logically saffron could be attractive to the widest range of people. or thisbe just thinks she’s hot. i’d ship it.

[izartn]

Rereading the scholomance series, and on the bit after El and Orion have their first time and wow.

Orion knows so so well there's something incredibly wrong with him, from the way he seems to have been avoiding getting more intimate with El bc he fears feeding on her mana (the implication it was this from the start of his mana starvation on senior year, not just the general risks El fears) to how he breaks down sobbing right after they have sex because she's the only (first) right (human) thing he ever wanted, and he explains he only ever wanted to hunt mals and suck their mana since he was little so he doesn't resent his parents for letting him do that (and he knows exactly what el thinks of that but orion is grateful, bc yeah. mawmouth-boy amalgama he needed it) (and the were desperate to make him more normal, except in golden enclaves we discover they're at fault orion is like this and wow.) and how he knows going fucking nuclear on the Shanghai Enclaves and co who tried to murder El wasn't normal, and that it unsettled El. I love that he remembered that it scared her, bc he doesn't want to, and tht after the incident he thought on it all and decided he didn't want to be that kind of guy.

I mean, getting angry and trying to reflexively retaliate when someone tries to murder you and El (whom he adores) I get it, most of us aren't heroine El Higgins as much as she likes to pretend she isn't, but that scene lasted more than just the moment, El got her giant shield, and then Orion demonstrated he's got a fucking nasty temper and a reflex for going to inflict gruesome violence, after taking the most chilling seconds on book canon trying to process just what almost happened to them both, but mostly El on his PoV. El tried to redirect him like twice and he went back to try very intently to have his chance offing Yuyan, Zixuan and Co, the second one when Magnus came with New York and the rest of allied enclaves thanks to Liesel and wwiii magician versión almost gets off was O.o, until El threatens everybody with mass destruction which brought back Orion to the world of, oh yah my scary girlfriend who could kill everyone in this room including myself is awesome. Dude.

It's the way you end reading all that scene and their conversation almost at the end of the book, and you feel El is not getting what Orion is trying to say, missing that there is something really really wrong with him. Because I think senior year Orion has had no choice but notice all the ways he doesn't make sense, and the way he seems to always need more mana from mals so much he starts looking mad to the outsiders and not caring for anything else (I think it feels to him like executive disfunction in that he gets into a loop of "I should be doing homework x but I can't bc I first need to hunt mals except I can't find any so I'm tired so I can't do anything") , to the point he starts fearing taking El's which almost happens in the library if not for Precious (hello??? rereading that having read the golden enclaves sent chills through my skin, holy shit) and I think he must have noticed by then. Because Orion is simultaneously more observant and more out of touch than he seems on first impression.

Agh no wonder he decides to stay behind and disappear into the void with the Scholomance, I wonder if face to face with mawmouths and his own almost lost of sense of himself to the rush of mal-mana consumption right at the end of The Last Graduate he realiced what he must be and just. Choose it as the only option so as to not go mad and hurt(eat) El. Must have killed him.

No, given The Golden Enclaves I'm sure this is exactly what happened. Orion needs a hug so so badly.

And then he passes that last book lost on the hunger, then goes through a grueling purification to bring back what's left of his sense of self and humanity, with the knowledge that hes more like a mawmouths but back (but still a monster inside) , discovering his mother did this to him after killing hundreds of kids actually, and she may love to get her hands on El and use her (which Orion isn't thrilled about), and the enclaves may go to war in wwiii magic version (this time for real) , and you know, no wonder he quits trying to stay (alive, as a person) a quarter to end or so of The Golden Enclaves.

I love him, I want his perspective on a spin off novella or something after canon, bc it has to be the most weird mix of super transparent and also heartbreakingly sad and heartwarming once you read between the lines, and because I want his super subjective PoV on Galadriel because he loves her so so much in both the adorkable teenagy way and in a "you've saved my life and existence and the world makes sense bc of you" which has to scare them both a bit. Also Orion PoV on the rest of characters now he isn't blinded by the hunger and he can actually interact with others and have interests of his own. Fascinated by his possible hobbies.

[imustbenuts]

man, book 7.

it kinda feels like they whiffed it 3 chapters to ending. there is so much ingredients here but its not being whipped into any proper meal. its like if the chef suddenly forgot how to cook halfway

its like. im seeing so much interesting things in the visual design and the sus golden snake orochi thing, but its getting utterly wasted. :/ i get trying to stretch the material so the gacha goes on forever but there has been so little significant payoff thorughout the books that it's becoming less and less effective the more it goes on.

it's also, you're telling me gullveig's existence is like an unending loop, but bc seidr suddenly could mentally fend off the snakes she's... ok now? not even showing kiran's +1 breidablik is doing stuff? really...???? after building it up?

you guys did something with kiran in book 3 and 4. why the sudden cold feet at this? utterly confusing.

and ive even seen this time loop thing written better in a thing that came out in 2003. Siren for the ps2. its full of it. how the hell is that not being studied and referenced for the writing of book 7. jfc lol.

book 7 is 1/10 and probably a set up for something in the future, but im not gonna sit around waiting for the pay off if any

[irrealisms]

no apple but a heart liner notes

fic here if you haven't read it!

i had the idea of vitalasubz funerary cannibalism pretty immediately after seeing "cannibalism" on the prompt list. it's a good concept. but i wasn't sure if i could get it to the minimum word count (it ended up juuuuust scraping by) so i decided to write the time loop fic first and then do the cannibalism as a bonus if i felt up for it

and then one of my friends (unrelatedly! without knowing about this!) started talking about eclipse fed cannibalism on discord, and i was like Man....i should write eclipse federation cannibalism....unfortunately i only really have enough ideas for One Scene of it.....and they were like write one scene then! and i went You Know What. youre right. and wrote this in one sitting

for research for this fic i read all of @erstwhilesparrow's mcyt cannibalism fics in a row. check those out if you haven't already: double life desertduo(&/)boat boys, limlife mean gills, 3rd life desertduo, new life owen(&/)scott

i knew basically as soon as i had the idea that i wanted to do stuff with the despawn timer. how much can you eat in 5 minutes, when you're grieving and dissociating and in shock, your action spurred on only by the knowledge that whatever you don't eat will disappear forever? that this is the only way to preserve anything at all of the one you love?

in contrast i did not know until literally the day of writing it that i was gonna do something with hearts-as-hearts. it was a good idea, though.

did you know that after subz dies, vitalasy stands without moving or speaking for 50 seconds, turns slightly, and then continues standing there without doing anything or speaking for another 13 seconds. yeah. fun little canon moment. it's also 63 seconds off the 5-minute despawn timer!

the title is from quattrocento by margaret atwood, which is a great poem. idk how well it actually works for this piece thematically, it works okay i think but i'm not doing a ton with serpent imagery here (even though i could! subz and eclipse are in fact totally doing various mythological snake imageries!) or with garden-of-eden stuff? but the imagery always stuck with me when writing cannibalism stuff and i hadn't gotten to use it for a title yet and figured this was my chance

cannibalism as devotion.... cannibalism as memorial...... mm. good stuff. i should have made a way to make this Eucharistic somehow, cannibalism-as-worship doesn't show up here as much but it would've slapped.

something that didn't make it into the fic but that i did have some thoughts about is vitalasy's feelings wrt zam + subz after this. i think he's glad, on some level, that he got to eat subz and zam didn't, but also he feels kind of guilty for feeling glad, but also he's arguing to himself that he shouldn't have to feel guilty, it's not like he stopped zam from being there, zam wasn't there bc zam isn't/wasn't on their team.

other stuff that is even less fic-relevant but that i've been thinking about is that you could do a lot with "if you kill someone you get their heart" + the various meanings cannibalism can have. cannibalism as domination of an opponent. cannibalism as possession. cannibalism as respecting someone's sacrifice. killing someone and then handing them their own heart to eat, when you kill someone and give them back the heart. yeah. fun possibilities!

shoutout to ihob. nothing much to say here other than i'm glad i somehow included ihob in the vitalasubz cannibalism fic. i love ihob. i love that bacon only eats pork chops even though they're worse than golden carrots! he's on three hearts anyway, what's the added saturation gonna do! i love the dumb fucking three-way contract for its ownership. i love. ihob.

fun fact: the only other fic on ao3 tagged with subz's suicide stream is ALSO a vitalasubz funerary cannibalism fic. i genuinely did not know this until after posting. what can i say, it's a good concept.

[rebuke-me]

im giving you permission to ramble more about the ever after high au

I AM KISSING U ON THE MOUTH /p

okay. okay. im gonna ramble under the cut bc i have so many thoughts.

crash course for new readers: son of cinderella jeremy, charming kids brooke and jake (they're cousins), pied piper kid michael, daughter of the boy who cried wolf jenna, beauty and the beast kid chloe, alice in wonderland daughter christine, and goldilocks kid rich.

chloe and brooke are constantly at odds. they're always together because they're both princesses. they HATE each other but cant ever seem to leave. chloe keeps putting brooke down because chloe has a story, a destiny, and brooke doesn't. she's a princess, she's beauty, she's a big deal. and brooke's just a charming, not even a specific princess. she doesn't have beautiful hair or glass slippers or anything. she's just... a damsel. in distress. but she's kind and caring and wants to help, but she's not beauty, right? and then chloe ends up being the beast. she's the beast and brooke's HER beauty, and brooke puts her foot down and says no. she's not going to be in chloe's shadow anymore. she's not going to bend over backwards for HER story, for HER development. she's not going to be nice and kind just because chloe needs her. and that's how brooke becomes a rebel.

rich has a lot of pressure on him, ever since he was a kid. he's always told to be just right. he's goldilocks, the pretty little girl who takes over a poor family's life and cares so much about perfection. too tomboyish, too awkward, nothing's just right. he doesn't feel right pretending, either. so he cuts off his golden curls. he shears them off and finally, for once in his life, he feels just right. he goes by rich now, and the gold theme finally feels earned.

jenna rolan will never be believed. she knows no one will listen to her, even if she tells the truth. because no one can EVER think she's telling the truth. she never can, anyways. there's always a little white lie that slips in. she can't help it, her mouth runs for her. her friends all keep her around for gossip with a grain of salt inside. she's not even a BIG story. she gets eaten by wolves, and she can't even feel righteously angry about it. no one will ever believe her, and yet she still keeps pouring as much of her truth into her words as fate will let her.

christine's always a little out of the loop. she's from outside this world, but not quite. she should be fine. she's alice, of course, she's just a normal girl who happens to fall into wonderland. but she's too curious, too wild, too eccentric. she's seen as not quite one, not quite the other. too wild for wonderland, too normal for ever after. she lays awake at night, wishing she could hear the narrators, like the other wonderland kids. or wishing that she could know the right words to say, like the ever after kids.

michael loves his music, but keeps most of it to himself, playing it over his headphones instead of out loud. he's not a villain, not technically, but he doesn't like it when people have the idea that he's somehow making them do things. he doesn't play his music out loud, doesn't want to call a plague of rats to him, doesn't want to bring kids away. he was adopted, anyways, maybe these powers will go away. but he knows that it'll happen, and he'll leave, and it'll be fine. but he still takes the first opportunity of rebellion.

jeremy and jake know each other since childhood. they're royals, of course. they don't get along at first. jeremy's a princess kid, and clearly. and then his story's started early, with his stepmother. his only solace is his little sister, the destined ugly stepsister. he doesn't want that for her. doesn't want her to feel ugly, or evil. and jake's the charming, going to be the beast and the prince of chloe. or at least, they think so. but things shift. they talk again, and it's easy now. they get along, they have things in common. they risk their happily ever afters. and then the storybook of legends, and the signing. jake was going to sign anyways, of course. he didn't know not signing was an option. but then he sees what the future holds for him. he's not chloe's prince, he's not the beast they've wanted him to be. he's jeremy's. he whisks him away, he finds his shoe, he... pulls him away from his sister, his family. there's no ending where jeremy has both. but selfishly, he signs. and then rich refuses to sign, refuses to be just right. and jeremy doesn't sign either. and jake doesn't tell him that he signed because he saw them together. because he doesn't want to make jeremy choose between him and his family, between a happily ever after and the right to freedom. and jeremy thinks that jake saw his future with chloe and chose her over him, because of course he would. why would jake ever choose him in the long run? isn't that a tragedy?

[wildflowerwoodsworld]

Talk to me about my aus!

Okay, so, I have a lot of aus. And I mean a lot of aus, but I don't really talk about them, so I figured I'd make a list of the ones I have a lot worked out for, and you guys can ask me about the ones that sound interesting. (Several of these are currently planned to be YamiFin bc I can and I want to, but that might change)

The Cryptid'verse. My baby. This fic is the thing in this fandom that I'm the most proud of. The Black Bulls as cryptids. No ships.

The Villain'verse. Villain antihero Black Bulls. Currently YamiFin and MagnaLuck (minor).

Underwater Temple Time Loop. What it says on the tin. YamiFin.

Unnamed time travel fix it. Finral and Vanessa see the end of the world after Spade went wrong, and come back to try and fix it. FinVan.

Immortals au (Comparing Your Past To My Future). Um, so some people are immortal and other people have problems with people being immortal and are trying to kill them (that's a horrible summary, I'm sorry). YamiCharJack.

Reformation au. In which the nobles of the Clover Kingdom have a problem with the Bulls being, well, the Bulls, and campaign to have them "reformed". YamiFin (minor).

Asta out of time au. Instead of trying to kill Asta, Lucius removes him from the timestream and rewinds to the start of canon. The Bulls are left with dreams of what could have been as they fall further into mediocrity. No ships.

Failsafe au. When the Dark Triad are defeated, their failsafe activates and they are sent back ten years. They decide that the best thing to do is to round up the people who defeated them to make sure they can't do it again. Featuring the teenage captains and their shenanigans as they try to escape. No ships.

Dark au. Not quite sure how to describe this one briefly. Dark Triad out to conquer the world before they open the gates. No ships.

LOTR au. Slightly cracky LOTR/Hobbit au. YamiFin and YunoLang (plus other minor ships).

Gods au. Me playing around with turning the captains into a pantheon of gods that spiralled. YamiFin and YunoLang.

The Bulls House. The Owl House but with Black Clover characters. YamiFin.

Villain au. Another Villain Black Bulls au. YamiFin.

Villain GD. The Golden Dawn and the Midnight Sun are the same organisation. YamiFin.

YamiFin RomCom. Yami and Finral get cursed so they can't go too far away from each other without being in pain. Finral very quickly realises that what he thought was admiration isn't actually admiration. Yami is oblivious to his own internal monologue. YamiFin (obviously)

Banished Bulls au. Clover gets a new king who doesn't like how hard the Bulls are to control, so he banishes them to the no man's land between Clover and Spade. Everyone, that is, except Noelle and Finral. Noelle and Finral's journey to escape Clover and find their squad. Very minor ships.

Everybody Lives au. I have no way to sum this up quickly. Multi-generational, everyone lives, Ichika ends up in Clover. YamiCharJack, FinVan, JuliusZara and others TBD.

[madhattervanessa]

Kinktober 2022 - #5

Kinks: Drunk Sex, Infidelity

Words: 1084

Pairing: Will “Ironhead” Miller x F!Reader

Look, I have never before written for this man and that’s half the fun but- damn. Also don’t mind me being late in my own schedule, that’s what I made this relaxed schedule for bc uni is kicking my ass.

Love y’all!

Kinktober 2022

"Will, your girlfriend is literally over there, stop throwing your charms at me. You're drunk. Besides, I'm not looking to get killed by her girl gang."

She’s not his girlfriend. You know that. But you can’t help yourself, you like to fight when you’re drunk.

"Tipsy. I'm just tipsy. I haven't seen you in, what, 2 years?"

You turn to glare at him and of course this close, he is even more handsome. He is still the golden Miller's boy, the charmer of your school and glory child of too many prom king election wins.

But he is also Ironhead and you can see it in his broad shoulders, the stiff military posture that barely slips even when he is drunk and crooning against you; the scruffy beard and beer stench from his mouth don't fool you. The few special ops runs you had done together had been on the forefront of your mind for years.

He grins and you roll your eyes at him, trying and failing to fight off the warm memory of what else had happened half the times you had been alone, amped up by too much adrenaline and bloodlust.

"You're looking real pretty."

"I have a fiancé." You hold up the simplistic ring for his view and nod towards the bartender, motioning him for another drink.

"I know." He leans back against the bar, spreading his arm over in front of you, flexing and showing off so obviously in front of you, you're starting to consider helping his girlfriend beat him up later.

You knock back the last sip of your drink and meet his eyes.

"'S this ranger kid from the national park, yeah?" He takes the hand you had previously shown him and lifts it closer to his face again. His fingers rub over the sleek metal as he intently studies it before that arrogant and smug look slips back towards you.

"How deep is your nose buried in my fucking business, Miller?", you sneer, feeling the alcohol shortcut any thought prior to talking. The tequila and the mojitos are always quick to make your blood boil, quick to act out - Miller knows. And he likes pushing your buttons.

"You know I look out for you."

Your new drink arrives and you shoot Will another look before draining about half of it.

“I do know you, Ironhead. Maybe a little too well.”

“Then why are you sitting all the way over there?”

-

It's wrong.

It feels very right, though.

Your lips are tingly from the alcohol and salted glass rims and you melt into him, pliant under his touch as he guides you into your own apartment like it's his, too. Your lips meet as soon as the door falls closed.

It's almost instinctual at this point - you know each other's bodies better than any girlfriend or boyfriend could, every movement intimately familiar as you shove yourself into his waiting arms.

He groans against your lips and tugs you closer by your belt loops. You almost stumble over the hiking boots in the hallway before he manages to steer the two of you towards the couch.

His movements are sluggish and you taste whiskey when he dips his tongue into your mouth- it takes you both a second to get more coordinated than just tongues bumping into each other but when you feel his tongue tangling with yours it shoots straight down to your core. He spreads a hand over your jaw and when he ends the kiss, he pushes his thumb into your mouth. You envelop it with your lips and when you open your eyes you catch him watching, staring at your mouth as he slowly pulls his thumb out. He rubs the spit slick digit over your bottom lip and you open your mouth only for him to kiss you again with a grunt.

He falls backwards into the generous cushions and you fall with him, bumping your shin against the leg of the couch and then your arm on his elbow before he manages to pull you on top of him.

He pulls your shirt off before he discards his. You struggle with the hooks of your bra for a moment and he reaches up to tug at it, pushing your own hands away - a moment later you hear a loud rip before your bra falls to the ground.

You can’t even look if he really just destroyed your underwear because he manhandles you down to lay underneath him to pull at your pants next.

“Ironhead- slow down”, you mutter but he already has you naked underneath him. He does back off but only to pull at his belt until he is standing there naked, just like you are.

He is breathing heavily, meeting your eyes from where you’re leaning up on your elbows. Your lips part as you take him in: He had never lost that military, lean build, if anything, he has become more bulky. You feel the want in the back of your throat at the sight of him in front of you.

He moves in on you, pulling you towards him by your ankles over the sectional and you wriggle against his grip but go still as his large hands fan out over your calves, sliding up over your thighs.

He kneels between your legs, his lips pressing open mouthed kisses against your sternum and you squirm as he licks over your salty skin, rubbing his cheek against you. His lips find the swell of your breast and he looks up at you, swallowing you whole with his hungry gaze before licking over your nipple.

You let your head fall backwards, straining to push your chest out towards him more as he pulls you further down, one of his arms slung around your back and shoulder, cradling you as he slides his hard cock into your shamefully slick pussy.

“Fuck- Ironhead-”

He lifts his head from your tits and mock bites at the tendon of your neck before kissing you again.

“Say my name.”

You strain, gritting your teeth as he rolls his hip deeper into you. The next bite to your skin is real and you curse him.

“Will- oh my god, Will, don’t stop.”

-

You slip your ring back on in the morning, regarding both the sleeping man on your couch and the simplistic metal a sad look despite the morning sun bathing everything in a dreamy, comforting glow.

This could never happen again.

Ever.

[meganechan05]

Imma be delusional for a second.

Toei could've stuck Rita's cover of "Moffun no Uta" (a song that doesn't represent them at all and is sung in a persona that also isn't Rita at all) into an EP like how they did N'kosopa's secondary theme, "I'm still alive" so Rita could've had an original song that would fit them.

Before you come at me saying "it balances out whatever the ignoratia's about", no. No. Ignoratia is Gokkan's theme written at the beginning of production. Character songs are written about halfway and represents the characters as they are and some of their development. Rita singing in their idol persona made for the sole purpose of tricking the enemy of a song that is the complete opposite of them is not Rita. That's idol fanservice that I listen to on loop bc that shit slaps.

Now Himeno's song "Golden Garden" fits her character perfectly but some of those lyrics are also directed towards someone. You can say her people because she cares about her people, but some of the lyrics were written in a way where she's encouraging someone who also carries a burden much like herself and to walk together. If that doesn't hint at HimeRita, I don't know what the fck does.

Now if Rita's song is the same thing, just imagine what it could be about if they tried to write an original song.

Rita, the ice-cold Supreme Justice who stands firm on Absolute Neutrality while also locking away their chances of forming relationships despite knowing that relationships won't break neutrality. A huge part of their story is opening up to their team and those they consider dear to them but also being able to be themself and maintain neutrality.

A song about being unwavering but knowing they can still be themself.

Now who tf in the giant ensemble cast allowed that?

Himeno and Morfonia.

TOEI CHICKENED OUT BC THEY LEARNED IT'S POSSIBLE THE SONG COULD HINT AT HIMERITAMORF AND IT PLACED RIGHT AFTER A SONG WITH SUBTLE HINTS OF HIMERITA!

TOEI, YOU FUCKING COWARDS!!!

plus, if we're gonna include Moffun bc it's their comfort character, it's during the bridge where they have a small convo with it in order to continue finishing the song.

Or Toei ends up giving Rita "Jagaton no uta" but with Moffun.