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kamenstranger · 3 months ago

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Batman: Caped Crusader Review.

Well, I didn't expect to be reviewing another cartoon so soon but I forgot this was still happening and here we are. So much like X-men '97 I will be getting into spoilers, even some finale stuff. But it's nothing you probably wouldn't already know. Like is saying something along the lines of "Harvey becomes Two-Face" or "Selina becomes Catwoman" really a spoiler? Still, if you want to go in completely clean then I'll give short spoiler-free summary: It's fine. It's good, even very good. It has enough going on without being overly reliant on nostalgia, though a lot concepts and ideas that never made it into TAS are used; which is obvious in some episodes like 2 and 8 which honest to god feel like lost episodes (sans the obnoxious references in 8.) But even a number of other episodes feel like they could've fit right in.

Likewise, the animation is simply lovely and feels like an appropriate continuation of the DCAU while also working as a throw back to TAS with its use of shadows and art deco design. They even have a film grain effect that looks shockingly good; uplifting the show's late 30s early 40s aesthetic by adding some literal grit. I've seen numerous productions go overboard with adding grain in post, but Caped Crusader keeps it very subtle and is probably the best you're going to do with a modern production. Frederik Wiedmann's score also complements the atmosphere, adding that quintessential gothic noir vibe. The entire soundtrack is on youtube and is well worth listening in isolation.

If I had one compliant... it's that Batman is the weakest and most underwritten part of the show. Regardless, the show has enough quality elements to make it worth a watch.

However, if you're interested in leaning more about my thoughts, hit the jump.

Let's start with some background information. Contrary to how it seems, this isn't nor was it ever intended to be a prequel to TAS-- at least that's what they say. It was originally a sequel to The New Batman Adventures before transmogrifying into another 30s-ish setting and using abandoned episode concepts from TAS along with completely original works. A number of episodes at the very least feel like they were written with a prequel mindset, and the final shot of the series was absolutely conceptualized as lead-in to TAS and is begging for the Walker Theme to kick in. But despite how much this could work as a prequel with just a few tweaks, I think making it disconnected was the right call. For one thing, with Conroy gone I don't think you could ever make something that leads into that very specific version of Batman, it wouldn't feel right. Secondly, it allows the series to stand on it's own and not rely on TAS as a crutch; even if comparisons are inevitable with the period setting and Bruce Timm's designs. Additionally the tone of the series is right in line with The Animated Series, only slightly darker and never going overboard just to be considered "adult." Characters say damn, people die, sometimes there's blood, the occasional gruesome character design, some stories are super pulpy and even have a slower pace than what they would've done on network TV for Y7+. But otherwise this would've fit fine on Toonami back in the day and the option to go darker is there should the story demand it. I will admit I'm a bit of an easy mark for this, particularly the heavy pulp elements that remind of The Shadow and The Spider.

On that note, Cape Crusader is a bit more basic in terms of setting and scope. I'm using "basic" loosely because there are still some eccentricities like Gentleman Ghost showing up, but outside the one supernatural aspect-- and an umbrella cannon-- there's nothing too crazy. No Freeze guns, mutant plant ladies, robots, Lazarus pits, mind controlling cards, airships etc. Clayface might be the one other outlier, but even that's just a guy who can change his appearance, not a big clay monster who can form a mace hand. I'm perfectly fine with all of this. We've already had a vintage Batman series that did all that anyway, so why not do something a little different and keep it simple? In maintaining that simplicity, most of CC is episodic with a larger narrative sprinkled throughout: Ruport Thorne is slowly taking over Gotham and begins trying to leverage Harvey Dent who is running for Mayor. That's it, that's the main plot. The more nitty-gritty parts largely center on relatively self contained adventures around the trio of Lawyer Barbara Gordon, GCPD detective Renee Montoya, and Therapist Harleen Quinzel.

It's a decent compromise between how involved modern shows have become sprawling season long stories while still maintaining the appeal of a self contained case in any given episode.

Of the three, Barbara (Krystal Joy Brown) has the most active role throughout the entire run and is arguably the main character of the show. She's compassionate about people, her clients, criminals and their circumstances. She has a strong balance between someone who is optimistic yet not naive, although still young enough to not have the harsher experiences as her father. This allows a contrast between her and Gordon's world weary, almost Black and White POV. In fact, her willingness to hear people out and consider alternatives leads to her establishing a form of contact with Batman before her father.

Renee Montoya (Michelle C. Bonilla) is about on par with Barbara in playing an active role in the series, albeit almost always work related for obvious reasons. She's a consummate professional, brilliant detective and the only trustworthy cop outside Gordon. That last part is particularly note worthy since it actually gives Gordon a reliable subordinate and not just Bullock. She has solid chemistry with Barbara and there's a lot of untapped potential with her and Harley. And hey, nice to get little bit of the two dating and smooching. Speaking of, Harley (Jamie Chung) is surprisingly prominent in the first half and I love how they handle her. She's legit intelligent and even knows there's something up with the public perception of Bruce. She's quirky without rehashing the whole bubbly blonde routine, she's delightfully flirty with Renee and she's also fucking demented. Oh yes, Harley is already cracked, but in a curious way where she's not exactly insane but clearly has a dark side she indulges. Honestly? Really neat to see a version of a character not influenced by Joker. She's still a Harlequin, of course, but much more traditional and I love that we don't waste time going through an origin. She just uses her therapist profession as a means to hash out her idea of justice against clients she can't reach, often mind breaking rich jackasses who refuse to better themselves. Harley assigns them personalities and forces repetitive tasks or absurd tortures. In a cute little meta nod she's responsible for creating the persona of King Tut, a character originally created for the '66 show, just as she was a creation for TAS.

I also have to mention Chung's voice acting, which the VA in the show is great all around, of course. But villain roles always get to stick out, and this is a prime example. The shift between that very intelligent caring quirky woman to… what I can only call an analytical seductive manipulator and abuser, well it's just wonderful. We've had so much of bubbly Quinn and silly crass Quinn that this version is so refreshing and one of the most pleasant surprises out of the show.

There are other characters outside the trio, but I simply don't have much to say about Gordan, Flass, or Bullock. The VA is impeccable, as previously mentioned; I love Eric Morgan's Gordon, Gary Anthony Williams' Flass and John DiMaggio's Bullock. Perfect casting. But character wise they simply serve a role and I don't have much to say about them. Gordon is, well, Gordon trying his best among a corrupt department full of people like Flass and Bullock. Flass himself is brilliantly sly and Bullock is a slob who does all the dirty work. I will say that even if I don't have much to go into with them, I do appreciate how much Flass and Bullock are featured and how effectively they're utilized.

The only major reoccurring character left to go in-depth on, outside Batman, is Harvey Dent; ironically voiced by Brave and the Bold Batman, Diedrich Bader. Harvey is… odd in this series. He's a dick headed "tough on crime" sleazy DA who is self interested in becoming Mayor, no matter who he has to steamroll to get there. On one hand it is an interesting angle; a man of once upstanding morals slowing eroding them to gain political favor with the ultimate goal of proper reform-- assuming he even has any left by the end of it. There is an inkling of a great idea in the political process of Gotham grinding you down, bringing out your worst, makes you compromise too much. The system changes you, not the other way around.

The issue is the tragedy of a good if flawed man giving into his worse impulses doesn't entirely work due to the simple fact we hardly see a good side to Harvey. No signs of a different better person underneath or who he used to be before DA. The show only gives Harvey one very minor scene of empathy and moral upstanding before his disfigurement, so he kinda goes from jaded cynical asshat to homicidal asshat. To give the show credit, that is in part the intent. We don't like Harvey all that much but still feel bad when we see how sad and broken he is, all because he finally did something good and he's punished for it. The episode dealing with the aftermath of the acid attack is really solid at showcasing his slip into insanity and drawing forth pathos. In a bubble it works beautifully; A man who was already breaking, even if they didn't know, now thinks everyone is out to get him. Almost every invasive thought is acted upon. They also don't make Two-Face the default or more common of the personas, it's a lot of back and forth. Harvey is relatively calm one moment but suddenly becomes violent the next. Hell, he even has moments of clarity and great remorse not only for his actions as Two-Face but as DA. The episode is handled very well and Bader is selling the hell out of it. I just wish there was more before that change, a little more to like about Harvey Dent. Bruce was friends with this guy and from an audience perspective it's kinda hard to see why, Harvey is a shit head, an absolute knob. I dunno, Batman is kind of dick in this so maybe there's something to be said there? But even so, his dynamic with Barbara is FAR more engaging and nuanced than with Bruce because Barbara has more impactful scenes and is the direct opposite of the same coin. I kinda wonder if the stuff with Bruce was something shoved in at the last minute because they felt they had to. Which I guess that finally bring me to Batman, who you may have noticed I've talked very little about in this Batman show up until now.

Batman is a boring wet white rice motherfucker with barely a character arc and almost no connections to the main cast.

Oh sure, every episode has Batman doing things that move the plot along, provides some very minor characterization or some plain 'ol detective work which is fun to see. But even when he does investigating, finds a clue, confronts a villain etc. it feels lacking because his interactions with the rest of the cast are severely limited and sporadic.

Batman himself is integral to the show, but he's more like an anchor for the rest of the cast who have far more captivating screen time and better defined relationships. Babs is friends with Harley and Renee, Harley and Renee are dating, Renee works for Gordon, Barbara is of course Gordon's daughter, Harley has a brief stint as a consultant for the GCPD, and Harvey works opposite Barbara. These people flow into each others stories, converse, have opposing or similar ideologies to make stories around. Batman lock picks and punches things. I mean, Christ, he doesn't have a friendship with Gordon because this is long before that, he treats Alfred like a valuable tool rather than family and he has more empathy for Nocturna in a one off episode than Harvey over the entire season. I'm serious when I say I think the friendship was tacked on, because there's a line in ep 6 about Dent's biggest donors pulling out of his campaign, implying Bruce never gave any money. Maybe they could've made an entire subplot about the Batman aspect taking so much priority that he ignored Dent's troubles until it was too late. Have Batman learn a lesson about balancing the personas and how Bruce Wayne can be equally useful in aiding Gotham-- and the consequences of forgetting that. Maybe even intersperse flashbacks to a younger Bruce and more optimistic and likeable Dent to show why and how they became friends. This could've been done in a two-parter just like how Robin was handled in TAS.

For the instances the show does put a spotlight on just Batman it's simply going through the motions. The best we get is Bruce Wayne attending therapy sessions with Quinn, which is a great concept ultimately wasted on flashbacks of Bruce's childhood I've seen a dozen times over and maybe should've been used to explore his relationship with Dent.

Another reason why this Batman is so bland is because there are almost no sympathetic villains, which you've probably gathered by now. Harvey in the last episode and Nocturna in ep. 8 are the only two that fit the criteria (And frankly Barbara does more to help Harvey.) But everyone else? No tragic backstory, no victim of circumstance, no injustice, and no chance to showcase Batman's greatest attribute. On paper I understand what they were going for; this is an early Batman attempting (and sometimes failing) to be emotionally walled off. He's in the background, he needs to learn to open up and temper his anger. Midway into the season have something drastic happen to shake his resolve (endangering Alfred, of course)

By the end of the series he begins casually referring to him as Alfred rather than "Pennyworth" and he's established connections with Barbara, Jim and Renee. I don't dislike this slow burn, I enjoy seeing Batman's humanity slowly seep through. The series has a lot of great little moments where we see that happening, like Batman chastising Barbara for being reckless right after she saved his ass and a friend of hers is assumed dead. She's going through a lot and Batman clearly doesn't know how to processes the situation, he doesn't know how to be comforting.

There's also a great scene in the finale that I'm pretty sure was a giant middle finger to a certain director. The problem is the entire season is doing things like that. Sure we get growth for the character, but that's grueling for a 10 episode season. Maybe it's just me, but I'd kinda like to be more invested in the title character before the season finale. But as is so often the case with streaming we're limited to just 10 episodes per season. It's... so tiresome spending an entire run getting Batman to a state where we can actually tie him in with the rest of the ensemble cast and show some goddamn empathy. I realize rushing through this could result in the opposite problem, but this once again leads to me pointing out, as always, the stories writers want to tell are too big for these gimped 6-10 episode season the modern streaming has pushed on all of us. You know the first season of The Animated Series was a whopping 65 episodes? I probably wouldn't be talking about this problem if we even had a quarter of that.

I do want to stress this is no fault of the performance, which I know is going to be on everyone's mind. This is a problem with writing, the limited episode count, and possibly Zaslav not seeing enough blood in his stool before dumping this production onto Amazon. Conroy alone wouldn't have been enough to elevate the more shallow aspects of Batman's character, it just wouldn't. The writing for Batman specifically is very by the numbers at best. If this was material that fell flat because of Conroy's absence that would be one thing, but it's just bland characterization from the get go and no amount of nostalgia, art style, or iconic voice work will cover that up. It's kind of funny because the show is enjoyable by in large, but the title character is the weakest part. I wouldn't be surprised if a great deal of the mixed reception was because of that. "Batman is the worst part of a Batman show" is a perfectly valid and damning criticism.

That said, I do want to praise Hamish Linklater, the poor guy's got his work cut out for him, being in the Shadow of the Bat, as it were, and he does a fine job. I can tell it's not Conroy, obviously, and sometimes it sounds like a mix of Brave and the Bold with New Frontier Batman where I'm not sure if he's trying to do an impression or not. But midway through the series it starts to get really close, there are even moments that remind me of Conroy's performance in TAS' Two-Face two parter, glimpses where Linklater almost has the softer tones down pat. And his Bruce is damn near spot on. I hope he stays on as a voice for Batman and gets more opportunities as the character, he could potentially become to Conroy's Batman what Matthew Lillard is to Casey Kasem's Shaggy; It's not the same, but goddamn do they do a fine job capturing the tone and vibe while being a fine performer in their own right.

But they have GOT to give him better material because this Batman is sorely lacking in the things I love most about the character.

Speaking of, I don't want to spend too long discussing the second season (Which it is getting) but I have concerns there. The big one for me is foreshadowing that Alfred is keeping a secret about the night the Waynes were shot. I HATE when they over complicate the murder and try to make it something more like a targeted hit, or the court of owls or some other stupid shit. That's the one major thing I hate in The Batman movie is them muddying the waters with a perfectly good victim of circumstance story-- although it's kinda worse there because they wouldn't even fully commit. But I digress. I do not want the shit with the Waynes more complicated than it needs to be. If Alfred suggested a shortcut and he feels responsible for their deaths, sure, whatever. That's simple enough to add some character drama without going overboard. But it's probably gonna be the big overarching story next season with secret twists and- blegh. Honestly, I think I'd rather just have stand alone episodes without a running narrative thread; just have the characters and their dynamics developing and that be it. The show is clearly better when it's just that. But alas, modern streaming.

But with all that said, I still liked the season well enough. As I said at the beginning, the series is good to very good. I love the atmosphere, I enjoy most of the character and the cast, the self contained stories are solid and there's plenty of potential. But next season I need Batman and the villains to be more interesting, let Linklater give a sympathetic performance for fucks sake. If Season 2 is just more of the same, I'll clock out.

Still, I guess anything is better than say Harley assaulting Nightwing... Or the Killing Joke. You know what, there's a blurb of recommendation for Caped Crusader: "No weirdo awkwardly shoved their fetishes into the story." So check it out.

#Batman #the caped crusader #review #dc comics

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acefaun · 1 year ago

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Sanderson Zodiacs

Synopsis: You’d been waiting all month for this moment. After much preparation with your zodiac boyfriends, it was time for the summoning! Of course, something that was all in good fun turned quickly into a night of distress when there were witches on the hunt for a starry-eyed goddess.

✨Masterlist✨ Female goldfish!

A/n: Happy Halloween! 🎃 If you don’t have some crazy Halloween Party to go to, join these guys! We’re having our own Halloween Party! Let’s summon witches! Another glorious fanfiction! …Makes me sick! We got fanart with this one, YAY! It’s also my masterpiece thus far in my artistic journey, so I’m pretty proud of it! This is definitely going up on my facebook! 😚

–Word Count: 8,925–

The sky was barely getting a hint of that darker blue color the closer the sun drew to the horizon. The edge of the sky was starting to glow a dim orange color. It was almost time for a Halloween party-of-four! The other gods had to attend a ceremony in the Heavens where they would meet and greet with the returning souls of humans. The souls of the dead returning was a bigger event for the gods than it was for the humans of Earth, who treated it more as a game.

The only reason I was able to snag Ichthys, Dui, and Teorus was because they were the troublemakers of the two departments, and they wouldn't be sorely missed. Besides, my the zodiac gods wanted me to have a happy Halloween as well. I couldn't do that if I were home alone and moping… So what would be better than a Halloween party with a Hocus Pocus theme?

The mansion was elaborately decorated for the occasion. The entire mansion felt eerie, from the entrance all the way to the living room. The lights were turned off, replaced with light from candles, jack-o-lanterns, and the moonlight through the windows. There were cobwebs everywhere, but that only added to how old everything looked. Similar to how the outside of the mansion appeared to be falling apart, the inside matched perfectly. The once-clean marble was replaced with planks of wood, and the wallpaper was peeling everywhere. It would’ve been scary the way it was without the addition of a light fog that rolled across the floor.

It seemed my additional plastic trinkets weren’t going to be necessary for this party. Walking into the living room, I paused, taking in the equally spooky atmosphere. It might’ve seemed more welcoming if Ichthys, Dui, and Teorus would have been there like they promised. But my eyes locked onto something that was set up on a wide coffee table. Was that the book from Hocus Pocus?! I bolted over to kneel on the floor as I eagerly flipped through the book. It was everything like the movie. It left me wondering if they actually stole these props.

Too occupied with the realistic book, I hadn’t noticed anyone was there until arms wrapped around me from behind. I don’t think I would’ve been so scared if it weren’t three pairs of hands gripping at me, forcing a startled shriek from my lips. Though, it only took a moment for me to recognize who was harassing me.

My eyes narrowed as I both heard and felt Ichthys’ laughter from behind me. His head leaned against my shoulder, his tongue sticking out playfully. “We got you! Happy Halloween!”

Pouting, I tugged out of their hands, finding that all of them were in on Ichthys’ prank. “Not fair… You guys nearly gave me a heart attack! You can’t just gang up on me like this when the mansion’s all scary-looking.” If the mansion didn’t look like it could pass for a haunted house, I wouldn’t be so jumpy. “Well… Anyway, whatever! Did you guys get this stuff from the movie?”

“We actually got the book from the Heavens,” Dui explained, though he didn’t look too comfortable about the memory of it.

Ichthys, on the other hand, was grinning as if this was his biggest achievement in life. “It took really hard work to take this from the palace without anyone noticing. Luckily, everyone was pretty occupied with other things today.”

Teorus nodded his head in agreement, but he appeared more on Dui’s side of things. Neither of them seemed comfortable with the lengths they had to go through to get the book. “It was actually in the forbidden section,” Teorus added, “So, while it wasn’t hard for us to get in… it was hard to smuggle it out without getting caught.”

Ichthys grinned at their successful heist of the library as he held out a candle made with pale wax. My mind was quick to recognize that as well, and I exclaimed, “You got the spell book and a black flame candle?!”

Dui nodded, a smile spreading across his face thanks to my contagious excitement. “We followed the ingredients from the book, so it’s an authentic black-flame candle. So… uh,” he paused, tilting his head. The ingredients didn’t seem too special in creating a black flame, but what did he know about witchy stuff? “It should have a black flame. And there’s only one way to test it.”

“Ah,” I praised nervously, “I have chills; this is so cool! You guys are the best! Just- You have to promise you won’t take advantage and try and scare me!” My eyes were evenly trained on them to make sure they heeded my warning. I didn’t need to have more heart attacks than I could handle in the spooky mansion.

Teorus pat my head like a child and reassured, “We won’t do anything scary. But after we do our ritual, we can dress up and go trick-or-treating! (Name), do people give out milk for Halloween?”

I fell silent at his odd question. Last time I checked… no one in their right mind would give out milk for Halloween. But who was I to crush his dreams? “Well, there’s such thing as candy that’s made with milk. Like… milk chocolate? Yeah. So you’ll get candy-milk! That’s it!”

His eyes began to glow with excitement as he grabbed my arm, pulling me over to the small coffee table where they had their candles ready. “Come on, virgin! Light our candle so we can go get milk candy from humans!”

My eyebrows furrowed together, half-glaring at him. I lightly smacked his hand off of mine as he pulled me to kneel on the floor with him. “Don’t start calling me a virgin, weirdo!” Huffing, I gestured for Ichthys and Dui to join us on the opposite side of the rectangular table. “Let’s get the party started then! How does that saying go again…? On All Hallow’s Eve, when the moon is round, a virgin will summon them from under the ground!”

Grabbing one of the longer candle sticks, I used the small flame to carefully light the candle that was sitting on the table. Almost instantaneously, a black flame was atop the candle, and we all stared at it in wonder. Ichthys was the first to make a comment, “Hey, Dui, I guess this makes you a witch now! You can make magic candles!”

I would’ve made a joke to go along, but I couldn’t help but feel unsettled… as if something weren’t quite right in the air. Teorus also had an expression that told me he felt something off.

After a quiet moment, all the candles went out in the room suddenly, and I latched onto Teorus like my life depended on it. I shouted accusingly, “You said you wouldn't play more pranks and scare me!”

“Ichthys?” Dui called the pisces for an explanation.

“It wasn’t me,” he quickly tried to defend himself. Or… maybe it was? He definitely didn’t turn out all the lights, though! “Teo, did you do this just so (Name) would jump on you?”

“No way,” Teorus argued, though he wasn’t going to be one to complain that I latched onto him for protection. Needless to say, it wasn’t any of us that did it… “Maybe it was a gust of wind?”

I pulled back, trying my best to give him a questioning look despite how dark it was. “Really? A gust of wind strong enough to blow out the fire place inside the mansion?” It sounded like the most ridiculous things ever, but it was better than the other possibility… My eyes popped open as the flames suddenly reappeared on the surrounding candles, the black flame still lit as it was before. My limbs started trembling as I wondered if this was like the movie. I didn’t want to die!

“Hey…” Dui muttered, our eyes scanning the still room. “I don't have a very good feeling about this…”

If the gods were uneasy about this entire thing, then how was I supposed to feel? But glancing around the room, I quietly asked, “If things do go south… the mansion is considered hallowed ground, right? Even if they wanted to… witches couldn’t come in… right?”

“Well…” Ichthys scratched the back of his head, drawing glares from both Dui and Teorus. Ichthys, yet again, did something he wasn’t supposed to, therefore putting all of us in unnecessary danger. Well, that’s what his face was telling us. But seeing our expressions, he quickly tried to brush it off, “It’s not like I completely masked the divinity of the mansion. I just wanted to make it feel more scary in here. But… if all else fails, we can always escape to the Heavens, or just hide in our rooms.”

“Right,” I snapped, gesturing around the room. “Let’s just escape to the Heavens while the witches are feasting on children and becoming eternally youthful! Perfect plan from the gods in charge of protecting humanity!”

Dui tried patting my head to get me to calm down. We were all pretty high-strung with the way our ‘perfect’ night was going, but we didn’t need to be fighting. “Calm down, guys. The obvious answer to our problem is just to keep the book away from them until the sun rises. We’re gods. They’ll never find us.”

I nodded my head, agreeing with Dui’s logic. Just based on the movie, we already had a higher chance of success. We knew exactly how to beat them. Despite the comfort of having a sound battle plan, my heart leapt in my chest as we heard the echoes of cackling filling the empty mansion. Weakly, I muttered, “It’s the Sanderson sisters…”

We all watched the door in apprehension as a voice exclaimed, “What a disgustingly large house… BOOOK!”

I flinched, snatching the book out of the air before it could fly out of the living room. Dui pulled me out of sight behind a bookshelf just in time for the doors of the living room to burst open and reveal the three ancient witches. I didn’t have time to see where Ichthys or Teorus were hiding before Dui pulled me into hiding, but I hoped they stayed hidden and unnoticed wherever they were.

Sarah danced around the room, her arms flinging her sleeves around as she sang, “A virgin lit the candle again, Winnie!”

“Ah,” Winifred gleamed at the black flame that sat on the table amongst the other seemingly useless knickknacks. “It seems they did. Which means… they have my book. Mary!”

“Yes, Winnie?” Mary and Sarah listened intently to their sister’s orders. I watched them quietly from behind the bookshelf, but I knew we couldn’t stay there forever. They were searching around the room pretty thoroughly, starting from the middle.

Winifred gestured around the room for them to get searching. “Sniff our little virgin out.”

I wasn’t the only one who figured out that by Mary sniffing closer to the candle, she would get my scent first. Then it would only be a matter of time before they found our hiding spot. Dui caught onto this predicament and held me closer in case he needed to make any sudden moves to get me out of danger.

We waited with bated breath for them to do something or say anything more. I leaned closer against Dui, trying to make us smaller and less noticeable.

“Winnie…” Mary called with a subtle smile, her eyes flickering around the room. “I smell… children.” Though, she didn’t look like she had an exact location. I figured it was probably because Teorus and Ichthys were hiding elsewhere, so our scents were probably a little everywhere. I was sure that was some kind of plus, but I knew better than to think that a witch whose power was in her nose wouldn’t be able to figure things out. Based on the movie, their goal was usually to find the youngest one. Unfortunately, that meant me—who was also their black-flame virgin, as well as the current holder of their precious book. Aside from Ichthys being the youngest god, I was less than a fraction of their age. Still, when it boiled down to it, we were all considerably younger than any of the other gods; I was sure that fact alone made all of us targets.

With the witches drawing steadily closer to us, however, Dui firmly wrapped his arms around me, ready to get me out of harm’s way at a moment’s notice. But as if to save us the trouble of getting caught, Ichthys was the first to burst out from where he was hiding. “Hey!” Seeing the witches in person for the first time, he hummed, shaking his head. “Yeah, you’re not as pretty as I thought you’d be. You should definitely leave this place before we kick you out.”

Despite Sarah and Mary fretting over a boy, Winifred seemed surprised to see Ichthys… as if she knew him. But she wasn’t faltering in the face of this newcomer. In fact, she sounded quite familiar as she hissed, “Ah, a pesky little god. I could only imagine how sweet a soul like yours might taste.”

Before she could attempt to attack Ichthys, Teorus distracted her, throwing a plastic skull at her. “Why don’t you witches go fight someone your own strength? You think you stand a chance against gods?”

As much as the three witches were interested in the power of the gods, it was too bad they were outnumbered four to three. But… two gods were sure to do the trick against three witches, right? At least, that was what was going through Teorus’ mind as he shouted, “Dui, run!”

Fleeing with the book made sense and was really the only choice we had here. But how were we supposed to flee when we had the full attention of those witches who were quick to corner us?

Dui seemed to have the same doubt of mind as I did, since he made sure I was behind him as we faced off with the two younger sisters. Teorus and Ichthys were occupied by Winifred, who was waiting for Sarah and Mary to retrieve her book from me—or freed from me, at least.

“H- Hang on,” Dui weakly said, hesitant to face the two surely powerless witches. “I don’t want to hit ladies… Plus, I’m a god; I could really hurt you. You should stay away from (Name), or else we won’t be gentle.”

“We?” Mary couldn’t help but chuckle at how I seemed to hide further behind Dui. This seemed like an easy hurdle to jump, in their opinion. “Your little friend might have trouble keeping hold of that book.”

The minute they tried to distract Dui by going separate directions around him. After all, Dui couldn’t stop both of them at the same time… right?

Oh, how wrong they were to underestimate a god. Dui’s expression shifted, and a scowl crossed his face as he glowered at them. “That softie wasn’t talking about the goldfish!” Snapping his fingers, the two witches were shoved back a decent distance from me. But, he knew that wouldn’t get rid of the problem. Turning, I flinched as Shadow Dui glared at me, snapping, “What are you waiting for, idiot? Go to the Heavens. I thought the whole point of this god-damn fight was so they don’t get that book.”

He was right… but I was too alarmed to leave their side. Well, that wasn’t exactly the problem either. I quickly exclaimed, “But I can’t go through the door without one of you, and- and that wouldn’t stop them from causing trouble on Earth!” My eyes flickered to Ichthys and Teorus, but they didn’t look like they’d be able to slip away without giving Winifred an opening to come after her book. My grip tightened around the living book in my arms.

These witches were just humans, when it came down to it. Sure, my gods weren’t as powerful as usually because of the general darkness and negative energy of Halloween night, but we still had to overpower these guys! Well, that’s the optimism I was going off of, anyway.

Dui hissed, “Then we’re just going to have to get you into a freaking church!” He sounded sarcastic, but if we couldn’t leave Earth, and we had to keep the book away from the witches, then his suggestion sounded like the best option. After all, the goal of the Sanderson sisters wasn’t to catch childish gods; their goal was to get their book back so they could make their youth potion. Their dilemma was that they couldn’t make their potion without their book, and I wasn’t planning on letting it go anytime soon.

“Agh~”

A sudden shout made everyone pause, the room falling silent. My wide eyes flickered to where Teorus and Ichthys were once fighting Winifred. “Ichthys…?” I apprehensively called out. He was in pain and he was… shrinking?

Right before our eyes, Ichthys shrunk into a black cat. We weren’t really sure what to expect from a witch turning a god into an animal, but Ichthys’ laughter rang out through the room as if this were just some funny game. “Wow,” he cheered, “now it’s just like the movie, huh?”

Winifred smiled triumphantly over the defeated god. “Well, meddlesome god down… two more to go.” Her powers were able to best a god, further securing their position as the most powerful witches in history.

While the situation wasn’t as fun as he was making it out to be… that was, indeed, an Ichthys response to danger. It only made me warily sigh, while Shadow Dui snarled, “You damn fish!”

Teorus relented, stepping between Ichthys and Winifred. “There’s nothing we can do now. Ichthys, go help (Name)!”

“I’m on it!” Ichthys agreed without hesitation, swapping places with Dui who worked on distracting the sisters with Teorus. Bolting past me, Ichthys encouraged, “C’mon, (Name). I don’t have hands to open doors anymore; keep up!”

I rolled my eyes, frantically following him through the dim halls of the mansion, opening doors per his directions until we finally made it out of the mansion's front door. I absolutely wasn’t made to be running around like this…

Ichthys, on the other hand, seemed like he was living for every second of this excitement. Irritated, I snapped at him, “Stop enjoying this!” This was far worse than the movie, in my opinion. The movie didn’t show that they could overpower even gods on Halloween night! Besides, what good was Ichthys as a cat? Ichthys couldn’t fight back like this. Not to mention if Winifred did that to Teorus and Dui… “Ichthys,” I murmured as we slowed our pace to a walk, “we need help from the other gods.”

“Don’t worry,” he responded quite confidently. “You’ve got me, Dui, and Teo.”

I shot him an uncertain glare. “You mean I have Dui and Teo. What good are you? You can’t even fix yourself.”

“Hey…” Ichthys sounded disappointed that I thought so little of him. “I might be smaller, but I’m still a god. I might’ve had my guard down around some humans, but when it comes to keeping you safe, I’m giving you my all.”

“I…” I faltered, exhaling tiredly. “I’m sorry. I know you are. It’s just that this isn’t about me. This book puts everyone in danger. I’m starting to have my suspicions about why it was locked up in the Heavens.”

“Yeah,” Ichthys uttered, his ears falling. It was a slight movement, but it was enough for me to notice as he sullenly added, “I guess I messed up pretty big this time.”

Noting the heavy mood that was suddenly bearing over us, I suggested cheerfully, “It’s like you said, isn’t it? This is like the movie. What do three old hags have against modern gods? Besides, there’s no mess you can make that we can’t clean up. Haven’t all your years in the Department of Punishments taught you that?”

I smiled as I heard him chuckle. That’s right, there was no point in being negative. We had to do what we could, given the circumstances. At least he seemed more cheerful, as our destination was whatever church we came across first.

We had a good plan, everything was figured out, and we were sure we would make it until morning. If only more trouble wasn’t stirred up the closer we got to the tree line. What kind of luck did we have to emerge head first into two dark gods?

Crow and Servillah were loitering around the forest, which was brimming with dark energy on Halloween night. However, even they seemed thoroughly surprised to find me, the ex-goddess, running straight into them. They never in their wildest dreams expected me to walk right into their arms.

Though, we were both seemingly at a loss for words to exchange. Face-to-face with each other, there was awkward silence.

After a brief moment, having had time to comprehend the current situation, the dark gods were more than pleased. Crow grinned, the first to speak. “I can’t believe some dimwitted goddess like you actually had the gull to come into a forest brimming with dark energy!”

Before I had a chance to escape their presence, Servillah grabbed my shoulder, jerking me towards them. The sudden motion along with the way his fingers dug into my skin made me wince and cry out, “O- Ow!”

Seeing me in pain, Ichthys hissed defensively, lunging into Servillah’s face with his claws extended. The dark god was easily startled, quickly releasing me in favor of prying the cat off of his face. “Wait,” Crow ushered the other dark god to be still so he could help.

With Ichthys serving as a distraction, I stumbled away from the two dark gods, scrambling behind a tree and staring at them with wide eyes.

“Stupid beast!” Servillah growled at the cat as Crow finally pried Ichthys off of him, throwing him to the ground.

The two dark gods were about to approach me again, when Ichthys darted between us, interrupting, “I’m not going to let you lay a hand on her! (Name), stay behind me!”

Both of the dark gods were surprised by the cat speaking; but they were no less pleased with the amusing situation as they realized… this creature before them was a god.

Servillah regarded his friend, “Hey, Crow… How do you suppose a god snaps his fingers… when he doesn’t have any fingers?”

Crow, grinning, replied, “I suppose… he doesn’t.” There was a pause as the two seemed to register the situation as they spotted the all-too-familiar book in my arms. “Those Sanderson witches scared you straight into our waiting grasp, did they? Regardless of how they were resurrected this time round, I guess we’ll have to give them a little reward for their good work. Now, goddess, don’t do anything stupid and come with us.”

Seeing that they were going to grab for me once again, I was quick to use the book as a weapon of self-defense. At least I wasn’t alone, and that was a comforting thought as Ichthys helped in fending off Crow from one side while I took my chances swinging the heavy book at Servillah.

Of course, our defenses could only last so long before the book was knocked out of my hands. I was sure I was on the verge of being snatched away to the Under Realm before my saviors showed up.

Dui and Teorus arrived just in time to scare the dark gods away—though it took a little convincing, via their powers.

After our momentary success, Ichthys then glanced between the two other gods curiously. “Hey, you guys were pretty fast. How did you two manage to get away from all three of the witches?”

Teorus smiled as if it were nothing and explained, “Well, our powers are a little weak on Halloween, but we still had enough power in the mansion to make a bunch of voice-activated books that would respond to Winifred’s voice… So those three are going through a bunch of books right now.”

Smugly, Dui added, “They’ll have to go through them one by one to find out they’re all made with divine power. Though, I doubt it will hold them up long with the dark gods suddenly around.”

Ichthys excitedly said, “At least this gives us time to come up with some sort of counter plan.”

“I- I don’t think it does,” I said, sounding particularly nervous as I revealed the fault in our position, “The dark gods took the book…”

“What?!” The three gods were shocked. Though, Ichthys was looking disappointed again, his head drooping as he mourned, “I messed up again. I couldn’t keep you safe or keep the book from falling into their hands.”

Teorus comforted, “It’s okay, Ikky. It’s not like it’s all your fault. Besides, you protected (Name) until we got here to help. You did what you could.” He sighed. “We should have been more careful and really checked this stuff out before stealing from the palace library.”

“Right…” Dui sorrowfully agreed, “We could have just taken the things from the movie, like (Name) said.” He winced. “Meaning… we should probably fix all of this before Zyglavis finds out.”

“Then our goal is to get the book back and protect the humans!” Ichthys nodded, pausing in thought. “Should we sneak back into the mansion?”

“I don’t think the witches would stay there, though, would they?” Teorus tilted his head with furrowed eyebrows as we tried to work through this problem of ours.

I shrugged my shoulders in silent response. “Maybe we could give it a look? It’s gotta be better than standing around waiting to figure out what to do.”

“I agree with Teo,” Dui offered his opinion. “I don’t think they’d stay at the mansion for longer than necessary—especially if those dark gods are helping them now. If they stayed in the mansion too long, not only would it hurt them, but it would also alert the other gods in the Heavens.”

Ichthys sighed, his tail wavering behind him as he sat on the ground. “While that might help us… I don’t really want to face Zyglavis’ wrath for freeing ancient witches…”

“Well, I’ll take Leo’s wrath over losing (Name),” Teorus decided with a firm pout. “They would all be more powerful, just coming from the Heavens. Being on Earth on the darkest night of the year hasn’t been very helpful for replenishing our powers. Otherwise, we’d have already turned you back, Ikky.”

“I guess you’re right,” Ichthys reluctantly agreed. “But they’d have to notice something was wrong first, and who knows if that’ll happen.” He exhaled again. “Let’s start by scanning nearby areas for dark power. We’ll be able to single out where those witches went from there.”

***

Hours passed, searching ceaselessly for the three witches and the dark gods, but nothing came up in their search.

“All this walking around, and we haven’t found anything,” I griped, growing frustrated as I followed along the road with the two gods and the cat. “It’s not like they’re summoning children or anything like in the movie, otherwise we’d be able to find them easily—follow the zombie children to their secret witch hide-out. But… also… if they’re not eating children by now… what are they doing?”

Dui shrugged tiredly, his shoulders sagging. “I’m not sure… but this going in and out of places with dark energy is getting really draining. At this rate, we might become like Ichthys.”

Teorus added, “I wish we could have just gone trick-or-treating with you instead, (Name). I was really looking forward to getting that milk chocolate stuff you were talking about.”

Ichthys nodded his head as he bemoaned, “Yeah, it would’ve been super fun to dress up in costumes and walk around Earth with all the humans. I bet I could’ve played some awesome pranks tonight.”

“I feel like we’ve been trick-or-treating for witches, going from place to place with no results,” I pouted, compared our long night of witch-hunting to trick-or-treating, though the two really weren’t anything alike. “It’s not fair that we can’t seem to get good or bad results. There haven’t been any tricks or treats all night. That’s not how trick-or-treating works!”

“Trick-or-treat!”

“Waah~” I felt like the air was knocked out of me all at once as my body was lifted off of the ground suddenly, an arm crushing around my rib cage. I wanted the arm to release me, but at the same time, I had no idea how high I was dangling in the air.

The only thing that revealed my position was the cackling of the three Sanderson sisters. As quick as I was taken, the gods tried to race to my side in a panic. Only… they found that they couldn’t fly to my rescue. Teorus’ eyes were wide as he sputtered, “H- Huh…? Hey, why can’t we fly now? The dark energy shouldn’t be making us this weak.”

“The gods haven’t realized they were cursed…” Sarah softly sung, “The little goddess has been draining your powers all night.”

The gods were confused, but I was even more so. “I- I haven’t,” I argued. Surely one of us would have recognized something like that. But it was growing hard to keep my optimistic thoughts with me when I could have been the cause of their weakness. We needed answers. “What are you talking about…?”

“Ah, but you have.” Winifred drawled. “Our dear companions put it on you when they first had you in their grasp. Mary,” she demanded, gesturing for her sister to prove it.

Then, Mary lowered my collar, exposing a dark tattoo on my shoulder. It seemed like such an obvious place, but of course we never would have been looking for something like that on me.

Dui’s eyes widened as he muttered, “A curse… We never even noticed…” He looked exceedingly guilty for missing something so important.

“No wonder we were so weak,” Teorus lamented. “We couldn’t even help Ichthys because of that thing. It’s been draining our powers, it wasn’t the dark energy on Earth to blame.”

Sarah chirped, “Now they understand.”

“Let us go!” Winifred ordered, “We can’t have this little goddess slipping away from us again.”

The gods were clearly fearful as they watched the witches fly away with me. Ichthys hopped onto Dui’s shoulder, doing his best to get as close to me as possible as he yelled, “We’ll be right behind you, (Name)! We’re coming!”

The three gods would never leave me with witches and dark gods to steal my soul. Now, however, Ichthys was kind of wishing for Zyglavis to hurry down to Earth with all his wrath.

***

Midnight… It was officially midnight; meaning, that it was November 1st. The other gods had to collectively agree that they were relieved to finally be done with their long night of Halloween.

Tauxolouve sighed, complaining, “Why does it feel like All Hallow’s Eve lasted longer this year?”

Aigonotus nodded in agreement, his head leaning to rest on Tauxolouve’s shoulder. “There were way too many spirits to talk to this year…” He grumbled tiredly, “I can’t wait to see (Name).”

Karno pointed out with a knowing smile, “You just want to use her lap as a pillow, don’t you?” Wordlessly, Aigonorus nodded his head in acknowledgement. It was pretty obvious what his intentions were.

Krioff added in confusion, “Shouldn’t (Name) be sleeping right now? You better not wake her up.”

Partheno nodded with a slight shrug. “Perhaps… Trick-or-treating is over, in any case, and I’m sure she had her hands absolutely full with those three.”

However, as the three wishes gods and two punishments gods walked into the mansion, they have to pause, finding Huedhaut and Leon neck to neck with Zyglavis and Scorpio. While the sight wasn’t that uncommon between the two ministers, there was an odd feeling in the mansion that wasn’t so familiar. Not to mention, it looked very eerie, like an actual haunted house.

Though everyone was tense and silent, Karno was the first to address it. “What’s going on here?”

Leon’s sharp eyes shot to Karno. “Those troublesome-”

“Those three stole a very important book from the Heavens for (Name),” Huedhaut interrupted Leon with a powerfully frightening scowl of his own. Moments like these, Huedhaut looked like he belonged in the Department of Punishments. “While their intentions were well, they should have known better than to summon witches.”

“Witches…?” Aigonorus was wide away with that startling news. His nose scrunched up. “Where’s (Name)?”

Zyglavis’ eyes darkened. “We’re searching for all of them now. Let me be clear, we’re not dealing with anything relatively good. These particular witches have been on the Punishment’s list for centuries, as they are in cahoots with the dark gods; the Dark King being the master they serve.”

Leon added, “This dark presence in the mansion can only mean that there’s been trouble.”

The gods were clearly frustrated that they had this problem running around Earth once again. Scorpio criticized them, “They honestly thought it was just a movie? Stupid problem children… Stupid goldfish… If it were just a movie, we wouldn’t have had that stupid book locked away in the Heavens.”

Tauxolouve sighed, asking, “Well, should we find and help them?”

Irritated, Leon answered, “We need to clean up this mess around the mansion first. If we don’t get rid of this dark energy now, we won’t be able to help anyone.”

“Besides,” Krioff said bluntly, however helpfully, “The sun’s going to come up in a few hours. Won’t those witches just turn to dust?”

Zyglavis sighed, rubbing his forehead. Everyone was sure he would refute that and explain that movies aren’t accurate, but he surprised them with an affirmative answer, “That’s right, but there are still hours left until then, and we should prepare for the worst.”

“But hope for the best,” Tauxolouve added optimistically. Of course, all the gods knew I wouldn’t fold to any old witches when I tended to put them, gods, in their places almost on a daily basis.

***

The air was suffocatingly still. The only sound to be heard in the silence was the cawing of crows along with the murmurs of the witches and dark gods a short distance away from me.

I was nervous to be tied to a chair in the middle of a forest, somewhere that would likely take Ichthys, Teorus, and Dui a while to reach since they weren’t able to fly. Not to mention, the dark gods were there too, likely deciding what to do next with me. The sun was still a few hours away from rising, I knew, but it couldn’t come fast enough. I was stuck with these witches until then…

Servillah observed me from where he stood, noting that I was stubbornly refusing to meet their gazes or acknowledge their presence. Still, in my position, I wouldn’t be going anywhere anytime soon. “Good,” he commented, “Now that we’re certain she can’t move… We’re going to take care of those pesky gods and make sure they doing interfere. You three take care of the ritual to summon the Dark King. When we come back… we can get started. I’m sure her soul will be ready by then.”

Watching the two dark gods leave, we were once again left in uncomfortable silence as the witches prepared their potions and spells. Clearly, there was still work to be done before they would use my soul. But… maybe I could stall them.

“Y- You know…” I stuttered, trying to convince the witches to spill their plans. “You’re not being very good villains.”

“I thought…” Sarah uttered, glancing worriedly between her two sisters, “we were being really evil witches…”

With their skeptical expressions, I took my chance to continue, clearly having them with hook and bait. “What I mean to say… is… that typically, in modern times, there’s usually an evil monologue. You know, to hype up your purpose for doing… whatever it is you’re doing; and… I don’t know, scare your captive by giving them a scary overview of what’s happening?” I was only slightly confident in this distraction plan, but the worst they could say was no… right?

Seeing them huddle together, I pursed my lips as I watched them deliberate over my words. But finally, they turned back to me with wicked grins. Winifred started, “Very well, little goddess. Our master would be pleased to have a trembling goddess at his feet when he returns.”

I flinched in surprise—though, maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised. So, they were going to bring back the Dark King. They were serious about it… and I supposed this was a perfect place for it. I didn’t have to act apprehensive as I asked this time, “You’re… not talking about who I think you’re talking about… Are you?”

“Yes,” Winifred only smirked as she answered me. This ‘villain’ role and getting their captive to tremble in fear was quite simple.

Mary added with a hungry grin. “We’re going to get a filling portion of thine soul for catching thee from those pesky gods.”

Sarah sighed happily over my shoulder, “What a delicious soul our little reborn goddess must have…”

“But,” Winifred paused. “Let us explain why the little goddess is so special, hm? Even just a small portion of thy divine soul shall grant us eternal youth!”

“We’ll be young and beautiful forever!” Sarah danced giddily.

They were too excited over this… I had to keep stalling, pressing for as much information as they were willing to spill. “My gods would never let you get away with this!”

Mary wheezed out a laugh as she pointed out, “Your soul is going to resurrect the dark lord… and those gods are going to die.”

“Mary,” Winifred ordered excitedly, “The potion, retrieve it, now!” The three witches were moving about excitedly as they brought the potion before me.

The three witches were crowding me. I didn’t like this; I didn’t like how Winifred’s nails were digging into my cheeks, angling my head up. Attempting to get my mouth open was no small task, but it was easily done with a bit of persuasion—pain.

The potion didn’t taste good, and I definitely didn’t want to know what was mixed in it, as I was forced to choke it down.

“Now…” Winifred contemplated, “What was the next step?”

Reading from a sheet of crumpled paper, Sarah said, “Let… simmer for… 60… minutes!”

“Now, that doesn’t sound right, dear sister,” Mary lightly chastised her, pulling the paper from her hands. Though, Mary tilted her head at the words written on the page. “But it is… Winnie, are we going to have to wait an hour to taste her?”

Winifred snatched the paper out of their hands, hissing at the directions. “Indeed,” she uttered in distaste. “Tis because this little soul is a divine one. It will take time for the potion to extract the undamaged soul from her.” The explanation made sense; however, they disliked having to wait for something that was so tempting. “Regardless, we have to wait for the Dark gods to return and complete the ritual to summon his highness.”

The three sisters collectively sighed. “Alas.”

***

After a long hour of waiting, it seemed the return of the dark gods wasn’t growing any nearer, and there were a measly three hours before the sun would rise. Suffice to say, the witches were growing restless with my delicious soul teasing them, glimmering around my tired form.

“They wouldn’t notice…” Mary started carefully, “if we took… just a taste…?”

“Not a sniff,” Winifred shot a glare to her sister, “Not a taste, until they return.”

They sat tiredly like impatient children with a cookie in front of them.

“Hey!” A shout came from further within the forest. “Hey! Catch that god!”

Their heads snapped up as a small black cat bound up to them, skidding to a stop in the dirt as he ended up beside my tied feet. Ichthys’ eyes were wide as he looked between the three witches and me. “(Name)! I’m here to save you!”

The witches were suddenly surrounding Ichthys as Winifred spoke down to him, “I think not. You may have escaped the wrath of those dark gods, but you won’t escape from us a second time! Take a look, your beloved little goddess has already succumbed to our potion! It’s only a matter of time now…”

Ichthys’s tail swished behind him as he stood protectively between me and the witches. His head tilted as he shot back, “I would look… but I think it’s you who needs to turn and take a look behind you!”

Turning, they were surprised to find Teorus and Dui still alive—and, not to mention, in very personalized robes that looked unironically similar to Sarah and Mary’s outfits.

The sisters were clearly flustered over this, as Mary pointed out, “I thought they were supposed to be dead…”

“I know!” Winifred huffed, clearly angry with how things were looking. But the gods were clearly at the disadvantage here. “We needn’t worry. We’ll handle them ourselves.”

“So, is that what you think?” Ichthys suddenly asked again, drawing the attention of the witches, who suddenly found themselves surrounded. Ichthys was no longer a cat, but, in fact, dressed in a very… ironically familiar robe.

The little kerfuffle between gods and witches didn’t last nearly as long as the first time, and it only ended with the three gods standing proudly between me and the witches. The three gods stood close enough to spare their powers to undo the effects of that nasty potion, while still being in a good position to protect and defend you.

With the effects of the potion wearing off, I gazed at the three gods in a daze, as if waking up from a dream. “Dui…?” My head lulled slightly as I lifted it to try and take in the situation. “Ichthys and Teo?” I blinked, swearing that I was still dreaming—and maybe had been this whole time. Only, if it were a dream, I was sure I wouldn’t be tied to a chair in the middle of a creepy forest. My eyebrows furrowed as I asked, “Why are you… the Sanderson Zodiacs?”

“Hah!” Teorus laughed. “I like that name. Yeah, let’s go with that.”

My eyebrows furrowed as I failed to make sense of what was happening. “But… I thought your powers were drained because of me?”

“If you’re the one that was draining our powers, what do you think happened the minute they took you away from us?” Dui smartly asked, pausing to let me connect the dots. But they still had business to take care of. “Sit tight for us, (Name). We’re almost finished here.”

Their attention went back to the witches, and I watched in awe to see what my gods were planning on doing. With their powers recharged, this was bound to be an interesting show for me.

“Do you want to know something cool about Teo?” Ichthys gestured to the blond god, pausing with a dark grin before he pointed out, “He’s the god of time…” This time he paused to try and let the threat settle in.

“Oh!” I exclaimed excitedly, seeing what they were getting at. This was a perfect strategy; Teorus could make the sun rise early! Why hadn’t they thought of this before? “Of course…!”

“And now,” Teorus grinned, and I waited with bated breath for him to continue. “I’d like to introduce you to a little thing known as daylight savings time.”

There was a quiet pause and Dui sighed loudly in disappointment. I turned my head away, muttering, “You just… couldn’t leave that line out of it…?” I groaned quietly; I thought he was going to say something scary, something that would dissuade them from returning again. What I hadn’t expected… was for him to mock a line from the movie… “Please… go back to being the scary and intimidating god of time.”

“And what are you going to do?” Winifred mockingly asked, “Give yourselves more time to save your little goddess?”

“We could do that,” Dui—or maybe this was Shadow Dui who came out—agreed. His tone was just as mocking, and his grin was just as unpleasant. “Or we can speed things up a little! I’m sure you wouldn’t mind if we turned the lights on!”

“Ah, Winnie,” Sarah called, “The sun! It’s rising!”

“Curses!” Winifred screeched furiously. “Damn you, gods! We’ll be back! And when we do, your little reborn goddess will be ours!”

Suddenly, my vision darkened as I felt Ichthys’ hands hover over my eyes. Softly, he whispered, “This… isn’t quite like the movie, so I’ll have to cover your eyes for this part.”

***

“Hm?” Krioff’s attention was stolen by a sudden glimmer outside the window, far in the distance, and his eyebrows furrowed as he found the sun rising. “That’s weird… Wasn’t the sun supposed to rise in an hour from now?”

“No worries,” Tauxolouve eased, smiling at the sight of the rising sun. “This is a sign that things went well, don’t you think?”

“I agree,” Huedhaut added, looking out of the window with a fond smile. “(Name)’s just fine in the hands of our three troublemakers.”

“Tch…” Scorpio scoffed off to the side. “Those brats are gonna get what’s comin’ to them when they get back to this mansion.”

Tauxolouve nodded his head as if content with the fact that the three gods were going to be punished very thoroughly by likely both ministers and vice ministers. “Yeah… This was a stressful Halloween.”

***

The grass was cold beneath me as I leaned back on my hands, sitting beside Teorus, Dui, and Ichthys. The only thing that warmed me up was the feeling of the sun that was rising just above the horizon. I pursed my lips, hesitant to break the peaceful silence, but finally, I had to speak, “You know… you guys are going to be in a lot of trouble when we go back.” I paused, adding, “Especially since you kept me out all night… Well, more-so for the dark gods and witches stuff… but, well, you know.”

There were solemn nods of agreement. “Yeah,” Dui verbally agreed with me, but he had something else on his mind. “Hey, (Name)... we still didn’t get to celebrate Halloween with you, though. Do you think we could hold off on going back just yet?”

Ichthys eagerly suggested, “Yeah! Can’t we go to your place for the day until Zyglavis and the others calm down?”

Teorus leaned toward me eagerly, “Please? I know we didn’t get to go trick-or-treating, but I really want to try some of that milk chocolate!”

I sighed loudly, but I couldn’t deny my finely dressed Sanderson Zodiacs. I glanced over at them. “Are you three planning on staying in costume all day?” They glanced at each other before collectively nodding. “Fine,” I relented. “It’s November first, so the Halloween candy should be on sale today…” Glancing at their eager expressions, a huff of laughter left my lips. “Alright. Let’s stop at the store on our way to my place.”

They followed me like excited little Sanderson ducklings down the street. Teorus praised, “You’re so good to us, (Name), letting us stay at your place so we don’t get in trouble with Ziggy and Leo.”

“And letting us celebrate Halloween with you a day late,” Dui added with his usually friendly smile.

Ichthys peered over my shoulder with an equally innocent smile. “You know how much we love you?”

I scoffed, angling my head up with a somewhat satisfied smirk. “Problem children… C’mon.”

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hey-sherry · 2 years ago

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Sherlock Holmes The Awakened Demo Thinky Thoughts

A bit late, but I wanted to share my first reaction to the Awakened demo! This is essentially an expanded version of what I wrote on the FW discord, with screenshots edited to look nicer for tumblr. I will do a separate post on the extra stuff that is normally inaccessible without Ansel. [Extra stuff post here]

So: spoilers ahead + keep in mind that the game is darker and moodier, I edited some of the screenshots so that they are clearer on tumblr/mobile view.

Sweet sweet concept art, gorgeous intro music, yay! The main theme is atmospheric and dark, giving me very slight vibes of the Sarif HQ track from DX:HR... I mean this in a good way, not in a “they copied it” way. It’s that sort of nostalgic ambience, but deeper and darker. One day I’ll stop drawing parallels to Deus Ex, but today is not that day.

The intro cinematic is pre-rendered and really good; I liked Sherlock's narration and the implication it's all in Watson's/players' hands now... He sounds more authoritative and distant than in CO.

I really liked the visual with the fly caught in the cobweb.

I did not expect this! It's a really fun title sequence and wow, we’re being thrown straight into chapter 3. I too thought it would be London but this is great 😄

WATSON!!! At this point I’m thinking, “Oooh we're gonna play as Watson, they probably don’t want to show Sherlock just yet, I know someone who's gonna be very happy about this o,o” (ahem hem, @lucere-aeresta) I like long dialogues/cinematics so this intro was a treat. I'll have to replay of course but it felt very satisfying to see a chunk of the story here and be introduced to the new characters. There’s a lot going on!

The receptionist

Dr. Gygax!

You can walk around a little and talk to a couple of NPCs. There’s this easter egg - it’s a Lovecraft easter egg (thanks for figuring that one out, Lucere!) The paper itself is straight from Cordona. :D

You cannot pick this letter up, but the message is very clear. May be a clue in the final game.

Who’s there...? BTW this is the exact face Sherlock gives Jon when he plays the guitar too loudly in the CO seance scene :D

OH NO. LMAO! This had me in stitches, and of course I lied. Nice American accent, you dork. The subsequent journal entry essentially saying "Watson tried to act, I guess" gave me a chuckle. I tried! So hard! And in the en-- moving on...

Here’s how the journal looks like now. The clues have updated icons and you can toggle to sort them by type (document, conversation, item, etc.) or the order in which you found them.

So yeah, Sherlock shows up in disguise and a terrible American accent, says the iconic “Guten day,” and then he gets sedated because Watson cannot lie to save his life.

Of course. OF COURSE. Now I know someone who's going to be a bit disappointed we don’t spend much time as Watson, but that's not me. 😂 My first thought -> they heard us cry and wail about the stubble and said "We're gonna make you beg to have the stubble back" Ok, ok, you win. I'm sorry. 😭

(insert half an hour of zooming around with Ansel instead of playing the damn game) This is how the game levels look when you go out of bounds!

Found some of you in the back! And in the cells! :3 (There’s a wall with photographs of the Kickstarter backers, and a row of cells with names and custom faces - although you cannot see the characters very well at this point.)

Right, I should play. The lockpicking puzzles were fun, but I'll admit I found both of them extremely easy. But I am a seasoned adventure game fan and it's a nice little thing to do for that feeling of escaping the cells. The “Mycroft” (custom) difficulty setting does let you change the puzzle difficulty, so we are probably going to face a bigger challenge in the finished game. The settings don’t make a difference in the demo, though.

SHERLOCK. NO. PUT IT DOWN.

PUT THOSE DOWN OH MY GOD

So yeah, I think it’s safe to say he’s a full blown addict by now. Vogel, what have you done?

Ran into the guard three times, got a game over 😎 Confirmation that yeah Sherlock is still afraid of water! I bet he's gonna love the trip to America and boating around the swamps. What could go wrong.

FYI, there's a guard that you need to figure out how to get past. It's not a sneaking sequence, but you need some items. If he notices you 3 times he rings the alarm, and the game reloads

At this point I'm having fun just investigating stuff and admiring the new journal etc., it's all very nicely designed. It's awesome that we can sort evidence by type now! The mind palace facelift is so good and feels more involved than before.

Back to the game... I SQUEALED!!! 😄 duhhh

And again! Two back to back CO references, yay ♥

Well I am a smart detective and deal with the guard with my brain and not my fists. Time to yoink all of his clothes. Where did his body go? We don't ask such questions around here...

HEEEEEEEEELLLLLLL YEAAAAAAAH

ANSEL PHYSICS RESET MY BELOVED ♥♥ never fix this please never ever

(cue another photoshoot)

The biggest tease in all of the demo: THAT EXCLAMATION MARK. Let... me... see... outfits! 😂 Lovingggg the updated outfit screen, so happy there's some gorgeous lighting in there. It looked kinda bad in CO.

Okay, back to playing the game! I LIED, more photoshoots as the inmates scream, cry, and wail all around me. Sucks to be them, I guess.

Okay, Gerda! I LOVE her new design, and her voice actress too! She was so great.

Gerda is the second inmate that we meet. She wants her friend Heidi back and until then she will not talk. The first inmate that we meet is Mauricio Napoleon, it is just a short but entertaining conversation/cinematic. We don’t talk to him any more in the demo.

He does that lil smile as she spits the worst threats at him, it's glorious

Something something Silent Hill 3 (Gorgeous!)

I try to play the mountain goat in every game and the absence of the jump button will not stop me

So I didn't take screenshots of the quite meaty gameplay surrounding getting Heidi back and figuring out what's going on, so here's some thoughts: - The updated crime scene investigation looks fantastic! The smokey green aesthetics are fitting and everything is much clearer than it was in CO. I like that we can see how many variations there are for each 'node'. The only thing I'm not sure about is the first person perspective - Sherlock's close focus mode - because I had trouble seeing what's different in the variations, and sometimes the models would push me back a little bit when they loaded. I'd move away from the node just by trying to see things and had trouble re-positioning... not a great deal of trouble, of course, but it is a downgrade from SHCO. I think the 3rd person mode like with Jon in CO works much better. This is my biggest criticism of the demo. - There was a tad too much running back and forth just to seemingly fetch a few items... this may be polished further, I don't know. It gave me old adventure game vibes where you kinda run back and forth for a few small things lol. - I wished we could use the items more directly and/or assemble things, not just have them as text in the inventory... but I understand that making a new puzzle feature may be too much work at this point - The "three clues" dialogue confused me for a moment, but so it did in CO as well so this may be a ‘me’ problem 😂 I keep forgetting that there are 3 different questions to answer, not that I need to present 3 accurate clues... hahah. - The darker overtones are soooo up my alley! When I figured out what had happened to one of the people in the casket... ooof anyway, time to find and assemble Heidi!

Him <3

Awww, isn't it cute?

BUT IT'S WRONG

Oh so wrong 😂 I did NOTTTT expect this ahahahahhhh Hands down the best part of the demo The mental health aspect of the remake was what had me a little worried, but you know what, I think it's gonna be fine 😂 Heidi is one bad bench, and Sherlock just ACCEPTING he's now talking to a demonic doll and making the most of it is just chef's kiss Love, love, love. We're all mad here.

I unlocked a reward, and what a sweet one it is! Sadly, you cannot change your clothes in the demo. The updated physics make his chain and bag go bouncing like crazy, haha.

And thank

you

for reading! Feel free to send me an ask if you have any questions.

#sherlock holmes the awakened #sherlock holmes #john watson #frogwares holmes #SHTA demo #thinky thoughts #my screenshots

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fatgumsurpremacy-remastered · 2 years ago

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Do you have any kinks that you like to write about? Any that you don't like?

Ooh. Anon that’s a wonderful question.

Many of my kinks don’t get brought up when it comes to my requests, and generally I feel like my audience wouldn’t prefer the way I go about portraying characters when I write them.

There’s a lot, a lot more dark then the rest be ready.

Tw: Discussion of kinks further on, dark themes.

Like: Bondage (light and heavy), body worship, oral, yandere, impact, pegging, sounding, roleplay, breath and temp play, dom/sub, light marking.Heavy verbal degradation, sensory deprivation. Cucking, voyerism, threesomes, Medical malpractice adj. (Ie. Inappropriate use of medication, medical equipment, or medical profession.) Body mods, robotics, monsters. Water sports, spit, Heavy physical violence, Heavy knife play, Burning, Marking (permanent), CNC, Dubious consent, NonConsent. Mindbreak, Captivity. Primal, aphrodisiacs, Blood, blood consumption and other gore. Amputation. Anything relating to Catholic trauma.

Refuses; Forced detransition, sissification, sensual genital mutilation, general filth, puss, dirt, necrophillia, beastiality, gang, feet, socks.

When it comes to my lighter works I don’t like to include kinks so much as experience. Light bondage maybe, as more of a trust factor in these.

I get requests for softer things sometimes, and it does give me a chance to write fluffier work surrounding the characters. Many of the people I like are older men, so softer works give me an opportunity to write about their body. And their age. A huge component in these is body worship. I feel like it’s a component focused primarily on the reader most times, when in fan fiction not directed at cannon characters.

In short meaning I like to draw focus away from the readers body so they can feel attracted to the characters in the story. A lot of that is told through foreplay. I personally like oral in these cases, as I feel it adds a need of tact to an act otherwise kinda messy, lol.

In my darker works I feel a bit more liberties but I try and keep it more tame for my audience. When I want to go dark I want to make it really dark but I’m afraid I might accidentally trigger someone in my work, even unintentionally. A lot of dialogue in my darker yandere fics are based of my own and my close friends experiences, and it’s realistic. But it’s also a release of trauma and anxiety related.

Many of my kinks on this end are kind of embarrassing so please-please don’t judge me too harshly. I’m gonna go from most ‘acceptable’ to lesser. I just feel like thats a good way to go about it.

Heavy bondage, light impact, pegging, and roleplay. I like these generally, they’re on the lighter end and generally will have a softer underlying tone coming from me. Spattered about will be bits of humor and a less heavy tone.

Breath, temperature, dom/sub, light scratching, marking as in hickies. I like these, they’re pretty base but they’re good for setting the mood in stories.

I feel bad because I’m blanking on what’s more socially acceptable or not so I’m going to move onto ones I’ve been side eyed for liking to write.

Heavier verbal degradation: I enjoy this specifically in context. Usually it’s for a darker or more yandere story and plays into another element which I’ll go into more context over later.

Sounding: Like the idea of a hole that’s ‘not supposed to be used’ being used. Really enjoy that.

This one’s specific and I don’t know the name for it, so I’ll explain but I think it goes hand n hand with my medical kink.

Person a) dommed by person b. Person b) Out of control given some sort of control mech by person c. Person c) initiated it all so they could record findings.

Medical kink, needles, surgical play, medical malpractice but sexy?? Gaslighting kinda. I’m scared of the doctors but fear can be a huge motivator and I feel the sterile atmosphere of a hospital or the creepy attitudes of a doctor can set a great mood.

Body mods, robotic parts, things not considered human on a human being, plays into monsterfucking.

God I’m going to get killed for this.

Piss. Piss and spit, I find them hot, but a lot of people don’t so I never get the chance.

Physical violence to the point of pain.

Deep stabs, cuts, burns, or marking.

CNC, Dubious consent, NonConsent

Mind break, gaslighting. Heavy bondage and captivity. Again yandere themes and heavy subject matter, a lot of which has to do with subdoing the s/o of the yandere.

Primal, this one allows me to run and convey the fear I have without actually being in danger!

Drugs and aphrodisiacs.

Blood, and other gore. I don’t know what fucked me up in such a capacity to like this. I’ve never actually done this and don’t plan to.

Blood sucking came from vampires but as I grew out of vampirism It grew from there, and now I have a much worse kink that people will certainly judge me for.

Amputation, especially when it’s not needed and as a form of possession. It sends shivers down my spine. The pain plays a heavy role. It’s also about writing dacryphillia.

A lot a lot a lot of religious trauma went into my preist kink. Think of anything that can be related to blasphemy and I most likely want to fuck with it.

I don’t like forced detransiton, or other things about gender such as sissification as a trans man. Generally it makes me cry trying to write it so I just don’t.

Anything dealing with dirt, puss, other insertion I can’t deal. Genital mutilation, scat and farting are off the table.

Scent kinks are ok so long as the above aren’t mentioned.

Nothing to do with feet or socks or relating to feet or socks I will cry my eyes out.

I don’t Like Gang scenes because they’re hard. I refuse to write necrophillia or Beastiality.

Thank your for asking ive left a tldr at the top.

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capcavan · 6 months ago

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flattered to be villain expert anon. i just want to finish up that the anon is objectively wrong (and i'm sorry but i learned so much about writing dissecting ygo when you go beyond oh silly cards games because there is so much talent and craft there, they don't actually pull in hack writers, they good writers in and then tie their hands) zexal is not the worst it just has a bad reputation. vrains is objectively the worst, do you know how bad a ygo spinoff cashcow has to be to be cancelled a third of the way into its run and get ygo pulled off air for 2 years? all the seasons have pros and cons and honestly solid writing in various areas that sync really well with some of the stuff that aftg really sucks at discussing (go sit and the corner and think about what you've done aftg fandom when ygo fandom is more mature and better at nuance than you):

DM: mostly filler and iffy animations but amazing once it gets to egypt several hundred episodes in (aka the bit the mangaka was actually invested in)

GX: fun school romp, fascinating descent into madness for the mc, rushed ending because the mc's voice actor wasn't booked properly so had to rush the important scenes and cut everything else.

5Ds: the older edgier darker atmosphere that doesn't stick the landing, wanted to be about cults and inequality (if you want cults 5Ds arcadia is great, they actually attempt to sympathetically tackle what it's like to leave a cult when you were their poster child) and does a really good job in the first half (also just everything about the dark signers is peak ygo fanservice), before the director got sick of the board forcing product placement over story and changing things last second so he couldn't even adjust properly so left to do symphogear (a show mostly unknown over in english fandoms but is one of the most anime anime ever and regularly goes toe to toe with giants like HQ, AOT, YoI and MHA for ratings), and also the tokyo subway cult attack happened and one of the voice actresses was in said cult, so a quick rewrite was done that made no sense.

Zexal: is the best villain writing in the series, pick a villain type it's got it and it's written it pretty damn well, has the best rating for any spinoff in japan and the only one of the first run of spinoffs not to have controversy, making it more cohesive as a whole, but it has a brighter style to hide the darker themes, and a younger protagonist, used as a jumping on point for new younger fans and even fans suggest skipping to episode 12/13 to avoid the worst of that and get into the plot when the real villains start appearing.

Arc-V: (pronounced 5, which sucks because Zexal spent its entire run telling us V= vee) the 5Ds director returns, then has the same issue of the board interfering just as a new season of symphogear is confirmed so leaves half way again, and once again you can tell (ygo fandom loves to blame director ono for shit he wasn't even there for), but if you want a decently good story about forcing yourself to bury your emotions and just be happy, the horrors of war and the realities of making children save the world, it's a pretty good one until about episode 80, honestly does a great job of tackling child soldiers and their cult mindset and what happens when that is challenged and the various reactions from rejection all the way up to well i've done too much shit to change paths now to the ygo equivalent of suicide.

Vrains: so much potential absolutely wasted, a really good attempt to tackle childhood trauma and abuse and ptsd and the need for revenge on your abusers and how far it can take you but plagued by behind the scenes drama that left the show itself a mess that got cancelled only a third of the way in.

all to say ygo gets written off as a dumb show about a dumb card game but its got some real writing talent hidden in there the same way aftg has if you're willing to pay attention and have some media literacy. and i am sorry for forcing my ygo has good writing once you get through the bullshit opinions on you

been distracted sorry it's okay ! appreciate expert's helps with navigating this !!!

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ralith · 1 year ago

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My late review of the new digimon film. Overall I really enjoyed it, but it did have some issues. TW for mentions of child abuse as that was a central theme to one character's backstory.

Pros:

-The return of several of the OG voice cast. Brian Donovan is so great as Davis, and Steven Prince returning as Ken and Veemon is perfect.

-New versions of 02 songs sound fantastic.

-Updated graphics, especially digivolution sequences looked great.

-A simple plot to follow that expands the digimon anime lore and creates more questions that we may never get an answer to.

-The plot is not afraid of dealing with darker themes, namely Lui's childhood abuse. Both visually and emotionally, this is a painful theme in the film. It didn't treat the audience as children and met darker issues head on.

-The bonds between Digimon and Tamer were on full display and handled well.

-The film didn't toss out the epilogue to the 02 series and leaned heavily into the digidestined following careers paths that match the series finale.

-Battle animations were smooth and vibrant.

-Lui and Ukkomon are wonderful new characters with depth (I prefer them over anyone introduced in Tri. I didn't watch Kizuna.)

Cons:

-This is a short film of about 1 hour 30 minutes. The first 3-4 minutes of the film were shown early through various promos, and these scenes were unchanged in the film. So nothing new there to watch. (They showed the first 2 minutes of the film at NYCC during the digimon panel.)

-An overwhelming portion of the film is setting up Lui's tragic backstory. In a longer film this may have been okay, but in a 90 minute film, this used up so much time there was no breathing room before they had to pivot to the films climax.

-The final battle was short, and very little fighting was actually done. I think the original movie "Our War Game" had more fighting in a shorter time frame.

-The short run time didn't benefit from several scenes that dragged out in silence. They were supposed to build up the tense atmosphere and severity of the situation, but it felt like padding and should've been dumped when the film needed to move.

-The 02 cast felt like they took a backseat to Lui most of the film. Even the final battle had them feeling like background characters. Unless you were Davis/Ken/Veemon/Yolei, the movie didn't give you much attention.

-Cody did bog all the entire movie, so sorry if you were a Cody fan. He got shafted the most.

-The replacement of several VAs was VERY noticeable. They weren't...awful, but you couldn't ignore they weren't your favorite OG voices. Wormmon was the most tolerable voice replacement, but damn I missed his original VA. Stingmon didn't sound right either.

-The worst voice though? Armadillomon. What. In. The. Actual. Fuck. Did they do to Armadillomon? I know his original VA passed away, but they didn't even try to find a comparable replacement. Where was his Texas southern accent? He sounded like a fucking squeaky toy that was so high pitched my ears were ringing.

-The "resolution" to Lui's childhood abuse I don't feel was handled well. His mother beats him til he's purple, locks him outside in the dead of winter for so long his hands and feet begin to frostbite, and they turn around at the end of the film by having Lui travel back in time and tell his mother (acting as a stranger bc she wouldn't recognize her adult son, (also because Ukkomon killed her(?) that 'hey, it's not nice to abuse your son bc he loves you. I know you're stressed out, but please be nice." And this shit pep talk was supposed to change his mother's entire attitude and change the future?? Like they actually said stress was the reason she beat her son until he was bleeding, not because she was y'know a fucking abuser or anything, and a 30 second pep talk from a stranger was enough to change her behavior. WTF.

-Ukkomon transformed into some fucking Eldritch being and it really did fuck all for most of the battle except some tentacle attacks.

-Again, the final battle was lacking in action and ended very fast. Imperialdramon is just that effective! He finished Ukkomon off in one attack.

-Hi Angewomon!...Aaand she's been defeated in 10 seconds. Bye Angewomon! Sorry if you like Angewomon.

-The final battle and Lui's time travel end up rewriting the past so the majority of the movie setting up Lui's tragic childhood doesn't matter anymore bc it never happened?

Favorite parts:

-Anytime Davis and Veemon were on screen. MY BOYS 💙

-The Davis/Yolei/Ken polycule vibes that permeated this film.

-Davis/Ken shippers were eating good!

-Yolei teasing Davis and Ken for flirting.

-Wormmon's deadpan face in the intro scene is its own fucking emotion.

-Lui and Ukkomon are, again, great characters.

-Ukkomon's arm wiggles!

-The scene where Ukkomon reveals he's been manipulating Lui's parents as puppets to make him happy (it's implied Ukkomon may have killed Lui's parents and is controlling their corpses to make them good people, but it's never made clear.)

-The cameos of the World Tour arc digidestined and WILLIS IS THAT YOU? AND TERRIERMON AND LOPMON HOLY SHIT

-The baseball bat scene with Lui and Ukkomon. My theater audience let out a collective OH SHIT when Lui pulled out the bat and we were all sure he was gonna beat Ukkomon to death.

-You're telling me Lui hit the digivice with the bat so hard, and it flew back at him with such velocity that it destroyed his eye?! What the fuck are these digivices made of?

-Patamon is so dumb I love that flying potato.

-The scene using footage from Diaboromons Revenge Holy Shit! I feel like that movie is practically lost footage in the west.

-The biggest threat to the world was not Eldtritch Ukkomon. It was Ukkomon creating so many digimon to give to every person on the planet that it would throw the planet into utter chaos because the population would explode and infrastructure would fail immediately. And it was all so Lui would have new digidestined friends.

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bearfrosts · 3 months ago

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okay I genuinely haven't read enough of TBC yet to know much about shadowsight yet but I've got a take that may or may not be a hot one (idk, this fandom is new to me): this applies to every single warriors character. all of them. even your most favoritest one that you think has such a deep and complex character arc.

not to totally derail your post, but—

they're all extremely bland with a handful of surface level traits and motivations that never get explored in the way they deserve. this series is a concept bulging at seams reinforced with steel. it's a profit cow series that was never meant to have more than six books, written for children, with a strict limit to word count and arc length, and almost certainly strongarmed by corporate interest at least some of the time.

the books crash through the plot at breakneck speed without ANY time to truly understand the characters or even the setting itself to the fullest degree possible. most worldbuilding is mentioned in passing and much of it is forgotten by the time a few more books roll out. there's that core of it that feels like a cohesive narrative, but it feels like you're being grabbed by the neck and punted into the atmosphere at escape velocity because there's literally just not enough space to do it justice.

i tried to get my friend to read warriors recently, just to see how it reads to an adult that never read it as a child and therefore is not tainted by that nostalgia that really drew me back to the series at this age. he basically told me that it had potential but it never went deep enough. there wasn't enough time to get to know characters or actually understand the extent of what was going on. i absolutely agree; and i think i've realized now that the reason i'm still such a fan is because as a kid i got really attached to these characters and now i've built them into something more complex in my mind.

this series is poorly written and quite grievously restricted by the length of each book. with all the possibilities in the series you could easily write an endlessly continuing series of epic fantasy novels, like a song of ice and fire but following generations and generations of characters through books that thoroughly explore the psyche of the characters, their environment, their relationships, and the setting itself. and that isn't to say that i think it should mirror the themes of a song of ice and fire, to be clear, it was just an example—the story doesn't need to be any darker, any grittier. it's fine! all it needs is more time. it just needs more space to grow and expand.

so i guess my point is that yeah, all the characters are bland as hell. i personally think that's why people in this fandom find it so easy to "hate" on characters—because they're basically shells that are suuuper easy to project wildly varying interpretations of their actions onto because we're simply not given enough canonical exploration of them as a character. but in the end...it doesn't really matter? we all have an idea of these characters, whether we like them or love them, that is expanding infinitely beyond what we are given in canon. and since there's not much to go off in that regard...well, we all latch onto different characters, and build our own versions of them in our heads that we can appreciate. that's the thing about being in a fandom for terribly written media, yknow? it's all about the potential.

90% of shadowsight fans are annoying about him im sorry. your "uwu sad anxious little boy who lost everything" is incredibly bland as a character

#to be clear im not trying to criticize the original point bc its half true just continuing the conversation #wc #warrior cats #wc meta #sorry op i got too high and decided to mourn the non-existence of an alternate warriors series that's actually written well #rereading pot and oots made me realize how bland hollyleaf actually was directly on the page #but in my mind she still comes alive and i can create her a more expansive narrative that actually explores her as a character properly #and THATS why she's my favorite yknow #idk #realizing i definitely should've made my own post now #OH WELL lmao

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pop-punklouis · 3 years ago

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#i have such conflicting feelings about halsey’s record ugh #on one hand i really dig the theme that revolves around the darker underbelly of motherhood and pregnancy that runs throughout the record #and there are definitely moments that are striking/worth the build up #but…. on the other hand…. it just suffers from something i find it so much of halsey’s work: the inability to stay cohesive musically #it started out incredibly strong— and the first four tracks had me deliriously excited for the rest of the album #but once it hit its middle… it began faltering and it felt like weird choices to shove such overwhelmingly synthy tracks in between parts #of the album #it gave me whiplash to hear a grittier cinematic sound and then all of a sudden be hit with underperforming synth pop that didnt do much #for me and took me out of the experience imo?#what i struggle with the most regarding halsey is that her projects always start out with such a vengeance but they #can never keep up the momentum throughout the entire project— really underperforming in the middle #and even though it does pick up and feel better as the two closing tracks swell #it doesn’t save the album from its musical inconsistencies and all around ? to me with certain choices #i do believe the visual elements from the short film will cause the record to come more to life and possibly not feel so cut up #but from the initial listen i still have found myself only cherry picking a handful of songs to download instead of wanting to absorb #the entire album #which is a shame because the lyrical content is beautiful and heart wrenching and complex #and the songs that are good are fucking fantastic and truly keep the album interesting #i just wish that was reflected more in the sound as the cinematic atmosphere that was built from the first four tracks all but fade as we #get into the meat of the album sigh #i do think it’s halsey’s best since badlands but i still am not :/#10/10 impressed with its musical presentation #theme wise and lyrically? it’s magnificent #it just doesn’t stay that way in its sound unfortunately #regardless i’ll say it’s 7.5/10 rn #just my personal thoughts

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kurosukii · 3 years ago

Text

𝐞𝐜𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐬𝐲

pairing: miya atsumu, miya osamu x f!reader

summary: there’s a fuzzy feeling in your stomach when they choose you to taste the new onigiri flavor for the restaurant, but little did you know...

genre: smut, mafia au

warnings: 18+. noncon/dubcon, yandere themes, somnophilia, drugging (they give you an aphrodisiac), dacryphilia, bastard and sleazy miya twins, objectification, multiple orgasms, threesome (no brother action), slight bondage, corruption, praise, degradation, pussy slaps, spanking, hair-pulling, fingering, nipple play, spitting, oral (f and m receiving), face-fucking, facial, squirting, double penetration, anal, creampie

word count: 4.7k

author's note: for @iwas-baby crime and punishment collab! thanks for letting me join! pls i was heating up while writing this . (let me know if i missed any warnings!) (MINORS DNI) @hqintheclub

no beta we fall like heroes <33

[12:14 PM]

the background laughter and conversations amidst the soft music playing through the speakers are probably some of the things you loved about onigiri miya.

the food is amazing, the atmosphere is calming (despite the occasional group of rowdy youths that grab a bite) and because it’s a family-owned restaurant, everyone is so friendly, even towards newcomers like you.

of course, it doesn’t hurt that the owner is a sight for sore eyes. grey-haired with brown roots, coupled with even darker grey eyes and a muscled frame hidden underneath his black long-sleeved uniform—it’s no wonder that you and the rest keep coming back.

he introduced himself to you as miya osamu, accompanied with a crooked smile that had you weak in the knees.

“may i interest you with one of our specials? it’s on the house,” he had said, causing you to gasp and fumble with your hands, frantically replying “no! um, it’s alright, i’ll pay!”

osamu just laughed and shushed you, not minding your shocked expression. he insisted, and you would have argued with him further had he not winked at you slyly.

you’re a sucker for guys like him and it’s proven with the way the butterflies in your stomach fluttered like crazy.

since then, you’d been forgoing your packed bentos in favor of visiting your new favorite restaurant every lunch break. your cheeks burned in embarrassment when you realized that you just have a tiny crush on the handsome owner.

it went on like that for weeks, skirting around each other, sending flirty smiles and gazes, cracking jokes, and sharing little anecdotes of your life in the hopes that the other would finally make a move.

it’s your routine with osamu until it got disrupted when you finally met his brother and their...who was it? old friend?

osamu never really gave much away from his private life. he was very tight-lipped about it, but you guessed that he was just really a private person.

maybe if you had prodded further, things would’ve turned out differently.

“sweetheart! right on time, want ya to meet my scrub of a brother and uh, our very dear friend.”

it’s the first thing you hear when you open the doors into the restaurant, and your eyebrow quirks in confusion when you realize that it’s empty. funny, you didn’t see any ‘closed’ sign on the glass doors...

the pet name didn't go unnoticed, however, it never does, and osamu loves it when your cheeks flame in response to his teasing.

your attention is taken by his brother—you learned that his name is atsumu—when he bristles and frowns at osamu’s insult, immediately punching him in the arm.

“oi ‘samu! why’re ya calling me a scrub in front of the pretty lady?!”

you duck your head at his compliment, giggling at their brotherly antics when their quiet friend makes his presence known.

his hair is like osamu’s, but a couple of shades lighter and he regards you with a small smile as he raises his head in approval. you notice a dark shape protruding from his neck, is that a tattoo?

“kita, at your service,” the shorter man says, bowing his head in greeting as he keeps his clasped hands behind his back.

atsumu interrupts kita by taking your hand in his much larger and calloused one and drops a kiss on your knuckles. he’s definitely the more shameless twin.

it’s uncanny how he and osamu share the same face; the only way you can tell them apart is by their eyes and hair—atsumu’s eyes are warmer, more on the chocolate side and his hair is ash blonde and brown at the roots.

“ya already know my name, pretty,” he winks, smirking when an embarrassed expression crosses your face.

“stop harassing her, tsumu!” osamu scowls, pulling you from atsumu, cause your back to crash against his warm and firm chest.

kita watches the spectacle with thinly veiled amusement before clearing his throat and making the twins stand up straight.

somehow during their bickering, the twins sandwiched you, leaving a small amount of space in between that has your blood racing with how close and warm they feel.

“before i was so rudely interrupted by my brother, i was gonna ask if ya don’t mind tastin’ this new flavor me and kita came up with?”

osamu says in his deep voice, his large hands resting on your hips as his thumb draws slow circles on your covered skin.

“m-me? to what do i owe the pleasure?” you ask, clearly shocked at osamu’s statement. you totally miss the way atsumu’s eyes flash when you say pleasure.

“you’re a beloved patron of onigiri miya, so we want to run it by you first. besides, osamu values your opinion.”

kita finishes, and while your brain deduces that this is probably the reason the restaurant went under an impromptu closing, you feel someone discreetly sniffing your hair. you don’t have time to question it because the loud blonde pipes in.

“i value your opinion too! i know we just met but i can see why samu’s so smitten with ya,” atsumu reveals, and his brother quickly swears and punches him in the chest.

your heart swells at the idea that maybe your affections are returned; the other miya is quickly growing on you too, he’s different from his brother but it’s a good kind of different.

kita watches from the sides, silently appraising osamu’s—and by connection, atsumu’s—newest toy. you’re a pretty little thing, it’s no wonder that osamu has been so taken with you—so taken that he’s been neglecting his other duties.

such as testing the new party drugs their clan has been brewing at the basement of their compound.

like the dynamic of most twins, atsumu quickly catches on to his brother’s newest obsession; it’s why he couldn’t waste the opportunity of seeing you in the flesh and he definitely likes what he sees, you’re such a cute girl.

like osamu, he’s already had multiple fantasies of you ever since his brother showed him a picture of you sleeping. your pretty face would look so nice moaning in ecstasy and your luscious lips would look divine wrapped around his thick cock.

atsumu guesses that maybe you might need a bit of an enhancer so to speak, something to encourage you to let him and his brother have their way with you.

their lucky stars must be shining down on them because kita needs a dry run of the product, and it just so happens that the drug amplify the user’s sex drive.

so why not kill two birds with one stone?

“c’mon, i hear samu’s new onigiri flavor tastes amazing,” atsumu says, chuckling to himself as if he knows something you don’t.

osamu plants a small kiss on the crown of your head, shocking you and making you squeak. but he just smiles at you, grey eyes twinkling with mischief as he guides you by the arm towards the kitchen of his restaurant.

you miss the way he nods to kita as the older man nods back, placing his hands in his pockets before he strides towards the doors and into a waiting black car by the sidewalk.

“...she’s so fuckin’ wet, samu.”

“‘course she is. our pretty baby is a fuckin’ whore for us, ain’t she?”

their voices are a bit muffled, but you can definitely make out what they’re saying, as opposed to when you were streaming in and out of consciousness previously.

but this time, you’re finally torn from your fitful sleep because your body feels like it’s being kissed by fire.

you try to wipe your eyes to clear out the fogginess and stray tears but quickly discover that you can’t even move your hands.

“look at her buckin’ her hips against your mouth while she’s half conscious.”

that’s osamu’s voice, isn’t it? and what is he—?

“f-fuck!” you shriek, your chest heaving when you feel someone suckle your puffy clit harshly into their mouth. your body is slick with sweat, clinging to the soft and silken sheets beneath you.

you find out that the person responsible is atsumu, and the said miya is between your trembling legs, blonde hair in disarray as his tongue licks and sucks on your aching clit.

atsumu catches your eye and winks, lifting his head to blow you a kiss before returning to the task at hand. (more like at mouth.)

“finally, you’re awake, sleepyhead. didn’t expect that the drug would knock you out like that,” osamu says, more to himself than you as he sits on his haunches.

he palms your breast and his fingers give a quick pinch to your nipple, causing you to moan and buck your hips against his brother’s face. atsumu groans at your movement, and the vibrations send a shiver down your spine.

“w-what did you do to me, o-osamu?” you question him with tears in your eyes. the tears are from the pain of how hot and tingly your body feels, rather than the absolutely fucked up situation you’re slowly starting to realize you’re in.

you wail when you feel atsumu’s tongue bury inside of you, and your eyes roll back from the sheer pleasure of it all. your thighs threaten to close around the blonde’s head but his strength overpowers you.

his arms wrap around your thigh, preventing you from suffocating him as he bobs his head in a fashion that has your pussy gushing even more, causing you to gasp and moan his name brokenly.

was this the work of the drug? the fire you’re feeling in your veins and belly?

osamu tuts, displeased by how his twin brother is monopolizing your attention. he holds your chin with one hand so you can face him, while the other slowly strokes his leaking cock.

your eyes widen at his size, but you can’t help but become even more aroused at the length and girth that osamu’s carrying. it even looks more enticing when you realize that his entire left arm, as well as his shoulder, is covered with a myriad of tattoos that are all intertwined.

just who the hell are these people?

“kita-san wanted us to test out the new product. he’ll be damn well pleased to know it’s working.”

“p-product? what the hell—”

“shh, pretty girl. that’s enough talkin’. won’t you let me fuck your mouth, hmm?” osamu cuts you off by slipping his thumb between your lips, pressing down on your tongue as you struggle in your bonds.

your struggle is futile, the twins know it—you know it.

because with the way atsumu is practically making out with your pussy and combined with osamu’s saccharine words, your resolve is slowly crumbling.

it doesn’t help that the drug is finally showing its desired effects. the aphrodisiac in the onigiri osamu fed you is spreading through your bloodstream and increasing your sex drive, making you hornier and needier than you would normally be.

osamu knows it as well. a smirk graces his handsome face when he sees the pupils in your eyes practically disappear. you’re a hot mess; loud and needy whines erupt from your mouth, muffled by his thumb.

your chest is rising and falling rapidly, your breathing picking up as your hips move on their own accord. you’re riding his brother’s face and atsumu groans, slapping your thighs to show his approval.

“tsumu’s happily eatin’ your cunt, won’t you suck my cock? please?” osamu pleads, his grey eyes feigning hurt at your ignorance of his problem.

you nod vigorously as you whimper. you want, no, you need more. you need to be filled.

“open up, baby,” osamu orders as he removes his thumb, groaning when he sees a string of spit connecting his finger to your mouth. you whine when he guides his cock to you, smearing his pre-cum as he taps the tip of his cock on your cheek.

you squeak when atsumu’s teeth graze your clit, then moan long and hard when he soothes the little bite with his tongue, sucking the bud into his mouth. osamu seizes the opportunity and deftly slips his cock between your lips, and you can’t help but whine when his girth stretches your lips to the point where it aches.

osamu shivers when the vibrations from your moan go straight to his cock. he barely gives you a few moments to prepare yourself before his fingers tug at your hair and shoves his entire length in your mouth.

your squeal gets muffled, gagging as tears spring into your eyes at the sudden intrusion. but you find it so arousing that your mouth is being used as a cocksleeve. your arms struggle against the silk cloth tied around your wrists but not because you want to push the twins away.

rather, you want to run your shaking hand down osamu’s abs, and through atsumu’s soft blonde strands. you just want to touch them like how they’re touching you.

osamu moans when his cock reaches the back of your throat, his other arm holding the headboard as he pulls his hips back to thrust into your mouth. his grip on your hair tightens as he controls the movements of your head, his lips parting as he watches the tears mix with the drool that’s seeping from your mouth.

you’re making an even bigger mess of his cock and you can’t control your cries of pleasure either—though it’s all garbled—because atsumu pushes your legs up to your chest, holding your thighs as the folds of your pussy squeeze together.

from what you can gather through the mess of limbs and your blurry vision, atsumu’s right arm is moving rapidly with his hand wrapped around his cock as he jerks off with a speed equal to osamu’s thrusts in your mouth.

another notable thing about his arm is that it seems like it’s parallel to osamu’s tattoos; the entire sleeve, along with his shoulder as well, are covered with the black ink but your thought gets derailed quickly by the fact that atsumu is a savage pussy eater, uncaring of the sounds or mess he’s making.

whatever they’re doing, it doesn’t change the fact that both twins are on a mission; one’s determined to take pleasure from you and the other one is determined to make you cum all over his mouth.

“fuck yeah, that’s a good slut, letting me fuck her mouth,” osamu hisses as the headboard creaks beneath his tight grip. his grey eyes flutter as you choke and gag all over his dick, his fingers tightening in your hair as the vibrations from your mouth increase in intensity.

his abs clench and balls tighten from his incoming orgasm, eyebrows furrowing when his twin gets even louder and messier where he’s eating your slutty cunt. there’s practically a puddle where atsumu’s eating you and your slick is smeared across the back of your thighs and crevice of your ass.

eyes even blurrier through the cascading tears, it seems like your body is only getting hotter the nearer you get to your orgasm. your clit is throbbing and painful from atsumu’s ministrations, your lower stomach tightening until the spring threatens to snap.

osamu’s cock thrusting in your mouth feels so good too, you feel like you’re about to burst with all the pleasure you’re feeling—just a few more thrusts, a few more slurps, and suckling—

“fuck i’m gonna cum!” osamu groans, cutting your train of thought as you feel atsumu’s moan rumble against your pussy. all three of you cum together, the cries of your pleasure bouncing against the walls of the room as your body stiffens then shakes as the fire in your veins stretch throughout your sweaty form.

“fuckin’ shit, yeah take my cum baby, that’s a good slut, c’mon swallow it.” osamu says through gritted teeth, jaw clenching as he empties his load down your throat. there’s so much cum that it spills around the sides of your lips, leaving a white ring around his cock as tears stream down your face.

atsumu’s too busy smearing his release all over your throbbing pussy, spreading the white strings between your folds and teasing your clit with his continuously leaking tip as he lets out a couple of groaned expletives.

“want me to paint your face with my cum?”

your eyes flutter at osamu’s question, the grey-haired twin getting an idea as he watches his brother make his mark on you with his leaking cock. your shiny eyes look pathetic, wide, and pleading to get branded by osamu’s cum. he moans at how slutty and needy you look, pulling his still hard cock out of your overused mouth.

he bites his lower lip as he presses the tip of his dick on your face, watching intently as droplets of white mark your sweaty cheek. fuck, if this isn’t an explicit sign that he, and begrudgingly his brother, have ownership over you, then he doesn’t know what is.

“fuckin’ slutty bitch, wish you could see how messy your face is.” atsumu croons, brown eyes watching with glee as his brother smears his cum over your pretty face.

“shit, haven’t jerked off like that since i was a teenager,” atsumu quips to himself as he winces at how sensitive his cock feels. his balls are still so heavy, the only way he’ll feel satisfied is if he empties himself inside your cunt.

“you got a real good pussy on ya, princess.”

you whine, jerking against your bonds when atsumu slaps your hypersensitive pussy, whimpering pathetically as more slick gushes out of you. you can’t control the way your hips involuntarily roll against the air, searching for something to fill you up with. your body is still burning from the aphrodisiac and even though atsumu is talented with his mouth—you need more.

“look at her samu, still horny as fuck. want your other holes to be filled that badly, huh?” atsumu teases, giving your pussy a few more slaps. the bed sinks underneath his weight, brown eyes piercing through you. “good thing me and samu are good guys. don’t worry, you’ll get your cocks, sweetheart.”

the twins move quickly; you squeak when your wrists fall to your stomach, immediately realizing how sore your arms feel from being held up for so long. osamu’s holding a shiny knife, clearly having freed from the silk cloth.

he returns it to the drawer while atsumu makes himself comfortable against the headboard, mirroring your position as he pulls you on top of him, your palms finding purchase on his warm and defined chest.

he observes the dried cum on your face with interest as his tattooed arm makes its way between your legs. two of his fingers prod and play with your pussy before he inserts them inside, causing you to whine and instinctively ride his fingers.

atsumu clicks his tongue in disapproval as he holds you still while osamu takes his place behind you. osamu pushes your lower back none too gently, further deepening your arch as your body trembles from flames of unadulterated desire.

osamu spreads your cheeks, loudly spitting on your asshole. the wetness on your puckered hole makes you squeal and squirm as his fingers spread the globule of spit around the tight ring of muscle.

“have you ever had your ass fucked before?” he asks but doesn’t wait for you to answer because his fingers circle the rim of your ass, smirking when your back arches even more. atsumu probably curled his fingers inside of you, miffed at the way osamu captured your attention.

osamu’s question hangs in the air, you have never had your ass fucked, and usually, the apprehension of partaking in something foreign would weigh you down, but then again, that’s what the drug is for—removing one’s inhibitions, to formally speak.

the brothers stimulate your holes with their thick and skilled fingers, their mouths spewing filthy words as they watch you take them, causing your cheeks to burn. your nails scratch along atsumu’s chest, grunting when osamu inserts his index finger in your ass down to the knuckle.

the tip of his tongue rests on his lower lip as he swirls his finger inside your ass, stretching you out so you can take his cock. he spits again before his middle finger stretches you further. your head is hung low as you slowly move your hips along the rhythm of their fingers, gasping when the twins probe at an extra sensitive spot.

osamu removes his fingers from your stretched hole while atsumu continues to torture you, his other hand holding your chin as he pulls your face towards his. he captures your lips with his own, not caring about the taste of his twin’s cock lingering in your mouth.

you moan against atsumu’s lips when osamu taps his heavy cock on your ass—as if he’s saying hello—before the tip nudges your hole. red streaks from your nails cover atsumu’s pecs as osamu’s dick splits your ass open.

“your ass looks so pretty stretched around my cock—fuck, you’re so tight,” osamu hisses when he bottoms out, prompting atsumu to remove his fingers from you as he sucks and nibble away at your bottom lip. one of his hands squeezes your waist as he guides his cock to your pussy.

atsumu slowly brings you down on his lap, causing all three of you to cry out in pleasure. the skin separating them is thin and they’re both so thick that they can feel the weight of each other’s cock. both of them are cursing while you’re just there, cross-eyed and drool freely dropping from your mouth as your body trembles from practically being split in half.

atsumu bottoms out and the two brothers groan, your name mixing with a couple more colorful expletives. they take one long deep breath before osamu pulls out, only leaving the tip inside. he goes back deep in your ass with one hard thrust, your whimper turning into a scream as your body jolts forward.

atsumu takes that as his cue to mirror his brother’s actions and soon they fall into a near-perfect rhythm that only twins can do. osamu’s large hands are holding your hips so hard, his fingers surely leaving bruises on your skin. atsumu, on the other hand, is slapping your ass so hard that there are imprints of his palm on your jiggling skin.

just like the twins’ rugged and edgy looks, they fuck you rough and fast, greatly encouraged by your loud and pathetic cries as they take turns ruining your holes.

“this good enough for you, whore?” osamu hisses in your ear, hips thrusting wildly as he pulls your body back and forth on his cock.

“both your holes will be overflowing with our cum, ain’t that what ya wanted?” atsumu teases you, groaning when you tighten around him. the smacks of his hand on your ass mix with the slaps of your thighs on his lap.

“more, more!” you beg, face messy with fresh tears, drool, and dried cum. atsumu groans at how completely wrecked you look—his pretty baby, reduced to a mindless whore by his and his twin’s cocks.

“you really just can’t get enough, huh?” osamu grunts, his hips stuttering as he feels you tighten around him. one of his hands tug your hair by the roots. you squeal when he pulls your head towards him, your neck straining from the sudden movement. “we’re already splitting you open and you’re still begging for more?”

his raspy voice against your ear makes you shiver, the deep timbre sending tingles down your spine. you’re inconsolable, their filthy and degrading words not registering because all you currently care about are the two cocks pistoning in and out of you.

“please! need you, need your cocks— fuck, please!”

“yeah? then that’s what you’ll get, pretty,” atsumu rasps, his voice husky as he and osamu make eye contact, their twin telepathy playing in motion. they subtly nod to each other, their thrusts increasing in intensity and with shortened intervals.

they’re not leaving you enough room to breathe due to their eerily precise movements that are particularly exclusive to twins. they’re loud and noisy, sweaty skin slapping and rubbing against your trembling form; it’s just so messy.

everything is dripping, making an obscene squelching sound as the twins fuck your creamy slick back into you. you’re a blabbering mindless mess and the only thing you know how to be is a glorified sex doll to these wayward brothers as they fuck you with a vigor that nobody has ever had in your life.

the twins are rutting into you, one from below and one from behind. the bed is creaking with your combined weight and movements as the headboard behind atsumu’s back is thumping against the wall. your nails leave red welts on his chest and your neck is aching with how osamu is bending your neck so he can see your fucked out expression.

eyes crossed and unseeing, your eyelids flutter as the pleasure takes over every nerve ending in your body. your vocal cords feel raw with how much you’re stressing your throat (and from osamu’s brutal face-fucking).

you’re clenching and unclenching around them, unintelligible words coming out of your drooling mouth as the twins snatch your breath away from you, tits swaying all over your chest from their powerful and hard thrusts.

“i’m gonna cum,” osamu grunts, voice tight as you clench around him. his eyebrows furrow in concentration, droplets of sweat traveling down his abs.

atsumu whines, not quite at the same place as his twin. “wait samu!”

“hurry the fuck up, dumbass.”

“m-my clit, please!” you plead, eyes wide and bright. you’re almost there, almost. osamu obliges you, one hand from your hip goes down your stomach as he spreads your folds, giving atsumu’s other hand reaches down as he furiously rubs your clit before pinching it.

you scream as you clench around them, causing them to moan your name as their hips jerk and stop abruptly, hot and thick spurts of cum spilling inside of you. their orgasms trigger yours, wailing as clear liquid shoots out of you, drenching atsumu’s abs as your nails scrape his pecs.

your eyes roll to the back of your head just as atsumu gasps, garnering osamu’s attention. the said brother was resting his forehead on your sweaty back, breathing heavily as he languidly raises his head.

“samu! she squirted!”

loud groans fill your ears as more ropes of cum spill from their cock, overflowing your battered pussy. the squelching of mixed fluids is deafening to you, their shallow thrusts pushing out rivulets of white as they moan quietly through their lips. you’re a whimpering and whining mess, the twins stopping their movements as the three of you pause and take a breather.

osamu pulls out and watches with wide-eyed interest as a thick globule of his cum leaks from your ass, traveling down the crevice to run down atsumu’s balls and onto the drenched sheets. you’re shaking and numb, atsumu’s whine sounding far away as he lifts you off of him.

osamu ungraciously crashes on the other side of the bed, breathing heavily with his arm across his eyes. atsumu’s shaking his disheveled blonde head from side to side, trying to gather his wits when his phone rings on the nightstand.

his phone lights up to indicate that it’s kita-san and he immediately scrambles to answer it with a stuttered and breathless greeting. it’s scary, actually. their boss always has an eerie and impeccable timing.

“h-hello?”

“judging by your heavy breathing, am i correct in assuming that it worked?”

atsumu nods slowly, forgetting that kita can’t see him, too entranced by how you’re still able to go at it because you’ve climbed onto his twin’s lap, vigorously bouncing on his cock as your tits sway around your chest with every movement you make.

osamu’s practically immobile on the bed, groans borderline sounding pained as his hazy grey eyes watch you fuck yourself on his aching cock. your voice is weak and soft as you cry out and whine more, more, more!

kita sighs at the lack of response from atsumu, and he quickly hangs up the phone because ultimately, he got his answer by hearing your pleasured whimpers traveling down the line as you fuck his enforcers to overstimulation.

the twins have been bitching about the lack of a—quote on quote—“pretty baby doll they can regularly sink their cocks into”.

well, now they got what they wanted. they should be thankful that you stepped through the doors of onigiri miya that one afternoon, and the fact that kita technically played matchmaker.

[3:04 PM]

#💋.crime collab #atsumu smut #osamu smut #atsumu x reader #osamu x reader #miya atsumu smut #miya osamu smut #miya atsumu x reader #miya osamu x reader #miya atsumu x reader smut #miya osamu x reader smut #haikyuu smut #haikyuu x reader #atsumu scenarios #osamu scenarios #[ 🁣 ] – jul scribbles #[ 𓃥 ] – inarizaki

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captaincryolicious · 3 years ago

Text

Date at the Amusement Park!

➳ Chongyun, Beidou, Xiao, Thoma, Gorou, Ayaka (separately) x gn!reader

➳ Headcanons ; I'll add word count later

➳ Fluff ; No warnings

What is it like to go on a date to the amusement park with them? (spoiler alert, lots of fun!) [18.O1.2O22]

content under the cut | masterlist

≡;- ꒰ CHONGYUN ꒱

He is nervous beforehand, not because he is afraid of the rides, but because he doesn't know if he will be comfortable in these surroundings.

This is a bit of my personal view, but Chongyun seems like someone who is prone to experience sensory overload quite fast?

Amusement parks draw in a huge number of people, meaning his senses will have a lot of imput to deal with the entire time. He worries that it might become too much for him, that he will leave you disappointed when he needs to take a breather away from the busy heart of the park, that you will come to the conclusion that he isn't fun to go out with.

Still, he decides to risk it, only to find out that it's totally worth the risk!

He actually likes the elated atmosphere that hangs in the park and as long as it doesn't get too crowded around him he is totally fine.

Most rides aren't all that intimidating, he also comes to find, and the excessive music and flashing lights add to the fun factor, so he can bear it pretty well.

Okay, maybe he isn't too big of a fan of the more extreme rides, only hopping in occasionally if he knows you enjoy them but please give him a bit of time so he can ground again after being shaken up by that one rollercoaster with multiple loopings, freefalls and corkscrews.

With Chongyun, there are quite a few moments where you just retreat to the more quiet areas of the park, to sit and relax for a bit while you eat and drink something and just relish in the small break from the liveliness.

Oh, give him cotton candy. The blue one because Chongyun with blue cotton candy is adorable for obvious reasons.

You two also decide to eat churros but I speak from personal experience that it takes quite a while before the nauseous feeling disappears after eating them so you spend a lot of time skipping past all the rides and just walking through the park hand-in-hand.

He preferably goes home long before the amusement park closes its doors for the day, but you convince him to stay longer by telling him how the park will empty out as it grows darker. Having the park almost all for yourselves brings a sheen of peace over the area, and it's a good way to process all the events of that day before you go home.

≡;- ꒰ BEIDOU ꒱

Yo, Beidou absolutely loves it here.

The buzz in the air, the liveliness, the contagious joy shared between all the visitors, the rowdy rides that are sure to set the adrenaline pumping; yeah, that's her definition of entertainment.

You're bound to have the time of your life when you visit an amusement park with Beidou.

She's so cool!! Truly not afraid, not even the tiniest bit nervous at all, for any of the rides. This woman is probably the calmest person in the queue between all the nervously fidgeting people. Even the waiting time doesn't really bother her, I think she's pretty patient and only thinks of it as an opportunity to talk to you and not as a waste of time.

"That was quite tame," she states after getting off the most intense ride in the entire park.

You are standing next to her, trying to process what kind of rabid storm you just went through as you thoroughly wonder how Beidou is so unfazed.

Is there even a ride that can impress this woman to begin with? I honestly don't think there is. Nothing can stop her.

Maybe it's just a thing in my country, but a lot of the amusement parks here have pirate-themed rides and of course Beidou would gravitate towards them.

Her excitement is so contagious and you too enjoy the buzz of adrenaline as you go from ride to ride though you are a lot more nervous than Beidou lol.

She also really values the moments of leisure, though. Taking a seat near the arcade or near the food stalls, taking a break from the adrenaline and enjoying the livelihood around you.

Yeah, she still favors the bustling parts of the park over the quiet parts, but if you tell her you need a break from the chaos she'll listen to you without second thought and find a calm spot with you.

In these moments, she still makes sure to have fun and the two of you enjoy some light-hearted conversations and a good laugh together while sharing a drink. Even now, there won't be a dull moment with Beidou around.

≡;- ꒰ XIAO ꒱

He genuinely doesn't see the appeal of amusement parks. Those big metallic structures? The loud noises? The lights that flash everywhere? Mortals have peculiar ways of passing time, he thinks, following you through the park with his hands buried in his pockets stubbornly.

Don't worry, he isn't completely appalled by the idea of being here. The joy in your eyes when he said yes is all worth it, he just isn't expecting to have fun at all and his expression is a bit sour.

Maaaybe his mood is a bit grumpy at the beginning of the day as well, but it is quick to dissipate since your joy and excitement is pretty contagious and Xiao loves it when you look so happy – how can he possibly stay grouchy when you are smiling like that?

It's fairly easy to convince him to join you for rides, and it doesn't really matter which rides you line up for because he follows you anyway. If this peculiar form of mortal entertainment makes you happy, then he shall partake in these activities as well.

Xiao seems quite unfazed by the rides, and even if he is nervous at all, he doesn't show it in the slightest bit. At the same time, he doesn't really get why you are nervous because you're the one who wants to take the ride?? Still, finds it adorable but won't admit it, just quietly tells you that nothing bad will happen and emphasizes that he won't hesitate to confront whoever is responsible for this place when something does go wrong.

His protectiveness makes you laugh softly – of course you know nothing is going to happen, it's just the adrenaline and excitement that makes you a bit jittery.

It's not long before he comes to find that he kind of likes the adrenaline rush that awakens during rollercoaster rides.

"Hey, Xiao," you call out, taking his hand in yours and using your other hand to point at a specific ride ahead of you. "Wanna try that rollercoaster?"

Even though he replies with a gruff "fine, whatever," you can see the excited glint in his amber eyes and it's the cutest thing ever.

He still isn't a fan of the crowd and all the flashing lights and chaos that surrounds you, but he endures it for you and now that he has found his enjoyment as well, it bothers him less and less and against your expectations, you end up staying until closing hours.

Also, please take this guy with you on the ferris wheel at night.

You softly take his hand and watch his awestruck gaze when you reach the top of the ride, where you have a wide panorama view over the almost fairytale-like scenery that stretches out afore you.

He is speechless, the sea of tiny lights reflecting in his eyes. He turns to you and for the first time that day, or maybe even for the first time in a while, he offers you a grateful smile.

≡;- ꒰ THOMA ꒱

Honestly, I think amusement park dates are a reoccuring event with Thoma, simply because he truly enjoys going there with you and it's his goal to visit all the parks across the country together.

Expect to be there from opening 'til closing hours!

Cool guy who isn't all that intimidated by any of the rides but exits the more extreme ones with wobbly legs and a look on his face that says "what the heck just happened–"

That doesn't stop him from lining up again, though. Especially when you enjoyed the ride, he will gladly go in once more despite feeling like he has just conquered a hurricane.

Oh, prepare to also spend quite some time at the arcade section.

Thoma must and shall win the biggest plushie for you, no matter what it takes please stop him as soon as it gets out of hand!

He's doing really well, and you can't quite tell if it's skill or just plain luck, but without wasting too much money he manages to reel in quite some smaller prizes, but as I said, he isn't satisfied before he wins you the biggest plushie of them all.

Yeah, of course he succeeds.

He realizes too late that you now have to drag the massive dog plushie through the park for the rest of the day but he takes responsibilities and thus, he walks around with a massive stuffy in his arms.

He won't complain, not even once!

But you might catch him looking at the plushie with a very troubled expression sometimes.

Thoma is a real gentleman.

He carries your bag and all the snacks and drinks and prizes he won, on top of the huge stuffed toy. He also hold your hands reassuringly in line if he notices that you are a bit nervous for the ride, but yeah even if you're not nervous he still holds your hand because why not?

This guy just wants to give you a nice day full of fun and enjoyment and he doesn't care if he ends up with sore muscles the next day because of all the stuff he carried for you all day.

You don't even have to thank him. Seeing the smile on your face is the best reward he could wish for!

≡;- ꒰ GOROU ꒱

He's a courageous baby.

Even if some rides initially intimidate him a bit, he doesn't hesitate to line up, reassuring you that he'll be fine.

Maybe a tiny little bit to look cool in front of you, or maybe even because he wants you to be proud of him, but mostly because in his eyes, fears are something to overcome.

Especially since he knows that he will most likely have lots of fun as soon as the nervousness wears off, and he really wants to enjoy all the rides with you.

I think Gorou sometimes has these little burst of energy every now and then and then he's skidding next to you excitedly with a sparkle in his eyes, while a little later, he's more laidback in his demeanor and just looks around him to take in his surroundings and all the things that happen in the bustling amusement park.

Shooting games at the arcade!

He's very good at them and he looks absolutely adorable when he's like super focused on taking aim to guarantee a bullseye hit in nearly all of the targets.

He ends up winning a lot of stuff but I can see him as the type to forget them somewhere and by the time you realize you can't find them anymore no matter how many times you wander around the park.

He feels so guilty!! But you tell him that it's okay while secretly gushing over how cute his adorable pout is.

Also expect a lot of hand holding because he doesn't wanna risk losing you in the crowd.

But he also uses this as an excuse when there is hardly anyone around because he just wants to hold your hand y'know?

Every time the two of you take a break he will heave out a relieved breath now that he can finally stop summoning up the courage for all those crazy rides for a minute or so, but it won't be long until he decides that it's about time for the next ride.

Yeah, he really likes it here.

Bonus; Gorou getting all shy as you offer to share a huge fluff of cotton candy but he's more than happy to do so, and he takes really tiny bites until you stuff his mouth with a big floof of candy floss and burst out in laughter until he returns the favor!!

≡;- ꒰ AYAKA ꒱

She never really did anything like this before, so you two visiting an amusement park together is really special to her!

The days prior to the visit, she is super excited, though she is quite timid when it comes to showing it, and it's the little things and habits that let you know how much she is looking forward to it.

On the day itself, though, she gets quite nervous. She has absolutely no idea at all about what to expect and is happy that you are going with her because she wouldn't set foot there with anyone else.

Though she is kinda used to big crowds because of her family's importance, she still gets quite overwhelmed once you arrive, due to the jittery atmosphere and flashing lights and cacophony of sound.

Please hold her hand!!!

She will take some time to let loose a bit, but over time you see the smile on her face grow wider and brighter as she points at rides and games she feels like trying.

Ayaka isn't a fan of the extreme rides, not because she's afraid but because she just doesn't find them enjoyable at all, prefering the calmer rides where she can actually enjoy your presence instead of being trashed around in rollercoasters filled with loopings and freefalls.

Your date has a lot of wholesome times where you just share ice cream or other snacks you buy around the park and talk about small things that come to mind and Ayaka is just smiling softly all the time and it makes you so happy because her smile is so precious and it's so sweet to see how she enjoys her time with you!

Ooh, hear me out! Getting plushies together at the arcade!

Ayaka holding her breath and cluthing her hands against her chest every time you are close to winning a prize and the little encouragements she lets out when you are nearly there and trying her best to hide her disappointment when you lose because she doesn't want to give you the feeling of pressure.

Maybe the claw machine isn't in the best mood, maybe you end up pushing in a few more coins than you initially planned, but the smile on Ayaka's face when you hand her the plushie is all worth it!

She is sooo happy!

As grateful as she is, she thanks you over and over again, telling you how much she enjoys her time at the park with you and how much it means to her.

You leave quite early since both of you are pretty worn-out, but you make a silent promise to take her out on another date again soon!!

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