#but anyways we’re almost out of hermits

[dailyxisumavoid]

[184] Mumbo has built a fancy computer out of redstone

X didn’t know he could do that!

[imrllytootiredforthis]

A Night at the Bar

Pairing: felix x reader

Pt.2 Here

Summary: A regular night out with your friends turns into something more when you meet a new kid going to your school

Warnings: fem reader, dom reader, sub felix, college!au (everyone’s 18+), dry humping (he grinds against her leg, whatever that’s called), nipple play, mommy kink, pet names, oral (f receiving), probably more that I forgot

Word Count: 6.8k

A/N: So I’ve been asked a few times of I have a taglist and I was wondering if you guys wanted me to make one? Just lmk. Anyway, as always ignore my bad grammar and possible spelling mistakes lol

18+ Minors DNI

It had been an uneventful night.

All you had really wanted to do was stay home, cuddle up in some blankets and watch a movie, maybe even make some microwave popcorn. 

But, the people you decidedly called friends refused to let you spend yet another Saturday night being a quote unquote ‘hermit’, holed up in your apartment like always.

“Besides, school is starting soon! Don’t you wanna get out before you’re going to have a truckload of schoolwork to worry about?” Samantha claimed while rummaging through your closet, settling on an outfit and throwing it in your direction. “Put this on.”

So they dragged you to the new bar that opened down the street. 

Music made its way outside from within, low bass pounding in your head before you even entered the place. You rubbed at your temples, grimacing at the way the headache building in the forefront of your brain throbbed in protest.

It started out fine, as it always did.

Gossiping about your classmates and teachers and updating the others on whatever happened in your life lately.

But then it got boring. And when it got boring, desperate measures were pulled out.

Your friends pestered you about turning away the guys approached you, offering you free drinks. They scrutinized you for sending away a ‘hot’ one, telling you that you needed to take charge and finally get a permanent man as opposed to your regular hook-ups.

And so they took up the challenge upon themselves.

Firstly: What was your type? 

“What about him?”

“Really? He’s pretty cute.”

Secondly: Judging you base on the fact that you didn’t like any of the guys they suggested 

“Him?”

“Why not?”

“Yeah, he’s fit. You must be blind if you don’t want him.”

“Like, look at those muscles, that hair!”

Thirdly: Getting mad and giving up on the game

“Well what is your type then?”

“Come on! Why are you like this? We’re just trying to have some fun! Don’t take it so personal!”

When they were done bothering you about boys like excited schoolgirls, they switched up topics and moved on to begging you to dance with them.

As the bright lights flashed leaving coloured imprints in your vision, you bluntly told them no.

The idea of dancing right now felt gross and judging by the way the sweaty bodies of the crowd moved, with gyrating hips and wandering hands. ‘Whispering’ that was almost yelling and guys on the side with drinks watching like they were searching for their next prey.

Nope. Absolutely not. You wanted no part of that and no amount of begging could make you. Refusing, you ordered another drink as they boo’d at you, fake heckling as they left. 

And finally, you were alone. Well as alone as you could be in a crowded bar that was a prime way for everyone there to catch the flu, which was actually going around right now.

In fact, you shouldn’t have even left your house today. You should’ve stayed home with your blankets and popcorn and proceeded to binge watch your favourite show for the 50th time.

You wished with every ounce of your being that you could go back in time and tell yourself to never go out tonight.

You should’ve turned down your friends and stayed in the warmth and comfor-

The next thought disappeared. 

It wasn’t an electric spark like movies describe attraction but it was...something. Something that caught your attention. Made you freeze in place, eyes caught, unable to look away even if you wanted to-and you didn’t want to.

Maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea to come out here after all...

Brown-his eyes were brown. 

And his blond hair was mussed as if someone had purposely shaken it up. His face was youthful-around the same age as you with adorable freckles dusting across his rosy pink cheeks and makeup probably better than your own. 

Something akin to a shy smile played across lips. He licked them and looked away for a split second then back at you as if he was checking to see that it was really him you were looking at.

You smiled, he was cute. 

Your friends were wondering what exactly your type was.

This. 

This was your type.

The cute ones that looked softer, sweeter. Nervous with almost hint of uncertainty. Body language alone that conveyed they were gentle. A touch feminine in a way if that was an appropriate thing to say.

He lifted his hand and gave a little wave, awkward with a smile to match but endearing. 

Adorable. 

Yes. This one, whoever he was, was your type.

Should you gesture for him to come over? Or should you walk over?

Someone said something and his gaze left yours.

You huffed, taking another sip of your drink. Too late for that now, you thought bitterly.

But still, you couldn’t stop staring.

He was with his friends, on the opposite side of the room. Loud and practically screaming in their corner of the bar, laughing and slapping each other on the back. 

You could recognize a few of them. 

Chan you have a few classes with and had worked together for several group projects. The two of you exchange conversations now and then in class and you could confidently say that you were friends.

And you could pick out Seungmin and Hyunjin from past interactions or travelling word. The rest of them you could recognize from passing in the halls or seeing around in general but you couldn’t quite place names on.

But you’d never seen that one before.

Maybe he went to another college or didn’t go to one at all. Maybe he was one of their family members and was visiting.

Enough speculation, you were gonna find out.

You downed the rest of the cup and crossed the bar, shoes clicking with every step.

“Channie!”

Eyes turned to you at the use of his name and Chan laughed with a smile, opening his arms for a hug. “Y/N!”

You obliged, letting him pull you into his arms whilst trying to ignore the scent of alcohol coming in waves off of him. He hung off of you, drunkenly slurring to the others, “Guys! This is Y/N! Y/N, meet the guys!”

You jumped slightly, wincing as he yelled it in your ear. “No need to yell. I’m right here.”

Chan slapped a hand over his mouth, eyes wide in a comical way. “Sorry.” He whispered loudly.

“Sorry about him. He’s kinda drunk.” One of them offered.

“Thanks, I couldn’t tell.”

Someone snorted at the smirk you made and you turned to see the whole reason you’d approached in the first place. 

He blushed, silver ear piercings glimmering in the dim lighting. 

“Sorry, I’m not familiar with all your names.” All while you spoke the words your eyes never left him. Those ridiculously cute freckles hypnotizing you.

Chan broke the trance with his slurred speech, stumbling slightly and almost putting you straight on your ass with his weight. “That’s Han,” 

He only gestured in the general direction so your only clue as to who he was pointing to was the way the man you assumed was Han waved with a bright smile. 

“That’s...Hyunjin,” 

You smiled with a nodded head in greeting toward him. “That’s Changbin, um Jeongin and a-” Chan gestured wildly with his hand, eyes barely staying open, “...Seungmin!” 

Each waved at their name, making your life much easier as you struggled to support your friend’s weight.

Suddenly Chan got up and stumbled over to one of them. “That’s Lee Know.”

The poor boy’s eyes widened as his Chan stumbled, foot catching on nothing but thin air as he tripped over his own feet, falling straight into him, both of the boys falling to the ground like a sack of potatoes.

You nearly laughed at the pissed expression on Lee Know’s face. They were both covered in the drink he had been holding when his hyung knocked him over.

They were all rushing around you to pick up Chan, unpinning the other boy from under him while the others went to the bar to ask for napkins to try and clean the mess up.

The chaos ensued and you tried your best to help but in the end you ended up just standing there, watching on the sidelines as the others handled in cleaning everything.

“I’m Felix.”

You hadn’t realized he was that close until he’d spoken, close enough that you could feel his warm breath against your neck and smell of mint and beer in his breath.

At your flinch, he chuckled awkwardly, laugh deep just like his voice. “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you...It’s just that Chan-um,” his stutter increased when you turned to look at him. The weight of your steely gaze settled on him once more sending chills down his spine. “I uh, -sorry what’s your name?”

You laughed, a beautiful sound. 

He wanted to make you do it again.

Felix hadn’t wanted to go to the bar that night either.

The others had said they were gonna show him around tonight, just give him the basic run-down of where everything was but then Han had pointed out that this place had just opened.

The next thing he knew, they were in the bar, drinking and laughing.

And it wasn’t that he didn’t like partying or going out like the rest of his friends, he just didn’t want to go out specifically tonight.

The area was new and he’d much rather explore the rest of the city than be here in a loud sticky bar. Sure he’d visited a few times and could recognize a few streets but now he was moving here to pursue his dancing career. He needed to at least know how to get to school on his own before it started.

“I’m Y/N, as Chan said.” God, he wanted to cry. Here he was, talking to you, someone beautiful and most likely out of his league. Acting like a blushing schoolboy with his first crush.

“O-oh yeah, what Chan said. I’ve had a few drinks tonight-I’m really sor-”

“-no need to keep apologizing Love, it’s okay.” you purred, smirking at the way he blushed, eyes averting as he subconsciously licked his lips.

“I was wondering if you could uh, drive Chan and I home? I’m bunking with him right now and well both of us have had a few drinks...”

You pursed your lips. “Why doesn’t one of the others take you then?”

Felix’s eyes widened as he scrambled for an answer. “Well-...they are going to their own place for the night.”

It was a lame excuse and he knew it. You knew it. Anyone who heard it would know it. But nonetheless, you were going to do it as long as you got to stay with the pretty boy a little bit longer.

“Okay.” You looked over the swaying bodies to see Chan being supported by Han and Seungmin with his arms swung around their shoulders. 

“I think that we should leave soon before the poor boys are left permanently deaf.” You pointed out, Felix’s attention turning towards the way his roommate was screaming into the two boy’s ears. 

“I agree.” 

It wasn’t easy attempting to get the older boy’s nearly limp sluggish body into your car.

The entire time he screamed about random topics such as what he ate for lunch yesterday and raving about how much he loved Seungmin, who told him to shut up as he clipped on the seatbelt. 

Felix started to get into the passenger before you stopped him, throwing a paper bag at him. “Nope, you’re in the back making sure Channie here doesn’t make a mess in my car.”

Reluctantly, he got into the back. A sad expression, reminding you of a kicked puppy plastered across his face.

The car ride was loud, with Chan shouting unintelligible nonsense and Felix apologizing to you over and over with you telling him to shut up and stop apologizing.

Three stops for Chan to barf on the side of the street and what could’ve been a ten minute drive that resulted in an almost half an hour drive because Felix barely knew his way there, later you finally arrived at their house.

Together, you and Felix lugged him to his room. His body weighing on your like a bundle of bricks.

As soon as he saw his bed your friend flopped backwards onto it with the coordination and gracefulness of a baby deer walking for the first time.

“Should we do anything else? Dress him or something?” You wondered aloud as he promptly fell asleep, not so quiet snores leaving him.

“Nah, he should be fine.” He led you out of Chan’s room and into the kitchen which was opened to connect with the living room. 

He rummaged around, gesturing for you to sit on the barstool which you graciously obliged. “You hungry for anything?”

“I’m good, baby. I should probably actually get going.” You pulled out your phone, sending a quick text to your friends who bombarded you with messages and voicemails wondering where you were. Too wrapped up in that to see the way he froze at the name.

He didn’t want to admit how the names you called him affected him. 

Didn’t want to admit the fantasies that ran through his head when he heard you say them, rolling smoothly off your tongue.

Baby, Love, you called him those and they all made him so, so needy. Needy for you. For you to whisper them to him as he sat on his knees between your legs, gripping his hair between your fingers, controlling his movements the way you wanted to.

The thought was enough to get him hardening. He internally cursed himself, hoping you wouldn’t notice.

You looked up to only see him frowning, “No! Don’t go.” You slid your phone into your bag, jaw clenching. 

Had it been any other situation you would’ve said yes. Any other random guy’s house you would’ve probably already been on top of him, finding all of those places that would make him cry out in pleasure.

But he was drunk. And you were still level-headed enough to know that it would be wrong for you to do anything with him in that state.

“I think I should, both of you guys are good now.” You got up from the seat, slipping your bag over your shoulder, giving him a friendly smile to mask the want that you were sure was apparent in your expression.

He crossed the kitchen, leaving the leftovers he’d pulled out of the fridge, getting close. “Please don’t go.” The small whine in his words left you wanting to shove him against the kitchen counter and wreck him here and now.

He was drunk. That was that and you weren’t going to do anything but you were still curious. “Why should I stay?”

His mouth opened then closed. Eyes falling down to your lips, trailing farther down to what would be considered indecent before snapping back to your face.

“What would you say if I asked you to kiss me?” He asked so innocently with a big pout, bottom lip jutted out.

His eyes told an entirely different story as his face, lust blown pupils wide enough to swallow the entire iris of his pretty brown eyes.

You moved closer to him. Close enough to count the individual freckles on his face. “I’d say you were drunk.”

His frown deepened and he moved backwards, grabbing your arms to pull you with him until the couch hit the back of his knees and slowly, without breaking eye contact he laid back…

With that, he looked down to the wrist he was holding before lifting your hand up to those pretty pouted lips, slipping your middle and pointer finger into his warm wet mouth. 

His head cocked to the side as he wrapped his legs around your hips making you stumble right up against him and his very obvious hard-on.

Holy fuck.

A hot liquid tension filled the room and you tried to restrain yourself from jumping him then and there. “You’re drunk Felix.”

But god, the way your fingers felt in his mouth, wet tongue laving around them before lapping; a lewd sucking sound that had you clenching around nothing, almost taking over your rationality as he took your digits farther down as if he was trying to deepthroat them.

Unlatching from you he looked up, eyes serious albeit still wide with want. “I’m not drunk. I swear.”

“How many drinks did you have tonight?”

“Two.” He thrusted against you and you bite your lip to keep the moan at bay.

“Are you sure?”

He sat up, nuzzling his face into the crook of your neck. “Yes.” A stray whimper left him, the noise shooting arousal straight between your legs. “I sobered up in the car. I promise.”

Your bag slipped off your shoulder and fell to the floor as his thrusts continued. Heavy pants and whines leaving him in earnest at the friction his tight pants provided as he ground against you.

It was getting increasingly harder to not shove him back onto the couch but you needed to be absolutely sure. “Are you a hundred percent positive Lix? Don’t lie to me just because you want me to fuck you, Love.”

You could feel him shiver at your words, ignoring all but the last one. His plush lips moving against your throat, biting and licking your heated skin causing a traitorous moan to leave you with a gasp.

“Felix.” Your fingers laced into his hair, pulling him back to look at you.

He let out a helpless cry. From being pulled away from you, from the delicious feeling of you pulling his hair, from the way your other hand held his hips down preventing him from moving.

“Are you absolutely sure? We can do this another time if you are but don’t lie to me just because you wanna get your dick wet right now.”

You didn’t tell him that was a lie. That you most likely wouldn’t seek him out again but you needed to be sure if you were going to do anything with him tonight.

His hips desperately tried to move in vain at the grip you had on him, hard enough to leave bruises on his pale flesh. “I promise! ‘M sober!”

You leaned ever so closer, the tips of your noses touching. The feel of his warm breath against your lips. If you moved ever so slightly...your lips would touch his. “Then what do you want me to do baby?”

A glassy sheen covered his eyes as he whined. 

“Please.”

And just like that you could hear the sound of your willpower snapping clean in two.

Tilting your head to slot your lips against his. He whimpered out, your fingers growing ever so tighter in his hair as the other switched from holding his hips in place to setting them at a pace to grind hard and quick against you.

His mouth opened wider, allowing more access for your tongue to slip inside. Your moans rang out in sync, breathless and wanting as his heels dug into your back trying to pull you impossibly closer into him. 

Arms move around your neck, clinging so helplessly, so wanting, as if he thought that if he let go of you now you’d disappear out of thin air and leave him here all alone. 

You kissed him raw and hard until you had no choice but to pull away from lack of air, leaving his lips with a bite to his bottom one while dragging him by his hair away.

There’s spit glistening all over his lips and a blush coats his face and neck, already looking so fucked out. “Love,” an involuntary shiver ran through him, almost violent through his vulnerable state. “Lift your arms for me.”

He obeys with no question, unlatching from around your neck to raise them above his head, letting you lift the hem of his shirt over and throw it somewhere forgotten on the floor.

“Lay back kitten.”

The name is received with a mewl, almost exactly as like a cats and he nods quickly, you feel his heart race under your touch, breath heaving faster. His legs loosen but don’t let go as he falls back onto the couch.

And fuck, you wish you could take a picture. 

Make a painting out of it. The beauty of it rivalling the finest of the renaissance. You’d hang it up where only you could see it, remembering each time you looked at it the way he looks here and now forever. Look back at it and see how utterly gorgeous he was.

Yes, this was exactly your type.

Felix bit his kiss-bruised lips, blond hair highlighted against the black fabric of the coach. You let out a soft groan to see that the freckles continued down his chest, littering all over his chest and shoulders.

“Shit, kitten. ‘M gonna ruin you.” 

The words were meant to be smooth but they came out nearly a moan as you leaned over him to trace your nails along the spots and his pretty pink nipples, watching with a smirk of satisfaction as he squirmed under you, loose whimpers and restrained moans coming from him as you rubbed the buds, quickly turning into hard peaks from your ministrations.

“So sensitive aren’t you? ‘S anyone else ever played with your nipples before baby?”

He gave you no reply. Too caught up in the moment, too lost in the new sensations you were gifting him. Too dumbed down to the pleasure to control the words falling from his lips. “Please Momm-.” 

Just barely catching himself, he tensed, eyes flashing to look up at you, hoping you didn’t notice the words or the reaction to them he had.

He’d never meant to call someone that in bed before. Much less you, beautiful and somehow willing to give him a chance.

Sure, he’d felt like saying it tons of times before. With his past girlfriend he’d accidentally called her it while he’d been thrusting into her in missionary. She was submissive just like him and had just called him daddy. They’d both already known about their similarities and had just rolled with whatever happened in the moment but apparently this was too far for her and she’d broken up with him because of it.

What would you think? Call him a freak and leave? Leave him now, all needy and horny. Spread out on the couch like this?

The thought was enough for his thighs to tighten around you, pushing you to put your entire weight onto him. He didn’t want you to leave, couldn’t even stand the thought.

You stopped. Stopped your thrusts. Stopped the way your fingers danced along his chest in a way that made his head spin in the best possible way. Stopped it all and a voice deep inside his brain screamed in protest, his head burying into your neck, hoping to anything that you wouldn’t leave him. 

“I asked you a question, Felix.”

His head was hazy. He couldn’t remember what you’d said, didn’t even think he’d heard the question in the first place. 

Luckily, you spared the poor boy, pulling him back to look at you. 

Shit, here it comes. You’re gonna call him disgusting and gross which he could handle if you wouldn’t look at him with those disgusted eyes that made him want to cry and not in a good way.

But you don’t say those words?

Instead what comes out of those perfect lips is, “Do you want Mommy to make you feel good baby?”

Was he dreaming? He felt like in he was in a dream. 

That same voice from before shrieked in happiness.

“Yes! Please Mommy! Need you, ah!” His fingers gripped onto your hair as your lips latched around one of his hardened buds, nipping slightly before sucking. “Ha! God! Please, fe-feel so good, don’t-don’t stop, please Mommy!” He sobbed.

His words had heat zinging straight to your core and you began grinding against him harder and harder, trying satiate that ache settling between your legs.

He watched in a lust-filled fascination, trying to keep his eyes from rolling into the back of his skull, trying to keep his tongue from hanging out of his mouth as strands of drool dripped down his chin. But he couldn’t keep back the breathy incoherent pleas, mixtures of faster and slower and close and mommy that had you clenching around nothing.

You could tell he was close, very close. Not only from the way he chanted it, repeating the words over and over like they were the only things left in that pretty head of his. But also by the way his breathing grew erratic, his pulse hammering and fluttering in his chest against your lips.

And then...and then it...stopped?

He whimpered at the sudden loss of stimulation, eyes flying open to stare at you, glittering with unshed tears and confusion. They searched yours, as if he could figure out why you stopped in the depth of them. And he could. The teasing light in them. An inward smirk as he cried out and rutted up against you, trying to chase the high that was quickly dissipating.

Your finger still traced over his pecs, soothing and tantalizing all the same. “W-why’d you stop?” He whined in frustration at your lack of movement.

Red splotches that you know will turn to purple bruises covered the expanse of his chest. Such a pretty visual just for you to see. 

Just for you, no one else. Your little toy to play with and ruin, to use for your pleasure and he’ll love it all the same.

Sweat and saliva covered him-both yours and his. It was gross and lewd and fucking hot. 

“Jus’ wanna play with you for a bit, baby? Don’t you wanna let Mommy feel good too, Lixie?”

He nodded with vigor, chest still heaving and hips still subtly trying to press up against you which you let slide from the way that sparks of pleasure shot up your spine. 

“Yes Mommy, Lixie wants to make you feel good too...” His voice was higher now and he paused as if trying to decide whether if he should continue or not. “Could I...um...”

You tilted his chin up and nodded for him to continue. “Could I eat you out...?” He was so quiet you nearly missed the question but decided to spare him from repeating himself as you bit your lip to feign thinking.

“Aww, does baby wanna taste Mommy?” Despite the teasing lilt, he nodded, earrings jingling with the movement. 

You smiled and let your hand ghost down his neck, feeling his throat bob under your hand. Milky skin soft and smooth, practically begging to be marked up by you.

Finally after what felt like forever of teasing touches and small kisses, working him up only to back away once his moans got loud.

You repeated it several times before pulling away completely. Felix whined in protest, making desperate grabby hands at you as your hands untwined his legs from around your waist.

“Be a good boy for me and get on your knees baby.”

His whines quieted down at that. And he slid off the couch, falling to his knees on the hardwood floor eagerly wide-eyed. 

His hands folding behind his back, looking up at you with a pleading look, completing the perfect picture of obedience. 

‘Just when I thought he couldn’t get any prettier,’ you mused, letting yourself sink back into the couch, spreading your legs to make room for the boy.

It was so hard to restrain yourself from ravaging him then and there, edging him until he cried from the pleasure, begging you to stop and let him cum and still ignoring him. 

Going on and on until you decided that he had enough.

You beckoned him toward you and with no hesitation he was scooting closer and pressing his face sweetly against your lower stomach, looking up at you in a silent ask of permission.

He shudders against between your legs as your hand reaches down to play with his hair, lightly scratching at his scalp. Eyes shut in bliss he begins to nose against you. "Please."

It’s a whine-a plea, a beg to let him give you pleasure.

“Yes,”

The warm, comforting smile he gives as he stares up at you makes your heart skip a beat.

 Tantalizingly slow, he tugs at the waistband of your pants, lifting yourself up so the fabric falls to pool around your ankles. And with an ungraceful pull, they’re landing somewhere across the room to find later on.

A shudder runs down your spine as you feel his hot breath lightly ghosting across you. And with open-mouthed kisses and nudges he slowly parts your legs, coaxing you to vocalize how good it feels.

He looks unsure. 

And he is. He hasn’t done this in awhile, doesn’t really remember what to do. His eyes flash up in quick glances to to see your face, trying to decipher if you enjoy what he’s doing or not.

A soft moan escapes your lips as he teases you, nipping and mouthing everywhere but where you need him most. But you can’t tell if it’s from inexperience.

Then your eyes catch him and you can tell by the way he periodically glances up at you between licks, stopping when you seem to be enjoying it that it’s a kind of payback from your teasing earlier.

“Lix.” You warn, a subtle edge in your voice telling him to hurry up.

He stops with a whine, unable to do anything but melt against the comfort of your plush thighs. He wishes that he could stay like this forever you, devouring you and hearing the way you praise him and-

“Lix.” You warn again, voice hardening as your hips start to push towards him in slow restrained grinds.

He pauses to look up at you with hearts in his eyes before his attention moves back down, watching, heart pounding and cock throbbing as evidence of your arousal drips down your skin and onto the fabric of the couch; practically salivating.

Growing too impatient with him, you grip his hair and shove his face into your pussy, throwing your head back with a moan as his tongue begins to eagerly lap at you.

He whines into you, the vibrations provoking a drawn-out groan that has something bubbling up deep inside you.

“Mm, such a good little slut for me kitten.” Breath hitching as his lips wrap around your clit, sucking gently. “Yes~”

His ever-willing need to please you, he shifts closer and pulls one leg over his shoulder allowing him to more access of you. At this you can do nothing but bite your lip and find purchase in his silky smooth hair, digging your fingers-almost painfully-into his scalp.

It doesn’t faze him, if anything it makes him go harder as he continues to lick you, alternating between deep thrusts of his warm muscle into you and harsh tonguing around the bundle of nerves.

“Oh, yes baby. You’re doing so good, ha, making me feel s-so good kitten,” He whimpers at the praise, the vibrations pulling a deep groan that has him palming himself over his pants.

You’d greatly underestimated the skills of the boy. A tongue on him like no other that had you gasping for air.

With your fingers already intertwined in his hair it’s easy to pull him away from you. He whines and tries in vain to bury his face into your pussy again but it’s your steely grip that prevents him as his long tongue sticks out, far as it can go.

He pouts with a long whine, “Mommy...”

You’re breathless at the view, him between your legs, your leg hitched over his shoulder, bottom lip jutted out, his face covered in your juices as he shamelessly bucks into his hand.

It’s positively erotic.

You don’t say a thing, drinking him in. Before you finally challenge, “If you can make me come before you do,” gesturing toward his little problem, “then I’ll let you come. If you don’t...” you shrug, letting the challenge hang in the air, waiting with a bated breath to see his reaction.

Nodding once, quick and determined he dives back in with a new fervor, lapping and licking all around you. Whining and whimpering, gasping breaths and making noises out of some kind of cheap submissive boy porn, desperate in his mission to please you.

And it isn’t long until you’re gasping as well. Sucking gulps of air into your breathless lungs, lightheaded as waves of pleasure pulse through your veins and flood throughout your body.

Praises and degrading terms fall from your lips, calling him a good boy, your little toy, your precious baby, your slut, your Lixie. Marvelling at how he’s so willing to please, acting like a whore as he gets hard from just tasting you.

Telling him how good he’s making you feel, mindless blabber that he eats up, moaning into you and rutting harder against his hand, hanging onto your every word.

He’s close, he knows it and he knows that you are too. The way your legs tense around him and your words raise higher in pitch. Telling him not to stop, that you’re close, that he’s your good little kitten

And that’s all he wants to be.

In this vey moment all he wants to be is a perfect little brainless toy for you, pleasing you, craving your touch and aching for your hands on his body.

One last suck to your clit and you come with a cry, fisting his hair tightly. That mixed with the way your thighs tremble and clench around his head, holding him in place. He nearly comes too, mewling causing shockwaves of overstimulation to run through you.

It takes a few minutes for you to come down, finally releasing his head and petting his hair. 

Only to realize the way he humps up against your leg. Tongue hanging out, thrusting like a bitch in heat as he moves faster and faster, chasing his high.

But he doesn’t expect you to meet his thrusts, pushing your foot to meet him, he lets out a loud gasp, palming at your legs for more. “Look at you, baby,” you coo, hand slithering down to press against his lips.

He opens, inviting your digits in with little prompting, resuming in his efforts. “Such a pretty little kitten for me...” your other legs slips off his shoulder, planting it more suitably against the ground. “Getting off on my leg like a little kitty in heat aren’t you?”

Frustrated tears slip down the angles of his face, farther ruining his already smudged makeup as a gargled moan slips out around your fingers.

The thought of the blushing cute boy you met eyes with a the bar, contrasting to the one you see now. On his knees below you, humping your leg at an earnest pace as those pretty brown eyes you intensely stared at earlier slip back and finally shut. In fact, his entire head slips back. Blunt nails dig into the soft skin of your leg and high pitched whines vibrate in his throat.

He can hardly think and hardly wants to. 

Felix wants nothing more than to be reduced only to the mind-numbing ache pulsing heavy between his legs. Nothing but pleasure and sensation, overwhelming and all-consuming. 

The feel of you comforting him through, fingers pressing firm on his tongue while the other rubs over his throat and jaw. He’s finally free to. To lose himself in it all knowing that you’ll be just as happy to watch him falling apart because you know it’s happening because of you.

“Come whenever you need to kitten. Mommy’s gonna take care of you. S’okay.” And he lets go with whimper, clinging to your leg like a lifeline, comforted knowing that you’re there the whole way through. 

Nothing compares to this feeling; floating as waves of ecstasy wash over him unyielding and harsh, making his toes curl and stealing the breath from his lungs like he was winded.

The sight is gorgeous. Thrusts not stopping even in his peak, unconscious as he whines from self-inflicted overstimulation. 

You watch, breath hitched as his pants darken with his release.

Gradually, he comes back, grimacing at the uncomfortable sensation. It’s cute, the way he pouts.

His eyes are still dazed as you gesture for him to come sit with you and on wobbly legs he does. Laying on top of you with his chin propped up on your chest to look at you.

“Thank you.” He whispers.

You pet his hair, pushing the sweaty strands back and wiping away the tear stains on his cheeks. “No need to thank me, Lixie. If anything I should be thanking you.”

He looks at you, smiling wide with metaphorical heart-eyes and you could feel the blush rising on your skin. 

“Wanna take a shower? I dunno about you but I think I really need one right about now.” Your strokes stop to cup his warm cheek, thumb swiping under his eye.

“Yeah, just gimme a moment to remember how to walk.” Both of you lightly chuckle, his voice back to its deep cadence. 

**

After you lay in his bed, hair wet and wrapped in a towel, his fluffy from you blow-drying it.

His light snores fill the room, having fallen asleep as soon as his body hit the bed. You couldn’t blame him after such strenuous activities.

Now he lays, tucked against your chest. His body is curled up as if he wanted to feel as small as possible with your arms wrapped around him and body cradling his. 

For the first time in a long time you felt...happy?

Normally after sex you there was little to no words, much less cuddling exchanged afterward. You’d offered in the beginning but after being rejected several times, left alone with them scurrying out of your apartment immediately after, you’d stopped asking. You didn’t kick them out but just didn’t ask, always allowing them to have the option of whatever this was but no one had ever taken you up on it.

But you decided it was nice. It was a strange experience that left you feeling fuzzy and warm inside. You could get use too-

Cold ice replaced the new fondness you felt.

This feeling, the feeling you’d felt budding the entire night-you’d never think you’d feel it again-much less for a one-night stand. 

It was a big and overwhelming feeling as you looked to the sleeping man in your arms, looking like a sweet angel even in his slumber.

You felt a sudden urge to lean down and kiss him on the forehead, tuck back the loose strands of hair that fell across his face, trace your fingers over the complexion of freckles on his-

Fuck. 

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Suddenly the room felt unbearably hot, smothering you until you could barely breath properly.

You needed to get out of here. Now.

**

Felix woke up the next morning with a yawn, stretching like a cat and reaching over to...?

He flipped over and...you were gone? The bed was cold. You’d been gone for a while. Maybe, you’d just gone to the bathroom or-

Felix threw the covers off and jumped out of bed, quickly throwing on some clothes before walking out of his room.

Maybe you’d be in the kitchen, making breakfast or drinking coffee. You’d greet him with a soft smile and a ‘Good morning sunshine!’

His fantasy was short-lived as all he found was Chan in the kitchen, sitting with a glass of water and a piece of toast on the barstool-the same one that you’d sat on last night.

Chan looked up as he entered the room. “Morning.” He nodded, lacking the nice way your voice rolled when you spoke, making shivers run down his spine.

“Morning.” Felix couldn’t coat the disappointment in his reply.

Luckily, Chan sensed nothing out of the ordinary as he continued eating, taking another bite before swallowing. “By the way, don’t care if you bring someone home but keep it down next time will you? You woke me and probably the entire apartment complex up.”

He froze and turned to look at the older man, blush coating his face, “O-oh, you uh, heard that huh?”

He snorted. “You could say that. I heard a lot of things I didn’t want nor need to hear last night.”

“Stoooop!” Felix covered his pink cheeks with his hands. 

He was never going to be able to ever live this down. 

Chan shrugged with a smirk before as if trying to be casual, clearing his throat. “So, (Y/N) huh?”

His ears perked at her name. “Yeah...by the way, did you see her leaving this morning? She just left without waking me up or anything...”

Taking another bite, he shook his head wordlessly. “Nope. Besides, she doesn’t really date much. Isn’t really the type to wake the other party up when she leaves more like leave the bed cold-or so I’ve heard.”

At the way Felix’s face dropped at the accuracy of his situation Chan stuttered, trying to backtrack. “Uh, I-i mean-you never know! I can...give you her number, send her a quick text to check up y’know.”

“Ah, no that’s okay.”

Chan nodded awkwardly. “Do you want me to show you around today? School starts soon and you should really learn your way around.”

Distracted in the way he mechanically got water from the tap, Felix replied without even looking up at his hyung. “Yeah, yeah. Sure, we can do that. Not like I have anything better to do.”

A/N: Sorry about my little obsession w/ Felix’s freckles but like, how could you not? I left this open for a pt.2 so lmk if you wanna see that, my requests are open and the rules are here

[ween-kitchens]

since there are awful people on this site, I am taking this time as an excuse to empty the silly au drabbles I have amassed over time onto here!

this one is also from the 'all hermits are hybrids and none of them know' au, but this time I inflicted my creeper brainrot onto the sillies

scar fiddles with the cuffs of his sleeves as grian watches him. his expression is oddly reassuring—not pressuring him into anything, waiting patiently for when he’s ready.

“it, um.” scar runs his hand over the fuzz on his left arm. “you’re not going to tell anyone else, right?”

“of course not.” grian says immediately. 

scar nods, and takes a breath. “I- um. i’m a creeper hybrid.”

grian’s eyes widen, and scar’s stomach drops. is that a good-surprise or a bad-surprise?? oh gosh, what if he’s just ruined everything and grian hates him now and they’re never gonna be friends again and-

“me too.”

scar stares back. he- “you what?”

grian rolls up his sleeves to reveal dark green fuzz, almost identical to scar’s. “i’m also a creeper hybrid.” 

“you- i’m sorry, you are also a creeper hybrid, saw this,” scar gestures to the fuzz on the side of his face. “and thought ‘oh yeah, scar is just a normal human’?”

“I- you said it was moss!” grian protests, visibly trying not to laugh. “how was I meant to know!”

“common sense!” scar exclaims, giggling. “jimmy knew immediately after he saw me, and there aren’t even any creepers here!”

“you wear a mask!” grian says.

“you can still see the fuzz!” scar says.

“right, I need to know how jimmy knew this, because you didn’t know I was a creeper either apparently.” grian decides, and grabs his arm.

scar blinks at the periwinkle polish on his nails, and gives him a questioning look. grian groans. “oli did it. apparently my hands were ‘too boring’ for the olipeligo.”

“I thought scott was the colour man?” scar says, letting grian lead him in completely the wrong direction. 

“yeah, he stole it from scott.” grian grins at him.

“g, you are going the wrong way.” scar says.

“oh- I don’t know where anything is in this place.” grian says, and scar pulls him gently in the opposite way.

grian promptly falls directly into scar, who can’t help grinning. 

“i’m getting my tail out.” grian decides. “everyone here is a hybrid anyway.”

scar smirks. “that’s what she said-“

“oh, scar!”

-

“of course I knew!” jimmy is laughing at them both. “how could I not know? it was so obvious!”

“we didn’t know!” grian protests.

“yeah, ‘cause you guys are idiots.” jimmy says. “you were terrified of lizzie when you saw her! no one is scared of lizzie except for creepers and competing scam artists.”

scar stares at him. “she’s a cat?!”

jimmy laughs even harder, and if it weren’t such a lovely sound, scar would feel slightly slandered. “next you’re gonna tell me you didn’t know ren is a dog.”

scar can see grian’s mouth drop open out of the corner of his eye. “he’s what?!”

jimmy’s smile fades slightly. “you- no, you’re kidding.”

scar just shakes his head, dumbfounded. “not kidding.”

“he- seriously?!” jimmy exclaims. “he has dog ears!”

“I thought they were fake!” scar’s tail lashes behind him, and apparently this is the first time jimmy has seen it, because he gasps.

“wait, you guys have tails?” he says excitedly.

“yeah!” scar says. “i’m incredibly off balance if i’m hiding it—that’s why I wear skirts!”

“for people who are terrified of cats, you sure look like them.” jimmy says. 

“we do also hiss when we’re scared or angry.” grian says thoughtfully. “huh. why are we scared of cats?”

“uncanny valley, maybe?” scar suggests.

grian snaps his fingers. “that might be it.”

[silverflqmes]

໒⦂ 𝐁𝐄𝐘𝐎𝐍𝐃 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐆𝐋𝐀𝐒𝐒.

synopsis. in which you find yourself falling in love with the player behind the main character of the game you have been coded into.

genre. mild hurt + comfort

for @diorlumx <3

kenma kozume x gn!reader

a normal person wouldn’t believe it if they were suddenly told their life was etched into the very coding of the game, left in the hands of the person behind the screen. but that was reality — yours, and that of many others in your world.

you knew, you knew it all too well, as you were the exception.

why it had been you and not someone else, you were uncertain of, though.

part of you assumed something was wrong with you. that your file was corrupted or that a virus had found its way into your mind and consumed you wholly, allowing you privileges most do not possess.

however another side of you, thought it to be a gift, a blessing of knowledge.

for this love would not be possible, had it not been for the adulteration that allowed this interface between you and kenma kozume.

wheras your life was a singular branch to a great tree that was the story this simulation had created, the boy in front of you right now was none other than the player who controlled your fate with a series of clicks.

the protagonist of your tale.

one with an abundance of choices — each option more pleasant than the last, and yet.. it was you that he chose. the person who had captured his frigid heart and melted the ice away, layer by layer.

“y/n, i know we’re separated by reality.. but i just wanted you to know,” he paused, flushing a bit as his bangs fell over his visage. “that you are the reason i keep coming back to this game — why i keep holding off on finishing it.” he confessed, trailing his eyes back over to find you listening, offering him every ounce of your patience and attention.

he was almost certain any other person would have pushed for him to speak up — but you, you looked at him like he was your whole world. as though you’d waited a thousand years for him, and would wait a thousand more, just to hear the words fall naturally.

a smile lifted your lips as you picked his hands up in yours, squeezing them gently. “i wake up every morning hoping to find you again, kenma-san. wishing upon every star that litters the night sky to answer my dreams of truly being with you.” you answered softly, a bittersweet tone behind your words.

“how i wish i could cross the glass that sunders us from one another..” you finished in a mutter, lowering your gaze to the grassy expanse of the school courtyard. “but alas, fate is a cruel, wicked thing.”

the second year slid his hand underneath your cheek with great delicacy, as though you were made of porcelain. prone to shatter into a million different pieces if not handled with care. “fate is also a wonderful thing.. for allowing me the chance to meet you.” he reasoned quietly, urging you to lift your head and meet his loving gaze.

anyone who knew kenma outside of the protagonist character in front of you now would call him a joke for acting as he was.

to just about everyone, he was the hermit of nekoma high’s volleyball club — the unwilling setter thrust into said position by his childhood friend. but he was more than that, so much more.

kenma in love, displaying his true self, was the best version of himself. and he was right here, standing before you and slowly pouring that tentative heart out to you.

although the universe divided you both into reality and simulation, it was still kind enough to allow you one good, real thing. and that was the opportunity to meet again and again, even if an invisible wall separated you.

notes. i didn’t plan to add angst, but it just felt suited to build emotion.. anyway, i haven’t written much for kenma so i apologize if he is a bit ooc! i figured he would have a more vulnerable side if he’s in love yk? i hope you enjoyed though<3

↳ return to main masterlist . request rules . send an ask

[cal-daisies-and-briars]

Fic Update: Cowboy With A One Track Mind

Happy TTPD eve! Here's chapter two of Montana!Buck :)

Summary:

Evan and Eddie begin correspondence, and slowly form a connection.

Snippet:

Dear Eddie,

Okay. I’ll bite. 

You should probably know, though, whatever was so great about your Buck that he had all these people who loved him, it’s not in me. You want to try and get to know each other and see if we’re each other’s people, or whatever you want to call it? Sure. But maybe manage your expectations a tiny bit.

In fact, let’s just give you the rundown. 

I've got no formal education, nothing impressive to say about myself. I ran out of Pennsylvania when I was twenty-one, fucked around the country for a few years, ended up here, and haven’t left in almost ten years. 

I have nothing and no one but this job and this cabin. I don’t have internet. I rarely have cell service. 

So before you get attached, just keep that in mind. I’m more or less the hermit from cautionary fables. ‘Don’t end up like this guy.’ 

Anyway, thought you should know.

Hope you are well.

Sincerely, 

Evan

---

Tagging:

@epicbuddieficrecs @theotherbuckley @sevenweeksofunrepression @slowlyfoggydestiny @buckleybabyblues

@diazsdimples @exhuastedpigeon @aquamarineglitter @loserdiaz @steadfastsaturnsrings

@your-catfish-friend @incorrect9-1-1 @hawaiianlove808 @babytrapperdiaz @watchyourbuck

@lyricfulloflight @tizniz @aroeddiediaz @estheticpotaeto @buddieswhvre

[evolutionsbedingt]

Wip Wednesday Snippet!

Have a snippet fresh off the press from yesterday's writing marathon which also saw me crossing 20k written for this month despite having been on a festival this weekend!! (ﾉ^ヮ^)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

I would warn for spoilers but... that's what these snippets are for anyway, right? So, without further ado, enjoy the return of Shangguan Qian! ;)

★★★

Of course, since Zijian was placed to Shangjue’s left he’s now sitting right across from Shangguan Qian and he struggles to contain his glower when his eyes fall on her face. At first she doesn’t spare him so much as a glance and when she does her spine stiffens minutely, her eyebrows twitching as if she has to keep herself from frowning. 

Zijian smiles serenely at her and then turns to whisper into Shangjue’s direction, “It seems she was really quite convinced you brought Yuanzhi and not me.”

Shangjue hums, his eyes fixed on the ground between their tables. “The last thing she knew was that we stood in opposition to one another, even before the whole charade began. And I still think she figured out my feelings for Yuanzhi, at least to some degree.”

“It’s possible,” Zijian agrees softly and glances at the Minister. “Though I do wonder why she didn’t believe her own husband.”

“He doesn’t fully believe her, she doesn’t fully believe him.” Shangjue huffs a laugh. “What a pair they make. Even we are a better couple than that.”

Zijian blushes and clears his throat. He takes care to speak a little louder when he replies, “This one is glad to hear Shang’er thinks so.”

Shangjue smirks, looking up at Zijian and leans in very obviously to say, not quite quietly enough to not be overheard by the attending servant, “How could I dare to think anything else with a wife this lovely at my side?”

Zijian is almost tempted to reach out and press one of the many bruises he left on Shangjue’s body earlier in retaliation for this bold statement but he restrains himself. “Behave yourself,” Zijian instead hisses, the words softened by his smile which isn’t half as false as it probably should be for this to still be a pretence. 

Shangjue laughs and straightens back up in his seat.

Apparently their exchange caught Wu Chenxi’s attention and his sharp eyes are flicking between them as he asks, “So, Gong-daren brought this Yue-gongzi with him from Gong sect. He must be quite important to travel this far with you.”

Zijian swallows. If this were the emperor they’d have repeated their explanation that he is an expert in Wufeng’s poisons and also happens to know quite a bit about the organisation itself. But this is a general of the dynasty and one who seems to be quite close to Liu-daren to boot so they'll have to pretend to be lovers deeply dedicated to one another. He’s suddenly glad that he isn’t the one who has to explain this to the general. 

“Zijian-xiong is indeed quite important to me,” Shangjue answers, casting a fond look at him. “I could not have left him at home anymore than my sword or my horse. His knowledge on the matters we’re here to discuss is invaluable and his company is greatly appreciated.”

“You say his knowledge is invaluable and yet I’ve not heard this man say more than a few sentences the whole time we were in that meeting,” Wu Chenxi says with a disbelieving laugh. 

“When words are not needed, why waste them?” Zijian asks, folding his hands in his lap. “Shang’er knows the subject.”

The general seems a little stumped, but before he can find something to say, Liu Fuling speaks up. 

“Well said, Yue-gongzi. I had not realised you were a man of learning.” He raises his cup in a toast and Zijian inclines his head. 

“The pursuit of knowledge is the highest of all,” he says, refusing to touch his cup and return the gesture. He’s still feeling rather petty about the ambush at the minister’s home. “But neither the stork tower¹ nor deep within the clouds² seem appealing places to be for me.”

_________________________

¹ - On the Stork Tower by Wang Zhihuan

² - Visiting the Absent Hermit by Jia Dao

[jos-has-too-many-hobbies]

Alright, for today's Hermit a Day I decided I'd finish this old oneshot from @saphushia's phantom etho au, so here ya go

Goodness How’d it Get so Late?

“So, like, we can all agree that Etho is… strange, right?”

“Mumbo, you’re gonna have to be more specific than that,’ Grian rolled his eyes and stifled a yawn. “Strange is like, Etho's middle name or something.” 

“Well yeah, I know, it’s just-” Mumbo tried (and failed) to stifle his own yawn, “he’s just been a lot stranger lately. Like, I keep seeing him at night, and he just stares at me, he almost seems angry or annoyed.”

“Mate, I don’t think ‘staring at you’ counts as particularly strange, I mean, this is Etho we’re talking about, he’s done a lot stranger things than that. When did this start happening anyway?” 

“Uh, I think I first saw him a couple days after we started this whole Mooner thing, but it was weird, it was like he was trying to stay right at the edge of my vision. Oh- oh and he, like,  had wings? I think? And he was all bony, like a skeleton, but… not a skeleton?”

“Mhm, and you’re sure this isn’t, like, some sleep deprivation hallucination then?” Grian asked, raising his eyebrows. 

“Uh, I’m not- I don’t…think so?”

“Wow, you sound very sure of yourself there.”

“Well you- you’ve sown the seeds of doubt now, you have!” Mumbo cried with mock indignation. “Y’know what, yeah, I am one-hundred and twenty percent sure of myself actually, and there’s nothing you can say to make me doubt myself again, you hear?”

“Sure, sure, and y’know what? I’ll believe you on this one.”

“Wait, really?”

“Yeah, I believe, that you believe, that you keep seeing a vaguely menacing Etho with wings out of the corner of your eye.”

“Gosh, that means a lot G,” it was Mumbo’s turn to roll his eyes now.

“Anyway, speaking of sleep deprivation,” Grian continued, unphased, “have you heard the phantoms recently?”

“Wait, do you mean the laughing?”

“Yeah, exactly, glad it’s not just me hearing that,”  Grian shook his head and sighed, “Honestly it’s getting kind of annoying, like first you try to kill me for not sleeping, and now you’re distracting me with this creepy laugh? It seems a bit counterintuitive honestly, I mean, who’s gonna be able to sleep with all that noise?”

“Wait a sec, mate,” Mumbo’s eyes went wide, and he practically jumped out of his seat. 

“What?”

“Y’know who’s laughing the phantoms sound like?”

“Who’s?”

Mumbo paused, for dramatic effect, before he whispered, “Etho’s.”

Grian stared at him for a moment, blinked, and the two men burst out laughing. 

Above Boatem, Etho chuckled to himself as he circled Treesa. He swooped lower, and gently landed atop the van, so as not to alert the two exhausted men below him. Not yet, at least. Spying on the sleep deprived dorks over in Boatem had recently become one of his favorite pastimes. It was just too easy, y’know? Etho waited for a lull in the conversation, before leaping into the air and cackling shrilly. As he swooped back around he heard a loud thud against the roof of the van and a yelp, followed by a very disgruntled Mumbo shouting.

Flying back toward his base, Etho pulled out his comm.

<Etho>  mumbo and grian haven’t slept in over a week and they’re convinced I’m a hallucination

<Etho> #neverwinning ;-)

<VintageBeef> I hate u

[all54321]

Starborn Soulmates

While hybrids are generally accepted, those who know magic are extremely disliked. Most magic-having hybrids get hunted, for one of many different reasons. Therefor those who know magic have to hide it and lie about what they are. So Scott hides the fact that he’s a Starborn, similar to how Scar hides that he’s a vex to non-hermits.

This is the start of the server created soon after everyone gained traits from their soulmate. Some of which require in person discussions to make sure everything is fine.

—————

While Scott doesn’t disagree with creating the server, even being in favor of it, he isn’t too enthused about joining it for the first time. Sure he doesn’t think any of them would be like Them, but it’s not like there has ever come a chance for that kind of conversation to come up. Magic is a barely talked about topic, almost becoming taboo, since any hybrid with isn’t treated fairly, one way or the other.

Sure Scar had that wizard thing going on in Last Life, but everyone knew he wasn’t genuinely a wizard. Whether anyone bought from him or not, they all knew that he didn’t have magic

He casts a glance at where Pearl is standing, but he doesn’t have much choice here. The only thing more dangerous then revealing that he’s a starborn is someone with that kind of magic unaware of having it. Besides, Pearl can probably already feel the magic.

Once Grian is done with his speech, Scott quickly heads over to Pearl, “can we talk in private?”

Pearl nods, “yeah.”

They break apart from the rest of the group, going far away from everyone. They get a few glances, but most everyone refocuses on talking to their soulmate soon after. Once a good distance away, Scott turns to face her. “What I’m going to tell you can’t be told to anyone else.”

Her expression quickly turn very serious, “got it.”

He takes a breath, “I’m a starborn.”

“…really?”

He nods, “now you get why this can’t get out.”

“Yeah. I had always thought you were an elf of some kind, but I didn’t think they knew tangible magic.”

“I’ll teach you have to harness it, but you can’t use it freely.”

“Since others will see it,” Pearl finishes for him. “On Hermitcraft none of us really care about that kind of thing, but since it’s your magic I won’t say anything.”

Scott smiles at her, “I appreciate it.”

“Of course. Do you need help with anything avian related? I know you have Jimmy on Empires, but since we’re soulmates I should ask anyways.”

Scott’s wings twitch at the reminder, he knows a lot more about avians then she probably knows. He casts a glance over to where Jimmy is talking to Tango, wings puffed up in excitement. Scott pulls his own closer to his back, pushing back his jealousy, and facing Pearl again, “yeah, I have it covered.”

She nods, “magic time?”

“Yeah, let’s get out of eyesight first.” Just as they start heading towards the trees their communicators buzz.

Grian: This server will always be open for anyone to join or leave whenever. I’m going to stay on for a while longer to keep an eye on things.

Grian: Message me if there’s anything else I should change here at any time.

BdoubleO100 left the server

ImpulseSV left the server

“Grian has experience being a server admin,” Scott murmurs, surprised. He figured when Grian offered to start one for them, but he didn’t realize it was to this extent.

Pearl stiffens completely, replying after a moment, “yeah… he does.”

Scott shoots her a curious look, but she quickly continues forwards again, clearly not wanting to elaborate.

[bookworm-2692]

No liveblog of Grian’s episode because my sister woke up so we watched it together and liveblogged it together. But have some thoughts compiled anyway:

I love the “going through the rift” animation Grian included, and also the fact that he showed every empire at the start before continuing with the episode

The culture shock between the hyper-capitalist hermits, and the emperors for whom diamonds are only good for tools, and otherwise they trade items directly, is going to be super interesting going forward

Grian reading Jimmy’s laws, specifically the one about peace between Empires and saying “that’s why we’re here, we love peace on Hermitcraft”. Reminder that this is the man who has instigated or otherwise played a major role in every war/rebellion/conflict/resistance since he joined the server however many years ago now...

The prank on Pixlriffs!!! Honestly it was getting to the point where I was almost more excited to see what the recap would do with the crossover than the actual crossover itself, and Grian and Impulse’s prank on Pix with the Hermitcraft Recap music and the “this week on Empires” was absolutely brilliant. Especially Pix just... running away from them. Cannot wait to see Pix narrate this in a few days time

Also the fact that this week’s recap also needs to cover the King’s Gauntlet stuff and the end of that storyline... and then also the start of this storyline, in the same week

Also at least we now know why it was such a rush to finish up the King’s storyline, so it wasn’t hanging over their heads while half of them were on Empires

Also the fact that starting a new server with a prank (or otherwise just messing with someone) is now standard for Grain - in S7 he pranked Scar with the zombies, S8 was the Boatem Pole (granted that was also pranking himself as well as the others), S9 was the messing with Scar and throwing him down the hole... yep, definitely on brand for Grian to prank Pixlriffs before doing anything “useful” here

I loved seeing Grian and Impulse genuinely admiring Pix’s redstone contraption - and due to Mumbo’s latest video I now have a 5-10% understanding of comparators so I understood slightly more of what Pix was describing it as haha

I love that Grian told Oli he lived far away and that his base was small so it wouldn’t be that hard to move it, and then Oli told him it took a month for him to build it. Grian was like “okay if you want, I can move it for you in a day. I can rebuild it for you at that hill and we can be neighbours if you like”, and Oli thinks that might be nice. But the thing that stands out is like. Yes Oli welcome to Hermitcraft Insanity. You’re talking to the crazy builders, and Impulse (who was also there in the conversation) is the one who famously moved his entire base in S7 up by one block. Yes something that takes you a month quite literally will only take the Hermits a day or so

If Oli takes Grian up on this and then just opens his next episode with “yeah so a Hermit fairy came in the night and moved our entire base and we’re here now” would be funny

Grian trying to follow along with Empires lore, and make “Hermits” be a species, but struggling to think of what that could be, other than hobbit-ish. He’s like “yeah so we’d be a bit shorter, and Bdubs even smaller”, I love it so much.

“It shouldn’t take us too long, with all the Hermits on the one team, that’s unprecedented” yep you’re usually too busy starting wars Grian lmao

“The Hermitcraft-Empires Invasion - I mean crossover” great save there Grian well done

And then - the Portal broke on both sides. I knew it was glass on the Empires side so they couldn’t go back, but the fact that it also broke on the Hermitcraft side, so no one else can come through later? Interesting....

[grailfinders]

Fate and Phantasms #299: Ibuki Douji

Today on Fate and Phantasms we are creating the great god of Mt. Ooe, Ibuki-Douji! In this build, she is a Rune Knight Fighter to properly appreciate her stature, as well as a Storm Sorcerer to make her a living force of nature. Ibuki almost hits as hard as the Orochi she can summon.

You can examine her character sheet here, or her build breakdown below the cut!

Next up: If I had a nickel for every snake-based goddess that made Rex feel funny I would have three nickels. That is not a lot, but it’s weird how it’s happened twice in a row.

Race and Background

We had quite a bit of trouble deciding on Ibuki-Douji’s race, which is an interesting experience for us. We decided against Tiefling because her skillset is more water-based than fire, and Aasimar was also in the running due to her godly origins. In the end, we went with Yuan-Ti Pureblood, specifically the version from Volo’s Guide to Monsters. She is famously friendly with the Orochi, and if you are going to build a god it pays to be a little overpowered. If the issue is forced, the more modern take on the race is also acceptable.

As a Yuan-Ti Pureblood, she gains +2 Charisma and +1 Strength thanks to Tasha’s customizable races. She also gains 60 feet of Darkvision, and her Innate Spellcasting lets her cast Poison Spray and Animal Friendship an unlimited amount per day, though the latter can only affect snakes. At third level you can also cast Suggestion once per day, and all these spells use your Charisma to cast. Speaking of spells, you have advantage on all saves against magic, and are immune to poison, both the damage type and the condition.

I admit we have not gotten far enough into Heian-Kyo to understand Ibuki’s exact point of origin, but our general understanding is Shuten is hiding out on her mountain and gained otherworldly power, and that would make her a Hermit, giving her proficiency in Medicine and Religion.

Ability Scores

Ibuki’s strongest point is, appropriately, her Strength. at a certain point she just throws away her sword entirely and starts beating people to death with a snake skeleton larger than most people. Definitely a “girlboss” moment. Very empowering. Second is her Charisma. She gains power from divinity, but specifically her own divinity. But not in the same way Divine Soul Sorcerers do, where their only mechanical identity is “Sorcerer with Healing”. Anyways, we’re getting off topic. Third is her Dexterity. She does not fight in a lot of armor. In fact, it would be more accurate to say she fights in no armor whatsoever. She barely fights in clothes. Her Constitution is also above average, as gods typically aren’t known for dying easily. This does mean her Wisdom is rather low, but she is easily influenced and can even become a berserker, so it is appropriate. Finally, we’re dumping Intelligence. From what I gather Shuten doesn’t like letting you out that often.

Class Levels

1. Fighter 1: at level one you get your Great Weapon Fighting Style, which means you can re-roll 1s and 2s on damage dice for two-handed weapons. we’ll be adding quite a few damage dice to your two-handed weapons by the time this build is done, so that’ll be super helpful. you also gain a Second Wind for a little bit of healing, as a treat.

you also get proficiency with Strength and Constitution saves for better concentration, Athletics to make you even stronger, and Intimidation because you’re literally a demon god. even if your charisma was dogwater you’d still be intimidating.

2. Fighter 2: second level fighters can use an Action Surge once per short rest for an extra action in a turn, no strings attached. this action can be used for multiple attacks, another levelled spell, literally anything you could fit in a normal action. it’s like Quickened Spell, but significantly better.

3. Fighter 3: at third level you get your martial archetype, Rune Knight. this lets you activate your Giant Might as a bonus action proficiency times per day, turning you into a Large creature for up to a minute if you have space. during that time you have advantage on strength checks and saves, and once a turn your weapon attacks deal an extra d6 of damage, like diet rage. this is how you go from your little babby form up to that Raita-drawn-twice-as-large-as-Guda form.

you also get the Rune Carver feat, letting you carve designs into a weapon or armor or piece of jewelry, y’know the kind of stuff you’d think would have runes on ‘em. you can put one of each kind you know on an item at the end of a long rest, and they stay magical until your next long rest, giving you passive buffs while carrying them around. you can also invoke runes- usually as a bonus action- once per short rest for an extra bonus. for example, the Fire Rune gives you double proficiency with tool checks, but the reason we’re taking it is its invocation. as part of the same action you hit someone with a weapon attack, you can invoke the fire rune to summon some burning snake heads to restrain them if they fail a strength save. this lasts a minute, and they take damage and can retake the save at the end of each of their turns.

our second rune right now is the Frost Rune, giving you advantage on Animal Handling and Intimidation checks. you were already good with snakes and good at scaring people, but now you’re better. you can invoke the rune for a +2 bonus on all strength and constitution checks. sadly, we can’t really invest too much into constitution as a gish, but we’ll do what we can.

4. Fighter 4: use your first Ability Score Improvement to bump up your Strength. you hit hard, it’s kind of your thing.

5. Fighter 5: speaking of hitting hard, now you do it twice as often with your Extra Attack each action.

6. Sorcerer 1: now that we’re set on physicality for a hot second, let’s pop over to Storm sorcerer. yeah yeah you’re a Wind Speaker, you know Primordial, but the real fun is Tempestuous Magic. if you plan on casting a levelled spell with your action, you can use your bonus action before or after it to fly up to ten feet away without provoking attacks. it’s a discount version of the little cloud thing she does.

and of course, if you’re gonna use Tempestuous Magic you’re gonna need some Spells to cast using your Charisma. for cantrips, pick up Booming Blade and Sword Burst to hit even harder than before, and grab Gust for even more windiness. Message is just always pretty useful, it’s your standard Chaldea communicator. for levelled spells, Mage Armor will help your low AC even when you’re not wearing much, and Fog Cloud completes the aesthetic of your magic. it gives you a big enough cloud to hide in that even your giant self can fit!

7. Sorcerer 2: at second level you become a Font of Magic, giving you sorcery points equal to your level at the end of each long rest. you can convert points to slots or slots to point, but you can’t have more points than you started with. they’ll get more interesting next level, I swear.

for your spell, grab Burning Hands for a little Orochi action right away. well, not right away, we’re at level 7. still, faster than the main spell we’re grabbing for Orochi.

8. Sorcerer 3: at third level of sorcerer you can use those sorcery points from earlier on Metamagic options, customizing your spells as you cast them. with Subtle spells, you can cast them without vocal or somatic components, so you can now cast spells while holding your big fuckoff swords. meanwhile an Extended spell has double the duration so you don’t burn through spell slots as fast.

if you’re still not strong, tough, or fast enough, grab Enhance Ability for advantage on one kind of ability check for up to a minute.

9. Sorcerer 4: use this next ASI to grab the Slasher feat to spice up your swords even more. that rounds up your Dexterity for a better AC. the feat also lets you reduce the speed of whatever you hit by 10 feet for a round, and your critical slashing hits force disadvantage on all their attacks that round.

for spells, grab blade ward to turn that diet rage into… zero sugar rage? i think? its still not 100% ragealicious, but it’s a lil closer with the damage resistances. also, dragon’s breath. when we summon orochi later it’ll already have fire breath, but now you can turn any snake into orochi!

10. sorcerer 5: fifth level sorcs can spend their points on magical guidance to re-roll a failed skill check. you can also cast third level spells like fly! now we’ve got a full-length flight for ya!

11. fighter 6: with the basics of magic covered, lets head back to fighter to make more heads roll! at level six you get another asi which we’re using to grab the great weapon master feat! now whenever you score a crit or kill a creature with a melee weapon, you can make a bonus action attack, and that’s not all! whenever you attack with a heavy weapon you can take a -5 hit to the attack roll for a +10 to the damage! dont wanna put too fine a point on this, but ibuki’s rlly good with a sword. or a snake corpse. that’s a heavy weapon, right?

12. fighter 7: at seventh level you get a runic shield, letting you protect your buddies as a reaction proficiency times a day! you can force whoever is attacking to re-roll the d20 and use the new roll.

speaking of runes, now that you’re level 7 u can use the hill rune! the normal stuff is just poison resistance, which doesn’t really help you, but you can invoke the rune for resistance against bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage for 1 minute! so now it’s a… low-cal rage? i think.

13. fighter 8: use this asi to bump up your constitution for more health and more concentration! the one downside of multiclassing with casters is their terrible hit dice.

14. fighter 9: ninth level fighters are indomitable, so now you can re-roll a failed saving throw once a day! use it wisely!

15. fighter 10: at tenth level, your great stature gives you up to a foot in extra height (ibuki be biiiig) and your deal an extra d8 of damage each turn instead of a d6! you also get another rune, and you might as well grab a storm rune. you get advantage on arcana checks and you can’t be surprised normally, and you can invoke it to get all godly for a minute- whenever you or another creature makes a check, save, or attack roll, you can react to give that roll advantage or disadvantage. things just go right for gods. mostly. sometimes. okay honestly being a god kinda sucks unless you’re monotheistic.

16. fighter 11: eleventh level fighters get another extra attack! now you got three attacks in an action, and up to 7 per turn! most people would kill for that kind of action economy, and you have!

17. sorcerer 6: a sixth level storm sorcerer knows the heart of the storm, giving you resistance to thunder and lightning damage. on top of that, any spells you cast that deal that damage makes you explode, dealing damage to creatures you wanna hurt nearby. we don’t use that a lot, but your dragony spells are pretty flexible, so we won’t tell if you won’t!

you’re also a storm guide, so you can stop the rain nearby or control the direction the wind is blowing. it’s mostly flavor, but it can be useful!

oh right, we don’t need much til level 20, so let’s grab thunder step for extra mobility and explosions. you teleport, you explode wherever you left and you can even explode where you’re going!

18. sorcerer 7: seventh level sorcerers get fourth level spells like storm sphere! i know your np probably isn’t totally literal, but now you can make a storm anyway, woo.

19. sorcerer 8: use your last asi to be a tough guy for 38 extra hp now and 2 more next level. like i said, sorcerers suck at not dying, so try to suck less.

annoyingly sorcerers can’t bestow curses, so we’re gonna grab vampiric touch for those unclean fingers of yours. you can make a melee attack against a creature, dealing necrotic damage if you hit and regaining half that in hp, then for a minute afterwards you can keep making attacks as an action.

20. sorcerer 9: our last level is for fifth level spells! with summon draconic spirit, you can make a dragon show up for up to an hour. orochi’s probably chromatic, but you can pick gem or metallic if you really want. it takes its turn right after yours, and you can command it without spending a bonus action or anything.

it’s only got 50 hp which is bad for level 20, but it’s flashy and it gives you resistance to whatever its breath weapon is.

Pros and Cons

Pros:

giant lady! well yeah, but more specifically giant lady with giant fucking sword. Great Weapon Master is a good feat, and while you don’t have a way to ensure you get advantage to take full. well, advantage. of it, good shit is still good shit. with seven attacks you can dish out 133 damage before we even account for any dice in your attacks. dice that you can re-roll for better damage thanks to Great Weapon Fighting.

you’ve also got a pretty solid defense. your AC’s nothing to write home about, but you’ve got resistances and immunities up the wazoo. you are either immune or resistant to poison, thunder, and lightning permanently, can get resistance to physical damage types for a decent amount of time per short rest, and if you know you’re going up against an element you’re not resisting yet, you can summon a dragon and just leave him out of the fight to get an element of your choice too.

you’re also great at being consistent in just about everything. you can give yourself advantage on an important attack, re-roll a failed skill check or save, can’t be surprised, and have advantage on most of the skills you focus on.

Cons:

your even if you’ve got defenses to get around it, having a bad AC is still rough. though you’re plenty strong enough to just grab platemail or something if you really want.

your spells aren’t strong since we didn’t touch on charisma that much, so sword burst, burning hands, and dragon’s breath aren’t the greatest options. a lot of your spells don’t care about charisma though, so it’s not a huge issue. and even when it is you can give them disadvantage on their saves…

…you’re too tall? yeah look this is a pretty good build, the only real downside is not packing your own hea- wait no you’ve got vampiric touch. yeah this sheer heart attack has no weaknesses.

[zaph1337]

Monster Hunter Rating 48: Hermitaur

Just as Blango introduced Monster Hunter to the magic of monkey, so too does our next monster bring a breath of fresh air to the series. We may have seen arthropods before, but those were all insects; none of them were the ultimate in evolution, the pinnacle of the animal kingdom, the true inheritors of the Earth. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you, Hermitaur, better known...as CRAB.

(How it appears in the Second Generation games)

(How it appears in Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate [sorry for the poor quality; I had to enlarge it])

Appearance: I’ve been thinking: arguably the hardest part of these is assigning them a number rating. I’m constantly trying to figure out whether I like something better or worse than something else to keep the numbers consistent with my reactions, but I’m almost never sure which one I prefer or what each number actually means--they’re basically arbitrary at this point, so why bother stressing out over them so much? From now on, I’m just going to talk about my thoughts on each monster, rather than try to grade them.

On to what you’re actually here for, Hermitaurs are...well...giant crabs. That’s it, really. Don’t get me wrong, giants crabs have a novelty all their own, but it doesn’t leave me with much else to say about them. I guess the shells are pretty cool; they’re not big enough to hide in, which is kinda the main point of having a shell, but armor is armor, and it’s nice that Hermitaurs aren’t exactly like real hermit crabs and instead offer their own take on shelled crustaceans.

Behavior/Lore: Hermitaurs are juvenile forms of Daimyo Hermitaur, and are generalists that populate deserts and other biomes in great numbers, though their habit of hiding underground unless disturbed means that the majority of them likely go unnoticed. When I call them generalists, I mean it--they’ll eat basically anything, even humans. On the flip side, humans will eat Hermitaurs, too--specifically their brains, which are apparently a delicacy (not that I’d ever try it--blech). We’re not the only ones that’ll eat these things, as Plesioth and other Large Monsters will also gobble them up.

Unfortunately, that’s all we got: habitats, eating habits, and what eats them. There’s barely anything to talk about here, even for a Small Monster. C’mon, crabs, give me something to work with here.

Abilities: They protect themselves with their shells and pinch you. I have nothing more to say, y’all already know I’m disappointed.

Equipment: Just like with Blango, most of the Hermitaur weapons require parts from their Large Monster, so finding ones that were strictly Hermitaur was tricky. I’ve got two for your viewing pleasure, though, starting with the Great Sword, the Red Stripe:

Y’know, now that I know more about MH lore, it’s weird that serrated or barbed weapons would ever be used in monster hunting; the Guild places so much emphasis on respecting monsters--even when hunting them--that you’d think they’d outlaw such weapons, as the added spikes and such don’t increase the weapon’s effectiveness so much as they increase the amount of pain and suffering the target is put through (which, “fun” fact, is why using barbed/serrated weapons in war is a war crime). Then again, this is a video game that operates on video game logic, so I guess the spikes do make the weapon better. Anyways, the Red Stripe’s fine; it certainly gives me the impression that it’s an early-game weapon, though that’s mostly due to the straightforward design and muted colors.

Now, here’s something special for you: a long time ago, back when I was first writing these, I got a message from someone who recommended a Monster Hunter database called Kiranico for weapon images, since I was having issues finding decently-sized ones on the wiki. I didn’t actually use the database since the pictures weren’t big enough for my liking there, either, but I recently found out that the MHGen database specifically has larger images available (none for armor, though), so I’ll be referring to it for certain weapons now, such as this Light Bowgun called the Striped Shell:

I think the funniest thing about this weapon is that it’s clearly a normal rifle that all this Hermitaur stuff was attached to, and somehow those monster parts make it more effective. I was gonna make a snide remark about the spikes on the silencer (at least I think that’s what that is), but then I remembered that Bowguns have a melee attack, so I guess they’re good for that? Overall, this weapon has a sleek design, and I like it.

I’ll reserve my thoughts on the Hermitaur equipment for when/if we get to the Daimyo Hermitaur (my interest in doing these is flagging again, if you couldn’t tell by the time between posts), but so far, they’re on the right track.

Final Thoughts: It’s crab. It’s big. That’s all there is to say about Hermitaur, but trust me, their adult forms are something to behold. Hopefully we’ll make it to that point.

[tacom-literatureu-blog]

I have a question- how does MCC work? Like I not sure if you explain it, but the newest chapter stirred up that question for me.

Ok so you’re right in that we’ve never really explained MCC. And, to be fair, we haven’t worked out exactly how the specifics of it work either. However, MCC works roughly how you’d expect; it’s its own world, with its own rules, and every… hmm, maybe not every month because we’re working in a different time scale in-canon, but maybe every 6 months. Again, subject to change.

We have dropped a bit of lore about MCC I think. The blood god arena, that crowned Techno, Mumbo, Red and a few others (names have been dropped! gotta go find them yourself though lol) as Blood Gods has been called the first MCC. I think of it as the same relationship we have with the Olympics. The thing that happened hundreds of years ago is very different to the stuff we have today, but the inspiration came from there.

During the majority of the TACOMLU, MCC has been on hold. We might make it that MCC was on a break between seasons anyway, so for the first year and a half or so, no one would really think anything of it. However, in-canon we’re almost at the two years since doomsday (and time restarting) mark.

This is where the whole ‘DSMP is inaccessible’ comes into play. They literally don’t have enough participants for MCC at the moment. And also, the Hermits are kinda homeless right now. So that’s like 2/3 of every participant ever unable to attend. If they were to have a whole MCC with the players they have available and also maybe a few others (mcc rising?) then Noxite and the Noxcrew would have to do it without Scott helping.

TLDR: MCC is on break until something good happens with the DSMP and/or Season Nine.- Chambers

[peace-coast-island]

Diary of a Junebug

Resentment brings trouble, wreaths bring joy

What do we do with leftover holiday decor and fern gyroids? We make wreaths. After all there’s no reason to waste a bunch of perfectly good things like tinsel and pinecones. The holiday season might be over but that doesn’t mean we can’t prepare for next year. Besides, it’s not like we’re drowning in wreaths - there’s just enough for everyone to make at least two. As for the rest of the gyroids, they’re being used for a winter cabin themed set designed by Mabel and Arabella.

Sophea and Shinobu have dropped by with a couple friends to spend the weekend here. The four of them had gone up to Portsmith Summit to deal with something and the camp happens to be on the way back. Since it’s a long trip to Cardamon - where Julie and Shigeo live - Sophea thought it’d be best to take it easy for a couple days. I agree, long trips are a lot less daunting when you break it up with stops along the way, especially when you’re in no rush to get there.

After spending the past couple weeks being a potato by being a hermit at the camp, it’s nice to finally get back into the swing of things with a little event. Traveling’s fun but I’m still a homebody at heart so I often need breaks to kinda get away from it all and not be too overwhelmed. Like I’ve said before, I’m lucky to have friends who completely understand - partly because a lot of them are similar too - so I don’t constantly feel like I have to be “on” all the time and take as much time for myself without feeling bad.

That’s not to say that certain people close to me don’t respect that - I think it’s more like they don’t get it. I mean, I don’t mind when they call me up but it’s annoying when I try to leave and they sorta guilt me into staying longer even though there’s nothing else to say and then they complain that I’m boring them. Also, maybe it’s just me, but as soon as someone says that they want to leave then I’d be like okay and not force them, even if they have nothing going on.

And I know that they wouldn’t want to hear this as I would never say it to their face but as much as I love some of these people they really take a lot out of me. Like I love and support you but we absolutely cannot live together because we’re just way too incompatible and that will negatively impact our relationship. Sometimes the best thing you can do is maintain a healthy distance, especially when you do get along well but your personalities are almost completely opposite.

Anyway, enough about that, the gyroid event’s been a lot of fun. I think I like the way we’re doing events now, just more on the casual side and a bit more sporadic. This event wasn’t really planned and it ended up working out really well so I hope to have more like that. I’m more of a spontaneous person anyway so I don’t really like sticking to rigid planning and feel more comfortable going with the flow. Events take time, energy, and resources, so I don’t want to waste all that on something that might end up being a huge source of stress that accomplishes nothing.

What I’m saying is that I don’t want events to be some big flashy thing, I want events to provide memorable and fun experiences. Even if it’s seemingly mundane, there’s nothing wrong with finding something special in the ordinary.

As usual, Sophea’s been working on a case and Shinobu’s providing her assistance. Her client, Julie, had been reluctant to get some outside help but at Shigeo and Shinobu’s insistence, she finally reached out to Sophea. Part of the reason why Julie was hesitant to reach out was because it was mostly a family affair, which is understandable. However it’s escalated to a point where her estranged father, a powerful lawyer with lots of connections, and her mother’s parents, also some powerful people, have taken things too far.

With the way her family tends to muddle things, Julie figured it’s best to beat them by getting the truth out before they have a chance to warp it. The whole thing really started a couple years ago when her mother got arrested and Julie had to move in with her father. Before that Julie lived with her mother, who was also a prominent lawyer before the arrest. Her parents married young because she got pregnant and inevitably things didn’t work out. Julie mostly saw her father on weekends or when her mother was too busy with work - the latter which became more frequent as she got older and that put a strain on her relationship with her mother.

As for Julie’s relationship with her maternal grandparents, she finds it hard to believe that those people are the ones who raised her mother and uncle. Despite her mother’s flaws, Julie says she understands that she did the best she could, especially when it came to avoiding being like her parents. While she sympathizes with her mother for being under a lot of pressure as the eldest who also happened to be the gifted child, it doesn’t completely excuse her for some of the things she did. One of those things in particular is how she treats her brother, though Julie thinks her grandparents’s brainwashing is mostly to blame.

As one can infer, Julie’s mother grew up in a dysfunctional family and despite her accomplishments and former status, she was never able to escape their influence. Her uncle, Aki, who’s a friend of Shigeo and Shinobu, is considered the black sheep of the family, a topic of ridicule. He’s kind of person who’s considered a failure for not meeting unrealistically high standards, which explains why he doesn’t get along with them. As a result, Julie had this image of her uncle as someone to avoid being like, as in the lowest of the low, someone not worth acknowledging.

It wasn’t until she got to know to him that they don’t really know him at all. Meeting Shigeo and Shinobu furthered that point. Julie finds Aki to be a decent person, he may be a bit hard to get along with and can be exhausting to be around but he’s surprisingly easy to talk to. Shinobu confirms that Aki is indeed a good listener who actually tries to help without being intrusive or offering unsolicited advice, which kinda adds to why most people are baffled by him. Sure some of the things he does are questionable but that’s not much different from anyone else - in Shigeo’s words, he’s just some guy who tries to get by. So it doesn’t make sense why his parents are so determined to tear him down and pit other people against him.

Regarding the incident that got Mia arrested and ruined her life, it’s something that Julie still can’t wrap her mind around. I mean, who can blame her? Julie and her mother were visiting her grandparents and that happened to be the one time when her uncle came over too. That was when Julie started to get to know him as they were both trying to avoid the elders. Her mom was having problems that involved getting into fights with her parents so Aki would take Julie out to save her from being dragged into the conflict.

Then one day Aki texted Julie that he and his friend were stranded on the freeway because of car trouble so she asked her mom if she could take the car. Mia wasn’t happy about it and insisted on driving since it was winter and Julie wasn’t as familiar with the roads. On the way back after picking up the guys Mia and Aki got into an argument and next thing Julie knew, the car went off the road and flipped. She later found out that her mother walked out of the wreck, later confessing that she intended to leave the others in the snow. Aki managed to pull an unconscious Julie out of the car before it went up in flames while his friend, who was thrown out, died from his injuries.

From there, it all went downhill. Everyone had naturally assumed that Mia left the scene because she was disoriented and not thinking straight, which makes sense. So to hear her admit that she intended to flee the scene to avoid getting into trouble, even if it means leaving her own daughter stranded and almost killed, is shocking, to say the least. Though her mother has felt immensely guilty about it, Julie says she doesn’t know if she can ever forgive her. Leaving her own daughter and brother stranded and killing someone - even if it was an accident - doesn’t change the fact that she intentionally did what she did.

Not surprisingly, Julie’s grandparents tried to clean up the mess by pinning the blame on Aki and insisting that Mia was innocent. To make matters worse, Julie’s father, who never got along with his in-laws, took their side, though he dragged his ex through the mud too. Julie ultimately chose to go back to the city to live with her father - the lesser of two evils she said, the alternative being her grandparents - in hopes of putting the incident behind her.

Things didn’t quite work out that way as she found out that acting like nothing happened wasn’t going to help. She and Aki contacted each other in secret, which was how she later met Shigeo and Shinobu, and they went on like that for the next few years. With Aki and Shigeo’s help, Julie got into Mikawa University with a scholarship so that was her ticket out. After spending her first year in the dorms, she later moved into her own apartment.

Julie thought she’s be safe now that she was far away from both sides of the family. And for a while she and Aki were fine, at least until several months ago when her father found out. It wasn’t long before her grandparents found out too and they started harassing Aki, claiming that he was corrupting Julie. For a while they tried to ignore it but the harassment got worse. Eventually they started targeting other people like Shigeo, which Aki felt was going way too far - even more so when Julie herself became a target. Not knowing what to do, Julie turned to her mother for help and she suggested contacting Sophea since she knows things will escalate.

That’s why they went up to Portsmith and now that’s over with, all they can do is wait and see. Sophea mentioned that she worked with Mia in the past and that she was a good lawyer. It’s a shame that things ended up the way they did. Shigeo was aware that Aki didn’t get along with his parents but he never knew it was that bad. Even though he’s younger, Shigeo often worries about Aki like a concerned older sibling because he never lets on how much he’s struggling. Shinobu suspects it’s because he’s never had anyone stand up for him so that’s why he constantly has to prove himself. Sounds like she’s speaking from experience.

Although Julie was reluctant to reach out to Sophea for help at first, she’s glad that she did instead of trying to ignore the problem or deal with it herself. She pointed out that her mother’s family had a bad habit of pretending things never happened and playing the blame game in order to avoid responsibility and given their track record, she does not want to end up like them. Sophea added that it’s clear that both sides of Julie’s family are full of resentful people and sooner or later that’ll backfire on them.

In other words, Julie was lucky to get out when she did because if she stuck with her father, or worse, her grandparents, she’d probably end up like them. So while her mother isn’t perfect, at least she succeeded in making sure Julie didn’t end up like any of them by making sure she could stand up for herself and not be blinded or swayed by arrogance and bitterness.

Julie and Shigeo are still on winter break so they’re in no rush to get home. Aki would’ve come with them but he got knocked out with a cold so Shigeo’s mom has been checking up on him. They say he’s feeling a lot better but still contagious which is why they can’t visit him. Sophea plans to meet up with him in person before she gets back, hopefully by next week when he’s fully recovered.

The weather’s been really cold up here so it’s a good thing they decided to stop by the camp. We managed to collect a bunch of gyroids before shutting ourselves inside and making ourselves cozy by the fire.

Making wreaths has helped us unwind and take our minds off the cold. It’s fun to see what everyone comes up with when decorating our wreaths. And when we were done with that we got started on making furniture. Not surprisingly, Shinobu knows a thing or two about crafting furniture. She really is a jack of all trades. Shigeo mentioned that Aki tried to recruit her several times but she kept declining. They’ve been vague on what Aki does for work so I’m guessing no one really knows, not even Aki himself. All they can really say is that he tries to help people, usually in a roundabout way, and it ends up working out.

Tomorrow looks like it’s gonna be sunny - cold still but at least it’ll be bright - so hopefully we can venture out a bit to collect some more gyroids as well as show the others a bit more of the camp.

Read on AO3

[haldenlith]

Trouble

I still have Ardwynn brainworms, so have a little background story, featuring his older brother Kieran.

He was trouble. He was always trouble. Trouble with a capital T.

He was supposed to be back home for lunch thirty minutes ago. Mother was worried sick. Kieran wasn’t worried at all. He knew exactly where to find his brother.

The little bastard was always trouble, but he was at least predictable trouble. He went to the square. It was busy, always so busy, but somehow always so peaceful. The trees that lined the streets and marble-slab paths rustled so gently. The fountains bubbled away, water shimmering in the sun, creating miniature rainbows. Normally, children would be laughing, splashing about, but today was special. Today he was back, weaving words ‘round them, painting worlds of adventure and wonder.

And there was trouble, leaning against a tree nearby, listening. An angry bruise marred his face, and his lip was split. He wasn’t bleeding anymore, though, so whatever altercation he’d gotten into (again) had happened long before he stopped to take in Uldren’s stories. Kieran walked up to Ardwynn and lightly punched his shoulder.

“There you are! I thought you’d be here.” Kieran looked out to the center of the square, where the children were gathered around Uldren. “Aren’t you a little old for this, now?”

Ardwynn lifted his arms in a shrug as he crossed them over his broad chest. Many summers had come and gone as he’d grown into a teenager. “They’re good stories. Never too old for a little adventure, I’d say. Not like there’s any adventure to be had around here.”

Kieran scoffed and reached out to poke at the bruise on his brother’s cheek, earning himself a wince from Ardwynn as he jerked away. “You already found some adventure, from the looks of it. What was it this time?”

“Some soldiers bullying another. We traded some words, that’s all,” Ardwynn replied, side-eyeing his brother for a moment before his gaze returned to Uldren. 

“So that’s what we’re calling your fists, these days? Words?” Kieran teased. Kieran’s silver gaze followed his brother’s fiery amber eyes to Uldren, and he found himself pursing his lips. “... You know, you chase tail so much, and I’ve given up trying to talk you out of it, but… Do I have to worry about you chasing him?”

“He’s a Sov.” Kieran arched up a slate blue brow, looking back to his brother. That was an unusual answer for him. Ardwynn never bothered with social nonsense as to who was who or anything like that. You were either a good person, or you weren’t. To hear him boil someone down to their relations was… peculiar.

“That’s not like you,” he replied with a confused lilt to his voice, asking a question without actually asking it. Ardwynn turned to his brother.

“He’s a Sov. He’s that weird hermit’s brother. He’s popular. Everyone knows him. He’s got status. He’s got strings.” He shook his head, looking back at Uldren. “He’s beautiful, but he’s a can of worms I don’t feel like opening.” Kieran’s brows shot up, and he returned his silver gaze to Uldren as well. His brother had admired the man for years, grown up on his stories. And, despite his words, he could see the admiration still burning in Ardwynn’s eyes.

It almost made his words worse.

The distant admiration, the reverence. Mara might have had her followers, but Ardwynn’s heart seemed to have been captured by Uldren, not her.

“So, then, why are you here?” Kieran knew better than to try and talk sense into Ardwynn, yet he found himself trying anyway.

“Like I said, he tells good stories. There a crime in liking a good story?” His brother turned his attention back to him, shifting his weight to rest even more against the tree.

“Hm, I don’t think you’re just here to listen to him talk. Or, rather, you are, but for reasons you’re in denial for. But fine, be a fool. At least you pining from a distance is the least foolish thing you’ll have done thus far. Besides, you’re right, he is very out of your league.” Kieran reached out, taking Ardwynn’s chin firmly into his hand, forcibly turning his head this way and that, examining the bruise and looking for any other obvious blemishes. “What are we telling Mom this time?”

“I fell down the stairs?” Ardwynn replied, remaining pliable in his elder brother’s hands.

“Mmm, you said that last time,” Kieran distractedly responded, already formulating an alibi for his brother in his mind.

“I’m very clumsy.” A grin began to spread across Ardwynn’s lips, while Kieran rolled his eyes.

“You are, unfortunately, incredibly graceful when it counts. I’ll do the talking when we get home. She was worried enough as it is. She doesn’t need to know you got into another fight. We’ll say it was training for the Guard. … You did go by there today, right?” His silver eyes narrowed as he then forced Ardwynn to look at him. 

That damn ear to ear grin didn’t falter as Ardwynn replied, “Yeah. I wouldn’t have run into those bastards if I hadn’t. Oh, and if you think this is bad, you should see the other guys.” Kieran pulled his hand from Ardwynn’s face to his own as he facepalmed.

“You signed up for the City Guard and immediately got into a fight afterwards? Ard, you idiot.”

“Whaaaat? I like to think that my willingness to throw myself between ne'er-do-wells and our citizens shows initiative to protect them.”

“That’s not at all how that works, you dumbass. You’re going to be the death of me, one day.” This was how it was with him. You do your best to do the best for him, and he’d run headlong into trouble anyway.

Kieran couldn’t help but feel like maybe some of Uldren’s stories might actually be to blame, filling his baby brother’s head with foolish, heroic nonsense. Nonsense that “inspired” him to do things.

It was largely the reason Kieran made it a point to do his utmost to talk the Guard Captain into letting Ardwynn in. Leaving Ardwynn idle always led to trouble. At least this way, he could channel that idiot energy into something useful. What was it he got into last time? Elbow deep in muck and mud, rescuing someone’s goat from a muddy culvert. Or the other time when Kieran had to step in and rescue Ardwynn from a fight he apparently picked after getting in an argument with some folk.

He dragged Ardwynn home, asking, perhaps in futility, “So, let me guess, you defended the victim today because, ‘that’s what heroes do’?”

“Of course. I’ve got two fists and a strong body, I might as well put them to use helping someone.”

That’s what heroes do. It’s what he always said.

It’s what he said when he encountered him at the gathering of people talking about the excitement, the wonder of an expedition out of the Distributary. No, he wasn’t interested because of Eccaleist philosophy. Of course not. Kieran could hardly keep Ardwynn awake long enough to hold a conversation on that. No, he just looked at him and smiled. “Sounds like to me that Mara lady said there’s people that need our help out there. That’s where we should go. Saving people’s what heroes do, right?”

Kieran wanted so badly to tell him no, to say, “You need to be here for mom.” He wanted to say a million things to try and convince his brother to stay, but there was a touch of something that stopped him.

If they went together, he could keep an eye on him.

And so they left, with Ardwynn dragging his crazy posse of idiot friends with him. Those three were as bad as him, and did nothing to curb his bad ideas. They were like gasoline to the raging inferno that was Ardwynn.

Apparently, so were a great deal of the crew that left with them. Kieran knew the second he heard the push back to Mara declaring they were to stay in the Reef that there would be trouble. He saw it burning in his brother’s eyes.

He tried to talk him down afterwards. “She’s right. We’re in a precarious position. We should wait.”

“So what? We sit behind some space rocks like cowards?!” Ardwynn snarled. “We came here to pay back some debt, right? Humanity is down on that rock, suffering. Esila was right. We could make a difference!” Kieran’s jaw tightened as he gritted his teeth. This wasn’t like back home.

Before, talking Ardwynn out of something was the difference between a potentially broken bone or not. Getting him out of trouble wasn’t life or death.

This was.

“Ardwynn, please! Listen to yourself for one damn moment! This isn’t some — some story where you and the others run off and be heroes!”

But it was futile. Talking Ardwynn out of his wild eyed ideas was a task and a half on a normal day, but this was so much worse. Uldren had to come back with that footage. With proof.

And it had to be Uldren. Kieran almost wondered if anyone else had come back alive from scouting, that it wouldn’t have inspired Ardwynn so.

Not even holding a gun to his head would stop him. Kieran gripped the rifle as the riot exploded around him, holding it steady at Ardwynn. “I’m not letting you run off and get yourself killed on some rock.” But his brother knew him far too well. He just grabbed the rifle and pulled it, using it to pull his brother into his arms.

“I’m not dying anytime soon. I promise you that. Besides, heroes never die in the first act.”

Those were his parting words. That was it. That was the last he saw of him.

Kieran cursed Mara, for a while, in his mind. Both of the Sovs, for that matter. But his worry, his bitterness faded, with time.

He cursed himself for not following Ardwynn for far longer.

The Awoken established themselves in the Reef. Crowned Mara Queen of the Reef. Built a city.

Kieran often found himself wondering what Ardwynn would think of their accomplishments, building something so grand out of nothing.

Cowards.

Yeah, that’s probably what he would’ve said. No, he already said it. “Sit behind some space rocks like cowards.” It was the driving little voice in the back of Kieran’s mind. No one would know that was his little devil on his shoulder, that it prodded him to try harder, fight harder. He became one of the few male Corsairs, holding himself to high standards, even if he was, at best, just another soldier. He threw himself at battle after battle.

He was determined to make sure those words that whispered in the back of his mind stayed words. He was no coward.

Right?

So why didn’t he follow his brother to Earth?

The question circled round and round in Kieran’s mind. Ardwynn was still making trouble for him, without even being there.

Yet, perhaps, he also helped. Kieran survived in spite of all else, somehow.

Time eroded the questions, eventually. Even the wonder of what became of his brother. Decades rolled by. A century. Two centuries.

Then came the unusual raids. Not like the Fallen raids. No, this was… this was less a “raid” and more like a surgical extraction. The Fallen were like beating a safe open with a bomb, with little regard to the casualties and damage. This was different. Precise and careful, with as few casualties as possible.

Eventually, they started leaving a calling card. They thought maybe they were another Fallen house. The emblem resembled one of their markings, though it didn’t match any that were known.

He was lucky to be on patrol when one of the raids happened. There was smoke, gunfire, flashbangs. They weren’t Fallen, that’s for sure. Humans, Exos… other Awoken. Pirates? Perhaps. He slid into position to line up a shot before, in his sights, he saw him.

Those eyes. That fire.

He ran as fast as his feet could take him. He had to get closer.

“ARDWYNN!” His voice was like thunder, cutting through the gunshots.

Ardwynn turned. Their eyes met, briefly. Kieran leveled his rifle at him.

Again.

Ardwynn just grinned at him. His face was different, scarred, but… he was alive. With a salute, he paid no mind to the rifle aimed at him and ran. He knew his brother too well.

Again.

Go with him. The voice that had been so quiet whispered in his mind again. But he stayed where he was.

Again.

No. This was different. This time was different. Back then, he had nothing to lose. Now? He had a family. He’d built a life on this Reef.

Still. If only he could follow him.

Kieran ducked into cover. Another Corsair joined him.

“What happened?! You had a perfect shot!” She chided.

He couldn’t help but laugh to himself.

“Trouble. Trouble happened.”

Ardwynn was always Trouble.

Trouble with a capital T.

[the-eternal-quest-for-balance]

Life Changes and Life Lessons.

Monday Mutiny

April 8th, 2024:

Happy Monday. Below are five things that challenged, motivated, or entertained me this past week—hopefully they will do the same for you.

(1) For starters, I spent most of last week in NYC, where I was a guest on Elvis Duran and the Morning Show (you can listen to my segment here if you’re interested; I believe I come on around 1:35:20). Even though I’ve taken a step back from social media, I haven’t become a total hermit (yet). All in all, I had a good time in New York—and, yes, I felt the earthquake that everybody was talking about—but the most memorable part of my trip was the night before the quake, when I met up with a relatively new friend. We’d never actually met in person, but we connected online a year or so ago because we’re both writers and we talk often about books, ideas, serial killers, travel, and just random observations about the state of the world.

Monday Mutiny is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Anyway, the reason why going out that last night in NYC was so memorable for me was because it was so familiar—eerily so. For a moment, it felt like I had stepped back in time, and everything that has transpired over the past five years of my life was non-existent. It was dream-like, and I don’t know that I’ve ever felt something quite like that before.

There, in the commotion of a Midtown bar, I was sucked into a time-warp. I was immediately taken back to my life pre-2019, back to a time when I, myself, lived in New York City and spent the majority of my nights out and about—hopping from bar to bar as the life of the party, drunk and without direction, having short encounters and conversations with individuals that I’d never see again—all while trying to conceal the fact that I was dreadfully lonely in a city with a population of more than eight million. And, for a few hours last week, I felt exactly as I did back then, the same way that I had felt throughout most of my twenties and early thirties: alone.

So, when it came time to call it a night, as I walked back into my smaller-than-remembered Manhattan hotel room, I wanted nothing more than to be home, lying on my couch, with my son snuggled under my arm, watching a show about dinosaurs.

I had a taste of my old life, and I didn’t want it. Not even a little bit.

Over the years, my life has gone through a series of profound changes—as I’m sure many of you have experienced as well—and, currently, I’m going through another significant change, a change that wasn’t planned or chosen (at least not intentionally), but I’ve never wanted to live the same life forever. And, when I allow myself to step back and look at the bigger picture, I’m grateful for every change and interruption that has come my way—the good, the bad, the great, and even the downright painful—because they’ve all led me to a new life, a new chapter, and a new version of myself, a version that is almost always better than before.

(2) On my flight home, I watched this movie called “The Lesson” from 2023. And, if you enjoy movies that are a slow burn, more thematic than action-packed, you’ll probably like it. Personally, I thought it was a super original premise regarding the emotions of grief and envy—but it also happens to be a story about writers, so perhaps I’m more connected to it than the average viewer.

However, regardless of my personal draw to the movie, I can say with confidence that it was ten times better than that terrible “Road House” remake. I mean, I see what they tried to do with it, but it’s absolutely unwatchable shit. The original works too well. Name a better duo than Patrick Swayze and Sam Elliot—that’s right, you can’t.

(3) I read this passage from a book, and it hit me like a fucking brick.

“Nothing in this world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty. No kind of life is worth leading if it is always an easy life . . . I have never in my life envied a human being who led an easy life; I have envied a great many people who led difficult lives and led them well.”

—Theodore Roosevelt (American Ideals: And Other Essays, Social and Political)

(4) While I waited in the airport lounge at JFK—lying on a couch with my face covered because, well, let’s face it: I was hungover from the night before—I was asked by an older gentleman if he could join me. The lounge was pretty full at this point and I was taking up a lot of space, so I sat upright and we got to talking.

Turns out, he was a retired Broadway actor—and although our lives were/are separated by more than thirty years—we had a lot in common. We talked for two hours (I almost forgot that I had a flight to catch) about pretty much everything: food, architecture, dogs, horses, tattoos, social media, travel, and, most importantly, the power of good storytelling.

My favorite book as a kid, The Count of Monte Cristo, just so happened to be his favorite play to perform on Broadway—he, himself, playing the main character, Edmond Dantès—betrayed by a best friend and driven to seek revenge.

As he and I talked, I thought to myself, “Damn, what an interesting life this dude has lived.” Chances are, he may have thought the same about me. And, that right there, is the reason why I love airports so much: you really never know who you’re going to meet—especially when you’re willing to move your feet in order to make room for somebody else to take a seat. I think life works the same way: If you create space, you never know who will show up to fill it.

(5) Well, one of the cats just caught a bunny in the backyard while I was writing this—and the contractor showed up to replace some dry wall above the kitchen cabinets—so, I need to go handle some “life” stuff now . . . You know the saying: “Life, it comes at you fast—and even faster when you have a bloodthirsty cat.” But, seriously, if there’s one thing that I’ve learned over my thirty-seven years on this planet, it’s the fact that life changes when you least expect it. And, when it changes, your expectations of life, and yourself, are what make all the difference.

Thanks for subscribing,

-Kyle, aka “The Capt.”

P.S. If you find yourself in Florida later this month, I’ll be at Dunes Brewing on April 25th for a book signing, Q+A, and whatever else we can fit into the schedule. You can get your ticket(s) HERE—and I hope to see you there.

P.P.S. I will soon be removing my book Speech Therapy from Amazon. So, if you’ve been wanting a copy, you’ll want to buy one before the end of the month.

[nzlog]

August 2nd // Southern Hemisphere Longzo Day

CK asked me what my plans for the day were and I gave a very abridged answer because we only had a little bit of free zoom minutes left, and I forgot maybe every detail about our day’s plan anyway. So! Here were / are my plans for the day:

We intended on getting up at 6:45am to watch the sunrise for 7:15am over the bay our van is parked beside, at Island View reserve in Whangamata. But we woke to the noise of very heavy rain and wind gusts that shook the van we live in, so decided to snooze for another hour until our Palz Zoom.

Then I got to see our friendseses amazing faces on zoom which made my heart very happy. This is largely the only birthday plan I had that I followed through with approximately on time and I’m super pleased about it.


For the day I had planned on either: going kayaking to Whenuakura (the english colonialist calls it Donut Island, bc it’s a ring-shaped tip of a very extinct volcano crater) which is about 600m from the shore so a relatively handy trip for someone whose gammy* back is allergic to kayaks, or if not that then I’d do a handy lil trek through Wentworth Valley to gawp at two celebrated pretty waterfalls.

We did neither of these things because it was stormy as all heck out and multiple weather warnings were issued later in the day. One of these was for gales and the other for ‘squalls’ which me and Mark had a nice time trying to guess the definition of inside our van nest, we’re still not one hundy percent sure that we know. There was some mega heavy hale which sounded even more world-ending than the rain (squall? dat u?) and shortly after that when the rain came back with its reassuring endlessness, I drew a tarot card for the day and got The Sun. I am the sun.

Then I fell asleep in the middle of the day for three whole hours, which I’m still calling a nap. It was class.

It felt like the day itself called in sick, which was the perfect thing. I will put an expectation on myself to do something ~significant~ without being able to hear myself think about what I want so much of the time and I am grateful for an external source completely halting that automatic process. I got to talk to my great friends and have a huge snooze and it was the dream scenario.

It mildly concerns me that I’m so exhausted chronically, it feels like shades of fatigue but it’s so subtle that it’s almost sub-perceptual, it feels tricky to really notice it clearly, something you have to be not fatigued to do. I know it makes sense that being in a new place while living in a van in the wintertime and constantly moving around as well as planning, deciding, figuring and focusing are inherently tiring activities, but it feels like it’s an unusual amount of tiredness still. A tricky thing to figure out when either long-covid or depression could be triggers that I can’t determine because they’re not diagnosable as causes, and ocd brain tells me I’m over-blowing things while at the same time not letting me stop chronically worrying. Also, everyone’s very tired all the time, so it feels like it doesn’t matter. But it really does matter and I wish it could be different for all of us.

My main regret is that by falling asleep I didn’t get to spend so much time with Mark on my birthday. The first artwork I’ve put up inside this van is the card he gave me.


We drove our hermit shell house into Whangamata town centre (v small, mainly just a street of seaside town shops largely all closed up during the off-season. one of the bars we looked up was called ‘Whangamata Summer Bar’ and it is marked on the maps as ‘temporarily closed’) and we got ingredients needed for van dinner, I also cashed in the 6 blips I won on weird NZ scratchers (€3.33 under the NZD-EUR exchange rate at time of writing) at the shop I bought it in. I mentioned to the clerk that I was saving my winnings for some games of pool and she seemed authentically delighted that it was my birthday. She is the only person in this country I mentioned my birthday to, which felt exactly correct. The Leo sun shines on you, scratcher clerk.

We played one game of pool very badly in an incredibly empty sports bar then bounced back to our parking spot at Island View reserve freedom camping. Mark cooked an incredibly tasty van curry and I started typing the words you’re reading now (hi!). After that I spoke to both my parents on the phone individually for about an hour each, which was nice to try to do.

The full moon in Aquarius during the Leo sun was a primo gift from the universe. Thank you, the universe!

We slept early even though I had already slept for three fucking hours in the middle of the day, and I slept really well even though it was cold as fuck outside. The tips of our noses get really cold in this van at night, which is a cute but as yet solutionless problem.

Thursday morning: suprise! It’s still my birthday in other parts of the world! Timezones are the gift that keep on giving. What the fuck is time anyway! It keeps giving me a bad time when I try to think about it.

I woke up and felt truly relaxed for the first time in a while. I tried to spend time messaging people and then made us tea + van porridge when Mark woke. It is less stormy this morning.

When I had a moment to myself I felt the impulse to draw my birthday tarot spread, while it was still August 2nd in parts of the world that are of great significance to me. I did the five-card star spread and The Sun was the root. I am loving awareness. 


I will add more about infinitely more interesting days I’ve had here soon but not now because I want to go walk on the beach with Mark, and marvel at Whenuakura from afar. We will at some point bop out to it, a gift to our future selves.


*gammy twice auto-corrected to Tammy here; a strong NZ name